if time is my vessel, then learning to love might be my way back to sea.

[intertribal]

Wreckage of the 1977 crash between the KLM Rijn (Rhine River) and the Pan-Am Clipper Victor at Los Rodeos airport on Tenerife, one of the Canary Islands.  Essentially, a colonial backwater, administered by the Spanish military, a touch-off point for cruises, for first and second honeymoons.  I never knew about this crash, the worst in aviation history, until watching "Crash of the Century" this past weekend.  Both planes were Boeing 747s, and 583 people died.  I will be going on a Boeing 747 on Saturday.  But at least it won't involve the Atlantic Ocean. 

I'm oh so nervous, oh so antsy.  I hate late nights like this.  During the day you can walk it off.  It's hot and humid and I'll be arriving home in a winter between twenty and forty degrees, according to my mother, who is stressed with work and has to prepare various Thanksgiving dishes before I get home.  On Thursday it'll be my third Thanksgiving away from home and my second away from my mother, but I won't be alone this year, eating Chinese take-out and watching Friday the 13th in my suitemate's room.  This year I'll be packing, watching Law & Order.  Thank God it doesn't mean as much to me as Christmas.  I listened for the first time to the lyrics of "Winter" by Tori Amos: "I put my hand in my father's glove... I know dad the ice is getting thin".  It's her father telling her, "when you gonna make up your mind, when you gonna love you as much as I do... 'cause things are gonna change so fast".  But this line, it's ambiguous: "You say I wanted you to be proud of me" - is it "You say, 'I wanted you to be proud of me'" or is it "You say I wanted you to be proud of me"?  I think it runs both ways.  In four months I'll have spent more time without my father than with him.  He liked swimming at beaches at sunset, when I stayed on shore with my mother, so he didn't have to watch me and protect me from riptides or big waves.  I keep a picture of him when I cross international waters, next to my passport.  "I tell you that I'll always want you near, you say that things change, my dear."

The Partners of Veterans Association of Australia was briefly featured on tonight's Crime Investigation: Australia ("Who Killed Harold Holt?").  Harold Holt was a prime minister of the '60s who signed Australia's soul over to America and went "all the way with LBJ".  The PVA was only established last year, but I think it's astounding that it was established at all.  What it alleges is stuff we all know but don't want to admit - as one of their members said, "war damages men".  Suicide was mentioned; children with disabilities.  My impression from the program was that they want the government to acknowledge what it did to their husbands by sending them to Vietnam.  I think that once I'm old and established, I'm going to write a book - non-fiction - on men and war, because it's had such an effect on my psyche.  It will open with the lines from Nirvana's "In Bloom": "he's the one who likes all our pretty songs, and he likes to sing along, and he likes to shoot his gun, but he don't know what it means, don't know what it means".  Harold Holt, incidentally, disappeared in the middle of his term while swimming at Cheviot Beach, near Melbourne.  Considering the amount of people that have gone missing there and never been recovered - including 35 victims of an 1897 shipwreck of the SS Cheviot - it's not surprising his body was never found, but apparently some people think he might have been picked up by a Chinese submarine or committed suicide.  It seems much more likely that he got tied up in kelp gardens and eaten by sharks.  He is commemorated in the rich Melbourne suburb of Malvern by a swimming pool. 

There was a plane crash over the weekend near Wilsons Promontory, the southern tip of Australia.  Four millionaires in a private plane - the middle of the ocean.  A wheel washed up on the beach today.  One body is still missing.  I remember hearing the family friend a couple days ago telling the media, "our hope now is that they're sitting out there somewhere, waiting for help".  A lot of people have gone missing in this country.  At the Great Barrier Reef, from an Adelaide beach. 

sources:  Tenerife disaster, Harold Holt, List of people who have disappeared, Four lost in plane crash near Wilsons Promontory, Michelle Kwan - "Winter" by Tori Amos

Comments

[royinpink.livejournal.com]

hmm, i certainly match a lot of symptoms, but then, I've always been somewhat like this, and also, this year it is much, much more up-and-down whereas last year I was suck in it almost all the time. also, i sleep more (thank god), but not as much a freshman year (also a good thing). it's weird to think about yourself as being depressed when it's like the only existence you've known, though? I mean, I am only like this in the presence of a lot of schoolwork and/or emotional/romantic/sexuality-defining stresses. or maybe not...no, you're right, it is different. maybe. 'cause i got like this in terms of procrastination and stress still in high school, but I don't think i felt the same way about the stress...well, yeah, that makes sense. I wasn't a 'failure' then. i was going to go to college! and now i'm here, and i don't fit in, don't succeed...the bottom is so much closer (dropping out), I'm following my own path and not my parents' anymore. i don't know.

it's not that i don't believe in therapy, but unfortunately the free therapy here sucks beyond belief. Most of them are interns, and "In short: they don't ask the right questions, they don't offer analysis or helpful suggestions, they don't act like they care, and interaction is generally impersonal and shallow."

