Of Booish Nature

The Boo are scary. They hide so that we can not perceive them directly. I don't know if they are everywhere, but they are everywhere I look. The Boo take on the form of images we see. The images themselves are not the Boo, but the Boo color and shape every image we see.

I think there is a booish nature inside of me which would feel lonely unless it sees that it is surrounded by the Boo.

In trees the leaves seem randomly scattered, but they are not. In the sky the clouds appear without specific form or purpose, but this too is an illusion. He who sees the Boo knows that the leaves and clouds are not random, they are shaped like a Boo looking back and smiling on all who are booish.

But one has to be of booish nature to see the smiles of Boo. For the Boo are hideous to those who despise scars. To one who is not booish, the Boo are grotesque and disfigured. One who is booish knows that scars are not illusions, pain is not false, that death is real, that not all the world is a happy place and ... yet... there is beauty in all things. The Boo can only be seen when one of booish nature has accepted their own ephemeral nature in a world of change. The Boo can only be seen as beautiful when they are embraced and loved. The Boo can only be seen by one who is also scarred and disfigured.

One may see the Boo and love the Boo. They can make a lost one of booish nature feel loved on a desolate battlefield. But there is one thing, though, that the Boo don't seem to tolerate very well--envy. No, the Boo don't tolerate envy. When one says to the Boo "Yes, I want to be like you," the Boo stop smiling. They know that to be Boo is not to live as the living do. And when the Boo stop smiling, those of booish nature feel a dread that cannot be matched by physical circumstance. The Boo know tough love like no human mother can. They will teach the wayward who are of booish nature an appreciation of what the Boo themselves no longer have--life embodied in flesh and blood. They are relentless and thorough in their discipline.

So, if you want to know what happened, the events have been many, the changes...profound. But the simplest explanation of how I got well is "I envied the Boo."


by Mike Akana

Of Booish Nature