Give Me Ambiguity ...or give me something else

Every day I think about ending things. I haven't yet. I don't know how much of that is because I'm afraid, and how much of it stems from a kind of primal self preservation, where I'm waiting and looking and hoping for some reason to stay here. I tell myself that I’m the only one who can see the world the way I see it, who has the memories I have, who can appreciate the things I appreciate, but I also wonder if that's only a justification for my inaction, my fear, and my cowardice.

I've been reading this poem with the line, "stupid girls are always trying to disappear as revenge," and I admit that is part of it. Even hearing it called stupid, I still want to send the message that I was not loved well enough — that I felt alone during most of my life and more than ever now. I don't have words to explain how empty I feel, how desperate I am, how much I long for connection and meaning from someone who lives outside my body but could share my perspective. But there is an action that says this for me.

And beyond sending a message, there is a reality that my suffering would end. I've been alive for 40 years and in control of my own life for 20 of those and I haven't figured it out, how to feel a manageable level of emotional pain. I've gotten better at some things, but worse at a lot more. I don't see a path forward and I don’t have a reason to look for one.

I think about Danny all the time, our talks about what death accomplishes and why someone might choose to opt out. I consider the objections I had for him back then and the questions I asked him. I remember asking, "What if you stay and then later on you are happy and you think to yourself, 'I'm so glad I stayed'?" He said, "If I die I won't know that, and so I won't have any regrets. I won't be here. I won't be here to miss what I didn't get to have so it doesn't matter, it's just my consciousness disappearing." And this is something I think about too. He wasn’t wrong.

It seems like my life’s over but I just haven’t wrapped up the loose ends yet. I’m still mourning my losses, and myself. I cry most days, and the idea of ending that brings me comfort. I search desperately for meaning at the same time I ask myself, “How do I give up?” I don’t know, I don’t know yet, but I’m trying. How do I soften the fear of everything I don’t know and won’t know? How do I forgive myself for all the ways I’ve failed?

I’m proud of how I’ve lived in the world. I see a way I could be proud of how I choose to leave. Instead, I’m crying on the streets while people look away. I write these words that no one reads. I have lost, and I am lost, and I hate that I’m still here.