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- Story Listed as: Fiction For Adults
- Theme: Inspirational
- Subject: Faith / Hope
- Published: 10/27/2014
THE GNAWING SENSATION OF TENDERNESS
Born 1969, M, from Herten, NRW, Germany.jpg)
The artwork here on this page was painted by Charles E.J. Moulton
THE GNAWING SENSATION OF TENDERNESS
A Short Story Aiming to Inspire Hope
By Charles E.J. Moulton
Gnawing. Weird. River couldn't really describe the feeling other than that it felt bad. It drilled holes into his spirit. Every step ached. Every spiritual step, that is. And that made River wonder what had made him so uptight.
Uptight. That felt like the key to unravelling this mystery, didn't it? Uptight. His mind kept forbidding him to say certain things, meet certain people. All that was part of the picture, of course. The picture of his own gnawing sensation.
Gnawing. There was that word again. Gnawing. The feeling always arose when he felt forced to do something, say something, be something.
"Are you sad?"
That's what they always asked him at work when he just chose to withdraw himself from all the hubbub. But he didn't want to be the clown 24-7. So, contrary to popular demand, he was not "sad" just because of his own introvert appeal. Just a snail.
No matter how much he twisted and turned that wacko idea, the focal point was that gnawing feeling. The compulsive urge to act, get angry, protest, hate. Urge. There was that weird feeling again. Urge.
What had his shrink said the other day? "Don't think you have to make assessments." He did that, didn't he? Include that emotion, that gnawing feeling in his spirit in every word he said. Make sure that the feeling did not hurt anyone. Hurt? Why hurt? What had happened in River's life that made him so incapable of uttering a single word without having to judge his own motives. Weird. Gnawing.
The urge, there was that word again, to solve this mystery was all too strong to pass up on. Especially since that gnawing feeling that he had now and then had appeared when he imposed his own self on people. Saying good bye was an issue. Good bye. Skin contact. Shaking hands with people. Inspired, or scared of, Stephen King's book "Thinner", he had become terrified of curses and his own fear of having to choose between people or choose between career and family. It created deep psychological problems. It was almost as if he had this voice inside him that told him that if he shook a certain person's hand or hugged a certain person that person would die. That scared River to smithereens, especially since people he had thoughts like that about actually had passed away. Maybe River was psychic. Or maybe he was actually going crazy. It was all due to that weird feeling. "Thinner" really had been a difficult choice of book for the 15-year old he had been. That and his stupid friend who had played supernatural manipulation games with him. That had given him psychological problems.
Okay. He admitted it. River gave things too much thought. But he knew he had to deal with this. Could this be a problem from a previous life? Then what had happened back then? Had he actually said good bye to someone near and dear, shook hands with them and then never seen them again? Had he been on the Titanic? Or in a concentration camp? In the hands of devil worshippers? Several people in this life had actually taught him to believe in superstition. Only later had he learned to ignore that. Previous lives? Current ones? Doggone lover, who could say that? Who could tell? God.
River longed to hug his dear ones, longed to have a career and a family, longed to overcome his psychological terror.
Then River remembered the signs. The good signs that had actually meant good things were happening. Signs that had appeared out of nowhere and given him hope all of his life. Two seperate people in two seperate locations talking about a remote art film he had just seen on an obscure channel. By chance turning on the radio just as the song was being played about which he had talked about with a colleague the day before. The very first name of a man he was writing a mail to appearing independently on a paper on the table while he wrote the mail. The name of a colleague he had received a mail from appearing on a license plate the next day. Exact phrases that he had thought in his mind appearing ten minutes later on the side of a bus. A woman he had never heard of being mentioned in a conversation and coming to his workplace a week later. Spooky? Maybe. But safe. Fact was that River was protected by angels. He need not fear harm nor calamity nor death nor dire consequence of some silly thought in his mind. Thoughts are free. In fact, he and his dear ones could safely count on a prosperous life where career, family and roundabout health and success ruled the world for everyone.
Stories came to mind. Two dogs going to see the temple of mirrors. The happy dog calling it the happiest place on Earth, the angry dog calling it the angriest place on Earth. And so, River found himself walking out on his porch that night after work, looking at the stars, drinking Australian Cabernet Sauvignon, smoking vanilla cigarillos. The flock of migrating autumn birds in the sky above the bus stop today, they had crisscrossed randomly instead of flying in an organized fashion. River had seen that as a bad omen. Maybe it had been just a sign of the jubilant spree of mother nature, beings simply enjoying life and feeling damn good in the process.
Suddenly, the Big Dipper and the Orion didn't seem so life absorbing. And hugging that colleague and slapping his back didn't seem a threat to his life. It just seemed to be part of the random poetry of existance. Fear was the only thing to fear. At least, it seemed that way. And where was that gnawing feeling now? Resting.
After all, versatility was angelic and angelic protection was something his dear ones had lots of.
