Have I slept?
I feel as though I crossed a line that I cannot remember stepping over, or had an experience that I have forgotten like a dream. I feel that there has to be something, some cause or reason or explanation to justify the fact that I feel completely alien to myself. Tonight my sense of self does not remember how to feel as it normally does. Even writing this isn't theraputic in the way that I would usually find it. Something is different and I can't explain what it is. It's almost like I am two completely seperate consciousnesses inhabiting the same body. There is me, Theotus, and the train of thought and emotion that surrounds the things that I experience and the things that I try to accomplish. Then there is something else that is objectively observing every thought and emotion, questioning it. Collectively I feel like one part of me knows something, or sees something, or understands the ability and demands of myself to feel something that the rest of me can't grasp. It is mentally and emotionally exhausting.
Tonight, just as I was changing lanes on my way home, I realized that there is something about my life that has changed. Nothing is wrong, but my entire being is now beating to a different drum, and it's like I can't quite figure out the rhythm. I was thinking about how I felt as I was growing up in my house and going to school. I was thinking about what kinds of things were troubling to me then, and what kind of things I fantasized about, what dreamed of attaining and of being. Even as I did I began to question whether this new feeling I was experiencing had something to do with the fact that life is no longer as simple, or as structured. I do not believe that to be the case, because I realized that when I was younger, working through school (regardless of how much I may have hated it at the time) and coming to this point in my life was different because I felt like I was going somewhere.
Having reached this point, I feel empty. I feel like I am caught between being asleep and waking up. I am seperate now, from my thoughts and my emotions to the point where it feels like no matter what it is that I am doing, as good as it could possibly be, or as hateful and horrible as I could imagine, I would be doing no more than playing it like a part. I say what I say because it sounds like it would be the best response. I am stuck in stoic silence when I should be consumed with emotion, because I am too busy considering whether or not it is how I should be feeling. As though there is some fucking standard for that.
I don't know what it is. I don't know what it is. I don't know what it is. I. Don't. Understand.
I don't know where I've gone, to have come so far and not have the ability to recall any of the road that led me here. I don't know why it is a struggle now to make myself eat regularly. I don't know why it is a struggle to get out of bed at a reasonable time. I don't know why I feel completely out of control.
Today I went by an old friend's to visit him on his birthday. A few others were still there, as well, having celebrated vigoursly with a fifth of Monarch. One of my friends, who we shall call S, had killed a rather large amount in a considerably short period of time, and was able to do little more than lament at the way that he was feeling. Normal. It happens. The thing I don't understand about the whole scene of S sprawled out on the front porch, surrounded by two others and myself, his body cleansing itself of anything and everything in it, was that he kept apologizing for his condition. To me, as though he were doing something to disappoint me. I had gone inside earlier and got him a glass of water, and was doing my best, as were the others to be encouraging and help him through it, but he seemed to be worried about being as sick as he was in my presence. I don't know why. I have been that sick before him, I have done worse than underage drinking with him. I don't understand why I was concerning him so. Maybe I'll ask him when he is feeling himself again.
Theo out.
Feh.
I am just now coming to realize that my work schedule rarely grants me any semblance of free time. It is not uncommon for me to work three days in a row, from 1:00pm to 9:30pm, have one day off in the middle of the week, and then work for another three days. Closing every night, and having split days off is something that steers one into a very lonely and somewhat depressing routine. I have become some accustomed to working the same shift every day that my sleep schedule has completely changed. Getting off at 9:30pm causes me to stay up late doing virtually nothing, be it staring at my computer screen, playing a game I've already beaten or watching a movie I've already seen in an attempt to provide myself with some kind of personal time. Going to bed at 2:00 or 2:30am generally means that I wake up at about noon, giving me an hour or so to get ready for work and rinse and repeat the whole ordeal.
What the hell is so goddamn exciting at 9:30 that I could go out and do? What does Olympia's night life possibly have to offer besides vast amounts of maurijuana, and for those who are legal, bars? Realizing that there ultimately is not a goddamn thing to do when I get off work has led me to smoking more pot, distancing myself from my friends and family, and drifting into a stale continuum. Fortunately, my wonderful girlfriend has been providing much respite from that, as things are definately exciting when she is around. I asked my boss yesterday if he would start scheduling me to open more, after spending a few hours hanging out with a few estranged buddies. Things, in that respect, appear to be looking up.
