PART 42

Is anything truly unique? After the Universe collided and atoms burst into flames and separated into the darkness and formed planets and water and light… was there any room left for new creations? From that point on… did we just start the long process of building up a civilization filled with replicators?

I remember narcissistic times in my life where I would seek out an original experience. “Touch the corner of that table and say the name of an exotic animal.” I’d think to myself. “Because NOONE has EVER touched THAT section of THAT table and said THAT particular name of THAT tropical bird.” Or there have been times when I walked through a museum exhibit and leaned in closely to a massive painting and tried to find one small brush stroke and simply focus on it. I’d meditate on the painter himself and what he was thinking as he made that mark on the canvas. And I would think, “Surely no one in existence has looked at that ONE brushstroke and took the time to wonder about the artist’s mood at the exact moment he made it.” Well done, me.

It’s a silly search. The search for the original experience. But who knows… maybe it could pay off. Maybe it’s a small, neurotic quest that would accidentally lead me to unknown and fantastic destinations. Maybe I’d randomly touch a knot on a tree while saying the name of a president and accidentally open the gates to the underworld. It would be as if I found the candle stick holder of our world that once pulled… reveals the dark, stone steps to the land of clues and mysteries and darkness and worries. I’d look both ways and enter the tree’s depths. I’d walk down the slippery slope into an earthy and warm terrain. Miles of melting mountains. Fields of houses overgrown with vines and small animals. I’d swing on mammoth bones while being covered by the vast shadows of looming giants. I’d follow inky pathways that lead to illuminated objects in the sky that would sing haunting melodies of moments that have yet to occur. I’d wrestle with white legged clouds and lay in the hold of hovering claws that tried to crush me in my sleep. I’d climb to the top of incredible statues made in the likeness of unknown entities. I’d find the highest rocky tip and place my finger delicately on its edge. I’d survey the land and know that no one had climbed this high. No one had touched this small space the way I had. And no on had said aloud, “CORNUCOPIA.”