Creative Writing: Fish

Another story, this is actually complete.

She had been the prima ballerina. The one girl scores of others had sabotaged with voodoo dolls and slicked floors. Her skin hung loosely from her delicate, emaciated frame. She glanced out the bare window next to her sterile single bed and put her cigarette out on the fleshy tissue of the underside of her breast. She didn’t wince, but she knew the nurse would be in soon. The heart rate monitor would betray her again.

She didn’t startle when I entered, but upon hearing my heavy footfalls the sinewy muscles of her lower back tensed. Her back was pristine. Smooth yellow-white suede, not a scar or freckle or gnarled cigarette burn to mar its purity. She didn’t move again. Not as I stroked her hair or even as I traced each of her ribs with my clumsy fingers. Her eyes remained fixated on an imaginary group of dancers outside her window, and she critiqued them in her head. They weren’t like she had been; their lips moved as they counted the beats and their feet never seemed to arch quite as perfectly as hers had.

The nurse walked in and spoke cheerily, though of what she said I couldn’t be sure. She ushered me out of the room, displeased to find the dancer naked and sporting a new ash-stained blister. As she cleaned the wound, the nurse was unsettled by how complacently the dancer cooperated. Other patients would struggle, still had the spark of a fight, but not this one. She simply existed, indifferent to all forms of pleasure and pain.

As I sat out in the morning chill on the deceptively sunny patio, it seemed almost unthinkable that I could ever leave this place. My wife, Lawrence and Amy, the firm; it all seemed so imaginary, like a sort of extended reverie inserted into the otherwise uniform memory of this gated reality.

“I know how you feel,” she spoke from right next to me. I was too startled to refute this; she had entered so silently it felt more like she had materialized next to me. I realized then that I didn’t know her walk, had never even seen her in motion, just sitting or standing still in different places. She looked in my direction, but did not look at me. Fish swan in the oceans of her eyes. They were shy fish.

Her blank face had smile lines, divulging her former humanity. I had told her about it, the pressure, the deadlines, the crying kids and needy wife and fastidious boss; I’d ranted and screamed, fallen over as my knees buckled under the weight of shame and loss. But she’d never heard, had never answered or even moved. This sudden unprovoked confirmation that there was someone lingering deep in that ravaged body [who had been listening all along] was overwhelming. My fists clenched with a wave of anger and then loneliness. I turned to stroke her but she had vanished. Just as I used to do.

Watching the dancers the next morning, she couldn’t stand their ineptitude. Their poor extension and heavy landings and unsure expressions had become unbearable. She moved silently to their courtyard, her feet moving like jersey cotton being dragged along the floor. She turned out her feet, bent her elbows just so, and took her first visible breath in three years. As the slow crescendo mounted her empty body filled with the music’s vitality. Light shot out her fingertips and the creases in her paper face deepened. The fish swam up to the front of her eyes.

As she glided back and forth across the lawn, I knew she couldn’t hear the trucks on the interstate behind the fence. Word’s aren’t the medium for everyone, that’s something I’ve learned here. There are a lot of folks who would be a lot better off if there wasn’t such an emphasis on talking. I’d felt betrayed to learn she’d heard my story. She was apologizing for her cold silence, she was screaming that she had been there all along, and she was trusting me with her own most intimate secrets.

As the music slowed she made her way toward me, still consumed in her confessions. She paused, still in first position, and I watched the flush leave her cheeks as her breath became once again inaudible, and seemed to stop completely. The fish retreated.

As the nurse escorted me back to my room with its fluorescent lights, I knew I could sign the papers soon. All the little lines that I had let serve as bars would be neatly endorsed away. The divorce, the waiving of my custody rights, and finally my own release. That simple connection had woken me up, had put that distant reverie of life back into the foreground. Who knows when or if she’ll speak again; her aging body is a much stronger cage then my silly black lines. Maybe she’s hoping to just leak out through a little ashy hole.

Creative Writing: Tuesday

It has been suggested to me that being creative helps with recovery. I have done some creative writing lately and will post my work. I am not sure how this relates to ED, or if it does, but I have enjoyed the writing process.

This is a story I am writing based on actual events. I am about 60% through it. I will post the end eventually.

