Is There a Ghost in My House?

I was just thinking of that Band of Horses song. But seriously, a few days ago I had a very creepy dream that I was house sitting and there was a sort of poltergeist, except that its way of haunting was to overtake people's brains and make them hallucinate that horrible things were happening. It was kinda like that movie The Craft. Things crawling on me, my limbs turning into granite, and so forth. I'm not sure what to make of that, but the dream was surprisingly willing to let go of my emotions when I woke.

In fact, my inner emotional landscape has changed dramatically since I quit smoking. All kinds of things that would normally penetrate my psyche all the way to through are only thumping against the surface. I can barely hear the noise. It's not at all like despair, although it results in waves of a sort of anguish and guilt about how truly cold to and distant from the rest of humanity I feel (or, you know, don't feel). I was just telling my dear roommate about how relatively easy it would be to watch things die right now. Let me know if you need help slaughtering a bunch of Thanksgiving turkeys; I'm your man. Got some baby bunnies that need drowning? Call me up.

...I jest. Nevertheless, it's super weird to feel like all the empathy has evaporated out of me. Also, nothing really excites me at all. It's like my average operating mood is leveling out at slightly below neutral, and the only way I can go is down a bit more. I wonder how long I can take it. Personal effectiveness at the cost of joy is not a fair trade.

The nicotine monster has such elaborate schemes for worming its way into a person's head. What a bastard. It can actually make me think that I may never be a person I would like to hang out with again.

On a completely different note, I just finished reading a lovely book by Naeem Murr called The Perfect Man. When I tried to describe it to someone recently, the best I could come up with was that it is sort of like To Kill a Mockingbird written for an adult audience by an acolyte of William Faulkner. I imagined the main character as a more grown-up version of this beautiful, charming, and wildly talented Indian child who practices at the dojang with me.

That's it for today. I'm headed off to first wedding anniversary dinner #1. Mmmm Thai noodles.