As we live our lives, often we must decide what is wrong and what is right. Often as I try to label and compartmentalize I find myself suspended in midair in the gray.
   When I go to strip clubs and I try to enjoy myself, I take in all the intense sexuality. I find myself wondering is this right or is this wrong? It's definite defeat of a patriarchal society in which these women are free to make commerce as they please, owing no one but the owner of the joint. But is it really right that this is the only way to make the hundreds of dollars a night? Again, I find myself suspended in midair, my eyesight affixed upon this beautiful body gliding down a pole suspended in midair in the gray.
   When I think about the world and all the tragedy that comes from every sight we see, the news giving us news about how we're all incomplete and the only remedy is to buy their next big thing and how we all must pay attention to the gas that fills our tanks. But the gas really is destroying our environment, not in itself but in its misuse. And in everything we're sold we're all a part of this abuse. It's a never ending cycle but what are we really to do? Once again, we all have found ourselves suspended in midair; we can't seem to escape from the gray.

When I was a kid, our local Kroger on Main Street had a movie rental place built into it. It was in the corner where the new pharmacy is, the one they put in within the last five years.

Looking back, it is amazing how much technology has advanced, just in my lifetime. We used to rent VHS's, and we had to actually take the time to rewind them if we wanted to watch them, or return them politely. They also had to be placed in the case to where each "film hole" matched up with the little, circular plastic prongs meant to hold the tape into place. Remember that, when we used to watch "tapes". I am a mere 24 years old, and that alone takes me back to the "90's, the times of Buffy The Vampire Slayer which was one of dad's favorites. We used to rent and watch that "tape" all the time.

I also remember us owing the local Blockbuster tons of late fees over, "Gattaca". Eventually, in an effort to keep up with the then newly-installed and now already vanquished Hollywood Video, they offered late fee forgiveness if we simply bought the VHS for ten or fifteen bucks. We ended up paying like$30 and keeping several different titles.

Thinking about the, "Be Kind, Please Rewind" slogan reminds me to think back to my childhood, to remember those themes which will become the chapters of my young life when I am older. Those little nostalgias will bring warmth in my old age when my parents and pets of my youth have aged and gone, when friends have moved away, their children coming of the age we were when technology advanced to levels that made us feel like children of the Stone Age.

I am youthful yet, but as I see my peers age around me, high school friends and neighbors having children of their own putting into perspective for me that human mortality is awaiting us all, I realize that this is life. What is going on all around me is life. Life isn't a television set or a VHS tape, playing for us the scenes of our lives as hours, days months and years pass and fade away. Life is a verb. As another saying of the 90's pronounced, "Verb... it's what you do!" Life is to be lived, it is what we do. Too often we forget life is not only a noun, but a verb. Its cousin, "live" beckons us to not fear the scattering sands of time, but to go out, letting go of inhibition and let our hearts take us where we want, need and yearn to go.

This youthful inflection is a part of the transition into adult life. It is scary, it makes us feel as though we are letting go of a part of us we wish not yet to let go. But, alas... We must be kind to ourselves, and let the memories serve as a reminder of time served in adolescent purgatory, times of inadequacy, self-discovery. Of first, second and even third loves. Of numbness allowing us to think back on it all, evaluate and distinguish love from lust, "something more's" from "good friendship, nothing more", and even sometimes people whose only purpose in life was to teach us a lesson on how to not be treated, or from whom to stay away. These moments of growth are vital in growth for rendering healthy future relationships.  At this point in life, we can feel lucky to have known one good and true love at all.

It is important to lol back on happy family memories, as in the end family is all we have. We have family who stay family, family who go astray and friends who become family. Remembering the memories is part of looking towards the future.

In this day and age, we no longer have to "rewind", so it is important to take the time to do so. For it is in those moments that life is remembered, relived and future moments of life are born.

