Scattered Dreams & Dragonflies

The message in a bottle

What do we seek as humans? A simple question in hindsight, yet much deeper and more complicated than we accept it to be. Some seek enlightenment. Some a higher power to follow, a philosophy, a sensation, a mirage resembling happiness plaguing our minds, that afterthought that constantly lingers, telling us a simple irrefutable fact: life is finite, we are imperfect, and therefore we have a limit and an end. Sounds almost beautiful in a sense, right? The fact that at some point, life ends, the fact that we grow around our imperfections until we die. We never reach perfection, but it's what we strive for. That in itself, I would say, is an amazing way of looking at life—just fully poetic. Even if in the grand scheme of things, it means nothing, we were born from dust, and we shall return to it. One day, even if our names are kept by our lineage, line beyond lines will progress, and as our bodies, our names shall return to a vast open world of nothingness, forgotten forevermore. Some seek these kinds of thoughts, while other men, other women, are much simpler. Life is but a straight line, from one sensation to the other, from destination A to destination B. Some might say it's easier. To enjoy the simple pleasures in life and all that comes with them. It sounds plausible, in fact. Both ways of thinking share something in common, though. None are shielded or exempt from hardships...

Haha... I'm sorry, Esmeralda. These pills I took are definitely hitting me hard. I don't usually overthink this much. As I described first, I'm what you could consider a straight-line thinker. I look for the simple pleasures in life... One of those was you. I remember everything about you. That first day I saw you, reading your book, comfortably sitting at our local coffee shop. The same one we both loved. Without knowing it, you already danced in my mind for hours on end. Every day I'd go at the same time, even if I didn't want any coffee, just so I could catch a glimpse of you. You were a marvelous creature of habit, a damsel of refined custom. A renaissance painting, I would kill at the opportunity to paint. The way you always sat at the very last table at the end of the shop. You would cross your legs comfortably, putting your curly hair to the side, bringing some of it behind your ear delicately. Your beautiful hazel eyes only shone brighter through your wide glasses as they remained anchored to your book. The heat of the coffee coming from your cup only accentuated your immediate environment. It all meshed perfectly with the aroma of hot coffee in the morning. Then and there, I knew I had to somehow talk to you.

The following days, I did my best to connect with you. I tried to lock eyes on many occasions, but you, as an avid reader who respects the magnificent story within their grasp, remained anchored to your book. Your environment took second place to everything during that time. It only made me want to talk to you even more. I wished to know how your mind worked. How the words you read traveled deep into your mind, creating images, pictures only you could interpret, feeding your subconscious in a way you would want more and more. During those times, I understood you had no time for me. Hell, I knew I fought a losing battle. I stood no chance of beating your favorite book after all, hahaha. Imagine that... losing to some piece of paper before even trying. I found it somewhat comical, in fact.

So, in order to connect with you, I looked at the book you were reading. "Know Me," that was the name of the book you had in your hands every single morning. Such a simple premise, and yet, so complex. To know you... that is what I wanted. To get to know every piece of you, every nook, every cranny. Every virtue, every pet peeve, every red flag. Every talent, every shortcoming. I wanted to be your perfect complement, your other half. And all of this, without even saying hello... yet. "Know Me" .... Know you? At that time, that was all I wanted. But the real question, thinking deeper, was: Why were you reading it? What were you looking to find—something out there? Something in here... Something in you? Was your mind set on figuring out what you needed from someone who could complement you, or were you trying to figure out how to be whole by yourself?