I came into this world gasping
Strangled by my own umbilical cord
I came into this world blue
Fighting for the tiniest breath

Yes, I was born dying

I was born blue.

Thinking about adding
some old boyfriends
on facebook

I'm curious if they're fatter
smarter or balder than they were before

I wonder if they care to see
if I am fatter, saner, or pretty than before

Do they ever enter my name into search engines
just to see what comes up?
Do they ever wonder what happened to me
on slow and rainy Sunday afternoons?

Every psychic I have ever been to
said I would fall in love with and marry a friend
That someone in my life would come back
That my future husband would catch a glance of me
standing in a pool of sunlight
and realize his past mistakes

Then we'd live happily ever after

As much as I want men to follow me
to search for strands of my hair in the grass
I can't help but not trust in fate
and leave a trail of breadcrumbs
wherever I go, just in case

Maybe I'm Not As Bad As I Thought

I'm reading a memoir right now about Borderline Personality Disorder. Or should I say, about a woman who has BPD. It's the second such book I've read and there's one thing I keep hearing myself mumble as I turn the pages -- "this doesn't really sound like me."

I also have started going on BPD support websites and again and again I keep finding myself doubting the diagnosis. In therapy I stop my counselor often and say, "no I haven't done that in years. Not since I was 23 or so." She folds her hands and says slowly, "well maybe you're further in recovery than you think."

I don't know what to think of that, of any of this. I read about women who can't work, who are unable to get out of bed, who are unable to deal with the tiniest tasks in life. And sure, I've had periods like that but they've been abbreviated. A day here, a weekend there. But still I get up on Monday mornings and go to work and I still pay my own bills and take care of myself. I don't fall apart if my counselor isn't around to answer my calls (in fact, I've never felt the need to speak to them outside of session.) I just don't know. I feel almost bad even saying the words but... I just don't seem as fucked up as other people.

It's not meant as a judgment and the very fact of it confuses me. When I was diagnosed with BPD, I was in a mental hospital after my fifth suicide attempt. I was twenty-three. It was eight years ago, almost to the day. Does the shoe still fit?

My friend called me the poster child of BPD but yet after attending the BPD conference at Yale, he said to me "you're not really that fucked up." Maybe my skin is thicker than I thought. I don't fly into blind rages, I rarely truly act on crazy impulses, and I've learned to temper my needs. I have periods of depression and I certainly am triggers often but yet... even as much as I can fall to pieces.... it's just not as bad as other people I see.

What do I do with this? Do I feel superior? Do I throw away the entire diagnosis? So many characteristics still apply. But now with the ADD diagnosis, I have to wonder. With ADD, I'm unable to focus on thoughts and be productive --- is BPD just a form of ADD but.... with emotion?? The same way thoughts can storm in my mind and cloud rationale I also feel about feelings. Is it all related? All just about.... not being able to untangle clutter in my brain?

I want to strip away diagnoses and look at actual behavior and thought patterns. I don't think I want to say I'm a borderline anymore. It doesn't feel right anymore. I don't know. There's some sort of change in the air, in my veins, in my brain... and I'm jsut waiting to see where I land.

a friend writes of butterflies
wielding chainsaws
husqvarnas tearing at stomach walls

texas massacre
on the backs of loggers
winged insects
hummingbirds bring up the rear

stampeding, but on wings
those butterflies
and their chainsaws
armies of fluttering
confused with softness

you make me hard
as the fall comes
you make me hard
as the love leaves
the trees scream
they all turn red

and those butterflies
wielding those chainsaws

make paper, bleed into pens
punk rock my punctuation

hummingbirds giving blow jobs
in the backseat
of rented saabs

those fucking butterflies
with those fucking chain saws

leather faced, cocaine fueled
monarched yellow and orange
cocoons split

pupas desolated
you are no longer
benign excitement
you are no longer
malignant anxiety
you are those mother fucking

butterflies
wielding those chain saws

running out of gas
breaking your chains
tossed to the side
metal clank
they wield them well
but they cannot

juggle

they keep telling me
that i should sing

shaking hands with strangers
just stepped from the stage

they keep telling me
that i should sing

i remind them of beth ditto
of janis herself
of pink
of a screaming banshee

they keep telling me
that i should sing

i don't think i have the right
til I understand the music

Sped up
just to slow down

I pass the days
pressed against
the inside of capsules
tripping on microbeads

15 hours
15 hours of sleep

running in my dreams
falling to my knees

I wake
just past three
hands empty
arms bruised

attention
deficit
amphetamine
flawed

Hi, my name is Janice, and I have Borderline Personality Disorder.

If you google "Janice Brabaw" you're going to get several types of search results. Most of them pertain to my poetry career and my books and the other links will lead you to my professional accomplishments working as a freelancer in film and television. As much as I'd like to maintain some sort of separation between the two, I can't. It's something I'm aware of every time I get a call for a new gig. I wonder if my new boss did a search for me on the web and I wonder how many jobs I may lose out on because of what they may find. Most people don't have their psychiatric background splashed all over the interwebs.

If it wasn't for my poetry, I never would have been so public about my issues with mental health. Honestly, at first it was a marking ploy to sell some books at a time when I cared less about poetry and advocacy and sanity then I did selling some books to make some money to pay my rent. I threw together "Universe, Disturbed" in a weekend and added "depression" and "borderline personality disorder" as key words on Amazon when it was listed. I never expected everything that came from the publication of that book. The performances, becoming part of the NYC Poetry Circuit, the reviews, the accoldates, the book signings, the press releases.... and mostly, people throwing their arms around me thanking me for writing the book because it helped them. Helped them? How can I possibly help anyone? I put together a book of poems I wrote about wanting to kill myself and being a miserable teenager. How could that sort of angsty poetry help anyone? But more and more that's what I got. People thanking me for putting words to their pain, for making them feel less alone. It was beautiful, it was shocking, and it was humbling.

I was praised as being brave -- for talking to my hometown newspaper about past suicide attempts, for reading a poem about being raped in my college bookstore, to being honest about my unstable relationships and heartbreaks. I talked about being fat, about being unwanted, about having horrible self esteem and hairy legs. I did all of this without considering the consequences. I thought of other women who had written about their personal struggles -- Elizabeth Wurtzel, Susana Kaysen, etc etc -- and felt I was amongst the shameless and brave. But then .... as much as I am a writer with a message and a mission, I'm more than that. Suddenly I realized it wasn't just strangers that were learning about me (a thought that didn't scare me at all) but that I was standing naked in front of my childhood friends, my small hometown community, my family, my coworkers and announcing loudly "HEY I'M MENTALLY UNSTABLE. I'M A GIANT FUCKING MESS! COME LOOK AT MY DIRTY LAUNDRY!"

