driftexile

[driftexile]

Savant Level Action Manual - SLAM

Came in early at work, got a compliment on my polo, shot the shit and got stuff done. Ahead of schedule and etc. Chill day of finally getting my meds after being out of stock for a week.

And it happens. Intense anxiety out of nowhere and pentuple guessing what's going through other people's heads like my life depends on it. Suspicious unconsolable and disturbed. Just like college days I'm walking around avoiding eye contact rubbing my arms and keeping my head down. Everything tastes like poison and nowhere is safe. Confidants I've seen and socialized with in the past week are suddenly imperceptible watchers plotting a downfall.

This shit fucking blows, it truly does. Days or weeks or months pass of barely an inkling of this paranoia and it feels like a bad dream. It was never a dream though, possibly a waking nightmare but very real and very in your face.

Praying these new meds actually do the trick and this isn't about to be another round of esoteric bullshit to chomp at the edges of reality.

[driftexile]

big stretch

a lot has happened in my life since my last post. there's been a lot of thoughts, realizations, re-discoveries, you name it.

I still have that same familiar feeling, like I'm riding on a train and looking out the window at my life, eyelids half shut yearning for sleep. but I am doing things now. my new job is going well, I'm moving into a new place shortly, I'm seeing someone new, and I'm working on a novel. I am trying my best to be an active participant in living.

I always wonder if there's room for reconciliation between actively participating and having an observant nature. I've always liked learning and taking things in, but it feels clumsy and unnatural to put things back out into the world. like existing as a one way mirror. I see everything through the glass and everything only ever sees itself reflected.

I like to think that when I die I'll be in another world, just as fantastical to us as we'd be to them. I'd come back over and over, seeing new things and new possibilities. maybe one day I'd end up somewhere that felt like home and then I could rest peacefully.

[driftexile]

ah! the pain! the social situations of our time!

bordering on incel posting here but sometimes a brave voyage is the only way forward. I am bisexual and nb and I'd sum up my feelings on gender relations as being a femcel towards men and incel towards women. I saw it summed up perfectly recently - dating women is finding clean water in a desert and dating men is finding clean water in a swamp. almost every male I encounter is preoccupied with basal attraction and sex - not my dig. almost every female I encounter is preoccupied with stability and traditional masculinity - not my dig. now I am one monogamous son of a bitch and thus it only needs to work once, optimally, and this isn't the end of the world. however, having constant horrible relationships with both ends of the gender spectrum has left me quite bitter.

being a low sex drive psychotic twink is already not the most blessed fate for romance. being fairly attractive is a boon, but being incredibly niche in terms of actual personality attraction creates a certain purgatory. I've not had much issue finding sex but actually dating with people who Like Me As A Person is like trying to find someone that eats cherries for the pits.

As I say all of this and push the blame on those wicked gendered existences we all confront, I am also quite implicit. I have a very unfortunate tendency to push-and-pull in a way to keep someone perfectly in La Roche, never close enough to be needed but never far enough to leave. This is obviously an unpleasant predicament for the people subjected to it which tends to fuel the same sense of shame that caused it in the first place. I feel almost completely locked up - begging for affection then turning away and stonewalling once it's achieved. everytime I make real progress on this, the other person turns out abusive or opportunistic. everytime I react to that and put defenses back up, I meet someone who actually is worth opening up to.

If this were fiction it'd be a sort of comedy. The jester gets up to their usual hijinx and gambles foolishly, always assuming the last hand will be the next. we all laugh and jeer at the silliness of this oscillation and end the night in high spirits. however, unfortunately, it's not a play. men have burned me with distance and women have burned me with heavily uneven emotional loads. the more these patterns continue the more I'm leaning towards walking out of the entire situation, yet that seems like losing the forest for the trees.

I've always been a romantic and the idea of marriage and a family of my own has been a comforting idea for years now. It's been the primary thing I'm fighting for. And yet, more and more, these hopes are not only diminishing in mind, but feeling worthless on their own. Human connection seems inherently impossible and every glimpse of it feels not only fleeting but morally wrong on my part. I know what happens and I let it play out anyway, even if the other person is actually capable of living it.

this post is meaningless. I have no large audience, no result I'm looking for, no relief in expression. in fact, this level of self-disclosure and honesty could very well bite me in the ass. but I don't care. I am over these things. there surely must be some reason I do it. I think it's because I don't want to directly burden anyone I know with everything. I just wanna shout it into the void. Maybe one day the void will make a convincing argument in response.

