Entry 15 "Persona non grata"
For the last two years, I’ve skipped wishing my little brother a happy birthday. Not because I forgot, or even because of a grudge, but because I want him to move on. I haven’t seen or spoken to my family in almost a decade, and while I have no intention of reconciling with them at any point, my baby brother was the sole exception to my self-imposed exile. Throughout this estrangement, I still talked with him on occasion, and when if time provided, we would set apart a few hours to play video games together. It provided passing moments of light-hearted fun that, frankly, I never shared with any other person. But aside from that, it was just nice to know that even in my absence, I still had a positive impact on him.
But as so often happens, our paths began to diverge. He would get involved in his high school life and I would focus on my increasing responsibilities at work. Months would go by and only a few fleeting text messages would temporarily bridge the distance between us. There was no bitterness or yearning. I understood why things unfolded that way. We both had plenty to keep us busy, and there were still meaningful attempts to keep each other in the loop as to what was going on.
I only vaguely remember making the decision to stop reaching out, but our subsequent break in communication is all on me. I stopped wanting to be the supportive big brother and preferred to isolate myself from any remaining warmth. When I made the decision to end my life, I broke away from everything and everybody. I didn’t want to be seen for what I was, and didn’t want them to find out what I would become.
It was around the same time that I left my previous SW account. While stumbling around for some old stories I had written, thinking it may have survived the deletion, I realized that I didn’t actually delete my old profile. The story I had written over 2 years ago was still there, but the profile I used to post it was also still around, just abandoned. Naturally, temptation got the better of me and I clicked around to see what else I had written, what memories would resurface, and what thoughts my past self had bothered to document.
Turns out I was a very different person 2 years ago. It’s now been weeks since this discovery and it’s still hard for me to believe that I wrote the things I did. I remember doing so, and I recognize those as my words, but I am stuck with this uncanny feeling like it was written by someone else. It’s not as if I wrote anything remotely radical or so far beyond the reach of reason that it’s difficult to grasp. Rather, it’s just so incredibly disorienting for me to conceive of a time when I used to have hope.
My old posts had humor and levity in them. They had curiosity and humility. They weren’t so cold and analytical, and actually left the door open for wonder and wishful thinking. There were genuine attempts to connect with others and to explore the different dimensions that made up our humanity. It’s such a jarring contrast to what I am today that I even felt my breath shorten looking back at this snapshot of my life. It highlights so vividly all that I have lost in such a short amount of time.
But I continued digging deeper, and looked back at the comments I had made, the groups I had joined, what gifts I had received, and at last the friends I had made. While the other categories had a lot of light to shed on the type of person I once was, the last category told another, and perhaps more meaningful story. There was nothing to explore in the Friends section of the site. No friends, no followers, and no one in my circle.
Perhaps I deleted them before I left? I don’t remember doing so, but it’s not a possibility I could rule out. I do remember blocking the one person I was talking to at the time, but beyond that I don’t know that I would bother to save all my posts and leave my comments visible while only making an effort to rid myself of people that didn’t even know my name. It’s much easier to believe that perhaps I never had any friends here. It would explain why it was so easy to leave, or why my posts had such inconsistent responses.
I don’t really know, but I do remember saying to one person here, after rejoining, that it was only after I stopped caring about anybody that people suddenly began showing interest in me. And while that noticeable gap in my old profile might just be the result of people graduating away from this website, I can’t help but wonder how much that void influenced my psychological swan dive. Maybe I got tired of talking to all the walls in the room and showed myself the door.
For the last two years I have been living with one foot in the grave. I have no career ambitions, no personal goals, no ideal relationship, no dreams. I’ve structured the last two years of my life to deal only with immediate short-term tasks as they arise. Primarily, that’s meant working 7 days a week between my two jobs, using the sheer exhaustion from that much labor to tourniquet the bleeding emptiness that would otherwise pour over every waking moment of my life. When supplemented with the on-going tedium of adult responsibilities and the constant attention a dog requires to be happy and healthy, there’s little time to entertain fantasies of what could be.
But in the same vein, it’s palpably unfulfilling to live this way. While I can take solace in knowing I finally have a weapon to combat my darkest thoughts with, it’s benefits are quickly pared away when realizing that this sword is double-edged. It’s not lost on me that I’m keeping myself artificially sedated with the steady release of tiny dopamine bursts borne from monotonous tasks like finishing a shift, checking the mail, or filling my gas tank. I’ve boiled my life down to little more than self-induced tunnel vision for the sake of surviving until tomorrow. A strategy to be recycled ad infinitum solely because the alternative would be to prove my mortality before a jury of densely-packed trees.
And as much as I would like to die and get it all over with, I told myself that I would bear this cross for the sake of my dog, and ridiculous though it may be, I intend to keep my word. Currently, the plan is for me to quit one of my jobs within the next month and go down to a regular 40-hour work week. I’m making more money than I can reasonably spend, so I would rather trade that for some time to do things I can actually enjoy. Especially after largely neglecting them for as long as I have. But my fear is that even if I could add more balance to my life in the short-term, it would not be enough to counter-act the weight of my own crippling despair for very long. I will once more have to confront the isolation that drove me to the precipice, but this time without naively hoping that better days would be found on the other side of its wrath.