It is too hot in my room. The East-facing window has no curtains and the floor vent is partially obscured by the dresser so the whole space heats up like a Dutch oven when the sun comes up. Shit. Now I remember. He overdosed. The brief safe time between waking up and remembering why I drank myself to sleep expires abruptly. I draw a deep breath.

In the kitchen I see Lauren dressed for field hockey camp. Braces and shin guards accent her scrawny frame. I sit down and pour myself some Coco Puffs but do not eat them. She tells me about the goal she scored in yesterday's scrimmage. I wonder if Lauren is happy. Is anyone happy at twelve? Is anyone every happy? I hope so.

I can hear muffled music coming from the basement. My Mom is already downstairs, nursing her Irish coffee and updating the journal she keeps in her online bipolar support group. Lauren should have left already but I know Mom has forgotten to take her to camp again. I have a little time; I woke up too early anyway.

"Come on Dude, get your crap together." We get into my Chrysler, Lauren clad in her athletic attire and me in my underwear and an old thrift store tee. She still feels safer sitting in the back seat. Maybe it's only when I drive. We ride silently most of the way and Sublime plays over the two remaining speakers. When we reach the fields we are only a few minutes late. My old coach sees me and shouts down from the field house, something about "classic Johnson fashion". I don't know if she means my lateness or my underwear.

Getting home I find my Mom in the kitchen. I consider telling her the chaos that my day entails, but remembering my brother leaves for college tomorrow I decide against it. I take a shower in the bathroom I used to share with Lauren. The shower head whistles when hot water runs. I shampoo my short hair and put on a black dress that would have been too big six months ago.

I arrive at the dentist's office five minutes late for my appointment. I immediately feel guilty about the cigarette I had on the way over. In the waiting room there is a laminated article comparing teeth in unhealthy gum tissue to a stake in wet ground, easily jostled and pulled out. The secretary calls me into Dr. Holevas' office. He always makes small talk and remembers obscure pieces of last year's conversation. He must keep notes on all the patients. He tells me he could fit me in for a cleaning after he finished my fillings. I motion to my dress and tell him I'm flattered but I have a date with a dead man. All small talk ends abruptly.

With rolls of gauze placed between my gums and cheeks I can see a poster of a waterfall on the opposite wall. Dr. Holevas and the hygienist lean over me with a drill and a suction tube. I feel shards of my teeth hitting the roof of my mouth and I think about Dylan.

He made his living buying Lincoln Town Cars and transforming them into custom limousines. When we were younger he lived in his parents' garage and the concrete floor was carpeted with stolen restaurant welcome mats.

"Open winder please."

Stealing those rugs had been quite an operation involving multiple decoys and a getaway vehicle. After a few mishaps and several successful maneuvers, Friday's, Applebee's and Denny's logos filthy with heavy foot traffic covered the bedroom half of that garage. A work-in-progress limo-to-be usually occupied the other half.

"Bite down. Does that feel even?"

The welding torches and soldering irons he used on the cars doubled as glass-blowing tools. Dylan was an incredible glass worker and had sold his work at every head shop in the area. Most artists with his level of skill are professionally trained and his clients usually assumed he was a middle man. The thought of his unrecognized abilities makes me angry and sad. I start to feel my throat tighten.

"This new adhesive dries right away, so you won't have to wait to eat."

I leave the office make the short trip to Mark's apartment. The low fuel light chimes on. I ignore it and turn up the Sublime. The thought of running out of gas has no effect on me.

Mark's apartment has a red door and the "6" in the "516" is only present in the form of a sun stain. I am afraid to go in.

I found out about a year ago that I ought to consider Mark dead, but the reminders still make my ribs ache. I visited his old place, a studio in Boys' Town, last summer after a Redwalls concert at the Bottom Lounge. I found him tweaking on a solitary bare mattress with an emaciated girl who looked fifteen at most in a similar state at his side. Her name was Lilly. When I walked in he sat up and put out a few lines. Coked up, I lay back next to Lilly and Mark sat to my left improvising on his Les Paul. I thought about how he had sat to my left in sixth grade accelerated math and we had made comic strips about our teacher who we though looked like a hedge hog. I got up for a beer and found the sink filled with used syringes and cigarette butts. That was before Eric, Matt and now Dylan had died, but after Missy. It wasn't the norm yet, but I understood that death happened and who it happened to.

