Racing

My thoughts are constantly racing across, through, under, over and deep down in my brain. Especially at night. Sometimes weekly, usually less. And I forget to come here and write instead. It’s hard to make your brain remember that this would be more helpful when it’s the dead of night and it’s too quiet to do anything but think.

During the day I can find ways to occupy or distract myself. At night though, the more I try not to, the more my brain drills down; really just ruminates and grinds on something, anything, nothing. I never seem to gain any clarity or find a solution or a way through whatever it is. Honestly, at night and in the idle times when I spend too much time in solitude, I exacerbate the smallest, maybe harmless worry or problem. I work myself into a state of almost nausea, tingly fingers and chest, wild eyes and racing mind.

Sometimes I can lay wide awake or in a state of purgatory between waking and sleeping for hours. Hours! On those nights, I might find sleep in the early morning, seemingly just before my alarm sounds and it is so, so unsatisfying. On those mornings following fitful sleep, when I’m vertical and especially after I’ve left the confines of my house, whatever I was perseverating on seems less … consuming. Almost as if I dreamed that the battle raged.

Matters of the heart are a frequent source of my discontent and remain longer throughout the day than other conundrums because, unfortunately, I’m just not good at navigating relationships. I am currently trying not to penalize a good man for the sins of the ones who weren’t. I have a lack of positive experiences for sure but maybe even just lack of experience period? Unclear. This has never, ever been clear.

Work-related midnight wonderings definitely seem lesser in the morning light. For instance, I have an event this week, three nights from now, and I started perseverating on it last week. At night. I work on it all day at work and I am adequately if not overly prepared with very little left to do these next three days. And yet…and yet! I think about some of the details or the steps or the potential questions or the flow or the logistics, and I think about each of these things over and over and over. Sometimes complete thoughts but often I start to drift to sleep before I can gnaw down far enough, only to wake with a version of the same thought over and over again.

I’ll try to intentionally think about something else, another problem even, but it seldom works. I just move on to doing the same thing with that new thing though and, usually, I cycle back to the original or both or just keep adding more to the mix trying to overload the matrix so that I short circuit and have to shut down. If only I could force quit my brain! The too many open tabs analogy has never been more accurate.

I’ve spent nights worrying or over-analyzing or reliving awkward or powerful or scary or sad or frustrating interactions with others, perceived slights or wrongdoings, guilt over times when I am the slighter or the wrongdoer instead, my upstairs and next door neighbors and how loud and inconsiderate they are, what to say to them, how to say it, whether I’m too sensitive or if they really are willfully or blissfully ignorant. If I could afford to move. To sell. To rent this place out and rent or buy elsewhere. But I love my place and my location. Why should I have to move? Can’t I just insulate the ceiling or find a non-offensive way to get them to be less oblivious? How much would it cost to buy a beach house and live off the grid? What can I do to work remotely in perpetuity? Maybe it’s time for John and I to get a place together? But I like things the way they are.

I worry a lot of those restless nights about my parents, their age and health and safety and missing out on time with them by living here instead of there. Of what I could do for work to allow me to be there instead. Of how much time I have spent here on the earth and what I’ve done with it. Or not done with it. Whether I’m continuing to waste it or if I am motivated enough to make changes so that I don’t. Whether I am clinically depressed or just seasonally. Whether I have a clinical level of anxiety. Both? Whether I will ever meet someone that will value me and want to make time for me because they would rather be with me than do most anything else. Is John that person? Am I unsure because of what we have or because I am projecting the past onto the present? Is it actually too late to fall mutually in love for the first time at this age? Whether it’s actually too late to get married and start a family. Whether I actually want either of those things or if I just always thought and said that’s what I wanted because, you know, it’s what people do and I think I hurt far too much in wanting it for it not to be worth it. Right? Right? What if he doesn’t want that? The last one didn’t. At least not with me.

I think about how I would be able to live this life without either or both of my parents. About how I wouldn’t want to. About how I just wouldn’t. I think about what it might be like to have someone in my life that I could do it all with; if John were there all the time, to go through life with me for the trivial shit and the big moments. If it is possible that this relationship could allow me to withstand the loss of a parent or my brother, either of which render me unable to breathe at the thought. Real hit your knees, shit.

I think about g/God, religion, the origins of us, the purpose of us, why it even matters, who I am or what I do but also who am I and what should I do? Is it different from what I want to do? Why am I here? Why are any of us here? Am I a good person? What is a good person? Why do so many people and opinions and mannerisms and *lack* of manners annoy me so. damned. much? Why am I so judgmental? Am I judgmental? Do I annoy others? In what ways? Am I inconsiderate? Am I not as self aware as I think? Is this why I’ve always felt kind of alone? But also why I find comfort in it? What exactly is wrong with me? Nothing? Actually, wait, do I want to know the answer? To most of those questions?

How did I let myself get out of shape? Do I drink too much? Is it a problem? How would I know? Maybe I should have my liver tested. Then again, several people in my life drink as their primary social interaction, regularly to excess and repeatedly. Surely, I’m not as bad off as them. Why am I so nervous to walk away from a dude if he isn’t making enough time for me? Why isn’t it enough time? What is enough time? Am I accepting less than I deserve? Do I even have a clue what I deserve? Who even decides what that is?? Is it wrong to accept whatever it is with said dude because it’s so, so great when I am with him and it makes me happier than being alone-alone? I lean toward the latter and I think I actually feel guilty and slightly embarrassed about that. You know, in the age of renewed feminism and all.

Why do I become so emotional about the outcome of Steelers games? What will I ever do without my dad? I definitely do not want to know the answer to that last question. Ever. But it’s maybe the only one I care about. All of the others? I think I would really appreciate an answer to all of them. Please. Then I can sort through them and analyze. Probably drum up a whole new round of questions to ponder in the process though. So, never mind. I’m good.

How do you know you know?

See, the racing in my head just doesn’t stop. Ever.

Kind of like the fucking upstairs neighbors.

“I’ve learned less from daylight, than from night threatening to leave”

Music for the Mood: Try for Thunder – Chamberlain