I see nothing am I blind to the light or the truth ?I try to make out the sounds but I might as well be numb .the world around feels consistent as im just standing here stuck in the a dark emotionless place where thee is no escape I hear distant voices calling my name but I can find the strength to speak .the words are crumbled and fading away.

Waking up in constant darkness always sparked unease in me. I wanted to see. I wanted to see color. I wanted to see faces. I wanted to see myself.

The soreness in my body awakes as I blindly reach for my alarm clock. The alarm’s screeching welcomes the beginning of a migraine. Slamming my hand down on the clock’s button, I welcome silence.

Removing myself from the bed, I shift slightly. My feet searching the cold wood for my cozy slippers. I always wondered what they looked like. Were they gray? Maybe brown? Even pink? What about the floor? I learned my colors in school like everyone does. I just have yet to see them.

They say that the grass is green and that the sky is blue, but what do green and blue take after? Does grass smell green? Does rain smell blue?

My snout is my saving grace. Without it, I would have no idea when dinner was ready, or when it was time for me to wake. Not that I want to do either of those things nowadays. I want to sleep, and rest, and pass away in peace. Yet, despite the darkness, I’m still alive. Not sure how or where, but I am, and those around me touch my fur as I sleep and when I wake, and they seem to love me still. I loved me once, too, but not anymore. I’m not what I used to be, or who I used to be. Without my eyes, I am just a snout. Muzzle me, and I perish in all but body. It’s time to sleep …

I guess one of the worst things about living in darkness is missing what everyone else sees. When I was younger I believed I had to keep up, but I never could. Blindness in a seeing world is issolating. When I was around people I learned that they didn’t know what I went through so how could they consider it? It wasn’t until I began spending time by myself that I noticed the world was for me to experience too. Everyone saw a sun rise, I felt its warmth bathe my skin, its beams made apparent how old the day was. I could sleep hours during the day and wake up able to orient myself to the time without help. I left windows open, letting the fresh morning tell me its forecast for the day.
Most people looked to the sky or the news to know of rain or season’s change while I tasted it. I would feel the build up of nature’s anticipation to the sky opening. No greater fragrance revived me than the refreshing cleanse of heaven’s tears upon the earth’s face. The rich soil fermented its gift sprouting forward life. Fall tasted of crisp days and pumpkin lattes, winter made wonderful chilled days and warmth of hearts and spirit, spring brought life and hope, summer enriched joy and carefree ease. My hands have the most fun knowing the world. The tickle, of grass, or the bending and splashing of cool water. Texture and temperature are great guides. I learned glass can get as hot as metal, and that satin can be just as pleasureable to feel as new woolen blankets. A puppy, with its silk fur, or a senior dog with its greasey coat. A child’s chunky arms, are different from a grandma’s aged hands. The skins of trees can be tough and painful or smooth and like wax. The cool shade of a tree tells me what kind of tree it is and how big it is over my head. My bare feet enjoy a walk on the shifting warm sand of a beach or over the tumbling protruding river stones at the bottom of an ankle high streaming creek. And of course the sounds of the world are what I can only imagine as color to my mind. A young boy and his high pitched breaking voice mumbles with a sweet tempered girl. The gravel voice of a father as he talks to his young daughter, her voice young and innocent. The crashing of waves breaking on the surf, reminds me of wind as it tumbles through heaven bound pine trees and how even that sounds like the oncoming of a train. The animals and their languages, the people and their moods. All of this I can take notice of without ever knowing what my eyes pass over but never take in. Maybe sight is held back from some people so they can see beyond where others merely look, and feel more deeply what others think they know.

No matter you feel and touch, tough or smooth, just something around you with no harm. Move forward, is it more beautiful without seeing it, just feel it!

Alone in this flood… Drowning in the pain- Blinded by my blood. I reached out for you.

“You don’t understand.”

Those three words... Like the clouds over the sun- Suddenly the argument was done.

“If you don’t understand... What’s the point?”

Go ahead! Add some more- Twist the blade.

Where the hell are you? Did you lose yourself too? Can you think of someone besides you?

“I don’t care anymore.”

Ouch.

Six minutes in, I listen to the chitchat as my fingers move unwatched. I make notes I’ll never read. I make appropriate sounds. My mind is strips of saris washed, torn, and twisted. Magenta, turquoise, fuchsia, marigold, and an inky black, the yarn explodes in random clashing colors. Conversations weave in and out and all around me. My lids are heavy. My stomach grumbles discontented. Up and over, down and under, my mind shuttles to a peaceful place. The meeting dwindles down. My eyes open. My thumb is stained mysterious scarlet. Recycled sari yarn is skein beautiful but ugly knitted. I examine my handiwork of bristled spider legs of fiber. Sighing, I pull out the needles and begin unwinding the darkness. My mind becomes skein beautiful.

My bedroom is carpet, and the hallway is wood. That’s the big distinction to my bare feet. We don’t close doors here; what’s the point? You can’t see what’s on the other side regardless, and a closed door is just an unexpected wall. And so the soles of my feet tell me what room I’m in, my toes questing for the edge of the stairs as I head by memory for the ground floor, counting steps so I don’t misjudge the distance to the floor. Thirteen, fourteen, fifteen - landed.

Momma is in the kitchen, and I follow the sound of metal pots and utensils clanging together, walking slowly around where I remember the furniture is. We scold each other for moving things, here. Anything out of place could mean a stubbed toe or a worse fall. The kitchen floor is the same hardwood, but it’s warmer in here from the stove, hot air welcoming me in.

“Five o’clock,” says the electronic voice over the clock-speakers. “Dinnertime.”

If I were anyone else, I probably wouldn’t need the clock’s voice to tell me it was dinnertime. Everyone else comes running when they smell dinner. But I’m anosmic, putting me one additional sense behind everyone else in this world of darkness. When I was little, I thought smell was as much a fairy tale as sight, but then I realized I’m not important enough for literally everyone in the world to be lying to me.

It was dark now, so new-moon dark that River and I used our hands to feel along the bricks. We came back to the main road and its street lamps, we let them guide us past the Chinese food stores, past the Japanese hot pot place, past the rows of houses that all looked elegant in their dilapidation, lights still aglow as other students and their music thumped a faint beat in the background. I could see River’s hands instinctively sound out the rhythm. A few months ago, he told me that everything in life had a heartbeat, even the trees.

Hearing the clicking sound of my dog’s nails coupling with the hissing of my cat, I knew they were as frightened as I was in the complete darkness.