Down the River of Broken Dreams

Ever trusted someone? Well of course you have because you are a fucking human being (unless you're Spock or a Klingon), and therefore you've trusted someone. And more than likely, eventually that someone betrayed your trust. That's the beauty of betrayal only the people you trust can do it. You gave them your secrets, and they may have returned the favour, but that was then, this is now. Now is there someone out there with your secrets that might no longer be a fan of yours? They know what you like, what you don't like, who you like and who you don't like. Are you concerned you will suddenly see them talking to a person that you expressed your utter disdain for to them? Maybe they are friendly with that person, but more than likely you can sort out if that conversation goes on for too long what the topic will eventually come around to, your secrets. Or maybe you sent that person you trust some stuff (emails, letters, plans to rule the world), and are now concerned that all filters are off in regards to the secrets you gave to them, you know back when you trusted them. No one wants their door kicked in by some version of the Gestapo vaguely waving around some papers (containing your plans to rule the world with your army  of cats) and "saying now we've got you, you bastard!"

There exists a school of thought, and I should know because I belong to it, that the problem you are now facing i.e. the fear that the person you trusted will put your secrets on blast for the world to see, is exactly one person's fault, and that person is you. It is what you get for trusting them in the first place, it is your own fault. If you get hoisted on your own petard, well you should have left the damn thing in its scabbard in the first place.  Sure the more common and widely held belief is that if the other person puts you stuff "out there" it is their fault for being a cunt, and betraying your trust. But remember we are now talking about someone who has already betrayed you to begin with, so what do you expect them to do? You can hope that the human decency you believed they possessed (or you wouldn't have trusted them in the first place) will be enough to keep them from sending you down the river of broken dreams, but are you really that sure of your judgment? After all, you are still trusting them in some odd, dangerous way, and they've just got done betraying you.

That river, the one of broken dreams, is a river of grief, and just like rivers it can come in all types of sizes, shapes, lengths, and depths. It can have a swiftly moving current (if you are lucky), or it can meander, slowly along its way taking you for the longest, most brutal trip of your life. Each river has its own signature, its own DNA, and very rarely are two rivers alike.  Like all rivers, the river of broken dreams doesn't exist in a vacuum, there are "towns" dotted along its course all the way to the end of the line. I mean rivers were the earliest superhighways for all sorts of things to be traded. Wheat, barely, hops, honey, grain, monkeys, etc, etc. They help the free flow of commerce no matter what the trade is, be it dry goods, or secrets. That just what rivers do, and when you get a batch of defective monkeys, or if someone starts trading your secrets along the river, you can't blame the river. It's a river and that's just what rivers do. They just simply exist, it behooves you to try to stay out of the river of broken dreams.

Some people jump into that river, fed up with the circumstances that life has created for them, and probably in denial that they helped create those circumstances themselves. Those people want the deep, swiftly flowing river with all the rapids and rocks involved because they don't plan on coming out of the river. They are not waving, they are drowning, and it is what they want to do. There is no need to follow them into the river in a misguided attempt to save them. They don't want to be saved, and if you try, they will more than likely drown you with them. They will fight you not the river, and it is best just to watch them go, nod your head in the eventual acceptance of their choice, and if possible recover enough of them to bury when the river does what they intended it to do.

Other people are pushed into that river (I would posit this group makes up the majority), and they had no intentions of taking a "swim" in the river of broken dreams, either that day or any other in the near future. But we are humans, not Klingons, and we all live in fairly close proximity to the river of broken dreams. Generally, we know the person who pushed us into the river, and generally it is a grand, unhappy surprise to us. Maybe if we are clever enough, we saw it coming, but eventually the river claims us all. The "surprise" guests of the river aren't here to drown, they aren't looking for some quick, painless (we hope) resolution, most of them are shocked at how cold the water is, and bemused by the identity of the person that put them in the river.