Oh lymph nodes, how I loathe you. Unfortunatelly, scooping the fuckers out won't let me breathe any easier. Alas. On another note, I beat Gears today. That game is pretty much the best game that I have ever played. I am not trying to act as though my opinion about anything is the be all end all, and all that matters, but for what it's worth I've been playing games since Gauntlet, Dinowarz and Super Mario Bros. III on the nintendo. My entire social life in school consisted of kicking it with the "group" and playing games. I've worked at a video game retailer for the last year, and with all of that experience under my belt, I can say without hesitation that Gears has offered one of the most accessible, polished and intense gameplay experiences to date. Word to the development team, and to the 360 for finally fucking showing what the next-gen is all about. It's high praise, yes, but they earned it.
I love you, Molly. Thank you for being there for me.
Theo out.
herbToday, although it went along smoothly enough, was still another one of those days. The proverbial days. You all know what I'm talking about. I felt relatively good when I woke up, but I suppose I should explain that before I get into today.
Last night, after I got off work and kicked it with my girlfriend for a bit, she and I went to a post Halloween costume party. For some reason, over the course of the day I slowly started to lose enthusiasm about it, but I was still down to go, and she really wanted to. After getting turned around once or twice on the way over, we eventually ended up at her friend C's house by about nine. I, having little time to get creative with my costume, had to make an adaptation to the one my girlfriend and I wore to the last party. We went as a ball and chain, which was pretty fat. The entire suit is made out of cloth, the ball of which being a big, hollow spiked ball with thin pieces of string that could be used as straps, which I wore. My girlfriend wore the end of the chain, which she wrapped and velcro'd around the twins. I liked it. Anyway, because she wanted to go as a pimpette to the party last night, I ended up as the ball, but I didn't have a chain. Not good. I went to the mall and picked up a gigantic plastic war hammer out of a Halloween weapon bin for a dollar and took the top of the hammer off. I Velcro’d the end of the chain to the handle of the hammer and went as a flail. Pretty bitching, I thought. Unfortunately, people were either too drunk to get it, or essentially laughed it off. Wasn't too much of an issue for me, as I had it off after about fifteen minutes and was about doing other things.
The party itself wasn't bad, but I find that I don't have much of a place at them. A few bad experiences with alcohol have pretty much eliminated the desire for me to drink, and being around strangers, though not normally an issue, is tougher to manage when they're either preoccupied with their own company, belligerent and/or blacked out. I had brought the remaining herb I had and snagged one of the hash rice krispy treats that was floating around and figured that I would be fine for the night. Unfortunately, things sort of went downhill. Now, let me clearly say, for those who are reading, I did not have a bad time, I just ended up leaving in a bit more of a somber mood than I had when I arrived. I found a few people who shared my interest in the herb and asked if anyone wanted to smoke a bowl. Unfortunately no one else had anything, so I ended up using a fair amount of my stuff, and not getting much out of it because no one else had any to match. This is fine, it's still a good way to meet people. One would think, anyway. No one really had anything to say, so after a couple small bowls I figured I would rejoin the congregation in the living room.
It hadn't really hit me yet, at least I don't think that I had. I meandered about a bit, and then ran into C. We talked for a minute, and for some reason decided to give each other a high five, as it were. Sounds great on paper, but I was either a bit more far gone than I thought, or C wasn't expecting it, because when I clapped her hand, I accidentally caused her to hit her cheek with the back of her hand because it was so close to her face. I felt like a complete douche bag, and was pretty embarrassed about it. Of course I didn't mean for that to happen, but, being high, and having a tendency to over think things, I convinced myself that she thought it was intentional, and then when her cheek turned red I wanted to punch myself. The room started getting loud, and even though C was completely fine and not at all pissed, I kept seeing people notice her face and felt horrible so I stepped outside to get some air.
I was definitely starting to feel it by now because I was completely enamored with the sky. It was dark out, but the moon was extremely bright, almost like a forty watt bulb, and all of the clouds (which were moving really fast) were illuminated by it. I ended up standing out there for a good fifteen minutes at least. My girlfriend came outside and gave me a kiss, and shortly after that I decided to go back in. After that I pretty much spent the rest of the evening keeping to myself, to a fault, perhaps. I felt bad for being at a party and not socializing, but I also felt out of place at the same time and didn't want to stand around with a bunch of people I didn't know and act like I had something to say. So, I didn't. Drinks were poured and consumed, people came and went, and eventually my girlfriend and I decided to take off. We got back to my house, did some stuff and then crashed out.
This brings me to today. After we crashed out, I slept pretty soundly. I am assuming that if the rice krispy treats were strong enough to do anything, they kicked in after I fell asleep. I had dreams, but I unfortunately don't remember enough about them to write anything about them. She and I woke up before my alarm at 10:30, and spent a few minutes just lying there. It is worth mentioning, I think, that lying there with her is perhaps one of the most pleasant experiences I have ever had, and I am grateful that it is something we're able to do a lot of. Word.
