the box epiphany.

i can't collect the right words to form an adequate definition of it. hell, i can't even collect the wrong words. all i can tell you is that it's called "the box epiphany" and it changes your life everytime. the box epiphany: pe1- the realization of how closely your present [physical] environment is connected to your past [emotional] environment; the cause and result of nostalgia.

chapter 22
by hana lee

pol tells her: be quiet, you're talking to yourself again. she closes her mouth shut. it has been approximately ten years since they moved in and now they're taking those ten years away in boxes. remember baseball games with plastic pipes and a tennis ball? stomach aches from 10 tubes of pelon (damn that ice cream man, he always looked suspicious). backyard campouts with in and out burgers and orange bang. uppercutting the neighborhood bully. the earthquake. the rubble. the screaming tears. the cancer. the addictions. she duct tapes them shut, they're talking to themselves again, these boxes. and then, as fast as the movers pocketed their tip, she forgot everything- just locked everything up and threw away the key.

ten years later, pol calls her: pick me up, let's eat, it's been forever. no, pol, just ten years. she was out on her own now, living in a quaint and pleasant place with a backyard and a garage. strangely enough, it looks almost identical to the house she moved out of ten years ago. but she dares not tell pol, for reasons that weren't real enough for her to explain.

pol tells her: let's do bbq, dr. hogly wogly's will blow your fxcking mind. she nods as she adjusts her seatbelt. she nods as she drives him across the blocks, unevenly lit by dying fluorescent lights. she nods, as the radio plays a dumb song by a dumb band. pol whispers [to himself, not to her]: man, this place brings back memories. her nodding stops as she asks: mm, what do you mean? he looks at her, with his eyes calling her stupid and his lips mouthing: we used to live here, a few blocks down.

and somewhere and somehow, someone found her key and released every childhood memory that belonged to her. like flying snapshots in an HP commercial. Someone, quick, start playing "Picture Book" because she can't get anything else in her head but: you're back. you're back. you're back, and you didn't even know it.

pol tells her: be quiet. you still talk to yourself?

she tells pol: no, it's just... it's the box epiphany.

artist[ ben tour.