Trepidation, it seems to be my mission to be incapable of making a decision. I wish that I could get up and go instead of sitting around, be productive and envision. Envisioning one’s future is not enough. I wish I could get rid of this fear, the fear of actualization. It seems I am terrified of being able to provide for myself, to commit to anything. I have a fear of self-commitment, it seems to me that to a degree I live in fear of accomplishing my dreams.
    It’s hard to figure myself out, why I live inside myself, beside myself while muting the thoughts that try to escape through a gaping hole, not whole within myself. All day, I think of these great things I could say, and yet I sit and debate if anyone around can relate, or if they’d care or stare blankly and think to themselves that I’m crazy. This crazy lady who sits, alone silently in class. Like a timid deer, leering through bushes in a forest. Desperately seeking human interaction, but too afraid of being turned down to reach out and try. I live in constant fear of never being happy. I fear that I will never find my calling in life, that I will hop from job to job, career to career without being near to self-satisfaction, a feeling of inner peace, completion. I wish I could live peacefully within the regulated regime of a god, a god dictated by a group of people who claim to have the answers to all life’s unanswerable questions. '
   I think I may be incapable of living godlessly, a spiritual person who can’t live with the *******. I see it every day all around me, the theory of Christian exclusion, is there therefore an excuse to be a completely unreasonable person and treat others as lesser beings? Can I buy into the cause simply for the membership card? Give my intellect a breather, pretend that I’m not thinking. I can be a useful member of society, as a whole, not individually. It’s much easier this way, allowing independent thinking a little chance to decay, just enough to dismiss the bits of dismay that creep in when I find the world around me lacking in substance. When I catch myself being too self-critical, or critical of others as it sometimes turns out to be.
    I have a million endless, ceasing thoughts inside of me that I struggle to put into an assembly line, to assess the individual pieces and construct a completed, productive product that is my ability to function, happily in society. Should I consume the soma? Or should I let the unbearable sensations of the modern worldEe overwhelm me? Can I disregard the rest of the baseless rhetoric, the pathetic excuse for being a better person? “Because god told me so” I believe was the church nursery rhyme, repeated systematically like a cultish chant, a bedtime prayer said before hypnopaedic sleep. Can I find a brave new world if I simply give into the system? Give into the never-ending spiritual conquest of the intellectually-tormented mind? It all, you see builds up inside of me, all these restless thoughts and feelings of inadequacy. ‘I don’t take myself seriously. Or maybe I take myself too seriously. I don’t know. It’s time for sleep.

How do you know if you're bipolar?
How do you know it's not in your head?
Is there a way to determine if you have a medical condition, when you're not sure if you actually lack something chemically in your head?
What if the power of suggestion were all that were real?
Would that still merit a prescription to heal?
How the hell do I know if I'm well or not?
Can you pop open my head and perform a chemical analysis?
I'm a control freak, but I play along well.
I hide my feelings until there's an uproar, a deafening swell.
It all stays locked up inside, to make everyone else okay.
Inside of me there's a diva, and it's an everyday battle to keep her at bay.
So, what is the answer to this question that I have? Why can't they tell me yes or no, so at least I'll know if I'm making it all up or have the real deal.
Who can tell me? Can anyone? Because I truly have no real reason to be upset, or at least that's what they say. There's simply an unhappiness that rests deep within me, and it makes it hard for me to live a normal life.
I would love to go to work and get on with it with the rest of the world.
But there's is, nonetheless, a part of me that almost seems as if it wants me to be unhappy, because life isn't supposed to be happy, don't you see?
It's supposed to be difficult, to be a tumultuous uphill fight. Isn't that right? Perhaps I'm not getting my money's worth if I don't have an ongoing, real-world plight.
If not, then why is it so hard for me to Be happy? Why is it to difficult for me to be at ease? Perhaps I simply want the medication, to stand upright and shout, "see!? There IS something wrong with me!"