[driftexile]

I want to write rivers

I've had so many moments in my life

that have come and gone

silently leaving the room until they're gone

and I turn my back and where there once was warmth

everything familiar had disappeared

but I'd like to write about rivers

I've written about several people

different loves I thought I'd found

the love that would at last

make me stop writing

stop writing fictions and poetry

about something I could envision that wasn't there

and then walking outside to the desert

of what actually was

I don't want to write about that anymore

I'd like to write about rivers

I grew up on a river and it defined my city

I went to the water every year as child, a teen, and adult

I stared over the geometric patterns in the waves

and I knew I loved the river

I had so many confessions, so many moments on riverbanks

I was 15 talking about why suicide is rational for some people

on the banks of a river

I visited that same spot today to remember it

and stand by what I said

and the river just laid itself out

beautiful and perfect, as always

it did not mind my presence

and did not remember my sins

it just presented its beauty

and I thought "I want to write about rivers"

[driftexile]

yay positivity!!! cooking!!!

so, I don't believe I've mentioned it, but I am somewhat of a polymath (/j). I really like doing a lot of stuff; writing, making music, reading, watching movies, you name it, but I also really like cooking, nutrition, and fitness. I grew up being pretty overweight (220-230lbs at 6ft) and in my senior year of highschool dropped all the way to 170lbs. nowadays I fluctuate between 160-170 which is very comfortably in the healthy range for my height.

I have so much nutrition and exercise info to share, but for this post I just wanna talk about one thing - cooking! I think the best thing you could ever do for your day to day diet is learn how to make the food you love at home. a lot of people online pit health vs taste but honestly if you want a burger and don't want it to be junk food, you can make it at home quite easily. of course this assumes you have time to do so and actually find the idea palatable. but, I promise cooking is a worthwhile skill for pretty much anyone.

that being said - here is my dinner from tonight .

it's just two pieces of frozen salmon (maybe around a buck each?) and some mashed potatoes (very cheap from scratch). it easily cost less than $3 per portion. despite this, it tasted great and was very affordable. this is the joy of cooking! any flavor profile you like, any seasoning mix, any amount of salt or spice, whatever it may be, you can adjust to your individual taste. I'm not amazing at cooking but I've been consistently able to provide decent food for gatherings because I've experimented a good amount.

the reason I bring this up is because, if there's anything I've really gotten down, it's mashed potatoes. I always make enough for 3-4 meals and over the past week I've given half of that to guests who come over without warning. and it's a really nice feeling! feeding people good food is one of the only things I really relish in life so being anle to provide anyone from a close friend to a new acquaintance a nice meal or snack is a real pleasure.

so yeah. I love cooking, especially for other people. and if you've ever wanted to diet or count nutrients but miss the flavor of the old days, try cooking your favorites yourself. you'd be surprised how high protein/fiber/nutrient you can make a meal that you've only ever thought of as indulgent. the worst idea about dieting that I've seen is that it means giving up good food - in reality, 90% of the time it means eating the same exact food but to your own specifications.

[driftexile]

animal life

I was talking to a coworker at my new job today and we were discussing some dark subjects. we both work in the legal field and she had previous experience working in a prison and her brother was a paramedic. I myself used to work in a hospital. all of these jobs entail a level of seeing death and human lives being ruined by illness or punishments or debt or whatever else. that was the topic of conversation and I explained how I always felt naturally suited to that kind of work because it's easy on paper but a lot of people can't stomach it well. apparently the nonchalance of the conversation gave her enough reason to ask if I was autistic because of how easily I detach myself from all of it, and she explained that she herself was autistic.

when I got my psychiatric exam, I did score incredibly high on the autism questionnaire, but because I interviewed well they ruled it inconclusive. I've had a lot of people bring it up but it's never been a huge deal to me other than being ambiguous and confusing. if I am autistic, it doesn't change anything, and if I'm not, it also doesn't change anything. I'm pretty firm in being the kind of person I am regardless of what the labels are.

