A conversation about this chapter is available on YouTube: Confluence discussions
So many confluences.
So many moments today it’s hard to keep track of this rapid and hyperthreading of my own thoughts. Let’s catalog a few.
- Breakfast with my son – classic, he drove
- Nostalgia tour of my old condo and tour of next door neighbor’s place, the one I hipped him to buy when it came on the market 25 years ago
- Moment of reflection driving home, my son trying to show me the prowess of his beater VW GTI
- A notice arrived with “love lives on” as the subtitle to the brand, it was for planning your death wishes and paying ahead for the casket and memorial options, prepaying for your living memorial page
- I rebooted my phone by asking Siri to shut it down, then I forgot where I left it and complained that “find my” was not working, the phone was powered off in my bedroom
- I’m relaxing in the black chair listening to the EDM musician Tycho
I wonder about the angst-driven music my son is pounding into his head. On the drive home, I allowed his playlist. Angst. Anger. In fact, he said, “The chorus is great. It’s what I’m hearing all the time in my life, right now.” Ah, my ears perked up. I knew I would be capturing the song lyrics here if they had any confluence.
hurt by dead poets society
You need to get outta your head
You′re killing yourself again
You better get what you want
You only get one shot
You’re lighting yourself on fire
You know you aren′t going any higher
This is what you want but why?
You coulda been just fine
Are you insane, how you’re dealing with your money situation?
You’ll be running for the rest of your life
You can take this any way you want, tell me
Why the hell would you hurt yourself for this?
Why the hell would you hurt yourself for this?
It’s a legitimate question. I let the conversation rest on the song. I didn’t provide advice or feedback. We were incommunicado. I got it. I have been there. I know about diving into the pain and investing in behaviors that are unhealthy and unweildy. Like his guns. So cool. A fetish. A danger. A clear and present manifestation of his anxiety and fear. I believe it’s calling in violence to be carrying a loaded weapon at all times.
There was a moment, after we’d oogled and googled at the mirror condo of my college haunt, a key was underneath Jim’s house. My son saw it. “Wonder what this key is?” “Leave it.” “It might be important, I’m going to give it to Jim.”
He returned beatific. “It was his house key. Glad I got it for him.”
Yes, my son. That is wonderful. I didn’t say, The odds for someone to find the key and trying to open all the nearby doors, not zero. Not high either.
So, my mortality. My son’s struggle with his father. My laments about my father and my past living space. A time I can’t recover or return to. A moment of growth and bliss in my college years. The house I met and married his mom in. A high moment for sure.
“You can see, when your mom met me, she thought I was really loaded.”
“Yeah.”
“I sort of was, for a very short period of time.”
It was a morning of memory, loss, and appreciation. I can only fathom a small part of my son’s struggle. I’ve shared some of the same shame. Living with a parent. Fighting and struggling against the norms, against getting a job, against doing shit I don’t want to do.
After his professed self-agreement to put all the guns in the shed, he’s out in the garage, his office, polishing the one rifle he allowed himself to keep in close proximity. He’s doing what he was defending against. That seems to be his struggle at the moment. Fighting against what would be in your best interest. I understand.
We share the hyper high and uber lows. We are one. The through-line between my father’s malfunction to my son’s malfunction with me in the middle. What do you call that?
The streams between us have become less violent and heated. I accept that he’s where he is. I appreciate the way my mom took me in, no questions, and very few demands. I’m attempting the same homebase-no-matter-what love. A parent. We can only do so much. We can’t change their minds or their sleep deprivation experiments.
I learned in college how an all-nighter would send my body and mind into overdrive. Similar to speed or mania. More stressful and subtle in the first 24 hours. Degrading value and lift over the next 24 hours. And then blink out into dark energy, deep space, inner sad space. I am an astronaut like my son and my father. My dad used pharma and alcohol. My son uses guns and MDMA. I use a little SSRI, mind games, coffee, and CBD.
Inner space is where my future discoveries and unlock codes are going to be uncovered. I learn as I play. Here at 62-63, I know that’s going to cause my younger readers to hit snooze. Grampa. Well, wait. Listen. You can take on any role you like in this hyperfiction story. You can follow my thread, my son’s thread, and even Dr. McElhenney’s demise. The path is up to you. Like life, the adventure is made up of forking paths. Labrinths of our own design. The chemistry and nurture of our parents. The lifestyle we grew up believing was “life.”
Lies.
odd tangent: Does Tycho use real guitars or only samples? (answer provided by perplexity ai.)
