"Reoccurring Drowning Effect Entrenching My Brain I Hope You'll Be Ok Someday So I Can Say That You Moved On In The Right Way" - Taproot

I feel a warm trickle of fluid running down the length of my face, pausing momentarily at the end of my cheek and then drip, drip, dripping steadily to the ground beneath me. If I listen real hard, I can hear the plunk, plunk, plunking of my blood as it hits the ground and splashes neat little droplets on the already soiled sidewalk of this urban megacity. I realize now that the blood has found a way out and it’s not wasting anytime. But this blood loss, even as bad as it could be, is slowly being outshined by a greater, almost searing pain in my jaw that is becoming ever more persistent. It feels like something is on fire. The white, hot, searing pain is becoming all that I can sense. I feel like bones are broken beyond repair; I feel like I’ll never be the same again.

It may be time to succumb to the healing powers of sleep. Things always seem much better in the morning, after rest. That is probably because of all the natural light; it does something to the brain, opens up dopamine receptors or obstructs serotonin inhibitors or something else entirely. In the morning I will know exactly how to handle this situation. Everything will be fresh and clear. My eyelids are so heavy that I think critically about passing out right here on the sidewalk of downtown Los Angeles, mere blocks from the comfort of my own bed, the bed that every night comes with a price. With every obligatory, involuntary blink, my eyelids are becoming increasingly more reluctant to rise open again. They are stubbornly trying to dictate this situation and I'm thinking about letting them.

With every passing second, I find myself longer in the darkness of my mind. Unconsciousness is sneaking in, despite my lackluster attempts to rouse myself by rubbing my eyes and coaxing them to remain open and observant. But I’m losing the battle and I don’t even really care. I’ve never been the sort who was too proud to admit defeat, especially in the case of a worthy adversary and sleep is nothing if not worthy. I let it get in because I think I want it to. And I know deep down it’s probably the wrong thing to do because of the dangers of this place but this seems right nevertheless. It feels perfect. Inexplicably, there is less pain here.

And now a thought occurs to me, one that could either save or devastate me, depending on the outcome. I need to check for that vicodin. It may still be within my possession and if it is, I will eagerly consume some of those beautiful white pills. Maybe they will make me feel better. They couldn’t make me feel worse. So without further ado and because I am painfully impatient, I reach down and feel inside my pockets. It really hurts quite a bit to strain in this particular manner but as I feel the pills, right where I left them, I know that it has all been well worth it. Miraculously, and I don’t use that term lightly, my pills are still in my possession, floating around in the place I told them to wait. If this isn’t the definition of kismet, I don’t know what is.

What luck! I moan and close my eyes, grinning and reveling in this newfound fortune. The relief of still having possession of the painkillers courses through me like a welcome rush of euphoria, and I smile ever wide. It feels like a huge weight has been lifted. I feel free, like someone who has just broken out of a lifetime cell. It takes most of my remaining energy to get the lid off the canister but I would struggle against pain and agony all night for this tiny victory. I carefully pull out four pills and pop them into my mouth with as much grace as I can muster given my present condition. I think about taking a fifth one and possibly even a sixth, but I refrain. Four is good for now; I’ll save the rest for later.

With weak determination, I push the remainder of the pills deep into my pocket to hide them from the view of others. The paranoia over losing the vicodin intensifies for a moment as I feel them coming on strong, washing over my body with their typically vigorous calm. They make me feel so good I start to wonder why I ever let myself feel bad. Then I think about never feeling this good again and I get upset and think about crying. If these pills were stolen I don’t know what I would do. But the fear and dread associated with that loss passes quickly as the strength of the vicodin kicks in full throttle. These pills are already starting to make a huge difference; the pain everywhere is diminishing and I am feeling fine again. My body and mind are coming out of that dense fog of anguish that was so long holding me captive. Opiates are truly amazing things.

