And the wall, thump

Yesterday I wrote so much that by the end of the night I was so anxious and full of self-doubt it was unbearable.  I don't know if my writing triggered this hypomanic episode or if it was triggered before hand and it is what led me to write so much. 

And I've written a lot.  Over six thousand words in something I'm calling a "novel", but as always that is a word I avoid like the plague, because who the fuck am I to write a novel when I can barely make a coherent blog post. 

And I've been making frantic private posts just for myself, much longer than these.  And between all three of them I'm not sure what has been said and what hasn't.

Today was easy as far as the paper route goes, but everything else, I just felt this malevolent blob growing in my chest and didn't know what to do with it.  I didn't want to write in fear that it might grow, but here I am anyway.

What is there left to cover anyway?

The newspaper route is memorized, I say things like "oh hello molding box", or "come on man, grab your newspapers!" all to myself.  I need to start listening to audiobooks or something. 

I should probably be exercising but where and how.  Its so fucking hot outside and even in this wealthy area I don't feel safe running at night.  I don't feel safe running outside at all, where people may see me.  I don't want people to watch me.  I don't want to be viewed.

So why do I want to be read?

If my fear is that these nameless faceless strangers are judging me and know what I am thinking or know something about me that I don't want them to know.  Or see what I am wearing and think that I'm fake, or a phony or trying to be someone I'm not.


Oh god do I hate that, when people insult others with that.  "He is trying to be something he isn't"  We are all trying to be something, you may not know it, but you have an image of yourself, and you want others to see you the way you want them to and you try to maintain that balance.  Everyone does this and you don't get to decide someone is bad at it.


Why not just laugh at those who try something for the first time and fail, and crush their aspirations to ever try that again.  We do, and it feels good, and right, and why should they try to better themselves. Alright, everyone knows this.

So why would I want to actually show what I think, in the most intimate way possible.  By transcribing my thoughts out for anyone to read and see.  And know something about me that I would normally hide.

Attention?  The more people that pay attention to this the more scared I am of posting and if it gets bad enough I quit and repress the memories of that blog and its miniscule success.

The last time I shared a story with a group of people they tore me to pieces nicely, with smiles on their faces.  Smiles that couldn't mask that embarrassment for me.  That they had read this thing I wrote in a frenzy and thought about day and night and thought "this is it, when they read this, everyone will respect me even after a semester of silence from me.  This will change everything".

And it did, it changed my love of writing, it changed my ability to go into that class.

Or any class.  I tried something and it failed.  And if greatness doesn't come naturally what hope is there then?  Movies don't highlight the struggle and failures of people.  Just the ones who were naturals.  Surely I'm a natural at something right?  I'd have to be, I just have to explore enough.

That way of thinking is poison to my mind, and I need an antidote.  Depression could have been it.  But it's back, the poison.  I know it's not real but it doesn't know that I know that it isn't real.  So it still reeks its havoc.

I would mention something else but it will have to wait for years, for this "novel" that will never come to be.  It'll have to wait until I decide to give up on greatness and settle for what I actually have at my dispose.  These fingers, this keyboard, and my mind and it's various states of disarray.

Thump, and I bounce back.

The Ghosts in the Collective Consciousness

When I lived at home, before all the moving, there was a woman we were all aware of.  She wore a white hat, with a pony tail sticking out, white short sleeve jacket, and loose shorts.  And she would run.  She would be running when I came home from school, and I'd see her running when I left for work.  I'd see her running on the weekends when I was headed to see a friend.  Sometimes I had to swerve out of the way for her safety.

Her run was at a better pace than I could claim to have ever been at, but the form. The way she ran.

Who was this woman, how often did she really run, where did she live?  Did she work or was she taken care of?  These questions came up and went away just as she did from the front windshield to the rear-view mirror. Day after day, for those few seconds that it took to pass her by, the questions lingered and slipped away.  I wonder if they did for all of us.

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In Atlanta, on the way to the farmer's market, across the street from a small post office was this strange cart.  It looked almost like a hot dog cart you would see on a city street.  There was a pole attached to it and a tarp covering the whole thing down, with just the metal legs showing.  Next to it was a shopping cart, contents unknown.  I passed her often, as did thousands daily.  This was in an industrial area, near a steel factory and blue collar homes.  

I believe it was a woman who resided in this thing.  If she resided there.  I wonder if anyone ever stopped by that tent like structure and asked any questions, tried to talk to her.  Or if we all assumed that it had happened or that it had never happened and would likely never happen. I thought about her when I drove past the post office, on that eighth of a mile stretch of land between intersections.  It was her tent and cart, and gravel for fifty feet past it.  She was on the west side of the street, nearest to the encasement of trees around this rectangle of pavement.  The only place without the trees was where that street passed by, like some kind of window to watch, observe, see.

