HughVoltage Show, Beta Version.

I don't know where this is going, but I don't really have a proper outlet for it at the moment, so with a complete disregard for privacy, here it is.

Recently, I experienced a bit of emotional unsettlement. First reaction to disappointment was my old friend self-medication. The result was like that of being bitten by a dog. It failed miserably. After my medication trials of Memorial Day Weekend behind me, I tried hyper sleeping. I went to bed while it was still light out and woke up to the morning light after a slight 3:00 AM intermission. It was like living in Alaska. It was still a better alternative to self-medicating. Finally, this is a new thing, I reached out to friends and family to talk about things.

Started with a few friends and my sister. They were extremely supportive and helped immensely. They put a lot of things in perspective and expressed enough compassion to kill a small dog. It's just a few paper cuts on a heart. It's totally manageable.

Last night, it resulted in spending some time with my best friend I think I've got in my arsenal and his wife and his cute baby. We just watched a Giants game and ate ice cream and touched on the situation lightly. The situation is complicated and really logically unjustifiable. If you show up to the ice cream parlor and they don't have the flavor that you are looking for, there is no reason to sit and pout. Get a different flavor and fuckin' enjoy your ice cream. You STILL get fuckin' ice cream...unless you are lactose intolerant. If that's the case, you probably shouldn't get ice cream at all.

So, the reaching out project culminated with a just finished two plus hour conversation with my mom. The mom/son relationship is super complex and is really more of an old friends relationship. We fight like kids with each other. We hold grudges against each other and we even hurt each other a lot.

So, we talked about everything and started to get to the question of what prevents me from being happy. My dad and the old times were brought up and we started talking about my childhood. She started talking about how I was the happiest kid in the world and I told her that I didn't really remember a lot. I just remembered painful moments. It made no sense because she said I was the happiest kid in the world and everyone adored me. Based on this, the HughVoltage show may have been going on for longer than I thought. She told me about the time when I was two and a half and ran away. I had no recollection of it and she said, "Let me be your memory." At that point, I felt the bees starting to swarm in my chest and my allergies set in.

It was actually a really funny story. Apparently, we had been driving home from somewhere and I pointed at some girl on a horse and said that I was going to ride it. She gave it a whatever and we kept driving home. An hour later, I was nowhere to be found and was eventually found down the street on the horse with the girl. I had snuck out of the house and gone to ride the horse where the girl just grabbed me and threw me on the horse when I asked for a ride. I got invited back when it was all over.

I told her that she must be wrong because two and half seemed way too young to cross a road and get on a horse, but she swears by it. She said I had to be two and a half because it was before I ran away to Long John Silver's in Manteca when I was three. Her timeline checks out.

She went on to talk about how I would sneak out of the house a lot without telling her to spend breakfast with a neighbor family around that time without her knowing that I was gone. She commented that I was very good at coming and going as I pleased and that I ate two breakfasts a lot.

So, anyway, the question is Why do I remember so much pain as a kid when it seems like I was pretty happy. It really bothers me to talk about it. I thought I was all good, but I guess I've still got some of that crazy pissed off five year old weight buried in my head somewhere.

So, we talked forever and got into some really specific stuff about childhood and it really hit some buttons, but it was good to talk to mom in an unbridled situation. Painful as hell, but no longer an elephant in the room. We can be extremely open with each other and it's almost like my dad left both of us and we helped each other get through the whole thing, but we still share some resentment that is very similar. It was extremely disturbing when she told me that when they got married my dad told her, "Now, we never have to say goodbye again." Yeah, dude. Right. It was really weird to hear her tell me that my dad loved and adored me when I was a baby. I have no memory of a loving father ever, but if he had nearly the gleam in his eye that I saw last night at a friend's house and how much they loved their baby, I find it extremely moving. It's one of the most pure loves that you will ever see in your life.

I can't get into other specifics as they might get read into, but we seem to be very similar in some of our less self-serving traits. Especially the one where we neglect ourselves in lieu of others' needs. We agreed that we do it to ourselves and then we both took the blame for it and then agreed that we were doing it to each other.

She told me that I was one of the best things to happen to her when she was sixteen and that I really helped her get through the pain when she was young. It was really good to clear the air and talk about old times. It hurts, but it's good to talk about. Sometimes it feels like we were both growing up at the same time. So, heads a little fucked up from it all, but pushing along. Never going to stop pushing along.