January

Again I sit here, as I have every morning for months, waiting to hear singing birds in my mind, but the bee just won’t budge.
The snow's falling outside but I refuse to see any of its beauty. It’s just sludge.

Most times, the page in front of me is far too painful to look at, so I click X to exit followed by don’t save because there’s nothing there, but sometimes, when I feel adventurous, I elect to get started on something and change the typeset from Gill sans MT in 11 to Times New Roman in 14 but that doesn’t help either. Then I wonder why I’ve never bothered to ask someone how to change the default setting.
The page is still hideously blank, a mirror to my expression, and the only consolation is that I can’t see myself, even when I know I must look pathetic. After a twiddle of pubes and a sly old glance at my dongle, I’m off to the interweb to try reading someone else’s work. When that fails, I might look for a bargain Nikon D300 that’s probably a dud on Scumtree.

On a half-decent day I might start a sentence like ‘He walked out of the office’ but for the life of me I don’t know where he goes or what he ddoes so I laugh or huff or just nod at how incredibly empty I am, like the person on the ad that says ‘I just got a cheeseburger for 99p’.
Exit/don’t save.

Then there are the days I like to pander to inconsequentials;
Who uses Gill sans MT in 11 anyway?
Why does my computer stutter letters when I press a key only once?
Why does security information scream at me bottom right when I’m not even connected?
Why does it capitalise letters at the start of a new sentence?
Why, in fact, does my computer do everything I don’t want it to do?
Why do people use keys to make happy faces?
Why doesn’t LOL mean lots of love anymore?
Maybe they’re watching me.
Exit/don’t save.

I watch too much telly and dream of/have nightmares about relapse. The night before last I had one about a friend who’s not a friend trying to push a spliff my way and then constantly denying me it as I stumbled around behind him at a party trying to look cool, over and over again.

My illness always tells me that my career’s over, that I never even had one anyway and that if I choose not to drink and drug my imagination will continue to disappear with every clean new inconsequential day, but that’s to be expected. Addiction’s the cancer of the soul.

It’s January, the meanest of months, and as I pat myself on the back for getting through Christmas and New Year without a stimulant, my natural urge is to fall like snow and disappear on the road as quick as dust.

Looking outside, I suddenly realise that I’ve actually written something, and while it may be a load of rubbish to many, it might just help one or two people to see that we’re never really alone.
The bee will leave, but only when I let it out.