Log Off Of Life

I’m walking home. It’s cold and my headphones aren’t nearly as loud as they need to be. I try to keep a straight face but I know I look empty. Like my smile is too fake and my glare is too real.

My car broke down again. Something so trivial and it’s really getting to me. It’s been getting to me. Everything has. School and work, family and friends [or lack thereof]. My life has become an endless parade of Glee episodes, lying in bed, and cake. If it weren’t so pathetic it would be comical.

With every step I saw razor blades and blood. I knew what I wanted when I finally got home. I wanted it to be over. I wanted to be done.

But also I wanted to be selfish. I wanted other people to hurt. I wanted other people to finally see what was going on. Earlier that evening I had a conversation with my mother.

Mom: Are you okay?

Me: No I’m not okay. I’m doing terrible.

Mom: But you sound great?

Me: Well I’m not. It’s all a part of the façade. I’ve been fooling you guys for years.

The amount of emotion in my voice scared me. I didn’t have emotion did I? I mean where did that come from? I’ve been telling my mother I’m suicidal for a while now and I don’t remember ever sounding like that. I’ve always been so calm. And maybe that scared her, to hear me talk of not existing anymore with such complete lack of emotion. Or maybe that was why she never really understood the depth of it.

But I didn’t do anything, obviously. I have a rule. When I feel this way I just go to sleep. It doesn’t matter what else is going on I just take the appropriate dose of sleeping medicine and crawl into bed with my music. And obviously every time I’ve felt okay enough in the morning to wait.

Now I started this post on Tuesday night but something happened Thursday that changes this.

A friend of mine tried to kill themselves. As one friend put it “he tried to log off of life”. I wasn’t terribly close with this person but every time I hung out with him he seemed so happy. It was such a shock to me. The entire day I was just, I don’t know, blurry. Laughing and having fun seemed wrong even if that was the emotion that was playing out.

When I told my mother about my friend she told me to remember how this felt. To be on the outside and feel this way. How it would feel to my family and friends if I did commit. And even though I barely knew this kid it affected me. It made me wonder if I had done the same thing would it affect anyone?

And so when I was playing with this post in my head I realized that I couldn’t just end like that. I knew I had to put in some resolution so people wouldn’t worry about me. Something that said I wasn’t going to off myself anytime soon. At the time I couldn’t think of anything that I hadn’t said before but then something funny happened Thursday.

I looked over at a girl that I was kinda crushing on (way out of my league, nothing will ever happen) and she had her arm around another girl for just a second. The immense stab of jealousy made me laugh. It was so shocking. Like what is this emotion? I’ve been so hung up on people that have written me off long ago that a new emotion like this was out of the blue.

But liking someone, jealousy, butterflies, giggling. They are things that I’ve missed because I’ve been so dead inside. My general apathy for life was killing me. But maybe recognizing the little new emotions will be a stepping stone to a less a-pathetic life. Who knows… All I know is that I’m still here. And today feels like it will be a good day. And I have something to look forward to tonight and tomorrow. And I’ll just keep taking it one day at a time.