Dreamer's Depot

    I've had the same vivid dream for three nights now. I enter a train station, but I'm not myself, I'm something else - a creature of no definable species but who is obviously female. My memories and experiences of the world are completely different and I know different people, but when I wake up, I barely remember any of it even though the feelings are so vibrant in my mind.
    Whenever I enter the train station, I check the route map - I can read it in the dream, but do not remember the significance of the marks on it when I wake up, only vague pictures of its design. The most vivid dream had me taking the B route, which was blue. I don't remember where it led, but in a daydream later, as I was working on a homework assignment, I saw her drawing on parchment. She was drawing a map, consulting a flying creature. I surmised in this other world that I draw maps, but I do not know what for.

    I remember faces of things I talked to. Some recognizable as creatures of our world, or similar things, and others were strange or I do not remember their details clearly enough. All of this seemed everyday to me, but at the same time, brighter, dreamier, as if that world was more positive. Or maybe, I am more positive in that world. I remember being willing to help someone locate something. It was yellow, but I do not remember what it was.

    The route map is never the same, each time I've viewed it, it has changed significantly. Each time I board the train, the scenery is different outside. And one time, it wasn't a train, it was a plane that took me into space and dropped me off on a metallic floating island. I remember boarding the train again and finding shady characters in the first car, but I do not know if they had malintent. I didn't seem to think so at the time.

    I have no idea if I will have these dreams again, but I hope so. They are so vivid and I like being that person in that world that has such different vibes from my own. The different experience adds a spice of variety to my life.

    I feel something that I haven't felt in ages. I don't know what it is, but it feels like my heart soaring and my mind liberating, like my soul is pushing against my chest, demanding freedom, but at the same time like I am more animated and alive, and like I have something, something extremely important that gives me purpose and knowledge and good feelings, something that fills a void that has existed in my soul for literally years, something vital that I have grasped and can hold onto with all my strength, and which in turn gives me strength. I not only feel alive, but I feel like I want to live, to press on, like there is a purpose for pressing on, even though I have no idea what I'm pressing forward into, I feel like I need to.

    All because of a dream, I must sound insane.

    Or maybe it isn't a dream, maybe I am experiencing something real. It feels real, or at least, it feels like it holds substance. Maybe I have substance, a deep part of myself that fills how empty I have become. I sometimes feel like a husk filled with many things, and then having all of those things poured out of me when my views began to change, and now I feel like something is inside me, giving me weight and making me more than an empty vessel.

    I know something certain, more certain than I have been in a long time: I want to return to the Dreamer's Depot tonight and board that train to wherever it will take me.

Human Evils

I am a hell of a person to pass judgement on others.

    Sometimes I think I might be the embodiment of every biblical sin in history, as well as a few from orthodoxies I am unfamiliar with, but I'm starting to believe that being a devil means having a unique and intimate understanding of human evils. They are things that we all want to avoid o conquer within ourselves, and from what I observe of the human soul, that means that evil is necessary for good to exist.
    We fear evil, and there is nothing more frightening than the darkness that grows inside ourselves because it has more power over us than any other force in the world. It causes us to do things we regret later and it makes us question every major action in our lives. It is fear, doubt, hate, anguish, envy, anger, paranoia, and insanity. It is the demon that lives inside all of us and we all struggle daily to not be consumed by it.

But it is still a part of us that helps us grow. We need it inside of us.

    The monster rears its ugly head and it's our responsibility to combat it, avoid it, and survive. But that struggle cannot be won. We can weaken the beast, but not destroy it - it will always live inside of us and wait.
    At the same time, it reminds us of our virtues. It is a black knight that stands before the gate to hell and makes us face that gate when we are at our lowest point, and it reminds us that we can cross that gate or fight for the good inside of us. It points out our flaws, the cracks in our defenses, and it makes us stop and consider our actions. In our constant sparring match with evil, it drives us to improve and take action, and looking it in the eye makes the monster tremble and the knight return the glare, daring us to look away but inviting us to examine how evil we really are.

But what if we were also the black knight? Would we face a white knight?

