I Have Mental Illness - Part 2 (Age of Ultron)

I wrote a post in 2014 about ‘coming out’ as a person with mental illness. I reposted it a couple of times, and I’m still happy with it.  Truthfully, I should have just updated it every year.  It’s no knock on the original, but it should be noted that this is a process that will go on until the day I die.  It’s okay to be reminded that you still have this problem and that you not only have made significant strides, but you still have work to do.

I still have mental illness.  I still am medicated and I check in with talk therapy when I need it and when I can afford it.  That equates to about four to six sessions at the beginning of the year.  (Despite daily doses of vitamin D, I still feel it the most with the days are shortest.) That is my regimen at this point.  I also check in with a podcast called Mental Illness Happy Hour which reminds me that I’m not alone in this process. That is the most important ingredient to all of this.  You have to fight the feeling of being alone.  In my daily life, I am quite alone.  I work alone and my wife works inconsistent hours.  I have a lot of ‘me’ time.  That’s not always a good thing.

Trying to pinpoint my remaining issues is a full-time job. Loneliness and my lack of friends is a big one.  Connection to the human race is very important, but I have yet to figure out how to comfortably work my way in. What I’ve learned is that ‘making friends’ is impossible.  That is just something that happens rarely in life, like double rainbows and finding something to watch on Netflix. I should be open to the experience.  It could happen. But as the years go on I realize there aren’t as many opportunities.  As I was told when I was younger, I have a lot to say.  I crave people to ‘say it all’ to.  I also like to know when I’m full of shit.  I can only get that with the company of others and listening to what they have to say. I have not been able to either accept the futility of this situation or how to successfully solve the problem.

I mentioned in the previous post about the scene of Yasgur’s farm after Woodstock.  Just a post-apocalyptic wasteland full of trampled grass, mud, and trash. That is what your mind is after you begin treatment. You look back on your actions and reactions to everything life threw at you and discover how mental illness influenced all of your moves.  But now you know the virus that causes the glitch, but you still have a life full of those trained reactions.  You have the muscle memory of a person with depression or anxiety.  You know now how to think better, but that does not directly equate to doing better.  That is the other half of all of this.  Doing better.

One of my deep, deep issues is my feeling of being invisible. I know where it comes from.  That mystery has been solved. But now what do I do?  I am genuinely surprised when anyone, even close friends…even my kids…remembers anything I have said or done.  I have a genuine sense of surprise.  They listened to me?  They remember that?  I am brutally honest here.  I can’t believe that I have made an impression on anyone in forty-five years.  That is the cost of feeling invisible.  I believe no one has any interest in my life or anything I have to say.  If you compliment me, I doubt your sincerity. When I feel like I’m being ignored, I feel that it’s an attack.  If someone cuts me off in conversation, what I had to say must be worthless. My wife will walk around during a chat to go change clothes or get a drink, and I feel like a little kid abandoned in a department store.

Now take those underlying, everyday feelings and apply that to your ability to promote yourself.  I’m a writer.  I write fun books I want people to read.  The only way to make that happen is to promote yourself and tell strangers that your work is good and worth their time and money.  This may shock you, but that is a tall order for me.  The avenues are there.  It’s a steep climb for anyone who writes.  But to me, it is like climbing Everest with a sofa on your back.  Barefoot.  With a broken arm. And there is a Kodiak bear on the sofa. With a litter of cubs.

It’s hard.

I guess I can write whatever I feel like in here.  There are dozens of thoughts I have about this subject but today responsibility is on my mind.  When someone says they struggle with mental illness, I infer that there is a fight in progress.  They have an eating disorder.  They are coping with trauma.  They are trying to find the right meds for their depression.  What I mean is, I hope this means there is a battle between the condition and the person trying to overcome it. Using mental illness as an excuse just pisses me off.  It is a reason, not an excuse.  I have sympathy for those of you who have not admitted it to themselves or figured out how to seek help. I’m not talking about them.  It’s that small segment that has legitimate issues, but instead of engaging in a treatment or a healthy way to cope, they use it as an excuse for flaky, or just shitty behavior. They have decided to make it the world’s problem to deal with. That doesn’t help you or the rest of us with the perception of a condition that can’t be seen.  You are either a whiny child or an asshole.

Triggers exist.  They are a real thing.  However, the world doesn’t care. It’s your responsibility to deal with them as they come. I don’t believe in trigger warnings.  I don’t believe any college should cite them at the beginning of a lecture, or any writer should cite them at the beginning of an article. One of mine is high winds.  Should I ask nature to cut the crap during storm season?  Your issues are your business.  If you are an adult, you learn to cope.  That is your job.  If we are people with a shred of basic humanity, our job is to recognize your struggle and respect your progress.  We all have our own shit.  We can’t arrange the world around you to fit your needs.  Unless you are a rich celebrity.  The again, we all know how mentally fit those people are.

