The hook that sinks into you…

If there’s one “normal” thing about my mind, it’s that I cannot predict what it’s going to do next – and that unpredictability is constant… so I know to expect it…

Case in point: hallucinations. I have two kinds, generally. Type A are those full-blown, never existed, never will, aren’t real, and you’re fucking imagining it kinds. Thankfully, I’m not writing about one of those today. Type 2 are the kinds that did exist, did happen, were real… and you’re also imagining them. They are moments when my brain skips and lands in sometime other than the present, so I’m not experiencing the sensory input of today, but rather of another time.

This happens especially when I’m in some place with lots of memories. Going to my mom’s house is like a trip and fall and broken hip down memory lane for me and I have to shut out the things I think I see that aren’t really there. Oh, there are worse too… but I won’t get into those.

Today’s happened as I stood outside of work. I don’t have a key to the building so, when I show up too early, there’s some waiting involved.

You see, many years ago, when I worked for Best Life in Irvine, I would often stay late while Rosa was in school and, with us only owning one car, I would wait for her to come and pick me up once she got out. Sometimes, it got rather late. Occasionally, when it grew especially late, I would sit out in the front lobby and read, because I could see the headlights pull up from there. So, there I’d be, sitting in the lobby… and when it grew dark, sometimes I’d just sit in the dark.

And I’d see the headlights pull up. And I’d leave the building and see Rosa smiling at me from inside the car.

I don’t talk about this much. It’s kind of the daily workings of any relationship. (Ok, any relationship with one car.)

But then, this morning, my brain skipped – and I was standing outside of Best Life on a winter’s evening with Rosa waving and smiling at me from inside a Nissan Sentra. And I had to close my eyes and quietly tell myself (it takes practice) that what I was experiencing was not real. Your heart tends to race at a time like that and you just have to breathe deeply and tell yourself that it’s okay – just accept it.

I didn’t open my eyes for a while. I’m never sure what I’ll see. Times like that remind me that I need to seek treatment of some kind because I’m not as well as I claim to be.

I opened my eyes. Once again, I stood outside of my building – real time.

I’ve said it before. Why can’t I hallucinate winning lotto numbers?

(I later had a dream involving a topless Vicky so, you know, it goes where it will.)