On the chairlift you are made to face head-on your fear of heights and your fear of darkness. Up and away from the lights into an alien place where ghosts and demons flit between the trees, heavy with hoar-frost. You are swept almost silently into the storm, driving in billow after billow of new snow.
You do not pause at the top but hurtle down, not knowing the way, blindly following the circles of light on snow. It is not clear what is a shadow and what is a bump, but you cannot take the time to look. Faster and faster you race as if Death itself were at your heels and you cling to the inside of a blind curve hoping to get enough speed for the flat. Do not turn any more than you can help it and tuck where you can. Keep your skis flat and let them run into the wind where your face burns but you don't care. Laugh long and loud screaming through the darkness don't turn Do not turn. Anywhere you turn you lose speed. Keep your skis straight and flat and race down through the darkness. Don't look Don't turn Don't know but keep moving breathless toward the edge. Go faster Go harder Go faster Keep going until you can't go anymore.
I'd say now i've seen everything, except today i feel like i've been everything.
You know that feeling you get in your mouth when you eat one of those cough drops that make your mouth go all numb? My tongue has felt like that for days. That wouldn't be so bad, but the "pleasant cherry taste" is enough to make me want to kill myself, right there.
My friend Susannah writes in a letter: "There is a Quaker saying- Walk in the light, wherever you may be. "It is a gentle light, an inner light. Wear warm sweaters, my friend, and eat simple food. Lose yourself on a ski slope, and find yourself a future in a cup of tea. With honey."
I have been to Hell and back. It's not the extremes of emotion, but the node, the place where the curve crosses center.
For in that sickening moment you can see clearly the entire line, bent to its giddy rollercoaster. And before you go screaming off to another round of feeling with no control you have an instant to see that there is no comfort for you, nothing anyone can do but watch helplessly and if you are lucky, they won't hold this latest embarrassment against you when you break free.
The speed limit on Bolton Notch road is 35, which strikes me as unnecessary since on a good day it's hard to get up even that much speed, hard to get up enough speed to keep moving up the hill. "Oh," it strikes me all of a sudden, "the speed limit is for people on the way down."
The dump truck and the grader are such a welcome sight that you begin to wonder how you can get them to come back to your neighborhood, what to put in the feeder to attract them. What do these happy, gentle creatures like to eat?
Lately i get to feeling as if my reality isn't. Either it's not mine, or it's not real.
i think the bottom of the stairs right in the middle of the tread is the ideal place to leave a bowling ball, don't you? Well, it may not be ideal, but that's where i've left mine.
My life is getting weirder. One would think it's not possible, but it's true. You know, i don't think there's anything softer or sweeter than rat kisses, although i think that as a species they were shortchanged in the name department. 'Rat' just doesn't sound cute, not even as cute as 'walrus', even though walruses have bad tempers, bad skin and bad breath.
25 January 1995
Well, it has been an interesting day. i was skiing poorly at first, getting used to variable conditions.Your skis move faster on harder surfaces, so when you suddenly find yourself in powder, it can be trouble if you don't anticipate.
i keep being amazed by my own fluidity of movement, and my whole body feels good as i swing my weight back and forth across the fall line, trusting Newton's Laws.
Just at the point where i was becoming self-congratulatory, my left ski hit a small powder berm which would have been all right, except my right ski was on hardpack. Anyone with a rudimentary knowledge of physics can see what an awkward and untenable position i was in. As I twisted around i thought: "Now would be a good time to fall." i am very sensitive about the thought of knee injuries- i prefer not to have them. So i said to myself: "time to relax." i find that relaxing at a time like this lessens the likelihood of injury. If the fall is already in progress, there's no sense worrying about it.
26 January 1995
Measurement of my discomfort level can be described in terms of three zones: In the middle zone i have cramps and intestinal discomfort. From my ribcage up there is muscle pain and no small complement of bruises. My legs and feet feel OK; well, actually, they feel great and they'd like to jump up and face the day only they don't want to say so because they're afraid the head and torso are vindictive and there might be repercussions.
