Snippets here and there. Fragments of thoughts. Trying to make sense of the senseless. If none of this makes sense, it’s because I really don’t get it yet either.

The storm rages all around.

But still: Hope is not a blazing, consuming flame. It is embers and sparks, candlelights and fireflies. Infinite starlight, not blinding sunlight.

It’s been harder to concentrate on the here and now than ever before. I feel like I’m at a crossroads in many ways. Everything feels heavy and significant, no matter what it is.

Did I think I would ever stand here? Did I ever dream of such a place? Such sorrow and woe? Such hard-won victory?

So I have at last traversed the first quarter-century of my life. There’s nothing magical about that, I suppose. It’s just an arbitrary number. But as I’ve told people, this is as far as I’ve thought things through. The last time I made a plan was when I was seventeen and I thought I understood how the world worked, and I thought that I knew all there was to know about love, and I thought that Destiny was paving my path and all I had to do was stride confidently down that road. By the age of 25, I thought I would be Somewhere. A resting place where I could lay down and make my next plan.

But then, I was never one for plans and schemes. I’ve never liked thinking in terms of goals and checklists. Like a madman, I’ve been trying to live life like it was art. There are no definitions or guidelines: you just know it’s right when you get there. You can’t articulate it, but it’s somehow true. And if it’s wrong, you can’t just paint over it or erase it and make it right. You have to start over. All or nothing. But it is never finished.

It looks like I haven’t reached that Somewhere quite yet. I don’t know whether I should stop my journey now in the middle of Nowhere and reassess things, or if I should wait until I reach the shore before I chart my new course.

But even then, I know I will not know. Tomorrow will be a new day that I could never have imagined. How can I even wonder about a year, or five years? Even the next hour will be some wondrous surprise. The universe is really full of miracles, despite all the evil that people harbor in their hearts, all the terrible acts of violence that people can commit. I don’t know if my heart can take it.

Open eyes, and courage. That’s all I really need. It’s gotten me this far, even though I have sometimes forgotten it. I have fallen into deep pits and managed to crawl out. My heart and my soul bear wounds, but I’m still breathing. So there’s still hope. And hope is always an “if only.” In a world full of miracles, anything is possible.

Even in the darkest hour, there is light. Have faith in the light. There is no darkness without brightness, no sorrow without joy. All things are possible. Do not say “It cannot be,” or “It must be.” Both of these are lies.

What have I learned? That I know nothing, that I am learning all the time, that the Truth is out there, but no one can understand it. Maybe you can feel it at best, but that’s about it.

But in the end, I suppose there is no sense it trying to give form to the formless.

What is inside me will be enough. At times like this, the darkness seems overwhelming. But I’ll make it through, at least a day at a time.