Agoraphobian Memory Of A Man Named Sheldon

Part One

        Sheldon... The echo of his voice in his mind, saying his own name did nothing to motivate him from his own make-shift cocoon of a thousand thread-count comforter, mummified save for his face, looking like one of those glow-worm toys children squeeze to light and sleep with nightly. In fetal position, clutching the soft blue colored sheets under his chin, Sheldon looked as if a butterfly unable to escape that sinewy metamorphosing barrier of silk which housed it, locked in a comfort that was both prison and home, an irony in limbo of his own making.         

        The sunlight from outside seemed insistent on piercing between the blinds, adding a dim illumined view of the catastrophe that was his bedroom, clutter of unwashed, soiled underwear, shirts, and socks; as well as wrappings of snack foods and soda cans. By the position of the light streaming in, it appeared to be late morning at around 10:30 or 11:00 A.M., which was passed the time from which the evening critters that partook of Sheldon's disarray had returned to their hiding place. Keeping what was left of the disaster relief provided to the army trail of ants. Sheldon, at least, felt a little better that he could donate his scraps or crumbs to a social gathering of philanthropic creatures.         

        He yearned to be with people. Wept even many times for conversation or stimulus from this lonely hell of agoraphobic dementia.         

         In his usual lingering and self argumentative reasoning to get up and go to the toilet or grab a quick surplus of rations from the kitchen, always would lag to the lunch hour. Today, instead of conversing with his failure and self-hatred, Sheldon attempted a different approach which a neighbor who had studied psychology had suggested.        

        

        "Instead of trying to win an argument with your own mind, go to your happy place," she barely came around, saying that his apartment wreaked.         

         So Sheldon, in his odorous cocoon, began trying to imagine what it was like in California at his brother's beach house, in the summer of '87 before the world dealt him a smack in his psyche, dropping the tsunami fear of the outside on his lap. Even imagining what the sky and ocean looked like was difficult enough in itself, while his eyelids quivered to keep other intrusive thoughts that scared him from his recollecting happier days there, he actually felt a slight tingling sensation run across his skin like goose-pimples after a kiss. Sounds and scent of that time, in this new found way of sensing a memory, began to emerge and his eyelids softened from its quivering. Complete to this recalling of a time he thought forever lost, he truly felt as though his mind had transported there, when he had held his life with the ease of a seagull in flight. Sheldon's usual panic was forgotten if only for whatever blessed moments he was allowed to do this.                  

 

          The water from the sea, lapping the beach and crashing with larger waves, had never looked so blue--as if this was the first time he noticed the color before. The sand felt warm, as did the sunlight, and an occasional breeze cooling his face and neck to relieve the moisture beaded on his skin. All sensations from head to toe, from taste to sounds of endless seashell songs in his ear, felt so wonderful that it made him begin to actually cry.         

        "Why haven't I noticed it like this before?" he asked himself in his mind, as he strolled along the edge of the encroaching tide of the beach toward his older brother's home, which he glimpsed in the distance like a mirage from memory's open vault. He smiled, letting the tears dry without wiping them away, aware that he liked the way it felt when the wind passed to dry them. "How dense I must of been, so damn blind..."         

 

        Sheldon did want to hurry, knowing that this remembrance was of Independence Day, knowing later he would be hard pressed to confront the reality of that time. But everything was so effervescent, crisp, and worth every curious investigation - a closer look to make this moment all the more memorable than before. He felt a giggle escape him, as if suddenly a child again with the ability to enjoy and love life.

Author's Note

Had no stories in my collection here, so just decided to whip one out.