Type

It’s been hard, emotionally speaking. Uncomfortable.

Here I am, drinking a frothy concoction, named the Allusive Lucidity, made of gin and aria gin and slow gin, lemon, lavender, egg whites and peach bitters, while sitting at the middle bar at the Pinewood social. I wanted to pound the drink. I’m thirsty, and it’s light and refreshing, and alcoholic, just what I wanted. But expensive, so binge drinking, which is my other aim, has been thwarted, so long as I’m being conscientious of my budget.

I don’t have a job, ya know. And this whole unemployment thing isn’t so bad, I suppose. It’s a blessing in disguise, I keep repeating to myself, hoping the blessing will rear itself sooner than later, but I’m still waiting.

I finish the cocktail with another two gulps.

So much for being budget conscious.

I reflect on the time spent with my therapist. Is it simply indulging my ego? Or it is allowing true healing, by peeling back the layers of my suppressed passed, these repressed memories he validates, and emphasizes subtly, that need air, that need addressing, else they contaminate my present, like they have for years, the root of my anxiety and chronic depression that swings like a pendulum throughout my experience.

My therapist charges one hundred and seventy five dollars, twice a week, four times a month. Anyone can do the math: that is a lot of money. Specifically that is one thousand four hundred dollars a month. Seeing as how I will get paid, if I’m lucky, like I was told, I should at best be receiving three more paychecks of thirteen thousand, seven hundred and fifty dollars on November 15th, December 15th, and January 15th. I also must save approximately thirty thousand dollars for taxes, of which I have six thousand. Not in an excellent condition.

I have made two thousand, seven hundred and seventy seven dollars this month in AirBnb, at no minor expense to my emotional well being, seeing as how I’ve staying with Cindy, whom I care for deeply, and who makes herself all too available for me and my needs, yet simultaneously holds it against me when it is not reciprocated, as if I’m the one damning her. It does take a toll, I tell you.

A new drink arrives: gin and tonic, with some mint bitters, and a lime wedge. I take two large sips and the glass is already half empty.

I have been earning one hundred seventy five thousand dollars a year as an industrial sales engineer, selling solutions to some of the largest fortune five hundred manufacturing companies the world has ever seen. I have no engineering background. Simply a philosophy and economics and finance major from Vanderbilt. And I recall the days of being a drug addicted high school drop out. It’s all the more poignant as I peer out the massive windows in my vintage industrial loft, located in the heart of Nashville, overlooking the brimming waters of the Cumberland river. Classical statues and tasteful art and custom hardwood designer and antique furniture adorn the apartment where I live.

Writing used to be an every day occurrence for me. In 2012, that fall, I made the decision to write less, and do more.  Since then I’ve indulged in a variety of insane experiences, ranging from swinging with a milieu of couples, to escorting females young and old, to traveling the USA for fitness photoshoots, appearing in magazines, and magazine covers, competing to become an international professional fitness model, to discovering online black markets pushing LSD and an infinite other illegal contraband, to dating women all over the country… and now I am here. With my nine thousand dollar Breitling Navitimer on my wrist, and a solid gold Vanderbilt ring on my right ring finger, typing away on my fifteen inch Macbook pro, sitting at a trendy bar just south of the bustle of Broadway, Nashville’s most popular strip; and I’m alone, half drunk, with my forearms pressed against the cold copper bar top, my fingers dissociating with my mind, strung only to my heart, as my mind begins losing focus as the alcohol worms its way into my thoughts, softening the periphery of feeling, leaving the first hue of euphoria in a long, long time.

And maybe it just feels long. Maybe it’s been three days. But the abyss is black, and deep, and you lose sense of time and place while you’re here. You forget what you look like, in the dark, what it’s like to be human, but when you rise again, you can hardly remember that time and what it took from you, the toll it exacted, at all.

Six hundred and forty five, the word count reads.

I need ten thousand, damnit. I need to be able to breath this shit outta me, without hesitation, without the grip of anxiety pushing my voice back down down down. It’s suppose to flow.

A woman at the bar fingers the top of a champagne bottle, pulling and ripping the metal foil away, twisting the wire before gripping the cork and releasing a *POP*.

