I guess it’s just sadness.

That feeling when you wake up in bed and your eyes are open and you’re at your parents house and don’t have a job and you’re 29 years old and you’re just like…

Is this real life?

It’s when you will yourself awake to go downstairs and eat something but you’re not even hungry.

It’s that feeling when your insides are mush and you feel like crying but you don’t really have anything to cry about.

You’re healthy, you’re smart, and you’re warm.

The air conditioning works and you have a room with a tv and a shower and soap and clothes and everything you need to be a reputable member of society.

But still…

You wake up in bed after taking a nap at 5 o clock in the afternoon wondering if this is your life.

And, even worse, you can’t think of a way to make it better.

Even if all of your hopes and dreams were to instantaneously come true, you would still feel absolutely incapable of engaging in the life you’d worked so hard to achieve.

And deep down, you feel like you’ve barely worked hard at all.

So you slouch downstairs and stare at Facebook. Some of the videos make you smile, but they don’t provide relief. You’re looking for meaning and it’s not there.

So you start to write. And you try to make sense of reality, to make sense of emotions and thoughts, but it doesn’t work. Because no matter how many times you believe that you believe in yourself, you’re still absolutely, intrinsically alone.

You feel the sadness and embrace it. You look back at what you’ve written and realize that you can use this. You could share this one day…

———

Yesterday at work, a friend asked me if I believed in G-d.

I looked at him as he looked at me. I lived my life subconsciously. I saw doors close, and gates open. I saw risks being taken and pain being felt.

I saw people and stars and music. I saw electricity, creativity, and camaraderie. I saw the moment as it happened and recognized instantly that it had already passed.

I felt “time” leave me the way it always does. Right when I notice it’s there.

I thought about my mom, and my grandma, and my great grandma, and my great great grandma, and so on and so forth until I saw a tribe of Homo Sapiens expanding their genealogy throughout Africa and into Europe.

I thought about the monkeys who first figured out how to use tools and then survived past the other monkeys.

I thought about the oceans where life began and the primordial goo that washed up to shore and started adapting to survive on land.

I thought about the spark of energy that ignited our cosmos, infinitely expanding our universe in all directions. The planets, the stars, the galaxies and the clusters…

Like a gravitationally infused clockwork phenomena.

I thought about the three elements that make up our universe and my own body: Hydrogen, Oxygen, and Carbon.

The energy that connects neurons in my brain, sparking inspiration, awareness, and curiosity. Emotion, understanding, and connection.

I thought about everything and nothing all at once. The ability to rationalize beliefs even when there is no proof.

Even when I know we’ll never know. Even when I know whatever I believe may be wrong. Even when I know we’re all just trying to do our best.

I asked my friend if he believed in G-d.

He looked back at me, nodded his head, and smiled.