そんなこと

I guess I'm somewhere in the middle right now. I don't know if I'll survive. I'm fucking scared to be honest. So I know I say this a lot but I'll say it again.

If I die tomorrow, I'm sorry for everything I have done this far. I promise I have spent my life trying to make up for the mistakes I have made in my youth. I don't believe in a god or afterlife so I say these things of my own accord.

If this is the last utterance I make in this world. To my wife, I love you. To my mom, I'm sorry. And if you have the time, could you put this quote on my headstone "In this struggle of life you will find more love and you will be loved."

In the book I gave her, there was a chapter on the afterlife and what that entails.

We couldn't come to a concession about our feelings on the topic. The word fear came up quite a bit. She believes in god and heaven, that's what her grandma told her anyway. I felt more timid about the end.

After our talk I went home and thought a lot about things. Are our lives so god danm disinteresting that we have to visualize the end just to distract ourselves from the present? Is that just the way people are? We are never satisfied with who or what we are, that we have to become dreamers and philosophers.

After all, there is beauty in the unknown. You can visualize the ripples on a lake before you toss a rock into it, but you still want to do it anyway right?

That morning I got to my office early, I was the first one there. I booted up my PC as usual and popped open my book to get some research done before my boss arrived. Book in one hand and a sandwich in the other, I heard a knocking at my office door. Rushing over, I forgot to put my book down and hurriedly popped the sandwich into my mouth while turning the handle. The young office lady giggled when seeing me. I must have looked ridiculous with half a sandwich hanging out of my mouth. But I guess it's my privilege as a teacher to not care what anyone thinks. She handed me a green envelope and scurried off. I think her name is Tomomi. I hadn't seen her for a few weeks, I heard she was quite sick with pneumonia and took an extended sick leave.

I turned back to the envelope, I had to put something down before the sandwich disintegrated within my mouth so I threw the letter over to my desk. It landed perfectly on a stack of homework papers. Nice. I knew what was inside of it. It was an acceptance letter for the university I had applied to, or possibly a rejection, who knows. Anyway I had a full day of classes, I didn't want to get the news (good or bad) since it would throw my day off, so I waited until night to open it.

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It's been 4 days since I got the news of my acceptance. Nothing changed but everything feels different. Peeling eggs by the counter, washing dishes, looking down at my reflection in the sink. It's all I can think about now.

I looked it up online. It's called imposter syndrome; the idea that all my accomplishments are a mistake. Misattributed to me while others are more deserving.

I beat 14 of the best and brightest academics in my field. I know I deserve my position, but I feel on edge, like it's going to be ripped away from me at any time. My waking life feels like a dream and my nightmares feel more like reality.

Why me? What did I do to deserve everything I have? I feel terrible for all the people I've hurt in my lifetime and now that everything I've ever dreamed of is coming true I cant deal with the weight of it all. All the momentum in my life has been building and building to this and BAM, I hit the figurative wall. I exceeded everything I hoped for and have nowhere left to go.

I'll be studying at one of the best Universities in Tokyo, people call me "professor" in my classes and I'm just so tired of pretending. I'm still that danm teenage boy who can't get over his first crush. I'm still the kid who tears up when the teacher calls on them in class.