There's a cat in the rafters. I really want to get him out. I heard a meow from the closet and it wasn't one of mine. I am entirely compelled to draw him down, as I can hear the commotion from the aluminum vents, but I know it would only cause disturbance to our own  two pets.
    This is really killing me, like a dog watching a squirrel from under a tree, I have never passed up a chance to grab a cat, like a gambler who's never passed up a bet. I could easily get him down, cats come to me. I could lure him with the birdie and drive him to the SPCA where he'd find himself a cozy, insulated lock slot for the night. But, on the other hand there may be some poor boy or girl attempting to coax their precious pet as I was not too long ago.
    There, I've put in my ear plugs and made sure the closet door is shut. I sure hope the poor, little feller finds his way out!

Last night, I dreamt I went where people go when they die. I saw Jimi Hendrix, Kurt Cobain and asked if Jesus ever came. It was amazing, all the people that were there. There were many faces I couldn't see, a plethora of souls Earth has ever seen.
The scene was like a cruise ship, or so it seemed. There were many different rooms, all full to the brim with these beings. I wanted to talk with each of them, I wanted to know their stories. But, unfortunately I had to  be up for a class at 7:30.
That unconscious internal clock that keeps me on schedule, it alerted me that my time was nearly up in this vessel. I pled meagerly with myself, "please, let's just miss class this one day! I really think this is magical, spiritual. I don't want to go away!" But, alas the other world was calling me, to return to the "other" me. I had no choice but to succumb to adult responsibility, to will myself to wake up and face the music on the other side of the dream.

She doesn't pay compliments, nor does she pay rent.
She comes and goes freely, just as she pleases and generally doesn't clean up after herself. But she raised a good man, and for that I can't be too harsh.

She isn't very social, nor does she like to be touched, or hugged.
She is extremely homophobic and against same-*** marriage, although she's had 4 failed marriages. She thinks it's okay to marry a man half her age to make him legal to work for her, but not okay for two people who love each other with the same anatomy to do the same. But she raised a good man, and for that I can't be too harsh.

She lost her job a few years back, she lost her house about a year ago. She went to nursing school although she should've been retired, and she bought a $500 dog although she was broke. But she and I get along okay. Due to her domineering personality, I have to usually stay inside myself and not speak my mind to avoid stupid conflicts between a modern-age woman and a woman who wished she'd have been a small-town housewife.

She took her son to find a ring for me, and although I know she's against marriage, she must see some of what he sees. I pride myself in being tolerant and I think that goes a long way with us. So much has changed in the six years since we first met, and I know she, more than both of us wished she had had it turn out much differently. I guess she probably has to swallow a lot of what little pride she has left. She is probably more uncomfortable than I've ever been.

She is a hard-headed, impossibly independent, civil-issue intolerant and socially deficient 62-year-old Woman who leaves her dishes lying about and who has several times let my indoor-only cat out. But she raised a good man, and for that I can't be too harsh and must always be in her debt.

The end.

It is the mark of adulthood, I have seen to become accustomed to a regulatory feeling of emotional abandonment. Having less friends, unsure about work or college, having less and less in common with the current generation of degenerates.
Don't get me wrong, we're all degenerates. We have become a race of caustic destroyers of all things good.
We **** each other for fun, we watch others' suffering for entertainment. We ignore the world's crumbling state, and yet turn our faces against it. Yet, things are worsening, and I feel the younger folk are becoming more accustomed to the horrors that are becoming the New World Order.
   The world around me seems to have become pointless, hustles and bustles only for a bottom line. Fake, fabricated happiness, plastic smiles on everyone's face. Solitude is my enemy, and yet it has formed a cloak of comfortability all around me.
I suppose I have nothing left to say. I'll try to remain positive, for today is supposedly a good day.

She slowly awakened, as if from a dream. On a small two-person boat, she was perplexed at how she had gotten there. She saw ahead the accumulation of storm clouds, and the confusion quickly turned into panic. Then, she heard from behind her, “You have woken up”.

   She turned around, almost as if when in a dream, and one is afraid of opening their eyes to the horror their own mind has created. When she was turned fully around, she saw a tribal-looking man, with stripes down both sides of his face with what appeared to be ash and an adhesive liquid of some sort. “You might be a little hungry”, the man said and handed over some bacon and a banana. She still did not speak, for she knew not what she would say if she did. She was hungry, so she ate the bacon and banana, both going down rather quickly as neither is very massive in size. He then handed her a canister which she assumed was water, and she drank from it.
He looked at her with a smirk of inquisitive anticipation.

