Some (stapled) navel gazing at almost 5am

Got my sleep all out of whack, so I've been up since something like almost 20 hrs ago.

I watched some movies today, and by movies I mean a couple of episodes of the animated "Fantastic Four" series and the movie "Nekromantik 2," which, believe me, is a total mindfuck. (I'm on this insane quest to buy and watch as many of the movies found in "Fangoria's 101 Best Horror Movies You've Never Seen" book and Rue Morgue Magazine's issue #50 article "100 Alternative Horror Films." So far ... 74.)

Anyway, all of this idle time, the struggling to get out of the chair 'cause my staples hurt, the impending doom of a return to work hanging over my head, the complete claustrophobia that I've had since last Tuesday, when all this mess started ... it's really made me think.

I've come to realize that the old childhood dream of writing that great American novel is dead. I've always been a writer, and I'll always be a writer, but I had envisioned that day when I would be a published author. Don't think that'll happen anymore, though. Not at this rate. But that's not to say it's a bad thing, I guess.

See, I do a whole lot of writing for a career. I have to keep constant, endless notes on clients that I see in my office. I keep up a pretty fair pace of writing on this here online thing (it was daily until the warranty on my appendix ran out). In essence, then, it can be said that my "novel" is written on everything I touch. It's just not been collected in a publishable format. Well, there is that fiction thing that I write on here, that I have no idea where that's going to go.

Speaking of the body and the dream, relationships break down too. And relationships that I've had, both long term and burgeoning, are becoming the target of some serious reflection. Case in point: I've been laid up with the results of this appendectomy since last Tuesday. I've seen few cards, I've had few phone calls. The people I know from work, they sent me things, but that's about it. I've been in pain for a little over a week now, which for me feels like "as long as I can remember," and it's felt like being cast aside. Now that shit might work for the buffalo and the gazelle herds, where the faster ones keep running and leave the lame behind so the jackals can feast on them. But we aren't buffalos or gazelles, and it wouldn't have hurt some people to pick up the phone. (Present company excluded ... we have an online oasis for that kind of thing, and I appreciate the well wishes I've received from the majority of you. But some folks that have been the closest to me haven't even sent me an email.)

I find myself, at 31, questioning my role in the world. Stapled belly-button, horror movie worshipping, message board decorating, videogame playing, Mountain Dew drinking, mental health hating son of a bitch that I am, I feel directionless, purposeless. Like Jack Nicholson in that movie of the same title, "What if this is as good as it gets?"

When I got out of the hospital, I had two ideas in mind: 1) Return to Tennessee. 2) Become a rector for the Episcopal church (basically a priest). Now, that last one might amuse, but hey, you pretty much come out of anesthesia thinking some pretty wild stuff. But I digress.

I once told a group of clients, following the death of a group member, to try everything they could to not live angry; the group member that died left behind a legacy of internal and external rage. And it's not even that you have to live happy. Me, I just want to live satisfied. But then the question is, is it enough to live not dissatisfied? I find comfort in the rap CDs, and the horror movies, and the videogames, and those occasional moments when a client actually thanks me for what I do. So, then, what if that is as good as it gets? When it gets down to it, what else is there, really? Will that novel make me happy? Wait, let me rephrase ... Will that novel make me any more satisfied than cobbling together pieces of fiction that a handful of folks that I connect to and genuinely care about can read and comment over and *gasp* possibly enjoy?

That's nuts; my wife's alarm clock just went off. I hate when that happens ... means I've been up all damn night. Plus, it's time for another pain pill. One more day and these staples come out ... alright, then; let's get to it.