Living Two Lives At Once

One day at a time

I wasn’t supposed to remember.

One usually doesn’t. It’s safer that way. Easier to forget than to make sense of images that can’t be.

The room was noisy. A world filled with bright lights and vibrating machines, all pulsing and whirring and acting like they were the main attraction.

And there I was. Hands holding, hands swaddling and trying to comfort me. Frightened and curious. Bells softly ringing, wheels squeaking as clattering trays of long silver objects are drawn near. God help me — needles and aspirators — sucking at my nose. Probing ears unused and not ready for the assaults of sight and sound.

Then there you were — meeting for the first time. Soft and comforting. Is that me cooing or you? Soothing and retrospective as I remembered where I was but not so much where you are now.

One is reluctant to recall who we were, when the matter of who we are, is so dominant and overwhelming. New faces appear in rapid succession as the arrival seems far more important than the recognizing as we bounce from one accommodating pair of hands to another. Visiting and introducing. Pondering and reimagining what the ambient sounds might now mean as the past begins to fade.

Years later, it became apparent that I shouldn’t have remembered my reentry into this world. No one does. We simply glide through the formative years, the awakening years, and find ourselves on the other side. Ready or not — daycare and aunties. Strollers and mailmen pinching cheeks in recognition of our being whole.

We are prompted and pampered. Schooled and satisfied at intervals. Expected to be different and fun and yet, carefully monitored to make sure we are not — for we are appealing in our sameness.

And we learn. Not about us. Not from where we came, but of who they are. Our keepers. The guardians of our existence and well-being. Those who push and tickle, scold, and reacquaint us with our responsibilities. To make them happy. To entertain and preoccupy, so the years fall away without regret or undue pain.

But I remembered. As I sat in strollers and moved through a world of brick houses and grey automobiles, the images returned. As I sat quietly behind rails in a playpen, watching from my backyard, the birds swirling overhead; the clothing flapping in unison on the lines above; I saw myself.

Tall and upright. Long in arm and leg and having a bearing that was ramrod straight and not the soft and pliable me as I exist now, forever falling over and looking sideways at a new world.

I remembered.

The shouting of orders. The clattering of weapons in motion. The thumping of feet against hardened clay as men marched before me. Becoming something different. Changing from what they were into what others needed them to be — soldiers.

I was one of them.

I was the shouter of orders. The arbiter of right and wrong. And while the images before me differed from those I saw in my new life; I could still smell the dust rising up from a parched earth. Feel the sweat moving down my back as the sun, baked us all, allowing more mature thoughts of men and madness to fill my mind. Recalling green hills and cool rain from a place that I called home and wished to return to when all of the nonsense was over.

When all the killing and fighting and wasting of lives were set aside and normal thoughts, healthy thoughts could return to take their place.

This past, this life at some other point than the one parading before me, informed every waking moment. Filled me with introspection when I took my first steps. Made me wary when playing with children and splashing in small pools filled with cool water and yellow ducks.

Left me pensive when others giggled; questioning the purpose of a clown rather than just laughing at them. Challenging the reason for obedience, when common sense seemed to be lacking and parents assumed a higher position than me when their words spoke of confusion and uncertainty.

I was who I was and yet I was different. I worried at seven that the world did not understand me. I feared for the future at eight and thought we were forgetting too much too soon.

I longed to be the child I was; to laugh and feel unrestrained by some vague and unsettling notion of what had been before. I wanted to be free to explore the present as the present and see a future that was unexpected.

But it wasn’t meant to be. As the years passed and the body grew, the mind straddled two distinct worlds. The world of the present filled with bright colors, loud music, angry words, and beautiful poetry that made me think and feel and want.

And the vague mist-filled world that was, refusing to disconnect and coloring my everyday thoughts, making sadness a far closer friend than I ever wanted. And making happiness a unicorn, that I would search for every single day of my life.

And yet, what are we except for everything we have been? Everything that has touched us and hurt us and made us think and reject and fight for something better.

I remembered and I can’t say why. I brought a second life with me into this one. A much older and more experienced one that influenced every action and reaction as I plunged into a world that was strangely familiar but wildly different than the one, I had left behind.

For every year was like five. Every moment was new and exciting and familiar and well-researched all in one. What I lost in pure spontaneity I gained in foresight and understanding. I learned to laugh, hard and long, not from a position of naivety but from perspective.

I had witnessed loss and destruction at such levels that I was certain of its failings when I saw it creeping into my new world. I knew at once that there were no extenuating circumstances, no exceptions when madness made sense and death became a viable alternative.

It all meant I suffered a little more than most. Began crying a little sooner than most. But this advanced warning system, as it were, has been invaluable as a tool and a means of addressing a world that is no less crazy than it once was, but in my opinion more capable of change.

My reentry was a blessing and a hardship. I was a child and a man all at once. A brooding, thoughtful overly significant youth who failed to laugh as much as I should have, and yet, I wouldn’t change any moment. I wouldn’t give up what it gave me. No matter the cost.

Dr Mehmet Yildiz James Knight Desiree Driesenaar jenine bsharah baines Stuart Englander Liam Ireland Tree Langdon Karen Madej janny’s heart Adelia Ritchie