13/12/05
The Rubicon Cube.The other day my parents got back from a flea market, and my Dad toyed with something in his hand. He held it up, a box-like structure lacking any special lustre or immediate appeal. His concentration was snatched away by this ostensibly magic tool as he tinkered with it for hours, implacably. He finally grunted something under his breath and went to bed, drunk. I quickly abducted the inanimate object with swift stealth and hurried off to my room, with my newfound ‘precious.’ It seemed so
colourful yet dastardly disappointing, how could this grab your attention so indelibly? So I set off to work, uh, play with this souvenir of the 80s (I wonder if it comes with a free mullet and Hi-Tops?) with 99
Red Balloons aurally scratching the top of my head.
Interesting, engrossing, absorbing, fucking irritating. Those are the words which sum up those frustratingly fun feelings you get inside while trying to figure the bastard out. After spending what was probably an eternity, but felt like a couple of seconds hacking away at its enigmatic soul, the unthinkable happened.
In a myriad
colours and maculations the cube’s lower half shattered at my expense. I saw and felt it then, the unnerving feeling of a puzzle you haven’t solved shattering before you got the chance to unlock its oracular mystery. A guilt hung over my head, what was my Dad going to think? I shuffled along picking up the pieces of the puzzle and ran to my parent’s room throwing the unidentifiable blobs onto their table, then skulked off into the clutches of sleep.
The dude that my Dad bought it from probably had a million of them from a toy store he used to own during the 80s and now he’s trying to sell them off to nostalgic or unwitting customers. I plan to go to his stall and give him a piece of my mind; maybe I’ll buy one from him. I can’t go back now, the Rubicon has been crossed.
But then again, there are more important things in life than consuming your mind with a girl you never really knew in the first place.
(D)
