Damn my head itches. Which is where the title comes from, but I guess, usually, when you refer to an itch it should be symbolic instead of literal, as no one really wants to know about any kind of real itch you have.
So, I'll talk about my literal itch and the symbolic itches I have. And you insert whatever addiction you suffer from or pretend not to suffer from. It'll be fun.
But my scalp itches. It does from time to time. I used to treat it with Heads n shouldz, but no longer! I will be no slave to the shampoo industrial complex! I decided in favor of dandruff and against a lifelong addiction to a shampoo that would be my only hope to stave off the white specs on my dark shirts. No more! I said, and I quit, cold turkey. Dandruff came, like it always did when I quit or my mother bought a generic. But fine, I thought, fine! Let the snow from my scalp blot out the sun (or embarrass me if I walk near a black light) for the time being. I will wait it out. And wait it out I did.
And eventually, it stopped. It cured itself. But every so often, due to weather changes, I suppose, it comes back. And I try not to scratch it. But I've been scratching it today. And if it isn't the most satisfying feeling, just getting in there with my nails, really going at it, getting bits of hair oil and dead skin stuck in my nails and just digging in and my leg is practically kicking from the pure ecstasy of satisfying that urge.
But the itch just gets worse and worse the more I scratch it, the more I give in, the more I cave the itch just gets worse and it's all I can think about, and I just have to, I just have to resist though.
So I focus my energy on not scratching, but that means focusing on the itch itself, and god damn it's terrible, just scratch it and it will go away and ohhhh it will feel so good.
And I make it, I don't scratch it, I just don't. And eventually I stop thinking about it. And my hand automatically goes up my head and I just start scratching and I"m not even thinking about it, just like, I'm scratching my head in confusion like, damn, what did I come into the kitchen for, did I need something, why else would I come in here, and I'm just digging in and not thinking about it, just wondering what I wanted, and then I give up and sit back down in my computer chair and see my empty bottle and think damn it, that's what I wanted and I notice my head is itching worse than ever and I feel the oil and dandruff in my nails and I know what I've done.
There, that is symbolic for all kinds of stuff.
Just one scratch won't hurt, will it?
You know it's bad when you start dreaming about scratching your scalp. You are will your friends and they are all scratching their scalps and you have already told them you are done with all of that, but you remember how good it felt just to take one hit, one nail through the forest of thick hair, and just run quickly across the skin, no harm, no foul, just to remember what it's like. No to get like, rid of the itch or anything, just to see what it's like, just one more time.
And then you realize you've done what you didn't want to do, and you can't go back, and you are in that ecstasy of changing states of consciousness, and the thinking starts, the thinking that just keeps folding in on itself, analyzing everything. And of course in this situation you use this thinking on yourself, turning that unforgiving unstoppable thinking and paranoia on yourself and the fact that you scratched and now you will have to go through the whole process again.
But then you think, what if you just start to casually scratch it again, or go back to head and shoulders, that would take care of it altogether. And it wasn't so bad when you used head and shoulders every day. Just made the days you couldn't do it worse overall, but once you used it, oh sweet relief.
But what if, as the thinking turns on you, you were right about the scratching and the shampoo and everything that went with surpressing the itch was in fact responsible for ruining your college career, or destroying relationships, or gaining weight, or whatever it may be that could be blamed on the scratching and not something else.
And maybe, perhaps, the itch could be "scratched" in other ways, perhaps if you exercised more or ate right or focused on a hobby that had potential for the future you could just forget that old itch once and for all.
And you wake up, thankful you didn't scratch it, thankful you are still scratch free for this month or so, you aren't even counting you are so resolute in your quitting.
But then you do something out, with your friends or something, and you just think, for an instant, wouldn't this be more fun if I just scratched my scalp for a bit, if I just let the flakes fly and let the chips land where they may?
But this time I quit. Seriously this time. Because I know that just once scratch will lead to more and more and more, and no matter how much I scratch it will never be enough to solve the problems at the root of my scratching.
And no matter how much I think the scratching and the thoughts I have while under the influence of head and shoulders will help me figure out what these problems are, I know they really won't. And it won't help my writing. And it won't help.
Nothing and no one will do this work for me. I have to do it myself.
It's my itch after all. And it's my dandruff. And if someone comments on the specs of dead skin in my hair, I will smile inwardly, knowingly, that I am on a better path. That one day the itching will be a distant memory, something to tell stories about, but to never go back to, in the same way as reminiscing about old lovers long after the flame and the wick and the wax and the whole candle itself has been so lost and forgotten no chance of relieving that love and no desire to remain, but still, the memories are worth remembering.
And the itch is worth not scratching.
_________________
No comments:
Post a Comment