Story writer

Joe slammed his glass down hard onto his wooden writing desk. The whiskey swirled in his glass then burst from the cup when it struck the table. Whiskey spilled on the desk and soaked his papers.

 He went back to typing on his typewriter, the whole time thinking about the person he lost. It had been a while since he said goodbye and even though he was the one who walked out the door he still hurt just as much as if he was the one who was abandoned.

Joe screamed and cursed, all of the noise and anger meant nothing as he yelled alone in this empty house. He took another drink of whiskey and tried typing but his words were becoming more erratic. Her face and voice drifted through his head making it hard to think and making it even harder to speak. He tried to fight back tears, he knew he was perfectly allowed to feel any emotions that he wanted to but he was the one who left. There was a preconceived notion that the person who leaves in a relationship is the bad guy but sometimes staying is more painful than leaving. While it hurts being left, sometimes it is actually harder to be the one who leaves.

 When you wake up one day and you realize that your relationship has been stagnating for a while you know that to stay would be toxic, and end up hurting for both people. Joe didn’t want to hurt her, the pain he caused her felt like a dagger through his heart but staying wouldn’t have been healthy for either of them.

 Joe took another drink and laughed at his own emotional stupidity, he didn't regret leaving he regretted that he had to leave. He didn't want to leave he wanted to stay, he wanted things to work out and he wanted life to be good, but that's not the way life works.

His phone started to ring as he tried to continue his writing.  He put his face in his hands and listened to the phone ring repeatedly. The phone finally stopped and as soon as it stopped, it began to ring immediately after. He did not want to speak with anyone, he was in too much pain and his nerves were too raw to share any of this with anyone.

 The phone kept ringing and ringing, Joe couldn’t handle the needy grasping for his attention and in a rage he stood up and knocked the phone to the ground. The phone flew off the stand was unplugged from the wall and crashed to the ground.

Joe felt like he had been ripped apart, it felt like he had cut off his own arm just to save the rest of his body. Logically it made sense, but that doesn't make it easier to cut off your own arm. It also doesn’t help if your arm could get right back up after you cut it off and then tried to strangle you to death every time you looked at it. Joe was emotionally wounded and missing his other half and thinking about it made him feel worse. He wondered if having his arm actually removed would have been easier than moving out and never being with Her again.

Happy memories of times they shared flooded through his brain, he slammed his fist down onto his desk out in anger and sadness. As he thought about the good memories the bad ones started to flood in just as fast as if his brain was trying to remind him why he left in the first place. The mixture of anger from having to leave, being reminded of the bad memories and missing the life that could have been, Joe stood up and kicked his writing desk. The desk flew backwards his typewriter crash to the ground and his bottle of whiskey shattered releasing the Amber liquid all over his hardwood floor. He sat on the ground surrounded by broken memories, shattered dreams, broken promises and broken possessions. He wanted to tell himself that things would get better and logically he knew they would but emotionally he felt that he had been stabbed in the heart. It felt so real that no amount of logic could explain away the feeling a chest wound or fatal injury. Anyone who said that emotional trauma is not painful has clearly had a heart that died a long time ago.

 The next morning Joe’s alarm clock went off with a loud, annoying series of beeps. The alarm clock sang out to the world that it was morning. If there were any piece of furniture that deserved to be kicked and knocked to the ground it wouldn’t be the phone, the desk, his bottle of whiskey or even his typewriter, it would have been the alarm clock. Yet the reverse was true and while his beloved possessions lay strewn across the floor, victims of his rage, the alarm clock chirped happily and comfortably atom his dresser.

Joe slowly stood up and rubbed his face trying to get the sleeplessness out of the eyes. He stretch his legs, walked to the bathroom and took a very long shower. After his shower he walked to the kitchen and drank several cups of coffee then headed out the door to greet his day.

No one in is day-to-day life knew or would know about what had happened the previous night, they wouldn't know about the pain or the broken furniture, the wouldn't know about the lack of sleep or the cries of the pain from feeling like he was emotionally stabbed in the chest. He would smile to them, they would smile back and life would go on, boring life would go on.

Hate, Anger and Pumpkin spice

            Adam convulsed and threw himself around the room. He clenched his chest and his eyes burned red. Anger and rage surged through his blood harder than ever. His veins bulged out on his arms and all of his muscles tightened and shook. Furniture had been knocked over, dishes smashed and the television was broken. All of the destruction started in the kitchen, led through the house and ended at Adam’s feet as he shook and writhed.

