It’s as though my feelings of despair and hopelessness exist in a secret vault that isn’t accessible at all. All around that vault are littler, less secure vaults that I’ve learned to open so I can wrangle with their contents, bending and twisting them into submission, if only for a while. But THIS vault, where despair resides with its dark friend hopelessness, is locked. I have no key.
Yesterday, I read a story of an ICU nurse who was shot to death as she was driving to work on a freeway. 26 years old, a career based on giving, and her life ended at what may turn out to be random violence.
And yet my stupid ass still exists. Waking up to one’s own reality is tiring. Waking up to the same process of reciting the same mantras: “Let’s get through today. Just today.” Gee, that’s empowering. How full of hope for a brighter future that useless mantra fills me. “I’m blessed beyond my ability to understand why.” Really? Why? WHY? A blessing would be in the form of my accidental death, since I don’t have the balls necessary to do it my fucking self. “Who would take care of my cats?” LOVE that line of stupidity. Might as well follow it up with “Who would wear my underwear?” It makes as much sense. Do your cats a favor. Do the world a favor. Just fucking die, you stupid idiot. It is so unbelievably beyond time to leave. Every stupid ass plan I’ve embarked upon to defeat depression has failed. It isn’t a curable disease, and anyone who says it is full of it. This condition is manageable, which isn’t to imply it’s “sometimes ok.” Its never “sometimes ok.” Its either attacking at full strength or biding it’s time…depression is manageable like sitting in a burning house is manageable – at some point you’re going to run out of breathable air, and flames or asphyxia will kill you. Or the ceiling will crush you. It’s not a question of “if.” Depression is an incurable, “manageable” question of MOTHER FUCKING “WHEN.” It will kill you, if not by bullet, bag, or noose, then by slicing up your soul with crushed dream after obliterated aspiration. It will beat you like a ***** and stand over you, laughing as you cry. It is not a fixable condition, it comes with an expiration date and chips away at you, day after futile, useless day, watching as your strength ebbs. It takes notes. It knows what works.
This is “living?” This waking to panic and self loathing? Waking to a mindset of trudging through an hour, or maybe only half of one, breathing deeply and focusing on the positives. This is living? This curtain of lies I am obligated to pull before my eyes so I can tolerate the next hour followed by more lies to get me through the next one? And the hours after that one, all my bases covered as I continue feeding myself all the bullshit the experts say I need to say to overcome this nasty yet oddly inviting desire to pick up my g*n and aim for the brainstem…insert, angle slightly up, pull…face an asshole of a god, middle finger raised.
I don’t even know what I’m saying anymore. My whole body is shaking with rage, desire…desire to just freaking die.
The rewards of this useless life no longer outweigh the disadvantages. The fairytale of a caring god is the ultimate act of cruelty. “Pray, child, and he will come to you…in a still, small voice….pray, child, that you will discern this voice, and god will help you…”
WRONG. I say “Simply exist, and the fairytale of a loving god will accompany you into your own personal pit where it will sit with you as you suffer.” All our pathetic stories of a caring deity…what children we are, always needing the universe to spin around us.
Depression will take me. One day. And I’ll happily wipe the shit damn stink of this sewer off my sandals and march into the dark unknown. It has to be better than this crap pile, and to the god that may greet me I raise a middle finger and say “FUCK YOURSELF.”
This morning is a close the drapes morning. Keep out the sunshine, shun any hint of a shitless world. Today I’m reveling in my eternal indefatigable sense of self hate. The world can go on…I can’t stop it, so since I’m at least tall enough to reach the bottom of the sign, I’m gonna ride the ride of self pity today. Strap me in, ring the bell, flip the switch. “Remember to keep your arms and legs inside the ride so as to avoid having them torn off by shit…”
My prayer for today is that a random bullet ends my uselessness. An ICU nurse…the ones who assist us as we toe the line between “he certainly dodged a bullet” and “doctors say its only a matter of time”, randomly executed in her car, on her way to work…f*ck humanity. We’re a piss stain on a beautiful planet. We are a stain.
It will be my prayer from now on, but looks like it’s time to toss back the covers and be “sad”, in all of its connotations. Tomorrow will be another useless day of meaningless distractions, futile attempts to add meaning to the passing of time as my biological clock ticks, one, and now two seconds closer to expiration. Tomorrow I’ll summon the energy of the mindlessly distracted and fumble through a day of nothing, conning myself into believing that my efforts mean something, that they “effect change.” For today, my friend Jack Herer is coming to my rescue, and today can just jump off a cliff.
I’m going to eat hot dogs today. I ordered one years ago in Boston, at a Red Sox game. It cost one dollar, and it came in a piece of bread…not a bun. On a flat piece of bread, gently wrapped around the dog…I was shocked. It was fan-flippin’-tastic, and today, I will eat at least six, similarly served, with mustard and sliced jalapenos. Perhaps one will slide down my gullet and get stuck on my shmullet, closing my frullet and making me snuff it. Wouldn’t that just be grand? Dessert, because who in their right mind skips dessert after eating tubes of abattoir floor scrapings, (everyone knows hot dogs are made of lips ‘n assholes) will be as many lemon creme sandwich cookies as I want. My cat is asleep in my lap. Outside, a maniac won’t concede, a virus rages, a species rails against global warming while subconsciously reveling in its perceived power to destroy a planet that will live for millenia once we destroy ourselves, and the sun is crawling towards sunset this day…but I’m inside. I close my drapes and pet my cat, and “nothing else matters”, as Mr. Hetfield screams.
