Dead is Better?

When someone says “sometimes dead is better” I’m the kind of person that might respond with “well, maybe you should go be dead then.” Does that make me an asshole? Maybe. It’s really the sort of thing that gets on my nerves though. The kind of compassionate outpouring you see when people like Robin Williams commit suicide is just… it’s ridiculous. Don’t get me wrong either, I was bummed to hear he offed himself. But there are a few factors that make it more acceptable to me in his case, and a number of reasons I generally don’t give a shit about your average run of the mill suicide. I’ll hit on what makes it more acceptable to me first. Decades of depression, decades of success.

Of laughter, art, acting, comedy, and money. That’s a lot of what people are going to remember. He may have struggled his entire life, but even though I see suicide as a bitch out, a choice made out of weakness, his whole life leading up to it is a testament of strength. And when you get right down to it, the simplest and most clinical description of suicide is “exit strategy”. Top off his accomplishments and depression with the Parkinson’s diagnosis, and he had more right than most to take his own life.

That’s not to say anyone else has less of a right to it.

What you do with yourself is up to you as far as I’m concerned, but unless you’ve got a hell of a story to cap off with an abrupt, suicidal, and decisive ending I don’t find it to be acceptable. And I don’t get people who think it is. Unless you’ve got a decade or more of great success, it goes beyond a lack of sympathy. Without that, not only do I not feel compassion, I look down on your decision. I could’ve been right there with any of those sad fuckers were it not for my own choice not to be. The only reason I never killed myself years ago is because I’m stubborn. I don’t look down on it the same way I used to but I’m also not about to sympathize with someone who just gives up like that.

You’re going to be dead someday anyways. If you haven’t done anything with your life then why end it so soon. It’s only pain. Suck it up and stop being such a little bitch about it. You think the quality of my current life would suck that hard line right out of me since things are pretty good these days but… I didn’t always have it so easy and even now that I do, that doesn’t mean the thought of suicide is any less a comfort sometimes. None of this means anything. I mean just think… Williams had a relatively huge impact. But he’ll be forgotten in a few decades, a century, except as a famous comedian. That’s all. And the rest?

The people who’ve made only the smallest of impacts? I don’t know their names now, probably never will. Neither do you. They’ll be forgotten within a year of dying. Even if they weren’t though… let’s say you leave a mark the size of an emperor. So what? In the grand scheme of things what do I care about the human race or where it ends up? Will it even survive long enough to decide if it cares about any of the names in history? Give it a million years and even a massive impact won’t mean a goddamn thing. All I have is now, how far I can reach into the present world and how far into the future, and it doesn’t always feel like enough. There’s just no real point to doing anything. I mean fuck, for what???

So even now I think about the end. It scares me sometimes, and so does the end of the few people I’m close to. I don’t like the idea of life beyond the one I currently know, without these people. But it’s coming, closer and closer every day. When that day comes I might just off myself, except for the same reason: there’s no real reason to. I’m going to die anyways some day. I live this life like a dream a lot of the time because of that, because of the end that’s coming for me. I don’t know if dead is better, but I’m not betting my life on it. This is what we have. You want to throw it away then be my guest.

I will not.

Not until I’m absolutely convinced there’s nothing left to unearth in this life that might give me a reason to live. I’ve got a nihilistic outlook and a gaping despair to match any of yours, with plenty of self loathing to top it off, but I guess I’m just hopeful too. Or maybe stubborn. Either way… This life sucks a lot sometimes, but I’m not done with it yet. I’ve got a long way before I decide I’m finished.

When The Heart Guides The Hand

You ever find yourself totally stuck in web of uncertainty or indecisiveness? Stupid question because, well, who hasn’t. I find myself there all the time though, and was just there for the last few days. My views spiked, a bunch of new followers apparently liked what they saw when they came here, and I just didn’t know what to do with all of it. It’s like a high, and just like a high it’s always a little overwhelming when it’s stronger than what you’ve felt before, or when it’s been a while since you’ve felt it. Swirling around, not quie sure of what to do, and just kind of… fixed into place, first enjoying it and then… wondering when I’m going to move on from the spot I’m in.

Wondering “what next?” and not feeling sure about any particular answer. It kind of goes without saying that the indeciveness has been on my mind lately. But what I’m really working my way toward talking about is how we deal with it. Or really, how I deal with it. But hey, same difference. I do different things; depending on where I’m at, what I’m doing, what I feel uncertain about. This time around I set up another blog, one that you can’t read. One that I might delete.

I’m not sure if this “journal” blog was a good idea. I don’t know if I’ll use it or get rid of it… or what. If I want to just write without posting it where other people can read, there’s always microsoft word. It was just something to do to regain a sense of control, it was a way to deal with my uncertainty. That’s why I’ve got a blog, that’s why I’ve written a little fiction, and that’s why I believe in the things I do. Not uncertainty, but its opposite. Passion, enthusiasm, a liveliness I don’t always feel. When that feeling leaves me all I can do is try to find it again. It keeps life interesting… and if life isn’t at least interesting, fun, enjoyable, then there really is no point to it.

Where I’m going with this is the reason I write is the same reason anything in life even matters. Because I fucking like it. It’s just that simple. Everything is that simple. It’s a little something that makes me feel more alive. Anything that inspires that feeling is worth doing. It’s the reason I’ve thought about maybe, just maybe actually trying my hand at something longer than a few hundred words for each piece of fiction. If I ever write a book, that will be the reason. If anything else in life is worth doing, this will be the reason. Because it’s real, because I feel something for it. When the heart guides the hand, you can’t go wrong.

Speaking of which, you might have noticed there wasn’t a “shout out” post yesterday. I said I was going to start doing that weekly but honestly, my heart just isn’t in it. I think it’ll be better to just mention a site when and if I feel moved to. Besides, if I worked around a schedule, reliably, then I’d have to rethink the title of this site, and that would defeat the purpose of it as a reminder not to be to sane, to reasonable, or to stable. The freedom to do whatever I want whenever I want only seems to come with a little bit of madness. Playfulness. If I take the spontaneity out of it, I won’t enjoy myself nearly as much.

Plus there’s one thing I’m not going to do to myself. I’m not going to make writing here (or anywhere else) feel like an obligation. So… regularity and schedules be damned.

Charlie Chaplin (Quote)

“What do you want meaning for? Life is a desire, not a meaning.”
~Charlie Chaplin