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Walls are fantastic.
There's a lot you can do with walls if you want. Sure, they can surround you all they like, but you can have doors, and windows, to let some light in. Shame not all of it. But we're not allowed to live in glasshouses. Well, we shouldn't. The light can get in, but if they smash, no, not good. The glass would kill us.
Wallpaper can be put up, or you can paint them. Some like to hang mirrors on their walls, or paintings, pictures, things that have happened. Some even like to put shelves on their walls, so they can put stuff on them. Carry little things on their walls. Keep them amused. Store them for later, when they're bored.
If you lie down, you can pretend walls are ceilings. Or floors. That's always fun. Try walking up them, or pretending you're lying on the ceiling.
You can put phones on walls.
Radiators. Keep you warm.
Careful when it comes to night though, and all those windows might show people outside what line your walls. So make sure you can pull back the curtains when you need to.
How long, do you think though, would it take to get bored of the walls?
Mostly, people just change the wallpaper. Paint it a new shade. Hell, can't blame them.
Me? I prefered to look out the window. Play by the window sill. Look at the lands. It was nice. There was something I loved to look at the most though. A hill.
If I imagined hard enough, I could see shelves on the hill. Wallpaper covering them, or maybe painted blue. I wondered why the hill wasn't afraid to show what it looked like underneath. Perhaps it just hadn't chose a colour. Perhaps nobody loved it enough to paint them.
But I loved it. I loved the hill. Should I paint it? I didn't know. Would I love it if I painted it too, would I love it the same? Would I find it so rewarding to see, if it was lined with pictures, if there were little windows with horrible white netting covering them?
Nah. The hill didn't need windows. It didn't need doors. There was no need to escape from it. Strange.
It was nice to know though, that, through all the times I had spent with my walls, and the boring old colours, that never pleased me no matter what they were, I could always look out, and see that hill.
Night time would come. I'd have to close the curtains. Wouldn't want people to see me. But in those dark hours, I couldn't sleep. Oh no... the hill was still in my mind. The lush green grash where I could end my days, lie upon and watch the sunset. And when I did sleep, I'd fall into a land of dreams, of me rolling around the hill.
Mixing a few paints, I drew the hill on my wall, and painted it... it looked good, very pretty, much like the hill outside. I wasn't skillful, but it was the fact that it was my hill that made me smile. I'd reach it one day.
So, along came the day where I gathered the courage. I was very excited.
I asked if I could go out and see the hill. Maybe just lie on it for a while.
I wasn't allowed. I couldn't work out why. It wasn't that far away. And even if it WAS far, why should it make a difference? It wasn't dangerous, it was a hill. Hills. Something to lie on. Something to climb.
So I'd sigh, go back to looking at it. Watch as the sun set over it, the green grass fading into a beautiful purple before the sun died, split between acceptance and hope, clouds forming around as it died, as if to honour it's last moments.
And the days went past, and I got fed up with asking, answer was always them same. Suppose the walls could do with a new lick of paint. Getting bored again. Shelves are untidy. Perhaps some new pictures. And eventually I painted over my hill. But it didn't matter, I'd think to myself with a sigh.
Then, one evening, watching the hill and thinking about a new colour to paint my walls, I noticed something.
Someone was walking over the hill. I leaped out of my chair and pressed myself against the window, thinking that those few millimetres would help me see clearer as I squashed my nose into the glass.
And there, in the distance, a person. They climbed the hill, got to the top, stood tall, looked all around, and walked towards the sunset, and down the other side.
So, of course, that sparked me off again. Not only now did I want to see the hill... I wanted to see what was on the other side.
You wouldn't believe how excited I was. I couldn't believe I hadn't thought about it before... the hill was all well and good, and my, it was beautiful, but what lay beyond it? The hill surely went down... what was there?
So off I went again, even peaking in the night, drawing back the curtains to see what it looked like at night... so beautiful in the moonlight.
I painted again. The hill returned to my walls, and this time, I painted myself standing on the top of them, looking over in joy to whatever the other side would bring... it was beyond my imagination, and I didn't really want to guess.
One night, I decided to take another look out of the window... hoping my parents wouldn't catch me with curtains closed after dark. And once again, there was someone there, climbing the hill.
I couldn't believe it! Another one!
I knocked on the window, I screamed, I tried to attract the person's attention... 'WHAT'S THERE?! WHAT'S THERE?!'
The person turned, and looked back. I could see him smile, and he waved.
Then my parents woke up, and dragged me away from the window... I looked out of the window too often, they said. They were worried about me. They didn't like the way I painted things on my walls. It didn't look nice.
I'd scream, and I cried, and my parents boarded up my windows. No longer I could look outside, no longer could I see my hill. And perhaps I could have accepted it, if they hadn't painted over my hill on the wall too.
I couldn't believe it. No window for me. Nothing.
And so we'd paint the walls, again and again. Keep him happy, do what he needs... another shelf, another picture. No hills. No hills in the pictures please.
I didn't say much anymore. I smiled, said I was fine. But all the while, I knew, I KNEW that they could paint over my walls as much as they liked... but deep down under them, was my hill. I knew it was there. It was always there. And I'll climb it. I knew I would.
Somehow.
One day.
Maybe.
Sigh.
And one day, someone gave me a mirror, and I was left alone with it. It was a nice present, not one I'm sure I wanted, but I seemed to think it was a nice idea at the time.
And for the first time, I saw myself. I saw what I had become. It made me feel sick. I could see the walls behind me, my reflection stuck between them all.
It drove me mad. I felt like smashing the mirror... punching my fist into it... why did it torture me! What was it trying to do! I couldn't bare it...