    “You probably are wondering where you are, and who I am”. She shook her head yes. At this point in time, she was honestly not altogether sure her vocal chords would work, and she did not feel the desire to speak. So, she simply shook her head and at the same time relaxed her tense shoulder muscles.

   “Well, I am not going to tell you who I am. I am simply here to help you. Your guide, if you will.” She then suddenly was struck with the desire to speak. “How did I get here, because I really have no idea. I am actually quite confused and worried at the moment. I just remember lying down after going to eat with my boyfriend. I have been exhausted for days, in the mourning process. My favorite pet, my best friend passed away and I just have not been able to sleep. We buried him this morning, which was an ordeal which took all my energy away for today. We ate, came home and I lied down. I am really quite perplexed right now. Are we even in Ohio anymore?”
   The man just sat, with his almond-shaped eyes looking at her with an intent stare. He really did not look very modern-day, and yet he did not really look like a hobo, either. He was just wearing some men’s length shorts, no shirt. It was a pleasant temperature outside, probably around 70 degrees. She usually was cold in moderate weather, and she felt fine. However, she heard the distant rumble of thunder, which worried her.

   “We aren’t really anywhere. We are in a quiet, still place, a place where you need to be right now.” She was not sure what he meant, and she was becoming a bit irritated with this man’s vague way of handing her situation.

   “Well, I would really like to get back home. If you could take me somewhere where I could do that, it would be greatly appreciated. I’m sure my boyfriend is really worried about me. Does he know where I am, do you know?”

   The man kept looking at her. She began noticing a strange, orange hue in his almond-shaped eyes, a look that seemed familiar to her, although the look is not very common amongst men. It was almost like in werewolf movies when the man is turning, only a much, much more subtle coloration.

   “We are almost there. It will only be a few more minutes”, he said. She was becoming very frustrated, and moreso scared.

   “Really, we should not be out here, look at the sky. It is turning a rather bothersome shade of gray. And I hear the thunder. Warmth and storms are not a good thing. It means there may be a tornado, two different fronts colliding. I am serious, if you do not take this boat to shore, I will…”

   The man then stood up abruptly, almost with the agility of a cat. There was a very distinguishable spring in his step, and she wondered if he maybe had been an athlete. His eyes had become even more slanted now, and were a bit scary, almost like a gray alien, which terrified her to no end. His bald head shone in the light of what little sun came from the slits in the gray matter in the sky. He did not really look black, or white. He didn’t really look oriental or Hispanic, either. Honestly, if there were a color between green and black, a color that no one maybe had ever seen in a human being before, it would have been the color of his skin. Almost like a marble cake, with it all swirled almost entirely together, leaving only a very fine line to tell it was, indeed marble cake.

   “No, we are not going to shore. This is very important. I am sorry I cannot tell you, but a man cannot know where he is going when he is headed toward something unknown, something he has never seen before. For how could he? He has never seen. If I were to try to tell you without you seeing it with your own eyes, you may think you had gone mad and jump overboard. Not that you would drown, as this water is not more than twenty feet deep. But, there is indeed a pretty nasty storm coming, so doing so would not be in your best interest. Please, sit down and trust me. This is for you. You will soon understand. I am your friend…”

   The girl now felt in a bit of a panic. She seriously began to think she had been kidnapped by some crazy person, and she frantically dug through her pockets, trying to locate a phone she should have had with her…
   No phone. No idea where she was going, or where she was for that matter. Just that she was on a boat with a complete stranger, who was beginning to seem more familiar, and yet more odd and foreign by the minute. She could not have been more startled, nor dumbfounded.
Finally, a large ripping sound could be heard from the heavens, and rain began to pour down on them. She saw just ahead what looked like a formation growing in the water. But what could it be? A formation, in the water. It did not look like creature, but more like a hurricane. But a hurricane? On a lake, with a mere 20 foot depth? No way in hell that was even possible! She turned to the man, rain and hair streaking her face until all around her had become a mere blur of color and shape.
“What the hell is that?!” she screamed. She was beginning to shiver, partly from cold and partly from sheer terror. She looked at the man, and he actually looked like he was trying not to completely lose it, like a POW enduring water boarding to protect the secrets of his country. His almond-shaped eyes looked enraged. If she had to guess, she would have said he looked as if he had never touched water before, but tried to avoid it altogether his whole life.