the comment on the detachment did hit on a spot of recent reflection though. I've always felt kinda out of the loop on the world. escapism, art, and academia constitute the majority of interests and value I've ever had in my life. I had a pretty horrible upbringing and nowadays at the ripe age of 23 I'm relatively well adjusted. I work my office job, buy groceries, cook food, clean up, feed my cat, sleep, try to eat healthy and stay active, try to learn new things, work on my arts, et cetera. none of this has ever been particularly hard for me. I did very well in school despite sleeping through most of it and constantly procrastinating. the only thing I've ever had difficulty in is actually being a living human being. constant struggling between whether to be or not to be, forming connections with other humans, enjoying pleasurable activities, you name it.

in this way I'm very privileged in my life. I have experienced immense hardship but have generally been like wax in a rainstorm. and god, it's such a unique hell. I just drift through days, weeks, months, years. everything is always passing me by and nothing is ever very fulfilling.

I've done some very noble work here and there and provided a lot of support to people close to me but it always feels like I'm just stargazing. I can admire the stars, see every inch of beauty and light in them, understand their composition, be completely immersed in taking them in, but they're always across an impossibly long distance. people are very interesting and complex but if I'm sober and around another person in earnest I get so locked up inside. I remedy this in part by being sort of direct and outspoken, occasionally even abrasive. if I lay it all out candidly then acceptance or rejection will show themselves sooner than later. yet, I'm also still very inclined to paranoia, and I feel like revealing the two wrong pieces might unveil the entire puzzle and I'll be completely at risk of being destroyed and warped beyond recognition by this outside will. it's as if there's some demon lurking around my head and one wrong glare of a flashlight will give it away and lead to a complete exile and ostracization from humankind.

the love I've felt is almost always the same love found in a sentimental goodbye. sincere well wishes, sincere admiration, sincere appreciation, but always with the caveat that I might be leaving soon.

[driftexile]

a journal entry

I occasionally write little journal entries and I often find the more lucid and expressive than my other writing. there's a good deal of them but one I've particularly fixated on and I think it might be worth sharing, so here it is.

back to old ways, writing a silly journal thing again. I've deleted some entries as a way of expressing regretful embarrassment of the way I felt about people who turned out to be nothing special. but it is what it is. humans are fickle secretive creatures but somehow there's a very particular way to embody that fact that avoids any sort of detection from society. it's only if you're secretive and distrustful in a peculiar way that you're labelled a disordered individual, the malfunctioning cog in the ever-spinning machine of polite American society. contain multitudes, contrarict and battle yourself - but only under specific circumstances we approve of. it's a hellish cycle that seems to take vicitim of any well-adjusted person, turning them from a being bursting at the seams with potential into another drone enforcing a common narrative. I feel tired, exhausted, fatigued, sick of this cycle. but that's what brings all living beings into unity - the sickness unto death. the fears and anxieties that plague a temporal creature that can only ever consider what has been in its time and what may be in its time. the apocalypse is always on the horizon and the utopia is always a few steps back. I think it's better to realize this inclination and deduce that the only safety a person can ever find is in an idealized past, safe from possibility. it doesn't occur that that situation is precisely what predicated the current one, just that it existed and it was good. and there were times that were good - I think of the nice moments spent with friends, former friends, former lovers, and feel a deep nostalgic longing. I understand this feeling but I also understand a conflicting reality. what once was necessarily caused what is, thus what is must be the result of what once was. feeling that these times were perfect and timeless defies the very facts of their existence.

[driftexile]

on the modern situation

I've been pretty wrapped up thinking about society and politics and other humans and their experience of the world (typical) recently and I'm becoming more and more unsure of certain things. for a long time I've insisted on every human being fairly redeemable, intelligent, and capable of pro-social behavior. I've widely attributed failures in these and related departments to systemic issues in my country, and I still believe that to be the case.

the issue is. with the current political situation, the rise of AI, and the absolute lack of regard for the third world, I've become much more hopeless about other people. it feels like a large portion of the population is becoming less intelligent, less empathetic, less capable, more afraid, more lonely, just generally a fucking miserable turn of events. and it feels like no one really cares all that much. I interact with other humans online and in real life, it doesn't feel like some echo chamber effect. it genuinely seems like some people are so thoroughly wound up in the current paradigm that even if they were removed from it they'd insist on its return. in addition to this wider trend I've also personally had a fairly horrible experience connecting with others over my life and have found only a very small fraction of people tolerable, admirable, and likable on a closer level. maybe these two things are causally related and I've just been pushed into cynicism, maybe being headfucked skews my understanding of normal human experience, maybe whatever. I'm not searching for some truth of the matter or advocating for anything to be done about it. it's just incredibly demoralizing that my experience of the world has been so contrary to years of work I've spent trying to develop an optimistic and altruistic view of the world. some people just seem very disinterested in deeply considering themselves, their beliefs, and their position in the world.

