Dead Flies

I was going to talk about something else today, but I'm going to save it.

I have a strange story from last night. I can't decide if I'm worried or embarassed by it.

I'm unsure of the cause. It obviously wasn't hunger or some related thing affecting my brain, though I know that can happen to long-time anaoretics. Maybe it was just my severe frustration, maybe my fluxuating brain chemicals due to my newmedications, I don't know. Maybe I was just annoyed.

I'd gone to the graveyard to read Wintergirls after work. I love it there. Despite its location in the middle of town, it is quiet, with two banks of green rolling hills separated by a marshy canal. Large trees dot the landscape surrounded by mossy patches that are perfect for relaxation. It is populated by crows, squirrels, blackbirds, occasional housecats, the usual insects. Generally the only people there are the dead.

There were a lot of flies of all kinds out yesterday afternoon, more so than the past few visits I've made. Usually I can ignore them, but they really bothered me. I had a hard time concentrating on my book. At this point I suspected hunger (or just my general bad mood) was making me irritable, but it didn't go away after dinner.

Then a fly came into the house. Just a stupid housefly. I hate them, and always swat them. But this fly made me so. very. pissed. I couldn't concentrate at all. I waved the book at it every time it flew by, for what seemed like hours. I got up and grabbed the fly swatter, and crouched in the livingroom like a hunter. Finally I got a good thwack mid-air and sent the fly crashing to the floor.

This is where the story gets uncomfortable.

I am not a cruel person. I like animals, generally even bugs. I'm the kind of person who puts spiders outside instead of squishing them. I think that sometimes death is necessary, and flies carrying disease in the house is one of those times. Normally I swat them and move on.

I got up and watched the bastard suffer. I lay on my belly, chin propped on my arms, and watched him hurt. I'd busted his two back legs and a middle one, and dislocated one wing. He'd attempt to fly, but with one wing it sent him around in circles on his back, spinning like a top. Bzzzzzzzzzzz.

Sometimes I'd give him a poke, or let him attempt to climb on the swatter, pathetically clinging with his functional legs, always failing, falling. Bzzzzzzzzz. Bzz. Bzz.

I'm not sure how long it lasted, but I finally ended it with bug spray and went back to my book.

Vicious glee.

That's how I felt. I was so angry at it for making me suffer, I wanted it to suffer back. Obviously this is some serious misplacement, since all he did was, you know, be a fly.

But I felt like him. I feel like - look, I was born this way. Born "wrong" in the world, born to do something at odds with the other occupants. Like a fly, I was made to buzz from one thing to another, to thrive on things others would never touch. Have I done something wrong? Can I help it if I have?

And then, the world cripples me. And I deserve it, in their eyes. Instead of understanding and acceptance, I get negativity, judgement, neglect. I'm given the wounds of insecurity, of lonliness. I get eating disorders.

The world watches me spin and spin, getting nowhere. Climbing on my broken legs, finally moving, going up, only to fall again. Failures over and over. How can I go on with my life, have success, when all I can do is go around in circles?

I feel like that fly. I keep trying to live, because I can't see that I'm already dead.

*

EDIT: In case anyone is truly disturbed or concerned about me, please don't worry too much - I'm taking care of it. See this post for details.