Anemia, a deficiency of hemoglobin in the blood. I knew that had to be the problem even before the appointment. Anemia makes you weary and pale. You bleed too much, said the doctor. He gave me colored pills, one to stop the bleeding, the others to keep me strong, but I'm not strong. You think too much, someone else had said someday. I think too much, I bleed too much. A vampire had been sucking my blood for a long long time. But there are no pills for that. Are there? The creature walked in the shadows and slept inside a coffin. Anemia, the doctor said, a lack of red cells in your blood. I'm half myself now, but I'm persevering. I will have to tell the vampire he can have my blood no more. Weary and pale, I walk, slowly. "Eat some liver, some dark greens, take your pills, iron, vitamins...", well meant people tell me. Stay away from blood suckers and buy myself a "pensieve", I add to the list silently. I always thought the "pensieve" was the coolest gadget in Hogwarts, a basin where you'd put your threads of thoughts to rest, to air. Anemia, said the doctor, but he does not know of the creature that bites my neck in the middle of the night. When it leaves, it is like the world becomes contaminated by my paleness, life cannot recover from my weariness. Life becomes full of this creature's emptiness. My soul became anemic and I have to tell the vampire it can have my blood no more.
Schopenhauer says to live is to climb a mountain and when you see what is waiting for you on the other side of the mountain too early in life, you can never climb it the same way. I saw what was on the other side and decided I was simply not climbing that mountain anymore, unless pushed the way up. You wouldn’t realize that just by looking at me then. You wouldn’t see that I had quit. I would wake up, take showers, eat (actually there would be a lot of eating), go to work, do whatever obligation I was supposed to. I would even go out with friends or family. But if you looked really closer, you would realize I was only automatically responding to demands, except for the food. Food became my only source of pleasure. How was all the rest performed? At work, if there were tasks and deadlines, I’d do them, using no more than the basic skills required. As to my social life, it rested on the plans of others. They would say when and where to go. They would pick me up and bring me ho...
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