The Perfect Storm.

I'm looking for you and I haven't been able to find you. I found you, I lost you. I search in different faces for that same look that you possess, I search in different smiles for that soul that illuminated the darkest corner of my soul. I look for in people that essence that made you unique, that essence that made me feel special as if I were important to someone. I try and try and I can't get anywhere. I swim and swim incessantly, I kick with all my strength and I still can't see solid land. Some people say we should keep kicking, but what do you do when there is nowhere to go? With that sublime effort, I have not managed to get anywhere.

Maybe it's me, maybe it's my fault. Maybe it was the idea that got hold of me, maybe I'm wrong. But what if I don't? what if there's still an ocean to swim in? What if there are still storms to sail and waves to surf, storms to master? How about, and only how about, if I still have fuel left in the tank to keep kicking, to keep pushing when I think the point has reached where I'm running out of energy? What if all is not lost and the mainland is closer than I think? What if it's her?

I see you, but you are not here, I write to you, but you don't read me, I sing to you, but you don't listen to me, How come you are still my muse? I speak about you with fervor and passion, with my heart and soul, but I still feel the emptiness that your departure left me, I still feel the loneliness that I felt before I met you. Smiles, dreams, goals and purposes your arrival gave to my life. From the first moment you knocked on the door of my soul, my life lit up. I understood how beautiful it is to live, how delicate, fine and elegant it is to love, to free oneself from selfishness, to think of another person when acting and speaking. Walk through the streets and find something that reminds you of that person, and that, in its natural evolution, a smile appears on your face.

When you arrived, I was destroyed. A decoy of yours had arrived. She drew me a world full of rainbows, pink skies, and clouds, she drew me a world, but she never painted it. She sketched smiles on me, but she never brought them to life. She sang to my soul, but never songs of her own authorship. She seduced my senses, intoxicated me, and left me. She danced the most beautiful melodies with me, but she never taught me how to dance. She told me that I was special, that I was loved and appreciated, but at the first change, at the first mountain to cross, I realized that I was already walking alone, her hand had let go of mine, despite having said in my ear "Calm down... You are not alone, because I am with you.”

Maybe it was I myself who believed and got confused. Maybe it was I myself who idealized you. Maybe it was myself who didn't know how to express myself, maybe in that perfect storm I just needed shelter and shelter, someone who would make me feel that life is beautiful and that it is worth continuing to fight.

A cabin in the middle of nowhere, mysteriously in the middle of the Pacific Ocean, what a contradiction that already entails in itself, since it is the fiercest and the most respected by the most fierce and experienced sailors. Tired, I was there, putting my closet in order, cleaning my photographs, shaking out the albums and notebooks, and cleaning the floor and the wooden walls. Without knowing how I got there, I tried to live as best as possible. When I opened the door, a strong storm hit my humble abode. “We have to go to the doctor” “My dad felt bad, we're going to go to the emergency room” “What are we going to eat?” “There was some money” “I saw Lunita badly, I think we should take her to the vet”, and “I don't want to give up. I want to at least have one last round.”

With force that storm was coming, the imminent impact was. I didn't feel ready. Fear and dread ran through my being. Insecurities were born again. Insecurities disguised as fears and traumas for not having felt that I was enough when I loved for the first time. New insecurities were brewing. Opening the door was a risk, a gamble I knew I had to take. Either it was to die in the brave and audacious attempt to tame that storm and overcome with it every fear, every insecurity, or it was to stay doing nothing, not giving battle and just waiting for the moment of impact to come and for the water to drown me.

Brave to dare to leave that place. I watched her with anger and determination “You can destroy my home, you can raze everything in your path, you can take away my dreams and desires, but there will be one thing that I will not allow you so easily without giving battle, my life itself. If you want her, you must come for her, because I will not give her to you, I will fight and fight and if I have to perish in the attempt, I will meet with God with my head held high, because I never took a step back, I never bowed down and I always fought as my father and my grandfather did.”

00:34 hours. Time for impact.

It was early morning, and in my world, a pitched battle was being fought. Naked I felt, but in some almost inexplicable way, the stronger I felt. Seeing how my humble abode was flooding, it let me know that I should not allow the same thing to happen to me. You won the battle, but the war was yet to be defined. I came out wounded and fatigued, I don't know how I did it, how I was able to get out of that place alive. My soul screamed so loud that even its own walls echoed, but still, no one came to the rescue… So much for shouting and exclaiming, but without a voice that would allow me to do it... I got out without understanding how, but I did it with a few cuts, with a few bruises, with a few broken ribs, but I came out alive. I get up and look around. Chaos and desolation prostrated before me. I run towards the photographs, towards the albums and notebooks that once filled me with dreams, desires and hopes, with goals and challenges to overcome... But now there was a bigger one, and perhaps the most important up to that moment. My closet was destroyed. A garment here, another there, and there were some that, in short, had been lost in the immensity of the ocean. I lay down not knowing what to do. I turn to the sky and beg “God, give me the strength to get out of here alive, give me the energy to get up, because today I am very tired, the continuous rains had drained me completely and this storm came ready to end everything… To end with me".

I find myself doubtful. "To speak or not to speak?" t was a constant in my being, in my mind. I didn't want to involve them in all this, I didn't want to worry them, not knowing that they already were. With difficulty, I get back on, breathing hard and looking down, not knowing what to do, or where to go, or how to start again. In my mind there was the idea of not giving up, not succumbing to them, and not giving them my life, because it has been the greatest gift that my God has given me. With a dazed look, I try to look around, to see the destruction caused by that storm, which I call “The perfect storm", because it knew how, where, and when to arrive. I turn around, my blurred vision does not allow me to see clearly, I think I see in the distance the light of a campfire, I was confused, not sure I am looking for a way to get to that place, not knowing how to do it.

I try to move forward as best I can. Wobbly steps are what move me, unsteady steps are what remain, and knees without strength that creak when I walk. I trip, and I fall face down on the ground, one more fall or one less fall, what is the difference? Once more, with what was left of my strength I tried to get up, my limbs trembling, superhuman strength requested from the creator I cried out. I was squatting, and each time I thought I saw that bonfire that was waiting for me more clearly and closer. I turned to heaven and asked the Lord to give me strength, to accompany me on this new adventure, to never leave Him again. With effort I rejoined myself; Powerful pain in my back invaded me, but I decided to continue moving forward. The amount of rubble that lies at my feet is enormous. Walls, doors, windows, paintings, and frames were what was prostrated there. With hesitant steps, I continue walking, even without knowing how I would get there.

The creaking of a frame catches my attention. I turn around with curiosity, but also with particular fear. “What if it's something I don't want to see?” “What if it is something that does have something to do with it?” I look with doubts but with a hint of hope at the same time. I smile, rest, and caress the photo as if it were a love and a hug for those who were between that wooden frame and the glass that prevents us from being together once again as we were at that moment. I smile, I see myself, my brother, my mother, and my father, in what was our best weekend, in what was our best vacation. I know what I have to do. There was anger and determination in my eyes. “They won the battle, but not the war.”

“They want my life, they want my freedom, they want everything I am and everything I can be?! Well, come for me, I'm waiting for you here, ready to die fighting!” I shouted loudly to the sky while holding that photograph in my hands that reminded me of who I was fighting for…

To be continued…

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