Losing It

I find I lose my patience a lot more easily than I used to. Which is not saying too much because I have always been impatient. I have a low tolerance for stupidity and ignorance. I have zero tolerance for stubbornness. And I have difficulty dealing with people and friends who are ignorant to the truth. A recent incident involved a missed band rehearsal by the lead singer, who made up a dumb excuse and projected his own arrogance on the rest of the band. At the last minute, while he was lounging poolside, he decided to change up the rehearsal location to one that was more convenient to him, mainly his house. His argument was simple: come rehearse at my house today or I'm not rehearsing today. So he instigated a shitstorm of text messages and ultimately totally blew us off.

It is fortunate that this rehearsal is for what will be our final gig, one which I never wanted to participate in, but am stuck because, like a fool, I committed to it.

I should mention that this band member was also the best man at my wedding. We've come a long way in just a few years from being close friends to being casual associates who no longer speak to each other. I said some rather nasty things to him in textmessage-land. Some of which were merely pointing out reality, others which were downright mean. I really need to stop that. But all the same, this is a person who more often these days refuses to acquiesce to reason. People like this no longer have a place in my life. I have decided to move on.

It is true that our kids take after us. Kids pick up on pretty much everything we do, even if we think we're keeping it secret from them. They take promises seriously and however we handle ourselves when we keep or break our promises has a tremendous lasting effect on their psyches. For example, smoking. When you promise your kid that you're going to quit smoking, you'd better keep the promise. When you want your kid to grow up drug-free, then you'd better not be sneaking around behind your kid's back smoking pot, or worse. These are classical betrayals of the parent-child bond, the parent-child trust. And when someone points out to you that you have done just that, and that your kid is now a reflection of yourself, you should say, "Thank you."

This is just my side of the story, which is the only side that matters in this blog. I am losing it when it comes to dealing with people who claim to be my friends. I am moving exponentially towards an asocial existence. I abhor people anymore. I have my wife, whom I love, and who supports me 100%. She agrees that the kid is a reflection of his father's failures and is the only one who has expressed gratitude at my stating that fact directly to the father in this story. I have reduced my "friend baggage" by three in the process. And after next weekend, it will be reduced by two more. The only band member that I care to associate with anymore is the bass player who resigned 8 years ago to start a family. He's the only one I can see myself working on music with. To the other guys I offer a closing salutation and best wishes in the future.

Sleep Deprivation

It's a kind of magical, between universe kind of feeling, when I go without the necessary sleep. It feels like a rock is hitting me in the side of the head, but in slow motion. I put myself through a couple double-shifts, on consecutive days. I really shouldn't because I am so fucking tired right now. But I need to keep working in order to stay in this nice house with the beautiful wife and wonderful garden, etc. But there is a part of me that would be relieved if it all ended in a fiery head-on collision as I drive home this morning. No big loss, of course. No one gives a shit anyway.

It's Happening Again

I hate myself and I want to die. I hate my life. I am worthless, stupid, and unworthy of any kind of respect. I am treated like garbage. I am garbage. This is how I feel. There is nothing good. All is shit. Fuck everything.

The End Of Music

It's been nearly five months since I picked up a guitar. I played one song back in December for my family. Beyond that, nothing. I'm pretty much done. There is one show left this July for which I don't really care. I wish I had been smart and not agreed to do it. I dread it horribly. I was bamboozled into doing it by Andy, the rhythm guitar player for the now extinct Yesterday's Child. That will never happen again. Any music I do will be strictly to please myself, as it should be.

My Death

I am going to kill myself. Easy to say. Hard to do. But I expect that sometime soon I will get up the courage and the strength to do it. I am done here. I get zero respect. I don't want any fucking help. If you think this is selfish, then fuck you. Fuck all the whole lot of you.

Pain

Allow me to confess; I am in nearly constant pain. Physical pain. Mostly lower back pain. I have to check myself when I turn over or move in bed because the pain wakes me up, now nearly always. I forget about it when I am at work. I am able to function and do my job, with occasional twinges, shocks, and reminders that the pain is always there, waiting. Simple pain medication, ibuprofen helps less and less. Stronger pain medication leaves me in a stupor, unable to do anything.

