Sometimes I stop my life for just long enough to step back and appreciate the arcane mysteries of our world, and whenever I lift my nose from the lines of grinded stone (I've set in front of myself) for long enough to smell the wake-up coffee of reality, I start coughing on the kick-in-the-nuts zing it brings to my day: dark, bitter, and strong. So strong, you’ll go crazy if you drink too much at once. And much like the diner where I constantly corner my consciousness with caffeine, no one’s going to put whipped cream on top. I drink to forget. I douse my gullet in happy juice, enough sugar to stand up a spoon. Everything becomes brighter. I catch snatches of whispered conversations inside my head. By the time I kill the second carafe, the walls have started vibrating.
I drink to forget. I drink when I don’t want to think about what I have and have not done, when I want my excuses to be able to beat the Hellfire and Brimstone angel on my shoulder. I drink when I don’t want to think at all because when I think, I see only a perpetual montage of disgrace and tragedy. I think like I’m there in Auschwitz, watching my father help my mother into the shower room to wash the mud off her face. I think like I’m in Rwanda, tripping over the bodies of my friends as I struggle towards the UN forces who will surely put a stop to this carnage. I’m there in Bosnia, picking through pieces of where I live, trying to find enough pieces of my sister to bury. I’m lying in a pool of my own vomit, wishing I’d shared my friend’s courage to jump overboard and drown rather than endure this slaver’s hell. I’m watching my brother’s throat ejaculate a sticky, red sneeze of blood as the Ethnic Cleansers test the sharpness of their knives.
And the funny thing is, as much as this hurts, I wasn't there. I will never feel that pain; I’ll never taste the suffering of a jackboot on my mongrel, subversive, unnatural lips. It’s all based on stories - comics and movies, novels and songs.
I drink to forget the pain of the former Nazi officer, wishing to god that killing himself could even begin to alleviate the crimes of youthful fanaticism; the rapist who’s stopped hurting the one he loves, but can’t find a way to undo what’s already done; the mother who had to smother her infant child when it wouldn't stop crying when Germans were near. I drink to forget that!
Because sometimes, when I climb out of my cozy comforter at 8am, making my way through piles of luxurious crap strewn across the floor, into a room with a bath and hot water and a working toilet; sometimes, when I look in the mirror, I see them. I see a slave, a refugee, and prisoner. I see what they would look like if God hadn't taken a baseball bat to their lives and suddenly the space between us narrows to the width of a lottery ticket. And sometimes the ticket flips over, and I look back into the mirror and I see a young man who so hated the world that he would have given any begotten son or daughter to alleviate his own self-centered anguish. I see a killer who was taught peace; a rapist who was taught respect; a villain who was indoctrinated into the other side. The space that separates us is a lottery ticket. And I drink to forget that.
By the time I kill the second carafe it’s too bright to see the mirror, the voice in my head drown out the pleading in my heart, and in a world where nothing else makes sense, why the hell shouldn't walls vibrate? What I have, it’s called Survivor’s Guilt, and every day I live with the fact that nothing I do will ever be good enough. When you believe in Original Sin, the task of saving the world is a right scary proposition, especially when you know that if anyone else could do it, it would be done already. That’s why I keep my head to the grindstone and my eyes on what’s in front of me. That’s why I drink: to forget…
Comments
Justin, I have to apologize to you. In my excitement, I made a mistake when I wrote the French Kings name. Elizabeth was at the court of Louis the 14. I should have have written Louis XIV.
Yes the parallel is really important. We all are complex entities. We have had so many life experiences. When we choose to reincarnate, we have the opportunity to choose in which area we want to pursue.
It helps to know what we have been before. It helps us concentrate in area that we need to work on and not repeat mistakes that we made in the past.
It is funny that you point out Kiev as the capital of Ukraine Rosemary. You are quite right, of course. But in my mind it feels like Russia. Perhaps because it might have been during the time of the Soviet Union. I get glimpses of my appearance in this life and I mostly wore tailored black suits, with polished shoes. I did a Google search to see if I could find the time period when this was in fashion and it looks like 1870-1920. I am going to make more of an effort to explore my memories. They are there I am simply ignoring them.
When I think of Elizabeth I feel exhilaration. She came out in a past life reading I had and as you say, quite beautiful with curly red hair and a fair complexion. I haven't given her much thought since the reading and never connected it to Louis XVI, which I also find fascination because 1. I have always found him fascinating and felt a connection there... and 2. I share his name in this life...
I have been pondering this for the past 2 days and the parallels between those three lives and this incarnation is quite remarkable. I've just never really looked at it in that way until this discussion and I considered all the angles. Going to make more of an effort to explore these things as I agree with Byron that the keys to our awakening lies in our past(s)...
I have only remembered just slivers of a past life (or lives) in the past year. And when I was 7, I was having dreams of being a medieval princess who lived in a castle. That was weird.
I hope the remembering of past lives will be part of the awakening - I think it will!
As Elizabeth, you were surely living during Louis XVI, nickname the Sun King. Although you were a kept woman, you were not a person whom lack culture. Women at the court were beautiful yes, but they were also well educated and able to understand the subtleties of politics.
Your life in Kiev is interesting, and reading your description of the orchard was soothing. Kiev is the capital of "Ukraine."
Cheryl, it is good to know that others people have lived in Atlantis.
Byron maybe you could try to have a dream journal beside your breakfast plate. Just has a visual trigger.
Cheryl I will try your method and see what happens. Sometimes I remember my dreams for day's but the usually vanish when my eyes open. Sometimes I think about things I want to dream about before I fall asleep and it happens once in a while.
Rosemary, I seem to have an Atlantean background too. I know a few others on this site that have too. In one reading, I was told I was a master of sacred geometry and a weather controller. Another reading with a different person also said I had an Atlantean past. Don't know much about what it means, except I was told I was back here doing the same thing.... ya think?
Byron, another thing I found to work is to find a key word or image and say it in your mind, verbalize what you are seeing or hearing, and it helps to anchor it in your conscious memory. It seems to work well when you are in the half awake/half asleep state. Don't wait too long to write it in your dream journal otherwise it will vaporize.
Justin, thanks for sharing your insights.
My French life was more exciting, I think, depending of your perception of exciting. I was a woman named Elizabeth, somewhere in the 1700s and a courtesan at the French court in Paris. Basically a kept woman if I try to be diplomatic.
The life in Russia is very vague. I know it was Kiev. I have a vivid memory of an apple orchard in full white spring blossoms. I feel if you take me to Kiev I could take you there. All I know is I was a man, it was my farm, I was very happily married and content with my life. That's all I got on that one. It is also the one that intrigues me most, for some unknown reason.
Justin, I was wondering if you were in Atlantis in the same time period. I lived there in a medical facility where half human half animal people existed. I was responsible to find ways to make them transform into humans. I was using crystals to "operate on them." I also was involved in killing these types of beast that would attack villages spread on numerous island. I love flying the Atlantian crafts. These crafts were powered by a central crystal that created a power grid. I just had to add a different crystal into the control panel, and I was airborne. I was a male in that life. I was like a priest.
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