The Confession.


"Damn it, but I do have a very bad side to me. It's not like I'm struggling against being a mass murderer or anything like that, but when I experience my bad side...I...I wouldn’t put anything past it." Waltre's lip trembled as he spoke.

"Go on my son." Said the priest.

"I try to justify my bad side by thinking of it as my defender, I see it as my mad military side. Like it's a fierce warrior that's always ready to take my side in any argument, in any fight; he is for me, only for me, and for me alone."

" Can you control it?" Asked the Priest.

"I managed to control it very well, for a long time, but, now, I feel it has gained in strength"

"In what way has it gained in strength?

"It's become more powerful, because I've become weaker."

"In what way have you got weaker my son?"

"I've weaker because..." Waltre hesitated.

"Yes, go on my son."

"Because I've lost my faith." Waltre said.

There was a brief silence, then the Priest asked:

"Then why are you here?"

"I'm here because I think this is the place where I lost it."

"So you are here to try to find your lost faith...because you think you lost it here?" The priest asked with a tone of bewilderment.

"Yes." Waltre replied.

"Seeing as this is where I think I lost it, I thought it might be the best place to try to find it."

"I see." Said the Priest. "You have done well my son."

"Can you help me to find it Father?"

"I'll try, my son. I'll try; but let me first tell you a thing or two about bad side's. I know a lot about them, I hear about them every day, and it might surprise you to know that I have one too, or I should say, I had one."

"You had one?" Waltre asked. "How did you kill it?"

"Thou shalt not kill, my son."

"But you said..."

The Priest interrupted him.

"We all have a dark side. We must accept it as a valid part of our real self self, and then we must form a union with it. When one succeeds one then becomes whole. The dynamic energy that results from the union is what propels us out of illusion and into reality. We need the bad sides aggressiveness. We need it's anger, and we also need it's hatred because one cannot truly feel love unless one truly feels hate. There is no other way to find reality. It is only when we become whole that we find the strength to face reality."

"So, in a way, you are saying that because my bad side is growing stronger it just means that I am getting closer to reality?"

Only if you accept it my son."

"What if I don't accept it?" Waltre asked.

"It will kill you." The Priest replied in a matter of fact voice.

"And what of my faith?" Waltre asked.

"You have only lost faith in an illusion." The Priest said.

"So losing my faith is a good thing?"

Losing faith in what is not there is a very good thing my son."

"You said you would try to help me find it."

"I have, my son, I have."

"I see." Waltre said.

Now say your penance, and be sure to say three of the joyful mysteries before you go to bed tonight.

"I will. Thank you Father."

It was the brain booster CD that got Waltre thinking about it, and then he began to worry about it.

It was like...he felt so very very sane after listening to the CD, but then after a while the sanity kind of wore off, and he sank back to his normal state of mind - which was a hell of a lot less sane than Mozart's.

It actually began with a healthy dose of humility. Waltre marveled at how another human being could actually write such fantastic stuff as the concerto for two piano's. He also knew that he couldn't have appreciated the concerto any where near as much if he hadn't plugged into the brain booster CD first.

The brain booster pinged and ponged in all the right places, so as to awaken the finer parts of his grey matter, for half an hour, and then the concerto came on.

"Bloody marvelous." Waltre thought. "The things they get up to nowadays?"

The realization that he was completely mad came on him quite slowly at first. Then it got so bad that he decided to see a psychologist. Then he realized that the psychologist was mad too, so he cancelled all future appointments.

It got so bad that he began to worry about it. His main worry was about the embarrassment of it all. The idea that everyone else knew he was a madman, and that they were all being very tactful about it, like...it came as quite a jolt to say the least!

As a result Waltre began smiling, when he was around other people, in the hope that he could still somehow pull off the idea that he had only been joking, and he was now being his real self. However all that did was to provoke confused kind of smiles, and the smiles did not say that they got the joke.

He worried, and worried, and then he decided to stop drinking. It was then that things got really serious.

Life without beer was like...a whole new world.

He quickly reasoned that he had enough on his plate, what with realizing that he was a madman, like, add to the mix that he had recently accepted the idea of the evolution of the species, as such he went back to drinking beer; and it was after a few pints that he remembered the old Irish saying: "Things reveal themselves upon leaving."

"Be-Jeezus." He thought. "If I'd stopped drinking I might have never remembered that saying!"

He let out a huge sigh of relief.

"Ah yis, me madness is leaving, otherwise how would I know about it?"

Such is the tricky-ness of madness.