Scenes from a man’s life
Characters- Man, Tall hairy figure, Woman, Child
‘’To live is to suffer, to survive is to find some meaning in the suffering”
As the man comes out of the building, he walks hastily across the darkish, smoky and grey street around him. He was in a meeting until now with some movie producers as they approached him to gain the rights of his memoir. The movies, he thought were nothing short of hopeless fantasy, they lure you into the dark hall and showcase you a reality which is not real and people watching them think that they too can achieve it. “Ha! I think people need to go to the “cave” once in a while, smiling and fearing watching their own shadows.” People are voyeurs he thought, no one likes to admit it but everyone wants to peek and look into others’ lives. We enjoy that, it gives a sensation, a paradise for the eyes and a high for the mind. Moviegoers are voyeurisms, he thought of that movie he had seen, rear window where James Stewart watches his Neighbours with his camera. Well, what a situation he thought in the movie he is watching his Neighbours and the audience are watching him! Someone is always watching someone that’s for sure, he thought.
Keeping his beliefs aside about movies he sold the rights and the deal was finalized as he thought it paid good money to him. Despite the book being a bestseller and gained him a lot of money and prominence, he thought some more money won’t hurt him. He thought that the movie will be a much more “polished” version of his book. His book, he thought was by far the most personal thing he ever wrote and might be the only thing. Putting down his memories from childhood, things he has seen, experienced, felt all he put down in it. Now he has given it to someone, for what he thought money? He never detested money but felt it had a great importance and never felt guilty as he granted the rights to the producers.
As he was walking down the alley, which had a nightmarish atmosphere to it, he stopped suddenly to observe a narrow lane, he kept looking into the abyss. It felt as if it was calling him suddenly a sudden force pulls him into the lane, he is stopping himself but he gets sucked into the lane. As he enters into the lane, he finds himself in a beautiful garden like place, and he heard the voice of a baby crying. A hologram appears in front of him showcasing a baby growing up into a boy suddenly it disappears and the darkness surrounds the garden, the flowers and trees wear off, light disappears and he gets scared. Suddenly he sees a tall, dark and hairy figure come out. He sees it with a surprise look on his face and somehow feels that it resembles someone he knows, someone who played a huge role in his life, As the figure comes closer to him, he sees its face and recognizes it and starts running. Everywhere he goes, he sees the same place but now it was not pleasant like earlier and as the figure catches him and hold him tightly, he starts crying, but his voice is that of a small boy and he realizes that he has turned into a small boy. He soon finds himself outside the same narrow lane, but there was no garden around him.
He quickly gets up and runs away from that place and he stops midway, drenched with sweat and looking back as to what happened with him back then. One thing he’s sure is that the figure he encountered was someone he dearly knew, someone he wanted to get away from but seeing it again frightened him again.
He starts walking and halfway through realizes that he is again near the same narrow lane, again a force pulls him towards itself and this time he finds himself in a black void and there on one corner he finds a light and a woman near it. She turns and reveals herself. A confused look forms on his face as he goes near it, he recognizes it and feels strange, happy and confused. He tries to hug her but the she disappears and turns back to find her in a giant shaped hologram as she comes near him and he starts crying, “Don’t cry, I’m always around you”, she says and wipes his tears pats on his cheeks, “I know what he did to you, you did see him again, didn’t you?’’ she continued. He didn’t speak anything he just kept watching her, she strongly resembled someone he thought and then she turns around and starts do walk off. “Wait!” he shouted. “Don’t go wait … mo-’’ he stops in-between. “Hello” a voice behind him says, he turns around and sees a small child and says” Who are you?’’. “I am you, the one who observes from inside” the child says. “Every person has a dual persona within them, who sees from the outside which in this case is you and the one who stays inside and observes, which is me” the child continues. “Where am I? What is this dark place? How did I come here? ‘’ he asks hurriedly and in a shaking voice. “This is yours, your creation, whatever you witnessed till now is all yours. You witnessed it back then and have been witnessing it again” the child says. “Amor fati, heard about it. It means love of one’s fate, where one sees everything happened in one’s life both happy and sad. You have just seen that” the child continues. Pain liberates us, good and bad are interlinked with one and other. A will to live without rejecting anything of life, which is the virtue we must honor. We are porcupines, we want to get closer with one another but as we get closer and closer our thorns hurt each other due to which we back out.
You are the last man, sold your memories for money.” by saying this the child disappears.
The man standing still and quiet finds a door behind him. He opens it and finds himself in a movie theatre, with people all over the place and intently looking towards the screen, he too looks towards it and falls on his knees and shouts “Why didn’t nobody come then”. He runs towards the screen and jumps into it. He finds himself in cage, he realizes that the cage is made out of his book. He tries to escape it but doesn’t find anyway. Faraway, he sees a theatre which is in the shape of the man, as he looks towards it, he starts smiling as people enter into it.
THE END