(148: you could never publish my love)
I was drained and my head was pounding. Then it was cold and I was tired and weak. When I came to it was still cold and my buddy's feet were wet in his boots. We slept on muddy earth and flies buzzed around our ears. My left hand was ravaged by sandflies but the trees around us at night were decorated for Christmas with fireflies. It was in the midday heat that my hands dirtied the envelope, and it was in the midday heat that I was cold, that I felt the most comfortable warmth, then tears rolled down my cheeks.
Few things match up to the feeling of accomplishment. All guys go through the same thing, are pushed to their limits and still make it out alive. Well, most guys. And it doesn't matter that everyone feels the same thing, because the feeling shouldn't be diminished because of that. We've been through recruit hell. I was bitten by a centipede. My knees are giving way. The skin on my palms are peeling, stained by the burden of cleaning. And we all still feel the same things.
Yesterday I had a good lunch at home. Met with chrisandbobo for a fish & co dinner and starbucks supper, then late night chat with Lorrie over a beer, peanut butter cookies and a slice of carrot cake. Woke in the morning for breakfast waffles at the club with Lynnie, then had a swim at my other favourite pool before meeting Leon for Botak Jones lunch. Spending the last few hours before booking in rediscovering awesome music, and at my grandma's place with my relatives. It's a funny feeling, the knowledge that you'll be sleeping at a different place tonight, it being a distant reality yet nearing at a frightening pace, and I've yet to get used to it. Just as how I've yet to get used to so many things.
I miss so many things.