mindjames

Category: life

Writing that directly ties in to my life as a whole.

  • emotional pavement – memories of times I’ve been lucky

    I hate writing something and feeling like there was just a vacuum that sucked out all of the eloquence, coherency, and poignancy I was hoping for, but it is an unfortunate result of writing that we sometimes all encounter. Oh well.. here we go:

    Being emotionally flattened is an interesting thing. From what I hear, it is common with people who have gone through long phases of depression.

    I’ve talked about being emotionally flattened quite a bit– it was well chronicled in that year long period where I was incapable of tear shed, and though I had numerous events that should have drawn tears, everything was muted. Firstly, as if it weren’t evident enough (especially by my mid-February, 4 am meltdown of tears and vomit in my yard), I emotionally three dimensional again (mostly). The thing that has sparked this current thought line is not the depression I’ve waded through, or the emotional steamrolling I’ve recovered from, but more of a reflection.

    Battle of the Boulevard

    I realized, perhaps more fully, just how flattened I had become. My emotions were like paved asphalt, just a highway for a soulless machine to go through the motions.

    I am not a particularly lucky person. I have few recollections of winning any type of contests, drawings, raffles, sweepstakes, or anything that could be heavily luck based, but one of them sticks out if I think about it.

    Most sporting events run intermission based contests and activities for fans. Belmont was no different. The most famous of which is the half court shot for tuition that takes place at half-time for the men’s and women’s basketball games. It is funny I mention my luck, because a few of my friends and I always made a point to go to as many games over winter break as possible, because the attendance is thin while everyone is home for the holidays, and it is favorable to get drawn for the tuition shot. In all those times, and the other games I went to, I never got my number called for anything, not even the small contests, of course, until that changed (so dramatic, I know).

    It was 3 basketball seasons ago already, the biggest game we play every year– The Battle of the Boulevard. I showed up late, near the end of the first half. I went alone. I was still dating Kara at the time, and I don’t remember if she didn’t want to go, couldn’t go because she wasn’t feeling well, or if I just kind of snuck off and went by myself to get some time away from everything (I fear it was likely the last possibility), but alone I went– just an invisible observer of the game. I have trouble being an audible fan if I’m alone, or not in the right crowd. It is easy for me to slip into my ‘lover of the game’ mode and just try to process everything, almost objectively, rather than just a passionate fan. Regardless, I took a ticket for the contest drawing, they insist upon it when you enter for a big game like the Belmont – Lipscomb game.

    I have a number of quirky paranoias. One of which revolves around public restrooms. I have to give the signs multiple passes. When I was in 9th grade, I didn’t pay attention, and, as insignificant as the event was, I entered the wrong restroom at a basketball tournament, got laughed at by two cheerleaders, and credit it as the most embarrassed I’ve ever felt (I’ve since matched it with a similar scenario). Ever since then, when I approach a bathroom, I check the sign, then with each step, I wash over what I just saw with a layer of skeptical disbelief.

    “That said men? It couldn’t have said men. Check again. No dress? Are you sure? You should learn to read the braille.”

    I continue this cycle until I enter the restroom and immediately check for urinals, and it is only then, that I really feel that I saw what I saw.

    Take that concept, and apply it to having my number called on my ticket. The half was about to end, and suddenly I found myself reading a random group of digits instead of watching the game, until I mustered up enough confidence, certainty, and faith in my ability to be lucky at least once in a lifetime to actually go up to the table they hand out the tickets and proclaim that I am the chosen one.

    For most people, it isn’t every day that you find yourself the focal point of a few thousand people. For some people, it is as terrifying a meeting death in a dark alley, while for others, it is as invigorating as jumping out of an aircraft and free falling at terminal velocity. It was really neither to me, but it should have been. I just remember seeing a person or two I know yelling out my name, a ball, an event coordinator and two baskets. The rest was shade.

    The object of the contest was that I had to make 4 shots. I had to start on one end of the court, dribble the ball to the other end and bank it in (lay-up). I had to do this for my first 3 shots, coast-to-coast, and on the final shot, I had to shoot a 3 pointer and bank that in. If I did this successfully, I’d win $500. Big crowds are foreign to me, but I rarely mind talking in front of audiences, so I wouldn’t expect it to really intimidate me, and I knew that making the 3 layups was going to be a cakewalk. Essentially, I had good odds at getting a shot to win $500. I should have been wired. I wasn’t.

