I trace them to this not being an emotional issue anymore. It's more than words can convey. Reality falls apart at the scenes.
My co-worker asks me about the coming weeks' schedules and each week I tell him I'm alright with it, when at a subtle level I'm letting him rely on me coming in tomorrow while fully leaving open the option for myself that I
won't
show.
Eva's as . . . I don't know how to describe it accurately . . . magnetic as ever? We're not friends, but we have our thing at work and that's all. The reality scenes of her rip apart. Amber scenes rip apart. Am I really there? Will my not being there make any difference? It doesn't matter. How they may react to my not showing up one day is not reality. Not my reality.
If I consider their reality, well suicide fucks things up. It fucks everything up. A lot of things in life get fucked up. In the big picture, in the long run, my leaving is nothing. People deal. In the big picture, Ritu's suicide hasn't affected the course of my life. I've carried her around all these years, but what big impact has that had on my life that I couldn't deal with? People will deal.
Suicide fucks things up for people. I just have to accept that. I accept it. Sorry, guys. Well, some of you. Not all of you. Not most of you. If you know how sorry I am, then you.
I don't have a history of drug usage, but if I'm around people who are doing them and they encourage me, I have proven to be amenable to taking them. But drugs don't impress me, I realized recently while on ecstasy someone had given me. I'm so not about drugs I was once ridiculed for pronouncing it like the band XTC.
I mess with my perceptions and reality all the time on my own. Taking drugs is just a variation on that theme, another perspective and reality to explore and mull over. I never get taken over by them or lose myself in them. While other people are high, I think I might be annoying to them because to me I'm still analyzing and mulling over the experience.
Alcohol is, of course, my drug of choice in that sort of exploration, but music also probably falls in that category of artificial emotional manipulation.
I'm going day to day now. Each day wondering why not today, each day pushing for today. When it feels right, I'll do it. I may never do it, too. But most important is that it is not an emotional issue, and it is a fact. I've reached my expiration date and things aren't going to turn around, and I don't want things to turn around, that's just not a concept to me. Even if things "turn around", it only lays bare the fact that it's my time and I'm done.
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| MONDAY, NOVEMBER 16, 12:43 a.m. - Underground crosswalk connecting all four corners of the Dunhua N. and Minsheng E. Rds. intersection. Artwork by local elementary school students is displayed along the walls. Good place to practice shakuhachi late at night, too. I love the not-over-the-top perplexed look on the mermaids face at all the human garbage in her home. That's some high-quality expressive student artwork. |
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| 2:28 p.m. - Xinjiang N. Rd. bridge over the Keelung River in Xizhi township. The bridge marks the current end of the bikeways eastward and further on requires riding on surface roads. |
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| 2:32 p.m. - Cemetery along the river. |
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| 2:54 p.m. - A new footbridge over the canal that divides Taipei and Xizhi, making the bikeways more seamless. Crossing the canal before required riding about 100 meters further to a road bridge, which was inconvenient at best, dangerous at worst because the shoulder is very small. |
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| 3:20 p.m. - Crossing the Keelung River on the Dajia Bridge north to south to go home. |
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| NOVEMBER 17, 5:24-5:25 p.m. - Cute co-workers and baby bunnies. |
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| 8:31 p.m. - Someone brought in the baby bunnies hoping to find homes for them. They were very useful as stress relief, too. |