But I haven’t crossed that bridge yet. I won’t deny that there is at least some reasons for optimism. I at least have the semblance of an actual sense of purpose, money to blow on all manner of creature comforts, and a rediscovered itch for writing. If nothing else, there’s a lot more clarity now that the veil of hope has been lifted from my outlook. I'll probably never just be okay, but disappointments hurt far less when you expect them.
But as so often happens, our paths began to diverge. He would get involved in his high school life and I would focus on my increasing responsibilities at work. Months would go by and only a few fleeting text messages would temporarily bridge the distance between us. There was no bitterness or yearning. I understood why things unfolded that way. We both had plenty to keep us busy, and there were still meaningful attempts to keep each other in the loop as to what was going on.
I only vaguely remember making the decision to stop reaching out, but our subsequent break in communication is all on me. I stopped wanting to be the supportive big brother and preferred to isolate myself from any remaining warmth. When I made the decision to end my life, I broke away from everything and everybody. I didn’t want to be seen for what I was, and didn’t want them to find out what I would become.
It was around the same time that I left my previous SW account. While stumbling around for some old stories I had written, thinking it may have survived the deletion, I realized that I didn’t actually delete my old profile. The story I had written over 2 years ago was still there, but the profile I used to post it was also still around, just abandoned. Naturally, temptation got the better of me and I clicked around to see what else I had written, what memories would resurface, and what thoughts my past self had bothered to document.
Turns out I was a very different person 2 years ago. It’s now been weeks since this discovery and it’s still hard for me to believe that I wrote the things I did. I remember doing so, and I recognize those as my words, but I am stuck with this uncanny feeling like it was written by someone else. It’s not as if I wrote anything remotely radical or so far beyond the reach of reason that it’s difficult to grasp. Rather, it’s just so incredibly disorienting for me to conceive of a time when I used to have hope.
My old posts had humor and levity in them. They had curiosity and humility. They weren’t so cold and analytical, and actually left the door open for wonder and wishful thinking. There were genuine attempts to connect with others and to explore the different dimensions that made up our humanity. It’s such a jarring contrast to what I am today that I even felt my breath shorten looking back at this snapshot of my life. It highlights so vividly all that I have lost in such a short amount of time.
But I continued digging deeper, and looked back at the comments I had made, the groups I had joined, what gifts I had received, and at last the friends I had made. While the other categories had a lot of light to shed on the type of person I once was, the last category told another, and perhaps more meaningful story. There was nothing to explore in the Friends section of the site. No friends, no followers, and no one in my circle.
Perhaps I deleted them before I left? I don’t remember doing so, but it’s not a possibility I could rule out. I do remember blocking the one person I was talking to at the time, but beyond that I don’t know that I would bother to save all my posts and leave my comments visible while only making an effort to rid myself of people that didn’t even know my name. It’s much easier to believe that perhaps I never had any friends here. It would explain why it was so easy to leave, or why my posts had such inconsistent responses.
I don’t really know, but I do remember saying to one person here, after rejoining, that it was only after I stopped caring about anybody that people suddenly began showing interest in me. And while that noticeable gap in my old profile might just be the result of people graduating away from this website, I can’t help but wonder how much that void influenced my psychological swan dive. Maybe I got tired of talking to all the walls in the room and showed myself the door.
For the last two years I have been living with one foot in the grave. I have no career ambitions, no personal goals, no ideal relationship, no dreams. I’ve structured the last two years of my life to deal only with immediate short-term tasks as they arise. Primarily, that’s meant working 7 days a week between my two jobs, using the sheer exhaustion from that much labor to tourniquet the bleeding emptiness that would otherwise pour over every waking moment of my life. When supplemented with the on-going tedium of adult responsibilities and the constant attention a dog requires to be happy and healthy, there’s little time to entertain fantasies of what could be.
But in the same vein, it’s palpably unfulfilling to live this way. While I can take solace in knowing I finally have a weapon to combat my darkest thoughts with, it’s benefits are quickly pared away when realizing that this sword is double-edged. It’s not lost on me that I’m keeping myself artificially sedated with the steady release of tiny dopamine bursts borne from monotonous tasks like finishing a shift, checking the mail, or filling my gas tank. I’ve boiled my life down to little more than self-induced tunnel vision for the sake of surviving until tomorrow. A strategy to be recycled ad infinitum solely because the alternative would be to prove my mortality before a jury of densely-packed trees.
And as much as I would like to die and get it all over with, I told myself that I would bear this cross for the sake of my dog, and ridiculous though it may be, I intend to keep my word. Currently, the plan is for me to quit one of my jobs within the next month and go down to a regular 40-hour work week. I’m making more money than I can reasonably spend, so I would rather trade that for some time to do things I can actually enjoy. Especially after largely neglecting them for as long as I have. But my fear is that even if I could add more balance to my life in the short-term, it would not be enough to counter-act the weight of my own crippling despair for very long. I will once more have to confront the isolation that drove me to the precipice, but this time without naively hoping that better days would be found on the other side of its wrath.
But I haven’t crossed that bridge yet. I won’t deny that there is at least some reasons for optimism. I at least have the semblance of an actual sense of purpose, money to blow on all manner of creature comforts, and a rediscovered itch for writing. If nothing else, there’s a lot more clarity now that the veil of hope has been lifted from my outlook. I'll probably never just be okay, but disappointments hurt far less when you expect them.
31-35, M
