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Cambridge, Edinburgh & Amsterdam: Portrait Of The Artist As A Short Man

2012-05-23T12:43:13Z

Cambridge, Edinburgh & Amsterdam: Portrait Of The Artist As A Short Man

It is said that play is the work of children; indeed, psychologists would have us believe that young people come to understand the world and their role in it by having fun. (If I have assumed the tone of a vacationing zoologist describing the activities of Burmese dung beetles that is because until quite recently fun was an abstract concept for me, and play was something written by Edward Albee.)

By the time I arrived in Philadelphia at age six I had already lived in three different countries and learned two very different languages. My writerly personality - detached, solitary, depressed, thoughtful, lonely, mercurial, disingenuous, acquiescent, analytical, misanthropic and insecure – was already well in place. Drug abuse, chronic isolation, and a rich assortment of self-destructive behaviors lurked just around the bend.

I once asked a professor what it took to make a living as a writer. Without pausing he said, “You have to give up any hope of leading a normal life.” When I asked him that question I thought I had a choice, I did not understand that the decision had already been made for me. I was a serious wee lad, a miniature adult; the world was too much upon me. By six I was already scribbling poetry about God, death, and the meaning of life.

Time allowed me to grow up, or down, into my image of an aspiring, young artist - miraculously I never owned a beret, probably because I do not wear hats well. I pursued sensual indulgence, cheap thrills, and bourgeois decadence with relish.

I enjoyed the feeling of squandering talent, wasting opportunities, and pissing away gifts others might have killed to enjoy. It was an era of bad boys and anti-heroes and although I did indeed turn bad it never made me a hero. Also, somewhere along the way I stopped writing anything more culturally consequential than an ad for foot powder.

After you read Invisible Driving you will come to understand that it was only through traversing the burning landscapes of manic depression (bipolar disorder) that I was forced to break my personality down to its most primary elements and reconstruct. That process, hard as it was, gave me so many glorious gifts, among them the ability to have fun and play.

I read once that it is never too late to have a happy childhood – and I have taken that as my mantra. As far as I am concerned – He who dies having had the most fun wins. I learned at last that having fun is not difficult, complex or costly – it is simply a matter of knowing yourself, being yourself, and enjoying being yourself.

There is a coda to this song. You allow other people to enjoy you enjoying being yourself, too.

I wish I could tell the little boy in that photograph he needn't be afraid.

CLICK HERE To Order INVISIBLE DRIVING

The Tucson University Commencement Address – Taz Mopula

2012-05-22T13:20:20Z

The students who attend Tucson University, America’s most prestigious online learning resource, are scattered throughout the country. Consequently, a traditional graduation ceremony is both logistically challenging and inappropriate.

This year’s graduation ceremony was special indeed. Because Tucson, (sometimes referred to as Virtual U), finds its entire existence in digital ether; featured guest speaker Taz Mopula delivered his remarks in a series of tweets.

They appear below.

Tucson University 2012 Commencement Tweets – Taz Mopula

Class of 2012. As you explore what is arguably the world, remember:

It's lonely at the top. Then again, it's lonely at the bottom too, plus, the service is really bad.

There is nothing to fear except you itself.

If I could only give you one piece of advice it would be this: Do not, under any circumstances, take my advice.

The moment you are certain that you’ve got it all worked out is precisely when you finally not do.

If you think education is expensive, try insolence.

Why raise the bridge when you can lower your expectations of the river?

Those who can’t do, teach; those who can’t teach, teach anyway.

How can you think outside of the box when the box is inside your head?

There is no shame in ignorance; then again, it’s no cause for celebration, either.

The more you learn the less you know for certain; the less you know for certain the more you learn.

Be nice to your enemies; you just might be one of them.

Your college selection is irrelevant. However, where you go to high school is crucial; because they will never let you leave.

Thank you.

For more amusing words of wisdom click HERE.

Because You Asked Why Even The Bravest Fear Poetry

2012-05-21T12:10:48Z

Because You Asked Why Even The Bravest Fear Poetry

I took the photograph above in 1967, from atop the aft mast of a Norwegian freighter named Nopal Progress. But my obsession with the sea began long before that.

A Salty Dog

Tattered sails swell with breath
My battered boat groans and complains
As it’s guided from safe harbor to the
Cold and merciless sea
By invisible hands

I am weary of adventures
Scarred from fighting monsters
Hideous ones, beautiful ones

All I ever wanted was a cat
A hearth, a dram, a meal
A woman who knew how to sew
A roof and wall to guard against
The cruelties of winter

But fate decrees that I am bound
Bound to the mast, bound to the sea

Whatever rocky coast is my new home
I’ll tell my story there

Whatever rocky coast is my new home
I’ll tell my story there

Alistair McHarg

Harbor Lights

Outside looming harbor gates
Lightning scars the dark
Winds that shriek a cold lament
Of spirits lost and drowned
Whip the ocean into froth while
Raindrops strike like shot

Giants slumber by a wharf
Massive engines purr
Pushing only running lights
Mast and window, aft and fore
Not a soul dare leave the port
No man lifts a chain

Down the plank of one great ship
Several sailors tread
Collars turned against the storm
Navigating cobblestones
To seek camaraderie
In foreign vessels flying foreign flags

Dank and grimy dining room
Smoky, cramped, and warm
Weathered men drink far too much
Laugh too hard, and sing too loud
In tongues unknown to them

Pump your wheezy
Squeezebox please
Chipped and yellow ivories
Clap your hands ‘til dawn
This night all are safe
And one
Soon the sea will claim us

Alistair McHarg

My Lovely Angeline

Two long weeks at sea, New Orleans to Rio
High above the massive Jesus hovered
Arms stretched wide like a friendly traffic cop
Our pilot ship arrived and we were
Pulled
Right
In

Bacchanalian decadence of land
All the pleasure a sea dog could stand
Beef kabobs popping, chestnuts splitting their skins
Sweet, warm meat melting in our mouths
Music floating in on cool ocean air
Shhhuka shhhuka shuuk of the samba
Soft as an inner thigh
Rugged men from distant lands
Drinking desperately
Sang, yelled, cursed, and lied
In tongues unknown to me

Rushing tide of women, riot of color
Jungle green, parrot red, sun yellow, sea blue
High-heeled shoes and short short skirts, nicely tight
Fish net stockings, yeah, that’s right
Fish nets to catch a sailor
Bottoms twitching in that rhythmic female beat
Conga drumming street life, walking dancing singing
Scents designed to make knees weak
Reefer, incense, cheap perfume
Pretty faces smile and ask
“Short time, sailor?” - “You like me?”

