There is another simple question that comes into play.
What do you like?
I ask this because this is a great way to find peace.
You have to know what you like. And you have to know what you want.
For example –
They say music soothes the savage beast. I say they’re right. I can say this is true that music can soothe the savage beast. On the opposite end, music can be enough to incite the riot within. At times, I can see how music is enough to cause a stir or the way to allow us to rage or to scream or to yell or shout or dance around and sing.
I have a friend who has “Not today, Satan!” tattooed on their arm.
I like that.
I like music. I like the way music can either charge my battery or drain me from all of my misused aggression. I like that I can play something peaceful or soothing so that I can put on a track of something calm or something mellow and something relaxing, like an instrumental lullaby that seems to hit the right notes – and just like that, all of the angst is gone.
The rage is simmered down and the over-boiling kettle is quiet enough where I can think freely again without any static.
However, in the moment or in the fits of chaos or when a crisis at work takes place; or how about when there’s real-life problems or grown folk’s business going on?
I do understand that one cannot simply hold up their hand, as if to be like some kind of unofficial traffic cop who stands in the middle of an intersection, as if to try and stop the traffic and say, “Hold it! I’m going through some shit right now . . . Let me just play this song or do something so I can feel better.”
I have told you this before – and no, I cannot say that I am a chef by any means. However, at this point in my life, it is safe to say that I can pull off a good meal in the kitchen.
I have cooked my way through a dilemma or two. I have put on some background music and lost myself in the operation of preparing a meal from the beginning to the end.
But again, no one stop the presses at work. Life is still happening so the idea of “stepping away” when you’re in the middle of something is not always realistic.
It’s not like hey, I’m having a really tough day at work and meanwhile, there is grown folk’s business, happening right in front of us.
It’s not like hey, work is tough so . . .
You walk into a supervisor’s office and say . . . I’m having a tough day right now. So, screw your deadlines and the reports you needed to be in your in-box by noon.
I think I’ll go home to cook a good meal.
Well, I am sure this can be said and maybe even done. However, I’m not sure this leads to a long-term working relationship with a boss.
Now, I can say that I have been in fits of rage. I have had tough days at work.
I’ve had days when I screamed and yelled and sure, there are times when I have sworn that I quit better jobs than the ones I was working.
I can remember being so disheartened and unhappy with a job that I made my entire commute to work but never went in. I woke up when the alarm went off because I knew that I had to.
I knew that I had to make it in.
So, I roughed it. I washed my face and brushed my teeth. I gulped my coffee.
I made my train.
I dealt with the basic, everyday annoyances, or the common frustrations like finding a parking spot or finding a seat on a train or a place in the subway which was not too crowded so that I would not be pushed by some other meathead of a human being – because, like me, they’re trying to get in the subway before anyone else because they have something important to do, or they’ll push their way in, simply because of some rude need to be first or some other bullshit reason of entitlement.
Either way, I put up with this.
I made my way to work. I was walking up 7th Avenue and there it was – my so-called place of business. I was almost at 57th Street when I realized something.
“I just can’t want to do it!”
So, I went to a pay phone (because I am that old) and I called in sick from the corner.
I turned around and despite the bullshit commute that I just put up with, I went through all of that nonsense, just to turn around and go back home.
“I just can’t wanna to do it!”
This is a line that was commonly said between me and an old co-worker of mine. He was a friend, for sure, and a union brother as well. But more than anything, this was someone who I spent time with him in the trenches of life’s warfare.
We went through the ups and downs of an everyday life together – and there were times when we had bad or tough or terrible projects to face. And I mean the filthiest jobs you can think of and together, both he and I would tell one another, “I just can’t wanna do it!”
I suppose the healing power of our laughter was enough to get two people through the seriousness of our momentary or bullshit existence.
We did what we could to deal with being considered the low men who were assigned the asshole-end of some really shitty jobs—which I mean this quite literally.
I say shitty because there were times when we had to clear out stoppages in main drain lines – and mind you, if you’re not sure what gets flushed down these drains, I can assure you that it’s nothing that would smell pleasant!
I just can’t wanna do it.
But then I go back to that tattoo idea.
“Not today, Satan!”
As for the idea, “I just can’t wanna do it,” the truth is that I have said this more times than I can count. I have said this (in one form or another) throughout my adult life. I have said this in my young adulthood and certainly, there were times when I said this in my teenage life.