    Getting back to the actual event– I infused a bit of drama into the whole affair. The clock started and they sent me off. I will admit, I had plenty of adrenaline fueling me at that point. Adrenaline works wonders for your legs. I was jumping well, so I took off from pretty far out and glided into my first lay-up. I was feeling cocky at this point, but I was excited to be interacting with a basketball with people actually watching.

    Adrenaline works wonders for your legs. I might have,very literally, been flying. I was running too fast. I am a fast guy, but I am not always used to using all of my speed. I got to half court on the way to my 3rd layup. PLUNK! That may not have been the sound, but that was the feel of my shoe meeting ball, and kicking it 20 feet in front of me. I chased that thing down like a greased pig at a hoedown. I remember feeling a collective gasp from an arena full of people as it looked like I had horribly self-destructed. To them, I’m sure it was like watching one of those acts on auditions for Idol or America’s Got Talent that bombs. You can’t bear to watch, but you don’t want to look away.

    Adrenaline works wonders for your legs. There I was, hunched over awkwardly, like some poorly designed, malfunctioning robot. My arms outstretched, reaching toward the ground for the ball, stick-like body at a 90 degree bend, while my legs propelled like I were the road runner, all the while, this ball skids beyond my reach like I were the guy who was always the butt of every joke. The ball passed the out of bounds point, and subsequently the goal, with myself in tow. I finally lassoed the darn thing with my hands, back tracked, then, if I remember correctly, missed an awkwardly attempted reverse lay-up, rebounded it, and got up to the rim to make sure I got it in. Things looked grim for me.

    I must have had about 6-7 seconds left at that point, maybe less by the time I got headed toward my final shot attempt, but wait a second, I am a terrific athlete and basketball player. I wasn’t worried about getting that shot attempt off. I became the dark horse. I sped back into the mix of things, crossed half-court to the infamous sound of, “Threeeeee, twooo…,”

    And right as my time of being lucky expired on me, I lifted a runner into the air. Let me note, it is actually a shot I usually am known for, and being a guard, it is important to have in your arsenal. Left leg like a pole vault, right knee rising into a perpendicular state beneath the right arm, bent, then extending at the peak of the jump and release. Really, it is a hard shot to not at least have on line. The buzzer sounded– SWISH

    The crowd ignited into cheers– first we are playing our rivals, next, we get a buzzer beater contest, everyone thinks I just won $500 bucks. I didn’t bank it though, I knew this, but in retrospect, it is still flipping awesome. It should simply be impossible to not be excited, elated, caught in the moment somehow from that. How many chances do you get to hit a buzzer beater in front of a large crowd and do it– even if it doesn’t win you money?

    I felt… almost… nothing. To this day, I can see and hear a lot of large bits, but it doesn’t arouse my emotions in any way. There is no nostalgia. There is just a memory that only makes me smile off of mere logic.

    For the record,we lost the game, which I’m still bitter about, but they were all so excited about the shot that they still gave me $100, yet I just can’t get over thinking about it; the perspective. I can’t believe how emotionally flattened I was. Some things just ain’t right. This is one of them. What a travesty.

    May I never be so paved again.

    May I, at some point, be so lucky again. I’d much like to feel enjoyment from it this time around.

    So say we all.

  • “The Roaring Twenties,” History Says

    You’re weak. You aren’t usually, but right now, you’re weak. You need somebody to talk to. You need to spread that weakness out, knead it as if it were a cramp, but, tonight, there is no one.

    You’ve laid out this string of thoughts in your head on more than one occasion, but now that you’re finally putting it out there, you know it isn’t going to be the same. The sanctity of the thought– the feeling’s lineage– has been lost. You do it anyway.

