Fear! Scared about tomorrow … what will happen. Will I do it, will I really? This moment this is real. And frightening. Incursion. It will leave a mark. I just have to make sure the cut doesn't go all the way trough. No, no, no, no.
I am not fearless. I am afraid of the person I am. Afraid of what I do. Afraid of being wrong. Because of me, innocent people are going to be killed, imprisoned, executed, threatened, crippled, harmed … Suffer. They will suffer because of my actions, my thinking, doing, because of my belief, my conviction, my gun, finger. Shot. No one's asked them. They have no choice; they don't know what is going to happen. This moment, this incursion of my life could very well be the end of theirs. Dead, stop, no, leave. What I am about to do? I know what will happen to them, and I still do it. Is this wrong? Am I wrong?
I feel disgusted. Fear. Guilt. Blame.
I fear that this makes us equals. Them. These dirty, filthy, murderers, heartless, killer. They fight with violence. But we fight with violence, too… They are filled with hate. Am I not filled with hate, too? They are in the darkness…we are in the shadows. Dark. I don't know. Stop! No. I can't.
I have light in my eyes, Takes told me, Takes, he told me. He did. I am the most beautiful woman, he has told me. Because I have light. I think he is just blinded. By my light? Or by insanity? I don't think Takes understands what light means. It sometimes seems like he enjoys this battle. Senseless, senseless battle this is. It is so easy for them. But not for us. We have to change, they don't. I feel like we are fighting ourselves. Our darkened light against their pure darkness.
But can light defeat darkness? Isn't night deeper than the day? Black starker than white? Tar stronger than feathers? What if light is not enough…? Could it be an illusion? A dream, wish, that we can win, succeed, triumph? Defeat. Light defeat darkness? Their hate, terror, dread, cold. Isn't happiness, goodness and love weaker? Love… hate over light? Love over darkness?
Last night, the darkness was strong. After the meeting with Takes, I was walking, walking home, scared, afraid I would be found, out, after curfew, cold, my hands were like ice, cold and wet and unreal, but it was real, and I knew where I was, I was walking, walking through the town, streets, houses, places I know, I have been there, seen them, I can picture the streets and corners and roads in my head. But not yesterday. There was darkness everywhere. Unforgiving. I felt as though I had no eyes, no senses, I couldn't smell, hear. I was drowning and floating at the same time. Screaming. Like a nightmare. The war is a nightmare.
Confusion. Always, these days, unsettled by everything. Simple things. Nothing's simple these days. The resistance has made me think about things. Things I did not question. What is wrong, what is right … who decides? Who has the right to? Who has the right to decide over the fate of anybody else?
Takes thinks we do. Because we are right. He says.
But he was wrong before. He wanted to do wrong things, like them, like the collaborators. Kidnap children. Trade for prisoners, use them, destroy them. No, I told him. We cannot, we must not, it is not right, not what we are fighting for, this is what we are fighting against. Licke and Saar agreed. Silence. Never mentioned again. But he thought it. He thought of it, and this bit of black, cold darkness is somewhere deep inside him. Yet I still love him. Am I wrong, again? "What you believe, is right." He said that, yesterday, at our meeting. And it is true. It is, really.
The acceptance from others concerning your decisions is insignificant, it is the justification in front of yourself, whether you can feel at peace, with your decisions, with yourself, with the person you are. That matters. I don't have to worry about these people understanding, accepting, tolerating, forgiving me, as long as I can.
I can breathe. Free, for the first time.
Takes, was right. He is right, once again. "The smaller the chance, the greater the reason". That's what Takes told me. Yesterday I couldn't make anything of it. Not yesterday, no. But now I understand, I can see. I'll never be sure that I can win, never be certain that our good will defeat their bad. But as long as I fight, as long as anyone fights, as little and insignificant it seems, it will mean that there is a chance, hope, hope for light to replace the light, light to make the people see, hear, feel, understand. Light for people to live. For people to forget. Children should never associate anything with these events but numbers and figures. They should not know, not the fear, the panic, the hopelessness. They should never know what the occupiers did to grandma and grandpa, what real torture and reprisal, fear and hate feels like. It should neither be their past, present, nor their future.
I can justify myself. Because I believe in my actions, in the power and rightness of it. And I also believe in our hate and violence and our evil. Because it is aimed at theirs. It is to restore, not to destroy.
If anything should happen tomorrow, I will know I did everything, to prevent, to protect, to stop, to punish. To act as I believe I should have. Peace. I want to feel at peace with myself. And I do. Because I bear light. And because the people I love bear light. And because, at least for me, light will always win over darkness, hate, violence… coldness. Love.
