Tuesday, August 31, 2010

Dissonance

I get this interesting dissonance sometimes. Like my brain/mind/spirit/self becomes slightly detached from the outside world and lives internally for a bit. Usually it lasts a few minutes, a couple hours. Sometimes it lasts a few days, even a couple of weeks in a somewhat watered down form.
When it lasts just a few minutes, it's no bother.
When it's a few hours, I begin to get somehow itchy in myself. The disconnect wears on me, trying to live in both places at once.
When it's longer, the first while is tough; like it takes me a while to remember what's going on and that it's ok. I spend the first bit fighting the current, trying to snap the dislocation back into place. Once I settle into it, though, it's no bother. I kind of enjoy having to live slowly, contemplatively. It's almost a living meditation.
I imagine that on the outside it looks a lot like my depression often looks. It doesn't feel the same at all. Depression has an uneasy tang to it, a hint of desperation. Or sometimes I suppose my depression tastes of shut-down, of being switched off to everything, flat, matte, monotone.
The dissonance though; it's rich. There's this sweet melancholy. It reminds me of a baby's lips, when they pucker together. That tiny pinpoint of unbearable sweetness. Once I settle in, that is what the dissonance is. But it is internal. It is all about me and my senses and finding my own unbearable sweetness. It's about exploring the textures of the wrinkles of my brain and how the outside world fits into the crevasses.
So really, as Jack White put it, who's to say that I'm unhappy 'cause I rarely smile? I might not look like I'm having fun in the way most people would, but I'm sucking the marrow of life, my way.

2 comments:

Dejahmi by Beth Respess said...

i actually know exactly what you are talking about. for me it's almost like a state of awe. if we are talking about the same thing.

River said...

yeah. awe. basically. but in a syrupy, slowed down, 8 millimeter kind of way.
do you get it for extended periods of time as well?