From beneath....

Well this is awkward. I kinda feel like the family member who borrows a bunch of money, and then disappears for a few years, before showing up at a funeral or some shit. I’m not good with awkward conversation and platitudes, so we’ll gracefully move on and perhaps you’ll listen while I fill you in on the past 3 months of my life.

So on May 6th of this year, my family and I were sent kicking and screaming back to Ireland, by my work. I had tomporarily relocated to Oregon in January 2012 and we had hoped to stay a bit longer there. Somewhere in the region of forever. Alas, it wasn’t to be, and we were sent back to the old country. My wife who is American, didn’t seem to mind a whole lot, despite the loss of our not insignificant expense account. Like I said, she’s American, and I think she is still waiting to see a leprechaun or some shit. Me, I’ve lived here all my life. People tell me all the time how great a place Ireland is to visit, or if they’ve never been, how much they would love to visit. The key word here is “visit”. That is: fly in, kiss the Blarney Stone, drink lots of Guinness and get the fuck out of dodge. When you deal with the high taxes, and shitty infrastructure, and abysmal healthcare, and shitty weather on a daily basis, it becomes akin to a kind of large insane asylum with bad food.

Ok, ok, I’m being harsh. Truth is, our move didn’t go too smoothly, and I’m perhaps a little bitter. Plus there’s fuck all to do when the national past-time is drinking, and you’re an alcoholic. We arrived with nowhere to live and no car. We were staying in my Mom’s and driving a rental, so there was pressure to buy a car and get somewhere to live. After a week I bought a used BMW from the archetypal greasy used car salesman. And as you would expect, within a week, the engine fucking exploded (not literally, it was the exhaust manifold, but I spent a month waiting on the guy to get it fixed). After about three weeks, we found somewhere to live: a slightly overpriced -- but the only place in our search that felt like it could be home -- house in a quiet little neighborhood near work. Unfortunately, this was about two and a half weeks after living with my Mom had become un-fucking-bearable. We hadn’t seen the woman in 18 months, and within days she made it clear our welcome was eroding on pace with my sanity. Disclaimer: I love my mom, and she’s been wonderfully kind to us. It just was way too crowded for us all, and the feeling that we had invaded her privacy swarmed the air like a siren call.

I also realised that I hate my fucking job. The perks, and the cameraderie that I had with the guys in Oregon was not there when I got back to the Irish office. So all I was left with was work itself, which I have little interest or passion for. We’d also eaten into our savings a lot more than we’d anticipated, and then I remembered that alcohol existed. So I started drinking again. Because that’s what total fucking idiots like me do.

So the blog -- this blog -- just kind of died. There was no place for it in my life with two small kids, and settling into a new home, and trying to get your car fixed from a sheister who kept trying to get me to go halves on the cost of repairs (yeah right, pal), and drinking, and guilt, and drinking some more, and a job I hated, and hangovers. Eventually, about two weeks ago, I put the bottle back down. I was deriving little pleasure from it; just numbness. Which is kind of when you know you are an alcoholic. If it’s not social, it’s poison. And my wife and I talked things through. We got some long-standing issues out of the way, and things were better... much better. And I thought about maybe writing again. But it just didn’t happen.

You see, all that other stuff is only half of the story. Because during it all, and maybe because of it all, I fell into a pretty hardcore depression. Not gloominess, or sadness, but a bitter unyielding malaise. Those that suffer from depression can maybe Identify. I’ve been suffering from it for a long time -- it comes and goes with me -- and I’ve been on antidepressants for about 3 and a half years. Those that don’t suffer... it’s almost unexplainable. For me, it’s just an unbearable hollowness -- like somebody just scooped out my insides, everything important about me, and now I’m just left wandering around like Heathcliff’s Cathy, banging on windows and shit, looking for all the important stuff I’ve lost in my life. And that relentless emptiness just wears away at you, until it’s raw and agonising. It’s like heartbreak and  profound apathy rolled into one horrific psychologically scarred ball. And to just play with my kids, or shower, or hug my wife, is a grappling, struggle, like swimming through honey. So yeah, “fuck this blog” was kinda where I was at.

But another part of me missed it deeply. I was aware that I was treading water, that I was barely going through the motions of living a life, and that there were a lot of holes that needed filling, and part of me was desperate to fill them. But when everything is so painful, it’s hard to even know where to start. And in all honesty, there has never really been a time in my life when there haven’t been holes to fill.

I guess I’m out of the deepest part of this depression. I hadn’t seen her face in years, and had almost forgotten her touch, but when you’re gobbling Cymbalta and valium like they’re movie theater popcorn, it’s easier to avoid. It still lingers though. I almost cried tonight, leaving my son for the night shift (crying’s good though -- it’s the numbness, the void, that’s so hateful; crying is a fucking vacation from that). But I’ll keep pushing on. I’ve upped my dosage of meds, and will try to find a good therapist nearby. I might even start meditation again. And as cliche as it sounds, I need to start liking myself. I’ve been through a lot of pain in my life, and most of that was self-imposed. There’s an anchor of guilt and shame hanging around my neck. I’ve hurt people: ex-girlfriends, discarded friends, family... my closest family. Christ! It’s hard knowing there are folk out there who actively despise you, even years after our last countenance. I haven’t just burned bridges; I’ve scorched the earth behind me. Those closest to me have forgiven me, but I’m just not sure if I have.

So I’m back. I can return to describing the zany machinations of my everyday life, while we guffaw in unison at my mild misfortune and embarrassment., m’kay? So just forget you read all this, and we’ll talk soon.

