Rainbow V 22mm ultra-wide angle toy camera, generic color film:

I'm looking at taking a break and going to N.J. for three weeks in January. Other plans notwithstanding. If work wants to retain me, they have to figure out how they will fill the full-functioning English editor position without me for three weeks.

I will also not train anyone in the position. Either I put out a newspaper or I train, not both. If they wanted someone trained, they should've gotten someone in when there were two full-functioning English editors.

If they can't abide my leaving for three weeks, tough cookies, I'm out. And even if they can abide my leaving, I'm leaving it open to quit. By the time I get back from my contemplated trip, I'll be counting down one year to leaving Taiwan – one year that I want dedicated to language study. Other plans notwithstanding.

I admit I'm confounded, if not confused. I'm in a holding pattern. I feel like I've entered a reality that doesn't make any sense, while at the same time feeling perfectly comfortable wasting my life in my apartment, staving off the inevitable, maintaining holding patterns.

Holding pattern; there's nothing left to figure out. Confounded, because there's nothing left to figure out.

Am I really not going to kill myself? Why am I still here? Has all this just been the biggest sham that I've perpetuated upon my now useless life? Do I not realize I have to do this? Did I sabotage the very fabric of this existence for nothing?

Who would possibly wish this upon me?

If I don't kill myself ... fine, I don't expect anyone to want me to kill myself, but what would that mean?

Fine, theoretical "other people" would want me to not only not kill myself, but also build something constructive and fulfilling for myself. But that's not going to happen. And no one can be bothered to, say, "contribute" to that effect. Naturally, because I've already discounted the possibility of anyone else's contribution to my rehabilitation.

How conveeeenient.

And if they would've done something if they'd known my suicide was the other option, well, that's a crock o' shit. That isn't real. No, those people are cowards acting just to spare themselves from a difficult experience.

My life is where it is because that's where I brought it, whether I'm willing to admit I didn't want it to be this way or not; and I'm not going to comment either way on that. I know what I have to do, but ... there's still a but. And there should be no but. But is a way out, and I don't want there to be a way out. But is like I'm still trying to convince myself.

I'm not confused. This is not an emotional post. I am trying to get clear. I have to do this. I'm navigating day-by-day just on curiosity. Basically I'm waiting to get bored.

Facts are facts. If I decide I'm not going to do it, and then I look at my life ahead of me, . . . fuck, I thought I knew the answer to that and it just slipped away. No, the word 'unbearable' is in the mix. Isolation is the norm. And suicide would still be the reality; I would just go around this again eventually.

In fact, that's exactly what happened last time. I said I'd suck it up and never think about it again. Haven't we had enough?

And no time is "good" for the people around me. If shit hits the fan, it doesn't matter when it happens, it'll suck.