Hospital stay

Addendum: I need to mention something that may have gotten lost in this post - the staff, nurses and doctors at the hospital were first rate all the way and I am grateful for their care.

I'm home after over 24 hours in the hospital. It still feels like I went a few rounds with Mike Tyson. I'm sore about everywhere and have three IV holes in my arm. I thought it might be a heart attack (I had almost all the warning signs), but that was quickly ruled out by an EKG. 

Well, if you're me, you start running up a big bill for nothing

Then the frustration built: lots of blood work: all normal; CT scan: normal. Finally barium fluoroscope: normal. And yet when I was in ER, the pain and discomfort were so bad a nitro tablet did nothing and I need 2 mg of morphine (yes) to get the pain down. 

After all that, I'll be left with a big bill and a provisional diagnosis: well since you have had esophageal spasms before, this must be another one. But it wasn't because I know myself. The E spasms come on quick and hard but leave after 5-10 minutes. This was a whole other kettle of fish. Yes there were some E spasm issues but they were light - it was a whole different chest and stomach pain with lightheadedness and nausea. 

After all those tests I can only conclude one thing - the E spasms are often (not not always) triggered by stress. And so was this.

This had been building up all week - even though this was a three day week (which I find embarrassing). But when you never know when the next blow will come from, where the next little paper from your boss and HR will drop for something you said but forgot weeks ago, when all these people smile in your face when you find out what they do behind your back, knowing that yearly job review is coming up and wondering if that will be the next thing they'll use to get rid of you, when the date for appealing your case to a director is coming up (10/31) when your union rep says it'll be futile anyway, knowing that the letter being dropped in your file means there is no escape from this constant stress, still remembering all that has gone one before including the lasting repercussions to me and my wife over the SWAT team raid. . . . well . . .I've said this place will kill me and people just grin a little and think I'm kidding. 

And let me be clear because I've been told the Gestapo at work read this: I don't have to do anything to myself. The stress and worry alone will do it. Slowly but surely, when you work at a place full of smiling faces you cannot trust, wondering if every assignment you get is meant to trap you, having to watch every.single.word you say - well, how would you do? 

Added to my bipolar2, depression and generalized anxiety disorder, I'm actually, in a weird way, proud of myself for not dropping from a stroke or heart attack yet. I still stand. Not just for myself, but for my wife whom I love so dearly that I would give the world (and my life) and for but for every hung out person in the whole damn universe (h/t Bob Dylan) who has to put up with a brutal and ignorant workplace every day without the nominal protection of a union. 

I read their stories everyday in numerous websites and Facebook sites for people with mental afflictions. They are my people, my brotherhood, and, for once in my life I can honestly say: I feel your pain. I will never understand why some people get such a charge from being sneaky and cruel. I can't understand how I could have worked for over 35 years and only run up against this kind of reaction from my current employer. I don't understand, with all I have done for them including defending them on camera when no one else would, what horrible thing I have done to be treated this way? 

I realize I am rambling a little stream of consciousness here but sleep has been hard to come by in the last 48 hours and I'm still dopey from the meds and the constant interruptions of hospital life. But I just had to get this out of my system this morning. 

At least as long as I can come in and work, I have one thing I can do I feel really helps the Veterans I'm supposed to serve. When Vets write their Congressional representative with an issue they feel hasn't been resolved any other way, the aides write me and I get to work getting a solution or at least a response from the department of our hospital that can help. I feel an immense satisfaction with a Veteran get a home modification they need, a bill paid, a appointment made. 

That's the way it should be - for everyone. But that is 20 percent of my experience and all the other stuff easily overwhelms the good. I was a Army Reservist, my father was a Marine in Korea. This was never just a job for me.  I remember when I was called and offered the job how thrilled I was. I was literally jumping for joy - a chance to work on the side of the angels and honor the people who signed Uncle Sam a blank check. I had no idea how naive that sentiment was. And it saddens me. 

So I'll go in Tuesday and do what I can even though I get the willies just approaching the front gate. I actually have this worry in the back of my mind, the cop at the gate will ask me to pull to the side and. . .well. . .