I love art. I have forever. I wrote poetry as a melodramatic teenager and listened to music religiously. I regularly sought out the most raw and sincere displays of human emotion I could possibly find. I have never regretted it and I've never felt more in love with the world than when I was submerged in that ocean of creation. I've sobbed so hard I couldn't see from a movie about a life I could never imagine living. yet as time passes I can't shake the feeling that the world outside my window is a dying place with the walls closing in more and more every decade.

[driftexile]

here's the short story companion piece - it's longer but both should be able to be read in like 10 minutes. trying to start small.

pomegranate

after what felt like decades of traversing ice fields, I stumbled across something truly bizarre. it was exactly what I was looking for - a true anomaly. I salivated in anticipation, at long last I'd broken my world. a lone pomegranate tree stood planted in the ice, impossibly rooted into the frigid ground. I was struck with a sudden awareness once plucking a fruit crossed my mind, however. I recalled the merciless conditions of the journey - freezing nights spent alone, days of hunger, unfathomably deep cracks in the earth. I recalled times even further back, every stone I'd turned in every terrain searching for an iota of a majesty matching what lay before me. how many years had I'd been taught the same lesson? that the world, in all of its endless possibilities, simply lacked what I was searching for? that it dug in its heels, screeching to a halt the moment before it might finally speak an answer? surely, if the world was so insistent about teaching me this one thing, I'd have learned my lesson. I'd accept that what was in front of me must be an illusion, a trick, a trap. placed innocuously by some higher power, some overseer to the happenings of the world, of my world. yet, if I ever had learned such a lesson, I'd surely not throw myself so readily into the gauntlet of the search. I had finally found what I was looking for, but I'd concluded such a thing was not possible. this conclusion couldn't be so certain if I continued looking so frantically for what presented itself here. why here? why must my answer lie in the last place any sane person would think to look? the odds and circumstances just seemed too absurd. I must have finally broken down completely and began dreaming with eyes open. but, were it not so rare, not so obscure, not so paradoxical, it'd cease to be precisely what I was looking for. maybe it's only because I'd been so trained to expect only failure and suffering that I'd find this tree so enthralling in the first place. if I'd found it right away, I'd never have had to search in the first place. could partaking in its fruit possibly absolve me in this moment? after all that's been lost, all the pieces of myself lying in disrepair? had the part of me searching for a cure already rotted away and died along the way? would any disappointment be the final straw? regardless of these fears and doubts, it would be impossible to leave. the tree was far too significant, far too singular in its importance to ever be forgotten or abandoned. naturally, I couldn't leave it, of course, though partaking in its reward seemed too real and fatal to even consider it. I leaned against the trunk and turned my eyes upward to see the sun through the canopy. in this impossible compromise, I laid my head to rest, at last.

[driftexile]

first poem posted! the short story companion piece is in the next post

to write is to bleed

to find a lone tree bearing fruit

in an endless desert

expanding outward on all sides

and not trusting the sudden sweetness

becoming enthralled in the precipice

torn in two over the edge

on one side, fruits of labor

on the other, striving forever

the juices spill

seeping ink into pages

countless pages soaked in humanity

the once life giving blood

has been spilled to become immortal

living forever lifeless

the feeling has been captured

and killed to lay still

in journals, manuscripts, letters

providing no warmth and little solace

to the writer who delivers the final sentence,

[driftexile]

hello everyone!!!!

after a hiatus, I have returned. I've been writing a lot and support from one of my dear friends has encouraged me to share that writing. she knows who she is! I have a back catalog of poetry and short stories and will try to update the blog regularly now.

[driftexile]

off meds

taking antipsychotics has always irked me. it feels like I have to water down myself because society doesn't approve of certain types of people. you can be whoever you want! just so long as you don't cross the lines of acceptable modes of being. i think this social restriction heavily limits the exploration of humanity and the mind/spirit/soul whatever. I feel bizarre again and it's not sunshine and rainbows but it's like a voyage to the unknown.

