I don't remember exactly when I stopped carrying my ID with me even though I know it's illegal to not have it with me. If I were to die outside my apartment there would be no identifying me. I presume I'd get sent to a morgue and there would be no one to contact. There's no one who would notice me missing so I'd just be an unclaimed body. I guess maybe after a while the morgue would have to dispose of my body after taking pictures and fingerprints, maybe an autopsy, but then I'd have to be cremated and stored.

The first person to notice me missing would be my landlord and he wouldn't get suspicious for, I estimate, two or three months of missed rent payments. He is my cousin's uncle and I've never been a problem paying rent. He'd give some leeway, but then he'd notice something wrong. He might call my cousin, not concerned about the rent necessarily, but to alert her of the unusual circumstance and to ask if she knew if I was alright. She wouldn't and then she would call her father, who would then call my mother. 

I don't know what would happen then. In time it would become clear no one knows where I am and no one can get in touch with me. I don't know how far down the line it would occur to someone to "check the morgues" or if that even happens in Taiwan. My body would long be gone, but if they keep records, and I don't know that they do, maybe the mystery would come to light.

I'm still contemplating what I think of my computer. If my disappearance is a mystery, my computer is the first thing that will be looked at and it's probably not that difficult to find this blog.

However, it is statistically unlikely that I'll die outside of my apartment. I only spend about four hours a day out, and whenever I start feeling bad my impulse is to get back home. So unless I get hit by a bus while on my bike or if I have a medical decline too fast to get back home, then it'll be here where the first indication of my demise will be the stench that my neighbors will have to deal with.

I do have two actual time bombs ticking, aside from my amorphous attestations towards suicide (no current concrete intention) or hope that my liver is on its last legs (most eggs in that basket).

Right before I left for the U.S., I got a preliminary diagnosis that I probably have glaucoma and I was referred to a specialist. I was given the option to start a course of eye drops by the doctor who couldn't definitively say I had glaucoma. With good intentions I opted to take the drops, but since then I still haven't gotten out to see the specialist for a more specific diagnosis and I've fallen off the regimen of taking the drops regularly; three different drops three times a day!

So loss of vision is possible if I keep on living. With no one pushing me to go see the specialist, I'm not sure when I'll motivate myself to go. Next month? Next year? Ever? Not to put too fine a point on the possibility of going blind, a likely possibility if I don't get this thing treated, is that my vision has been noticeably getting worse. It's probably a naturally occurring development called presbyopia, meaning "old eyes" (I learned that from Northern Exposure). Even though I'm still fine riding my clunker bike at night just to get around, it's been a while since I stopped going on road rides in the wee hours like I used to because I just don't trust my vision in low light anymore. And I always have to look over the rim of my glasses to read smaller print. Just reading, sometimes I just take my glasses off.

And of course my bank account is running down now. I haven't calculated how much time I have left according to how much money I have left, but it can't be much more than a couple years. Appropriately enough, capital(ism) is a much more relentless time bomb than the vagaries of biology.

It does remind me that my quickly dropping bank account is what precipitated my leaving San Francisco after a failed attempt. My current situation is quite different. I figure it's much more motivating now to succeed in an attempt should I run out of money. I created an escape back then, running back to New Jersey, trying out the monastery, and finally coming to Taiwan. I don't know what I was thinking. I'm curious to how I'll react this time.

My life has been a complete non-starter since getting back from the U.S. in mid-September. Injury and illness were the excuses for about a month. Almost a month later, I . . . I was going to say that I've been able to get back to the gym, but what useless shite crap that is.

Truth is I don't really care. And that's great. I don't want to care, and that's great. It's liberating. It makes me breathe, relax and feel alright with myself. My life has always had suicide at its core, so my ideals, values and goals are not the usual ones people have. When my life starts to really plow into the muck and the mire, that's a good thing. My ideal age to die was 34 and I've blown waaaay past that. Even Ritu managed to die at 34. Albeit her reasons, if she in fact committed suicide, wouldn't be reasons that I would consider valid for me. Not judging her. Her reasons were good enough for her.

I wonder how long I've been living such a useless, worthless life. How far back can I go to determine when if I died, I would have had no impact by my own estimation? I'm glad about my time and efforts at Deer Park. I left there in spring 2005, so if I committed suicide then, what have I done afterwards that might have been missed?

My oldest brother got married that summer. Through the years, maybe I gave him and his wife a certain amount of support and encouragement, maybe? It's dubious, but possible, and giving benefit of doubt, I'll allow a few years of value to my continuing living. That said, my non-abstract value to them has long since ended. They have four children now ranging from 9 to 3 so their daily concerns have long superseded any theoretical support I've offered. To put a value on it, I think I can safely say my value to them has been zero since 2009 or 2010. And I think that's being generous. As for my other brother, I think our recent interaction is an indication of negation of any value I've had to him and his family. If I had committed suicide in 2005, I don't think there would have been any loss to him or his family. It would have just been an experience to go through.

What value has any of my time in Taiwan, since February 2006, had? Not extended family, that's all gone, including my cousin Audrey. Friends don't matter. No one feels the loss of someone they never meet, so even if I did add value to anyone, that's still arbitrary. I refute anyone suggesting I was at all significant to them. Anyone thinking I was significant to them is just ridiculous. Seriously, if I thought I was significant to someone, I'd know.

I stopped working in January 2010 and some may argue that if you're working, you're contributing to society. I don't think my time at the China Post was worthless. If no one else, the editor-in-chief Paul Chen seemed to appreciate me. I'd say that's significant enough.

So for five years, I've only been living selfishly for myself. Insignificant to anyone else. And my lack of interaction with other people is proof of said insignificance. I realize all this is a flawed assessment, and maybe says more what I feel towards other people than they towards me. But it's probably not that far off.