The Shadow Man commeth

Once there was a time of a never-ending dream
Of being free, of immortality
When a song was a mystery
And the stars so easy to reach
But something changed, now the sand’s trickling slow
The time of innocence is over now

I know the rivers won’t be flowing on forevermore
The wind of time blows right into my eyes
My flower withers and so do they all
Nothing lasts forevermore

I've been dwelling on my Shadow Man. I first started seeing a shadowy figure about five or six months ago. He would flash in and out of my vision like a little prick. Now I don't see him hardly as often but I can feel that someone is watching me. It feels like this all the time, like I'm being watched and judged. I don't really know how to react to this. On one hand, it's disturbing that a Shadow Man would even take interest in me, since I lead about the most boring existence on the planet. On the other it's sort of flattering.

I don't know what to make of the Shadow Man. Is he an entity of some sort, or is it all a figment of my understressed imagination? I don't know. When I know he is watching I don't necessarily feel evil or darkness at all, but I do feel dirty. That seems the most apt way to describe it. It feels like I'm sick or dirty in some way, after he's done watching me. Like he's getting off on it. Although putting it like that makes it seem sexual, which is certainly is not. I would just like him to stand still long enough for me to get a good read on him.

The lead singer of one of my favourite bands - In This Moment

I'm still on the antipsychotics and I've recently discovered that melatonin is a seriously bitchin' way to finally get some rest. I've been on melatonin drops for about a month and a half now, and it's made all the difference. I sleep about twelve hours per day now, and that's no exaggeration. I might even get more. I usually chem up about an hour before I want to sleep, then I'll lie down and do some reading on the ol' Kindle Fire, and when I'm ready to sleep I just fall into it right away. The melatonin in combination with the antipsychotics really help me get rest. I've also recently had a great deal of bloodwork done and it's been discovered that I'm intolerant to gluten, which is a real buzzkill. My antibody reading was four times the normal, so I'm borderline coeliac disease. I probably worded that wrong, but at least you get the gist of it.

I've watched six series of Dexter in the couple weeks. I basically just spend all my waking time watching that goddamn program. It's addicting and I hadn't seen past series four before. The incest vibe toward the end of series six really threw a bone into the narrative (pun intended). In other news I can't seem to get focused on my second novel. I have the characters and the basic flow of the story, but I can't start full production until I get a better grasp on the narrative as a whole. I've tried writing where I didn't know how the story would progress, but that always collapses after about 75 pages or so. While it's definitely more fun to "write as you go," it's no way to get a good story produced. Gotta have the whole thing planned from the start or it won't fucking work.

I feel like I'm eternally frustrated. I'm bored most of the time because I can't get motivated to do what I really want: write the motherfucking book. I just want to get into a rhythm again, where I wake up, pound out a few thousand words, then relax. That's how I got through my first novel, and it worked like a fucking charm. But now I just can't get motivated. It'll be one year in May since I finished my last book. If I can't get this second novel done by then, I'll be a massive failure. An absolute failure. I know that if I don't hit that deadline I'll probably kill myself. I don't think I'd be able to live with it. Particularly since this second book will be a fucking shitton shorter than the 116.000+ word behemoth that was my debut. Well it's a bit presumptuous to call it my 'debut,' given that only three people have even read excerpts --no one besides me has been privy to the full copy. I'm just too nervous to let people read it. I know it's pretty good, at least, but I also know the content would make getting it published a fuckin' nightmare. I'd have to halve it at best just to get it on store shelves.

But whatever. I just don't care about living. It exhausts me.

If any of you just sit back and think about how exhausting life is, it's really not worth it. And I don't even have a real job. I can only imagine how much I would want to off myself if I had to work with people in a place that wasn't my own fucking room. The amount of antipsychotics I would need boggles the mind.

I have a mental illness and it eats at me. It chews me to pieces inside and I have no way to get it out. It's like I need a lover to share this with. Part of me loves and revels in it; how many people have genuine mental illnesses? But the rest of me hates myself just for desiring this. As a learning experience, it's seductive. I want to hate it, but I can't. Just like I can't make sense in this entire paragraph, it makes even less inside me. I feel like my mind is filthy. As I sit here and drink a lemon-lime smashmouth drink (I made it myself; it's so strong I can only take baby sips) I love myself for being DEFECTIVE. I love myself for being different. But it's that same differentness which makes me the same as anyone else. Who doesn't have low points in their lives? And am I so weak that I can't get over it and move on? Am I that defective that I can't? Is it my Shadow Man who is strangling my desire to live?

I don't know what the fuck is going on. I feel like I've gone through a dozen different emotions just by writing this shit.

And it is shit. I know hardly anyone reads this --and no one who knows me IRL (at least I hope to fuck not). But I write it so I can let my emotions free and EXPRESS MYSELF. I know that's about the lamest, most hipster/emo-esque thing I've ever said, but there it is all the same. I don't feel like living but I'm not going to kill myself. How does that fit for size? Whatever. I'm the fuck out of here.