I don't know if it's this three weeks off in the isolation of Taipei. If it was the rejection of family in Kaohsiung. If it's the enduring drear that is Taipei. The lack of friends? Slowly discovering the annoyances of my new apartment?

Waking up continues to be one of the hardest things to do. Depression gently washing over me in waves, like lying on a shoreline.

I think of my path and the dead ends and failures after dead ends and failures, and that this is my karma that I'm living out and perpetuating, instead of definitively doing something about it. The two steps forward, three steps back.

I need to put suicide back into the equation. So many developments have taken it out of the equation, and something is missing without it. People don't matter. No one matters. If anyone mattered, where are they?

I need to focus on why I didn't enter the monastery, I need to focus on my aversions and attachments, the things I can't let go of. The things I'm not letting go of. They are key, they are what keep bringing me around again.

I need to stop glossing things over in blog.

I'm being consumed by anger, hate, negativity, and isolation. I'm wallowing. I'm constantly glossing things over. After this, I will go and get something to eat.

I'm in Taipei, where else would I want to be? Spiraling existence, useless existence. On the molecular level. On the quantum level. Why existence? Why exist?

THURSDAY, FEBRUARY 22,  5:04 p.m. - Rode down to the Bitan recreational area at the end of the MRT red line at Xindian station (NB: the MRT red line would later change as the system expanded, and the line going to Xindian would become the green line - future ed.).

FRIDAY, FEBRUARY 23, Rode down to revisit beyond Xindian MRT station where I had explored earlier this month. Roosevelt Rd. in Taipei turns into Beixin Rd. after crossing the Jingmei River into Xindian city. Beixin Rd. goes about three miles to the Xindian terminus station, and beyond that it turns into Beiyi Rd and quickly becomes less urban-choked. A short way later there's a right turn onto Xinwu Rd. which is what I did. "Xinwu" is a combination of Xindian and Wulai, where the road goes.

3:08 p.m. - I shot this structure from Xinwu Rd. before, but this time explored down by river's edge. I don't know what it is, but it's an impressive structure. It may be for flood control downstream to retard the river's flow during typhoons and heavy rain, but can't totally block the river or else there would be flooding upstream. I don't know.

3:12 p.m. - River jacks!

3:30 p.m. - Urban Xindian to the upper left. Xinwu Rd., visible across the center, has this climb but it's not too rigorous.

3:48 p.m. - I had no idea the Xindian River looked so powerful upstream in a more natural setting.

3:55-3:56 p.m. - Quite a few river crossings. 

4:14 p.m. - Wulai border. I didn't make it to Wulai. This isn't so much a "photo" as it is a marker of how far I got before I decided it was too late in the day to continue and turned around. 

5:39 p.m. - Taking the Xindian riverside bikeway home.