            It was a cold and dark night with only a sliver of moon visible in the sky.

Adam was walking home from work. It was almost Halloween and the neighborhood was all decorated with jack-o-lanterns, skeletons and orange and black colors. Adam gritted his teeth and muttered to himself as he walked. His work was stressful, he hated his boss and all of this incessant cheerfulness over a holiday made him angry. The sound of children playing and laughing echoed down the street from one of the expensive houses on the street. Adam was in such a foul mood that the sound of laughter, especially a child’s laughter made him even more angry. He couldn’t get a break in his life and so the rest of the world must suffer for it.

            Adam wasn’t normally an angry or hateful person but during the last month his personal and professional life had been force-feeding him a steady diet of shit every single day. A man can only consume so much metaphorical fecal matter before it starts to affect his mental and emotional state.

            Soon he was home and immediately tried to dive into distractions. Life was too much to deal with and he needed an escape. He turned on the TV and poured a beer. He muttered to himself, repeating words he heard from his boss and reliving moments from something that happened a week ago. Everything seemed to be happening at once, Adam didn’t have time to process it all. Every bad day within the last few weeks kept showing up in his thoughts uninvited, like they were following him, or haunting him.

            Adam spent the night drinking and watching his favorite shows. None of it helped but it kept him just distracted enough to get through the night. He was at a breaking point and was in too deep to rationally figure out how to handle it. The night went on and Adam was getting hungry. He was so distracted he forgot to eat. It was eleven at night and instead of going to bed, he went into the kitchen to fix a sandwich.

            He was mad at himself for waiting for so long to eat. Eating late meant going to bed late, not getting enough sleep, which meant work would seem harder. Work being harder caused more stress. Stress can cause weight gain from excess eating and lack of exercise. Eating at eleven at night can also cause unwanted weight gain. Adam was trying to watch his weight. Lack of sleep, harder work, weight gain, STRESS!

            Adam’s blood pressure went up as he ate his sandwich and stared intensely at the wall as his mind brought him through a tour of ever worse case scenario for the future and every bad day from the past. The TV was still on, the voices from the television blended with a high pitch whistling noise that rang out in Adam’s ears. Then he heard something happened. A soft tune played on the TV. A sweet little melody drifted through the air and went right into Adam’s ears.

            It was an old classic song, Adam remembered listening to it with his grandparents. It was a quiet kind of song and went well with the autumn air. Thoughts of his childhood flooded into his mind. Adam was a small child sitting on the floor of his grandparent’s living room. They played this old nostalgic song on their record player. the music played softly as the record crackled and popped like a wood fire. His grandfather said “This goes so well with the autumn air doesn’t it? so could outside but this song warms you right up” He would say to his wife, then smile warmly at little Adam. Adam’s grandfather had a smile so warm and cheerful that it could melt the coldest heart.

            Adam’s grandfather was a little overweight, he didn’t have much money and their car wasn’t very reliable, but he had everything he could ever want. He was married to the love of his life, he had a warm house, an adorable grandchild and a record player that could play all of his favorite old songs.

            Adam snapped back into reality. The song had brought him to another place and another time. a time when his grandfather was still around and a time before pain. Tears welled up in Adam’s eyes. These memories made him smile but then hit him like a train. His anger and hatred were still there. Stress and anxiety don’t go away very easily and they don’t like being ignored. His mind became a war zone. As he struggled to find peace and hold onto his cherished memories but he couldn’t let go of his anger. He was wronged so many times and it felt like that if he let his anger go than all the bad stuff that happened was meaningless. “Its not fair how I was treated! Why is all of this happening at once? Why doesn’t anyone care?!” Adam shouted as he clutched each side of his head. then he heard his inner voice talking to him. the little remaining sanity he had. “Holding onto anger will not help you. It will not stop the pain but only make it worse. The ones responsible will not be punished because you hold onto grudges and anger from the past. Any wrongdoings they do are for them to worry about. You need to take care of yourself. You need to keep track of your own sanity” said the voice, which was just Adam rationalizing with himself.

