THE DOOR

Imagine a door. Nothing special just an old wooden door. You can choose the designing of this door yourself. If you'd like some brain starters here is a few ideas. You could imagine a big heavy black door with the head of a white stallion gazing down upon you with carvings that glow of a liquid blue. You could imagine a small white door, so small you'd have to crawl to pass through. It has no markings just a silver door handle. Think of a door that is you. That shows your personality and mind. Let your creativity flow. The door that I shall build is an oak door. It had a carved wolf head with its jaws open and teeth bared at me. The door is marked with spots of black ash and cuts of a steel blade upon it to show that I have been to war where I have fought within myself and I have neither lost nor won but each time I was hurt. My door has a carving of a human heart above the wolf and there is dried up blood on the heart with a small name carved in the heart. A name I shall not reveal yet but this shows that I have bled for another. The heart is held within the hands of a person and it signifies that my heart belongs to someone else and that person will always hold it delicately. My door is surrounded by a mist that never leaves so you must be close to see the door to see. Otherwise you are blinded and that is how I and a lot of others walk through life. Blinded. This is my door, think of yours before you read on. Once you have your door in your mind, imagine yourself sitting before the closed door with your legs crossed. You're gazing upon this door, it once started out the same as your parents doors, but over time the door has shifted and changed and you were never aware of these changes. Perhaps you are still unaware of how much you've changed, why you've changed and if it is for the better or not. One day you notice your door and you realize that your door has been marked. You look at your door and you see all of your life. All of those mistakes, those pathetic boys and/or girls you've cried over, you see the hatred that boiled in your heart for your parents and family when they were against you. But not always were they against you. As you look you realize that you were punished because it was for the better. Your parents taught you who you are today. The world has taught you but your parents did the basics. They told you the

wrong and right in this world and you see that you love your parents for everything that they've done. Well... most of it anyways. Then you have another realization. That wrong and right is just a matter of opinion. It always is, everything in this world is just an opinion. Whether it is right or wrong is up to you. There are few occasions when the truth is revealed but the truth isn't always right, now is it? There are several different types of right. Now I say several because I'm unsure of how many. I'm only aware of two. The right that is your opinion and the right of the truth. You look upon this door and you see everything you thought was right turn into a puzzle. Now, you must rethink all of those morals, all those beliefs and argue both sides on your own. Once you come to a conclusion, life will challenge you against those morals and beliefs. Then you will know. The door shows the pain you've been through. The pain of death taking a loved one from your life. Curious isn't it? That the good people die whilst the bad live. But good and bad is like right and wrong. Just a matter of opinion. If you've had the death of a loved one, you've felt a pain like no other. Grandmothers, grandfathers, uncle and aunts, Nanna and Grandad, you get who I am talking about now? Well death is death. People die every day and the only people you feel pain for is those closest to you. Death comes in many forms and there is no nice way to die. The end result is the same. You feel, think, see, hear nothing. You are dead. Empty. Do not fear death, take comfort in the thought of death. Because when you are dead, there is no more pain. Your life is over. Instead, you should live life until there is no more life to live. Then when death comes, you are ready and you can look at your death and smile.

The door shows all the laughter and happiness. The happiness in your life can never be compared to another because it's yours. All yours. Happiness is different for everyone and there are many different levels of happiness. The moment when you are so unbelievably happy you feel like your chest is going to explode so you laugh. That's all you can do is laugh. Laughter is the ultimate happiness. Laughter is a happiness that is too strong for a smile or for words. This is true laughter. I'm not talking about a chuckle

or a giggle or a sick twisted laugh. I'm talking about when you laugh so hard that your stomach hurts and your cheeks hurt from smiling so much and the happiness still wants to explode inside you. You must find this laughter somewhere. Someone, something, will make you this happy. Again, it is different for everyone. The door shows your mistakes. When you loved a boy/girl that didn't love you the same way. When you fell for someone who didn't fall for you. When you drank too much and hurt or disappointed others around you. Or you did something to your body you regret or someone else did something to you that you regret. When you did drugs and the consequence that followed. When you physically hurt someone who did not deserve. Whether they truly deserved it or not depends upon the situation. But think clearly. If someone took something without asking, do they deserved to be hit? Don't be an idiot. Don't be a smart ass. If you're here to mock my words and not take the meaning and depth within my words, then leave. The mistakes you make, let them be a lesson, not a mistake. As if you were in a classroom, it's a lesson and the teacher is the consequence. The door shows everything. Now, everything is a big blur until you separate them and analyse each and every one of it. That is what a lot of people do. They allow things to pile on them as if it were a huge mountain when really it's multiple things placed into one and people try to tackle the mountain all at once instead of facing each problem individually. The door is your life. It's your personality. It's you. Like a map, you must look at your life, look at your personality and analyse it. You may have to feel the pain again because you haven't truly gotten over something. If this is the case, then you are not ready for the other side. You are still wounded and learning. And even after this, you need to find a happiness. And even when you think you are ready, you may not be.

