I was standing in line at The Moth in Seattle, my story ready, waiting for a couple of my new storytelling friends to show up. The doors open and we start heading in. I get a message. They won’t be able to be there, and they wished me a Happy Birthday. Others had cancelled earlier.
Everyone who was supposed to be at The Moth for my 60th birthday had canceled on me.
This is typical Seattle. Everyone acts nice but it’s very rare that you find anyone who truly cares. I often wonder what my life would have been like if I’d chosen to move to Chicago instead.
For me, it was the beginning of the end. An end that had been happening for the last 20+ years.
I finally stopped deluding myself about what had been going on with my life.
You see, I really haven’t been well at all. The severe bouts of insomnia that last for days. Once it was 10 days long. I was still going to work but I was pretty much insane. The constant headache (it’s just one headache if it never goes away). Organs were not always working correctly. PTSD causing coughing when I’m too close to people. A lot of pain from either my 5 herniated disks or my addiction to sugar. Or whatever the problem is. It’s been hard.
I was okay as long as I had something to hang onto. My job at MITS was that something for 9 years of all this nonsense. A lot of people there, on varying levels, knew I wasn’t well, but respected me because I still was highly productive. I could relax. There wasn’t anything to hide.
As long as I had something to hang onto, I could delude myself into thinking that things were not as bad as they were. There’s nothing like a good delusion to make you think you’re living life the best you can. Which I guess is actually true.
Weird how that happens.
I see now that being unwell and exhausted made me make a lot of choices to accommodate the situation. I let go of relationships. It seems like I just couldn’t get there with people. I haven’t dated in over 20 years. Haven’t even had sex in 20 years. Getting sex is much easier to get than dates. I’ve been more focused on being creative and experiencing things.
But the exhaustion made it so that even though I got into a lot of creative activities and did a lot of things, I never could make a go of it. I know it wasn’t just exhaustion; my brain chemistry had a lot to do with it as well. Such a joy.
My life was lived as a tasting menu. I did a lot of things most people will never do, just not well enough to be successful.
When I stopped deluding myself, everything changed. I became scared. I’ve spent the past year in and out of doctors’ offices trying to resolve the issues. During the past 20 years I’ve tried on various occasions to get a doctor to help me, and they rarely have. I’m not sure why I thought this time would be different, I guess I was afflicted with hope, a very nasty feeling if you are like me and have had entirely too many disappointments in your life. Of course, they couldn’t help me, so I’m letting that avenue go.
So, here’s the state of things right now. I’m exhausted beyond belief. I barely have the energy to do the few things that I am doing. The headaches have increased into face pain and pain on the right side of my head. I have some weird bumpy rashes that rotate between itchy and painful. And pain. Just so much pain. I cough a lot now. And I’m still having sleep problems.
I feel done.
Now that I’m seeing the past 20 years clearly, I realize that I’ve been done for a long time. I’ve just kept going out of sheer obstinance.
My goal now is to try and make some sense of my life. That’s what this post, and posts to come, is about. I don’t have anyone to really talk to about this. The people who know are either repressing the knowledge or trying to help me in ways that I don’t need.
I just want to understand what happened with my life and go in peace. I want to be heard.
I’m 61 now and still telling stories at The Moth and other venues. Maybe someday I’ll see you there.
