Yeah, I Want To Travel South This Year

So I've had this recurring daydream going through my head in some form or another. One day, after a heavy sigh and hopeless heart, I just pack up with my cat and move out to the desert--someplace like the Salton Sea or Kingman, Arizona. No warning, no sign, just dust floating through time left of my old life.

And I get some trailer out in the middle of the desert with nothing but the sun and cracked ground around me. I spend my years grinding away my days working at a Walmart, drinking cheap beer at night to make me forget. I get old and leathery, my face becomes a cracked walnut in the dry air and heat. If the slow alkaline poisoning from the land doesn't get me, the liver damage will. I wonder how different this is from my life now.

But the problem is I'm such a pop culture junkie that I'd tear my way back down the 5 to get to the nearest Borders or Tower Records after two hours fucking about in the desert. I guess being a dispossessed desert rat isn't my path.

Betty Blue

"I've been listening to my gut since I was 14 years old, and frankly speaking, I've come to the conclusion that my guts have shit for brains."
- Rob Gordon in "High Fidelity" (film version)

So yeah, when I fall, I tend to fall fast and I tend to fall hard. I've been through it enough that I should be able to identify the warning signs and prep myself. You know, like how some epileptics get a funny feeling--a word that's one the tip of the tongue waiting to break free, a lightheaded dizzy giddiness--right before a seizure so they can sit down or get away from sharp objects. I guess I'm a luuuuuuuv epileptic. (And for those of you too literal, or maybe my analogies are too forced, no, I don't have epilepsy though I do tend to fall flat on my face in my love life without any warning.) Except I haven't been smart enough to recognize the funny feeling and sit down.

I've looked at my past entries recently. What have I learned? That except for Her, I can honestly say that what I've felt was just an short-term influx of chemicals--dopamine and oxytocin mostly--making my heart go a flutter and my mind go completely and utterly bugfuck. Seizure baby seizure.

And so now, I'm trying to figure out what I'm feeling and sit down. My friends are saying to let these feelings pass, because if I do follow them, there is no happy ending. Why? This one dropped her career and followed her boyfriend across the ocean six months ago, only to have the relationship break up in November. I only got out of a relationship in December. Two rebounders? That's some bad chowder, Harry.

Before you get the wrong idea, I haven't fallen yet. That's the point, I'm trying not to. Feel free to drop a "Run! Run for the hills!" comment.

"Don't think about all those things you feel,
Just be glad to be here . . ."
-FC/Kahuna

Pull Me Out Of The Aircrash

Back when I had the malignant hypertension, I couldn't unwind. I'd lay in bed, trying to sleep, but my mind and my heart were pulling a techno beat. I was so tense that I'd wake up with pulled calves and sucking my breath in pain. I chalked all this up to work stress instead of blood pressure so high that the emergency room put me on drip within five minutes, just seconds before a gunshot victim.

Well, two weeks into work, and that inability to unwind is creeping back. The blood pressure isn't back up to 250/180, but it is higher than it's supposed to be.

Tuesday is the attorney lunch day at GatewayGig. We sit around eating a catered lunch and discuss what we're working on--a way for the firm to figure out who's busy and who's not. It's kinda weird being a contract attorney and attending those meetings, because technically I'm a temp. I'm not supposed to be busy as hell on a regular basis given that I'm being paid on an hourly basis. Yet I feel somewhat guilty when it's my turn to give an update on my work and it's on one or two projects, while everyone else spends five to ten minutes going over what they're doing.

Anyway, so there I was today, eating a chicken that was way too salty, and half-paying attention to what the other attorneys were saying. Then the dread hit me bigtime. Listening to words like "demurrer" and "discovery" and "summary judgment," I was bored. Then I realized that I couldn't imagine hearing these words 520, 1040 more times while eating salty chicken in a white sterile room overlooking suburbs. This was just another version of pulling out staples for eight hours a day (a summer job I had in high school)--rote repetitive mind-numbing tasks with no meaning with no end in sight. I began craving shots of Jack Daniels. I still crave shots of JD.

It doesn't matter that I happened to be dead right on a point of law and the partner who slammed my analysis at lunch was dead wrong. It doesn't matter that Morally Flexible Parther who blew off one of my tactical suggestions in the morning came around to my thinking in the afternoon. I just don't take pleasure in being right anymore.

