Third String Hero

I will not idolize my past. I will not idolize my past. I will not idolize my past.

But maybe-

NO! I will not idolize my past…

…

Yes, but hear me out-

NO! I will NOT idolize my past!

…

…

Okay?

…okay…

Good. See you tomorrow so we can go over this again.

:/ okay…

Extremely upsetting. She also feels as though no time has passed since.

Exactly! Which makes “getting over” things very difficult indeed. Ha ha

Your intense memories are remarkably like Shayne’s…

Does she dislike them as well?

I just spent the last three hours going page by page through my 9th, 10th, 11th, and 12th grade yearbooks.

It was intense.

After closing my senior yearbook I felt as though I had just relived those four years. I now feel like I just graduated.

I think it was a mistake.

Listening to () by Sigur Ros.

I don’t know how others handle their memories. I don’t know how they aren’t destroyed by the memories of pleasant things they experienced in their lives.

How do those thoughts of happiness not tear people apart?

I want, I need to drive a spike into my brain, destroy those thoughts. Not just certain memories. All the memories.

I don’t want to remember riding dogs with a friend when I was 6. I don’t want to remember hunting for trolls when I was 11. I don’t want to remember experiencing love for the first time when I was 15.

And I don’t want to remember any day after that.

But I can’t.

So I won’t.

But I’ll just sit here and feel sad until this record is over. Then I’ll smile again and it’ll be like before. I’ll forget I was sad today. And it’ll be like it never happened.

And I’ll get what I want.

And I’ll still be listening to () by Sigur Ros.

“I did all my best to smile”

I feel that sense of dreaming I experience before I awake. I’ve opened my eyes a few times but close them right away. That fantasy is better than anything this real life could ever hope to offer.

So I drift back to sleep.

But things never quite feel the same.

The edges are sharper than when I left. The voices are not as inviting. I try to fly but find reason is slipping into this world. Logic is breaking in where once it never mattered. So I open my eyes.

But I drift back to sleep.

Now stuck in some kind of loop.

I know where I am… or where I was. Now I’m not so sure. There’s anxiety and there’s sadness… so this must be real life. But I see people I haven’t seen in ages… so I open my eyes?

And I wake up.

Now awake for good.

I make the coffee and I take my meds. I write a chapter and smoke that celebratory cigarette. I read the news and I go for a walk. I listen to music and my heart breaks. Is this it?

There is no more than this.

Reality is where I live.

And yet I’m happy? I don’t understand it. All reason should say otherwise. But there is no reason it seems. So that would mean…? I smile knowingly and nod my head. I know where I am but I won’t try to fly.

I don’t want to ruin the illusion.

I’ll just settle with what I have.