Plea From The Falling – Explanation

[Meant to post this the other day but I didn't want it as my most recent post (just because) so I waited. Enjoy my attempt at explaining some of mentality.]

I get really overwhelmed with anxiety sometimes. I mean, I’m an anxious person by nature but over time my body’s been trained to over react to perceived and imaginary threats (PTSD) so its quite a bit more than the run of the mill stressed out and fretful. I get caught in memories, fragments, and illogical situations inside my head where every rounded object is a knife waiting to cut me open- in short, I get afraid of very unlikely and sometimes really stupid things. Sometimes I’ll huddle in bed holding my breath as planes go overhead because inside my head they’re about to crash on our house and kill everyone but me (greatest fear: being left alone). Sometimes I see a tiny spear of light shining through the dark and sleeping house and if I’m having a really bad day with lots of thoughts of the past I’ll think it’s a certain someone with one of those guns with the little laser on them (in the past this actually was a real threat-  once).

So, I think it’s needless to say at this point if I’m starting to feel anxious I don’t get much sleep. I have to keep myself busy at all times, my mind can not be left idle- at all! So as I lay there I have try to distract myself.

For as long as I can remember I’ve been telling myself bedtime stories. Don’t laugh I’m serious. When I was a little girl I told myself bedtime stories every night and acted them out in ‘plays’ during the day. I still do this though now it’s called ‘working on stories’ or ‘mentally writing.’ Sometimes when I do this I can distract myself from the anxiety… sometimes my anxiety twists the stories as they drift from one part of my mind to another. It’s like falling into a circle and sometimes I can’t help myself.

Most of you here probably don’t know but I have a small side hobby in the writing world called fanfiction- mind you I’m not about to admit this a second time. It’s where you take a pre-existing story (from book, movie, Tv, or other) or set of pre-existing characters and apply new plots to them solely because you love that story but wonder what would have happened if… etc. People write them and post them up (with disclaimer stating non-ownership of everything but the elusive plot bunny that started you down that path in the first place) on sites specifically for fanfiction so other fans might enjoy those wonderful ‘what ifs’. I am no exception (*cough* I do have a fanfiction blog but I’m not about to state where *cough*) to this though I do write and read far less than most people because I just have so many of my own stories eating away at what little non-attention deficit space I have left inside my head.

Occasionally I work on some of these stories to fall asleep. That’s what I was doing last night. I’m not going to state which fandom (if you guess don’t say it) I was working through because it’ll up the self-strange’ness I reveal here just a notch above my comfort level. To sum it up there are these two characters, Character A: a reclusive and bad tempered romance novelist (you see why I like it already) jaded by life and Character B: a naive and innocent singer on their way to becoming a rock star- muchly hyper-active. They’re pure opposites but they’re in love most of the time.

My anxiety warped my mental bedtime story so that CharB wasn’t doing so well. He changed everything about himself so CharA would love him more, so people wouldn’t complain about his wonderfully cheerful and occasionally grating personality, so that he’d never be a burden and he’d never be left alone. He decided he wouldn’t be loud, wouldn’t ask for anything, would always go to work early, and never ever do anything to disturb CharA.

He managed it alright for awhile. The only thing people noticed was it seemed like he was ‘growing up.’ CharA wondered occasionally if something was wrong but CharB always whined and cried over the smallest thing so if there was something he would have said it by then- the only problem being that he didn’t.

For months.

CharB is a rock star in progress. He has lyrics he has to write, songs to sing, concerts to deal with and fans to please. That’s a whole lot of stress. We’ve all heard of a stage persona and that’s fine at work but trying to keep it up at home too and the stress finally starts to take it’s toll. He goes whole days without speaking without being spoken too, which means he never speaks at home and CharA doesn’t notice because he’s  -always- locked in his office.

CharA has a brother (CharC) in the music industry, CharB’s manager, who gives him a call one day. CharC doesn’t much like CharB but he puts up with him because he’s a ‘good investment’ to the business. As a good investment he’s not about to stand by and let something like that crumble. He’s also a very observant person who knows music better than anyone and he’s noticed the changes, oh so subtle and not so much so, in CharB and that lately all his lyrics are starting to sound a lot alike. They’re happy and bouncy but they’re just… wrong. Music is nothing if you don’t feel it.

So, he meddles and calls CharA (who refuses to listen to any of CharB’s music- stating disinterest for everything in the music industry) and asks him to help CharB with the latest lyrics. CharA reluctantly agrees but takes a look at the sheet music anyway. He’s always been cruel stating that his lyrics stink (as a novelist he can’t help but hold things up to a different literary level,… that and he’s a cynical ass) but he has to agree that these poppy sunshiney lyrics all sound the same. Nothing is fresh, nothing is felt, and something is terribly wrong.

He confronts CharB and in the progress of the conversation finally notices the changes. CharB is quiet, too quiet. He finally gets it out of him that several months ago he made a decision to change who he was and no one noticed. They got more work done, the fans keep coming, the two of them fight less and everyone seems to like him more. CharB just shrugs with a smile as he states all this and adds, so it must mean I’m better like this.

CharA could’ve slapped him but one problem to a time (and I don’t want to tell the whole story in this post just a specific part of it). The lyrics stink. He asks why he’s not writing what he feels anymore. CharB says music has to be beautiful in some sense or no one listens to it. None of the words he has right now are beautiful. He doesn’t feel anything. CharA tells him to write about that. CharB says but that’s an ugly thing, no one wants to hear about that.

CharA walks away and comes back with a beaten shoe box of papers and asks he thinks his writing is ever ugly. CharB perks up instantly saying no, besides he’s a bestseller, how could anything like that be ugly- especially in romance novels. CharA nods, true, but then holds out the stack of papers saying- read these and tell me if they’re ugly.

See, CharA is a jaded reclusive character who does NOT talk about the past, himself, or anything sappy. For a romance novelist he’s notoriously unromantic, blunt, and just plain unfriendly. He’s always unwilling to share the inner part of himself with CharB so this is a momentous moment even as he walks away to let the other read.

The words are black, white and gray. Speaking of a time when all he felt was numb. It was poetry- something no one would ever expect CharA to write, and it was beautiful. Long story short, CharB learns to let some of the more ugly things seep into his lyric writing and is all the better for it. The rest of the mental story is irrelevant to this post. :)

While working on this story in my head I briefly took a moment to think what would CharA put into poetry… and what would CharB take away from it for his lyrics? The first two lines hit me like a brick to the face.

Tell me a darker story, bathed in broken glory.

That’s about when I popped the laptop open, the version above is diff from the final just because the flow changed as I went. As I wrote it down the poem was less about them and more about me. It was like I was asking my pen (I know I’m on the laptop but I still view all things written as channeled through a pen) to heal the darkness for me by bringing it out into the light.

Which spawns another idea that I’ll have to relate in a totally different post. :) Cause this one is long enough!

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