Yesterday i went power sledding. Now, this is a great game for anyone who professes to love winter in places with bumpy landscapes. To play this game, wait until it snows. The slipperier the better. Then find a road on a steep hill, at least an 8% grade, but something like that is for rank beginners. The road should be steep and narrow and long and above all, twisty. Then drive down it. Points are awarded for the percentage of the total distance you manage to keep traction in all four tires. In the stretches where you slide, points are awarded for controlling the skid. The objective is to stay on the road. Bonus points for staying in your own lane. You get more points for going quickly, but if you skid due to speed, you lose all your points and have to ride in an ambulance.
Today, if i fall, i will make a point of falling on my butt. Not by way of punishment of course, but simply a matter of "Whose turn is it?"
This is how my afternoon went: Everything at the mountain is covered with snow and frost, dazzling white against blue sky. The legs and feet have their day, but the head and torso make them do drills. "Because," they chide, "if you'd have done more drills before yesterday, there'd have been less falling." Since the brain is located in the head and not the legs or feet, no one points out that perhaps the legs and feet are not solely responsible for this oversight.
28 January 1995
Once, for a split second i saw a solar eclipse. It had been an accident, but there it was at that moment of totality and i had to tear myself away from this amazing sight. I felt as if having seen this great thing, my life would never be the same again. In truth, life would not have been the same had I been looking at a ham sandwich. Once you have seen anything, life is never the same.
Every time I find myself being asked over the phone to sing 'Happy Birthday' to a dog, i get the uneasy feeling that things are even stranger than they appear.
30 January 1995
I keep feeling very sad because i think i will never be the same again. But then i think that maybe how I used to be wasn't that great to begin with only i didn't know any better. But I still want to ask anyone that was there, anyone that might have seen me, sales clerks and gas station attendants, I want to stand on street corners and yell "Who have I been lately? Where has all the time gone?"
It is snowing now. It's almost midnight and i can't stop crying. i don't even need anything to be sad about. simply the way one wall meets another sends me into fits of tremendous melancholy. in the morning when i wake in my own sweet bed i will watch the snowflakes fall, watch them fall and think of my own fall, the long fall into sorrows, into knowing, my fall into grace and perhaps through madness we are healed.
31 January 1995
I am listed in the phone book under a name that's not mine. There is a charge to be unlisted, but it doesn't cost anything to be listed under someone else's name. Every so often I like to change the outgoing message on my machine.
Hi. You have reached the answering machine lottery. Leave your message at the tone and your chances zoom to better than 1 in 4 that I will actually understand it.
Hi. None of us can take your call right now. However, if anyone had answered, chances are very good nobody would have remembered it. Fortunate it is then that you are presented with this excellent opportunity to more or less make permanent record of your call right after the tone.
First February 1995
This morning i wake feeling as if i gained twenty pounds in the night. For a long time i lie on my left side, watching snow fall. Then, with gargantuan effort i roll to my back and finally over on my right side. It is a long time before i move again.
I am quite taken aback every time some jackass tells me how lucky i am to be having this little ski vacation. I have by experimentation found the simplest and most elegant way to make these stupid wretches see that this sort of remark is both ridiculous and discourteous. I give them a withering look and say: "Would you like to trade?" and if they seem to be the type on whom subtlety is lost, I add "'cause I know I sure would."
Candlemas 1995
I am desperately sad but there are two things that give me immediate comfort: one likes to sleep in my feather boa, and the other is a book- The Howling Dog, by Tracey Campbell Pearson. Any of you with small children should acquire a copy. Now. Run, do not walk to the bookstore.
Here's something that might serve as a primer on how to treat your mentally ill person. As far as I can tell, the common denominator is:
Treat us with respect and dignity. Modify everything else according to our understanding at the time.
Remember, you might have to ask one of us for a job someday. Although our medication might make us look all fuzzy now, some of us will remember if you were condescending. We will remember the wisecracks. Some of us will recover fully and return to work in personnel departments across the nation. And here's the kicker: You can't always tell which ones.
6 Febrary 1995
It seems to me that astronomy is a science largely devoted to discovering how and when the universe will end. Does anybody know the suicide rate among astronomers?
You know how many performance artists it takes to change a lightbulb?
Two. One to fill the bathtub with jello, the other to paint the power tools orange.
