Compartments

I identify with serial killers. That they look normal and fit in so well with middle class America does not surprise me. For a while, I thought the way I compartmentalized my life and my thoughts was odd but it turns out that we all do it. The BTK Killer goes to church, Bill Clinton gets a blow job without having sex, an acquaintance kills her grandchild blaming drugs and her errant husband and announcing her pregnancy to the court and I pretend I give a shit each day.

Exhaustion seeps from my pores like six cloves of roasted garlic eaten at lunch. I sleep at night but my dreams feature Russian trains, babies that give me lessons in Zen meditation, a dragon that curls around my ankles and my house in an old oak tree. Between fascinating vignettes, I wake up from bizarre flutterings in my arms, a pulled muscle in my neck and charlie horses trampling up my thighs.

These people down the street from my house keep blocking the sidewalk with their trash cans, branches from their backyard and their annoying existence. Neighbors on the corner keep all of their windows open and yell at each other and their dogs to shut up. I would so love to be able to snap my fingers and poof, they would be gone, never to trouble me again, but I believe in letting people be themselves.

When a cranky old man takes possession of your mind you should do your best to hide it and not parade the fact on the internet for the world to point at you and whisper behind their hands.