And I started to pull back into myself and think "why the FUCK did I do that?"

I was ashamed and scared and embarrassed. I had dreams about being in a classroom and having to get up in front of everyone and use a toilet in the middle of the room, everyone watching and judging. Dreams about being naked in a glass box in Times Square and unable to hide. So many eyes, so many words, so many abandonments and rejections and mocking laughter....

I thought that the world - both public and personal - would praise me for being honest. But I never considered the consequences.

I never considered that forever in the matrix of the internet my name would be linked to mental illness. I'd never be able to fully reinvent myself, or step away from stigma. What do most people remember about Sylvia Plath? Her head in the oven, not her poetry. I had not only labeled myself but permanently branded myself. Every man I date can read about my deep dark secrets online or buy it on Amazon. Every employer can google my psychiatric history. All of that is fine to poet Janice, to performer Janice, to artist Janice. But what about future employee Janice? Future daughter in law Janice?

On Facebook I try to maintain some sense of public and privacy. There is my "professional" list and my "BPD" list. I try not to post to my former coworkers about the days I ranting about not being able to get out of bed. But at the same time, I want to tell them about my writing, my advocacy, my performances. Never more was this so achingly apparent as when I was asked to speak at Yale. I wanted everyone I knew I was going... but not necessarily why.

I'm reading Kiera Van Gelder's book, The Buddha and the Borderline and I understand the the need for professional, public women to say "I have this disorder, I struggle, this is what it is." That is how awareness is spread, it is how we with mental illness will fight stigma. But I also need struggle with the other aspects of my life -- I don't want some accountant to think twice about hiring me on a movie because of my history. And its embarrassing sometimes! Imagine a star at the bottom of your resume that says "also has a major psychiatric illness." How do I prove to them, to new friends, to MYSELF that I am more than my case files?

So, this is the thing. It's already out there. My writing, my history, my diagnoses. I need to stand by them and continue to be vocal and to help other people to understand. I think of those with AIDS or who are bipolar or who have other stigmatized conditions. I'm not particularly brave -- in fact, if anything, I'm kinda stupid. I'm not even that honest and it's not exactly even a selfless act to talk about my condition -- I am just seeking understanding. It is a way to vent, a way to express myself. And as I write this, it's probably not healthy for me to try to be too many things to too many people. I don't want to splinter who I am.

So... my name is Janice Brabaw and I have borderline personality disorder. I also have attention deficit disorder and I struggle with major depression. I am one of two million people in this country with BPD. BPD is, at the heart of the disorder, the inability to regulate emotion. I have rabid mood swings and have very "thin skin." I am overly sensitive and have horrible separation anxiety. I have good days and I have bad days. I very prone to depression. I have tried to kill myself in the past and one of the signs of BPD is self destructive behavior -- cutting, eating disorders, sexual addictions, drinking, gambling, drugs... my vice has always been food. One of the reasons I am obese. Because of this disorder, I am in pain... a lot. I can be needy and clingy and quite often very illogical and unreasonable in my personal relationships. I have trouble being alone. I am better than I was and sometimes getting out of bed is more than I can bear. I take medication, I go to therapy, I lash out sometimes, I hate myself quite often, and perhaps need a bit more TLC, attention, and validation of love in friendships and relationships.

I am also a writer, a poet, a publisher, a film accountant, a performer, a daughter, a lover, a cat lady, an amazing friend, a fantastic girlfriend, a farm girl turned city girl turned suburban girl, a Pisces, an ADD case, a good driver, a decent singer, a hard worker, a great cook, a binger, a collector of self help books, a dedicated employee, a ruminator, a bitch, a crazy girl, a fat girl, a bubbly girl, a professional, a cigarette smoker, a best friend, a sister, a daughter, an aunt, a niece, a student, a client, a patient, etc etc etc

So yes, public and private world --- coworkers and writers and family and friends and childhood neighbors and teachers --- I have a major psychiatric illness. But I am also Janice Brabaw -- with all the good and bad that it entails.

I really never thought the day would come that you'd be out of my life. I guess that's the biggest upset - the shock. I mean I trusted you in ways I have never trusted anyone before, with feelings and memories and thoughts I never thought I'd share with anyone. I thought we were family, I thought we had bonded in a deep, spiritual way. I had never been so sure of anything before. With no lover, no other friend. I found home in you, I found comfort, and I fell into myself. I let me be me - ugly, beautiful, contorted, loving, selfish, depressed, ecstatic --- I freed myself and you encouraged it.

And now you're gone.

A thousand times a day I remember the stabbing pain of reading your text saying how your life is so much better without me. I try to understand what I ever did to deserve that. I blamed myself for a really long time and I contorted myself to try to win you back. But honestly.... I dont' think I was ever that bad. I loved you, I would have died for you, I was a good and honest and caring friend. I accepted your faults and encouraged you in your endeavors. I had bad times -- I had wretched dark nights and I'm sure I rattled you a bit -- but to say that your life is better without me? Like I was a disease, some sort of fungus, an infection.... after all I did for you?

To say that our friendship was fake. And that it all meant nothing. That I meant nothing.

It sounds melodramatic and if I were you I'd assure me that I am wrong. But I honestly don't know if I ever can ever bear to be that open and honest with anyone else ever again. Losing you -- having you simply throw me away and turn you back -- has torn me apart. It has left this black disease in my heart and my self esteem is about as low as it could be. That's how fucked up this whole thing is. I should be mad at you, i should blame you.... but I can't. I hope everytime my phne rings that it's you to tell me you're sorry. I simply do not want to believe that you -- that you that I knew and loved and trusted -- could turn into this person you apparently are now.

If someone like you could turn on me, become so cold..... then I don't believe I could ever let anyone else in again. I am sealing the holes n my heart, barricading all doors, and hoping I can make it through this storm.

How does one simply stop caring? overnight?

