I was sitting on my cot today, and all of a sudden, it dawned on me, it really is over, aside from the stuff I’m still getting back (she assured me through mutual friends), I have no contact with her any more. She might as well be a stranger at this point. I and she (we is no more, and I am the more important one), will never be more than mere memories, I and she can never go back.

I don’t envy her, even if she has better contact with mine and her mutual friends, I hope and believe that my life will be easiest eventually, for I can always look in the mirror and feel proud, for I am one of a dying breed, I do things, because I think they’re the right thing to do, just because that’s the way my father taught me. I wish I could go back sometimes, but that would mean denying my own principles, and foremost it would mean inviting a lot of unhappiness and strife my way. I do not envy this tortured soul no more.

I know I will never go back, and in this case it is very much warranted to say never, which makes the idiom of never say never strangely correct and incorrect at the same time. I will never go back, partially because I don’t want to, but also for it’s impossible to. I cannot go back, but am I happy here? I cannot go back, yet still the mind can’t help but drift there at times, the mind drifts aimlessly with neither a purpose nor a goal, drifts towards a better past, a past where I thought my first would be my last.

Still, I will not go back, I might not be one-hundred percent happy here, but I am happier, I will never go back, the stairs I walk are full of loose boards, but I stride on, for the risk of falling will only increase with moving down again. I might not be happiest, but I get happier with every step I take, I’ll reach the attic soon.

Roberto Strife