(steve: Yeah, a lot of people have complaints, and, from what I've heard, they seem pretty well-founded. I'm sorry about that. I wish I could have some influence, but (esp. because of my status as a Visitor), I really can't. Ugh,)

Medication is more of an issue for me. I'm not 100% in-all-situations opposed to it, but I have a few hang-ups because I don't like to be dependent on things (esp. drugs, even caffeine, which I currently am...), plus some of them are rather ill-prescribed or have undesirable side effects and etc. Basically, I don't trust them very much. I would probably have to be rather desperate before i'd consider it...

Thank you so much for the rest of what you said, though. You have no idea how much it means to me that you would say that...

[intertribal.livejournal.com]

You sound worse than you were in high school, and even if you were "always like this", that doesn't mean you don't have depression. It may be recurring, you may not have perspective. (also if you're depressed you tend to not be able to imagine a different, non-depressed state of life)

Well, I wouldn't advise medication that's very strong. When I went on medication it was a child's dosage, for six months, and it really shouldn't have been enough to affect me - however, I coaxed myself to believe in its power, and I saw two really good therapists while I was on it (one paid for, only two sessions - she was magic, and she was in Lincoln. my doctor, whom I trust with my life, referred her. the other therapist was the free school therapist, was an intern, and was really good. when I saw her I was already on my way up and I told her the kind of therapy that i need to improve, and that's what she did, so she solidified the climb). Of course, we are different people with different situations. I just feel the need to inform you it can work. Do you have a good doctor in Lincoln?

[royinpink.livejournal.com]

I don't think it's something that I "have" though. It's something that's caused by how I react to certain circumstances...and like I was saying, college is a different thing in my mind than high school was. Not only is there more work such that I get bogged down by procrastination much more easily, but before, I had no conception of failing. I was always an A student. I was always in my parents' house. I could relate to the people I was around. Reed, by contrast, is a profoundly isolating experience, at least for me. I don't know why, but lately I've begun to suspect it's a class-cultural thing rather than a geographical thing that's separating me from so many people here, not to mention the intimidation of the prestige of the place itself, of the notion of professors...I am much more frightened by everything around me than I was in high school. And then, no grade inflation. And then, living away from home. And then, realizing that if I don't succeed here I can't do the only things I might ever want to do. And then, getting through my emotional shit of last year and growing as a person (which I think I'm mostly through with...though Santiago emailed me today, ha ha). And then, not having any expectation or idea of what lies ahead, realizing that my parents' knowledge of how this whole thing works stopped at getting accepted to colleges, and until now, school was just what I did, what I was good at doing, but now that's been taken away from me and so I have to come to terms with really trying, getting through all the things I'm most afraid of in order to make it here. Honestly, I don't even know what will happen if/when I graduate, I really don't. I have a better idea of what would happen if I dropped out than I do of that. Point is, there is a reason (or rather, reasons) me acting like this coincides with my time at Reed, I think.

I'm not going to take medication. That's all the counselor ever told me..."learn how to breathe," "take these pills," "think happy thoughts." God, I hate her. Well, it would probably work better if I believed in it, I'm sure. I'm sure it can work, I'm just...not good at therapy. Because it in and of itself is the sort of situation I'm afraid of, it causes me to react in much the same way as I do to dealing with schoolwork. If I have problems, everyone hates me. That's what my mother believes about herself and everyone else, and I've inherited that belief, but it's by no means that simple. Anyway. No, I have a pediatrician and a gynecologist, and doctors make me cry because I get embarrassed.

