Day 317 - Shimmer

 Shimmer

Matthew Ryan Fischer

 

When George was young, he didn’t know what he was looking at. He saw what looked like a glowing shadow encircle a man on the street and then suddenly enter his mouth and nostrils and disappear down the man’s throat. He didn’t know what he was looking at. He was a child and the man didn’t seem to react, so George thought little of it, and convinced himself he had imagined the whole event. He soon discovered he had misjudged the situation.

A one-time occurrence could have been blamed on a trick of the light, or an overactive imagination or a dream creeping into waking hours. A second occurrence might make some question their reality or sanity. George took it as something strange and rare. Perhaps wonderful. Certainly special. A gift. Then he began to see more and more.

Energy of some sort, or a distortion of light. Or perhaps he could see someone’s aura. Afraid of how others might judge or treat him, George was cautious in the way he asked questions or what he revealed to others. He was curious if he was sick or had a tumor or cancer of some sort. He also spent a fair amount of time in and out of therapy. But he never wanted anyone to think he was crazy. So, he studied on his own and researched what he could to try and find possible medical explanations.

If it was medical, he survived a great many years with it. If it was mental, he had learned to live with it. If it was a message or a spiritual epiphany of some sort, he didn’t know what it might mean. George didn’t think he was a prophet or a messenger, but he sought some spiritual guidance just to be sure.

There seemed to be an infinity of colors, but broadly speaking, George saw them as mostly shades of light or dark. He didn’t know what they meant or why some people had one or the other or a mix of both. He couldn’t understand how or why they seemed to live around people, usually surrounding them in some shape or another, but then on rare occasions they invaded the person’s body. What the energy did to them or inside them was unclear.

Eventually he had the thought that he likely had such energy around him as well. If he did, he couldn’t see it. It wasn’t in front of him, and nothing appeared when he looked in mirrors. But every time he had a sudden change of thought or emotion, he wondered if something else was swirling around influencing him. He needed to find another like him, one who could see the energies and see what existed around him. But it wasn’t like he could take an ad out or anything. The would be crazy.

George remained suspicious. There were shadows everywhere and it seemed as if the rest of mankind had little clue as to this facet of existence. There was something there, existing, just out of the normal range of perception. He doubted he was the only one who could see it, but feared any others might be locked up by now. Or worse, what if some how these shimmering things realized and understood who could and couldn’t see them and had eliminated any others. But if so, then why was he spared? Why was he allowed to live on, painfully aware of this greater truth? What did they want from him? How could he ever know?

George stayed at home more and more often, afraid of his fellow man. He didn’t want to see them. He didn’t want to draw attention to himself. The shimmers were everywhere, but it seemed safer to stay hidden, stay alone, careful never to say or do the wrong thing. Solitude and silence with the lights turned down low.