As I walked through the London streets; the railroad station was busy this early morning, like the others I suppose. The streets were utterly filthy, fouled with the manure of its countless horses. It made my walking fetid and hazardous. Countless bicycles were everywhere. I was thirsty but I knew if I took any water without boiling it, it would be dangerous. The poor of the city lived and looked like sick horses. I found a public pump and filled my hands with the water, which is not unusual for the poor of London. I hadn't bathed in weeks, as I was becoming to the point I had to pick lice, fleas and other parasites off my body and cloths each morning. The air was polluted from the coal smoke; this was London fog I suppose, how poisonous a city could it be I asked myself and how soon could I get out of this city; to the countryside. As I had walked around London strangely for three weeks now, I noticed in some municipal areas, gas lights on. The horse-drawn carriages were the main mode of transportation, besides the person mode which of course was the bicycle. But what a marked difference from my Midwestern city, in Minnesota in the year 2005, to this 1895, London; for I had read a newspaper claiming it was l895, so it must be that year. The children have what I'd call inadequate clothing"heinous; they must have lived in a henhouse I concluded; for I've seen them scattered here and there. Furthermore, each morning when I woke up by the side of a building, wherever building it was, for I had no money, alcoholics also roamed the city, uncountable. I enjoyed walking along the Tames River in the afternoons, people bicycling by, so seemingly carefree. But how did I get here was my question I've been asking myself every morning when I get up; and afternoon. I mean, it is 110-years beyond my time, backwards that is. It was 2005, last time I knew, when I was at my house in St. Paul, Minnesota, the United States of America. When I was trying to go to sleep; no joke, now I'm in London; well, there is more to it than that I suppose. I was exploring the area, reading about Old London town, its past, its romantic past, and it was all fading I suppose. Not into a vision, but I seem to have become part of a vision, but it was the article I was doing for the "UK," magazine. It was an old London article I wanted to do. I was trying to recreate its painful past, its dirty sides, when I fell into a kind of sleep, or something, not sure what to call it. Perhaps a magical spell, yes, yes, maybe so, a magical spell and I was transported to 1895, and I'm in a dream, but I can't wake up, and jump out of it like most people do. So it can't be that, can it? I remember I was sitting by my bed, zoning off as I often do; looking t the walls, and seeing shapes and movements and shadows, and blue lights zoomed in on me like rays. I paid little attention to it, and just allowed it, and it seemed like I was watching a movie all of a sudden on the wall. Configurations of London did appear I suppose. I seemed to remember a window of some sort, fantastic as it sounds, here I am; whatever that means, or amounts to, because there has got to be more to this than meets the eye. Could the mind transport more than the soul through such a window between time and the past. I mean I have traveled in time before, but not ending up in the physical part of the past, physically. Yes, people have sensed my presence, and even seen me, but never could I alter anything by my physical appearance; it was more like a replay, yet with some eyes staring at me to make it a little more real. And here I am now; can I alter the future because of my physical-ness now? These are crazy thoughts for a man about to go crazy. How could I end up in this depressed stage of some big play, what I call demoralizing situation. It may well be I can learn from this, but who would I tell? And how? So am I walking around on an empty page in a book, or one that has been written, and I'm about to alter it? Five Years Later Five years have now passed and I find my self still among the population of London. How hideous can it get? I gave up trying to figure it out I need someone to tell me. Figure out what, I end up asking myself, and it is always: out of this dilemma. I see the Industrial Revolution coming, the one I read about in College. Oh, times are not as bad as they were five-years ago, I mean I've had many jobs, too many, but people keep asking me to work, and I seem to bump into them accidentally just in the nick of time; before I starve to death. I've taught at the university, I've been a street sweeper. I've worked in a wheel factory for bicycles, I mean they got so many bicycles here and horses, they are uncountable. I'm surprised the harmful bacteria have not crippled me. I sense I am being used, watched, sometimes, strangely so; by whom, my guess is a third party, an alien of some kind. But what is my purpose I ask myself, and I never can come up with a complete answer. It's taken me five years to figure I've stepped into this some how, like a projectile that is launched and you end up on the other side, so many neurotic possibilities. The Voice "It is not all that complicated Mr. Snaitram. You are part of a writers dreaming; just not yours. Writers need to dream in order to write. And as you lived, we gravitated toward you to open doors for other writers. It's all quite simply (Mr. Snaitram is looking around wondering where the voice is coming from, for he is standing by the Tames now, looking into the water from a railing; he sees a picture of a man with a little hole for a mouth, a weird looking creature in the reflection of the water). It is all done from a spaceship you see. You are what dreams are made of, dreams intervened by us that is for writers, and designed to help them develop what we need written on earth; so we provide the characters as you act it out, and we transmit that play in symbols to our customers, or clients, or even better out Ginny pigs. But we need a reflection, and a place, a machine, which is you. Gravity is stronger on Earth, and so we need someone like you on earth to transmit our dreams through, and you are the devise, in the bubble you could say. Your willingness to draw the blue lights back into your eyes without blinking helped us swiftly pull you through a porthole. No one will miss you. And if they do it is only for a while; as they say, life goes on. And you become a poster for the "Missing." |
