It’s Monday morning, again, and I’m starting another week writing a blog post in the morning instead of doing something productive or creative or whatever.  Or, I suppose one could also say I am doing this instead of sleeping, though it’s not as though I really had a choice about that.

Oh, and the reason I didn’t post on Saturday was because the office didn’t open on Saturday, since everyone kind of needed a break.  It wasn’t because I died sometime after my Friday morning post, unfortunately.

Anyone who thinks that dying would be the unfortunate thing clearly hasn’t wrestled with and internalized the fact that everyone is going to die anyway, and that chronic pain makes the process of being alive a form of slow torture.  And as some famous person from the time of the inquisition said, if anyone has not confessed themselves a witch or a heretic, it is merely because they have not been subject to torture.

He was commenting on the fact that, unless there is truly some greater purpose motivating someone, torture works on essentially everyone, eventually.  Now, I don’t know if it’s melodramatic of me or if I exaggerate in calling 20+ years of chronic pain (while still trying to live a gainfully employed, productive life) a form of torture.  Maybe I’m just a wimp.  I do know that I do not have that greater purpose, that goal on which to keep my gaze fixed.

I used to have something or some things like that.  One of the thoughts that helped me get through prison was that I could look forward to seeing my kids again when I got out.  The whole point of accepting a plea bargain, even though I consider myself innocent, was that I didn’t want to take the chance of being in prison any longer than I had to, because I wanted to see my children again as soon as I could.

Of course, that turned out not to happen, because they didn’t actually want to see me.  It turned out that their lives were at least simpler when I wasn’t around, just like their mother’s was, just like pretty much everyone else’s life is simpler when I’m not around.

That was about 10 years ago, and I still haven’t seen either of them since.  I ask you, what’s the point of enduring anything in that situation?

I have a lot of endurance, I think‒mentally, anyway.  I can put up with a surprising amount of stuff just out of general pig-headedness.  But after a while it all gets annoying.

And lest anyone be under the mistaken impression that I am someone who has not sought help or not allowed people to help me when they tried:  I have gone through years of therapy at various times and of various kinds, I have taken various types and brands of antidepressants and related medications, I have called the suicide crisis line more than once and have very briefly been hospitalized because of it.  I have taken various kinds of medications and have tried numerous interventions including surgery to address my chronic pain.  I don’t easily let problems go.  I don’t tend to give up easily, at least not at things that matter to me.

But I am tired and I am in pain and I am alone.  Also, it turns out I am autistic.  That would, of course, be nothing new, just newly discovered, but it does make it very hard to make new friends or new connections with people, especially now that I am no longer in an environment where there are people around who are interested in at least some of the things in which I am truly interested or who have shared backgrounds.

I would like to do good in and for the world in some fashion.  I would at least like to bring original creations into the world that make some people happy, at least for a little while.

I know we’re all just animals, muddling our way from the womb to the tomb, acting in ways shaped by natural selection’s effects on our ancestors.  There need be no deeper point to life than that to keep everything rolling.  But it’s not very interesting after a while.

I don’t know.  Everything is getting boring.  It’s hard to bother keeping oneself alive when everything is either dull or irritating or painful.  There is such a thing as learned helplessness, even for the very stubborn.  All creatures have their limits.

I don’t know what I’m trying to say or do here.  I don’t know what the point is.  Probably there is no point.  I know that I am pointless, at the very least.  So I’ll draw this to a close again, and start yet another pointless, unpleasant, idiotic day.  I’m stupid that way.  But maybe I’ll get smarter someday.