Vomit Out the Apple.

"Okay," Teddy said. He was sitting back in his chair, but his head was turned toward Nicholson. "You know that apple Adam ate in the Garden of Eden, referred to in the Bible?" he asked. "You know what was in that apple? Logic. Logic and intellectual stuff. That was all that was in it. So--this is my point--what you have to do is vomit it up if you want to see things as they really are. I mean if you vomit it up, then you won't have any more trouble with blocks of wood and stuff. You won't see everything stopping off all the time. And you'll know what your arm really is, if you're interested. Do you know what I mean? Do you follow me?"

"I follow you," Nicholson said, rather shortly.

"The trouble is," Teddy said, "most people don't want to see things the way they are. They don't even want to stop getting born and dying all the time. They just want new bodies all the time, instead of stopping and staying with God, where it's really nice." He reflected. "I never saw such a bunch of apple-eaters," he said. He shook his head.

-- "Teddy" by J.D. Salinger

So there I was with a 5 GB chip on my shoulder. I was having headaches. My shoulder hurt as if someone were shoving the point of a dagger in my rotator cuff. I was snapping at everyone and generally being an ass and I couldn't even stand myself anymore, I was so internally whiny. So I decided to get over it. Only I didn't know what the hell I was trying to get over.

Then I got angry -- illogically, unreasonably, indiscriminately angry. Only I still couldn't figure out why -- I mean aside from the usual racist, imperialist, misogynist, idiotic, commercialized, consumerist, egoist, tasteless, bunch of bad drivers freak nation which we try to pass off as a culture. But so what? I mean that gets to me everyday but I'm used to it, so whatever.

But it was getting to me, my anger shooting off my fingertips and zapping everyone around me and making my hands telegraph-tingle.

And I got mad and madder and maddest and this lasted for a few weeks. So I vented, spit and spewed all over my blog yesterday and I felt like I was released from an enforced vow of silence, and exhaled in relief.

And last night I went and saw a stupid, sappy musical with a bunch of ladies and I wasn't cynical about it, nor did I feel the need to bore the shit out of everyone with some long-winded didactic about our heterocentric society and the cult of marriage. I drank vodka and laughed with my family and listened to the jukebox.

I woke up this morning and I feel 100 lbs. lighter and I don't have any shoulder pain. I'm feeling so over myself -- but only in the very best way.

And I'm not angry at the apple eaters anymore for imposing some sort of soulless shopping mall reality on me. I create my own reality. I vomit out my apple and try to see anew.