My cousin Seigie, the closest cousin to me in age (or, evident of competitive breeding, as Andrews is just a few month older than George, and she’s only a few months younger than I, a constant point of humor with mom. The “rebuttal pregnancies” illustrating her sister’s adversarial nature and quid pro quo personal dictum) is marrying Steve. 

Met him for the first time tonight, and he seems, well, normal. This is, in fact, high praise. The malice I commonly associate, if not expect, in family affairs, simply is not there. In fact, though I used to witness the chronicle of Mom and her sister, Harriet’s, crazy shenannigans have been replaced by more recent memories of things being ….well, just fine. No doubt, without grandma around, there’s a serious lack of crisis generation. Thusly, things seem to be progressing well. Talked to Adelade, wife to George (whose wedding was referenced as the last time we three brothers looked presentable simultatiously)  about her cooking career, and feel nothing but pride for her accomplishments. Makes me actually think about going to the CIA or FCL. She seems happy cooking, and she seems another perfect example of following one’s heart for the passionate poverty of the game. 

The groomsmen remind me of Larry, Moe and Curly. If I can get a picture, I will. It’s astounding. 

Of Seigi though, I’m so proud. I see in her a happiness we all strive for. 

So here’s going into day two….lets hope it’s as good as day 1.

I know I hate so many things.

Now I know I hate me too.

I hate that I already knew that.

I stare, my eyes finding no point of reference for depth or distance as the void of the unknown becomes two dimensional in its great expanse. The possibility of happiness, matched only by its equal in pain, looms so great I cannot fathom either one’s expanse. I only see the possibility in front of me, amoral, without any hint or clue as to its outcomes.

Normally, I am in control of everything. I dare say, I have even stunted the diversity of situations I allow myself to be in for just that reason. There is no risk if I control every aspect of the possible outcomes. While the options are multiple, the beneficence is universal if I command the perimeters of the game. You know what though? I’ve played by my rules long enough. Maybe being able to beat the odds at every turn means I’ve been playing the safe odds every time. Macy is amazing, albeit, a bit nuts, but so am I. With her, I truly can’t foresee the outcome, frightening my most basic sense of self (a calculated and oft harvested system based on my intellectual superiority, real or perceived) but at the same time, my gut tells me to plunge in, headlong, and cast myself into the prospect and possibility of total annihilation. Maybe every relationship is supposed to be this way, and I’ve been calculating and assessing so long that I don’t know what it is to take a chance. It becomes apparent that maybe being secretly, if not in control, at least in a preemptive state of damage control, has fooled me into thinking that I was far advanced. Maybe without the devotion of going in, guns blazing, with wanton disregard for my well being is the only way to know who I am.

Or maybe it’s the chink in my armor that I allow to become a death blow.

Macy is amazing. I have loved her, without knowing the extent, from the day I met her. Unfortunately, in my damaged state, the freshman year at AU, after Kirby and Ashley destroyed my young and doe eyed view of the world (which I thought in my control) That mindset, coupled with watching Frank, my beloved best friend, destroy himself with a relapse into heroin, that I now realize I was a [majority] part of bringing back on, left me seeking self destruction, more so than I already did. I never saw, or at the time couldn’t feel, what it was to love. I loved Claudia because we were mutually destructive.

I became a drug dealer and character at AU because it was an easy void to fill amidst a class of the uninteresting. My previous experience with the commerce of the market made it simple. They wanted drugs, and would pay at highly inflated prices, and I had the connects at home to facilitate. Weekend drives home, flying down I-95, laden with cargo to further fuel my sense of superiority derived from taking advantage of the “rich kids” I watched time go by. As I was taking advantage of them though, I was truly only diverting myself. My school work was an afterthought, my fortune of attending a great school, went unappreciated. As much as I hated the out of touch wealthy, I was equally guilty of squandering my opportunity at such a great institution. My natural intelligence carried me through my first year, but half way through the second, I was expelled. Oddly enough, the very thing I thought I saw that they didn’t, was what I ignored, and was my demise. I allowed my self hatred to consume me. I destroyed myself, and knew full well what I was doing. I never believed that it would end. I thought I could be the perpetual malcontent, and coast along, but that being at au was an unchanging circumstance, not something that could be lost. All the rich kids I took advantage of, that I knew more than, ended up with degrees. I ended up out on my ass, and maybe smarter than them, but with nothing to show for it. To this day, I have never taken responsibility, to myself, for this failure.