Old Man

Get me off the damn Interweb!

I’m dealing with getting older well. At least I think I am. No longer do I pass frivolous nights in garish bars, trying hard to drown in a well of booze, trying hard to entice women who maybe pass for a seven (when drunk) back to my place for coffee – coffee and sex, trying hard to fit as many pills or powder into my stupid young head, trying hard to balance a lifestyle of excessive vapidity and vapid excess with my sanity. I spent most of my twenties (and some of my teens) living for the weekend, a weekend entailing the above, but with hangovers – I never mentioned the hangovers. Of course, I don’t miss it. It sounds hideous to me; ok I’ve just written it to sound hideous, but looking back it was a truly grotesque way of life. And yeah I’m dealing with the absence of that in my life really well.

 Don’t get me wrong, the hardest part of being a teetotal dad of two younglings and husband of a wife, who’s been unwell of late, is the boredom. The incessant, merciless torrent of boredom. You might think your Saturday nights have dried up a little recently: a bottle of wine and some friends around for a DVD, perhaps; maybe some take out and an early night with your significant other, and a cuddle before the lights go out, wink wink; fuck it, maybe you’re in prison or homeless or a ten year old. Doesn’t matter. You’re still having more fun than me. Last Saturday night, I had the pleasure of watching the movie “Hop” three times in a row before being puked on by both my kids. Meanwhile my wife was upstairs, herself puking – I alone was the only non-puker in my family, and still I would have killed to swap places with her. So later I had to change my daughter’s shitty diaper, which was a fucking delight, because she wasn’t yet finished, so I got to watch that. It went from green to a mustard-yellow color (it looked a bit like mint and butterscotch frozen yogurt, but it did not, repeat: NOT smell like mint and butterscotch frozen yogurt). My wife then felt better just long enough to hold my baby girl (Eva the Diva, as we like to call her, does not like not being held. Ever. I mean EVER… ha ha ha, it’s enough to drive one crazy. Weird huh?) just long enough for me to put my son to bed. Upon his insistence, I told him Goldilocks and the Three Bears about twenty times before he finally settled long enough to sleep. At Ten. Fucking. O. Clock! Finally, I got some alone time with my wife, which lasted about nine seconds before we both crashed into Slumberville.

So yeah, I’m dealing with that aspect of getting older real well. But as I approach my mid thirties (34 is NOT yet mid-thirties; it’s late, early thirties), I’m starting to notice a few …changes. I have bona fide white hairs now. There aren’t many, only one or two, but they’re there, and they weren’t there before. I’m getting aches and pains: I have this tightness inside my shoulder blade that I can never seem to stretch out; and my back… my back is like a game of fucking Jenga. And I can’t get away with eating crap, and not working out anymore. My metabolism is like a steel mill in the rust belt in the 80’s – grinding to a fucking halt. I have zero baldness yet, but I’m getting back-pubes to match my chest-pubes. It’s gross, and I’m too lazy/cheap to get it waxed. Seriously, if the hair doesn’t stop, I’m gonna look like I'm wearing a sweater... under my shirt.

I’m turning into an old grouch too. I don’t like modern music; I don’t understand modern clothes – skinny jeans on girls are great; on guys, not so much. I complain a lot – Exhibit A: This blog. I yell at slow drivers; I yell at fast drivers; I yell at pedestrians; I hit people on bikes. If I had a walking stick I’d shake it at people. A lot. The weather is a fairly prevalent recipient of my wrath; I’m an Irishman living in Oregon, go figure. I’m a pre-middle aged fogey, and guess what? I love it. If I didn’t have anything to complain about, I’d complain about that too. It’s the best thing about growing old, and the older I get, the more cantankerous I get to be.

Now where the hell did I leave my damn pipe and slippers?

Clowning Around

Joining a Circus with Dental Insurance was top of his wishlist

Pennywise the clown. That fucker haunted my dreams for years. He lurked in the shadows of my bedroom, hid between the cracked alleyways that dotted my hometown. He was everywhere I feared and many places I didn’t. I should never have watched that fucking movie: Stephen King’s “It”. I begged my Mother to let me rent it. I promised her it wasn’t that scary. “It’s about a clown, Mom,” I urged, “how scary can it be?” “It’s about an evil clown.” She countered. “A rogue clown, Mom. A clown who’s been chewed up and spat out by society. A misunderstood clown who’s made some wrong turns in life, and is trying to find some semblance of normalcy in his baggy-panted, white-faced, red-nosed existence.” Twelve year-old me probably didn’t say that, but either way she bought it. In reality, it was about an evil clown – one who feasted on the dreams and also the flesh (an important detail) of children.

Being a child myself, and knowing first-hand that clowns existed, and that any adult man, who painted his face and traveled around with a circus under the guise of entertaining kids, was almost certainly pure evil, I found this movie somewhat unsettling. Or put more succinctly: I didn’t sleep for almost a year.

Let’s cut to the fucking chase: clowns are weird. Anyone who aspires to be a clown is fucking weird, and anyone who has made enough poor decisions in life that they find themselves employed as a clown, is fucking weird. At face value, the concept of a clown is to entertain children. But let’s look a little closer at this supposition: The modern clown began as vaudevillian characters in French theater. You had the whiteface or ‘blanc’ clown, who would essentially abuse the lower class, or ‘auguste’ clowns. They did this with their faces plastered in colored face-paint, because, y’know, that’s hilarious and all. Later, common to North America, came the ‘hobo’ clowns, these are the guys who look like they’ve just murdered and raped some kids, and smell of piss. They’re usually sullen and grumpy and derive much pleasure from the physical (and one would imagine mental) abuse of their peers. Obviously anyone who can’t see the hilarity in that is lacking in the very basic tenets of a sense of humor.