   “No, it’s not a hurricane. It is something you will have to experience. I cannot explain it to you.”

   “Will it hurt me?”

   “No… it will show you…”

   She turned around then, and before she knew it they had entered into the gigantic formation of dark gray matter. She then felt a strange dizziness come over her, and then a sudden, almost unbearable burst of happiness and sadness, all at the same time. It was like a gigantic burden had burst from her chest, and she could finally rest in peace. She then looked over at the man… and she couldn’t believe her eyes.
To her, what her eyes wanted her to believe was that the man at this time, had turned into what appeared to be a cat, a tabby cat! The stripes of gray and black on his face had grown into fur of the same color, all over his face, like a Chia Pet on super speed. His eyes had become a very intense shade of yellowish orange, and his mouth looked tighter, puffier and had a few goatee hairs that seemed longer than the rest. His whole body, arms, legs, face… it all had taken a cat-like appearance. She felt as if he had to have been dreaming. But the rain, the wind, the “hurricane”… it all seemed so real. SO very real.


   “My name is Mr. Gingist, and I have brought you here to show you that I am okay. You do not understand it now, but when you do, it will all fit together perfectly. You can rest now. I am.”

This year, our first year of being engaged. We drank some, we laughed some, But mostly we worked hard. The ball dropped, we kissed and began our last year together before we're to be married. We were only engaged starting November in this, so the excitement is still fresh!

What's it like to have OCD?
   Did I count the times I shut the door? One, two, or three?
What's it like to have OCD?
   I read my school assignment a few times too many, just to guarantee.
What's it like to have OCD?
   Every night, I leave my fiance in bed for a while, so I can walk around and check everything; are both doors locked? Is the Dawn where it's supposed to be? Is the sponge correctly aligned? One... two... three

There are words in my mind that won’t let me go.
They strangle me, inhibit my ability to think and steal away my control.
The longer they stay inside, the deeper I hide within myself, unable to seep through to what I want to say and do.

   There are words in my mind that won’t let me go.
They strangle me, inhibit my ability to think and steal away my control.
These words are the words I read, write and verbalize at school. They get stuck in me when I leave to go home, and suppress the words I need to express what I’m feeling to those around me that I love.

   There are words in my mind that won’t let me go.
They strangle me, inhibit my ability to think and steal away my control.
They are the words I cannot say to the people around me who impose, who won’t leave because they’ve no place else to go. If I say these words, bad things happen, turbulence starts up and ends in me apologizing to keep the peace.

   There are words in my mind that I need to let out.
They will strangle me, inhibit my ability to think and steal away my control if I don’t.
I will scream them into my pillow, or write in a journal if I have to.
They will be let out.

