The person whose heart I want to gouge out is not 'you'.

There are songs that, despite not catching my attention when they were trending, come back to pierce through me across a span of several years.
I take the message contained in such songs as exactly what I need right now, and I end up playing them on repeat for a while.
Right now, Hikaru Utada's "Manatsu no Tooriame" (Midsummer Shower) is causing a major boom within me.
On a holiday afternoon when I had nothing but time, it was playing on the store's background music system while I was out with my husband.

For the past three months, I have continued to update every day.
The more I wrote, the more fulfilled I felt; it was truly fun.
But that was just me gently tightening a noose around my own neck.
I hadn't realized that.

"That was interesting."
"I laughed until my sides hurt."

I was truly happy to receive comments like those.
Thank you so much for always reading.
But as I kept churning out articles like that, I was putting a curse on myself, thinking, "I have to keep writing things that make people laugh."
I got my feet stuck in the mud and couldn't move.

I don't want to be misunderstood: it is by no means the case that the comments or the articles introducing me were a burden.
It is entirely my own responsibility for misjudging what was inside me and my own capacity.
The comments and introduction articles were truly a joy and are my treasures.
I take screenshots and look back at them.

I will return to my roots and ask myself: what was it that I really wanted to do by writing?

It wasn't to get laughs or to keep making dirty jokes; it was simply to pack the world I live in and the things I see into words.
I wrote about that in the day-before-yesterday's article.

I want to gouge out hearts.
I want to strike at the painful spots.
I want to show off that "even while containing pitch-black sediment, I am fulfilled. Nothing is missing."
Forgetting that, I realized while facing this text that my own axis had become blurred.
The person whose heart I want to gouge out is not "you".
It is "me". The "me" who was at rock bottom.
If there are people who find that interesting as a byproduct, that is fine.

I will not stop writing.
Because there are things I must write.
For my own sake.

I'm going to go train a little so I can write sentences that pierce through me.
I don't know when I'll be back.
It might be next week, or it might be next month.
But when I return, I should be able to write something even more amazing.

Because I didn't choose to write; I was chosen by writing.
That is my destiny. It's not about logic.

Well then, I'm off.