So I stopped sleeping. There was the mirror, smiling at me. Showing me... me.
I had never realised how close the walls were. So tight around me. I couldn't escape them.
So I gave up. I accepted the room, and I accepted my walls, I accepted all the paintings, the paintings I hated, the ones I loved, they were all the same in the end... But, as I was just about to hang myself from the top shelf... I looked in the mirror... and I accepted me.
I couldn't believe it. What the hell was I doing?
The thing that had drove me so mad... so... low... was the final thing that clenched me. The thing that finally clicked everything back. So what if I couldn't see the hill? So what if it was out of sight? It's still there... I know it, deep down. And if it isn't? There will be more.
So I bided my time. I'd smile, and for the first time in my life, I felt truly happy.
And came the day.
They accidently left the door open.
I knew what I had to do... this was my chance, I was given this. Make a move.
But as I left the room, I looked back into it. There was only one thing I needed to take with me. Not my pictures and paint, which held my memories, nor my shelves, which carried all the things that passed the time...
Just the mirror. The mirror was perfect, I needed to polish it, sure, but it would keep reminding me who I was... I wasn't the prettiest of souls, sure, but my mirror was blunt. It didn't tell me what I people thought I needed to hear... it told me who I was. And it was nice.
So I ran back, I grabbed my mirror, smiled at the walls, thanked my parents for everything, and ran.
And I RAN.
I was so happy to watch them in the mirror behind me, hugging, finally seeing that I had grown up, and finally allowing me to...
And there was the hill. I stopped at the bottom and looked up it.
It was so much prettier close up.
And after my second to take in it's beauty again after all these years... I climbed it. Laughing and crying, I climbed the hill, and I reached the top... and...
I saw.
I looked.
And it was better than I imagined... so much, so, that I burst out laughing. I cried with happiness and fell to the floor...
There were more hills.
I couldn't believe it. All of them, so pretty, and green... all reaching up and hiding the sun. Damn! My hill! After all that, just hid more hills.
So my mirror stared at me, and smiled. The swine knew this all along... I laughed. Right then, I said to it. Let's go up the next one.
But there were many hills... and which one was right to chose?
I looked in the mirror, and it told me who I was. Did it matter? No. It never did. All the hills are just there, for us to climb them.
And for then? In the passageways between them, I found homes... I couldn't just walk into them, and open all the doors... I mean, what would happen then? They'll climb one, maybe two hills... and then they'd quit... That couldn't happen... I mean, there was something out there, I knew it.
So I'd run up to their windows, and I'll tell them how beautiful the lands are beyond the hills. And I'll run off, wave, and climb another hill.
The only ones I felt sorry for, were the ones that lived at top of hills already... they had no desire to climb... they could see all they could from their window, they felt that's all there was... but... maybe... there must have been more...
Each time I climbed one... it was beautiful. I could see so high... and the sunset was always so perfect. It made me feel so good... but... where was the sun REALLY setting? Surely there must be somewhere where you can see the sun so perfectly...
And the nights went by, and I really did begin to lose hope... the only thing that really kept me going, was going down to houses, and knocking on those windows... one man tried to shoot me with a shotgun once for doing that, and leaving the girl alone with her thoughts... I just hope she'd be ok. Hope she'd have the courage to run for herself one day.
One night... I don't know what it was. I woke up. I don't really know why, I can't say I understand... but...
Well, I just lay on the grass at the side of a hill, and I watched the stars. It was so nice. I got up, and walked about a bit... I walked to the next hill, and stood at the very peak.
I looked up, and around, and there it was. The moon.
I smiled up at it, and I looked down and saw the moon in the reflection of my mirror... and they both looked exactly the same. I smiled, and it bought me hope again. We both saw the moon the same way, the same way... It felt so nice, and I didn't feel so lonely.
So I decided to walk a bit further under the stars, climb a few more hills in the calm lush grass. And I climbed another hill...
I stopped.
And listened.
What was that noise?
There was a noise... something I hadn't heard before.
I ran up the next hill, and looked down. More hills. A smell?
A new smell... I hadn't...
More hills, I jumped down them under the moonlight. And climbed another hill.
And then, my heart skipped a beat. Because, this time, there wasn't any more hills.
There was an ocean.
I'd seen it in a painting once... it was real? It was real all this time?
I had seen so much in paintings, and pictures... most of them were memories, but the paintings, some of them looked so weird, and my parents had told me that they were just imagination...
But this was certainly not my imagination. I was awake? I pinched my self, I slapped my face. This...
A sea, a sea ahead of me. I didn't know what to do.
Until I heard a voice, and I looked down.
Hundreds of people stood below me... I had looked at the sea so dreamily, that I hadn't noticed the hundreds that stood there, looking up and laughing, probably because they did the same thing.
And I smiled, and I walked down to them... they told me it was the sea, I said I knew, I had seen it in a painting, I didn't realise it was real, and they laughed again.
And I looked back, and remembered all the hills I had climbed... so many people... so many... I felt so happy, hundreds of people that had walked the same as me, I felt so alive.
I asked them what we could do.
They said we could go to the ocean. See what lay beyond it... for the waves went up and down... they could make you feel refreshed, and yet sick... but never drink from it, never take in too much at once, for you will go mad... just go across the waves, sail at your own pace, and in the end, you can watch the sunset like we were meant to see it. The sea held so much, deep within it, and beyond it. More lands. More houses to open, doors to knock on, windows to wave to.
I agreed, and smiled, and I looked around... for there stood a girl... she stood on her own... carrying a mirror herself... and she had noticed too.
We got talking. And we sailed together. And we lived together. And we opened doors and waved at windows together.
Life was good.
