first morning of unemployment

9/11/06

I am sitting on my front porch writing this morning’s entry, as I realize how sick my home, and especially my room makes me. I still am being doped up with speed, and it is tearing my body apart. I had to take a Vicodin last night in order to go to sleep, as my body and muscles started spasming again, with the consequent nerve pain and numbness in my left leg that is just unbearable. Even during my sleep, the NSA is able to dope me up, but last night I slept on the kitchen floor with the door wide open. The breeze comes in the strongest through the kitchen, but I am uncomfortable with leaving the door open, because there is no security lock, and it opens onto an alleyway here in downtown, where all kinds of predators prowl and addicts scavenge. But last night I didn’t care. I was sick with nausea, and hurting with pain. I went to bed still wearing my bra and shoes, and didn’t even brush my teeth. I woke up with a lot of muscle pain and spinal tenderness, but with more mental alertness than I have in some time. The buzzing in my head was more subdued than usual. I always know how much speed in my system by how loud the buzz is, and sometimes, it is a deafening roar. Candace Pert, a molecular biologist, wrote a book on noise in the body, and she brought up a point that I have found to be very true. Our bodies are full of sound at the molecular level, which we normally do not hear, and when everything in our bodies is in harmony, the musical sound of our bodies comes across as silence. I long for the days when my head knew utterly complete and peaceful silence. Ever since I have been doped up, I always have a buzz in my head—sometimes it is subdued, and sometimes it is a roar, but it is always there. My body and brain no longer are working in harmony, and I suffer, and sometimes, like last night, I suffer terribly.

In addition to engendering muscle spasms and arthritis in my joints, the speed also affects my ability to concentrate. I have known this for sometime at work, where I could no longer concentrate so completely on every call. I had to get out of a heavy retention queue because retention calls require so much concentration, and I no longer found it easy and natural to concentrate. It required too much mental energy that I no longer have. Instead, at work, I found my mind just going on "automatic pilot," and being resentful whenever, I had to take it off automatic pilot. I just was not up to being challenged anymore, even though normally, when I am healthy, I thrive on challenges, and they draw out the best in me.

The night before last, I had slept in my bed (my bedroom has the highest concentration of dope in the air—I’m not sure why, but I have a couple of unproven theories—still working on it), because my back was in pain. I woke up completely doped up on speed. I couldn’t get out of bed. I couldn’t function. I couldn’t even concentrate to read. I was looking forward to reading a little more in depth than usual, now that I am unemployed, and pulled out a book of John Donne poetry. Now admittedly, Donne is advanced level reading, but I have read him multiple times before, and am familiar with the archaic syntax of his poetry. But yesterday morning, my level of concentration was so poor that the words were nonsensical. The symbol of the word was meaningless. This morning, I read some Donne, and to my great relief, I don’t think that I have lost massive IQ. I still am not reading with my pre-lithium level of concentration, but at least I could comprehend the words. This also explains why I haven’t been able to pray as deeply as usual. Prayer, in the briefest of definition, is focussed concentration—at the spiritual level. Over the years, I have developed an intense ability to concentrate at the physical, emotional, and intellectual level, as I dedicated myself to, and matured in my prayer life. But the drugs completely wiped out years of disciplined work, and I still haven’t fully recovered. Depending on how much speed I have in my system, I struggle to get out of the imaginative realm and into the spiritual realm. This is very clear to me in yoga, during the final meditation. A couple of times, I have nearly fallen asleep, because I am going into the imaginative realm of the dream state, rather than the clear, pure awareness of the spiritual realm. It is all a matter of concentration, and speed can completely undermine my ability to do so. Imagination is important too, and there is no doubt that my imaginative abilities are much greater than my contemporaries. But that is their loss, not mine. So much of my giftedness is directly related to my superior imaginative faculties, but they think that neurotic, and in need of pharmaceutical correction. I think they are narrow-minded, pathetically handicapped idiots, who nonetheless have tremendous power to wreak great destruction and suffering—and in my case have done so.

I am unemployed now, and I intend to do something with this time, even if I cannot live in my own, contaminated home. I will do everything I can to avoid the drugs, and be productive, and regain my health. Even though my musculo-skeletal system is in really bad shape, I think I am finally losing a little weight, because an OTC pill is jumpstarting my metabolism for the first time since jail, when I went into starvation mode. On that positive note, I will end my writing, and start taking care of all the little details, I have to deal with….Thank you God, for allowing me to escape the drugs and have some energy today….