There's something people often say to me that annoys me. They're always talking about how much they enjoy, "turning off their brain". What does that mean? No really, what does that mean? Have I been unaware that there's an off switch for my brain? If you had told teenage me, or twenty-something me that there was an off switch, I would have flipped it a million times. Sit through a few hours of graduation? Flip. Breaking up with a boyfriend who's not taking it well? Flip. Customers? FLIP. Boss who's trying to tell me about their personal life when I really couldn't care less? Flip.
Depression? Flip but only after I got some kind of artistic value out of it on my blog.
During completely mundane moments in life I find myself asking, "Will I remember this later? Is this tiny moment of nothing going to come back to me? Or will something more noticeable take up it's space?" You can not imagine the amount of time I've held in a deep breath while nothing is happening, trying to burn the moment into my memory. The most recent one was as I rode in my husband's convertible (don't get me started on how I really feel about convertible vehicles). We were waiting under an overpass, and it was possibly the first time I had been in an open top vehicle while under an over pass. Across the road on the other side were two kids all punked out. They looked like the British punk scene. I looked up to the concrete and I felt like I was floating. I took in a deep breath and held it while we drove through. The sunlight hit my face and I let the air go. It was like the sunlight pushed me back into the seat and the air I let go was helping the moment write itself into my mind. Air as ink, that seems pretty useless.
I'm not someone who wants to be able to turn off my mind. I think of all the terrible painful times in my life and no matter how bad it was, I don't want it to not be there. When I have a terrible day, when I'm incredibly frustrated and feel like I can't possible handle thinking anymore, I grab a book. My brain doesnt want to turn off. It wants MORE. The simple wants just as much of my attention as the complex. I really don't have the best memory when it comes down to it. Yet I find myself wanting to experience every second I get. Not in the tacky, "Live life like every minute is your last." way, but in a liquid all around me way. I want my life to press up against me, surround me like I'm in a Bacta-Tank.
I want to be a cold, calculating bitch that has no qualms about using the word qualm. - That isn't going anywhere for now, but I wrote it and liked it.
