I didn’t do it today. It isn’t the first day or some round number anniversary. Just one of those days in the middle, a Tuesday, a day no-one will congratulate you on making it.

It was an ordinary day. I did everything that was expected of me: I showered, I ate, I went to work; I played with my son afterwards; I made love with my wife. Everything nice and fine.

But the urge lingers, even as I lay down in bed, exhausted. Just one to show myself it’s not a big deal, just one to drown the feeling of dread, just one to fog the never-ending fear of tomorrow...

And then what? Just one tomorrow, and the one the next day, until it’s just one day without it, please, just one.

So I lay down in bed, celebrating quietly, this one day I didn’t do it, the same as the hundreds before it.

Thinking about my love and my child and how I never want to disappoint them. How I always want to stay my son’s hero and my wife’s knight in shiny armor. They never met the person I was before I said: “not today, maybe tomorrow, but not today.” And I fight myself every day so that tomorrow never comes, that they never meet him.

“Why be sweet, why be careful, why be kind?” Tom Waits asks himself in his song “Everything goes to hell”.

There isn’t any reward in my experience. Bad things happen to good people as well as good things happening to bad people. It’s almost pure luck. And bad people have the advantage of getting out of consequences through lying and cheating while the good ones take responsibility for their mistakes. And the truly kind ones will almost never boast about their good deeds, I’ve seen a bunch of videos where people help people in need, but it always bugs me. Did they help because of kindness or to shoot a good video for internet? Not to say the helped ones care, they got help to get them through the day. Being kind can even get you in some dangerous, or at least uncomfortable situations. Help a stranger on your way to work, and he follows you every time he sees you expecting more. Ask a stumbling person is he okay, and he curses you to mind your business. Get a child down from a swing when it cries, and its parents attack you and call you a pedophile. There are certainly more examples of this than of gratitude.

In the end, if you need help, will anyone help you? You certainly can’t expect it, not even from the closest friends, not even from family. Everyone has their own problems, their own lives to live. And maybe them too are disappointed and have stopped helping anyone because they have no more strength or patience for it.

So the question stands: Why be sweet, why be careful, why be kind?

“They must be right, I am guilty” Jerry thought, sitting in the damp cell. The cell is small, 2x2x2m, the walls are built from enormous stone blocks, with one side barred with thick steel bars. That side opens, they threw him in through there.

“I don’t know what I did, but I always knew I’d do something horrible,” he thought, “it was just a matter of time.”

He kept a journal full of notes like: “Made fire today - father beaten me with a belt - don’t do that anymore.” and “Mother caught me touching myself - she looked very disappointed.” and “Drowned the neighborhood cat - everyone mad,“ and so on... But the beatings and the disappointment never meant much to Jerry, he was trying very hard to understand the rules.

“Hurt no one, unless you are defending someone. Don’t burn stuff, only for warmth in the winter. Don’t take stuff that aren’t yours, even if you won’t get caught...” He recited the rules in his head, they took his journal when they threw him in but he knows them by heart.

“And I didn’t break any of them! It must be a new one! They’ll soon let me out of here like always, and I’ll make a note of my mistake, and I won’t repeat it!“ Sitting in the dark and damp cell thinking hard made him exhausted, and he fell to sleep on the cold stone ground.“Jeremiah Cooper Smith!“ loud voice woke him from his troubled dreams” The town council have reached the decision. For the crime of witchcraft we sentence you to be baptised by fire! The sentence shall be carried out at dawn! Repent and your soul may still go to heaven! Maybe… “

“Please, tell me what I did wrong? “Jerry cried out as they were leaving, but they ignored him. What he did wrong bothered him more than the baptism by fire. They must at least tell him that before the fire. Jerry didn’t fear death, he couldn’t understand what was so scary about it.

The town constables took him to the town square where the angry mob waited. They watched him with hatred in their eyes and they screamed profanities at him but nobody told him what he did wrong. “Jeremiah Connor Smith” executioner read while he was being tied up to a pole “for the crime of witchcraft, you’re to be burned at the stake. Do you have any last words?”

“What did I do wrong” he asked, looking at the crowd. They answered with a cacophony of boos, and a rain of spit.

The executioner shrugged and threw the torch at the pyre below Jerry’s feet. The flames burned high and Jerry was soon engulfed by them screaming till he had breath to scream: “WHAT DID I DO WRONG?”