It’s 10:38 PM on Thursday, August 20th, 2015: My day off.

I just got back from the gym at work. I listened to LCD Soundsystem’s “Home” there and back. I wore a gray shirt, grey undershirt, my gray Nike sneakers, and grey shorts. Four shades of grey for what seems to be a metaphor in a movie scene. This moment in my life, this past year has been a grey area. I’m in stasis; in the middle of something scary, and something big.

Twelve years ago yesterday, I was diagnosed with Acute Myeloid Leukemia. I was 18. I don’t talk about it often, but I feel even the handful of times I mentioned it in person or in a blog has been too much. It’s not something that I’m embarrassed about, and definitely not emotional about–

Well, I take that back. I’m not sad about it. In fact, it was one of the greatest things that could have ever happened to me. Yes, I actually wrote that. Just now.

I’m deathly afraid of the person I would have become had it not been for this self-centered cataclysmic event. I wouldn’t have been appreciative of the things and people around me. I wouldn’t have fought harder for my goals. I wouldn’t have opened my eyes to the wonders around me. And most importantly, I wouldn’t have been this close to my brother.

I think about that a lot. The most immediate and ostensible effect of the news was the sudden “160°” of our relationship. We were often at odds, and now we are best friends. Sure we don’t always see eye to eye (hence the incomplete turn), and I still play the role of “Big Brother” here and there, but what can I say? Will that ever disappear? (Spoilers: No, sorry Bro).

I am joyful with my admiration of life and its constant narrative that unfolds. But this past year – The Grey Year – has left me in stasis; unable to move forward mentally. Call it a writer’s block, but I’d liken it more to a “Human’s Block.”

The desire– nay, the need to do something creative eats at me each day I arrive at my job, and every time that I come home unable to get any productive work done.

There isn’t anyone to blame but myself. I need a new job, I need to make movies. And I’m working on it. It just takes time, and sadly money of which I have none (thanks bills!).

It makes it hard to be the same, life-loving person. What feels like a “normal” life to most feels like a regression into the person I would have become in some alternate reality; ultimately for whom I would feel sorry.

This Grey Year is pissing me off. I’m about to go into the red (financially home there for years). Oh? Here comes “Dance Yrself Clean” on my LCD Soundsystem playlist. Sounds like a great idea, James Murphy. I think I’ll do just that.

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Continue on this journey of crazed daydreaming by following this blog and of course, my Twitter @GuyOnAWire

-Jamie