Morning Frustration

 After I first left my job at Ricky’s, I used to go in for coffee so I could write. I was already planning my suicide but it was a safe place to go where I knew I could write in peace. It didnt hurt that I was still getting free coffee from the owner. There was a server who didn’t like the fact that I would take up one of her tables in the corner and not have a full meal so eventually I started going to the local Starbucks to work. 

At Starbucks, I could be left alone and I made sure I was a gold star customer there, entitled to free refills on their coffee and teas. The only drawback with trying to work at Starbucks in this area is that the church crowd comes in for hours at a time each day to congratulate themselves on being born into the correct Christian belief system, as opposed to one of the tens of thousands of other religious systems. One day, I made the mistake of engaging with them and pointing out the holes in their logic to which they were not impressed and explained away my points by saying that you just had to have faith. Leaving quoting George Michael’s most famous song on the table, I resolved to never debate them again and always have headphones with me so that I wouldn’t have to even acknowledge them ever again. It was a peaceful solution which worked for me and if they saw me as a heathen deserving of hellfire, so be it. 

Covid has put a kink in that solution. A place to sit in any of the local Starbucks is a rarity these days and because I rely on transit to get out and about, an anxiety riddled problem in its own right, I could be trapped at a coffee shop without a place to sit and work without my ride home coming for at least an hour. I could ask my mother for rides but at 78 I don’t like bothering her or her aching back unless it’s a necessity. I could also use taxis, Uber or Lyft to get around, but the problem of seating still applies and I could be paying upwards of $20 each way for the privilege of standing with a rapidly cooling coffee and nowhere to get any writing done.

Now, I don’t want you to think that me not having a chance to write is anything more than a first world problem to most people but to me it’s a little more important than that. Writing is often the only time I get out of the house and when you’re a shut in like I am any chance to be comfortable in an environment outside my home is, for lack of a better word, a real blessing. Going beyond that, my writing is also often the best distraction I have away from my mental illnesses. I need to write to keep somewhat sane. NUmerous attempts have been made over the years to write at home without any success: I am uncomfortable trying to do any mental work in the condo to the point where I get nothing done. When I was back in school I could not get any work done at home. If you were a forty-something man living with your seventy-ish mother I doubt you’d ever get totally comfortable trying to accomplish any task which is completely self serving.

So I write when I’m not home.

And that brings us today. I am doing the fruit and veggie shopping today so I stopped at Ricky’s, hoping the staff would leave me alone so I could accomplish something of substance even if it would only be myself who would appreciate it. Two tables away, that distance being welcomed due to social distancing, is a group of three men from one of the three local Christian schools how to organize a prayer group for a COVID stricken household. Putting aside how useless prayer is and how much more help they could be if they just did some practical things like shopping for the household, that means I’m stuck once again next to a group of men whose ideology I find morally repugnant and have to listen to while I am trying to get some creative juices flowing. 

Sitting next to groups like this is not the same as if they were a Christian family. It seems to me, based on my experiences, that once you introduce a woman into the mix the arrogance of men believing they are chosen to be above all other than God herself is tamped down to a background level. A pseudo humility seems to kick in, keeping the conversation at a polite if not secular level. Instead, one of the three men just compared himself to Peter from the Bible. Imagine the arrogance which must exist in a person’s mind to see themselves as equal to a person they see as an actual saint. 

Now I have been accused of being arrogant throughout my life. I am smarter than the average bear and I have known it for all of my existence but no matter what my opinion of myself was, at any particular time, it was never so high that I thought I was better than the majority of the people standing beside me. Drug addicts, most criminals, and especially women and other underrepresented populations in our world were always just another group of people who existed with me in this crazy broken world.Sure, there are criminals (and politicians) whose existence makes me reconsider the idea of non-violence but they are the minority of this world. These men to my left are not like me. They see the world as fallen and themselves and those who agree with them as the only ones worthy of saving. No matter how far I stretch my mind, even if I go back to the days when I too was a believer, I cannot ever remember or consider that the rest of the world was beneath me in that manner. Even now, as I listen to these arrogant men I am unable to see them as anything more than victims of a cult-like belief system which has twisted their morality beyond its breaking point.

So, here I sit frustrated and only able to write about what it is which is bothering me rather than the things I would rather explore. There is the most important election of our time occurring in America in 5 days. There is potentially going to be another Armenian genocide any day now. Roving bands of government “police” are killing random citizens in Nigeria. But I can’t concentrate on those things this morning. Instead, I am forced to listen to three men planning how to cram as many people as possible in their school’s gymnasium for Sunday’s non-socially distanced religious brainwashing session. At a time when even close relatives are being warned against gathering together due to the exploding numbers of infections these men are planning, with a clear conscience, another of their weekly superspreader events. 

