a bit of an interlude...

If I just stop thinking. If I just stop thinking then the walls come down and everything flows from my hand to the paintbrush to my canvas. The colors come together to make something real in there somewhere, and it's not paint anymore but its own little thing that lives and breathes in some way that i don't see, but can sense. That's when you have to start thinking again. Because if your walls are still down when the thing comes to life, well then it could get you. I't happened to me before, and I don't really want it to happen again. It takes a long time to resolve. You have to get those walls back up so that you can watch what it does, because that can be valuable. you're watching some sort of abstract birth. It gets up, looks around, brushes itself off, gives you a sort of backwards nod and then goes off to whatever things may follow for things like that. I don't know.

But that's what it's like. It can be dangerous to create. Because, like I said, you have to have the energy to make the switch again in a snap and get your walls back up. Get protected from whatever it may turn out to be. If you don't have the energy to do that, well, it's better just not to do anything at all and lay there hoping whatever left will come back eventually so that it can help you get these little screaming creatures out, give them some space and let them breathe a while, stretch their legs. It gets awfully cramped in there when some of them get big enough. But, if the thing that's gone isn't back yet, it's best just to let them scream no matter how much it may hurt you. No matter how much it may feel like your head's going to explode. Just lay there and wait. If you don't, well then they'll probably get you in the birth process, whisk you away to their little realm before you even know what's happened to you and why everything's gone all of a sudden. I've seen the ending of too many people come that way. People who couldn't take the screams.

You have to be strong. Or indifferent, whichever. They're both the same in the end, really. But to do either, it takes energy, doesn't it? Stuff you don't have. I guess it's kind of catch-22.

But we all lose in the end.

So nothing matters. That's a conclusion that anyone with a somewhat intelegent mind'll come up with eventually, if you leave them to think on it long enough. But that conclusion isn't very likely to get me out of the house and to the restuaurant every day, or hell, even out of my bed. It's more likely to get me to put a gun to my head. But I don't have a gun, and knowing the way my life works the thing would probably be defective. And, when it gets right to it, I'm not ready to die yet. I don't know why. I'm just not.

So I started to work at the restauraunt nights. Traded with some early bird who got 'stuck with it', and was complaining about always being tired. I could have ranted at him about how everyone's tired these days, but I thought that that may end up having some sort of negative influence on the switch. So I didn't. Restraint is a good guy to ask for advice when he visits. He stands over my shoulder, and if I remember that he's there (he's always so darn quiet), I can consult with him before doing anything, um, drastic. I think I tend to do things like that when I'm irritable.

Anyway, back to the string I was following. Oh yes, I got on the night shift, and I'll tell you, you'd be surprised how much less sunlight can make me a little happier, or, at least, a little more alive. I think happy might be pushing it a bit. The air is moist when I get off, smelling garlic, and Adrian and I will walk in silence for a while. I don't think either of us have the strength to make conversation anymore. Alcie might be able to come up with a reason for all of this. She's good at things like that. But, damn it, I wouldn't be able to ask her even if I called her, so what good is bringing her up? god. Maybe I should just...lay...here. Be still. Listen to the screams for a while...

Yes.