Sun, Sep 30, 2001 10:09PM -0600

Maybe it's the lack of sunlight. Maybe it's the constant imbibing of alcohol.

This article from Slashdot about how college should be entirely about getting a good job made me really depressed and a little physically ill. Couple this with the Orwellesque erasure of the Twin Towers in Zoolander (as noted by Jon Katz's review on "Zoolander") and sometimes I wonder if it really matters that we won the Cold War, and it makes me think that in the end, capitalism is just as antagonistic to democracy as communism is, except that in capitalism, I think it's worse because we're being deluded into thinking we have freedom. But enough post-modern deconstructionism.

Let me tell you that my faith in humankind has reached a nadir as of late. Not because of anything that has happened (well, besides Sept. 11, but like I said, that's really too big a thing for me to mash into pathetic little words right now), but because for some reason I can't seem to draw inspiration from the little acts of kindness I've been seeing here and there. It's like this downward spiral of paranoia. I keep thinking there's a hidden agenda behind such deeds. I can't accept them for what they are. And it's because I've already prejudged all people as essentially rotten, so everything is tainted, and it only deepens my distrust. In other words, I've been thinking too much, despite the alcohol.

And I know that the only reason I feel this way is because I've gone through a bit of a spell of bad luck (see the luck I've had would make a good man turn bad... Thank you Steven Morrissey), about six years worth, though in reality, probably less, I've just been ignoring the good parts, and in my mind, even if it were six years straight, I know this still wouldn't be any sort of reason to think the world is a terrible place. Just this past summer, I realized that there's more hope available in this world than I could ever dream of (I did not know I was so empty, to be so full...), and I had some glimmerings of it stirring in my heart. But summertime dreams just don't fare so well in the cold autumn twilight, and I'm hard-pressed to separate fact from fiction at this point. Something was real. What it was exactly I have no idea.

I haven't been able to see the bright side of things quite as clearly as of late. I mean, I've been enjoying myself these past five days, but I haven't been able to just sit here and be content with the present. The future is starting to loom again, filling me with portents of dread and misery. Now is OK. Later may not be so OK. I hate being a Virgo.

But I suppose there's nothing for it but some benzodiazepines to calm my nerves, and maybe an SSRI to make me smile a bit. These are dark days, and I dread walking through them alone.

One thing at a time, I suppose.