The Abandoned





KC Chan Wing Haw



 
© Copyright 2020 by KC Chan Wing Haw


 

Photo by the author.

Photo by the author.                      


This story tells how I as an individual who likes to think we have forgotten our roles the way our daily lives take us on. Storeroom is one place we rarely spend time tidying up or even use our free time thinking bout what contains inside. I decided to open this door and I see a different self.

The lights went off and no longer the man stood inside holding his torch of thoughts the same way as collectors. Most of the time, usually, not in any manner an ordinary person would think, importance and significance are two crucial elements.

This man inside my home, I regard as someone who reminds what we keep in our storerooms can always be considered as solicitude, as always.

Don’t get me wrong as if this man is any different from you and me. We often hear every man for himself, thus, this social participant becomes part of me and everybody’s lives referring to our best heights.

Sometimes, storeroom such as mine, messy, untidy, often appears haunted in many degrees. I feel I have neglected my care towards some abandoned possessions. From the painting on the walls and objects I hardly come across teach me this – stay away from your past.

Whoever invented rooms to store or even the ones you lie down to rest, and, be thoughtful, one day, anything in any of these rooms go to the other room, vice versa. We don’t worship them during our lifespans, but somehow, we use the lowest values (in within) and purchase them on our credit terms to be part of this luxurious world.

Remembering where your lost items in the house can be challenging even at times you know exactly where they are. Each episode in our lives contain another dead end where these furniture, a piece of note, boxes or clothes can certainly make us see where we last held our breaths.

They (these little ornaments) inside our homes change the way we deal with the world and those around us. Time can easily mislead us as it alters and shifts our thinking. While some of these minor things lose its once believed made-up commercial values, we think highly of. We stop thinking and complaining.

The other side of this haphazard room lives a huddle quite the opposite. Some of us we notice the difference and expect a change. Quite a many of us we refuse to mess the inside to the outside. As this man whom I believe clearly, in his time, or at unattained time, when the house remains for solely its architectural purposes, he opens this door and directs me the definitive assets captured in between the storeroom and hallway.

There were questions asked, but, no voice, as strange as this man:

Aren’t we the same, after all? Do you not see what lives are when left abandoned? Will you set me free?”

The choice for me to close this storeroom, I once threw a piece of white porcelain China made statute and hit the wall, is firm and no other complains.

The sounds at midnight, couldn’t escape but groan elsewhere. Again, the door is closed and shut with another thought.

This man has left his stricture inside the storeroom. No argument can be formed at his peril, for he knows his voice is silenced. In between those tittle-tattle, in whatever ways, they destroy and ruin once a beauty then, now so recycled or maybe, entirely in its zero form, or just like any one of those seers gibberish said in their own terms, “my son, you must throw away what you’ve used and eaten in the house for they gather more infectious diseases than you think they shouldn’t. This turns out to be the same in life where you shouldn’t overuse something and mess about it.”

Walking away and lifting another piece of dead dry cloth means, it’s cleaning season. The man outside, again, thinks over what can be done. He looks and searches for the right hours to be the cat’s pyjamas.

Even as the wall grandfather clock is never a thing in the storeroom, it’s something valuable to look at. This man takes his cloth, finds a chair, sits down, smokes and watches the change of the clock. At present, he looks at everything because every hour speaks of the different themes in and out from where he sits to enjoy the living lifestyle.

Air is definitely different from the outside. Somehow, another knock comes right through his head and wakes some part of him. The unbridled hours and words escaping from the man sitting outside, the other man inside slowly consumes the ambience ignoring nothing at random found around him. He only clarifies his earlier intention.

Set me free.”

He wants to get up and search for the older bric-a-brac around but he’s startled by the sound of pendulum. It goes counting the seconds, quietly, while he’s holding the dry cloth, intended for unkempt purposes.

Far from living in the face of alack, we have forgotten how values can be drawn upon the brawn found anywhere close we choose to.

Later that evening, although all doors are safely locked and closed. This man outside can’t appoint his duty till tomorrow. He sighs loud enough to hear his lungs expanding only near his chest. But the clock shows him its warning, he has to make his move faster than a chess player. His mood drops to the lowest. Most of the chairs are cleaned, except the moist towel is left to dry near the glass window. His pace back to the chair the same we often think, “Work is done and time to relax.”

The opposite is extremely true.

We never learn the proper way to unlock our doors because we are afraid of sounds and memories. Twice he sighs harder than the first. He walks to the storeroom, unlocks it and says this – goodnight.


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