The Planet of Pleasure

Nane Sevunts (Armine Asryan)

 

Julie was aware that she was going down. Her illness devastated her, and she was hallucinating. In her hallucinations, she lived as she really loved to. It was the same country but a different time. In her dreams, she was in Armenia, as in real life, but in the fifth millennium. She travelled back and forth from the time she lived in to her imaginary life. She was already approaching her 30s, yet life remained illusory for her.

***

Planet Earth… The fifth millennium… Armenia… She woke up in bed and stretched her arms. A smile spread on her face. She did not care what she would do today. She knew that the day would deliver all the wonders that she had dreamed about.

Slowly she crawled out of bed. The floor was icy, and she felt the freezing cold across her body. She took a hot shower. She stood there under the water for a long time. The water was flowing over her body and giving her the pleasure of warmth and security. She did not want to get out of the shower, as she enjoyed the moment under hot water, and her whole body was relaxing. Then she poured some cold water on herself and quickly jumped back in the hot shower. She repeated this 7 times. Her whole body was red and trembling in pleasure.

Janet was one of the inhabitants of planet Earth in the fifth millennium. It was a world where dreams came true immediately. It was a world of security, pleasure, self-satisfaction and delight. The inhabitants of this planet had a wonderful ability to carve out their own world by virtue of thought. Everybody conjured up their own experience by thinking. Thoughts could materialize.

This was a planet of freedom and security. Everybody knew that they could not encroach on others, as this would disturb their own privacy and pleasure. It was not out of kindness that the inhabitants refrained from interfering in each other’s lives. Kindness was not a virtue here. They were egotistical. They knew that if they interfered in another person’s sphere, that would ruin their own privacy. Egotism drove the refusal. They did not want to lose the security and beauty of their own space.

***

She went out on the front porch to admire the beauty of nature. There were high mountains, a river, water flowing and a valley of green-green grass and red tulips. She walked barefoot. She stood in the morning mist. The dew on the grass covered her toes, and she felt the cold trembling of her body. She looked at this enormous beauty, and the smile did not leave her face.

She had a lot to do that day. She had to go through her notes and compose a critique for a book. She put on her clothes and went to the study. It was a large room with tall shelves and books on them. There was a table near the window and an armchair. The computer was on the wall. She worked there for three hours. These three hours passed as though they were a moment. She was immersed in her work. She composed an article about a book that was assigned to her by a publishing house. She went through every detail, touched upon each hero and the emotions that they prompted in her. She paid attention to how the characters developed. What solutions would they find? How did they react to their environment? And most importantly, what were the emotions that the characters conveyed to the audience. She made a spreadsheet where she categorized all the characters, incidents, conversations and developments. Then she connected the subcategories into bigger categories and designated them accordingly. She finally came up with the main plot and character traits portrayed in the novel. It took a lot of work but she enjoyed every moment of it. She was going from one character to another. She was looking through the lines and discovering things that the author was not even aware of. She was composing a totally new story out of the book that she was critiquing.

She finally left the study. She did not really want to eat. But since there were a couple of apples on the table, she chomped on one. She was tired. Her mind was drained, and she did not notice time passing. She needed to relax, so she went out to sit on the grass in front of the house. She laid down on the grass and touched the sky with her finger. It started raining from her touch. She lay under the rain as it washed her clothes, her face and her body. She finally stood up and went to have a hot shower again. A hot shower on her body… Relaxing…. She felt the warmth and tiredness leaving her body little by little.

She then sat on the front porch looking at the distant mountains and fell asleep…

***

When she woke up it was evening already. She took her backpack and wandered around the city. She visited shops, had coffee in a café, met with some friends and late at night came home to have a deep, healthy sleep.

Her life was full of wonders. She was one hundred percent self-sufficient. Even the young man in her life occupied but a tiny part of it. She sometimes met with him, and they would lie on a sofa or just on the green in front of the house and look up at the clouds for hours. No words were needed. Just two people lying next to each other and feeling their presence. That was enough for them to feel the good and to sense that they were one and were together.

However, their lives were only connected as long as they were in one place. Each had their own personal life and was content with it.

There were times when she would need some energy. Then she stood in the valley, and the rays of the sun gave her the energy she craved. She sat on the grass with her hands up, and the light would suffuse and stimulate her body. She did not move. No motion. Silent acceptance of the energy from above.

***

On this planet there was no word of God. It was pointless to ask something because everything you needed could become reality by calling it to mind. No one asked whether there was a God or not. Such a question simply did not exist.

The highest virtue on this planet was not love. They did not know how to love one another. But they knew how to respect each other’s space and take care of their own desires. They called it self-interest. I would say that they were the most egotistical people ever. It was all about yourself. Yet, they were able to communicate with evident care for others. They were natural, spontaneous and emotionally pure. There was no hatred, jealousy, envy. How could that arise when they got what they wanted just by thinking of it?

There was no competition, no ambition in this world. People had aspirations in the sense that they wanted to excel in the work they did. Yet they worked for their own pleasure. Work was part of the joy in their lives. They produced art, technology. They engaged only in activities they cared about. One fellow was a fisher… A woman wrote poetry… A trans worked in the local cafe…. An augmented half-robot cut hair. Everything they did was art, a production of attraction and care… They were the happiest beings.

Her days passed with a sense of self-satisfaction and ease of pleasure. There were no limits to her imagination, and she spontaneously did what she liked most at that moment. She trained, jogged, participated in marathons where everybody won. When she was tired of running, she stopped and had coffee in a coffee shop. Then she ran again until she was too tired to move any more. That was the day of sports, and she did that with great pleasure.

Sex, sports, entertainment, work, art, engagement, friends, family, children – all were small parts of her life. The most important person in all these relationships was herself. She liked being all alone, and these were the most precious moments. She had a place on top of the mountain where she would sit for hours. The wind would touch her face, and the sun would cuddle her. She was all by herself. It was wonderful. She was self-sufficient, completely.

***

After sitting on a rock for several hours, she stood up and walked back home. Her little doggie welcomed her. This little animal was the only being in her house except her. And even she disappeared for days, and Julie did not know where.

She then took a warm shower. The temperature of the water was close to cold, which she liked. She stood under the water for an hour. The water flowed all over her, and she felt her healthy body trembling from delight.

Julie did not eat much. An apple, an orange was quite enough for her to feel full. After the shower she put on her robe and went out to the front porch. She sat there and drank apple juice. Cigarettes were also a part of her life. It was just one of the pleasures. After the day’s marathon, sitting at the edge of the rock and taking a shower, she wanted to enjoy a cigarette and apple juice.

Then Martin came. They chatted, laughed and entertained each other. It was a long day, and they both went to bed…. But Martin did not want to sleep. He wanted to have a night walk in the city, and Julie joined him. They walked in the midst of sky-scraping buildings, bars and cafes. They strolled for almost three hours, not wanting to stop. Walking with a person you care about is just as much fun as sitting at the edge of a rock or winning a marathon. They did not want it to end. They wanted to walk and walk…..Finally, Martin took her in his arms, and they went back home.

It was a long, healthy sleep. There they were holding each other’s hands and sleeping with a slight smile on their face. They were happy….

They woke up together and visited a waterfall to stand under it. They screamed and laughed in joy. The water was freezing. Then they sat on the front porch and had two slices of red, sweet apple. Food was not a major part of their life. They mostly drew energy from above in the form of light rays. That was enough not to feel hungry. Apples, apricots, peaches, plums, watermelon – that was their food. They never ate meat or bread. Sometimes they would fry vegetables like peppers, onions or spinach. But that happened very rarely, after they did not have vegetables for months. Their main food was fruit. Besides that – coffee, cappuccino and different varieties of natural juice. And last but not least, a big part of their diet was water.

***

She had a guest from what is Saudi Arabia today. She took him to an underground cave designed for accepting guests. Sharp rocks illuminated, carpets on the bear ground, chandeliers, a big screen for the spacinet, plants, a huge aquarium with sharks inside – this was all in the underground cave. The sheikh from Saudi Arabia took a seat on a big pillow. They talked about life in Arab countries. He talked about his camels, wives and gold. She showed him her collection of diamonds. These were rare pieces of stone shining in the middle of the darkness of the cave. Then they switched on the spacinet and looked at his house in Saudi Arabia. They watched his wives, his children, the business at home, and he showed her how he lives there. Julie served him the most delicious fruits – apricots, figs, honeydew melon, mulberries, pummelo. He brought date plums with him, and they both enjoyed the meal together. After a couple hours of chatting, the guest from Saudi Arabia left this hospitable place and went to the world which he had created and liked.

