Dearest ghosts:

I’m starting again, now. From this point on, I have one focus, one goal, and I will not hesitate to ensure my own success. I expect conflict, but discord has only ever had impact when I had something to lose, and there is nothing here that I will hold on to.

Once you make the decision to look forward, it becomes very easy to leave everyone behind. Once you start moving, you know who’s keeping pace with you.

There is so much of importance in the world, and you are not part of it.

…

(removed)

…

Higher, she said. Just a little more, I can almost reach.

Just a little more, now.

Summer nights:

– Dark Carnival 4 (a resounding success) has left me with a feeling that perhaps there is something more to do here.

– A quiet moment on the porch, the moon half-full and as bright as day.

– A stolen night with Leslie, secret kisses and midnight whispers

– Insomnia(?) leaves me to watch the sun come up, filtered light and the cry of crows. They still live, here.

I used to spend my time on people who I know aren’t going to listen, on the off-chance that maybe, maybe some of what I say will make some sense to them, that I’ll make a difference, somehow.

In my heart, I know it doesn’t work that way.

I remember years of frenzied activities, stressful conversations, flamewars, debates, all of it. I remember throwing myself at countless brick walls, trying to knock them down through sheer force of will.

But still, stone remains stronger than flesh.

…

At my worst, at my most vulnerable and drained, I found someone to teach me, to help me cope with the world. Three lessons above all else: We are all responsible for our own happiness, whatever I put my efforts into will increase, and to choose my battles.

I try to keep these close to me in all things. I try to make sure that any cause I devote myself to is positive, just, and not outside of my reach. We can spend forever fighting on the ground to see who will be first to reach the stars.

I still feel these things are true.

…

There is a solution here. There is an answer, somewhere within these words and these walls.

There is truth, if I can find it.

This death is a slow one, this death is friction.

Listen:

There is a wall, made of language and logic and reasoning that I cannot penetrate. I cannot tell what the rules are beyond this wall, I cannot tell how it is that what I do is always so improper, so problematic.

I stumble and fall time and time again, thinking that what I am doing is correct. Appropriate. Just. In this, I cannot help thinking that I live alone.

I bloody myself via action and inaction, trying to make it to the other side through sheer will — but stone is stronger than flesh, and every scar is forever.

I hear them, speaking to me through the skin. They whisper secrets and truth in another tongue, and I cannot make myself understand.

..

All things are a process; on a long enough timescale, the probability of any action will approach certainty.

The process of life will always resolve itself; the process of learning has no guaranteed resolution.

There is no comfort here.

…

The only things that seem real are half a lifetime away.