I’ve blogged about consciousness before, which is what this boils down to. This morning, after a conversation during which I attempted to explain how life felt more “real” in Mexico than in the US, Sky asked me if I had watched the movie Waking Life. I hadn’t, and so we watched it. It was strange watching it during the daytime, because I had all day to think about it.

There was irony involved, which you’ll understand if you’ve seen it. I had this weird “outside myself” view of my life for the remainder of the day, which not only was mentioned in the film, but also supports the film’s idea that our thoughts/acts can influence those of another on an unconscious level. There is a lot of Jungian theory here, which I have always found fascinating.

(Alert: Off-topic break) Alex Jones made an appearance, during which he said this, among other things:

What a bunch of garbage; liberal, democrat, conservative, republican. It’s all there to control you! Two sides of the same coin. Two management teams bidding for control, the CEO job of Slavery, Incorporated! The truth is out there in front of you, but they lay out this buffet of lies. I’m sick of it, and I’m not going to take a bite out of it, do you got me?

I guess I should come out. While I’m not much of a conspiracy theorist a la Alex Jones, I am completely sick of our government. I really hope that Ron Paul at least gets a fair shake, although I don’t think he will. He’s too honest for our machine. (But finally, someone good out of Texas!) What really floors me is that I am going to have to register as a flippin’ Republican in order to vote for him in the primary. In my wildest dreams, I never thought I would do that. Also, I think things are so messed up that if either he or Kucinich isn’t on the ticket next year, then I’m going to vote for a third party.

Anyway.

Watching this, I realized that it has been a very long time since I have had an intelligent conversation with anyone. When a girl in the movie starting talking about the lack of authentic relationships and speech, it hit me so hard that I cried. I would like to watch this movie again and again and again, but I’m floored by how much distance it puts between me and my life. It is a bit frightening, which makes a case for watching it again and figuring out why.

I know that this mention is a little late for a movie that came out in 2001, but I wanted to mention it just in case someone hasn’t watched it. It is the only movie I’ve ever seen where I could turn off the sound and enjoy the visuals, and then turn around and turn off the monitor and listen only to the sound and enjoy that.

God, I’m lonely. I want out of my box.

The summer before I moved back to East Texas, Sage had swimming lessons every day at the public pool. I had these awful anxiety attacks every time I went, and ended up doubling my benzos by the end of the summer. It got to where I hardly wanted to leave the house, I was so sick of them.

This summer has been very different. This is the summer of quitting benzos. The anxiety is almost all gone. Until today, that is. Today, we went to the public pool for the first time this summer. I immediately felt that familiar sensation of not being able to breathe, and wanting to leave. I forced myself to stick it out for an hour and a half with no Xanax. Finally, Sage was ready to leave. Walking to the car, I had chest pains and had to try and stop myself from hyperventilating. That was when I flashed back to my experience at the pool in Austin. It felt exactly the same.

At first, I had tried to write it off to feeling self-conscious in a bathing suit. The thing is, this year I have been swimming in public almost every day at the apartment’s small pool, and haven’t had one anxiety attack. I didn’t when I went to the gym’s private pool, which no one hardly ever uses, either. But at the city pool, where there are children in diapers and a hundred kids in there at any given moment?

It is the chlorine!

I really can’t believe it, but it is as clear as day. About a year ago, I went swimming with my mom at an indoor pool, felt really horrible and ended up with bronchitis. Today, it is only a sore throat–the anxiety went away within a half hour of being away from the pool. I thought some more about pools in Austin and realized that the times I had went to Barton Springs, which is a public pool of sorts that is not chlorinated, I never had panic attacks, even though I was still fat in a bathing suit. I really wish I had made the connection then!

When I looked this up online, my suspicions were confirmed. What was creepy was also seeing all of the search results that referred to using chlorine as a weapon or for crowd control. I even stumbled upon a site where a guy was chronicling his attempts to quit benzos while discussing working at a pool supply store. If the post hadn’t been dated two years ago, I would have told him to check into it.

So it turns out that something I have thought was all in my head was in this case and many others, caused by a chemical. You can bet I’ll be drinking bottled water now!

Another interesting thing I read a couple of weeks ago was how levels of carbon dioxide get higher than normal in airline cabins (and car interiors!), which can cause anxiety in individuals who are sensitive to it. I just have to wonder if this is what triggered the agor, as all of this started after an overseas flight and a 2000 mile drive. I do feel better when I get out of the car and get some fresh air.

So this feeling of wanting to “escape”–can it be that my body is trying to protect itself? Definitely weird. Maybe I’m not crazy after all.

This morning, I called Stubeh to ask if he would take Sage to the 4th of July festival downtown tomorrow evening so Sage could see the fireworks. Stubeh loves these things, I don’t, which I mentioned. Fireworks are not my thing unless I am the one setting them off. Neither are small town downtown festivals, especially since I’ve now been to approximately 26 of them in the past two years.

At any rate, Stubeh said to me, “What is it you DO like to do?”

I didn’t give that question the consideration it didn’t deserve anyway, and told him, “Nothing, I guess.”

Jeez what a lame answer.

Of course, after hanging up the phone, I thought of scads of things I like to do.

1. Go salsa dancing, two left feet and all. With the right partner, I can look like a star. Watching others dance is fun too. Here, we have one club that features ranchero, salsa and cumbias. Unfortunately, there are knife fights in the parking lot every weekend. Nevermind.

2. Take kids to the park.

3. Hang out at bookstores.

4. Hang out at coffeeshops, either with friends or alone.

5. Learn stuff. If my schedule permitted, I’d take a class every semester. Probably Spanish and/or other foreign languages. Maybe physics. Definitely economics.

6. Go to the beach and look for cool stuff, enjoy the waves and catch some rays. I also spend a great deal of time at the pool either swimming, reading a book, yakking or writing down other people’s yakking in my notebook.

7. I like to write, a lot.

8. Bake stuff. This has taken a back seat to my weight loss efforts, though. Instead, I am working on cooking decent Chinese and Indian food.

9. Organize stuff. This sounds really lame, but I like to do it. A trip to Office Depot is like being in a candy store for me.

10. Go to parties where I know people. These days, that usually consists of barbecues and kid’s birthday parties, but still. Actually, these days, any party at all doesn’t happen often. I miss my friends in Austin. Doesn’t mean that I don’t still enjoy them, though.

11. Read. I really, really like reading. And being on the computer. So I can read.

12. Do fun stuff with my students, because they learn better and I am not so bored.

13. Go to comedy clubs. Dance performances. Really good plays.

14. Constantly brainstorm business ideas that rarely get implemented.

15. Hang out with friends. Am doing this later today.

16. Hang out with my kids.

So, I do a lot of “hanging out” and a lot of wishing I was back in the town where I went to performances now and then because they existed.

Maybe his comment hit a nerve because I am afraid that I really am boring. I’m sure to some people, this would seem to be the case. After all, lots of what I enjoy are things that are solitary pursuits. I’ve been that way since I was a kid. Oh well. I don’t really want to change other than to throw traveling into that mix.

No, I have not divorced Stubeh. We are not together, but I chickened out. I don’t even want to go into the reasons why, because you guys would blast me good.