I listen as the engine starts then fades and they drive away. I sink back into my chair and open the browser back to where i left it. My eyes skim picture after picture of bizarre shirts as i scroll down the page. A randomly shuffled song in iTunes drones on in the background. This is, essentially, what i've spent my day doing. Wasting time. It's mind numbingly boring but that's the point. If yesterday left me paralyzed by passion, today i'll avoid that by, well, doing nothing. I know, it's dumb and self defeating. But this numbness is better than what engulfed me yesterday. At least this way there's no pain of guilt or regret or failed hopes.
I continue scrolling then skip to another page. Images of retro jackets appear and a double breasted military coat catches my eye. Wow, i think, who knew Korean fashion was so interesting?
Yes, it's pathetic that i'm still here, hoping that if i avoid the thoughts and emotions for long enough, they'll stay dormant. Yet even as i write of them a pain stabs at my heart as though suddenly they remember their task to torment me.
My mind flashes back 24 hours.
My workout was quickly falling apart. I don't know if it was the lyrics that played on my workout playlist or if my core desires had finally just caught up with me. Unable to finish the push up, i collapse to the floor. I curl into a ball as if that will somehow protect me from the thoughts that flood through my mind.
"Don't wanna waste my life, life, life. Don't wanna waste my life..."
Lecrae continues to play from my computer. It's as though he's calling me out for having sunk so low, for having given up the fight.
"Yeah, well how the hell do i do that?" i shout back to Lecrae, to my thoughts, to everything. "I tried everything i could but i still failed. I failed, okay? Now let me just stay here."
But if anything, they intensify.
I realize that i'm now on my bed and my chair has been thrown across the room. I guess i must have done that. Songs continue to play and each one seems to bring with it a snapshot of the world as it should be. They're all different, some large, some small, but each so personal and important.
I think of my friends, my beautiful friends whose lives i was able to do so little for. I see the systems which trap them and the lies they believe. I so badly wanted to see them fully alive, to see them free from the dead, unquestioning mindset which seems to entomb so many of them.
I think of everything Ekklesia could have become but didn't. Was it my fault or theirs that it ended as little more than a social club? We had started so brilliantly. No one who showed up had ever encountered anything like it. I truly thought we could change our city, that we could free ourselves.
I think of the few glimpses of community which i've seen and the stories i've heard, yet was unable to create for myself and those around me. We all said it was a better way of life, but we were all to young and immature and selfish for it to be sustained.
I think of the society in which i live, so unimaginatively obsessed with one set way of doing life: stress and work to get good grades in high school, so You can stress and work and get into a good college, so You can stress and work and get an okay job, so you can get a house that's bigger than You need so You can buy lots of things to insulate Yourself from the fact that You've wasted Your life. Maybe if You're lucky, You can retire and have a few years to vacation and buy cheap souvenirs before You die.
And still the thoughts come.
"Damn it! What do You want? I fought for those things. I gave everything i had but i still failed. I was too weak, people were lazy and selfish, no one cared about my ideas, it didn't matter in the end. I failed! I get it!"
Yet they keep whispering, like they're trying to wake up my heart with visions i once loved, but i can't let that part of me wake. To have such ambition but to always feel so helpless to see it manifest is agony. Yes, i've been living within my bounds but at least my heart was safe.
Eventually, at long last, i get busy and distract myself. I push the down thoughts and fill my mind with a hundred different things. Anything to numb that dangerous part of me. The day flows by...
Today, Two friends invited me to hang out and i turned them both down. It's not that i was busy but i couldn't help but wonder what's the point? Go and make small talk, waste time, as the world around us dies. I know that's how we all act, we poor, blind, selfish souls, and i know i can't convince anyone to do otherwise. We have our ways. Why rock the boat? True, perhaps life is unchangingly this way, but don't expect to see me taking part in its emptiness.
I'm too busy searching for some solace from these damned beautiful visions.
It's funny how You talk about this. Like there was no one there. Like no one wanted to fight with and for You. They were there they wanted this too. They just didn't know how to. And the thought of that killed them every day, or me at least. Knowing that i need to be fighting and i wanted to be, but not knowing how to. Still, i did what i knew how to, knowing it wouldn't be enough for You. But what else was i suppose to do? As i grew and learned i tried doing more and more, still knowing that won't be enough. Until eventually my hope was so low it was painful returning. And to this day that is where i am at. It's too painful to see and talk to the people from Ekklesia, even the people that remind me of them. I keep our meetings at a minimum. Yeah, Ekklesia didn't turn out the way we had hoped. But You weren't the only one hoping. You weren't the only one too weak to fix it. I only now that because You weren't the only one who tried. I'm sorry for being weak. For not helping the way You needed it, but trying to help was like taking a shot in the dark. And although i still tried to shoot there comes a time where You have to face the fact that You'll never make it. I was weak. I was trying to heal. I was also trying to fight. That isn't the easiest thing to do. I was scared. My heart broke with Yours. You weren't alone. And i know i did i shit job of showing You that. Believe me i think about that everyday. But I am sorry that what i tried to do wasn't what You needed and wasn't enough. You can say that i was too weak or that i was scared and confused, but You can't say that i didn't care. Or that You were alone in this. Because if i didn't it wouldn't have affected me in the way that it did. I had everything that i deemed as home twisted and taken away from me which was the pattern that had brought me to Your door step to begin with. And as i was healing from that it happened again. You weren't the only one hurt by this, Love.
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