Going Left

Sleep for 24-hours? Didn't even manage five. Woke at 6:15 this morning with the dawn chorus. 

My lovely friend, IC, whatsapped me this. Made me laugh. Also had a supportive e-mail from mum, which reduced me to tears again. Feeling totally emotionally incapable at the moment. 

Woke with the mad idea of just signing the work contract for June/July. Whether I want to do it or not, it provides a certainty. Mum was of a similar opinion - just sign it. It's uncertainty that's doing my head in, so perhaps if I commit to something my rationale will return to figure out the details. 

So, that's decided. I guess. Will read back through the contract today and talk myself into it.

That would give me until August to see how things go. Probably more respectable than throwing everything in over a blip. Plus it wouldn't be fair to abandon IC and Jo. IC wouldn't have anyone to drink banana beer with, and Jo says she can't swear as much with anyone else. I think I'm her therapy.

So, I should probably just man-up.

I feel anything but manly today, though. Fragile, is what I feel. Damn sure this is some form of withdrawal. Not dissimilar to an MDMA crash. Emotionally fractured to the point where it's painful to think about anything except the next episode of Spaced you're about to watch with your phone off and your e-mail blocked. Don't want to talk to anybody, see anybody or do anything. Though I may have to venture out at some point, I'm almost out of loo roll. 

You would have though, after writing a book about entheogens, I'd know my neurochemical shit by now, but honestly, I was so caught up on psychedelics I must have missed the 101 on cigarettes. Like I say, I've never smoked as much as I have the past couple of months. 

There's a half-hundred weight of articles out there that tell you 'take one craving at a time, tell yourself just ten more minutes...' I don't have conscious cravings (was that a K. D. Lang song?). I don't sit here thinking I need to smoke. But this article opened my eyes. 

Once you cut out the nicotine, your dopamine and serotonin levels plummet, leaving you angry, anxious, impatient and scatterbrained.

Bingo. 20-a-day to zero in one fell swoop. No wonder I feel like shit. In my early 20s I did a brief spell on Seroxat. Did the same with that. Doctor wanted to up the dose, I said no and put the whole lot in the bin. Nobody had explained to me that it was a dependency drug. Was a wreck for days. Must be a similar reaction.

So, now I know what it is, I can draw from experience and treat this as a medical experiment. Going to take care of myself as though I were on a come-down. Eat well, plenty of water, no alcohol, tryptophan. It'll be over in a few days.

Meanwhile, none of this can really go on. Until August, maybe. But not indefinitely. I can't make a living this way. I'm banging my head against a brick wall if I think I can. I don't enjoy it. 

I can do professional stuff. Sometimes I'm even good at it (research design and statistical analysis especially), but I don't actually enjoy the organisations I work with a lot of the time, or believe in the process. Undeniably, aid has made a huge change to the world, and I can quote the statistics on that, but it's also vastly squandered, outdated and misdirected a lot of the time.

I have no interest in the UN, I can't stomach the private sector or all this entrepreneurship hype (you're just out of uni with massive student debt and absolutely no work experience? Well, sorry son, there aren't any jobs for you, but why not take a massive fucking loan and start a company! Only 70% of SMEs fail in their first three years, sure you'll be one of the luck 30%, and, if not, perhaps going bankrupt will cancel out your student loan...), plus the organisations I am interested in just don't pay. For example, I've reduced a workshop I usually sell for £600 in the UK to £100 here for an organisation that really needs it but hasn't got any money. Due to having to register for VAT (even though my quarterly turnover is now well below the threshold again) I only make about £80 on that. Where is the incentive to work with those who need what I can offer most?

The whole situation sucks balls, essentially.

It can't go on. No, no, no, it can't go on.

So. I've decided to join a commune.

No, I haven't, but I'm honestly exploring the possibilities. 

Browsing through sites like Diggers & Dreamers, which is where I got my writing retreat in Germany from a few years back. Someone donated their house for three months.

I can't do it. I can't work this hard for so little financial or spiritual return. The only point to working hard is to buy yourself time in between. Time to write, in my case. It's not working out well for me. So why not take the emphasis off money and work for board and lodgings? After all, that's largely what I spend my money on anyway. Sure my funding and organisational skills could come in handy, as many of these communes have a charitable bent to them. Rest of the time I get to hole myself away somewhere quiet until my next novel is finished. Then I could go home for a bath.

Look, it's just a thought. 

I need to tell myself there are options out there, however eccentric they may seem.

If by August I am doing better than predicted, I'll forget all about this. If not, I'll probably do something a little mad.

Ever see that film In Time? Yeah, that. Lifetimes bought and sold in minutes and seconds. Money really does buy time.

Right, philosophical rantings over and it's not even 11am yet.

Going to have a wash, pop to the shop for treats and toilet roll, then settle down with a good book, possibly a movie, and nothing else on my mind.