Stories we will never tell - The Flashback

On the bus ride home, he saw a girl wearing a Harry Potter T-shirt. On telly, he saw a guy baking cup cakes. They triggered memories in him. And everywhere he went, there were small things and instances that reminded him of another place and time, where he yearns to be, where he had found happiness.

The goodbye was incomplete. And the memory of the last time they met was clearer to him than reality. Her head was on his chest, listening to his slow, synchronised heartbeats. They didn't speak, he knew, until she asked him what he was thinking.

He kept reflecting, reminiscing and repeating the scene - again and again. He wondered sometimes if it was even real. Jamais vu.

But that feeling in his head was understandable. He was intoxicated now just as he was then. Then by happiness. Now by alcohol.

eigengrau - the darkness within

eigengrau noun 1.German for "intrinsic grey" 2.the colour seen by the eye in perfect darkness

blind adjective 1.unable to see 2.lacking perception, awareness, or judgement

It was ironic that I revealed my true self in a pitch black room. In that moment of blindness I surrendered myself - I was open, bare and unguarded and I let her plunge deep inside my thoughts, hold me tight and purge me of my fears.

You always need a light to guide you, to help you on your path to finding your purpose and make you a better person than you are. And in that unlit space I found my guiding light. In that darkness I saw what I hadn't all my life - I could perceive myself, feel more personally aware of who I am or was.

They say that it is safer and easier to surrender yourself to a stranger, but she wasn't one - or maybe she was for one last time in the darkness that engulfed us. And in that hour of blindness, she was my light at the end of tunnel and has led me to realize what would complete me and illuminate my world.

"We can easily forgive a child who is afraid of the dark; the real tragedy of life is when men are afraid of the light."

- Plato

Camera Obscura

It's Latin for "dark chamber" *click* I have a photograph from a long time ago - moments in time which are now lost and all what remains is the memory of it, preserved through this photograph. And as we develop the negative, bit by bit - the memory returns not in the mind but on photo paper. A reproduction of moments, a replica of time itself and it allows us to journey back to that time. A voyage through a dark chamber which leads us to touch, feel and sense a moment which has dissolved into the vast expanses of the past. A medium for us mortals to feel immortal. A channel that provides us glimpses of anachronistic joys and bygone sorrows. So it is of no wonder that the 21st century's greatest addiction is not money, not gold but photographs. Our prized possessions are memories, recollections and reminiscences; and this compulsion and craving from being frozen in time probably stems from our subconscious telling us that we are mortal beings - ephemeral, transitory, and brief. We know that we along with our memories are not safe and will ultimately slip away and be lost to the vast expanses of emptiness. We are obsessed with clinging onto our memories like a treasure. We have understood that life is a beautiful adventure and that we as humans can cherish and enjoy this odyssey, all the while leaving trails of small breadcrumbs for posterity. And all that it takes to attain such permanence is just a *click*! "Photography takes an instant out of time, altering life by holding it still."

- Dorothea Lange