Somewhere along the lines, people realized that these guys weren’t so much funny, as freaky-looking fuckers, and that rather than tickle the funny bone, they instead stomped all over their fear receptors. Horror writers, such as the aforementioned Stephen King, began to write clowns as the horrible, monstrous beings they are. Over the past twenty years there has been a flurry of terrifying clown movies. Clowns, as a source of joy, entertainment and gaiety, have virtually been wiped off the map (which is a good thing). Of course, many of these clowns have freaky-ass evil faces, as you can see on thiswebsite. But this isn’t even necessary. If, like me, you have a true fear of clowns, you’ll agree it’s the regular old middle-aged men with sad expressions and painted on grimacing smiles that are the most sinister. Except for Pennywise – the granddaddy of them all – who flips with consummate ease between creepy regular clown guy, and soul-petrifying monster, whenever those meddling kids piss him off.

His owner not willing to take a chance, poor Gizmo starved to death.

Of course, it wasn’t just clowns I was afraid of: Gremlins scared every shade of shit out of me. And a question: WHEN THE FUCK DOES “AFTER MIDNIGHT” END? 6am? 9am? Fucking when can I feed my pet, without him attempting to murder me and everyone I love? And I accidentally saw “Aliens” when I was eleven. I vomited that night, and every day for about six months I went to bed with anxiety that I had an Alien hitch-hiking in my chest. In fact, as a kid I was afraid of fucking everything: vampires, aliens, banshees scared the living bejeesus out of me (If you see one you die? How fucking unfair is that? Gimme at least a chance of escape, for fuck sake). On top of all these grotesque creatures of the night, I also possessed a vague fear of just your random, garden variety, amorphous type of monster; the ones that you never did see, but you knew looked all kind of monstery – a bit like the ones you see in “Monsters INC.” but less cute and more terrifying.

And then it stopped. All of it. I realized that the really frightening things in life were real. There were no Bogeymen hiding under my bed. There were actual real-life terrors waiting to strike at any moment. When my Dad was diagnosed with Cancer, just after my eighteenth birthday, I realized that adult life was a hell of a lot fucking scarier, than my childhood imaginings. Fears didn’t hide in the shadows; they jumped out and face-raped you in broad daylight. By the time my dad died, and I dropped out of college, got myself in debt, had my heart broken a couple of times, and been diagnosed with depression, I was no longer frightened of things that go bump in the night. I’d lie in bed at night willing them to come take me away.

Nowadays, things are much better for me: I have a beautiful wife; two amazing kids; a good job; depression still rears its head sometimes, but never for long; debt … debt still sucks, but I can handle it. I’m still afraid, of what the future holds for my kids, of how they’ll navigate school and the lure of sex and drugs in their teens, of their job prospects twenty years from now. I sometimes worry about my wife’s health, about my health – was my Dad’s illness genetic, or just bad fucking luck? But these fears don’t paralyze me; I still wake up in the morning and go to work, or make my son breakfast and watch cartoons with him. And I’ll be there for both of my kids when they get scared that there may or may not be an evil child-murdering clown in their closet. I might even check it out for them. Either that or run screaming for the door.

Sleeping like a Dad

Our own Dad-like Hell!

I’ll keep this one brief because the past few days, my spare time is like my sex life: It doesn’t exist. And when it does, it consists of me panting for breath, wiping the sweat from my brow, and weeping silently. You see, my wife has been put on permanent bed rest until the baby is born, which essentially means I have to take care of her, my 3 year old son, as well as cook, clean, do laundry, and make daily visits to her doctor’s office. I don’t need to tell you that I’m failing miserably. Already, the laundry is beginning to pile into a giant amorphous beast. I think it has developed sentience. We need to keep the door locked to prevent it from absorbing my son. And I’m pretty sure it raided the fridge last night.

My Wife has it pretty bad too. I have to admit that. Her body is serving up the eviction papers as we speak. My daughter will have to vacate, because my wife has had enough: Back spasms, high blood pressure, nausea, discomfort, pain, and about eighty more symptoms that she likes to remind me of every… 2 minutes or so. I told her that’s how I feel when I go to the gym. Now she has a sore fist to add to that list.

So there’s a high likelihood that I’ll have a daughter the next time I post – that could be when she goes to college, at this rate. Maybe I’ll get her to guest post. Hopefully she’ll settle down quickly, and her and my son will keep each other entertained, and perhaps they’ll tire one another out and sleep 16 hours a day, and my wife and I will have all the time in the world to rekindle our pre-baby magic. I know this is just fantasy, and I’ll spend most of the next three years in a sleepless fog of screaming kids and shitty diapers. But a man can hope. After all, “once you choose hope, anything’s possible.” Christopher Reeve said that… before he died… from severe complications from his quadriplegia. Hmm…

I do want to point something out. I would happily murder the person who coined the phrase “sleeps like a baby!” Babies don’t fucking sleep. A baby’s sole, single solitary goal in life is to deprive his/her parents of as much sleep as possible, while still managing to survive. It’s like a game of Russian roulette for the wrinkly little Benjamin Buttons`. “Let’s try to drive our parents to the point of insanity, without them abandoning us by jumping in front of the nearest passing train!”

