Excerpt: The Crazy Inside

“When I was younger I used to wonder if my life were just a dream. If one day I would wake up and find I was still just a baby lying in a playpen at my grandmother’s house. Do people really have thoughts like this or is it just me? Not that I wish neuroses on others. Yet it would be nice to know I wasn’t the only one with these randomly odd thoughts.”

“I don’t know about thinking your life is a dream, but why would you think you were the only one with odd thoughts? What about all of the people seeing therapists?”

“Yeah, but do ‘normal’ people have these kinds of thoughts? I mean, do people look at themselves in a mirror and see the edges of a mask even when there is no mask? Does that make me crazy? Or maybe that is too vague. Does that make me a little crazy or a lot crazy? Or is it somewhere in the middle? Or maybe not at all.”

“I’m not sure I would go around telling people these things.”

“So, you think it’s weird.”

“Yeah, but I think you’re fairly normal. You’re friends with me, after all.”

I shake my head. Maybe he’s right. I can’t be the only one having strange thoughts. It’s not as if everyone knows I’m having them. And just because I don’t know they’re having them doesn’t mean they aren’t, right? I needed to stop worrying about all of this and get back to work. It’s not like I’m paid to have really deep thoughts. Maybe that is what I am missing. I need a job that allows me to have really deep thoughts. Pondering the questions of the universe. What is the meaning of life? What is my purpose? Or yours? How does Snuggle get my clothes feeling oh so soft? Hey, inquiring minds want to know.