Notes of a Paranoid Schizophrenic

I have just spent that last two weeks in Whistler, working and playing during the Olympics.  It’s a little bit odd coming back to the town that I called home for more than 19 years;  I feel oddly displaced.  And for some reason, when I see locals that I used to know, I don’t want to be seen or recognized, I want to walk the other way.  I want to hide.

What an odd thing for me to do.  However, a bit of reflection and I realize that I’ve been hiding for a very long time - a very very long time.  There’s a sneaky side of me that doesn’t want to be observed.  The more I think about this, the more I realize that I’ve spent my entire life trying to get away with things, just little things, small things that chip away at my sense of self-worth.  Clashing with this is a basic honesty imbued upon me by my parents.  It’s as if there are two of me - the ethical guy, and the just-not-quite ethical guy.  The just-not-quite ethical guy will, for example, take  a beer from a wealthy friend without asking.  My justification would be something along the lines of:  it’s just one beer, and I would/will give it back someday.  Or I may just justify that the friend will never notice.  But it isn’t right, and my ethical guy knows this and hates the other guy for doing it.  It is stealing, plain and simple.  Perhaps the friend won’t notice, and therefore it could be looked upon as a victimless crime.  But the victim is actually me.  I know that I have stolen, and by doing that it keeps me feeling comfortably bad about myself.  I must be very angry with me.  My comfort zone is to continually and consistently hurt myself.  Fuck.

Another example is smoking.  I’ve gotten the habit down to about one smoke a day, but that one smoke costs me dearly.  I don’t want anyone to see me smoking, because I’m ashamed of it.  Aside from that, it’s very expensive and it’s clearly bad for my health.  So if it’s down to one a day, and the one a day that I DO smoke causes me to feel guilt and shame, why would I even bother?

All of this came to me in an epiphany just the other day.  I’ve been behaving this way for a very long time.  And every time I do it, it just furthers my own self-loathing.  I have no respect for myself, and therefore I show little respect for others.

The aggravating part of all this is that I have done it for so long that it has become a habit.  So has the self-loathing.  Give me some time to myself, and before long I have two black eyes and bleeding nose from beating myself up so hard.  And it hurts.  It really hurts.  And it’s lonely.  Very lonely.

I quit smoking yesterday, and I am hanging on today.  It will become the symbol for my rebirth as an honest guy who doesn’t hide anymore.  I am sick of hiding.