Her eyes scanned the room haphazardly as she did this, her long combed black hair rested just above the bottom of her breast. She was round up top, her rear was just as large, matching her bulbous breasts and swollen cheeks. She could pass as an Italian, I think. Momm Mia.

What the fuck to do with my life.

I listened to a voicemail left by my father last Friday. I played it in therapy on Monday, half as a way to insulate myself from an impulsive reaction, half to… well… I’m not sure. Because of fear, possibly entirely a fear of an impulsive reaction to empathize, or not empathize enough. I left therapy Monday with no clearer idea on how to handle the situation. How disappointing.

The family and I are scheduled to go on a three week southeast asian cruise, and my mother refuses to accept the falling out between my father and I.

Do I believe he wants to reconcile? yes. Am I sure exactly on why? I mean, I believe he doesn’t want to have bad blood with his son, but I wonder how much is generated due to my mother, or his own conscience. He’s not a bad man, per say. I wouldn’t say very many people are. Its a gradient of selfishness that makes men bad.

The bartender sits another drink in front of me. I take another several deep sips though the straw, and the glass is again half way empty.

Living with Cindy has been hard. Not having a job has been hard. Trying to figure out next steps has been hard. Breaking up with my ex, and confronting these alien feelings of… alienation, which really shouldn’t be that alien at all, has been hard. Breaking up with girls and feeling guilty about it has been hard. Feeling lost and aimless has been hard. Confronting my childhood has been hard. Trying to sort through this sordid past with my father and mother and my upbringing… has been hard.

And living with Cindy, has been hard. Do I care for her? Absolutely. Do I think highly of her? I do. Do I also recognize that her emotional disposition conflicts with my own? I believe so. Is she willing to work through this? I do. Am I? I don’t think so. Am I? yes, which has been hard. And why? Because, as much as I care for her, she’s just not the one I want to spend my life with.

I don’t want these women with perpetual father issues, and that’s all I seem to attract, or be attracted to.

I still think of my ex, and I can’t say it’s good feeling. Mostly just recollection, and not any regret. Just, bittersweet. Do I wish things were different? I’m not sure. She is who she is, and I’m not sure we woulda made it that far if she wasn’t as dysfunctional as she was. Who knows though.

Cindy. Living with her has made me vulnerable. I feel comfortable with her, yet I don’t want to “be” with her. I’d rather, not. I “wish” she’d be different, but then again, that’s no who she is, and so I don’t wish to be with her, and yet she says we need to work together, instead of independently. She recalls the past, as if when she met me she knew me, and things were better. And I insist that she didn’t know me, and the longer we know each other the better we know each other, not the opposite. The arguments are the best thing for the relationship, because it’s not compartmentalizing the pain and hurt and confusion. And so, living with Cindy has been hard. It’s forced me to confront things, to say things, to vocalize feelings that I’d much rather avoid, and I believe it’s done the same for her.

I’m hungry now. The time is 2:20pm.

I’ve been meaning to go to Asheville, NC all week, beginning on Monday, but excuse after excuse has prevented me from doing so. And the thought of the drive, a mere four and a half hours. Nothing too overwhelming, but its more of the thought of loneliness that scares me. More than any drive. At this point in my life, when all I want is freedom and independence, it becomes too much to bear, and what I want more is the comfort and affection that a loving relationship provides. Ironic.

All I have to Do is Dream by the Everly Brothers plays in the background, emanating from the speakers overhead.

Feeling has never been a problem for me. Its linear feeling. Its cogent, coherent, pointed feeling, towards something. That seems to be the problem, which I, and most everyone working with me, would attribute to ADHD.

One thousand five hundred words.

Hooray.

So being a writer, and producing something that is linear, like a story, like a narrative with an actual plot, and not some psychotic expungement of word and feel vomit, seems a monumental task, like building a home on quicksand, an analogy that transports me to my you

My computer died and I relocated to a community table where there is a power outlet.

Allow me to resume…

an analogy that transports me to my youth, during a summer camp across my from my home where a pastor of a christian science church and his family lived, and they told a story on their lawn about building your life on a strong foundation. And they read us a bible story from Matthew 7:24-27.

Anyway. I’m several drinks in now, maybe three. Feels like four. But it’s probably three.

I’m going to start a new post.