Word Vomit, Part One

Over the last days, I have spoken to Dave about some of the things that Jake and no longer speak about (we just recite and don't listen). Dave listens, albeit with his oddly blank eyes behind which the next outpouring is processing (eerie self-recognition), and answers, and in some ways that's a relief, to be talking to someone who will discuss it at length and with consideration. And all through this I just know I'm not wrong. I can't articulate what's happening or why it's not right. But I am only more sure: I'm not wrong about this. In some sense, this realization actually hamstrings me, because with the realization in hand I have to decide what to do with it. And I do nothing. And I cry. And I have short periods of time where I come as close as I have ever come to hating anyone or anything. Right now, I'm having the same reaction to Ben and MTC that I had to the yeshiva rabbis almost three years ago now: You awful, awful, blind men! These are people! Not mechanisms! Not replaceable, fungible, and defined only by their breathing and their willingness to keep walking! But if that's how Dave and Jake want to be defined... and doesn't it seem like it, with the new "It's not me, it's what I'm doing" mantra? Isn't that, actually, the definition of robotics? Maybe it would need a tweak, to "I'm not me, I'm what I'm doing." I can respect an action. But I can't love it. And if that's all there is, then that's all there is, and instead of a hard loud break there is only a sickening slow tear, that I feel alone and soundlessly. Behind the blank eyes there is a new soapbox percolating but there is also a bizarre emotionlessness. There is motion and there is emotion and, I guess, a balance is a choice, a choice to be balanced. The scale falls toward motion. There is no distinction between what is important and what is urgent when you're running shoulders to the harness and blinkers on.
He says he's the drowning one but all around him are people with arms out and life-saving devices, calling out how amazingly he's doing. And I just sit and tread water and it's so quiet and there is no one, at all, who notices or cares or even thinks about it.