    Mankind is naive, we blame many sins committed by others on the evil in their heart, but what about the good? The road to hell is paved with good intentions, and the battle between our light and dark sides is fought on a different battlefield for each person - only we can judge the good and evil inside ourselves, and the answer will always be personal - rarely will it be fully identical to another person's morality. What one person views as taking a life, another might view as saving one. What one human sees as pointless murder, another might consider it a grizzly means to an end. Our subjectivity is our greatest strength, but also our greatest flaw, and when we believe we are doing the objective good, who's to say we aren't the greater evil?

    The black knight is a skeptic, it undermines our actions and makes us doubt, but doubt is not always a bad thing. Observe as it sizes up the white knight, questioning its stalwart faith in the greater good and making it re-examine its concept of good. Even the courageous white knight must struggle with the black, because true courage is facing fear, and that also means facing doubt, acknowledging that it exists in your heart, and considering what it is telling you about your world. You are the black knight, you are the one doubting yourself, you are also the one who must listen to yourself.

As you must also listen to your fear, your anger, your madness.

    They are parts of your soul and they exist for a reason. In a room filled with light and song where the sun streams through the broad windows, the light loses its meaning and appears gray. The same applies in a room full of darkness, devoid of sound or feeling. It can numb us and take away our humanity, we lose our concept of light and dark with either scenario, but even the smallest candle burns brighter in the dark, holding that flame and nursing it to be strong and give meaning to the darkness as well as the light it gives off is what it means to possess a human heart.

The human soul is divided by two opposing forces, though those forces might change over time, the scale is always shifting, never still. Discontent is our constant companion, without it we would not move forward, we need our human evils to remind us of that, as well as our human good.

End

    I've been thinking about this for a long time now, maybe 2 or 3 years, but have never really given thought to acting on it before, and I wouldn't be sure how to act on this thought, but I can no longer ignore it.

I'm tired.

    I have done nothing with my life since I graduated, at first I had so many things I was going to do, but I never did them. I also had so many issues I was struggling with, and finally dealt with the really severe ones, but after that? I had no idea, I still don't.

    I have tried many different things thinking they were my dream, like making video games, writing stories, learning to animate, even getting a mundane job for a while and going to college, but as I continued to struggle with inner demons and look for what it was that lit a fire in my heart, I came closer to the true answer - and now it's time to stop burying it in excuses.

I want nothing, I want to do nothing, and there is nothing left for me.

    I'm not saying this because I'm depressed, I'm not writing this in a dark room while tears stream from my face and despair engulfs my soul. I wish I were, at least I would feel something besides this fatigue and anhedonia that has been eating me for years.

    I struggled with my purpose, with my strengths, with the world around me and its design, and my philosophies. I wanted to draw because it gave me purpose, it brought my ideas to life, but I no longer need to do that, it no longer satisfies me or gives me purpose. Nothing gives me purpose or makes me feel accomplished, and I have tried hard to consider the logical advancements I've made, but they don't matter.

And I feel old.

    I feel like I've toughed the universe and the human soul, albeit in a very small way, but I feel like I've gotten the answer, that answer people struggle all their lives for that isn't really an answer but the key to their contentment as they pass on into the next world and leave ours, the thing that makes their life worthwhile and makes them feel like they've contributed all they can. That's how I feel every day, but I've barely lived a third of my expected lifespan, ye t I feel ready to die.

    I don't want to kill myself, that would not be a proper end, that would be forced and I'd leave before my time, but I feel my time coming, and every day I feel like I'm wasting away more and more and it might be time to accept it and lay in bed waiting for it.

    The fuel that fires my soul has burned out and the passion of youth has left me, I feel like having a will to live at this point is irrelevant in the same way someone in a nursing home might feel their desire to live is irrelevant. I might want something more, my heart might reach out for new pursuits, but it feels meaningless and hollow like the pottery you make in an old age home - no value, no contribution, just a thing to pass the time before you die.

 I am lost in a void of gray and all passion and misery pass by quickly.

    I miss being able to let misery simmer and anger boil but now I let go so easily, it slips out of a grip that is too tired to hold it anymore. The only thing that makes me feel the way I used to is when I'm dreaming.

I wonder if we dream in death.

My insanity is how I cling to my life, maybe it's time to become sane.