I watched a turtle try to cross the road. To make a tedious and tragic story short, the turtle's journey, while not cut short, was redirected, ending in a total about-face. Wouldn't it have been more merciful to have simply ended the journey there? To have crushed it or flipped it upside-down, eaten it or something like that? Rather than to spin it about when it had nearly crossed the entire span of the road so that, believing it had at long last reached the other side, continued on in utter ignorance of the fact that it was back where it had begun! How absurd!

Last month, through a series of events and thoughts I cannot even recall now with clarity or certainty that they even occurred, I decided to return to school. Five years ago, I swore I was done. Done with dreaming, done with aspiring, done with all of it. For five years, I was true to the vow and never once wavered. I was never given cause to waver. But then, for some hideous, indefinite and cruel reason I changed my mind. I lost my job. I hated it anyway, and they hated me, but I lost it just the same and have been unable for the last month and a half to find another. I am living off of my mother. I am 32 and living off of my mom.

This time it was going to be different. I would study my you-know-what off, nothing else mattered but doing well and getting it over with. I would do my best. What could go wrong if I did my best? I had my first exam last week. I got my grade back yesterday. A "D".

And now what do I do? I can withdraw, but there will be no refund. I have no job, no prospects, no future, nothing. I have nothing. I gave what little I had up for more failure. I have no idea what to do. I am ashamed and embarrassed. I have no one to to turn to, nowhere to go, nothing to do. I am trapped inside this house, inside this town, inside my own failure of a life with nowhere to go and nothing to do! I don't know what to do. I feel that God has abandoned me, that He abandoned me a long time ago. I don't resent Him. It's not like I deserved the company. But I thought that...I was trying. I really was trying. I thought that, even if this wasn't the path (again), that my hard work would be rewarded with more than a "D". It's like a slap in the face.

"You fool! Didn't you get it the last time? What will it take for you to get it through your head that you aren't any good? You can't do this! Stop trying! How many times will take for you to figure it out, stupid!"

There is no place for me.

4/21/17

Is this really my life? Lonely, solitary, monotonous?
I have been advised, "Let God row the boat". This advice is of little comfort to me, for what's the use of allowing God to row the boat if I have never left the shore? I am standing upon the banks of some body of water, watching other boats sail, row, drift beyond the horizon. I stand here, thinking of whether I shall eat carbohydrates tomorrow or nothing at all. Do I go to work tomorrow? If not, how shall I occupy my time?
I go to my email inbox to find it empty. I search for someone to whom I can write, and find no one. I think, "Sunday night I shall be alone.". I'd like to do something, but can think of nothing to do and no one with whom to do it. "How many sleeping pills do I have? I'll go to bed early".
No book holds my interest. Poems are banal, sentimental, ridiculous. Television and film are redundant, tedious, egocentric, blind.
"What do you read my lord?"
"Words, words words."
Food is also troublesome and unoriginal. "Nothing tastes".
Ideas, opinions, ideals--all meaningless.
History. Repetitious.