Torso of an Archaic Apollo

by Rainer Maria Rilke

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Bumin':

(A Clockwork Orange in the background.)

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Writer David Sedaris.

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Its warm outside

I stole this from Jessy

Glasses

August 14, 2009, 8:00 pm,

There is a man with sunglasses (big ones) sitting at a table across from me reading a book. His face is solemn and concentrated, and his eyes are looking downwards towards the pages of the book that is laying on his knees. I know he is looking downwards only by assumption, as there is no way of seeing the direction of his gaze, since his sunglasses completely hide his eyes and because his face is pointing directly in front of him and in my general direction. This last point is what is so peculiar about this man: I have the continual and disquieting feeling that he is staring directly at me - right into me - and it causes me too look up and at him over and over in an awkward way, only to come again to the same unsatisfactory conclusion that he must indeed be focussing on his book and not on myself. Still, I find this discomforting and am having great difficulty focussing on what I am doing, which is also reading. I want to say something, but I don't, for fear of him overhearing me. I take a sip of coffee. I want to do something, but I can't think of anything which would make any difference.
He takes off his sunglasses (under which he is wearing a pair of reading glasses) and starts talking to another man - a stranger - but now I can't help overhearing them. He is describing to the man, an outsider no doubt, all the many things there is to do here in this little city of Fredericton. There is nothing to do here.
Finally he leaves and I can continue on with my reading.
His name is Brad.

Huxley Interviews

Aldous Huxley, author.
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OCD and me

OCD : Obsessive-compulsive disorder : a neurosis that can take on many different shapes for as many different people. For some, it is the over-exaggerated fear of germs, which causes the person afflicted to paranoiacally wash their hands over and over again. For others, it is the continual repetition of rituals, like locking and unlocking one's door a number of times. For myself, it has manifested itself as my constantly checking and rechecking everything; from whether the front entrance is locked, to whether the fridge door has been properly closed (the result of a childhood incident). Much of my unpunctual nature can be attributed to this disorder as it has me spending large amounts of time patrolling my house in the hopes of appeasing the worry that something is out of order. Once, I even walked back home on a distance of at least 5 minutes just to check whether the toaster-oven had been properly turned off.

However, it's not all bad, there are a few advantages to this: the chances of me causing a fire in the kitchen, because of my carelessly forgetting to turn off the hotplates, are almost nonexistent; I will probably never flood the house because I clogged the toilet and did not notice; and there is no way I will be responsible for the accidental defrosting of all the meat in the freezer.

Still, despite all this, OCD remains an unpleasant presence in my life. I have read that indulging in one's impulses only leads to the worsening of the condition and that the only sure way of curing one's self is to ignore the compulsions completely (or at least as long as possible), something which I have found to be exceedingly difficult. Still, I have made some progress over the past few years and am hoping to make a full recovery.