It hit me this morning. That was a year ago.
It was the day of The Big Game. Super Bowl LIX.
We were fucking horny. We needed naked time.
Near downtown. DayUse. We needed five hours.
A previous life walks into the room. Spring Fling.
Talk about coincidence. Fuck. What’s a boy to do?
Keep your head down. Don’t make eye contact.
We get to the room. Together again. Time to play.
—ooOoo—
I don’t mind the conversation. The inquisition is familiar. Heartwarming.
You little shit, you’re in it now, I hope they throw away the key
You should have talked to me more often than you did, but no
You had to go your own way, have you broken any homes up lately?
Just five minutes, Worm your honour, him and me alone
A life forever in judgment. Always on trial. Death from a million opinions.
I’ve got a little black book with my poems in
Got a bag with a toothbrush and a comb in
When I’m a good dog
They sometimes throw me the bone in
My air fryer. A new distraction. It’s kinda like fucking, but a lil different.
And I can feel one of my turns coming on
I feel cold as a razor blade
Tight as a tourniquet
Dry as a funeral drum
I wanna be the rebel depicted in rumors. Beats the life poisoned by fear.
I am just a new boy
Stranger in this town
Where are all the good times?
Who’s gonna show this stranger around?
—ooOoo—
Hardest question for me. The one I can’t ever seem to answer.
What does mac want?
I know what Jake wants, I know what my ego wants, I know what a profound sense of guilt, shame, and responsibility want, I know what a life stuck in the past wants, I know what she wants, I know what they want, I know what your religion wants, I know what society wants, I know what my fears want, I know what my insecurities want, I know what my intrusive thoughts want, I know what others want from me,
but “What does mac want?” is a fucking quagmire.
Reminds me of Churchill’s “A riddle wrapped in a mystery inside an enigma” … layers of complexity making it impossible to decipher.
I’m not totally rudderless, and thankfully for once, I’m not totally alone.
“We have so much time and so little to do. Strike that, reverse it.”
― Roald Dahl
Exposure and Response Prevention (ERP): The gold-standard treatment for breaking the Obsessive Compulsive Disorder (OCD) cycle through exposure to thoughts/situations without performing compulsive rituals.
I’m focused on the soul-crushing. I’m not too worried about the little things. I want to discard the big things. The things that leave me in a state of OCD-paralysis. The things that hurt me, and the people around me.
I used to think I was just bat-shit crazy, took too much acid as a kid. At times, when OCD-paralysis looked like depression, I’d try to tell myself I was bipolar, or disassociated, or suffering from some other disorder.
I always knew I had OCD. I’m one of those rare birds that picked it up at an early age. Lots and lots of rituals around intrusive thoughts and perfectionism. I have reasons why, but I’m not sharing about those now.
What I didn’t know, however, but I do now, are things like: how my OCD is progressive; how my OCD is impacted by the aging process; how my OCD manifests in odd ways sometimes even unbeknownst to me.
OCD-paralysis is maddening, and I unfortunately made it worse by setting myself up for failure at New Years. Not good. Lesson learned: I need to eat the elephant in smaller bites, and with a lot more strategy.
—ooOoo—
Not everyone sticks around. It’s incredibly hard for some people to understand. Some people quite frankly will never get it, including me.
I’m better at it. Explaining it. It used to be really bad, especially when someone wanted something from me, and I was stuck in OCD-paralysis.
The endless resetting. The constant deleting. On again – Off again. Changing phone numbers. Deactivating – Activating. Over and over.
What to do when the rituals don’t work anymore? When all of the resetting and deleting in the world can’t help anymore? No relief.
This is where I ended up again. In a state of OCD-paralysis, unable to move forward. Toward my being better at it, I provide the following:
—ooOoo—
So… Back to the question: What does mac want?
Don’t know. Don’t care.
—ooOoo—
“You used to be like that,” she tells me with awkward excitement, as if I didn’t know, didn’t dwell on it daily. “You used to say that all the time.”
I would say: “Don’t worry ’bout it. It’ll all work itself out.”
Then people would say: “For you! It always works out for you.”
Then I’d say: “That’s because I don’t have expectations.”
This tells me it’s possible. This reminds me of how it should be. This truly is my North Star, Carol. Second to the right and straight on til morning.
—ooOoo—
I’m not doing this totally alone. I have people. I’m now working with a group that specializes in Exposure and Response Prevention (ERP).
I also have a goal. A small but mighty bite of the elephant. A friend and I agreed to figure out our respective favorite color by the end of the year.
This means a lot to me. It’s clearly more than just a favorite color. Rather, it’s a mutual decision to support each other in seeking personal growth.
Additionally, I decided to open up to certain people about my OCD, and I even reached out directly to a few people that mean the world to me.
I’m also gonna write. I get sad thinking about all of the websites, stories, poems, and other things deleted in my resets. No more. Please, no more.
—ooOoo—
May it please the Court of Carol:
I object on grounds that your inquiry is simply not ripe. It’s too early.
Your inquiry is based on future events that may not occur as anticipated, or indeed may not occur at all. As you know, courts correctly dismiss such matters to avoid the unintended harms that may arise from erroneously adjudicating speculative or premature issues.
Dismissal is not with prejudice. You most surely may bring back your inquiry in the event an actual, present matter arises. In the meantime, let us not put our carts before our horses. This ultimately may be a long and hard journey, one for the ages, but let’s not count chicks until hatched.
Respectfully submitted,
Jake