Hey you came back. Thanks! I’ve been so lonely. Or maybe you are here for the first time, if thats the case I’ll never let you go. But seriously, if you read the first one of these thanks, and if you haven’t here’s a link to it so you can get caught up.
Week 1
One week of being on medication is in the books and I have no idea how I’m supposed to feel, which has been my problem most of my life. Its a weird combination of being hopeful for the future balanced out by an overwhelming feeling that nothing matters, so what’s the point? Is there a point? Could somebody please tell me there is? You don’t even have to tell me what it is, just that there is something to be done. Is it this it? Is just doing something for the sake of doing it enough? Lets hope so…
Good, we worked through that moment of existential terror together. I’m learning sometimes you need to work things out together. Is that the point? Shit, its happening again. Lets get to a recap of the week.
The negative.
I’ve been on these brain pills for a week now and chemically I don’t feel any better. The doctor said it would be three to six weeks before I felt anything so I shouldn’t be worried. But the thing about anxiety is you really don’t need anything to worry about. You can just invent something like ‘maybe these pills aren’t working.’ And then that’s there isn’t much of a jump to ‘why am I even trying to fix myself, maybe I’m just suppose to be miserable.’ And that isn’t that far away from, ‘I’m an idiot for putting myself out there at all.’ Which is just the beginning of the spiral of negative thoughts that ends with me being abandoned by everything I’ve ever cared about. What I’m saying is I would just like a little relief from those kind of feelings. Actually, at this point I would just settle for not having my skin feel like its trying to crawl away from my bones all the time.
On to other things. I don’t want this to be a journal of the ups and downs of my comedy career but I will talk about comedy stuff sparingly when I feel appropriate. This week I had a really mediocre set on a show. I know that is a real no-no to ever admit you didn’t have the most amazing set ever. I mean if the internet is to be believed everyone is always killing it on every show and every audiences leaves begging for more. Well, if I never get booked again because of this so be it. I don’t care.
Normally, I wouldn’t bother bringing up a mediocre set, it wasn’t a bomb or anything really terrible. I just couldn’t connect with the audience and it was completely my fault. I could feel it while I was performing that something was off but I couldn’t figure out what. As soon as I got off stage I knew I just hadn’t had any energy and that drives me crazy. It was the first time in a long time I couldn’t get excited about performing and that is never a good feeling.
Like any medication, the one I am on has some side effects. I looked at the list of what could be happening and I have been pretty lucky I haven’t had most of them. The two biggest ones have been my inability to get a good night sleep and random boners. I know weird, right? On the bottle it just says sexual problems so I had to look into it further and according to the internet its a thing. On to the positive.
The Positive
Random boners guys. Have you ever had a boner? They are pretty great and now I’m getting bonus boners for free. Make a note, if I ever get to the point of not being sad anymore remind me to rename this column Bonus Boners. As long as the boners don’t last for for longer than four hours I’m fine. After that I guess I have to go to hospital and get a hacky joke removed. I actually did more research on it and turns out you can have an erection for six hours before you do any permanent damage but they say to go the hospital after four hours because they must figure that it will take two hours of making everyone in that emergency room nervous before you get any help.
I also got to play with a really cool cat over the weekend. He was a big fluffy mess who thinks he’s a person.
Who could say no to that widdle face?
If that didn’t cheer me up I don’t know what would have. Also, I went to a brewery and that was a pretty good time.
‘That’s happiest face I’ve ever seen Ted make.’ – Comedian Ahmed Bharoocha
When I decided to write these as a weekly thing I considered going out and doing a good deed every week so I’d have something to write about in the positive section but that seemed like it would be kind of disingenuous to do good things just so I would look good. But as fate would have it I would have to do a good deed this week. There is this old lady in my building and she needed help because the front steps were being rebuilt so she needed to get down the two steps out back but there isn’t a railing and I helped guide her down the steps. She was super thankful even though it really wasn’t anything for me at all. I actually felt good about doing something.
Normally, I try to avoid old people because they, like all things, make me sad. Its a very specific sad related to inevitability of death and the slow decline of the human condition. But this time I thought about those things and actually appreciated my youth and that I still have most of my life ahead of me.
Finally, the most positive thing this week was my first column in this series was posted and I’ve received nothing but support and kind words. I really want to thank everyone who read it and liked it or shared or said something to me about what they liked. I’ll even thank the people who read it and didn’t like but had the decency to not shit on my feelings through my face holes.
