Flung From Axon to Dendrite: on the nature of change

Hop on, said the axon we'll find us a dendrite in no time.

Hesitating, I climbed abroad  the whitish gluey tentacle.  Sticky it was, no need to hang on. I found myself crawling easily along the slippery center track,  toward the glittery end. I felt quite confident as I learnt to balance among the whiskery filaments.

As I drew closer  to the narrow tip, I thought perhaps I ought to reconsider. I tried to slow down, and the strand began to oscillate and whip! 

I held on as tightly as I could, but there was no hope.  I made a last grasp for a filament, and Thwang!  I was cast out into the sprinkling starlit space, tumbling and turning like a helpless asteroid.  

My mind became a blank.  My life passed before my eyes and disappeared completely! What was happening?  The starlit sprinkles began to thin, and for a time I was suspended in a midnight vacuum blue.

As though in a dream, the emptiness began to fill, one shimmer at a time.  My eyes woke up and there in the far distance was a tiny, trunk-like element, swaying and bobbing like a pinkish, octopusian cobra, uncoiling closer and closer.  'I'm invisible aren't I?' I said to myself.   'I hardly exist!  That weaving thing will never sniff me out!'


Closer!  The tentacle grew fatter as it drew near.  I tried to pretend I wasn't there, but it touched my ankle, hesitated and wrapped itself around my foot!  It moved up to my waist and drew me in.  I knew it was a dendrite; what else could it be? Snuffing and snarling, it pulled me deeper into the new space of shimmers and gave me a toss. 

 I must have fainted, because I woke up curled in a sunlit cove, with gold sand and green edges, rimmed with a clear blue sky and coral flowers.