Okay, so I actually wrote this as a writing project, but it's entirely the truth at the same time. I wanted to explore my own experiences in writing. So mods, feel free to move this or any other pieces to the writers forum if you think it's more fit there than here. Although the response I've gotten from sharing it with others indicates it would fit pretty good here. Now, where to begin? Ah, yes... Last weekend I met a squirrel? Yes... on Saturday, May 3rd, I met a squirrel, and he taught me a great many things that I am still attempting to grasp. No, seriously. Our story actually begins on May 3 with a car, probably traveling anywhere between 20 and 40 miles per hour. This squirrel I was destined to cross paths with ONCE in my life was on the roadway, in front of the car, or something. I didn't see what happened, I wasn't there at the time. But it didn't get out of the way in time. Fast forward to 6 p.m. east coast time, May 3. I was at my friend's birthday. He and I were outside playing badminton (actually we were destroying birdies at a phenomenal rate ) while the rest of these guys he had invited were inside gaming because it had started to get cloudy and spat a few raindrops at us. What a waste of an otherwise beautiful day. Why bury yourself in an electronic world killing zombies for a sense of self importance when you can go out and meet the physical world? Feel the wind and the rain, not just hear it, you know? God... I sound a lot older than 16... Anyway, we were gonna go see a movie, so first we had to take his dog for a walk. So we get the dog on the leash, and start heading up the street. About halfway up the street, and ironically right in front of the town animal clinic, his dog starts getting really excited and runs up to this lump by the road. We pulled him back as soon as we saw it was a squirrel, lying still on the dirt on the other side of the sidewalk from the road. So he holds his dog while I get closer, and it starts scrabbling to get up the hill... with its front paws. The back ones are twisted around so the rear of the squirrel looks like he's lying on his side, and they aren't even twitching. The thing was paralyzed from the waist, possibly injured in other places. In other words, it was sentenced to death, lying by the side of the road. We wound up walking past it, and then coming back past it again on our way back, still lying there, scrabbling to get up the hill and to the small patch of woods and shrubs, not making much progress. In hindsight, we could have tried taking it to the animal clinic, or killed it. We didn't, though. At the time we passed it by as another roadside tragedy. Okay, fast-forward another half week. The squirrel was a distant memory at the time. However, my own troubles were not; these include those with mental health. Over the second half of this week I would learn the true meaning of mental anguish as depression worsened and worsened, until I was incapable of doing anything except sitting there and mumbling. I was suicidal. That experience in and of itself is something I could write about to no end, as it has made me quite a different person. But this thread is about that squirrel, who popped back into my mind during one of my "trips to dark places" shall we call it? And before anyone says it, no, it wasn't because of the squirrel I was depressed, it entered my mind as a contributing factor, one of many. Anyway, I was feeling guilty, because I could have done something. So first and foremost the squirrel taught me doing something is better than doing nothing, something I'm trying to re-teach myself as depression has taken that away from me. But that squirrel revealed a lot more to me - how much we take for granted in this cold world of givens. There will always be another squirrel. Hell, people kill them for fun, or eat them. They're pests. They are everywhere. You wanna care for one as a pet, set up a birdfeeder with a cage underneath it - Yes, but it won't be this one. This one is its own being, same as you are your own being, overly small and insignificant, but at the same time, meaning so much. I saw how it suffered, and I saw how it was afraid. I saw how it was alive. That's the most basic thing, when we all go to sleep at night... we all ARE, and we all are alive. In that way we're connected... and in plenty of other ways too. Humans tend to take that for granted. In that moment the squirrel represented to me just how basic a thing that is, and yet so incredibly wonderful and full of beauty: life. I went outside today, a full 14 days after the squirrel, something like 9 days after I almost ended. 2 days ago, for the first time in a long while I realized what it is to feel alive outside of the mask of laughing I wear around here a lot. I tried so hard to notice everything. The gentle breeze, the way the leaves and grass stirred, each individual bird, and yes, the squirrels. I knew them. I walked right up to a dear in the backyard. I knew it. And the little purple flowers that spring up by the clover patches... I knew them too. I knew what they were, what they are. I wonder how many people realize how beautiful the world is around them? Even the people could be considered beautiful, even if their actions say completely otherwise. If only they knew. So... in a sense, the squirrel traded its life for mine? Now I gotta learn how to live again... It's never very far away... Many thanks to my psychologist for helping me think this out enough to write. Many thanks to you nuts for the good times I've had here so far. I'm both lucky and glad I'm still around to have them. Many thanks to my wonderful, beautiful girflriend for convincing me to admit to myself that I need help, or I might not have even made it this far. I look forward to keep walking' down the road with all of you https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uYUS_2EuzC4"]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uYUS_2EuzC4
glad to hear that you are still around, and may the squirrel realize enlightened consciousness in its next incarnation :sunny: glad that you had some good folks to support you. it's unusual to have a gf that's that mature, especially if you are young don't be afraid to reach out here too if you are ever in a dark place again
Haha, yeah, I'm not out of the woods yet... it's gonna be a long time before I make anything close to a full recovery. That I know. I'm okay with that, though. She's great. I got real lucky, and I don't know how in the world she's stuck by me through this mess, but she has.
This part was my favourite. What a beautiful piece of writing. Good on you for being constructive with how you feel, it makes a big difference :2thumbsup:
