My Whole Expanse I Cannot See…

Baron VanderMeer hissed, “What did you think about Dune? It wasn’t clear from your post.”

Swallowing with a dry throat, Michael said presently, “I have nothing but abject hatred for it.”

In about five hours I go for another trache change, I’m a little uneasy about it just now. I’ve been pretty down on myself for a half a year’s worth of mistakes, and I’ve been really afraid that I can’t fix things, but that’s ridiculous. I can, of course I can, provided that I think clearly and don’t quit. I’m not going to lay down and die, I’ve thought about it, but I’m not. I’m going to Jefferson Smith my way out of this fucking mess, I’m going to fight for this lost cause.

I just have to not die in the O.R. After that, it’s so on.

So, I’m watching Death Race, and while mindless, it’s really rather entertaining. The fast cars, the violence, the over-the-top death and carnage, it’s fun to watch on some bizarre visceral level. I just saw a guy burn to death in his car, another guy impaled by steel beams through his windshield, neither shocked me. It’s all so overblown, to the point hilarity. I can watch almost any crazy violent movie and remain entirely detached. Rob Zombie’s “films,” however, really bother me, but that’s an exception.

Yet, as entertaining as an insanely violent movie may be, I could never watch a real-world Death Race if such a thing existed. Real-world violence is completely different in my head, completely disturbing. I can’t detach from it.

I don’t think liking fictional violence is unhealthy. It’s only unhealthy when a person can’t tell the difference between reality and fiction.

So, earlier this evening I was out holiday shopping when a woman, obviously filled with the Holy Spirit, excitedly asked to pray over me. I never say no to this, as the person always seems so into it. Tonight’s prayer was particularly intriguing, as the really excited woman prayed for the restoration of my entire body in the name of Jesus.

I don’t think it worked.

See, I write dark things so that I can look at the darkness from a different angle. I look at the darkness from the outside, it’s often frightening, but then I’m able face it. I should be able to deal with things internally, but sometimes I just can’t.

I bleed out in writing, and that depressed part of me dies. I get focused and try again.

I’ll be 28 in eleven days, and I’ve never looked forward to my birthday less. Fact is, I wrecked everything I ever wanted. I don’t know if I have it in me to fix it. 

Rationally, I know that I shouldn’t give up and what-not, it’s all a choice and so on. I’m aware of all that, but I just don’t feel the little spark in me. I wish I did, but I don’t. People break, sometimes there are  no more fixes. I’m really tired, I get tired of building and re-building. I’ve lost so much so fast, I just don’t know how to cope anymore.

Fuck, there’s so much, it’s not just Sara. Lately, it’s even difficult to type. I let them dig around in my left arm for an I.V. and now half of my hand is numb. If that hand goes, I’m absolutely and astonishingly fucked. That really weighs on me. Having Sara just made things feel easier, I didn’t feel alone. 

I’m ridiculous and awful for feeling like this, I know. Still, here I am. I feel like a failure. 

By the way, if anyone comments with inspirational quotes and what-not, a basket of kittens will drown.

Nirvana songs are great because nothing Kurt Cobain ever wrote is particularly straightforward, there’s lots of room for interpretation. He never really told a story word for word, he liked to mix his true ideas with random thoughts or lines of poetry. On a Plain is a good example of this technique. Lately though, I’m really fascinated by Old Age. It’s an outtake song found in two box-sets, With the Lights Out and Sliver: The Best of the Box. The song’s so interesting because it sounds spectacular, but it seems practically incomprehensible. Kurt mumbles his way through it, and google-searching the lyrics doesn’t bring back consistent results. It took some doing, but I think I found a reliable version…

I like listening to it, trying to crack it. To me, it’s a song about a losing battling with addiction, that last fix that can’t ever be the last. I’ve felt that struggle, the idea that this fix will make today feel safe so I can get to tomorrow, then maybe tomorrow I won’t need it.

I think that’s true of liquor, drugs, sex, a lover whispering in your ear, coffee, anything that turns off constant noise. I think life is just series of fixes, all the little things we need today to get to tomorrow. We all have different levels of noise, and how much we can take. Our fixes might not be the same, sometimes they’re ultimately destructive, but a life without fixes breaks. We replace the fixes we lose, try to drop the ones that hurt, that’s how we keep going.

Having had time to look back and process the entire experience, getting myself committed is definitely one of the top five Goddamn fucking dumbest things I’ve ever done. I needed help, but Christ on crackers, I picked the absolute worst possible way. I basically did cut my wrists. I hurt myself, but not on purpose. I should just do the opposite of whatever the fuck I think is a good idea. I don’t do anything the easy way or the right way anymore.

So, in the very back of my mind I had a rather romantic idea of what it would be like to be committed. I kind of pictured a comfortable little room, lots of talking to therapists, nice meds to help me sleep. However, it really wasn’t like that, there’s absolutely nothing romantic about getting yourself committed.

I spent over twenty-four hours waiting in the emergency room, medical, then psych. The psych e.r. is cold and empty, the rooms have electronic locks, no curtains, shatter-proof windows. Since I’m trached with a vent, I got admitted to a medical floor and not the psych floor. I’m really not sure that the latter would have been better. Rather than talking, the first course of action is drugs. I got so fucked up on Remeron I couldn’t think straight for almost two days, my hands and feet swelled up, I didn’t feel real.

It’s all a little fuzzy, really. The entire  three-ish days were physically exhausting. I hadn’t felt so bad since my two-month stay back in 2006, only this time I volunteered for it, I signed up for it. I felt ridiculously stupid, like I was killing myself, but accidentally. In doing so, however, I reminded myself just how much I really want to live.

Eventually, I did get to talk to a psychologist, not a drug-pushing psychiatrist, she referred me to some out-patient therapists. Overall, I feel better about my situation, I don’t feel so lost and stuck. After Sara left, my life took a really bad turn, ridiculously so. An entire nice little future, gone in a blink. Apparently, I couldn’t cope. I had to do something to set things right again, and I think that’s what I did.

Still, I’m absolutely exhausted, and as a bonus, my trache got rather nasty inside, so I’m on ten days of IV anti-biotics. My arms look like a junkie’s, track marked and bruised from failed IV attempts.

Get yourself committed √

Not sleep √

Get astonishingly fucked up on various drugs not in a fun way √

Have the custodian lady ask how your girfriend’s doing √

Regain strong desire to live √

Marvel at your spectacular stupidity √

Finish reading Fathom and love it √

Go for long walk outside with hospital permission to think on everything that went so very wrong √

Learn from a ridiculous and absolutely horrible experience √