Client Missed - Session 1

(Beep. Music fades in.)

Words have immense power over us. They were the creation of human minds. We gave them their meanings, but now, they hold meaning over us. Some more than others, right? There are some words we react to more strongly than we do others. There are words that stand to represent huge swatches of our lives. Our current states, as it were. There are words that could practically stand in for our names. 

And your word is missed.

(Music fades out and new music fades in)

To which, you say, “What do you mean?” And you may feign some level of surprise when you say it. Or it’s not feigned. It’s just not the sort of surprise someone might expect. It’s not disagreeing with the notion more like the context. You’re surprised I noticed. You’re not surprised that there’s something there to notice. In fact, you know about that all too well. This is your reality, after all. I’m just passing through.

And passing through doesn’t mean you’re actually looking, you want to say. You know that too. You regularly drive your car. Your workplace is back fully in-person after all of those unprecedented times, and you live just as far away as you did before then. You can’t afford to move, you think. You don’t want to gamble with whether or not you’d be able to afford the higher rent that you’d be taking on. Because anything can happen, right?

“Things can always get worse,” you want to say, but you don’t say. Because there’s no one there to say it to.

You’re not alone. The space around you is occupied, but still, something is missing. It’s the connection, the interaction, you think. And I suspect that you are probably right. Presence is not the same as company. Those around you offer the former but not the latter. No one offers you the latter. And that company is something to be missed, right? Human beings were never meant to be alone, and yet, there you find yourself. You are not without your social contacts. You have family, friends, and coworkers, but do they see you or perceive you in any meaningful way? 

You don’t think so. In fact, you are inclined to think the opposite. You’re not a connection to them but a presence. And you have reason to think as much. You just ignore those reasons. You aren’t missing them. You just don’t like the weight of these reasons in your hands, the way they grate against your soul when they move. But at the same time, they are a very familiar devil. And that makes them hard to let go of. 

But you are alone. You are missed. In the sense of being overlooked, you say. Or you think you should say. 

(Music fades out and new music fades in)

“Things can always get worse,” you don’t say, but if you were to say it, if there were people around you to hear you say it, then you would have to deal with the true heart of what was said. Things could always be worse, implying there is a worse, right? That is a premise lurking beneath the surface of the words themselves. Things cannot get worse if there is no worse to descend into. 

But there’s another side of it, right? There’s the side we don’t think or talk about. Yes, things could always get worse, but they could get better as well. They could have been better. There has to be a reason why you look into such things. There’s a reason you want the assurance. Something is missing perhaps, and you are looking for assurance that you never needed it in the first place. 

“No,” you argue, “It’s not that. I have everything I need.”

But need is an interesting choice of verb in that sentence. One might think it’s objective, right? “Need” refers to the sort of input that keeps us alive. You can agree with that definition. But what is alive? What is a life, even? Or would you not distinguish it from such a thing as “existence?”

“You’ve lost me,” you say. But you won’t clarify why or where you fell of this train of thought. You only want to make it clear that you are gone. To what end? Of that you know, you want to make the conversation stop. If you don’t feed into the beast, it does. But that goes back to need, doesn’t it? Because it’s the need of something you want to stifle or avoid. In that need, there is power in the denial or deprivation, right? 

At least here. Maybe in other places as well. Maybe in your life more broadly. But you don’t want to think about that. You don’t want to think about times when the flame within you was denied something or what it needed. A fire without fuel is on the verge of burning out. 

And are you that fire, you sometimes think. Did your light dim from deprivation, not just that of other people but your own? Did you not stoke the light within you as diligently as you should have? And what does that even mean?

“What does that mean?” you fear. What should have been yours–be it gift, victory, or duty–that you never seized? What were you meant to become, that you never did? What have you missed out on, you could say. You won’t say. 

(Music fades out and new music fades in)

There are things we don’t want to think about. There are truths that we hide about ourselves, but that isn’t wise to do. These things always float to the surface of who we are, so it’s a fruitless endeavor. But it’s even worse when that thing extends beyond us. When it’s larger than us, and hiding it becomes impossible. We may try, but there’s something absurdly naive about the attempt. 

So you can try to avoid seeing it as much as you want, but it is still there. It will never not be there. But, I wonder if–perhaps–your other senses are just as unagreeable on the subject. Sure, it can be hard to see certain things. But perhaps it’s easier through other mediums. I know you cannot face the truth, but will you, by chance, be willing to hear it?

(Music fades out. Beep.)

The Oracle of Dusk is a production of Miscellany Media Studios with music licensed from the Sounds like an Earful music supply. It was written, edited, produced, and performed by MJ Bailey. And if you like the show, tell friends about it or the quasi-friends that are still on your social media feeds because social norms evolved before words did, am I right?