Flinching at What's Possible

Nothing like a call from Veteran's Affairs to fuck me up. Suddenly I am stripped bare of all protections. Not even my scar tissues can stop the stabbing guilt. Plunging to the root of me. I am rendered speechless, dreadfully fearful. They'll find me out! They'll call me a faker, i see the call as a waste when there are SO many more people out there suffering, people without homes, without loved ones, without the prospect of any of these  - they are invisible, their urge to self-protect keeping themselves out of view, out of harm's way. Any interaction can be harmful. So we stay away we hide out, we don't speak we don't connect, all the while staring longingly at signs of friendships blooming elsewhere. People giving up because you take too much energy to sustain a relationship.We excel at self-fulfilling prophecies, at self-sabotage. It adds credence to our self-theories. If we are indeed bad people, everything makes sense. No other explanation is necessary.

Fear is so powerful, it is a paradox. Our will to survive at odds with our will to survive. We live with the harm we know, dread the the risk of others. Flinch at what is possible, because anything is possible. We know this so bitterly and painfully. Any thing is possible. The capacity for utter ruination lurks everywhere. This stark existence suffices.