Two Days ago I was born again.

Jake Durand

Two days ago was my birthday. Two days ago and nobody came to the party. Two days ago and i'm still sitting... alone. Not that i mind. i

know everyone says that, those who have no friends, that say they don't care, but i'm serious and i'm here to prove it. Two days ago my

mother and father sang loud as ever and my siblings eyes' gleamed in the candlelight. Two days ago i wished they would go to the place

everyone else was, and leave me alone. I once thought that i was special and that my parents were special, and that the fact i have any form of

fraternal companionship was special, but now i know. Nobody is special, because if everyone is special, then no one can be, because we are all

just plain. And everyone has their gifts, but if we all have gifts, and no gift is better than another, nobody is special. I'm not special and neither

was two days ago, because two days ago was thousands of other peoples' birthdays and they had family to celebrate as i did, and some of them

had friends but that's OK, because i am as happy without them, as they are with. And two days ago was no more special than today because

also today are another set of birthdays and someone amongst them celebrated as i had, without kith, and oppressed by kin.

And so i'm not special, and two days ago was my birthday, and there i sat alone, nearly shielding myself from my family's self-indulgent party.

It wasn't for me, it was for them. So they could eat their cake, or love their child. Either way it wasn't for me, love is not love when love is

unwanted and it was a chocolate cake, i don't eat chocolate cake. i sat, two days ago, and watched the rims of my brothers mouths become

stained with the thick cocoa, and i watched my parents try to get me to open up, like a clam, so they may pull out my innards, and eat them raw.

I'm not special, but i'm not stupid.

If the reader can not tell (yes, i am addressing you directly), i am at conflict with myself, but only because i am at conflict with the world. It's a

sad state to be in, for i put myself in the position of sounding hypocritical, or present the possibility that i may be exaggerating, or even lying,

but i assure you, unlike Nick of "The Great Gatsby", i do not lie, but rather tell things through my eyes, on the most objective level i feel

possible. This is my telling, of a nature without direction, in the hopes that i may enlighten.

Dreams are amazing things, they reveal more to us than we could dream of (i know that sounds stupid but bare with me...) Dreams are bearers

of truth. i say that with caution, because sometimes we interpret what we want as the truth when really our dream is telling us the truth of what

we want. Interpretation is dangerous, very dangerous. I had a dream once, where i was infinitely spread out, on the palette of reality, and each

action and object that has ever occurred could be found in my pigments. I was the omniverse, a place where all time, and places co-exist, in

chaos as well as harmony. And i watched my battles flare, and soon after a quiet peace settle, only to have yet another conflict rise from the

cooling ashes of the first. And i realized that is the way of the world. That is the nature of things.

In another dream i was infinitely small, i was not an atom, not electron, proton, neutron, i was neither quark or any other particle possibly

capable of making up something, i was so small that i was not part of anything. But I was as just important of an object as the quark, the

electron, the proton, the neutron, the atom, the molecule, I was just as important, and the absolute seizure of my existence would set the balance

off, and we'd all fall into oblivion.

I once also had a dream that i was an animal. I'm not sure what kind, i suppose i was the amalgam of all animals, i had paws and horns and a

curly tail, as well as a snout and whiskers and cat's eyes, it was rather strange, especially the two canary wings, totally useless for the purpose

of flight. Either way i was the amalgam of all animal creation, excepting humans, and i was scared shitless. But after a while all foreign

appendages were tamed and so i began on apparently what was some sort of trail. The walk was not long, in fact it seemed that it was

instantaneous, and very painless, i came to an observatory upon a hill and climbed the stairs to it's peak. From there the lush forest behind me

paled into a dying wasteland, life only fluttered not thrived on it's surface, the creatures doing the fluttering were nearly indistinguishable,

however the greedy manner in which they pillaged their food and raped their woman reveled to me that i was looking to my own, the human

race. Only about 27 remained and it was clear they were to die rapidly. This wasteland was a product of my people, and my animal-self felt a

self-disgust i had never had before. I noticed in the more ancient of corners on the rubble before me, the thin vibrant green arm reaching for life,

it was a vine or ivy, climbing up through the rubble, seeking the air. Upon closer observation, there were literally thousands of green specks,

arms that are soon to bust through the decay of human monuments and bodies. I let myself for what i believed to be a smile, and i knew that i

knew this all along, that nature will find away. And despite the fact that nature is watching it's hell-spawned children kill their mother and

themselves, each creature out there has the twisted satisfaction that nature will always find a way. And here it has.

Dreams say a lot, but really not much at all. I'm trying not to lie to you here, my dreams aren't the future, well maybe there aren't. Keep in

mind, however, that dreams are the bearers of truth, and in some way or another my dreams tell a truth. Be also warned that my dreams give off

haunting vibes that can really shake you, they seem to really make too much sense, seem to be too much a true to life prediction, rather than the

hauntful nightmares of another angstful teen.

I once had a dream that i was a child, and i acted and behaved as a child, and the world urged me to let that go, to no longer dance in the rain, to

no longer dream, to accept what i was instead of aspiring to be. I drempt that I never bowed down to the throne of society and ran from it's

threatening grasp. I ran so hard i believed my lungs to burst from lack of breath. But when I stopped running i found myself surrounded by

others like me, i was at this oasis of dreamers, and they too say all i saw, and lived according to the ruling of our dreams, and not our bonds.

We learned to release our physical selves and fly lighter than the air itself. It was a wonderful dream. Perhaps someday there will be some truth

to that.

But then again. Two days ago was my birthday, and that was nothing special. And if I'm nothing special, then perhaps we all have these

dreams... Do you? Perhaps we all have these dreams of intellectual utopia and freedom from binding realities... Do you? And maybe, just

maybe EVERYONE knows that we are the dreamers and that we determine the truths of the worlds... Don't you?

All you need is a dream, and Change is bound to happen. I am not special, and neither are you, because we all are special. Because we are all

equally special and therefore we are all plain. When I am the Omniverse, you are the Omniverse next door, watching your inhabitants constantly

destroy and create. When I am the infinitely small particle, you probably bounce off of me not noticing that i am infinitely minuscule along side

of you. When I was the amalgam of natures beasts perhaps you came to the observatory as i departed, or perhaps you watched the exact

moment i did from another hill, of equal height. Perhaps you too run until your chest bursts out from it's ribcage, and when you stumble and

fall, believing it to be impossible to breathe, you look up, clutching your shards of rib and lung, to notice the oasis, where water and fruits are

bountiful and books and papers are scattered amongst the foliage, to read at your leisure.

I suppose I can only hope that these things are so. That I am not special. For if i am special, that indeed is a scary and wretched thing. If I am

special it means i am alone in my quest for peace, for love, for equality. it means i am the only crusader for the reign of dreams and longings in

a world filled with reality and limitations. If I am special, it means that when i run away from societies throne and clutch, all of you, under it's

command, will hunt me down, like a beast, of blasphemer of the worst degree. Let us all hope that i am not special, for if i am, the we are

certainly doomed. Please... i beg you... Dream with me.