I don't love me
but I love you
however, that's not enough
for either one of us

I have one leg
You have two
You offer me a steady arm
i instead, take your leg

We both fall over

I don't have dreams for me
I dream for you
I awake sweating, and desperate
You are wet and clammy, through no fault of your own

I bleed
You apply peroxide, bandages
I forget to breathe
Knowing you'll inhale

I fall down
You begin to pick me up
Then think again
Leave me to crawl, to cry

You teach me to fish
not to steal your bait
A younger me would call it cruel
Now I call it kindness

.... eh shitty poem in progress.....

my heart turned inside out
like mango clinging to its skin
backbended, split open
theirs to sink their teeth into
to feed on

you quiet me
you shutter me down, you
release the gaskets
you remind me that I don't need
to scream like that little girl
I once was
that I can stop this
anytime I want

i writhe and then settle
breathe
and hope you can see
that I am constantly getting better
even when
i fall apart

Rejection
Tastes like morning cigarette breath
And bile on your tongue

Stomach acid coating
Your teeth
Its time to crawl

You’re two years old again
Inching along the floor
Tears lubricating the wood under your skin

Howls and screams
No longer produce gentle arms
Just the suggestion of fear, brings no rescue

Indignant that this world would knock you down
Pissed off that no one comes running
Balled up fists beat the door jambs

As you lay
As you lay
As you just lay there
In that puddle of you
In that reduction of your soul
Your blood, your piss, your spit
Your tears, your vomit, your own sweat

A knock at your door
You can only whisper
“I am in here, this is where I am”

I’m afraid
I can’t come to the phone
Right now.

Perhaps I spend too much time
Storming heart first into Morrissey tragedy
When I should be dancing in the rain
Toward Jack Johnson love
Soft, innocent, sweet….

Why do I lean toward darkness
When trees are meant to crave the sun
I find special, I declare my chemicals
Run contrary to nature
I find myself on shelves
With greats, with the misunderstoods
With the shotgunned, the ovened, the praised
The fallen young, the … others

The queen of hearts
With her queer painted mouth
Muses, decides, then sneers
Yes, it is better to be feared
Than to be loved

The queen of hearts
Isn’t always your best bet
Not if you want it to be over
Just yet

I fell in love with you
Drunk, sitting on my broken-tiled
Brooklyn floor
A party roared around us
We listened to Pink Floyd
You closed your eyes
And fell into Comfortably Numb
And for the first time in my life
Or at least for the first time in years
I felt I had found my home

Billie holliday
In the early afternoon
a/c whirls, and my mind distills
it’s almost tequila time
vampire skin bakes in june sun
I drink, I miss, I will myself to grow

Come rain or come shine
She silks in my ear

Yes, come rain or come shine

I was drunk on
Pineapple, apricot, and champagne
Floating in the Atlantic
Holding my nose
Like a little girl
The sun was setting slowly
As vacation suns are paid to do

I looked back at the shore
And the light hit the waves
Casting the sand silver in its wake
Then within a breath of the earth
It returned to beach to light summer tan

My tears are not as salty as the ocean
They do not sting as much
Nor leave my eyes as red
So I have found
It is a good place to cry

Like bleeding in water
It is unfelt, it tendrils in the froth
Wisked away before seen
Sorer to be sure, but safer to the un-promised

I am alone in the salt, the surf
A young couple bounce and giggle
Twenty feet away
I pretend they and their love do not exist
And they ignore my solitude and stench
Of hearts broken
Dreams shaken, identity stolen

I make you think
With me, you sink and engage

Relativity over martinis
I don't blink an eye

And you find me
Intriguing

And collapsible

At the end of the day
You walk me to my car

And return to the shallow
The hollow
The easy answers

The concept of small talk
The exhilaration of conquest

I figure out how to walk tight ropes
And drive on the solid yellow line
Without blinking

Mr yorke and I
Walk on the shore

I ask him how he can find
Such beauty in such sadness

I've been living
The bends
On and off
My entire life

I say

Young women first go insane
Around the age young men
Find themselves wanting to save them

Problem is
Crazy is only fun in short bursts
And sex can only go so far

The men move on
And the women stay mad

Move on to younger men
Paint their baggage in different light

Sad is sad is sad
And if you keep crying --

Wolf

The firemen stop coming
With their ladders and
Trampolines

They change
Before your eyes
To white coats
And needles

And I cannot live in theory
In art, in poetry
Even if I am more in touch

Even if I am an alien
Amongst you walking pods

I have bills to pay
There are concessions you make
If you don't leap off the fifteenth floor
And as always
Before love, before passion
Comes the rent.

I sit deep in jersey sand
And even through
Darkened plastic lenses
I see them


My thighs
Loose and white
Appear as war victims
Scars run across their expanses
I have been sliced
Mutilated
I wonder if others see them

Razor slashes
Red and angry
Against pale soft
Pillowy thighs
So bright and screaming
In early afternoon sun

I attempt to cover them
Self consciously with my arms
But in the bright
I can see the past there too
Up and down my left forearm
Scars I thought had disappeared
Returned to life
Like invisible ink
Under a black light

I run into the ocean
Before anyone can see

I've come to regard
The twangs and twinges
Of falling in love
Like the first signs
Of an illness

The longing, the butterflies
Fluttering in a dizzy belly
The lack of concentration
Blurred vision
And the dread of realizing
That soon I will be missing work
Relegated to my bed
To moan and groan
Shaking and crying
wondering if death would
Feel nicer than this flu

I imagine its what detox is like
This falling in and crashing out of love
In the hell of it, I make promises
To eat right, lots of vitamin c
Avoid others use purell
I can't take the memories
And the missing

I just wish I had been stronger
That I could control my heart
My immune system
My emotions, my disease
My anything, really

I don't ever want
To fall in love
With the wrong person again
This unrequited bullshit
Burns like an ulcer in my gut

And I fear it will eat a hole in my guts
My soul

I write poems
that everyone reads

that many appreciate

except the ones
they are written for

written about
bled for
bled about

I write poems
on the back of cereal boxes
under my bed
on clean kotex pads
in pickle slices
on my torn cuticles

with
cracked pepper
insulted salt shakers
broken heart fragments
scattered chances of showers
mislead school girls
kidnapped puppy dogs
with a dash of

sugar and spice
and everything
nice

I listen to Radiohead and Sia
wish you'd walk through the door
or someone like you

used to be

someone like I thought you were

maybe someone
I just imagined

????

who knows

but I'll go back to writing poems
with

tar on tree bark
with rug burn
on new lovers's knees

with
broken bottles
flecked bloodied spit
with

vengeance and hope
malice and sauce in the corner
of my mouth
with

dreams and wine
and
and

it's a matter of what it's without
i suppose

with me it's always that matter
something is always the matter
because that's the way i roll
that's the way i rot
a baby that cannot comfort itself
or articulate it's needs
a

horse without a tail
or that is at least blind to it
or

I write poems
to get over you
to get over it
to live
to scratch these itches
to satisfy these mad men
who live behind my eyelids
under my nail beds
that demand

type type type type type

as loudly as they demand

bleed bleed bleed bleed bleed

I'm hoping someone
will fall in love with me
through my poems

call me a genius, peer into my windows
for a glance of me writing
smoking
fucking
dreaming
falling

again

Can't someone examine my wares
and demand to see what I hide
in the back room,
offer to pay top dollar?

