The Fall

 

Photography by Madelaine Bustamante

Today I tried breathing again but it was pointless as I noticed all the air had gone away. I looked at everybody around me in despair, it couldn't be possible that everybody was acting so calmly while lacking oxygen.

Big was my surprise when I noticed a sort of respiratory machine around their heads, it seems I missed the announcement about wearing them. It wouldn't be my first time missing it. What should I do now? I was holding my breath as people do underwater, I had nothing but a few minutes, but my despair continuously increasing would tell me that I have nothing but counted seconds, making it unbearable.

I thought about the people I could ask for help... Asking for help. I have been working on asking for help for the last couple of years, and I could reach out my agonizing hand to someone for help. But who? Also? What should I say? How can I explain myself if I can not talk? I believe I will lose my ability to think soon enough as well. Oh God, I am starting to feel dizzy.

I started looking around me more carefully, to find a familiar face, or even a friendly one. Everybody seemed so busy, I didn't have the courage to disturb anyone's day; I wouldn't like anyone interrupting mine, especially in such a brusque way, asking for air, desperately. No, I needed to find a familiar face as soon as possible. Somehow moving started becoming heavy and difficult.

A known face! I tried to run to it if what I did can be considered running because even if in that very moment it felt like that, in my memories it is played as a pathetic attempt of moving. He couldn't see me, couldn't hear me, couldn't feel me. The only known face around me was miles away from me. I started sobbing, I couldn't hold my breath any longer.

People continued moving around me, while I faded away, slowly, painfully, sadly. Oh, my dream of becoming invincible finally comes true. I wondered if it was the right time to let it come true. I would have hated anybody seeing me in such a state of fragility, therefore I guess it was okay. But then again, I didn't ask for help because I couldn't speak! My intentions were others. I wanted to say: “Help me!” “I can’t breathe,” “Where did you get that respiratory machine?”, “When was this change announced?”.

I felt how, while I faded away unhurriedly, my anxiety was growing visibly. I was wondering about my loved ones, about the people that would start looking for me at some point and wouldn't find me, I thought about the ones I cared the most about, and I hoped, from the bottom of my heart, that'd give me one last shot of strength to try one more time. But I was hopeless, my body wasn't responding anymore, even my brain seemed further and further away from me, I wondered if my heart was also decreasing the intensity of its beats.

Everything was useless at that moment. Everything was valueless. As my last drops of consciousness got ready to leave me, I did, once again, what I have learned would always be the only exit door that would lead me to the hallway of containment. I raised a prayer, not to get more time, or solutions, or salvation, nor anything that would involve more efforts. I just asked for a good ending; so that even when my life was pure chaos, my death would be peaceful.

First Day of Ramadan

Photography was taken by Madelaine Bustamante

It is the first day of Ramadan and I am at ease. See, in my constant search for understanding many times, I forget to recharge my batteries. I forget that my heart and soul need to be fed more than knowledge. I forget that I have a strong need of God in my life. A need for God that isn’t minimized to a few reminders here and there, or to a bunch of studies, but in truth, to a real relationship, within my current capacity with God.

If I have to be completely honest, the past two years have been a big challenge for me regarding understanding many things in the spiritual realm, and I felt lost, confused, overwhelmed, and scared many times. But not once did I turn to the divinity without feeling protected, recovered, stronger, motivated, and recharged. Still, I have this terrible habit, just like most of us, to push away my spiritual needs and overload myself with teachings, books, and writings; and don’t get me wrong, I have learned a big deal and I am nothing but grateful. But, only God knows how much I missed this feeling, this inner peace, this calmness. This sensation of being able to breathe in this air seems so asphyxiating sometimes.

Many times I wonder how we make it. I wonder about the reality of my fortitude because I always find myself so weak. I can’t face things on my own, because I find myself so small, I find everything huge! And it is just when I turn to Allah and I am able to see my own power through Him that I feel I can do it. I can do it because I am part of Him, I can do it because there are still thousands of worlds and mysteries for me to discover; and if my frailty, accompanied by cowardice doesn’t allow me to go on, my curiosity and my deepest feelings that I can’t even name will always do the job.

I was not born imperfect. I was born the exact way I was supposed to be born, and it is up to me to navigate this life and find in this sphere and others the many gifts God has put along the way for me. Just as He has done for all of us. I hope you are all suffering and enjoying life as much as I am. I hope we are all alive enough, to revive to the death call every single day.