Be a Little Bit Ugly

Two days.

And it started again, the same as last time.

This song’s been stuck in my head since I was in the hospital (since June this time...).

Oh, and don’t try to end your life, guys. When you wake up after that, you’ll be glad you “failed”. Maybe not immediately, but you will be. I am.

A little note about my most recent hospitalization: Here’s Gee putting it in the simplest words possible:

(Well I can be, but you gotta at least say “hi” first.)

Anyways, I’m looking at my leg, down to my ankle, to my foot. I’m flexible, whatever. This isn’t a kinky thing — I want to learn so much about the human body. More than I already know, which is a lot, compared to the average person who’s not in medicine. I’m not bragging; it’s just a fact about me.

Or any body, really. When I was doing well in life, I went back to school, taking pre-med classes. (While working full time... I managed, for a bit. It’s all downhill after that.)

Yup, stupid me still thought I could be a doctor. Imagine that shit.

Back to my point: in the lab for our class, we dissected parts of several animals almost weekly. Being a vegetarian and a little bit animal right-sy it should have bothered me. And of course, deep down, it did. I don’t like to see anything that once had life — dead.

But nothing I could do was gonna bring these animals back to life, so in the name of science and pure curiosity, because you’re allowed to be curious, and I don’t think most people really accept that, I’d be the one grabbing the scissors and scalpel and going to town. I wanted to learn. I wanted to see. I wanted to give these animals the dignified deaths they deserved, even if I was holding one of their eyes up to my own to compare the size or looking at the massive veins and arteries in their kidneys or liver or hearts, because, fuck, if I were dead, my body would just decay. And so did theirs, in biohazard trash bins, but they served a purpose, alright? I saw something new. I learned. So, thanks, guys; I made sure you didn’t die in vain, and I hope that’s okay. I appreciated you to the end as best I could in the situation I was in. You gotta make the best of things, I’ve been told.

But...

But looking at me is different. If someone were here, I’d look at them. But I’m alone, so it’s just me. And it’s different. Why?

Well, for one, I’m still somehow not dead. So I can move. And see the things making me move, and wonder how my brain is doing it, because I’m not consciously saying “okay, move”.

But I have ankles and legs and feet to study.

Ankles are weird.

The end.

...

Yeah, ankles are weird. I can bring mine to my face... kiss them if I wanted to, which I don’t. And maybe it’s ‘cause mine are so thin — I can almost do the whole thumb touching the pinky like thing people do to other people’s wrists... anyway.

There are so many bones. And they all jut out nastily. Obnoxiously. Noticeably. And my foot — I hate feet. I once said, a lot, and people remind me of this on rare occasion where they actually remember me and things I said and did and thought, and the way I was, when I felt I had an identity — fucking confused, sure, but I still had one, back when I was a teenager: “people should just walk around on pegs...”

[Redacted]

You’re allowed to be curious.

Or maybe I haven’t grown up at all — maybe I still am that crazy teen who looked like Avril Lavigne that everyone used to love.

But I still hate feet.

Do you know how many bones are in a foot? I did, but I forget the exact number. It’s a lot.

216 bones in the average human body.

I can suck on each one of my toes. Sick. And not a “oh that’s fucking rad” sick. I mean gross. Disgusting.

But there are so many things to look at besides bones — ligaments, tendons — the things that push and pull to make you mobile. Pale, thin skin on the top, hardened callousness on the bottom. The way it all moves when you flex.

It’s fascinating, and if you don’t think so, you’re the weirdo.

It just reminds me of how much I want to learn and how my life is completely a wreck right now. And whatever, I literally hug my leg up into my face for comfort. It’s nice. Flexible, remember?

Feet are gross. I’m done. It feels like verbal vomiting via text pad at this point.

Afterthought: Hands though.. those are pretty.

🦶🏻🦶🏻

This post obviously didn’t focus 100% on anatomy... if I were reading this (I just went through and read some of my old posts, so, maybe that’s where my mindset is, but..), I’d think “holy shit, there’s a lot here, and this is clearly a disorganized person.

...

Especially when she was the only one you remember from the last time you were in jail.