Another grumble of laughter comes from the table and I am forced to wonder if they realize they are planning the potential death of one or more of the people they are claiming to care for? Somehow, I doubt it. After all, the afterlife matters more to them than anything which happens on this planet, any situation where they can be tangibly helpful, any outcome which comes from the actions they take or fail to take in this world. I wish they could see the world as I see it: a chance to help people escape suffering in the only life we know we will ever get.

 

Being Nice - A Letter

I'm watching the movie Stakeout and I just realized why something you said tweeked me a little.

There's a scene in the movie where the woman tells the man he's "nice" and it really bugs him, cause he gets it all the time. He compares it being called "medium". 

My whole life I've been called nice, when I've been able to shove down my BPD tendencies at least and it's always kind of bothered me too. You only get so far by being nice. Maybe that's why I like it a little when my BPD takes over from time to time, why it feels good to let loose. 

Anyways, I know you didn't mean anything by it and I'm not upset or anything. It's just that you're the closest thing I have to a therapist in my life right now and I needed to let that out.

Stay warm. Be well.

Musings of a bored, depressed and anxiety filled mind

 October 21,2020

I’m sitting in my old work, Ricky’s, the restaurant that pushed me to make the final decision to end my life eight and half years ago. Sometimes being here is a comfort. After all, I spent twenty years working here so despite all the renovations and staff changeover it is at the very least a reminder of nearly half of my life. On the other hand, it’s also the place that caused me the most stress and anxiety I ever faced in my life. To say that I have mixed feelings about being here is a severe and complex understatement.

But I had to do something and go somewhere. I have been up since 3am this morning was becoming restlessness incarnate. On a normal day when I take my morning medication it knocks me out for at least two hours and often for as long as five but today is a wednesday and it’s the day that the gardeners are on site to mow the lawns and use leafblowers outside my bedroom for ninety minutes or so. If I don’t fall asleep before they begin, then I am stuck awake until after they leave and by that time, my meds have worn off. So here I sit, both comfortable and full of anxiety, trying to quell my palpitating heart by writing about how awkward I feel.

Marcia and Laura are both here, two of the waitresses I used to work with back in the day and they keep coming over to me and trying to chat, to catch up with old times but I’d much rather that they just leave me alone. I can’t ever get any work of substance done here because they keep interrupting me so I write this babbling soliloquy instead. I know they are just trying to be friendly but I have my laptop out and am judiciously tapping away with my fingers. You’d think that one or the other would get the hint. I won’t be rude and tell them to leave me alone. I’ll be happy when this COVID stuff is done with and I can again go back to working at a Starbucks, where they leave me alone to my work. 

I have invited Oscar out for breakfast and will know in a few minutes if he can make it out. I’m not really sure I want to spend any time with him but he’s as susceptible as I am to depression so I thought I’d reach out for a change. He has so much going on in his life right now it’s bound to be a stimulating conversation. Oscar has been diagnosed with an auto immune disease which will eventually take his life and has a baby on the way, a decision no doubt influenced by his currently limited quality of life and the ticking clock following him around each day. 

Sitting where I am I can see the front of the restaurant quite well and a couple just tried to seat themselves and had to be stopped by the hostess. In the middle of a pandemic they chose to ignore all the signs asking them to wait to be seated, sanitize their hands upon entry, and give their phone numbers to the staff, in case contact tracing is necessary. They looked quite annoyed when they were asked to follow the rules. It might just be a Karen and Kevin situation. Wait, and a third person just came in to sit at the same table and she refused to use sanitizer. What hell is wrong with people? I’ve been trying to understand this mentality since the pandemic became apparent and have been unable to figure out a logical point of view which would account for it. Is it willful ignorance? Is it simple lack of intelligence? Or perhaps they are conspiracy believers, that the entire world is out to control them by making them hide their face and nose?

To a certain degree I wish I could believe like they do, Dunning-Kruger effect in full effect and keeping me from understanding how little has been done, how many sick people there are and how much worse it is likely to get before the situation improves. I was recently asked if I preferred, in general, the level of knowledge I have now compared to what I had in the past and I said I’d choose my current level although in the past, ignorance truly was bliss. It’s like my lack of belief in a god. Maybe I’d be better able to deal with my mental illnesses if I believed there was a reason for how I felt and yet I am forced to come to the conclusion that had I never believed I may have asked for help much sooner, leaving me in a much better mental state than I am currently in. But as they say, if wishes were horses…

InValids

In 1997 the movie Gattaca was released. It was the story of two classes of people: those with genetic enhancements and those without. The term for the superior class was Valid while those of natural birth were In-Valids, as in non-valids.

I loved the play on words that was used because the genetically modified class saw the others as below them, not worthy of the equal chances, freedoms, and rights.