"The only thing to fear is fear itself," someone had once said. If that was true then love had its own merits and luck could come only from one place: trusting the eternal soul.
THE GNAWING SENSATION OF TENDERNESS(Charles E.J. Moulton)
The artwork here on this page was painted by Charles E.J. Moulton
THE GNAWING SENSATION OF TENDERNESS
A Short Story Aiming to Inspire Hope
By Charles E.J. Moulton
Gnawing. Weird. River couldn't really describe the feeling other than that it felt bad. It drilled holes into his spirit. Every step ached. Every spiritual step, that is. And that made River wonder what had made him so uptight.
Uptight. That felt like the key to unravelling this mystery, didn't it? Uptight. His mind kept forbidding him to say certain things, meet certain people. All that was part of the picture, of course. The picture of his own gnawing sensation.
Gnawing. There was that word again. Gnawing. The feeling always arose when he felt forced to do something, say something, be something.
"Are you sad?"
That's what they always asked him at work when he just chose to withdraw himself from all the hubbub. But he didn't want to be the clown 24-7. So, contrary to popular demand, he was not "sad" just because of his own introvert appeal. Just a snail.
No matter how much he twisted and turned that wacko idea, the focal point was that gnawing feeling. The compulsive urge to act, get angry, protest, hate. Urge. There was that weird feeling again. Urge.
What had his shrink said the other day? "Don't think you have to make assessments." He did that, didn't he? Include that emotion, that gnawing feeling in his spirit in every word he said. Make sure that the feeling did not hurt anyone. Hurt? Why hurt? What had happened in River's life that made him so incapable of uttering a single word without having to judge his own motives. Weird. Gnawing.
The urge, there was that word again, to solve this mystery was all too strong to pass up on. Especially since that gnawing feeling that he had now and then had appeared when he imposed his own self on people. Saying good bye was an issue. Good bye. Skin contact. Shaking hands with people. Inspired, or scared of, Stephen King's book "Thinner", he had become terrified of curses and his own fear of having to choose between people or choose between career and family. It created deep psychological problems. It was almost as if he had this voice inside him that told him that if he shook a certain person's hand or hugged a certain person that person would die. That scared River to smithereens, especially since people he had thoughts like that about actually had passed away. Maybe River was psychic. Or maybe he was actually going crazy. It was all due to that weird feeling. "Thinner" really had been a difficult choice of book for the 15-year old he had been. That and his stupid friend who had played supernatural manipulation games with him. That had given him psychological problems.
Okay. He admitted it. River gave things too much thought. But he knew he had to deal with this. Could this be a problem from a previous life? Then what had happened back then? Had he actually said good bye to someone near and dear, shook hands with them and then never seen them again? Had he been on the Titanic? Or in a concentration camp? In the hands of devil worshippers? Several people in this life had actually taught him to believe in superstition. Only later had he learned to ignore that. Previous lives? Current ones? Doggone lover, who could say that? Who could tell? God.
River longed to hug his dear ones, longed to have a career and a family, longed to overcome his psychological terror.
Then River remembered the signs. The good signs that had actually meant good things were happening. Signs that had appeared out of nowhere and given him hope all of his life. Two seperate people in two seperate locations talking about a remote art film he had just seen on an obscure channel. By chance turning on the radio just as the song was being played about which he had talked about with a colleague the day before. The very first name of a man he was writing a mail to appearing independently on a paper on the table while he wrote the mail. The name of a colleague he had received a mail from appearing on a license plate the next day. Exact phrases that he had thought in his mind appearing ten minutes later on the side of a bus. A woman he had never heard of being mentioned in a conversation and coming to his workplace a week later. Spooky? Maybe. But safe. Fact was that River was protected by angels. He need not fear harm nor calamity nor death nor dire consequence of some silly thought in his mind. Thoughts are free. In fact, he and his dear ones could safely count on a prosperous life where career, family and roundabout health and success ruled the world for everyone.
Stories came to mind. Two dogs going to see the temple of mirrors. The happy dog calling it the happiest place on Earth, the angry dog calling it the angriest place on Earth. And so, River found himself walking out on his porch that night after work, looking at the stars, drinking Australian Cabernet Sauvignon, smoking vanilla cigarillos. The flock of migrating autumn birds in the sky above the bus stop today, they had crisscrossed randomly instead of flying in an organized fashion. River had seen that as a bad omen. Maybe it had been just a sign of the jubilant spree of mother nature, beings simply enjoying life and feeling damn good in the process.
Suddenly, the Big Dipper and the Orion didn't seem so life absorbing. And hugging that colleague and slapping his back didn't seem a threat to his life. It just seemed to be part of the random poetry of existance. Fear was the only thing to fear. At least, it seemed that way. And where was that gnawing feeling now? Resting.
After all, versatility was angelic and angelic protection was something his dear ones had lots of.
"The only thing to fear is fear itself," someone had once said. If that was true then love had its own merits and luck could come only from one place: trusting the eternal soul.
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