Magenta And Blue.

Wrapped together like braided rope
Thrown longways across a neverending bed
There, watching the most wondrous colors
Through a window, magenta and blue
I lost sight of me and faded into you

In my dreams I floated elsewhere
To a home nestled in a valley, surrounded by mountains
The flood had come, sending water to our doorway
And yet you swam in the deep mountain rain without worry
Just let it all go, you told me over and over
Peace begins with opening your own cage
And learning how to be free

I awoke to the coming of the cool, breezy night
But somehow, I emerged on the other side of the window
Though the color had faded, I could now see with clarity
My mind saturated with magenta and blue
Finally found in a dream, envisioned with you

Merge with the universe.

Hovering in open space, surrounded by glowing ribbons of cherry red, plum and teal; I take one look down. And I fall...

This is the beginning of a reoccurring dream (both day and night) that I've had for as long as I can remember. It doesn't take place on a building, or even on this planet. Instead, I'm free-floating in the universe. There's no one else around; I am alone.

I find myself looking around at all the universe has to offer. The infinite colors and shimmering stars are the most beautiful thing I've ever seen. As I begin to fall (though you technically can't fall in space, but you understand what I mean), I steadily pick up speed. The galaxies of vibrant light begin to twist and morph. Faster, faster, faster - I go forwards with voracious velocity. My fingers reach out and cause the stardust to ripple. Eventually, my trip seems to enter a tunnel. Colors and shapes have lost their meaning; everything is a blur. My body feels lighter and less dense. I can feel my own body... my essence... begin to merge with the universe.

Faster.

Faster.

Faster.

At this point, I feel as if I'm not moving at all. My speed has become so rapid that it's as if I'm floating at a standstill. My body doesn't seem to be present. The universe and I have become one. I can look at myself, but there's nothing there. All the while, I still don't know exactly where I was traveling to.

And that's where the dream ends.

I've had this dream while riding on a school bus, sitting in a doctor's office, driving a car, watching television, swimming in a pool, etc. The list of places I've had this day dream is lengthy. If you ever see me in person and I'm staring away blankly, then you can assume I'm probably in this dream.

My dream of journeying through space is always the same. I never find out where I was traveling to, much to my disappointment. As of late, I've been experiencing this dream quite a bit. At times, I can activate the dream depending on my mood. More often than not, the vision just happens.

The strange part? The older I get, the more this feels like a memory and less like a dream. With certainty, I've been there before at some point in my existence.

I believe this vision relates to my personal transhumanist ideology. My aim is to "upgrade" my body through technological means. You may scoff and say that's nonsense (or at the very least improbable), but I'm very serious. One day, I hope to actually take this trip and see where I wind up.

Another dream.

I had another quite peculiar and unsettling dream last night. I thought I would share it with you.

Oddly enough, I found myself in a church. Not a fancy church or cathedral, but a very homely, dilapidated country church. The pews were filled with a wide variety of people, whom seemed to be shouting and hollering. I was sitting in one of the pews, trying to find a way out of the madness. Suddenly, my mother took a seat next to me. She was in a condition very similar to the months before she became bed-ridden and passed away -- still able to walk, but feeble and weak.

As she sat down, I noticed that was she excited about a box in her hands. The box said 'Holy Nuts'.

Yes, you read that right -- 'Holy Nuts'.

These weren't nuts like cashews or almonds, but mechanical nuts used with screws and bolts. For some reason I can't explain, my mother's excitement lead me to believe that she was going to eat these nuts. She was hollering with the rest of the crowd now, shouting exclamations of hope that these nuts would completely heal her.

This overwhelming sense of pity engulfed me. I truly saw my mother as a pitiful and defenseless creature, just trying to get by however possible.

I leaned in close to my mom and said "This will not make you better. They will make you sicker and kill you." Yet, she continued to profess the magical ability of the items in the box and would not listen. Finally, I grabbed her and said "You can't eat these mom. You'll die!"

The shouting and hollering in the room stopped. All became still and calm. It was as if the other people in the room disappeared. My mother placed her hand on my shoulder and said "Son, I'm not going to eat them. I am going to sell them. The money will pay for me to get better."

So there we sat... on a pew in a church that I assuredly had no business being in. She began to rub my back. It was like... like I could feel it for real. Just a comforting rub, back and forth.