Especially when your fellow inmates start gossiping about how she’s a total “dyke” (their word — I think it’s offensive) and how she wears cologne.

...

I don’t care what she smells like (I mean it’d be nice to know... but in all honesty, that artificial crap just gives me a headache), all I know is that when she pulled her mask down and spoke to us and smiled at us — I was gone.

And I’m a fucking creep.

...

They tell me rehab is better, but I’m resisting.

I’ve been there. Landed me a week in the hospital from withdrawal, and not even withdrawal from the poison that put me there in the first place. The real problem. But in their program, their house, their territory, their rules, they turn it around and say you’re addicted to your pills instead.

Because in rehab, they sporadically and irresponsibly change around all your meds and make you see doctors you’re not acquainted with and therefore can’t trust. They say they’re trying to fix you. Assert that they know what’s best.

Well, they didn’t pay my hospital bill. Or for 6 weeks of physical therapy.

They’re not trying to fix you. They’re not trying to help you. They’re trying to mold you into someone else chemically and then say “all better” after a few weeks and release you back out into the wild. With the expectation that you’ll never use again.

Give me a fucking break. Please. That’s not how it goes, that’s not how it works.

Changing your meds — sending your brain into overdrive while making you attend countless meetings and classes where whomever is.. leading won’t intervene when discussion gets out of hand because they’re not trained professionals, just people with two years of sobriety, minimum, under their belt.

That’s all it takes to get hired. Counseling experience — who needs it?! A couple years sober and you’re the fucking paid expert who, in all reality, doesn’t give a shit about you. You can make people pretty fucking apathetic when you throw money into the equation. Just do what’s expected of you, do your fucking job, because now people’s lives are your job, dozens of people you meet every week.. do you even know their names..? and dinner will be on the table. Easy. Who cares about anyone else when you’re turned into a goddamn narcissistic piece of shit with no training and nothing to give besides your own sob story and feigned empathy and support.

Then, take your money. No, correction, that’s the first step.

All about the cash.

Really fucking helpful. I can go to meetings for free, thanks. At least the people I dish out money to are trained. Faked it until they made it to a master’s degree. At least that’s something; it establishes a teeny bit of trust that just might go somewhere. Someone who paid money to now take my money to listen to my shit.

...

Maybe I should just sleep.

...

We are literary soulmates.

I don’t know you, and I know I never will. It goes both ways — you don’t know me either.

And I’m not a poet, I don’t write songs, but I am a writer. And when I read your words, I feel we are so connected in the way we feel. You’ve laid your emotions out there, so you can’t blame someone for taking them and holding them and relating to them. And not in a creepy, obsessive way; when you find someone in the world who thinks, feels, and expresses the same way you do, well, I think that’s something — notable, at the least.

You’re so raw. Well so am I.

And then you put your music to it, and it’s — unbelievable. That feels like a cheap word, but it’s all I can say. (Guess I’m a shit writer.)

Unfathomable how someone could be so purely talented to take art and throw it out to other people in multiple mediums to consume; that is more than someone like me could ever expect or hope to do.

But I’m just.. a fan. An admirer. You move me, inspire so many, and you know it. And you’re not cocky. It makes it so much better — simultaneously so unreal. I want to know your faults, your flaws, just to bring you back to this mundane, earthly level.

So I pose this random question to you, that you will never see: how do you help an addict? I think you’ve known at least one closely and have done it. Fuck it, I know you have; it’d be pretty hard to deny. Sucks being in the public eye, right? I’d think so. But... how do you aid someone who’s so low? How’d you lift them up? Cause, fuck, I need that. Someone amazing to help. Where does a lonely loser like me even begin to look?

Final note — you are gorgeous. People accuse me for liking you for your looks, but if you read my words above, I think you’ll see that’s not true. It doesn’t change the fact that you are just— ugh. Talented, inspirational, and stupidly attractive. Fuck you.

Signed, just a fan. An insane fan that you’ll never know; lord knows you’re stuffed to the brim with them, and at what point do you ever reach annoyance? Or just bland apathy.

Let me try that again.

— Just a fan.

