...that I'm still here. And that I should probably quit posting these title-first sentence connections.

Life is made of ups and downs and if you've been unfortunate enough, or bored enough or any combination thereof, to be following this blog recently you understand that my lows are particularly low. If you knew me personally on a daily basis, you'd also notice my highs are particular high. I don't even want to look up the definition of bipolar disorder.

But anyway, we're always learning to live throughout our entire lives and whoever thinks otherwise, I pity you. These past few weeks have been particularly intensive on that learning to live subject and I guess finding out one or two (or more) truths about life has been scary enough for me. The question I beg to ask and which begs to be asked is this: We can prepare for most things in life... but can we prepare for life itself? Always the one with the hard questions, right?

I've been fighting a good fight of not letting the highs soar so high and, most importantly, not letting the downs plunge so fucking deep. This is a constant battle, I tell you. Kurt Cobain claimed he "missed the comfort of being sad", on "Frances Farmer Will Have Her Revenge In Seattle", off In Utero. I hear ya, Kurt, wherever you are now. Sometimes - most of the time? all the time? - it just seems and feels so much easier to revert back to ourselves, close the door behind us and conveniently forget others exist and that the world is still ticking away outside.

I've been trying to learn what is valuable and what's not. Been trying to learn how to separate the wheat from the chaff. Been trying to learn which fights are worth picking and which are not. Been trying to learn who is my friend and who is not.

I haven't really graduated on any of these accounts. But I've learned that I will never get it completely right. It may be obvious to you and superficially it is also obvious to me, but deep down inside where it matters the most, there's still a longing for perfection, for getting it all right, the proverbial bull's eye. But there are shades of gray and you have to pick your favorite one or at least the one you can afford.

As those guys I love once said:

Here before me is my soul
I'm learning to live
I won't give up
Till I've no more to give


Damn right. That's hopeful as hopeful can be.