And that person will watch from the banks of the river broken dreams as you struggle to comprehend why they did what they did. The torch you were carrying for them, and make no mistake you were carrying one, extinguishes itself in the river, their eyes will be lit by its flame for the last time. Gone are the days when they would rescue you from life's drains. They knew this long before you did, and that is the pity of it.  They will never break your fall again. They have now become your betrayer, your own personal Judas as it were, and as you drift away you would do well to remember that, and turn your focus on the problem at hand, and that problem is the river of broken dreams. Maybe you've been here before (it is more than likely you have), but as Heraclitus tells us, you can never step in the same river twice, and the river of broken dreams is no different. And the river of broken dreams is chock full of broken reeds.

Again, like most rivers, the river of broken dreams, is going to be dotted along its course by "towns" these towns are going to be familiar to you, after all you've been in the river of broken dreams before. And like most "towns" they have names, after all, they have to be distinguished from one another, and what better way to distinguish them than to give them different names. Each of these "towns" have their own character, and their own purpose, and your knowledge of them hopefully isn't entirely complete because if it was it would mean you've been in the river of broken dream way too many times.

The first town is pretty much right next to the point where you entered the river, it is the "town" of denial. You want to deny you are in the river to begin with, but here you are wet as a June bride on her wedding night waiting for her newly minted husband to ravage her for the "first time." Denial is not a pleasant city, and the less time you spend there the better. Denial also usually consists of your disbelief of the identity of the person that put you in the river to begin with. The largest "building" in the city of Denial is the Identity Bureau. The place where people in the river line up to hope against hope that the identity of the person who "rivered" them is a horrible, horrible mistake. It isn't and the sooner you realize that, the sooner you can leave the unpleasant town of Denial. Most people stay here quite a long time, after all the line at the Identity Bureau is long, and the other popular hang out in Denial is the Pourqoui Department. It is an entire waste of time to go to the Pourquoi Department, they don't speak your language (no matter what or how many languages you speak), and it is fruitless to try to understand them. However, that doesn't stop people from spending way too much time in the Pourqoui Department, and by extension way too much time in the sad town of Denial.

Once you float past Denial the next "town" you will encounter is Anger. Anger is a very dangerous place. All sorts of miscreants walk around in anger, and most of them intend harm upon their fellow citizens. Of course most of their anger is directed at the person that "rivered" them in the first place, but if you happen to be in their way, they will settle for gutting you like a fish on their way to get revenge on that person. The people in Anger don't really give much of a fuck who they hurt, they just want to hurt someone. Sure they have a person in mind, but collateral damage is not really their concern. It is best to get the fuck out of Anger as quickly as possible. After all, you might commit some atrocity here yourself that you will later deeply regret. Anger has its charms for people who are on their first, or second trip down the river of broken dreams, not as much for people who have been here multiple times. Anger is a dangerous, sometimes deadly place. The river is the lesser of two evils, and that is saying something.

Jump back into the river and thank the god you've chosen that you survived a lot of people don't and the graveyard outside of Anger is full to bursting. The next town you will encounter on your journey in called Bargain. And it is just like it sounds, it is a merchant town that exists solely to trade. It is full of market stalls and bazaars full to bursting with all sort of commodities that you think you need, and you probably do. But here is the problem with Bargain, you've got fuck all to trade. You were surprised when you were pushed into the river of broken dreams, and you didn't think to pack anything to trade. Few people do. Think back to the god you've chosen, and ponder is he/she fair? Have they ever listened to you before? The answer is mostly likely either going to be "No" or "I don't know." Neither one of those answers is helpful to you in the town of Bargain. You've got nothing they want, and whatever you do have, they've already got plenty of. It doesn't stop people from lingering in the alleys of Bargain, vainly trying to concoct some deal that will get them back upstream to where they entered the river. It won't work, it hardly ever works, and if it does work then the next time you are in the river (and there will be a next time I promise), will be exponentially worse. Anger is a physically dangerous place, Bargain is a place that takes your soul. Get the fuck out while you still have what's left of one.

