I usually write when I'm feeling reflective, when I'm not using short term distractions to hide. Busy hands are happy hands. I think there's a lot of truth to that. I used to be able to escape into life, now I use a book or Netflix or too much YouTube. 

I used to sit alone in my dorm listening to the acoustic version of the Counting Crows song Have You Seen Me Lately? over and over. Among other similarly somber songs. I even used a few lyrics as my AOL Instant Messenger away message. A year+ out of high school I had lost my brother, hadn't made any friends at UVM, and felt like I wasn't the person I'd always been. And the world kept moving around me. 

And of course now I know I'm not who I used to be. 

I could say that I look back wistfully, jealous of all the things I had but couldn't see. But I don't. The only real difference is that with time I climbed out of that hole and made a new me. I can't climb out of this one.

Enough. YouTube time.