There are some days where I feel like I'm not making progress. I feel like how I did yesterday which is how I felt the day before which is like how I felt the day before... Will now ever be enough? Heather Havrilesky has a book called "What if this were Enough?" Despite never reading it, I ask myself that question all the time. What if right now where all I would ever have? I wouldn't be too upset. My sources of food, shelter, and income are all reliable. I know tons of pleasant people who enjoy my company. I have work that is engaging and meaningful. My lot in life is good.

But needing that question and its subsequent response feels faulty to me. I'm a human being, and human beings like to feel things. I want to feel like now is enough, not be convinced by a calm and rational argument. That's not societal expectations talking, that's my goddamn bones shouting at me from the depths of my mechanical body saying "please let us feel something". I don't want my life to be a list of pros longer than a list of cons, I want it to be a fucking life, something that fills me with joy, pride, delight, excitement, and all those things I see on the television screen that I know my diluted joints are also capable of.

I've been trying. Taking up one hobby here, one friend there, one new thing that makes my life a little more brighter than it was before. Even getting this far is a blessing, although I should stop trying to minimize the remaining distance. The only way to the top is one step at a time, and right now it feels like there's so many flights remaining. Other days it feels like the top is right around the corner. Other days it feels like there isn't a top, just a point where you feel like you don't need to climb anymore. I think that's all I really want, is to not climb anymore.

All of this, this writing, these stairs, these hobbies and friends, is predicated on the belief in that point existing, where I no longer need to climb. Of course, there's always death, but I want to stop before then. I think this belief is what people call hope, and considering how far it's gotten me from where I was, it may as well be. But it doesn't feel like hope. Hope is supposed to be the thing with feathers, that perches in the soul and sings the tune without the words. Whatever I have feels like a teacher handing me a poor test result remarking that "you can do better than this". Although, even without glamour, what I have is what I have, and I love it with all my heart. So I love the teacher, I wake up every morning thinking like the teacher, "you can do better than this." So one more stair I climb.