I don't know if I am a woman
that normal men can hold
I doubt my charm, my appeal
I send out centaurs
I reverberate vibes
and write living wills
when I feel I am about to die

I eat cheese doodles
til they crust my finger nails
I drink wine until my lips
blister, turn purple,
tumble to the floor
and I send them to you
with a self addressed
stamped envelope
with strict instructions

to please return them
when you are through
as well as my heart
my head
my soul

sprinkle liberally
with rock salt and curdled lye
stab the heart to make sure
it does not bleed through
cardboard, so the folks
at the post office
do not question

I don't think anyone
can ever fall in love with me
for more than a few seconds
but perhaps they can encircle
my poems, and allow them to touch their soul

Woke up
Feeling ugly
And old
Walked to the beach
To watch the sun rise
Found that day
Had already broken
And the sand
Was littered
With hand holding
Snuggling couples
I turned round
And gave up
That dream
Of solitary
Daybreak
On solitary sand

The blessing
And curse
Of having
Close friends
Is that the really
Good ones
Deny u finding
Truth in
Your own
Lies

The stories
We tell ourselvs
The creatures we
Create
Are shaken from
The pages
Like stray ants on
A picnic newspaper

And once confronted
Once the curtains are
Pulled back
Once we are seen so naked
A spotlight on you
But blinding you
From the crowd

Once all the
Self deception is
Stripped away
We stand shaking
Frightened
Exposed
And can only
Whisper

You are right.

are we all just writing
to find our own epitath

and if we don't pick it
will someone else ever pick
just the right one?

oh, it's roaring, hank
it's roaring loud and clear
i don't need your loose women
i don't need your postal clerk blues
i don't need any of that ennui
seems i got my own

i think it's the ugly that speaks loudest
the muffled voice from gutters
from suburbs
from darkened brooklyn windows
i don't mean to have an edge
but yet i make you bleed

yeah it's roaring, hank
but i don't think it'll do no good
neil and i got a pact, you see
tonight we're staying up all night
eyes dry but open to sight

lose the sleep

you are a staggering guitar
growing intensity
your tongue a spear
a sticky pistol of poison
and subdued charcoal flavors

tonight is the sort of night
that pretty girls die in car wrecks
their drug store lip gloss
tossed out of broken windshields

nixon is coming back from the dead
and you still can't play a single riff
your window overlooks deer and gravel
and i can't get my damn cat
to return in from the grass

yeah, it's that kinda night
you're that kinda guy
and guess who will lose
the sleep
tonight

bukowski's daughter

hey, bukowski
are you home tonight, you old fuck?

i just can't help
but think
that i
could've been
your daughter

you were the one that said
"some people never go crazy...
what truly horrible lives
they must have lived."

what would you have thought of me?

neil young night

i want you to listen to tori amos with me
but it's a neil young night
and i'm all alone

i'm craving that lobotomy again
so annoyed with myself
i have such a penchance for unrequited love

fucking up everything around me
i punch the cruise control
and point the car toward concrete walls

you're not in that dive bar anymore
it's not the best place to wait for me
in fact, i don't know where you are
i just have an endless list
of everywhere you're not.

or maybe you aren't anywhere,
just a ghost in my mind, a misperception
maybe a failed communication
a dream gone awry or one of those unanswered prayers
the happy people go on and on about.

i'm just so sick of the ones-who-have
telling me how to handle my i-have-not
and i'm tired of asterisks next to my name
and after thirty years still being the one
who feels the need to explain

he called me a genius again
not everyone can have that
perhaps there has to be some
torture to find the truth
and in my melodramatic, egocentric way
i bend my head to keyboard
and think to myself over darkened, flying fingers

it's just another thing
that is so much nicer to read about
than to feel, than to live with
than to try to paint pink and
assign positive adjectives

i can't even feel self pity anymore
because it's so cliche
so used like april lilacs
and albatrosses around callused necks
there is nothing fucking new under the sun
just holes in the ozone
and an acceleration of sound

i never wanna hear you say

i never wanna hear you say
that the freckle on the
inside of my thigh
reminds you of venus or
stars burnt out and

falling
tumbling
to earth
or other far away
melon-scented
grass-stained lumps
of underappreciated land

i've been running from something
by calling it racing toward
ticket stubs pile up in torn pockets
i just gotta face the fact
that you can't be here tonight
even if you wanted to

if i can't leave a memory
perhaps i can leave a scar
i think that's how my mind works
when i'm afraid of being free

what i miss about love

what i miss about love
has nothing to do with cigarettes
and wine stains on rented carpets

what i miss about love
doesn't make me feel ugly, or fat, or unwanted
even if the feeling is unintended

what i miss about love
lies in bed with me without struggle or complaint
a partner in my pillow fort, under a canopy of stars

what i miss about love
has less to do with you than it used to
than maybe perhaps it ever did

Bitter
I drove
past the stewart's where
i craved a root beer float
I drove,
making the left turn
onto yet another street
whose name I haven't bothered
to learn

Bitter
I drive
not missing cigarettes
not missing even you
time has frozen but trips
it skips and folies and rehashes
elementary school stories
it remembers dreams of
an imaginary bank, cathedral ceilings
a painting stories-high
of a face i can't recognize

Bitter
I realize I'm blown my heart
and the alocation of caring is spent
apathy sets in and I won't love you
even if I saw you fade and die before
Not until the spell, the dream has passed
I can't and I don't know how and it's like
I'm no longer able because it's overload my circuits
shut down my neurotic mind
my brain focuses, an aperature closing
I can only think of breath
of fruit juice, of the scent of grass in the air

