Left hand of darkness (is a good book)

[catharsis_logs]

Today was a fairly good day. Eventful, but not memorable. I finished Left Hand of Darkness by Ursula K. Le Guin which was an excellent book, and sad, but in a kind of melancholic dulled (but not dull) way. Like being buried under snow for a long period of time, feeling it melt into your clothes. The intense uncomfort of the cold, and then the painful numbness of deadened skin. Except I didn't have the intense uncomfort of the cold, I just had the painful numbness. I had feeling, but it was wrong, and empty in a sad way. I feel like I'm under a blanket, being stifled with too many new experiences for the first time in a long time. I both look forward to, and dread when classes start.

I got some flash cards today for my Japanese class, I don't know how well they'll serve me, but they should do in the case of me needing to learn all of the hiragana and katakana within a certain time period.

I'm perpetually tired, and emptily bored. I need to go to Powell's tomorrow if I get a chance and buy the book that accompanies Left Hand of Darkness. That book just drew me way in, it was almost like reading a holy text. Isn't that essentially what our relationship with all holy beings is, first contact with an alien being? Perhaps an alien born out of a human womb, but an alien mind at the very least.

I'm also scared. I'll be a week without my abilify, before I can get more. This week. I don't want to kill myself. There, I said it, I'll put it in bold I don't want to kill myself I'll put it into bold and italics I don't want to kill myself I'll even put an underscore underneath it while it's in bold and italics I don't want to kill myself. At this point in time, I really don't want to kill myself. I can see the future coming up, and it looks kinda lonely, but also kinda content as well. I just need to get used to the now and not let myself get too depressed when (not if) the depression hits me. I'm hoping that the abilify won't be a variable that's too important, it's not like it's helping me a ton anyway (I'm hoping) but that's the thing about brain chemistry, sometimes you don't know when a drug is helping. Sometimes you have to have people tell you that yes, you are (seem) better than you were before.

The funny thing about my depression when I was younger, was that I didn't want to kill myself. I didn't want to exist, but I existed and I accepted that there was going to be no escape. I almost existed in an unhealthy zen state when I was depressed. I was nothing, I did nothing, I just curled up, and let my thoughts (or lack of) take me and smother me. I was so lethargic that even suicide seemed like too much work. At least I know how to explain that feeling now, that if I ever fall into that state, I'll at least have the capacity to say "I'm depressed, it is how it is. Now get me some damn help." I actually consider when I was that depressed to be a medical emergency. And I'm going to make sure and tell that to the SHAC official(s) that I'm going to be meeting tomorrow. I'm going to tell them (even though it's a health meeting not a counseling meeting, but I consider this to be medical in nature, and I'm hoping that they can at least keep an eye on me.) that I'm soon going to be off my meds, and that I need someone to keep a watch over me, someone anyone, to be observant, and to care. That's the problem with my new 'friends' they like me(I think) and I like them, but I get the feeling that they don't care. At least not to the extent of watching over me and figuring out when I'm super depressed and ready to kill myself. I don't really have that observant person at home either, but at least I DO have someone to go to, to hug, to lose myself for a second in them. (My dad, obviously)

I'm going to try and give it my all this term. Take my classes, study, learn, get some new friends and if it doesn't work out, I have an escape route, dropping out. I can always quit while I'm ahead, take a term off for a break and then (maybe) come back. In fact, I'll make this year a 'try' year. I want to try and get the most I can out of this year, to pick up and learn the ropes of life. If I fail this year, then I can go back home, get a job, and exist. I'm already looking forward to Thanksgiving break, if we even get one. :)

Comments

[enemyofperfect]

In fact, I'll make this year a 'try' year. I want to try and get the most I can out of this year, to pick up and learn the ropes of life.

I love this way of looking at it.

And I'm so glad you're planning ahead and making sure the people whose job it is to care about your health are kept informed. It's awesome that you're making friends, but I think it can take a while to get to the point of really being able to rely on someone.

I'm just going to go ahead and say: I don't want you to kill yourself, either. In fact, I would very much prefer that you stay alive. So to that end, please let me know if there's any help I can offer, okay?

Le Guin is an amazing author. On the topic of science fiction -- have you ever read anything by C J Cherryh? Some people bounce hard off her writing style, but I love her work (although I'm not sure it's ideal for reading when deeply depressed).