Don’t bogart that joint, my friend…
13 comments
Almost poetic, and definitely have been there if I am not in a similar mood/attitude/snit now. Consider, perhaps everything is meant to be pointless. What then? I had this idea awhile ago, somewhere between my tenth and twelfth total loss of capacity to function;
What if we’re just here, little meat bags with the misfortune of having the awareness to understand how silly we are, and the misfortune of developing the capacity to feel shame for such a condition? To me that would explain a lot.
The one thing I come closest to liking about the whole humanity is the ability to form and define one’s own narrative. Thus, considering that the above is a reasonable assumption, how might we view our own weary tale?
I think we’re here, sitting in the misery of failed design, assigned the unenviable task of making such a thing worth the thousands of dollars and billions of calories it took to get us to such a point. Consider, however, the relative shallowness of the mortals. They do not consider that they will die. They go to work, go home, eat, repeat on endless cycle until they get too old to work, then eventually die. We are a fundamentally different kind of thing than that.
We’re challenging the utter futility and humiliation of that path. Thus, perhaps that is our part in the world. IDK, but it could be. I try to make the best I can of it. Right now I’m training to investigate mistreatment of people who can’t defend themselves. It is a task I find myself overequipped for, yet that appears a rare thing. Thus, I am given some money, and pretty good benefits in exchange. It works, for now, better than sitting at home waiting for death. Death will come for me at the exact same speed regardless, might as well fill my days such that the time passes faster.
Death and decay are assurances, unavoidable. Some people stumble upon it unexpectedly. Lucky bastards. The rest of us on the long and weary path must endure whatever pain and struggle occupies the intervening space. That, or choose an exit. I don’t have the ability any more to choose an exit, thus I spend my time doing the best I can to look meaningful. To others I am, it is only to me that I am an utter waste of humanity, and given that all of reality is probably just something that most people agree on and not an objectively verifiable thing, maybe that common perception of my usefulness is more correct than mine. I do not know, I know that people are way more invested than I understand in keeping me alive and functioning.
For all of our “evolution”, (and I suppose this is more prevalent in Western culture) we’re so terrified and confused by death. Our energies are invested in avoiding it. I still find it odd that for all the avoidance, we comfort one another with “He’s in a better place” when someone experiences death. Are these just words, or a collective premonition that life here is generally a large pile of excrement and we’re all better off dead? I don’t know.
“Consider, perhaps everything is meant to be pointless. What then?”
Chuckle. If we are better off dead, and we knew it was all pointless…I think there’d be a mass exodus. I for one am still fighting just a bit with the whole fear of retribution in an after life. I think if we suddenly ditched that notion, yeah, the news headlines would change from “covid, covid, covid” to “Hey, where did everyone go?”
I love how we create a god and assign it our basest and pettiest traits, like jealousy and vengeance, because we need to fear it. A pleasant god wouldn’t bring in the offerings…he needs to be nasty and spiteful, like us, so we can amaze ourselves with how semi-godlike we are.
Anywho. Off to bed to get all rested up, got a big day of futility scheduled for tomorrow. 😉
you articulate it better than i do. thanks for this! makes me feel less alone, though not any more hopeful than when i started posting to this site.
i like your writing style! the way you express how you feel is wonderful, though the feelings you’re expressing aren’t exactly the most positive.
i checked your profile to read more. how are your cats? you mentioned them here and i saw some photos of them. they look adorable!
@ nofaith, thanks for stopping in. No, there’s little positivity in my heart right now, much less my words. Such is life. As for the cats, they are well. They are so important. Do you have pets? I appreciate your compliments, I seem to find a writing “gear” that conveys my feelings well only when I’m severely depressed, and if it helped you, I’m glad!
@Once i do! i have this little poodle mix of a dog and she’s very intelligent and very cute.
pain is a very quick avenue to creating depth of art, so it’s only natural that when you put this specific brand of ache into words, it sounds poetic. it really did help me through yesterday, and i’m glad you’re still around to reply!
hope the hot dogs and those lemon creme cookies were good!
A better place after life would be nothing; to go back to what it all is. All I want is to not exist. This would be my peace.
Amen.
Hey Once. I wrote on your 12/7/20 post but it got deleted. It has to do with me making a change in my life –not suicide!! A new job, getting healthy mind, body and soul, A new view of life–all positive things!!
Hi Lovedogs. Sorry, I deleted the post before I checked for comments…one of those days. As I read this comment, I’m reminded that positive changes are the only way up and out, and would like to hear more of your story, if you want to. You’re always so helpful.
Hey, I left a comment on your post asking if you used Discord(?) but it got deleted because someone tried starting an argument.
No, idfkanymore, SP is it for me.
That stinks, I felt like telling you my story since you seem to be receptive to the long conversations, I don’t really wanna share the personal details with everyone here
Hello Once. It’s been awhile. I’d ask “how are you” but we both know the answer to that one -_-