my therapist dalton will say shit like, “how are you feeling?”
and so i’ll say, “like oatmeal that’s been forgotten in the microwave for four hours” or “an achromatic kaleidoscope” or “like a hamster wheel without the hamster” or “like a whirlybird falling from the top of a tree” or “like a baby animal with spindly legs going viral on the internet because people think me looking stupid while learning to walk is hilarious” or “like someone is watching me walk downhill” or “like ikea furniture that didn’t come with instructions” or “like the ambiguous blue liquid being absorbed by a paper towel in a commercial” or “like the human equivalent of ¯\_(ツ)_/¯” or “like the sound a wet trout makes when smacked against a wall”
and then he’ll say some shit like “berklie we’ve been over this. you have to say how you feel not what you feel like.”
and then i’ll say something like, “i dunno. just like the way waluigi says ‘wah.’”
and then he’ll say some shit like, “berklie for the love of god you have got to give me an emotion and not a metaphor.”
and then i’ll have to say something like, “fine. i guess i feel bored. or listless. or apathetic, but only in regards to myself.”
and then he’ll say some shit like, “berklie, that’s depression.”
and then i’ll say, “how was i supposed to know?”
only i’m sisyphus and my emotions are a boulder and once a week a man who has an extensive knowledge of mules gees and haws me until i manage to drag out the government name of an emotion from somewhere.
thi is very much the non-funny therapy bit i didn’t include.
Yet there is something far more whimsical to say you how you feel like that how you actually feel. It's probably intellectualising the feelings rather than feeling them but where's the fun in feeling sad but you're actually feeling sad in the way plants miss the sun, when the warmth on your face from the winter sun is cast over by a shadow and you feel hollow in your bones like a desk toy if a bird that dips to drink but can never actually drink.
Sometimes the government name for a feeling doesn't encapsulate the way you are actually feeling. Depression sadness is more than just sad it's an apathetic ache of something missing but with only boredom to try to fill the space.
#just things - feelings are hard and I have both a loathing and love for them #the obscure book of sorrows does so well I'm giving names to feelings you couldn't name before #funkenzwangsvortstellung - the primal trance of watching a campfire in the dark