***

Her days were full of wonders that had no end. Angels played harps for her. She travelled on a sky full of lilies, sleeping in the flowerbeds.

She did one thing after another and never got bored. It was an endless world of surprises and wonders. Once she visited another dimension and a family of “angels” hosted her. A father, mother and two children lived together on the vapors of the sky. They were the happiest beings on earth. They cared about and loved each other. They treated her with some fruits and juice, sang songs for her, and she cheered up. But that was not what she wanted. In her world, nobody cared for anyone else. Everyone could take what they wanted. There was no reason to care about each other or love. There was affection and pleasure, however. It is wrong to say that in their world they were free. Freedom assumes free from something. There was nothing to be free from in her world. Free from what? It was senseless to even utter the word freedom. The doctrine of freedom in the sense used in our time was not workable there. They were completely self-sufficient. They could enjoy life without anybody’s company. Yes, she had a mother to whom she went for affection. She sometimes cooked food for her and would sit with her head on her knees for her mother to comb her hair. They enjoyed each other’s company but each of them had their own world where they would soon return. She had the drive to be with her mother for half a day or so, or maybe a day, but no more. It would become boring. Not only for her, but for her mother as well.

***

Julie, a woman in the third millennium, had to be ill to dream about all this. Yet, she was sure that there was some truth behind what she hallucinated. She knew that there would be a time when people would be self-sufficient and happy.  Today, in this millennium, Julie was an isolated woman who had panic attacks and delusions. She did not know how to live or why to live.

The stories that came to mind were comforting. They gave her hope that at some point, even as far away as in the fifth millennium, she would be happy.

One day, after a panic attack, she stood up and said, “The Planet of Pleasure is here. The Planet of Pleasure is now.”

She forced herself to go out and jog. At the beginning it was hard. All her body resisted and she did not want to do anything. Her mind, her body were her enemies. They wanted her to keep away from simple actions that could give life to her. But Julie was determined. She forced herself to exercise some. And suddenly she felt energy in her muscles. Nothing is lost. Take action. Move on.

She then went to a shop to buy paint. She wanted to paint her house in light orange as a sign of new life. Can you understand that it was hard for a woman that lived only in hallucinations to paint a house? But Julie was determined. No doctor could cure her. She had to realize the Planet of Pleasure is today and now. When her strength was betraying her, she would concentrate and move on.

Finally, the project was complete. Her house looked a lot better and joyful. The house painting project was worth more than any psychologist she knew. And she also knew that it was within her power to change things.

Julie had been a curious girl in her childhood. She had liked to collect leaves and make albums. That was Julie’s second project. She had also liked painting and writing stories. These interests gave meaning to her life. But to tell you the truth, it did not come easily to her. Julie literally forced herself to go to the nearby park to collect leaves. She viewed it as therapy. A substitute for endless talks with psychologists. She literally forced herself. But the interesting thing was that once she started doing things, she was also interested in them. The rays of life would penetrate her during the small activities and projects she was engaged in. She knew that. She knew that planet Earth is today in everybody’s life and in her life. She just needed to have determination and strength.

Slowly, Julie felt a bit of energy filling her body. Yes, she forced herself to do things. But once she did them, she also felt little sparks of happiness and satisfaction. Her hallucinations continued, but she was halfway to a real life. It was here that real happiness lay. She was in Armenia. And she lived in the 21st century. That was her time and place, and she knew that her voyage to the fifth millennium was just an escape from life.

That was why she forced herself to do things. She had the determination to live, and that gave her the strength to do those tiny things that many others do not even notice. Her whole story was a struggle. A struggle for a piece of life. And Julie wanted to have her place. Her place in a tiny world like Armenia and in a crazy time like the year 2022. She did not want to travel to a different world. She wanted to live her life here and now. And she did it. She managed to come back to earth and lead a life that was real. It was real. It was the Real in Unreal. And it resembled the Planet of Pleasure.