And now I'm home, still keyed up, still hypertense.

"Pull Me Out Of The Aircrash
Pull me Out Of The Lake"
-"Lucky" by Radiohead

Old Moon Fades Into The New

So I'll save the hopelessness for another day. Instead, even though I hate this holiday, I give you the lyrics that best sum up that feeling we're supposed to be celebrating today.

When I'm weak, I draw strength from you
And when you're lost, I know how to change your mood
And when I'm down, you breathe life over me
Even though we're miles apart, we are each other's destiny.
-"Destiny" by Zero 7

Love love is a verb
Love is a doing word
-"Teardrop" by Massive Attack

You don’t have a clue,
What it is like
To be next to you.

I’m here to tell you,
That it is good,
That it is true.

Birds singing a song,
Old pain is peeling,
This is that fresh
That fresh feeling.
Words can’t be that strong,
My heart is real,
This is that fresh,
That fresh feeling.
-"Fresh Feeling" by The Eels

Oh you've got green eyes
Oh you've got blue eyes
Oh you've got grey eyes
No I've never seen anyone quite like you before
No I've never met anyone quite like you before
-"Temptation" by New Order

"I am waiting for the stars to change"
-"Cherry" by Curve

Run

File this in "It's A Small World After All," and "What Have I Done To Deserve This." Back at SmallLawGig, we took over a case from a lawyer who also (1) happened to be a percipient witness in the case, (2) and had what I'd call some moral flexibility. I wish I could get more specific, but I'd probably be breaking some ethical codes.

GatewayGig just got a new partner. Guess who it happens to be. And guess who happens to be working for him on a project. Why can't I have the good time of drama with Swedish twin sisters and a jet set lifestyle instead of second hand Grisham-esque crap?

Future Proof

Even with all the medication, my blood pressure is starting to rise again. I've been having a constant low grade headache, like a dull hum.

When work was slow, there was a part of me that thought maybe having something to do would at least slow the creeping, onsetting malaise that I've been feeling. But now I have several matters at work, enough to keep me busy for at least a month, and all that has done is made the week go by faster. I come home and all I have to look forward to is a couple of hours of television and sleep.

My dreams have been more violent, more vivid, and more passionate. I've been dreaming of trains and gunfights, wide rivers and large cities. It seems I can feel the highs that I once had only in dreams.

The end of January seemed to bring promise. The beginning of this month has only brought inertia.

There was a part of me that looked for signs and meaning in everything that I saw -- the elevator that appeared before you pushed the button, or the favorite song heard on the alarm radio. Now, I all I see is signal to noise.

What I miss is awe, or at least the ability to be awed.

"Happiness is a dark thing to pursue . . . and the pursuit itself is a dark thing as well." Steve Erickson, Arc d'X

Pounding

So I have a quick project that should pay for, I dunno, one one-hundreth of my hospital bill but that will go to swag and alcohol instead. And theoretically, I should be happy about making money. Yay money! But I'll tell ya, after a couple of days of legal work, my mind has an icky taste. It's like the mental version of biting into bad chicken salad with the creamy texture of the mayonnaise just highlighting the sickly taste of spoilation and undercooked meat. My blood pressure was up when I got home, which explains the headache and slight nausea (well, work might explain part of the pressure, but Duke's loss to Wake Forest and dealing with a flakey chick didn't help either--damnit I promised myself I wasn't going to deal with Asian women anymore.)

At least Wonderfalls is out on DVD.

It's Funny Because It's True

Bwahahahahahaha!





take the WHAT INTENTIONAL TORT ARE YOU

Via Cerulean Blue.

Manteca

Life lessons learned in the past week:

1. If your doctor refuses to re-submit a very important insurance form when a five-figure hospital bill is at stake because he doesn't want to incur to additional copy fees, you should probably get a new doctor.

2. If a very cute former CNN-Asia correspondent asks you for your card, you shouldn't say "Oh, it's my last one and I need to save it for that blonde former Fox Sports anchor." (Don't worry, I only said the first part which probably explains why she was sitting on my lap at the end of the night instead of pouring vodka on my head.)

3. The designated driver should not be drinking more than the passenger. Ugh.

Nevermind

I usually have a spate of college-related dreams about four times a year. Mostly they're either the first day of class no idea where I'm going or last day of class haven't studied for finals variety.