One thing that exacerbates the pain is the dreaded walking of the dog. We have two dogs: a pit bull, Pickles, and a frenchie, Duke. I am the one who has to handle a barely controllable but usually rampant and jarring Pickles. Every time I do, I suffer for at least a day with even more aches and pains than I can describe. I never asked for Pickles. I never wanted a dog, period. Over time, he has grown on me. But he is a handful. And quite unpredictable and untrainable. My hope is that he finally puts me out of my misery for good. As in, sends me to the hospital where I can be drugged to death in an endless sleep.
This is not a fear. It is a hope. Why? Because I just don't care anymore.

As I get older, the pain gets to be more and more of a presence and a personality of it's own. Let's see: headaches on most days. Jarring lower back pain and stiffness that jolts me sleep nightly, prevents me from standing up straight without an orchestra of pain pulling me back down. Joint pain in my elbows, hips, and knees. Various unlocalized aches and pains up and down my body. And lastly, a gradually more persistent twitch and swelling of my right eye which the clowns at Kaiser failed to diagnose a couple years ago, and which I don't care about anymore.

In short, this life of pain will be the biggest impetus to my ending it. My parents used to say I could be anything I want to be. Well, I want to be dead.

Suicide

Recently....OK, pretty much since high school,...I've given a lot of thought to suicide. The first time I actually considered doing it, and very nearly acted it out, was in 1980. I climbed over the balcony and threatened to let go. That freaked the fuck out of my Mom and brother at the time. It was because of my brother that I decided to climb back over to safety.

I've considered it many times since. Many. Times.

These days, its something I think about almost every day. I simply am done and don't want to be here anymore. Well, where then, if not here? Not anywhere. Dead. Now, before you get all silly and start calling who knows who, let me tell you, I am not nutzo. I have a good head on my shoulders. I make a decent living. I have a wife who loves me, children who show me respect and love, etc. I am a reasonably clear-headed guy who thinks things through. But now and then, there is something that comes up that puts me over the edge. Usually, it pertains to money, if you can believe that. Why would I want to escape money issues? Well, I guess it is because I have a goal to rid myself of debt. And as soon as I make some kind of headway, my wife comes up with a diabolical plan to plunge us even deeper into it.

Right now, I work at two jobs to barely break even. It is a killer because I sometimes work two weeks straight without a day off. And just when I find some light at the end of the tunnel, it gets snuffed. I don't need this stress. So my answer is a simple one, suicide. Wait, once again, please don't go to your phones, texts, whatever. I'm not nutzo. I'm not going on a rampage. I don't believe in physically hurting or maiming others to make a point. I am definitely not one of those whack jobs we see on TV every fucking day. I am sensible, hard-working, and I care for those around me.

So let's visit the idea of selfishness. There are those who would say that suicide is a selfish decision and does not take into account loved ones or the effect a suicide can have on them and their lives. That is but one side of the equation. The other side is this, and please don't panic,...just consider... The people that try to keep me here are being just as selfish; thinking of their own needs and putting them above my own. They would selfishly keep a hurting, emotionally damaged, flailing individual on this earth to satisfy their own desires than to let them be free. That sounds crazy, I just read it back. But I'm not saying this to be crazy; I'm making a point. Selfishness can go both ways. And I suppose we can visit the terms, "hurting," "emotionally damaged," and "flailing." But that's really not here or there; but a few adjectives I use to describe how I feel when I consider suicide.

Suicide. How final. Many people don't succeed because there is a part of them that still wants to live, or they are just plain stupid. For example, suicide by tylenol. People usually don't take enough pills (and you really need to ingest a LOT of tylenol) so what ends up happening is they survive, go into fulminant liver failure, need a liver transplant, and end up dying horribly and painfully because a suicidal patient does not register as a high priority on the transplant list. Or they use a gun, and flinch at the last second. Or they jump from a building, and survive, but paralyzed. I have a foolproof way of doing suicide without potentially taking anyone else out, without leaving a bloody corpse, and without surviving to endure a painful demise due to liver failure. I am a scientist, and believe me the solution is simple. Easy to do. And it'll work the first time.

I will keep it to myself because one day I may end up doing it. But I would not be doing it to be selfish, nor to escape the selfishness of others. I would do it because I want to. Period. That's not crazy. That's called making a rational decision and sticking by it. Suicide? Rational? Well, I think there are situations where it is a rational decision, and where it should be considered in context, and not out of some kind of mental defect.