You wonder, as you look at this door, what is on the other side. You've been through life, you've suffered, you've smiled, you've laughed, you've had lessons, you've done everything. Why not open the door? Is it death waiting on the other side? Is it eternal happiness? Is it peace? Is it what I want most in the world? You stand up and take the handle. You breathe deeply and slowly open the door. You smile.

Guidance
She had to be the most embarrassingly dim person in the world, he was sure. As she sat there on the other side of her pretentious looking desk, he loathed her like nothing else. It wasnt so much her chubby, pasty face, smeared as it was with an abundance of lipstick like a dressed up, bloated corpse. It wasnt even that her do -good ideal of finding the best in everyone was contained to the most bourgeois of notions as to what that best may be. No, what was truly loathsome about her was that in spite of her glaring, narrow-minded incompetence, she wielded the power to alter and disturb the fragile state of contentment he called his life and she could do this at will. She pushed a pile of paper across her desk towards him without looking up from his file (she always pretended to read that file as if she didnt know it by heart already). It was his most recent grade card and his history assignment on medieval European history something he considered his greatest masterpiece yet, academically at least. She had been kind enough to circle several of his least impressive grades on his report card for him. He decided not to respond to the gesture and remained seated, adding to the awkward silence until, finally, she broke it. - Care to explain that? She still didnt look at him as she said it, instead she was now randomly organising different stacks of paper on her desk. - I thought it was all pretty self-explanatory, really. She looked at him, down over her glasses with weary, lifeless eyes. - Well, it isnt, so why dont you give it a go anyway? He glanced quickly at the report card. - Well, I got a D minus in French, as you see. And I think this is bec ause I dont actually speak a word of French. And you know Miss Pioline, she is all Canadian and seems to have a pretty good grasp of the language. So I think that grade may be spot on, actually perhaps even a bit over the mark. - I wasnt talking about your grades; they are indeed sadly self explanatory. I was talking about the history assignment. Explain that, please. He sighed as he ran his fingers quickly through the forty odd papers of true brilliance marred only by the injustice of a large red F written on the final page. He felt his internal balance waver and he shrugged without talking. She reached over and carefully took the papers from his hands.

- Alright, I will give you some examples then here is one: My primary source will be practically applied history. I will compare play-by-play analysis from six Medieval Total War II and Europa Universalis III savegames played out as Spain, Britain and France respectably three from each game. She paused to look at him for a few seconds. - And you go on: I will thus show three credible alternatives to conventional history that might as well have occurred had slight details in strategy among the three beforementioned nations been applied with a subtle difference in style and technique around the fourteenth and fifteenth century. And and then, remarkably, you indulge in more than thirty written pages about, what I can only assume, were six computer games that you played at home on your computer over no less than two weeks. Written thoroughly, in detail every turn and every what do you call it, event, as if you were referring facts. What were you thinking?! She actually sounded sincerely frustrated. How do I even begin to explain this to that overdressed, sub-educated, bovine creature, he asked himself. She ranted on. - This has nothing to do with a history assignment, you must see this. You cannot just turn every assignment you get into something to do with computer games! You cannot She leaned in across the table to look him more firmly in the eyes. - you cannot live your entire life in those computer games. Finally he lost the grip on his own silence. - I am not! How can you say that this has nothing to do with a history assignment? It deals with nothing but history! - Historical facts taken from a computer game. A COM-PU-TER-GAME! It isnt real. - Real? What history is real? It is a very decent time specific representation of the general historical consensus that rule our current times concerning the medieval period of European history. As good as any other at least. She looked at him as if he had just recited Hebrew poetry in its original form to her. At any given time, now, she may jump out the window and run onto some pasture to eat grass and produce dairy products, he thought to himself. She sighed as she shook her head slightly and turned to the last pages of his report. - You end up gaining world domination in all six scenarios.