The problem is, it doesn’t end with the newborns. Tonight, my son (whom I’ve spent every waking hour with over the past five days) decided I’d misjudged his bedtime tonight. “Hey Dad,” I imagined him say, “it’s Saturday night. Let’s stay up for two more hours.” Well, son… believe it or not, I had a game on the DVR I wanted to watch. Maybe you should just go to sleep and climb in to our bed around midnight, like you do… Every… Fucking… Night! Nope. It’s 10.30 now and the little Beelzebub has literally just fallen asleep 10 minutes ago (To note: I began writing this post 12 hours ago).

So yeah… the uncle, or aunt (‘cause it wasn’t a Mommy, or Daddy), who coined the phrase “sleeping like a baby” is more than welcome to spend the evening putting my son to bed. Sleep like a baby? Yeah right! Should be ”sleep like the parent’s of a baby… any fucking chance they get!!!”

H.E.R.O.

Nondescript Super Hero Type Character

If you haven’t picked up on it from some of my other blog posts, I’ll spell it out: I’ve been feeling a little depressed lately. That’s nothing too unusual for me; I suffer from depression and anxiety. My doctor told me. Depression, for the uninitiated, isn’t a simple case of feeling a bit blue, a bit glum; depression is a way of life. You might punk your hair up and listen to death metal on the weekend, then show up for work on Monday in a suit and tie, but we’re the guys with tattoos on our faces and gauges in our nostrils. We’re living it 24/7. We don’t have bad days, or a bad weekend; we have bad fucking years. My depression usually lasts for about three months at a time, maybe longer, maybe shorter. And I don’t just feel sad or wistful: I get headaches, I can’t eat, I succumb to alcohol, I keep the blinds closed until my wife can bear it, I wear pajamas 90% of the time I’m home, I miss work, I go into short bursts of panic when the phone rings or there’s a knock on the door, I don’t cry at sad things – I cry at happy things, but worst of all, I walk around with this emptiness, this emotional black hole that sits in my chest with the weight of a collapsed star, and eats… just eats away at me, at my humanity. So yeah, I’ve had that going for me for the last few months.

But here’s the good news: I can feel it start to lift. A lot of this is just timing; it’s the gradual and natural healing process. Some of it is experience; I’ve come to terms with having this illness and have learned when, and how, to say “fuck off depression” and kind of force myself to get over it. But there are some awesome changes going on in my life right now, and I surprise myself by how excited and happy I feel lately (seriously, having a happy disposition is a depressive’s Holy Grail). In two weeks (maybe sooner), I’m going to have a daughter – the absolute mind-fuck of awesomeness this brings is starting to sink in. We’re cutting her out, so already that’s one decision we’ve taken out of her hands – the first of a lifetime full of them. I guess therapy has helped too. My therapist played a key role in getting me to write again, and that sure has helped. The outcome of that is this blog, and I’ve had a lot of positive feedback about it, from people who don’t know me, and thus don’t have reason to offer false platitudes just to protect my gentle ego. But most of all, I’ve had the unconditional support of my family: My son and my wife.

When I was about 15, I had every inch of wall covered with pictures of Rock Stars and Sporting heroes. I had a poster of every member of the Manchester United ’94 double-winning team. Individually. I had about 50 posters of Eric Cantona. And while my hero worship for these guys never faded, the pictures eventually came down (there comes a point in time of every man’s life, when he either starts taking pictures of fully-grown, athletic men in awkward positions off his walls, or else starts putting them up; they’re a different kind of picture). Nowadays, although I’m still a fan of sports – to the point of obsession – I don’t really look up to the guys on the field anymore. They’re not my heroes. Sure, I can admire them, and I can appreciate the action and drama they create in my life. For a start, they’re all younger than me now. It’d just be weird to worship a 22 year old because he can throw a ball real good. Ditto with music: I can be moved by a piece of music, inspired by lyrical genius, but I wouldn’t cry if Robert Smith died tomorrow, like fifteen year old me did over Kurt Cobain. Nor do I try to find deep, hidden meanings in their lyrics, as if God’s signature was hidden somewhere in the second verse.

Le King

My heroes are a lot closer to home now. More tangible. They’re my heroes because I love and admire the sacrifices they’ve made in their ordinary, everyday lives, not for fame or fortune, but because it was right, or because they had to just to get one foot in front of the other. Because of pure, old-fashioned integrity.

My Dad is my hero: he faced his death with a stoicism and strength that’s still unfathomable to me as a mature (no really…) adult, and a father. Even in his dying moments, he tried to protect us all from the worst of his pain. But more than that, he was a man of incredible integrity, who didn’t take bullshit off anybody, who believed in himself at all costs; he a man with razor-sharp intelligence – he studied math for fun – but most of all, he was a kind man, and an awesome dad, who never failed to make my Brother and Me laugh. And even though I haven’t seen him in 15 years, he’ll always be a hero to me.

But I have another hero in my life. Right here and now, the one person who continues to stand side by side with me, through my darkest days, through all the shit I’ve created in her life, is my beautiful wife. My wife suffers from a long-term chronic illness, which sometimes is a complete drag and the rest of the time makes the simple act of existing painful. It’s the kind of illness that would have destroyed me years ago, but every day she gets out of bed, eats breakfast – sometimes through a thick mist of nausea – gets in the shower, puts her make-up on, makes her hair all pretty, and says “Fuck you Ulcerative Colitis” like a fucking boss!

She cares for our son while I’m at work, with no family for support, despite the fact that she’s 37 weeks pregnant, and often enduring the kind of suffering most of us can only guess at. And she’s awesome with him. She does little art projects with him, and teaches him his colors, and numbers, and letters. She’s even thought him to read a bunch of words. And she’s sweet and loving and patient with him to an extent that seems almost impossible on reflection.