I got a form letter response from the Federal job I applied for a few weeks ago. It doesn't look promising but it was my last chance until the letter drops in my file. I wanted to give them what they wanted - rid of me. But it is not to be.

Like many in this situation, all I can do is what I can do - go in and work as much as I can. 

But the next time I start collapsing like I did Friday morning, I'll assume it's just accumulated stress and I'll try to take leave and get myself out of the situation for awhile -- take some deep breaths and some rest. I will never go to the ER again unless I get dragged there. If, someday, it really is a heart attack, well, whatever. Nobody lives forever.

I Have A Little List

I have a piece of paper hanging taped to the support beam on my side desk. 

Not MY petition but A petition

I’m debating the good it does. It’s a debate that will go on for a while.’

The paper is a petition, dated Dec. 29, 2015 and signed by eight co-workers and presented by two other employees to top management where I work. 

Basically, without naming me (cowards) they asked management to protect them from an employee (me) who was using “inappropriate, threatening and alarming language,” and asked management to provide a “safe, secure environment” moving forward.

The petition was ginned up by a former boss and pseudo-management co-worker, who took the ‘incident’ of Dec. 19, 2015 and ran with it in an attempt to get me fired. I don’t need to recount that sorry tale again – you can read it here.

The member of management who received the letter asked for written statements containing specific allegations from the people who signed. None ever came. No specific instances, no dates, times or locations were ever forwarded. Of the 10 people who had anything to do with this petition, five are gone and five remain.

The echo of the HR hack at my last interrogation still rings in my head: “the people up there you think are your friends are the ones that are reporting on you.

Yesterday, I sat in my office, on the far side of the floor, isolated and alone. This is the usual day for me nowadays. I try very hard to keep to myself and communicate with co-workers only when work needs to be done. I have exempted myself from all further get-togethers as a stray innocent remark made at a luncheon in June was used against me. 

And yesterday, the lonesomeness and isolation was making a mess of my mind. No matter how many distractions aside from my normal work I can indulge in, it’s tough to maintain a façade when your co-workers are outside your door, having an animated conversation with your supervisor. 

And you’re not a part of it. I could step out with a smile on my face and a “hey guys, what’s happening,” and watch the conversation die and the group break up. I can’t bear that.

So, back to the petition I have on my desk.

The reason I have it there is to get it through my thick skull that as bad as I want to have some human contact (I won’t even go so far as to say ‘have friends’) in this office, that the atmosphere has become poisoned enough that the HR hack’s warning (and my union rep’s warning) that I have no friends here.

" . . .a BLABBERMOUTH!"

And that I have to keep my big mouth shut. Because bipolar people tend to be notorious blabbermouths. Ask me how I know.

 

I really thought I could handle this. But every day that goes by gets just a little bit harder and it wears me down. 

I sit in silence and dread the sound of people approaching my door, coming up the stair, off the elevator or hearing the phone ring. I dread opening every email addressed to me. I didn’t used to be this way. 

I don’t know how NOT to be hyper-vigilant anymore. 

I’ve been this way since my mom’s health started to go downhill which was in the summer of 2008 and my bookstore started to fail because of the economy. Then I had to sell the bookstore in the fall of 2009 and move to South Dakota for a job in December of that year. Then I had to spend the next year (2010) with my bags packed waiting to fly to Cleveland whenever my mom would take another turn for the worst.

Then in December 2010, I started the job with the VA in Pittsburgh and moved here. From the very beginning there was a good deal of stress as my job duties and expectations were never clearly given to me and I never received one whit of training. It was ‘stumble as you go.’ At the same time, my mother’s health continued to decline and I eventually became her power of attorney and executor of her will. During the period 2011-12 I was constantly spending my weekends in Cleveland with my wife and arranging both my mother’s care and the disposition of our family home. This was NOT a very good period in my life. 

