What Brought You Here?

Wednesday, February 6, 2008

So I was having a chat with Mickey Mouse last night about politics. . .

And on topic. People who experience the world in 2-D, who assume that she who plays devil's (republican/ recovery/ MIA queen/ recipient of disability accomodations/ devoutly religious/ nurse-who-made-a-triggering-comment's advocate must be the devil (or the republican, the recovery nazi, the MIA queen, the receiver, yadda yadda) irk me. I don't know, maybe its a fault and my brain is hyperextending (soon to implode on release, I'm sure). But wow- is it really that hard to process one or two additional bits of information on a subject that might greyscale it? Is it really that unusual to despise some of a person's beliefs while truly empathizing with some of his experience?

When a person appears to exist only as a bundle of compulsory idea/ action- devoting most of his time, thought, and energy to a distasteful pursuit like recovery/ eating disorder/ converting to Catholicism/ watching television I have to believe that he is using a new obsession as mental protection against some thoughts/behaviors that might be far more dangerous. Clearly this can only go so far with something like an ED. But if attending the seminary is somehow filling your ex-boyfriend's life, and blowing his brains out has ceased to be a viable option, maybe Catholicism deserves a break.

I mean, honestly- how can one make complete sentences without the capacity to hold two ideas in one's head simultaneously?

Monday, February 4, 2008

Hyacinth House

So, before I was derailed by the threat of unexpected disenfranchisement, and caught up in the urgent need to employ as many words, in as many different places, as possible in the umpteenth reiteration of my All the Viable Candidates Suck platform (conveniently forgetting that independent, critical thought is rarely born in the eleventh hour) and spewed my unpolished endorsement all over the internet- before I bored at least 2 of my 3 possible readers off to more shameful pursuits or straight into a bag of croissants - I was starting to write about how my life came to be measured in milligrams and cubic centiliters. The History of High According to Miss Delusional, and the evolution of its role in my life.

Unfortunately I keep getting about this far- 8 or 10 lines- and running out of. . .

Another Electile Rant. . .

Of course everyone knows who's going to take the D-nom
in Illinois, but it would be nice to make it clear (to
both remaining candidates) that at least a few of us
have witnessed their in/actions and words in context.
Refusing to vote odds might convey the message to the
2008 dem presidential nominee that he can't get away
with blowing smoke up our asses about social welfare.

God forbid elected officials should actually devote
some thought or attention to the concerns of their
(proposed) constituents.

Lord knows Hillary Clinton refuses. Of course I wouldn't bother with the ramblings of the unwashed and disassociating masses either, if I were that deep in the insurance industry's pockets. Hell, I'd write limericks feigning concern for the state of public health while simultaneously evading the issue of mental illness myself.

Barack Obama doesn't even know the scope of what he's overlooked. It's not bad enough that the man has failed to distinguish between Medicare and Medicaid. His regurgitation of the party line regarding the inadequacy of health care for vets truly flops when he skips the record on the particular dearth of mental health facilities for treatment of PTSD and other mental disorders available to veterans.

It's hardly as if the nation is flush with psychiatric beds or workers, with care being denied disproportionately to veterans. Veterans aren't getting adequate mental health care because the resources de facto do not exist. It's ridiculous to propose "breaking down the barriers" to care before anyone has even proposed "laying down a foundation" for the facilities which would provide that care. In a neighboring county seat, one finds the office of the two psychiatrists serving all public needs and most private for a population topping 80k. This is not exceptional, such figures can be found throughout the US. This is a national crisis, but Barack Obama should at least have an inkling of a clue about the status of his own backyard.

It will be a disaster if either of them wins the
nomination on PR and good looks alone- as far as I'm
concerned both need to undertake some serious
education before either belongs in the White House.

Please use your vote this Tuesday to give support to the candidate whose beliefs you want in the White House, electability be damned. Let's shake these two up. We know damn well by now the danger of a complacent leader.

Sunday, February 3, 2008

Live Fast, Die Young, Leave a Good-Looking Corpse

I was fourteen when I pledged myself to alcohol in the name of poetry- an idea excavated from unexceptionally critical reading of the Jim Morrison biography,No One Here Gets Out Alive. Over the next year or two, the background literature for my plan diversified and grew, as did the procedures and processes.

My faith in the fundamental utility of (at least a few random) mind-altering substances had long since been confirmed as well-placed. I'd yet to try the amphetamines so innocently sought as a 12-year-old bulimic, but in the mean time I swallowed, inhaled, and drank questionable concoctions (truly toxic or merely disgusting?) in (usually successful) attempts to change my mind. There wasn't any peer pressure to get high, I recall early attempts at ego-obliteration as being my primary objective and motivator. I was yet to even much experience social inebriation. I just wanted to lose myself, mostly. It was emotionally redeeming to find "insanity" sanctified as a defining characteristic of true artistic temperament. I had accepted that I was insane (or sane in an insane world), and now I had a realistic model for how to execute a brief and beautiful life.

Just like Janis, Jimi, and Jim- I was going to be a public crazy genius, and I was going to go out in flames at 27 before I could rot away. I almost made it out at 28, but the rot had long since set in.

Live fast, die young, and leave a good-looking corpse? Mendacious marketing propaganda from peddlers of dead-rockstar biographies and anorexia memoirs.