A very short story: My Last Breath

It's a short distance, but it may as well be an ocean.

My arms are the first thing to give up. Breaching the surface becomes impossible, as if someone is holding onto my arms, weighing me down.
I slowly turn onto my back again and kick desperately, hoping to float. A soft wave immediately flows over my half submerged face and I inhale more water.

My eyes are open and I'm suddenly aware of just how dark it is. The water doesn't feel cold anymore. I glance up through the water for one last look at the moon but the overcast sky denies me.
I wonder how she'll react when she hears the news. 
I feel sad as I know she doesn't care as much as I would like.
I give two last desperate kicks and manage to breach the surface; a pathetically futile gesture as I only manage a brief cough before going under yet again.

I cough and splurt and inhale water and feel my insides burn, and my head throbs but not as badly as I had expected.
I notice that I'm sinking as I drift off into unconsciousness. For the last split-second of my life I see her face.

Finally I shudder violently as my living body grinds to a dead stop.

Everything is dark now as my feet finally touch the seabed.

I wonder if she cried.

The grave I don't visit.

It's a cold place where in life she never was. A small plot of land in a field not particularly close to where she lived.

To me it has nothing to do with her, other than a reminder of those days when she was in hospital, and the days when she had just died. Her bones have rested there for nearly 10 years now, but there's more of her inside of me than inside her bones. Thinking about a lost loved one isn't something you do so much as something you live with. 

Why would I go to a place just to remind myself of the worst time of my life? I know it happened, every day her absence is there somewhere in your mind. It'd be impossible to say if I think about her every day, I don't know how often I think about her. What even constitutes thinking about someone? Is it just thinking their name? Is it remembering some event you shared? Is it recalling how you felt in their presence?

Death isn't hard on the person who dies. Dying may be if it's drawn out, but death isn't. 

For them it's over. 

Death is hardest on the people left behind. So does that make mourning a selfish act? I don't think so. You're sad that they're not with you for important events, or non-important events, but you're also sad that they no longer get to experience life, which for the most part can be pretty good.

Some day in the not very distant future I too will be dead. The only thing that remains of anybody is the impression they leave on other people. This is passed onto their children, and that again helps shape their children and so on. Every good and bad person you meet in your life leaves an impression on you that helps you to define yourself, and you leave an impression on them whether either of you realise it or not. 

In that way, nobody ever really dies. Everybody is survived in some aspect by leaving a mark on others. The only change is when you die your impression is no longer active. It has taken it's effect, like a forced bend in a growing tree. The tree will live it's entire life with that bend in it, even when you remove your (for want of a better term) "bending force". 

She's survived through everybody who ever met her. 

Especially those who loved her, and who she loved.

She's survived through me, and the biggest testament to her life that I can make is putting to the forefront the parts of me that she shaped.

I'm sitting at work writing to my friend who listens

I'm nearing 200 posts and I've been considering ending this blog.

More and more these days I find that I have less and less to say on this. 

The words don't come as easily, but the thoughts are still in there somewhere.

I feel as if I'm bursting with a creativity that I need to express, but when I try to I express it so poorly that I don't think I do myself justice.

I feel I can be great at anything but I'm good at nothing. Instinctively I want to do and to be everything, but I really want to be nothing that I can think of.

Having cleared my heart I've been trying to sort out my mind the last while. TV has me wanting a life that I can't have. Games have left me wanting a meaningfulness, a purpose, that I can't have. Books have left me confused as to what experiences are actually mine. All of these have left me dreaming of a love that might not exist for me. 

Our society pins love down as the most important thing you can have, but what if it's not? Most of us spend so much time chasing it for this promise of giving a meaning to ourselves, what if we chased something else instead? 

What would people think of you? 

Would you be happier? 

I don't want to talk about trivial events anymore; I don't want to try make them into anything more than what they were. 

I don't care about remembering every last detail of my life.

I've been tempted to end this blog and maybe start a new one which reflects more the direction I want to take my life in. End my "confused early 20s" blog and try to become a mid twenties man embracing life and giving myself goals. I still can't refer to myself as a man without finding it strange. 

I think I need to sort my life out before I can call myself a man.

I think I'll wait until I no longer actually am a confused (not so early) 20s male trying to figure out a world that doesn't make sense before I end this blog. I doubt I'll ever figure out an outlook that makes sense of the world for me to be honest. I think there comes a time when people just stop trying and live with everything the way it is.

This playlist is very nice:

http://8tracks.com/idril/electric-folklore

Respect the thin line eh?

I love this song. I've always liked it, but over the last agess I've had a real big crush on one particular girl and it made me feel like I could really relate to a lot of this song. 

Before I start I should probably say I was in Galway over the weekend and got terribly drunk, I think I may have told one of my friends that I like this girl but I don't remember, I was too drunk to remember much. I then had horrible hangover blues in work one of the days and was hating myself for not having the balls to say what I wanted. 

We're good friends but I knew she doesn't like me the way I like her, but I figured fuck it I have to tell her. So I did. For so long I'd felt there was no point saying anything because it only would mean nothing would probably ever happen then, so I thought I'd be better off just hoping she starts to like me some time. 

