UNCANNY FASHION

The Story

UNCANNY COLLECTION

A man is walking along a road that leads to somewhere unknown. Along the way he encounters a collection of characters beckoning him from the side of the path. Each one presents an obstacle or challenge. To pass he must make a choice between the offers that each character gives him. He struggles to make these choices, tearing himself apart over each

one but makes a decision at each stop so that he can pass. In return for his thorough deliberation and difficult choices he is given something by each character to help him on the way. When he has almost reached his destination, all the possessions he has collected disappear. Disheartened and discouraged he proceeds along his path, his empty hands hanging by his sides, one as long as the other. As the feeling of loss starts to fade, he meets one final figure, who unike the others, stands firmly planted in the middle of the path. Weary and tired, he asks what he must do to pass. He is reluctant to begin the process of deliberation and choice again because he fears whatever he receives will dissapear again. The figure slowly approaches him, revealing himself to be death. “I do not offer you a task, to pass you need not choose for yourself. I offer you a question, to pass you must answer for yourself”, He says, thinking he has thrown the man off his path. Death had been following the man and was familiar with his journey. He asks the man “what do you have to show for your journey?”. The man is confused at this question. Death, seeing this, continues.

“My counterpart, life, has given you a gift. To pass, answer this simple question and show you have not wasted this gift of life”. Thinking long and hard about his journey and all the items he collected that disappeared,
all his internal conflict for nothing, he finally speaks. “I am the me that

I am now, not the me that I was then” he says. Discontented with this answer, death deliberates with himself. “You have come far and you have grown much. You have answered this question and as promised, will go along your way”. He pauses a moment and finishes, saying “Leave your conflicts here, but take your lessons with you”. Without his past conflicts weighing him down, he continues on to his destination, ready for the next leg of his journey. He promises himself that when he will next meet death, he will not have wasted life.