Life is good.
There's a lot you can do with walls if you want. Sure, they can surround you all they like, but you can have doors, and windows, to let some light in. Shame not all of it. But we're not allowed to live in glasshouses. Well, we shouldn't. The light can get in, but if they smash, no, not good. The glass would kill us.
Wallpaper can be put up, or you can paint them. Some like to hang mirrors on their walls, or paintings, pictures, things that have happened. Some even like to put shelves on their walls, so they can put stuff on them. Carry little things on their walls. Keep them amused. Store them for later, when they're bored.
If you lie down, you can pretend walls are ceilings. Or floors. That's always fun. Try walking up them, or pretending you're lying on the ceiling.
You can put phones on walls.
Radiators. Keep you warm.
Careful when it comes to night though, and all those windows might show people outside what line your walls. So make sure you can pull back the curtains when you need to.
How long, do you think though, would it take to get bored of the walls?
Mostly, people just change the wallpaper. Paint it a new shade. Hell, can't blame them.
Me? I prefered to look out the window. Play by the window sill. Look at the lands. It was nice. There was something I loved to look at the most though. A hill.
If I imagined hard enough, I could see shelves on the hill. Wallpaper covering them, or maybe painted blue. I wondered why the hill wasn't afraid to show what it looked like underneath. Perhaps it just hadn't chose a colour. Perhaps nobody loved it enough to paint them.
But I loved it. I loved the hill. Should I paint it? I didn't know. Would I love it if I painted it too, would I love it the same? Would I find it so rewarding to see, if it was lined with pictures, if there were little windows with horrible white netting covering them?
Nah. The hill didn't need windows. It didn't need doors. There was no need to escape from it. Strange.
It was nice to know though, that, through all the times I had spent with my walls, and the boring old colours, that never pleased me no matter what they were, I could always look out, and see that hill.
Night time would come. I'd have to close the curtains. Wouldn't want people to see me. But in those dark hours, I couldn't sleep. Oh no... the hill was still in my mind. The lush green grash where I could end my days, lie upon and watch the sunset. And when I did sleep, I'd fall into a land of dreams, of me rolling around the hill.
Mixing a few paints, I drew the hill on my wall, and painted it... it looked good, very pretty, much like the hill outside. I wasn't skillful, but it was the fact that it was my hill that made me smile. I'd reach it one day.
So, along came the day where I gathered the courage. I was very excited.
I asked if I could go out and see the hill. Maybe just lie on it for a while.
I wasn't allowed. I couldn't work out why. It wasn't that far away. And even if it WAS far, why should it make a difference? It wasn't dangerous, it was a hill. Hills. Something to lie on. Something to climb.
So I'd sigh, go back to looking at it. Watch as the sun set over it, the green grass fading into a beautiful purple before the sun died, split between acceptance and hope, clouds forming around as it died, as if to honour it's last moments.
And the days went past, and I got fed up with asking, answer was always them same. Suppose the walls could do with a new lick of paint. Getting bored again. Shelves are untidy. Perhaps some new pictures. And eventually I painted over my hill. But it didn't matter, I'd think to myself with a sigh.
Then, one evening, watching the hill and thinking about a new colour to paint my walls, I noticed something.
Someone was walking over the hill. I leaped out of my chair and pressed myself against the window, thinking that those few millimetres would help me see clearer as I squashed my nose into the glass.
And there, in the distance, a person. They climbed the hill, got to the top, stood tall, looked all around, and walked towards the sunset, and down the other side.
So, of course, that sparked me off again. Not only now did I want to see the hill... I wanted to see what was on the other side.
You wouldn't believe how excited I was. I couldn't believe I hadn't thought about it before... the hill was all well and good, and my, it was beautiful, but what lay beyond it? The hill surely went down... what was there?
So off I went again, even peaking in the night, drawing back the curtains to see what it looked like at night... so beautiful in the moonlight.
I painted again. The hill returned to my walls, and this time, I painted myself standing on the top of them, looking over in joy to whatever the other side would bring... it was beyond my imagination, and I didn't really want to guess.
One night, I decided to take another look out of the window... hoping my parents wouldn't catch me with curtains closed after dark. And once again, there was someone there, climbing the hill.
I couldn't believe it! Another one!
I knocked on the window, I screamed, I tried to attract the person's attention... 'WHAT'S THERE?! WHAT'S THERE?!'
The person turned, and looked back. I could see him smile, and he waved.
Then my parents woke up, and dragged me away from the window... I looked out of the window too often, they said. They were worried about me. They didn't like the way I painted things on my walls. It didn't look nice.
I'd scream, and I cried, and my parents boarded up my windows. No longer I could look outside, no longer could I see my hill. And perhaps I could have accepted it, if they hadn't painted over my hill on the wall too.
I couldn't believe it. No window for me. Nothing.
And so we'd paint the walls, again and again. Keep him happy, do what he needs... another shelf, another picture. No hills. No hills in the pictures please.
I didn't say much anymore. I smiled, said I was fine. But all the while, I knew, I KNEW that they could paint over my walls as much as they liked... but deep down under them, was my hill. I knew it was there. It was always there. And I'll climb it. I knew I would.
Somehow.
One day.
Maybe.
Sigh.
And one day, someone gave me a mirror, and I was left alone with it. It was a nice present, not one I'm sure I wanted, but I seemed to think it was a nice idea at the time.
And for the first time, I saw myself. I saw what I had become. It made me feel sick. I could see the walls behind me, my reflection stuck between them all.
It drove me mad. I felt like smashing the mirror... punching my fist into it... why did it torture me! What was it trying to do! I couldn't bare it...