At hand now though, Macy. She has understood and loved me since we met, at least I think. My view of the world was so clouded, so tainted by self hatred manifest in an inflated sense of self and superiority, that I can’t be sure of anything I knew back then. The recollected emotions are genuine, but knowing how misaligned my world view was, I can be no more sure of my love than of my hate, and even they are interchangeable at times. Even now, I am not “fixed”. After such a long period of drug use, and delusions of grandeur, how can I know that now what I feel is untainted? How can I know what is true? How can I know what love is, when I cast aside my family and friends genuine love and never loved myself?

I do know I don’t want to hurt her. Maybe that is the first step in wanting to save myself. She herself though, in our years at AU, and as well up to this point, is on her own journey of self destructive masochism. She loves me, and at the same time is just as crazy as I am. She was just as coked, pilled up, stoned and drunk as I was all that time. Is her love the same as mine for Claudia? Misguided and futile?

I wrote it just now, but I’m not sure I believe it; is loving me futile? Upon reflection, what scares me more is that I can’t think of a world where it isn’t.

Melodie Cox and Dylan Hughes are the only two people in the world who have gotten anything close to the full story, all these years. They’re the only two that I’ve ever thought of whilst acting and stopped myself because of what they would think of my actions. How frightening is that? That my two inspirations to not bring the world down around me, neither one knows the full story. In seattle, there was Jodie and Caitryn, who I was uncensored with, but they never knew the history, the full extent of my sins in the years prior. I would never burden them with even describing my former self. In seattle, 4 years removed from my most self destructive years and self targeting brutality, I was a pale comparison to what I was. They were amazed I wasn’t dead already from what they saw, never knowing the masochism and self destructive drive I had dodged for years before. 

To never be able to inform a confidant of the whole story, due both to the mind’s ability to block out trauma, and simply never remembering a proper chronology of everything one has done wrong, is to never present one’s self in the true light of judgement. the cruelty is that for someone to know me that well is all I want. I wish someone knew everything, and could offer insight, but they only know versions of me; selected excerpts my subconscious allows past which not even I can control. No one knows me, because there is no one left in me to know. I am no more than a shell, wishing desperately to have been full this whole time.

The idea, upon starting this journal, was an unabridged view of my life for my own benefit. The selective nature of memory is seemingly benevolent, but in fact, serves the same subconscious and self preserving demon that redacts the actions that conjure the stomach acid taste of shame and self loathing. Mission statement aside, the real difficulty is consistency. I have to force myself to testify and be, above all truthful. If I fail to achieve my goal, I have nothing more than another delusion, self perpetuating and self aggrandizing. If I should succeed, though, I will have a record to reflect upon. True, that regardless, a certain slant of perspective will be present, but a truthful bias far surpasses, and in its own right, offers even more of a window into the perpetrator of the malicious epoch.

In media res: I start at the end, or rather, the middle. From hitherto for, I will drive myself to chronicle the world as I see it. I want to be able to look back upon this and see an accurate record, instead of the self aggrandizing and wholly inaccurate yarn of my live journal. The difficulty therein lies not in recording my history, but doing so with the knowledge that another will read it. As far as I know, now, only Melodie can read this, and as we haven’t spoken in what I imagine as a year, but is more likely three, but even then, to know that my testimony is not private requires either my relapse into the rose tinted entries, or to present myself to an, albeit, out of touch, friend and offer myself up for judgement. Weather I can or not remains to be seen.

As the needle danced, and the buzz filled my ears, those years back when I sat with Tony standing over me, carving a great reminder in my back, I thought the script was from what I already learned. The words “Et Tu Brute”, across my back, were the result of realizations, of assumed completed lessons I wanted to be sure never to forget. That humming bird song of electric pricks, riding a path whose importants was no more the end point save for the completed image laid in permanance, and the reminder of what it meant.

