Against much protest, I have long since crawled out of bed. I am still full of tubes, have a nasty infection, and am still having my lung pumped in the morning.
Strangely, oddly perhaps, I have taken to walking in the cemetary in the cool of the evening. It borders my property. It is a quiet peaceful place. It is, to the contrary, a place full of life. I go there, well past the witching hour, and walk. The racoons and creatures of the night do not fear me, they follow me as I go about, as I scatter them breadcrumbs and treats. And how they lecture me when I run out.
It is a place full of pointed reminders of lives foolishly spent on lost causes. There are many there buried during the Civil War, with little iron crosses showing that they were Confederates. A lasting monument to hatred and folly. Also there are reminders of worthy battles, as there are those who were buried during the Revolutionary War. This is an OLD cemetary. One of the oldest in America. There are graves there over 250 years old. There are reminders there, and there is wisdom spoken from the lips of the dead, as surely as if they were still alive. In the mists, in the star light, in the glow of the moon, there is a mirror, full of reflection, showing life among the dead.
I have been dead now more times then what ever could possibly be healthy. In this last go round, something broke. Fear, the overwhelming dread I usually feel, has gone from me. Has my Post Traumatic Stress Disorder went away from me? No. I am still a twitchy nervous fellow who can't sleep much. But fear has been mysteriously absent. It is almost as if it is no longer a concern. Pain too, has changed. After many mornings of feeling what might be the most agonizing pain in my life, I stopped caring. I stopped taking pain killers. I still feel, but it no longer means anything. Pain has become a sensation much like any other, a slight hunger pang, or mayhap the tickle of a fine pair of silk boxers. It is no longer of my concern. I am not sure how to explain it. I don't even wince. I am not numb. I still feel. It just no longer matters.
I have poored out every drop of alcohol in the house. I don't know what made me do it, it too no longer meant anything. I realized that of the past few years, I have drank more then I had cared for. I do not know if I have become an alcoholic. I am not even sure if I care. It caused me no trouble to merely poor it out, if anything, it troubled my wife greatly, bringing her to near panic, causing her to ask if I had lost my will to live. I just... No longer have a desire for it. Nor do I desire much of anything as of late. I have to be reminded of when to eat, something that is very strange indeed for me, seeing as how I am about food. I strongly dislike the sensation of hunger. Something inside is different now, mayhap broken. Mayhap fixed. I do not know. Everything is strangely grey, and I am not even sure if I care about it. As strange as it sounds, I can't remember ever feeling better inside. It is as if I am strangely beyond everything. Even my grumping and fussing seemed to have passed into the grey fog. Things about people that used to send me into furious bouts of cursing and shouting merely cause me to raise an eyebrow. People who know me best think there is something terribly wrong... My wife even wants me to talk to a head shrinker, so unlike my self I have been lately. Instead of exploding as I should have done, I realized, she was baiting me, I casually dismissed her musings with a wave of my hand. Is something broken? Fixed? Does it matter?
I stared quite a bit into the Abyss, as I thought to do in one of my previous posts. My own Abyss. There were many eyes staring back, all of them my own. All of them mirror images of my self, but each one different, each one a possible "What If" doppleganger tormenting me with visions of what might have been had a taken a different course or turned away from the worst moments as I traveled down the road of my life. I dismissed them, I condemned them, I cursed them. Did I damn my self? Mayhap I did.
My dreams are filled wth birds, my waking hours as well. In my walks at night, mocking birds chide me, and the song birds of the night sing to me. In the day, I am set upon by swarms of birds if I go outside. I can not shoo them away. They crowd about me in the yard, chiding me, lecturing me, taunting me with memories I try not to understand. I think of my aunt, who had the same problem. Are these birds psychopomps? Messengers? Do the many bread crumbs, muffin bits, and bits of fruit that wind up in my stubbly new growth of beard tempt them? Their beadly little black eyes stare at me profoundly. Try as I might, they will not go away. Threaten them as I might, they do not take me seriously. They gather, they watch, and make me question.
I am on my feet again, whatever feet those might be. My life has grown strange as of late, I have not been online as much, and I have even pondered becoming a Luddite and getting rid of my computer altogether.