    You are depressed right now. You might be for the next few hours. You might be for the next few days. Your common state is far away from this, but you can’t avoid these things when they hit. You don’t take comfort, but at least can find some stability in knowing  you aren’t alone. Successful people, happy people, miserable ones, lonely ones, the deceased, and unborn, all do, or will experience it to some degree. You don’t beat yourself up anymore. Not since you read that girl’s comic, you more easily accept that this comes on with no purpose. You were inspired by something; that’s a good sign.

    You know beating yourself up about it will lead to no good. You just accept it.

    When you feel this way, you open up that album of ugly thoughts. You try to keep it out of reach; put it on the top shelf, but somehow it keeps getting knocked down and you trip over it. It is in front of you right now. You open it.

    You feel alone. That’s not a big deal, but you feel increasingly alone. Each day that passes, you feel a little bit more alone. You have those friends that are out of the country right now. Of those, the one you actually talk to regularly isn’t around right now. He has his own thing he is going through, but when you do talk to him, one of you always feels distracted. It’s like you’re looking at each other and trying to make out details through a thick layer of fog. You only really know that the person is there, but for all you know, it is just an impostor. You have the friends who are all busy with work, and when not with work, with things such as fiancé/eés, spouses, or lives. Or the one who is on the relationship seesaw, up and down, on and off; she rarely feels like she is even there anymore. Or one of the newer ones, but you don’t feel like it is a two way street on opening up to each other, plus they don’t live nearby. There is the globetrotter, the one who will become The Dude when he is older, and so on.

    You know this doesn’t even count all the estranged ones. You feel like estrangement is all you’re good at. You get close, then the bomb gets planted. It ticks until one day it ticks no more, and all that is left is rubble. And this is why you feel increasingly alone. You forecast each day and expect another one to drop off. You will either watch them slip away, or you will cut their hand off. You don’t feel good.

    Never mind that you often feel like you need to be the one who is there for them. The iron curtain of security. You don’t even want to think about your family.

    You are losing your imagination. You’ve seen it. You’ve been stuck at home. You’re twenty-five years old, and stuck at home. It hasn’t quite been two years, but it feels like much longer. You want to start your life, but you can’t seem to do it. As long as you live here, you feel like that is impossible. You’re living in a coffin; trapped in a box, and buried beneath the ground. You no longer can see yourself getting out. You can’t imagine that day. You lost your imagination. You realize you lost your hope, too.

    You own nothing. You’re American. Sole-proprietorship is hardwired into your brain, but you don’t have your own place, you have to share your car, you don’t even have your own laptop anymore. You’re upset by how much weight this carries. You’re also upset at how much these things stack.

    You’ve keep busy by caring. You care a lot. You care for a lot. Even though you know numerous who sometimes feel nobody is going out of their way to care for them, you look into the mirror and reject it. On a day like today, you feel like nobody really cares unless you care. You don’t want to reach out today. You don’t know if you want to reach out ever. You plan to either sink, or have someone come pull you out of the arctic.

    You can’t figure out if you’re useful. You have come to think you are, because you grew up feeling more talented than most. You worked hard to become better, but you find those who have less of both far ahead of you. You get opportunities, and you sleep through them, instead of attacking it. Your true talent might come in the form of squandering everything away.

    You don’t like any of this. You wonder, skeptically, who compiled this album. It is revolting. A disgusting, dangerous collection of thoughts, feelings, and memories, but you keep turning the pages.

    You never thought your 20’s would be like this. History says the Great Depression came at the end of the 20’s. You would rather be paralleling history. Your Great Depression has come a bit sooner.

    You’re bored. You thought you gave up boredom with your teens, but these days, you are often bored. You know if you think about that boredom any further, you’re just going to flip back to page one.

    You close the album. You know that this is just a pothole, and when you zoom out this is the final upswing. You just have to find enough thrust to outrun gravity. But for today, you are weak. You aren’t happy about that, but you accept it.

    You accept it. In an effort of obscurity, you tuck as much of it you can into your pocket, then you carry on. Right now, it’s all you can do. Different than it was in the past, and different it will be, for now, this is your life.

     

  • an open tunnel

    To me, love is just an open tunnel. That tunnel rarely seems to bring anything but pain.