Back at 516, I swallow hard and knock. "Kimmy!" A warm hug and awkward scruffy kiss greet me. His teeth are jagged and discolored. His girl's black jeans are probably a size zero and his Van Morrison tee is covered by a thrift store blazer. I look past him into the apartment. It is bigger than the studio, but not any cleaner or more abundantly furnished. I see Amy sitting on the mattress. Her eyes are wide, her skin pocked with tiny abrasions. She smiles at me. "We were gonna smoke outta some of Dylan's pieces before the big show." I hadn't planned on being stoned at the funeral, but the gesture seems appropriate. I settle into the familiar mattress, my head on Amy's gurgling stomach. There are cigarette burns on the ceiling, and I pick up Amy's arm to see if the mark from her ex-lover's cigar is still in her wrist. Hidden under a scrap of bandana tied around her forearm it is gnarled and scratched. She jerks her arm away and pulls the cloth back down over her scar.

Mark comes back in the room with a green and blue dragon bubbler and a small pinkish pipe. He stuffs a wad of sharp smelling green pot into an indentation in the dragon's back. He offers Amy the first hit. She puts the hole in the beast's tail to her lips, flicks the lighter and inhales deeply. She sets the creature down and smoke streams languidly from its glass nostrils.

"This was the greatest piece he ever made. He just gave it to me last week, wouldn't take anything for it... Oh! He finally made you that pipe he promised you like forever ago." Mark gets up and comes back with a swirling yellow water pipe. He hands it to me and I drop it on the mattress. My heart drops with the pipe, but my pipe doesn't break.

Sufficiently high, Mark puts a few crystals into the pink pipe. He holds the meth in my direction but I shake my head. He shrugs. Mark and Amy take a few wheezing drags. We get into his dented Honda and I hope he is sober enough to get us to the funeral intact.

On the ride over we talk about how there are so many funeral parlors in Elgin, how weird it is that we are pseudo-adults, how Hemmingway is the best writer ever and how fucked up it is that Mrs. Maggiano has to bury another child. We start to laugh from the pot, and then I feel guilty. I see all the Burger King soda cups on Mark's car floor and I think about my psychopharmacology class back in Champaign. Dr. Gulley had talked about "meth mouth" and the debate about whether it was caused by the drug itself or by poor hygiene and all the Coke users tend to crave. I feel very removed and alone, realizing that I am the only one of us looking at this as a past rather than a present, a jumping off point rather than an end. I look at Amy and I know that she too is already dead.

We arrive at the Forsyth Funeral Home on East High Street. Amy and I make eye contact, acknowledging this little irony. An usher greets us at the door. "The viewing is currently underway in Room B and the service will start in about twenty-five minutes in Room A." Amy laces her fingers into mine.

In Room B I see Dylan's parents standing stoically by the far wall. Melissa is inured at this point. After Missy's suicide I don't think anything else will ever provoke a feeling in that woman. James looks the same as I remembered him: lean with a prominent jaw line. My stomach tightens and I feel a toxic loathing pulsing through my veins. The thought of him sweating over his daughter consumes me, and slip away to find a bathroom. Bent over the toilet I spot a jug of Drain-O on the floor. James is a plumber, so that very chemical was Missy's drug of choice when she took her life. I laugh a little: It is a good think I am already vomiting, because if I hadn't been I would be now. I feel the effects of the pot creeping up on me again.

In Room B a group of kids I used to know is huddled around what must be Dylan's body. Glad my stomach is empty I make my way across the room. The familiar faces all tell the same story. It is hard not to count upcoming funerals. A man named Jim who once kissed me in the Drama room after class puts his hand on the small of my back. I don't want to be touched, but I don't pull away. I get that same vulnerable, violated feeling I used to get when my fifth grade teacher, Mr. Tecktiel, would corner me by the coat rack in the nook in the back of the class room and put his fingers on my newly budding nipples.