See what someone can live like.  Wonder what exactly they lived on, or if they ever moved, or what happened at night.  

She didn't exist unless a car drove by and someone saw her and looked upon the tent, and thought about it for even the briefest second.  Then she would cease to exist again.  The forgotten.  The part of our collective consciousnesses' hippocampus that would never make it into the short term memory.  Always stuck in that first stage, the sensory image of the person, before it fades away forever.

The last time I visited the farmer's market she was gone.  No trace left.  Did she ever exist.  Does it matter?  

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And finally here, in Annapolis, we have our own invisible man.  He walks and is clearly making some attempt at speaking, while carrying a black garbage bag between his arm and his side.  He always walks on the street, never on the sidewalk.

No police officers have offered to help this man?  No one has seen to his well being?  Why does this happen.  As far as I've observed his black garbage bag is full of clear grocery bags.  Refuse of our consumerism, being carried by a man we deny the privilege of full existence in this collective consciousness of ours.  How many people are excluded, how many are lost.  How many brain cells of the human collective have had their synapses separated from the rest of the system?

We all except someone else to do the right thing, to help one of these lost cells in our system back in, to allow entrance, but no one does.  They just drift in and out every time a car goes by, feeling the slightest electrochemical shock.  Or maybe they don't feel anything.  Maybe we just do.  Just the electrochemical shock of shame.

I keep spinning the wheel but it always hits one

 I disabled my facebook at the right time.  It was when my peers were graduating while I was unemployed and dropped out of school.  While I did nothing, and had no prospects of doing anything.  My experiences for potential employers include five years at a movie theater (do not contact), one month at Macy's (Supervisor's Name: The fuck should I know?), half a year at Zoup, making sandwiches which were practically already made.  This I found out when I got a real job as a cook.

Word of advice: Never apply to be a cook.  I have never hated a job as much as I hated that one, and I got paid the same as I did when I stood in one spot and tore pieces of paper.  And no gloves there.  Nope, just stick your hands right into that beef and sausage and toss it on that pizza.  Oh go ahead and toss me that dough you just shaped into a circle, whoops it fell on the ground.  Guess I'm a fucking moron, shoulda known that's how a kitchen works three shifts in.

And that alcoholic owner's son who ran the place.  What a fuck.  Fifth shift and I was working alone on a weekday afternoon.  Well, people eat lunch, so I had to make meals for all of them.  And here is what else, I wasn't taught how to make all of the meals.  I still never learned to make the lasagnas.

You know how one is supposed to learn the recipes, the very large amount of recipes?  By reading a mini-menu that is the same menu customers get when they order food.  Boy, "delicious melted provolone cheese", and what the fuck else do I do?  How many meatballs in this fucking thing, do you have a prep list made, you shouldn't be making that sauce, you are almost off the clock, it's too late to make the sauce, hey why was nothing fucking made yesterday afternoon, we ran out of sauce and almost everything else, what exactly did you do all day.

The last quote was from a coworker.  I was shaking so badly I fucked up the next three orders.  I felt so sick that day he referred to, but there was so much to be done I worked non stop, making orders until that alcoholic moron yells at me for not making enough orders at the same time, or not cooking everything in one order at exactly the same time or...

And when I clean everything up I start prepping, I do things as well as I can, nearly vomiting, and having no problem with producing waste from the other end.  Washing my hands took too much time too.

Why didn't you do dough, you didn't cook the meat long enough, you made too many wings.

WHAT EXACTLY DID YOU FUCKING DO YESTERDAY AFTERNOON.

What exactly have I been doing yesterday x4 years.  I didn't have to stay home after high school.  But I did, until I realized I should have been going to this other school so I transferred, but transferring is like moving schools in high school, you won't make any friends.  All the cliques are formed.  There isn't room for you.  At least you don't think so.

Leaving your dorm room door open playing music and noodling around, hoping someone will come in, someone will talk to you, someone will initiate.

But I wouldn't, in the same situation.  I would think, they left the door open so someone would come in and talk to them, but not me.  They don't mean me.  And when the self-fulfilling prophecy of loneliness and alienation comes to fruition in the place that was supposed to change your life, well, it's enough to do some powerful things to you.

And so I failed out, well kind of.  I'm not sure I never even checked really.  I just dropped out and gave up on any kind of plan.  I didn't want to borrow any more money from my fathers pension, I didn't want to have to succeed so that an investment paid off.

I wish I hadn't taken any of that money.  I wish I could have taken out more loans so we didn't have to come up with it ourselves.  I wish I'd stayed home and finished there.  I wish I could have picked a major and stuck with it.