    I loved a girl for a few years. First, we were barely more than acquaintances through a mutual friend. There was never a day that I was aware of her existence that I didn’t like her. Then we were friends. For a lon time we were friends. Then I was truly able to take that affection, and close friendship, and care for her. Quite later, that tunnel opened up on her end. Over some more time, I can truly say I loved her.

    I loved her for a long time. I loved her more than I ever realized I could love someone. I loved her through harder times than I ever foresaw. Each day, I loved her more and more. I never ran out of love to give, but I was not equipped with enough experience and wisdom in my life to that point to prevent what came. I was strangled; a choke point finally closed and I ran out of that ability to let that love, that care, flow.

    Each day, I woke up trying to be renewed, and love would eek out, but I experienced pain in conjunction with that love. Eventually, it was more pain than love, and I made one of the hardest choices in my life to barricade that tunnel until time healed the broken. Not since that choice have I come anywhere remotely close to caring for anyone on that level.

    To this day, the one I loved so dear still won’t talk or associate with me. She must still feel the same level of pain I do. It still hurts more, though. Over a year later and I only get one real correspondence; an e-mail, a dream, and part of a letter, and like that it is back to that long forgotten, long abandoned tunnel to eachother’s hearts, eachother’s lives.

    A couple months ago, I actually cared for a girl again. I didn’t think I had it in me. We were good friends. I was terrified. It wasn’t much, just care, and a very trusting friendship. I was afraid of the care. I was afraid of ruining a friendship already going through a rough patch. I was probably most afraid of the astronomically long shot odds of actually having a chance to have that care materialize; pebbles of rubble sliding through the cracks, then rocks, then boulders, until that tunnel was open again. I wasn’t looking for that, but it was nice to at least be able to care again.

    It turned for the worst. I wanted those feelings out of the way. In a confusing, poorly represented attempt to simplify, I presented myself and my care to her, like a loyal knight approaching the throne revealing a plot to betray the throne he protects. I wanted not to care more, I wanted to just keep my trusted friend, and care a little, on my own, on the side, just to remember myself that I am human, and contrary to my conditioning, love is not pain, but something that can bring life.

    The worst happened. I wasn’t rejected. I wasn’t accepted. I still don’t know what that means. I wish that she had the guts to have rejected me. In my gut, I wanted that. In my heart, I guess I wished she had the crazinness to accept me, I only wished for it when my mind was away.

    Now, we don’t talk at all. There is no communication. I don’t get to represent myself. I don’t get to represent my trampled feelings. I don’t get a chance to be understanding. I don’t get to be friends, at all. I’m the square root of a negative number.

    Someone I consider a best friend asked her on a date. They went on a date. It was some of the sharpest, most venomous pain that ever coursed through me. I care not, to the best of my abilities, to know anything beyond that one thing I found out. I try to live beyond it, but more often than I like it creeps in my bed at night, and forces itself upon me. I feel terrible those nights and converted mornings.

    A date? A date? A date?? I never even got a friendship. I don’t even know if I get to apologize for the stress I put her under. I don’t expect anyone will ever apologize to me, or not when it will hold any relevancy to my feelings.

    I see my friends. Some are married. They were stronger than me. They didn’t burn out; or maybe it was they weren’t extinguished.

    I see my friends. They still get to talk to their ex’s. They get to drift apart a little more naturally with someone wth whom they literally shared their life with. They have things fall in place. They find new people they get to mutually care for.

    For me, any distant relative of love has just been further conditioned to be, to me, associated with pain, with hurting, with tears. Care, trust, companionship, friendship, these things aren’t even love, but they all have tracked in the broken glass fragments from my concept of love, and likewise, even a step can, at random, cause me pain.

    It is another insecurity I have to carry around now. I’m not looking for any pity or anything. I’m sick enough of feeling bad for myself; last thing I want is anyone else doing the same. I’m simply bringing another insecurity to the table.

    This way, nobody can say anything to me sometimes see sawing from functioning, well, and to not ok.

    Sometimes I’m going to not be ok. Just let me at least not be ok sometimes, I don’t ask for much anymore. This is not too much to ask. If I ever warn you about getting too close to me, please know I’m just trying to keep that tunnel blocked off as long as I can. It is all I can do to keep moving on in life. Just stay barricaded. Keep moving on.

