Did you really think it was over? Me too. But as I sit in bed alone, away from the warmth of loving arms (and paws,) I ponder, I think, I dwell, and I remember. Remembering sucks. And what brought on this remembering, pondering, dwelling, thinking and sucking, was a late and sleepless night of sifting through pictures and delving back in time without the muted benefits of a prescription fed brain. But admit it; you've missed me. I know I have.
I feel like I've been living some one else's life for so many years. I'd forgotten what the drugs subdue. I'd forgotten about those pesky sads and feels. Yet somehow, by having myself drugged away for a time, I've found peace. Or so I thought. Well yes. The truth is that things have been going well for "me." Or the "me" that I've been playing at. But still. . . It seems tonight as though I have come back from hiatus and dawned that old skin; the one that never healed properly before, but just set aside to be mended later. Well it's later, and I'm still wounded.
Looking back I see then that I was eager for drugs. I was eager for anything that could numb me. My passion for life had been drowned in a series of misplaced trust and confidence. It's no wonder I wanted to kill myself at times. And it's no wonder too that when suicide proved useless, and things like trust and confidence became futile, there was little else to be done but to shed my self and allow whatever remained to be numbed by whatever kept the social wolves away.
I quit writing music. I didn't know how anyway. I couldn't feel it. Lyrics became forced and cliche. Music had no emotion anymore. It was just noise. Noise I didn't want to hear. Music rarely touched my mind.
I couldn't find the time or energy to go exploring, or hiking. My camera became yet another outdated dead piece of technology that sat in a drawer. It had taken all the pictures I cared to see or think about. In fact, I hardly looked at them anymore, as my computer fell into disrepair. I simply didn't care. Or maybe I didn't have the nerve to continue with them. It seemed as though the spirit of the things had died. And now they were near forgotten relics of some one's life I used to live.
I still wanted. I still had desire. I just couldn't define what I was in want of. I tended to my work, and the yard. I never concerned myself with things beyond those unless pressed. I left myself but one good friend and dared not allow any others. I retreated into my mind more than I had since I was a small child. The world beyond my bones did not concern me. Much of me was locked away. The rest was subdued. I have never been more depressed than the times I've been treated with drugs for depression.
But in all that dismal day-to-day, I found a value in staying busy that I had never seen before. I found stability in it. I've never felt stability before. It's different than feeling stable, or being stable. Feeling stability in one's self for the first time is subtle, and takes time to realize the feeling. For this reason it's unlikely that most people wouldn't recognize the feeling, having probably become accustomed to it at a much younger age than I. But when you're an adult experiencing stability of self for the first time, once you have recognized it enough to look back on it and see it, it is a profound emotion; an empowering emotion. Although it may take, yet again, a lengthy time to reveal, the tools you will have moving forward can change a person's life. Maybe yours.
So I've ditched the pills. They served their purpose in their time and now that time has ended. They taught my brain how to live knuckled down without needing to erupt. And that's a skill I don't plan to forget. But now it's time to un-inprison my wrongfully convicted brain and let it do what it always has, unimpeded and with new conviction. It will never find peace and happiness otherwise. Viva la brain! Viva, Love, Music!
Viva! Hillbilly Flyer
