ARTICLE ~ I Let Go - No 5

TWO DOORS

He sat in the armchair for seemingly hours, hours that were really minutes pulled unrecognisably out of shape and then plumped up like cushions. He rested heavily on them, glancing at the doors that lay at either end of the room he was in. One door, he knew was the door he'd entered the room by, but that was a long time ago. Sometimes he'd prop the door slightly ajar so he could glimpse inside. The room was very much like the one he was in, but wallpapered with fusty, melancholic memories. In the summer, the room smelt sweaty and soured like blue cheese. He had a fondness for what he remembered, just so long as they sat quietly in his lap like a cat. He didn't like it when they stretched out their paws and stuck their claws in his thighs.

He'd always a strong tendency towards restlessness. Physically he fidgeted, one minute his feet were on the ground, the next his legs were crossed left over right, then swapped to right over left, or slung rakishly over the armrest. In his mind, the images he conjured up in his head would change constantly too, he couldn't stop it, he didn't want to stop it. He could imagine himself as being anyone or anything he wanted, and be whatever it was to a superlative degree. His body would posture, in preparation for his vision to be made flesh. There was a thrill, a creative excitement, a sense of potency, of virility, for the possibilities within his imagination were literally endless. However, what usually became endless, was the waiting. The waiting for the dreams to be fulfilled, to reach fruition, as the days,weeks, months of expectation cranked themselves up. It was as though he was stood on a station platform waiting for a lover to arrive on a train. With each empty train his anticipation became more anxious and tense. His heartbeat turned heavier, began preparing itself, not for victory, but for defeat. As the last train of the day hit the buffers, he'd walk away alone, with yet another crumpled design filed away in his briefcase.

Ah! the potency of the dreaming, designed to quell the regretful tide, designed to stop the murky river from bursting its banks. Dreams kept him going, kept him from going insane. So he understood one door, at least he knew what lay behind that. Tarnished things, painful sensitive things he couldn't really forget or erase the memory of, no matter how much he'd have liked to. What was the other side of the second door he knew not, but that in itself made it all the more enticing a prospect to imagine. Was it a room empty of history, empty of disruptive emotions, a room for the un-dreamt of, where anything was possible? A room where unbridled desire might run rampant.

This turning from door to door, from the definite past, to the indefinite future, was as though he was observing a tennis match that no one else could see. Nothing came or went without him knowing about it. He believed he decided what would stay and what he would let go. Yet even when he was heartily sick of something, would it leave, even when he'd pointed out the exit? No! In extremis he'd have to pick the darned thing up, and kick it firmly into the past. That didn't necessarily solve the problem. It seeped back under the door like smoke, and hung around as the ghost of a fire that was not yet extinguished.

He started to regret his impulsive behaviour, wishing dreams would come back, so he could say he was sorry. Every dream became an intimate, personal friend. When they fell out, he wanted to make amends. His past never seemed to remain benign, inert or fully dead. Old decrepit dreams, half forgotten or half realised were still half alive, just awaiting a fresh magical spell to restore their potency.