Betrayal, the final words of a man facing his betrayer, his judas, and the realization that perceved truth is falable. My most solid truths have been in the unspoken, the state of being, in great friendships. The weight of it is in that which lies outside the definition. I’ve had best friends, the sort that fill the space in a belt amongst other similar repitions, my arsenal of self assuring social worth. But I’ve always been prone to dishonesty, in a self affacing sense, of letting them call me a brother, of replying that they were in the inner sanctum and top tier of who I valued. While them that heard this were probably fewer than 20 in number, in all honesty, I can count on two hands those that truly were recipients of my undying devotion. It’s no slight to say the others weren’t great friends, or good people , but I’ve probably only felt that weight, almost a fear, of the  tragically crushing love and investment in a few people. Of those few, it only took two or three to inspire me to ink a lifelong reminder of the brutality, the gut wrenching, and paradigm shifting effects of betrayal across my back.

When Frank swore, up and down, that he hadn’t started dope again, with arms covered in tracks; he hugged me. I believed him. Unquestioningly. Despite the obvious truth, and concrete proof, I believed him. Forsaking reality, and rationality, I believed him. It was, truly, the first heartbreak of my life, to see heroin make my best friend lie to me. Deaths of friends shake me, but the abandoment of someone I knew, surly, to be an absolute and assured partner in mutual devotion, who kept living after, was a greater pain. I felt the knife of brutus, pushed into my back, and uttered those same words “And you? My closest friend?” and looked into the eyes of a faith no longer there.

Some never deserted though, and the dichotomy of the situation is simply put. While betrayal, the most assured charachteristic of humanity and complex relationships, is a possibility, and one that becomes more severe with every greater extend of the participants devotion, the denial and withdrawl is the opposite. It is assured. It is assured to result in being alone, at heart, and worse, surrounded with muted examples of those who will never become, an isolation for fear of the greatest and most heart rending pain in exchange for the knowledge that, if only a few, someone knows who you really are. Maybe not in constant contact, not up to date on your current events, but someone that knows the unfiltered self that is hidden for almost every minute of every day. Melodie, Brian, Dylan, and now again, after all of it, proof that it defies logic, Frank, these are my anchors. If nothing else, these four could sit together after I die, and know that the person they were talking about was not a version, calibrated to the situation, but the real me. They would all be talking about the whole, same person. At the wake, they’re the only ones I’d really want there.

I consider myself to be, while unreasonable at times concerning my own welfare, generally measured in my reactions to people and events around me. It is only in that control, measure and calculation, that my most vile side comes out. If I were to overreact immediately, ignore or endure with any predictability, or as a default, the same course of action, or at least the same timbre of response every time, I would be both sane and predictable. Instead, I allow each situation (serious enough to gain my attention) it’s own consideration, it’s own moment, to allow my gauged response to be intentional and without rash inconsideration.

This is why I have been called sociopathic, instead of psychotic. It is not irrationality, or unchecked aggression, but instead a calm malice that I embody.

Tonight though, I found myself almost careless, upon hearing that a fellow patron of the bar had made a pass at my woman. One that calls himself a friend. Kim asked why it mattered, due to the fact that she has eyes only for me, and failed to understand my abject rage. I said that the conflict resided not between her and I, and that she was almost an inanimate object in the consideration of the issue. The offense had to do with him and myself, and that my response was going to be swift and violent. I am not a juiced up frat boy, looking for a fight on Saturday night, but instead a justifiably angered party. She did not understand.

I may be wrong, but at least I can to my own moral set be true. Whatever the cost, I will sleep knowing that I fulfilled the required response, so mandated by my own conceince

I suppose that I could pinpoint the most painful moment as when I no longer witheld my id from thrashing, allowing myself to listen to myself, the self that I’ve fought for years, if not my whole life. There is a part of me that is not only self destructive, but opportunisticly so, that seeks to destroy that which is long term, that I have invested in, for better or worse. I hate the knowledge that this swirling maelstrom, for all its lack of structure and guidance, it is a part of my greater self, and benefits from all that the more civilized part of my brain knows and values. It knows what I know, and I know that I am composed, at least partially, of it. This destructive force is no less a part of me than my humor and inseparable as the yearn for the fist drag in the morning, or the taste after the jameson tips past my lips and the rocks chime like bells in the glass.

I have almost given up on this civilized version of myself, that has remained for almost 4 years, unmolested. The rage was silent for so long that I almost forgot it was there, save for those few nights I let the beast loose, fueled by whiskey and the promise of a preasure release. I have heald it in check, but now, I have lost the drive to keep it caged. I can feel not the beast itself, but worse, the concious apathy of the part of me that kept it so in check. If the part of me that’s sane no longer cares to keep that part of me at bay, so be it. I will bide my time, and it will take hold. The damage will be massive and permanent, and my fault. I can only hope the sane part of me doesn’t regret allowing me to drive.