Angeline, above them all
Tall and slim and young
Starched white blouse cut down to here
Cigarette leg slacks
Face that spoke of Europe, but dreamt of Africa
I bent down to your quiet grace
And you pulled me
Right
In

Not a word in common
We only looked and touched
Your soft brown skin, my Angeline
Coffee blessed with cream
Your room, so large and empty
Dresser, mirror, broken chair
Ceiling high, you reclined
A vision in the glare
Of one bare bulb suspended
Thread of fraying wire
Wearing just a shark’s tooth
On a golden chain
You grabbed my hair, pulled back my head
Bit me on the neck
And pulled me
Right
In

I’m a little bit like you, my lovely Angeline
I can’t remember all of them, nor would I even want to
Coming to me, passing through me, leaving me behind
Touched and yet alone, untouched
Keep on smiling, that’s the trick
Life’s a party, live it up, never feel a thing

But long ago, we triumphed for
One heartbeat on the clock
We beat them at their unforgiving game
When it was done you made me swear
That, should I ever come back there
I’d race straight into your waiting arms
You said that you would slit my throat
If I ran to another
Told me that I now belonged to you

It makes me feel like sailing back
To Rio, now, this instant
To stroll your streets and alleys
With a wanton, painted trollop on my arm

Alistair McHarg

CLICK HERE TO BUY MY BOOKS

Thelonious Monk & Johannes Vermeer: Live At The Delft Blues Festival

2012-05-20T14:53:49Z

Thelonious Monk & Johannes Vermeer: Live At The Delft Blues Festival

My father was from Scotland and my mother was from Holland. It would be difficult to find two more different countries. Scotland is an intensely spiritual, melancholic place roaring with mad, natural majesty. Holland is a tiny, quiet garden where one luxuriates in order, calm and reason.

I have lived in both countries and know them intimately. Despite my fondness for Holland, I’ve always identified far more strongly with Scotland. As a bipolar bear my appetites invariably draw me towards grand, intense, excessive sweeps and the raw, ragged Highland glory, ungodly bagpipe wailing, and merciless rain, wind, and snow fit my disposition as snugly as a broadsword might have fit into my hands short centuries ago.

But four-plus decades of life with manic depression (bipolar disorder if you must) have changed me; the highs are not so high, the lows are not so low. A decade of abstemious recovery has had an impact too. Life today is in the center lane; extremes have become simultaneously dangerous and tiresome; thoroughly unappealing. Recovery and health have shown me that the real depth, the value, is deep within the gray scale.

I will never lose my abiding love for Scotland, and the feeling that my soul has wandered those rough slopes for countless generations. But today I am happy to inhabit a landscape as ordered as any Mondrian canvas, where barges drift along canals straight as knitting needles. I have come home to Holland.

There is a wonderful painting by Vermeer (is there a Vermeer that isn’t wonderful?) of a woman making lace, which provided the starting point for this poem.

It was said of Thelonious Monk that, while the notes he played were astonishing, the real music, the genius, was found in the space in-between the notes.

White Lace Handkerchief

Once, in Delft, a humble
Young woman gazed upon
Lush silken fabric cut square
And saw within a perfect place
That longed to be discovered

Pointed pins like tiny arrows
Pierced a velvet cushion
Miniature scissors in hand
Bits of thread fell like snow
Remove, reveal, loop, twist
Braid, again, again, again

And so, pattern and
Symmetry fashioned the cloth
Into a song; flourishes and
Trills evoking wonder and
Delight, but in between the
Sparkling notes, in silences
And gaps, a small tattoo is
Etched upon the heart

In Amsterdam, a fine
Lady surrendered the
White handkerchief
And watched it fall
Into the grasp of a
Gentleman, did she
Think of that humble
Young woman in Delft?
Did she know that what is
Unsaid speaks most clearly?

Alistair McHarg

CLICK HERE to experience the most bodacious writing of my entire life!

Everybody Wants To Know Why I Sing The Blues

2012-05-19T16:06:24Z

Everybody Wants To Know Why I Sing The Blues

I felt as though the air had grown thick; I navigated it laboriously, as one walks through knee-deep water. Sweetness and flavor were gone; colors had faded into a thousand gray variations. I was 26 and thoroughly adrift. In need of employment I followed a path worn smooth by thousands of over-educated lost souls before me, complete immersion in a dead-end, service sector job.

Penn Radio Cab was a poorly managed, independently owned taxi company that prospered by transporting Philadelphia’s under-served population throughout its most distressed neighborhoods. We were not Yellow, parked in front of swish hotels, on our way to the airport, oh no. Our days and nights were spent prowling the forbidding landscapes of North and West Philadelphia where money was scarce and life was cheap.

The management at Penn Radio exploited its drivers mercilessly - 12-hour shifts, 6-days a week, weekends mandatory, no exceptions. Saturdays were okay, but Sundays were useless, no fares, no money. Rolling the desolate, trash-lined streets, awash in post-apocalyptic rubble, cars on cinder-blocks, hookers, junkies, cops, and newspaper delivery trucks, we ate donuts, drank coffee, and smoked cigarettes.

Early one Sunday morning in April, gritty city trees in graffiti-smeared planters bravely pushing buds out into the carbon-monoxide, I answered a radio call in North Philly. It was a slim brick row house in a block of identical dwellings distinguished by the presence of bright green Astro-turf on the front steps. Out of the house, moving with precise determination; came a distinguished, buttoned-up black nurse. She got in the cab.

Philadelphia is known for its hospitals, so when she gave me the address of a Baptist Church I was confused. In my innocence I asked her if she was attending church on her way to work. She said no, she worked at the church. More curious still I asked her why a church would need to have a nurse on hand. She said, “You know, in case somebody gets too happy.”

Then it all came to me, like a wave. Being a choirboy at St. Martin’s in the Fields, my mom driving me and my friends to the service on Sunday, listening to the live feed on WHAT from The Cornerstone Baptist Church at 33rd & Diamond Streets and the way the entire congregation sang with a completely unqualified euphoria of jubilee shout halleluiah until we couldn’t figure out why the building was still standing and even then I ached for that kind of belief, that faith, that mad commitment and wondered how it must feel to give yourself up to the divine and surrender and then we would go to St. Martin’s in the Fields and sing and men in tweed with their women in mink would fall asleep and I thought this can’t be what religion is.

And so I drove the nurse to her church.

