And It Turns Out...

         Just so you know, it wasn't a dream. All the illusions of grandeur came from a part of our minds that was very awake. We thought we had the solution to everything. World hunger. War. Economic breakdown. We thought we knew everything. The meaning of life. The human mind. We thought we were special.

Turns out, we were all just really, really fucked up.

         The thing you don't realize on drugs is how these revelations are only as good for however long you remember them. Hours later, coming down from the high, we'd argue over which key was to the front door. So much for the great masters of knowledge.

         We were cool. Surrounded in a haze of smoke, sitting on a broken couch watching Dave Chappelle, we thought we were the envy of the outside world. How they might view us with disdain, but underneath there was jealousy. We thought people wanted our laid back attitudes, our superior understanding, and our ability to not give a crap. With the plastic click of poker chips and the words "check or bet" for our sound effects, our lives were the dream each person wanted. Everyone outside of that room, with its walls of chipped blue paint and stained woodwork, well, they were missing out. They might condemn us for our habits, but we all 'knew' that they wanted in.

         After I quit, I thought 'they' were stupid. Wasting away their lives and fwhat little money they made on various narcotics. Being on the outside, watching a window fan blow a thick fog out of the room, I scoffed at the stupidity. Fromt he room you could here laughter; the sound of a snowboarding videogame yelling "That was EXTREME" at the end of each level. I felt pity. How pathetic that life had been. The outside had taught me. In a South Park kind of monotony, "Drugs are bad, m'kay?" We were definately no longer we. It was them and me. They couldn't believe I'd crossed over, accusing my boyfriend of brainwashing. Accusing me of dumping them for a boy, for other friends, and for my family. And there...right in front of me, lay my own sort of revelation. Friends who need you to be on drugs are perhaps not the friends you need.

It turns out, when all your so called best friends abandon you, it might be time to start smoking cigarettes.

         So here I was, abandoned, with only a few things that I tried to hold on to. Fast attaching to the boyfriend who convinced me to try quitting. Trying frantically to patch up the broken pieces of old friendships and family ties. And slowly, building my life back up, when I realized...

That it turns out, maybe living in the dream wasn't stupid after all.

         Here, on the outide, everyone hates. People treat one another like crap. There's backstabbing and betrayl. Cold, heartless people waiting to work you over. Individuals are nothing more than the newest conformists. Here on the outside, everyone talks of the perfect world. A place where one is carefree, one sits and chats with friends, laughs and plays. A simple life where coexistence is peaceful and there's no need for the humans to treat one another like dirt. All the people here on the outside, well, they might not know it, but they're looking in. Standing in a foot of snow with their nose pressed against a frosty window, they can imagine the world but not touch it.

         That little blue room, with its hazy air and poker talk, it's inhabitants thinking they understood the world? Those fools who believed they knew what the dream of humanity was?

Well, as it turns out, we were right.