The boy fell asleep again today. As usual, without warning he fell to the floor. When his eyes opened back up, he was hiding in a closet as a train whizzed by just inches away. From below, he was able to see all the way down into the space between two cliffs. It could've startled him, but it didn't.
   When he woke up again, he climbed out of the closet and ran outdoors. He and his brother had both been involved, and as he ran into his father's worried arms he was told this time, it'd been for days. His father picked him up in his arms. As he did, the boy whispered in his ear, "daddy, I'm a girl inside." After a moment's pause, he asked if he still loved him, to which his dad replied "of course I do." The boy fell asleep again.
   This time, he dreamt he was in Salem during the time of the witch trials. In a cabin conference room full of angry women he opened his eyes and instantly knew he was in for trouble. As they began to crowd around, he unintentionally began to float in he air. This time a woman, his levitation brought the shouts from all around, "WITCH! WITCH! BURN HER AT THE STAKE!" Luckily, he awoke just in time.
   Each time he goes out, he asks how long it was for. Usually it's only a few minutes, maybe an hour or so. But sometimes, it's for days and these times are the worst. The longer, the scarier. The more he misses.
   The last time he went out, he was on an all- girl's bus and one of the girls in-particular showed interest in him. She has very short blonde hair and dressed in all black. She scared him because she was so quiet and frightened everyone else. Someone had told him she'd once nearly drowned and when she came back up, she was so brain-dead she was practically a vegetable. He didn't know if all the was true, but she just sat there, quietly and looked at him most days.
   Their bus was taking a trip through the mountains and at times it was scary. They were so very high up and there were places they could fall hundreds of feet to their deaths. Every so often, the girl would look over and look anxiously at him. This made him so nervous he tried to get as far away from her as he could. But, no matter how far away, there she always was. The trip seemed to last for days until finally they arrived. At that very instant, the boy woke up with a shock. He didn't recognize a thing but his family on the couch. When he asked how long he was out, his mother hesitated a moment before saying softly and nervously, "you're 18 now..." When the boy last woke he was 12, and this revelation terrified him. "Why, I may have less than 100 waking moments left in my life!" The fact that he could go out whenever, without warning scared him most. He, like the ******* the bus lived his life as a ghost. But his situation was in a way not much different than all of ours. We never know when we may go. Life is but a dream.

Before we were friends
Got along just fine
then before we knew it, **** got out of line
**** got real there for a minute, **** got real there for a minute
I was deep in love with the man you raised
So I thought what the hell, this'll be fine for now
**** got real there for a minute, **** got real there for a minute
Before we knew it, three years had passed
You still lived with us, and I was losing my mind
**** got real there for a minute, **** got real there for a minute
It was like my whole world was upside down
I didn't feel at home in my own home
**** got real there for a minute, **** got real there for a minute
Sometimes I don't know what to do here, should I say to get the hell out, or should I sit and bear it?
**** got real there fora  minute, **** got real there for a minute
Three years went by and you still lived with us, three people, two beds and one bath; three big personalities, two from the same family
**** got real there for a minute, **** got real there for a minute
You finally got a job, we're getting married and saving for a house
I don't know how happy I'll be once you finally move out!
**** got real there for a minute, **** got real there for a minute
I just hope that once this is all over, we'll all go back to being calm, cool and I'll be more rationale
**** will hopefully be more real then, a reality I can live with.
'Cause **** sure has been real for a good minute.

How does one fight starch negativity? Abrasion so callous it digs in deeply, without even intending to be so cruel? How does one make do with feeling uncomfortable in their own shoes? Afraid to stand still and afraid to move? How does one interpret indifference when effort has been put forth to gain love and respect? Sometimes, one deals by succumbing to it. It doesn't happen easily, it takes a good amount of time, usually. It starts when hopelessness begins to make its home in the gut, with a never-ending clip of cold-shouldered numbness every time one comes home. The darkness is much easier to live in than the light. The anger, the brooding sense of needing approval, once light and sweet now become sour and incomplete, because a complete anger is not possible in some. It's abnormal behavior, and it takes much pain and suffering to be won. It's trying to fight for your sanity and dear life on a daily basis, trying to not make others feel unwelcome, yet wanting it to be known that dissatisfaction has come to call your soul home. One can go on and on and on and on. The same words trying to convey the same sense of hellish hopelessness, a soul and ego resorting to the painful notch of anti-tranquility that creeps into the head, right into the stress and joy centers. Can I have the man and not the mother? Soon, she will move and once again I'll be able to be another, the original, non-convoluted, full of kindness and warmth once again. Soon, the mother will move out and I will marry the man.

Look, lady. I'll give you credit for one thing, and one thing only. You raiesd a helluva good man. Other than that, what the hell have you done lately? You haven't worked a job in over four years. You've lived with us for nearly two, and yet, when I ask you to do something around the house I get the equivalent of "*******."

