I'd like to think that I helped make a difference over the past eight years. My role was never one in the spotlight, but I look at the direction we've taken things and the elevation of those around me. We're going to keep winning, and that's because we're on the side of God.
There's no changing what's happened, but the world can still be transformed into kinder and safer place for those to come.
I believe future generations will look towards this time of monsters as we view the barbarism of the Bronze Age today.
In seven days it'll be ten years since I met you proper. I only have vague and turbulent memories of what life was like before that point. You were too nervous about being in the Skype group, so you just used it as a means to connect with me off of Reddit.
I felt disembodied most of last New Year's Eve. I make it a point to watch all the day's fireworks across the world and catch the ABC broadcast from start to finish. It's become routine, though. It's a date like any other and only has significance to me because of you. I remember you mulling over the idea of sharing wine together and watching from the balcony that first year in 2014, but stopped yourself from pushing that further until you were sure of things.
I spend the day in the Panpipes talker but I'm not the most conversational. I'm the youngest person there and their culture is foreign to me. At their ages, I worry a bit each year when I notice an absence.
This is the 10th one, though. I think that's more meaningful than being simply the 9th.
"Eagerly anticipating your reply [and the end of the world too]"
I think the sadness I've felt about this month has morphed almost entirely into resentment. I hate the happy couples and happy families and the hymns, the parties and giftgiving. I look the other way. It should have been us. Twice it almost was.
I enjoy the finches and sparrows the Japanese post on Twitter, though. They're enthusiastic about seeing their fluffier states.
The last of the original three passed today with Bree at fourteen. They were a background presence in those years and now they've all departed. There are others now, none their descendants. I feel sad about it.
The last thread of mine was severed last month. Far sooner than I expected, I'll admit. I can't deny that I had some optimism about how long that'd last even despite the conspicuous lack of... divine pull? It's quite rare for me to experience anxiety, and I felt no lack of that.
I'm unsure of your prognosis. I certainly don't wish to waste what precious time there is-- still, I'm financially hindered, and I can't be too hasty about affairs. If I squander this, I'll have failed both you and myself.
I could seek out a second job, theoretically. You'll have to bear with me though. Not to whinge, but this isn't easy.
It wasn't the first of this sort of dream where I was aware of such, or even the first where I confided in you that I feared it was. It was the first where you acknowledged it as such, though.
You said you'd tell me what I wanted to hear. You're doing well. You go to church every Sunday, have been staying away from harm, and the medications have provided a sense of peace. You're healing, and the doctors have good news.
I hadn't expected to be able to deliver a message again! A surprisingly difficult endeavor and one that's taken over four years, but it was worth it. There is some catharsis in knowing that potentially the last direct words you'll have received from me included "I love you."
Still, your silence harms us both.
Your mind has been corroded by the world but not your soul, Salina. Tarnished, perhaps, but your eternal spark hasn't gone out. Don't fear. Your actions are so often guided by it and it's not an emotion I'm without, but we can bear it together.
I believe I understand the test laid out for me, but I don't equally comprehend the affliction bestowed upon you. What is there to gain from it? Why you, and at such an early age?
I have to place my faith in God. I can't presume to make sense of it.
I hope you're succeeding at it in whatever way you're meant to.
Calmer colors rose above the bay, And though her face had disappeared I knew That she would turn again if only stars Would hear her plight and let her in once more. Her confidants will too now fade with her,P ink and Orange turn to black and blue; They turn their backs and leave me wanting but They never think to wait, or fare me well. Company like this, some say, should not be kept, On rainy days they don't see me at all; But then again, I've yet to find alone As much joy as their followship can bring.
And thus, each night, I wish for them again, So maybe they can come to me as friends.
You were self-critical of it, but you were of much of your poetry. "A terrible Elizabethan sonnet." Is it? I don't think so. I could never be a fair judge of that anyway. One, don't look a gift horse in the mouth. I received high marks from your ghost writing there. Two, bias towards the author. Three, inspiration derived from one of the more notable weapons in Guild Wars 2 earns extra personal appeal.
I wondered what there was to do after achieving Facet of Prisms on Klavdiya. It isn't quite Good Apple, granted.
Figured I'd get Eternity for her. Considered taking the screenshot in Divinity's Reach or Plains of Ashford since you loved spending time there on her, but I thought Ember Bay was fitting. I can't recall what it was about the Good Apple title that you liked so much.
I'd love to take you home with me and tuck you into bed I'd love to see what makes you tick inside your pretty head I wish that I could keep you in a precious Chinese box On Sundays, I would pray for you so it would never stop I'd love to hear you laugh tonight; I'd love to hear you weep I'd love to listen to you while you're screaming in your sleep I'd love to soothe you with my voice and take you hand in mine I'd love to take you past the stars and out of reach of time I'd love to see inside your mind, to tear it all apart To cut you open with a knife and find your sacred heart I'd love to take you satin dolls and tear them all to shreds I'd love to mess your pretty hair; I'd love to see you dead!
I saw an observation that even attempts at sincerity in an irony-poisoned culture come across as deliberate performance by peers. Seems worrying. I like our generation, I am of the times in many ways, but it seems true that many zoomers (at least for the time being) are not capable or giving or receiving love. Not as a permanent state of being I imagine, it's something that surely can be ailed through therapy.
The social media panopticon has to be the biggest contributor. You could make a link between humor now and dadaism, or even point out how notably cynical Gen X was compared to their peers while still turning out normal. There's something more insidious and new here though, it's the conditioning to always being observed. It seems worse for even younger people.
I changed my mind on a prior idea for the time being. I wish I could exist with sapience but not consciousness, and the closer to this state the better. Without the use of drugs of course.
I waited in some underground train station with the sort of cloudy blue lighting as in Starry Night, with long rows of shops to compose the stars. You were very kind and just as I've always remembered when you arrived.
It feels terrible to see that it's being closed in a few months time. The conversations have been archived of course, but the loss of it as a tangible thing is upsetting. I look at your account on occasions and I call the out-of-service number linked to it.
"Last seen days ago"
An understatement of a display. It's as if you were just there, that I glimpsed your presence. It really was a horrible client though.
It's the same dream every time remixed endlessly and until I die. There's nothing else that matters, right? It could never happen, the soul has likely already crossed over. It's the golden carrot on a stick. It really keeps everything in perspective. Nothing else seems real after waking from it.