So I stopped sleeping. There was the mirror, smiling at me. Showing me... me.
I had never realised how close the walls were. So tight around me. I couldn't escape them.
So I gave up. I accepted the room, and I accepted my walls, I accepted all the paintings, the paintings I hated, the ones I loved, they were all the same in the end... But, as I was just about to hang myself from the top shelf... I looked in the mirror... and I accepted me.
I couldn't believe it. What the hell was I doing?
The thing that had drove me so mad... so... low... was the final thing that clenched me. The thing that finally clicked everything back. So what if I couldn't see the hill? So what if it was out of sight? It's still there... I know it, deep down. And if it isn't? There will be more.
So I bided my time. I'd smile, and for the first time in my life, I felt truly happy.
And came the day.
They accidently left the door open.
I knew what I had to do... this was my chance, I was given this. Make a move.
But as I left the room, I looked back into it. There was only one thing I needed to take with me. Not my pictures and paint, which held my memories, nor my shelves, which carried all the things that passed the time...
Just the mirror. The mirror was perfect, I needed to polish it, sure, but it would keep reminding me who I was... I wasn't the prettiest of souls, sure, but my mirror was blunt. It didn't tell me what I people thought I needed to hear... it told me who I was. And it was nice.
So I ran back, I grabbed my mirror, smiled at the walls, thanked my parents for everything, and ran.
And I RAN.
I was so happy to watch them in the mirror behind me, hugging, finally seeing that I had grown up, and finally allowing me to...
And there was the hill. I stopped at the bottom and looked up it.
It was so much prettier close up.
And after my second to take in it's beauty again after all these years... I climbed it. Laughing and crying, I climbed the hill, and I reached the top... and...
I saw.
I looked.
And it was better than I imagined... so much, so, that I burst out laughing. I cried with happiness and fell to the floor...
There were more hills.
I couldn't believe it. All of them, so pretty, and green... all reaching up and hiding the sun. Damn! My hill! After all that, just hid more hills.
So my mirror stared at me, and smiled. The swine knew this all along... I laughed. Right then, I said to it. Let's go up the next one.
But there were many hills... and which one was right to chose?
I looked in the mirror, and it told me who I was. Did it matter? No. It never did. All the hills are just there, for us to climb them.
And for then? In the passageways between them, I found homes... I couldn't just walk into them, and open all the doors... I mean, what would happen then? They'll climb one, maybe two hills... and then they'd quit... That couldn't happen... I mean, there was something out there, I knew it.
So I'd run up to their windows, and I'll tell them how beautiful the lands are beyond the hills. And I'll run off, wave, and climb another hill.
The only ones I felt sorry for, were the ones that lived at top of hills already... they had no desire to climb... they could see all they could from their window, they felt that's all there was... but... maybe... there must have been more...
Each time I climbed one... it was beautiful. I could see so high... and the sunset was always so perfect. It made me feel so good... but... where was the sun REALLY setting? Surely there must be somewhere where you can see the sun so perfectly...
And the nights went by, and I really did begin to lose hope... the only thing that really kept me going, was going down to houses, and knocking on those windows... one man tried to shoot me with a shotgun once for doing that, and leaving the girl alone with her thoughts... I just hope she'd be ok. Hope she'd have the courage to run for herself one day.
One night... I don't know what it was. I woke up. I don't really know why, I can't say I understand... but...
Well, I just lay on the grass at the side of a hill, and I watched the stars. It was so nice. I got up, and walked about a bit... I walked to the next hill, and stood at the very peak.
I looked up, and around, and there it was. The moon.
I smiled up at it, and I looked down and saw the moon in the reflection of my mirror... and they both looked exactly the same. I smiled, and it bought me hope again. We both saw the moon the same way, the same way... It felt so nice, and I didn't feel so lonely.
So I decided to walk a bit further under the stars, climb a few more hills in the calm lush grass. And I climbed another hill...
I stopped.
And listened.
What was that noise?
There was a noise... something I hadn't heard before.
I ran up the next hill, and looked down. More hills. A smell?
A new smell... I hadn't...
More hills, I jumped down them under the moonlight. And climbed another hill.
And then, my heart skipped a beat. Because, this time, there wasn't any more hills.
There was an ocean.
I'd seen it in a painting once... it was real? It was real all this time?
I had seen so much in paintings, and pictures... most of them were memories, but the paintings, some of them looked so weird, and my parents had told me that they were just imagination...
But this was certainly not my imagination. I was awake? I pinched my self, I slapped my face. This...
A sea, a sea ahead of me. I didn't know what to do.
Until I heard a voice, and I looked down.
Hundreds of people stood below me... I had looked at the sea so dreamily, that I hadn't noticed the hundreds that stood there, looking up and laughing, probably because they did the same thing.
And I smiled, and I walked down to them... they told me it was the sea, I said I knew, I had seen it in a painting, I didn't realise it was real, and they laughed again.
And I looked back, and remembered all the hills I had climbed... so many people... so many... I felt so happy, hundreds of people that had walked the same as me, I felt so alive.
I asked them what we could do.
They said we could go to the ocean. See what lay beyond it... for the waves went up and down... they could make you feel refreshed, and yet sick... but never drink from it, never take in too much at once, for you will go mad... just go across the waves, sail at your own pace, and in the end, you can watch the sunset like we were meant to see it. The sea held so much, deep within it, and beyond it. More lands. More houses to open, doors to knock on, windows to wave to.
I agreed, and smiled, and I looked around... for there stood a girl... she stood on her own... carrying a mirror herself... and she had noticed too.
We got talking. And we sailed together. And we lived together. And we opened doors and waved at windows together.
Life was good.
Life is good.