I keep thinking I hear the smoke alarm going off, but only when I'm sitting is this chair. And crickets? I hear them all over the house.
Do you know that feeling when you're at a friend's funeral and you're trying to hold it all together so you can help take care of his family?
D'ya know what it feels like when you just happen to be standing there when something happens and it would be really funny if it wasn't happening to someone real but it is and you can't quite contain yourself?
That's how I've felt all day.
7 February 1995
You know, i think all this would be so much better for me if someone would only tell me the punch line.
i am cleaning everything in my path, cooking two things at once, practicing four instruments in an hour, and dancing around. i am doing my best to hold onto what makes me me, holding on a little tighter than perhaps i have to, afraid that i will slip and i will be no more.
I am driven to do one more thing, just one more pot to wash, one more thing to sort, one more thing made tidy and clean and perfect as if by some ancient primitive magic these small acts will protect me, will keep me safe from the fallout of anger because i wasn't perfect, i wasn't good or good enough. And if i can keep moving, cleaning up, i know i can never wash out the stain but maybe i can atone for it and i know and i keep saying "it's not my fault" but it doesn't keep me from thinking that still there might be something i can do to clean up the mess.
8 February 1995
It's morning and I look like hell. Feel like it, too.
22:30 and i'm walking through downtown Burlington weeping openly. There is nothing else to do, nowhere to go but keep walking, loose and fluid hoping i will get to my car before the howling begins.
The torrent of sound, the great open scream with no word or meaning wells up in me and begins to spill over before i sink into the safety of my car. On the road it comes and keeps coming and the only feeling that i am sure of at all is the feeling of the steering wheel in my hands. i don't know who i am anymore. i never knew and may never know. What i do know is what i want: to keep driving down the interstate and never come back, never be heard from. To be lulled into silent dreamless sleep. To be nameless and faceless, insensate.
10 February 1995
Either people see things the way they prefer to see them, or I project future events into people's minds. In any case, I always know my hair is too long when friends begin to compliment me on my recent haircut. Never mind it's been seven weeks since the last one
12 February 1995
For days now I have been having some of the worst night horrors I have ever had. I can't remember the dreams at all, but my manner of waking keeps telling me there is something terribly, terribly wrong. I keep waking up with the light on, or trying to turn it on in a panic, trying to get dressed in a hurry and leave the house, trying to run, to escape, standing transfixed at the top of the stairs listening to every little noise, listening for clues that might tell me if there is a reason to be frightened. With nights like this, is it any wonder i spend large portions of my day staring at the walls, numb with sorrow and rage i can't explain?
14:15 and i am useless. Can't nap, can't play trumpet, can't eat, can't cook, no attention span for cleaning, can't write decently. I do note however, that 1415 was the year of the battle of Agincourt, one of the bloodiest battles of the hundred years' war. This line of thought will inevitably feed my own existential crisis, so maybe as an entertaining diversion I will instead have a nihilistic crisis. No, i think that's a bad idea. Maybe I'll just wander aimlessly about for a few hours. Maybe I'll stare out a window for a while. Maybe I'll just get dressed and go snowshoeing. Yes, I think that's probably the best thing.
What i am saying here is that i am about at the end of my rope, and I'm not sure it really matters. i'm not sure anything really matters. And i think this is a bad sign.
13 February 1995
There is a calmness in me that i have never had before. i will not lie to you; i don't think there is safety in this. Food makes me sick, sleep makes me weary. Anything i do, i do out of boredom as i mark time, waiting for the hours to pass.
i feel a little bad carrying on with the activity of living, as if i am committing fraud. But i realize it doesn't really matter what is done or what is not done. It is not necessary to ask forgiveness or to explain. None of it is any concern of mine.
You know how many surrealists it takes to change a lightbulb?
Fish.
14 February 1995
There is quiet here. i need less to eat, less to drink. i may not feel good, but i feel strong. i can almost feel the dross burning away.
There is a pleasure in this calmness, where the center of being meets the center of not being. It's all the same.
If they ask you when you see them, tell them where i have gone. Tell them i am weary. Tell them there were days, days that were gracious, days when i didn't know any better. If no one will tell a story anymore, it dies. No one will mourn it as it passes out of memory.
