Like christmas and Thanksgiving, it would appear that such anniversaries force reflection. And I cannot help but feel morose-going-on-despondent if I foolishly stop distracting myself for a moment and, like a lemming on autopilot, look around my life.
I see only that which is missing.
The cuddle in bed in the morning from a partner whose love even I am sure of. The haphazard birthday card made from half-potato and poster paint or glued-on pasta shells from a young son or daughter. A family home. The things that - in my eyes - might make me feel like an accomplished man instead of a flippant child trapped inside a, now, 39 year-old pale, haggard, malnourished shell.
Somewhere along the line my life went very wrong, and I am so far away from where I want to be that I can't even see it on the horizon anymore. The elastic that joins me to it has not so much snapped as withered and perished with age, and feels all but gone.