For The Ride Of Your Life CLICK HERE

Fashion Fundamentals For The Wacky

2012-05-18T16:52:21Z

Fashion Fundamentals For The Wacky

How many times have you found yourself in this all-too-familiar predicament? You’re handcuffed and sitting in the back of a police car, on your way to yet another mental hospital, rehab or county lock-up. As thoughts cascade through your cattywhumpus consciousness like an unruly herd of Slinkies descending a dark, dilapidated staircase, you inadvertently spot your own reflection in the rear view mirror and stop to consider your attire.

Pre-WWI leather football helmet (complete with earflaps) and Dame Edna rhinestone-encrusted sunglasses pilfered from your Aunt Belinda’s attic. Cinderella costume with fishnet stockings and engineer boots. The alligator handbag resting next to you on the seat contains two partially thawed flounder fillets, a small jar of mayonnaise and the collected poems of William Shatner. “It’s bold and dramatic,” you think to yourself, “but is this the fashion statement I want to be making when I’m being fingerprinted?”

Of course, in the case of you women out there it might look quite different.

Either way, if you are about to stroll the aisles of Cookoopantsatopolis, it behooves you to remember that it’s not about what your wear, it’s whom. You are going to be evaluated on what your ensemble says about you, and you would be well served to remember what your needs will be after the doors have been locked. A Gianni Versace jumpsuit is certain to get you noticed, but nothing says, “I’m ready for my meds” like traditional work wear from Levi Strauss.

Know chic, Sherlock!

Fashion on the inside of Cookoopantsatopolis is very much like fashion on the outside – the idea is to give the impression you are something that you aren’t! Doctors, nurses, cops and Ken Burns will be watching your every move and recording anything noteworthy, so make your wardrobe say what you want it to say.

Here are a few fashion do’s and don’ts intended to hasten your reintegration into society.

Don’t:

1. Spill borscht on striped pants. (Staffers call this the “psycho-killer” look.)
2. Wear white after post-partum depression day.
3. Wear “busy” patterns. (Staff shorthand states – Busy is dizzy!)
4. Dress in the dark. Wearing clothes backwards will lengthen your stay.
5. EVER wear a T-shirt with an arrow pointing straight up at your chin that says, “I’m with stupid.”

Do:

1. Change your clothes at least once a week – staff will be impressed!
2. Pockets! Spend hours hiding things from yourself and hunting for them!
3. Trendy leisure togs. Jog corridors purposefully; check heart rate often.
4. Tennis whites. Staff will think you are identifying with them!
5. Corporate attire. Mingle with visiting family members and leave when they do!

Spoiler Alert: Do NOT read this if you are sane!

[We’ve all been there, we know. Even in the heights of whackadoomiousness the little voice inside is whispering “show time” - if we would only listen. So take a few minutes to change out of that gorilla suit and into something that says, “All right Mr. Freud, I’m ready for my close up.”]

Enjoy satire? Click HERE.

WWF (World Writing Federation) Presents Cage Match Aphorism Smackdown!

2012-05-17T12:38:50Z

WWF (World Writing Federation) Presents Cage Match Aphorism Smackdown!

The use and abuse of aphorisms has grown to epidemic proportions; today the Internet is awash in frequently misattributed, pithy sentiments. For this reason, the WWF (World Writing Federation) has sanctioned a Cage Match Aphorism Smackdown.

It works like this. Every thought nugget listed below appears with the names of 4 possible authors. You get to guess which writer originated the quote. Author with the most votes wins (allegedly).

In the true spirit of WWF entertainment, the result is fixed, but it’s a grand opportunity for cheering, screaming and banging Ernest Hemingway in the head with a folding metal chair.

WWF Cage Match Aphorism Smackdown Questions
Who Said The Following?

1. "Why pay to exercise in a gym when you can enjoy an exercise in futility for free whenever you like?"
a.) Cicero
b.) Snooki
c.) Nostradamus
d.) Taz Mopula

2. "You have the right to remain silent, and listen. Might be advisable to exercise it before they take that one away, too."
a.) Marcel Marceau
b.) Lao Tzu
c.) Boxcar Willie
d.) Taz Mopula

3. "Don’t honk if you love auditory hallucinations."
a.) Antoine de Saint-Exupéry
b.) Sylvia Plath
c.) His Holiness the Dalai Lama
d.) Taz Mopula

4. "Laughter is the best medicine; except when it comes to poisonous snakebites, then it’s the second-best medicine."
a.) Albert Schweitzer
b.) Baron Rochefoucauld
c.) Kim Kardashian
d.) Taz Mopula

5. "The real tragedy of political correctness is that it has given lying a bad name."
a.) Pliny The Elder
b.) Pliny The Younger
c.) Regular Pliny
d.) Taz Mopula

6. "Think twice before burning bridges; you never know when you might want to jump off one of them."
a.) Zig Zigler
b.) Pema Chödrön
c.) Reverend Ike
d.) Taz Mopula

7. "Looking for self-worth in someone else’s eyes is like trying to breathe with someone else’s lungs."
a.) Maya Angelou
b.) Charlie Sheen
c.) Gertrude Stein
d.) Taz Mopula

8. "It’s not that I don’t love you, I do love you; I just don’t love you enough to lie to you."
a.) Dante
b.) Paris Hilton
c.) Shakespeare
d.) Taz Mopula

9. "Should you meet someone who claims that visualizing a thing makes it so; tell them to visualize being flattened by a bus."
a.) Tom Waits
b.) James Dean
c.) Hunter Thompson
d.) Taz Mopula

10. "Life is good! Death is poopy!"
a.) Dr. Wayne Dyer
b.) Oprah Winfrey
c.) Tony Robbins
d.) Taz Mopula

11. "You can’t fool all of the people all of the time; but why would you even try when they’re so eager to do the job for you?"
a.) Abraham Lincoln
b.) Will Rogers
c.) Niccolò di Bernardo dei Machiavelli
d.) Taz Mopula

12. "Why raise the bridge when you can lower your expectations of the river?"
a.) Albert Camus
b.) Søren Kierkegaard
c.) Jean Paul Sartre
d.) Taz Mopula

13. "Ultimately it’s not what you don’t say that matters most so much as how you don’t say it."
a.) Harpo Marx
b.) Tomás de Torquemada
c.) Oscar Wilde
d.) Taz Mopula

14. "Be nice to your enemies; you just might be one of them."
a.) Pogo
b.) Socrates
c.) Ozzy Osbourne
d.) Taz Mopula

15. "The best things in life aren't free, the worst things in life aren’t free, and the cost of mediocrity is hidden."
a.) John Lennon
b.) Jack Lemmon
c.) Blind Lemon Jefferson
d.) Taz Mopula

CLICK HERE TO MEET THE NEW
WWF APHORISM CHAMPION

An Alcoholic Bipolar Bear Reveals The Irony Of Reversible Stigma

2012-05-16T14:01:39Z

An Alcoholic Bipolar Bear Considers The Irony Of Reversible Stigma

Regular visitors to Funny In The Head know it is a weekly mental health humor blog found at HealthyPlace. I rarely, if ever, reveal anything resembling a personal detail there. As a long-term professional writer, I am very careful, and selective, about what I do and do not say. Like a spy, I know how to offer only the appearance of self-disclosure. As a mentally ill person moving incognito among “sane” citizens, one becomes a skillful actor.