26 March 1995
Sunday Morning
This morning i woke up with a long list of things i want to do, although i am by no means committed to actually doing them today. That would, i feel, stress me unnecessarily and the great accomplishment is in wanting to do these things rather than completing the list:
You will notice that none of these items included making my bed, filling out a menu, or trying to get a pass. I intend not to go to any groups, not to eat anything off a tray, and not to tell anyone where i'm going. AND i do not intend to have to explain to anyone "exactly what i meant by that." I am going to have the first really good day i have had in what- six weeks? three months? six months? twenty-five years? Let's just say a really long time.
Same day, 2130
I worked on many of the items from my list although regrettably grocery shopping was not one of those items. So I had to eat only what I could find in my sadly depleted stores. this turned out to be either kidney beans or cookies. Now, I love kidney beans as much as the next person but i don't care for them if they don't form part of a larger unit- some recipe including other food items, perhaps. Call me strange that way. So cookies it was. Five or six of them.
28 March
Life is OK if you happen to have one. I WILL have a sense of humor about this.
30 March
2235 h
Well, kids, it's time for me to go to bed and sleep the sleep of the righteous. And I'm sure the righteous will want to know where their sleep has gone. If you see them, let them know how much I'm enjoying it.
1 April 1995
2200 h
Well, I'm speeding again. I feel just great. I keep seeing something akin to the shadow of a high-speed fan out of the corners of my eyes. I keep hearing the sound of crickets. Not one cricket, but lots of them. Or maybe it's the seventeen-year cicadas.
Do you know that feeling you get when you've been up for about thirty hours in a row and you've averaged a cup of coffee every half hour? That's what I feel like, and the novelty has worn off. I wonder if I can get my body to vibrate at such a high frequency that I might pop off into another world.
It's two o'clock in the blessed AM and I feel more awake than I did twelve hours ago. The walls and ceilings are beginning to stretch and undulate in a way I find most unattractive. Not for the distinct sense of mal-de-mer it brings me, but for my nagging suspicion that walls and ceilings are not supposed to appear that way. Letting go is holding on. The less i try to hold things in focus, the clearer they become. I will just remember to breathe.
The rat has developed a disgusting habit: she finds dead flies on the floor and eats them.
4 April
midnight
And I'm tired of keeping silence. I want to wear my pain like a black leather jacket and hate the world as much as I hate myself and scream at people to make them look at me.
And then I remember that there are people will will look at me whether I scream or not. There are people who don't seem to mind if I'm ugly, don't care if I wear my pain on the outside today, won't let me forget that this too shall pass. I am so well loved that should I get tired of wearing my Really Bad Attitude for a while, there are people who will save my place until I need it again.
There is life in me. There is life in rage. There is life in sorrow. And I have to believe there will be joy in life.
9 April 1995
1925 h
I am still having little lapses in judgement; I ate an entire box of raisin bran in two days. Not the regular size box, either. I had to have the jumbo size. And I don't even know why I had it in the house. I don't particularly care for raisin bran. All I know is that I WANTED it. I kept hearing myself say "just one more bowl". And taking into account my lactose intolerance it was not hard to understand why I felt so bad. BUT I KEPT EATING THE STUFF!
Well, my system hasn't entirely recovered from that one.
16 April
2240 h
Last night I was so sick that after a while I was ready to give up on going back to bed and instead sleep on the bathroom floor. During one of my flights I had time only to stop and get a dictionary so I could look up 'peripatetic', a linguistic question that had been bothering me for days, stalking me and springing out into my consciousness when I was least able to do anything about it.
This vocabulary deficit seemed to be a problem of the first magnitude at 3:45 in the morrning. My reasoning? Apparently, It is bad enough to be sick in the middle of the night, but worse to be sick and have no idea what 'peripatetic' means.
17 April
0925 h
I'd love to know what I was dreaming last night. I'm pretty certain that in my sleep I picked up the phone and called someone at a quarter to four. I wish I knew who it was so I could apologize for waking them. Guess I can't keep a phone by the bedside anymore.
The other day my friend Pete looked at me and announced: "You're nuts."
"Yes," I answered, "but they let me out."