how to believe in beauty
Hey! I hope you are all doing alright. My apologies for the more sparse entries, school is starting back up, so I have been very busy. I will probably be sending out newsletters once or twice a month for the time being. As always, I appreciate your reading my words.
A quick foreword, please understand that the following writing is an expression of specific thoughts and feelings, often ones that read as much more tragic than they truly are. I love being alive.
If you stare at a spot on the ceiling long enough everything else will start to move. I don’t know if I believe in illusions.
What if Hermes lied about everything? Would it all be true? What a stupid question.
Today I realized one of the reasons that I love learning about religion is because I have no stake in the game. God, to me, does not exist, so I am always learning as an outsider. Often I feel like an exoticist. Wow look at this ancient transcription. It’s amazing that they did that. It’s all porn for me. It’s hard to be close to things.
Phone calls are terrifying. Every time I get a text my heart skips a beat. How do you work through trauma when you’re traumatized by life? In a way, I have trouble even saying I have “PTSD”. To me, it feels like an oversimplification. I’d rather say I’m afraid. Anyone who asks for a reason why is looking to compare.
I am tired of dealing with other people’s trauma. Maybe I’m calloused, I’m definitely calloused, but I don’t think I am able to be anyone’s life raft. I have a friend who says I am the glue that holds our friend group together. What the hell does that mean? I don’t want to be glue, I want to be your friend. She said she wishes I was her dad.
I’m tired of being the rock, let me float! Love is such a burden. I care about you so I want you to be better and I know that you would feel better if I gave you all of my love and attention so I will do that but then I am left with nothing to give myself or to anyone else.
But I don’t think love is finite and it’s not something given, it's nurtured together and I’m done with it. I’m not upholding my end of the bargain. It’s void. I guess I will love you in a new way.
Years ago, someone told me I was the “keystone species” in our friend group. From what I remember of grade eleven biology, a keystone species is a species upon which the entire ecosystem depends. Without said species, the ecosystem would dissolve. Mom has always said I was a special one. What a burden.
I think I am turning into an old man. I don’t want to go out and dance anymore, I just want to go to a nice restaurant by myself. Everyday I wake up and make the decision to keep living and honestly that’s on me at this point.
Part of the issue is that I am surrounded by people who would die for one another. This goes against my carnal instinct to trust absolutely no one and so I start to trust them and my vulnerability begets their vulnerability and soon enough I am inexplicably tied to their eating disorder or suicidal thoughts or their abusive ex or their dying relative or their low self esteem or the fact that they can’t get out of bed. I can’t be that person anymore. I can’t shovel coal like I used to and for that, I am sorry.
It’s hard to come to terms with the reality that you are not able to fix everything. It’s harder to come to terms with the reality that you are not able to fix anything. You just change it. Matter is neither created nor destroyed. I think that’s Newton or something. Your world is a container and you are water. Pour into your world and it will shape you and you will give it weight.
One of my best friends said they can’t listen to music anymore, it makes them too sad. We were on a walk and I was subconsciously singing and it hurt their soul. I could tell by the way they breathed and gripped their chest. Their container has holes, but they will mend with time.
I always wanted to be the one to help you, but I can’t and I’m sorry. Everyone around me is dying. Please don’t ask me how I am. I’m great, thank you. Don’t grab at my leg, we’ll both drown.
Sleep feels wrong now. I wake up asleep and go to sleep asleep. I drive asleep, I walk asleep, I study asleep, but I sleep awake. Every once in a while I am shown something amazing and I’m welcomed back into the world of hope and wonder. A few days go by and I forget all about it.
What a strange thing to assume, that at the age of twenty, I have already felt as good as I ever will. I have so far to go to find the depths of my lows, but I fear that everything onwards will be disappointing. There is no greater beauty than rest and there is no greater rest than that delivered by the God of Sleep, Morpheus. Morphine. Sleep.
There’s a poem for this. John Wiener’s “The Acts of Youth”.
Yes, I am writing again about morphine. That's almost all I think about now. That particle. Just one electron off from heaven.
I believe it is worth staying alive for small reasons. I believe it is worth staying alive to see what happens next. It is worth staying alive to see how far we can go. It is worth staying alive to feel the stratum of everything. Up and down. Inside and out. It is worth staying alive just to feel anything at all. Death is never an answer, it’s another question. Who needs more questions? Stick to what you know.
All things considered, I am doing well. I am having a good time. I’ve been having sex just to have something to do with my hands. I am sure someday someone will come to me and tell me everything I need to know. I am sure someday I will wake up and I will be a new person. I will wake up and nothing will be fixed, but everything will be new again. There’s a reason I rarely talk explicitly about what has “traumatized” me. It’s because I don’t think it matters. Everything will be bright and I will see color. I have never been a very happy person, but I have always been a big smiler. If all of life is a series of chemical reactions, hook me up to the drip.
Thank you for reading. I never wanted this to be about mental health. Remember to reach out to people in your life or a professional if you need help.