Day 67: It Lingers

Although I increased my meds yesterday, I am incredibly down today. I have shut myself up in my room all day and didn't speak to my parents until after 6pm. That was just because I had to be in the kitchen to cook myself some dinner. I guess it all started this morning when I had to coordinate two of my friends, Mark and Max, with going to see a movie this weekend in Charlotte. Now, I have to leave Greenville at 5:30 and pray we hit no delays or I will be late for the movie. What was supposed to be a fun thing I was going to do now becomes a stressful thing I don't want to do. I've been watching this really shitty season of the West Wing (the one after Sorkin left) and the reason it is so bad is because it comes out of the gray areas of the first four seasons and starts treating politics as absolutes. People get all they want and win, which I am sure is not how politics works. The first four seasons felt like wading through molasses but they also felt true. Now, things are moving fast but unrealistically.

So I started thinking about how I have to compromise sometimes and do things I don't want to do in order to do things I do want to do. Seeing Dunkirk in 70mm is important to me but I don't know if it is worth the hassle of the long drive back and forth. This is after I talked myself out of going to Carowinds with a group of my friends on Saturday. They were going for the water park and all I can imagine is how hot and miserable it will be. I don't know what's wrong with me.

Day 66: Post-Party Depression

I celebrated my 40th Birthday this past weekend by doing my 10th movie marathon in 11 years. Everytime one ends I swear I will never do another but, eventually, the temptation to force my friends into watching movies I like gets too great. The weekend was divided into movies I picked and movies I had never seen that others picked for me.

1) Coffeetown- My mother, John and Aubrey, Adam and Kirby all made it for at least part of this one. I think it went over well. I wasn't embarrassed by it. We started at noon.
2) Roller Town- This one is my sense of humor personified but I am afraid the others didn't get it as much. Ellen, a friend of mine who never shows up to parties, shows up for this and the next one. Neither are the strongest movies I have shown. Mark shows up during this one. So I have my largest group for...
3) Stretch- Not as good as I remembered it with Ed Helms chewing the scenery and Chris Pine giving a ballsy but brief performance. Everything happened so mechanically, I was very embarrassed showing this. Ellen will never trust me again. Mark says it was his favorite.
4)Heist- Probably my favorite of the movies I showed. Adam and Ellen left before it. We ordered food. I still like the movie very much but others didn't care for Mamet's writing.
5) Bone Tomahawk- There was a dinner break with John and Aubrey leaving to feed their dogs. That left me with Mark and Kirby (my mother rejoined us after sitting out Heist). I was going to show a moving about gambling addiction called Mississippi Grind but I called an audible and switched it to Bone Tomahawk to get some horror in the mix. John and Aubrey come back in time for the end.
6) Calvary- I know Kirby left but I think Mark and the Ferrers stayed all the way through this one. The first night ended pretty well but I was super tired.

Day two started at 1pm with...
7) Akira- Adam, Shawn, John and Aubrey made it for this one. Lots of fun.
8) Two for the Road- The same crew for this one. At the end, Adam and Shawn left and Max came in.
9) What's Up, Doc- Just me and Max (and my mom for part) for this one. John and Aubrey went home for the dogs but came back.
10) Rope- Hitchcock with Max, John and Aubrey.
11) Friends of Eddie Coyle- Max left and we were joined by Amanda and Stephen for the second half of the last movie.

That night, I had a cockroach run across me as I tried to sleep. It made it very hard for me to rest (I slept with the lights on). Ever since the party, I have been a little down and out of it. I like being surrounded by friends and watching movies but it goes too quickly. I'm always left with a hollow feeling. This time was no different. Maybe I can explain more tomorrow.

Day 60: Mother

So, today I was talking to my mother in the living room. This isn't an unusual thing, we talk all the time. Right after I told her I was worried about her mental health, she changed the subject to ask about how I approach new people. As I was telling her about this guy I know that I don't like she responded with "That's why you have to be there to teach Mushroom Dan or whatever his name is." It was like having someone fall asleep while talking to you but she was wide awake in the early afternoon. She tried to recover by explaining who Mushroom Dan was but this only made less and less sense as we talked. It terrified me.

