There is nothing more that can be feared, in my opinion, than for one to lose their mind. Throughout life, through all its burdens and challenges, we are always supposed to have ourselves. That is life’s one promise: one always has their own life, until they do not. No matter what should go on in the physical world, one may always retreat into their own mind.

It is the place where ideas are created, philosophy is pondered upon, and memories are stored. Should that shatter, should that essentail piece of the body become disfunctional in me and I am not dead, then, in my oppinion, I am trapped. This would be the worst kind of torture because one would not know, in most cases, that they have lost their most prized possession.

To be wrongfully looked down upon by others, to have the essence of reality shattered by delusions and horrors, to become impaired in the worst way possible and still cling to this Earth...That is the worst thing that can happen to a person. Of all those people I feel sympathy for, it is the mentally impaired I feel for the most. For they could quickly be neglected by society and can do nothing about it. This terror holds both physical and mental consequences, a hurting of two entire realms of existence.

I am most afraid that the people I love notice the gap

The small space I put between us

That protects me when they leave

Either from falling out of touch or more permanently

Because I can't prevent either

But I can prevent some of the damage that happens

When inevitably they do

Although my other fear is that my gap

Is what causes them to leave

In the first place

The end of life as I have known it.

In recent years, my life has become one where people no longer return my ever-present smile with a smile, but rather respond with a barely disguised look of disgust; where a seemingly growing number of people feel it is acceptable to express - and act upon - racial, ethnic, and religious – even political party - hatred freely, giving no thought to the rights of their fellow citizens to live peacefully.

I have a growing fear that I will have to leave the home I love to live elsewhere, if such a place exists, where I will not have to worry about my husband’s safety, simply because he was not born American but rather proudly chose to become a citizen; or my own, simply because of the color of my skin.

I fear that the term “law and order” is being twisted to mean something very alien to having principles, following rules, acting in a civil manner, protecting our country’s citizens…each and every one of them, regardless of ethnicity, race or religion. Indeed, the catchphrase, as it is invoked by some, seems to have turned into its opposite. For some, “law and order” has become the encouragement of violence and anarchy. It is an example of what Orwell called, “newspeak” in his prescient novel, 1984.

I fear that the words spoken by Abraham Lincoln some 150 years ago are becoming a sad truth:

"Shall we expect some transatlantic military giant to step the ocean and crush us at a blow? Never! All the armies of Europe, Asia, and Africa combined, with all the treasure of the earth (our own excepted) in their military chest, with a Bonaparte for a commander, could not by force take a drink from the Ohio or make a track on the Blue Ridge in a trial of a thousand years. At what point then is the approach of danger to be expected? I answer. If it ever reach us it must spring up amongst us; it cannot come from abroad. If destruction be our lot we must ourselves be its author and finisher. As a nation of freemen we must live through all time or die by suicide."

The danger has sprung, but it hails not from Russia, Cuba, Mexico, Venezuela, Afghanistan, Syria, Iran, Iraq, North Korea, or China. No, it is domestic. National. American.

My greatest fear?

That when I die, I will not be dead.

That there will be some form of afterlife.

What soothes me most is the thought of nothing, the idea that death comes and that’s it.

That everything stops, the light leaves, a body becomes nothing more than an object.

My fear is most people’s hope, and vice versa.

How unorthodox of me, hm?

I want to die and be dead; no thoughts, no feelings, no heaven nor hell— I crave the nothing and fear the possibility of continuity.