Britney

I am sick. What is it like to be cared for when you are sick? Once I knew but not now, and sometimes, it feels like not ever again. I have no real, consistent source of warmth in my life. I want to laugh because it is so sad.

If I could leave my body, I would do it just to look myself in the eyes and say, “You must be the saddest person in the world. I feel for you with all my heart.”

Yesterday I stood on the edge and then cried from sheer terror on the 3 train. The possibility of suddenly not existing in the evening of the same day is enough to break anyone down.

Am I supposed to be alone? Am I supposed to be alone?
I can’t do it! I can’t do it alone! Not all alone! Not all alone!

If I am this dependent maybe it is best. But maybe I am wrong and countless other humans are this way and lots of people just do their best to hide it because vulnerability is so ugly to them. I love its ugliness so much that I wear it daily.

You can see how my emotions change throughout most of my pieces of writing—especially this—and I love it because it is the only way to say to people, “Do you believe me now? My emotions are carried on the wind. I can’t do much to stop them.” I can though. I just never have much motivation unless they are destroying me. I do not want to pretend to be someone else for the benefit of others.

I am home sick and I can hear the workers in the next building sawing and hammering behind the thick black tarp, Death draping itself over red brick. The faded Latin music and caustic metallic clanging are the most familiar thing in this neighborhood to me.

We are reading Oedipus Rex in my English seminar class. I sat on the train yesterday with my copy and said to myself, “What a sad man. He must have the most tragic life of anyone who ever lived.” I wonder how many people have looked at me and thought the same. ♦