I'm convinced that I am a different person by noon than I am in the early morning hours. I wrote several pages early yesterday, but then became busy with work and never quite finished. By mid-afternoon I was appalled at the memory of what I had done, happy that I had not finished it, had not published it. It was an explanation of sorts for my last published post, which nearly required one. It was a mental experiment. I wanted to see if I could still enrage myself and pretend as if someone else had done it.
By the afternoon, as work is starting to come to a close, I feel differently than I do in the mornings. I'm less interested in my own opinions, which is helpful for someone like me. I think that I can only argue for things or against things, with so much passion, for any given time. I am in middle life now, everything has changed. If this is the only good thing that comes out of the Trump presidency then I accept that. Trump has forced me to accept my age. That, and having a child of course. Those two things combined somehow while I wasn't paying enough attention and they performed a sort of intervention on my delusions concerning my own evaporated youth.
If they still offer grave sites when I die I want my tombstone to only read: Sean, Never Intervened (1968-20**)... And yes, I want two asterisks, rather than letting anybody know the exact year I died. Maybe a footnote, explaining that I purchased in advance, they were having a sale on the engraving and I didn't wish to feel stupid after it was too late to take advantage of it.
The closest I ever came to conducting an intervention was in the bathroom of a well-loved nightclub in Florida one time, high on designer drugs. This little Jewish girl pulled me into the stall with her, said she needed my help, which I was happy to offer. Then shit got real, as they say. Another friend was pulled into the makeshift cubicle with us, at which point I believed we were going to all snort some sort of crystallized powder that would help explain the next few hours of music for us, wherever we may be.
But no.
The little girl started explaining to my other friend - who I just started to notice looked as if he didn't exactly need another indeterminate dose of whatever it was I knew she had in her purse - that he had problems and his health is on the line. She even told him that he needed to lose weight, which I thought was a bit off topic, but she looped it in anyways as a bit of supporting evidence.
She proceeded to intervene. A miniature miracle worker, channeling the power of the people that produced Jesus for us. Just like that, voilà, he was healed. I should have notified the Pope. I won't say that he never did drugs again, though I did start to keep a more watchful and suspicious eye on him. Over time, I was able to detect that drugs were being diverted towards me in greater supply, after his successful recovery.
He is now a happy father that I regularly see on Facebook. I sometimes ask myself if he ever even thanked me. Like, now.
Sort of.
That's the basic outline of the story. There was more involved. Because his condition improved, mine was only made to seem worse, which I never quite forgave him for. Few things aggravate the mind of an aging dullard more than the improved health of others, especially at that young age.
Those sure were crazy times. I try to go relive them every now and then, but I get so tired after the sun goes down. That bathroom stall is now long gone, with its haphazard attempts at graffiti and stylistic self-expression. The speakers and disco ball have been unplugged, retired accoutrements of the never ending rave. The after-party lingers on somewhere, more after than ever, but the people have been all replaced with imposters, or duplicates of imposters.
When I go out people treat me like a mummy that has unexpectedly broken free from his sarcophagi. They seem afraid of any unravelling that might result from my becoming ambulatory.
But isn't that why people do drugs? To live in the moment is to shed your past, otherwise you're just compromising with time.
I was only ever involved in the dance music scene because I liked to hug people. This was the environment that seemed to encourage me most. That, and bible camp. You can always hug chicks when they find Jesus. Hugs are what they want the most right at that moment, when they come out of the water all dressed in white, crying through their laughter and happiness at being free. I'll be waiting there, ready to hug them into the fold.
Okay, before this post veers into the regrettable territory, I'll stop.
Perhaps I'm becoming a prude. Too much self-consciousness. I spend much time gazing inward now, rearranging my prejudices and preferences in place of conducting any actual thought. I'm not changing, I'm adjusting. This is perhaps the best that can be hoped for after a certain age. Some can't even seem to get that part right. I don't want to be one of those aging men that just insists the past was better, though life is structured in such a way that it can always seem that way. It is the easiest of conclusions to draw, the evidence is everywhere, and growing.
Never before has the future seemed so dim, so hopeless! Middle age must demand these feelings of everyone who enters. I don't blame Donald J. Ahab for this. He is perhaps the logical result, not the cause. It's the way of things, I suppose. People have been spooked, now they are panicked. Animals kill for less.
Why does the sky fall so unequally for each of us, my dearest chicken little?
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