Book about Dreams
I once was a Pebble.
Being part of something greater than myself, I came to be an individual existence after a myriad of actions and repetitions across time. My body was carried along by water, changed in form and shape by cold and heat alike, broken apart from within and without for hundreds of millennia, until one day I became just one small and smooth pebble. Being frozen and melted many times, I travelled great distances, miles and kilometers across time, leading the monotonous and boring life of a rock.
But after the world's landscape changed, something new came with it. The pebble was, by chance, taken in the grasp of a magnificent bird, its claws closing around it sharply and scraping against its surface, and for the first time, the pebble felt what it meant to fly across the sky. “Such freedom, such vigor, if only...” And for the first time, one thing it craved came to mind:
“If only I had wings of my own.”
I once was a Wolf.
I travelled and hunted in packs, always proud and confident of my way of life, my fangs were white as the trodden snow, and as sharp as wild thorns, and it always made quick work of my preys. But the path of the hunter brings with it no solace against the harshness of nature, and in the fell swoop of circumstance, an accidental injury led me to a halt, leaving me with a broken, limping stride.
Walking slow and now trailing behind the pack, my fangs dulled with time, and the reality dawned upon me that this was a wound never meant to mend, as the evidence of the packmates' eventual dismissal began to rise. It wasn't long before I was left behind, as the pack dashed ahead, eager on their hunts as I once was. Dragging my lower half across the snow, cold permeating my body, I fell sideways, looking at the pale sun behind the veil of snow in the sky, and a single, ardent wish welled inside, with a ghost of warmth at the incessant desire:
“Just once more. Let my legs carry me just once more.”
I once was a Man.
I was born into a mediocre family, and led an ordinary life, neither unhappy nor particularly content. I worked, ate, slept, and watched the years pass much as one watches rain against a window, distant and half-awake, simply gazing at it as though I were an outsider looking into someone else’s life. But one day, I was pulled from that quiet daze when a new kind of disease spread across the world, and someone I was close to was struck by it.
Being the only family available to help, I felt it was only natural to do so: to accompany them, bring food, and take care of them. I often took time off work, made small sacrifices to make time, and before I knew it, I had become far too good at it. Days became weeks, weeks became years, and somewhere along the way, I began dedicating myself entirely to that person. Before I knew it... I was consumed by that purpose. And yet, while I was busy caring for another life, my own kept moving without me. One day became another, one year became another, and I never thought to stop and count them. When the person finally died, there was a strange emptiness where my purpose had been. I remember looking around, almost expecting the world to still be waiting for me. But it wasn't. So much time had passed that I could no longer tell where the years had gone. I was already old. As though some veil had finally been lifted from my eyes, I noticed the cracks in the walls, the mold spreading across the ceiling, the dust that had settled into every corner. A slow, quiet despair crept down my spine, and I realized:
“All this time… and this is all I did with it? I wish I had been selfish, just once.”
I once was an immortal being.
I travelled these lands far and wide, crossed every continent and wandered through countless countries. I met all kinds of people, experienced countless cultures, and watched civilizations rise and fall. The more I came to know humanity, the more human I became. I grew attached to people, and then time took them away. I would grieve, isolate myself, grow lonely, and eventually crave connection again, only for the same cycle to begin anew.
After a certain point, after enough repetitions, my memory began to grow hazy. People I had once loved dearly faded until I could no longer remember their faces, their voices, or even their names, while others came to take their place, again and again and again. As my awareness of the futility of it all grew stronger, I began to regard humans, and eventually all living things, as belonging to the same indistinguishable category. Or at least, I tried to.
In the end, I was still thinking like a human. To end my torment, I would have to stop pretending that I was one, but, like a poison that had seeped too deeply into the blood, I could no longer rid myself of it. After living with that way of thinking for so long, unlearning it proved far harder than learning something new. Wonder and adoration slowly turned into disgust, first for humanity, then for myself, and finally for life itself. And beneath all those feelings, there remained only one incessant wish:
“How cruel, that the one thing every human possesses is the one thing I was denied.”