My mom is currently dealing with the fact that her husband (my father) is pretty useless. He drinks himself stupid every night and takes pills if the booze doesn't get him there. He is about 400 pounds and falls a lot. He can't get up by himself. He does nothing all day but read books by Tom Clancy and watch sports. His other big thing is telling everyone how to live their lives. A real control freak. So Mom is dealing with that and her own mother, who is sliding into dementia. For my mom and I, dementia is pretty much the check in the mail. I just can't deal with my mother losing her mind yet.

I have been having flashes all night of me as a kid, watching movies and trying to show them to my mom. She would try her best to stay awake but usually nod off halfway through. For a little while, I would poke her couch and try to wake her up but eventually, I would just have to let her go. I don't think I need to belabor the metaphor here. I'm nearly 40 years old and I am scared of losing my mother. Some people don't get their mom for that long or at all. I've been lucky. But when your dad is the way he is and your life has gone how mine has...you treasure the people you can depend on. And mom has always been my rock.

I want to be hers but I'm just not in that place yet. I can't be helpful as her world keeps falling apart. I am trying to be supportive but this is really where siblings would help. Or at least a good wife. Alright, I've cried enough for one post. More on this later.

Day 58: Time Matters

The roller coaster seems to have finally pulled to a stop today. My company wrote to me to say I would be starting August 21st, they even sent a new letter for me to sign with my hiring date. It all feels official and like it can't be yanked away. So, I decide to go ahead with my birthday party and go ahead with my trip to the beach. I will continue doing what I've been doing all summer until my training starts. This was unexpected to say the least. Not only getting a firm date but moving it up three weeks was a bit of a godsend.

And I think about how I've been spending my days. I've been making lists of things to do as I wake up, it makes everything feel more official and structured. However, the past couple of nights I find myself finished with what I want to do by 7pm or so. This leaves me with some time to fret and fidget. My friends are working hard to get my birthday party right this year, bless em. I hope I have room for everyone to be comfortable. We need to get this TV in here. Now I'm just typing whatever comes to mind. I thought I had a point to make but maybe I don't.

Day 55: Same old developments

The Progressive roller coaster only lasted one day. I took an online test this afternoon that said I was unqualified for the job. Corrin was crushed, so was I. I was trying to imagine a life in the insurance business but it is very difficult to picture. I would show up everyday and sit at my little desk, maybe with some wacky personal touch calendar on it. I would talk to my co-workers and set up phone calls and hear people describe their accidents to me. Corrin talked about travel for training and two hour meetings and all sorts of things I can't picture myself doing. Maybe I threw the psych evaluation on purpose.

The other thing I did was reconnect with my cousin today. This can sometimes be a dangerous proposition because we are very different people. I spent a few years not talking to him after he got bogged down in drug addiction. You tie your own mood to how well these people do and they keep letting you down. Still, when we have fun, we have fun. That's the trade-off, drama for someone to have a beer with. We'll see how it goes.

Day 54: New Developments

Things hit the skids last week and I reached a really low point. I didn't think I could go on with the diary project because I was so depressed. I met with my therapist and basically just learned that, yes, I am fucked. The next day, my company pushed back my start date to September 11th...surely nothing bad happened that day, ever. I was lower than I had been all summer. I figured out I could maybe make it, if I drained my unemployment dry. Oh, in other news, Kirby invited me to go to the beach with him this month for a few days like we used to do when we were kids. That actually gave me a little bit of hope. After the job announcement, I started actually applying to all the things I had been pretending to apply for online. And then, today, Corrin (a classmate from middle school) told me about a job opening with Progressive insurance. I spent some time applying today. It could be just as much money as my investigator job, if not more. While I still don't know what a claims adjuster does, it has to be better than sitting around my house getting fatter.

Day 47: Talk Talk

One of the worst realizations as I get older in life is that I have no one to talk to except for my therapist. Once a month, I get to reveal my innermost thoughts to someone but I have to pay for the privilege. And as much as she is invested in my well being, there is something off balance. Last time, she recommended I stand up to my mother about not wanting to walk with her and when I balked, she withdrew the suggestion with the implication that I was being impossible to deal with. When you exasperate your therapist, something is wrong. I want very badly to speak with someone but I will have to wait until next Tuesday.

