The Daily Nighmare (1978)

[A passage from my journal, written 27 October 1978 at 8:17 am PDT in Crookshank 213.]

I

 was down badly yesterday for no good reason that I can see—perhaps because nothing repeatedly continues to happen. The idiom of despair—the small certainties comfort one: that sooner or later the sun will come up; that whatever one does, nothing fundamental is going to change; that eventually the daily nightmare will end, to be replaced in its turn by tomorrow’s nightmare; that one day in the not too distant future life will end, probably with one’s brains scattered over the blanket of the bed, but certainly by one’s own hand. What is there to say? We are aliens, strangers under one roof, and hostile at that. To play unpleasant games in one’s head is not the most comfortable way to spend the day—still, the time passes.

They say that time flies when you’re having fun—I’ve always found that time goes by slowly when you’re enjoying it. Last Thursday is a long time ago, last August an æon. It’s when you’re caught in routine, performing a daily ritual, that one day merges imperceptibly into another, and Thursday a month ago is separated from now by paperthin walls—the days are interchangeable, and eventually you look up and a year has gone by, and in your memory is nothing but the same day, repeated in more or less uninteresting variations.

—thus goeth my mind. This is the sort of crap I’ve been into for a week or so—which is to say I am depressed. Maybe it will go away sooner or later, maybe not.

I keep telling myself that I’m going to eat out sometime soon but the trouble is I want to get “home” to play the piano while I have the place more or less to myself. If I could go out in the evenings—but that’s probably bullshit also.

Speaking of piano, I’m currently working on the “Maple Leaf Rag,” the rest of “The Entertainer,” the twelve scale chords and various variations, and perhaps the second movement of the “Moonlight” Sonata (I started “The Entertainer” and “Moonlight” Sonata yesterday). I’m also working on piano versions of “Let It Be” and (tentative title) “Nothing is Real,” (Lennon/McCartney parody)—the last two are beginning now to go fairly well.

While I’m on the subject of current efforts perhaps I should mention again that I’m attacking the storyline/plot question by assembling stories by modern authors (who are taken seriously) as well as sf, mystery, and humor writers.

Class is about ready to begin—I think I’ll stop here and get a drink of water.