Dylan looks like he has been dead for weeks. His cheeks are sunken and the makeup on his skin does not cover the dark yellow around his eyes. His hair is styled wrong, flipped up in the front rather than pulled together in the center as it is supposed to be. I see the scar under his hair above his right ear and think about the night he got it. It was the first time I had used ecstasy. Missy, Dylan, Mark and I had gone to a rave in a warehouse south of Joliet. Missy and I were leaning against an eight foot speaker rubbing each others backs, arms and heads. I remember thinking what a perfect tactile sensation human touch was. Dylan came up to us and his whole right shoulder was covered in blood. He said it was time to leave. I didn't feel scarred or unhappy. He had fallen while dancing, he said. I don't really know. We drove the sixty miles back to Elgin and snuck back into the Maggiano's house throw Missy's window. I never asked him what had really happened. I don't know that he would know.

"If everyone would please proceed into Room A, services will begin in five minutes."

I take a seat next to Amy and Sarah sits down on my other side. I remember the promise I made Sarah a few days prior. She had called me on Friday night. "Could you do me a huge favor? I know this may sound weird but Jason and I really like it when other people watch us have sex. Like you don't have to do anything or join or anything, but like would you be willing to do that?" I told her I would think about it, and probably would have declined, but when the news of Dylan's death came I figured I might as well. She looks at me and smiles. "Are we still on for later?" she mouths. I nod. Amy looks curious, and after she and Sarah whisper a bit it is decided that Amy and Mark will come over to Sarah and Jason's after the funeral as well. I feel like I have just scheduled a play date.

The priest stands at the front of the room. I hate Catholic funerals. I hate Catholic anything. The room utters an eerie opening prayer and the sound of the syncopated "s" when the crowd speaks the words "sin" and "salvation" is serpentine. The priest begins to talk about Dylan's life. He tries to excuse the drug problem and comfort mourners by telling us Dylan still has a chance to make it to his Heaven. He doesn't say a word about Dylan's ingenuity, his artistry, his brilliance, his loyalty. I am infuriated.

The woman in front of me isn't wearing black. She has an off white dress with a green floral pattern. It looks like the ivy border in my family's dining room. I want to wrap those linen vines around the priest's neck and tighten them until...

Amy nudges me. I realize I am seething audibly and stop. I try to pass it off as crying and listen to the priest, but my thoughts are on Missy. I feel guilty about that, but I don't try to re-focus. I smirk at the way the Catholic guilt still controls me. The pot has worn off by now. I haven't cried yet today.

Funeral processions are an odd ride. Traffic is stopped and our Honda follows a green Jeep without any effort. It feels like the fairy tale rides at Disney World where riders sit in a car they can not control and a foreign world passes by safely out of reach. We arrive at the graveyard. My hands and arms are no longer safely inside the vehicle. Amy takes my hands and laces her fingers in mine. It is late August and her hand is even colder than my own.

The people standing around the grave seem uncomfortable; we are young and unpracticed in the role of solemn mourner. While the priest is talking I am looking at the casket lowering apparatus. A green woven hammock of thick vinyl bands holds the casket and a complex arrangement of gears and pulleys are in place to lower it. Someone had to design, engineer and patent that contraption. I wonder if he was proud of his work, and how many other caskets that particular machine had lowered. Maybe one day it will lower someone who is looking at it now. Maybe it will take me on that final six foot journey.

People begin filing into a line and throwing handfuls of dirt on the grave. The sound is at first a clear pelting as clumps of dry earth shatter on the lacquered wood, but as more people make their contributions the sound fades into the muffled thumping of dirt hitting more dirt. I grab a handful and squish it down so the imprint of my fingers remains on the surface of the clump. Throwing it into the grave I feel like I am somehow defiling him. It seems so insulting. Hot angry tears well up in my eyes and I feel my nose start to run. Mark puts his hand on my shoulder and I shrug him off aggressively.

On the drive home Amy asks Mark to take her some place where she can scream as loud as she wants. He pulls into the quarry where we used to party in high school. Amy gets out and stands on the hood of the car, Mark and I join her. She takes a deep breath. "I don't think I can scream anymore. Let's just have a couple hits." I pass on another round of the pink pipe, but gladly accept the open bottle of cheap merlot that Mark holds in my direction. It tastes musty, like it has been open for several days and I immediately get an appreciated headache. Me heady and Mark and Amy high, we head to Sarah and Jason's apartment.