Mom passed away in December 2012. It took six more months to settle the estate and satisfy all the obligations. I really didn’t even have time to grieve. I still don’t think I have as I tend to avoid all the family albums in the basement, especially the ones from the last five years of my mom’s life.

Then in October 2013, the man who hired me left one step ahead of his own dismissal. Like many VA managers, a friend set him up in another part of the organization. I did not realize at the time, that this man had been my protection. I didn’t even know I needed protection. 

What followed then was a procession of detailed managers and two ‘permanent managers each of who lasted less than a year apiece and presided over tumultuous times for our section. The first one flooded the zone with new hires in the spring of 2014, many of whose names were on that petition. They were hired in order to get this manager a higher pay grade. When he didn’t get it, he left, but not before using his new people to gradually strip me of all the media relations responsibilities I had had under my old boss. I went from being the ‘go-to’ guy to being the superfluous clerk. 

He didn’t like me. It wasn’t a secret. He was influenced by others in the section who wanted to purge the people from the old regime. Had he stayed around long enough he might have succeeded. I called him on that and his lack of management effectiveness. I’m sure he didn’t like that either. I’m also sure he and the other employees in his little mafia briefed the new manager when he took over in March 2015.

It also strikes deep. Into your life it will creep.

I know this sounds like paranoia but it’s true. I’m sure I’m not the only person who has faced this situation. The new boss was worse than the last one. Within three months of his hire, the incident of June 8, 2015 happened which led to where I am now.

Eight years of looking behind my back. Eight years of worry and fear. More shrinks, more pills, more attempts at living a life where I could relax and enjoy life without the need for pharmaceuticals. 

Even if the magic job fairy came and performed a miracle for me now, I’m not sure I could dis-attach the wires and circuits that have made me what I am today – at least not for a long time. You just can’t turn it off that easily.

Solitary Amusement or What Next?

My little corner of the universe

It is Wednesday and I am again in my office with silence, my old friend, punctuated occasionally by the sound of my typing.

Yesterday I spent the entire day like this. I saw no one and no one saw me.

Today is much the same. There is no communication, except by email (rare) and telephone (even rarer).

I could walk down the hall but I have nothing to say to them and, in fact, I am doing my best not to say anything at all unless it is work-related. I’m not sure they want to say much to me either. I’m saving us both the embarrassment of making useless small talk.

I should not be surprised that no one has come down to knock on my door. Since the reprimand came down on Wednesday, coupled with my email to my supervisor saying I would, at the advice of my union representative, attend no more employee social functions, the word has apparently got around: he has isolated himself from us.

People I see, weary of me
Showing my good side
I can see how people look down
I'm on the outside

This was not my choice but my idea, enthusiastically pushed by my union rep. I felt I had no other choice.

An email needed to be re-sent for some information I need for a report. The original email, to a former co-worker, had been sent five days ago. She responded back to day, curtly, with one sentence and no greeting.

Previously, I had requested leave from my supervisor and had to remind her five days later for approval.

I listened in on the staff meeting held yesterday by phone conference. My supervisor recalled none of my projects including one very important one that necessitated her meeting with the Director. That was a week ago and she said she would get back to me. I’m still waiting.

I could have jumped in to the phone conference and reminded her but I wanted to see if my work was important enough to be remembered. It was not.

Crazy I know, places I go
Make me feel so tired
I can see how people look down
I'm on the outside

She is at the other campus, perhaps for the entire week.

It has been five working days since the reprimand was proposed. After five days, unless a response for appeal is made, the reprimand becomes official and is placed in my personnel file for three years. I did the paperwork with the union rep last Wednesday. I have heard nothing. I sent her an email this morning asking where we stand. I am still waiting.

I am a natural paranoiac, but I sense that something is up. Either that, or I have, again, been ‘rubber-roomed.’ I’m left to figure it out for myself.

Yesterday, I called the number for the Employee Assistance Program (EAP). I did not want to do it but I figured it was free and added a layer, however thin, of protection for me. Since I was no longer seeing a counselor, there was no real issue in having two.

