These days I have been thinking about life quite a bit. Perhaps this comes from the uneasiness and amplified uncertainty that came as another quite deadly consequence of COVID-19. I’ve been thinking about this feeling that churns my stomach. The world seemingly bizarre than it was ever before. Somehow, life seems to be more present- in time, and time moving excruciatingly slow. I feel like the passenger in a car that broke hard in the middle of an expressway. My chest pressed against something heavy while my arms, my head and even my limbs losing every sense of position. Like those sudden harsh brakes while riding a metro which send you flying from one end of the coach to another, or toppling over someone else standing in front of you. And in that brief moment of adrenaline rush which almost stops time- I feel suspended in that present.
Life’s always been there in the future. A destination that we are always told would finally give us a breather. The one job that would pay all our bills and give us happiness, or that fame which would finally bring us friends. Life is happening, each day, every moment, but not in my present. This present me is always made to look up to that future me, who’s finally happy- finally living the time of his life. Who’s finally gotten a breather. Now that the entire façade has come crashing down due to the sudden halt in this race for ‘The Life’, the future me seems fuzzy. In an abrupt moment, time seems to have slowed down, stretched to a full stop.
All control seems to be lost and what had been a chase all along finally begins to unfold. I slowly find my breaths in these pine woods, and green grass, where life takes a breather. I believe this is the cause of my uneasiness. My lack of control over future that I was made to chase. Perhaps the uncertainty of these times derives from the dawning of a big lie- the veil finally lifting.