Let There Be Light

Dear Diary, it’s day 5. I say it out loud but it’s still hard to believe. I’ve been on this island trapped in a dream for five days straight. I’m not sure if that’s dream days or Earth days. It took a day or three, but I remember. Perhaps my entire consciousness hadn’t fully downloaded into my brain. But I remember now. I remember my real life. I have a wife – a daughter. I can still see them in brief flashes. The patter of my daughter’s footsteps as she stumbles down the stairs. The beckoning aroma of my wife’s morning coffee. My last waking memory is my daughter’s birthday. We went out for ice cream and…she was so happy. I remember falling asleep that night. I had been working late on a file and I was running on fumes. Too many sleepless nights. The calendar on my dream phone says today is September 22nd and her birthday was the 17th. Given that, I tried to surf the web but apparently, there’s no actual Wi-Fi in the dream world. That’s a real missed opportunity by the modern telecom industry.

Anyhow, no matter what I do, I can’t wake up. The weather here is the same every day – like a program. Sunny, overcast, sunny. I’m frustrated but have nowhere to address my complaints. In my five-day retreat, I’ve yet to locate the front desk. Mythological battles play out in the sky in translucent forms. The melodic notes of a harp glide gently on the wind. “Somebody help!” My plea echoes for miles.

I laugh. I’ve shouted that every day and it just gets funnier for some reason. There’s something about slowly going insane that’s enlightening. Everything is consumed by its rapture. It deprives of all familiarity but all burdens as well. Like losing your home but also the responsibility of the mortgage. Base sentience. The factory reset button. “Upon a river I float, no man, nor boat, or hope to take my fare.”

In my waking life, I recalled reading somewhere that the feeling of falling can help you wake up from a dream. So, on day three, I sought out the highest cliff and shuffled toward the edge. I paused, staring off the rocky depths. Unable to shake the fear of somehow being wrong, I searched for a shorter drop. Needless to say, all the feeling of falling brought was despair. And a face full of sand.

I huff for the hundredth time in disbelief. How do you get stuck in a dream? Something this incomprehensible would only happen to me. The island breathes and simmers and squawks and shimmers and wades. An empty paradise. Stubborn in its illusion – though not perfect. Faded images flicker in and out like channel-bleed on an old box television. Perhaps, back in the real world, I’ve slipped into a coma of some sort and this island is some kind of limbo. Maybe it’s a riddle – a message I must figure out to unlock a secret door that leads back to consciousness. I fall to the sand. I just want to go home. I’ve been reduced to a five-year-old version of myself. Pouting in the wind. Powerless.

I stand. Wafting somewhere between misery and resolve, I decide to become a great explorer of the prison island instead of a prisoner. Or at least a patient wanderer. I begin walking and notice a cool breeze that seems to intensify as I move faster. There are buildings and structures all around. Empty sand bars by the beach. Empty bike rental stations. There’s a surfboard shop just off the coast with no name. What if it was called, The Web? That’s going to make me a fortune when I wake up. Commit that to memory.

Why would I dream a dream that’s so lifeless? I’ve always said I wanted the world to myself, but this is far from what I had in mind. Perhaps I should take control – manifest something. Yes of course! I rub my hands together and shake them out to get ready.

“Dream gods, bring me a dog,” I command. I push out my open palms and wait. And I wait. Not even a ruffle of dust. Learning curve perhaps. Something inanimate. “A cheeseburger!”

Not even a wisp of air.

“Aw c’mon!” Perhaps this is psychological karma. ‘Your idea of paradise, you cognitively dissonant mortal, is your hell. A being doomed to perish can have no concept of its own eternal bliss.’ I strain harder. “Wake up! Wake up! Wake up!”

I pry my eyes open. I’m face to face with the overcast sky. I have the distinct feeling of a lapse in consciousness. My left side is buried in a hill of sand like I had been planted there. Driven into the ground like a foreclosed sign. Great. I fell asleep in a dream and woke up in the same dream, again. I stand and brush the sand grains from my arms and legs. I check my phone. September 23rd. Sudden memories come pouring in.

A wedding…

The birth of a child…

Awkward steps…

A father guiding his son on a bike…

Placing a corsage on a feminine hand…

An argument at a dinner table…

Handing money to a stranger…

A car crash.