I was born a straight white Male into Canada which made me privileged but I was too young in 1997 to understand that fact. Today, 21 years later I have come out as atheist, enough for half the population to see me as less than they. I have also been open about my mental and physical challenges, as my body and mind fight against my wellness. Without even knowing it, at first, I had become marginalized.


I was in-valid.


I live on the love of my mother and assistance from the government. I am now, in actuality, an invalid, no longer able to care for myself. I see so many attempts at positive messages here daily and I try to believe them but whenever I close my eyes I see this image from the movie and find it difficult to escape the fact that they just don’t apply to me.

On courage and love of ones self

All cowardice comes from not loving or not loving well, which is the same thing.

Ernest Hemingway in “Midnight in Paris”





I just purchased a new laptop. It is not a beast of power nor is it a weakling but it will suffice to replace my dying computer which I have had for around seven years. It is on this new tech that I will be trying to begin writing once again. I’m hoping to steal a little creativity from the novelty of having something new, like a child on Christmas morning playing with his new fire engine before it gets thrown into the heap in his closet.




I’m cracking out the old tricks, since my one trick of simply going to a coffee shop to write is unavailable to me at the moment. The coffee I can produce and is tasting fine. I have downloaded Spotify and the sounds of movie, TV and video game soundtracks are coming through my earbuds, instrumental pieces of creativity once again useful to inspire me.




Last night I began the last of my preparation; watching old and favourite films of mine, ones where the dialogue flows like lava, smoothly and free but burning everything it touches. I am a fan of film but more than that I am a lover of clever dialogue. I find myself pulled to the works of Mamet, Sorkin, Hartley, Lynch and, despite his less than moral standing in the world, Woody Allen. Last night I pulled out one of my favourites and indulged in a little Midnight in Paris.




Allen does an amazing job of uniquely voicing each of the characters, especially the albeit fictitious ones of the historical figures he brought back to life. The film, like most of Allen’s work, is about love but that is only the surface layer. It is really about the fear to accept one’s reality, constantly hoping for it to be something better than what it is, in many cases something from the past. There’s nothing wrong with the remembrance and even reverence of the past so long as it doesn’t interfere with one’s ability to embrace the reality of what is around them and make the best of an often not so perfect situation.




And that is likely why the film speaks to me so strongly as my depression often anchors my mind in what once was rather than what is around me. My friendships are mostly shallow, remembrances of events long past even when I am in the same room with the person and I am given the chance to create new memories. I am searching for a replay of what once was good in my life or I look to replace the seemingly unacceptable present with that of the past, whether I was a part of that past or not. Twenty years ago when the swing dance scene erupted, my friend and I threw ourselves into it and found what we thought at the time to be kindred spirits. Sadly, time showed me that the others were embracing the enjoyment of dancing and living in a recreated version of an old reality while I was actually hoping that those old times were going to be recreated once again. That time came and went, leaving me in the literal burned down remnants of my favorite bar in downtown Vancouver. My friend and the other dancers moved on while I continued to remain within and hold on desperately to a reality which no longer existed.




Those few months were as close to loving myself as I ever got. I certainly didn’t love myself in my school days, where being a nerd and a geek got me beat up on a regular basis. In those days, I had to create a level of reality, of arrogance that I was better than those who judged me, that they were merely the unintelligent underlings of whom I was forced to abide until the years of high school were over. I came across as arrogant and superior to those around me. I can’t say I blame people for thinking that. I worked hard at it but I had to because I knew deep down that I hated who I was.




I don’t use the word hate lightly. I wasn’t aware that’s how I felt about myself but looking back it’s the only thing that makes sense. Those days formed the basis of many of the self beliefs which inform my opinion of myself to this day. I was sure of many things which led me to that conclusion. Like the time that a girl I met through friends was throwing herself at me, to the point of giving me a picture of her with her phone number in the back but not Only did I never call her, I never even entertained the thought of calling her. I was so convinced that no one could be romantically interested in me that the thought never crossed my mind. I hated myself so much that the thought of another person loving me back was a completely foreign idea, and this is a thought which twenty five years later still purveys my deepest beliefs about myself. I simply don’t believe that I can be loved, not by another nor myself.




I look back at my life and see how different it would have been had I had the belief of being lovable. I would have trusted people far more often rather than always wondering what their reasoning for being nice to me was. I could have had the chance to do something more with my life than waste it working in restaurants as I am certainly intelligent enough to have taken a serious crack at anything I set my mind to. I just never believed that I could, or deserved to have the things which bring joy to others.




And this is why the quote from the movie moves me so much, for while Hemingway was referring to the love of another person, with me it refers to myself. How much courage could I have had if I’d had just one epiphany when I was younger that I deserved to be loved by myself. I could have called that girl who gave me her number rather than putting it aside as a keepsake. I could have believed that I deserved to go to college. I could have allowed myself to truly understand that the love of my life didn't move away to get away from me and that it truly was just a job she was forced to take.




