--  They're messing with my mind --

                          (c) Saketzu 2002


Extra translation, advice and final touches by rook, BIG thanks. Also
thanks to APz, B-jazz, Cyrus, K. Manni, Arto, #mokia and #pinball.
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                   1. The heavy patter of navy boots

   I'm walking back to my apartment on this cold and dark winter night. The
bleak Christmas holidays are over, it's time to study again. I begin to think
about how I'm going to spend the next days. There are many exams within these
few weeks, this is the last chance to start reading. I've been living in a
dream, even though the dream is not at all better than the real world. The
easiest thing is to let go, just founder deeper and deeper, until you exist
no more. That's what I would want, not to exist at all. The outer world does
not care to listen to what I'm trying to say, reality blasts straight to my
face like the cold northern wind.
   I have a strong vision of how things really should be. I see myself reading
and studying actively and systematically. Learning things from the books,
finding information from the net and applying the information on the classes.
This way, learning things both by myself and at school, I should become a
highly skilled professional, ready for the challenges of the working life.
   The problem is the lack of inspiration. I need it to really go deep into
the things I'm doing, without it the result is nonsatisfactory. Nowadays I
must force myself to even the basic things. I tried to ignore my feelings, but
if I manage to get some simple facts into my head, I forget them in few days.
If I try to solve something more complicated, it makes me feel frustrated and
desperate. I fail time after time. The lack of any success indicates the
existence of some more fundamental problems. If I only knew what they are. 
   Tall trees line the dark road with houses and gardens. The patter of my
navy boots can be heard on the icy road, the banks are covered with white
snow. The suburban area is even darker than the side-streets, the weight of
the bags is starting to piss me off. No time for stargazing now, I feel tired
and want to get inside as fast as possible.
   I know that I want to study, I want to become an expert. Not one of those
arrogant idiots who know nothing really but pretend that they do. What is
wrong? It's hard to start doing something, and easy to leave everything for
later. This overall negative and depressive feeling. They are messing with my
head. Someone is telling me all the time: "This is not going to work, you
can't do this, you're going to fail." Any kind of activity is being disturbed
by this feeling of being pissed off. I should definitely start getting some
motivation. The feeling is oppressing and menacing. I don't have the strength
to overcome. I open the door and walk upstairs.



