The price of freedom

Five years and two months have gone by and just one reflection nurtures your every single morning: “yesterday is today, and today is tomorrow.” What you once called “your life, your choices, your plans and your destiny” lost their very sincere meanings, as deciding now only belongs to the privileged and you have become subject to the strict lifestyle and schedule forced upon you. There are no fancy surprises anymore, no extraordinary affairs to look forward to. Only the occasional visits, which gradually get to be the highlights of your existence. For you, it is all written in the books.

Recall the cards you wrongly played -- or even thinking how bad luck stroke and the cards handed to you were just plain unfavorable to you in the first place. The infamous moment that changed the absolute everything develops into a greater obsession as the clock keeps on ticking and ticking... Talking about regrets only is appropriate to those who get hit with this kind of reality. “What is life?” when you are compelled to the idea that the most precious gift given to humankind was taken away from you: your freedom. Jesus, does anyone ever know what it feels to be trapped until you are in a cell? In the absence of something so vital, cherishing it with every breathe you take will forge the essence of your being.

There are no misunderstandings. There are no excuses. Some people deserve what they’re in for. (And of course, if that weren’t the case, then it’s not even bad luck. It’s just of very bad taste.) Meeting someone who is locked up will make you lose control over your emotions. Your heartbeat takes a slower pace, and bit by bit, it breaks down. Your heart is crushed into pieces. And they cut, they sting, they bleed. Immediately, an abundance of questions bring you to a dangerous yet somewhat pure, incorruptible place. Inquisition of fundamental matters, one would say. Does repentance equal to the absence of freedom? When does time stop and simultaneously matter so, so, so much to someone? What is innocence if you cannot ever come out clean? Where is your family when even just looking at their photograph breaks your heart? “What is life” when the light of hope does not even come close to the light of day?

Answers are not impossible, they aren't unsolvable mysteries. It's just hard to find them. Yet for the first time, questions seem not to require a direct explanation. Truth is: the responses are but overwhelming feelings, naming them near-perfection realities. Weren't they inside you all along?

Someone once said that the people you should love the most are the ones who are less fortunate. You underline that statement when you can seriously consider: Who could ever love a murderer? Who’ll grant forgiveness to a rapist? Who should even talk to a smuggler? Who would feel sorry for an innocent man wasting his time imprisoned? Do you believe it is no one else but those close to them? Definitely not the case. I am but a stranger who’ll look into your eyes, shake your hand, give you a tap on the shoulder. There is a reason why I saw you. But then again, I can't help but wonder, against all the odds, could it have been that you saw me first?

I will love you. Forever, until the end.