01-16-2013, 12:53 AM
I think it's important to understand that we are animals, and our mental and emotional lives are not a perfect art nor a real science.
If you get nervous and sick just because of a simple sight or sound, or something seemingly random like that: what can you do? You have to deal with it the best way you can, or find some way to "fix" it; or just give up.
Some people do give up. I don't, and nobody else writing here has. Not yet anyway.
I know that my childhood ended the first day of school, and after a while I stopped going. I used to have nervous tics, I had these abstract feelings that my mom was being murdered, and the only way I could stop it was if I cleared my throat really loud until the feeling faded behind the tension in my throat. It might sound weird, but that's just the way it was. And of course the teachers punished me, and kids picked on me for it. So I became a clown. But my weird stuff made them simply mess with me, not out of hatred, but out of the desire to abuse someone along with your peers. So then I stopped going to school; and when I did go, I just slept, because they put me on drugs, and I slept about 18 hours everyday.
I decided to become scary, so the people stopped picking fights with me. But the girls were afraid of me, so if I was seen talking to one, a group of whatever group the girl belonged to: rednecks, self-proclaimed gangstas, rock 'n' roll meatheads, a group of guys would threaten me. But then the suicidal, depressed, severely "mentally ill" people started to be drawn to me. And I was constantly being accused by others of forming some Satanic cult. And things got even worse. So I just started travelling around like a bum, doing stuff I liked: wrestling, acting, singing, writing. And I'd have breakdowns and come back here to my hometown--that word pains me, but it's true--and would be locked in my little storage shack alone for years at a time. And I lived like Howard Hughes, without the money or the servants. And I'd leave long enough to clean myself up, seek out and have disastrous affairs of varied success with the most beautiful women in town. Then when they finally go back to their "normal" men, I go off somewhere, or back to my shack and rip my mind apart searching for reasons to go on living.
And to give one more example of how things work. I run on raw emotion, and my intelligence is only a toolbox that I leave to one side. Instinct and emotion. I know it would be a bad idea to get drunk and go to the workplace of a woman that's recently deceived me and broke me into pieces. But I wake up, and I consciously decide to get drunk and walk all the way to where she works and cause a scene. And afterwards I spend weeks in feverish torment; shame and regret. In fact, I almost convince myself I regret it for a year or two. Then I start to feel a bit proud of myself. And I get drunk, and listen to music, and feel great emotional well-being based on the way I behaved.
So, that's life for some of us. I love to use public restrooms, because I enjoy the refreshing sensation of shitting in society's public domain. I might be alone right now, but I've known and still know some of the most beautiful women alive today. And they're afraid of what society says and does; but they're not afraid of me. I can see it in their eyes, and that makes me happy. And it gives me hope.
And you can have hope too, The Card. You are smart and decent enough to make it in this world despite everything. As long as somebody doesn't show up and randomly shoot you, like has been happening so much lately in this crazy country.
If you get nervous and sick just because of a simple sight or sound, or something seemingly random like that: what can you do? You have to deal with it the best way you can, or find some way to "fix" it; or just give up.
Some people do give up. I don't, and nobody else writing here has. Not yet anyway.
I know that my childhood ended the first day of school, and after a while I stopped going. I used to have nervous tics, I had these abstract feelings that my mom was being murdered, and the only way I could stop it was if I cleared my throat really loud until the feeling faded behind the tension in my throat. It might sound weird, but that's just the way it was. And of course the teachers punished me, and kids picked on me for it. So I became a clown. But my weird stuff made them simply mess with me, not out of hatred, but out of the desire to abuse someone along with your peers. So then I stopped going to school; and when I did go, I just slept, because they put me on drugs, and I slept about 18 hours everyday.
I decided to become scary, so the people stopped picking fights with me. But the girls were afraid of me, so if I was seen talking to one, a group of whatever group the girl belonged to: rednecks, self-proclaimed gangstas, rock 'n' roll meatheads, a group of guys would threaten me. But then the suicidal, depressed, severely "mentally ill" people started to be drawn to me. And I was constantly being accused by others of forming some Satanic cult. And things got even worse. So I just started travelling around like a bum, doing stuff I liked: wrestling, acting, singing, writing. And I'd have breakdowns and come back here to my hometown--that word pains me, but it's true--and would be locked in my little storage shack alone for years at a time. And I lived like Howard Hughes, without the money or the servants. And I'd leave long enough to clean myself up, seek out and have disastrous affairs of varied success with the most beautiful women in town. Then when they finally go back to their "normal" men, I go off somewhere, or back to my shack and rip my mind apart searching for reasons to go on living.
And to give one more example of how things work. I run on raw emotion, and my intelligence is only a toolbox that I leave to one side. Instinct and emotion. I know it would be a bad idea to get drunk and go to the workplace of a woman that's recently deceived me and broke me into pieces. But I wake up, and I consciously decide to get drunk and walk all the way to where she works and cause a scene. And afterwards I spend weeks in feverish torment; shame and regret. In fact, I almost convince myself I regret it for a year or two. Then I start to feel a bit proud of myself. And I get drunk, and listen to music, and feel great emotional well-being based on the way I behaved.
So, that's life for some of us. I love to use public restrooms, because I enjoy the refreshing sensation of shitting in society's public domain. I might be alone right now, but I've known and still know some of the most beautiful women alive today. And they're afraid of what society says and does; but they're not afraid of me. I can see it in their eyes, and that makes me happy. And it gives me hope.
And you can have hope too, The Card. You are smart and decent enough to make it in this world despite everything. As long as somebody doesn't show up and randomly shoot you, like has been happening so much lately in this crazy country.