I could prattle on forever.  There are so many dumb opinions I’d like to unleash upon the world.  Maybe I’ll break them up and write about them later.  (Remember, as noted above, I am shocked you’ve made it this far.) I wanted to update my echo chamber on my journey. I wanted to reaffirm that all of this is indeed real and ongoing. I wanted to make sure that you know that you are not alone.  Whether you have mental illness or are trying to understand it, there are millions just like you. 

Why I Love Ready Player One

Only a few spoilers ahead.  I’d be a terrible book reviewer. My instinct is to be as subjective as possible and write about how stories make me feel.)

               I read Ready Player One at the very beginning of 2013. Within eight months, I had written the first novel I wasn’t ashamed to show other humans. This happens to me a lot.  Something will inspire me and then I am off to the races creatively.  Most of the time the feeling fades and I go back to wondering what I should do with my spare time in this stupid world. But not with this book.  It hit me so squarely in the jaw that I continue to write in the hope that more than four people will read what I have to offer.

               To begin, I don't know if Ready Player One is even a good book.  I think it is.  In fact I think it’s fantastic, but because it hit so many emotional buttons it’s difficult to truly be objective.  But I don’t care. (See the above bit about inspiring the novel writing.)  It is certainly a fun book, and since it’s going to be a movie, there were enough people who thought as I do.

               There are a few reasons I’ve read this sucker three times.  The story is unique and fun; Ernest Clines kept the tone very light even though the setting is a dystopian American landscape.  The conceit of the story is escapism.  The world is hooked into a VR system called OASIS where all enjoyable human contact occurs. It’s where you go to learn and meet people and get away from poverty and fear.  You can customize your avatar and travel to far off worlds and do and see things that would be impossible in the real world.  As the creator of this world reiterates throughout the book: The real world kinda always sucks.

               My therapist told me that he read this book and immediately thought of me.  Damn straight, you did, I thought to myself.  There is so much of me and my sensibilities wrapped up in this book, it would be ridiculous to list all of the details.  Its also a book about the 1980’s; that sad, shitty, plastic, dumb decade during which I had to grow up. Most things invented or promoted in the eighties are worth forgetting.  However, there were small introductions into the culture that were the impetus of stuff we embrace today.  Computers. Video games. Role-playing games. Early internet access. But the most accurate detail for me was referential-based conversation and humor.

               We were the generations that memorized shit.  We quoted movies, TV shows and music.  We knew movies by heart because they were repeated on TV thousands of time.  Boomers didn’t. Millennials have so much to choose from.  Gen X had (and still has) a secondary shorthand that came directly from Saturday morning cartoons, japanimation, Monty Python and SNL, commercials, movies with Chevy Chase and Bill Murray, early sci-fi movies like The Last Starfighter, Dune, Krull, The Ice Pirates and dozens more.  We used quotes from this media to identify each other like we were members of a club.  A club of kids with too much exposure to TV.  One of those guys was Ernest Cline.

               Forget that Parzival, the protagonist, creates a spaceship in the OASIS and calls it the Vonnegut, the first author I ever binged and remains a huge influence on my writing.  Forget that the creator of the OASIS, the fictional Steve Jobs of this book that takes place in the 2040’s, was born the same month and year as me. Forget the bulk of the action in the third act takes place in Oregon, where I live now.

This book is for us.  This one is for me and mine.

I heard is called a futuristic Willy Wonka, and that is apt.  The plot is a treasure hunt and it follows the lives of young people. I would say it’s a Harry Potter for Gen X.  It has the feel of a young adult book but it is read by adults. It is geared toward me.  I’ve read reviews and comments that take a huge dump on this book and cite the simplified plot and obvious nods to nostalgia.

To them I say: GOOD.

First of all, nostalgia is a spice to be used lightly in life. You can’t escape it entirely. It shouldn’t be demonized in all its forms.  Just don't roll around in it all the time.  Second, the lack of the cultural foothold my generation has is frankly upsetting. We are sandwiched between two giant generations.  The one proceeding gobbled up all the airspace well into their forties, and the succeeding one moves faster than anyone can possibly keep up. We didn’t have a large window of opportunity to make more of a cultural impact.  So, if a few of us want to reminisce about Atari 2600’s and Rush lyrics, it doesn’t bother me one bit.

It’s a book written by someone influenced by film and TV as much as sci-fi lit.  Maybe more.  That’s okay.  Have you seen how many books are out there? There’s plenty of room for the literary equivalent of popcorn fare. It is incredibly visual and the pacing is closer to a movie than a drawn out plot of a science-based thriller. I think that caught my attention, too.  Modern audiences are savvy when it comes to “fun” genres like sci-fi. I like the idea of smart, but fun reads.

This book has hope.  I avoid a lot of dystopian fare because of the lack of hope.  It has hope, fun, charm, and a refreshing innocence.  If you weren’t born between 1965 and 1985 or so, I’m not sure you will get as much out of Ready Player One as I did.  But because of how it really touched me and made my past seem somehow more significant, I guess I really don’t care.