i never took the photograph...
I was walking through a local park when i stopped at a little gazebo. This gazebo has benches that go around the inside and on a railing next to one of the benches someone had scratched the words "I Am Lonely".
I wanted to see if i could capture an image of that weak scrawl but i didn't. The photo would have meant nothing to anyone else, but it may to me.
"I Am Lonely" scratched into a railing. An etching probably not much noticed and of little concern to anyone. I wondered who had left it and what was going on with them. I felt something of a kinship with them due to my own lone evenings walking through that park seeing the laughing couples strolling arm in arm, the young families with their children playing in the grass and clusters of friends swimming and splashing. Things that were not a part of my world. Things that show me how separate i have become, how separate i always have been.
I had spent many evenings walking through that park seeing what either by fault or fate was not a part of my life. I had wondered if i were to die or disappear, how long it would take for anyone to notice. I imagined that my place of employment would notice first. After a couple days they would conclude that i had quit with no notice and they would start the termination process. Junk mail would collect in my mail box. The mail man would leave a notice that my box was over full and that i had to go down to the post office to pick up my mail. The landlord would eventually leave a note on my door telling me that i was past due on the rent. In time the utilities would send cut off notices due to nonpayment.
It seems that eventually someone would have to start checking. Possibly the landlord when he notices that a week later his note is still hanging on my door. He may ask my neighbor about me. The neighbor will tell him "He seemed fine when i last talked to him two years ago or so".
"I Am Lonely" etched into a rail.
I did not take the photograph and now it exists only in my head.
![img_2351[1].jpg](https://cdn.imagearchive.com/alonelylife/data/attachments/0/451-4b5bbdccc896cef8c7e659b3fda56d96.jpg)
