The Story of the Man Who Had No Memory of His Past Life
Once upon a time, there was a man who had no memory of his past life. To clarify, I don’t mean that he had no memory of a past life that had occurred before the current life that he was living, but that he had no memory of the past of his current life up to a certain point, after which he remembered everything. He hadn’t had any sort of traumatic brain injury or anything that would cause this sort of memory loss; however, he did carry one remnant of the past—his bad conscience. This is the story of this man as he recovers from this selective amnesia, and has to come to terms with his past actions and words that were so hideous and so horrible that his brain chose to selectively eliminate them from his memory entirely in the interest of self-preservation.
His name was Mitch, and he lived quietly in a nice condo near the beach. He didn’t own the condo, because he was really poor. He’d had a full-time job for about a month before he was fired for starting an argument with a co-worker. In his defense, the co-worker, indeed all of his co-workers, made fun of him mercilessly. He’d ask himself as he sat waiting at the bus stop on his commute home, “What did I ever do to deserve this?” He really didn’t know. Before firing him, the manager gave him a chance to explain himself. Mitch described in detail how all of the co-workers had been insulting him rudely and consistently. The manager chose to fire him immediately anyway, because he figured that it was more likely that Mitch was hearing voices in his head, rather than actually responding to real insults.
Luckily, Mitch had just recently quit a different job, because the manager at his current (now former) job had refused to allow him to keep any available days open for the other job. She did this despite the fact that she allowed everyone else to request days off, gave availability to every other co-worker, and made Mitch close the store (which required at least three or four times the amount of regular work) alone for four out of the five days that he worked. It was not just a turn off the lights sort of close. He had to wash every pitcher, cup, spoon, glass, etc., sweep the floor, mop the floor, replace all ingredients, empty the trash and take it out, make syrup for the morning, cover the pastries, wash out the bins and lids, rinse off the dispensers, wash the drains, and more every night by himself. Every morning when he came to work, his manager would tell him that he did a horrible job closing the night before and that he left the place a disgusting mess. He would respond by saying that he did everything on the list, so she would make a new list every night with more things to do on them. The night before he got fired, the list was over four pages long.
Anyway, luckily, when he had quit the other job the supervisor had told him that if he ever had more availability to give them a call. He was thankful to have that contact now. He called her, and she said that she would be able to hire him in about a week and half. He thanked her, and they hung up. Therefore, he was really poor because he only had a part-time job. Part-time meant especially part-time in his case. He was a little surprised to see that he was only working for six hours in a seven day work week on the schedule.
So, Mitch lived in the condo, not as the owner, but as a roommate whose bed was the couch for a cheap three hundred and fifty dollars a month.
Of course, with events as unfortunate as these, you would expect that Mitch had done something very bad indeed in his forgotten past that would result in the development of poor karma that was currently coming back to him. You would be correct in that assumption. It takes no small misdeed or disreputable action to cause the brain to make the decision to eliminate a memory entirely.
Although, not all aspects of Mitch’s life were totally abysmal or abysmal at all. Living close to the beach is no small advantage to the quality of one’s life, and in addition he had been graciously provided, by God, with enough money to support himself with a reasonable shelter. In fact, the condo was very comfortable. Every day he would give thanks to God for providing him with these things. He also had some possessions, mostly of higher sentimental value than monetary, which included a surfboard, wetsuit, clothes, laptop computer, cell phone, books, and shoes. Actually, he was living a generally blessed life. With the added free time he had from being (essentially) unemployed, he was able to surf several times a week, and was actually becoming fairly talented at it.
However, there were of course a number of things that (rightly so) made his life a living hell at times. For one, there was the issue of the roommates. He hadn’t always lived in the condo. In fact, he had only lived there but a month. Before, he had lived in a small two-bedroom apartment with a roommate. Indeed, there he had been blessed with his own room. However, the wall between the rooms was very thin, and as a result he was often kept up at night to a very late hour with the loud playing of musical instruments. It might have been soothing if the player had been talented. Unfortunately, the roommate was practicing to become a star, but hadn’t quite mastered the chord progression part yet. He had, thankfully, mastered the drug-use aspect, the loud, obnoxious aspect; and the “I don’t care” attitude which was the main theme of all of his songs. Luckily, only a small number of Mitch’s possessions and a couple hundred dollars were stolen during his short month-long stay at the residence. Unfortunately, the roommate had not only insulted him, calling him a faggot, but had also managed to inform everyone that came to the house, loudly, that “He didn’t like this kid. He is gay.”