Reveling In Shamelessness – Repudiating Stigma

However, I am temporarily discarding this policy. Shamelessness has been a wonderful byproduct of my recovery and there is little I am not willing to do in the battle against mental health stigma.

When I began writing Invisible Driving (my bipolar memoir) in 1990, I realized there was no longer any room for privacy, anonymity, and secrets. Terrified, confused, and completely overwhelmed, I painstakingly recreated the bizarre and harrowing odyssey; thereby taking charge of my own healing. That, dear friends, was transformational.

The journey lasted many years; I worked hard. In diverse settings I received kindness, guidance, and wisdom from a wide spectrum of wonderful people. Triumph over fear and shame, acceptance of life as it is, celebration of self, and peace of mind, grew gradually through the incremental process of recovery.

So, a few facts about me. Male. White. Dad. Hetero. Highly educated. Posh lineage, famous father. Christian upbringing. Widely traveled. Diverse, prestigious work history. In other words, I began life at the very top of the food chain and learned early that – when everything is designed to fit you, and society itself is doing backflips to please you, it is easy to succeed.

Worse, it is easy to believe you did it yourself. Worse still, it is easy to believe you are entitled to it – simply because you are a white male straight Christian who went to a good school, drives a nice car and looks good in Madras. When the world is beneath you, everybody carries just a whiff of stigma, and the mentally ill are at the very bottom of the heap.

I’ve Looked At Stigma From Both Sides Now, Win & Lose, Still Somehow…

But life beat me down, way down, all the way down to the streets, the prisons and of course, the madhouses. There is no lonely like the lonely of a madhouse. Everything was taken from me and I had to rebuild from zero many times. It was a process that might have killed me, but instead, it made me. Today, I live a life beyond my wildest dreams; I am the only person I envy.

Madness took me places most folks could not spell, much less imagine. I had every stupid scrap of entitlement, superiority, and prejudice ripped away – I was reeducated in the realities of life, of being a moral person, of daring to be the very best me, the me that finds joy in contributing to this world without the expectation of benefit. Of all the unexpected blessings of life, ironically it was mental illness that gave me most.

At this point, I regard the attempt to stigmatize as a public admission of fear, insecurity, and unapologetic idiocy – like a self-administered learning disability. (We fear what we do not understand, and, to be fair to the apple pie crowd, insanity really is hard to fathom when viewed from the outside. Of course, that’s why I wrote Invisible Driving – to give a name to the unknowable.)

My problem today is an intense desire to stigmatize those who actually believe they are superior to people suffering from an illness. This cruel illusion is revolting and ludicrous; almost like believing one person is better than another because of their skin color. I mean, can you imagine?

HealthyPlace Mental Health Radio Show Gary Koplin/Alistair McHarg Interview

Open Letter From Alistair McHarg, President & CEO of alistairmcharg.com

2012-05-15T14:49:04Z

As President and CEO of alistairmcharg.com, I am directly responsible for the conception, development, and dissemination of recklessly creative efforts ranging from books (Invisible Driving, Moonlit Tours, Washed Up) to poetry, cartoons, blogs (serious - humorous – cumulus), and enigmatic Taz Mopula quotes.

"Even the greatest paintings are flat; they only become three-dimensional in the eyes of those who behold them." Taz Mopula

As Taz, our company spokesman, reminds us – an artist without an audience is like a blind ukulele salesman arguing with a passive aggressive mime, in Rio. For this reason, the alistairmcharg.com team has developed a six-point plan designed to make our sweet product suite readily available to the largest number of people as affordably as possible.

Our commitment to you is absolute, and we are serious about comedy.

Six-Point Customer Delight Creative Rollout Strategy Implementation Plan

All 3 of our books are available from Amazon.com - paperback & digital. CLICK HERE to visit product pages, read reviews, and purchase.

Home sweet homesite. www.alistairmcharg.com is your online resource for poetry, Taz, cartoons, blog, links and more. RSS feed. Updated daily.

Taz Mopula on Twitter! https://twitter.com/#!/TazMopula 7,000 Twitter followers can’t be wrong! (Well, they could be, but in this case they aren’t.)

Healthy Place showcases “Funny In The Head” – our weekly mental health humor blog. http://www.healthyplace.com/blogs/funnyinthehead

Humor, mental health, spirituality & deconstruction of what passes for contemporary culture – this blog has it all. http://blog.alistairmcharg.com/

Facebook Fan Page. Phat, fun & funky as a bow-legged monkey. LIKE IT! https://www.facebook.com/pages/Alistair-McHarg/324729607581189

"Technology has democratized the tools of creativity, resulting in a tsunami even more cretinous and loathsome than anticipated." Taz Mopula

Life today is a cacophonous serenade; adrift in a digital sea we can only marvel at the endless succession of water-skiing squirrels. It is difficult to navigate the hoarse latitudes and find shelter in a safe harbor of calm, reason, and silly. But you have done so; enjoy the respite and return as often as you like.

Sincerely,

Alistair McHarg
President & CEO
alistairmcharg.com

Pithy Literary Quote Quiz: Match The Message To The Master

2012-05-14T12:37:46Z

Ever noticed that there is almost nothing more insufferable than an actor talking about acting, a musician talking about music, a painter talking about painting, and – gasp – a writer talking about writing?

The reason is simple. Most creative artists have the psychological sophistication of an ambitious egg salad sandwich. They live in a world of exploration, instinct and impulse and are at their very best when ruled by forces they themselves do not control or understand. Trusting the art, not the artist, is recommended.

While you haven’t been to hell until you’ve heard a comic explain humor, the most egregious offenders of all are writers. Most are no more spiritually evolved than the average, semi-literate sculptor, but they have no match in the art of deception. Using phrases carefully selected to intimidate, these bloated gasbags inflate their self-image as one might fill a dirigible, torturing those too slow to escape them with interminable dissertations on the scary, alleged brilliance of their creations.