This last week, I've been dreaming of high school. What the hell? Am I started to regress? What's a real kick in the pants is that in the dream, when I meet somebody I suddenly realize I'm thirty-two (though I still don't realize it's a dream). I mean it's quite a come down when you realize that pretty redhead who starts singing Lou Reed's "Perfect Day" with you after biology is half your friggin' age.

Gravity Always Gets Me Down

There was a book I read a long time ago in which the author correlated bipolar disorders and depression with creativity. It was dry and clinical, which accounts for me not reading all of it and forgetting its name. Anyway, given my current "meh" status, I wouldn't be surprised if the correlation was true. That impulse to create comes from emotion, and if you have no emotion, you might as well write instructions on how to construct cardboard boxes. I used to have tons of ideas, and now, as I said before, "meh."

So what does that mean? I don't want to give up writing just yet. I'm sure there are well-adjusted or highly medicated authors out there. Anyway, I was wondering how all those works by writers in the pre-better living through chemistry era would've turned out if Lexapro had existed.

Edgar Allen Poe--Wrote "Nevermore-- a poem about a man whose wife died, got over it, and married an accountant's daughter from Gaithersburg. Nevermore refers to the mince pie first wife used to make but second wife couldn't repeat the recipe. Hence he nevermore had the pie.

Shakespeare--Wrote "Hamlet"--A comedy about a prince whose father died, so he goes on a comic romp around the world to find himself with his dead father's ghost--the original odd couple.

Rutger Hauer's final soliliquy in Bladerunner--"I've seen things that are mundane beyond belief. Fat chicks eating fries on the shoulder of the Eat N' Go. I've seen traveling salesman picking up dry cleaning near Cleveland. All this will be gone, like something that isn't permanent. Feh."

Know What A Turtle Is?

So what's life like half a month into my antidepressants? Well, it can be summed up by the following: "I don't give a shit." Wait! I mean that in a good way, as opposed to an existential nothing matters to me so long cruel world way.

Here's what I mean. Is there a lack of work and mounting medical bills in my life? I don't give a shit.

Friend of a friend hasn't forwarded me the digits of the cute blonde lawyer I talked to this weekend? I don't give a shit.

Life seems to be stalled and there's a part of me thinking it won't unstall? I don't give a shit.

It's not really apathy. Yes, the problems are still there, but I'm not freaking out in a spiral of despair, panic and annoyingness like I usually do. If I eventually need to take action, cool. Otherwise, why worry.

On the downside--there's a part of me that misses some emotion. There is a sort of disaffected middling average type of vibe going in my brain. I guess I was expecting some sort of sunshiney day type feeling, but mainly, it's kinda cloudy.

I Ain't Happy, I'm Feeling Glad

There's nothing like a cute happa chick who you find out later is a Playboy Playmate calling you "Mr. Writer" all night long at a party to give you a really fuzzy warm feeling. I suggest you try it sometime, though without the whole her boyfriend is the host of the party sorta thing. We know that Marty has blown his hitting on chicks with boyfriends/fiances quota for his lifetime.

Blue Skies

Sometimes I think that I need the drama, that I need the sadness to well up in me so I can feel something. I need to be diverted from what is essentially day after day of so whats.

Once in a while, the sun comes out and lights my place up. There's silence. I'm reading. A cat is dozing on my lap. Sometimes I think this isn't so bad.

Sometimes A Cigar Is Just A Cigar

Before I was hospitalized, I had trouble getting a full night's sleep--I'd wake up hyperventalating with my heart beating at 120 bpm. Now, I sleep too much.

Last night, my sleep was filled with dreams about various Playboy Playmates wandering around my pad. You'd think that would be a good thing, but I was mostly bored in the dream. Then my dream segued into a party on the rooftop of a highrise.

There were no guard rails, so one slip and off you fell eighty stories. My parents had dragged me to this soiree--it was a business meeting/reunion for them. I was trying not to panic--even without my fear of heights, eighty stories would have still been daunting. The roof was only ten feet by ten feet, so there was not much room. Then I freaked out and grabbed the floor, not wanting to slip off the side. I told my parents to lead me off, but they just got pissed, ignored me and went back to their mingling.

I eventually made my way back to the interior of the high rise (which was a hotel). I was trying to find my room, but I spent the rest of the dream lost.

Imagine my mind without meds. Yeesh, right?