The Dark Days
In the heart of the central business district at lunch time, where the activity level is at its highest, and where the pace is blistering.
I had time to kill before training, and longed for a quiet place to read and people-watch, yet strangely, my legs took me right to the middle of a buzzing hotspot. I grabbed a sandwich for lunch, fitting right in with the urban lunch crowd (if not for my shorts and flip flops), and found a quiet place by the river to do some reading.
Here I am, staring at the city’s skyline – a familiar place that brings back fond memories. The feeling I get whenever I am here; it remains pretty much the same, except for the added tinge of loneliness. It was probably a couple a months ago that I last came here, but I had someone with me, unlike the solitude in which I now come with. It was drizzling the last time, with a thunderstorm looming, but it is cloudless today, with the heat as brutal as ever.
Recently, I feel as if I can understand how it’s like to be clinically depressed. You contemplate the purrpose of life not as a philosophical question, but in a bid to find something worth living for. You try to fill the emptiness and loneliness with mundane activities, only to deeped the sense of disillusionment. You wake each day and go through the motions, with no one beside you to keep you going, I begin to understand why depression is such a dangerous condition, for it can be concealed outwardly, and only those who truly care and understand will notice.
It came as a jolt when someone close asked me, “do you ever feel like you life has no meaning?” I simply looked at her expressionless. She gave me a knowing look and then asked, “have you ever felt that there is nothing worth living for anymore?” We both knew it was a question I didn’t have to answer.
Perhaps theses are the dark dangerous days. The days where you hate yourself and who you’ve become. When happiness is the one thing that eludes you, and no one seems to care. When every aspect of your life is tethering on the brink and threatens to come crashing down, and when the people you hold dear prove to be fair-weather friends who are never there in time of need.
Every day, you wake up and fight the inner demons and the thoughts in your head; you live for practically nothing, counting down to the end of your life.
For since the day we were born, we begin the process of dying.
