Part Two
Note to Mike: Please don’t print this next submission. I promise to pick up where I left off next time, where I was stepping in front of the oncoming car, but for now I needed to get this off my chest. It is a little personal, I have to say, so I’d rather you didn’t print it.
This is the perfect place for me. Everyone here is nicely categorized, well labeled, pigeonholed into his proper place. My favorite category is “borderline personality”, as if these people somehow are only on the cusp of having a real personality, but for whatever reason, have yet to cross the line. I suppose if they ever do cross the line, they’ll all have winning smiles then, and benevolent pats on the back for all. They tried to pigeonhole me with “borderline personality” when I first came here, but I guess I was a little too sardonic to not have a personality. I think they’re heading for “delusional psychotic” now, but personally I’ve got other directions I think they should go, other symptoms they should be aiming their microscopic glances towards.
It occurred to me recently to continue in here my practices from the outside world. If they could do it, then why couldn’t I?
I started small the other day, just to see what I could get away with, and wrote “sheet” on my sheet in a four point block font on the inside lower corner of the fitted sheet. It comforted me that night, knowing it was there, but I began to panic secretly the next day for the safety of my secret pen. What if the washwoman found the mark? Could they trace the sheet back to me? If they did, could they find my pen? Would they shock me ‘til I told them where it was?
I waited a week before trying again, trying not to push my luck. I know – you’re probably thinking “paranoid schizophrenic” now, but you should see the way these guys operate. Anyway, so I needed something more permanent, closer to home, that I wouldn’t lose after a week and risk them tracing back to me. I looked around my room – the bed, the toilet, my clothes. Not much inspired me. I finally settled for my shoe and wrote “sole” on the bottom of it in a more daring ten point italic type, though this didn’t turn out too well for all the bumps and lines in the tread.
I walked around for a day or two with that on my sole, worried sick about raising my foot too high when I walked or crossing my leg over my knee during sessions. I was disappointed that night when I released my feet from those shoes and couched them in the cool, tightly tucked ends of my sheets to not have the word as near to me as “sheet” had been.
I thought about it long into the night – and I realize that now you’re thinking “obsessive-compulsive” but don’t worry because I never wash my hands – and I finally came to a conclusion in the quiet hours of the first of the morning.
This morning I played sick so they’d leave me in my room and only check on me hourly. This gave me plenty of time for my piece de resistance: the labeling of self.
In the most carefully scripted and elegant forty-eight point (or so) serif font, I etched with my pen a label for each part of my body – well, for each part not visible to the outside world anyway. I started with the obvious: belly, thigh, shoulder, shin. I made pains to reach and still write legibly: back, knee-pit, shoulder blade. I got bored and started getting creative: asset, kneed, areola (this hurt a little), x2, ear this way ], and football. And, for the coup de grâce: dick (by day), Washington Monument (by night). You wouldn’t believe the pains I went through to accomplish that.
P.S. Sorry about this, Mike, but I felt I had to confess it – I did promise to tell you everything. I haven’t anytime left now, and each label pulses and stings, though it’s nothing compared to the pain I felt when that car hit me.
This is the perfect place for me. Everyone here is nicely categorized, well labeled, pigeonholed into his proper place. My favorite category is “borderline personality”, as if these people somehow are only on the cusp of having a real personality, but for whatever reason, have yet to cross the line. I suppose if they ever do cross the line, they’ll all have winning smiles then, and benevolent pats on the back for all. They tried to pigeonhole me with “borderline personality” when I first came here, but I guess I was a little too sardonic to not have a personality. I think they’re heading for “delusional psychotic” now, but personally I’ve got other directions I think they should go, other symptoms they should be aiming their microscopic glances towards.
It occurred to me recently to continue in here my practices from the outside world. If they could do it, then why couldn’t I?
I started small the other day, just to see what I could get away with, and wrote “sheet” on my sheet in a four point block font on the inside lower corner of the fitted sheet. It comforted me that night, knowing it was there, but I began to panic secretly the next day for the safety of my secret pen. What if the washwoman found the mark? Could they trace the sheet back to me? If they did, could they find my pen? Would they shock me ‘til I told them where it was?
I waited a week before trying again, trying not to push my luck. I know – you’re probably thinking “paranoid schizophrenic” now, but you should see the way these guys operate. Anyway, so I needed something more permanent, closer to home, that I wouldn’t lose after a week and risk them tracing back to me. I looked around my room – the bed, the toilet, my clothes. Not much inspired me. I finally settled for my shoe and wrote “sole” on the bottom of it in a more daring ten point italic type, though this didn’t turn out too well for all the bumps and lines in the tread.
I walked around for a day or two with that on my sole, worried sick about raising my foot too high when I walked or crossing my leg over my knee during sessions. I was disappointed that night when I released my feet from those shoes and couched them in the cool, tightly tucked ends of my sheets to not have the word as near to me as “sheet” had been.
I thought about it long into the night – and I realize that now you’re thinking “obsessive-compulsive” but don’t worry because I never wash my hands – and I finally came to a conclusion in the quiet hours of the first of the morning.
This morning I played sick so they’d leave me in my room and only check on me hourly. This gave me plenty of time for my piece de resistance: the labeling of self.
In the most carefully scripted and elegant forty-eight point (or so) serif font, I etched with my pen a label for each part of my body – well, for each part not visible to the outside world anyway. I started with the obvious: belly, thigh, shoulder, shin. I made pains to reach and still write legibly: back, knee-pit, shoulder blade. I got bored and started getting creative: asset, kneed, areola (this hurt a little), x2, ear this way ], and football. And, for the coup de grâce: dick (by day), Washington Monument (by night). You wouldn’t believe the pains I went through to accomplish that.
P.S. Sorry about this, Mike, but I felt I had to confess it – I did promise to tell you everything. I haven’t anytime left now, and each label pulses and stings, though it’s nothing compared to the pain I felt when that car hit me.
© 2006Labelman
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