It took time, but I have assembled some pithy quotes on the subject of art, literature, and poetry that, mercifully, do not fall in this wretched category. Just to make it interesting, I’ve given you four possible authors for each. (Contact me through the Blog Responses feature for the answer key.)

Guidance & Advice From The Masters Of Creative Art
Who Said The Following?

1. "Poetry is far too important to be left to the sane."
a.) Rod McKuen
b.) Richard Bach
c.) Erich Segal
d.) Taz Mopula

2. "Mediocre art misrepresents reality; great art obliterates it."
a.) Grandma Moses
b.) Norman Rockwell
c.) Andrew Wyeth
d.) Taz Mopula

3. "If you need mania to be creative, then maybe creativity isn’t for you."
a.) Lord Byron
b.) Ernest Hemingway
c.) Terry Gilliam
d.) Taz Mopula

4. "Without life, poetry itself would be meaningless."
a.) Nipsey Russell
b.) Mark Russell
c.) Tom Lehrer
d.) Taz Mopula

5. "No artist, however prodigious his talents, can create a great audience."
a.) P.T. Barnum
b.) Cecil B. DeMille
c.) Gaius Julius Caesar Augustus Germanicus
d.) Taz Mopula

6. "Great soldiers are brave; great poets are reckless."
a.) General George S. Patton
b.) Audie Murphy
c.) Hannibal
d.) Taz Mopula

7. "Writing great poetry becomes much easier when you’re willing to die for it."
a.) Dylan Thomas
b.) Donatien Alphonse François, Marquis de Sade
c.) Wayland Flowers & Madame
d.) Taz Mopula

8. "The audience is never wrong; that said, one does occasionally wander into the wrong theater."
a.) Abraham Lincoln
b.) Ronald Reagan
c.) Gerald Ford
d.) Taz Mopula

9. "Art is the shortest distance between two points, when one of the points has no known, or knowable, location."
a.) Albert Einstein
b.) Stephen Hawking
c.) Carl Sagan
d.) Taz Mopula

10. "Even the greatest paintings are flat; they only become three-dimensional in the eyes of those who behold them."
a.) Clarence Fountain
b.) Art Tatum
c.) Andrea Bocelli
d.) Taz Mopula

To receive the correct answers simply enter a request in the Blog Response section.

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Ballroom Dancing Lessons For The Dead

2012-05-05T15:54:32Z

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"In an age where anti-matter matters more and more, anti-heroes matter less and less." Taz Mopula

When you spend a life haunting the dark corridors of mental illness, chemical dependency, and art – well – suicide is always near, rather like those bright red fire extinguisher cases with the label that reads, “In case of emergency break glass.”

Losing a long parade of loved ones to this merciless toll taker eliminates the awe: terror; glamor and luster retreat. (Notably, many people choose to purchase their suicide on the installment plan.)

"If you need mania to be creative, then maybe creativity isn’t for you." Taz Mopula

My generation fell in love with a mythology that linked madness (frequently drug-induced), self-destruction, and the complete abandonment of all our society held dear. Our special gift back to the society so busy attempting to spoil us was contempt. Our battle cry - sex, drugs, rock & roll - simply translates to - hedonism.

(Need I say we had no alternatives to offer?) We romanced nihilism like it was going out of style, (which, thank God, it has at last.)

"Mediocre art misrepresents reality; great art obliterates it." Taz Mopula

This atmosphere proved to be an ideal breeding ground for artistes who perfected the empty pose, and empty prose that went along with it. Kerouac and Burroughs were early adapters, Hunter Thompson threw himself into the fray, and today Tom Waits is a living homage.

Even now these icons of hip negativity and gleeful self-destruction are taken seriously, revered by people who should know better.

"Art matters most when it reminds people they might." Taz Mopula

I am very fortunate in that I outlived my cynicism, sarcasm, and nihilism. Today I find negativity lazy, cowardly, and worst of all – dull. Any imbecile can say no – it’s a trick we all learn at the age of two.

To be fair, I also have no time for those who turn away from the world’s darkness, paint on a photograph smile, and stupidly say yes.

But time is running out, and things certainly aren’t getting better. I seek the people who have looked Satan right in the eye and say yes anyway. They are my heroes.

Ballroom Dancing Lessons For The Dead

A seedy neighborhood in Hades
Shabby streetcars groan
And squeal on Nowhere Boulevard
Madame Putchky winds up a Victrola
Drops its needle into wax and listens

Hissing like a fire made of cellophane
Lester teases blue notes smooth as silk
Slowly they decay into the hall

Empty box with shiny floor
Massive mirrors cloak each wall
Smiling now she wipes away
Some wrinkles from her gown

Soon the students will ascend
On sagging metal steps
Shuffle through the door

What they failed to do in life
They’ll do forever more

Alistair McHarg

New SAT Questions Will Probe Your MIQ – (Mental Illness Quotient)

2012-05-04T11:11:18Z

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New SAT Questions Will Probe Your MIQ – (Mental Illness Quotient)

For decades, mental health professionals have reminded anyone willing to listen that infirmities of the mind are underrepresented in popular culture. They point to a paucity of pithy portrayals in film, literature, television, puppet shows, and motivational seminars. How, they ask, will maladies of irrationality ever shed their stigma, (to say nothing of the cloudy cloaks of ignorance surrounding them), until awareness, like sunlight succeeding a deluge, warms the landscape?

A handful of well-known advocacy groups; YABA (Young American Bipolar Association), DABA (Deranged American Benevolent Association), and DEW (West End Dyslexics), have lobbied tenaciously to insinuate mental health awareness into all aspects of our culture, if culture is really the right word. Recently they scored a major hit in that universally feared arbiter of societal acceptability, the SAT.

It has long been observed that SAT tests do more than measure rational prowess; they also reinforce social values, beliefs, and assumptions. With this in mind, rambunctious, radical rapscallions at YABA petitioned College Board program designers and administrators to include questions demanding at least a rudimentary understanding of mental illness in next year’s SAT test. As luck would have it, I got my hands on an advanced copy and am able to share it with you now.

Here are just a few of the multiple-choice, complex reasoning questions slated to appear in SAT 2013. Note that each one demands not merely the ability to identify common forms of mental illness, but also sufficient comprehension to understand them in context.