I won't lie on the floor
for fear that
I won't ever get up

- a new but old one written in a particularly sad, depressed time


I was cycling, hard
disregulated, disembobulated
evil-spell caught
and caught up in the stream
of negativity
that the broken faucet
in my mind
occasionally spurts and spews

i said
"why would anyone love me?
why would anyone want to spend time with me?
when i'm probably just going
to off myself by the time i'm 35 anyway"
and it startled us both
a psychic hand over my mouth
i couldn't back-peddle
and the words fell to the ether

we both pondered the truth
the perception, the power of the
self-fulfilled prophecy
and returned the old fear
that my mind is going to kill me
that my heart is going to splinter
and shattered and slice everything inside
the feeling that hyde will plunge
a sharpened letter opener
deep into jeckyl's aorta
or vice versa
in order to save the world

i laid my head on the desk
and the depressed exhausting returned
a phone call, a text, a reassuring hand on the shoulder
it'll pass, it always does
into inner chambers i retreat and sleep
waiting for the time i open my eyes
and find the dawn has broken
the fever has disapated
and I am back to me again

sometimes i think
i don't give a shit about other people
most don't interest me
most annoy me
and in my head i constantly bitterly judge
i think of my friend
describing his evil, cunty landlord
"I just don't think she's ever been happy"
and I cringe
hope someday that won't be me
barking at my dogs at 6 am
mowing the lawn before others wake
just to know that i put a dent
in their perhaps perfect mornings

saw a young couple
laughing, smiling, absorbing sun
pushing a new baby stroller
down watts street
blissfully ignoring
unaware
of the half-mile long length
of cars lined up for the holland
where i sat
watching
and crying

on the other side of the galaxy
things twine, twist, twice-rebound
flattening and fattening
crashing and exhausting
cat-calling and dreaming of
lost childhood best friends
foot long hot dogs
and purple balloons set to the breeze

my mama says times square
reminds her of the gouverneur fair
and i can't help but laugh
she says guinness tastes like
cold, bitter coffee
i giggle, but can't help but agree

and on the other side of the galaxy
we can't see the end
even with hubbles and trillions spent
we can't see the edges
because time and space are relative
and without an observer, without perception
it all curls back on itself, it bends
into tightly curved tendrils
past, present, future end
and i'll suddenly understand
the series finale of lost

:)

i tried to explain to you
one breathless morning
that it's like waking up from a spell

but kissless
and without prince charming

Like someone opens a valve
and the steam streaks out
whistling, highpitched, and screaming

then the wilting
the shaking of the head

it's like opening your eyes
to a psychological hangover
and not remember the night before

it's finding mr. hyde's ticket stub
in your dr. jeckyl wallet
a blood stained playbill
a bullet lodged in your shoe

great
if only
in my own mind

loved
if only
in distant hearts

i drive to the lake
to the center of cornered towns
past houses where you don't live
and where I can't sleep
anymore

cigarettes on the back of my tongue
razorblade barbs on my chin
paintless nails
suitcases of yesterday
strapped to my back
a pack
mule

forcing exuberance
and most other gestures
and emotions
that will miss your gaze
once again

up before the sun
awakened to dawning birds
i peer out into the twilight
making out the pink flowers in the garden
the white fogline of the early road
wondering where that distance owl rests
and whose bed you fell into tonight

you don't read the words i write for you
you are ignorant to the bliss, the depth, the turbulence
i am not worth a double click, an opened book
loved but not loved, pages not turned
you don't have time or gravitation to perchance
and i consider return to my disturbed slumber

i'm not that girl anymore
low cut and swooning
across beer-stained bar room floors

i'm not that girl anymore
with sideways boozy eyes
praying for an errant hand, a captured gaze

i'm not that girl anymore
slinking through brooklyn streets
a big fish in a big pond only in my mind

i'm saved, you see
i was caught and carefully dusted off
returned to my feet

i'm saved, you see
secure and sane in suburban lawns
found a god in the grass and the dandies

i'm saved, you see
sold a bill of clarity, solidity
but still falling apart just smaller pebbles

and a lot more drifting dust

it's a hard love to sit still for
it's a hard love to break away from
i want to dance around the world with you
discuss the tiniest nuances of life
tucked under a white cotton blanket fort
i want to taste strawberries on your fingertips
i want to --

i want to slam my head into shower doors
i want to cry and scream and claw
i want to exorsize these demons
i want to grab you and look deep in your eyes
i want you to see the sedation of my soul
i must maintain to compose this calm

tranquilized
to dispel the traumatized
a lion bedding with the gazelle
locked behind glass
deep in the dankest zoo
i pace and i fight this frenzy and i --

it's a hard love to maintain
because it won't let go
it's a hard love to sing for
it's become my supper, my salvation




ugh.... to be continued when i can actually WRITE again....

celexa is a dam
that forces me to censor
words do not flow
my brain just can't go
in the crazed paths
and starry directions
it longs for

pharmacudical leash
i consider the connection
between creative and crazy
hemingway and his cats
zelda and her fountain dancing--


something...

fuck...

what was i trying to say?

in this subdued seduction
plexiglass
i charge head first
into plexiglass
unharmed, unscarred
i fall backwards
flat on my ass
no words to say
no words to write
the little pink pills
escort me away
like white coated nurses

shhhh they say
shhhh they coo
tucked into bed

what was i saying?

where did the poetry go?

all i can say is this ---- mother fucker. MOTHER FUCKER!

I did it again.

first draft, filled with many typos and needing much editing

My best friend calls it "Janicing."

It's when I text her at some ridiculously late hour and we have a conversation of pre-text. I tell her I'm not feeling "well." She assures me it will pass. I don't go into details. She doesn't ask questions. We've been there before, we both know what's going on without it being said. She's learned not to freak out, she's learned that what I need in that moment is validation, reassurance, and mostly, just to know that I'm not alone and that she's not going anywhere. That she loves me uncondtionally and that she doesn't hate me for the mess I occasionally become.

And what a mess I can be.

I tell myself that I'm thirty years old. That the past is in the past. I was a bullied child. I was one hundred pounds by five, two hundred by ten. And while the weight gain slowed over the years, it still persists. My parents used to tell me that sticks and stones will break my bones but words can never hurt me. That I needed a thicker skin.

And maybe that's what this weight is. A thicker skin.