And then I awoke. Not just a half-asleep consciousness like when you first get up in the morning or slam on your snooze button. I was AWAKE. Rolling over, I glanced at the clock and saw that it was barely 5 AM. The piercing sense of pity was still with me. Turning to my side, I fell back to sleep quickly.

The emotions contained within the dream have lingered with me all day. What did the dream mean? Was there a message to be had? What was my subconscious mind trying to work out? We all know that I'm not a religious person at all. Why would I find myself in a church of all places? Much less, isn't it odd that I had this dream on the night of my birthday?

I've been asking myself questions all day, with no real answers to be found.

Mental booby trap.

I experienced what I can only relate as an "emotional panic attack" this weekend.

This past Saturday, I traveled to the Triad Highland Games in Greensboro. Being my first ever Highland Games experience, you'd think I'd be ecstatic. Those of you that know me understand my fervor and excitement for my Scottish heritage. Scotland is like my home away from home - a dream destination that I hope to visit and/or move to one day.

"Slàinte mhath!"

Needless to say, the event did not go as well as I planned. Instead of being happy and excited, I was miserable. Looking around at all the history and culture that I mentally swim in almost daily... I just locked up. Oddly enough, I grew distant and became horrible company to keep. I resorted to being short and snippy with people. The sad part? I didn't even know I'd morphed into a vile monster until after the fact. In the midst of my ass-hat extravaganza, I was unaware that I'd channeled a pool of dread into my demeanor.

And there I was - pushing away people that cared for me and wallowing in my own anger.

Eventually, I fell out of my funk after watching border collies chase sheep for forty five minutes. As if in a stupor, my anger switched to guilt and I emotionally turned off. By the time I made it to lunch, I was an emotional wreck. Trying to hold myself together, I felt it bubbling up.

And by it, I mean my age-old sense of never being good enough for my father.

It just kind of spilled out of me while I was driving. I can't fully explain why I had this "emotional panic attack", but it felt like I wasn't deserving of enjoying my love for Scotland. The fact that I attempted to assimilate into the Scottish culture more directly sprung a mental booby trap. Better yet, a demon reared its head and said "No, you don't GET to be happy. You must SUFFER!"

"Suffer my boy! Mwahahahahahahahah!"

I realized at that moment that I'm thirty years old and not fully capable of letting myself be happy. Why? Because I'm still trying to satisfy a tyrant that lorded over me as a child. I must admit - it takes a POWERFUL man to control your life long after you've exiled them from it. Therein reflects the hold he has upon me. I can't let myself be happy because I was never given the command to do so. It sounds strange, I admit. If anything... I just feel guilty and ashamed for letting it get to me. Jared Manning - a passionate bastion of strength and independence... and I can't even allow myself a moment of joy. I punish and torment myself every day. Over what, though?

What did I do to deserve this hell?

The torment spilled over into Sunday. More of the same emotional distance was in order. I floated in and out of concentration, even when performing simple household tasks. I couldn't even cut carrots and make dinner without feeling empty and utterly pathetic.

Someone very dear to me levied a powerful judgment over the weekend. They suggested that I am self destructive when I reach for happiness.

Were they right?

Stirred memories.

I dreamed of my maternal grandmother last night.

Typically, my dreams are comprised of mundane events; I'm cooking, shopping, walking through forests, taking a bath, attending a party. It sounds weird, but my dreams usually involve me living a normal life somewhere (and somewhen) else. Sometimes, people from my life will come into my dreams - friends from grade school, the occasional family member, but usually they're strangers to me. Last night was haunting, though. The dream has stuck with me all day. The details are fresh in my mind.

My dream starts out with me in my grandmother's kitchen. Like she often used to do, my grandma is mixing up some powdered milk. As she turns to put her milk in the fridge, she takes a fall in the floor. Mind you, I never knew my grandma to be one for falls, but that's neither here nor there. As she falls, I can see the milk flying through the air and spilling all over us. I get down on my hands and knees and try to pick her up. No such luck, though - I can't get her off the floor. Then, as if I psychically broadcast a call for help, people from all points of my life begin to enter the room. Many of you probably reading this blog were surely there. Exhausted and in despair, I call out to everyone to help me get her up. Yet - no one can hear me. It's like they're phantoms passing through. Crying and still trying to get my grandma up, she looks over to me.

"It's alright Jared, you've tried your best."

