Death is the sort of thing that can be written at length, whether in song, poem or book; there's ample amount of material to unpack. It's a great place to start one's own existential travels, asking 1) where do I come from; 2) where am I right now; and 3) where am I going?

When someone close to us does move on, we become more immune to the brevity of our time together. In our most sober moments, we recognize that death will happen to everyone we've laughed with, cried from and loved until we cross the threshold into the infinite ourselves.

Nevertheless, it is a strange transition. Seventeen years ago today on a rainy Wednesday morning, I encountered the shattering of the known with the passing of my father. Surprisingly otherworldly in the moment, as the years fell off the calendar, the clarity of that person, the realness of the one I loved, drifts away into memories of what once was, memories that fade in time where realized vivaciousness becomes a cardboard box of packed memories.

Among the reasons—and I haven't heard anyone ever put it this way before—is our knowledge/context/relationship with that person is frozen. Over time, there is a contextual shift. Yes, there was once a time I was tight with my Dad. I made sure we had dinner at least once a week together, if not twice, regardless of schedule. And at age 25, I had a lot going on, but those other things didn't matter.

However since I knew him those seventeen years ago, a lot has happened. Back in early 2004, Trump was just another rich guy in New York City—he hadn't even been on Celebrity Apprentice yet; Obama was just a state senator; and Saddam Hussein was just captured. The best Internet browser was Firefox; there was NO YouTube, Twitter or Facebook. NetFlix was just a new place where me and my geek friends would have DVDs mailed to us. Back then, there were no iPads like something off an episode of Star Trek. Phones were basically walkie talkies and we would laugh off if anybody every thought they might outperform the processing power of our desktop computers.

In a whirlwind from 2004 to 2021, in all of this time, my relationship with my Dad (and later my Mom) has been frozen. From a cultural perspective, the world he knew no longer exists. As there is no opportunity for our relationship to grow, it is boxed and put on a shelf in a storeroom full of boxes of past loved ones and friendships that have faded out of view from the twilight shining upon our finite moor.

And upon this side of eternity, maybe this is why things feel less real, that he has become relegated and locked into a two-dimensional timeline; it is because this world around me is not the world that was. In the moment, death feels like something that can be tweaked for a quick fix or as if we have a backup saved game to reload. In time, the vitality of that person is just printed upon a trivia card in my consciousness, admittedly a better fate than being engraved on a tombstone.

In amusement this morning, I considered adding a content-rich section of my site by adding all the dings I've been contending with in these early weeks of 2021. I thought I was out of the woods with my knees until a quick jaunt out to the mailbox yesterday rendered a tightening up behind my knee just like what I experienced in my showstopping workout. I also:

1. Contend with a left arm that makes popping sounds when I do a press under stress;
2. Experience a weird tightening up in that left forearm in random applications, the forearm equivalent to a finger that needs to be popped;
3. Find when I rise my left arm over my head, my shoulder instantly tightens up;
4. Forever reminded by aches from what I think is a broken left foot from January 2019's personal daily best of 50,000+ steps on Fitbit;
5. And frown as my right eyelid still occasionally twitches from that time when grease leaped out from the skillet and stuck the landing...in my eye.

Well, I've got another to add to the list: my right ankle. There's a sharp pain on it that has left me largely immobile today. But, you know, who cares about the losses? All I want to do is win.

I'll concede that emotionally, the collective body of work these dings have been dragging me down. I'm in the last 20 lb stretch of going below the 200 lb threshold that it's been unnerving to not enjoy this space.

But, I've got good feelings for the future, such perfect days lie ahead.

Today, I added a little bit of dairy into my carnivore diet. I exhibited Kerrygold butter to my beloved Coffee at a ratio of 1 tbsp per 8 oz. Now four cups into this rich euphoria, it continues to be a deeply satisfying time together, especially in context of an instensely gratifying 2 lbs of beef roast as presented to me by the Instant Pot, all within the the backdrop of my Eternity for Men scent.

I don't have my feet, my knees are tenuous at best and my left arm is a glass cannon. But, I still have my right arm and a killer core. I feel good. It's time to make a run!

Have I said how I'm dissatisfied with all the negative causality that could be associated to future workouts? Back in January, I was a star shooting across the deep of the night sky. And now, I feel...ordinary as I cling to what remains. It's really NO way of building a larger-than-life 2021. I cannot lose my mindset even in a sore and tight context.

But, what good is it to dwell on what I cannot do? Instead, I consider what I can do and dream upon the months that are ahead. While I once wrote how I would return to Facebook on February 25, I may push it back another 6 weeks. Somehow, I thought the world would be a different place by then, though I might have held loftier expectations, when clearly, the world just takes underwhelming positions. It's not that I'm stroking the fire of perfectionism, a context where I'm on fire and inviting all the thrillseekers to join me on a rollercoaster of new heights, no, I don't have all of the answers or the best of vision or the capacity to play error-free life.

I want to return to social media as the spring breeze gently caresses our faces. I do not want to emerge from the wilderness in the grasp of winter. I suspect the world is indifferent (isn't that its modus operandi), but I see my return not as an end goal, but a beginning, a beginning of what I really do long for, to Restore, Retrofit and Retrowave together! I've gotta get back into my training rhythm to have the frame of mind I need; I've gotta get back to working the bag over in my striking regimen; I've gotta feel ALIVE!

I've simply lost too much to the world. And I'm coming to get it back. I feel it coming. As it has been sung:

I'm running out of time
'Cause I can see the sun light up the sky
So I hit the road in overdrive...
...The city's cold and empty