January 10, 2008
Things I Have Done to Myself
We could all write volumes on this topic.
Around this time of year- days from my birthday and just into the new year- I tend to look at the big picture more often. Reflect on things that had previously slipped by me. I’m noticing that this life has been handcrafted by the choices I’ve made: both the intentional and incidental.
Little voices have, for most of my life, guided me towards these things. Something- whether born from paranoia/fear or innate knowledge- has always said DISAPPEAR. It’s why I severed ties with almost everyone over a period of several years. It’s why I try to stay “off the radar” when it comes to the Vast Machine. (Great phrase from a book I just devoured called The Traveler) It’s why I have been dreaming about leaving the country without telling anyone and dropping off the face of the earth. It feels really important somehow. It was the oddest realization when I was reading. The Corrigan boys had spent their entire life staying “off the grid”, never really knowing why. When one of them fucked up and used his real name and SS… everything became clear.
(Note to self: Mum called here and I spent an hour encouraging her about Alison and her parenting in general. For about the 100th time. I could play her a recording and she wouldn’t remember from one call to the next. Yah, I’m pretty sure not loving my parents makes me a bad person. Then again, their not loving me… eh… nevermind)
I could easily be romanticizing simple paranoid delusions, but I have begun to wonder if this long standing notion to DISAPPEAR is actually based in reality. No idea who might want to find me, but this world is full of people who are pawns, willing to hurt or kill “troublesome” individuals in the name of ideology. Since my ideology is nearly opposite from “the norm”… fuck, I don’t know. I can’t say it without rolling my eyes: I’m on the Red List! The Man is gunna kill me!
But I started this entry with other focuses.
I also realized recently that my intentional lack of connections has had a very sad side affect: I don’t really have anybody mentally stimulating in my life. IRL… and this is both sad and probably a little self-delusional… I’m the smartest person I know. (No eye roll required. Might be untrue, but it doesn’t seem like it.) Questions fly out of my mouth and there is always silence or “gee, I dunno”. I can often get Sean to input a few ideas if I phrase questions like “what if”, but it’s mostly me theorizing alone. The other day this hit me and I was dumbstruck. What if I had surrounded myself with intelligent friends and colleagues instead of choosing solitude? Oh, the endless possibilities that could domino from that! Now every time I ask a question and hear silence… I kind of want to scream. It’s so indicative of how little I actually know, but I feel like the world is, by and large, full of idiots. I’m Luke Wilson in Idiocracy, cept’ I don’t have a sweet jaw and am smarter than his character, too.
I’m suddenly filled with the desire to laugh hysterically until my heart stops. Why does that make me miss Liz so much?