In the beginning there was darkness and chaos. And I created a reader in my own image, and saw this was good.
That’s really how it was. Outside it would be eight in the morning and it would still be nighttime. It was as if the Party had forgotten to divide the day and the night. And chaos was everywhere. Just listen to cacophony of horns and watch the barbaric motorists. People drove like Mongolian warlords jousting in the primordial chaos at the beginning of the world. And in those days, there were only two types of weather. Cold, wet days. And relatively dry days. Both types were dark and dreary. But on the cold wet days, the sidewalks were slick with grease, excrement, and mystery. During dry weather, the sidewalks were sticky like the floors of a Saturday matinee.
As a consequence of this, I never went out. I wrote instead. I found these conditions conducive to staying indoors. I wrote many things in those days. Most of it was drivel that wound up in a file folder labeled Do Not Open Until Doomsday. Some was okay. That stuff was fun to write, but when I saw it again I found that it not good. And that too wound up in the file folder. I had yet to write something that I felt was really good.
My words did not come out of the darkness and chaos. That would have been a miracle. Instead, words seemed to coalesce out memory and dream. Sometimes, it was only an idea or a question or a word that would launch an article or story. Other times, it would be something I read that would trigger my own response. But want I really wanted was to escape where I was in life. I wrote because the words transported me elsewhere to where I really wanted to be, which was always on the road to somewhere else. I wanted sentences that grew wild like a forest primeval. Once, I created two sentences. They were the best sentences I ever thought. But then they disobeyed the rules of grammar, and they grew feral and lusty, and I evicted them from my imagination and onto the page. They took on a life of their own. I feigned anger. But I saw that it was good.
I wanted words and sentences that took me far and away from the real world and into another seeded with possibility, mystery and wonder. So I wrote a sentence that pulled readers along. Most readers would grow weary, but then I would lead the one reader on with an idea here, or an image sprouting there by the wayside. I used whatever it took to get this pilgrim to keep moving through a bone white desert. Sometimes it took bread. And other times wine. Until finally the reader would make it to journey’s end.
The reader must have faith in me, for through me is the way, the truth and the life. The way is filled with hardship and ordeals, and of course you must have the heart to endure labyrinths and quests, and appreciate that this is all about the journey and not the destination. And so the reader must ramble along over the plains and mountains, zigzag along windy trails full of crossroads and intersections, and enjoy the blistery wind upon your cheeks, the icy sting of random snowflakes nicking your cheeks and then melting, and there is the sound of rams clashing, their horns clap like a crack of thunder in the crags above, and then moving onwards, your calves and thighs burning with fatigue and your chest heaving and breathless, you will eventually find something wholly unexpected and delightful: An ancient monastery with white brick walls and red and gold roofs, perched upon a precipice overlooking a great cloud ridden abyss of darkness and chaos. It is a good place to rest. A lama will greet you and tell you stories. You can put your pack down and rest by the fire. Somebody will bring you a clay pot of hot tea. It is as if you had been expected.