Ghost in the Machine

When I was little, I was really obsessed with fire. My first burning incident happened when I was around two; somehow I lit a newspaper and tossed it on the living room floor. I later scaled down the incidents, but still, whenever I get my hands on a matchbox, I would light matchsticks one after another. It was very pleasing to watch the fire glowing, the matchsticks getting twisted. And the best part was smelling the sharp carbon-sulfur smoke in the air.

My parents didn’t get the appeal, but I just really liked watching something vanish into light.

Maybe I still do. But now, I want to be the match.

Most days, I wake up from sleep, feeling like I should be waking up from one more layer. Like I’m stuck in the almost-awake phase, punished with the unbearable edge of almost-transcendence. There have been some occasions I felt the weight of descending while waking up, like existence itself was a punishment dragging me back from another realm.

There were moments I was sure there was more to this life. A certainty that you can prove with your five senses. But I could hold it for only milliseconds after waking, then it disappears like the smoke of a crisp match.

I think we can define it as ‘spiritual edging’, a heavenly tease.

A chase of truth, without the holy climax.

You get a taste of the beyond, a glimpse behind the veil, maybe even a good grab, only to realize the veil is just your skin. And I’m too soft to tear my skin open.

Some mornings, somewhere between washing my face and having coffee, I ask myself: should I just stop trying and go crazy instead.

It is not a loud thought, I barely hear it but I know it is there.

Then my rational brain shows up with a beautiful lie that gets me dressed and out the door. The kind of lie like Radiohead’s “everything in its right place”. Maybe that’s the truth and I’m the liar. It’s hard to tell anymore.

I just know, despite my best efforts, my threshold for madness is too damn high. I may never be able to go crazy. Not sure if that means I’m too resilient or too repressed. Or maybe I just have too many attachments.

I think I crossed at least one threshold some time ago, the point where something should have broken me or make me mad. But it didn’t. Instead I spiraled inward.

Maybe the journey was always supposed to go that way. What do they call it? The dark night of the soul

And then there is the other kind of weirdness; that is not existential but sensory. Bodily memories that I can’t explain.

Like, why do I know what it feels like to finger a brain?

I have absolutely no story to trace it back to, but I am certain of the texture and the sensation. I can feel the stickiness on my fingertips. I imagine my fingers wandering through its folds, and the folds speak to me; whispering all the memories, both good and horrid. I read them like a blind person reads Braille. Is this kind of intimacy too much to ask?

These are the kind of thoughts you cannot tell your friends.

And I have to confess something else, I’ve felt jealous of the dead. At least eleven separate times.

Is that a thing? Again, it is not a rehearsed thought, not a fantasy either. You see a news story and think: ‘lucky bastard’.

I am not jealous because I want to escape, or I am depressed and want to hurt myself. But because the dead can finally sit in silence undisturbed, unburdened with no expectations and no goals.

No one asks the dead to be consistent. I personally ask a lot of people to be consistent and I think they find it annoying.

But I will keep saying it: going crazy has benefits.

It resonates with something real, raw, unperformative, unfiltered. Dangerous and sacred.

If crazy people took regular showers, I’d spend all my time with them.
That’s the trade-off I guess.

And the person reading this -yes I am breaking the forth wall- go buy a coffee for your local mad person. And if you can afford the smell, you can even wait for the sermon. It might just be worth it.

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