Pisaries Creator

This should be a better place for all of us. This would be a more respectable place if we didn’t kill each other, but we don’t live in this type of city. We have never been a part of any respectable place. We should be. Boy, we should be.

When the day slipped out of his grip, he wasn’t sure what should fill his void and what would make sense. Oscar did the only thing he knew how to do and that was to open up his generic life manual and went to page 34. On this page, the realization came to him. The sentences someone typed and later printed had been erased. He had only himself to blame. His countless soda spills and food droppings made it impossible for him to read the sentences he needed.

People closest to Oscar said his habits were messy. His sister called him a slob. His mother called him worse. They didn’t bother him about it for too long. Oscar had made progress. In the past he allowed others to open his doors. He was known to be lazy. Lately, it had been his own hands opening the doors to the outside. He saw many sights beyond his nose. The space in his brain had been filled with dialogue, full of questions and answers he felt were correct.

Try as he might to get to another achievement on his road, there were roadblocks. Oscar kept going and turning the pages. This was the only response he knew. He jumped to page 67. This page had no stains or spills. His feelings had boiled to the surface. He ran his fingers over the words as he read them outload.

Take out your passport. The one you hardly use because you are too afraid to travel to places you’ve never been. Look at your old photo and ask yourself what you recognize in it. Do you see lines on your face? Do you see your broken teeth? Do you see the tiredness in your eyes?

Oscar believed in the power of these questions. He half expected a voice to come from the direction of the spine of the book he was holding tight, stating to him when he was going to answer the questions. The lines on his face and his broken teeth were not his fault. The tiredness wasn’t just on his face. It found a home everywhere. He kept reading. There had to be more meaning found besides the lines on his face and his missing teeth.

When a man complains his feelings are not his own, he is being honest. The truth has turned  ugly. This means he allowed his strength to pack it up and move to another city. He has given up and lost his hardly used passport.

When he comes to his senses, finding his passport is no longer an option. He will never find it again. This man has allowed a stranger to take his passport and kick it toward the city drain. No one watched it float away when the water came. No one reported it missing. No one cared it was lost, not even the man whose feelings were not his own.

But now like him, you must change. Now is the time to care. You do not want to be lost. You can be found. Are you up to the challenge? Will you make the first sacrifice to be a better person? Or will you continue to pull on the thread and unravel until there is nothing left but a circular mess? The choice is yours to take. Will you take it today? Tomorrow? The next day? The next year? Don’t wait too long. You might be gone if you wait too long.  

Oscar stopped reading the manual. He let it close on his hand. His fingers being the only bookmark he possessed. His feelings were still on the surface. When he touched his arm, it was warmer. He knew his anger was hot enough to curl the hairs on it. If he had availability to ice cubes and a sink, he would have submerged both arms as far as they could go without bending at the elbows.

He was convinced feeling emptiness should never be an indicator of his failure. For many years before this, emptiness was model behavior to possess. Emptiness was a perfected flaw to embrace within yourself. The competition between his sister and himself was fierce. Oscar’s mother did not want to invest the energy to stop this behavior. She wanted her children to be predictable. Her desire led to Oscar’s expressionless face.

He was not sure when the invisible bars were placed around him. He could not break them apart and look up at the sky. There should have been clouds in the shapes of mythical animals. He saw nothing but the obvious: redundancy and boredom with his small eyes. No amount of drops of rain or from a tube will help. For Oscar to restore his faith, he must believe deep within and share his every word to everyone.

Fear does not make a wimp. But what if there was no death? If we valued nothing but a few, could we be more connected? We could breathe easier. We could live longer. We might live in a better city. We could live respected and no longer swim in an ocean of loss. Oscar opened the manual and heard a voice.

“It’s over there.”

“What’s over there,” Oscar asked.

“Everything you need.”

Oscar opened his eyes, trying to see the answers.