But that isn't me.  And it never will be.

So who is me.  A newspaper deliverer?  The person who follows the one who is living their dream.  At least I have that.  At least dreams can be fulfilled.

I haven't eaten more than 1000 calories in two and a half days, I'm really not this depressed.  Don't worry about me.  I just thought this would make a good blog post.  For those of us who aren't on societies year-by-year checklist.  For those of us who keep spinning ones.

Annapolis

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Surprise! Open mic tomorrow

When I first moved here, I sent emails to most of the places that held open mics.  I received emails back from almost all of those people.  One I didn't get a response from was the Laughing Skull, probably the top comedy club in Atlanta.  Today, I received that email, with a list of shows one could sign up for.  Tomorrow and Wednesday were marked with "Really need people", and being eager to get on stage as quickly as possible, I signed up.

Could be a mistake, but oh well.  I would have been happy, but this has me worried:

Open Mic at The Laughing Skull is unique, and intimate.  It’s your responsibility as a performer to bring people to the show.  If you are a new performer, rounding up a group of friends to attend your show is easy, if you don’t, your chances of performing here are slim.  The success of the show, and your reputation in the Atlanta Comedy Scene relies on this, so please promote your performance.

Easy when all of your friends don't live eight hours away.  So there it is.  A problem I don't know how to solve.  Hopefully my "reputation in the Atlanta Comedy Scene" won't suffer too much from tomorrow.

Eh, whatever.  Good luck to me.

WOAH, it's been a while, huh. I meant to call, I swear, it's just that I got busy, and well, you know how it is.

I know, I always turn to you when I'm upset.  When my emotions have taken hold.  When there is no one else to turn to.  But you are always there, silent and waiting so patiently. 

So here I am again, waiting for your open arms.

Writing, ah, the last bastion for my extreme emotions.

And this time, the emotion is fucking ANXIETY AND FEAR AND NERVOUSFUCKINGNESS OH SHIT I'M FUCKING NERVOUS AS FUCK.

This is an emotion I don't think I've fully expressed, and that is likely because I've never written after being put on the list for three open mics this week.

OH FUCK OH FUCK.

Calm down.

I need a paper bag. And I don't smoke but I need a cigarette.  I don't even know where to buy them here.  Oh man.

But yes, I moved to Atlanta (technically Decatur, but it's considered a neighborhood of Atlanta and I live very close to Midtown and all the other great areas of the city).  And I love it.  Still haven't found a job.

[Mark is at dinner with Emily's family, though now it is ending.  Everyone stands up and farewells are exchanged.  Emily's grandmother approaches the young couple, about to fly away from the nest.

Geema:  Good luck Emily.

They hug.

Geema (to Mark): I hope you find a job.

They shake hands.

Mark:  Um, thanks.]

Instead, I have found a way to induce the feeling that a panic attack may come at any moment. 

First show is tonight, ten minutes.  I have the material, I know it well enough for it hopefully not to sound rehearsed.

I've been thinking a lot about how strange this whole thing is, me moving to Atlanta.  One day I was just lying in bed trying to stay asleep despite the light breaking through the curtains.  Emily had just left to go to ballet.  Then I woke up again when I heard the door slam just seconds after drifting away in my semi-conscious state.

Emily stood over me, with a letter in her hand, trembling.

"I think I just got a job in Atlanta"

Three months later and I am here.  Pursuing something I thought would take years longer to actually try.  But instead it took less than two weeks after arriving to my new home.

I don't have much hope that tonight will go great, or tomorrow really, but once I get some experience and get over the fear of being in front of a bunch of strangers and trying to make them laugh, things will get better.

And even if this whole thing, my latest pursuit, goes nowhere, well, I'll be a better person for it.

After all, would one rather regret doing something they wanted to, or regret never doing it at all.

Wish me luck.  

I don't believe in luck.  

Or wishes.  

So never mind. 

Mundane confession and confusin' mussin': An unpostable post.

As ideas often do, this one has strayed from it's original purpose.  I think it has anyway.  The premise at first was to showcase my writing.  I suppose it's doing that.  However I think I had in mind short stories and essays (when I say essays I often just mean nonfiction short stories that I wrap around a moral or two relating to my life philosophies).

Instead, this project has become more of a, well...  Let's give this as a pretext:

"Why don't you write about that cop harassing you when he gave you that ticket?" asked my girlfriend.

"I just don't want the blog to become, well, a blog.  I don't want it to be a diary where I can whine about shitty things that happened to me.  I want it to be..."

"I understand" she said, nodding.

"I want it to be..."

"I think I get what you are saying" she insisted.

"I want it to be, well, more..."