As much as I want to lose weight, it insulates me. A man can reject me because he doesn't find me attractive. And as much as that hurts, it comforts. Because I know he's not rejecting me for ME. The person, the soul, the integral essense of who I am. I think the reason why I can't lose the weight, is because it'd leave me vulnerable to a much deeper rejection. And as someone with BPD, a good part of my life is spent trying to anticipate and avoid pain. If I'm no longer the fat girl, then who am I? If I'm no longer the crazy girl, what does that leave?

I feel more, I feel more intensely, I absorb pain. It's what makes me a good writer, an artist. This world stuns me with it's beauty and its ugliness. BPD, my sensitivity, is a gift and a horrid curse. My inner world is complex and deep but yet tortured. A lot of the time, I am a raw nerve and everything hurts. ANd when it becomes too much, I desperately seek release. I cut. I binge. I drink. I cry. I lash out. In my younger days, I'd manipulate and lie -- anything to keep the people I love near me. I still dot' know how to say, "I'm scared. I'm paranoid. I'm .... Janicing.... and I need you. As illogical and inconvenient as it is, I need you RIGHT HERE. And then I'll be ok." I don't know how to say that, I don't WANT to say that. I don't want to be that girl. That needy, that desperate, that.... much of a pain in the ass. Because after enough of that, anyone ... would want to get away. Including me.

I don't know how to be that vulnerable. It's too scary. To show the guts of this disorder, the ugliest manifestations, the pathetic neediness -- I am terrified that it's too much. That I'm not enough. And it's a cycle. Because I hate myself for it, but I can't help it. And the pain multiples and divides, adds, subtracts. And I'm left a huddled, sobbing, terrified mess of an emotional child that is frozen in need but too afraid to ask for help. Because I don't know what will stop it. And I don't want to make it worse by chasing the people away that I am so sure are going to leave me eventually, anyway.

I was diagnosed after my fifth suicide attempt, when I was 23. I was hospitalized in a psych hospital. Lost, empty, completley desolate, the three psychiatrists sat across from me and asked me if I had ever heard of BPD. I hadn't. Upon release, I was sent back to see my regular psychiatrist who had diagnosed me as bipolar at 19. When I told him what the other doctors said, he scribbled on his prescripton pad. He didn't look at me as he said, "why would you want that diagnosis? It means nothing. And there's not even a pharmacudical treatment. You need to think of your condition lke diabetes. Or wearing eye glasses. Just something you need to accept... and medicate."

I've spent my entire life medicating this condition. Food, booze, sex, shopping, occasionally drugs. I'm on a low dose of Celexa now and it helps immensely. But two weeks ago I foudn myself crying in my shower slicing at my arm with the blade of my food processor. Sometimes this thin skin gets punctured despite medications, despite meditation, despite loving friends and family, despite logic. Despite me. And depsite all of you.

I've seen many counselors and doctors over the years. They always ask me what my goals are in seeking treatment. My answer has never changed. "I want to have more stable relationships. I want to be more independent. I want to learn to cope with -- if not control - these monster cycles and emotions I feel." What I mean is -- I want to be loved, I want to feel like I am worthy of love."

Over the years, I definitely have gotten better. I know my patterns, my friends know how to spot my cycles. I know that the week before my period, every month, I'm going to lose it. I end up on the phone with my friends sobbing and wanting to jump off a bridge. PMDD? Who knows? But every month I fall to sadness. I see my patterns. A friend moves away. I take it personally. I take everything personally. I try not to, but I do. And sometimes I run away from people I love, I chase them away to protect myself. A good defense is a good offense. Because sometimes I just can't stand to lose one more boyfriend, one more friend. I am an expert at self-demolition. I fear this building is going to tumble one way or another. And if I can't control that inevitability, I'd like to at least knock it down myself. To attempt to control how I fall.

If I could tell my doctors, my friends, my family anything, it is this. This condition burdens me with so much guilt and shame. Start there. The foundation. Validation, assurance -- ACCEPTANCE. This is who I am, how I am. And it's improved and it will continue to get better. But right now, in this moment, in the moment I'm texted my friend, in the moment that I'm desperate and terrifed and slicing my arm, in those moments -- that is who I am. It is from pain, it is a way to cope with overwhelming pain. I'm heavy, I'm thick, but lift me. I need to be lifted and held and safe. I am not a damsel in distress. It takes great courage to be that raw and open and vulnerable and... needy. I am... Janicing. And I can't vocalize at the moment what I need. But right now I'm telling you. AS someone with BPD... during an episode.... we need to know that we are ok, we will be ok, and that there is nothing more to fear or feel guilty about. Sometimes we need to just be held while we scream. We need to feel safe. Accepted.

I wish I didn't have scars on my thighs from late night razors that I have to explain to all new lovers. I wish that my books were fiction so I didn't have to hide the fact that I'm a writer from coworkers for fear of judgement. I wish I could lose this weight because i know I'm missing out on so much. I wish the same wish I did the entire time I was gorwing up -- that I can be normal. I wish I hadn't caused my family anf riends so much pain, I can only imagine what it feels like to watch someone you love want to destroy themselves. And to try over and over again.

I wish black box warnings existed on the medications I haphazardly took and discarded in my early 20s. Because I'm pretty sure that a lot of my struggle came from that, from the medications themselves. From the going on and off them haphazardly. I wish I wasn't so afraid all the time. I wish I could find my home. Wherever that is. With whomever that is. With whomever I need to be.

Been Thinking....

When I was in 11th grade, my chemistry teacher, Mr. Milone was also our Key Club advisor. Key Club is a community service group affiliated with the local Kiwanis Club. My best friend Doug and I were supposed to be leading it. Supposed to be. Only, you see, Key Club wasn't as fun as all of our other activities and we admittedly were half-assed about it. In frustration, Mr. Milone said to me once -- "but Janice, this could be your legacy. This could be something you look back fondly at when you think of high school. What do you want your legacy to be? You need to think about that."

Yeah, well, pretty sure I've failed over and over and over in that whole legacy department. I'm horrible at finishing projects. Got to the point where I've even stopped starting them if I don't think I can do them quickly. Probably why I still struggle with my weight, am a freelancer, am single, haven't written any short stories/books/scripts in forever (other than the apparently never-ending work on my memoir that oops! isn't done), and probably why I no longer do readings or host readings. How can I be so passionate about something and then it just wanes? Do I have some sort of ADD? How can I throw myself heart and soul into something and then just be like "well, sick of that." Then I wonder why I can be so apathetic. So many other people have life-long passions ---- I have some life-long interests but certainly not PASSIONS. Is that normal?

