A couple years ago, there was a week where both my parents were in different hospitals- my dad for his pulmonary embolism (due to pressure on his heart from the Mesothelioma), and my mom for a surgical procedure to correct her spine. Every day I took two trips to each locale to visit them... When I think about this period, my heart breaks for the vastness of my life, for how many memories I've squandered. Drowned in sorrow, I fell prey to the bottle and disconnected from everything except the ever-prevailing terror of looming death, so that when I closed my eyes and drank or smoked my mind into a stupor I saw my own demise, waiting to take me into a spiral of nothingness.

An image I cannot relive/explain/examine in any way- which terrorizes me- comes from that of looking out the fifth story window of the Kaiser hospital in San Bernadino, and amidst all the construction and the stark white exterior was tucked a small, lush green garden, presumably an outdoor lounge for the nurses and doctors. In all my agony and hopelessness, I stared and stared at this enigmatic square of greenery, as if it was a beacon of hope, an architectural representation of everything I wanted and felt like I would never deserve or attain.

For inexplicable reasons, this vision haunts me still, as if the events that led me to the place I'm in now were experienced by a different person, by a man with no reason to live, no purpose or direction. Now, when I visit Riverside, I am pervaded by memories of a life I feel nothing for, and it's precisely in this nothingness, in the dimming of the light behind me that I am compelled to push forward to darkness, to the furthest boundaries possible.

This is no longer a pursuit of happiness. It is a pursuit of vision.
I desire now to be awake. To be in a field, running my hands through the tall grass, to appreciate the splendor and mortality of the breeze that hits my face. I desire to be able to sit under a tree and listen to the noises around me (in my case, mostly freeway traffic), to absorb the pleasures of the world and accept who I am within it; To relinquish my obsessions and hand them over to the fates. I desire these things for myself; Not for you, not for my mom, not for my brothers, not for my friends, not for the entire world. I desire for myself to be awake, with clear vision.

I've become a Hydra. If you cut off my head, five will grow back.

I would kill a small child right now, just to hear your voice. Just one word. Just a whisper into my ear, the most infinitesimal utterance. Yes, I would die to hear it.
These days move at a pace that's simultaneously slow and fast, veiled in a hue both painful and triumphant, but for the first time in years I'm hopeful for the future I see ahead of me.
I know what I need to do, and I'm doing it, but it all seems futile without you to share it with.

I recently read an article by Russell Brand (of all people) whereupon a British General during WW1 reflected on his soldiers' inability to adapt to civilian life after the war. He said, "You cannot rouse the animal in man then expect it to be put aside at a moments notice."

I am counting the days until I may see you again, so fervently that it feels like I'm drifting slowly to another planet, isolated in my grief and renewal, hoping for a safe landing.