Third Post--Vindicated

I spent twenty minutes googling someone I thought I'd forgotten, gotten past. Why?

I'm caught up in this melodrama, nostalgia. I keep looking back at the past, because the future doesn't have what i think i need in it. I keep tossing glances over my shoulder and turning into a salt pillar. I keep...

It's not quite compulsion. It used to be. Now it's just loneliness. That's a kinder word, at any rate.

I feel like I should be better at being me than I am. I've been working at it for the past score plus three, and I've been doing especially well in the recent past. But i alternate between feeling hopeful and feeling broken. Vital and useless. Up and down.

It's this ambivalence that's driving me crazy. I can't seem to stay in one mode for more than a few days. I keep swinging back and forth, on that razor-thin wire. I am the Pendulum. I am the Pit. I am Vincent Price's worst f-ing day.

I think this back-and-forthness that I cannot escape is why I like the new Dashboard song so much. Because it's both depressing and hopeful. It's struggling to pick a side.

I keep hearing people tell me what I can be. My potential. My responsibility. But it all becomes hollow. I can't hear what I can be. I hear what I am. And what I am holds only the bare minimum of functionality.

I want to be the "together" guy, who's got the maturity to fulfill all his adult responsibilities. He meets his obligations, he is aware of every deadline, every expectation. He comes through with flying colors. And everyone is impressed by him. He's an astronaut.

And I'm not. I'm plain old Dave, struggling to make things work the way they're supposed to. And the saddest part is that I can't even attribute my half-function on being a superhero. There's no good reason for dropping the ball. I'm not saving children from burning buildings, or rescuing damsels. I'm dragging my feet through my life, ashamed of all of it.

I spent twenty minutes looking for some trace of the Dave I was, the one with dreams within reach, with an unblemished future ahead of him. The Dave who was adored by the one he adored. But the search came up empty.

=====
Hope dangles on a string
Like slow spinning redemption
Winding in and winding out
The shine of it has caught my eye

And roped me in
So mesmerizing, so hypnotizing
I am captivated, I am

{Chorus}
Vindicated
I am selfish
I am wrong
I am right
I swear I'm right
I swear I knew it all along

And I am flawed
But I am cleaning up so well
I am seeing in me now the things you swore you saw yourself

So clear
Like the diamond in your ring
Cut to mirror your intentions
Oversized and overwhelmed
The shine of which has caught my eye

And rendered me
So isolated, so motivated
I am certain now that I am

{Chorus}

So turn
Up the corners of your lips
Part them and feel my finger tips
Trace the moment, fall forever
Defense is paper thin
Just one touch and I'd be in
Too deep now to ever swim against the current
So let me slip away (3x)
So let me slip against the current
So let me slip away (4x)

{Chorus}

Slight hope
It dangles on a string
Like slow spinning redemption...