An incredibly beautiful day as far as the weather goes in New Jersey, and what did I do? I sat in front of a cathode ray tube killing brain cells on the internet. Why? I don't know if I can say, honestly.

I can look outside and know that somewhere there's something going on I'd like to be a part of. Somewhere somebody may be thinking of me and smiling and I'm missing it, not there to make that smile even wider. Somewhere is somebody I'm thinking of who would make me smile and I'm missing her because I have neither the motivation nor the means to travel the hundreds of miles to her. Somewhere is a game I'd be playing if I could let myself forget what I want to be. Somewhere somebody is pleased, and it isn't me.

Here something is going on that I'm the center of despite the fact that I'm not sure whether I like being a part of it. Here somebody is thinking of me and frowning, and I'm right here to make my own frown turn into a resigned and partially cynical sigh. Here is somebody who needs somebody else but can't decide who that is or why he needs that connection. Here is a game played by going through the motions and neglecting to consider that the rules are long forgotten and in their absence any real joy is lost. Here somebody is apathetic, and I don't care.

I'm missing this day, this sun, this warmth, this chance, because I can't bring myself out of my self-designed and implemented pit in order to affect change. I'm missing so much because I don't have it, and I don't remember ever having it, and so I am convinced that there is in fact nothing to miss. I've put myself here, and I acknowledge that, and I accept it, because accepting the consequences of their actions is something that mature people do and even though I'm no longer so sure that I want to be mature it seems to late to turn back now.

So what happens now? I could put forth an effort, stand up out of my chair, stretch my legs, walk out the door and breathe deep the fresh air knowing that I was ready for anything. I could make myself a person and join the others in what they've been telling me without words for so long. I could go pick up a ball and throw it into a basket confident that I was enjoying myself despite the fact that I openly dislike *organized* sports and confident that this fun is alright because no pride is on the line, this is anything but organized, I am among friends.

More likely I will remain in my chair, giving the energy that would go to lifting me from my seat to my fingers to type out friendly greetings to people whose faces I've never surely seen. I will remain here wondering which choices I made to make my lifestyle so sedative and wondering why I enjoy it so much even as I curse it because of my abhorrance for it. I will remain here until my eyes are too heavy to stare into the monitor any longer, and then I will go to my bed and stare at a television monitor because I need the projections of a moving cathode ray tube to keep me from going insane. And when my eyes hurt, when I can feel the blood vessels breaking in them and I know that anyone who could see them would know at once that I was in pain and that there was something fundamentally wrong in a high school student with veiny yellow eyes and an almost constant shaking, I would close them and fall asleep, thankful for the rest and still eager for my next opportunity to rot my retinas and my brain with the digital drugs.

It sure was a beautiful day.