Where do thoughts come from?

The words

Mom's calling. ...Tomorrow.
Night one: tomorrow. Night thirty: tomorrow.
The car. Almost mine.
Two years of "not yet." Worth it.
I hate my job.
...Do I?
Or one Monday. One voice. One train.
Doctor can wait.
After the car.
Running on empty.
Just get through the week.
Mom. Car. Job. Doctor. Friends.
Who could watch all this?
Tomorrow.
Not yet.
After the car.
Just get through the week.
after the car
That's my voice.
Every brick, something I said.
Nobody locked me in.
I talked myself in.
...What is that?

About this episode

A man floats in the dark among his own thoughts. Each time he puts something off with a small sentence, the sentence turns into a glowing brick and drifts behind him: the phone turned over when his mother calls, thirty evenings of "tomorrow", a car that is almost his, a job he says he hates, a doctor who can wait, friends he will see after the car.

None of these sentences feels like a choice. They are small and reasonable, said in passing. But they gather. The bricks form a ring, and in four beats the ring closes into a well around him.

The turn comes when he recognises his own voice on the wall. Nobody locked him in; he talked himself in. He pulls one brick out, and through the gap something vast and calm turns its head.

Where do thoughts come from? Often not from where they seem to. Many of them are old sentences, repeated until they sound like facts. This is the first episode of an ongoing story from The Inner Observatory, made by SWB-AI. Episode 2 picks up at the same moment, from inside the well.

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