Is Anything Real?

          In the modern world, we struggle to distinguish truth from falsehood. We inhabit silos, echo chambers of our favored beliefs. Artificial Intelligence erases the lines between reality and illusion.
          Wars rage, numerous and hot. Where will our leaders find the “facts” to make clear choices when all their staff wear tinted lenses? Presidents and Kings send their strongest and bravest into harm’s way based on incomplete information, because that’s all they have.
          Is anything real, enduring, and true?
          Consider dirt. Earth itself. We see dirt, smell it, dig through it, and even pull worms from it. Dirt sticks to us, and we wash it off. But just because something sticks, does that make it real?
          What about things that don’t “stick,” things we cannot see, taste, smell, or hold? Gravity doesn’t stick, and yet it seems real. We set our ladders squarely against our houses. We climb carefully and shingle our shelters, lest gravity destroy them with its inevitable summons of rain and snow. If we forget gravity while roofing, we fall. Gravity’s sister Pain, also invisible and undeniable, meets us where we strike the ground. If something is invisible but unforgettable, like Gravity or Pain, is it real?
          Some things lie so far beyond our natural senses that, apart from technology, they remain forever outside our awareness: radio waves and cosmic radiation, for example. Are those “real?”
          What about things beyond even the scope of technology, the intangible sources of meaning like Hope? We can “lose” Hope, and what an absence! When Courage is gone, how do we find that again? When life’s Purpose flies away, where does it go? Who can map the course to those distant shores?
          How about thought itself? Is thought real? Or metaphor? Or humor? Or dreams? Are thoughts and insight as solid as dirt, as undeniable as gravity, and as critical to life as Hope? Maya Angelou says, “The caged bird sings of freedom.” Freedom is a thought—an idea. Have we not all been caged birds, bound by weakness and imprisoned by pain? Which is better—an endless field of rich dirt (full of worms) or the irrepressible dream of liberty? If the two seem equal in majesty, is it not because every field of dirt doubles as a dream, a metaphor for freedom?
          Writers anguish over what is real. Their characters must choose what’s worth fighting for, and how they would really pursue their goals. Writers themselves ponder whether their work is real. Do their words march with transformative power or shine with eternal beauty?
          Every writer is a pregnant mother in active labor. She gives birth at last to her newborn, usually alone and with no memory of how she conceived. Her baby flails and cries in her arms. She draws her fragile girl close, dries her off, and feeds her. How quickly the time passes! The baby grows, leaves its mother, and disappears.
          The memory of the child remains, piercing the mother’s chest. The mother carries the loss to the grave. With every breath, she wonders . . . Does her daughter live? Did she find a life partner and bear children of her own? Or did she die, alone, frozen on some barren field, never buried, unknown to anyone else?
          Who was her father? Might he still live? If so, is he the kind of person who never accepts responsibility for his actions? Or is there a valid explanation for his absence? If she ever met the father, would she recognize him by his resemblance to their child? Wouldn’t that be shocking! Would he explain himself? Would he know anything about their daughter’s life or where they might find her?

Do My Stories Live?

          Every tale I write is the Child of my mind. But is it real? Does it live?
          My thoughts give birth to words. No photographs exist to confirm the breath within my Child, save for the images in the mind of my Reader.
          The pain of labor comes upon me—driving, driving—and it cannot be stopped. Sleep escapes me. I pant, sweat, and bleed, for the hour is at hand. I scream.
          It’s a girl! My Child. I draw her near, skin-to-skin. She drinks, and I know not how I feed her.
          Will you live, my Child? Will you discover purpose and make a life for yourself after you escape my grasp? Live, my Daughter! But wait! Must you leave so soon? Even if it’s proper.
          Go, then. Find your father and return to me. Bring him with you so that I may know everything about you, Child of my heart and soul.

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