  • simple metaphors

    source: http://www.trigpointinguk.com/trigs/trig-details.php?t=724

    I was driving home from work on Friday, in fact, it was my last day working there. Honestly, I don’t process things well. That’s probably why I incessantly process things, so it still hasn’t hit me that I’m moving on, but what has been my life for the past 2 months, and a huge part of my life for the past 6 months is no more. For many, this may not be a big deal, but for me, it is. I guess it was more about the people, than it was the place or what I was doing that makes it significant.

    As I was saying, though, I was driving home on an overcast day– we are talking just a bleary, colorless day– scanning the skies as I was supposed to be driving. Clouds, clouds, everywhere, like a soft, washed out blanket. It was getting cold again, after a perfect day the prior, and I was trying to register the significance of the day and my current point in life, but all I could really notice was the grey and an anomaly; a ray of sunshine poking out. Somewhere on the landscape ahead, the sun was providing color, warmth, energy, and life. Then another hole, and another hole; several solar punctures radiating light before me, and at the moment I knew; I was looking at my own life.

    In the rear view was more lifeless grey, and cold. Cold times, years filled with a lot of hurt, weakness, lifelessness, but also a lot of beauty, a lot of growth, and a long time with a special person. I didn’t care what was behind me anymore, I was just fixated on the bit of sunshine. Things are still largely overcast and dreary for me right now, but as I have for so long, I can count on these spurts of sunshine blessing my life just long enough to head down the way a bit more, until finally the skies clear up, and I am once again surrounded by color and warmth.

    It was the simplest of metaphors, and not a very original one, either, but in the moment, it was the most powerful thing I had witnessed in my life. So I keep going on.

  • Narrate

    I’ve arrived at what I sense has the risk to be an unpopular decision, but popularity is of concern to politicians and high schoolers. I didn’t care about popularity in high school, and I’m disillusioned with politics, so it looks like greater sense won’t be stopping me.

    I want to narrate my life. Not every little piece, but as some form of exercise, and equal parts archiving, I want to take bits and pieces of my life as they happen, and package them into some sort of self-reflecting narrative form. It isn’t really like anything I put on here is often read, anyway, but I do recognize the potential to upset people involved in my life with my own account of my life, the people I interact with, and the instances I navigate. Of course, I would never want that, but I also recognize that I’m my own, unique person, and this is just something I am going to do. I only hope that my worry never materializes into something corporeal.

    I also recently decided that I want to try and do something bigger with my writing than just writing insomnia laced uncogencies, and I am hoping that I can use this regular exercise as a stone of which I can sharpen my writing with.

    And so it begins. I don’t really have an interesting or compelling life, and this feels like I am about to commit high level taboo, but I’m going to narrate it.

  • getting personal

    I was in the car. I was driving the car. There were 4 of us in there.

    We were driving around the city of Fairview, looking for a graveyard. We were going to take pictures, maybe make memories of each other as ghosts. It was in the summer, of course, which is the appropriate time of year to take pictures with friends in a graveyard.

    I knew the cemetery I wanted to go to,. It had a nice aesthetic, and it was removed from everything else. For some reason, that place remained hidden away like some secret area in space-time. I knew where it was, but when I drove there, it wasn’t there.

    Jesse said he knew of a couple others. They didn’t really sound like they fit the bill when I asked him to desribec them, but what else was I going to do? I was feeling uneasy. I typically felt uneasy around people, but now I felt uneasy around my friends. I felt even more uneasy because I was with my friends and my girlfriend.

    I hadn’t seen Corey in weeks, probably. Furthermore, I hadn’t really seen him on any terms of substance for months, maybe even a year if you want to be honest.

    There we were, driving that car; that black Toyota Camry– the same year as my own. Kara was to my right in the passenger seat, and Corey and Jesse behind us in the back. I wasn’t happy. Things were not going how I planned. I felt like I had a target on my back. I felt like Kara had a target on her back. I felt that , together, we especially carried a dangerous label. I was pretty sure our friends had alienated us. I am pretty sure. I don’t know if I blame them or not, things got to a point where they couldn’t be contained. When you are a couple, you try to do everyone around you the courtesy of putting problems and quarrels aside until it is behind closed doors. That hadn’t been an option for maybe a year now. Everyone had seen the ugliness, our craziness.

