WHO TOLD?

Some years ago, I quit painting and drawing because it was hard work to listen to the noise that the creative drive made in my head, so I locked it in a little box in the messy attic of my imagination.  

I'd had a good shrink, for as long as I was able to see him, & this was one of the survival tools he gave me. I've been grateful and resentful in turns, ever since.  I suppose that's appropriate, my being bipolar and all, but it never really occurred to me that this sense – that being even somewhat talented was not worth it – might be a common attitude.

Suddenly, I'm reading this brief article, and I can't seem to stop crying.

The thing is, the voices in a crazy person's head are all packed up inside, and nobody else hears them.  It's an isolating experience.  You can scarcely trust anybody, when you're first forced to inform them of the problem, because you know, you just know, that they'll stop loving you, stop liking you, stop respecting you... or worse, tell you it doesn't matter because what you do is worth all the torment. They have no idea what you're really feeling, because you don't dare tell them, because they want what you have, what you can give them... or, at least, that's what those voices say to you.

So there we all are, a little bit crazy, or a little bit more than a little bit crazy, and we're all alone with the enemy, the neighborhood bully who won't leave us alone because the bastard is sitting right there between your ears.

And, now, the neighborhood bully has company.  But then, so do the rest of us.

We'll see what this means in the long run.