The longest post ever.
Walls are fantastic.
There's a lot you can do with walls if you want. Sure, they can surround you all they like, but you can have doors, and windows, to let some light in. Shame not all of it. But we're not allowed to live in glasshouses. Well, we shouldn't. The light can get in, but if they smash, no, not good. The glass would kill us.
Wallpaper can be put up, or you can paint them. Some like to hang mirrors on their walls, or paintings, pictures, things that have happened. Some even like to put shelves on their walls, so they can put stuff on them. Carry little things on their walls. Keep them amused. Store them for later, when they're bored.
If you lie down, you can pretend walls are ceilings. Or floors. That's always fun. Try walking up them, or pretending you're lying on the ceiling.
You can put phones on walls.
Radiators. Keep you warm.
Careful when it comes to night though, and all those windows might show people outside what line your walls. So make sure you can pull back the curtains when you need to.
How long, do you think though, would it take to get bored of the walls?
Mostly, people just change the wallpaper. Paint it a new shade. Hell, can't blame them.
Me? I prefered to look out the window. Play by the window sill. Look at the lands. It was nice. There was something I loved to look at the most though. A hill.
If I imagined hard enough, I could see shelves on the hill. Wallpaper covering them, or maybe painted blue. I wondered why the hill wasn't afraid to show what it looked like underneath. Perhaps it just hadn't chose a colour. Perhaps nobody loved it enough to paint them.
But I loved it. I loved the hill. Should I paint it? I didn't know. Would I love it if I painted it too, would I love it the same? Would I find it so rewarding to see, if it was lined with pictures, if there were little windows with horrible white netting covering them?
Nah. The hill didn't need windows. It didn't need doors. There was no need to escape from it. Strange.
It was nice to know though, that, through all the times I had spent with my walls, and the boring old colours, that never pleased me no matter what they were, I could always look out, and see that hill.
Night time would come. I'd have to close the curtains. Wouldn't want people to see me. But in those dark hours, I couldn't sleep. Oh no... the hill was still in my mind. The lush green grash where I could end my days, lie upon and watch the sunset. And when I did sleep, I'd fall into a land of dreams, of me rolling around the hill.
Mixing a few paints, I drew the hill on my wall, and painted it... it looked good, very pretty, much like the hill outside. I wasn't skillful, but it was the fact that it was my hill that made me smile. I'd reach it one day.
So, along came the day where I gathered the courage. I was very excited.
I asked if I could go out and see the hill. Maybe just lie on it for a while.
I wasn't allowed. I couldn't work out why. It wasn't that far away. And even if it WAS far, why should it make a difference? It wasn't dangerous, it was a hill. Hills. Something to lie on. Something to climb.
So I'd sigh, go back to looking at it. Watch as the sun set over it, the green grass fading into a beautiful purple before the sun died, split between acceptance and hope, clouds forming around as it died, as if to honour it's last moments.
And the days went past, and I got fed up with asking, answer was always them same. Suppose the walls could do with a new lick of paint. Getting bored again. Shelves are untidy. Perhaps some new pictures. And eventually I painted over my hill. But it didn't matter, I'd think to myself with a sigh.
Then, one evening, watching the hill and thinking about a new colour to paint my walls, I noticed something.
Someone was walking over the hill. I leaped out of my chair and pressed myself against the window, thinking that those few millimetres would help me see clearer as I squashed my nose into the glass.
And there, in the distance, a person. They climbed the hill, got to the top, stood tall, looked all around, and walked towards the sunset, and down the other side.
So, of course, that sparked me off again. Not only now did I want to see the hill... I wanted to see what was on the other side.
You wouldn't believe how excited I was. I couldn't believe I hadn't thought about it before... the hill was all well and good, and my, it was beautiful, but what lay beyond it? The hill surely went down... what was there?
So off I went again, even peaking in the night, drawing back the curtains to see what it looked like at night... so beautiful in the moonlight.
I painted again. The hill returned to my walls, and this time, I painted myself standing on the top of them, looking over in joy to whatever the other side would bring... it was beyond my imagination, and I didn't really want to guess.
One night, I decided to take another look out of the window... hoping my parents wouldn't catch me with curtains closed after dark. And once again, there was someone there, climbing the hill.
I couldn't believe it! Another one!
I knocked on the window, I screamed, I tried to attract the person's attention... 'WHAT'S THERE?! WHAT'S THERE?!'
The person turned, and looked back. I could see him smile, and he waved.
Then my parents woke up, and dragged me away from the window... I looked out of the window too often, they said. They were worried about me. They didn't like the way I painted things on my walls. It didn't look nice.
I'd scream, and I cried, and my parents boarded up my windows. No longer I could look outside, no longer could I see my hill. And perhaps I could have accepted it, if they hadn't painted over my hill on the wall too.
I couldn't believe it. No window for me. Nothing.
And so we'd paint the walls, again and again. Keep him happy, do what he needs... another shelf, another picture. No hills. No hills in the pictures please.
I didn't say much anymore. I smiled, said I was fine. But all the while, I knew, I KNEW that they could paint over my walls as much as they liked... but deep down under them, was my hill. I knew it was there. It was always there. And I'll climb it. I knew I would.
Somehow.
One day.
Maybe.
Sigh.
And one day, someone gave me a mirror, and I was left alone with it. It was a nice present, not one I'm sure I wanted, but I seemed to think it was a nice idea at the time.
And for the first time, I saw myself. I saw what I had become. It made me feel sick. I could see the walls behind me, my reflection stuck between them all.
It drove me mad. I felt like smashing the mirror... punching my fist into it... why did it torture me! What was it trying to do! I couldn't bare it...