I always clean up after your ***** ***, load the dishwasher and clean up after the cats. I vacuumed your bedroom when you were gone for months, and when I ask you to do one thing, you reply "why do you always ask me to do things? You're not my mother. Why don't you go vacuum my bedroom?" If I weren't marrying your son, good god...

It really is no surprise to me you've gone through five husbands in 62 years. Given, two of them were abusive, but you've said yourself you gave up a few good ones because they didn't "meet your standards." So, I suppose since no more 20-year-old mexicans want to marry your trifling *** for citizenship, you're just going to *** it out with us.

The irony is, I DID vacuum your bedroom regularly back when you stayed at your daughter's for months on end. **** if that'll ever happen again.

I'd give you credit for more if you deserved it, but you're snide and rude although you put on a good rouse, and for that you get credit for one thing, and one  thing only. The man who is 1/2 of the children who still give a **** about you. I know the other two kids are pieces of **** and you have good reason for not speaking with them, but let's face it. You'd have found a reason to disassociate with them regardless.

So, continue not showing me any affection, no touches, hugs or any form of love a future in-law should give. You're a miserable *******, and my relationship with your son is the only reason I put up with it.

That feeling I get when I obscure what's true, that feeling is you.

When I feel the impulse I know is the death of me, the draw towards destruction, that feeling is you.

When I think back to back then, when I didn't know what was good for me, when I didn't know what a real man was; when a distant, guitar- clad look and an aim to go nowhere was a teenage libido driven by a fantasy.

So much has changed since them, about eight years gone by. When you first began manipulating me, I felt like I would die. The giver I was, undisciplined in self-worth and chasing after a lost, broken boy. I gave you my affection and attention, which you in-turn treated as a toy.

I don't blame you altogether for it, I don't think you loved yourself either. I think you saw a source of physical completion, a misdirected ****** force.

Neither of us really cared about one another, it was just an silly high school thing. Your depression became my project, and I became a useful thing.

We don't talk anymore, we may be friends on social media, I'm not even sure. But when I think back to carelessness, face-value affection and the time in my life when I lost myself in a bad thing, there is one thing I can undeniably conclude.

That feeling was you.

I often find it puzzling when my 28-year-old sister displays her total lack of adult feeling. In her adult years she never has shown an ability to feel what my parents were feeling as they took care of her 100% financially.
    She was mentally ill from a very young age, a spectacle for the neighborhood kids to see as she took the smallest things to heart and didn't care much for friends to play with. Once old enough to have a job, she had no interest in having a job. And not in the usual immature teen kind of way, but a more deeply-rooted, adult fear of work and adult responsibility type of way.
    Now 28, still living at home and jobless she attends the local community college where she is afraid to check her grades because having no job or responsibilities does not allot her the ability to firmly grasp all A's. I was not always so highly critical of her. To the contrary, my whole family was made to think she was some mysterious *** of gold we all had to treat as if there was nothing peculiar and all her outlandish antics were okay.
   Indeed, I'd have no problem with her if she could only hold a ******* job, or do like I am and get on FAFSA and find a loving, kind-hearted man to support her while she goes to school. A man for whom she'll clean up after, do his ***** laundry and fulfill all domestic obligations in-part or entirely until she graduates an honors student and finds a career she can be proud of. But no, instead she found an abusive boyfriend who was himself mentally Ill, as arguably anyone would have to be to want to get with her, and after a fight she broke her cello and now my parents are paying for it. My dad, who has been for several years saving up for something nice for himself, who is now committed to paying for my wedding, who has been ignoring my emails inquiring about money to start buying little reception things, willingly or unwillingly. My mother, who barely makes anything as a public school teacher. Who both help support my uncle who is also living there now.
   *******, the hardship of my mental life has been to be angry at these people, the sweetest of the sweet for continually allowing her to suckle their metaphorical ***** for 10 years too long. The enabling has put me into a mental twist and I have become obsessed with it because I was down in it for so long. I guess all families have that one person, but few too my personal knowledge have one like this. Sometimes, I wish one of her suicide attempts had been successful, but then my parents would be enthralled in pain and anguish for something that may have been different, but probably never will. It is just like how it is better to have loved and lost, than to never have loved at all. If she'd never been born, maybe they'd been happier. Or maybe she'd have been born a different person. But now they have her, and they can't go back.
   She'll probably wind up homeless once my parents are gone. We've both agreed we can't take her on...
   This all might make me seem like the bad guy, but you wouldn't know unless you spent a day in the life.