Consciousness, Love and Synthetic Purpose

Part of an eating disorder is a feeling of emptiness. I have been told by my shrink time and time again that I must be running from something, that I binge and purge to stiffle feelings I don't want to experience, that there must be a gap I am trying to fill. Part of the gap is love. There is not enough love in my life. The other part is purpose. That I have been working on for years, but I actually feel as though I may have a small grasp of mine now.
I am not religious and thus do not have the predetermined purpose that Holy rollers are "blessed" with. I, like so many of the rest of us, have struggled to identify a reason to live. Obviously I do not know why I am here, but I do believe that with enough dedication I can understand most other mysteries of value. Through this process of learning and evaluating I have created for myself a synthetic purpose that will hopefully lead to continual happiness and allow me to help others find the same.
My jumping off point is always that which I cannot understand. In my field consciousness is often referred to as the elephant in the room, the one subject we cannot approach because it remains beyond the grasp of science. Therefore, I have chosen to devote my professional life to furthering understanding on this most incomprehensible phenomenon. I am driven to carry on living, to find love where I can, to develop my mortal self. I cannot explain why (though I will continue trying).
A note on the nature of mortality...
People often talk about the true point being the journay or process rather than the destination or finished product. This seems an interesting reflection on mortality- we are driven to develop ourselves despite the fact that we are mortal. The process leaves us eventually with nothing and the destination is nonexistance. People often shirk this advice, but it makes complete sense in the larger context of the human condition. Finding joy in the process is the only joy one will ever experience.
For me, the process is learning. It brings me both present and future joy and satisfaction. I love to further my understanding of foreign concepts, and have chosen to spend my life in an academic environment. My goal is not, ultimately, to get a PhD and a tenure track position. My goal is to have a life that allows me to learn continually.
Like other humans, however, I have not entirely accepted the idea of mortality. Death, yes, but disappearrance, no. I still feel compelled to leave a legacy. To be remembered is to be, in a sense, immortal. It is the ultimate having because it is the only thing that a person keeps beyond the grave (not that he would have the ability to appreciate it, but it does offer comfort). Being remembered for something great is the only way to assure you continue to exist. I am trying to let go of this concept, but I am not there yet.
So enjoying the journay has two components for me: learning and loving. Learning gives me present and future benefits and equips me with the tools I need to help others on their quest for happiness. Love is inexplicable- love between families, friends and, well, lovers inherently valuable. The fact that I am conscious and you are conscious and we can recognize one anothers existence and exchange thoughts and ideas and emotions is as far as I am concerned completely true, inexplicable and beyond science. Love is the ultimate source of happiness and I want ot fill my life with as much of it as possible.

So, in short, my purpose:
To enjoy the process by loving and learning continually.
To use what I learn to help others enjoy the process as well.

Who Am I and What Am I Doing?

I am a daughter, sister, friend, student, writer, artist, lab member, teacher, employee, classmate, cousin, niece.
I am strong, confident, beautiful, brilliant, loving, driven.
I am working toward becoming a neuroscientist so I can discover new truths about the human mind and brain and so that I can use my knowledge to help people suffering from neurological problems.
I am attempting to love as much as possible: myself, my family, my friends, my fellow man.

You Need To Know What You Want In Order To Get It

The start of the week always has a cleanliness about it, a new chance. For me, this means a new shot at eating healthfully and declaring myself one step closer to recovery from ED.
But being happy and having what I want means more then just following some rules this week. It means actually knowing what I want. In my classic neuroticism, I have composed a list of my various wants. These are the things I think it will take for me to be happy throughout life.

This Week:

1) To feel healthy.

-Eat healthfully and follow the plan I have set up with my nutritionist.

-Follow my exercise plan.

-Sleep and relax sufficiently.

2) To feel confident in my classes.

-Attend all lectures and discussions.

-Complete all readings, homework and quizzes before due dates.

3) To feel connected by being be active socially.

-Go out to dinner with the girls Sunday night

-Go out at night with friends 2-4 times this week

-Go out on one or more dates

4) To feel emotionally content.

-See my psychologist

-Sleep every night

-Write or sculpt at least 2 times this week

-Call my family at least 2 times this week

-Shower, dress and feel good about my appearance daily

-Journal about ED, sleep, emotions, exercise, nutrition, etc. daily

5) To begin plans for upcoming travel.

-Research spring break destinations and air fares to Thailand

-Plan out a budget that will allow me to save enough money for this

This Month:

1) To feel pride for being successful academically.

