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I had an out of body experience once--
i hovered above my body
and watched a circle of painted savages
spit on me, mock me.

it happened at a lake
as i lay half-conscious in the bushes
sick from bad alcohol
bad drugs
or bad both.

it wasn't the best experience of my life.

i've had many visions in my time
--some good, some bad--
most not induced by drugs:

i've rarely had a vision from drugs,
only haunting feelings
that nothing i've ever done in my life has been good--
imagine sitting in a midnight cemetery
surrounded by the headstones of every hurtful memory in your life

i don't do drugs anymore,
but those feelings stay.
ever wonder about neuroticism?

when i was a child i frequently wondered
if everyone else were a robot and i was the only real person;
just in case
i never let my guard down.

i also thought God had called me
to be the chosen one, whatever that means;
file that under delusions of grandeur.

chris always told my mom
that i was a paranoid schizophrenic--
i didn't know what that was
so it freaked me the hell out.

remember playing ninja turtles with josh
back when everyone loved ninja turtles;
secretly i loathed them,
i just wanted to sit in the same room with him and be close.

then when everyone else was outgrowing their toys
i didn't want to let them go.

he had an issue of people magazine
that showed a woman's tits;
for some reason i couldn't stop looking at it.
for that day it was my addiction,
i liked it,
what it did to my body,
it was a wonderful mystery.

i followed josh around
b/c i thought i should be more like him
b/c he didn't think about things as much as i did,
he seemed like more of a real person
than i felt i was.

how do you know you're real?
not just a mute monkey for everyone else to
bounce their own lives off of?

i guess i see myself as someday
floating over the plateau of the world,
not existing,
and watching with interest
at everything exploding below.