21 August, 1831
Dear Diary, I'm still angered by the action of several of my states. I am currently laying in bed with a small patch of cloth covering a bleeding wound left center on my torso. They can't seem to agree with my terms, can't they? When I don't want slavery in my states, I really mean I don't! I was straight forward to my stubborn state representative, and my god was he screaming in my face, spitting even! This goes to prove the black side of my Industrial Revolution not too few years ago, that Cotton Boom. What a funny name to call the event! I'll halt the conflict here, I'd like to talk something good that happened from one of my meetings with Matthew. I told him about my Erie Canal and how long it took. I also mentioned the amount of lives that were lost to the construction, but how much it had improved my economy as a whole. His eyes glistened when he expressed how inspiring the endeavour was to him. He explained to me the planning of his own canal that should begin by August of eighteen twenty-nine. I encouraged him to do so, describing all of the benefits from the canal. All of the benefits were the outcomes from my canal, a great national achievement! This was something funny that Matthew asked me during that meeting, "Alfred, why do you smile so much?" I didn't even feel myself smiling until he asked me that. I told him how by just having a smile on your face can affect the people's behaviors around you greatly. By just smiling you can turn someone's day around completely. I then told him to try smiling, which he did. His smile was beautiful, it was real. The best part it about was, he was smiling at me, for me. I searched his eyes for any signs of haze and found none. His eyes were pure. It was nice while it lasted, but the meeting came to a close. We were heading our opposite directions and then I said earlier about being angered by my stubborn state representative. He approached me with the flyer, we had a heated argument, I got saliva in my face. I believe things are starting to look up from here. I don't feel tension in Matthew's presence and the same thing for him. I was happy to say to my representative that him and I have become well acquainted. I believe that we are friends now, as we seem to have more fun through every meeting going underway. I hope he sees our relationship the same way I do, I think he'd be happy to hear it. Moving back to my wound, it's almost healed entirely. The spot still stings slightly every time I try to move around. Minor injuries don't last forever, these usually take one to two hours to heal and disappear as if it was never there. The same goes for gunshot wounds. I recall the war I was deployed in against Mexico, I was shot in the shoulder and taken immediately to a medical tent. Removing the bullet from my shoulder was a very painful process which felt like it took hours to pull through. They wrapped the area up in bandages and ordered me to rest for the day. I woke up the next morning, unraveling the bandage to see that my shoulder had ridden itself from any signs of the gunshot. The tissue returned back to its smooth white state. I showed everyone the strange recovery that morning. Receiving astonished looks from the soldiers, General deployed me back into the front lines and the battle was soon won. I later explained the same thing to my representative. He said that I'm "Special", I'm not like the others. He says that Matthew is "Special" too, but he doesn't want me looking in too deep with that. I'm becoming too busy to get in depth with this strange trait of mine, so for now I can end it here.
Your keeper, Alfred