Indeed, a pattern was arising. Mitch hadn’t stayed in one residence for more than a month since he had left school for the summer last year. The pattern didn’t appear to be stopping any time soon, as his current roommates at the condo had also been rudely and constantly insulting him. He finally decided to confront one of them on one morning, when he was awoken by the roommate loudly calling him a bitch. He got out of bed, and of course, like always, the roommate denied having said anything at all. This is also what happened at the job when he was fired. The roommate said that if he had called him a bitch, then he would have said it to his face, instead of saying it to him while sitting facing him on the back porch. It was obvious that he was lying, and because the roommate was the owner of the house, he told Mitch that he’d better leave the condo soon anyway because it was clear that he had “issues”. When Mitch walked back inside to go to sleep, the roommate continued to insult him, calling him “creepy”, “weird”, “gay”, “bitch”, and a “girl”. This seemed ironic to Mitch, because that roommate was actually openly gay.
Before the gangster rapper music roommate, he’d lived in a hostel for short two week stint. He’d chosen a hostel downtown, because at the time his cell phone service had been deactivated, and he’d only managed to find a hostel through using a computer connected to the internet available to an apartment community through the goodwill of the bellhop at the desk. He was given about ten minutes to use it. There he was able to find one for a fairly cheap rate. He stayed at the hostel in a room with three roommates, two of which were foreign, and one of which was from Hawaii. The Hawaiian one seemed to take to Mitch immediately, and indeed Mitch thought at first that he had actually found a much needed friend. The man talked about passion and work, giving Mitch inspirational sounding advice, and the names of authors like Rhonda Byrne and Brian Tracy.
It was only during the mornings when the man would openly insult Mitch, saying things like “Well, at least I’m not as fucking creepy as this kid,” and “I bet your scared of everything in life, aren’t you, bitch?” that Mitch began to realize that he was not as friendly as he appeared. Mitch would be woken up by these comments, but he would keep his eyes closed and mouth shut as he died a little inside.
However, staying at the hostel was somewhat pleasant. He was able to see the city through the eyes of a tourist. He was able to choose from different events that the hostel held, and go along with the foreigners to enjoy all that downtown had to offer. He made a couple of friends, including one Australian tourist on his way to the Burning Man festival in Arizona. The Aussie had been his roommate for a night or two before leaving for the concert. He’d gone to the beach with him once and he had been cool and everything, so Mitch decided that that counted as him having made a friend. “Score one in the friend column for Mitch,” Mitch had thought.
He’d also made an acquaintance with a sweet woman from northern Europe or something. She’d been very friendly, and had accompanied him on the hostel’s excursion to the local farmers market. When the hostel leader started back, the woman had stayed with Mitch for a short walk on the beach to watch the sunset. He was happy to have the companionship, and gladly walked with her. As the sun began to set, he saw the moment come and pass, because he was too nervous to kiss her. However, as they walked back towards the bus stop, he attempted to romantically sweep her into his arms. She looked at him, confused but relaxed, as he’d tried to move in a little making a move. She kindly kissed him on the cheek. Her face turned red.
Mitch was pretty embarrassed, and felt the quick return of old familiar guilt wash over him. She was kind though, and still friendly, and only said that she didn’t kiss him because he was so much younger than she. This made Mitch even more embarrassed, but he swallowed it, and continued on in a friendly manner in an attempt to salvage the trip’s pleasantness.
They talked a little more before saying good night. He saw her a couple of nights later when she was going out with a group of guys to a bar.
In reality, staying at the hostel had been the beginning of Mitch living his elaborate dream of picking up and moving out to the west coast where he was born. He’d always wanted to learn to surf better, and that was essentially the only reason why he wanted to go. Literally, if there were an ocean with waves close to where he’d previously lived, then he would’ve stayed. Surfing was just so awesome in every way. Not only was it incredibly fun to pop up and ride a board on this big moving wall of water, and then skim down the face, pulling and twisting, using the power of the big, momentous waves; but he also was able to get really good exercise and big muscles without spending time at the gym or doing something monotonous and boring.