[driftexile]

absolutely mental; the sequel

I have gotten back the report from my psychiatric evaluation. aaaaand it's useless. inconclusive results for autism, ptsd, and the MMPI. I did not manage to fit into any of the little categories we've created to define people's suffering. this wouldn't be the worst thing if it wasn't a trend. I've seen psychiatrists, therapists, evaluators, social workers. Nothing helps. I've been hospitalized and they didn't help me, just put me in a sterilized box. it feels like this system is just meant to push you further into the abyss. it's all problem and no solution. you're sick, terminally sick, and we can pay some lip service while you're still kicking. I don't have much else to say about it. I don't have rosy words for this one. It's just another nail in the coffin.

[driftexile]

what's in a name?

I figured I should post some doodles about the name of the blog. the tag (driftexile) is a reference to some underlying idea the two words share. growing up the main way I was described was as a stray dog. I was barely home, I walked around for hours, and I was always somewhere or another just exploring. I also had serious shelter dog habits. the blog name (apathy wholesale) is in reference to what I've felt is the main thing I grapple with. I want to have goals and aspirations and energy and emotions but unfortunately I just kind of exist. I live doing what's necessary and not a lot more. I spend a lot of my days just sitting or laying down and sleeping. I used to have more passions and whatnot, nothing big, just playing games and studying and all that. however sometime in my late teens I just kinda dropped off the face of the Earth and became way more wrapped up in my own head. I spend a lot of time daydreaming and thinking about different things or stuff to write. I've been working pretty half-assedly on a novel for awhile now, but it's just sitting at one chapter.

so yeah, that's the tea on the name choices. hopefully it elucidates something about the character of the blog.

[driftexile]

day in the life

It's a nice breezy summer day today. I didn't do a lot. some job applications here and there, some time-killing, etc. early 20s are a weird age. you're supposed to be something, but that something is entirely up to the future. I have a degree with a good gpa but I'm still stuck. working dead-end food service jobs to get through while dealing with the leviathan of being a human being. you know something somewhere is supposed to bring a dose of meaning and purpose and direction and all those things everyone seeks - but still, it has yet to arrive at your doorstep. for now, there is temporary relief and glimpses of the sun. I had a simple dinner and a simpler night. just scraping by is certainly a way to live, but it isn't The Way. I have dreams of being something - a musician with a small cult following, a prolific academic, a beating heart worth seeing. but for now, it's all just possibility and smoke and mirrors. one of my favorite writers is Sylvia Plath. I think she hit the nail on the head with the fig tree metaphor. there's a million paths to being something, but every path is exclusive - you commit yourself to a goal and you risk every other option in the process. I can't help admitting to myself that I love this potential. until I've realized one path, every path is open to me. but right now, in this moment, I have to choose and lean in hard in order to get a semblance of anything. I only hope the next few years are forgiving and kind.

[driftexile]

absolutely mental

so, tomorrow I've got a psych eval coming up. I've had an array of disorders theorized by different therapists and psychiatrists and I'm hoping this will clear the air. I've got a good few people banking on an autism diagnosis but I'm personally unsure. my main thought going into this is just mentally preparing for what's to come. there's a good chance I'm going to receive a diagnosis for some lifelong mental condition that I will have to learn to cope with until I die. I don't think people really grasp how devastating it can be. in my experience, a lot of mental health advocate types are quick to defend basic run-ins with things like depression and anxiety - young adults struggling to cope with entering the workforce, uni students anxious over grades and tests, people suffering from depression after a sudden loss. while I'm glad these people are being seen and validated, it feels like psychotic spectrum disorders, personality disorders, and the wrong types of autistics still get pretty heavily stigmatized, even in supposedly safe spaces. I remember getting 10-foot poled by nurses when I was in the hospital for psychosis and how isolating it felt. I think we're making good steps to accepting mental disorders but damn is there room for improvement.

[driftexile]

homes

today I had a plumber come to the apartment for a quick leak fix. I was thinking (a habit that will show itself over time) about what it must be like to have one of those jobs - electricians, plumbers, cleaners, all of these occupations that regularly enter people's homes. it seems strange to think that you'd get to glance at such a personal part of so many people's lives. seeing how they keep their place, what decorations they pick, how often they clean, what color the walls they sleep within are. I think this would easily be lost on me if I actually worked one of these jobs - I'm sure there's plenty of magic in food service that I don't realize because I'm busy dealing with customers.