He shrugged and squirmed a bit. - Well, first of all: no, because I cannot achieve world domination in Medieval Total War II. There I only control Europe, North Africa and most of Asia Minor. And secondly: but that isnt my point at all! He felt annoyed, his internal balance, his world, was disrupted now. - My point is, as I write in the conclusion by the way, that given a scenario where the supreme leader of any of these three nations have a direct and unhindered line of command over every major aspect of his empire and assuming that leader is competent an equal amount of potential can be attributed to each of the three nations position in that period of history. And so, their respective successes and failure during this period of time can be attributed to seemingly minor or even random faults in these lines of command or within the supreme leaders themselves. This time she didnt answer. She just looked very tired. - Look, I know that accurate historical facts are not to be found in computer games, but they are not to be found in just any old history book either! The science of history is dynamical and should always be based on as much archaeological research as possible I havent got the time to do archaeological research in high -school! I mean, be realistic! If I just read some random history book and based my conclusions on whatever it said, I would be nowhere nearer the truth than I am here anyway. Historians disagree all the time, you know. She had stopped moving entirely, and he felt sure she wasnt listening anymore either. - Here at least I have made my own conclusions in a new sort of scenario that I actually question and debate! Her head sank down and rested itself in her hand, the pale skin under her chin collapsing to form a noxious pillow of excess flesh. - You wrote your last English paper from the view of an Imp in the computer game Doom III, and your last social science project was a four hour video of you playing Sim City 3000. - You are so hypocritical! He felt anger rise in him and tears pressing against his eyes. - You never wanted me to write a history paper at all! You just wanted me to find a random history book by some random PhD or above and show that I can extract the essential meaning from it and that I can debate it. So so then just say that; stop

saying that you want us to study history, when you dont. In every God damn study related to humanities that is all you ever want us to do; read a text, analyse it and debate it. It really doesnt matter if the text is about contemporary history or obscure Greek literature on the occult just go through the motions. Its the same with the computer games that you hate so much; you dont want me to play them, but you DO want me to produce them! You said so yourself, right? And I bet you have it in your paper there somewhere to say it again to me today, right? She looked down at her paper very shortly with the slightest of frowns. - Well, it would be an obvious career choice for you, but not with these grades, you know. Its not the easiest of careers to get into, you know, so - No, but exactly! Why would you want me to produce computer games that you dont want anyone to play? Think about it, for once! You want us to read philosophy, but you certainly dont want us to use it to question reality, do you? Ill tell you what the difference is; you want me to produce. To circulate money in this self-sustaining monster you call society, that is all you want. I can produce anything based on inconvenient sciences and thoughts as long as I dont try an apply them to your idea of reality. You claim to be here to guide me, but you are only here to fit me. There is a difference, you know. That actually made her look hurt and she sat up and took off her glasses. - No, that is not true. Even though it may feel as if society is imposing on you like that, I am just trying to prepare you for the reality that awaits you. Not a theoretical reality that can be debated with clever words but one where you will have to acquire food and basic necessities for yourself. And to do that you will have to produce something that someone is willing to pay you for. I just want that something to be as gratifying to you as possible, and that is why I keep suggesting a career in software programming or designing. And that is why I try to remind you that such a thing wont be easy, and that you need to start preparing for whatever you want to do soon. Her rehearsed caring slapped him across the face like a giant, frozen fish. His anger froze solid inside him. - I just want you to at least stop hiding from the reality that awaits you. You are a very bright boy, but you are hiding behind your intelligence; distancing yourself from what you dont want to face. That you are able to logically and academically defend your escapism does not make it any less dangerous to you, you must believe me. If She went on ranting about how she was only trying to help him prepare for his future, as if she had any idea of what the future would bring anyhow. As if her life was some form

of ideal for him to strive for. Chaos reigned inside him, a big whirlpool of repressed emotions around an iceberg of anger. He had to find his balance again, to restore contentment. He blocked out the sound of her voice, reminding himself that she was only paid to pretend to care for him. None of this would matter if he could just make it out of here soon. He could choose freely from any reality, he wished, if he could just make it out of this office. He could be the king of England, leading his armies across French soil. Or the hero of the far away realm of Cyrodil, fighting off the imposing hell from the doorstep of the empire. He could be the perfect thief, hidden in shadows of the city or anything else he wanted. This was all nothing, he reminded himself. Just distractions. She kept ranting on and she would for some time yet, he could tell. But she would get no more from him. He could retain his inner balance as long as he could block out the unintelligent babble of this ruminant human. How could she guide him anywhere, when she did not even understand what he said? He sat back and started breathing slower and slower, knowing that he would escape this place soon. He was misunderstood by reality, not the other way around. He knew the hypocrisy of the real world only too well, and he was in no hurry to join it. Finally she finished and looked at him expectantly . - So what do you think? He smiled and talked but didnt answer.