The brain has a really uncanny way of convincing us of reality’s opposite. Originally posted on Medium.
My aunt and I dillydallied by the marina many afternoons ago. Prior to scooping me up in her pearly silver car, she let me know about a thought that came to mind.
“I thought it might be fun to do a little writing,” she hinted.
You know the If You Give a Mouse a Cookie… narrative?
Yeah, well…
Similarly, if you offer a writer the opportunity to scribble thoughts onto paper, they’ll likely jump at the chance to do so. And just like that, I jumped at the chance to do so.
“Oh that would be fun! I have a plethora of journals.”
It’s quite true.
I sure do.
After a bit of strolling, we settled onto a bench along the shimmering blue-hued waters and slid moleskins out of clasped bags. She posed two prompts, the first of which I opted for, and she followed suit.
“Write about who you were before and after the first haircut that you remember.”
So I did.
And she did.
After our stories spilled onto the pages, we took turns reading them aloud to one another. I was mighty shy at the thought of doing so, but I caved and it was comfortable in a way that I could trust.
There was a definite and noticeable moment where I felt like I was the only one aware of a standstill. Everything around me appeared to pause, though it may have been nothing shy of a mental illusion.
But even so, I’ll always remember everything around me muted while I scanned the scenery in front of me and stored a memorized copy of the moment I was in within my cognitive cortex.
For a fraction of a millisecond, I thought about nothing other than the fact that connection is the epitome of human desire.
I zapped back into real time reminding myself that we are not as misunderstood as we think ourselves to be, which we could agree with more readily if we allowed ourselves to be understood in the first place ☽