Blue Light
Turns out being mentally well is like winning the lottery, except you don’t get to buy a ticket for this game. You’re either normal, or you’re not, and the definitions of such a concept change over time. Some people are crazy for a while. Some people are crazy forever. Some people who you think should be locked up are called productive citizens.
What is normal anymore? What was ever normal? How do you know you’re sane? Isn’t part of being insane the denial of insanity? Maybe we’re all a little crazy. Maybe it’s just a matter of to what degree.
Maybe I am crazy. Am I crazy?
The blue light is flashing amid the black. I don’t have to look at my watch. I know it’s around three in the morning. My eyes have closed only briefly. I’ve stared at the ceiling for hours.
I don’t have to check my mobile. I already know who it is. I know it’s her. I know the numbers that will be there, right by her name. I can see them. The slanted back of the seven, the curves of the threes, the endless knot that it is the eight. I see it all. She called. She wants to talk. I want to talk, but I know better.
I don’t need to get up and talk, because I know that light actually isn’t flashing. It’s just what I want to see. My doctor is calling these hallucinations part of the stress, part of the temporary insanity that my mind is putting me through after the accident. I just call it hell.
He says it’s weird that I see things, that people only usually report voices, that there are usually only flashbacks and nightmares. But what is normal? They don’t know everything yet.
And I am a guinea pig, a part of the great continuing studies.
I wish the light would stop flashing.
Sometimes I wonder. What is real? Is it just my mind willing me to see that blue in the night, or is it happening—somewhere? Not here, maybe. Not in this room where my body is lying—where I think my body is lying—maybe somewhere else. But where?
The pill bottle is on my nightstand, right beside the blinking-non-blinking phone. I let two rest in my palm until they melt. Wonder what’s in them. Names of things I can’t pronounce, probably. Tested on mice I’ll never meet. Trial studied on people who are never spoken to.
I’m supposed to trust this.
The blue light is not flashing. Telling myself this, does not make it stop. I bring the pills to my lips, reach for my glass of water.
But I want to believe it is blinking.
My hand drops to my lap.
What is normal?
What is real?
Anne van Alkemade
I like to think there is no such thing as ‘normal’. I like to think I don’t know anyone who is ‘normal’ but then again, perhaps I’m not attracted to ‘normal’. I think the artificial attainment of ‘normal’ hinders, dampens, destroys creativity (at least that’s how I feel at the moment – it’s been a 3-year ‘moment). I live to write. I can’t imagine not writing creatively and there’s the rub – I can’t write creatively the way I did 3 years ago (with the occasional exception of a brief flash here and there). I can write factually and that’s handy to earn my daily bread, it does not fulfill my soulful desire.
Que sera
Anne van Alkemade
sorry, meant to say I am sorry for your sadness and confusion and that it’s no picnic feeling displaced but ‘normal’ is not everything it’s cracked up to be.
meanderthal
normal is just having the same diseases and problems as the greater majority….
how boring…....
MiMiDesigns
I love the endless knot that is the eight.
Lelia Thomas
For the record-
as some have seemingly thought otherwise-this is a piece of fiction. Just thought I’d clarify that for anyone who might be curious!@Anne: I hope your creative writing endeavors work out better in the days to come. I find reading quotes, history, psychology, etc. to be really good ways to inspire myself to write creatively. Might try something like that. I can’t speak for everyone, either, but “forcing it” has never worked for me. Relax, and it’ll come in its own time.
Michael Alesich
normal, normal is different for everyone. In each case it is a reference point as to what a person wants to be or what they detest.
Great writing, very visual, very easy to see inside the mind.
AmandaWitt
Firstly, Lelia, I share your passion for music, although I play more classical stuff- I do know of a Scottish Fiddle Club somewhere in Melbourne (though I know not where)
In regard to ‘Blue Light’ I wrote a piece entitled ‘What is normal’ a couple of years ago as I felt the odd one out in my family.
AmandaWitt
I’ve put this in the art shop forum as well – seeing as you are in Hawthorn, there’s a small art shop just about under the railway bridge at Glenferrie, and since they cater almost exclusively for Swinburne students, I think they offer generous discounts.
(I should mention that that place was there about two years ago- haven’t been since)