"You suffer from me," moaned the Anxious One.
Nobody said anything. They had been over this so many times already - all old arguments - and they were far more interested in what the Writer had to say.
"Anyway...I had not considered it. It just had not crossed my mind. And when... when... well, when on of my dearest friends' wife started to maybe exhibit traces of something like this, it just completely zapped all my desire to even come close to mocking it."
"It wouldn't have been mockery, you know."
"Yeah, but it might've." The Writer buried her head in her hands on her lap.
"You've been drinking that one's kool-aid," said the Researcher, pointing at the Anxious One.
"Hey. Kool-aid is gross. I don't even drink that stuff. It's just for kids with parents who don't care about red-40 making them hyper."
***
"Why do you have all these shirts, anyway?" asked the Researcher to the Mystic. She had just finished an hour long yoga class in the park and was now folding laundry. Her Na-Meow-Ste tank was neatly folded next to a pile of others. For example:
Another tank with a cat in sunglasses in a yoga pose with the caption "Caturanga!"
A faded Three Wolf Moon shirt that she had owned before it was really a thing
A shirt with a Kit Kat bar and the caption "Break me off a piece of that!"
A shirt with about ten cats sitting on stand-up paddle boards doing yoga, one of them saying, "Flow With Me."
A shirt in German Fraktur stating, "Making Eyes Bleed Since 1515"
"Easy. They're really dorky."
"Huh?" The Researcher was genuinely confused. "What's the... what's the appeal in that?"
"Misdirection."
"Tell me?"
"Sure. It's just this: you guys are always mocking me. Making fun of my attempts at reaching inside myself, trying to focus on the good, breath away the bad."
"That's because it's a bunch of hocus pocus nonsense that isn't based on rational thinking."
"No, it's because you guys are all somewhat insecure, and you don't or can't admit that there are things that I could teach you about the world."
The Researcher didn't really buy it, but was genuinely interested in hearing more. "But what does that have to do with the tees?"
"You always mock me anyway. Why not give you something concrete to laugh about, why not live up to your expectations of me. It hurts a lot less when you're laughing at something that doesn't matter and actually, maybe is a bit funny."
"So... the tees are just a way of getting us to forget about why we actually dislike you?"
The Mystic frowned. "I don't think you actually dislike me."
"Distrust, then." The Researcher waved her hand, as if the two were one and the same.
"There's a pretty big difference, you know."
"Hmm. If you say so."
"Wasn't there something else that you wanted to talk about?" asked the Mystic. She was getting a little bit irritated.
"Yes!" The Researcher brightened. "It's been brought to my attention that - that, well, you've been... how do I say this? You've been dreaming."
"We all have dreams."
"Yes, yes, of course, but I mean night dreams."
"Sure. Don't we all?"
"That's just it! I don't think we actually do. I certainly don't. The Writer doesn't. The Philosopher doesn't. The Anxious One only has nightmares, and that's not at all what I'm interested in studying right now."
"Sure, I dream. I had a really great dream last night."
"Will you tell me about it?"
"No."
"Was it too sexual?"
The Mystic laughed. "Not at all. In any way."
The Researcher frowned. "Then - then why won't you tell me?"
"You wouldn't get it."
"What wouldn't I get?"
"You would go about interpreting it the wrong way."
"Oh? You... you interpret these things? How can one interpret the subconscious?"
"It's literally all about feelings. There aren't cold, hard calculations that go into it. I simply replay the dream and think hard about my feelings, and the meaning is just there. It's simple."
"So let me get this straight - after you think about it for a while, the meaning just... it just appears?"
"It's just suddenly apparent."
"How?" The Researcher was genuinely fascinated.
"It just is. That's how it's always been. That's how I receive messages from beyond."
"What?" The Researcher looked skeptical.
"Look, I have stuff to do. I don't really need you making fun of me about things that are actually important. If you came here to laugh, just do it." She pelted a t-shirt at the Researcher. It had a confused looking cat in a downward facing dog position, except her belly was towards the sky. All the surrounding mats had dogs. The cat's thought bubble read, "Am I missing something?"
The Researcher grinned and was pelted by another t-shirt that said, "THERE'S NO BUSINESS LIKE FLOW BUSINESS."
"Fine - fine. You're not going to tell me the dream. You're not going to tell me how the analysis works. But can you at least tell me the conclusion? What does it mean? Why are you so happy?"
"When I've had dreams like this in the past, happy, calm, good dreams about the thing I've been worried about during the day, it has always been so irregular, so outside myself, that I take it to hold a bit more meaning. Once, a long time ago, a dream like this literally protected me from completely giving up on a friend who was being particularly difficult.
These dreams are not really assurances of *exactly* what's to happen. I don't predict anything actually like the scene that played out for me will actually happen, or even with the exact people I was dreaming about. Dreams aren't that literal in meaning (usually). But still, it means I can have good reason to hope that I will get what I'm longing for, and that what God has in store for me really does involve people with whom I can relax and just hang out, and be me - people who actually listen to me, and ask my opinion, and want to know me. That I'm going to get what I'm after.
It was a very, very good dream. Precious to me, even."
The Researcher smiled and did something unexpected. She got up, walked over to the Mystic, and gave her a hug. "I might not understand everything about the way you and your mind work, and I may be predisposed to distrust what I do not understand. But something about your story just make me feel so happy. I want the same things, you know, and my methods and net-casting aren't...well...they just..."
"They don't really work that well."
The Researcher hung her head in shame. "I don't understand it."
The Mystic touched the Researcher's hand gently. "Hey, it's okay to not be perfect yet. You gotta just accept who you are in the Now. It's going to be okay."
"I want to know everything."
"You either will, or you won't, but right now you don't. And that's okay."
"Sounds like a mantra for lazy people."
The Mystic laughed. "Don't you remember the other day when the Writer sat there at her computer, laughing and laughing and laughing? Her co-author friend had written something about how happy he was with the progress, and how surprisingly fast they had been getting along through all the Czechlish."
"Don't even mention Czechlish," sighed the Researcher. "It has been a major source of frustration to me these past three months."
"Yeah. But anyway, don't you remember how our co-author friend said something like, "I overestimated my laziness."? And the Writer said, "That's literally something that I have never done in my life.""
"Because it's true. We've never done that. I can't even really quite imagine circumstances under which I might think, let alone utter, those words."
"The point is, yeah, some people would take some sappy mantras the exact wrong way and interpret them to mean complacent, immobile apathy. But you won't. So they mean something different for you. You can internalize them and they can really help you with the kind of self-love that would ultimately increase your productivity and - and - and perhaps be the key to solving this weird How to Make Friends mystery."
"I thought the problem was more that I only get along with people who share my same super-niche interests."
The Mystic shook her head. "No. The problem is squarely that you don't believe that other people out there exist who might love you as you are. And until you yourself love yourself, you're not going to be able to internalize it as a real possibility."
"So, focus my efforts on self-love?" The Researcher felt really uncomfortable and skeptical.
"In a way. But the First and Greatest Commandment is actually not self-love, you know."
The Researcher smiled. "Sure do know that. I've been studying the New Testament, you know! Matthew 22..."
The Mystic smiled back.
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