Tuesday October 25, 2005

I was just a kid back then. I always had a smile on my face. Nothing seemed to be terrible bad. I remember when I walked into my room and first discovered the door. I know what you’re thinking, it’s silly for a boy to have an infatuation with a door, but that’s what happened. Twenty steps away from the main door and twelve steps away from the window, that’s were the incredible door opened for the first time. Counting the steps was my way of remembering because that was how pirates remembered where they buried their treasure; I guess the door was my incalculable treasure.

My mother would hear songs about how strange people are and my dad would read books about a man with a weird last name, something with an h and an x. I never questioned my parents, because that was just the right thing to do at the time. I also had no choice in the matter. I could ask and question all I wanted but I would never get an honest answer. Somehow it would always end with an answer like: “Because I say so.” That was it. The definite end of my discussion and what I later in my life referred as a way my parents politely said fuck you. So, that’s why they never found out about the door from me. I wasn’t going to tell them but they were going to find out anyway.

I was sitting on my desk when it first opened. A door slowly appeared in the only bare wall in my room. It almost seemed like I planned it all. After that, twenty-one days had passed. I was on the other side of the door for twenty-one regular days. Then out of nowhere I appeared it was December 21. The story doesn’t seem so fantastic when I only tell you what happened when the door was closed.

The door opens.

And nothing is the same.

I painted a rose on the wall; I played with fish on the bluegrass; and I was in all the continents at once. The light was dark blue and it smelled like chocolate from a Swiss confectioner. Twenty different creatures walked inside my room and twelve little monkeys talked to each other on cell phones. A tall tanned man descended from tall narrow steps that protruded from the door. He gathered everyone around me and the monkeys were ready to speak. They left their cell phone conversations behind and talked for a minute to each other like football players before a play. The creatures gathered behind the tall man and waited for the monkeys to address me.

And so they did.

“Four of us want you to take your bed with you,” said one of them very eloquently, “the rest of us just want to stay here while you take the tour.”

“I didn’t sign up for a tour like this,” I thought to myself but they heard it like if I said it out loud.

“Look, we have nothing against you but we are very tired,” they all said in concert, “our friend here Bob will show you around, make sure you drink water and don’t ask for the time.”

I was never really sleeping when it happened. It all seemed strange and surreal. Sometimes it all seemed random. The tall man didn’t say a single world. He was half naked and made me a bit uncomfortable. I think he noticed and grabbed a suit from a falling tree. I’m not sure if it was a tree falling but that’s what it seemed to me. There rest looked very white. The sky was white, the horizon was white, but the steps were an old grayish color. The steps ended up in a path and a path ended up in a street and the street ended up in a sea of what seemed to be dark chocolate. The creatures all followed me, and some looked like they’ve never seen a kid.

“Hello my name is Neuchatel, and I have absolutely nothing to tell you other than this,” said a man dressed up like Napoleon sailing on a paper boat with a Swiss flag on top. The tall tanned man submerged in the chocolate sea and Neuchatel sailed into the distance, leaving me completely alone with an assortment of strange looking creatures. They were all very curious of me, and I thought that was strange, so I dove into the chocolate to follow the men. They were all strange men but better to follow men that stay with indescribable curious creatures.

The chocolate was thick and it was delicious but not very deep. Something else was underneath and I was led into another set of steps. Bob was quickly going down the steps and I followed suit. Now the sky was made of chocolate and the bottom was something else, now that I think about it, the ground looked like the sky. It was all so weird.

I turned around and there they were. The little creature had now followed me down the steps. I didn’t want to be rude but I looked back at them defiantly. They all stopped and stared very scared. They were all cute in their own way, but it was all just too creepy. So I decided it was best to ignore the whole pack of little beasts. When I turned around to look for Bob he was right in front of me, staring. He gave me a note and walked back up, passed the creepy herd and disappeared in the chocolate. I read the not and a woman was drawn on a letter with a pink and green letterhead. I stare at it wondering what it meant.

“You know it’s not polite to stare,” said the woman in the paper. “Now, how about you keep going down the stairs and we’ll see what we can do.” I looked at her with what I think was a confused face. She didn’t care and before I could reply she moved herself from the paper to a bag. There it was, a woman in a bag, and the bag was dancing in the air like in American movies. She wasn’t too fond of the bag so she moved from there to the steps and walked. It didn’t matter to her that she was a drawing; somehow she managed to walk without a body. I followed her and the creatures followed me. The steps lead to a path and the path lead to an old red brick street. She didn’t like the red bricks; she complained it made her look sick. So she moved to a wall on the outer side that was white and blue. She pointed upwards and there it was, a giant TV with static on. Somehow of all the things I had seen this one seemed to be the least interesting to me. There was a door somewhere in the wall and a girl my age ran up to me and yelled: “Do you want to play a game!”

The door opened and light emitted from it. I entered the door and I was in ten different places at the same time. I knew I was in India, I knew I was in France, I knew I was in Canada, I knew I was in Chile, I knew I was in Vietnam, I knew I was in Tasmania, I knew I was in Cape Verde, I knew I was in Puerto Rico, I knew I was Syria and I knew I was in Ukraine, on the night of December 20th at the same respective times.