I was treated politely and put through to an intake counselor to whom I apologized for telling such a long story. I had to repeat myself several times since she kept getting the sequence of events out of order, even after I had specifically told her the dates and times.

She then found a local psychologist and connected me with her office voice mail, which I left my name, phone number and intake number, provided by EAP so the counselor would know who would be paying her.

It wasn’t until I got home that I had the chance to look her up. After checking, I was very surprised this person was an EAP counselor and equally sure she would not call me. She’s a media darling, a book author and a marketer of . . .well, herself. I left a message at 5 p.m. and. . . I’m still waiting.

(PS: Oh EAP called - I didn't hear the phone but I got an email. Wanted to know how things were going with my appointed shrink. I emailed back and said 'I don't think she'll be calling little old me' and attached one of the Star Shrink's webpage URLs. Suggested we wait 24 and then try someone else. I got a response back just now (430) that went like this: I'm sorry I'm not permitted to consult further via email, but I know that we can offer other options if you would like to call back to the XXXXXX number.

Ah, there's help out there. All you have to do is pick up the phone. . . 

I can’t stress enough how quiet it is in this otherwise deserted wing of our office floor. Occasionally the silence is punctuated by someone going down the stairs, a scrap or two of conversation, but otherwise the only noise is the quiet hum of the air circulation system.

It is the kind of quiet in which all kinds of thoughts present themselves. It may sound pretentious, but I think to myself that I have lost all usefulness not only to this office, but in general. I had a good run, but it ends here, again, not with a bang but a whimper. I did things in my career I had dreamed of as a child but I always had this nagging feeling that after some close calls, my need for security and mental quirkiness would box me in somewhere where I would sit in silence and contemplate what was and what might have been.

I dealt with my issues as best I could, fighting an enemy I didn’t understand. Perhaps making it this far was an accomplishment.

Most of the time I am tired, I think probably because this whole 18 month ordeal has worn me down.

It’s funny, if I ever meet Robert DeNiro, I could tell him that mimicking his quote from The Untouchables was the final stupid thing I said that led to the deluge.

But the only thing I ever really wanted to say
Was wrong, was wrong, was wrong

All I ever wanted was to be relevant in some way to some greater cause. And to have real friends I could trust that I could be myself around. And because of my illness, I could and did have those things, but only for a short time.

I don’t want to believe this is the end of my usefulness.

But in the silence, I can’t help but think that perhaps I have played my last hand.

It's that little souvenir of a colorful year
Which makes me smile inside
So I cynically, cynically say the world is that way
Surprise, surprise, surprise, surprise, surprise

Lyrics: ‘Here’s Where the Story Ends,’ by The Sundays (1990)

Well meaning advice and sick coping strategies

You have your coping mechanisms, I have mine.

Post Script: HOW COULD I MISS THIS? It's one of my favorite movies. Anyway, the subtitle for this piece should be:

How I learned to stop worrying and love the bomb.

The Mighty has run another interesting article by an author who deals with a problem very familiar to me: pre-worknight anxiety (is that a thing? it is now).

3 Tips for Managing Sunday Night Anxiety

The author, Andrea Addington, is a self-desribed (and commonly known as) an 'Anxiety Counselor' who plies her trade in the wilds of New Brunswick. Apparently she has mad marketing skills and is attractive enough (and young enough) to make it into The Mighty. That aside, she offers a basic set of pretty good techniques to help the garden variety anxious ready for their workweek.

I wish these techniques worked for me. 

They deal with WORK DEMANDS which are a real thing for a lot of people with anxiety. I get them too, as an added bonus to the real 800 lb. gorilla which is a hostile workplace which Addington doesn't address. 

What Addington describes are what I refer to as the 'mind tricks' that I have tried several times (including failing miserably at meditation) that no longer work.

Ergo, Ativan. Ergo, addiction.

But I sure can identify with what she writes here about her 'catastrophic thinking:'

“Oh no I’m going to go into work Monday morning and have a ton of emails to respond to, I won’t be able to get it done in time and my boss is going to get upset with me and think I am a terrible employee, then I will have an awful performance appraisal and get fired and wont be able to pay my mortgage and lose my house and end up homeless!” 