So I stopped sleeping. There was the mirror, smiling at me. Showing me... me.
I had never realised how close the walls were. So tight around me. I couldn't escape them.
So I gave up. I accepted the room, and I accepted my walls, I accepted all the paintings, the paintings I hated, the ones I loved, they were all the same in the end... But, as I was just about to hang myself from the top shelf... I looked in the mirror... and I accepted me.
I couldn't believe it. What the hell was I doing?
The thing that had drove me so mad... so... low... was the final thing that clenched me. The thing that finally clicked everything back. So what if I couldn't see the hill? So what if it was out of sight? It's still there... I know it, deep down. And if it isn't? There will be more.
So I bided my time. I'd smile, and for the first time in my life, I felt truly happy.
And came the day.
They accidently left the door open.
I knew what I had to do... this was my chance, I was given this. Make a move.
But as I left the room, I looked back into it. There was only one thing I needed to take with me. Not my pictures and paint, which held my memories, nor my shelves, which carried all the things that passed the time...
Just the mirror. The mirror was perfect, I needed to polish it, sure, but it would keep reminding me who I was... I wasn't the prettiest of souls, sure, but my mirror was blunt. It didn't tell me what I people thought I needed to hear... it told me who I was. And it was nice.
So I ran back, I grabbed my mirror, smiled at the walls, thanked my parents for everything, and ran.
And I RAN.
I was so happy to watch them in the mirror behind me, hugging, finally seeing that I had grown up, and finally allowing me to...
And there was the hill. I stopped at the bottom and looked up it.
It was so much prettier close up.
And after my second to take in it's beauty again after all these years... I climbed it. Laughing and crying, I climbed the hill, and I reached the top... and...
I saw.
I looked.
And it was better than I imagined... so much, so, that I burst out laughing. I cried with happiness and fell to the floor...
There were more hills.
I couldn't believe it. All of them, so pretty, and green... all reaching up and hiding the sun. Damn! My hill! After all that, just hid more hills.
So my mirror stared at me, and smiled. The swine knew this all along... I laughed. Right then, I said to it. Let's go up the next one.
But there were many hills... and which one was right to chose?
I looked in the mirror, and it told me who I was. Did it matter? No. It never did. All the hills are just there, for us to climb them.
And for then? In the passageways between them, I found homes... I couldn't just walk into them, and open all the doors... I mean, what would happen then? They'll climb one, maybe two hills... and then they'd quit... That couldn't happen... I mean, there was something out there, I knew it.
So I'd run up to their windows, and I'll tell them how beautiful the lands are beyond the hills. And I'll run off, wave, and climb another hill.
The only ones I felt sorry for, were the ones that lived at top of hills already... they had no desire to climb... they could see all they could from their window, they felt that's all there was... but... maybe... there must have been more...
Each time I climbed one... it was beautiful. I could see so high... and the sunset was always so perfect. It made me feel so good... but... where was the sun REALLY setting? Surely there must be somewhere where you can see the sun so perfectly...
And the nights went by, and I really did begin to lose hope... the only thing that really kept me going, was going down to houses, and knocking on those windows... one man tried to shoot me with a shotgun once for doing that, and leaving the girl alone with her thoughts... I just hope she'd be ok. Hope she'd have the courage to run for herself one day.
One night... I don't know what it was. I woke up. I don't really know why, I can't say I understand... but...
Well, I just lay on the grass at the side of a hill, and I watched the stars. It was so nice. I got up, and walked about a bit... I walked to the next hill, and stood at the very peak.
I looked up, and around, and there it was. The moon.
I smiled up at it, and I looked down and saw the moon in the reflection of my mirror... and they both looked exactly the same. I smiled, and it bought me hope again. We both saw the moon the same way, the same way... It felt so nice, and I didn't feel so lonely.
So I decided to walk a bit further under the stars, climb a few more hills in the calm lush grass. And I climbed another hill...
I stopped.
And listened.
What was that noise?
There was a noise... something I hadn't heard before.
I ran up the next hill, and looked down. More hills. A smell?
A new smell... I hadn't...
More hills, I jumped down them under the moonlight. And climbed another hill.
And then, my heart skipped a beat. Because, this time, there wasn't any more hills.
There was an ocean.
I'd seen it in a painting once... it was real? It was real all this time?
I had seen so much in paintings, and pictures... most of them were memories, but the paintings, some of them looked so weird, and my parents had told me that they were just imagination...
But this was certainly not my imagination. I was awake? I pinched my self, I slapped my face. This...
A sea, a sea ahead of me. I didn't know what to do.
Until I heard a voice, and I looked down.
Hundreds of people stood below me... I had looked at the sea so dreamily, that I hadn't noticed the hundreds that stood there, looking up and laughing, probably because they did the same thing.
And I smiled, and I walked down to them... they told me it was the sea, I said I knew, I had seen it in a painting, I didn't realise it was real, and they laughed again.
And I looked back, and remembered all the hills I had climbed... so many people... so many... I felt so happy, hundreds of people that had walked the same as me, I felt so alive.
I asked them what we could do.
They said we could go to the ocean. See what lay beyond it... for the waves went up and down... they could make you feel refreshed, and yet sick... but never drink from it, never take in too much at once, for you will go mad... just go across the waves, sail at your own pace, and in the end, you can watch the sunset like we were meant to see it. The sea held so much, deep within it, and beyond it. More lands. More houses to open, doors to knock on, windows to wave to.
I agreed, and smiled, and I looked around... for there stood a girl... she stood on her own... carrying a mirror herself... and she had noticed too.
We got talking. And we sailed together. And we lived together. And we opened doors and waved at windows together.
Life was good.