However, no man can outrun his past, and Mitch was learning that first hand. Every day, he trudged on, facing the newest creation of heartache and hurt that karma brought back to him on a daily to weekly basis. Mostly, it was in the form of insults, stolen property, or being treated poorly.
Of course, he also had several friendly conversations with people, including lots of surfers who, as it turns out, aren’t all assholes as some might think. I’ve long heard the rumors that surfers, especially locals, have poor attitudes toward anyone new that they don’t know, and I, myself, was pleased to find that this isn’t the case. In some locations, you will hear the occasional “creep” and “Are you gay?”, but for the most part, they are generally friendly. Several of them will start and have conversations, giving advice about different types of boards, or talking about the waves. One was particularly friendly, and pointed out a specific type of bird that he knew the name of that swims on the water in the midst of powerful, giant, crashing waves and casually floats along, diving down occasionally after some fish or for some reason.
And of course there were the pelicans, and the dolphins, the seals, and the seagulls that make surfing even more pleasing and awesome. It is always great to be watching the horizon for waves, and then to see a dolphin catching one within ten to twenty feet of you. Seals are fun to watch, as they lazily roll around floating on their backs. The pelicans either travel in flocks, zooming one or two feet above the water and rising gently above the waves, or fly high in the sky, only to twist and shoot down straight into the water to prey on an unsuspecting fish. The seagulls are always there, shouting their soothing song, along with countless other birds that I couldn’t name, because I just don’t know what they’re called. Anyway, this gives some more insight as to why Mitch would move such a long distance to live near the ocean. Of course, there is also the beach atmosphere. For the most part, people are more laid back and happy to be alive than in other places where it gets really cold and rains.
Nevertheless, Mitch could have been living in the tropics, but he still wouldn’t have been able to outrun his wicked past. He was truly a little bastard, as they say.
You may be wondering, “What did he do?” What perverse and offensive misdeeds did he undertake, that made him deserve such unkindly treatment? He only committed the worst possible misdeeds that you could ever possibly imagine.
Basically, if you combined all of the rapists, murderers, drug dealers, assailants, and criminals of all of the major prisons and maximum security institutions for the criminals and the mentally ill, and had them all go out and do all of the bad things that they did to be put in those places, then it would still only add up to a fraction of what he was responsible for committing.
In fact, Mitch had spent some time in a mental institution, prior to signing out against all medical advice, and taking the trolley downtown to stay in a hostel. He was being treated for depression and psychosis. When he’d left school after the semester was over, he’d been hearing voices that sounded like they were coming from the apartments and people around him. In reality, they were in his head, figments of his imagination. He was sure they were real at first, but then as time went on, more and more people confided to him that they weren’t hearing anything when he would be complaining about the people insulting him. In fact, most likely, he really lost his job and is going to now have to move out of the condo, because he is standing up for himself against these insults which aren’t even being said.
Yep, things look pretty bleak for Mitch, considering it’s a progressive mental illness, and so in reality about ten to fifteen years from now he may find himself having to seek psychiatric help once again, because he may lose contact with reality to the point of not being able to support himself financially and make a living. He may find himself homeless soon enough, fated to sleep on the ground on a spare piece of cardboard that he found next to the dumpster behind the local grocery store.
Luckily, he has no memory of what happened, and is convinced that everything is really happening, and so he isn’t going to seek psychiatric help anytime soon. Nope, he’ll just continue on, seeing the world through the eyes of someone who is constantly being trampled on, insulted, and degraded by the people around him. That’s right, none of it is real. Not one bit of it.
But I digress. So, he’s mentally ill and victim of constant entanglement with possibly some real insulting and degrading behavior, but, what did he do? What did he do to deserve such horrible smiting from God, Hare Krishna, Buddha, and Jesus?
Well, it was no small deed. It occurred a long time ago, between the short period of time when the winter months were transitioning to that of spring time, and the birds were beginning to chirp in the midst of the winter darkness. It was the time when you’d find yourself enjoying the surroundings and the beautiful feelings of rebirth that encompass you, until you decide to go home to your comfortable living space. When you enter, there is a cookie jar on the counter.
Yes, that’s right. Mitch took the cookie from the cookie jar: that greedy bastard.