I'm crying hard at this point. Eerily, I feel like I was really crying in my sleep; the sensation was that powerful. I lay across my grandma's chest, not understanding why I can't pick her up. Looking at her feet, I notice that they've disappeared. Steadily, my grandma is vanishing. As I look on in disbelief, I can see her eyes staring at me one last time.

And with that... she's gone.

I awoke in a cold sweat this morning, feeling quite peculiar. No... perhaps a better word would be shocked. My heart was racing; my neck was wet... and I've walked around all day feeling like I was hit by a ton of bricks.

My maternal grandmother was always great to me. I can't think of a single memory that involves anything painful. The same goes for my grandpa; they were both incredibly kind to me. From what I know of them before my birth, I know they were different people. That being said, I have an understanding that grandma and grandpa changed in their later years.

My grandmother and grandfather - Fannie Mae and Edward.

If not for my grandma, I probably wouldn't have my deep love for baseball. We used to watch the Atlanta Braves games together on television. She loved the Braves (and the handsome Chipper Jones) and I'm a staunch St. Louis Cardinals fan. We'd get into some heated arguments about baseball, especially when the Cardinals were in town to play the Braves. I'd always accuse the Braves of using corked bats. To this day, I can still see grandma's face every time I'd tell her that (she'd sour up and scoff). To be honest, it was grandma and grandpa's fault that I'm a Cardinals fan anyway. On a trip out west, they stopped in St. Louis and purchased my brother Josh and I Cardinals baseball caps. When they brought them back to us as souvenirs, I was hooked. Sitting at their kitchen table, I can still recall slipping that baseball cap on for the first time. Instantly, I was a Cardinals fan.



My first Cardinals cap.

As you can see, the old hat doesn't fit me too well anymore. My head (as you know from a previous blog post) is a little big for the cap these days. I've kept it clean and secure all these years, though. It means a lot to me. More than you might think.

So here I am, left with a disturbing dream and stirred memories. That's nothing new in my book.

One missing piece.

The green rush of summer has given way to brown. The frozen ground beneath my back has set a chill upon me. Using what strength I have left, I grip the cold tentacles of a tree and pull myself underneath. Resting my head against the trunk, I'm able to see the silver sky cast before me. The clouds have turned to ash and ember; a ruby shimmer sets them on fire for a fleeting moment. Is it the sun? I'm not able to tell anymore.

I place my hands over my chest. My breath has slowed its pace.

In the distance, a single star falls from behind a cloud. A tail cast aglow in the brightest blue and violet; oh how gorgeous it is. Then another star falls, and then another. Before long, hundreds... no thousands of stars rip through the fog and smoke. I notice that dead leaves have begun to spin down from the tree. I can feel a trembling, much like a thundering herd of buffalo racing towards me. As the vibrations become more violent, the falling leaves increase in number.

A vicious gash tears through the valley. Rocks, dirt and dust; they all crumble away to a bottomless void. Even the stars, they too are sucked into nothingness. The heavens descend upon my head. A typhoon of energy has shred the silver sky apart.

Like a mask being torn from the face of a stranger, I see the hollow suspension of the unknown.

And there I am... floating in a pool of onyx.

No earth or sky; no up or down. I have just bear witness to a great unrendering. A world completely stolen away from me... and here I rest with no power to have stopped it. With icicles for fingers, I feel for my chest once more. Yes... the pace has almost come to a halt. And then... my breathing has stopped. I am no more.

-----

I awake to you kissing my forehead. A cold sweat has set in my flesh. I inhale a large gasp of air and regain my senses.

"Wake up silly-head."

There you are, racing towards a clearing in the trees. I can't see your face, but I know it's you. Your feet carry you as if wings have burst forth from your ankles. Hair as black as the night sky wraps your figure in a contrast of wonder. I know I'll never be able to catch up to something so graceful, so completely magnificent. I let you glide away and watch in amazement. Though I can't run with you, at least I can see you one last time -- happy, alive, without any sorrow.

Your figure skips towards the far end of the clearing. Dusk has set in and my sight has grown weary. Suddenly, you dart back into the brush like a frightened creature of the forest. As quickly as you were here, you're now gone. Forcing myself, I rise from the comfort of our old tree and brush off. It's time to go, I lie to myself.

And with that, I return to a world -- fully formed with the earth, the sky, the clouds and stars above. Everything is as it should be... except for one missing piece.

___________________________________________

“Where you used to be, there is a hole in the world, which I find myself constantly walking around in the daytime, and falling in at night. I miss you like hell.” -- Edna St. Vincent Millay