By Me

It takes a long time to open my eyes. A part of me is painfully aware that I’m stuck in that small place between dreams and wakefulness for a long time before the rest of me realizes that I’m headed irrevocably toward consciousness and fruitlessly attempts to reverse that process. The haze takes a long time to clear out enough for me to feel like it’s time to open my eyes, and then my eyelids feel like they weigh a few pounds each. Too much to be worth the effort. I roll over again. Even through my eyelids the light from my window through shades that are completely drawn is far too bright. Breathe deep. Try to ease myself back to sleep. Roll over again. Wait. Breathe deep. Again. Again. Finally I lose even that bit of energy and quit. Realize I haven’t breathed in about twenty seconds, and try to remember how to breathe in. I open my eyes a fraction and see I’m pointed toward my desk, where my cell phone is sitting. I look at it and wonder the time. I look and wonder, look and wonder, look and wonder, remember to breathe. I spend a bit more time summoning up some energy and reach out and tip the cell phone slowly upward. It takes time to focus my eyes on the time and more time to comprehend it. It’s late. Damn. I really won’t be able to sleep any more.

I try to remember how many times I woke up this morning before finally reaching this point. I woke up in time for a run before class. I woke up in time for my first class. In time for each of my classes. I have now missed all of it. Lazy. Undisciplined.

It’s blazing hot under my covers. My window faces east and so my bedroom gets the worst of the morning light. I lie there, roasting, without moving, without really thinking. Minutes tick by. I think about getting dressed, and dismiss the thought almost immediately. I can’t fathom that process. Too many steps. Find the clean clothes, pick out clean clothes, how many pieces do I need, what order do they go on again, what if it doesn’t match, what about my hair, pajamas are more comfortable, makeup seems stupid, my eyebrows need plucking, it’s all too much. So I just lie there, doing nothing, trying to think of nothing. Lazy. Undisciplined. Ungrateful. I stop and listen intently, listening for footsteps or doors or music I wouldn’t listen to. Sounds like the coast is clear. All of my roommates are gone.

Finally I can’t ignore my bladder anymore, no matter how long the walk to the bathroom seems. I push myself upward. Sit. Breathe. When did it get so hard to sit up. Swing my legs over the edge of the bed. Sit. Breathe. Stand up. Sway. Sit back down. Breathe. Walk across the room to where I left my hairbrush on a pile of nothing. Walk past a mirror without looking at it. Fat. Ugly. Fat. Brush my hair so as not to give away that I really have only just gotten out of bed too blatantly, just in case someone is home. Open the door and walk into the hall. It feels like walking through gelatin, or up a stream that’s flowing toward me. I come to the same realization I come to a lot of days: it’s past noon and the only accomplishment to my name is that I’ve managed to pee. What a great contribution to the planet. Lazy. Undiscipliend. Ungrateful. Fat. Ugly. Worthless.

The refrigerator is overwhelming. Do people actually peel fruit or wash vegetables, can openers are ridiculous, when did I go shopping last and why don’t I have bread, the oven is out of the question. I settle on ice cream. I literally watch it melt long enough to where it is easier to scoop. I take it back to my room and get back in bed. Finally I turn on my computer and check my email, my bloglist, and the rest of my to-see list. I avoid anything school related. I visualize myself as a kind of thermometer, and as long as I reach a certain point I’m okay, no matter what is pushing me past that point. True, I’ve never really reached the “okay” point, but I used to come closer. My past academic near perfection (graduating from high school with a 4.0 isn’t really perfect, as you can always do better) helped to balance out my physical hideousness, my sometimes social awkwardness, my lack of ability to save the world. It’s hard to tell yourself that at least you aren’t dumb when your grades are in peril, when you are an unemployed mass that doesn’t make it to class or even look over Powerpoints before taking exams half the time. And I know how I could fix it. I could ace my classes if I would just do the basics. Hating myself became a lot easier when so many of the things I say about myself became more tangibly true. Lazy. Undisciplined. Ungrateful. Fat. Ugly. Worthless. Stupid.

I haven’t read the news in weeks. I just don’t care about what’s going on. That’s weird. So much of my identity is becoming almost too involved, too invested in others’ lives and problems, being passionate about the world outside of me. This apathy is foreign and I feel like it should bother me. The fact that it should bother me and doesn’t should bother me more. It hardly registers. The friends I have who are hurting don’t get nearly the face time they used to get, because I’m too busy staring at my walls. Lazy. Undisciplined. Ungrateful. Fat. Ugly. Worthless. Stupid. Uncaring.

After more ceiling staring, I glance at the time. Only a few hours to go until I said I’d meet some friends. I wonder if I can get out of it, without even really considering going. I realize that I really can’t. I’ve used every excuse in the book to get out of my social engagements over the past couple of weeks. I’ve been sick, I’ve been busy, I’ve had car trouble. I haven’t answered my phone in weeks and my mailbox is full and I don’t care. The people I’m supposed to meet will have a better chance of realizing something is wrong if I don’t show than others will. Five hours left. Four hours left. Better start gearing up. Recheck my email. Watch a movie. Three hours left. Walk to the closet and give up halfway. Sit on the floor in the middle of a song and sway a little. Get up and walk the rest of the way. Take a long time dressing. Take longer doing my hair. Put on makeup and get my keys just as it should be time to leave to get there on time. I wonder where the hours went. What took so long? Lazy. Undisciplined. Ungrateful. Fat. Ugly. Worthless. Stupid. Uncaring. Wasteful.

I sit and talk and laugh with a smile plastered to my face, doing my best to not seem too out of it. It’s incredibly taxing, even though I’ve had some years of practice. I screw up a little and someone looks at me funny for a while. I straighten up. I count down the minutes until it’s over. I put on the same face with my roommates that night until I can finally retreat to my room, where I chat with a few people over the internet. If I was honest, I’d tell you that at some point during the evening I literally have to count to twenty to keep myself from burdening some unsuspecting person with far too many of my problems, as none of my normal two or three confidants is on that night, though I don’t usually talk to them about it, either. I hear many other sad stories, breakups and hard days and someone’s roommate isn’t eating, but I don’t say anything. Lazy. Undisciplined. Ungrateful. Fat. Ugly. Worthless. Stupid. Uncaring. Wasteful. Needy. Untrusting.

Finally, after conversations and pointless YouTube movies and general surfing and hours, I start to drift off. I leave my computer on, roll over, and wonder if I want to wake up tomorrow morning. The truth is that I don’t.