Author: zornog

i just wish i had a woman who loved me.
oh, there were plenty, and you let them go. you had women who loved you so much that you didn’t know what to do with it so you let it go. now why did you do that?
i don’t know.
because you don’t like yourself and while you are desperate for contact with a woman, you don’t think you’re worth her time or energy. because the only things you know about are theatre and video games and both of those are extremely boring to talk about and no women like to hear about them. maybe that’s generalized. maybe it’s a bell curve, really. maybe you really aren’t worth anyone’s time. maybe all the shit you do makes men excited which is great i guess for camaraderie but now you don’t know what to do or say that will make women want to be around you. maybe this is it, maybe this is the crux of your entire depression, the fact that you aren’t cool enough to get laid on a regular basis, just casual sex, and the fact that you dwell on it makes it worse and worse, until days like this when your eyelids are brimming with tears at work. maybe that’s it. do you think that’s it?
i mean … is that even a reason to be depressed?
depression’s just a chemical imbalance. anything can make that imbalance happen. anything you do can make you depressed. you just happen to think that your reason is embarrassing and pulls the “confident actor” guy mystique rug out from under you. these people, they don’t know how much of a sad sack you’ve been your whole dumb life. these people here, they like you, they see you as a great person. is that true? are you a great person? remember, the answer to that question will change the chemical composition in your brain.
are you helping me? what are you doing?
i’m your brain, man, i’m not here to help.

i tried to stay on target, i was counting calories, i was going to the gym every day. i’m doing this for susan. i’m doing this for susan, i kept saying to myself during my second hour on the treadmill. i know she loves me regardless but still. i’m a fat slob. my pants don’t fit anymore. my shirts are too small. my man boobs are horrendous, look at these things, i have tits, gary. i have legitimate tits. if you put a topless picture of me, neck down, next to a topless picture of a fat lady and had someone try to pick which one was the guy? whoever picked, they’d have to think twice!

but … today at the office. we had “office birthdays,” you know, for the month of october, and the boss sends me to saint cupcake with the work card and explicit instructions to order two dozen mini cupcakes. this is a typical order. the boss is kind of a sweet tooth and he always wants to make sure everyone gets at least two cupcakes. he’s a pusher, gary, a goddammed pusher.

so anyway i get to saint cupcake and i buy three dozen boxes. on the company card. i buy three dozen and i walk back to work with three boxes and i sneak in through the back door and hide the third box, so i can eat it by myself. and that’s what i did. and NOBODY CAUGHT ME! i just know accounting’s gonna find it at some point, they’re gonna find it and i’m going to be up shit’s creek without a paddle. and i was just sitting there in my office, eating cupcakes all day. they were all red velvet. oh god i’m so screwed, gary. i’m so fucking screwed. what do i do? should i just admit i bought $30 worth of cupcakes for myself? i guess i could and just pay him back. what do you think?

it’s internal. everything. like a plug, blocking whatever happiness is. it was the middle of winter. i was washing the dishes and staring out into the backyard. it was night and the only light was a floodlamp beaming downward, creating these long, twisted shadows off of the branches of the old tree out back, and the sharp angles of the swing set and jungle gym i used to climb around on as a child. the snow was a couple of feet, receding into darkness. i was rubbing a dishrag against an old gray plate, not paying attention, just this constant circular motion while soapy water filled up in the sink…

and then, for a moment i was there, and i thought, hold on to this moment. what are you feeling? what are you thinking? and i looked down at my hands holding the plate and the dishrag, stopped mid-circle, the soap bubbling up from the rising water in the sink and lightly grazing my hands. it’s internal. this mechanism that stops me from being alive, that forces my brain to live with blinders on, so i can’t see the world around me. sometimes my eyes open and i feel like i can really see.

tendrils of steam escape from their watery prison. i turn the faucet off, set the plate in, submerging my hands in water so hot it makes me clench my teeth. that’s a feeling. that’s something. that’s a tangible change in my nature. i just … let it scald me. i let go of the plate, of the dishrag. i just let the hot water scald me, until it becomes normal. and then i’m back. back to square one.

i mean, if you think about it, friendship is way more important than a relationship. how long have i known my friends? ten years? some twenty years? and i’ve only been dating you for eight months. so when we get to a situation like this, should i hang out with my friends that i haven’t seen in months, friends that you don’t like to hang out with, mind you, or should i stay here and mollycoddle you, well, i kind of want to hang out with my friends. i’m happy to mollycoddle you once or twice a week. but it’s been almost every day now. no, listen, listen to me. i know you want to argue your point but right now just listen and absorb how i am feeling, okay? don’t deflect it away from you. a relationship doesn’t mean i get to carry your burdens, or vice versa. it doesn’t mean when you’re sad i have to be sad too. it’s one thing to help you through your depression, which i’m happy to do, versus be a party to your codependency, which is what i do every night. do you understand the position you’re putting me in? it’s a no-win situation. everything i do is not good enough, every step i take to protect your fragile ego is not good enough. and we’ve only been together for eight months!

i mean, shit. i’d rather just hang out with my friends. the only thing i’m missing from them is sex, and i think i’ll be alright without it. i … whew. i’m sorry i kind of went off there. i still love you, i just need you to lay off me for a bit, okay? let me hang out with my friends. i’ve known them longer than you and they help me deal with stuff like this. doesn’t mean i don’t love you, it just means i … need help. loving you.

