Missing the Mark

I went back to my house to wash laundry and do family-related activities last night. My mission, complete, I grabbed my clothes, walked towards the door, and told my mother, "I guess I'd better head home."

She noticed it too.

I've commented on loss before, but I thought I'd go ahead and do it again. It's odd, for me at least. The actual act of losing, of changing, of taking one more step on my hike to hell is treated almost scientifically. It just "happens." It's not until a bit after the event that you realize how accustomed you'd become to "the way things were." How everything fit so well. How, now that it's gone, your sense of safety and security is merely conceptual.

The actual word itself isn't such an indication. To me, "home" is where I "should be." It's where I return and am "normalized." It's not a word of great significance to me. It was just the moment where it really hit me that I'll never go back to home again. Because it's not home anymore. I'll stay there, of course, but it's no longer my permanent residence.

It will be years until I have a "home" in the real sense of the word. If then.

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I had a dream a few nights ago, where I tossed and turned, obsessed about people that didn't exist. It's happened with math problems too, a sort of half waking/half sleeping state where I repeat the same process over and over, always incomplete. It's like turning the key in the engine of your car, the engine revs, but it doesn't start. I just keep turning, but the car never starts. The problem, of course, is that I'm half asleep so I don't realize the car isn't starting. I just keep turning the key. It generally takes me 15 minutes to snap out of my stupor. It's almost painful, to keep trying to figure out something in your head that is literally impossible because it's an incomplete nothing.

I'm going crazy and I'm not even drinking. Go figure.