#167

I came back a week ago, slightly jetlagged, vaguely reeling and entirely exhausted. Naturally, I fell right back into working eighteen hour days filling my nights with sawdust, bourbon and silence wild parties. Flicked my way to Blogger almost every evening, at the usual time of zero dark thirty. But then, a thought finally occurred, a thought that strikes me periodically and usually shakes me out of a slump for a little while. It's not particularly deep, or even particularly pretty, but it works for me: if you always do what you've always done, then you'll always get what you've always gotten*. So I ditched the blog (without any guilt, honestly, I doubt anyone noticed.) and the bourbon (well...I stopped drinking it alone...mostly) and the basement, all in favour of doing something more socially accepted healthy.

It worked, I guess. I've joined a gym, which is something that is long overdue but I hate doing. Gym bunnies tend to look askance at cripples with canes asking about membership so it's one of those things which requires...well, a spine. Perseverance paid off and I unearthed my ideal gym, run by a grizzled old guy with an artificial leg. Naturally I got so over-excited that I absolutely maintained my cool, suave exterior and didn't at all exclaim that it was bloody brilliant that he'd lost a limb. Sometimes...sometimes I really wonder how I've survived this long in polite society. I thought I was forgiven and then he challenged me to a race up the Arch climbing wall, said he'd been looking for someone who was on an even footing with him. I lost, emphatically. Re-match in a fortnight.

All of this is good, undoubtedly. Creeping my way slowly out of isolation and the twin prisons of work and the basement. But things still set me back and some sights or smells or sounds trigger intense memories or flashbacks and feed my nightmares. All of that conspires to make this feel less like progress and more like a prolonged flaying. I wasn't happy alone, in the dark and peace and thick wood-smell of the basement, I wasn't happy curled up in the bottom of a bottle and I'm still not happy. Except now I'm not happy in public, which seems worse somehow, to be seen to twitch and shake and sweat and remember, to zone out of conversations or stare oddly off into corners. But then...if you always do what you've always done...right?

* Yes, I know "gotten" makes my inner (British English) language nerd cringe desperately. Unfortunately it's a quotation so I feel obliged to keep the blasted thing intact.

#157 OR home movies

My shrink had me recording my evenings for five nights, initially it was a little unsettling to be recording myself but by the end of it I'd forgotten. Poor bugger had to sit through hours and hours of me talking to myself, getting drunk and generally being a basket case. He hasn't told me exactly what he thought, he's cutting together a best-of selection of my insanity. Something to show the grandchildren, for sure. He wanted to see what I'm not telling him, which is a lot. No hiding from the video camera though. He said watching me wake up from the fifth nightmare was pretty hard for him. I was a touch scornful. It's pretty fucking hard to live with, thanks. And he touched me. Not a handshake for only the third time in our illustrious decade-long history (first - I punched him, second - he hugged me) a strange, strong grip on the back of my neck and telling me very firmly while glaring that we will. Fix. This. I hope he's right.

It reminded me of home movies; got a bunch of them in the spare room that I haven't watched since January. There's never going to be a good time to track them all down and spend my time lost in hours of footage of my family. I prefer to carry an SLR but for a while took to hauling around the video camera as well (residual guilt from splurging on it in duty free, why does everything seems like a good idea at the airport?) and I'm glad I did. Glad that flight was delayed so I spent seven hours wandering the endless corridors of Bangkok's vast (and unpronounceable) airport. I have a few clips on my laptop which made me smile, re-watching them today. A smile! At a memory, a first, a relief, the end of this misery is in sight. It's all of sixty seconds, a friend is holding the camera, shaking, sound of him laughing and my wife shushing him. She creeps into frame, holding a saucepan of water, the camera pans across a little to me; asleep in a hammock strung across the porch. As she gets closer her grin gets wider and the camera shakes harder, my eyes open too late, she's already upended the pan and I'm soaked, disoriented and finally - flat on my ass on the deck. The two pranksters are roaring with laughter which turns to squeals as I pull her down onto me, grip her in a tight, wet hug and shake cold water from my hair onto her upturned face.

Christ, I can't believe it's June. Time is crawling and flying. In much the same way as this apartment is too full and too empty.

#153 OR hanakotoba

Nights like these I wish I didn't remember things so clearly. It all seems to disturbingly tangible. As though, if I just tried hard enough I could reach out and touch them. Sometimes I wake up as if she's lying right there with her lips in the hollow above my collarbone. For a blurry half-second I wonder why I can't feel her breath there. I don't move, don't open my eyes. Remember countless nights of insomnia; wide awake in the warm night, the weight of her down my left side, her hand on my chest. Eventually, through the soft dark the same muttered words as always "stop thinking, it's too loud" and she rolls away, collapses onto her back, smoothing the hair from her face with the back of her forearm. Flips the sheet up and I can hear her smiling in the dark as the cotton drifts back down slowly. Press a kiss to her temple, an apology. Hand on my cheek, scratch of stubble  against her palm, lips on mine; curved in a smile.

I'm looking for a tattoo artist, a good one. I met one today, recommended, we talked about how to finish a piece, about how I left in the middle of it. She traced her fingers over the lines on my wrist. Oddly intimate. Couldn't remember why.

Couldn't remember why.

It hit me on the train on the way home and I was doubly appalled. I couldn't remember. It's just the beginning of things slipping away, it will happen and it will hurt every time but this first forgetting... This first desperate grasping for information left me speechless. Remembering on the train; her fingers tracing lines of oil onto my fresh tattoo. Inspecting it, memorizing it the way we learned each others scars and ink. So relieved that I remembered, at last. And still so upset about forgetting. Hunched over on the plastic seat, flickering lights of the tube, hands folded on my cane, head on the back of my hands. Eyes closed. Can almost feel her fingers again. Remember her laughing and pointing a stern finger at me as she discovered the hidden letters, the date. Her name, hidden in the crests of a wave. Anniversary tucked away along the edge of a lotus petal. She told me not to, but I couldn't resist. Two years later she was pointing the same finger at me, making me promise to put our daughter's birthday in there somewhere. She drew a flower, an Iris, to hold her name, date of birth. She studied Japanese, lived there for six months, explained Hanakotoba and researched flowers to include in the design. There's space for more, luckily. A Red Spider Lily*, Sweet Pea** and of course, her Iris.

Missed my stop. Walked home with her fingers ghosting up my arm.




*Red Spider Lily - never to meet again
Lotus - far from the one he loves
**Sweet Pea - goodbye
Iris - good news, glad tidings