                       2. The next day at school

   The alarm clock beeps. Some coke from the bottle, with the traditional
lumps of scraped scab and scurf. A nutritious breakfast. I run out of stiff
snot the day before yesterday, haven't been able to develop any more of that.
I take my bike from the storage, and cycle through the same old route to the
school buildings.
   Other students look surprised to see me at the Swedish lesson. I hate this
language from the bottom of my heart, the feeling grows stronger when the
teacher continues to humiliate each one of us, personally. "How come can you
be so stupid??" Everybody starts to be very pissed off, the looks and quietly
muttered curses express the general concentration camp atmosphere.
   Finally the lesson is over, we're having lunch at the canteen. We shoud pay
for it with special food coupons, but hardly anyone does that. The shit is
being made and served by so-called "Amish people", folks at the vocational
institute. They couldn't care less if someone is not paying for it.
   I'm sitting in the table, next to Kalervo. We are talking about suicide,
the subject that everyone else is fed up with. "I'd say a 9 mm pistol would be
optimal", I said. "A 7.62 would do fine for me", replied Kalervo. He is my
kind of a man, really has a grip to what is going on. Life sucks, then you
die. It's a fight we can never win, just fight well. Try to achieve something
that we are satisfied with before the reaper's final swing.
   The last lessons, Business English. Doesn't suck as much as Swedish, but
I'm not really into that kind of speech. I have no idea of the business terms
in Finnish, so it's quite difficult. 
   While playing truant in the library, Arto fired up the motto of the year.
We were discussing the upcoming lecture and my bad marks in Business English.
"I know I can make it, but I don't care." Our lectures didn't turn out to
be very good, because we didn't prepare them very well. Not at all, actually.
   A two-pack of 1.5l Coke bottles from the supermaket, rye bread and two
boxes of chocolate. I guess that'll do for a while. Back home to my computer,
the 1.2 GHz Thunderbird is booting up. I feel very tired. After a half an hour
nap I feel even more tired. I start the IRC client, say hello to a bunch of
friends. Just a while of this, I have to check my Email and do some other
important things. Then I'll read. I must read.
   Math homework. Before the latest exam I studied everything at the night
before the test. I managed, but it won't be that easy this time. These idiotic
interest payment calculations are not my favourites, not at all. The complex
calculation patterns... my head is just about to explode. After a few hours,
I feel an irresistible urge to burn these books, along with their authors.
   Again, I feel my path descending. The last structures of sanity are
crashing down. I feel powerless rage, it corrodes my mind. There's nothing I
could do to stop that. I remember the rare moments of inspiration. At that
time, the physique started to resist very strongly. I tried to ignore my body,
- or how I like to call it - the corpse. Headache, sore throat and nausea.
The body temperature is rising, the hurting back is killing me. No, that's
not enough. When I have finally reached the point, when I see my visions clear
in front of me, I'm so tired that nothing can stop me falling rapidly and
irresistibly to the dreamworld. In the morning, I remember nothing. Oh God,
they're playing with me! Laughing at my face, those bastards.
   The clock says 2:38. Everybody in the neighborhood is sleeping... except
the madman. Insanity is an escape, sweet and gracious when it appears. That
means an euphoric feeling after the worst kind of fear and depression. I
laugh at the middle of the night, at the computer. Brains and chocolate will
be my nightly meal. I feel this way of living is far more healthy than
shutting everything inside. All those things the masses call abnormal and
insane. I want to follow my heart. I must know my heart.



                     3. Denial - the descending path

   A glass of cold liquid brown to clarify my head, some bread for breakfast.
The stomach hurts like hell. With pain I cycle towards the AMK, I use the
"no trespassing"-shortcuts once again. An old man with a mat doesn't notice
me. Maybe better for his health. The pain twists my face to a terrible grin.
I's a chilling cold morning, I don't find the useless morning lessons very
interesting.
   Nobody is doing anything useful, Kalervo is surfing in the net and Susanna
is in the IRC. Bloody hell. Despite the constant pain, I try to do some
exercises with Arto. Suddenly I must leave the room and run to the toilet.
Enter diarrhea with the most horrible stomach ache anyone can imagine. I bite
my arm to prevent the scream. I return to the class shivering and pale, my
face is white as a blanket. I have to repeat this twice before I can cycle
back home to get some sleep, I feel totally powerless.
   I wake up after a couple of hours of sleep. A glass of warm, stale coke is
quietly waiting on the table. The feeling is strange, but I'm quite used to
it. Life is not beautiful, it's obscure with all its pieces scattered around
in piles of junk and dirt. Most of them are missing leaving me incomplete.
   Now I'll start to read Swedish, the final test is tomorrow. I know that
it's going to be a tough one, only few of my class will pass it at the first
attempt. But, I know that my head is not going to take any more of that
crap, it's now or never. Failure is a straight way down to hell. The teacher
is an asshole, we can't expect any less than an infernally difficult test.
   I start from the grammar, these things should be quite familiar at this
point. Rather boring, later on I move to the business terminology and customs.
This is the most sucky part, because I hate the whole business world, the
idiotic, old customs and stiff manners. The vocabulary is hard to learn, I
wonder why I didn't start reading until now. I guess only fear and extreme
concern can ring the bell of reason in my head. Time to see, what I've
learned so far having read for six hours now. I have exercises with the
correct answers in the back. I feel the growing uncertainty while filling in
the right forms and sentences. Oh God, haven't I learned anything? Almost all
of these are wrong!
   For some time I try to pound the words into my head, hysterically. Oh shit,
it's happening again, my thoughts are getting out of control, can't reach them
anymore. No way to get off now, I'm in total panic. The madness grows bigger
by the second. No, I can't stand it anymore, I throw the books away and start to
stare into the dark chaos, which is all I can see anymore. Suddenly I feel the
enlightment: I couldn't care less! The stupid life, exams, jobs and all things
I do are totally insignificant. I start to eat chocolate and listen to mp3's.
   Finally I realize, that I don't want to go to school, I don't want to study,
to get a job or anything else ridiculous. I have a plastic bag full of all
sorts of different pills from the military hospital, anti-depressives, beta
blocking relaxants, painkillers. Oxepam, Voltarene, Rinexin, Burana and all
that I know nothing of. The friends from HQ & Service Company gave me a share
of their tablet collections. I want to get high before I'll leave this world.
What if this world doesn't even exist? Maybe it's all just a dream, at least
it seems and feels like that. I pour the bag into my mouth and swallow the
mass with some fresh Coke from the refrigerator. Click, here it goes...