Tonight, on the track lighting spot-lit stage, with my half progressed PBR emphasizing my hand’s every swing, with a crowd that surprisingly embraced the opportunity of giving a chorus when staring down the barrel of my mic, I sang to one seat and one seat alone. I channeled the crouches formerly performed by Prince, while I cribbed the eyes-closed-two-handed manuver, now only a foot from her. I realized that there were more lyrics than the epic refrain I knew well, but decided that commiting to showmanship rather than tracking the white to magenta progress on the awkwardly high slung monitor for irregularly prompted lyrics was the path. I improvised. The mic shot into the air, the fist around it keeping pace with the bass drum as the opposing hand gripped the heart that, in that very moment, was nothing but hers. My knees hit the carpet, hard packed after years of the bar traffic trauma, but still managed a few inches more of a slide than the minimum to qualify as visable, the pain of impacted rug burn to follow later. At that perfect moment of stage presence, the refrain kicked back in.

“Oh-oooooooo….” I started strong as I arose not six inches from her, eyes locked together.  Momentarily, the world didn’t melt away, and it wasnt just us in the bar, but I never so intensely wanted to sing just to her. I was jogging back a few steps and wishing deafness on all the crowd but her as I drew in again.

“Your love..” Outstrech hand to her, wink and look to her accompanying friends to make it more dramamtic to snap back to her “… is like bad medicine”  Her eyes piercing back against my stare “Bad medicine is what I want.”

Those few seconds remind me of everything that is in us. To sing, foolishly, and poorly, amongst folk you will see tomorrow, and not only tempt embarassment, but welcome it, all in the name of pushing that spark of laughter across sky blue eyes, takes motivation; and there, absolutely perfectly presented, was all the reason in the world.

My frustrations, they’ll be there tomorrow.

My inability to tell her what I want, will return with the sunrise.

My self sabotage, recommences at first light.

Tonight though, I’m belting it out for her, wishing the song never ended and the sun never comes up. I look at her, and bad medicine is all I want.

Six hours, five of realitive bliss, one of absolute agony. “The needle tears a hole, that old familiar sting, try to kill it all away, but I remember everything.” The words of trent reznor (though better delivered by one Mr. Johnny Cash) but instead of it being the heroin spike, it’s the finite sizzle of the electric needle. As Alan brushed on meticulous layers and built what I can only describe as high art in the form of my father’s portrait, I really did remember everything. Memories that haven’t surfaced for years come rushing back in a random hodge podge, unsorted as to importance or relevance to eachother. Truly amazing. I’m still digesting everything I saw for the second time today.

I realize that I am a creature of base instincts. I spend most of my time supressing my innermost self so that I appear to be “normal” or at least what can pass as a human being. My id, the part of me that spurs what some would call bad behavior, but upon close inspection is the unfiltered desires of the self, catalyzes the execution of the worst of the ill planned manuvers. Few people know this part of me, due to my fear of letting it, the monkey, out of the cage. Many that know me, they say that they know me and love me, because they know that the monkey is not the total of who I am, but they’re still not what I would consider to be on the inner sanctum of my personal relationships. Them that make up that closest circle, they’re the ones that love the rest of me, like everyone else, but also love the monkey, the truly crazy part of my persona. They unlucky few, the one’s who really love me, they know that nothing is more brutal and self destructive than that part of me, but they know also that it is more a part of me than most would think. Frank’s seen it rear its brute nature in watching the monkey do the math, laugh, and tell me to take the lethal dose anyway, only to jump in excstacy when I don’t die and, with shame, feel proud of my defiance of death. Melodie knows the monkey after watchings years of its powerful grip on me as I discovered and hated myself. Nothing is more self destructive than someone who self realizes that they hate themself, and nothing saves them, calms the monkey, like a bunny to convince them that just because they’re the opposite of what they’re supposed to be, that they’re not a lost cause. Brian’s seen it, but looked in admiration upon something that he didn’t understand to be as self destructive as it was, but only saw an entity that seemed to revel in the percieved immortality that tempting fate gives. everyone else only knows the shadow of a farce of who I am.