… fuck.

i was having trouble with the doorknob. that’s when i knew something was wrong. i was walking fine and i, i grabbed the doorknob and tried to twist it but it wouldn’t budge, and i was frustrated and tried to say something, but all that came out was gibberish. next thing i knew, i was lying in a hospital bed. stroke. big one. this hand don’t turn doorknobs anymore. this hand is a constant reminder that life is a fickle son of a bitch, destined to fuck with you in ways you never knew possible. just when you think something fine, BAM, stroke, or BAM, brain aneurysm. then you’re a cold slab of meat on a stainless steel bed. or you’re like me, where half of your body wants to be a cold slab on a stainless steel bed, except it can’t because the other half is still kicking. now i get to spend the rest of my life wondering what i did to deserve this. bad diet? not enough exercise? who fucking knows. everyone tells me to look on the bright side. i’m not dead, they say. well go have a stroke and then tell me if it’s better being alive. i go to physical therapy every day and all the people there look miserable, even the physical therapists. they try so hard to not look completely devastated by their job but we all know it. we see it in the haggardness of their eyes, their slow, calm pacing around the room, or when they bolt for the exit for their smoke break. they all smell like cigarettes, even though their wash their hands after they smoke.

it’s miserable. you’re supposed to find hope in a moment like this. the only solace i have is that my husband still loves me, but he’s an old bag like me too and it’s not like we’re gonna get divorced at this point. we’re just gonna stay together until we croak. i guess that’s good.

i guess that’s good.

terry had this idea to put a cape on the cat. like a little superman cape. it was honestly the best time being on mushrooms i’ve ever had in my life. terry wasn’t even on them, he just drank a bunch of four lokos, and pete and i were staring at his big weird mural he painted on his garage wall a few months ago and terry had sparkles in his lap, babbling about how weird his parents were growing up, and suddenly he looks down at sparkles and is like, “sparkles should wear a cape.” pete and i both looked at each other and were like, “YESSSSSS” like this was the greatest idea in the history of mankind. we all bolted into the living room trying to find the appropriate fabric. terry insisted on silk. “superman’s cape is made out of silk,” he kept saying, and pete thought he said “silt” and we spent a good five minutes hashing that out in our advanced inebriated states. we also thought this couldn’t be the case, considering the quality of superman’s cape and how it never gets messed up. anyway we didn’t have silk, obviously, we’re three dudes in a shitty house in gresham, so instead we found a dish towel and cut a little hole in it for sparkles’ head to fit through. sparkles was surprisingly chill about the whole thing, except when the cape was actually on–then he started creeping around the house like the weight of the towel was too much or something. like a little cat ninja except with a cape. and he meowed a lot, broad mrowrs imploring us to take this stupid contraption off of him. but goddamn he was cute, and we were stoned out of our minds, which made the whole experience magical. to this day pete insists that sparkles jumped on the couch and then flew around the room briefly. terry says he was just jumping to catch a bug buzzing around. i guess we’ll never know the truth.

so i had this dream where i’m getting into a bathtub full of custard. and it’s not cold custard, it’s warm, a bath full of warm custard. it felt amazing. it felt like my entire body was a dick entering a gloriously warm pussy. it felt so good i sort of just melted into it, i became the custard, and i felt all of my muscles and organs just relax, everything relaxed so much, and i didn’t have to breathe. i was just submerged in warm custard.

when i woke up i was all tingly and felt like a couldn’t move. i also noticed that i had pissed the bed.

so … that’s why i pissed the bed. because i was enveloped in custard.

which opinion is this? come on you can tell me. fifth? sixth? i mean i can understand if i’m the second opinion, or even the third, but to come in here and ask for a fifth opinion, or a sixth opinion … i’m kind of hurt, chad. i’d like to be the doctor that reverses what the first doctor said. he’s like, “it’s cancer” and then i’m like, “no chad your blood tests came in and it is not cancer,” but now, i’m looking at these reports you brought me and … four out of five doctors say it’s not cancer, and the one who did isn’t even a doctor but a naturopath. why did you even come here, chad? why did you ruin my good day with this? my wife called me this morning, my son dieter just took his first steps, she put it up on youtube and i watched it while consulting with this old man with dementia… it was beautiful. but now this. why couldn’t i be the first, chad? you’re not the first person to do this to me. is it … am i so far down the ladder? look, i’ll admit it. i get half of my business being the third, fourth, fifth, opinion. how many opinions do people need, chad?! i went to medical school, twelve years i was in medical school, i did my residency at cedars-sinai for chrissakes, and now i’m just parroting what four other doctors have already said. “it’s not cancer.” it’s not cancer, chad. it’s not cancer. you want me to give you the names of twelve other doctors who will tell you it’s not cancer? it’s not. fucking. cancer.

now, do me a favor before you go, chad. next time you have what you think is a life-threatening illness, come to me second. that’s all i ask.