I am dead serious when I write that that 'fired' and 'lose my house and end up homeless' part is the end of pretty much every fear I have.Every. One.

So I thought, here it is, Monday, which is my Sunday, my I don't have to run day (OK, I couldn't resist the Bangles reference), and even though I work four 10 hour weeks to get a three day weekend every weekend (I know: what the hell am I complaining about?), so what would my paragraph of fear contain?

“Oh no I’m going to go into work Monday  Tuesday morning and have a ton of emails to respond to, one of which might be a summons to another inquisition about something I said that was jumped on as 'disturbing' by the people I work with who are constantly listening for me to say something they can take the wrong way. Despite getting my work done in time and in good order, they will eventually find some other rationale to convene another administrative investigation board, and, because I already have a reprimand in my file for quoting a movie line,  I won’t be able to get it done in time and my boss is going to get upset with me and think I am a terrible employee, then I will have an awful performance appraisal and I'll get fired, [redacted], but at least I won't have to work at the VA anymore!” 

But this is defeatism, yes, and it's not like I still try to play the psychological mind tricks on myself to put all this horror in perspective. I mean, seriously, how would you cope at work when behind every set of smiling eyes you see in your office you know they're just waiting to pounce? It's not paranoia when it's already happened more than once. And going back to the story of almost being killed on my front step by a SWAT team is getting a little tiresome. 

Yes, I'd quit if I could and I almost got a PR job locally in another Federal agency until one (or more) of my coworkers called said agency and, well, what are the odds of two positions, advertised nationally, going to two employees from my office?

Anyway, with the reprimand in my file, that cuts off any chance of getting another Federal job. So I am well and truly fucked trapped. I have to deal, I have no choice. Private industry? Again, give me a break? Two words: age discrimination. PR is a young person's game. I don't even bother looking at Linked In anymore.

So I how do I get ready for Tuesday?

This article has me thinking about things I can and could do to help, so let me blue sky a little here.

1. Ativan - the go-to benzo. The problem of course is with a dependence on it, one has to ramp up the dosage in sudden crisis situations. But it's there if needed. Like the old Dr. Pepper commercials, I tend to take it at 10, 2 and 4. 

2. All my other meds. What do they do? I don't know anymore, but if I stop taking them bad things will happen. Big Pharma loses a point or two on Wall Street. Not advised. 

3. Prayer. I don't mean to offend anyone but for me this is a desperation move. I'm always reminded of a Mad Magazine spoof from my youth, titled 'You Know You're A Football Fan when' where one of Jack Davis' (RIP) football fans is on his knees in front of the TV and the caption reads "you rediscover a childhood prayer when your team is behind by six points with one minute left in the game." 

One day, I don't remember what was happening, the Ghost of Catholicism Past pushed through all the shit that normally clutters my waking stream of thoughts and blurted out:

"Remember oh most gracious Virgin Mary, that never was it known, that anyone who fled to your protection, implored your assistance, or sought your intercession, was left unaided . . ."

Good Catholics (or those with good memories) I'm sure recognize that as the opening line of The Memorare. It's an intercessional prayer to the BVM (Blessed Virgin Mother) to get the pray-er out of some serious shit.

Then, of course, when you want to call out the heavy artillery (no offense BVM), there's this:

"St. Michael the Archangel, defend us in battle. Be our defense against the wickedness and snares of the Devil. . . "

Of course, I feel GUILTY when I utter these prayers because I have not turned out to be a Good Catholic, and where the hell do I get off saying these prayers when I am not in a state of Grace? Do I really think that God, whom I'm not sure exists in the form I was taught, is going to even pay scant attention to the prayers of someone who only rediscovers their childhood religion when they have nothing more to fall back on?

 But hey, deus ex machina and all that. 

4. Walking around the complex. This doesn't seem to help anymore because it leads right back to my office and I'm sure when I'm out I catch the cops giving me the look. It's not a "short calming break." It's more like taking a stroll around the prison yard. But in this one, I can buy a candy bar; see: fat.

