These days, a rock on which I sit on a plain with a pool on one side and a fog bank on the other. There is frenetic activity on the plain but, even if I can see it, I'm never a part of it.
The pool is full of alcohol and, whenever I lean forward to drink, the Kracken gets a tenticle around my arm and starts trying to pull me in. The fog bank contains a Tobacco Plant with tendrils that are constantly trying to pull me towards it.
In the distance, I can see one person surrounded by life. She is walking further away from me illuminated by the light that once shone on the teeming life on the plain before I even understood how much I needed it. She is now so far away I couldn't shout loud enough to make her hear me, and wouldn't want to disturb her if I could.
A child is crying beside me because, one by one, most of her dolls have been smashed. She keeps saying that something is causing her to drop the dolls, but each time she pretends that the doll is naughty she smashes it herself. I have a bag full of dolls and keep giving them to her, but she keeps finding excuses to smash them and always says it's because they were naughty. Every time I look at the activity on the plain she smashes another doll and asks for a replacement, crying harder than ever.
In my pocket is a candle snuffer. It looks tiny but, sometimes when the crying gets particularly hard, or the life on the plain particularly far away, it grows, and I realise I could put it over my head if I wanted. I would never be able to leave it if I did, but nor would I ever hear the crying again, or see the life move further away than it already has, or have to avoid the Kracken or the fog bank again.
So I decide to take another drink from the pool or delve into the fog bank for a while, avoiding tentacles and tendrils as much as I can. And then I get her another doll.