Paper Cuts for Me...

Slow motion - see me let go.

Oh, and these are such dastardly days. Confusion is my companion; my mind and my inner-most secrets are standing alongside one another like they're the closest of friends. It doesn't make sense, and neither does much of this life and these days in particular. I'm in a strange limbo - mentally, physically, emotionally. Blessed I am that I am spiritually sorted: I shall never believe again. How good it feels to say this.

Almost touched the sky in the last few days. Now for the descent. I've been at the top before, and I'm nowhere near now, but this fall will be from higher than I've fallen in recent times. I was not unprepared for the fall, but most certainly unprepared for being pulled up so high. God-damn, how does naivety infiltrate even the most cynical mind? No wonder I am a part of The Quixotics. My feelings are peripatetic and they don't seem to want to settle down. They'll wander their itinerant path until something grounds them finally - be it something golden, or something that will finally see my body burned in a box and my ashes scattered on the waters of these beautiful lakes.

And I suppose that is the life of the emotional-wayfarer. We are so much less in control of the way we are composed; so much more subject to the whims of our unpredictable and often self-destructive hearts. But would we have it any other way? I can't honestly say yes to this, because despite the control I would have, I would be lacking the thrill of being crazy. Some parts of me don't want this all to end.

There will be some of you who look at me querulously. Those also, who would sooner backhand me than let me make such a foolish statement without repercussion. But hear me out, you quick-to-the-punch theorists. I am the King of justification - I have justified the unjustifiable all my life. How else would I be alive still? I have done nothing but justify my existence for such a long, long time. Now it is time to step up to the plate and take a swing on behalf of my bizarre feelings once again. I am not the nut-job you will believe me to be at the end of all this.

This is not an attempt - before we begin here - to rationalise this sickness. It is not a futile exercise in making the evil face of this beast seem more benign. There is no way to do this, for starters, and I know much better than to give it a crack. But I have to tell you, soon-to-be-stunned disciples, that there is a large part of me that is scared of getting better. There are sections of my being that feed on this emotional-cancer, and it sustains them. Parts of my heart that need the sadness, the sickness, the sadism of it all. Parts of my brain that can't operate on such lucid levels with my serotonin levels on full. I may have found my perfect operating-environment.

I may be the best I can be in this state.

I know it sounds absurd. The preposterous nature of what I am saying is not easy to gloss over. But I am not trying to. I'm afraid that if I don't have this strong-armed sickness pinning my heart down and pulverising my head every day, then I'll have nothing. What if I wake up one day, well and happy, but empty? What if the view from the top isn't as good as it is on the struggle up there? What if I'm simply born to feel down? Even the best can find happiness in misery.

And I have to admit that I don't see a long life on the cards for me. Not all of us are meant to fade away - many are made to burn out. Some of us are the foundations for a succession of others; the people who lead families and inspire those who come after them. Others of us are the shooting stars that flare across the skies of a chosen few, lighting the way momentarily then disappearing forever. And others of us are neither of those. Not all of us are made for greatness: this is the human condition. If we were all made equal, no one would ever be special. I'm yet to decide which of these groups I fall into, but I don't think it is the first one. I'm not here to argue the point, this is only my personal view. After all, who would know more intimately than me?

This nasty little devil on my shoulder has been the only constant in my life for the last eight years. Others have come and gone; some have left and returned; still more have simply gone for good. All have their reasons, and the validity of each decision is too subjective to speculate on. But if everything happens for a reason - as so many people believe - then why would I want to change things? If there is a universal order - a divine plan that casts us as beautiful leads in some scenes and dowdy extras in others - then why would I turn down the starring role in such a long-running and successful tragedy? For happiness? For love? I have forgotten what either of those feel like, anyway, so why take the risk? Oh, I am such a damned fool.

But it will all be OK. Tickety-boo, girl. I can still smile on occasion; can still taste the sugary-sweetness of the world on brief and fleeting days. I am no more than wood in a fire or a drill-piece on an oil-rig: a piece in the puzzle, but not the solution. I am a part of something good, but not the sum of it. But something bad, something tragic, something macabre? Well, I might just be the whole, bitter-sweet shebang. If you can't be special at something positive, why not be the best at a negative?

What songs would play at your funeral?