Living

He knew as well as anyone who had been diagnosed with a disease such as his that it changed your life. Permanently. But it was still his life. The only one he knew for sure he had. And it was a good life to boot. He had stopped asking why eons ago. Fate? Kismet? In the end he supposed the why of it wouldn't really make much difference. In fact on some level he didn't want to know if this was his karmic bitch-slap for something he had done. Or for that matter, payback for something he hadn't done that he should have. It just mattered that it was destined to be this way. It dawned on him one particularly cold and lonely night in the dead of a long harsh winter that occasionally ignorance truly is blissful. There just might be circumstances where not knowing what he knew could be infinitely preferable to those things which he knew for certain.

Learning to make more than the best of it was his latest quest. Living as gracefully and as unapologetically as possible in a world where society expected him to disappear into the shadows like some sort of thief who steals away into the night is one tall order. The initial spikes of anger that had coursed through his veins had mellowed like fine red wine into a more subtle shade of bitterness. It was counterproductive to his cause to dwell outwardly on emotions that were unquestionably costly to his sanity. Bitterness was almost as expensive as the hope he could no longer afford either. He kept it to himself. Successfully most of the time too. There was no more looking backwards at where he'd been. No more hoping, wishing, waiting for the doctors to tell him they'd made a mistake. Gotten it all wrong. No more sitting idle strumming his fingers on the arm of the easy chair. If he was going to leave this life any time soon, he needed to go out on the highest of all high-notes, after having lived a life free of regrets.

The act of trying to stay positive was about channeling absolute fear into something more. Something tangible. Something of substance. Something that had a lasting effect on humanity when it seemed his time to make a difference was running a little short. Somdays it was liberating really, knowing what he knew. No need to worry about famine, plagues or pestilence. No fear of natural disasters or overindulging in an illicit vice or two, now and then. No apologizing to a seemingly perfect world for making them uncomfortable in the face of his stark and frank imperfections. He knew his death. He had looked it square in the eye and defiantely shaken it's cold hand. He refused to be intimidated by it's presence in his life. Before long he and the bastard were on a first name basis.