I have said this when I tried to dodge the figurative bullets or in my momentary blindness of lazy excuses and bouts with procrastination. To be clear, I have said this at times when I put more work into being lazy than I would have if I just did the job in front of me.
I tell you no lie when I say procrastination is a symptom. I can also tell you that procrastination and putting off the inevitable is an enemy.
This is an enemy which leads to nothing else but more problems and more symptoms – and trust me, the more symptoms we add, the more troublesome the symptoms become. Hence, we look at the stack of shit that goes on our “To-Do” list and then we shake our heads.
Then we say to ourselves, “I just can’t wanna do it.”
And so, we don’t.
I have lost more than gained while thinking this way.
I have ruined relationships by allowing myself to sink inwards. I have allowed this to hurt my professional life, my love lie, personal life, and all around, I have seen what procrastination leads to.
I just can’t wanna do it . . .
I like music. I like to cook. I like to find ways to unwind the bullshit that ravels up in my head—and sometimes, the only way “to it” is “through it!”
No matter if “I wanna do it” or not.
Time is ticking. . .
I know this.
“That pile of dishes ain’t gonna wash themselves!”
I’ve heard this in dish crews while being involuntarily stationed in a farmhouse.
I know what it’s like to need a get-away or to take a little mental vacation. Sure, there were times when I believed this came in a liquid, powder or in the form of a pill – whereas, in this case, the chemical interaction disrupted the chaos in such a gentle yet such an unhealthy way, to bridge the chaos in wild forms of gentle explosions.
Boom . . . And the brain takes off.
And BAM! The body hits the floor, only to wake up the next day to ask someone the question, “I drank what?”
Sure, I can relate to being the white leaf, trailing atop a slow-moving stream, lifeless and weightless, numb to all, and simply being carried away, lifelessly drifting as I move downstream to end up at the mouth of an outlet to some overwhelming sea.
As if to say Ahhhh . . .
That’s it.
Sure, I can say that I stood at half-mast, eyes somewhat closed like the shades on an abandoned window to a home that no longer exists.
I get that. Nodding . . .
I know why people hit the bars on Friday nights. Better yet, I know why people down their fifths of vodka before walking through the door to their place of business.
I knew a person who would do this every morning before 8:00am.
He was told that all of that drinking would kill him.
He would say, “My drinking ain’t never did nothing to me!”
(only, you’d have to imagine this with a thick, New York accent)
He argued that his drinking would never kill him.
He was right. His drinking didn’t kill him.
It was the express bus at 28th and Broadway that did him in.
Either way.
I need a vacation too. As a matter of fact, I can think of a place right now. I can think of the sounds of peaceful things, like the early morning, “Wake-up” sounds of doves cooing by the Hollywood Hills.
I have a picture in mind too. This place only exists in my head.
But I like it, nonetheless.
I like the idea of its slow-moving stream. I like the thoughts of how the stream cuts through the meadows of a summery place where a weeping willow stands by the edge of the stream, leaning in an off-set way – its weeping limbs, dropping down, like a hushing dream that defines where peaceful little children rest easy beneath the warmth of the Great Mother, the sky, Mother Earth, the bosom of it all, Milk of the Universe to nurse all to health.
Like I said, this part of paradise is only in my head.
No pill can make this so and no powder or liquid can duplicate this for me either.
It’s not like I can walk in and tell my boss – sorry but, um, I just can’t wanna to do it today.
I heard someone remark to someone who heckled them at their speech:
“Life is hard. Wear a helmet.”
I do not credit names nor do I back or oppose any political side here.
And I agree. There are moments, days and times when life can be absolutely unforgiving.
So, wear a helmet.
But no matter how tough it is, we cannot or will not ever give up.
All we can do is show up.
Even if we just can’t wanna do it.
Not today, Satan!
As I write to you, I have some music playing in the background.
This is all soothing, to say the least.
But the caffeine from my coffee is about to kick in, which means it’s time for me to hustle and get moving.
Can’t wanna do it, or not.
Here it comes . . .
Good morning, sunrise.
It’s usually you who has something in store for me.
But not today, bitch . . .
Now, it’s my turn.
Oh, and Satan . . .
Stick around.
I have something to show you too.
Bitch!
The Written Addiction 