It’s like my brain is swimming around, unconnected to strings and nerves and doused in the gratifying concoction of serotonin juice. Fantastically, I am drowning in feel-good chemical explosions that are only underrated by the ignorant of mind. What’s more, like the perfect gatekeeper, my brain fends off all the painful stimuli and only lets pass the blissful sensations that remind me that parts of life can be, by definition quite pleasurable. A nod to the vicodin, it makes me feel so relaxed and circumstantially invincible. Really, I get the feeling that I will survive and even thrive from this experience. I have always been quite taken with it as drugs go.

The heat that was previously emanating from my angry wounds is beginning to cool off and those familiar idyllic vibes that opiates are famous for are streaking their beautiful way throughout my body in perfectly spaced intervals. A new, blissful feeling of calm is settling in and I am overcome with sleepiness. I decide to let unconsciousness have me with reckless disregard. Who am I to fight the gripping hand of nature? It is for the best anyway. If I don’t wake up again the darkness wins; if I do wake up the darkness still wins. There’s really not much to fight for in my case.

As I close my eyes and accept that fatigue and strife and chemicals will dictate the next few hours of my fate, I imagine that my body has become something like velvety smoke, floating thickly and with luminescence through the night air on a path to nowhere. I imagine my smoky self sailing a few feet above the ground, weighted down by uncertainty and the unfulfilled desire to be free, going nowhere at all yet hungrily awaiting some kind of great destiny, like a gifted child in a broken home. I imagine myself as the viscous sort of substance that often sways and swishes around inside of flooded potholes, creating those infinitesimally mesmerizing figure eight patterns, colorful and free to be whatever the hell they want to be and no one there to tell them differently. What an awesome notion! I let my head fall back against the surface of the ground and revel neatly in the pretend. I have always been much better with fiction than fact.

My mind, for what it’s worth these days, is nothing more than a commanding presence sitting within me and never allowing me a moment’s rest. It is the true hand of torture, poking and prodding my inner psyche and calling me out on things that don’t matter at all, in moments and times of my life that could be better used for productive endeavors. I wish I were that slippery, smooth and wispy puddle of oil, confined to the flooded pothole indefinitely yet still swimming around without guile, so fantastic and unreal, so unbothered by my existence and purpose. I wish I were that amorphous bundle of smoke, floating around without abandon. If I even had the illusion of freedom, like that suspended and swishy oil, like that thick and cloudy smoke, I think I could find some degree of contentedness. But there is nothing perfect in real life; if it is not completely manufactured then it is wholly unsettling. Goodness and pureness just don’t exist, at least not in the true life that I lead.

I expend a huge sigh and look around once more. My field of vision is quite limited due to the swelling of the bone and tissue around my eye. Regardless, I swivel my head from side to side as I lie on the ground, trying to get some idea of where I am and what could approach me. Now that some time has elapsed since my ingestion of the vicodin, I think I am feeling the subtle changes within my bones, courtesy of one of my favorite drugs in this world. It’s actually quite remarkable; my bones, my skin, and my muscles are all undergoing this beautiful process of liquidation that I cannot condone nor emphatically deny. Maybe it’s my time to melt peacefully away.

I will not discount the power of nature even though I frequently rail against the existence of a god. The two concepts are wholly distinct. At this point, I am willing to just let nature take its course, whatever course it turns out to be. I feel so open to anything and everything right now and the fight, if there ever was such a thing within me, has long since disappeared and I couldn’t care less. I am accepting of things as they are now. I don’t fight what I cannot change. It’s a special transformation that I cannot quite account for but it is my new reality nevertheless. I won’t go so far as to aver that I am grateful for it but I do accept it for what it is.

So as I lie here, sinking carelessly into the hard cement below, I realize that soon I will be nothing more than a puddle of tissue and whatever else bone melts into. It may seem contrary to everything that is definitively human but I don’t mind this fate. It feels nice to just shut my eyes, shut my brain, shut away everything, and feel the sensation of my muscles, my bones, and my tissue melting away into mush, into microscopic pieces of the carbon from whence I came, and beyond that into nothing but the bleakness that greets us all upon death.

TBC...