Or is it the meds?

It's so fucking annoying. If I'm not asking "is it the meds?" I'm asking, "is it my brain?" There's just a certain unbalance, a certain askew-ment (not really a word but I'm using it) to me that renders me at a 90 degree angle tot he rest of the world. Sometimes it's 30 degrees, sometimes it's 150.... but it's never, never parallel. And I wonder if everyone feels that way or if it's the meds, or if it's my brain, or if it's my "creative" nature. Is this just a desperate effort to align myself with the concept of "normal?"

OK, from the existential to the concrete. I want to use my writing and my creativity to make my living. I would like to write tv shows. I work in an office filled with people who have the job I want. But yet I stare at them and think "how do I get there???" But I'm too shy to ask advice. it's retarded. I think part of me thinks it is just unattainable. That it is naive to even try. Then i think about to the best writing advice I ever got. Can't remember her name but it was from this novelist I attended a workshop with at a conference in high school -- she said "to be a writer, you need to write." And yeah -- guess what? I haven't been writing SHIT.

And I keep thinking -- I have SO many contacts. I have connections and access to resources that other people who also want to be write for tv DREAM of. I've worked in the tv and movie industry for 9 years. Why the hell haven't I sat down and figured out how to make the jump from production and finance to the creative? I think because of fear and I think because years ago I decided that pursuing this path would be easier and just as profitable. (okay, not as profitable as the WGA writers on this show make $6142 bucks a week plus $12,000 a script plus royalties plus bonuses...) It's not like if I try to be a writer and fail I can't go back to what I do now. And even if I did fail, it's not like I couldn't try again. I couldn't network more (sooooooo bad at that) and hone my craft.

My craft? Shit. I abandoned my craft. Well I settled into poetry because it's immediate. And I'm pretty good at it. But I've ever stopped doing that. (is it the meds? is it my brain? is it because I'm lazy? is it because the muses are ignoring me? is it because i suck at it, after all? -- oh the frenetic thoughts in my poor, ravaged brain!)

So what the fuck am i supposed to do? what do i want to do?

Well..... you know what sounds fun? Writing for tv. What I wanted to do 9 years ago and then got scared and side tracked. And here I am so insanely close to the opportunity. I just need the balls, some scripts, some drive, some confidence.... and it just COULD happen. I mean it really could.

So.... this weekend I am going to buy a desk and a nice chair and set them up in my room and I am going to dedicate a safe little area JUST to creativity and writing. My bedroom will be a place of tranquility and comfort. A little room of my own where I will only invite in the very fortunate :) I'll make it very clean, organized, girly, and a warm place for creativity and poetry and .... just good stuff. :)

So that's what I'll do. :)

uterus --

despite
what grey
may say

you are
an asshole.

both our beds lie empty and wrinkled
bodies so far from sleep, from recline

i want to swim in the blue ocean of threads
of you
i want to sink into the red comforter
of me

entwine and release
aliens and god and the purpose of blood cells
wondering if we can see through each other's eyes

you make me feel like
a radiohead song
the intense, the passion, the sorrow, the electric,
the smooth, the emotion, the perfection

to trace the outline of your lips
and tell you this
and for it to matter
to anyone besides just me

i whisper things to you
when you're not around

parking in the driveway
of a convenience store

soft words, barely breathed
"i miss you. do you know i miss you?"

i send you psychic messages
across green spring lawns

blades soft under painted toes
black kitten amongst daffodils

i hear myself say
"when are you coming home?"

how easily i fall to tears
it infuriates me and instead of
showcasing swollen red eyes
and dramatically choking on muffled cries
I hide, I hide, I hide

I hide, I hide, I hide

It's deep inside
where my secrets lie
the faltered alibis
the cripple's wine

it's deep inside, it's deep inside, it's deep inside

this scarred up hide
stained scarlet suicide

it's where I hide
it's where I hide
it's where I hide

i am in hiding
i listen to fishtanks
and whooshing suburban traffic
the scrap of pant buttons
against the dryer walls

i am done with brooklyn
i am done with a phase
i am done with the best of days
i am focused ahead

i am writing new books
if only in my head

my ego grew large and posthumous
danced, trotted, and slutted
her way around
unannounced and rarely invited

i don't want to be important anymore
not even sure i want to be heard
not sure if i want to be the pretty girl
or the one holding awards

i think what i want is what i've found
in these fishtanks and kenmore whirls
i think it's beneath the stars
the relief of "Exit 40" in the headlights
knowing that I'm finally home







and then the secret part

it's in the you
the comfort, the closeness
the "awwwww almost"
the what could be, what won't be
it is in the daffodils
blossoming in my yard
it is in the porch steps cigarette

it is, it is, it is

Borderline

My nerves lie outside of my skin
They wince and gasp,
wrapped around tattoos and old scars.

Too sensitive to function
without medication and intensive care
perhaps, perhaps
perhaps, perhaps

A breeze can shake to the floor
this precious house of cards
that all of my life
I have built but never glued

A breathe, a giggle, a well-intentioned caress
and I'm a mess, I'm a mess
all over again

Foundation I have found
it lies at the bottom
at the heart
where I never thought to look
but of course,
being the foundation,
has always been

These nerves shoot pain, overestimate
the pressure of a kiss, of an embrace
love can crush, casual a casuality

I ain't crazy no more
I ain't crazy no more, darling
but there's still too much of me
I brim with mire and angst
I brim, I brim, I burst and ooze

I spill out of jeans
My heart an overbubbling pot
My arms extend too far,
wrenched out of sockets
fingers splayed,
reaching and grasping
at empty air
Eyes locked, their gaze
dry and desperate
on the closed door
three feet above the floor.

The muses have returned
they recline around my living room
snorting Adderall
notepaper in shreds and ink spilled
on my brand new carpet

Perhaps it's the price you pay for genius
he says as we drive through town
he's too drunk to be behind the wheel
and I'm too drunk to care

Reckless and free
I think - a price for genius, perhaps
it is to be paid
but a cost for medicoricity and namelessness
and me, pennies too few

Everyday when I write, when I can, when i am able
when whispers echo in my brain
and fingers, possessed, dance upon plastic keys
I think of Sylvia, of Papa, of all those
who died at their own hands
unable to take their own brillance
all those who died at their own hands
who also wore their nerves
on the outside of their skin

Celexa, you sound like a goddess
you tuck me in bed at night
in cat-clawed crimson sheets
you kiss my forehead
promise to keep crazy away
for one more day

You turn off the light
and left in the dark
I ponder borderlines
I chew on compromises
and sacrifices

To burn out
or to fade away

To burn out
or to fade away

3/7/2010

There are many places
that I do not fit

due to expanse of hips
or a lack
of social grace.

