Phantasmagoria

Word of the Day Wednesday, March 10, 2010

phantasmagoria

\fan-taz-muh-GOR-ee-uh\ , noun;

1. A shifting series or succession of things seen or imagined, as in a dream.
2. Any constantly changing scene.


The phantasmagoria of faces blurred together into one steady stream. Like watching a video camera on fast-forward. A face would stop in front of him, move its mouth as if speaking to him, although he would devour hear any of the words coming out of their mouths. Some of them wore masks, some wore hats. Some were pretty young women, other serious middle aged men. The only thing that remained the same was the back drop behind them.

The lights would dim around him, although they never went completely out, on some sort of regular schedule. But he had no idea what sort of time frame all this activity happen within. There was no clock visible against his backdrop.

Once or twice he thought his father's face slide past him. Which was odd because his father lived across the country in Ohio and had never been able to conquer his fear of flying to make it out for a visit. His mouth seemed to tremble and his eyes were very moist.

It took a long time for it to occur to him that it was odd that the scenery in front of his eyes never changed, and then slowly, the slightly buoyant memories of a silver car appearing suddenly started to rise and coalesce on the tip of his brain.