Nephew letter

Monday 5/18/26

This is a letter to my uncle from Friday. I include it here because for all the things that this journal is, it's ultimately telling a story. Sometimes I use outside documents that then become internal documents as per this record in the telling of that story. What I wrote about "Love, Your Mouse" is true and I feel like including it makes sense. My uncle is a good man.

Dear Gerard,

It's early on the morning of 5/15. I was just checking in. I understand you weren't feeling well and that had derailed you a bit from your workout routine. I hope you've been able to resume those activities. I know how important it is for me to make myself run stairs even when I don't feel up to it. 

I have been struggling much. I feel like a ghost--like I'm already dead. I see people doing whatever they're doing--a mother playing with her child at this park I go past--and I feel as if I'm someone taking a last look at the world in which there's no place for him. I'm terrified all the time. I had actually called you three or four weeks ago on a Sunday when I was barely hanging on. Wanted to hear a friendly voice. I didn't leave a message, though. Even that can feel like too much. 

I'm creating amazing work. The best work there's ever been. That makes it harder. Knowing how good it is, and that it has no chance, may never be seen by anyone. All I'm able to do is create and run stairs. There's nothing else, and I don't know how I'm able to do those things. Which I have to force myself to do. 

The pain and the hopelessness has been such that I've had to fight not to drink for the first time in ten years. That's not so much a drinking thing as it would be a giving up thing, a ceding of myself over to the end. That's what the bottle represents to me. I haven't, though. The few people who know me tend to think that because it's me, this is some eminently doable thing. "Oh, it's him, he's so strong, etc." But it isn't. Not when everything else is like this. 

Anyway, I mostly wanted to say that I hope you're doing well and are back to your Monday-Wednesday-Friday workout routine as it's obviously served you well. I'm going to send you a special story, probably in the physical mail. It's "only" 1600 words long, but it may be the story I've worked on the most in my life. Which is ironic, maybe, because it's meant to be for a children's book that is also for adults. But I put years into this story. That doesn't necessarily mean anything on its face; something amazing can be composed in a day. They're all different. It's called "Love, Your Mouse," and I think it's what I really believe in, most believe in, I guess you could say, about why we're here, if we're here for anything. 

Love,

Colin