Overheard: a brain talking to itself
Brain: Fuck
Brain: No kidding. Fucking fuck.
Brain: God.
Brain: Jeeze.
This is why other people were invented, so our conversations would be more interesting, like
Gamma: [Contentsofentiregermandictionaryatsuperfastspeed]
Me: No kidding.
I was talking to a guy. About prozac et al, as so often. He said his brother (who killed himself a few years ago) took one of those, but then stopped, because it worked.
I was all like, whoa.
Cause, what do you stop doing not because it fails, but because it works? I don’t mean something like scratching an itch, which you stop because the itch stops so you don’t need to scratch anymore. I mean something that succeeds, and the success scares you.
Or the idea of success.
I went and printed out two manuscripts and made multiple copies of one. As soon as I figure out which agents and publishers to send them to, I shall.
Cause, boy, there are a lot of them out there.
[Insert brain conversation here]
Right now, I’m all, melancholy is okay, it’s fine, I appreciate it greatly, but stasis is for the birds, one foot in front of the other etc.
Also: morbidity.
I managed to shock someone who has known me for a long time with a sick joke. She said I was morbid.
I dunno.
Here’s the way I look at it: we’re all gonna die.
Take a soldier in the trenches somewhere, WWI France or something, up to his butt in mud with bullets zinging around his ears and poison gas drifting in.
Except for the mud and the uniform, that could be any of us, is the way I look at it.
Every day we survive is a miracle.
[Insert brain conversation here]
Just because we don’t hear the bullets doesn’t mean that wasn’t a really close call just now.
I’m not morbid, I’m really, really thankful to be here.
Okay, I’m morbid too.
I was thinking, recently, about two things: everywhere I’ve worked out since attaining adulthood has been next door to a cemetery.
On three continents.
Try that view if you want to put exercise into perspective.
Second: I know a lot of people with death-related jobs, if you include the medical profession. A writer friend grew up in a funeral home. Someone told me recently they have a part time job picking up bodies for a different funeral home.
The fact that I think about this, I suppose, instead of how I know lots of people with blue cars, might suggest I’m slightly morbid. What do I know.
Here’s what I think: dead is dead.
People are reluctant to discuss death.
I want to tell you something that I tell myself all the time re: publishing. Not that I know anything about it, really, but it helps me delude myself that bigger things are possible. It is this.
Just because you’re not published, doesn’t mean your writing is no good. It means you don’t have the right publisher. Yet.
I love to read your writing. Good luck.
Hey, you’re talking about me! :) Nothing wrong with being glad to be here. I like being here, and I’m not afraid of not being here any longer, but what gets me is the old age part of it. I also worked in assisted living for the elderly, dealing with people who were no longer capable of using the bathroom on their own and people who thought they were at the bus stop waiting for the bus… all the time. I fear that, but I suppose I shouldn’t, because by the time that hits I won’t know about it anymore.
Weirdest death-related story I’ve got… my brother and I picked up a dead lady to transfer from the funeral home to the crematory and when we got to the funeral home we noticed she had a remote control sitting on her chest. We’re like, “What the heck?!” so we called our boss to ask him what was up with the remote control and he said, “Oh, that goes with her.”
“Why?” we asked. He had no idea.
So on the way to the crematory, we developed some interesting theories, my favorite of which was that she had cleverly devised a way to make sure her husband never ever got hold of the remote control ever again.
I have lots of good stories like these. :)
And I can relate to your Gamma conversation. Upon finding out that I speak fluent Spanish, Mexicans often assume that I also am capable of comprehending it at roughly 3,000,000 miles per hour. This is a mistaken assumption, as I can only comprehend at 500 mph, tops. :)
I’m almost as bad as Chuck Palahniuk when it comes to telling friends’ stories, Meagan.
Mig
Please publish please publish please publish…..I can’t wait to see the book.
Chuck Who?
Is this one of those people I would know if I were twenty years older than I am?
I seem to be running into that a lot lately…
i’m making a t-shirt out of that:
CHUCK WHO?
That was the part where you were supposed to tell me who this Chuck dude is, and then you could all have a laugh at the ignorance of the young.
Read the script, Mig! ;)
What do I look like, wikipedia? My mission is to spread falsehoods and increase confusion in the world.
my job is totally death-related AND i drive a blue car.
and if you published, i would order right away.
this writing of yours kicks ass, man.
So, I looked it up on Wikipedia then. I don’t know why I should be expected to know him. He’s not even a Portlander. Though I have seen the movie version of Fight Club… my ex-husband made me watch it.
I don’t drive a blue car anymore to my death-related job, but I have had two different blue cars in the past. Now I have a red car.
I think Chuck rides a bike.
Seriously, he’s not a Portlander? I thought he was.
Pasco, Washington, man.
Besides, I’m not a Portlander either. Why should I be expected to know a Portlander who isn’t even a Portlander?
Especially when he’s not that cute, really. ;)
print is dead.
keep blogging!
Did someone mention Chuck? He just writes about Portland. And totally swipes everyone else’s stories and then weaves a weak plot for a story around them to hide the fact that its really a collection of retellings of other people’s stories.
On the plus side though Choke just got made into a movie and they picked Sam Rockwell to play the lead, which is inspired casting.