Reality & Fairytale: the human experience sits somewhere in between, I think. The human thought process, particularly in spouts of internal dialogue, often dives off the flat earth of reality. Its not that we don’t realize what reality is, the perception of that is directly sensed, but on the inside we like to spice things up with a little ‘what if’. Internal dialogue is one’s personal narration of life, a silent, but often loud voice that announces feelings and thoughts inside which others on ‘the outside world’ will only ever experience in a suppressed degree. That flicker of a smile breaching the face of the internally amused is inwardly accompanied by hundreds of words or images an observer will never be privy to. This is for the most part because the ‘experiencer’ will never be able to translate that flight of fancy into the realities expected in the spoken world. In the outside world there is strong divide between the categories of fiction, and non-fiction (reality). A human being is expected to act and speak with the decorum of explicability, a salute to the rationalism so valued by the unromantic. But consider the names of these categories. Which name is derived from the other? The real human experience, the unspoken one, particularly when considering that of internal dialogue, can only be defined as a defiant mixture of fairytale and reality; the movements of the outside world and the ‘experiencer’s’ inward story. The narration takes reality that we know to be true and blends it with all significances we may store in the deepest pockets of our brain. This is how we live life, in-between the experiences of a moment, and a lifetime of past.
So what richness of experience could be found in the dialogues of a human-being? Or at least, say, one centered on an insignificant bridge; a structure unspectacular at its finest description? There must be, undeniably, some charm to the structure, some favorable, experiential aura it entails, or she wouldn’t have come here. She must enjoy some beauty on this contraption, where dirty city water trickles through crevasses of ratty concrete and stone, and where it does not, dams and swells, a putrid mixture of rotten leaves and sordid clay. Perhaps it is not so much the major appearances or flaws of the bridge that add appeal, but the minor details, the pattern of ripples from a pooling rapid, the curious wanderings of a moth in daylight, or the comments and gesticulations of the passersby who interrupt her musings: small things that spark some deep down memory or amusement. It is not just the scene itself, the reality that prompts delight here, but the past as well. Inside, her experience is a mixture of fairytale and reality.
She sits, unmoving except for her pen, half an hour on that stone bridge. The day is cold, and interruptions on this typically well traversed crossing are few and far between. What amuses her? It can hardly be said that nothing passes through her mind in this extended period of time. Instead she tells herself stories, embellishes the surroundings with happenings she is already quite familiar with: fairytales, memories. And so it happens, this space means more to her, something different to her than anyone else. Are these stories she tells herself true? Are they reality? Perhaps they are not, but they are in truth, what she experiences in this space, why this space means something to her. This interior dialogue, which she fruitlessly understates, separates, and incompetently interprets to the spoken word below, is flashes of her understanding in that time and place.
*In the outside world these flashes would consist merely of an amused smile, if not less.*
an attempted translation of interior dialogue.
The Magic Creek of Troubles
She sits by that creek, on that stone bridge for half and hour. Half an hour, and it’s cold and hardly eventful. She thought this crossing, this bridge and intersection between nature and human existence would be the perfect place of exchange, but it seems not too many people use it in weather such as this. She looks up, but the sky is so white and cloudy she is almost blinded and is forced to look back down. Below her feet the dark murky waters are lethargic, their flow barely visible to the human eye. Dirt and slime on the oily surface obscure the view to its depths. Cynicism occurs. What craze prompted her to travel to this place which now seems ridiculous to like? She closes her eyes, and sighs at her stupidity, listening to the gentle trickle of a small waterfall, the call of birds she cannot see. And relaxation comes. Cynicisms and troubles are washed away. This is no ordinary creek. For in its waters dwells infused magic. Nymphs and fairies line its edges, embodying the branches who stretch out over the water, Narcissus trying to see his reflection. But the water is to dark to reflect well, as is the day. But she understands now, appreciates its darkness, for it is she, and many others who have contributed to make it so. The water flows clear and thin over the rapids, between the rocks she sits on, but as it pools over the waterfall, it thickens, darkens, tainted with the troubles it has selflessly washed away from those who sit in askance at its edges.
The Troll on top of the Bridge
A woman disrupts her ponderings as she approaches the incline of the bridge with trouble. “I seem to be looking and acting more and more like my grandmother everyday.” But she smiles, amused, as her troubles wash away, “Sorry to disturb your musings, but I’ll probably be back in fifteen minutes.” It’s not long before a man, too, comes to the bridge’s edge. “I keep passing you,” he mentions. “Yes, I’ve seen you twice already” the girl responds. “Well, have a good day.”
“You too,” she murmurs back. And it continues. Each person who passes the bridge keeps speaking to her, unprompted. ‘Strange,’ she thinks.
But then again maybe not so strange, for after all, this is her bridge. She, an evil troll starved of company for the last five thousand years, lies in wait of the unsuspecting passerby. There is no simple password however, no clever trick that will allow some to pass uneaten. Deep beneath this troll’s crusty surface there is a soft interior, a gentle spirit that longs for conversation, understanding, friendship. So it sits on top its bridge, in hope that the sensitive soul will realize this in passing. Luckily the man and woman did. The others get eaten.
The Moth and the Mountain
The troll goes into recession as a moth lands on the rock beside her. Its fluttering beige wings are perfectly suited to the rough limestone she’s been sitting on for quite some time now. She finds it hard to understand why something that can fly chooses to crawl around with no small amount of trouble. These rough outcroppings of rock must seem like mountains in comparison to its size. And then it is on her, a burden so tiny she cannot feel its impact upon her pants leg. But she has become the mountain, its landscape. It does not differentiate between her and the rock! If only there were more of its kind. She would be Gulliver in his travels, tied down by a minute people of moths, trapped by their multitudes of clever ropes. Then it comes to her. He is only the scout. In a voice so small a mountain such as herself cannot hear, he is silently calling droves of moth compatriots secretly hidden in the brush along the creek. He is calling. She sits and waits patiently for them to come. “Where is that lady?” she ponders. It had been more than fifteen minutes.
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