"To be a skillful warrior, you must first make yourself invincible." 
~Sun Tzu, The Art of War

  it would seem i have my work cut out for me, then.

GOING DOWN
ani difranco

you can't get through it
you can't get over it
you can't get around

just like in a dream
you'll open your mouth to scream
and you won't make a sound

you can't believe your eyes
you can't believe your ears
you can't believe your friends
you can't believe you're here

and you're not gonna get through it
so you are going down
 

i should have packed more slowly.  now everything is done and there's nothing left but to wait.  and five days is going to feel like a month without anything to distract me from my own head.

i, personally, would love to bask in the eternal sunshine of a spotless mind.  i wish i had no memories save where i put my car keys and how to drive a car. 

these days i purposely exhaust myself and then pop benadryl tablets as insurance against insomnia.  i sleep just to escape.  and i wake up with tears in my eyes and a heart so heavy it anchors me to the mattress.  an hour, sometimes two, will pass before i finally find the strength to get up. 

i'm beginning to see alcohol as an acceptable plan for dealing with the pain.  depression is too clinical a word for it.  this is despair.  i don't even know what it feels like to be genuinely happy.  not just for a few hours, but for years.  months.  even days at a time would be novel. 

i need help.

"how did you do it?"

"i put one foot in front of the other."

sadness wants to know the past.
fear wants to know the future.
peace wants to type this sentence.

HERE.  NOW.  HERE.  NOW.  HERE.  NOW.  HERE.  NOW.  HERE.  NOW.

a bitch, an asshole and a fool walk into a bar...

my father's right foot--
five toes packed into church
shoe shined with mink
oil and sunrise

tapped briskly down
on a wayward snail
with a crisp more
than a crunch.

if it had been
a tuesday or a wednesday
rather than a sunday
i could have forgiven him.

"I will deal with them according to their conduct, and by their own standards I will judge them”  Ezekiel 7:27

people will find a way to justify any action, no matter how horrific or cruel.

always.  always.  always.  trust.  your.  gut.

i know you won't believe this, but it happened.

i got to the mall.  i got out of the car.  and my pants.  fell.  off.

bad day to be going commando.