                      4.  The new dawn of winter 
 
   The morning is quite bright, the mind is light and heavy depression seems
to be over. Those pills did't turn out to be so bad. This must be the normal
state of my mind never seen before, I guess there must be something wrong with
my brain chemistry. Off to school, the test is awaiting.
   Back in the classroom, a couple of hours later. It wasn't so bad I thought
it was going to be. Actually, everything starts to flow more easily, when the
terrible pressure is over. Studying is not hard, when you get used to it.
Reality is a thousand times better than the dreams, now I feel I'm really
living this life, playing floorball and collecting precious information.
   The days go like flying, this steadiness is almost unbelievable. I finally
see the things I've always been trying to see, hope and visions of future.
Even better, those visions are coming true. Strange, that I feel no fear of
losing all this, just unusual things are happenig every once in a while. As if
the time stood still for a moment, quick flashbacks and feeling my body in a
strange way, an empty feeling. The headache disappears, probably nothing to be
worried about.
   A normal day at school again. After the lunch we sit at the tables in front
of the cafeteria. The lower grade schools don't have anything like this, ours
is in the center of the building, downstairs. The teens from the commercial
academy are going up the stairs, this is mainly our area.
   A girl, probably from the logistics, is drinking light coke at the table
few meters from me. I don't like those light drinks, but I guess it's a matter
of taste... Damn, she is pretty. And she is looking at me, I'm just wondering
why. We meet each other in Hesburger, talking about the intranet and logistics
studies. What a wonderful person. Her smile seems to be a cure for my
melancholy. So warm and friendly, and beautiful... she's my new angel.
   We meet again at the cafeteria, this time we talk about literature. She
writes poems, I tell her about my own attempts to write them. Short stories
are more of my territory. Really fascinating to meet someone with all these
same dreams and visions, her thoughts make mine more complete. Somehow she
seems to be interested of me, which is mysterious. Some days thereafter, I
see her in the library. She is borrowing a Juntumaa's book, that I had
borrowed earlier. The book is a psychological exploration of love and
relationships connected to it. She replies to my look with a smile. The tempo
of my pulse is rising, I barely can stop myself from hugging her right now...
She looks at me so sweetly, that it can only mean one thing. Just like the
maximum doze of heroin straight to the vein, my blood is roaring inside me.
   The park is lighted softly by the lampposts outside the library as we step
outside. All we can see is us, surrounded by the heavenly white masses of snow.
It feels so warm, though the temperature must be below zero. At the same time,
our hands touch each other, a tender kiss breaks down the walls around my
heart. Our tears are running, those held back for so many years, as we embrace
under the newly changed night sky. I no longer see darkness, just all the
stars shining bright and clear. I'm whispering those three words to her ear...
I love everything you do, everything you are. Life has never felt this real,
she has opened a whole new world. A world that is just for us two. I'd do 
anything to make her happy, to bring that smile on her face.
   Everything has changed, I live no longer for myself, but for us. This has
brought me a lot of new energy, so powerful that I don't know where that can
come from. I study and organize everything with a totally new attitude. Now
people can see me smile, not just when something bad happens. "He's high",
they said. I'm walking through the hall downstairs, whistling, a pair of
rings in my pocket. This is strange, I shouldn'd see myself in third person.
Again. I just thought that I walked through that hall. Uh, never mind.
   Something is squeezing my head, need to get rid of this. OUCH! I feel a
strong impact through my body. I'm going blind, that's what it is! I can
feel the rail of the stairs before me, OUCH! What is this, the feeling is now
lost as well! Only unrecognizable perceptions are coming through in this
darkness.


