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Michael considered fate at 18:12   |   Permalink   |   Post a Comment
I am a shell of my former self. I am flighty and distracted and my nails, once long and healthy or now bitten to the bone. I drink coffee by the gallon. My attention span, once the wonder of many, has been reduced to half that of a wrigley's spearmint commerical. I am a shell of a man.

I stopped biting my finger nails a few months ago for no real particular reason. Call it random self-improvement. I didn't read it in any book by Deepak Chopra and my shrink did not suggest it. I don't even have a shrink, in fact. I know, I know, hard to believe in these heady days of our decadent culture, so self-absorbed are we that we can not open our eyes unless they face inwards. But I stopped biting my nails and with little good reason. I was not socially ostracized for nail-biting ( I did not do it excessively in public or in a slurping, snarling way that would disrupt my neighbours, so why should anyone care? ). I did not suffer economically for my sins - indeed, may have profitted for I have replaced far fewer lost nail clippers than most. I did not contract any disease or otherwise downgrade my health by biting my nails ( okay, perhaps my teeth have somehow taken a toll but then it is slight and insignificant at best ). My rights, as a human and a citizen of my country were not degraded based solely on my biting. The days, growing longer through the seasons and then shorter again, did not stop their cycle on account of my *snap* *snap* *snap* at my finger tips. Great authors and leaders did not stop their greatness nor did lowely whores and drug dealers deviate from their normal course because of me, here, nibbling at my nubbins.

So why is it that I stopped, what is it that cast doubt and shadow upon my sunny day? Why did I fear the bite of the canines and the chomp of the incisors? What, after years upon years of nibbling away, caused this mouse to raise head from cheese - warily oh verily sniffing about the air in fear and paranoia?

Some things must come to an end. Nothing is forever. It is better to burn out than to fade away. And a diamond is certainly not forever. The honeymoon with my fingers was long past and it was time to experience the freedom of a new life far from the nervous biting of an anxious boy. It was time to make a decision and with that decision change the course of my life for ever and ever amen.

I won't lie to you. There were some very specific reasons I quit. I shant repeat them here but let us say there were certain gambling promises made - contracts signed in hushed voices 'neath the dark street light of my soul. My ego, my id, locked in a duel of ultimate proportions, came out both gripping what they thought was the upper hand only to find that they were holding onto themselves. But the deal was made and I'm not one to go back on a promise and so for two months I went without.

My teeth mossed over. The brushing helped but didn't grind down to the root of the problem like some good nails can do. My demeanor mellowed to a lathargic rate and my daily drive, my soul, my hope was leveled out like a bedspread smoothed and laid out after a harried night of tossing and turning. For better? For worse.. I do not know. The promise - always double-ended - was not evenly balanced in the end. The refrain from nails did not bring about the intended outcome.. I realize, of course, that I can not expect a trivial thing such as not biting my nails to bring about huge change but as we humans are want to do I attempted to make a deal with the devil.. I promised one thing and he promised something completely unrelated and in the real world anyone in their right mind would not think the one could effect the other but inside, in the mind, we think differently. Like a boy praying at night - "I promise not to bug my sister anymore if you could just bring me a toy truck for christmas" - I expected a miracle for a molehill. I expected all the world to stop and lay before my feet for the price of a simple refrain and I did it - I refrained.

I'm biting my nails again. They are short and can barely grab the edge of a stack of paper, can barely seperate a sticker from the refridge or even properly scratch my back. I am a junky, always looking for more nails where there is always none. When I was letting them grow I was amazed at how fast they shot out of my fingers and now I am shocked at how slowly they come. I fidgit idly while work sits nearby and I stare out into the distance of nowhere - always expecting to be jolted by my seat. My heart races - not like a race car revving up and down at the start but more like a rampant river overflooding at it's banks; always more and consistently fast and dangerous.

At night I turn the fan on. It is winter now in Maine and still I turn the fan on. If I don't, I can hear the creaking of my nails slowly growing in their own beds, creeping out from under the cuticles like so many hobgoblins come to steal away my first-born thought. So, like a child who throws the blanket over his head, I close my ears with the whir of the fan and I pretend, every night, that it's not there. I block out the fear and the doubt, the questions of virility and potential, the expectations of great things. I try so very hard to think simple simple thoughts - the kind of thoughts a cucumber has while it sits quietly on an early august night, slowly growing and minding it's own business, worried only about the sun the stars the wind and the rain. I try to think happy thoughts.. thoughts a mother might whisper to her new born son, not to sooth him when he cries, but just because she feels like it, because the warmth she feels for that human being is unsurmountable compared to the troubles of this world. I try to imagine waking up tomorrow with all the questions answered and all the troubles dispelled. I try to imagine the place where I want to be and I try to imagine the people I want to be with me.

and sometimes.. I chew my nails.


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