I am still fighting. Nearly nine years since all this insanity first began I am still here, still fighting. I've lost everything I cared about along the way. Most of the people I once thought were my friends have turned their backs on me. I've lost what little semblance of a home I thought I had. All projections for a worthwhile outcome have burned to ashes. In the last two months one of the only people I know irl has been effectivelly declared braindead and I nearly died myself. I am at peace.
Yet, I am still fighting. I always have always been fighting. I limp a little bit more than yesterday. I drag my feet somewhat more heavily. My breathing is more haggard and my vision is blurrier than I remember. But I keep putting one foot in front of the other. Stubbornness. Some consider it a virtue. Mayhaps it is a curse. This soul is not simply ready to die quite yet.
I still stand. Just barely. But I do. 2022 has been brutal. Life continues to throw punch after punch and taking piece after piece with every swing. I laugh. I roll with the punches. I bleed. But I'm still here. Just for a while longer.
With AW's completion I've been devoting time to modernizing SS. At the turn of the insane heat in summer I began to push more and more to work on ApexX again instead. I hope to have a public conceptual presentation by the end of the year. Until the last couple days I wasn't sure I'd be around to even do that. I was close to posting what would have been my last Coffee Hour and final good-byes. The house of cards has crumbled and everything is drifting in the sea like chunky vomit flotsam. Somehow, for the moment, we find ourselves afloat using our own, inflatable prostate.
I'm tired. I'm exhausted. Mentally, physically, emotionally, spiritually. My body has well had enough. But still I keep forcing myself forward. I am a creator. It is my nature. I'll die with a sword in my hand. I fear nothing. Not death, not pain. I am awaited in Valhalla. They can wait a little while longer.
I'll show you soon. It isn't much. But it's something. I did something. I made a thing. I did things. I released LP's. I worked on my game. I helped a few brothers out. I'm not dead yet. Only death will stop me now. Could be tonight. Could be tomorrow. Who cares? I haven't cared since this time last year. I'm not going to care now. What's done is done. There is no turning back. No walking away. Here I am.
24 years. It's been 24 years since I first got into digital content creation. What a long, strange journey it has been. Almost every single person I met along the way has moved on years ago. As far I'm concerned, they simply weren't creators - only drifters. I thought I was a drifter. I lived as a shadow. It is true, in some respects. But really, my heart has always been right where it belonged. It simply couldn't breathe with all this smoke. I know that, now. I see things for what they really are. I've tried to walk away so many times, but I always ended up right where I began, asking those silly questions again. I was simply too afraid to take the steps into the unknown necessary to begin carving the path I needed to begin all those years ago.
Well. Here I am, now. Don't expect greatness. Don't ask for success. Just keep walking. Just keep fighting. Nothing else matters.
They did not know fear. They were simple creatures. It helps to be simple. I envy it all. I can't be like them. I've tried. Now, I can't be anything. It's close enough. Let's get some work done.