I confess, I spent a lifetime… well, *most* of it anyway, just waiting. Waiting for permission to be myself, waiting for the right moment, waiting for someone to finally say, “Alright, your turn.” We humans are such creatures of habit, aren’t we? Such creatures of expectation. My whole life, it felt like there was always someone whose needs came first. First my mum, bless her heart, then the kids, then my Elsie. And I wouldn’t trade a single day, not one of them, for anything. They were my everything, every single day, every day. But now… now that the house is quiet, really quiet, just the hum of the fridge and the TV talking to itself, I realize that I never actually got to my turn. I’m 72, and I’m still waiting. Funny, that. Or maybe not funny at all. It’s not regret, not exactly. More like… a dawning awareness. Like waking up from a very long dream and realizing you’ve been sleepwalking through most of your own life. All those little quirks, those thoughts I kept to myself, the books I wanted to read, the places I wanted to see that weren't on anyone else's map. They just… collected. Like dust bunnies under the bed. And now there’s no one to share them with, no one to even tell that I *had* them. It’s not that I wanted to be selfish, not ever. That felt like a dirty word, didn’t it? Selfish. But what if a little bit of selfishness is just… being a complete person? What if it’s necessary? So here I am, an old plumber with hands that remember every wrench and every leaky pipe, sitting here in the dead of night, wondering who I would have been if I’d ever truly taken a breath just for me. And the truth is, I don’t know. I have absolutely no idea. And that’s the real confession, isn’t it? That for all the love I gave, all the care, all the years… I never actually figured out the fellow who was doing all the giving. And now? Now it feels a bit too late for introductions. Just me and the quiet, every single day, every day.