[catharsis_logs]

Thanks, it's nice to have someone say that. I know with so many people, that they don't want me to kill myself, but I don't talk about it enough (because of my shame of suicidal thoughts)to have my dad, say, or my sister, actually tell me that they don't want me to kill myself.

Yeah she is, and thanks for the recommendation. I actually went to powell's today and bought Cyteen, and once I'm finished with that (or its series) I think I might start on the Foreigner(?) series. I'd heard and seen that series before but I didn't really register the author's name and it didn't really draw me in. But I think, if I can ever find the first book in the series, that I'll give it a try thanks to your recommendation of the author. (It's always nice to have people share what books/authors they really like.)

I have a recommendation as well, have you ever read anything by Elizabeth Bear? I find her descriptions really beautiful and her worlds to be very interesting. I especially like Dust, by her. :)

[enemyofperfect]

It's tough how some of the things that most need talking about are also the things it's hardest to talk about. :/

Oh my gosh, Cyteen -- that book ate my brain. I still haven't gotten around to reading the sequel, and I'm not sure if that's because I'm afraid it won't live up to it, or because I'm afraid that it will. I'm behind in the Foreigner series too -- I think I'm up to number eleven? -- but I love those books so much. Well, in honesty, there's hardly anything of Cherryh's that I haven't loved. Ahaha, I could ramble about her books all day....

Elizabeth Bear, yes! I haven't read all of her work -- the sequels to Dust are still on my to-read list, for example -- but some of it is glorious. I can't remember... I think "Lucifugous" might have been one of the first of her stories that I fell in love with. Vampires and zeppelins and gorgeous characterization: what's not to love?

If you like Bear, have you read anything by her friend and sometimes co-author, Sarah Monette, and if not, can I recommend "A Night in Electric Squidland"? It's actually the sequel to "Blue Lace Agate", but while I'm normally kind of a purist about reading things in order, I think "Squidland" is the stronger story, and I don't regret having read it first myself.

[catharsis_logs]

Wow! Thanks for all the recommendations! I just got two books today (well four, but two of them are just fun-reads) that I adore already and I haven't even started either of them. I've just skimmed through them but their stories are very intriguing.

Look 'em up! They're called respectively:
1. The Dream of Perpetual Motion BY: Dexter Palmer
This one, ever since I read a little bit of it months ago, haunted me until it had me frantically searching the internet yesterday to find out what it was called and who wrote it so that I could find it and read it. Looks to be a really intense book. Sci-fi fic about a Zeppelin, a greeting-card writer that's slowly going crazy (or is he?) and the disembodied voice of the woman he loved.

2. Charlotte Markham and the House of Darkling BY: Michael Boccacino
This is a book about the afterlife, and a dead mother wanting still to raise her children. At least that's what I got from the back description. Plus I scanned through the book and my eye lighted upon a description of an octopus-man, or at least a man with tentacles. And who doesn't love octopi? (lol, only me, forever alone!~) Victorian Gothic tale. :)))

[enemyofperfect]

Both of those books sound fascinating! I admit that I'm curious about the distinction you draw between them and the mere fun reads, too.

Meanwhile, though -- oh my gosh, who could fail to appreciate our octopoid brethren? They're so interesting and nifty and intelligent! I mean!

[catharsis_logs]

Well, one of my supposedly 'fun' reads isn't all that 'fun' though it's more 'mainstream' than anything he's written before it's still a pretty heavy read. I'm embarrassed by it though because it's by an author that my dad dislikes, XD. It's called The Fall of the Towers by Samuel R. Delany :/ And it's not about 9/11 (as I thought it might, it's about a culture that sprung up after 'The Great Fire' which was apparently something that irradiated the entire planet except for little islands here and there.

Then there's Blood Rights by Kristen Painter that's pretty purple-prosed-fanciful in a not totally great way but I'm reading it just to read something not as heavy as the rest of the stuff I have queued for my 'pleasure' and for school. :)

I know right!? They're so great, one of my favorite animals. :D

[enemyofperfect]

Oh my gosh, Delany! At first I was stunned at the idea that anyone could not like him; then I remembered that he's written several books that are pretty widely viewed as, well, off-putting. The worldbuilding in the few books of his I've read so far is amazing, though.