1. Malignant Narcissism is to Peter Pan Syndrome as…

a.) A duck-billed platypus is to a beaver
b.) Ernest Hemingway is to F. Scott Fitzgerald
c). The hokey pokey is to the mambo
d.) All of the above

Correct answer is D.

2. Munchausen by Proxy Syndrome (MBPS) is to Compulsive Gambling as…

a.) A trolley car is to a Segway
b.) A duck-billed platypus is to a Tasmanian devil
c.) The national debt is to global warming
d.) All of the above

Correct answer is D.

3. Attention Deficit Disorder is to Sex & Love Addiction as…

a.) The Hindenburg disaster is to Lady Gaga
b.) Technophilia is to devolution
c.) A duck-billed platypus is to a talking gecko
d.) All of the above

Correct answer is D.

4. Asperger's Syndrome is to Pathological Xenophobia as…

a.) A fork is to a spoon
b.) Hang-gliding is to safe cracking
c.) Astrology is to juggling
d.) All of the above

Correct answer is D.

And that, dear readers, is only the beginning! Study hard!

Escape Into Substance Abuse Tempting For Some Imprisoned Primates

2012-05-03T15:21:24Z

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Escape Into Substance Abuse Tempting For Some Imprisoned Primates

When I was a very young lad living in Edinburgh, I would go on perambulations with my mother. Edinburgh is a grand city for walking, and we explored it at length. (As a Dutch woman recently transplanted from Amsterdam I think she found it as exotic as I did.) Edinburgh Castle, with its steep, cobblestone ascent, was a regular haunt. I loved the expansive train station, spewing steam as if the arched glass roof concealed a nest of restless dragons. And then there was the zoo.

It was at the Edinburgh Zoo that I rode my first elephant; and one never forgets one’s first pachyderm; nor do they forget you for that matter. There was no shortage of star attractions, but by far the most popular was Charlie the Gorilla, so named in honor of Bonnie Prince Charlie. Charlie was a 400-pound, silverback gorilla from the Congo. Even as a small child I was moved by his soulful face, power, and imprisonment. But crowds did not gather to marvel at his size and strength; they came to see him smoke.

In post-war Scotland, cigarettes were a scarce and expensive luxury. Even so, working class types would toss lit cigarettes into the cage and Charlie would puff on them furtively, carefully secreting them behind his back when his keeper arrived. (This Heckle and Jeckle routine was as ancient as vaudeville itself. Charlie would exhale clouds flamboyantly, exhibiting satisfaction Bob Marley might have envied. Then, when his keeper looked over, the cigarette vanished into a large, furry hand. The act never got old, and when the keeper knitted his eyebrows in disapproval, the kids howled with delight.)

In those days my parents were barely scraping by, even so, cigarettes were a line item in the family budget. My dad bought them in packs of 5. Later, he smoked the way waitresses chew gum, obsessively, constantly, thoughtlessly. As a youth I quickly came to understand that smoking was something cool people did, and I was physically and psychologically addicted well before leaving high school. Cigarettes were my one, true friend through it all. I smoked in prison and in mental hospitals, on the desolate streets of North Philadelphia at midnight; I even smoked at The White House.

Education, mercilessly delivered at the business end of a Louisville Slugger, pushed vices away from my grasp, as a ship gradually drifts away from the dock. Alcohol and drugs, abandoned over a decade ago, now seem foreign and counter-productive. But smoking clung to me like a tick, it was the last to leave, just a little over two years ago.

I’d like to go back to Edinburgh and tell Charlie, “You’re a 400 pound silverback gorilla from the Congo. You're fabulous. You don’t need cigarettes to be cool. You’re already pretty damn cool.”

The Ugliest Face In The World: Picture Postcards From The Inferno

2012-05-02T12:54:26Z

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The Ugliest Face In The World: Picture Postcards From The Inferno

The summer of 1969 found me in McGrath, Alaska, which is only a little further from the moon than it is from Woodstock, New York. (You may recall that, in addition to the first moon landing, that summer featured a social anomaly predicated on the idea that taking LSD, having random sex in the mud, and listening to music, were the key elements of radical social evolution. Imagine an even more naïve version of OWS. But I digress.)

I was working for the BLM (Bureau of Land Management) as an EFF (Emergency Fire Fighter), being dropped by helicopters into the middle of active forest fires throughout the state. Specifically, I was on a back-burning crew, traipsing through dry forests with a flamethrower strapped onto my back, fighting oncoming forest fires by depriving them of their fuel. It was the closest I’ve ever come to combat.

McGrath, at the time, was little more than a Government airstrip, some BLM barracks, and a handful of small buildings connected by wooden sidewalks. The pride of McGrath was a log cabin that served passably as a bar in an area where, with no women to be found, blue-collar men could drink to their satisfaction. A massive moose head, antlers adorned with tinsel, dominated the bar area and the opposing wall featured a full-sized stuffed grizzly bear forbiddingly poised next to the jukebox.

One evening, in-between assignments, I was passing time with Jake, a fellow EFF. We had money, time, and absolutely no responsibilities – consequently, the phrase about idle hands being the devil’s workshop came alive until at last we were drunk; not inebriated, tipsy, three sheets to the wind – not even tight as a boiled owl – just good old fashioned, funky monkey drunk.

Jake excused himself to use The Little Firefighters Room and I was left with the moose who, looking even more glassy-eyed than I did, stared at me with the gloomy insistence so frequently observed among the beheaded. Long minutes later I heard riotous laughter to my right and saw Jake emerging from the bathroom. He lunged, lurched back, and threw himself down on his stool, clutching his right hand, which was bleeding profusely

“What happened?” I asked.
“I was washing my hands and I stared at the face looking back at me and it was just so fucking ugly I had to punch it.” He laughed with demented enthusiasm until tears began to form.

The bartender looked on wordlessly. I walked Jake back to the barracks and dressed his wounds.

Scotland Gave The World Golf & The World Is Still Waiting For An Apology

2012-05-01T14:32:50Z

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Scotland Gave The World Golf & The World Is Still Waiting For An Apology

A lifelong battle with manic depression (bipolar disorder), 17 years of therapy, two divorces, three weddings, fatherhood, alcoholism and substance abuse leading up to 11 years of recovery in AA – you might think that time and tide had forced spiritual growth upon me. While it has, I am constantly reminded that certain character flaws remain, however altered, up to the present day.

For example, delighting in elitism, flaunting differences when I would be better served by underscoring similarities, and torture. My cruelties are practiced exclusively in social settings; I am a drawing room brute. An example.