I'm not even sure what I would be talking about, to be honest. I am sad. I have been crying at every episode of the West Wing. I'm not sure what else I should be doing with my time. A few days ago, the tv was out, the internet was out and I had lost my phone. I have never been more lost for what I should be doing. One by one, these problems have been solved (the tv is still out) but I still feel overwhelmed and adrift. I am thinking of instituting a new work out policy by going to this health club near my house. I want to workout a 1/2 an hour a day. Probably on an exercise bike or treadmill. It will require washing oh so many clothes per week as I only have a few things that fit me. This is probably all just a nice fantasy. We'll see.

Day 46: The West Wing

Over the 4th of July holiday, I have been watching lots of Aaron Sorkin's West Wing (currently on season two). The show makes me cry a lot. Not sure why. Well, that is not entirely true. It is filled with moments of people being nice to each other. Friends helping out friends and strangers helping out strangers. It is sort of a civics lesson in TV form. Whenever a character does something selfless, I find myself getting worked up. Maybe this speaks to the loneliness in my life. I hung out with friends last night but I feel forever apart from them. Not that they aren't good friends, we just don't have each others backs the way I always thought friends would. Mostly the married couples have each others' backs and the rest of us are just kind of there. In high school, you really felt the concept of taking a bullet for someone else. Now, I don't know.

I miss things that have changed too far to ever change back. I think Kirby has my back. And other people care about me but...something's missing.

Day 44: Waiting for the Fall

Yesterday, my dad fell twice. Once was in the front yard, I was in the house, oblivious. Our neighbors helped him inside. His face was covered in blood, he scraped up his face falling down. He swore he wasn't drunk but my mother got the truth out of him later. He weighs upwards of 400 pounds and can barely move of his own volition. This is really the portrait of a man who has given up on himself. The fact that I look like a slightly smaller version of him, this bothers me. That I wasn't really surprised or concerned that he fell again trying to open a bottle of wine later...that bothers me.

I don't know, I don't have much to say. I got car insurance today and moved one of our cars out of the way so dad wouldn't park right over a break in the concrete of our driveway. I am thinking of joining a gym just to get out of the house. But I need more clothes.

Day 43: Halfway Through the Year

This is it, the midpoint of the year. Just as much ahead of us as behind us. It's a good day to reflect on what's been accomplished. I made a list of 17 things I wanted to accomplish this year. So far, I've done five. One isn't worth accomplishing. One is impossible for this year, which I didn't know at the beginning of the year. Well, let's just look at them.

1) Rewrite my novel. I lost almost a whole novel I had written when my last computer crashed on me. I'm not even sure I still have the outline anywhere. I haven't summoned up the will to rewrite the whole thing from scratch yet.

2) Get a new job. This will be done sometime this month. Either the 10th or, as I am not expecting, the 31st. So, that will be nice to check off.

3) Get a new place to live. Not possible from what I've learned. If I want to be out from under this crazy credit card debt, I need to settle with them. In order to do that, I will have to stay with my parents so I can afford the payments.

4) Get a car. Did this yesterday. Kind of. My parents paid for it. I won't feel good until I've paid them off.

5) Rework the diet dice- I had this marked as completed. I have definitely not completed it. This was a weight loss scheme (the last one that worked for me). I have yet to replicate it.

6) Kurt Russell Marathon? Seemed like a good idea at the time, now I don't care.

7) How to Host a murder- Harkens back to game nights past. My regular gaming group is split to the winds now. Not sure when or how to do this.

8) Get a CPAP machine. I have one. It works well but I can't use it at the moment due to my facial breakout.

9) Watch my 31 horror movies for October. I plan to do this.

10) Keep up with my daily horror blog. I am doing this.

11) One Last Birthday Marathon. I plan to do one in a few weeks, somehow.

12) Continue Random Christmas-  I am doing this so far.

13) Work on a comic. Jay is kind of making this come true by going back and working on our old script. Once again, he did a lot of work and then lost steam. Not sure if it will get done.

14) Direct a short. I have one in mind, I just need to do it.

15) Go on a vacation. Yeah, we'll see. I doubt this one.

16) Finish my board game. This is tied into my lack of a gaming group. I have it all together. We'll see if the spirit moves me.

17) Get alive again. My credit report was showing me as dead. I somehow fixed it.

So, some still to come. Others are impossible and others rely on me getting motivated. If this new job would goddamn start, I would feel much better.