[intertribal.livejournal.com]

I'm sure Reed and college have a lot to do with it... if anything, as triggers. But part of therapy (hell, part of life) is teaching yourself new and effective coping techniques for dealing with those things that cause you stress, fear, problems. I understand not wanting to go on medication, but please consider therapy outside Reed. Also, everyone has problems. I think it's better that we deal with them now rather than when we've pushed them down in denial and they only come out in bursts in our 40s, which is what a lot of people do.

It's really the only advice I can give you besides my personal encouragement. I really do think you're a brilliant person and you are way too hard on yourself considering how talented and intelligent you are. Please don't drop out of college, it would be such a waste.

[royinpink.livejournal.com]

I do try to be honest with myself about and deal with my problems, rather than continually recreating them...I know sometimes I don't do that, and maybe it would be a faster (or easier?) process with a good therapist (or maybe not), but I'm still a bit hesitant about seeking therapy, to say the least. Mostly because of what my parents would think and whether they'd pay for it but also partly because I don't like a lot of people, and some of those people are therapists...and therapy is scary, but then life is scary, so what's new.

Thank you so much for saying that. I hear that sort of thing just about never, and it always amazes me when anyone thinks so, and it means even more coming from you. I have a lot of respect for you, how you live, your intelligence...so, thank you.

[intertribal.livejournal.com]

I know you do (try to be honest with yourself, etc.). Really. Hopefully a good therapist would guide you toward doing things that would help that process, make the falls less deep and painful (because there are always falls). Yeah, I hear that a lot (the parents thing)... and I know your parents are extra scary (at least to me) so I understand that as a barrier, but... considering your father's in therapy, I'd hope they'd understand. You don't like a lot of people? Really? Good to know...

When I was telling my mom about how we've stayed close for years and all that (as opposed to some of my other friends from high school) she suggested it's because we're intellectually compatible, so, you know, have a lot of respect for yourself too. You know I have been in pretty shit places in my life and quite frankly I know I'd be a lot worse off if it weren't for therapy in middle school and college.

[royinpink.livejournal.com]

Oh, wow, I never responded to this?

Yeah, there are always falls. My father was only in marriage counseling because my mother had been going by herself and finally managed to force him to go with her (the prospect of getting divorced again, I think, compelled him). My mom might understand, I don't know, but I have this aversion to therapy because it's like an insult to me. It says, "You're not good enough to solve your own problems. You need someone to do it for you. You're pathetic." Plus the fact that having any sort of problem in the first place makes me feel worthless, because good people don't have problems, ha ha (my mother's deep-set belief).

I don't think that of other people, just myself...that's what I meant, though, about therapy itself being the same sort of situation as what I have with schoolwork. And so I respond the same way to therapists, try to hide my problems from them so they won't "hate" me. I mean, last year just going to ask anyone for help made me cry. I have to be really desperate, have to have given up on myself entirely, before I even get to the point of asking someone else for help. They thought I was like 100 times more crazy simply because I looked like a wreck just trying to make an appointment, it stressed me out so much. I'd get migraines whenever I had an appointment, too, couldn't get any work done those days, broke down crying more often.

I'd probably be a little better about it this year, but the prospect just fills me with dread, like a cat going to the veterinarian (like Tess, who used to wedge herself in the cat carrier such that you couldn't get her out even if you turn it with the door facing straight down).

I mean, I don't hate a lot of people either, but yeah, I'd rather not interact with the vast majority of people.

I think that's true--you are more intellectually compatible with me than most, if not all, the friends I've had.

[royinpink.livejournal.com]

Also, it's a two-part problem. There's the schoolwork, and there is my mood. Where I like to say they correlate, they don't always. Right now, I'm in a fine mood (which is why I can write at all...). And yet, 8 or so hours ago, I was not. Freshman year, I think I was depressed...I wanted nothing more than to sleep, I cried so much, had no real drive, etc. And last year I was paranoid. I never slept. And then I had breakdowns. This year, it's slightly different...I do okay for awhile, and then I freak out again, and then I talk myself out of it again...it's getting, I don't know, faster or something. Also, crying only happened yesterday morning. I actually haven't done that for awhile. Midterms, maybe? I don't remember crying then. Well, when I get stressed about presenting or speaking in Chinese, sometimes I get near crying, but that's different. No tears about problem sets like last year...

And yet, in terms of how well I'm doing in school, it's better than last year, but not by much. Part of it really is just how I see things and not how well, objectively, I'm doing. But they're both problems.