However, the next stop along the river of broken dreams isn't exactly an improvement. It is a town called Triste, and it is a gloomy, grey, and joyless place. The great sad clown Pagliacci, would make a fortune in Triste. His plays and performances would sell out the largest of venues. And Triste is a very, very large venue. There is no joy in Triste, there is sadness and sadness alone. Some of the greatest creations in the world have been forged in Triste, but unless you have an sturdy constitution, or a death wish, Triste in not the last stop on your trip down the river of broken dreams. It is a solitary crowded place, a paradox to be sure. Triste is full of people to be sure, but those people have little to no desire to interact with their fellow citizens. It is a place full of Eeyores, not a Tigger or Pollyanna will be found in Triste, they don't exist here, they can't exist here. No matter what your disposition or outlook was before you entered Triste, Triste will impose its sadness on you whether you like it or not, and trust me, you will not like it. Most people stay a very, very long time in Triste, and a great deal of the ones that do leave (and you will really have to leave) leave with a unfathomable reluctance.  Stay as long as you want or need to in Triste, it has a little something for everyone, and a little too much for a lot of us.

Your final stop on the river of broken dreams, the last town before it enters the "Bay" is Acceptance. It is an odd town. It is like a "twin city" in many ways. There is the one side, the side you generally enter first that is, at first blush, a bit like anger. It seems to lead back to Anger in some ways, and sometimes it can but don't fall for that. That just leads you back into the river in the wrong direction. It is the side that says "well here I am, I can do fuck all about it now, so I accept it, that doesn't mean I have to like it." That is the wrong side of the tracks in Acceptance. It is a faux dream, and don't fall for it, there is nothing there for you on the wrong side of Acceptance. If you make it past the wrong side of the tracks in Acceptance, well good for you, because a lot of people don't. A lot of people see the 'posh' side of Acceptance as defeat. It isn't but it sure as fuck does a great imitation of it. It is hard to see, and a lot of people refuse to see it, but Acceptance is the place you need to be, whether you know it or not. It isn't surrender and don't confuse it for such. It is, in many ways, the top of the mountain that Sisyphus reaches with his burden of a rock just before it falls back down to the bottom of the hill he has been pushing it up for so long. You might not stay long in Acceptance, it is a gloomily happy place, and your stay here will be both joyful and yet still very, very sad. It isn't the overwhelming gloom of Triste, but they are neighboring cities, and sometimes Triste's clouds block out Acceptance's sun. You have to leave Acceptance whether you want to or not. It feels like a final stop, but it isn't. Acceptance is a bit of fool's gold. It gleams, but it really is quite as real as you want it to be.

Your journey on the river of broken dreams is over, whether you know it or not. You're probably still wet, and probably still cold, and each of the towns you went through have left a little of themselves in you. It is just what they do, and it is just what the river does. Crawling out of the river of broken dreams must needs doing, and it is now your job to do it. Sure there are people on the banks who might want to help, and maybe in someways they can. But those helping hands are not always as helping as they seem, and take hold of them with a degree of caution. Caution that you should have displayed in the first place, after all a lack of caution is what put your dumb ass in the river of broken dreams in the first place, and even though you survived your trip (if you survived your trip) it was not some river cruise that you want to take again anytime soon (or ever) again. But of course, that won't stop you, it never does, and sometimes the trip into river of broken dreams doesn't end in tears. Sometimes the river adds an odd strength to a relationship you thought was weak in the knees. The river may drown certain expectations, but it rarely fully drowns hope.  It is rare,but it can be done, and it is incumbent upon you to try. I wish you luck.

J____s' Plan??

Comrade S______v,

You address me as Citizen now do you? What the blue fuck is going on at the Central Committee? I do not even know you, and you address me as Citizen. Be aware COMRADE that until I am put against the wall and shot, which may happen sooner rather than later, I do not response to the honorific of CITIZEN.  I am aware that out here in the provinces we are behind the news rather than in front of it, but where is this Citizen coming from? Has there been a "fronde" that has been successful and we are now are going to be required to wear powdered wigs, and short breeches?

