Nothing. Yes, you read that right. Nothing.
I’m pretty certain that I’ve learned my life lessons exactly when I needed to learn them. If I had come to know certain things earlier, I wouldn’t have made the same mistakes. And I wouldn’t have become the person I am today.
That actually reminds me of a dream I once had.
Cue lights, fog machine, and theremin.
One night, many years ago, I went to bed the same way as always – filled with regret and wishing I could change the past.
My mother’s voice woke me up. She was yelling that I’d be late for school. I found myself in my childhood bedroom. As I opened my eyes, it took a few moments to get my bearings. Everything was familiar, yet different. My body also felt quite a bit different. In fact, I was much shorter.
Struggling to understand, and yet also not wanting to be late for school, I decided to go with the flow. I threw on my school uniform (black slacks and a polo), grabbed my backpack, and headed for the car.
Various thoughts ran through my head as I sat silently in the passenger seat. The drive usually took about thirty minutes, during which time I was able to weigh the odds of several possibilities. Perhaps my entire adult life had been a dream and I had awakened to the reality of childhood. Perhaps I had fallen through a crack in time. Or perhaps I was actually hallucinating in a mental facility.
That last thought filled me with dread, but still, I told myself to go with the flow.
The first class of the day was math. We had a pop quiz. Unlike other “dreams” I had in the past, where text was distorted, I was able to read my schoolwork perfectly. Also unlike other dreams, there was no time dilation. The 60 minute class felt exactly like 60 minutes.
Fifth grade math is surprisingly easy the second time around. I’m sure I aced the quiz. In fact, whatever the cause of my situation, certain benefits seemed to be shining through very clearly. This was a do-over. A mulligan. I could easily get A’s in all my classes since I already knew the material! That means later on I could do well enough to get a good scholarship, go to the right college, graduate with the right diploma, get the right job, and make all the money! In fact, I never had to repeat any of same mistakes. I’d avoid all the moments that left me with scars.
And so the day went on. English class. Snack break. Bible class. Lunch. Recess. Science. History.
By the next morning, the hopeful glimmer had faded and the cruel reality of youth had set in. Being a kid kind of sucks the second time around. You constantly have people telling you what to do. You can’t drive yourself places. You have a bedtime. And going through puberty is just uncomfortable.
And so the week went on that way. School, homework, meals, bedtime. And the next. With each successive day, I found myself more and more depressed. Whatever had happened to me, reliving all of my past experiences was not worth the ability to correct them.
A month had passed. I started cursing my predicament. I didn’t want a second chance. I started missing the failures and the true experience of learning. I longed for the chance to fall down so I could pick myself back up again.
The next night, I went to sleep begging to be sent back to reality. Whatever mistakes I had made in life, I would accept. I would choose the flawed, messy version of me.
And I woke up shaking and in the fetal position, back in my “normal” adult reality.
It was the most realistic dream I’ve ever had. But I like to think it was a vision sent from the gods — their way of saying “dude, quit your bellyaching.”
Good morning and happy Monday, friends!
This is an experimental post. I’ve decided to try it out in order to accomplish two goals:
- Provide more updates
- Keep my writing at more consistent intervals
These posts won’t have pretty graphics or headers. They won’t even be listed in my website’s main feed or posted to social media. But they’ll be here if you know how to find them.
I’ve got so many projects in my head. It turns out that some of them, quite naturally, take longer than others. When I first started working on this site, it was purely writing and posting articles. I found that I was able to get one article out per week, sometimes two. At first, my lack of knowledge in wordpress formatting was a bit of a struggle, but I feel like I’ve streamlined my processes more and more with each post. That gives me more time to funnel into additional projects, like videos.
For me, videos are a strange, new beast to tame. My production experience started in its entirety about one month ago. It would be very easy for me to sink all of my free time into a video and still not have anything finished each week, so I have to repeatedly remind myself not to let perfect become the enemy of good. I keep encountering new and unforgiving problems, like cameras that don’t have satisfactory resolutions, audio that won’t sync properly, or hard drives that don’t have enough storage space. But I’m learning!
I interviewed Jason Mankey on Thursday of last week. We talked about a bunch of topics, but I won’t spoil anything here. You’ll see the article and the video later today as Music, Myth & Magick Episode 3. I have a running joke with Selene that there is always a vacuum running somewhere in our neighborhood. You never realize how truly noisy a location is until you try recording audio. Sure enough, 5 minutes before the interview with Jason was scheduled to start, someone parked a large truck right in front of our door and turned on a giant, industrial vacuum. I think one of our neighbors was getting their ducts cleaned. I grabbed all my gear and quickly ran it to our bedroom, which was mostly safe from the deafening noises.
Selene and I had our weekend volunteer time at prison cancelled because the entire facility was in lockdown. Prison ministry brings its own set of challenges, but it’s a a worthwhile experience. After we get a few more things worked out, I’m going to share some of what we’ve learned in the process so far.
Aside from the above, I’ve been working on a Mabon/Autumn Equinox article that you can expect to see later this week, just in time for the Equinox! I’ve also been adding lots of information to the Fluid Condenser series, which will now extend to 3 or 4 parts. When I started the article months ago, I really only expected it to be one installment.
I’m off to finish some videos! Expect more updates later today!
Aerik Arkadian 
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