A Eulogy to My Sanity

A Short Story

Oh, woe is me! Woe is me indeed, for my mind has lost a ticking pocket watch that counted the seconds to this very moment. Oh, woe is me! A part of me lost forever. A piece that I will never be able to retrieve. How might one console me in this time of grief?

Oh, woe is me.

I tried to gather the pieces but it was like water, memories and emotions slipping through my fingers until there was nothing left. By the end I only saw my hands covered in blood. My wrists still bear the scars which I do not recall inflicting.

Oh, how I will miss you; your willingness to allow me to act like everyone else in society, encouraging me to find work, a wife and even get a suit fitted. Mind you, I was tempted to stab the tailor with his own needles but you stopped me, making me realise that perhaps he didn’t want to feel like me; that is, a human pin cushion.

You stopped me from a whole lot of things; throwing myself off the harbour bridge to see what it was like to fly and even running naked into the local pub, around it and out again. You were there for me then.

But now, you are not here and I have done one of those so far. Instead of the quiet voice in the back of my head telling me not to do those things, there is a louder voice screaming, pleading with me to do them.

So I will.

But now I want to say how much I will miss you. Your unsmiling character, your humourless nature and your lack of imagination. Oh, how I will yearn for your… blandness… Your constant need for normality and structure… I will miss your desperate insistence for hair maintenance and your daily reminders for me to eat.

I will treasure the times we had together. When you convinced me not to scream in the face of my work colleague or throw food at my father in-law. But now that you are not here…

I can.

I can do all those things! I can kiss the beautiful bar maid and dance on the street in only my underwear! I can go weeks without bathing or changing clothes! I can divorce my wife and sing as loud as I can in court!

Wait.

Now I see it!

You! You have held me back! All these years I tailored myself to your standards! You stopped me only from fully seeing and expressing myself as I truly am!

I am mad! I am as mad as the Hatter. As mad as science. As mad as if all of humanity’s consciousness was my own to hold!

I will miss you, my dear. But now I have an entire Bedlam of a mind to explore.

Goodbye. I won’t miss you, old friend.