From the album "Living in a Box"...

It is a good morning. Really. It's 5:39 by the computer clock, and I'm still awake. I've been up accomplishing things, fueled by strong coffee and Bob Dylan. Yes, I've been singing at the top of my lungs.

And it's been good for the soul. When I'm not singing, I've got a mantra: If not me, who? If not now, when? This morning, this good morning it runs through my veins with the blood. Because it's time.

I was thinking about this friend of mine, and something he said to me once, a long time ago. He said that the only time he'd ever seen me truly happy was when I was about to do the stupidest thing ever. (He's right; it was the stupidest thing ever. I was about to take a dive off the edge of a cliff, so to speak.) To his credit he tried to talk me out of it, and I love him for that because he's the only one who did.

It didn't occur to me until tonight that that stupid thing was the last real risk I'd taken in some time. Maybe it scared me. I'm sure some would say "scared some sense into me."

I was walking into the unknown, and it made me happy. Right now I feel like I've been asleep for the whole summer, possibly for the past two years. I don't take chances any more because I've been afraid to fail, so I've built up walls around myself, and I've been hiding inside them.

No more. I don't have a plan, but I'm not going to waste any more time. Right now, sleep seems like a waste of time. There are things around the house that need to be taken care of, and I've been waiting for somebody else to do it. I don't know who I'm waiting for. There is nobody else; that's not a problem, it's a fact.

I've allowed myself to become weak using my illnesses as an excuse. I hate that.

I don't know what I'm going to do, exactly. I need to figure out what I'm living for. I think people should know that, really. I'm not going all Seven Habits of Highly Effective People on you--because I don't think I'll ever be a Highly Effective Person--I just want to give myself a chance to live again.

I want out of this box that says "Sick Person" and back into the world at large.

before - after