My last blog post was my 200th post, which is quite a landmark. I was thinking of having my 200th post my last one, a nice round number to finish it off on, but I don't want to finish this without saying goodbye, so I'm not gonna finish it yet. I definitely won't make 250 though :s
Throughout my blogs lifetime I've always watched the stats, and for a while I quite enjoyed getting more views. It made me feel like what I was writing was worth reading for reason.
So to anybody still checking up on my blog here's some stats on it that I'm going to share because I've nothing more interesting to say.
Right now my blog has had 11,755 views. Mostly Irish, and then the States ones are probably entirely Dave :P, my first blog post was most viewed, and March 2013 was my biggest month with 530 views. I know it's a pittance compared to what some other people I know were getting on their blogs, and I'm skeptical about whether these are all real people, but I'm still happy with it. It would have been fun to get more comments from strangers (I think I got 1, maybe 2).
I was hoping to find a list of all the tags/labels I've used for my posts, I never re-use one, but I couldn't find any list :(.
Anyway, here are the stats for anybody bored enough to care.
Next time I'll talk about something exciting. I promise.
Everything is bright in this palace of light where only souls reside.
We reluctantly express our goodbye before we embark on this next breath of life.
A breath which, much like a dream can last both an instant and an eternity at the same time.
And therein is what troubles me; if we spend a lifetime apart will we still remember what we had? We recall the life we spent together, but was there not a life before that again? If in life we forget what came before birth, in death does it still elude us or does it come rushing back? I will find you in this life. I will remember. I can't forget you.
My turn has come.
I begin to breathe in.
And I try not to forget..
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.
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 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.
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!
