EXHAUSTION

(Original Image by Gilbert Beltran

Here I am again at the end of another weekend. No more enlightened, no more at peace than when I began. Ronnie and Red came over, yes. And there was a lot to talk about, a lot to drink, a lot of pleasure to be had in the company of two very close friends. But when they finally said goodbye, the thrill had returned to zero, much like the dead stillness after a heavy orgasm.

Facing down the barrel of another work week, I think of the week previous, and how I had been fairly productive, both physically and artistically. I wrote over ten poems, squeezed a couple journal entries in there. I also forced myself onto that exerbike I had received for my birthday and rode for over 20 minutes, Monday, Wednesday, and Friday. By the end of the week, though, I was exhausted. I had been getting 4 to 6 hours of broken sleep per night, and, by Friday, I had three glasses of wine and passed out.

I acknowledge there’s no end to my endeavors. There’s no pinnacle of writing in which, having reached it, I’d put down my pen, kick up my feet, and bask in euphoric bliss until the end of my days. There’s no point in which I’d be able to stop working either, whether it be for myself or others. And so, in developing a routine, I must be careful not to focus exclusively on output. It might be worth pulling back a little bit if it means I’m not exhausted every day for the rest of my life. This is where I struggle most. My passion gets the better of me, and I push myself harder and harder to achieve greatness. Trouble is, I push myself too hard too often, and I find myself hating life and the act of creation itself.

It’s no surprise that under these conditions I gravitate towards the inverse in my leisure time. But, again, pleasures such as booze or buddies flare up high, but burn out quickly. It’s a hedonistic affliction. It’s mental masturbation when you convince yourself you can escape the drudgery of life if only you did the right thing with the right person at the right time. In the back of my mind, as I indulge, I know that I am only kidding myself, and eventually I’ll be sitting alone on a Sunday night, wine glass empty, typing about how I hadn’t found what I was looking for that weekend…

In the same way, my bottom right tooth aches terribly when a piece of food gets lodged against it. It throbs and throbs, and I wince and chew on the left side of my mouth until the pain goes away. And it does. But I know the inevitable solution is that I must see a dentist and either get the fucker filled or extracted. Joy joy joy.

My wife, Mandi, is doing all she can to keep me satisfied (which is no trivial feat), but ultimately I need to confront my issues of inadequacy and abandonment and find a routine, or develop a routine rather, that keeps me productive without killing me in the process. The tough part is accepting that I may write less; I may workout less; but hopefully there’s more peace, more inner quiet on the other side of that hill. That’s the dream anyway, for I cannot keep this pace up much longer.