For some shit's and gigs I popped on here to see my stats. Someone read my blog last month through Facebook. Whoever you are, kudos, because I haven't touched this since April. While I'm here though, I might as well write something instead of stare at the Calculus that I still don't know how to do. I don't know what though.
I keep saying to myself that writing is my outlet, but the weird hypocritical part of that is that I'm not even comfortable enough talking about how I feel on a day to day basis with friends let alone write about it for the whole world to see. It's a strange double-edged sword I've forged for myself. On the one hand I hate keeping everything bottled up, on the other is the crippling fear of someone reading what I write and treating me different because of it. So why write it on a blog? Simple. I feel like if I just write it all in some journal that I'm just bottling it up, just externally. It's still there even if I can't see it. Posted on the internet, it's free to fly, off into the bandwidths of people I will never meet or into the people I see on a daily basis. It's a horrifying thought to be sure, but I'm thinking doing this might just help a little bit. I feel awkward as all hell writing this and knowing I'll click that publish button for all to see, but I guess that's the risk isn't it? Risk the stigma for a benefit of letting it go.
So, where to begin? Well, I'm off the anti-depressants for one thing and haven't taken a sleep-aid in almost a year. That alone is a huge positive in my life, the fact that I overcame my depression and my anxiety to get help and fight back and fix something for a change.
But I don't feel like it.
It's hard to explain. I don't feel depressed anymore. I'm anxious, that's beyond any reasonable doubt and I really don't think that will ever go away. I almost feel... empty, and to a certain extent like the anxiety has filled the void that depression left when I forced its eviction.
I stopped writing here for a moment. Well, more like a few hours. Even writing this I still don't feel like I'm conveying what's going on in my head. Yeah, I have ways to explain how anxiety feels, you know, the whole "being followed by a voice" deal that haunts you and fills your head with lies even if you know they're not true, but I'm at a loss. I don't even know what to tell people when they ask me "if I'm alright" while I'm off somewhere lost in my thoughts. What am I going to say, really? "Well, I feel empty inside and sometimes I wonder if my life is just going to hit a dead end and I'll spend the rest of eternity slamming my head against some brick wall somewhere and by the end I'll figure out the real kicker is that I bought and have been paying for maintenance for that wall myself out of pocket and now I'm bankrupt of all my possessions except for this goddam wall."
That may be one of my favorite sentences I have ever written and its so poorly constructed it hurts me inside, but I digress.
Instead I shrug, say "I'm fine" and get right back to whatever I was doing. Often times I just listen into other people's conversations (some of which I enjoy immensely) or I get into conversations in my own socially awkward way (or often completely normal way) and feign some sort of fulfillment and happiness. You know that song Jack's Lament from The Nightmare Before Christmas? That's how I feel. That I could give all this education and life in Colorado or Texas up and just go off and do whatever the hell I want and then utterly crash and burn with nothing to show for it but a few fleeting stories of where I've been because all of this just feels like the same old song and dance I've been doing since I was fourteen. "If they only understood, I'd give it all up if I only could." And exactly that, I can't give it all up, and no matter how I explain this I can't even get myself to understand it.
And this leads me to feel bored, of all adjectives, around people that I hold near and dear. And you know how that makes me feel? Like a cynical asshole. My therapist calls it "social angst." I don't know what to call it. I want something new, something exciting. I don't want to keep spending my days hanging out at school, doing work (read: math) that I hate, and coming home just to sit and do nothing because getting anywhere is a pain in the ass without a car and a busted bike tire. I'm an adult goddammit, so why can't I live my life yet? Why do I feel so trapped into decisions I don't want to make, trapped into a life I'm being told I have to live in order to be successful, trapped into a goddamn corner with nowhere to turn.
I don't feel alive anymore. That's it. When I was first coming out of my depression I saw the light, I felt it, I was in a moment where I felt free and pure and bursting with life and energy. I had so many places to go, so many things to do, so many people to meet and things to see. I was there. And now that I've had a taste I want more, and I can't seem to find it. My therapist thinks that maybe I outgrew college too soon. Maybe that's the problem. It's not a feeling I want to have, but it's there regardless. I finally grew my wings well behind everyone else, and then I was caged. I don't want to go to some house party on the weekend and watch a whole bunch of random people get drunk over themselves like we started doing almost every other weekend. No, I want to go and actually meet people. I want the open world in front of me. I don't want some boring, crowded college party. I'm weary of nights spent watching movies I don't want to see. I'm sick of plans that fall through. I'm tired of relying on other people, of taking their advice too much to heart, that's how I became an unhappy Math minor. I'm ready to be a pillar for myself. I want to hold up someone else for once, I want to be the one people turn to. And I don't mean that in a way of people asking me what the microeconomics homework is for the next class period (for the record, sick to death of that). I want to be the guy. I want my social anxiety to take a back seat because I'm driving this fucking train, and we're gonna go to hell and back and laugh about it when we return.
People always tell me how like my father I am. Is this its final manifestation? That want to go out in my 20s and just find myself wherever the wind takes me? Do I feel crushed because when I look at that reasonably I know that for me its impossible? Do I feel more crushed because I tell myself that it's impossible? Yes. Yes to all of these things. I list out all of these things I want, all these things I'm sick of, and I'm always brought back down by that reasonable thought of, "but you're here now, and there's not much you can do to change it." I can't quit school. I have to get an internship. I have to make a career. I'm "leading" honors students to make a presentation at the RMHC conference in April. I'm renewing this apartment for another year, I need a job to support that. When I'm in classes I enjoy in school, I'm good at it. I'm half decent at writing. I'm good at policy prescriptions. I know that's where my life should be heading, because I know it'll be successful.
And I want to say "no" so goddam badly. Every time I make the "reasonable choice" it leads me to somewhere I don't wanna be. Sometimes I lie awake at night and try to play out my what if's to see where my decisions would have taken me. Sometimes its better, sometimes its worse. I don't regret my choices, but I want to play them out beforehand sometimes just so I have some idea of where I'm going. I'm a boat at sea, and the waters are choppy.
I don't have much else to write, so I'll end it here. You did it, you're at the end of my stream of consciousness of (almost) everything I've been thinking for the last few weeks. I'm terrified of pushing that publish button, but I know that doing this will somehow be good for me. This is really where I'd like to see how my choices play out before I make them.
I'd just like to find a car, nothing special, a cheap P.O.S. that barely runs for all I care, and take off. I want to find myself driving on mountain roads in the snow, driving parallel to beaches I've never visited, I want to find a cliff overlooking the ocean, spread my arms and scream my lungs out because I'm finally free and off doing something that I've dreamed of. I don't want to just exist here anymore. I just don't know how to do it.
Until next time.
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