Following The Bert Through the Labyrinth

From a dream.

(Digital)

I have very warm nostalgic feelings about the two years I spent living in a 300 sq foot box while reading and writing all the time (aka pre-ABD grad school). I’m not sure why, because I’m fairly certain it was extremely stressful on a number of levels, but I did get to just… think all the time. Which I excelled at and enjoyed. If it were the 15th century, I absolutely would’ve been one of those people they walled in at the convent.

Maybe it’s because the pressure was so high that it didn't all fit properly into conscious awareness, and maybe that’s why I dream about it quite a lot. It was so long ago now and actually such a brief experience (in the scheme of a whole life) that its repetition seems odd.

The dreams now usually crumble under the force of my underlying, ever-pervasive concern for the Bert. At which point I find myself in the expanding corridors of new apartments, following along his path and calling his name while he plays, happily oblivious.

If there were ever a cure for the addiction of the glass bead game, it's a stubborn dog who revels in the now.