Quote Tuesday - the nature of existence

“Existence is a strange thing. It falls under the surface, under all the things I throw on top of it until one day it’s forgotten with everything else that used to be important, if only I could remember. It becomes an assumed separate reality if it’s identified at all, not as important as tomorrow or what I will do with today. But it continues nonetheless beneath the life I think I am creating.

Then one day it comes to the surface and becomes the one thing I can’t hide myself from anymore (but still no one else can see). All the other layers have been pulled away or broken, and all that’s left is the unbearable presence of existence with nothing to lessen it. It feels heavier than all the distractions put together.

It is better to choose despair than expedients (Kierkegaard). But I wonder if we ever really choose for ourselves until one of the two is offered to us (you don’t refuse a gift). Then even life itself can seem like a poor alternative to coping, it seems so small and so much of me.

I wonder if this is all my life is: a default survival and some days not even that. It seems different from what it was supposed to be and from what I asked for.

Maybe I don’t want it anymore.”

A Delicate Fade, Ben Devries, p. 25-26