CALEB

    CALEB


Caleb sat on the bench.  Every now and again he got what he thought of as one of his old style, magnificent thoughts. Of course he couldn't know if these thoughts were anything like his old thoughts.  He hadn't had success in using any of these concepts in what seemed like years.  He couldn't remember.  Maybe it had been years.  He could still remember, sometimes, taking one concept and molding it over, or intertwining it with another.  Synthesis of new pieces of reality had been his specialty.  He remembered changing and molding his reality and the reality of others.  Maybe that was delusion.  Delusion that had been drifting for years toward dementia. He knew his dementia was his own fault.  Not just a mechanical fault in his brain, but a moral fault burning its way deep into his soul.  Guilt had always been a companion.  Caleb took on the guilt of all, never understanding that this was the occupation of deity.  Shortly before we approached him, sitting on his regular bench in the park, trying to identify the birds, counting the box-elder bugs on the box-elder tree, he had been concentrating.  He was investigating the concepts of guilt and absolution.  Trying to relate them in a perfect way, to create an epiphany.  He has been hoping to forgive himself.  Now those thoughts are long gone.  Caleb groaned to his feet.  It was time to try to find his way home.