In my dream I sat on a plane, though it was hard to say why. I don’t remember where I was flying from, or where I was headed to, but for some reason I was anticipating the destination.
The first vivid appearance to emerge from the haze of vague impression was the observation that the plane had gone into nosedive. I scrambled for my seat belt and latched it, but it was no use. The plane twisted wildly downwards through the air and the ground rushed up to meet it with fatal velocity. There was no impact — only darkness.
I woke up in an odd place. It had most (but not certainly not all) the appearances of an airport. The only thing I could be sure of was that it was not the airport I had taken off in. It was suspended in some sort of ether, detached from the usual surroundings and somehow instilling of a deep sense of unease. It was bright, and yet, curiously, there was no sun. Instead, the light seemed to simply exist, emitted from no discernible source.
There were other people for company. They were running around without guidance, trying to find a way out. Although there were no apparent instructions, there seemed to be a general understanding that escape was of the essence.
At first, responsive to this communal intuition, I joined a few attempts to leave. Together with one of the insistent hordes, I followed perplexing exit signs and ran wildly about. The efforts were always fruitless, and spit me back towards the beginning of an endless and impossible labyrinth.
When I met her I was out of breath, bent over with my hands on my knees and black tendrils creeping along the edges of my vision.
I cannot remember what she was wearing or what she looked like, but I remember her challenge to me. I remember how she guided me to another plane, an unusual one; lived in, in a way. Instead of the usual rows of seats there were beds and nightstands, and where one would normally find a cockpit was a homey kitchen, fully stocked for an extended stay. I had a companion on this plane in the middle of the tarmac, and we were given a task; a strange one. We were to prepare a meal, following a recipe with very specific instructions.
I did not do my task well. I lost interest and turned my focus to other things. I tried to assimilate my companion’s creation and left mine abandoned to the side. I stopped my work to watch others running around, smirking at their misdirected strains towards freedom. I got all the way to final touches and then put everything down, letting somebody else pick up where I had left off. Through it all I fooled myself with my own reason; what is the purpose of this activity? How can I be certain the result is worth the effort? In the end, who wants to have to clean dishes anyway?
After each failure, she was back, taunting me, admonishing me, teaching me. Each failure drew a fresh mirthful exclamation.
How are you to rise if you can not even work?
Will you choose to ride the coattails of another’s achievements?
Are you so simple that you, perched on the dispirited rubble of your own work, are satisfied to mock the search of others?
Finally, something broke; something deep within me. I lashed out at my companion, who had just again put the finishing touches on what had originally been my project. He could not understand my frustration.
Have I not brought you towards your goal?
That doesn’t matter! It doesn’t matter what I do on this plane in the middle of a tarmac in the throes of passing into nothing. It could never make a difference. It matters that I finish a task that I have started. It matters that I prove I am worth the chance that was given to me. It matters that I show that I will not put things down quickly and lose interest, I will not try to ride other people’s talent to success, I will not laugh uselessly at the paths of others, and I will not make it to the finish line and then turn away, letting myself be distracted by things that are less important. Don’t you understand? That was the only way for me to go! That was the only way to walk out into the sun.
I expected her to come back this time like she had the others, but she didn’t. Despite having been tormented by her earlier appearances, I now screamed out for her desperately.
Come back, and taunt me for my failure! Come back and make criticisms of my efforts, teasing hints that I don’t deserve to takeoff and fly away, to land in a new place and walk out into the sun! Come back and bring me a thousand recipes and see how I lay every single one in the oven! Come back and assign me my task, but don’t leave me here!
The dream ended with my sudden release into a green courtyard. I was surrounded by other people lounging happily and enjoying the fresh air and bright rays of golden sunshine. At first I was confused, unaware of what had happened, and unsure of where I was.
Then I found words at the roots of an old oak tree.
They said that in the face of my struggles, I had learned. The tasks we are assigned will inevitably lead to failure, and so she watches the response. The planes never take off, but one does not need them to fly.
I am to enjoy my time in the sun, but never forget the airport.
The airport in nowhere, where aircraft sit idly on a tarmac and tightly knitted groups of desperate souls run after signs pointing vaguely to false exits; a subjective eternity where there are only meaningless tasks to do and infinite ways to be distracted; an artificially lit place where there is no sun but that which one can begin to build in himself.
Many have remained there, I imagine, trying randomly, instinctually, to sprint towards an exit. Others have probably idled as I did on the tarmac, questioning the usefulness of their task and succumbing constantly to diversion. Still more, perhaps, have simply given up the fight, curling miserably into defeat until the day she comes to guide them gently onwards, to somewhere else entirely, and for good.
When I finished reading the words, they disappeared. No matter how I looked, all traces were gone, replaced by dirt and fallen leaves.
I am still not sure if I stood in that courtyard reading a message crafted for me or if I was simply walking around the roots of a tree and seeing things that made sense only in my world. Whatever the case, I glanced up eventually and, after spending a while quietly watching the way the light reflected off the leaves and onto smiling faces looking boldly into the sun, walked towards a gate to meet her, choosing the way most generously bathed in sunlight.
Does it matter more that the words were actually there, or that I had once seen them so clearly?