    I felt like I had turned crazy, and I felt like everyone thought I had lost it. That didn’t help me feel any less crazy.

    I so badly wanted this to be a good day. Seamless. Flawless. Peerless. Enjoyable. And if things really go well, perfect. A sign of hope, a reminder that we aren’t cancer, we are just the same two friends you’ve always had. I had trouble truly wanting anything in those days. I was stunted, but, I truly, truly,  wanted that.

    I couldn’t find the right place. I was on edge. I was messing things up already. In my head I could feel Kara beginning to fret; the cogs and gears coming slightly loose. I was figuring her to start worrying that we won’t find a good spot, and that one bolt of negativity firing off, suggesting that we just go back home, forget the pictures and just hang out at my house. That one blow would dismantle the entire machine, and  I couldn’t let it happen.

    We were still driving. Forty minutes to no avail, I was out of ideas. I tried to keep things going. I worked hard, like they were going to tip me, if I kept the atmosphere comfortable and enjoyable. While I was driving I glanced over at Kara after something I said. I saw something. It was a slight removal of comfort in her face, to the corner of my eye, it looked like that seed of distress. I was in no place to make that judgment.

    I did anyway.

    I was so sure that she was about to unravel. To prevent the peace from being broken, I broke it. I took the offensive.

    “No, no you don’t. Not today! Not today!”

    Nobody knew what I was on about.

    She didn’t really either, she just heard my tone, saw the alarm in my face and demeanor. It was Chernobyl all over again.

    I continued to accuse her of indicating to me that she was not keeping things together, that she was about to crack.

    I guess I forgot to say that it was hard for her to be social in those days. Working her up to have group interaction among even the closest of our friends took weeks on a slow stew. One small mistake and that is another week or two of work. Just as it was hard to get her up for it, maintaining her ability to when we did was something that I had taken responsibility for. I was the nurse. I was probably wrong to, but then again, in those days, it was probably necessary– I don’t think retrospect has granted me any other light on that.

    There we were, trapped in this vehicle, a good 12 minutes from home. I was yelling at the top of my lungs. It was a very grotesque scene. There were a handful of times where I was really, truly mean– just mean00 and mean to her in some sort of public setting. When I say mean, I mean like in a way that I knew I was being mean, but I did not feel bad about it; like I felt she had earned it from me. This was one of those few times. Of course what followed after I regathered myself from those incidents was the ugliest, muddy feeling of dreck and self-loathing grime infiltrating every last pore I had.

    In the middle of my tirade I glanced in the rearview mirror, seeing my two friends in the back seat, as uncomfortable as sleeping on a bed of spikes. It only made me feel worse.Maybe these moments were some type of out of body experiences for me, and seeing those two, then her, then myself, started to pull me back in. I had too much momentum to just stop, but I just finished up a good 30 seconds more of vicious yelling and blaming for thinking that or plans are ruined before I did stop.

    Then, they really were ruined.

    She cried, trying not to erupt into tears– she instead just melted away in a ball of salty discharge as she curled up in her seat facing down and away from everyone. The two in the back didn’t make a peep. And I just recoiled away toward my window a bit, wearing my mask of distress anger, and disappointment. I was holding back. I wanted to cry, but I wasn’t going to. I sped up, but I didn’t speed too much. I thought to myself, “this is it– you’ve really done it this time.”

    I knew that when we got home the other two would leave both as quickly as they could, but also as politely as they could. That made me more upset. I’d rather them just leave and not feign the courtesy part. I am not ignorant, of course.

    As soon as we did get back, the exact scenario happened.

    Jesse was kind of quieter about it, his voice doesn’t carry like most, so it could be seen as him just kind of getting in his car and heading off. Corey is very adept at the uncomfortable courtesy bit, and he really let it out in this case. I don’t blame him, but as soon as he said what words he said, in the tone he said, and that door shut, the red in my vision and head rose. The cars started driving off and I just let myself lose control of my body. We went inside, because I needed to unlock the door for her, but it was merely a stop on the way to wherever I was going.

