Half Way Progress Report
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(or: How to Have Fun with Your Most Hideous Moments)

(or: Motley Thoughts, Black Holes and Mild Exultations)

I venture into this book with closed and lifeless
eyes, because I am afraid of finding in others what I
dread to find in myself.

I venture into this book keen-eyed and alert,
because I am sure of finding in others what I hope to
find in myself.

Oops. Perhaps the chaos inside is visible. I’d better
hide. But what if somebody sees me? The only thing
worse than being discovered is to be discovered *hiding.*
The mind is a crazy place; dangerous territory.

Where is the reset button on this machine?

When will amnesty be declared?

Piss and moan. Bitch and Begrudge. Poor sport.

Tonight I go out of my way to ensure that
everything is just as bad as I think it is. I want to hurt
exquisitely, because it identifies my uniqueness and is
better than hurting without distinction. My paranoia
glows with a light of its own, and Oh my, the baddies
are out again tonight.

A few moments ago, I took this little depression
I’m having here outdoors for inspiration. There are
flowers and trees and mountains and valleys out there,
and sometimes it works. Tonight it rained and my pen
dried up. This problem has nothing to do with
paraplegia.

My Sense of Deepest Personal Tragedy is grandly
romantic. I imagine myself to be on the Very Rim of
Darkness, the Last Edge of Light. Walls of Trivia
confront and confound me. I am having a Wonderful
time being Deliciously Morose.

Still ... I once heard of a quad who bit his thumb
to spasm his wrist out of an uncomfortable position.
Can I spasm my psyche?

Sure. Just take a little Transmutation of Energy
potion, and all that negativity changes valence and
becomes unstoppable positive energy.

It starts slowly. There is a tentative, almost furtive
reach of hope. But hoping, says my Internal Central
Security Censor, Cynic and Spoilsport, is the most
childish of sins. It’s like praying to God for candy
instead of grace.

**Doing** is much, much easier than hoping, because
you get something done. Now that’s profound. Really.

**Doing** can be instigated by negative events and
feelings just as well as by positive ones.

**Doing** results from interest, attraction, hope, love.

**Doing** results from disinterest, repulsion, fear, hate.
Is one set neurotic, yet not the other?

**Doing** is what we need to do.

What shall I do? A project, a prospect, a love, a
life, a job, a journey? They all contain threats equal to
their promise, so I constantly meet both ends of the
stick head on—the joy/sorrow bleepstick of life. I'm
beginning to like it.

Ecstatic rape.

A sense of humor. A sense of privilege. That’s the
ticket. It’s not such a warped idea, either, this sense of
privilege. Do you know anybody you’d trade lives with?
Not bodies, legs, or jobs or wives, but *lives*? Your own
identity?

Gratuitous information department: Did you know
that you can become unafraid of fear? You can. I know.
I’ve done it. Fear is like a headache; if it happens, it
happens. But there’s nothing *scary* about it. Not any
more. That much, at least, has been accomplished.

Lethargy and energy seem like opposites, but they
actually require equal amounts of Lethenergy to
manifest themselves. Do you have lethenergy? Yeth.

Enigma pie.