lingering unease
I think I was disproportionately traumatized by Vegas. Nothing particularly bad happened. I wasn't mugged or assaulted, I didn't get violently ill, I didn't get ahold of any bad drugs, I didn't get food poisoning from shrimp cocktails, I didn't get lice. Yet, I came back to Portland utterly shell=shocked and I still haven't recovered.
Part of my unease is probably to do with my brother. There were a couple of moments when he seemed as far away from me as a dust particle floating in a dark and lifeless part of the universe. I saw in him tiny hints of autism or Asperger's Syndrome -- a certain unrelatedness. And it made me cold. It reminded me of his cold, aloof father, my step-father, and I wondered if these disorders are genetic. Dave was actually the one to suggest the possibility that he has Asperger's. He was joking, but only half.
I love him and I felt an almost desolate feeling as I hugged him goodbye at the airport Tuesday afternoon, just an hour after we'd arrived from Vegas. He put his arms around me awkwardly, like a badly constructed cyborg, and was sure to hold me as far away from him as possible. Mahavira and I had strange, repeating, tedious arguments for the rest of the afternoon and again the next day. We still haven't settled back into our usual routine. I'm in a fog and am considering an increase in my daily dose of happy-pill. It's such a weird thing.
Why should two days in a miserable city throw me into such a tailspin? I feel like holing up in a quiet cabin somewhere in the woods for a weekend, just to think about everything. I'd like to walk in a hushed forest, breathe cold air and look at the trees. I think that would help.
Part of my unease is probably to do with my brother. There were a couple of moments when he seemed as far away from me as a dust particle floating in a dark and lifeless part of the universe. I saw in him tiny hints of autism or Asperger's Syndrome -- a certain unrelatedness. And it made me cold. It reminded me of his cold, aloof father, my step-father, and I wondered if these disorders are genetic. Dave was actually the one to suggest the possibility that he has Asperger's. He was joking, but only half.
I love him and I felt an almost desolate feeling as I hugged him goodbye at the airport Tuesday afternoon, just an hour after we'd arrived from Vegas. He put his arms around me awkwardly, like a badly constructed cyborg, and was sure to hold me as far away from him as possible. Mahavira and I had strange, repeating, tedious arguments for the rest of the afternoon and again the next day. We still haven't settled back into our usual routine. I'm in a fog and am considering an increase in my daily dose of happy-pill. It's such a weird thing.
Why should two days in a miserable city throw me into such a tailspin? I feel like holing up in a quiet cabin somewhere in the woods for a weekend, just to think about everything. I'd like to walk in a hushed forest, breathe cold air and look at the trees. I think that would help.
posted by reasonably prudent poet at 3:35 PM
2 Comments:
The way you describe Las Vegas confirms what I already thought -- I don't want to go there. However, feeling the after-effects of being in such a soulless places confirms that you have a soul and you are connected. I don't know your brother, so I can't say what that all means. But I did once have a layover in Vegas and just was awful enough to last for days. Oh yeah, and the whole after holidays deal, etc, can't be helping. My two cents.
The place is toxic and ungrounding. Your response is a sign of a healthy sensitivity, in my humble opinion.
I generally have an art response to Las Vegas, meaning it generates creative work as a way to process the discomfort and disconnection I experience while there.
It iS possible to be there without being sort of "infected", but it helps to have a purpose other than swallowing what they're selling.
Go out in that forest. It will help. Good luck to you.
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