Reagan's Last Letter

Reagan's POV

Good-bye, world.

Some people think this to be a surrender, a cowardly act, but it is quite the contrary. Only the rolling green hills of Pennsylvania will miss my song. Only the murmuring Monongahela will long for my touch, my long fingers gliding through. Only the foolish dandelions will plead for my whisper, the breath that spread its contents throughout the innocent spring breeze. The more notice I take, the more I realize that all of mother earth is my friend.

I was not lonely.

I did not live a lonely life.

Closing my eyes helps me breathe, which in return helps me live. You see, we are all just subjected to Social Darwinism, survival of the fittest. We spend the majority (if not the entirety) of our lives scrambling to compete with our neighbor and our neighbor's neighbor. Nonsense! Why can't we accept that we are all universally the same but very, very different all the more?

By doing this, I fully understand what is lost: my fragile mortality. The same thing, the same concept, millions of cancer patients pray for each and every day. They clutch to their hospital beds, unaware of the chemicals flooding in their bloodstream. I wish I could help and give them the yellow flourescent moon and lungs made of steel. My deepest condolences for every individual and I mean this with whatever compassion still thrives within me. To have the sun stolen right before your eyes. To struggle blinking away the tears. Let them come. They're as real as the pain you encounter.

Back against bark, pipe hung ajar, I comtemplate nothing.

“You need to get help!” Mom, do you remember saying that? It was more than once. I raced out into the hazy twilight; you followed 'til you watched me barrel into the whistling train. Then it was over. It was all over.

You and the rest of society believe my soul to be dormant. This somehow brings me immense peace. You don't understand. But, did you ever? I don't blame you. You raised a black sheep that was nursed and trained to be white. You always wanted someone different; I could see it in your eyes.

Underneath the playful grass is my body.

What no one grasped was that I loved life. I loved picking up cheesy romance novels and spending my rainy Saturday afternoons reading. The characters became my companions, the setting my safe haven. Everyone looks down on words and other things they believe to be inanimate; they don't realize that these things are very real. In some ways, they are more real than we are.

As peculiar as it seems, I never found myself drawn to humans. I befriended, sure. But, when I could choose, I always chose spending my time admiring nature. It made sweet love to me in a way no human could. I fell in love. He respected and adored even my flaws. Most people would honored his genuinity, but I am far from most people.

He waited for two hours at the altar.

In tenth grade, I was diagnosed with bipolar disorder. My elderly psychiatrist Andrew recommended medication, especially in my manic depression mode. This, he believed, was my most volatile state. Tongue sticking out, I'd pop a pill and wait for magic to happen.

It's all I did anymore.

Time passed. I began to study life and its mysteries and why things happened the way they did and why I was alive and how if I'm such a speck in the universe do I impact anyone or anybody. I shared this with Andrew.

“You affect those around you,” he told me, scooting the glasses up his nose. “You may not directly affect the world, but you affect it one person at a time, each and every moment.”

To some people, this would have been comforting and improved their pessimistic outlook. To me, though, to the moldy slice of bread, this made matters worse. Because I didn't affect those around me. Because I didn't have an incentive to wake up each morning. Because I didn't see why my life was necessary. I am not sad. I am happier than ever because I possess understanding of why I did what I did. Was life so precious that in a heartbeat I took it all- the people, the memories, the breaths- away?

Without a doubt.

My physical being mutilated, I get lowered into the soil. People I faintly recognize weep and weep. They recall moments and memories that make me question just who they are mourning. Mom, I adore the tombstone picked out, my name in shiny embroidered letters. Atheists pity me, wondering how I can live the rest of eternity in a box. How I can tolerate insects murking and munching on my body. How my family allowed an open casket when half of my body is missing. How could I put an end to a beautiful existance.

What no one understands, though, is that I am everything and now exceed human capability.

I am finally free.