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Negativity Storm not to be taken seriously

Negativity Storm not to be taken seriously

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And this is why I won’t be taking Chantix again…

The combination of nicotine withdrawal, chantix prescription medication, and the increased attention I’m spending to my own state of consciousness is all creating very strange thought-storms. I know that all of this will pass, and I know not to believe any of it or even to take it that seriously. This is where training in observing your own thoughts and emotions is very helpful.

Yes – I’m bracketing for my own protection, but there is no reason to spiral down as though any of this were real.

I know, I’ll miss that. A lot.

Then the voice is MY voice. I can’t reproduce the entire chant that got me home, but I fell into a sing-song negative rant. I tried to let the thoughts be spoken to help release them. Here’s a little sampling of what I remember – it was a constant stream…

(reee-me-owwwww, morphing into a deep double-sound chant, then) yah yah yah, nee nee, LAAAAAAA!

You don’t even know a thing
You don’t even know
ALL THAT WORK FOR NOTHING
IDIOT
NAH nah nah nah nah
Cuz I’m a girl, ain’t it
Blue collar RISING
SICK of it

SICK of HATE HATE HATE HATE
Sanctimonious self-righteous corrupt asshats!
Wadda ya think you’re gonna do about it?
YEAH, just be the crank, just be the crank

I shall wear purple? PURPLE?
Like royalty, like PRINCE?

What does it matter?
What’s the damn point?
Why do I even waste my time?
I don’t have the energy.
So tired, can’t do anything.

DO DO DO DO – la – DO DO DO
You are such a stupid little shithead
No imagination at all –
Dumb suburban undisciplined scatterbrain
Dumb dumb dumb dah dah dah dah DUMB

All that money wasted
All that reading just to be alienated
All that curiosity just to be faced with

COWS COWS COWS COWS
SHEEP SHEEP SHEEP SHEEP
PIGS PIGS PIGS PIGS

Yeah, yeah, FEM FEM FEM FEM
fem fem fem fem
fem fem fem fem FEM FEM fem fem

Everything’s a mess
People don’t really like me
I can’t keep my house clean
I have so much to do

I’m so TALENTED –
I’m so INTELLIGENT –
I’m such a waste of air.
WHY do I try?

I could give up like a ZEN MASTER
and back away and escape SUFFERING
and bathe in LOVE LOVE LOVE

But I hate those indoor voices
TOO DAMN soft! FAKE! FAKE!
Compassion! Yeah – TRYING! TRYING! TRYING ALREADY-YA!

Turn down the critic!
Turn down the intellectual!
You’re PUTTING US OFF…

OK – NICE NICE NICE NICE NICE NICE NICE
Then I can be WRITTEN OFF
Underestimated, then I’m
PERKY!
NICE NICE NICE NICE NICE

OH “YOUR” so SWEET!
I’m NOT SWEET!
I’m an ALIEN! A LEGAL Alien!

WEIRDO, different species.

Must be me.
Must be MEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE.

So yeah, it took about 45 minutes to get home. It had been a trying day. The tears that followed restabilized me, and then I waved my arms up vaguely toward the clouds, as though some God(esses) would shoulder my dark side for me.

Still – the benevolent deities did do a nice thing. My son had lost his key in the bushes, leading to a series of issues and problems – but I got out of the car, walked over to the general area and walked right to the key and picked it up.

Key. Got it.

I’m not the stoic kind. I’m checking in with people I trust as an early warning system in case things need to be adjusted and I can’t see it. My mind is going places without me – but this too will pass.

Independence Day and Freedom

Independence Day and Freedom

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In this quick review of an anti-Bush novel by Nicholson Baker, Kurt Nimmo runs down some interesting examples of what happens to people who are openly critical of the president and this administration.

  1. Richard Humphreys of Portland, Oregon, sentenced to 37 months in prison for saying God might speak to the world through a "burning Bush” at a bar.
  2. Barry Reingold, a 60-year-old San Francisco retiree, visited by the FBI for talking about terrorism and September 11th, oil profits, capitalism and Afghanistan at a local gym.
  3. A.J. Brown, a Durham North Carolina freshman attending Durham Tech with the help of an American Civil Liberties Union scholarship, had the Secret Service and Durham police knock on her door for the crime of possessing an anti-Bush poster.
  4. Dan Muller and Andrew Mandell of Voices in the Wilderness in Chicago were grilled by the police and the Post Master after they told a clerk at the post office they did not want to buy stamps bearing an image of Old Glory.
  5. Or take the case of Steve Kurtz, whose grand jury case as a bioterrorist under the Patriot Act was dropped, but who is still being charged with procurement and possession of harmless biological agents. His artwork is critical of biotechnology and transgenic contamination.

He doesn’t mention the journalist here in Atlanta, visited and threatened by the FBI for reading a published article "Weapons of Mass Stupidity" at a local Starbuck’s.

Did you ever in your life think we would have to refight these battles? Our national mood seems to echo another authoriarian regime, and Nimmo closes with this quote.

“When I hear the word culture I reach for my revolver.”
Hermann Goering

Whether you are for or against the policies of this president, our freedom of speech allows us to be critical – openly, with freedom of assembly, through print or art (just as was done during the Clinton administration). The legal – and I think rightful – line is drawn at conspiracy and threats against the President’s life.

Let’s try to hold on to the First Amendment. It is one of the ideals for which this country stands.

Happy Independence Day.