Colloquialism Vs. Lexical purity:

A semantic showdown

random / ran-duhm / adj. 1. made, done, etc., without method or conscious choice. 2. contemporary colloquial expression, used for variety of purposes to describe unforseen events, erratic behaviour, unpredictable personality traits, generally anything that is either beyond explanation or normality. (man, you are so random).

As he was walking home, his iPod was not being random enough. Music was blaring in his ears and the setting was on random, however he kept getting the same old favourite tracks. "I just want something different, come on!" Repeatedly pressing the next track button, the same thing happened; the randomness was failing him. With his feet dragging down a dark alley that he had walked many times before, a door suddenly grasped his attention that he was sure had not been there before. Stopping, the boy examined the door. Very slowly and cautiously he edged closer towards it, until his nose was almost touching the door. It was then that it dawned on him, the door was quivering slightly. Putting his hands lightly on the surface of the door, he gave it a slight push. The door didn't move, the boy took a step back and threw his shoulder towards the door, when it un-expectantly disappeared. With a shout the boy fell through.

As he came to consciousness, he found himself on a path floating over nothingness. Looking around, he tried to see what was around him, where he was, but all he knew was that he was here, which was neither here, there nor anywhere, except among nothingness.

Looking down at his clothes, he saw himself, but yet saw nothing at the same time. Clothes suddenly appeared on him, and his brain registered that nothingness had transformed into something. Feeling a bulge in his sleeve, he reached with his hand and quickly pulled the object out. A small mirror appeared in his hand, and he brought it up to his face to examine his face in the ghostly reflection. Somehow, it appeared he looked different to what he remembered. With hair now blonde, not brown, his eyes grey not black, and now with two eyes brows instead of that peculiar mono brow that had once adorned his face, his appearance was completely different.

It was then he looked down, and the realisation that he was on a path above the nothingness crashed down onto him. Although the nothingness was all around, he was really in the middle of it; however the boy imagined he was above it. The nothingness was not black as space is, for space holds matter within it, which means it is not nothingness, but something. It was beyond the brain to comprehend and the nothingness was overwhelming. Frantically he searched in every direction, upwards, sideways downwards, but with all his efforts, all he saw was still nothingness.

The boy quickly walked forwards along the strange path, hoping for somethingness below him and the path, instead of the nothingness he was confronted with. He continued walking, his pace quickening, his mind trying to grasp something solid. However no matter how far he travelled, all he saw to the future was more path and nothingness. Feeling what seemed like a chill running up and down his spine, the boy whisked around, fearful of danger. He found himself to have set his eyes on a twisted path. The walkway he was on had been rotating, as one empties the water from a wet face washer, so that bits of path were now cascading down to the nothingness like water, and soon disappearing into the nothingness.

With mystification consuming him, somethingness had suddenly become apparent. It seemed the nothingness had disappeared, and the boy wondered if the nothingness had indeed been nothing but empty thoughts to fill his mind with something although it was indeed nothingness itself. As he began to anxiously think of where he was, he realised there was now no nothingness, but blackness instead. Looking for something around him, colours began dancing amidst the darkness. They did not seem to be touching anything solid, they were not reflecting or lighting the somethingness that seemed to be somehow around him, they were just there. The colours that swirled were ones he knew and ones he had never seen. His mind devoured the new colours and turned them into excitement and the passive fear the boy had felt was disappearing.

The blackness disappeared and the colours stopped flourishing. Suddenly there was another path floating over the nothingness. The boy realised it was a different one, for it was wider. As he looked around him, searching for signs of life, a cohort of twelve greeted his eyes, which at an extensive look turned out to be huge clocks. The faces seemed to be at least a metre in diameter, and they had no arms but legs instead. The movement of the legs seemed to be in beat to the ticks and the tocks of the clocks. As he examined the mechanical devices of time further it dawned on him: the time-tellers were in fact ticking backwards, and their feet were in reverse. As soon as he noticed this, the clocks turned to face him.