And she’s sweet and loving and patient with me too. She didn’t sign up for an alcoholic with depression who’s let himself go a little, but she sure as hell is sticking by him. My wife is the main reason why I’m starting to feel better. Without her support and love, I’d be drunk in a studio apartment somewhere, weeping silently while I furiously masturbate to some kind of strange foreign pornography. But she’s protected me from that life – Goddammit, she’s swooped in superman style, and saved me from that life. A life of bad pornography and tears. Her problems are hers, and my problems are hers, and though that might not be fair, she gives zero fucks because she’s my wife and she loves me. And I love her. Immensely. She’s my hero for all that, and more.

Plus… she’s super fucking hot!!!

Freudian Tip

Freud: They see me rollin'... they hatin'...

I seem to have started a therapist turf war. I’m in demand. I’m seeing a Therapist about a half an hour away in downtown Portland, but the local Therapist ain’t having that. Downtown Therapist has stepped on suburban Therapist’s patch, and it’s going to end only one way: in a violent and bloody shoot-out.

Or at least it would, if either of them knew the other existed. See, for a few weeks last month I was seeing two Therapists. This wasn’t planned – I’m not that messed up that I need a team of Therapists to fight my inner demons, like a nerdy croc-wearing version of Fathers Merrin andKarras. I just kind of got stuck with two Therapists. I was going to explain how this happened, but it’s quite a boring story involving the kind of clumsy, disjointed social awkwardness you only see from people with deep-set, OCD veterans, such as yours truly.

A cinematic representation of my treatment. My Brain is the levitating 12 year old girl: apt as a motherfucker.

Long story short, I ditched local, suburban Therapist because, while he was professional, and clinical, and understanding, I didn’t really connect with him like I did with downtown Therapist. I think he actually blushed when I mentioned sex, which then made me blush. One awkward silence and a change of subject later, I decided he probably wasn’t my guy. By the time we finally made eye contact again, I was certain.

The first guy, my current Therapist, is a pretty cool guy. He talks a lot about acting, and truth be told, he nudged me to begin writing again. The outcome is my blog. So you can blame him for that. Personally, if I had to make a guess, I’d say he’s an ex corporate drone, who cut loose, moved to Portland (he’s from out of Town, just like everyone else from here, it seems; about 90% of people I’ve met in this town are from elsewhere), and began living his dream as a Therapist. At least I like to think so; I have no way of knowing this, because despite being privy to the very darkest moments of my life, I know little more than the dude’s name. Weird isn’t it, how you can strike that sort of relationship with someone because you’re paying them? He’s like a stress ball with legs, and a mouth and brain, nudging my verbose meanderings into some kind of revelation. It’s a very underrated and overlooked skill.

But one thing I have noticed, in my search for Therapists (plural) is that there are fucking millions of them. The market is flooded with them. That kind of competition must get vicious at times, right? You probably have inner city Therapists capping each other like 90’s rap stars. It’s like personal trainers. It’s like every fifth person is a fucking personal trainer. Where’s the demand? It’s getting to the point where PT’s and Therapists are going to be hustling on street corners, promising to fix your body and your brain “for fie dolla!!!”

Take Suburban Therapist, for instance, who went to great lengths to “squeeze me in next Wednesday at 11”. And every time we scheduled a new appointment, he would go to great pains to make it seem like he was struggling to find a slot for me. “Hmm, how does ten o’clock on Tuesday suit you?” No, I can’t do Tuesday. “Ok, well… hmm … hmm.” Pause. ”Hmm…" Long pause. "How about ten on Wednesday?” But then, two hours later, after I realize mine clashes with my Wife’s appointment – sorry Doctor, can we make it Wednesday afternoon? A flash of irritation, overridden almost instantly by desperation (We’re losing him!!! we’re losing him!!!) “Hmm…. How does Wednesday at four suit you?” Sure. “Thank fu… I mean, uh, see you then.”

I can afford it, fortunately. My co-pay is five dollars. I feel almost rude handing it over. “I can buy lunch today,” I imagine him wonder, as he snatches it Gollum-style from my hand. But I forget it doesn’t work like that here. In Ireland you either pay or you don’t. Insurance covers everything but a deductible, which essentially means you pay full price for a lot of stuff (medications, primary care visits, etc.). But when they carted me out here, my company gave me really good insurance. I’m not sure why; part of me thinks it’s because they are so awesome, but another, more cynical part of me thinks it’s so I didn’t run screaming for the nearest airport after the first brief flu season. Either way, it’s really good insurance. The problem with this, however, is that when I walk into a doctor’s office, I can feel them eyeing me up; I can hear them wiping the drool from their chin. I feel like a big roast chicken to their Sylvester the Cat.

To be honest, I’m not complaining. They can poke, prod, slice, crack, bend, and straighten all they want if it’ll make me feel any better. Five dollars? Just keep the Vicodin coming, Senior Doctor.

Fade to Black.

Beards n Bellies

Zach Galfinanaiakinaniakis 

My wife seems to think I’ve let myself go, over the last few years. She says I don’t take care of myself like I used to. I’ve let my gym membership expire. Twice. And I invest neither my time, nor my money, in grooming myself like I did when we first met. My answer to that is: be careful of what you wish for.