This was a terrible plan. 

When I was with the ex (who I really don't think reads this, but if you do eh, skip the next few lines), I used to think about how I have a lot more fun with this other girl, and that whenever we broke up I'd have to tell the crush before I start another relationship because if she likes me that'd be amazing, and if not, well at least then hopefully I'll stop comparing other girls to her; they all fall so short. So I finally plucked my vocal chords so I could sing to this butterfly, and sent my words via text because anything else would be too frightening. It was the most difficult text I've ever sent. Knowing that she wouldn't want anything, but still hoping for that 1% chance she did, and trying to make it obvious that it's totally okay for her to say feck off you're just me mate.. She sent a lovely text back 3 hours later (I had managed to fall asleep early because sleep was all I could do to take my mind off the waiting) saying very nice things and the standard things you'd expect in such a text. I woke up about 10 mins after getting her reply and saw the text. 

What really surprised me though was the fact that I felt pretty great afterwards. I thought I might feel crushed, I wasn't really sure, but I felt unbelievably relieved just to not have this secret anymore. I never knew if she knew I liked her or not, sometimes I thought maybe she could tell, and it made me feel awkward not knowing if she knew. Apparently she had absolutely no idea. That she knows and in future I can be more myself since I won't have to worry about the whole thing is such a relief. Maybe some day she'll come to like me in that way, or maybe not, but at least for now I know she doesn't and I can give other girls a proper chance without thinking I could be missing out on something better. It also felt nice to be able to tell her she's beautiful; I don't know why.

I found some amazing music too last night, and some more great stuff today. This Polish Ambassador guy is great.

Check this amazingness out.

I'm falling asleep here so I'll leave it at that for tonight! 

Goodnight my lovely friends.

Awaiting the postman

I have decided I'm not posting another blog post until this fantastic blog is resumed.

88dates.blogspot.ie

A short thought

I've been thinking a lot lately about the similarities between us and ants.

With the internet giving us a hive mind and our general disposition to enjoy serving a greater good and numerous other things we really are a lot like gigantic ants.

Message me some more ways that you think that we're like ants please.

This song is really great.

I'd like so much to hold your hand.

So I was out this weekend.
It was a very unusual night but I really had quite a bit of fun.
For the most-part it was myself, d-money and a girl who will remain nameless. So nameless girl was going to hookup with someone she'd been talking to on tinder and myself and d-money tagged along for moral support or whatever. She was so cute about it. I'd never really seen a girl act quite that way before, she was so happy that they scored. It made me happy. Happiness is such a contagious thing. I think I get too much enjoyment from living vicariously.

This left me terribly hungover this morning.
Dad came in to me at like half 11 and asked me to help him take the boat out of the water at 12 which I basically said a cold No to. I never tell him no so I felt like a bit of a dick, but he really never actually needs me. He just likes to do things together (usually things he enjoys like boat stuff, but I never suggest things so I can't complain I suppose). I always just end up standing there with a rope in my hand for about 4 seconds and then it's an hour of standing around. He could easily find someone to fill my 4 seconds. I kind of hate doing anything to do with the boat with dad. I appreciate the fact that he has all this knowledge he has accumulated over his life and he wants to teach me whatever he can while he can, but it really gets very annoying. I'm surprised he doesn't ever correct me on how I drink water, or walk, or breath, or tell me I'm blinking in-efficiently and I'll wear out my eyelids much faster if I keep on doing it; and really I should spend an hour a week oiling my eyelids. Sometimes I'd do something and he'd re-do it identically. More often he'd re-do it slightly differently. Where's the fun in doing something if you're just going to be made feel like an idiot the whole time? Fuck that. Sometimes I feel like he just likes to feel intelligent instead of teaching. There's definitely a bit of both. I only know that because sometimes I notice he goes out of his depth in things I know about, like misusing computer words. He has no shame in being wrong though, I wish I had inherited that from him! And to be fair he admits when he has realized he's wrong. I remember one time when we were driving somewhere in town and a bus cut us off which was quite dangerous. Dad rolled down his window and started shouting at the driver, but then the bus driver told dad that his lights weren't on so he couldn't see him. Despite being really pissed off dad immediately apologized. At the time I thought it made dad a bit of a fool for having gotten annoyed at something that was his own fault, but as time went on I've become more impressed when I think about it. It takes a big man to admit you're wrong while you're still angry. And it wasn't very dark either, so the bus drivers excuse was debatable really.
Anyway we went for a cycle together this evening so hopefully that counts as our doing something and he won't hold the boat thing against me.

By the way in case you're wondering, no I didn't score anybody last night. I did get this lovely message from someone though "Fuck off, you're not shit. If you're shit then what does that make everyone else?".
Thanks, this made me feel better about myself :).

Someone who I liked for ages doesn't like me back, it's pretty plain to see and I've known for ages. I need a new love interest. Something that could actually happen...

It's time for bed. I'm going to drift off to sleep listening to this and thinking about what would happen if I just tried to kiss her. What's the worst that could happen? Surely it'd be outweighed by the best that could happen...

I'd like so much to hold your hand.