TRUST AND TAXES

It was just like in school. I could never accept that I was actually there or that it mattered to anyone if I was there or not. The teacher would be talking and I would look out the window and see like an old man walking his dog or something, and I would think, why am I not him? Or hell, why am I not his dog? And the other kids just frightened the hell out of me. They just seemed like fucking animals. I got along with them only because I was afraid of what would happen if I didn't. I still feel that way about people. I feel like at any moment they can turn on you like wild beasts. I feel that way even about my family. But anyway, yeah, the whole tax thing. I still don't know why I allowed it to happen. There was a handful of years where I made a lot of money and, you know, when April came around, I just couldn't quite accept that it was really something that I had to do. That anyone gave a shit about any money I made or anything like that, or that I existed at all, just seemed ridiculous. I mean, why didn't squirrels or giraffes have to pay taxes? I had started to go pretty crazy by then. Every time I got my mail, I would just stand there and stare at my name printed on all the envelopes. It just didn't seem possible that anyone would take the time to type out my name. And I could never really figure out what the hell I was doing living in New York anyway. The years would go by and I would travel a bit but I would always wind up back in some shitty apartment somewhere in that fucking city. It really got to me. I mean, I really did go totally nuts a couple of times. I remember once, jogging up and down 3rd Avenue completely naked. One time, I was walking with some friends and for some reason, I decided to dive into a pile of blue trash bags beside some sort of strange rehab clinic or something. I landed on my back and I looked around and saw all these needles poking out. I would climb scaffolding or sometimes the side of buildings themselves and I would be totally fucking wasted while people would gather and cheer me on, many, I'm sure, hoping I would fall to my death. But, actually, that wasn't the real crazy shit. The real crazy shit always took place inside those apartments with whomever I happened to be living with at the time. That was always where true madness went down. I was already seriously committed to becoming a writer, desperately trying to learn how to let go of my stupid brain and just receive the information. It's pretty scary stuff at first. It's still scary. It's like being blind folded and led to the edge of a cliff and there's this voice telling you, "It's okay, man, trust me, there's water down there. Alright, you ready? Here we go... one... two... three..." and you just have to trust it, you just have to fucking jump.