Flashing

Recount 2: The Secrets of the World

 I woke up this morning with a desire to uncover the secrets of the world. I lay quietly in bed at noon, grey light filtering through the shade and around the room. I was completely naked, the blankets pulled up to my ribs. Staring at the ceiling with my face contorted in penses, I was relaxed in body though not in mind. Ideas ran through my head like wind in the trees causing leaves to shiver.

  I'd wear the same skirt, same tights, and put myself in a similar situation to that of yesterday. I had leapt out of bed, setting Gulliver's Travels neatly on the end table. The table itself was the same medium wood as the desk pressed against the opposite wall. This medium wood could also be seen on the two-high drawers set side by side beneath the bed. I pulled out the bottom drawer of the set on the left, digging around for my striped elbow glove. I was alone for all intents and purposes, and the day was already grey and moist with freshly fallen rain. Today, my hair was a faded orange color, like a natural ginger. I wore the same handed down tights, the same school-girl esque skirt I'd gotten at Goodwill. My coat was absent from me though, as I left it in the wash on my way out the door.

  All the while I was getting dressed, my mission ran through my thoughts like a seductive purr: "The secrets of the world." My walking speed was brisk. The wind's gentle gusts added to my aesthetic, pushing my hair around my face. Here is a sample of my thoughts: "It scares me to give myself so wholly to my mind. The abyss looks back at me; I've been staring it in the face for years." Another repetitive thought of my journey was Thoreau's words: "I went to the woods because I wished to live deliberately." I was trying to trigger a flash. In the shower, I'd decided that it was a foolish thing to do, if not an impossible one.

  To explain this, I imagined a gun in someone else's hands. Only they can pull the trigger, and though I believe that if I were to convince them to do so responsibility would still fall on them, the action's true intent is brought into question. Furthermore, the same outcome is reached if they pull the trigger, whether or not I convinced them. However, as I deduced, the legitimacy of their pulling the trigger becomes controversial with my intervention. This situation is akin to my triggering a flash, considering that a true flash is brought about by circumstance. If I persuade these circumstances to occur, I'm messing with their legitimacy. Despite this awareness, I continued on the path towards what I was calling "enlightenment."

  For quite a few steps, across a couple parking lots, I could have deceived myself into believing I was dreaming. The scene around me lacked any other human life. However, the outdoors did not lack pleasing scenery. An overcast sky floated above the swaying trees. Patches of the tar were dyed a dark gray from the aftermath of a shower. The air was crisp. Though as my journey progressed, I came to realize that the whole stretch of beautifully Autumn-hued leaves had a manufactured feeling to it. I ran into people once I'd crossed the street. There was an Asian couple, walking slowly on the left side of the sidewalk. Before them, I'd passed a short guy with brown hair and a pale face. I intentionally made eye-contact, wanting to see how he'd react.

  A car slowed as I walked along the sidewalk. The white car stopped for a moment, right in the middle of the road. It wasn't too busy a road, so they were undisturbed until a truck sped towards their backside. I wondered why they had stopped, thinking perhaps they were going to offer me a ride. I had veered off my path, meandered through the woods before coming across a field that led, unfortunately, back to the road encircling the edges of campus. Uncertain of where I was, I decided to follow the road around; this was an adventure after all. As I walked, I saw myself beside and around me. My alter ego, September Indigo Rain, perhaps, or another undefined figment of self. Of course these figments showed only in my imagination. The day was already gray, so voiding my surroundings of color wasn't working. There were memories lining my way, revealing themselves to me slightly like glimpsing  a naked woman through a keyhole.

  All the while, my mind ran with narrations. For this reason, I did not grasp reality enough to truly flash again. Not even when I was sitting in the library, reading words on a page and pausing periodically to see the infinity of the shelves that stretched before me, did the world change colors. I now feel defeated, having missed the world's secrets again. All I seem to have done was wander amuck in a dreamy state of Saturday.