Two summers ago, I rented an apartment with a friend of mine. He was known around campus as being a troll of a human being, or a dwarf. People made fun of him, laughed at him behind his back. I respected him for living with that pain, also for his ability to endure and be awe-inspiringly brilliant.

He had major emotional problems. We didn't mesh well as roommates. I am very...introverted when it comes to my home. It is my only place of peace. Everywhere else is war, decisions, eyes staring into me as I feel ever glance prickle my skin with electric shockwaves.

On the more practical side, I hated my job and was constantly tired as a result. Things got to the point where he rushed into my room one night and forcefully proclaimed he was taking my bed. He barred me from using anything in the apartment and made it very clear I was not only not welcome, but explicitly told I was evil, wrong, a parasite.

He paid me 500 dollars to move out. I did as soon as I could. Noone has ever looked at me with that much hatred in their eyes: raw, naked, it was a silver man with fangs dripping like liquid mercury, screaming at me with a wide, open mouth. No noise, just the face contorting..and that hurt more than any sound.

I thought on him often, most often when I wandered around that night for hours wondering if I was the horror he made me out to be, like others...like I've made out me to be. Eventually, it slipped by and we mutually ignored each other.

Tonight, as I was sitting in an obscure corner of the library, he came up and asked me a question. I replied what business was it of his to ask me. His arms were folded, defensive, like a giant ball of power and energy. He said he was just being civil and trying to bury the hatchet. He seemed to almost leave several times, only to come back as if to get in the last word, maybe some foot inside of a door that he didn't want shut.

He was repetent. Apparently, that summer, he found out he had a disease that will make him 50 times more likely to develop stomach cancer. His father is dying at 50. We are not friends, but I started praying for him in my mind.

Enemies and hatred to me aside, I see the worth in others and cannot stand when it is not excercised as they should use it. Brilliance should never be shaded, passion never ebbed...just all put in some form that melds to your place, your time.

Presumptive of me...but I didn't ask to be shown other people...they do it for me, or it just comes and I know, and they see..and in that seeing I have hundreds of mad stories and scenes. Vomit, blood, tears, the stench of death, but sometimes a white light so piercing that my mind is split by it, the transformation, the realization they find, and I feel them, their joy at discovering something that blocked them...and oddly it affects me in no way. It is an internal mirror, a quiet fire in those moments. I think everyone is beautiful at those times, past the masks we put up in fear.

Forgiveness. I can't understand it. There he was, a man who I had condemned in my mind and made a symbol, an object of scorn to myself...and slowly, as he spoke to me about his disease then something about law, in my mind he transformed. He became a human being to me again. The change was strange...that someone reached out and asked for forgiveness, to right things in their life, make up for mistakes.

Someone else who saw my approval, my acknowledgement that things were ok as something worthwhile to persue. It may seem a trifle, but you have to realize I'm not used to people acting on me. I act on them, almost always act on them. People just seem to...know that I am different in that way, that coming is something that is foreign, odd.

I'm rambling.

Another moment was when I read in the study downstairs. I was having trouble concentrating, willing myself to read deeply, more quickly. Then a wave of deja-vu hit me, much stronger than the daily ones have been. I saw paths to failure, success, so many things, so many people.

I felt like I was going to fail. Many of these instances I catch myself and wonder if the emotions I saw in this scene are really happening, going to happen. This probably seems odd to you, feeling emotions because of a scene you saw but you're actually living that scene right there...like a script for the heart and eyes, only you aren't so sure it's plausible.

I thought how could I be like this, so accomplished yet still having so much trouble reading, focusing, paying attention. All I could see was his face, the look of fear and of commitment. It's the face of a man who knows he may die the next day.

More...I don't know if I could ever share that forgiveness with myself. Others, yes..I expect difficulties from people. Pain and conflict define the face, mold the wrinkles, give character to the light of joy and happiness that washes over with blood and warmth.

But, to forgive me...no, I can't. I can accept my faults, learn from pain, but I cannot give mercy to myself willingly; no quarter. More than anything I know what I am capable of..and that myself, this entity, me...is a tool.

I am a tool unto myself. All of us are in a way. I see a tool, a sword, crafted in vicious heat and pounded on continuously. Defined, honed, losing shape to regain a more solid composition. I am to use myself to bring about change, enlightenment, in ways I can't explain without making you even more confused.

Suffice it to say, who I am is important, but what I can become...and more importantly what I can do by being who I am...that is critical. I...I am nothing, nothing without the goal of impacting this world, others, myself with that sword.

To cut away binds, bonds, chains around the minds and hearts of those who need new ways and new directions to move...to put it away and lay my hand on a shoulder, grip around someone, or plant something worthwhile and creative.

That is what is clear...and I..I become more transparent to myself with every passing year. I am a conduit and I can see the lines through the flesh, through my essence, through me. Can't you?

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