Well, Here it is ... again.

So once again. It is September 10th. I wake up a bit after two in the morning. Its very quiet. I guess its a good time to contemplate death. Death and cowardice. Oh, don't get me wrong, its not the only time of the year that such thoughts descend heavily upon me. It is, however, that anniversary wherein such thoughts are inescapable and overwhelming.

I know I am likely to survive this day. I have in past years and it does become easier as time goes by, yet guilt feelings overwhelm me this day each year. I engage in the usual tricks of avoiding as much as possible the thoughts of all the media comments there will soon be. I think of my own problems. I scream silently about my rage on other matters and I declare to myself that I am not to blame. Others have of course told me that it is not my fault. I know that they are right yet my knowledge of the correctness of their views brings little solace.

I face this anniversary. Its inescapable. I long for escape of course. Given my age and health I will indeed find an escape at some point in time. It may well be soon. I look forward at times to my escape of this day. I often hope that such escape will indeed come soon to me. It will be a good thing when I no longer have to experience this day each year. I mentally re-live some moments of dread. I mentally trek to a pay phone and imagine myself actually making the anonymous call that I had contemplated. In my mind on each anniversary I get past that apartment door threshold without thoughts of criminal charges or insufficient evidence. I re-live the looking up of a phone number and nearly making that non-anonymous call. I re-live the disorientation and physical collapse of utter exhaustion. Yet amidst all the thoughts of this anniversary I still experience the hopeless rage of my failure.

Time heals all wounds? No. Time diminishes their intensity but it does not heal them.