What are they saying? Do they truly believe that I can’t hear them? How can they say I am dying when I am aware of everything going on around me? My body may be in a coma, but I am still here. I wish there were ways to let them know I am still around.

He stopped for what it is considered a minute. He needed to make some sense out of the situation. His mother and father were talking to the doctor about pulling the plug. His mother had just finished a crying spell, and his father was doing his most heroic effort by appearing calm.

He couldn’t help to notice how monotonous the doctor’s voice was. There was detachment in his eyes even though he appeared to be concerned, hew knew it was a facade. The doctor was telling his parents what the social consequences would be if they carried out his wishes. At one point in time, he had asked his parents to pull the plug if he was ever in his current situation. As he contemplated the circumstances, he didn’t care anymore and decided it was time to go. Without regrets, without saying goodbye to those who he had loved, without looking back, he left. He could see what he had just left behind. It had been very attractive; brown hair, green eyes, toned muscles, 5’8" tall, full lips covered with a well kept mustache and clean shaved.

The monitor alerted the medical staff and for a fleeting moment, he felt sorry. Then, the sorrow was gone. He knew it was the right thing to do. The body was not useful anymore.

He had been a happy person. For him, life was a wonderful experience until his parents started forcing him to attend church under the duress that he would be punished by God and would go to Hell if he didn’t follow their teachings. For the first time he learned fear. Going to Church was not his own choice anymore. He followed their orders and he was considered a wonderful boy.

At the age of twenty, he rebelled. In not uncertain terms he told his mother that the reign of terror was over. His mother was horrified and after telling him, for the millionth time, that he would go to hell, got up, called his father and informed him of what had just occurred. At this point, he knew he was in trouble. However, he was twenty after all. His father couldn’t discipline him the same way he has done all these years.

What happened to the happy kid that I used to be? He thought. He had to face reality and the consequences of his rebellion. He knew he had to face his father’s wrath. He wondered if this was the gate to hell – it appeared so.

His father arrived and started shouting at his mother, blaming her for his upbringing and for not correcting him while she had the chance. Didn’t she know that he was doing more than called for by providing them with faith, shelter, food, clothing, education and discipline? Those were his only duties. He continued accusing his mother until she was so devastated that she was blankly looking at an unknown point in her feet. Like so many other times in the past, he observed that his mother looked very small and incredibly tired. He couldn’t take it anymore! How could his father treat them that way? How could he be so cruel? Why was his father especially cruel to his mother? He slowly got up and for the first time in his life he felt detached. He moved to the window and looked out into the mountains, without hearing what his father was saying. By now, his mother was sobbing. She was sobbing so hard, that he thought she would stop breathing momentarily. His father was saying something to the effect that he, and his mother, needed counseling and that he would make the necessary arrangements for them to see a specialist. As his father spoke, he continued looking out the window to the mountains, to the immense beauty and space the panorama provided.

The office was not a very warm or inviting place. He sat next to his mother while they waited for their names to be called. His mother had astonished him by not saying anything about the incident. Not one word. As a matter of fact, she was so quiet and her demeanor was such, that he thought his mother had become a statue. A forgotten marble statue not discovered by civilization yet, hence, she had not been dug up from where she had laid buried for over twenty years. He thought that those twenty years might have seem as an eternity to her.

Their names were called and they went in. Once the session started, the situation got even more complicated. He was at fault for everything that had gone wrong with his parents and his parents’ lives. For the first time, he realized how much of a terrible burden he had been for them. For starters, he had been an accident. At that moment, his ride to hell had truly started.

One action led to another. After the diagnosis and before he understood what was happening, he found himself in a white room. Was this part of a continuing nightmare? It had to be! He was given pills that nobody wanted to call by name and he had to swallow them. If he didn’t, the people at the hospital would find ways to make him do so. It was better to do what they said.

He hadn’t seen his father since the day of the problem, and to tell the truth, he didn’t miss him at all. His mother came to visit once a week but the since the day he learned the truth, the relationship between them was not one of love. It was one of duty. His new predicament had changed him. He was starting to forget and was "happy" all the time. He pitied himself in those rare moments of sanity he had left. Gradually, he lost track of the hours and then of the days, weeks, and finally months.

The decisive point in his life came when he was moved to another room, tied and secured to a bed, he was given electric shock. Who knows how long after that the doctor and his mother did not seem content with his progress so a lobotomy was arranged. Eventually, a coma was unavoidable.

Now, watching what he just left behind, he couldn’t understand why his parents pretended to care and be sad for his demise. He most have done something terrible to deserve such hatred from his family. He searched for answers and came empty handed. He felt relieved by his assertiveness when he had made the decision to let go of the body.

Leaving the body behind in that hospital was a vivid memory for now. As I glided through different places, I saw her. Didn’t the woman looked like the grandmother I knew only in pictures? Yes, she did. She invited me to follow her. She looked at me with a tenderness I have not known and enthralled by her, I followed.

She started our ascent. I didn’t care where were we going. Anything should be better to that which I just had left. We continued our uneventful ascent until I saw our destination. I won’t describe it, but it was there – massive and occluded from human eyes. We went in. As soon as we entered the place, the facsimile of my grandmother disappeared and I didn’t see her again.

I found out this was the station before my turn. Here is where some of us have to come – like it or not. We are here to forget everything related to the life we had just left, and for nothing else. It suited me fine. The purpose of The Station is to erase all memories. My time came and I received the standard action. When we were done, all my memories were gone.

I found myself wondering through space. The Station was not even a memory. I had no memories and had no past. I didn’t know where I was going. I was just wondering around. At some point in time while in The Station, and during the standard action, I had understood why my old parents believed in Heaven and Hell, and the purpose they did serve. As with everything else I had been and known, this knowledge was gone. I continued my wondering. I don’t know for how long I did so. I went from place to place, looking for something. Didn’t know what.

She was in pain, excruciating pain. She was only twenty-three and her husband twenty-six. This was a first for them, even though they hoped it wouldn’t be the last. She was a very strong willed person and her efforts were not less than valiant. She wasn’t screaming like other women do when in the same situation. There is nothing worse than a screaming woman while giving birth. It is totally unnecessary. Holding her hand, her husband encouraged her to continue with the arduous task, and with a smile that resembled a shadow, she responded by giving one more push. There were others who, like them, were experiencing and witnessing what it is a true miracle: Birth. I realized that I liked the woman. At the right moment, pushing one of the other ones to the side, I went into the little body.

As I let out my first cry, I noticed how constricting the little body was. I decided it had to do. That was the way it should be. The woman was breathing fast and her husband had tears of joy. She was informed that she had just given birth to a beautiful seven and one-half pound, twenty-two inches tall little girl. Both looked at me with joyous tears, and loving eyes, while I was crying out of fear.

Resting next to her, I could smell her and could feel the tenderness of her voice. She told me that she would be the best mom there ever was. Where had I heard that before? Doesn’t matter, this was all new. My father was caressing my chick, counting my fingers and when he was sure I had a particular number, he said it was the happiest day of his life.

I started to grow up as a happy person. For me, life was a wonderful experience and my parents started teaching me about Heaven and Hell. What brings me to the day I remembered it all.

I told my parents the story. My father couldn’t believe what was coming out of his daughter’s mouth. My mother was silently sobbing next to him. I thought my parents were different than those from my past. I didn’t see the consequences. If I had known what the results of remembering and communicating my memories would be, I would have said nothing. Too late isn’t it?

The office was not a very warm or inviting place. I sat next to my mother. We waited for our names to be called, and when called by name we went in. The doctor diagnosed me with schizophrenia. I was institutionalized and the same cycle started all over again.

This time I did not die. I became a vegetable and while in that state, I wondered how many times and how regularly I had to go through this. My parents often inquired as to my well being. The body may have been a vegetable, but "that" that I am, is still aware and it will remain aware. And this constant awareness, is the true meaning of eternity.