That mirror.

That fragile piece of glass that is designed to reflect the fragile creature that stands before it. The question whether fragility is a characteristic of its own or whether it is another reflection of the man that stands there, staring at what he thinks is how he looks like.

The drunken refer to this as ‘a moment of clarity’.

It's when you stand real close to a mirror and look at yourself; and by yourself it's not the nose and ears, not the eyes and lips. It's barely even yourself. The ability of sight magnifies to a newly discovered understanding. Superman can fly and Spiderman can cast webs. I, all graciously humble, can now see.

I believe. I fucking believe.

I believe in God. I believe in my country. I believe that men are weak. I believe that nobody really grows, expect in size sometimes. Aren’t we all divided into the gang of bullies and the geek squad, where the geek aspires to be a bully, whereas the bully pretends to be something that he’s not?

The grass is always greener, huh?

It’s always been like that… and it’ll stay that way.

Words don’t mean shit anymore. If I said that I’m John Doe you’ll need proof. If I said that I’m an excellent banker, you’ll need proof. If I told you that I loved you, you’ll need proof. Well, I don’t have any except my word. I never thought I’d need one, but hey… guess what? I should have had evidence. I should have had proof. My false assumption that my decency would be the only evidence that I’d need did not serve me well at all.

They were right when they said that 'assumption is the mother of all fuck ups'.

An ex-friend taught me that it's not what you say if you don't have evidence. It is a certified world where paper matter, contracts matter. What you are is how much you've got in a big fat wallet at the bank. What you say is what you must not share.

Nobody gives a fuck.

It’s sadly true.
You can’t touch or see or feel or smell a name.
You can’t touch or see or feel or smell a profession.
Same with love I guess.

Too much love might be considered a charity case.
Too little love is one sadistic motherfucker.
I never found the pivot that balances it all. I am, sadly, inexperienced.

What I thought was my edge morphed into being an edge of a blade that stabbed me where it hurts most. I lacked proof.

If you succeed for yourself only you’re selfish.
If you succeed for the people you care for, you’re unambitious.

I’m confused. I don’t understand.

You got money, pay me.

What you see is what you get.

And I stand before that mirror and stare at something new, something improved, something bleeding.

I have made mistakes. I quote an ex-friend who asked me something along the lines of ‘What makes you think you’re any different? Why do you believe that you don’t make mistakes? You’re not a messenger of God, are you?’

No, I’m not different. I’m trying to be.
No, I have a list of mistakes that could wrap me up as my inevitable death shroud.
No, I am not a messenger of God.

Now that I think of it, though… perhaps I did have a message from God to that ex-friend. I don’t know. Maybe to that friend, I wasn’t supposed to be a person; a sign maybe, but that would be giving myself too much credit, wouldn’t it?

Or would it?

I don’t know.

Bullshit falls in the middle of the scale of being too honest and being too dishonest. The more you do either, the less they believe you, I guess.

I wonder where total silence falls on that scale.

Oh the things that I’d give away just to be able to return to being inexperienced and innocent, to be that little boy who dreamed of becoming an astronaut, to float near a star and hop on another, to witness a scene of God’s creations and beyond.

It costs around two million dollars for a space trip… or so I heard. I never cared to remember the figure. At this point, I can’t even afford a world trip, and I wonder whether I'm still going to hold on to all the bullshit they made us fall for when I'm old and wrinkled.

The mirror reads the future now. A 40 year old man who still wants to be an astronaut, who's still not sure what he wants to do with the rest of his life. Perhaps it's because he's still naïve; but it might be that it's because he knows he's destined for more.

The question of 'more' strikes back as the eternal question on top of the hill of literature and articulacy. The question whether to be or not to be.

That is the question.

The mirror stares back now. It tells me things. It tells me that I shouldn’t trust my judgment anymore. It tells me that my common sense perhaps should be described as being unemployed. It tells me that it won’t get any better, but that I’ll make it through anyway.

It does get cold when you’re self-criticizing yourself, fucking yourself upstairs, asking yourself whens and whys, confessing what you thought was right. That ravishingly cold felony of free speech and pure silence is what I hate the most about moments like these. It’s when you’re waiting for your invisible other to speak, to guide you.

They never did. They probably never will.

It's too quiet in here a tuning fork wouldn't break the silence. It’s like I’m standing in a vacuum dimension, all shivering and disbarred.

Is this how space feels like? Is this my dream come true? Or perhaps it’s a nightmare unaccounted for?

I wonder whether this is caring I feel or is it hatred and rage that drive my shuttle engine.

I’ll just float around, bleeding, praying, hopeful, and confused; an astronaut that drifted away from his shuttle, off the space grid, into the dark and endless abyss.

Vacuum ain't fair;

If only it was,

If only sound could travel in space,

They could so hear my screams.