They say life is a journey. Like walking down a road. You've heard that metaphor before haven't you? "Walking down the road of life"? It's retarded. Walking is way too easy to be anything like life. Life is more like freeclimbing a cliff over a bottomless pit on a moonless, starless night...

Of course some people skip out on all the exertion. They just forget about the climb and let go... free fall through life. It’s a rush. It’s great…until they go splat on the bottom. Some of us know this. We "have the light," though we climb in darkness, toiling on, painstakingly. We constantly scratch around blindly for a better, higher handhold, expending all our strength in a climb where we see no results, where there is no view. We keep the light of truth in our pockets, or in our packs, and wear them like burdens... extra poundage... dead weight. As long as we "have the light" it's good enough! Afterall, we need our hands free to climb! Every move is potential for life or death, each new hold a choice which takes us up or down...which, I don't know. I seem to be in constant vertigo. Of course I feel the pull of gravity sometimes...or was that a gust of wind? Sometimes I get confused. Perhaps that tug is merely a warm air current, come to ease my climb...to make me fly like an eagle. I've heard stories that we can fly like eagles. But I'm afraid to let go. I cannot trust to hope amidst this darkness. So I cling to the cliff with a numb and rigid grasp. My heart turns to stone, hard like the rock in my hand. It is better this way, I tell myself. It is safer not to feel at all. Feelings are no guide. They are more irregular than this face on which I climb.

I need a light, confound it! Wait...what's this in my pocket? Maybe I should try using that?

I'm such an idiot.  ¶ 6:36 PM