5. Relaxation tapes. There is no sanction against listening to music at your desk in my office as long as it doesn't disturb anyone and I have tried this numerous times. Again, it doesn't seem to work anymore. It throws off my concentration when writing. Then I have to lean back, close my eyes and listen and you can imagine the fear I have of being caught doing that! If I do it for two minutes, that will be the two minutes my boss comes through the door. I try music as well, but I find that classical music is what I reserve to myself when I am home or in a safe place and my good old time rock and roll just reminds me when life was not so painful (and it seems every song has a memory attached to it), so I pretty much spend my time in silence.

6. Reading self-help inspirational pieces on the Internet. See above. They're column fodder, nothing else (it's all been done, like 29 shrinks). 

Ah hell, what's the point? Andrea has it all down pat for her situation. Good for her. 

The brutal truth for many of us is, at some point, life becomes a slog and a bad one at that. I have been able to punctuate it with brief but happy moments of diversion but as they say, the laughs are getting fewer and farther between. 

The only real mental coping mechanism that works is reading various websites that remind me that the world is truly going to hell in a hand basket. Between the US and Russia perhaps willing to start a war over Syria, the North Korean madman anxious to try out his new nuclear toys, the artifice of an unsustainable economy disintegrating and the acceleration of global warming and the rising extinction of species, plus the fact that the next leader of the US is either going to be a warmongering, psychopathic liar or an arrogant, fascistic psychopath, I think I'm in pretty good stead to this - this too will pass - into some kind of nuclear fireball. 

It's sick, but it's all I got. 

. . . some sunny day

Not Fade Away

Prelude: my ‘discipline’ handed down to me today was a written reprimand which is 1-2 steps away from a firing. After all the star-chamber proceedings all they had was what I said in jest originally to another co-worker. I’m going to make an oral appeal to the Director but I was warned by the union rep it would probably not change things. My union rep felt it wasn’t the institution that was trying to get rid of me but my co-workers. Conveniently forgotten was the incident of July 8, 2015 which started it all – they day that due to the actions of my employer, I was almost killed in front of my wife.

I’m at a crossroads in my life.

Everyone reaches a moment in time where they are faced with their own mortality as well as the mistakes they have made in life. They have a choice whether to pack it in and retreat into themselves or continue to fight for some unknown and unrevealed personal triumph.

Earlier in this week, my last psychologist and I got into what was almost a shouting match. This is a person who I felt finally ‘got me.’ She understood, even though she didn’t say much. As I’ve done so many times in my life, I made a tragic miscalculation.

She believed I was trying to get away with ‘something.’ I told her I merely wanted to be judged by the same standards everyone else is. We were both a little right and a little wrong. But I had the distinct impression that she had grown to, if not despise, at least have a strong dislike for me personally.

This isn’t anything new for me. I’ve mentioned that a big reason I have shied away from trying to make friends in later life (even though there is a part of me that desperately needs them) is that there is something about me, probably linked to my bipolar, that eventually drives people away. Give me enough time, and I’ll say or do something that will fuck it up.

In the wee small hours . . . staring at the ceiling cursing your life's decisions

To me what happened felt like the final blow. I left feeling I was too old and too fucked up for this shit to even have a chance anymore. I grew old, my therapists grew younger and there seemed to be a gulf between us – we didn’t share mutual experiences or grow up in the same time and place. I think another tragic miscalculation was my long-held belief that therapy would be easier with a woman – they listen. Yes, and with many men they make judgments. I would suggest that with any therapist, you make sure what their background and politics are before you say too much. They are not impartial saints. 

There’s a strong feeling I’m fighting now to close up shop. Shut down Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest and stop writing this blog. Very few people read it, I doubt I have really helped anyone suffering to understand and it’s not going to turn into a book deal so I can quit my job because it’s just not that marketable. I’m not some celebrity, nor am I young and pretty. I’m some middle-aged schmuck whose been trying to get my shit together all my life. Who wants to read about that?