My life to date has had multiple passions, but athletics has never been one of them. The only sport I ever cared about is squash, which is virtually unknown outside England, India, and American WASP enclaves. Mainstream sports hold little appeal for me. This is especially true of golf, which I consider less exciting, and much less athletic, than chess.

When I entered the rooms of AA eleven years ago, I did so in a rather swank suburb of Philadelphia. Most of the regular attendees at meetings were financially successful, i.e., lawyers, doctors, financial planners, businessmen. In time I came to understand that golf was a religion for many of them. They spent (not so) small fortunes on equipment, country club memberships, and travel to exotic courses nationwide. These zealots spoke endlessly about the “Zen” quality of golf; even mapping their spiritual progress in AA to their performance on the links. I struggled hard not reveal how ludicrous this all sounded.

My father was from Glasgow, Scotland. Eldest of four, he was alone in leaving the old country for the U.S. Consequently; I have many Scottish relatives and have visited them often. My aunt Joyce married Alec Mackenzie, a golf fanatic. They purchased a summer home in St. Andrews specifically because residents of St. Andrews automatically become members of The St. Andrews Royal & Ancient Golf Club – the first golf course in the world and indisputably the most famous and prestigious.

Many a family holiday to Holland and Scotland featured extended stays in St. Andrews, with romps on The Royal & Ancient, courtesy of Uncle Alec.

One of my favorite dipsomaniacs, a Saturday meeting regular, was a lovely fellow we’ll call Chauncy, (although his real name is Syngen). Chauncy had been handed a very successful company by his dear, departed dad and consequently had the means and opportunity to devote an inordinate amount of time and treasure to his real passion, golf. We became friends and he would extol the many splendors of golf, telling me how much I would enjoy it. (He attempted the same thing with Christianity and failed there as well.)

One day Chauncy asked me if I had ever played golf. I waited, silently counting off the beats in my head. Then I told him the truth, delivering it with flat affect.

“The only golf course I ever played was the Royal & Ancient at St. Andrews.”

I knew full well it was like saying – the only car I ever drove was a Rolls Royce – the only guitarist I ever saw perform was Jimi Hendrix – the only train I ever rode was The Orient Express. But it was true, so I indulged the dark side.

I will never forget the look on his face. All good humor and affability instantly drained away, he was at once incredulous, consumed by molten hot envy, and hatching a ferocious resentment with intensity unique to alcoholics.

We remained good friends in spite of the incident, but he never forgave me.

I Am Not Your Friend I Am Your Driver. If You Arrive My Duty Is Discharged.

2012-04-30T13:55:06Z

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I Am Not Your Friend I Am Your Driver. If You Arrive My Duty Is Discharged.

In 1976 I returned to Philadelphia after three years in Louisville where I worked for a newspaper and got an advanced degree. (I discovered later that an M.A. in creative writing virtually assures unemployability.) My mother had recently died, my father had taken up with a student of his, and I was well into a prolonged clinical depression. I had no family, no job prospects, and more importantly, no will; so I got a job as a cab driver.

There was an existential purity to that job; it was sublimely meaningless, which was deeply appealing. For 12 hours a day, 6 days a week, a river of unimportant people flowed through the back seat of my cab. I can honestly say I didn’t care about them at all. Some were beautiful, some were ugly, some were entertaining, some were annoying – it didn’t make a difference. They all had one thing in common, the only important thing; they needed to go somewhere and they were willing to give me money if I took them.

One fine spring morning I was dispatched to a Pennsylvania State Liquor Store where I would be collecting a fare and proceeding to The Alden Park Manor, a stately red brick apartment complex abutting Fairmount Park. I pulled up to the curb and there, holding a brown paper bag and waiting patiently, was an attractive, middle-aged black woman with a wooden leg. (She was wearing a skirt and no stockings; the device was in plain sight.) Neatly dressed and perhaps a bit too thin to be healthy, she looked road-weary and yet oddly serene.

It was a short drive and conversation was minimal. She leaned forward to pay me and whispered.

“Would you like to come upstairs?”
“I really should be going.”
“I’ll give you a drink.” She wiggled the brown paper bag.
“Thanks a lot, but, I can’t drink on the job.”
“I’ll take off my leg,” her voice danced musically, “you can have a look.”
“Um. Well. Well. Um.” I simply could not think of anything appropriate to say.
“I’ll let you touch my stump.” Her smile was warm and generous.
“Yeah, I really do have to go.”
“I’ll pay you, I’ll give you $20.”
“That’s all right, thanks all the same.”
“The other drivers like it.” This was offered with a whiff of bitterness. She opened the door and got out.

I had been living in depression for a very long time, my own pain had become alpha and omega. For that instant she had forced me out of my prison and into hers. I felt the wreckage, the doom, the longing – the strange hunger that would cause a person to abandon all shame and propriety in order to be fed. The world is larger than you know, I thought to myself, feeling humbled.

Paris: Gargoyle With Listerine - On The Ledge With An Unreliable Mind

2012-04-29T14:34:45Z

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Paris: Gargoyle With Listerine - On The Ledge With An Unreliable Mind

The dark forces driving mania also drive depression, indeed, mania and depression are like twins separated at birth and raised by different families. The more you understand them the more you are struck by similarities, not differences.

I have written much more about mania than I have about depression, but depression has consumed a far greater portion of my life. The death of my mother, which occurred when I was a grad student, triggered a long down cycle during which being and nothingness seemed almost indistinguishable from one another – it felt as if all color had been drained from the world.

During this bleak season I went on a European vacation with my brother. At one point we joined forces with a Dutch cousin and toodled through France in a borrowed car. Like good tourists we visited Paris and paid homage to the obligatory icons. Climbing the tower at Notre Dame I had an inspired idea for an ad - Gargoyle with Listerine. After huffing, puffing, and trudging round and round rickety wooden stairs we at last reached the roof and walked into bright sunlight.

Paris lay spread out at our feet like a pornographic postcard featuring men in masks and black socks held in place with garters. Standing at the edge, no railing to protect us, we gazed at the broad cobblestone square far below; remote and yet close enough so that we were able to make out individual faces. It was a lush summer day but I went dizzy and cold, sweat grew on my forehead. Abruptly I backed away; the nausea decreased.

It was nothing so simple as fear of heights, or even the proximity of death. The terror was this. If, for just one instant, my inner, irrational mind had taken control it might have moved one foot just far enough to pitch me headfirst into midnight. The faith I had in my mind’s reliability – to always act in my best interests – was incomplete. Some part of me knew this was dangerous territory.

