Where do we go - when we only manage to disappear inside of ourselves?

Deeper and deeper under layers of hardened skin, worn muscles and aching bones to a place beyond life-bearing organs, fierce-pumping blood to find refuge within our battered soul.

I've been missing for quite awhile now, removed and distant. My apologies to my friends that I've been distant too - my grief didn't allow room for friends, I should have tried harder to run the show myself.

Healing is of all things, a most unusual process. Maybe I thought I would never come back - maybe I thought I would have come back sooner than this. Perhaps the wounds have healed enough, perhaps the stitches have never correctly healed and the scars are more visible than I think.

I wanted to be able to say that I'm 100% - that I'm Jesus Lil Beam O' Sunshine, but then it dawned on me, I never really was. I was a beer-swilling, foul-mouth, sex-obsessed, overworked and overwrought, silly and tough, rough trade fag who drafted his issues in to a spreading tattoo and wrung his heart out in his dirt-stained hands for all to see.

But for some reason, it's here I'm most comfortable - the online shrinks office - playing with my wounds, giggling at my fumbles and running at break-neck speed into oncoming traffic.

I haven't written a word since that last terrible post - I guess I probably have a lot to get out.