11:05 p.m. - 01/07/03
connection.
I have to be up early for my regular doc appt tomorrow, and I don't even care that I'm at least an hour's wind-down away from sleep. I think if something dropped on my muscles right now, it would shatter, despite the consistency. I think glue would shatter on my tenseness. Oh, I do.
Despite this, things are better. I don't know how he did it (and yes, I assume he did it; I certainly had no concept it was happening) but the doctor has managed to convince me, at least slightly, that connecting to the Internet does not make me inherently evil (or evil otherwise.) And indeed, it's becoming a saving grace again. Actually, I think it's becoming a saving grace for the first time, as before, the loveliness became distorted through my dependence on it. It was the only outlet I had for emotion, and what I really needed to be communicating was more desperate, more urgent. Now, being on-line seems more like a source of what I was saying I wasn't getting before: silly, "normal" (by which I mean non-sick) conversation. I mean, I've been talking tonight about fairies and revolutions, bullies and violence, prejudice and music, regions and playwriting. There's something so fabulous in that, so invigorating. I wish it could be this time of night all the time. By now the artificial light seems like a blessing, not a silly alternative to the daylight we had earlier, and there's this magic in knowing my parents are approaching comatose. There's this absolute freedom that comes from knowing I could write right now about wanting to become a trapeze-jumping clown with a raggedy blue mop and a crush on the girl who tames the lions (but really wants to set them free) and they would never know. It's becoming another rift between us: this place. They're loyalty to it feels disloyal to me. Even more so, it feels incomprehensible. How on earth could anyone choose to live here, even when they can drive away at their own will, even when they did *decide* to move? (I didn't decide; I didn't exist then.) I have to start learning practical magic. (ha! Sandra Bullock. never saw it.) I have to learn how to purchase things (a ticket out), maintain things (money, a roof, some walls, some doors, a window, job), and so forth. I have to let myself learn. Just a couple of pills and a couple of risks. A panic attack here or there versus never. leaving. D!@#$%^. No one ever died from panic. I believe this now. I won't believe it when "here or there" becomes "now."
But I can't breathe here either. I should remember that. It's becoming physically difficult to breathe. My heart starts pounding and I feel like, even though I'm breathing, there's no air. That's D!@#$%^: ten million trees and not a spec of oxygen. It's only through my modem and my music I survive. (God-dess-e-s bless Sleater-Kinney. I'm totally hooked on One Beat today.)
I managed to do quite a bit in my last day of freedom (from school, not general freedom, of course.) Part of this included drawing in what I realize is probably far closer to a diary than what I'm keeping in here- as evidenced by the fact that I've never shown it to anyone, and back in the olden days, that's how diaries went. I don't know why I haven't shown it to anyone. Maybe because it's scribbled symbols I'd need to explain. Maybe because it isn't finished. Maybe because secrets nourish me, and when I share it, I want to feel it's absolutely right.
I'm going to look like a total ass if the first person who sees it is Dr. R...but then, I don't really care. It sustains me, and that's all I can ask right now. Enough environmental safety to push the boundaries a bit. I need a few of the more normal weapons. It's so funny, in a way. It's like I already know how to fly, and travel through time, and bring people back to life, but I don't know my times-tables. It's totally random, what I have to learn. Or not random, but apparently lesser. Still...necessary, I suppose. Tomorrow, we might make a list of what situations scare me. And I'm going to anticipate this as- we might make a list. Because oh, lists are good.
I was going to talk about what seems to be the topic of the day- Socially Ingrained Idiocy- but it's been talked about quite a bit, and I really need to start pushing my anxious little self closer to sleep. But oh, the gratitiude. If you are one of the connections, bless you. You're as important as Winter Machine in my day-to-day survival. And if I weren't scared to say it, you'd be more.
chord
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