-Get an A on my first Bio test

-Stay caught up with all readings, homework and quizzes and score well

-Plan out LAS101 classes well and feel proud of my work

-Create a final list of the graduate programs to which I will apply

-Request recommendation letters

-Draft my personal statement

2) To feel strong and beautiful.

-Continue to make progress in overcoming my ED

-Continue to see nutritionist, exercise advisor, sleep expert

-Do not weigh myself

-Accept compliments graciously and avoid putting others down

3) To feel connected.

-Date new people

-Go home at least once

-See all my close friends at times when I am not drinking at least once

4) To feel centered.

-Continue to see the psychologist twice monthly

-Journal frequently

-Take me time by doing at least two of the following every day:

walk to no where in particular, read something not for school, watch a movie, watch TV on the couch, play with clay, write not for school, take a bath, go shopping, meet a friend for coffee or dinner, take a nap, masturbate, etc.

5) To follow the travel savings plan that I created and finalize Spring Break plans.

In the Next Year:

1) Get into the Neuroscience program at Northwestern

2) Go to a Thailand

3) Declare myself recovered from my ED

4) Become financially independent

5) Enter into a new romantic relationship

6) Gain full control of my bipolar disorder

7) Stay close with family and friends

In the Next 5-10 Years:

1) Receive PhD in neuroscience

2) Get tenure-track University position

3) Get married

4) Stay Close with family and friends

5) Maintain a healthy weight and lifestyle

6) Travel to Argentina, Germany, Austria, Ukraine, Japan, Morocco

In Life:

1) Never stop learning

2) Have a successful marriage

3) Raise well-adjusted children

4) Keep many meaningful friendships

5) Stay very close with my family

6) See the world, its natural wonders and varied cultures

This activity has shown me that feeling a certain way is the ultimate goal, and that this is achieved by being and doing, not by having. Living a life that makes me feel proud, beautiful, connected and centered is my goal and achieving this will require professional success in a field that utilizes my talents in a way that helps others, a healthy lifestyle, strong interpersonal relationships and making time for myself.

What my Mother might call a revelation of the obvious.

My first semester of college I had an incredible political theory professor who told a small group of eager Freshman the simplest and most profound thing I have yet heard. She said that if you can figure out who you are and what you are doing, you will find happiness. The statement seemed imbecile at first, but I have returned to it frequently. I still am unable to say that I can answer that question entirely, but I am much closer than I was three years ago.

Why Daft Dragon?

Dragon because I was born in the year of the Dragon. Also, people talk about addictions as "chasing the dragon", perpetually trying to recapture the experience of the elusive first high. But this need is insatiable as I am insatiable. Dragon because my eating disorder is my addiction. I am recovering from "exercise bulimia". For the last year of my life I ate approximately 5 times what I needed to and ran literally 100 miles per week. My shrink said I ought to think of the urges as something outsaide myself so I dubbed my disease "the Dragon". Dragon because I work in a psychopharmacology lab, primarily researching cocaine and methamphetamine, so drug terminology is often on my mind. Dragon for the raw power the animal connotes.
Daft because I fear my reality is skewed and my control is waning. At this moment I feel quite sane, but I have the fascinating condition known as rapid cycling bipolar disorder. Just because it's sunny now doesn't mean it will be in five minutes. Daft because my eating disorder makes me feel as though the person inside me that drives me to accomplish all that I do is cohabiting with a saboteur ready to unravel me at every opportunity. Daft because I am anything but usual.

And so daft dragon shall meander my path.

Overture

I do not know what a blog usually entails.

I would have titled this section "introduction", but I'm reading Kundera right now and he talks about "composing the symphony of our lives" so I opted for this slightly contrived title instead.

As is my custom with journals, I will start with a formal introduction. I am 20 and a student. I will graduate this year with a double major in psychology and political science. I want to go to graduate school for neuroscience, and am fairly confident I will get into a good program in Chicago.

Without going into too much detail, I want to let it be known that I have had the most trying year of my life thus far. I am going to use this space to talk about everything: my chaotic love life, my bipolar disorder, my research, my aspirations, relationships, revelations, body art, accomplishments, health habbits, everything. The main point of alot of this blog, however, is to help recover from my eating disorder. This is my catharsis.