September: Curiously, Courageously
Thoughts on not wanting to get hit by a bus as much anymore! Can I post that?
This will bore you. I gather most people feel that for the most part, suffering is boring.
At the very least, I can promise you: This is the tail-end of mine.
‘Enjoy Cold’ is written on the side of my blueberry Topo Chico. I saw it on a shelf and overheard a boy’s “okay, gross!” So I bought it promptly on a silent, one-sided dare.
I don’t like demands. That checks out; apparently I have an ‘Aries stellium.’ If given an order and if possible, I’ll often try a roundabout way — if not the exact opposite. I’m not necessarily proud of this trait, but it does keep me alive out of pure spite when nothing else more gentle works.
The drink is now warm as I sip. It is awful.
The flavor is unnatural and the carbonation seems amplified in the heat, stinging my nose. Not all experiments prove fruitful. But I’m very tired, and thirsty, and my muscles have lost what little mass they gained in Spring from too much rest.
Too much and never enough.
It does jumpstart the journey out of my bed, though.
I’m able to reach and grab the jar of chopped walnuts and dried berries I keep on the bedside. I shove a couple feral fistfuls in my mouth — and cringe at remembering the presence of the invisible cameras around me, but quick and easy access to protein and fiber is vital for any hopes of movement from my designated rot pocket.
But I soon realize, I still can’t go outside today.
Look, it’s not my fault this time! The past month or so my yard has been witnessed in full view by a crew of construction workers, who I mistakenly gave the benefit-of-the-doubt once already, as I do, and was greeted to a morning air of jeers and lewd comments (never subtle as they think they are) as I laid out in the sun. Fully clothed.
I take my vitamin D in pill form for now, circadian rhythm be damned.
I’d normally exercise some empathy here and wax poetic about the genuine woes of manual laborers and the suffocating grip of white supremacist capitalist patriarchy on all of our mind and souls, but at last — at the ripe age of 30, it appears I no longer have a shred of patience left for willfully stunted men.
After all, the government is about to shut down due to republican fuckery, it’s over 110 degrees in Los Angeles, most of my friends have some combination of anxiety and depression of equal measure to my own, and I’ve already lost my usual haunts and creative resources, my foundational artistic community. Now I’m feeling coerced into giving over existing in my own fucking backyard.
Yeah, nope. Too tired to not-all-men today.
Sure, it’s temporary, and the rebellious streak in me that won’t take orders and drinks a whole can of nasty soda water for the sake of committing to the bit is still alive somewhere in there, clearly. I could just grin and bear it.
But there is the matter of me being a woman living alone.
I’ve surprised myself in rekindling a desire to “continue the experiment,” if you will, so I don’t really want to gamble with it. I even wear a seatbelt now.
Mortality aside, evening strolls to move in the trashcans and take in sunsets over the neighborhood (after the crew retires for the day) have helped a bit with the agoraphobia.
I still shudder at the sound of approaching footsteps turning the corners, but slowly and shakily build up resilience by refusing to obey my body’s excruciating urge to run.
I do this so I see, time and again: there is nothing to fear.
In standing my ground the body with its nerves are reminded - it’s just that one couple walking their scrappy terrier mutt. He’s sweet, sneaking in a lick of my calf as they pass. It’s always only them, or another pushing a stroller, or jogging after dinner. Or meeting with friends to walk down to Douglas. An evening mix of original families and we the gentrifiers, all strolling along our patch of the cosmic joke on this glorious, gut-wrenching stretch of life. It’s short, but it’s ours.
Woah. I soften. That thought made me feel safe.
I get home and despite my efforts, cry. Again. Which is humiliating (see: invisible cameras). But I believe the message is starting to become more ingrained each time. I can’t feel it yet, but science is on my side — and so we persist.
I might make it, I dare think. There’s still a chance this isn’t all of who I am. Maybe, one day, I could walk into feeling like being somebody real again.
It’s in whispering to myself ten times an hour: “There is nothing to fear. You can be curious, walk a little further each day.”
Sometimes I don’t, but that’s the idea.