Life is good.
There's a lot you can do with walls if you want. Sure, they can surround you all they like, but you can have doors, and windows, to let some light in. Shame not all of it. But we're not allowed to live in glasshouses. Well, we shouldn't. The light can get in, but if they smash, no, not good. The glass would kill us.
Wallpaper can be put up, or you can paint them. Some like to hang mirrors on their walls, or paintings, pictures, things that have happened. Some even like to put shelves on their walls, so they can put stuff on them. Carry little things on their walls. Keep them amused. Store them for later, when they're bored.
If you lie down, you can pretend walls are ceilings. Or floors. That's always fun. Try walking up them, or pretending you're lying on the ceiling.
You can put phones on walls.
Radiators. Keep you warm.
Careful when it comes to night though, and all those windows might show people outside what line your walls. So make sure you can pull back the curtains when you need to.
How long, do you think though, would it take to get bored of the walls?
Mostly, people just change the wallpaper. Paint it a new shade. Hell, can't blame them.
Me? I prefered to look out the window. Play by the window sill. Look at the lands. It was nice. There was something I loved to look at the most though. A hill.
If I imagined hard enough, I could see shelves on the hill. Wallpaper covering them, or maybe painted blue. I wondered why the hill wasn't afraid to show what it looked like underneath. Perhaps it just hadn't chose a colour. Perhaps nobody loved it enough to paint them.
But I loved it. I loved the hill. Should I paint it? I didn't know. Would I love it if I painted it too, would I love it the same? Would I find it so rewarding to see, if it was lined with pictures, if there were little windows with horrible white netting covering them?
Nah. The hill didn't need windows. It didn't need doors. There was no need to escape from it. Strange.
It was nice to know though, that, through all the times I had spent with my walls, and the boring old colours, that never pleased me no matter what they were, I could always look out, and see that hill.
Night time would come. I'd have to close the curtains. Wouldn't want people to see me. But in those dark hours, I couldn't sleep. Oh no... the hill was still in my mind. The lush green grash where I could end my days, lie upon and watch the sunset. And when I did sleep, I'd fall into a land of dreams, of me rolling around the hill.
Mixing a few paints, I drew the hill on my wall, and painted it... it looked good, very pretty, much like the hill outside. I wasn't skillful, but it was the fact that it was my hill that made me smile. I'd reach it one day.
So, along came the day where I gathered the courage. I was very excited.
I asked if I could go out and see the hill. Maybe just lie on it for a while.
I wasn't allowed. I couldn't work out why. It wasn't that far away. And even if it WAS far, why should it make a difference? It wasn't dangerous, it was a hill. Hills. Something to lie on. Something to climb.
So I'd sigh, go back to looking at it. Watch as the sun set over it, the green grass fading into a beautiful purple before the sun died, split between acceptance and hope, clouds forming around as it died, as if to honour it's last moments.
And the days went past, and I got fed up with asking, answer was always them same. Suppose the walls could do with a new lick of paint. Getting bored again. Shelves are untidy. Perhaps some new pictures. And eventually I painted over my hill. But it didn't matter, I'd think to myself with a sigh.
Then, one evening, watching the hill and thinking about a new colour to paint my walls, I noticed something.
Someone was walking over the hill. I leaped out of my chair and pressed myself against the window, thinking that those few millimetres would help me see clearer as I squashed my nose into the glass.
And there, in the distance, a person. They climbed the hill, got to the top, stood tall, looked all around, and walked towards the sunset, and down the other side.
So, of course, that sparked me off again. Not only now did I want to see the hill... I wanted to see what was on the other side.
You wouldn't believe how excited I was. I couldn't believe I hadn't thought about it before... the hill was all well and good, and my, it was beautiful, but what lay beyond it? The hill surely went down... what was there?
So off I went again, even peaking in the night, drawing back the curtains to see what it looked like at night... so beautiful in the moonlight.
I painted again. The hill returned to my walls, and this time, I painted myself standing on the top of them, looking over in joy to whatever the other side would bring... it was beyond my imagination, and I didn't really want to guess.
One night, I decided to take another look out of the window... hoping my parents wouldn't catch me with curtains closed after dark. And once again, there was someone there, climbing the hill.
I couldn't believe it! Another one!
I knocked on the window, I screamed, I tried to attract the person's attention... 'WHAT'S THERE?! WHAT'S THERE?!'
The person turned, and looked back. I could see him smile, and he waved.
Then my parents woke up, and dragged me away from the window... I looked out of the window too often, they said. They were worried about me. They didn't like the way I painted things on my walls. It didn't look nice.
I'd scream, and I cried, and my parents boarded up my windows. No longer I could look outside, no longer could I see my hill. And perhaps I could have accepted it, if they hadn't painted over my hill on the wall too.
I couldn't believe it. No window for me. Nothing.
And so we'd paint the walls, again and again. Keep him happy, do what he needs... another shelf, another picture. No hills. No hills in the pictures please.
I didn't say much anymore. I smiled, said I was fine. But all the while, I knew, I KNEW that they could paint over my walls as much as they liked... but deep down under them, was my hill. I knew it was there. It was always there. And I'll climb it. I knew I would.
Somehow.
One day.
Maybe.
Sigh.
And one day, someone gave me a mirror, and I was left alone with it. It was a nice present, not one I'm sure I wanted, but I seemed to think it was a nice idea at the time.
And for the first time, I saw myself. I saw what I had become. It made me feel sick. I could see the walls behind me, my reflection stuck between them all.
It drove me mad. I felt like smashing the mirror... punching my fist into it... why did it torture me! What was it trying to do! I couldn't bare it...
