When a tree falls in the middle of a forest with no one around to see it, does it cry? Does it reach up to the sky for guidance? Or does it accept its fate, knowing that there is not a soul around to care for it, to aid it, to suffer with it?

You want to know so badly. So I’ll tell you.

In all those teen novels and coming of age films, in all those hero-driven epics and stories of redemption, it always starts with a bottom. A rock bottom. The hero experiences a moment of pure dread, or a defining event that causes him to decide to transcend the pit of despair and make something of himself. A friend commits suicide. A bully shuns and humiliates. A life ruining drug is offered. An expulsion from a school. A tragic milestone.

I have always been an introvert. A loner. Just existing with my thoughts. I used to think that was my tragic trait that would launch me on some adventure of self knowing and destiny. But now I realize that I almost crave the time to myself. The idea of being a lone wolf.

But at the same time, I want so painfully much to have what those tragic heroes have. They have a rock bottom. They are exposed to some grand epiphany and use that event to better themselves. I erroneously desire to be alone, but at the same time I don’t want to be so secluded. I don’t want to be so innocent.

I used to long for my shining moment. But now I know that life isn’t a fairy tale. So now, I’ve reached a new low.

I don’t have a rock bottom.

Do you know how much I WANT to be offered a cigarette, or a blunt, just so I can refuse it and do the right thing? Do you know how much I CRAVE to be part of some horrible love triangle, just so I can emerge a better man? Do you know how much I plead every day for a loss, or a first kiss, or a nemesis, or a best friend? Do you know how much I DESIRE to be challenged by some terrible event just so I can use the pain to launch myself to the stars? I want to feel blood on my lips and fire in my head, just so I can prove to the world that I am strong enough to prevail.

But instead, I just exist aimlessly. I simply am. I am not being. I’m just “is-ing”. While the heroes of these stories aspire to climb up and be victorious, I want so desperately to achieve their starting position. I want to be the hero of my own story. Do you understand? I hate myself for it. For wanting armageddon. I don’t deserve to pity myself.

I want the ability to feel sad, to feel sorry for myself, but I can’t, because I am just one collection of meat and bones amongst a sea of meat and bones.

I want to BE, but instead I am stuck in some miserable limbo of

NOTHINGNESS

Where I am doomed to spend eternity just walking on a plain of depravity and emptiness. All my issues, those things I take the pills and the meds for…I fight them in secret. It’s slow,  and sneaky, and gradual. There’s no lesson in that.

So what is the point of trying to be something I’m not? What is the point of trying to live life when you know in your heart that you don’t have some special goal or plan assigned to you at birth?

My coming of age is not a beam of light. No break through a shell or burst through a forest canopy. It is just a pile of meat and bones.

I want to have my epiphany, I want my moment of realization, or my moment of despair that shows me what my true purpose in life is. What I am destined to do, my spiritual sign in the clouds that screams

“WELCOME TO GOD’S GREAT PLAN!”

Because then…

Then I would have a story to tell.