Now that I had arrived back home it seems I would now be able to move on with my life, maybe go back to school, get a job – rather than lay around Albuquerque trying to fit in with punk rock artists but falling short by drawing help with rent from a few Marilyn Manson fans. All they ever said was that they were having more fun than me. They must’ve been doing real well for themselves considering I was very depressed just wanting to “sleep to death,” to just kick away the day and dream for eternity. The more I flopped the less flipped out I felt about not having friends around, family especially. But when I was back home and did have them around the only thing that changed was I had people around who knew me before depression. For the first few weeks I would wake up joyfully with static electricity around me that zapped me out of bed, then I would do a pirouette, and like a magnet to metal I’d be right back to smiling into my pillow which I suppose could be considered change as well, smiling.
Well the smiling and electricity didn’t last long for anyone to consider me well enough alone. There was a lot of concern for my well being as I lay there living as an escapee, freed from having been free from home. The furthest thing from my mind was that I could’ve been without a roof over my head and food, if I was not so lucky. It was a slow decline over six months where I couldn’t work, where it must’ve seemed I wouldn’t. Family knew something was out of sorts since normally I didn’t sleep midday while everybody else was swimming or skiing or fishing or sitting upright comfortably somewhere.
Two years prior I was right in the thick of it all, in the pudding so to speak, wallowing in nature and culture, experiencing the best of both worlds and for that I was the Great Appreciator. I was from the north, out east were the Great Originators and out west the Great Communicators. I could say this now because I had experienced our differences and by doing so I could now communicate original thoughts. But what I wouldn’t do was communicate to my mother and sister how appreciative I was for a place to stay and companionship.
It wasn’t just sleeping that revealed my depression, I was starting to physically slow down in my waking moments. At its apex I would go on short walks down a long pier and would entice myself to continue on to at least dip my feet into the reviving water but I would again fall short because getting wet seemed so tepid and not invigorating, like extra steps that were impossible to take. If I went beyond the jetty I would no longer be fighting for each step but would be fighting for air or my life because I had forgotten how to enjoy both. I needed to realize how far I had come and that the air and sun and water were there for me now and would also be available a hundred feet from here. I think what kept me coming out to the pier, besides it being right out my doorstep, is that a remarkable thing had happened one evening during sunset upon returning home. When being beseeched by the sinking sun to gaze into its swirling and burning blue center, while the sky gave way to observable beauty, I looked away. I looked away so fiercely that the paisley blue dot was all I couldn’t see. The amorphous yet orange sky had afforded me 360 degree vision with two quick turns of my head. It was like a panoramic freeze frame tracer or almost like having vision with your eyes closed but instead of darkness it was light. I wanted to return there.
Francis Erich McElroy 