Sounds of silence

Thursday, September 25, 2008
Still no phone calls here. Only silence and darkness. At least the weather is still really nice. I know it will turn off much cooler soon. On “Malcolm in the Middle” they went to an amusement park and Dewey was left at home. Gabby came home from work, mowed the yard and went to a tractor club meeting. He has to be worn out. He said he received 2 calls yesterday about the Jeep he is selling and neither person, one was Berman Jr., came to take a test ride today despite saying they would stop by. Went out to feed the Chow and saw something black at the top of my shirt. I assumed it was a fly but as I focused, it was a big, black, nasty spider! I hate spiders! Spiders are just about the only creature that I fear. I’m not even scared of snakes. No creature should have 8 legs. The new season of shows started tonight. On “My name is Earl,” Seth Green guest starred as Earl helps him make a movie before dying. On the 2nd episode, Earl found out his mom cheated on his dad once. On “The Office,” one of the best shows on TV, the entire company participated in a weight loss competition.

Hello darkness, my old friend, I've come to talk with you again, Because a vision softly creeping, Left its seeds while I was sleeping, And the vision that was planted in my brain, Still remains, Within the sound of silence, In restless dreams I walked alone, Narrow streets of cobblestone, 'Neath the halo of a street lamp, I turned my collar to the cold and damp, When my eyes were stabbed by the flash of a neon light, That split the night, And touched the sound of silence.

Read through Jim Henson’s biography on wikipedia. I looked him up because I saw old footage of him in a new credit card commercial. I wasn’t a huge Muppets fan but I did watch them most Saturday mornings when I was growing up. I guess the Muppets hit their peak popularity in the 1980’s and since this is when I was a very young child, they did have an impact on my life. His death has a lot of similarities to mom’s. He was just about mom’s age – he died at 53 in 1990. But there are more similarities, he died of a bacterial infection that lead to septic shock and organ failure. Once this shock and organ failure set in they take their toll rapidly and are very hard to reverse. Many people do not recover. What really hurts is mom was conscious and in a lot of pain for 2-3 hours before losing consciousness and then, about 5 hours later, passing away. I know she had to be in a lot of pain because my mom was someone that did not complain about pain. She was always under a significant amount of pain due to her Rheumatoid Arthritis but she rarely complained. I was in the hospital room when she flat-lined and it was a strange feeling. All at once, I felt shock – is this really happening? Is this a dream? I’m also devastated because reality is setting in as well while at the same time there is some, albeit small, relief because she was in so much pain during the previous few hours.

If you had a magic pill, a single, tiny pill, that you knew if you took the pill, you would go to sleep painlessly and never wake up, what would you do? I’m referring to a pill that would cause no pain, no nausea, no sleep terrors, wouldn’t upset your stomach or cause heavy breathing, just simply pain free sleep. However, as soon as the pill is taken, there is no turning back. Would you take it? I would not take the pill today, tonight or tomorrow. I’ve never been a person to self-harm, other than extremely limiting my food intake, so I wouldn’t take it now. However, just knowing the painless option was there, that such a way out was available, would be a huge relief for me. I would keep it locked away somewhere that I would always know I had access to if I needed it. I do feel like I’ve used all three strikes against me now and the last 2 years have only been one steady decline to the bottom. I’m ok now, and I make a point to take very good care of myself now because I hope to have a healthy body and mind and use it for a long time. But I’ve always felt like I’m only 1 breakdown away from taking that pill. This is especially true since I feel I’ve used 3 strikes now. Specifically, what would likely trigger such a breakdown would be losing my dad, or stress related to work. As for now, I just try to live day to day and enjoy every small victory I have. There is always a possibility that things will all work out in the end. I could always look back years from now and think, “wow, I had a rough patch there but I’m doing to much better now and I wouldn’t change a thing. After all, the past is what made me who I am today.” Yeah, it is possible, but so is winning the lottery jackpot with only 1 ticket.