A dream within a dream. “Is this my fate?!” I scream at the heavens. Stumbling backward from the force of my voice, I’m met by a large wooden slab. I turn to see a sign that reads, Directory. Ignoring all the sightseeing, my eyes are immediately drawn to one message. “For assistance, text, Help, to Guardian Angel. Carrier rates may apply”

“Seriously?” I look around and pull out my phone slowly and in a discreet manner as if to avoid some sort of embarrassment. Click, click, click, click, click.

Rolling dots. Then miraculously, a reply.

“How may I assist you?” Reply STOP to Cancel.

I respond with finger anger. “WAKE ME TF UP!”

I wait. No response.

Whoosh! “Greetings!”

I almost jump out of myself when a woman, in a rather stylish pantsuit, appears out of thin air. “Are you tech support?”

She smiles. “You could say that.”

“Okay, listen, I really need to get home – back to the real world. This is a really nice place you have here but if you would kindly point me in the direction of the concierge, I’d like to check out now.”

She brushes my nose with her index finger. “You are home.”

I wait momentarily for her smile to break. “No, no, you don’t understand. I fell asleep. I have a wife – a daughter – a business.” I laugh, tensely. "I’ve been here for over six days now and I just want to wake up. So please, wake me up.”

Her eyes brighten. “You’re from Earth?!” She joins her hands with a jovial sigh. “Welcome back!” Without warning, she joins me in her arms. “Usually there’s a lot more of us on hand and we sing you a jolly-old tune, but we are currently experiencing increasingly high volume so – it’s just me!”

“I’m sorry – back? What do you mean, back?”

“A day on Earth translates to about forty-thousand days here, which is approximately one-hundred-and-nine Earth years, or simply put, a lifetime.”

“That’s impossible.” My voice trembles. “My name is Daniel Eames and ¬–”

“And Thomas Scholtz; Bruce Wellington; Edgar Isles; Jean Dubois. And don’t forget, Yusef Amor.”

I am now unable to stand. But I can’t sit either.

“You have memories, yes? Random memories that play out like a motion picture. Each time your awareness leaves this place, you incarnate. You live a full life and return here the next day. And trust me, you’ve been here a lot longer than 6 days.”

“Really? Like how long?”

“Much longer. After many adventures in the material realm, a soul’s awareness tends to shift. Your lifetimes in the physical world begin to feel more like your dreams and this place becomes your waking reality.”

My mind doesn’t believe what it’s hearing, but my heart flutters. “Is this heaven?”

Her eyes wander, boundlessly. “This is eternity – ad infinitum. The forever time. More aptly put, it is whatever you would like it to be.”

“But if I’m none of the things I’ve experienced, then who am I?”

“You are all the things you’ve experienced and no single one. You are God.”

“God? God? The God? What kind of God gets trapped on an island kicking sand for all eternity?”

“Your full creative potential has yet to be restored. Precautionary measure. Just to ensure that before you’re fully ready, you don’t panic and drive yourself mad inside your worst nightmare.”

“When you put it that way, I guess on a scale from one to worst, this place is a solid five. So, if I’m God then who are you?”

“God.”

Not quite the answer I was expecting. “Well, correct me if I’m wrong, but isn’t there only one God?”

“One sun can nourish an entire living planet. One source of light can fracture into a spectrum. One minute can change an entire life. One idea can change an entire world. One womb can produce an entire family. One consciousness can be shared by billions. These forms we take are merely expressions of that consciousness. One is not scarcity, it is abundance. We are one. We are Many.

I sift through all my thoughts. A fullness takes over me. My internal photo album spans lifetimes. The memories distilled are my body of work, and I am the soul of them all. I reach out my hand, “Then, it’s nice to meet your acquaintance, God,” and bow graciously.

“Likewise,” she nods.

“Well now, let’s liven this empty island up, shall we?”

“Let’s!”

With outstretched arms, I declare, “Let there be music!” waving my magical hands and a symphony of sound serenades the shores. “Let there be miles and miles of happy people everywhere!” The cheers and shouts of a parading crowd pour in from the ethers. Let there be great ships gallantly sailing on the waters and planes trailing the skies.” I watched in wonder as the once vacant and predictable island came to life. This is my kind of dream. “Do robots go to heaven?”

“No.”

“What about robot dogs? Ooh, and one more thing. Let there be Wi-Fi!”