the one that made me feel invincible

Here's a scary question: What do you do when you lose what makes you you?

Too grand, that.

Here's a better one: What do you do when you lose your primary defense mechanism, that certain something that outshouted the naysaying voices urging your insecurities with their incessant "Eew, no one likes you," with a great big, "So? Who the fuck cares?"

A nice evening driven into the ground (way too far into the ground -- like "Journey to the Center of the Earth" too far) by three or four people who were (minorly, really) assholic/insensitive/drunk/stupid/whatever -- three or four people who shouldn't even register on my radar, mind you -- left me a terrified, hopeless, sobbing wreck. Well, that and the gin. But yes, my all-time worst ever cry, precipitated by what should go down in history as the least worthy reason which spun into a total fiasco. And of course, that wasn't the reason, I guess. But it kind of was. And if it wasn't, what was it? And why didn't the "Screw you bitches" backup kick in? Why, even when I sat there and stared them down and forced it out, was there no echo of it in my head? What the hell happened to me?

I don't know, man. But I don't like it. And last week, when I happened upon this song* from a year or two ago and thought, "Wow. Some lyrics," I didn't think I'd listen to it again tonight and think, "Oh. I ... oh," and feel like I'd just been punched in the throat.

The night I got my iPod, I brought it into my bed with me, and in the dark, under the blankets, I listened to songs, some very familiar, some less so. And I felt very young again, because I used to often go to bed with a walkman, probably right up until I got my own room in my own apartment six and a half years ago.

But this night I felt especially young, and excited and overwhelmed. And in my own little world. I, in my own pod. It was bizarre and unsettling, but familiar. So when I listen to songs like "Shine a Light" from the Constantines and "We Can Have It" from the Dears and "11:11" from Rufus Wainwright and the shattering Tommy Gnosis version of "Wicked Little Town" (as performed by Ben Lee and Ben Folds and Ben Dover, whatever) while ducking people I know on Manhattan Ave, I feel overwhelmed; I feel very apart from everything around me and very alone. And I don't know what to make of that. I don't know what any of it means, and I don't know if it means anything, even, but it makes me wonder what's really happening while I float along in my pod (which has been happening in a greater way for a very long time now). And it makes me wonder what to do to fix this, and what's next.

*Lost/ I've lost that secret hold/ The one that made me feel invincible/ Where did it all go wrong?/ I felt like I've had it all along/I'm just tired/ But I'm still fighting // But it's hard/ It gets harder every day/ Different personalities grate/Wear you down until you're not yourself/He has my face but he feels like someone else/I'm just tired //The old rhetoric, it's a burning wick/And I explode 'cause my heart's sick/I don't need to rock and roll/I just want to crawl back home to you. // Life/I'm chasing it, it's not chasing me ... (Dear Leader, "My Life as a Wrestler")