And I could be sitting here describing how the courage I had to push past my doubts and fears to find a life which was truly fulfilling rather than this near pointless day to day existence I am forced to endure day after day.

10:35 at night, David Mamet and an in demand liquor store

May 9, 2020
10:35pm
On the condo porch




We’re in the middle of a mini heatwave here while California and New York are having snowstorms in the midst of May. The clouds are rolling in just enough to obscure the stars and keep me from truly enjoying the night sky. I have the David Mamet film “State and Main” playing on the screen, desperate for some inspiration to flow through my fingers.




I haven’t written anything in nearly two months and haven’t posted to my blog since the middle of February. I’m not sure if that’s me neglecting the blog or if it means I’m neglecting a piece of myself. I don’t really see my blog as an extension of myself but I do know that if I don’t express myself somehow it builds up and I get emotionally blocked.




(two raccoons just walked down the fenceline, one after the other, skulking along)




Sarah Jessica Parker is talking about how a particular scene wirtten for the film inside the film is the reason she chose to take the part. Her need to fulfill that need within is how I’m feeling right now.




(cars are coming and going as fast as possible into and out of the parkling lot, desperate to catch the liquor store before it closes for the night.)




I’m not really sure that it matters what it is that I write but at the very least, getting to put something on a hard drive and put it out for my one or two readers is as close as I can get to therapy in this time of pandemic and social isolation.




(why do people seem to think that this minimal amount of traffic is an excuse to speed down the road far above the the speed limit)




I can’t afford any one on one therapy, even if it’s online, not that I have the privacy needed for such things here, and group therapy is obviously cancelled. I have to talk with someone, anyone who might understand what it is that I’m going through. It isn’t that I feel lost and alone.




It’s that I am lost and alone and yet due to living with my mother I can’t even be alone in my solitude.




(pine cones are falling sporadically from the trees beside me, hitting branches on their way down)




David Mamet really is the king of foreshadowing. He drops it in little hints and never hits you over the head with them. Yet each flows and sets up the next scene, the next piece of action or conflict. If you’ve never seen “State and Main” I can recommend it, especially if you are a fan of how films are built from the ground up.




This blog post is pointless. I’m just trying to survive and I hope this helps.




(the liquor store has been closed for over a half an hour and people are still pulling up to it, swearing when they realize they are out of luck.)

When Doctors Lose Hope

Doctors aren’t miracle workers. We want them to be and we want, or all too often need, them to be

the source of our hope. Perhaps it’s unfair to put that kind of responsibility upon them but where else

are we supposed to put it. 

I’m lucky enough to have a rheumatologist who actually cares about my wellbeing but today he was

at a loss as to what we should do next. As I am writing this, I am sitting in Starbucks with huge

plaques of psoriasis on both my forearms. I’ve caught the women to either side of me staring at my

arms. My hips are both on fire today, a leftover symptom from when I went outside my comfort zone

and attended a Vancouver Canucks game. Two of my fingers in my right hand are causing me more

trouble than they ever have before. It is clear that my current Taltz regiment is, at the very least,

inadequate and far more likely to be losing its effectiveness all together.

Don’t get me wrong. I know that I am lucky to be living in a country where pharmacare covers the

cost of Taltz in the first place, with each injection costing well over $1500 CDN, and that’s atop the

specialist and general practitioner appointments, as well as the monthly blood tests which are also

covered. However, when all that effort leads to no results it’s difficult to be thankful for very much. 

And perhaps that’s what makes this all so hard, no forward movement. Hell, I don’t think I’m even

holding in one place anymore, instead being dragged backwards no matter how hard I struggle. So

when the doctors are giving up on hope for you it becomes impossible to keep looking forward

because you’re constantly checking over your shoulder for what hellishness is behind you. We will

all face that moment in our lifetime when we have to accept the eventual decline and failure of our

bodies, unless of course something tragic robs you of the ‘opportunity’. I had hoped, in 2012 when I

asked for help, that there was going to be some possibility of forward momentum for the foreseeable

future. That positive outlook lasted at most for two years until I hurt my knee once again and was laid

up, had to stop running and eventually walking.

After that moment, my entire life has been in a backwards direction. I failed my way out of school. I

put back on all my weight. My mental state has been in steady decline, despite the occasional bump

of a good day a couple times a year. My financial situation is about to take a huge turn for the

worse, with my income dropping as much as 40%. I eat and drink because those are the only

reliable things I have in my control which I know will give me an all too short feeling of contentment,

even knowing the incredible guilt I will feel later that day or the next. 

I am alive today not because i fear death but because of what my suicide would do to my mother.

Not even the prospect of finishing and compiling my book is a reason to keep going. Where do I go

from here that isn’t backwards into the mire of loneliness, addiction and utter morbid gluttony?

x