don’t like it when I scream.
I burn for something.
Crave it.
Got a fever for it.
But no, not for more cowbell.
It would be easier if I knew exactly what it is I need. But I don’t.
Instead I’ve read at least twelve books in the last month, with another currently in progress.
Binge-watched multiple shows on various streaming services.
Logged into work on off hours and days.
Taken the family on long hikes through the Redwoods.
And done other…more shameful…things to fill the void within me.
(Like stoop to writing…gasp…a radio play, to name but one.)
I think the pandemic has finally gotten to me.
Spending more time at home, enclosed within the same encroaching walls, dealing with exactly the same pets and identical family members day in and day out, I’ve struggled to feel …productive.
Whole.
Relevant.
I started with the streaming services, the gateway vice into maddness. Looking back, I can’t even tell you everything I watched. Despite being within the last thirty days, it’s all faded into a blur.
I mean, yeah, it’s a pandemic month and therefore technically longer than that, but still.
I do remember some Classic Doctor Who, snippets of Marvel movies and shows, and the first season of True Detective (good, but I really wish that was one of the programs I can no longer remember!). There was more, I just know it, but my memories of them remain hidden behind a facemask of inordinate size and opacity.
And I can count off twelve of the books I read (the last four Murderbot books, a Jasper Fforde fantasy series, some on-offs not worth mentioning), but I’m pretty sure there was more than twelve and I just can’t remember the earliest ones.
Like the radio play, the hiking, and working during my time off, they have all been ways to fill the void. Maybe escapism?
Though if the world of True Detective, Season 1, is an escape, how bad must reality be?
Turns out, pretty bad.
I’ve watched as people around me sank lower and lower as the pandemic stretched on and on.
I was doing OK until recently, or so I thought. I chalked up my resilience to being an introvert. Assumed I was handling things so well because I didn’t need or miss the social interaction suddenly yanked from all of us.
And the people I yelled at at home and work? They deserved it. Or so I told myself.
But I was wrong.
I have a problem. I crave input. Stories with, if not happy, at least satisfying endings.
Hello, my name is Ian and I’m a content addict.
A baleen whale trawls for krill and zooplankton by opening its mouth, swimming forward, and hoping. I think I’m doing the same thing, only my mouth is open to scream and my version of moving forward is taking advantage of Netflix, Amazon Prime, Hulu, and thriftbooks.com.
My biggest problem, of course, is that unlike this pandemic, books, TV shows, movies, and even hikes all come to an end. And while my vices soothe me in the moment, I’m painfully hollow after they conclude.
Leaving me dangerously vulnerable and looking for the next hit. And in that moment, during that profound, bottomless low, I’ll take anything to fill the void and feel whole again.
Cat memes.
Opinion pieces.
Reddit threads.
Anti-vaxxer websites.
Even…[shudder]…fan fic.
So I’m ready to get vaccinated. Ready for herd immunity and parties and writing in coffee shops again. Ready for things to return to some semblance of normal.
Ready to have more in my life than just books.
Read that last sentence again.
One more time, slowly. Really let those words sink in.
Ready to have more in my life than just books.
The fact that I just wrote that sentence speaks volumes (no pun intended) as to the condition of not just my mental state, but our entire world right now.
We need help. All of us.
Though I suppose all of this could be down to flat panel displays. No, really, I read a thread online about this. WFH and binge-watching has resulted in me spending a lot more time in front of screens and the unnatural amount of blue light they expose us to. Maybe the 450-490nm wavelength emissions are what’s leaving me empty inside.
Perhaps the solution to all my woes isn’t a vaccine and hanging with people and coffee shops. Maybe it’s as simple as taping a sheet of transparent red plastic to my monitor and filing a class action lawsuit against the manufacturers of said displays.
If nothing else, a lawsuit gives me something to do.
Hmm…
OK, maybe I need just a little bit more help than the rest of you.
ian m dudley 