Time takes time takes time

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                                                            Literal hands on a clock

As I sat in the art room of Aurora Behavioral Health unit I wondered what to draw. I had a big white piece of paper and some markers. This image flashed in my mind. It's something that is on my mind a lot: Time. We all wonder about time. How much time we have left. How much time we've spent. How much time we've wasted. For me, the hands seem to take a brief pause at high noon and 6:30. I find myself wondering what the next click will bring. Sometimes I'm thinking about 8:30 when I'm at 7:30 and by the time I arrive at 8:30 I'm thinking about 9:30. The most sacred and true time we really have is this very second. It's the only time that isn't distorted. We aren't left romanticizing about the past or predicting our futures. I drove to Nevada today and shut the radio off. I thought about my breathing. I watched my thoughts float by. In that moment I decided to think about the actual time. As humans, we seem wired to look everywhere but right on the road we are traveling. Catching a glimpse of miles ahead while completely unaware that we are the ones behind the steering wheel. Losing sight of the actual journey. I like time. Living with mental illness, I see what time does. It really does spin around and around. I use to always worry about the turning of the hands but now I see it as all part of the process. Ok. Time to stop writing now. 

Book em, Danno

The timeth hath cometh.

In July of 2014 I was reflecting on my time in San Diego. I realized there were changes I went through in the past 10 years that I would have never expected. If 31 year old Veronica told 21 year old Veronica, "You'll live in San Diego, become a music therapist, get diagnosed with Bipolar 1, like women, AND dress like a man" I would have asked for *heavy narcotics.

So I started writing thinking I may get about 30 pages in and be done with it. 30 pages came and went. Came and went. About 300 pages and one year and 8 months later, I closed my laptop and let out a big sigh. It's "finished." I have three editors working on the first draft. 

Here's a little snippet in the behemoth chapter on Bipolar 1. In all 3 manic episode a reoccurring delusion exists. I have access to the water of truth and the more I drink, the more I will know the truth. The water of truth in this snippet happened to be a water cooler in the psych ward I was in at the time. I kept blacking out and coming back, primarily because of the medications they needed me to be on. Oh, I also thought my roommate was Mary Magdalene. I mean, come on, I was Jesus, why can't she be someone cool too?

For days on end I didn’t sleep. I was certainly Jesus, and to prove my divinity I had decided that the water cooler in the lunchroom was in fact the water. The holiest water that would save everyone, and reveal all truth. I had a Styrofoam cup I carried with me everywhere. I called it the cup of truth. I would drink a lot of water from the water cooler using that cup alone.

You know what else I would do with the cup of truth filled with water? Baptize people! This did not make the staff or patients joyful. I would be calmly walking down the hall with my cup of truth filled with holy water, and without warning would release the water from the cup onto faces, backs, arms. Whatever the Holy Spirit willed. When they would react adversely I knew it was because the Holy Spirit was trying to do his work…not because a random stranger just doused them with cold-ass water.

The screen goes black again. I wake up on the floor of my room. There is water everywhere and I’m sopping it up with a towel. I look over and Mary Magdalene is sopping up the water too. She must have made a mess and I am helping her. Later on I found out I was baptizing my room with our toilet water. With the same cup I drank from.

I’m gonna go throw up now

Open Book should be available by the end of the year.

Ok. Bye. 

*A pint of Ben and Jerry's Half Baked ice cream, a pack of zingers, a yoohoo, and a king size peanut butter twix.

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Someone get this man a baby wipe.

Hi, I'm Bipolar Biweekly

           Sometimes up. Sometimes down.

Nice to meet you. I will be coming around twice a month. I am a product of Veronica's mind and fingers. Today Veronica is at Young Hickory coffee shop wearing a purple shirt with Hot Air Balloons on it. She isn't trying to make some statement about the importance of slow and aimless travel though she does find merit in wandering with no purpose. We (Veronica and I) hope you enjoy the meanderings of her site. Veronica will do her best to create a multi-modal blog post. Incorporating sights and sounds of all sorts. Today, she will leave you with a drawing connected to having Bipolar 1 Disorder. She will also post a song she wrote years ago during a low point. Ok...guys...it's been me the whole time. Veronica. I've just been talking in third person. Don't freak out.