We are always losing something or another, or at the very least, feeling like we are.  Sometimes more quickly, at other times more gradually.  It used to be that I'd feel the loss of people, connections, experiences, activities, memories.  Somehow, I find that the flavor of loss has changed.  It's not to say that I don't lose those types of things anymore.  I still lose people, I still find that things have changed.  If I open up the little box, I still see the crystal unicorn, not only that, but I see its mate.  I have both of them, you see.

But somehow none of those things are at the forefront.  From what I've been writing in here, it's already apparent that I don't find myself wishing to travel back in time to the past.  That has never been a surprising thing; I've always been aware enough of the changes, of the "milestones" along my descent from the dreams of "forever" and "someday".  Like dominoes falling one by one, it was a natural progression -- one experience scarring me, triggering a changed perspective on another.  It was scary at first, but that fright had given way to grief, weariness, and perhaps now, even a sort of somber acceptance.

I don't feel the loss of people in my life anymore; it's the loss of parts of myself that I seem to feel and write about.  That too, is not necessarily a new thing, either.  I wrote many times about not being able to be who I used to be, not being able to dance the way I used to be.  It was not always negative either; I knew for example, that I could probably not write music the way I used to, but there was not a reason I felt like I really needed to.  Of course, there was -- for a time -- a lingering sentiment of, "if I could be who I used to be then I could have what I used to have".  But that, too, faded, along with the rest, it seems.

I don't feel destabilized, like I don't have any value, or that I'm not myself anymore, or that I'm not special, or anything drastic like that.  I still hold strong ideals, precise standards, virtues that I espouse even in private.  But there is a sense of spiritual loss.  Perhaps it is akin to a sort of nihilism of the soul.

We all know where this kind of thing came from.  Is it really surprising that the more I handed out, the more I lost?  Draco gave away half of his heart, but ends being afraid that the choice has cost him his "soul".  In the end he is able to return to the "stars", but at what cost?

What is the most tragic end for the Girl of the Stars?  Is it that she would join the stars by taking the leap, or is it that she would simply give up entirely?  If she were to turn her back on the sky, to "return to the city", let's say, it would be the end of her, in so far as it would be the end of her story.  She could not be the Girl of the Stars if the story is no longer about the Star.

The situation is, perhaps, different for me.  I do not need to be reborn with a new name, as I find myself in this new world without the familiar signposts, without the north star to guide me.  I do not need a new direction, I can simply go the same way that I always have.  What is missing is the "raison d'être".  I always had a goal before; even an impossible goal was a thing that brought definition and clarity.  It contextualized all of the struggles, the hopelessness.  That goal, though, has faded.  I am waiting, perhaps, for a door to open.  For something to show me the way, after I stopped walking forward in the darkness.  That sounds wrong though.  I'm not really waiting so much as I am simply stopped. 

2026.04

https://ddrkirbyisq.bandcamp.com/album/monthlies-202604

We keep on improving ourselves and our work, believing that someday it will lead us to happiness, but no amount of talent, skill, or discipline truly gets us there. Society may value certain traits and disciplines -- confidence, diligence, charisma, performance -- but it is only those more abstract things that can serve as nourishment for the spirit and soul. Peace, faith, compassion, and the like.

I find it harder these days to press onwards. Not that I have a problem going on with life, or the day to day, but it feels difficult to want to proceed forward. Even those things that I took for granted like putting thoughts and emotions into writing in my blog entries and letters, feel sometimes like a dream where I try to run as fast as I can yet the ground keeps slipping under me.

In the past I would always resist forward motion because my goal was to reconnect with my past. But over the years, after licking my wounds and stitching my broken-ness back together, it's no longer a guiding north star for me to reach out to, unreachable as it may have been. I'm good enough at continuing my ever-steady navigation in the same direction as I always have, but perhaps there is a sort of lack of purpose I'm feeling, a sense of "so what?"

I clasp my hands together to pray, but the derelict shrines provide no solace. What remains is nothing more than the stillness of the lake.

A wordless prayer, then.