​“Well, it’s funny… I would say up until 2020 then that holds true! I can’t, I guess, pander to anybody else – that’s a cardinal rule, and once you start doing that you’re already dead in the water. But now, because of 2020, a lot of opportunities have come in to write for other people, and that was something that I never really thought about doing before, but life has dictated what projects have come in. And I’ve found it to be a pretty intriguing and fulfilling undertaking. If nothing else it’s an exercise in how to write songs and music, and how to make people feel a certain way. With a project that just came in, they gave me an idea of, ​‘This is the type of song that we want, and this is what we would like you to convey. Can you write a song like that? Oh, and by the way, you have three days!’ And it’s like, ​‘Oh shit, okay!’ So you figure out how to do that: to write a song in a restricted amount of time that checks all these boxes. And hey, if it works out then they could want it and use it for something, but if not, whatever, it’s a song that I wrote. But I love the challenge of it...”

Has writing for other people taught you anything that you will take with you into future material?

​“Yeah, I think so. Different chord changes evoke different emotions, and I love playing with people that are from different backgrounds than I am, and even have different playing abilities. It makes your brain think in different ways. If you want to become a better basketball player, you should play with people that are better than you, or different from you. With anything that you want to get better at, you have to work those muscles and you have to train, and that kinda stuff throws a curveball and it makes it fun – sometimes you forget that you’re even doing work!”

I don’t know. Knowing Frank is writing music for other people makes me feel delighted for him, because I know how fundamental writing songs is to his very existence. I suppose that’s where his career path is naturally leading him, but knowing there’s potentially material out there that he wrote that isn’t going to be coming out from him makes me sad.

Uhh.. okay. 🤷🏻‍♀️

(How about since I live in Florida, I pick something about the skin being burned off you? No connection to this song being called “Sun”.)

Just whatever comes to mind first.

First of all, nothing is going to change when the clock strikes midnight. No one’s carriage is going to turn back into a pumpkin, no one’s dress is going to turn to rags, but no one’s rags are going to turn into an elegant gown, either. People who are struggling are still going to be struggling. The sick will still be the sick and the rich will still be the rich. I’m going into the new year without a job and facing another possible arrest and jail time. I won’t suddenly be surrounded by friends and a partner isn’t going to appear in front of me, like they’ve been there the whole time. My cat won’t come back to life, just like the hundreds of thousands of lives lost to Covid-19. My mother will still hate me, nothing I do will make any more sense than it has before, my obsessions won’t go away, my mood won’t stabilize, and I’ll still be an alcoholic who’s practically drooling for a drink right now.

Maybe I’m just being cynical, which is typical. And maybe 2021 will bring a change in people’s attitudes that will spark some positivity. For me, I don’t think so. I’ll feel as alone and as shitty as ever. Truthfully, I don’t think I felt the brunt of 2020 because not all that much changed for me. Not seeing friends? I barely have any. I only “dated” one person, and that quickly didn’t work out. Not seeing family? I fucking live with them. Losing a job? I didn’t have one to lose. The highlights of my year? Rocket died, I relapsed, got baker acted for a suicide attempt, slashed my arm open with a box cutter just because I wanted to see blood and ended up with a nasty scar, joined an out-patient hospilitization group that kicked me out after 2 weeks, had to self-isolate for Covid symptoms TWICE, pushed people away who wanted to be close to me, relapsed again, got arrested, went to jail, and now have one eye over the back of my shoulder waiting for my next run-in with the police. I feel yet another relapse coming on, maybe tomorrow, cause there’s no way I’m getting out of here tonight without questions being asked. There’s a Zoom AA meeting in 10 minutes, but I just wanna be alone.

People will say that these things are all my fault because I don’t try. If I didn’t try, I’d be fucking dead, and I have days where I wish that were the case. I think my medications are headed in the right direction, but they’re not perfect, and I can’t wake up in the morning. So that’s a problem. There’s always a goddamn problem with meds. Always.

I guess that’s it for me, now. Maybe I’ll suddenly feel festive and put my New Years shirt on. But not right now. Not right now.

Edit: I put on the fucking shirt.

Whyyy did I not watch this last night?!? I’ve loved Thursday as long (longer, maybe) as I’ve loved My Chem, but I don’t think I’ve ever seen them. Fuck me.