Because my parents cried, the saddest I could remember, and I loved them so much
Because my parents suffocated me, made me scared they wouldn't let me go

In early 2020, my mom went to visit family in China. When the Virus hit, she booked a flight home. When the Virus spread, she moved her flight one day earlier. She arrived home the day travel closed between China and the US, for a long time.

At home, we washed our shipments in alcohol wipes, after waiting a week. When she apologized for overreacting, she explained that “growing up where [she] did, people don't always live through pandemics.

Because I couldn't go anywhere, the Virus locked me Inside
Because I couldn't move on, to the next place, to the next stage

We got all our groceries delivered, and cooked every meal. I only left the house once every few weeks; I only left the neighborhood once every few months. The first time I walked outside, I got hit with a wave of dizziness from the vastness of Outside.

I just moved out, two years after originally expected. I see myself stunted. Though I blamed the Virus, I could have done differently. I insulated myself from opportunities to broaden my knowledge, my experiences, my relationships.

In my most recent call with a friend, we shared the fear and excitement of, for the first time in our lives, making our lives decisions ourselves. If you imagine life as a stage, I was acting before, following the script of child and student. Now I've become the director, and I don't know.

Because I feared death, coming mid-paragraph, putting an End
Because I feared life, of how I would live and live on

In my deepest negativity, I imagined death, mine and those of people close to me. I rage against life as a single narrative, so I have denied myself an easy ending.

In elementary school, I sometimes fought sleep, asking “What if I don't wake up?” It Ends. What happens after that? Maybe nothing. Then what matters?

I don't believe in a religious afterlife (right now). When facing the After, I conceive a Stream of Consciousness. After I die, the Stream, independent of time and state, moves onto the next person (or more radically, animal). What does the entire Stream look like? Does it have more suffering or pleasure? Does it move up or down goodness, worth, or complexity?

Death juxtaposes life. I wonder if I'm living as I should, or could. I wonder if I should or could have children. I wonder what I will become after I pass.

Bleeding tears from wounds inflicted by others, by myself,
I cried

Final exam season of freshman year, my roommate returned home before I did. For those final days, I faced his empty bed and swallowed acute homesickness. I dreamt of my mother dying. I walked behind her and my sister down a tunnel of white light. My sister said goodbye; I don't remember if I said anything. I woke up, and as I wrote down panicked, “bled tears into the pillow.”

In the hole of pondering death, I worried I lost the capacity for strong emotion. I had enough to cry. I have enough.