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I'd surrender emo status since I think you're a cool lot and avoid rejection by not posting this but Anton LeGay's avatar sig got me thinking about this quote from a more favorable moment in V for vendetta.

"It seems strange that my life should end in such a terrible place, but for three years I had roses and apologized to no one. I shall die here. Every inch of me shall perish. Every inch, but one. An inch. It is small and it is fragile and it is the only thing in the world worth having. We must never lose it or give it away. We must NEVER let them take it from us. I hope that whoever you are, you escape this place. I hope that the worlds turns, and that things get better. But what I hope most of all is that you understand what I mean when I tell you that, even though I do not know you, and even though I may never meet you, laugh with you, cry with you, or kiss you, I love you. With all my heart, I love you. Valerie."

So I was just wondering what you considered your inch.

My inch has been stretched to roughly the breadth of Jupiter. It covers any hint or suggestion of knowing myself better than myself knows myself being suggested by another; mostly. Which invariably leads to some follow up berating my self worth as though it could be done. It's plainly annoying. Something like Michael Corleone's "Don't lie to me, it insults my intelligence." Unless of course that knowledge carries an effect = feelings of wellness.

Anton's sig - "You do not exist" is not an example. Just got me thinking in this direction. Should someone take it that way.

I yanged my yin the other night and came up with this.

Age has taught me little. There was a time when every moment was spent anticipating the future. Nothing's changed. For the life of me, I can't figure why. Memory perhaps. It's difficult to recall all the mutations of character and life experience which has brought me to this exact point in time. I'd like to imagine there was a time, and I can almost convince myself that there was a time when my memory held sharp, pristine clarity. For the sake of a more concise reflection I'll suppose there was.

As a teen I had all but obliterated that self. The self of youth that thinks his parents might get back together, that friends might finally respect him fully or that his family might notice all the things we held in common. Why did I care? I'd imagine I did, but it's more likely I didn't. Maybe I just felt it was the right thing to do, to care. My ego's occasionally a desperate mess. But again, I'd have to go under the assumption that I had ever even experienced an actual ego. Am I now? Is my sitting down, typing this out completely self indulgent? Only I could know that. Is my self esteem so low that I don't have any answers? 

So all self indulgence aside - drugs. Drugs have been shaping my life since I decided to start using them at fourteen and end using them at twenty two. Not residual effects as much as there being a huge gap in some important developmental years. I was an artist, my faux memory recalls. I created many pieces of music, some of which I still have stored away. Some drawings which would impress some art school somewhere but would hardly be enough to get admittance. That requires money and ambition. Both of which are skills my lower middle class upbringing could not shape.  At least it's easier to blame circumstance, I think. I was also a carpenter, sales person *ehkk*, file clerk, boyfriend, skinny, handsome know it all.

So I've inflated it at times, this self. I toy around with the notion there's something more, somewhere for it to grow. I continue on, anticipating the future. Day by day, night by night. Immobile. Just thinking. It would be all the more impressive if I had actually arrived. Ultimately I can not escape the comfort zone. Sanity won't allow it. It knows, if even relegated to empty corners of the subconscious that there's nothing but a present moment. Both future and past are little more than maybes. Skewed perspectives of what is real. Fate presented, course unknown. As if I had a choice which didn't lead right back to fate.

Back to twenty one. That terrorist attack had happened. I was having a complete meltdown. It's foggy still but it all came to a head. My country, the one I had been raised in was suddenly experiencing a very dramatic thing. It would be another five years before I come across a book called "The Universe and The Teacup" which had really downplayed all the drama to plain statistics.  Not so dramatic anymore. Not as dramatic as it would be to a weakened mind experiencing a highly inversed sense of being. Oh yeah, that's right. There's a world outside my own personal bubble. Beyond that, there's a world outside a country's own personal bubble. And then a planet's, and so on. The micro and the macro. Leaves, insects, galaxies and turnips. All with a unique perspective on any given point in time. The manual on uniform traffic control - a flitter of melody. Boom, clarity.

A life engaged, a pleasurable life and a selfless life are the three paths to happiness. This according to a psychiatry lecture I saw. The pleasurable life being the less satisfactory of the three if not homogenizing with the other two. Pleasure is merely icing on the cake. A reward of balancing appropriately. But how and when does a light bulb go off? And when it does, will it be remembered? Not likely. I remember many epiphanies but their fruits, never. Until they are experienced at this very moment... Ooo, dinner's ready!

I need attention. Gimme. I will try to be rude, I promise.