Drifting

For me, everyday is just some empty, hollow shell. I wait for that last screech of breaks that finally ends it, but it never comes.1

Waking up is like re-entering hell. Sleep is a blissful sanctuary. Some people would think I was talking about faith. That I was communing with God in my sleep. But I know that the only god that's out there is one that cares about us only distantly. 2

I remember the day I heard about it, and how everyone who really knew about it was gasping and saying, "Can you believe it? It can't be true." And how all I could think was that this must happen to a thousand people a day, at least. And that I thought, "Why isn't there ever really good news in the newspaper? Why can't I read a story about a woman who fell in love with a man and they just got married after two years of trying to meet each other in real life, because they met online?" what I wondered, in that moment, was why the News ever even bothered anymore. I wondered why all these people were acting like they cared, or that they had some sympathy.3

I could see through their facade. I could see their hollow, empty lives stretching out before them just like mine did. I could lean back in my office chair and study them for the day as if they were ants, and they'd think I'd just been so touched by the whole thing that I was being introspective.4

The truth is, I couldn't muster the will to care. I'd lost a lot of people in my comparably short life. But this was just one more drop of water in the cup. One more loss, one more grief. And I didn't have the tears to cry anymore. There just wasn't anything to mourn with.5

The years wear you down. After a while, you get tired and it's harder and harder to really care about the people around you. And the more you love them, the more they seem to disappoint you. And after awhile, as much as you love them, you can't care anymore. Your faith can only be shattered so many times, your belief in the upstanding goodness of the world, as hidden as it is can only be challenged so often, and then you snap. Then you can't muster the will to cry, the will to say, "I do care" anymore. 6

After a certain point, there is nothing left to give. For anything. Not even yourself. I got ready as fast as possible in the mornings, out of the house, out into the rush of life that almost succeeded in reminding me that I was there along with it. Almost succeeded in bringing me back from this dark, lonely place I had entered and seemed to no longer have the will to leave. Things are much simpler when you don't care anymore.7

But then there is the breaking point that brings you back. And what I wanted, more than anything when I heard of the death and the end and the way it happened, and all of these people who were touched and reborn because of it; What I wanted was to be there with them. To care with them. I wanted this to be the point that brought me back. The thing that said, "wake up!" to my drugged and tired soul.8

But it wasn't, and so I sat there in a busy, loud, office, and watched as some girl started to cry, and other people continued to gasp and say, "This can't be happening." And all I could think to say was, "Well, obviously it can. Because it has happened."9

And all in all I no longer felt very good.10