Who wants to read the ruminations of a loser? Every single story or request for stories from all of the websites dealing with depression or bipolar want tales of people who have ‘overcome’ their illness. You don’t ‘overcome’ mental illness in the same way you don’t ever ‘overcome’ alcoholism. You only overcome it when you die. This fight has gone on all my life and it will go on until I am dead.

For the most part, I have failed. My vaunted introspection turned out to be navel gazing. I was missing the big picture.

What has happened to me at my current employer has happened before. Not in the same way but the result was the same; strained work relationships, job loss and failed marriages.

If there was no psychologist that could help me because I could not help myself, then I am going to have to be my own psychologist. No one will ever know me better than myself. The trick is, you have to be tough and honest with yourself. 

My last post received one comment. I’m not sure why. But I did mention in that post that the one constant string in all the negative things that had happened to me was me. So it’s kind of a misnomer to say they ‘happened to me.’ 

Because of my inability to control some deep yearnings and inner urges, I stepped into minefields I’d laid myself. 

It is correct to argue that had I gotten a diagnosis earlier and understood what the illness could do, then I could take steps to control some of the nastier problems that cropped up. But that only goes so far. 

The realization that a big part of me is a hurt little kid still lashing out at the world for all its unfairness to me was a hard one to make. The hurt little kid is still inside of me. I don’t know what to do about him yet. He's up there as the main photo of this blog.

The hurt little kid grew up misplaced in a school environment where he was one of the fat, middle class kids in an upper middle class school. His mom didn’t have time for him, his father emotionally disowned him and his sister was (and still is) bitterly resentful that he was the so-called ‘favored child’ which I never felt.

He retreated to his room, with his books, his TV, fish, scratchpads and imagination. He kept trying to come out of that room and re-enter a world which seemed to him, held so much promise if only he could keep his shit together.

The hurt kid just wanted some friends, some compadres he could run with and trust. He wanted to be loved by women to let him know he had worth as a man. He wanted this coterie of people to follow him around repeating a mantra that he wasn’t so bad after all and that he was worthy of being liked. 

But he couldn’t keep his shit together. Whatever he got, it was never enough. The goalposts always moved just a little out of reach. He had something to prove to everybody – the nuns from his elementary school, the kids in school, his parents, society.

I bought into a lot of mythology about American life: church, state, success, appearances. I seemed to be searching for some place or person that would allow me to fit in. I wanted so much to fit in.

Without a real plan and without the necessary self-control, he thrashed about for decades. Only his ability to escape from the messes he helped create got him this far. And now all trust, even hope for decency in people I can identify with, is gone. I can’t be myself because ‘myself’ is like battery acid to forming lasting relationships.

The room, though, my room, is always beckoning back. “Come back,” it says. “No one will hurt you here and you won’t hurt anyone. All your books, diversions and memories are here. Retreat and lick your wounds and never let the world in again. Everything you need is right here.”

Right now, ‘the room’ is calling very strongly. It’s in the basement, which I have furnished like I always wanted my bedroom to be. I didn’t realize that I had done that until it was nearly finished, but there it is -- not just a TV, but a 55-inch flat screen. Not just a portable radio but a home theater system. Not just library books, but a whole library. And a fully stocked bar and refrigerator (“you know if that kid had a fridge up there, we’d never see him,” my dad would say). But most of all, I have created my museum – pictures, movies, scrapbooks; things that have gone to make up a life.  All surrounding me like a soft cocoon, beckoning me.

It’s easy to say to someone else ‘don’t go in there; you’ve got so much to give.’ It’s another thing when you’re the person who feels he’s given all he can for nothing and just wants to retreat into a familiar, nurturing womb that, unfortunately, has only one exit. 

Hit it Blue Eyes:

But I'll keep my head up high
Although I'm kinda tired
My gal just up and left last week
Friday I got fired
You know it's almost funny
But things can't get worse than now
So I'll keep on tryin' to sing
But please, just don't ask me how
                                     -- Frank Sinatra