Gibberish

A first-person conversational narrative

Let me tell you something important, but before that -

 

Do you know that the first man to build a bonfire doesn’t know what the glowing hot ember was called? Or that there were no established language to even base the etymology of the word ‘fire’ from. I believe that when he strike two flat stones together, and it created a spark that got caught on dry wood, all that came out of his mouth was a grunt of surprise.

 

“Ugh” that translates to “What is this?” and “Ack!” that means “Okay, I’m not touching that again.”

 

But this man knew eventually how essential that glowing hot ember is. How necessary it will be for his survival and the survival of those who were with him that time, munching on wild berries (except that those berries weren’t wild, probably, or was it called wild because they themselves didn’t plant it? I digress). They discovered how good it felt to just be near the burning thing in the middle of the camp (or cave), but not to make the mistake of touching it or else risking getting hurt.

 

And someone did get hurt. Let’s just call him Dave. Dave’s curiosity was advanced in his time - no one was as curious as Dave. And so Dave touched the new discovery that was warming them up. And it burned (although the word “burn” wasn’t coined that time, as there was no established language yet, as I have said). Well Dave got burnt, and it smell like something to be eaten with, but of course, as primitive as they were, they had their moral conducts. They can’t, for the life of them, eat Dave.

 

So what’s my point? Well, my point is that -

 

 

But before I get to that point, Dave’s people couldn’t tell where the urge to hunt down boars and mammoths for meat had started. Maybe by the time Dave touched the burning glow, got hurt, and the smell of burning meat turned their olfactory nerves on - they realized that, hey, meat is great! Let’s make spears to catch some. And so they did. And now the food pyramid was partially completed as they had fruits and meat on their diet.

 

I apologize if I’ve wasted your time. I’m just not good in articulating my words. I’d probably have the primeval gene of not having a language to be articulated to. In simple terms, what I mean is, I’m lost for words.

 

If you’re going to open my skull, and pick my brain - besides all the icky gray mass, and nerves, and synapses (and blood!), besides all of these, you’ll see how the nerve endings light up at the moment, especially on the prefrontal cortex and its neighbor - the amygdala.

 

Or if you’re going to open up my rib cage and look inside the left-side cavity where my heart nestled in, you’d probably be amazed as how I am still standing here and talking to you. An average person has a heart rate of 60 to 100 beats per minute, mine was a thousand pulses -

 

I exaggerated that last part but you get me, right? You always do. All you need is to look into my eyes, and just like that, you’d read me like a book.

 

I’ve got something important to tell you. But before that -

Haven’t you wondered where and when wishing on falling stars had started? Maybe some Roman astrologist started a fad in making a wish on potential comets that could destroy the world. I’m pretty sure dinosaurs didn’t start that one out. They were wiped out of existence because of these heavenly lights that decided to fall down and create a cosmic firework display.

 

An account I dug up said that the Greeks believe that when there were shooting stars in the night sky, these were the time that the gods would peek down from their heavenly sanctuaries to look on their mortal subjects, thus making the stars slip down in earth. And what excellent time to make a wish knowing that the gods who can grant requests were looking down at all of us here in earth.

 

I made a wish. Or maybe some wishful thinking. That from the people present that night, you’ll look up on the other side of the camp’s bonfire and notice an awkward human being staring at you and trying to rehearse all the words that can possibly make a sentence that starts with “Hi, I am…”

 

Hi, I am just here looking at you and how the reflection of the growing fire reflects in your eyes. And I’m just mesmerized how it flickers like dancing on a beat that only our hearts can hear. How your smile is as warm as the red embers that create distance between us but, ironically, pulling me closer to you. How the night sky is full of stars but none of those stars are as beautiful as you.

 

But as you caught my eye, and gave me that inquisitive look that would, later on, always stop my thousand-pulsed heart - the words that would come out of my mouth were “ugh” and “ack” and gibberish. Yet, even then, you always knew how to read me.

 

I’ve got something important to tell you. It is so important that my mind just went blank and I have to sidetrack once again to the time when Shakespeare wrote his prose for the Queen while trying so hard to hide the fact that the true muse for his words was Her Majesty’s maid. You are the muse of all the words that I can’t make myself say out loud.

 

My muse. The highlight of the prose. The first thought after praying to the Lord of one best thing to look forward to in an ordinary day. The missing puzzle piece when the day was spent not having a conversation with. I guess, what I’m trying to say is that, you complete the 24-hour cycle of the analog clock. And I’m not even kidding when I check for the nth time if a message somehow pops up in my phone, and if that message happens to be from you.

 

I apologize if I beat around the bush too much. Like a lost sheep looking for the greener pastures when what I am looking for is right here, waiting for me to get to that important thing that I’m going to say.

 

I do have an important thing to say -

 

That from the moment that I started knowing you, discovering things about you -maybe the Greeks were right that gods do peek from the skies every once in awhile and grant favors to us mortals. That I am truly delighted to be able to stick around. And that I would do everything I can to be able to stay. And I do hope that I can, that you’ll let me.

 

I have something important to say, and that is -

 

I just want you to know that I am truly delighted to be in your life.

Reviews

[JayG]

• Do you know that the first man to build a bonfire doesn’t know what the glowing hot ember was called?

Of course he did. People FIRST learned to use the fire that was started by lightening. And they saw it burning, and know what it could do, and to keep away from wildfire long before they “tamed” it for their own use. In fact, they probably decided it was useful when they found, and tasted, an animal that had been burned by a wildfire.

There’s a lot of interesting history that goes with use of fire, and it’s thought that one of the reasons we are what we are is that cooking our food made it easier to digest, thus giving us more nourishment with less food. Here’s one article on it: https://time.com/5295907/discover-fire/

• I believe that when he strike two flat stones together,

First, slapping rocks, flat or not won’t strike a spark. That takes flint.

Remember, not matter how much you may believe something, it has nothing to do with it being either true or false. In short: Do-your-research.

As for the story, the same applies. Do a bit of research into how to write fiction. The approach to it is VERY different from the skill our teachers called writing, in school. That was the kind of writing we label nonfiction, and meant for reports. Use that approach and it ends up reading like a report. No way around that.