It bothers me that I think. I think always, about everything. When others walk about, chatting happily away, I sit in the corner, thinking of something "good" I could say. Instead of going on cheerily, I am forced to think. And this bothers me.
It worries me that I think. Thinking, for me tends to lead into worry. I think about the world around me. I try not to imagine all the pain and suffering. The children beaten for no reason, animals slaughtered for a spot on the dollar menu.  All these things sink deeply Into me, but instead of giving in I fight to keep sanity. And somehow, even in this I find an "appropriate" degree in which to worry.
    I think I have begun to judge too much. When I see people behaving stupidly, it annoys me more than it should, so it seems. I used to be much more relaxed and carefree. It didn't much matter to me when I'd observe this, our culture of idiocy. But now, as I have begun to reflect on it more, I have come to see people as much of a bore. And this has shut me down socially. I have become too judgmental, both internally and externally.
    As I read my books, I feel more at ease. Though I miss companionship, I somehow manage to do without. I think I may be depressed, at least bogged down with anxiety. But that's just who I am, who I will likely always be.
    The unrelenting worry-wart, I am my own lawyer, I take my case to court. And there I will stand trial against the id and ego in me, the two sides that make up each and every cognizant human being. I will review the evidence, hear testimony and be judged by a panel of my peers. They will dissect all past and present intellectual transgressions, and see where I go too far. They will objectify and analyze what I do and how I perceive. Then, the gavel will sound off and I will hear rite verdict of my plea. Although I don't know what the end will be, I know I will never allow myself to think to any lesser a degree.

One woman's unfaithfulness can be another woman's wedded bliss. I'm living proof of this.

When you get what you want, it's not always so sweet. When you've been waiting on it forever and it feels like you must compete. After awhile, it gets old and your efforts begin to wane. Before too long, indifference takes over and you can't distinguish apathy from pain. I, too once felt the wait extenuated and it hurt because I didn't know why. It took 5 1/2 years for my first installment of my "Special Day" to arrive. Take heed, young maiden for once it happens, it won't  come yet again. Once he takes that knee, if you don't agree your fair fellow's love may end. But, if you're anything like me and you'd been waiting for a long time, when the ring comes out and you sense a hint of trickery, don't doubt. For sometimes, you do indeed get what you want and all is well. Ah, sweet love! It could be heaven, or it could be hell!

Well hi there, I need a mole removal. I'd do it myself but I need biopsy approval. If it 'a cancerous, I'd like to know. And for this reason, to the dermatologist I'll go.
  Well hi, there, I see you're in-network. A $50 copay? Sure, that'll work. What's that? Later in you're going to charge me a $150 new-patient fee? But, why? I was only in here for maybe twenty minutes. Am I now being charged rent to sit my *** on your medical chair?
   So now I'll wait for the bill to arrive. Oh, look. It's here... Wonder what it'll be?
$298!? What the hell could've cost so much? All you did was inject me with some sedative, bring in something comparable to a box opener and lop it off. The whole thing, in-room with me took you just about less than 15...
   Oh, and look... It looks like my insurance did pay more than half. It cost nearly $800 for the whole thing. What the crap?!
  Oh, I suppose our country is trying to work out the kinks. And for all my troubles, I guess I'll be finalizing my account for mostly, if not all free. Once the financial assistance department decides to stop giving me the run-around. Next time, I suppose I'll need to inspect further. Just because the office is down the street does NOT necessarily mean it's going to end up being cheaper. Because if I'd have known maybe $10 in gas would have saved me all this trouble, I would not have gone to what is technically classified as a "hospital."