I've been telling myself that a lot lately, and today, at work, on a particularly annoying call (they all are, really, I despise the general public. They're stupid, immature, lazy, and mean) this voice whispers, like it was right next to my ear, really, Rachel, you should just kill yourself. You know that, right?
So, I don't hear voices, just a Voice. Big difference. For awhile, I didn't really notice it, anymore. It's like a white noise, only . . . it's suicide-slanted. And it's like the boy who cried wolf. To the point where, if I have to run to catch the bus, it's there, waiting to tell me what I can do to solve that thorny problem, and in a way that doesn't involve running or sweating.
See? I'm still in good shape. Fighting trim, even. Look out, personal demons.
Dunno if one Voice even counts anyway, especially since I've been hearing it since I was old enough to know what kill and death meant. So from five onward, if not a little earlier. I used to hear it rarely, randomly. Any time--during the Highs or the Lows, more often during the nice, uber-rational, mostly emotion-free Numbs.
I'd hear the Voice, and to shut it up, give it shit-tons of reasons why I should not just kill myself. Not step in front of the D-train, or that speeding minivan. Reasons that always won the day. And did, until recently, I mean--who can kill themselves when the Star Trek franchise's received an infusion of fresh blood? Not me!
And that Voice has gotten quieter, over the past couple of months. I thought that might mean, whatever other things were going horribly, off-the-rails-wrong with me, I had that wee, death-hungry Voice beat.
Thing is, I've taken to muttering I should just kill myself aloud in idle moments. Some stressy moments, but mostly non-stressy. I've had to stop myself from doing it on the phone with customers.
("Unfortunately sir I can't look up your iPod warranty with your social security number or your driver's license number oh my god I should just kill myself because this is all this is all this is motherfucking all but may I have your phone number please area code first?")
So, I'm now saying what the Voice used to say sometimes, and sometimes the Voice, playing what I assume is Devil's Advocate, tells me why I shouldn't kill myself. But. Well. It's running out of good reasons and so'm I. The reasons used to be passable but now, they don't hold water.
But mostly, the Voice tries to sway me with logic--or the only kind of logic I'm capable of understanding with regards to my own occasional death-wish: you're tired. Life is tiring. It won't get any less so. Why put yourself through it? If you just kill yourself, you can rest. Forever. No more emotions so big, it feels like you're being ripped apart half the time. No more being afraid of what you might do in the grip of these emotions. Just kill yourself, and you can rest. Don't you want to rest?
I do. I really, really do. I'm tired, and I'm not especially motivated or strong. But for now, I'm also not there yet. Not ready to accept the Voice's logic. Or my own logic. Whomever's. My voice and the Voice are starting to say all the same things, and I really can't tell them apart anymore. Not all the time, anyway. But yeah.
I hear a Voice. It's no one else's but mine, in the end. Some better demon, or worse angel, sitting on my shoulder, dispassionately telling me how to solve every problem I'll ever have, the easy way. And sometimes, telling me why I shouldn't take the easy way out (though suicide takes, I imagine, a brass pair to go through with it). I dunno if anyone else--anyone else sane, that is--has such a Voice. But I do. It's my oldest friend, at this point. I can ignore it, shunt it to the side, but I can't not hear it. Not when it's always made so much sense, and life almost never has.
I can't see my GP for a referral soon enough. T minus five days, and counting. . . .
Guess what, though? The voice telling me to scrag myself and save all this damn effort of living? Ain't god. It ain't his evil brother Lazslo, either, so . . . I may be nuts, but at least, at long last, by logic, I am not a theist.
No comments:
Post a Comment