I’m just… tired. That’s the long and short of it, I guess. Sixty-eight years old, spent forty-five of them bent over a workbench, sawdust in my hair and calluses on my hands the size of quarters. Always doing for others, always making sure everyone had a roof, food, something a little extra for Christmas. You learn to live on what you make, you learn to save a little here, a little there, because you never know what’s coming. And for all that, all the scrimping and the saving, all the years of feeling like my own life was on hold while I kept everyone else afloat – what the fuck was it all for? My sister, bless her heart, she got sick. Not a sniffle, not a sprained ankle, but the kind of sick that hospitals love to charge you an arm and a leg for. And where was everyone then? Her kids, all grown up, off living their own 'important' lives, too busy to even pick up the phone. My brother, well, he’s always been useless, never held a job for more than a year. So it fell to me, naturally. The “responsible one.” Again. All those years of putting away a few bucks every month, that little nest egg I’d had tucked away for… I don’t even know what anymore. Maybe a new roof, maybe just the peace of knowing it was there. Gone. Every last goddamn penny, drained dry to keep her from losing everything. And you know what? No one even batted an eye. No one offered a dime. Not even a "hey, can I bring you dinner?" It was just expected. Like I’m some endless well of money and patience. And I am patient, believe me, I’ve had to be. My whole life has been one long exercise in patience and putting others first. My own kid, my parents when they got older, now my sister. It’s always been me. And I’m not saying I wouldn’t do it again for her, for any of them, because that’s just who I am, goddammit. But sometimes, late at night, when the house is quiet and my back aches from just… existing, I just want to scream into the void. What about me? What about the old carpenter who just wanted to rest his bones and not worry about a goddamn thing for five minutes? What about *his* future? It’s all just… gone. And nobody cares. Nobody ever has. And I’m just supposed to be okay with that, aren’t I? Just suck it up and get on with it, because that’s what I’ve always done. Well, I’m tired. Fucking tired.