consider it a blessing. not a curse. every cloud with that lining… every coin with its inverse… to feel hardship, to overcome a difficult situation, a broken bone, when healed will form a stronger bond. i tell this to myself in order to believe that the path i choose is where i belong. that instead of health shakes and meditation, exercise and sunshine, I will insead choose poison that was discovered when we were inventing mustard gas in the 50s. in recent weeks, the toll of this path has started to show, as my nurse today compared my hair loss to the leaves that trees lose in the winter, i buckle down for further waves to come.

physical and mental pain is part of our trade off to feel the joy and stimulation that living is. without sadness it is impossible to be happy just like a bright space is only light when coming in from the dark. hard work and painful experiences define our lives, often we look back at the paiful times and think of the great things we have accomplished.

inbetween it all, we glide. we lurch from problem to solution then back to a new problem, we keep making the same mistakes again, pretending we will get a different outcome. we watch the news, hoping to gleam something of importance to marry into our own lives. we wait, perhaps for the thing we know is coming. the moment when the valley ends and the cliff presents itself. into darkness we fall, only to know that at its murky bottom, a small light will again appear only for us to repeat it once again.