Look Back at 2004

This past week's been a pretty sobering reflection for me as I look back on where I was at this same time of the year in 2003. It was then that my life took a harrowing downward spiral on December 23, one from which I've only recently begun recovering. For the week after that day, I was up at all hours light or dark, stuck in what felt like some strange state of shock. I won't discuss the events that led to this because they need to remain private, but suffice it to say that I was a dead man walking, ready to leave once and for all. Something held me back in stasis for a while but from that moment I was falling apart in every possible way -- in love and life, in spirituality and intellectualism, in relationships with family and friends, in career and fortune, in physical and even mental health.

For the first half of 2004, I behaved as a persona non grata, unnoticed, unmissed, unloved. I'd admit that even in the second half of this year, I've gone through each day as someone who has yet in his heart to be complete and healed and absolved. Sure, I could put on an act; I'd laugh and and pretend that not a single thing was amiss. (Theatre training came in handy there, huh?) But behind the scenes, I was slowly and sadly losing grip and giving up on life.

Through the end though, I managed to hold onto my faith, however tenuously. Always, I've possessed a belief that all is good and just and never without reason though the logic may be beyond me in the here and now. Those who know me would probably say that I like to play the eternal cynic but the truth is that hope is an integral part of my foundation. Without it, I really might not have much else to live for, and I mean that in a most literal way. Faith isn't just an excuse for my incapacity to understand certain things. I believe that it's gradually shaped me into a man of character able to overcome and do much of the good that I've accomplished. Besides, even if it were an excuse, I'd rather live by faith than deny it and live in hopelessness.

I don't think I've had what could be called a good year since 2000. But I've been comforted to know that if I can walk through these trials and still remain standing (if only as a wiser, weaker man) then I've got reason to have hope for the future. There should always remain a hope and faith in the human condition. If I have to find that hope in myself and whatever faculties I have, then so be it. What need in me dictates that I should find my hope in others and not be the one to give it? Ultimately, I have my share of troubles and sorrows, but I don't needlessly object to the righteousness and validity of my life experiences. I've come to see that even the cruelest that life has to offer holds those qualities in its potential to teach and enable overcoming. I know that I've got plenty more lessons to discover and lessons to impart. Gives me something to do to keep on going, right?