Run fast; try to pass quickly, nimbly, but in the recurring multi-dimensional purgatory of the ailment, of my ailment, it is not possible to clear feet of the drag of thousands of emotionless grains of thought, each cognitive morsel bogging down body and soul in mocking slowness, each thought unfulfilled, each unborn image serving only to sharpen the flame beneath frustration’s cauldron.
Stubborn anchors claw, grasp and drag in a toe-hold, steadily and patiently halting clarity and ambition, dooming both to exist without influence. The clutching dregs of ennui deflect the body’s course to a meandering circular shuffle, losing each step forward to two steps sideways.
And I don’t care. Deep within the recesses of my being, I utterly do not care, but even closer to my core is the panicky certainty that I must give a damn, and in the mind’s periphery it becomes – no, it always was – the same indescribably horrible helplessness that a diver experiences with deep water blackout.
Deep-water blackout: When labored breathing is allowed free rein, the pull of the regulator yields insufficient oxygen, and carbon dioxide builds in the horrible cycle of panic until the corner is turned.
Deep-water blackout: Suffocation while breathing; fighting the body for control, desperately needing to move, but knowing that to move now, at the height of incapacity, is to die.
Deep-water blackout: When primal fear harkens to an ancient experience far beyond conscious understanding.
Deep-water blackout: For the diver, losing this battle means death of the worst kind; death by default, death without evidence of a fight.
Deep-water blackout: Nature’s misplaced compassion abates the pain of suffocation and the weight of sleep is seductive and overpowering; the fear of surrender pulls opposite, leaving the diver confused in the middle.
And that is ultimately what kills – hesitating, confused purpose.
When found—if found—the diver appears peaceful in a cruel parody of death’s seduction.
My ailment’s path to life lies opposite deep-water blackout: not moving is death.
So, I straighten my neck and back against the relentless pull, rock back and forth in my Levodopa utopia, and struggle to ignore the suffocation of those who surround me, those who look but do not see; those who question but seek no answers; those impatiently awaiting my peaceful departure.
And I continue to move.