It’s true, I sometimes cut my own hair, and go unshaven for days on end (but hey, facial hair is nothing to run from right? Beards are cool now. And I live just outside of Portland, Oregon. Beard capital of the world. Even some of the chicks have beards. Maybe). And yeah, I might have packed on a bit of weight around my gut and jowls, but she’s a damn good cook. And to be honest, food is one of the few pleasures I haven’t yet sacrificed for one reason or another. When you don’t drink alcohol, and you haven’t had sex since the summer, and your idea of a Saturday night is watching Stuart Little 2 on loop, with a whiny three year old, come back and tell me you’re going vegan. And I’ve essentially replaced booze with soda. Sell your shares in Anheuser-Busch and buy Coca-cola, I’m mainlining that shit.

But what my wife fails to remember is that I spent a lot of time, money and effort on my appearance for the very purpose of snagging hot, blonde chicks that otherwise would be out of my league. Aka: her. My motives have changed, and that’s a good thing. I’m a dad and husband now, and $50 haircuts and expensive clothes are the domain of younger, singler men in search of their prize (“you sir have just won, two kids, a wife and all the responsibility and burden your broad shoulders can carry – and then a little bit more).

Ultimately – and this is what’s sometimes hard to admit – I agree with her. I have let myself go a little bit. If I told you I wake up and feel a healthy sense of self-worth and just, well… just the fucking energy to lift some weights, shave, style my hair and floss, then I’d be lying to you. I have spurts. I have times when I’m ready to take on the world, but they’re little islands of an archipelago surrounded by an ocean of languor (I robbed that line from The Dice Man, then changed it to make it look original. It’s a little trick us mediocre writers like to call “blatant plagiarism”).

The sad part, is I’m not sure why. A part of me knows that well-groomed David was a fake. That the guy who made the effort did so with the ultimate goal of someday not having to. That isn’t fair on my wife though. She didn’t sign up for the guy in his pajamas, eating cold Pizza at four in the afternoon, watching the game. Ok, she married a guy, so she kind of did sign up for that, but not every fucking day. But a bigger part of me knows that it’s more than that. I’ve allowed myself to put walls up, to hide away from the outside world. I suffer from anxiety and depression, and I have had sleepless nights about the responsibilities I’ve taken on (I’m a delicate soul – don’t judge). I’ve used alcohol to cope, and all I got out of that was pain, a label, and a copy of the big book. And now I have to figure how to cope with all the tricky, nasty parts of life. And really I don’t want to. That’s why I go to therapy, I guess. To figure it all out.

So I guess it is that I’m allowing my exterior to reflect my interior. “I’ve let myself go,” is really another way of saying, I’ve parted, or hidden from myself. Which is kinda what I’ve done inside. I just hide from all the debris and complications I’ve gathered in my 34 years on earth (most of which I’ve been privy to their creation; some of which just blind-sided me like birdshit on a new jacket).

There is no real moral to this post, by the way. Just maybe that I look like shit because I feel like shit. And that I’m really trying to figure it all. So maybe I’ll see if I can start from the outside: clean up the diet, bring my gym gear to work (we have a gym, awesome huh?), maybe hit a nice barbershop, and trim the ol’ nose hair.

And the soda? From my cold dead hand…

Our Last Dance Together...

I’ve started listening to The Cure again, and I don’t know if that’s a good thing or a bad thing. I first started properly listening to The Cure after my first ever session of therapy. I had been experiencing emotional pain that I hadn’t known possible. It scared the shit out of me, to be honest. When you think of physical pain, you have a map of it in your head. You may never have had your hand chopped off, but you can kinda, maybe take your mind to that place; to how horrible that might feel. But emotionally, I was in uncharted waters. Until then.

I rode the bus there – I think I had intended to drink heavily afterwards, or before… during if I could swing it – but because the session with my therapist went so well, and because I vomited all this congealing, rotting bile of emotion onto her office floor, and because afterwards I felt a glimmer of hope, and maybe because it was a crisp October afternoon, I decided to just walk home. Past the bars, past the liquor stores: just home. I had bought Disintegration a few days before. My ex and I had liked some of their more upbeat tunes. The poppiness of Just Like Heaven, and Friday I’m In Love along with a bunch of other favorites bands from our past had added a flavor of blitheness to the previous summer. I guess I’d never been a huge fan of theirs before that but I picked up a copy of the album few weeks before our split. Though I hadn’t yet listened to it. Couldn’t, if I’m honest.

I put it in my Discman (I’m not gonna lie – I’m old) and listened to it on the walk home. And I didn’t stop listening for the rest of my twenties. Robert Smith’s lyrics and music were simply who I was – and, more importantly, the part of me I couldn’t figure out – converted from brain chemistry to sound. They fucking echoed through every cell in my body. And for the next five years every friend, girlfriend, family member, colleague, shop-teller, fucking passer-by were bombarded by my obsession with this band.

The break-up with the ex had destroyed me. I sometimes wonder how I survived it. That kind of trauma can’t be compared to a physical suffering, because if it had been physical I wouldn’t have survived (there were many physical side-effects: I lost a shit-ton of weight, and essentially became an alcoholic around then, for example, but the white-hot core of agony was purely emotional). Still, to try to give it some context, I liken it to a car crash. A sickening smash from which I emerged forever changed – scarred and disfigured.

And then the pain kind of reached a breaking point, whereby for no other reason than it simply could not get any worse, it had to start getting better. Like when you’re travelling so far away from home, you eventually reach a point where you’re returning. That’s what happened that day, the day I bawled my eyes out in my therapist’s office, and listened to Disintegration in full for the first time. And there I found something just like me; with exactly as much shadow as light, and exactly as much hope as despair.