                                5. WB

   My eyes are suddenly wide open. I stare at the floor I lie on. There's
something in my mouth, between my teeth. I can't get a word out of my mouth.
I can't move my hands. Damned straitjacket. What is this place? My legs are
tied too, I'm trying to wriggle around the cell. After a while I get tired and
lie still on the padded floor. A black label in my light blue trousers catches
my eye. "Uusikaupunki Mental Hospital." This is not true.
   "He's awake." The nurses come to check my status. "I wonder if he has
anything left up here, after the treatment", the taller one says pointing at
his head. "At least he's not catatonic anymore. Let's give him a shot." They
stick a needle into my arm, I sink back to the uninterested state. This seems
like porridge, this mass that has no meaning. Days after days. I can't speak,
the nutriments and heavy medication are administered intravenously.
Nothing is nothing, I am nothing. ICCL.
    Tied into my bed. This must be another room, they left me here for some
purpose. I'm waiting for something. They seem to have reduced the medication.
I hear voices from the door. "The doctor is here, he's got work to do." I
hear a female voice. "In Hawaiji for two weeks? Right." Quiet coughing.
   A vigorous man in white clothes and with some gray in his hair steps into
the room, with my files in his hand. "Good morning, you're Riku Malmio, a
former student, I am Dr. Janatuinen. Two weeks ago you were found in your
apartment nearly starved to death, in some sort of a coma. You have been given
some electric shock treatment in addition to the antidepressive medication. We
assume that you were trying to commit suicide. Did you understand what I have
spoken?" A choked "YES" was the only thing I felt I could say.
   I get some more freedom in the course of time. They allow me the radio,
and won't keep me tied up to my bed. I hide the pills and won't take them. I
begin to think about the situation of my life at the moment of downfall. The
Swedish exam was failed just like all the others, I just did't show up. The
student aid and other social security have been called off by now, probably
the phone, ADSL and electricity too. I have no idea of the rent payments. I
can't continue studying, can't get any job. I have no life, just as before.
Welcome to your new home, sanitarium.
   Growing desperation and self-hate. I feel that I'm nothing, that my whole
life was a mistake. I should have been aborted. Depression increases, quite
probably because I'm not taking the pills. I don't want to live in a cloud of
lies, created by drugs. They are twisting my mind into somebody else's. I am
not me anymore. I was a jerk, an idiot who was nothing but a harm for
everyone. I decide to end this hopeless shit by hanging myself with my belt to
the ceiling.
   Today my use of medication is being controlled very strictly. I'm taking
lithium tablets, they prevent me from feeling anything. So they won't let me
kill myself. The dark infinity of my mind is gone forever, but every night, I
dream about freedom. In the morning, I remember the dreams of my blood sweetly
flowing away down my arms... the cold steel of a pistol in my mouth. But, the
days are safe thanks to the medication I must take every morning. My sleep is
protected by heavy sleeping pills.
   I thank you for this life. For it is so steady and secure. I'm living on
welfare nowadays, I have nothing to worry about. I am a nice and healthy man,
thanks to modern medicine. Goodbye now, the visiting hours are over