Part of my brain is an archive room. There are plenty of shelves. On those shelves, plenty of boxes. Different colors and sizes. All carefully labelled. Names, sometimes with dates and places.
In the boxes, I can find words of course, whole sentences, intact, out of time. Mental photographs with sharp details. And more elusive perceptions, such as looks or gestures.
I have one or several boxes for most people I've met. Some for relevant places and animals too. After all, human beings have never been the center of my attention.
I can't always access what's in the boxes. Sometimes, someone else will open a box for me as they happen to have one with the same label on their own shelves. A common memory. A TV show or a song can also trigger that, when least expected.
But usually, it's my unconscious that shows me what's inside the boxes I can't access. Good boxes... a few, mainly bad ones. It's not necessarily the dustiest boxes, but clearly those with sharp blades in.
I don't think those boxes are placed randomly on the shelves. I don't think the shelves themselves are placed randomly in the room.
I believe I can move some of those boxes consciously. Now and then I choose to keep some at eye level for a while. Rarely for positive reasons. I know that to live a better life, I would have to go up there and put order drastically. Then, I would place only "good" boxes at eye level. The labels of those read Jesolo, George and Yiannis, Clinton, Sölvesborg... The "bad" ones, which are way more numerous, I should bury in the very back. Actually, if there was a way to just remove those boxes from the shelves, I would gladly do it. This, I guess, would be amnesia. Does amnesia necessarily means no more nightmares?
My nightmares feed on those boxes. To the point that I now fear bedtime, and insomnia is a regular visitor. Those nightmares usually pick a detail in the day just gone by and choose a box accordingly. Or they just go random (unless I missed the "triggering detail", which probably happens often).
Their favorite box — my mother's one — should now have been moved far into the back, to the "cemetery section". But I believe there's no such place. Already years ago, I realized that my unconscious doesn't make a difference between the living and the dead. In my nightmares (or dreams), they're all there, vividly alive. On top of that, I see myself stuck in my late teens, exactly how I was back then, hair to the bottom and obnoxious behaviour.
Among my most frequent nightmares are those linked to the North-East of France, where I've spent my first 19 years. Here the sick mind o'mine picks from many different boxes, big and smaller ones. Whatever the size, all those boxes have something in common: they're all dark. I'm still chewing on their bitter stuff 30 years later. Would a steady psychotherapy have helped me out? I will always wonder, but I'm a deep pot of doubt.
When I try to get an overview of my archive room, I see that the majority of the boxes are in dark shades.
I wish I could keep only the colorful ones, featuring warmth and safety. In them I can find the Adriatic sea, fig trees, insane rock gigs, squirrels and rabbits playfulness... Kind words. Kind words above all.
And that box. The all white one. Oversized.
The one I would keep on the very top shelf, where it's been since its creation.
The one I carefully selected what I put in, leaving the rest empty on purpose.
My very own handcrafted work. Twisted but sacred.
On the label, only two letters.
That one, is my box for dreams.
Only once touched, for ever mysterious.