wan in a box

life within death within life within death within life within death within life.

what we have achieved is sisyphean in nature.

i mistook a streetlight for the moon tonight.

i am losing sleep and cannot remove the taste of blood from my mouth.

it is sickening me. i'm dying for more.

i'm exhausted.

and i feel as though i'm being watched.

it never feels malicious. simply curious.

it makes me uneasy still.

i cannot escape the feeling of it. it is sitting in the back of my mind at all times. someone out there is watching me. past the cameras. in the absence of them, the stare grows harder. scrutinizing me. waiting and judging. watching the offers i accept. noting the ones i reject.

it is sickening me.

i feel ill.

it is a beautiful night. the chill in the air is welcomed. it is needed. i'm unaccustomed to the heat here. makes it hard to focus, especially as battle wears on.

it is unfathomable how hot the battlefield gets. it fries me. i look at my teammates. i watch them struggle and have no power to aid them.

and i feel it.

the softest hand of my shoulders. the whispered sighs.

tomorrow is another day.

i am not sure who is telling me this, though i am aware it is not self-reassurance.

i fear i'm going mad.

you flip the page over.

lifeafterdeathwithinlifeafterdeathwithinlifeafterdeathwithinlifeafterdeathwithinlifeafterdeathwithinlifeafterdeathwithinlifeafterdeathwithinlife

who are you?

what have you come to do?

what does it have to do with me?

where are you?

where are you watching from?

why can't i find you?

i'm searching. i'm watching. you will show yourself soon.

i just know it. i can feel it. i can taste it.

you are haunting me.

why are you haunting me?

why are you just watching?

i will find you. i will find you within this life.

i will search for you through death.

you are on the tip of my tongue. the back of my mind.

Walks for your mental health!

I wouldn't use an adblocker if ads were just banners on the side funding a website I enjoy using and want to support. Ads pop up invasively and fill my whole screen, I misclick and get warped away to another page just for trying to read an article or get a recipe.

Every app shouldn't be like every other app. Instagram didn't need reels and a shop. TikTok doesn't need a store. Instagram doesn't need to be connected to Facebook. I don't want my apps to do everything, I want a hub for a specific thing, and I'll go to that place accordingly.

I love discord, but so much information gets lost to it. I don't want to join to view things. I want to lurk on forums. I want to be a user who can log in and join a conversation by replying to a thread, even if that conversation was two days ago. I know discord has threads, it's not the same. I don't want to have to verify my account with a phone number. I understand safety and digital concerns, but I'm concerned about information like that with leaks everywhere, even with password managers.

I shouldn't have to pay subscriptions to use services and get locked out of old versions. My old disk copy of photoshop should work. I should want to upgrade eventually because I like photoshop and supporting the business. Adobe is a whole other can of worms here.

Streaming is so splintered across everything. Shows release so fast. Things don't get physical releases. I can't stream a movie I own digitally to friends because the share-screen blocks it, even though I own two digital copies, even though I own a physical copy.

I have an iPod, and I had to install a third party OS to easily put my music on it without having to tangle with iTunes. Spotify bricked hardware I purchased because they were unwillingly to upkeep it. They don't pay their artists. iTunes isn't even iTunes anymore and Apple struggles to upkeep it.

My TV shows me ads on the home screen. My dad lost access to eBook he purchased because they were digital and got revoked by the company distributing them. Hitman 1-3 only runs online most of the time. Flash died and is staying alive because people love it and made efforts to keep it up.

I have to click "not now" and can't click "no". I don't just get emails, they want to text me to purchase things online too. My windows start search bar searches online, not just my computer. Everything is blindly called an app now. Everything wants me to upload to the cloud. These are good tools! But why am I forced to use them! Why am I not allowed to own or control them?

day 208