The Only Way Out

“I don’t wanna do it”, these were the first few words that came out of Noah’s mouth when asked whether he was ready to jump over the river. He was ten years old back then, and this simple thought was enough to spread both fear and pleasure all over his body. He remembered as if it had happened yesterday. The biting cold, the earsplitting sound of the wind flowing all around his weak existence; what he felt that day was still haunting his brain. His friend Eddy, long-time gone now, had kept shouting at him, “Noah! You don’t have to do it! C’mon buddy, let’s head back home!” In spite of this very precious advice, he had done it, and had regretted it, for some time. He actually was not to lament forever. Of course, his whole existence would be changed, along with the load of opportunities it carries. Noah’s inner life package was to be highly different from that of his mates, and he would have to muddle through his difference. He was still human, his arms were right there at the right place, his legs well attached to his body, and eventually his head was still thinking and reasoning, just like any other proud member of the human race. But it could not work together, as dependent parts of a single mechanism. His head ordered and his rebelling limbs disobeyed; he was what we, the commons, call a paraplegic. By many, his way through the hard path of life was foreseen as a nightmarish, almost unbearable journey. Noah, himself, had believed it for a few years, digging deep inside his weakened mind to find an escape from the reality of his existence. At first, he was brought back to his harsh truth, and the loving people around his inactive body were making his attempt to dive into the virtual world he was desperately trying to build difficult. Eating, peeing, watching, and listening; these primary functions we all consider as harmless, even necessary, were, to him, the worse activities of the human experience. The most pleasant was of a different kind, intangible, unperceivable, what Aristotle defined as the activity of the soul. Of course, both conceptions differed considerably. Noah was thinking and reasoning the virtual environment he was structuring day after day, trying to make it more and more plausible. Aristotle wanted to explain and understand our world through the soul, whereas Noah was just struggling for his very own world. He had to turn the non-existing into his existing, his reality; for him to stay alive in the real world, he had to break out and reach his second life. His second existence was ideal, although not perfect, and he could travel the world, cry, laugh and comprehend. Sometimes, he was hurt, but it was good and acceptable; it was a non-negotiable constraint for his world to be real. Being hurt is part of our lives, and wishing to reinvent the human experience implies complying with every requirement of the tangible life. Noah succeeded. Noah would manage to find happiness, but no one would ever know. The story of his experiences would never be witnessed, his actions would never be felt and appreciated, and his merits would remain within an invisible and unreachable pantheon. Starting his virtual existence was not easy, even if the real people around him were less and less present as he was becoming less and less aware of their existence; they were still incredibly active in reminding him about the necessity to be fed and washed, which, was considerably complicating the mental process crucial to his virtual escape. Hopefully, the wake up calls were decreasing in quantity and days after days, months after months, years after years, they completely disappeared from Noah’s world. To us, outsiders, he had been put under an artificial feeding tube after falling into a deep and definitive coma, to him, he had just finally made his way into his own environment; he was able to live a life of wonders only appreciable to his self. As the architect of his own world, he had erected his kingdom based on very simple foundations. He had to live virtually the life humans live authentically. He strongly rejected any notion of control and gave a great importance to unexpected encounters; his world ought to be conditional. One might wonder how the human mind could possibly render human choices and dilemmas; no one knows but Noah sure made it realistic in the realm of his virtual world. From then on, mystery surrounded the whereabouts of a mental path, we, terrestrial entities, would have characterized as a physical misery. The only sign the paraplegic was willing to give of his hedonistic experience was a discrete smile he always carried on his mouth, to the greatest surprise of all. His family and other relatives had abandoned the trips into his sanctuary a long time ago, and nobody dared visiting him anymore. His little room had become as empty and dead as his mind was rich and alive. Time went by…

         Noah was ninety-four of age, tangible life, but he had just turned thirty in his very own real world. Actually, he had turned thirty several times before but it did not matter. Why would it? He was happy and fulfilled, and his friends were there to treat him with all kinds of presents. Micky was standing, next to Eddy who was throwing bad jokes at Chrystie, and Samantha was seating on the couch right in front of him. Noah had always liked Samantha, and today was the day he wanted to propose her, and it would work because everything works in Noah’s world… everything. Of course Noah’s physical body was to die soon, but he would not die. He did not even know about the near termination of his life on earth. He would not care anyway; Noah had never lived on earth but on a very far planet on which he could walk, run and have many friends, a planet on which he could marry Samantha and turn thirty several times, a planet on which he would never die. At least, not that he knows.