I Crossed My Own Event Horizon

I've been staring at this NASA black hole simulation for three hours. The camera falls toward the event horizon—the point where nothing escapes. I know that feeling. My advisor called it 'spaghettification' when I described how stretched I felt. Pulled in different directions until I barely recognized myself. The simulation shows time dilation near the black hole—everything slows down while the universe speeds past. That's grad school. I'm moving at light speed through experiments, but to everyone watching, I'm frozen just shy of success. The camera takes 12.8 seconds to reach the singularity after crossing the horizon. I've been past mine for months. Still falling toward something I can't see, in a space where physics—and maybe sanity—don't apply. The alternative scenario shows escape. The camera orbits safely away. I should have taken that path. #Science #LabBurnout #GradSchoolLife