9:00pm beckons the habitual trawl through social media. It seems a standard day at the office in my digi-sphere; photo’s of dogs, the Italian peninsula, and attractive people. I count myself lucky to have been physically close to all three at some point, however, unlucky to have only been emotionally close to one; and since I can’t sustain a healthy emotional or sexual relationship with an inanimate land mass, I continue to scroll.
God, so many attractive people. Maybe I should post a picture? No, best not- my tear duct is swollen, and I think this past months interest in woodland insects has resulted in a slight, but noticeable, hunch in my back. I would like to meet someone tho, the most erotic thing that’s happened to me in the last few months was that dry chest shave the nurse gave me before fitting my 24hr heart scan. Scroll on, dear boy.
9:30pm. Perhaps, I should post an ambiguous photograph of an art-house film that I’ve only seen half of; the attractive people will not be able to resist such a nuanced mating call. Yes, that’s it! My hallucinatory PR team gives me a ceremonial standing ovation; I thank the Academy and God.
10pm. The picture has been chosen. It’s a black-and-white still from some Iranian film someone told me about sometime, somewhere. Looks half-decent, maybe I’ll watch it someday. Focus! Must remember the task at hand- find partner to fill the void of narcissistic existentialism.
I’m ready to post when I notice my left index finger shaking. I feel the cortisol rush through my veins as if it’s been intravenously administered by an anxiety addict. I start to wag my finger as fast as I can, I swear I could to do that faster yesterday, I internally yell. The foreplay to my panic attack leads me to my neck where I am now convinced I have a rare form of undiagnosed cancer. A quick web search confirms my suspicions. My whole body surges into an uncontrollable fit of feverish energy. I feel like I’m stuck in one of those carnival stick walls where everything around me seems to swirl and blur at break-neck speed and all I can do is grit my teeth and wait for it to end. I catch myself in the mirror, you were a lot better looking at 13, my PR team reminds me.
10:20pm. I am now chugging Valerian oil. God, it tastes like shit, I should try the breathing exercise my mum sent me the link to. I pull up the video. A new-age guru is sat cross-legged in some bougie apartment in California, telling me everything will be alright. She seems nice and good at breathing; and so calm! Why is she calm?! I’m not calm, why is she calm?! She should start these video’s in the midst of a raging episode of fear and panic about hard-to-spot diseases! I shut the laptop.
10:30. I imagine dying. I will never be able to face death with dignity and valour, I’ll be too petrified to speak. Then I remind myself that hospitals have morphine. Yeah, that’s it, they can just pump me full of morphine until I’m adrift on an endless cloud of bliss; tragic for my loved ones to see but I’ll be so smacked out I’ll never notice. This calms me. I open the laptop. My respiratory angel is still there, waiting for me. Show me the ways of the breath, Sensei; I’m ready to learn. I begin to snort oxygen with an alarming gusto.
10:45. I let my mind wonder to lighter subjects; like her hardwood floors. Maybe one day, when I’m older, I’ll have a place with hardwood floors. It’s funny, I never imagine being older anymore. When I was younger, all my fantasies were played out with me as an adult; an old friend of mine and I on holiday in our 50’s, telling my children stories of our younger years, or me nonchalantly doing something heroic in front of a girl I fancy. Now, my dreamscape is mainly comprised of a nostalgic slideshow which replays the past; a sort of ‘Best Of’ memory album, all shot on Super 8 video stock, of a time when I didn’t think as much, or as fast.
11:00. The panic begins to loosen its grip on me, it is replaced by a bearable exhaustion. Sitting on the floor, I think I’m about to cry; but I fight it, not out of any shame or embarrassment, but out of frustration, that this thing can do this to me. How this thing doesn’t just hurt me, but my family. How it feels like it has it’s crooked finger wrapped around the dimmer-switch of my life, constantly regulating how much light I see the world through. How it makes me lonely and selfish and sad and mean. How I’ve had to have two emergency calls to the doctor in the last week because of it. How it’s so entwined with my being, yet, I barely understand it. Or how, at times, it feels more powerful than me, as if the real me is backed up in a corner somewhere- it’s like I’m living inside a stranger. The tears flow regardless. I put on the new Phoebe Bridges’ album. Unsurprisingly, this makes things worse, then better.
11:20. The Iranian film still remains on my instagram launchpad, my phantom PR team on standby. I feel silly, fake, lame, and feckless. Why do I do these things? I hate instagram. I think about deleting it all, put a bit distance between the devil and me. I get a rush; the kind of rush you get when you entertain a decision that you know you will ultimately never take. I think about the fact that I spend so much of my time being the audience for other peoples life, that I forget to live my own. Perhaps that’s the true disease of this era; or maybe I’m just bad at it.
I wonder how I can fix myself, but I’m overwhelmed by the workload, so I stick up some scaffolding instead by having a shower. Tomorrow the real work can begin, just get through tonight.
1 week later. After seven days of light exercise and rancid smoothies, I find little progress; but that’s ok. Remember what the Breathing Queen said, “patience”. My new anti-depressant makes me feel sick, but I don’t throw up. It is evening time and I retire to my panic chamber- I have since cleaned it and invested in a new-brand of lavender oil; this has helped. My cursor hovers over the seductive curves of the instagram icon. Why risk it? I think. Instead, I decide to give the Iranian film a shot. It is about a man on a quest to find someone to bury him after he commits suicide- ah, perfect! During this journey, he picks up an old man who tries to convince him not to end his life. In doing this, he tells him an old Turkish joke:
A Turk goes to see a doctor.
He tells him: “When I touch my body with my finger, it hurts. When I touch my head, it hurts, my legs, it hurts, my belly, my hand, it hurts”
The doctor examines him and then tells him: “Your body’s fine but your finger’s broken!”
I think on this for a while; then switch my laptop off and go to sleep.
By Matteo Luigino Addis
Me, Myself and Why 