Billboardology - Part 2

Posted on April 3, 2008
Filed Under Fake Culture, Society |

Alice felt like she was in a new world; the scales of illusion had been removed from her eyes - nothing was as it had once seemed. She had been born and raised in The Community, it was all she had known for the 22 years of her life. In her eighteenth year the place had finally begun to feel oppressive. From an early age she had never felt as though she belonged there. The Community just didn’t make any sense to her - in the minds of the residents it represented Freedom, yet for the life her she couldn’t understand their concept of the word. Surely Freedom didn’t mean confinement, she had been certain of that and now, out here on the Road she knew it for fact. She thought for a while about that new guy, in her mind she could hear Ol’ Bullsy’s words to him - he said the same thing to every new arrival; ‘Cars are the antithesis of Freedom. They make the world smaller; cars present choices and choices invite doubt.’ Doubt, the destroyer of Freedom - this was the first lesson they were taught. The Community placed great emphasis on the dangers of Doubt.

Yet deep down she knew Ol’ Bullsy’s words were full of circular reasoning. They didn’t mean anything, it was simply an idea which fed itself. And thus that idea fed The Community. But no longer was it a food she would have to eat, not out here on the Road. The sky had turned a golden orange as the sun approached the horizon, she loved the Desert - to her people The Community was home, but to her - in the deepest and truest sense she felt the only home she would ever want was the Desert.

For weeks she had wondered if she would feel any Doubt after leaving. Most people believed the patriotist way; ‘For and of The Community’ it was etched deeply into them…but she didn’t feel anything but exhilaration, and now she new for certain that she was indeed different. There had been no hard feelings about her leaving - people like Alice sooner or later became known as Sowers of Doubt. They raised questions about the way of life in The Community - most people didn’t like that. So whenever a new arrival came - if they brought a car, then one person from The Community was allowed to leave if they so desired. It was seen as a suitable trade-off, removing both the Sower of Doubt and the car (the antithesis of freedom no less).

Now out here on the road a question began to emerge in her mind. Questions were a rare thing to her people, and even though she was ‘different’, the sensation was still more than a little odd. As it formed in her mind, the subtle shades of Doubt began to appear. She was out here on the Road, but what now? Where was she going to go? She had thought about nothing other than leaving, and therefore she hadn’t had a destination in mind. Within the minds The Community nothing other than the Desert existed…and she obviously couldn’t keep driving forever.

Now the sky turned to a dusky blue, then descended into the sudden darkness of the Desert. Here it was truly dark. The darkness began to eat at her mind, like thousands of little beings sowing doubt in every corner. Where would she go? Should she go back? She had been taught all her life that Doubt was the destroyer of Freedom, and now out here she was alone in the Darkness (for it was indeed - to her - the Deep Darkness). How could she have been so stupid? Everyone knew that the Road was dangerous, that it was vast, unknowable and empty. The Community may have been enclosed, but at least it had been safe.

Should she turn back?

She hadn’t heard of people returning from the Deep Darkness, but that didn’t tell her anything. Perhaps they got lost, maybe they simply disappeared. Right now - in this complete blackness nothing seemed real and everything seemed possible. Somewhere in her mind a spark of logic temporarily illuminated her thoughts, prompting her to switch on the car’s headlights. The lights brought a measure of balance to her sense, they only lit the road ahead for a few yards - but in this small action it was as though she had found herself again. But the doubt remained, feeding the fear which continued to grow within her chest. She had no idea where she was, she didn’t know her bearings and she didn’t know where she was going. She realized then that the Deep Darkness was an unreality! Yet it was the only reality. She managed to express this realization into a thought; I am on the Road, but I cannot see the road - within this Darkness maybe the road doesn’t even exist. Yet I know I am here, but how do I know I am here when i have nothing to measure myself against? She wondered if these were the first utterings of madness.

Somehow, she manged to keep the car going. The headlights gave her just enough light to show her the next step, and so she continued onwards taking one single step at a time - because that was all she could see. Her world had become timeless, the road passed underneath the lights but nothing gave any indication of movement. Sure she could feel the forward motion of the car - but all other senses were blinded. She now Doubted if the cars motion even was real. What is this car anyway - other than a container to move me around in? She wondered what would happen to her out here on the road if she didn’t have the car. Without the car, its lights and sense of motion she would be in complete darkness - maybe she would even disappear! Alice was surrounded by such thoughts, and they were myths built on her complete dependence upon her senses. No one had ever taught her about this in The Community - hell they probably didn’t even know.

Her mind flowed like liquid back to her Community life. There life had been full of structure, and the structure was built upon reason and knowing. It was a knowledge which acted as a foundation for her life, for her beliefs. Within the community that foundation was so strong that there was no room for doubts. She understood now the Community’s resistance to questions, she understood their fear of Doubt. Doubt created cracks within that all important foundation, without the foundation life would crumble. Life needed structure didn’t it? Structure gave meaning and identity.

Identity…that word struck her like a hammer blow. Right now - here in this car, in the complete absence of her senses - almost floating within this complete darkness, that was her identity. She could not measure it, because there was nothing to measure it with. She could not see it, and could not even give a label or a word to it. But she could feel it - it was a sense beyond her normal understanding of senses, it existed here and now within that timeless moment. It was her. At that moment light began to scribe across sky on the eastern horizon. She had been driving all night - she wondered at herself, thinking she must have spent the night in a half-slumber half-dream state. Yet she couldn’t shake the feeling that something immeasurably important had occurred.

It was a difficult experience to fathom, obviously she couldn’t have been fully asleep or else she couldn’t have carried on driving. But that sense of unreality had felt so real. Her education from The Community came to her then, it told of ancient tribes who lived in the Deep Desert. She had learnt of their superstitions and strange beliefs, once a strange man had appeared in The Community when she was very young. He had looked at people as though they were ghosts - she remembered his expression with such clarity. Later after he had been driven off, she had been taught how those tribes couldn’t understand the civilized ways. That even a caravan was something out of his wildest dreams. He had been displaced with no reference from his world and it had confused him. And so she believed that is what must have happened to her in the night. It sort of fit - in fact the more she thought about it, the more reason and logic she found she could give to the idea. Yet - it had seemed so real.

Opening a window, the heat of the morning air dispelled such nagging thoughts. Up ahead she saw a distant shape, as she approached it resolved itself into a great rectangle…it was splashed in mottled blues - large yellow words covered the sign; ‘LIFE IS RELAXATION!’ The manner and way of the Sign reminded her of something - but she couldn’t quite figure what. Pulling off the road, she parked up underneath the Sign and looked out at her new surroundings.