Later, in mania, I would learn how right I was. Because, dear reader, this is precisely what happens in mania – involuntary, irrational behavior, fabulously self-destructive behavior. If there is a suicidal component to your personality, one second of losing your grip on it can be enough to lose it all.

WARNING: STOP – LOOK – LISTEN – BEFORE CROSSING THE LINE

2012-04-28T15:41:59Z

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WARNING: STOP – LOOK – LISTEN – BEFORE CROSSING THE LINE

As a poet I believe:

nothing is frequently the best thing to do
one should remain silent if one has nothing valuable to say
brevity shows courtesy by demonstrating respect for others

Today’s blog consists entirely of Taz Mopula quotes.

"Technology has democratized the tools of creativity, resulting in a tsunami even more cretinous and loathsome than anticipated."

"At what point does communication become air pollution?"

"Our ability to broadcast the wretched detritus of daily life is no argument for doing so; restraint is increasingly precious."

"Why is it called the age of communication when nobody listens?"

"Is the Internet merely a mechanism by which alien life forms can quantify human gullibility and fatuousness?"

"How can you cut through the clutter when the clutter goes all the way through?"

"Pre-Internet scientists were unable to determine if the general population was as dim, dull, and dreary as they feared."

"It doesn’t qualify as listening if you’re busy thinking what to say next."

"You have the right to remain silent, and listen. Might be advisable to exercise it before they take that one away, too."

"In the future, everyone will be obscure for 15 minutes."

"Artificial intelligence will soon be the only kind remaining; thus conclusively proving the failure of human intelligence."

"White is the new black, silence is the new eloquence, and obscurity is the new fame."

Profiles In Psychology: Doctor Zick Meind Pfrawed

2012-04-27T11:06:45Z

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Profiles In Psychology: Doctor Zick Meind Pfrawed

These are wonderful days to be whackadoomious! Awareness of mental health issues is at an all-time high, and those of us troubled by unruly squirrels have a cornucopia of resources to draw upon.

But it was not always thus. Medical care specifically targeted towards mental health is a relatively recent phenomenon, and while we all understand our indebtedness to giants like Carl Jung and Oprah Winfrey, (a woman who makes a big impression wherever she sits), lesser lights responsible for pushing the discipline forward are often overlooked.

Doctor Zick Meind Pfrawed is one of these unjustly slighted geniuses. Fortunately, a recent surge of interest in this complex, daring man has revealed that his contribution to the field of psychoanalysis is far greater than originally thought.

Here is a partial listing of Dr. Pfrawed’s accomplishments:

Credited with originating the phrase: “Mmmm, and how did that make you feel?”

First to establish patient/doctor power dynamic by always making patients wait past designated start time, even when patient arrived early.

First to scribble shopping lists, vacation ideas, and peevish letters to the editor while pretending to jot notes referencing patient diagnosis.

First to realize that insanity, (far from disqualifying an individual from practicing psychiatry), actually improves their level of expertise.

First to realize it’s all your mother’s fault.

First to rank patient value using a complex algorithm balancing degree of whackadoomiousness, extent of medical insurance, and entertainment value of psychosis.

First to bill for an hour but only deliver 50 minutes. (This is widely considered one of the most original, and lucrative, innovations in all healthcare.)

First to realize that, if a doctor’s chair is behind the patient, it is possible to nap during interminable recitations of pointless childhood memories. (This breakthrough in itself secured Dr. Pfrawed’s place of honor within the psychiatric community.)

Originator of the now iconic – (“Hmmm” – followed by a chin scratch) – one/two combination move. Ironically, the great Sigmund Freud himself tried to popularize the – (“Hmmm” – followed by a rear-end scratch) – one/two combination move. This was not popular with patients and failed to catch on.

Memorable Misstep

Though justifiably admired for his multiple contributions, Doctor Zick Meind Pfrawed is perhaps best remembered for his controversial white paper – “The End Insight Will Be When The End In Sight Is” – presented in 1902. In it, he asserted that all therapy should be aimed at the point where therapy is no longer required.

Early psychiatrists, busily saving for second homes, sailboats, and life-sized self-portraits, were horrified by the idea that a patient could one day be cured and consequently no longer require costly treatment. Dr. Pfrawed’s professional status declined accordingly.

There’s A Man Who Leads A Life Of Danger: Every Day He Gets A Little Stranger

2012-04-26T14:11:21Z

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There’s A Man Who Leads A Life Of Danger: Every Day He Gets A Little Stranger

For many years I hid, in order to keep from being discovered and exposed as a fraud. My flaws were not visible; I “passed” for normal and learned to provide the public with a convincing show. (Much later I would learn that the hideous flaws I sought to hide were imaginary, I was, in fact, no worse than the average Bozo.)

Like thousands of lost souls who eventually find themselves in the damp church basements of AA, I avoided intimacy as others avoid influenza. For reasons too dreary and predictable to enumerate, I imagined that – if you truly knew me you would be disappointed and ultimately repulsed - so I saved us both the trouble.

I was like a John le Carré character in deep cover, impersonating a person, blending in, hiding in plain sight. Writer is an ideal occupation in a case of this type; we are a bit like voyeurs and spies anyway. So I honed detachment and isolation down to a fine art.

This luscious anonymity was ended by the eruption of mania and a subsequent, highly public, battle with manic depression (bipolar disorder). As I struggled back from the rubble that remained of my former life and brick by brick rebuilt and built anew – reinventing myself as I did so – I found that I now had a very real, and very dangerous, secret which had the power to wreck my hard won recovery. I understood the stigma; I understood how people fear mental illness. Even criminals fear crazy.

In Alistair V.2 I guarded information jealously, revealing only what was absolutely required. I shielded my employer and new friends from my past; every day was spent on eggshells. But, after two cataclysmic manic episodes I realized that I had to know, and kill, this hideous monster, and for me, that meant writing a book about it.

Bear in mind, this was 1990; at the time there was no such thing as a bipolar memoir to be found anywhere. (“Call Me Anna” by Patty Duke was as close as the curious reader could get). I knew that, by writing my memoir, pitching it to agents, and publishing it – going “bare” for all the world to see – I was making myself incredibly vulnerable to ridicule, contempt, marginalization, prejudice, misunderstanding and worse. But it didn’t matter; I had to do it. It was both my emancipation, and my gift to the afflicted and their loved ones.

At that moment I ceased being a spy, my double life ended. The polar extremes were integrated into one completely imperfect entity. That is my joy today, just one of the many gifts bestowed on me by manic depression.