I was talking to my mom the other day about how I’m only a little over a quarter century old, yet I feel I have lived so many different lifetimes in just this one body. I made a list of the top 10 lives I’ve lived, and if this consciousness didn’t already feel old, it sure as hell does now.
10. Post New York
If you know, you know. But I survived! This only makes the list because of the unconditional love and support my friends and family showed me. Also, the healing during this time was very formative, so I felt obligated to vaguely reference it.
9. Maine
I got a shit ton of weed from some dude I worked with, and I learned how to make edibles. That’s when my relationship with weed blossomed from casual to committed. I had disposable income and got a lot of shitty tattoos. I was 19 and working at a single-screen indie theater. My 50-something-year-old boss was my only genuine friend. I had other people I hung around with, but I didn’t exactly enjoy them. Quite the opposite, actually. They were the type of people who you meet once to see if you’re compatible, and even though you’re not, they still harass you until you give up and hang out with them.
8. Mortician Bill
I went to school for mortuary science once. It was really fucking cool, and I wish I had stayed in school to see this lifetime out. I didn’t actually end up attending my psychology of death and dying class, but I did read the textbook and it changed how I viewed death. My hair was pink, then purple. I drank a lot of Pipeline Punch flavored Monster. I don’t remember much of this time except that my dad recently moved back home and drove me to class in the morning once a week, which was a consistently interesting experience. I ranked this one because it was honestly quite a boring life, but historically speaking, boring is better than chaotic.
7. Hartford Part 1
The first space I had that felt like mine. I had a lot of fun here at first. I was finally closer to the vast majority of my friends which made the whole loneliness situation better. I got my cat, found a roommate I really liked, we had good times drinking beer and watching Godzilla movies and shooting each other with Nerf guns. Then they crashed their car, and I thought I killed their lizard while they were in rehab, and my neighbor tried to kill me. I went back to school for the third time, then ran out of adderall during finals and ended up freaking the fuck out and dropping out again. But Nerf guns and Lilith!
6. Freshman Year
I was really into pop-punk and Warped Tour, and I had a best friend who was into the same exact stuff. I went from getting bullied at my rich, white, homophobic hometown to going to school somewhere where there were people from all different demographics- no one gave me a second look. It was eye-opening, and I didn’t even get bullied. I was first-aid/CPR/PPE certified, and I also knew every medical term to ever exist. Nursing was okay, but I still think I would’ve had more fun in hairdressing. I liked this lifetime because it’s when I started listening to music that really resonated with me. I got really into Black Flag. And I saw Dead Kennedys live, which was honestly a very weird experience. Great, but odd. Then I found out about Skramcave. Things got weird after that.
5. Brooklyn Bill
This was a short-lived one which ended so so horribly, but one of the most fun by far. I moved in with a close friend, we smoked weed and did medicinal anti-depressant grade ketamine, I was banging out collage after collage, we moved to Brooklyn, and I ran some random dude’s art gallery. I found a lot of great music during this time because all I did was sit out on my fire escape, people-watch, and chain-smoke with my stereo. I was a year sober, and life was peachy keen. Then came The Divorce. No, I won’t elaborate.
4. That Time I Was a Tag Hag
My first real love in life. We weren’t together, but we didn’t need to be; we had a good enough time as friends. One time, I made him drive down this spooky non-existent road in my hometown because I wanted to show him the shitty graffiti in Ye Olde Drunk Tank, as I call it. It’s basically a stone square erected in the late 1700s that a nearby tavern would throw unruly patrons into for the night. I found a deer skeleton there, and he let me put it in the trunk of his dad’s car so that I could take it home to degrease it/soak it in peroxide/etc. We went on lots of adventures that ended with me taking a trophy or pilfering a memento. I remember him fondly. I also really miss the drunk tank.
3. Those Two Years Where I Went to Gigs Non-Stop
When I was ages 16-18, I went to multiple shows a week. I’m talking at least 3 or 4 a week. I had friends- I was attending my local community college, where I met my best friend, August. I had friends in the scene that I’m still close with now, and I was still connected to a couple of people I went to school with. Local shows were $5. Cigarettes were $10. I was underage, so my drinking problem was fun and quirky and not yet an actual problem. I made a zine, made comics, changed my name and decided I was gay, pierced my ear in the school bathroom, went to Denny’s in the middle of the night frequently. All that good stuff. I also had pet cockroaches. Shoutout to Spicy Chorizo and Honey Roasted Peanut, they were great until they weren’t.
2. Post Wellbutrin Euphoria
This one was a close second because I felt like I had been reborn in a sense. I just didn’t take my Wellbutrin for a week and felt great, but I thought I was manic, so I brushed it off. I started taking it again and resumed my miserable ass life until one day I put two and two together and realized one medication was pumping norepinephrine and dopamine on blast, while Wellbutrin was blocking one of the 4 channels through which those specific chemicals travel, so those 3 channels were working overtime. Very counterproductive, I thought. So I addressed it with my med provider, and she was like “Omg you’re totally right. That’s why you felt great off Wellbutrin.” Thus, the anti-Wellbutrin era was born. The sun shone brighter, the leaves on the trees were more vibrant, and sunsets were more saturated.
1. This One/Hartford Part 2
This life, the one right here, right now. The one where I discovered my passions lie elsewhere, and that loving something shouldn’t be hard. The one where I ghosted alcohol, went back to school, and found out what path I want to take in life. The one where I watch a lot of cartoons and smoke a lot of weed and listen to The Dandy Warhols every day. The one with Lilith. I live 5 minutes from my best friend, and we grab coffee multiple times a week. I reside in a tiny apartment all by myself, and no one yells at me until I cry about forgetting to take the trash out or put a dish in the sink. I am prolific in my studies and dedicated to making art as frequently as my body allows me.
Phrenectomy 