Naked Swimming

I feel as if I am ripe for a cult picking. I have become so lost from myself, I could be molded into anyone by someone with the willing hands, some soft words and an empty promise.

Parcel

I can not read anymore. Oh, the words are there, I see them and comprehend them, but strung together, sentences leave no mark on my brain, in my soul. I haven’t been able to properly digest a novel since the beginning of the year, or maybe slightly before. This is always the first sign.

I knew this, but I did nothing about it. There was too much else going on, too many outside things that required my attention. An inability to focus on a book seemed the least of my problems. I ignored it. I hoped it would go away.

It didn’t.

Hold it together, I said. Hold it together for this reason, for that reason, for this person and that one. There is always a reason to keep the pieces together, to keep going despite the fact that cracks are slowly forming inside. So many reasons to hold it together, so many cracks to keep glued. .

In the end, reasons are not enough. People are not enough. What has begun can not be undone. There is no going back, there is only cleaning up the mess.

My fingers are rusty at the keyboard. I have not written in so long. The fact that my desire to is another sign. My best words come at my worst times.

Forgive the roughness of these first few posts. Returning is always hard. I shall slip into it. I always do, just as I always slip down the dark road of mental illness, again and again and again.

The Grand Drape

I thought I was sitting still in the audience, waiting for the final bow and exit. But it turns out I was onstage the whole time, pushing you into the wings.

Vacancy

I have been neglectful in my writing these days. I have been neglectful of several things, actually. The writing is only one of them. But I have good reasons for this, I promise. Which I shall now be very mysterious-like and not explain. It’s not the fifth I’m pleading, it is exhaustion and the Angel rerun that requires my full attention.

So just a short notice that I am still here, I have not abandoned this place.

Discard

The letter isn’t dated, but when I see it, I know immediately when it is from. I have no memory of writing the actual letter, but the words on the college-ruled notebook page gives it away. The time is spring of 2003. I remember where I lived, what my favorite clothes were, what my classes where, what shows I was working on. I remember the depression, the fear, the pain and exhaustion. I also remember exactly how much I weighed.

Z,

You were in my dreams last night, but I don’t remember anything about them except that you were there. The sky was purple tonight. I caught a glimpse of it between the blinds in the cafeteria. The whole sky was just purple…the clouds, the stars, the hint of moon. Purple. It was just such a sharp contrast to the dull whiteness of the blinds & tables & chairs. The same dull lifeless people that pass by & eat there every day. Behind them this purple sky. It was beautiful. I had to go outside & stare at it to make sure it was real. I sat outside on the ground looking up. It was sprinkling & I was sitting & the sky was purple & that’s when I rememberd that I had dreamt about you.

I feel isolated from everyone & everthing, which just means that I’m pulling myself away. I tend to hide myself from life at times & then blame the world for not caring. But I’m smarter now. I know now. It’s not the world that doesn’t care. It’s me.

I try to care. I do. I try to smile & be charming. At parties I try to socialize & have good times. But I usually just end up leaning against the wall with a drink in my hands (water now, I don’t trust myself with anything stronger) & that blank look on my face. It just takes too much energy to show emtotion. The random person will come along & look my way & I’ll look back & the mask will be turned on. Long enough to satisfy the people & send them away.

Andy doesn’t really talk to me anymore. Yet another combination of me pushing them away & them giving up on me. It was bound to happen eventually. It always does. He’s transferring schools next year anyway, to someplace in D—–. So it’s for the best that I get over my attachment now. Right? That’s what I tell myself.

Ah, but that was yesterday. It’s Friday now. I’m picking up where I left off.

I have a letter for you. Another one that I wrote last Friday. It’s been sitting on my desk for a week now. The few times I’ve been home I catch glimpses of it & think to myself that I need to address it, stamp it & send it. But I keep putting it off. I don’t know why. I keep putting everything off lately. School, work, rehersal, people. I don’t know what I’m doing anymore

A boy hung himself in H——– last night. My roommate came in hungover at noon & told me the news. I wonder how he did it. The ceiling or the closet?

Love,

   Me

Z was in boot camp at the time, unhappy and homesick. He was always asking me to write. I wrote, my problem was I had so much to say and I was so afraid to say it to anyone, even my best friend.

Today, things are different. I am no longer afraid to say things things out loud, and I have the ability to share my darkest times. The problem is, I am not really sure how much it helps.

The Other Hand

On second thought, that last post is a little more despondent than I meant it to be. I am swimming towards something, albeit very slowly. Patience is a virtue and all that jazz. I’ve never been very virtuous. I must have slept through that class in college.

Unmade

My anger exhausts me. I do not have the constitution to ride out these high levels of emotion on a consistent basis. This is one of the reasons I give up so easily.

One of these days I will stop treading water and start swimming towards something.

Tell Me Once Again

It is four in the morning and I have decided to clean my room. This most likely stems from the fact that I am high. One of the reasons I enjoyed certain substances so much is it turns me tidy. Normally, cleaning and organizing gets put off until a tomorrow. And then a tomorrow after that. Back when Facebook was just for college students and not potential employers or elderly family members, my ‘About Me’ section read: “The messiest person you know.” My friends laughed, they loved it. Because it was true.

But oh! When on a lovely powder or pill, motivation seems to spill out of me. My cup runneth over with motivation. I clean, I straighten, I wash, I fold and hang. I discard, I alphabetize, I wipe and I scrub. I am a productive member of society and I want to be like this all the time. Unfortunately, that means being high all the time. (For the record, I tried this. It didn’t quite work out.)

I once got into a fight with a boyfriend after a night out at the bar. He settled into my bedroom as I slipped into the bathroom to change. As I pulled off my shirt, I noticed all the clothes on the floor. Those needed to be picked up and thrown in the laundry basket. So easy, why hadn’t I done it before? Oh, and the sink Had scum on it. Well, that was an easy fix, those lemon-scented Lysol wipes would take care of that. And so on and so on. Forty-five minutes later, I finished up by mopping the floor. My boyfriend was still in the bedroom, listening to me bang and clang around, cheerful as can be. He wanted sex, I wanted a shiny bathtub. At the time, I honestly couldn’t understand why he was so upset.

But now I am sleepy and sorry I started this load of laundry. I want to crawl into bed and turn on my portable DVD player and watch season one of Angel. Though, maybe I should change my sheets before I do that. Because if I changed my sheets and made my bed, that would make getting into it an even greater experience. And I do enjoy great experiences.

Throughout all of this, I tell myself it is okay. I don’t do this often anymore. My chemical friend is all used up and gone, and I have no intentions (or, frankly the means) to get more. I have run into Sunday and will eventually sleep this off. I will get up again for a few hours, then pass out early so I can wake up Monday morning and resume my regular life. The difference is, I don’t need this to do my job or live my life. I don’t need this to feel happy

One may ask, if I don’t need it, why do it? The answer is really very simple. I do it not because I am an addict, or depressed, or lonely, though one could argue I am all of these things. I do it because it is fun. And that’s how I know I will be okay. When it stops being fun and starts being necessary, that is when it is time to worry.

Violet Kingdom

There are great changes in the air. Some are favorable, some unfortunate and some just merely fair. On a day when I am less weepy with exhaustion, I will perhaps write something more coherent rather than the half-fragments and unfinished thoughts that have been gracing my college-ruled notebook paper.

Headstones

My head has been a graveyard of thoughts. There, but buried so deep I can not actually reach out and touch them. There is so much in my head, but when I sit down to a blank screen, I can think of nothing at all. My graveyard must be full of empty coffins.