Journal Entry Type #120: Here We Are

I have mixed emotions, feelings, and whatever else you describe as thoughts. It’s weird how the things you imagined you wanted 20 years ago are not the things that are actually important to you now. Well, some of them are although I would sure like more of a certain thing and less of another thing. This is cryptic, but it’s for a reason. I’m similar to everyone else. I am willing to share some things but not others. I commend people who are open about their depression on social media and although I’m not one to go out of my way to share (okay in some cases I guess because it’s easier to share them from behind a computer screen), I don’t readily go out of my way when I’m really down in the dumps or sitting in the proverbial cesspool in the dark. I suppose a part of me is trying to resolve some issues I’ve had a hard time flushing out of my system and getting rid of once and for all. These feelings and emotions involved keep coming back about several issues. The rooster has come to stay.

The reality is my life seems to be harder as each decade passes on some fronts. The part that has improved is nothing I imagined. I thought it was me, myself, and I. There was nothing in the world to stop me from getting what I desired. There was nothing in the universe to stop me from being active and engaged. Then, life happened between my 20s and 40s and here I am about halfway between 40 and 50 with many questions and fewer answers. I’ve come to loathe those positive quotes and sayings that seem so simplified at the moment. Even I am guilty of posting those stupid quotes. I would love it if things were that simple. Really, I would love it. The reality is life is complex. There’s more to life besides “just doing it.” Seriously, there’s more to life than putting in the work. You can put in the work and things still are the same. In other words, things more or less suck all the way around the block and back. Sugar coating the obvious is aggravating, quite maddening really when it comes to certain people who have their eyelids open in the most closed of ways.

Besides this happening in the world right now, I’m getting slowly back to writing my second novel. A part of it felt good. Another part of it felt useless. Few people would want to walk in my shoes for a day, and while I’m not saying my life is difficult, parts of it are 150%. I wish I had more time and peace. I wish I had a lot more of everything. I recently celebrated another year and commented I was looking forward not backward. I’m working to make that a reality (another simplified mindset you find in positive quotes) “one step at a time.” No kidding. You put your right foot in front of your left foot or vice versa? That is if you have two feet to begin with and can do that. What about people who lost a leg or foot? What about people who can’t afford to replace their lost leg or foot? What about those people with two feet and legs but feel as if they only have one? Everything feels unsteady to them. I will end with another quote that ties to writing in the most intimate of ways (if you know how to spin it on paper or computer).