Strangely, oddly perhaps, I have taken to walking in the cemetary in the cool of the evening. It borders my property. It is a quiet peaceful place. It is, to the contrary, a place full of life. I go there, well past the witching hour, and walk. The racoons and creatures of the night do not fear me, they follow me as I go about, as I scatter them breadcrumbs and treats. And how they lecture me when I run out.
It is a place full of pointed reminders of lives foolishly spent on lost causes. There are many there buried during the Civil War, with little iron crosses showing that they were Confederates. A lasting monument to hatred and folly. Also there are reminders of worthy battles, as there are those who were buried during the Revolutionary War. This is an OLD cemetary. One of the oldest in America. There are graves there over 250 years old. There are reminders there, and there is wisdom spoken from the lips of the dead, as surely as if they were still alive. In the mists, in the star light, in the glow of the moon, there is a mirror, full of reflection, showing life among the dead.
I have been dead now more times then what ever could possibly be healthy. In this last go round, something broke. Fear, the overwhelming dread I usually feel, has gone from me. Has my Post Traumatic Stress Disorder went away from me? No. I am still a twitchy nervous fellow who can't sleep much. But fear has been mysteriously absent. It is almost as if it is no longer a concern. Pain too, has changed. After many mornings of feeling what might be the most agonizing pain in my life, I stopped caring. I stopped taking pain killers. I still feel, but it no longer means anything. Pain has become a sensation much like any other, a slight hunger pang, or mayhap the tickle of a fine pair of silk boxers. It is no longer of my concern. I am not sure how to explain it. I don't even wince. I am not numb. I still feel. It just no longer matters.
I have poored out every drop of alcohol in the house. I don't know what made me do it, it too no longer meant anything. I realized that of the past few years, I have drank more then I had cared for. I do not know if I have become an alcoholic. I am not even sure if I care. It caused me no trouble to merely poor it out, if anything, it troubled my wife greatly, bringing her to near panic, causing her to ask if I had lost my will to live. I just... No longer have a desire for it. Nor do I desire much of anything as of late. I have to be reminded of when to eat, something that is very strange indeed for me, seeing as how I am about food. I strongly dislike the sensation of hunger. Something inside is different now, mayhap broken. Mayhap fixed. I do not know. Everything is strangely grey, and I am not even sure if I care about it. As strange as it sounds, I can't remember ever feeling better inside. It is as if I am strangely beyond everything. Even my grumping and fussing seemed to have passed into the grey fog. Things about people that used to send me into furious bouts of cursing and shouting merely cause me to raise an eyebrow. People who know me best think there is something terribly wrong... My wife even wants me to talk to a head shrinker, so unlike my self I have been lately. Instead of exploding as I should have done, I realized, she was baiting me, I casually dismissed her musings with a wave of my hand. Is something broken? Fixed? Does it matter?
I stared quite a bit into the Abyss, as I thought to do in one of my previous posts. My own Abyss. There were many eyes staring back, all of them my own. All of them mirror images of my self, but each one different, each one a possible "What If" doppleganger tormenting me with visions of what might have been had a taken a different course or turned away from the worst moments as I traveled down the road of my life. I dismissed them, I condemned them, I cursed them. Did I damn my self? Mayhap I did.
My dreams are filled wth birds, my waking hours as well. In my walks at night, mocking birds chide me, and the song birds of the night sing to me. In the day, I am set upon by swarms of birds if I go outside. I can not shoo them away. They crowd about me in the yard, chiding me, lecturing me, taunting me with memories I try not to understand. I think of my aunt, who had the same problem. Are these birds psychopomps? Messengers? Do the many bread crumbs, muffin bits, and bits of fruit that wind up in my stubbly new growth of beard tempt them? Their beadly little black eyes stare at me profoundly. Try as I might, they will not go away. Threaten them as I might, they do not take me seriously. They gather, they watch, and make me question.
I am on my feet again, whatever feet those might be. My life has grown strange as of late, I have not been online as much, and I have even pondered becoming a Luddite and getting rid of my computer altogether.
![[Image: vipersig.jpg]](http://www.danasoft.com/vipersig.jpg)
