I'm Not Crazy

~9~ I'll take the The'rapist for $100.

I went to a shrink
To analyze my dreams
She says it's lack of sex
That's bringing me down

Green Day - Basket Case

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Friday - May 29 - 3:00 PM

As soon as I walk out the front door of the Madhouse, I feel like complete crap as the fresh air and sunlight assault me. Even behind the oppressively dark shades that I am rocking, the daylight blinds me in beauty. I have discovered a sudden urge to hate the sun with a passion that rivals RA itself.

So I pull the hood of my sweatshirt over my shades and make my escape to the car the best I can. Sidling slightly sideways down the porch steps as I try to avoid the hot afternoon sun. My body is starting to ache and itch pretty much everywhere, and my heartbeat is pounding nails into the back of my skull.

I can barely make it down the steps to our old crappy government auction Ford Taurus in the driveway. I yank open the door and slip quickly into the passenger's seat. Where I immediately slam the door closed, drop the seat all the way back. Then pull my hoodie all the way over my eyes, to block out the celestial blazing spotlight in the blue sky above.

I feel like one of those movie vampires, but not the sparkling forest fairy kind. But the other kind that burns up to a crisp in the immolating sun.

As we drive away down the hill away from the House of Crazy, I do not even bother to say goodbye to all the ghosts that remain behind in the Madhouse. My mom drives us out of Hillsdale, up the long winding road over the rolling hills and one valley over to San Fallcon Valley. What all the local kids call San Fall. We come over the pass and down into the dead town of Fallon.

To me downtown Fallon has that historical "death warmed over" feeling to it. That at some point in the past something important happened here a long time ago. But everyone who was alive forgot what that was. All the buildings are old brick and mortar, lined up side by side like gravestones. Which sorta suits the whole graveyard theme this place is rocking.

It almost reminds me a little of the 1950's town in Back to the Future. It even has one of those old-time theaters with a long vertical neon sign, The Maltese. Which looks exactly the kind of place that should be showing the Rocky Horror Picture Show on the regular.

We finally pull into the back parking lot of an old industrial office building. Thankfully, my mother parks directly under the shade an ancient weeping willow. The parking lot is pretty much like the entire town of Fallon...virtually empty and looks as depressing as all hell. Hellfire, even the trees are weeping willows, so go figure. This place is what I will come to know as "The second saddest parking lot in Three Valleys" right after unplanned Parenthood Clinique.

So I force myself to get out of the car and follow my mom up to the back of the brick fortress of healing. We come up to the first white wood door with its shiny brass placard on the outside that reads Dr. Beverly Q. Kline, Psy.D. I don't know about anyone else on this field trip to mental wellness ...but I'm already super psyched just to be here and shit.

Unlike the oppressive prison façade on the outside, the lobby waiting room inside is surprisingly light and airy, thanks to floor to ceiling French door windows. The industrial brick walls are painted white and festooned with a dozen Georgia O'Keeffe flower paintings. And one really big ass painting of a very pale barebacked girl with eight arms. It's actually a really interesting painting, that sort of looks like one of those Indian goddesses with all the arms. Save that this particular goddess is juggling all kinds of sports balls, and holding one big ass nail in one of her hands. Which I assume is to spike all the balls dead with, when the goddess finally gets tired of juggling them.