Everything seemed like a blur. When I woke up and forced my eyes to open against the sunray peeking on the hole of a make-shift tent. The memories vague and clear at the same time. They seemed like a dream and the wounds I carry ain't visible to the human eye yet too remarkable to be seen within.
I am on a piece of land where war just ceased with people I barely know but with faces too familiar to forget. Faces I believed I've seen in my dreams. Like this lady I strangled with my bare hands and this old woman I slapped and bumped her head against a concrete wall. The nightmares were all filled with violence I didn't knew existed in me before. Of losing something important. Of inablity to breath. To get drowned of something intangible. Of rage and fear.
It's about to end. The quest I've been set to surmount. I died. But I still exist. And I don't know what part of "what I used to be" is left to live and tell the tale of rigorous process of change.
I still look the same but I feel totally different. Like the sun felt different on my skin. And my skin became immune to dust and dirt. My ears became deaf but more sensitive to natural sounds. My eyes see things differently, on how I discern things and people. And when I thought my battle strategy is the best of what I can, I still had a lot of growing up to do. That some attacks are more effective than the others. And an effective general strategy doesn't always equate victory.
In due time, I will not return with the same armour I left with but with a skin stronger than what I forged. That the war brought death and has killed something within me but nurtured life and gave me a chance to change something.
At the end of the day, I realize that those living-dead who rather stay the same will never be better than those who seeked death and found reason to live.
Labels: career, life, self