To Abe - Moments 02

I had already scared my wife so much that she left with the boys. I can’t remember what it was that did it this time, but I do remember her being very afraid. All I felt was joy. It was evening. My labrador was with me. This was an early event. One near the time they started that night I took LSD. Looking back, I would label it as HPPD – hallucinogen persisting perception disorder. I had been getting high on marijuana for years by this point. Two to be exact. I cannot remember if I had gotten fired yet or not. But after the LSD event, my mind had been altered, and every time I got high on weed afterwards, I would start to trip again. It was as if it had opened pathways that were not there before. I sensed it as if all the thought pathways that I had had in one 24-hour period expanded beyond what I could see, like branches on a tree, with the ending unable to be seen. Those pathways were new territory for my brain to explore, experience, and try to navigate. New areas for life to find meaning, for existence to make sense, for understanding to try to connect different branches together. When I got high, I could actively explore these pathways. When sober, I could remember my explorations. To me that was the bliss of it. Not the high experience alone. But the coming back down to reality and then setting off on the adventure again. My wife, a saint in every sense of the word, anchored me. Were it not for her, I would have stayed gone. She reminded me what was important. She protected the kids. She held our family together. She is the truest thing I have in this world. Remembering back to those times of depression that led to my drug use, makes me very sad with the ideas that my brain had generated. The worst idea that I had come up with – trying to figure out how to ease my pain – was to end my pain with death. But I could not figure out how to end my pain without causing greater pain in my wife and sons. The only solution that remained in my hurting mind was that I had to take their lives before I took my own. I wish I had not had that thought. I wish it were not the only solution to helping my current state of mind. But it was there. Looking back, I was too honest with her. She was hurting deeply within herself, and I had forgotten the pain she carried. Were I thinking clearly, believing clearly, I would have taken that thought captive as soon as I had it. But in that state of depression that was accompanied by a very real pain, which I could not then identify the source of, my thoughts waged war against myself. This was the reason for my drug use to begin with. Why did it have to hurt that bad? My wife would confide in her brother, Mikey, when I was out of my mind. Him being the only one who knew the situation. I do not know what he felt at the time, but I can imagine that he felt guilt. Guilt for bringing me the LSD. Guilt for letting this happen to his sister. And responsibility to try and make it right. I heard the garage door open and slam shut. He came in yelling at me. I went to the kitchen to meet him. Smiling because the pain was gone. That ever present, ever persistent pain – it was gone, and joy alone replaced it. I cannot remember the exact contents of the conversation that ensued. He yelled a lot, telling me how much I made my wife terrified by my actions. Telling me how he was protecting her from me killing her. Telling me to look at my actions and see how I was hurting her. Telling me to look at myself and how I was shaking, bobbing my torso up and down. He picked up a steak knife and held it overhead. I felt no fear. I felt only love towards him, and joy at being free in that moment. I knew also that he was not going to stab me. I could see the wheels spinning in his mind as he considered. I could see how he knew this would not truly protect her. I could see how unwilling he was to give up the rest of his life for one moment of anger. He paused. He then grabbed the half drank bottle of whiskey from above the stove and took a huge gulp and left. There are moments I remember from his rant. Not his words, but what he was doing with his body. He kept grabbing his phone to make sure the microphone was unobstructed by his pants. It seemed to me in my own mind that he was wanting some unseen watchers to be able to listen in to our conversation. In my mind, they already were.