11.28.1999

The Second Vision

Bri had already left for school and I was running about trying to gather all of my things in time to catch the bus. As I was closing the door to the apartment, the click of the lock catching to wish me goodbye, I had a sudden premonition that if I turned around and rang the doorbell then I would be inside the answer the door and let myself back in. Ridiculous as it seems, at that moment in time I believed it whole-heartedly, and so I faced my door and rang the bell.

And waited.

And during the wait all sorts of thoughts crept through my head— What does it mean if I do answer the door? Will there then be two of me with the same ambitions, capable of completing double the amount of work in the same quantity of time? Can one of me lead another life completely, separate from the ambition of the one I'm currently living? Would our lives be interchangeable: each of us waking up from time to time wherever the other one laid his head down— unaware of where we are and what brought us there?

I fully believed that I would answer the door and let myself in. But after five minutes it hadn't happened and so I shrugged the thought off and went to catch the bus.

All of this and I was entirely awake.