"Totally understand what you are trying to say"

"More trans... transcendent?"

"Gotcha."

Transcendent then.  Perhaps that's too lofty for posts on a blog.

Universal works too.  But what does that actually mean?  Something every human being can relate to on some level? 

Let's try relatable to at least one person who can read it and feel something from it.  Gain something, no matter how infinitesimally small. 

And I don't want my posts to whine.  So those are the two objectives.

Good.

I feel as though my last few posts have been more akin to therapy than anything else.  Instead of seeing a therapist (and who can afford it?  Cheaper to just let the mental disorder fester) I'm talking to you people, the few of me who read this, and allowing you a glimpse of something politely hidden in society.

Something I've always thought I should cover up with the guise of "fiction".

But the fear of being discovered, well, this is my point.  I can't be discovered if I lose the camouflage of "short stories" and just admit details of my life that bother me, things that affect me, things I use Freudian defense mechanisms to hide from myself and others.

(Perhaps I've been listening to too much Marc Maron's WTF podcast in which he interviews people in the comedy industry about depression, darkness, and "demons" inside themselves.  And now I seek that public redemption.)

So here is my confession for today.  A confession about my early short stories.  To celebrate my reaching of a milestone I set a while back- reaching 1k views on this blog.  Not much, but people decided 1000 times to see if I had a new post, to read a new post, or to just look and close it immediately.  One thousand times since April.

So this then, is my gift to you.  And myself.

I'd just finished vaporizing some cannabis during my 'semester of solitude' (just decided to call it that) at Indiana University.  I can't remember when during the semester I had what could be considered an epiphany, but was more likely just the unlocking of a truth I'd known all along.  Or to be less poetic, the weed allowed me to be more objective about my life than usual and I evaluated my writing.

And here is what I found: I was expressing my desires and intentions in my writing before I even knew they were my desires.  I think anyway.  Maybe a lot of people do this but it was horrifying to me.

Remember that movie with Will Farrell, Stranger than Fiction?  How he was a character in a book and the novelist was controlling his life by writing it?  In an instant I was convinced I was doing the same.  Panic.

Panic.

I'm glad I quit smoking pot, but still, even today, this thought haunts me.

Let's look at my evidence:

Story One: The Peasant Tree Farmer meets God-

I write about a guy who was a philosophy major doing blah blah blah.  Six months later I change my major to philosophy.

Not so much, but I hadn't decided I wanted to write at this point.  It was a rare hobby and nothing more at that point.

Story Two:  The Mountain Goats-

(I had an analogy about a mountain in the story, and song lyrics from the band in my story, and I needed a title.)

I was at IU at this point.  In a dorm. 

So I wrote a story about a guy who goes to a town far away from home, as an English major.  His roommate was an Art major who had dropped out but was coming back to school.  He had friends and partied, but was really dark and disturbed, running from the fact he didn't have a single ambition and had destroyed the one good thing in his life- his last relationship through self-destruction.


When I wrote the story, the guy, Ben I think, was supposed to be me in my mind.  It was a secret outside of my mind though.  And the roommate, Chris I think, was the guy Ben was supposed to envy at first as the person he wanted to become, but then realize he could become something in between by first exercising (I lost 50 pounds that year) and finding a girlfriend (I did).  He found a girlfriend at the end of the story.

The other thing going on in this story was I was having an imaginary war with my parents.  Pretending they wanted me to be something like a lawyer, and I didn't want to follow that path and there were intense arguments about it.  I did have an argument about it with my grand mother, but never with my parents, not really anyway.

So, perhaps these things are just a confirmation bias.  Actually I'm pretty sure it is.

Story Three- Asshole gets struck by lightening. 

Another avatar for me.  This time he has dropped out of school and is dealing with a long lost unrequited love.  Then he gets struck by lightning.

I haven't, yet, so no big deal.

Then the most recent story, one for the Machine of Death, was about a guy who had moved to a major city (as I am) in pursuit of a job as an artist (see, it's not me, this guy is an artist) as he graduated from college with an art degree (and he graduated!).

Eh.  Maybe I was wrong about all of this.  Considering deleting this post, but who gives a fuck.  You can see it. 

As a reward for my readers, instead of this failed confession, I'm going to start posting my older stuff.  Now, that older stuff is shit, but!  But I say, I will post them with commentary! 

Maybe, but maybe I'll start reading them and realize they are all terrible.  I'm not very reliable.  But so what?  I'm not getting paid here.  As a matter of fact, fuck all of you!  Draining me of all my creativity for free, for nothing in return, not even comments!

Kidding, of course.  I love you, dearest reader.

I'm trying to redeem this post with something, anything. 

Eh, forget it.  See you next time.