So I stopped sleeping. There was the mirror, smiling at me. Showing me... me.
I had never realised how close the walls were. So tight around me. I couldn't escape them.
So I gave up. I accepted the room, and I accepted my walls, I accepted all the paintings, the paintings I hated, the ones I loved, they were all the same in the end... But, as I was just about to hang myself from the top shelf... I looked in the mirror... and I accepted me.
I couldn't believe it. What the hell was I doing?
The thing that had drove me so mad... so... low... was the final thing that clenched me. The thing that finally clicked everything back. So what if I couldn't see the hill? So what if it was out of sight? It's still there... I know it, deep down. And if it isn't? There will be more.
So I bided my time. I'd smile, and for the first time in my life, I felt truly happy.
And came the day.
They accidently left the door open.
I knew what I had to do... this was my chance, I was given this. Make a move.
But as I left the room, I looked back into it. There was only one thing I needed to take with me. Not my pictures and paint, which held my memories, nor my shelves, which carried all the things that passed the time...
Just the mirror. The mirror was perfect, I needed to polish it, sure, but it would keep reminding me who I was... I wasn't the prettiest of souls, sure, but my mirror was blunt. It didn't tell me what I people thought I needed to hear... it told me who I was. And it was nice.
So I ran back, I grabbed my mirror, smiled at the walls, thanked my parents for everything, and ran.
And I RAN.
I was so happy to watch them in the mirror behind me, hugging, finally seeing that I had grown up, and finally allowing me to...
And there was the hill. I stopped at the bottom and looked up it.
It was so much prettier close up.
And after my second to take in it's beauty again after all these years... I climbed it. Laughing and crying, I climbed the hill, and I reached the top... and...
I saw.
I looked.
And it was better than I imagined... so much, so, that I burst out laughing. I cried with happiness and fell to the floor...
There were more hills.
I couldn't believe it. All of them, so pretty, and green... all reaching up and hiding the sun. Damn! My hill! After all that, just hid more hills.
So my mirror stared at me, and smiled. The swine knew this all along... I laughed. Right then, I said to it. Let's go up the next one.
But there were many hills... and which one was right to chose?
I looked in the mirror, and it told me who I was. Did it matter? No. It never did. All the hills are just there, for us to climb them.
And for then? In the passageways between them, I found homes... I couldn't just walk into them, and open all the doors... I mean, what would happen then? They'll climb one, maybe two hills... and then they'd quit... That couldn't happen... I mean, there was something out there, I knew it.
So I'd run up to their windows, and I'll tell them how beautiful the lands are beyond the hills. And I'll run off, wave, and climb another hill.
The only ones I felt sorry for, were the ones that lived at top of hills already... they had no desire to climb... they could see all they could from their window, they felt that's all there was... but... maybe... there must have been more...
Each time I climbed one... it was beautiful. I could see so high... and the sunset was always so perfect. It made me feel so good... but... where was the sun REALLY setting? Surely there must be somewhere where you can see the sun so perfectly...
And the nights went by, and I really did begin to lose hope... the only thing that really kept me going, was going down to houses, and knocking on those windows... one man tried to shoot me with a shotgun once for doing that, and leaving the girl alone with her thoughts... I just hope she'd be ok. Hope she'd have the courage to run for herself one day.
One night... I don't know what it was. I woke up. I don't really know why, I can't say I understand... but...
Well, I just lay on the grass at the side of a hill, and I watched the stars. It was so nice. I got up, and walked about a bit... I walked to the next hill, and stood at the very peak.
I looked up, and around, and there it was. The moon.
I smiled up at it, and I looked down and saw the moon in the reflection of my mirror... and they both looked exactly the same. I smiled, and it bought me hope again. We both saw the moon the same way, the same way... It felt so nice, and I didn't feel so lonely.
So I decided to walk a bit further under the stars, climb a few more hills in the calm lush grass. And I climbed another hill...
I stopped.
And listened.
What was that noise?
There was a noise... something I hadn't heard before.
I ran up the next hill, and looked down. More hills. A smell?
A new smell... I hadn't...
More hills, I jumped down them under the moonlight. And climbed another hill.
And then, my heart skipped a beat. Because, this time, there wasn't any more hills.
There was an ocean.
I'd seen it in a painting once... it was real? It was real all this time?
I had seen so much in paintings, and pictures... most of them were memories, but the paintings, some of them looked so weird, and my parents had told me that they were just imagination...
But this was certainly not my imagination. I was awake? I pinched my self, I slapped my face. This...
A sea, a sea ahead of me. I didn't know what to do.
Until I heard a voice, and I looked down.
Hundreds of people stood below me... I had looked at the sea so dreamily, that I hadn't noticed the hundreds that stood there, looking up and laughing, probably because they did the same thing.
And I smiled, and I walked down to them... they told me it was the sea, I said I knew, I had seen it in a painting, I didn't realise it was real, and they laughed again.
And I looked back, and remembered all the hills I had climbed... so many people... so many... I felt so happy, hundreds of people that had walked the same as me, I felt so alive.
I asked them what we could do.
They said we could go to the ocean. See what lay beyond it... for the waves went up and down... they could make you feel refreshed, and yet sick... but never drink from it, never take in too much at once, for you will go mad... just go across the waves, sail at your own pace, and in the end, you can watch the sunset like we were meant to see it. The sea held so much, deep within it, and beyond it. More lands. More houses to open, doors to knock on, windows to wave to.
I agreed, and smiled, and I looked around... for there stood a girl... she stood on her own... carrying a mirror herself... and she had noticed too.
We got talking. And we sailed together. And we lived together. And we opened doors and waved at windows together.
Life was good.
Life is good.