I'm lost.
On the one hand, I am bristling with pride and just a little apprehension that today I was named an official officer of the agency, that I gave a presentation to a very packed boardroom of people who made it very clear that they didn't want to be there, and by the end of it they were throwing in comments, opinions, and submitting written suggestions.
On that hand, I have a ring on each finger for some of the impossible coincidences that have turned me into a role model for people that I am looking up to in turn. On that hand the bracelet is fashioned from official emails sitting in executive inboxes, with my name in the subject line. That hand is half-gloved in a dream.
On the other hand, there is a stigmata-like hole lined with rust and metal shavings, for every tear that I've talked through today, for every time I've heard "I don't understand", for every person who has yelled out at me that they don't care who dies so long as they get the bad guy. They couldn't have propaganda'd better if they'd airbrushed photos of the current national enemy wearing a Darth Vader bucket.
I can't trust the newspapers anymore, their lying has become so blatant, the way I've watched them choke one independent reporter after another for daring to disagree.
How long until idealism becomes a crime again?
I don't understand. I have inklings, rumours of whys and wherefores but I can't bring myself to believe any of them, to let go and believe in the devils and hells of Jesuit nightmares.
I don't understand what is happening, what killing for peace means, I don't understand why I'm worrying that not everyone laughed at my incinerator joke during my presentation, when in the back of my head I know just how unimportant it is.
I didn't understand why this morning I was wide awake an hour earlier than usual, why the five on the clock refused to change to a six for many very long minutes.
I had strange nightmares of pedicure wars, of acetone bottles filled with sarin.
I stood outside before dawn this morning, barefoot in the back yard, mud between my toes, trying so hard to find that moment in the grass in pre-dawn Vancouver when I felt the earth rumble with me.
Wandering back inside to go searching for my freshly ironed corporate whore pants, I washed the muddy footsteps into long term memory as I washed them from the kitchen floor, just in case.
In traditional monstre fashion I feel guilt for being here, guilt for being so unscathed. Somewhere in that, though, I also know that I'm listening.
I wish for peace, or total annihilation.