My present bout of melancholic introspection was forged in the embers of a fitful night of delirium-inducing toothache, which seeded excruciating pain through the entire left side of my body. All of a sudden I found myself twenty-five years back in time, a fresh-faced undergraduate entering a peculiar world. All night long, I found myself inhabiting my youthful body, as if I were Sam Beckett quantum leaping backwards. Perhaps the excruciating pain that night stirred subconscious memories of a pain derived from a suddenly maniacal lifestyle lasting a few short months. Perhaps it was just my sleepless restlessness. Either way, I found myself interrogating myself for my stupidity back then.
Since that night, I have been in reflective mode. Where on earth have the past two decades gone? Disappeared into the ether. I can’t account for the passing years really. A dress rehearsal for the day to come, when it shall seem as if I tarried on the earth for a matter of hours at most. A small mercy, perhaps, that at night I jumped back in time and not forward to the very end. Have I been living my whole life in delirium?
Last modified: 10 February 2021
