Memories lost, illusions fostered.  Reliance on specific medication taken routinely, as directed, has placed me in a precarious position.  I feel things slipping away before I’ve even had a chance to grasp them.  My past doesn’t much exist for me as I have been denied access.  Therefore I have nothing of note to share with others in order to prove that I do indeed exist, have made observations, have experienced something in this bleak world worth remembering.  All conversation is predicated on memory; without memory there is nothing to say save opinions and they prove merely to embarrass those who bear them to any length.  Real conversation is grounded in perceptions and facts.  We share what we have seen, heard, told, read, conceived, admired, loathed, feared, questioned, etc.  All of these require that our minds take in information, process it, and store it for further use.

For me, memories fail to form and I blame the drugs.  Sure they prevent another major psychotic episode from pulling me asunder but they also effect the way I absorb information.  I read something and I forget it as soon as the book is closed.  I attend a film and I can hardly relate anything substantial regarding plot, tone, style, lighting, photography, etc. after the final credits have rolled.  I can never remember dialog or lectures nor commentaries that follow certain films on DVD.  I never remember faces or names or places I’ve been.  I have no orientation and have no bearings regarding where I am at any given time.  I can’t even give directions in my own hometown.  I am convinced it wasn’t always this way although I cannot remember my childhood either so its probably a moot point.  I have few memories of my mother who passed away four months ago.  I can’t say what I played with, what I read, where I went, and what hobbies I might have enjoyed.  I honestly feel that I haven’t actually lived at all and am damned to never experience anything else that might actually leave an impression.

Yet I can remember just about every faux pas I have ever made in my life.  I can remember the anxiety, the confusion, and the welling up of self-loathing and self-directed psychological violence.  I can also remember what it felt like to be flying during my previous manic episodes.  I fondly recall the sensation of maneuvering my way through life brimming with self-confidence while possessing a real interest in everything I encountered.  From the smallest insect to grand schemes, ideas, constructions–I experienced them all with joy and wonder.  I found it easier to remember song lyrics although I could hardly sit still long enough to read a book or watch a film.  Still, when I did, the information actually managed to stick firmly in my brain only to be washed out as soon as the medication started kicking in.  But during those brief months my mind stored things that I could actually use.  Now, I often feel that my brain is utterly devoid of substance; quite literally, my brain feels empty of anything save fragments of whatever I have recently attempted to load into it.

Since the past is dead and my perceptions are so dull, I gravitate toward being and staying alone.  Because when I am around others I most sincerely realize my utter lack.  I have nothing to communicate and so I tend to wallow in the filth that lines the bottom of my sagging, negligent brain.  It’s easy under such conditions to think about the uselessness of this entire experience.  Other people make me consider ending it far more than being alone does.  When I am alone I at least have nothing to gage my inadequacies against so it doesn’t gall me as much and I am left to my own devices.  I can pretend under such circumstances that I do indeed possess the skills to wow and confound, tease and berate, but I ultimately crash into the realization that I no longer possess a viable, fascinating personality.  It wasn’t always thus, I believe.  I have vague memories of entertaining small groups with strange anecdotes relating directly to my experiences.  Of course, other medicinals helped back then but at least they opened up doors as opposed to closing them.  I cannot fathom why this is considered a more worthwhile existence and the other is so haughtily demonized with impunity.  At least with Mania you relate to things in a very tactile manner; you feel vibrations emanating from everything you encounter.  You want things; You desire to be blasted apart into fragments and scattered throughout the universe.

Your mind holds on to things and create a framework for you to share your impressions with as many people as it is possible to meet.  Of course all you want to talk about is yourself and your experiences so basically the idea of a conversation utterly dies at your feet.  You are left spouting off gibberish to both the patient but essentially disinterested or the chagrined and explicitly demonstrative.  But you at least have things to impart under these circumstances.  You can remember.

Perhaps the lack of memory is related to the acute anxiety I feel at all times.  My perpetual state of discomfort may prevent sensations to become impressed upon my mind.  I can only recall those Manic afternoons when I felt utterly at ease in my own skin; I was eternally free of debris and any discouraging thoughts whatsoever.  My mind was clear and ready to accumulate information and to gather resources.  What I see now is a genuine disinterest in practically everything about me.  The world is a dead place and everyone in it is a walking corpse.  This acute pessimism is a product of my youth, I suppose (although I cannot remember).  Since my mind retains nearly nothing about what I perceive, I feel a decisive disconnect from my environment.  I live in a green granola town where everyone rides a bike and shops organically.  It’s so healthy and sunny right now with people out walking their dogs, pushing their kids in strollers, and otherwise basking in the simple fact that they have figured out a way to make their life make sense.  Of course it’s merely circumstantial and entirely illusory but they have used their time and experiences to forge memories that are pleasant and seem to be permanent.  Memories define these people and allow them to navigate their way through whatever society suits them best. 

Overall, memories are tyrannical.   We accept them at face value without considering that they might be faulty or warped by our desires to maintain “positive” images regarding the experience.   Without memory it is just like it never happened.  For all intents and purposes it might as well not have.  So, entire youths are wasted and lost.  One cannot connect with the child one was and the resultant gap is terrifying to overcome.  Subsequently the child ceases to communicate and the adult is left to navigate new mysteries alone and without guidance.  Voices do not connect with the present and routinely go unheeded.  Without a record of past experiences it might be said that we are free to make the same mistakes all over again having learned nothing about how to overcome them the first few times around.  So, we remain stuck, trapped in a present that is both novel and excruciatingly banal.  Every experience is certainly new and autonomous but the overall environment leaves no impression.   Finally, a faint memory emerges of a time when one was connected to the great symphony of becoming and every experience found its place in the mind’s catalog to be recalled at will.  Like all memories, this one fades before it’s possible to lay claim to it.