    The puppy of Kara’s was howling, she had severe separation anxiety. She was in her kennel in my living room. I yelled at the dog, and rattled her kennel. I told the puppy to shut up in all different manner of ways, then transferred that to Kara as she busted out into total weeping. I started throwing and kicking things. I didn’t want ot hurt her. I didn’t want to run my friends off. I didn’t want her to be crying. I didn’t want plans to be ruined. I didn’t want to be the one who ruined things, but I was. I kicked some of my mom’s somewhat new furniture. In fact, I broke some of it. I continued to the back porch so I could continue to follow my blind rage even more. I grabbed the weight bench and threw the barbell off the deck into the lawn. Primally, I screamed and shrieked about. I noticed that the neighbors down the street had been outside when we got home. They were still on their porch at this time. Just more people to alienate me and think I am mentally unstable.

    I don’t remember everything I threw or tried to destroy. I do distinctly remember a broom stick of which I broke. I didn’t break it snapping it on my leg, or banging it on anything. I merely flung it across the yard. Mid release, it snapped in half and split off into two paths, one end hitting a tree. At that point I started to calm enough to stop physically lashing out. I stayed outside for a while. I sat on the steps of my deck and let some tears come out.

    I didn’t know what I was going to do when I went back inside. I didn’t know how I was going to recover between any of those people involved, or what my parents would think when they saw all the destruction. I didn’t want to sit out there forever, though. It only made things worse. After  a couple minute I went inside.

    We didn’t say anything to each other, she was on the couch, or maybe she had gone into my room on my bed– either way, she was coiled up into a ball, still outpouring tears and snot like the river Nile. I set to clean everything inside up. I made good progress until I realized some of the furniture I had broken. I had a little kid moment again, when I was trying to figure out how I was going to cover this up and lie to my mom about it so she doesn’t notice. She still doesn’t know about it to this day, so I guess I did well on that front. Maybe my childhood was just teaching me how to deceive better.That dilemma set back my efforts to recollect myself by 30 minutes, though.

    I don’t remember much of what happened in the next 30-60 minute, or maybe I just don’t care to go that deep into something already terribly personal. I remember it being dark. Dark and quiet. The only noise was slow breathing patterns, sniffling, a ticking clock on the wall, and dog tags clinging about. These things occupied our senses until enough time passed that the only thing left in me was weakness, tenderness and gentleness.

    We were both hungry and exhausted. I fed myself and fed her, after persuading her that she needed to eat too.

    We sat curled up with each other on my couch as we ate dinner and in the dark watched Man On Wire.

  • Indie Size IV

    Lately, I end each day feeling mentally accomplished. In my current state of things, my mind just gnaws and gnaws on things in an effort to break them down into something I can swallow, digest, and, uh, get them beyond my system.

    Thus is the cycle. The end of the night hits, I’ve thought non-stop about a few things, and I feel like I’ve made some monumental decisions that will help me in the long-run. Funny I mention this, because I think that I arrived at an entirely new set of decisions to help me keep my life progressing.

    I will say this, maybe I can actually settle on some things. I need to start over. On everything. I need to go back to what got me through so many years. I need to deny oneself– myself. I have decided to do a number of selfless things, whereas the last few decisions I had made in the past 7 days were all selfish.

    I don’t expect this to lead to my transition phase being completed any quicker, but I feel better about these decisions. Maybe it will help with that whole fulfillment problem. But for all I know, come tomorrow I will have come at a new set of decisions. I hope not.

    And that leads me to what I wanted to write about. I have become horribly indecisive. In fact, I have arrived at the worst form of indecision, I make decisions, I carry them out, then I make different decisions about the same thing. I don’t know if I was always this indecisive or not. I did date a girl who would admit to being pro-tier indecisive, and maybe that rubbed off, but this is worse.

    I just wish I could decide on things I feel like I need to decide on, but it seems that this is like trying to finish puzzles with only half the pieces.

    source: http://www.helenhanson.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/06/one-size.jpg