Eventually I started to recover. I fell in love again. I matured. I got married and had kids. I bought an iPod and put fucking Britney Spears on it – gym music. I started listening to Just Like Heaven and Friday I’m In Love again. Eighties rock became my soundtrack. In a way (Oh God, this is corny as fuck) I felt like I was cured (barf!). The scars have faded; like little silver ribbons, they remain a part of me. I’m better for them, but I wish they weren’t there. And I still miss the ex from time to time; in ways that it shouldn’t, my heart sinks when I remember her. But it never lasts long.

I have therapy tomorrow. It’s my second visit. And no, I haven’t cried yet. Shit happens: I sometimes find it hard to cope with stuff. I can feel blue too easily. I suffer from fucking depression and alcoholism – it’s clearly not a bunch of flowers. But I’ve a good job, a great wife, an amazing son, and a daughter on the way. I’m just listening to The Cure again, well… because they’re awesome!

Crash and Burn (or just exchange Insurance details)

The above dent was the result of a nuclear explosion. Probably.

You might, if you’re one of the 7 or so people who read this blog, remember me writing about having to exchange my rental car (provided by my employer) for a new one, due to a pesky maintenance light on the dashboard (If you didn’t, go read it now; I’ll wait….). Well, it seems that was quite prescient of me – either that or my subconscious is an irredeemable asshole – because on Wednesday night I drove into the back of a 1967 Chevy Pick-up. Before I continue, there’s one thing you should know about driving into the back of a 1967 Chevy Pick-up in a 2012 Toyota Corolla: You.Will.Lose! It’s comparable to the time Darren Sproles ran into Ray Lewis (apt Super Bowl reference: check).

It was literally no more than a tap; it may have been the alcohol, but I barely felt it*. Of course, this could have been because my hood took all of the impact, and crumpled like the look of the guy’s face when he got out of his car. “What the fuck, buddy?” he yelled, looking at the ruins of my front grill. “Look what you’ve done to my…” and his eyes rested on his almost perfectly intact rear bumper. “What’s this?” he asked, dusting off a light scratch with his hand,” and this is all bent,” pointing at the almost noticeably buckled license plate. Of course, I don’t blame the guy: we were at the stop lights; he moved, I moved, he stopped, I didn’t. And if he puts a claim in, that’s understandable. What’s awesome is that no cops were called, he wasn’t hurt, I wasn’t hurt, neither of us had passengers, and the only car that had any significant damage belonged to a giant multi-national corporation.

Of course, it rattled the shit out of me. My hands are still shaking (could be withdrawals from the sedatives, but who’s counting; the effects linger). The next morning I went to the Hertz office and they were spectacularly awesome about it. As it turns out, I’m 100% covered for the whole thing. They didn’t have a replacement there and then (or at least not one they were willing to part with to the idiot Irishman who keeps wrecking our shit), so I came back the next day (the Corolla was still drive-able; it really was a minor crash) and they handed me the keys to a two year old Nissan Sentra with 50,000 miles on the clock, a rust-hole in the side, Utah plates, and – which I thought was a beautiful touch, intended or not – a giant dollop of birdshit on the hood. In rental car terms, this was the equivalent of Fred Flintstone’s ride. And I was eternally grateful, because for someone with so many innate tendencies to fuck my life up, it seems I’m one lucky bastard.

So, I’ve spent the last two days driving around like a 90 year-old on Xanax, and that still feels too fast. I’m determined not to wreck this. But don’t worry, you’ll be the first to know when I invariably do.

*No alcohol was involved during the making of this crash – that was merely a joke. Laugh dammit!!!

Life of Pie

My pie was less pretty, but a lot more substantial than this stock image.

Being someone who suffers from depression, as I am (I know because a Doctor told me, plus… all the misery and sadness) I can testify to its soul-emptying, spirit-depriving heartlessness. It’s every bit as bad as people say it is. At its worst it can be fatal; at its best it can just be a drag, but it’s never far away. Like being paralyzed, or having Cancer, it never lets you forget. My own depression tends to filter out all the joy, and light, and hope in my life, and leave whatever’s left.  It’s like numbness, but with pain.

Having said that, however, it would be remiss of me to say it doesn’t have some (albeit minor) positives; slivers of silver linings, if you will. For instance, nobody ever questions why you’re still in your pajamas at 1 o’clock in the afternoon. And if, say, you want to eat pie for breakfast, you can just damn well eat pie for breakfast. I ate pie for breakfast today, and it was delicious – my salty tears adding an extra frisson of flavor. It was banoffee pie for those wondering, made by yours truly. I would post up the recipe, but, well… google.

Of course there’s something inherently depressing in itself about eating pie for breakfast. It suggests a very faint sense of hopelessness (unless you’re hungover, in which case, knock your socks off…) It’s like a vain search for something, anything; that sugary hit to squeeze out a few more drops of dopamine or serotonin from my arid synapses. It’s like, “everything sucks, but fuck you, I’m having pie for breakfast!” A rebellion of sorts.  But really you’re just sitting there in your pajamas staring at a blank TV eating pie while the world rotates around you.

Whenever I go to see my doctor or my therapist, I have to fill out a form with the same old questions: Have you had feelings of hopelessness since your last visit? Do you find it difficult to sleep at night? How many times have you felt depressed since your last visit? etc… I think they could shorten those forms substantially? One question: Have you recently had pie for breakfast?Yes: No.

“I think we need to increase your dosage.”