I am also informed, though not by you shockingly enough, that the J____s' Plan has been renamed the "Imperial Plan"? I guess because it carries a bit more gravitas, and sounds better in official dispatches? Or maybe you lot finally put the author of the plan against the wall, and while the plan can still be used his (since he is now a "non-person, and doesn't have one) name can not be attached to it. What sort of madness is this? Are we all drunk on our own sense of power, and somehow still cowards at heart? What happened to the boisterous debates among the party rank and file? Where is the intellectual rough and tumble that gave birth to us as an organization? Buried in some history book that no one bothers to read? Trapped in old photographs in worn leather frames in some sweethearts attic with no identifying postscript on the back to tell future generations who we were? Strangers without a name in a picture torn, tattered, and stained, faded to yellow in that worn leather frame? Have we, while somehow being present, already become history?

I even obtained a rather tattered copy of the newly minted Imperial Plan, and again I see no difference from the original plan named after that newly minted traitor J_____.  Perhaps I am a bit thick, but I do not understand the direction the Committee is taking, is it to lead us into a new(er) glorious future where we call each other citizen, and prance around with our dogs on fancy leashes, and push our babies in jewel encrusted prams on the Prospects that our previous generation bled out upon for the principles that allow us to choose our own futures? Would they know why they died if they were to peruse the Imperial Plan, or would they roll over in their plainly marked graves, disgusted with the last post and chorus of the band playing the dirge over the plan they so painstakingly formed all those years ago?

We (and I mean the collective we, not the royal we, Imperial Plan or not) broke with our past because we refused to be condemned to repeat it. We were stuck in a recursive loop, that led each successive generation to the same brutal (and ultimately fatal) destination. Certainly, there was hope as each new generation came of age, but that hope was quickly dashed as we watch helplessly that new generation make the same awful mistakes that the previous ones had made. We knew, all too well, the outcome. No man can be said to have the ability to predict the future, there are no tragic Cassandras among us.  But, we were clever enough to see the pattern, and that if that pattern remained unbroken the result would almost inevitably be the exact same as before. Prediction isn't the same as prophecy.

Like most men, I expect you to hear what you want to hear, and disregard the rest, but I hope for the sake of us all, that you keep an open mind, and make no rash decisions. You ask me to remain "loyal, steadfast, and true" but you neglect to tell me to what I am remaining loyal to? The Party? The one currently tearing itself apart with nightly debates that have ceased to become stimulating but are merely accusatory? To the State it created? The State that seems to be crumbling from the center outward, staggering from poor decision to poor decision like a punch drunk, broken down, old boxer that is merely doing what he has been trained to do for years before finally taking his final dive?  Or should I take the advice of Polonius and "too thine own self be true'? If we all do that COMRADE, then we have created a monster, and not only have we created it, we have taught it how to kill. These are not the "monster under the bed type" these monsters have weapons wrapped in burlap, and they are very, very real. They will laugh at how we feel, and will keep track of each of us as they track us down and exterminate us like the rats they believe us to be.

Or perhaps I should remain loyal to god? Should I say some prayer to some god I think is fair? Which god is that COMRADE? The one we torn down all those years ago? Are we now to place it back on the pedestal we ripped it off of nearly 35 years ago? How would we explain that to the people, or more importantly could you explain how I would explain that to myself?  The god that we were convinced abandoned us, and we in turn abandoned.

You say that "plans are in place to resolve tensions in the Empire." What are those plans? Where is the manifesto that delineates the plan(s) of which you speak? Platitudes have never won the day COMRADE, pretty words written on expensive paper do not a plan make. Plans are active, they do not sit around like the homely girl at a dance vainly hoping some dashing young man will ask them for a turn around the dance floor. That is not how this works, that is not how any of this works. Make your plans if you must, but action (preferably of the brilliant type if you can manage it) is required. Many a success has been obtained by action first, and the writing down of the plan of that action later. All it requires is changing the date on the top of the paper in order to be able to (with a straight face) say "See comrades, we had a plan all along, and it has succeeded beyond our wildest expectations!"

I hope, for all our sake that the "plan" whichever one it is, is adopted soon. You say the center is chaos, but if the center cannot hold, then we are all of us, every last one of us COMRADE, CITIZEN or whatever title you give yourself, are lost.

Yours,

COMRADE  U_______y