“Reality’s  a nice place to visit, but…”
–Me, Just Now, Right Here

I have a complicated relationship with reality.

On the one hand, I am clearly living a lifestyle which minimizes contact with it. I am a recluse who spends all day playing around in a virtual world where he feels safe and powerful because in Skyrim, I am not clumsy, clueless, or a mess.

In Skyrim, I am a hero with awesome skills who routinely defeats evil and saves the day. I can be a mighty wizard. a fearsome warrior, or a sleek and deadly assassin, and many things in between. I don’t have to deal with my social anxiety (except in one party scene) and I have no depression or other issues b ogging me down.

Skyrim is something I can do.

And when I am not playing Skyrim, I am asleep or reading before going to sleep or eating while watching whatever online.

I feel like I am becoming even less social lately and it worries me. I don’t even hang out with the fuzzies as much as I used to.

It’s just so much easier to do things by myself.

And I know that withdrawing further from people is not a vicimless crime. As hard as it is for me to belive, people actually do like having me around and consider me to be a very special person in their life.

And objectively speaking, I am kinda fun to be around.

But it’s very easy to forget that when I am esconced in my hermit-ically sealed little world. My depressions is always ready to convince me that nobody cares if I live or die and that my not being around is probably a relief to them.

The demon speaks :

“Wow, I just realized I haven’t seen Fruvous in a while. No wonder I have been happier and more relaxed lately. ” 

“I know. Isn’t it great? That guy is such a pathetic loser. And he tries so hard to be funny, but all he is really doing is irritating people. “

“Too true. People only put up with him out of pity. He should get a clue and just stop bothering people and go away. “

“Well we haven’t seen him in a while. Maybe he finally did. “

“Ha! Well if he really did go away, it would be the only useful thing that he’s ever done!” 

Both laugh, end scene. 

I am sorry if that was harsh and upsetting to read, but I feel a lot better for having gotten it out of my mind and onto the page.

It has occurred to me that I need to stop suppressing my negativity in an attempt to bend myself into a better shape and just let loose with it in my writing and thus expunge it from my soul.

The above was a first tentative attempt at that. It may get much, much worse. And I apologize for that.

But that’s how I feel a lot of the time. That people are having those exact kinds of conversations when I am not around and sharing stories of how pathetic I am and how they wish they didb’t have to endure me any more.

You can see how, in that state, it is damn near impossible to believe that people would actually miss me when I am not around. Even though I know they do.

Anyhoo, back to the subject at hand. Pretty much everything in my life points to someone who wants as little to do with reality as possible while knowing that he has to maintain some contact or descend into the finaly madness that is his worst nightmare.

Well, okay, that last part is not necessarily obvious.

But the thing is, on another level, I have a far better grasp of reality than most people. I have real vision and I see what is really going on and understand how it all works to a level that sometimes creeps people the fuck out.

I can’t help it. I’m a mutant.

All my life, I have “seen” things that nobody else saw. Not in the “I see dead people” sense, but in the sense of active understanding of how things work and what people are really doing as opposed to what they say they are doing or even think they are doing.

Things which are blatantly obvious to me are opaque mysteries to others, and my depth of understanding makes me a chronic soothsayer.

I try to keep my saying of sooth confined to this space and people who know me and know that extraordinary perceptions are part of the package along with the wit and the silliness and the friendliness.

Well, semi-friendliness. Another thing I have been (reluctantly) pondering lately is the icy hostility that underlies a lot of my attacks of extraversion.

Underneath it all, I do not trust people. More specifically, I have no faith in people. I have no faith in anything. All I have is knowledge, insight, and understanding. If I trust someone, it is because I have used my X-ray vision to peer inside their skulls and decided they are worthy of my trust.

And there is always part of me that stays coiled like a snake, ready to lash out at people for hurting me, and nobody is immune to that except maybe my mother.

That part of me – the crazed lunatic ready to take a hostage and make demands at any moment – has been with me for a very long time, and has gotten in between me and others many times by filling my head with paranoid thoughts and doubts about the sincerity of damn near everyone, all the time.

And you know what? Past a certain point, paranoia turns into solipsism. If everyone is lying all the time, wouldn’t that mean you are the only “real” person?

My point is that underneath all my happy fuzzy emoting is an ice hard ball of hostility and rage ready to explode like a hand grenade  and spew shrapnel in all directions while shouting “LEAVE ME THE FUCK ALONE!”.

And thaty for someone who avoids as much reality as he can, I sure do “get” a lot more of it than most people.

I guess when you are on the outside looking in, you see things that are invisible to the people on the inside.

It’s not worth it. At all.

I will talk to you nice people again tomorrow.