There are many invitations
that I turn down

because of fear
that I'll be Carrie'd
and drenched in pigs blood.

It's a lonely way to live
but perhaps also wise.

thought it was a clear morning but glanced up and saw it was snowing like hell.

hate that.

acceptance

Well obviously I can't force myself into epiphany. It's going to come in its own time and I've got to accept this and try to nurture patience. I'm still on my path even if I'm just sitting at a cross roads, right? I guess I should just stop and smell the daisies where I am.

Zak says I think too much to the point of indecision and then inaction. I say he rushes to action without enough thought. He needs temperance, I need passion. Or maybe perhaps it is just what 9 year of experience does to you?

After I wrote the last post I huffed around the house and pouted until I realized that while I can't seem to figure out what will make me happy, I can figure out what makes me unhappy and avoid those things. I've just always been a girl with big lofty dreams. I spent most of my life wanting to be famous, to be reknowned. Now I don't know what I want. But at least I can look at what I don't want, right? I can start there. And maybe some action on my part will spur some epiphanies that sitting on my ass watching the snow fall isn't.

I like not worrying about money. Which means that I need to cut my expenses and make more (or at least consistent money.) I am making the first step toward that by moving to Jersey. I just need to make smart decisions. I need to slow down and figure things out. I also need to work more in my current job and/or find something to supplement it. Or I need to move on.

These are the big struggles. I guess if I make my priority saving money so I don't have to WORRY about money then maybe things will become clearer.

I'm tired and sick of thinking. Going to go practice avoidance :)

flat

I'm still so lost.

I keep waiting for epiphanies telling me where I should go and what I should do but I'm just as lost as I have been for months. Life is so juicy and full of adventure and here I am struggling through to figure out what I want by process of elimination. I don't want to live in the North Country. I think life would be easier in Jersey. So I guess I'll try there. But there's no joy in anything. It's not even that I'm depressed - I don't feel I am. I just have a very hard time thinking of things that make me happy. That's not normal, right? I love my friends and family and being around them makes me happy. But I don't want to live up here. In the city my friends are spread out and I'm afraid I won't ever see them. Especially if I move to Jersey. I'm not so afraid of the prospect of meeting new people though, so that's good. But I am just SO lost.

I'm trying to find my way, I'm trying to rediscover dreams and passions. Just nothing stirs me. I don't want to write. It feels like a chore and it's so draining. I love performing. Maybe I should do that more? Fuck, maybe I am depressed. I don't fele it though. I just feel... flat. Uninspired.

I just hate the idea of chugging along just to chug. Of settling. I want so badly to be happy, to be over-the-moon happy. But I don't know how. Or what. It's so frustrating. I'm starving with a fucking buffet in front of me!

There's just something missing from my life. Missing from me. There's a vacancy, there's this lack of .....

I hate this SO much. I hate it. I fucking HATE IT!!!!

Flow. Part One.

It’s called a thrisis.



Or at least that’s what some cutesy Gen X-er labeled it to sell some of those cutesy pink-covered books at the front of Barnes and Noble. It’s mindless bullshit like chick lit that gets published these days, that is spoon-fed to the masses. Not like my books. I drum my fingertips against the nicotine-stained Macbook and remind myself that the only thing that stands between me seeing my titles on the shelves at B&N is that pesky application and review process. Somehow a month has passed and my memory is like sieve. Why haven’t done the paperwork?



Oh yeah, I’m having a thrisis.



With no one to share my joke with, I light another Marlboro Light. Another day in the North Country – the third day in the row of snow. Only an Eskimo and their supposed fifty names for this sky dandruff could tell the difference between morning and evening. Constant white falling toward the thick white ground leaves me feeling like I’m at the bottom of a grave watching the dirt pile up on my chest. The plows and sanders rumble down the hill and down the road, cutting through the fluff like nostrils clearing a path through a pile of cocaine.



Cocaine, now there’s something that could help me write. Help me rediscover some passion. It appears that my brain is experiencing some sort of limp dick complication. It can’t be ADD. I’m thirty. But synapses aren’t firing right and since the Celexa I stopped skating razors across my forearms. So it can’t be depression. And despite the pseudo-demensia that my doc attributed to ten years of borderline personality disorder and medications, it can’t be just memory. This swiss cheese brain of mine. I’m like a fucking gold fish. Five second of memory that no ‘to do’ list can save. I’m writing now, I’m even wearing pants and sitting at my computer. I have a –



thrisis - a mid-life crisis for those in their mid to late thirties



Mid to late? Goddamnit. I got my period at eight and now I’m ahead of the curve again. Deep drag, the kind where you’re ensured that something’s sticking, that the carcinogens are in your lungs long enough to really burrow deep in pink tissue. Twenty-two years of wasted eggs, of fertile ground left fallow. I’m convinced that by the time I get ready to have kids my ovaries will only be spitting out dust.



Have you ever used Google as an 8-ball? I type, “Will Janice ever have kids?”



Press enter. Shake the black orb. First article up – “meet the women who will never have kids.”



I stub out the cigarette and peel the label back on a container of Activia Light, Raspberry flavor. The pooping yogurt. This is what life has come down to. Starring at snow sitting in my childhood bedroom eating food to help me poop. I feel about fifty years too early on this one.



Perhaps I’m some kind of young, female Bukowski. He sure wrote about shit a lot. Maybe if I do people will think I’m edgy. I consider other adjectives people will assign me. I’m tired of “fat,” “troubled,” “crazy,” and “different.” I can do my own marketing, I can manufacture personality and persona. There’s this whole world out there and I know deep in my gut that I have something to offer. I am a brilliant twisted genius and within me I hold answers and secrets. I could slay this world and earn fame and accolades. A fucking contender, right here.



I swallow the thick pink load, sweet and cold on my tongue. I am too lazy. I am too heavy and too melded to this chair, to this floor, to this ground to fly.



And the worst part? I don’t think I even fucking care anymore.



I’m feeling lucky, Google. Give me your prediction, give me your definitions.



An apathetic individual has an absence of interest or concern to emotional, social, or physical life.



The opposite of apathy is “flow.”