Anyway, I digress. I got up, took a shower, did the getting ready thing and then she and I left. I dropped her off at her house and got to work by 12:00. Sunday is a pretty hellish day at the Capitol Mall's Gamestop because we're supposed to change all of our advertising throughout the day. Sunday is one of the busier days of the week, and the shortest in terms of how long we're open. So between all of the people and all of the marketing, it was pretty trying. Even though I had food in my stomach all day, I started crashing by about 4:30 and started feeling pretty lethargic. After getting off, things got better though. I stopped by my girlfriend's house and kicked it with her for a little while before I came home and played some F.E.A.R.
Good game, for those who are interested, I am planning on checking out the online component pretty soon. At least it will hold my attention until Gears of War comes in. I wants it, precious! Anyway, aside from writing this, I haven't really done anything else with my evening, and that's actually pretty nice. I am going to go relax for a bit, get my game on, and then crash out.
Theo out.
godWhen it comes to blogging, the most difficult thing for me has always been finding the correct place to start. The right subject. What I consider to be important right now may be something that I'll look back on and shake my head at later, and with that in mind it is a struggle to put my thoughts into words. I find that I rarely keep anything that I write, because when I look back on it I don't see myself in it anymore. Whether it is due to ruthless self criticism or a lack of meaningful things to say, I am never able to see why it was that I was so concerned, or stressed, or elated, or what have you about whatever it was that I was writing about.
Ignoring my internal dialogue is one of the things that I am trying to do more often, because when I over think anything, even if it is something that I am ecstatic about, it ceases to be anything more than something which causes me mental suffering. I used to pride myself on my critical thinking skills, but lately I only make myself feel bad about things.
I was talking with my girlfriend the other night about how people are really not so different from each other. That no matter who you are, you still have something in common with everyone else because you're still human. When it comes down to it, we all process and cope with things in a very similar way, though our problems may be very different. One of my talents, for lack of a better word, has been my ability to talk people down, because I am able to see their problems from the outside. I felt unique in my ability to be able to sum up a problem in two sentences and offer a simple solution to it. I am just now finding that the only person I am not able to do this with is myself, and over the course of realizing that, I became a very unhappy person for a while. Then she told me what was going on in my head, and now I feel better. I would always watch how people get so caught up in their problems that they can't see how easy it is to deal with them, thinking that I was above it. I got really mad when I found out that I wasn't. But, she said, we're all human.
I've been finding myself thinking a lot about God lately. One of the things that I admire most in people, and perhaps even envy, is their ability to have complete faith in something beyond this world. I adhere to no religious group or belief, but I find myself yearning to. There has been nothing in my own experience to lead me to believe that there is any explanation for things besides random chance and freak occurrence, but there is much comfort to be had in the idea that there is something there, something beyond this place that gives it meaning and purpose. I guess that that is what it all boils down to for me. I don't have that. I want that, but I don't have it.
This is the part where things become difficult for me to explain, because I can't rationalize it. I say that I want to believe in God, but I don't look for him. I say that I think believing in God would fill a void in myself, but I reject the idea of relying upon anything beyond myself for my spiritual crises. If there is a God, who is worthy to ask for his help? Not I, certainly, so while I want to find him, I am not expecting him to show himself. I don't know. It's irrational. When some of the people who are close to me relate to me the stories of their spiritual experiences, I have no doubt that what they are saying is true. No doubt at all. Sure, it happens, but it won't happen to me. It's like these people have taken a trip to a place that I will never see. Sometimes that is easy to live with, and sometimes it isn't. Again, I don't know. I was speaking to my girlfriend about this as well, and she said that the fact that I am thinking about it at all is, to her belief, God pointing himself out to some extent. I was greatly encouraged by that, but still doubtful. Thinking about that made me so eager to believe in signs that I felt by looking I would see them when they weren't there. The fact that when I lifted my head up, my eyes drifted immediately to the bible stacked with the other books on my desk, for instance. Coincidence?
My current problem is that there are so many different places that God could be, I am hesitant to look, because I'll invest myself in the wrong one. A friend said that the worst thing one could do is stay in the same place, because one knows that there isn't anything there. Another instance in which someone else needed to point out something obvious because I was too preoccupied to realize it. I'm starting to work on it though. More bulletins on that as events warrant.
Other than all of that introspective crap, I am just trying to balance time between work, the girl, and games. Thankfully there will finally be some good stuff launching, and my relationship pwns. Enough is enough for the moment. We'll see if I can stay consistent with updates.
Theo out.