Kar-El

I'm on my third rental car in twelve months. My company, due mainly to inter-continental displacement, but also because they're so nice, rent a car for me to drive around in. I presume they're still expecting me to use it to come to work in. I should really ask about that.
After breaking the first two -- both 2011 Nissan's -- Hertz Rent-a-car have tried switching me over to a 2012 Toyota. This seems to have been an unsuccessful endeavor. Faced with the prospect of reaching its first birthday, the car unveils, upon ignition, a light on the dash which flashes "Maint Reqd" in a you're-not-yet-totally-fucked yellow. Now I'm no mechanic, but I have a feeling this means the car -- my third in a year, remember -- requires some maintenance.
I know I should follow this advice before I'm stranded at the side of the interstate during rush hour, cursing the fucking idiot who designed this piece of shit (or whatever I call the perfect combination of years of innovation, technology, and Ph.D's in extremely difficult stuff that involves lots of mathematics and graphs, over the phone to the guy from Hertz). I suppose I've slid all my chips to the middle of the table on the chance that there'll be a sterner red light that says "Get to a garage quick, asshole, before the green light comes on". What's the green light? I'll wonder. "A big fucking dollar sign, Idiot", another light will reveal itself, from some other corner of the dash.
There really are a lot of those lights, let's be honest. And most of them are just some obscure, indecipherable symbol vaguely representing an engine, or an oil can. And that's if you're lucky. Some of them are just random shapes in various colors, designed to keep you're eyes off the road as much as possible. Some of them aren't even bad: "Hey, bro just letting you know your lights are on." Uhhm... thanks. "Yeah I'll just stay here, next to your speedometer, just in case you forget why you're able to see in the dark."
It's not that I dislike my cars, and I promise I have passed my driving test. I'm just careless. We all do regular, menial tasks on autopilot, such as take to the streets in our 100 mile an hour metal killing machines while listening to 80's rock. Who needs to concentrate on that shit? It takes care of itself, right? So my autopilot just happens to be a 15 year old with ADHD, sue me (Disclaimer: please don't sue me).
Anyway with the first one I hit a pothole. Ok, I hit a curb. While answering the phone. While turning a corner. In the rain. The important thing, however, is that the nice lady behind the desk at Hertz Rent-A-Car in [undisclosed location] thinks I hit a pothole. "Those damn potholes, Dah," I tutted shaking my fist in the air at the madness of it all. I think I convinced her. (The important thing to remember, for anybody who might ever read this and happens to work for Hertz' legal team, is that none of this is an admission of guilt, and I love you guys, and we all make mistakes, and... free advertisement, and you look great in that shirt/blouse...).
The second car I didn't really break. Hey, I'm not a total idiot. Ahem... I just kinda scraped it a bit along the side. In my defense, it was while driving along a really narrow bridge, and the barrier had all kind of scrapes and different colored paints on it, so I'm not alone here. I don't judge the other stupid jerks who can't drive in a straight line, so please don't judge me. As it happened this car came due for its regular service, and they wanted to sell it on, so I brought it back, parking it strategically with its "good side" facing the office, then very calmly returned the keys, made polite conversation about the weather (cloudy, if I remember correctly), picked up the keys to the Toyota (Christ, imagine if they'd bought American) and shot out to the parking lot, a trail of flaming tire tracks in my wake. I thought I'd be able to hide out until it was time to fly home. I didn't even wreck this one; I made the missus do most of the driving. Then a quick drop off at the airport, "Damages? Surely not? Why madam, I have a plane to catch..." But because seemingly I'm car kryptonite, I've got another super awkward moment of sheepish, tongue-tied explaining to do, all while wondering who in the name of all that is good and holy decided that adulthood be based on age, and thus I was one.
But not until that fucking red light comes on.

Time management

Over the last year, I’ve essentially gone from watching at least 8 hours of TV a day to almost zero. An achievement I must say I’m particularly proud of. I simply found more productive ways of filling my spare time. I now spend at least 8 hours a day online looking at pictures of people’s pets, and pictures of strangers in humorous and sometimes humiliating predicaments. Sometimes, when I see something particularly amusing, ill elicit a quick snort of air from my nostrils. I presume this is what people mean when they say "lol" and "rofl". I haven’t truly rofled since, well... drugs.
Anyway Tony Robbins was right: it’s about reprogramming your habits to achieve your goals. I still take anti-depressants. Sometimes I sneak an extra one.

Take a sad song

So there's that moment when you realize, truly figure it out, that you're failing as husband, as a father, and as a man. It can happen at any tine. But for me it was tonight, when having spent the day butting against my son -- time outs, tantrums, him wailing, me yelling -- I put him to bed, and sang him the song I sing to him every night -- The Beatles, Hey Jude -- and he gripped me, wordlessly, and wouldn't let me go. Asleep, and holding onto me like he was holding on to the world.
Us old hardened depressives, us old dogs of war, we don't cry. Not anymore. When you start to slip into the abyss of depression you can't stop blubbing. You cry because the wrong (or the right) song comes on the radio, or you caught the scent of an ex-love in a crowd, or you ran out of fucking butter. But us old pros, us with the years of emptiness and numbness and pain behind us, we don't cry anymore.
So when my son held so hard our cheeks became one, and he snored gently in that sweet rumble that only a small child can elicit, all I felt was that familiar ball in my chest chomping away at another little piece of me. Making a little bit less of me than there was a moment before.
Eventually when he was deep enough to unlock so I could sit up and watch his heart-shaped little lips and those gentle eyelids that only come out at night, I thought about why we were here. Money? Opportunity? I'd taken him away from his life and given little back. And then I wept. I guess there's depression, and then there's just sadness.