The Bitter Kiss of Reality

It never ceases to amaze people, how in one's mind there remains a firm belief that we still think and feel as we did when we were only teenagers!

How many times have you heard similar words to these?

My mind still thinks it is eighteen, but my body doesn't seem to agree!

The sad irony is only exposed, when you try to recall something that you thought rested on an easily accessible shelf, just beside the Cornflakes. Your mind forlornly attempts to focus on the detail of those special moments that only you and your closest friend's value. The memories tantalise you, lingering just beyond your reach, teasing you as they pop in and out of focus, it's like reading the newspaper through your bifocals.

Who are we trying to kid anyway, it all happened a bloody long time ago, and we have just been awakened by 'The Bitter Kiss of Reality'. At the age, those memories were forming, had we looked back equally as far into the past, there's no doubt we would have considered it to be in the olden days. Far, far too much water has flowed under the proverbial bridge. The current of life, and those 'Rivers In Time', flow endlessly into eternity, carrying with them our precious memories, taking them deep into the furthermost reaches of our minds.

This is my story, which talks of such a challenge!

In the eyes of my friends and family, I have lived what on the face of it, is a fairly, normal life. However, I've experienced a far different life to the one perceived by those who believe they know me. There have been many times when I've found myself for want of a more apt description, transported to what you might call an alternative reality. These transportations have always occurred at significant waypoints in my life and may be circumstantial or traumatic, but one question always remains unanswered. Are these transportation's a figment of an emotionally induced psychosis, or are they really occurring in some alternate reality that interacts with ours? I cherish the later and choose to believe it to be true.

Having passed middle age, and moving with increasing speed into old age, I am attempting to relate the truths and fantasies of my real or unreal experience, by putting them into words. I have deliberately chosen not to start at the beginning, but to focus on a pivotal adventure shared with four of my teenage classmates. These were not my best mates, but a group of lads who became important to me, when circumstance had unkindly separated me from my chosen friends. To begin this process, I needed to find a means of bringing us all together, one more time. This was no easy feat, as I had not met with either Tank, Owl, Mac or Gio since leaving school, nearly fifty years ago.

I've chosen to start my search for the truth, by arranging a school reunion, at which I hope to meet up with the lads in question, and this is where my story will begin.

The transcription of my experience into words, may or may not help me rationalise the reality of the secret path I've taken, nevertheless, it will I'm sure, prove cathartic to me, and provide you with an insight into the strange and often fascinating world trapped for so long inside my mind.

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