The Line

A line in the sand... I drew a line in the sand once. Then I drew it again, and again after that. My last line in the sand looked pretty much as I do now, yet here I am again, only this time there is no line. My hands are no longer strong enough to draw that line. I am no longer certain about where I am going, where I will end up.

That's the problem with a line in the sand; the smallest breeze can erase it. The slightest change in direction, in condition, in approach can make that line irrelevant, causing it to disappear as grains of silica on the lip of a dune. I've given up on lines in the sand. My horizon, much like the lip of that dune, is ever-shifting, ever-changing.

I no longer think of my life in terms of can or can't, will or won't. These days my life is more about what, right now, do I need to keep going. The concept of a future has become increasingly unimportant as I draw closer to that day when I will not have one.

For all but the strongest of us, we will see our lines shift and sway with the wind. Only the few will draw that line firmly, daring never to cross it, taking the decision when the line has arrived. For the rest of us, we will cling to life desperately, blazing through that line in the sand like a missile over the desert itself. We will ignore this one, drawing immediately the next one, until we are no longer able to draw lines. Then the line won't matter. The decision will no longer be in our hands.