His father was lovingly authoritative, and yet the noise reverberating throughout the son’s mind gave him the impression his father was disappointed. Demonically-derived, deafening whispers of, “You’re not good enough” permeated his soul, and, despite his father’s reassurance, he believed the lies, spiraling ever further into a menagerie of delusional devastation and self-destruction.

The father desperately wanted to intervene and rescue his son from the conflagration of confusion. He desired nothing more than to extinguish the fraudulent flames that had been stoked by tinder of treachery. But alas, the father dwelled in Reality, and although the flames were actively consuming his beloved son, he was unable to gain access to his son’s world. The fire was real, but his son had chosen to reside in a mirage; the father’s Key of Rationality was incompatible and fruitless.

Heartbroken and helpless, the father watched his son burn. And his son’s misplaced fury burned against his father, perpetuating the devastation. And although their abodes were worlds apart, their hearts were united in brokenness, welded together by the cruelest inferno of disappointment and shattered dreams.

Somewhere in the distance, the father perceived the outline of a bridge. Initially figuring it to be an apparition precipitated by pain, the father initially ignored the image. But the Reality in which he lived had become so exquisitely excruciating that he forlornly trudged toward what he believed to be a Mirage.

And the son, tormented by his fiery prison, suddenly perceived a different voice. This voice was different than the familiar whispers of inadequacy…this voice offered an oasis of Hope. And unsure whether this was an auditory hallucination or a route of genuine egress, the son dragged himself toward the voice.

And after what seemed to be an eternity, somewhere between Reality and Mirage, the exhausted father arrived at the bridge. Moments later, the voice of Hope guided the beleaguered son to the ostensible oasis.  

And as they embraced, it became apparent that there was, in fact, no bridge, and there was, in all reality, no oasis.  But Faith and Hope had bridged the seemingly untraversable chasm, and the tears of the father extinguished any residual flickers of his son’s resentment. 

The son had finally come home to Reality.  And a blissful deluge of genuine Love forever drowned out the painful past.