I feel a pall of loneliness radiate somewhere behind my eyes. Like a kid's fiberoptic wand at the fireworks show. But I have met this foe before and prevailed. I have allies. I have weed, and coffee. I have books and magazines. I have a laptop replete with videos, music and pornography to distract me. I have Tony Soprano and I have Diana Ross. And I have this. Writing this, here.
This morning I took Concerta for the second time in my life. I took two pills two hours before my Communication Law test.
Oncology Encyclopedia Online says: "Patients should not take two pills at the same time."
Essentially it negated my need for coffee throughout the day: It's more than 12 hours later and I still feel like I drank a pot. I think tomorrow I will take three.
I pondered on how my views on health have changed. Somewhere along the line I decided to stop worrying so much about which chemicals enter my temple. I found a pack of Marlboros at work today and took it. On my way home, my bike got a flat. I smoked two as I walked the remaining distance. I wanted to do something bad for me. Something I normally wouldn't have allowed myself.
Then after I finished them a car rode up and its passenger called me a motherfucker. I replied in same, but my outstretched finger-salute soon became a defensive guard as I was riddled with gas-propelled plastic pellets. I must have looked quite the fool chasing them on foot, my bike held aloft, shouting. They looked as if they were going to stop, and I had to reflect for a moment on what I would actually do if they came out. But no, the driver chose to be the bigger man.
The amphetamine, adrenaline, testosterone, caffeine, nicotine---take your pick, it was rushing through my veins and I released some of it when I saw a car by the side of the road. It's been parked in front of a body shop down the street from my apartment for weeks. An old blue sedan, or rather the carcass of one. Tires flat, interior gutted, engine removed, tape deck liberated. Stenciled along the side in pink block letters:
YEAH I KNOW BUT ... IT MIGHT BE FUN
A glance to my surroundings, and the U-lock comes off the handlebars. I turn to protect my face as I shatter the windshield. Side window. Deep dent in the trunk. Incredible, the ease with which merry destruction is wrought. I make a sound like a giant hole puncher and then crushed ice.
I'm bitter. Misanthropic Monday. I'm in control. I cleaned dishes, took out the trash. Made some rice and ate it, brewed some tea and drank it. I took a shit and I read a column in the Athens News called "The View from Mudsock Heights." Generally this prickly old dude champions the small-town, rural virtue of southeastern Ohio. This week Dennis E. Powell tears apart a "cosmopolitan" straw man from New York who asks Mr. Powell why he likes living in a small town.
Powell contends that what makes small towns great, what really makes them superior, is neighborly love. A strong community rises up to seal the widening gaps in public infrastructure. He cites the hypothetical of a flat tire. In Athens, "a half dozen people would stop and ask if I need help." In New York, they'd just hurl profanities at you. Maybe they'd shoot you with an Airsoft gun.
Fuck you, Dennis Powell. I've never encountered a place as alienating and hostile in all of big-city Chicago. Blame the college students if you want; I do.
Hope I did alright on my Law exam.
TIMMM. Why aren't you here, I have that same radiation in the back of my eyelobes and no where to put my stress. I have merely become uncontrollable apathy.
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