            Then the anger struck back, then the rational voice piped up. Adam’s head began to spin. He reached for the counter and knocked his beer and plate onto the floor. He stumbled through the kitchen as the voices grew louder. The veins on his neck bulged and his eyes went blood shot red. He stumbled into a stand were we kept his coffee maker and supplies. He knocked it over, breaking the coffee machine and spilling coffee and sugar everywhere. His chest hurt and his head hurt, he felt dizzy and his veins were on fire. He stumbled through the living room and knocked over the TV and broke picture frames on the walls. He threw himself around the room as rage filled his mind. He tried to fight it every second but it had taken such a strong hold of him and wouldn’t let go. “I just want to be Happy again!” he screamed inside his head. “I must make them pay!” Growled another voice in his head.

            He leaned against the couch to rest but the pain struck up again and in a fit of rage he flipped the couch and then spun around and punched a hole in his wall. Adam began choking and gagging. He hunched over and began to vomit. Bile the color of thick black tar was expelled from his mouth and splashed across the floor of his living room.

            Then everything went black. Adam woke up the next day. Sun was shining on his face he woke up and smiled. This was something he had not done in a very long time. He felt an inner peace. When everything came to a breaking point, he won out in the end.

            He was late for work, there was black vomit on his carpet and his house was a wreck. These things didn’t bother him. He called his boss to say he would be late and got ready for work. Before he left he went into his bedroom and rustled through some boxes to find something then ran out the door, locked it and made his way to work.

That day felt different than all the ones before it. The air had that crisp fall feeling, the trees had full red, orange and yellow autumn colors and he knew that he would be able to get a pumpkin spice latte from the local coffee shop down the road. And it was that day he walked to work with a smile on his face. A smile, a pair of headphones, an old portable CD player and a very old song playing on repeat.

Anger

Anger throbs in my head. It has its own heartbeat. On a daily basis I keep it at bay. Like a caged animal locked away, I keep it from the world. We live in a civilized world. There is no need for thoughts of violence. Yet, here I am. A ‘normal’ guy, polite and kind hearted, some would say even happy. I hold onto this anger. It is not polite to yell and against the law to kill, but what should I do? Every fiber in my being urges me to fight, urges me to kill. The world is a harsh place and those who say otherwise are lying to themselves.

I try everything. I let it go, I hold back, I breath deeply, calm myself, see things from the other persons point of view and I bite my tongue. I have been biting my tongue so much that its starting to bleed. Idiots, lowbrow knuckle draggers feel the same anger, how do they survive? Lord knows they don’t have self-control. The eleven kids and daily addictions prove that. Either they are too stupid to realize how fucked up the world is, or having sex with everything in sight and drinking every night keeps them too preoccupied to be angry. Then again, I see plenty of angry people, some drink, some don’t, some have kids, and some don’t.

I wonder what is the source of my anger and why is it so difficult to control? I pray for peace, I don’t want to be angry, but the anger is there. Like a voice that keeps telling me to lose control. Oh how good it would feel. This anger voice is not alone. How many of our bad traits have its own voice. Too much eating, sex or alcohol, gambling and anger to name a few. How seductive the voice “Go for it, its what you want”. A religious person might say it’s the devil, I don’t believe this. how easy it would be to say it’s the devil and he is tempting you. No, this voice is you. It’s the deep part of your brain that doesn’t reason, it wants what it wants. It’s the animal in you that has no regard for anything else. This isn’t evil, its nature. So when you hear the voice, the urge to let go, its just your own voice, echoing what you really want. Which means I am fighting myself. I don’t know how much will power I have left sometimes. The urge is always there, its constant.

In Christian religion there are seven deadly sins. Lust, Greed, Pride, Envy, Sloth, Gluttony, and Wrath. Everyone has a little of each seven. How often have you been slothful? Not wanting to get out of bed, or off the couch. Moving is a pain, make someone else do it. Or envious? Smith from work has the latest Iphone and you are stuck with a little cheap phone that barely gets service. His has games and apps, yours has an address book and maybe a clock. I feel every single sin a little of each every so often. Humans embrace sin and so they feel the burden of it. I used the think my sin was Lust. How lonely I was and sex was all I could think about. That was just hormones. My whole life, the real sin for me was Wrath. I remember being five and having indescribable anger. I didn’t know why I felt it or how to handle it. I just remember from an early age. I wanted to hurt things. I wanted others to hurt as much as I did.

I’ve found some resemblance of peace since then, I can control myself and am in constant control. But the anger is there. Its my oldest friend. Crohn’s disease and anger, my two buddies. They both sit and wait for me to slip up. Then they strike. Every day is a new challenge, every day I hear the whispers from angers cage. “let me out, I can help you” says the seductive voice, and maybe some day, I will.