The individual who coined the phrase “you never see anything on the Interstate” must have just finished driving through Kansas. In all directions are fields of grain which dance with wind that never takes a break. Trees, probably planted to break the never ending bluster, have few leaves. The highest structures are an occasional silo or overpass.
The state with its hard working farmers and wonderfully warm and friendly people is flat, boring and monotonous as hell.
I left Kansas City, elev. 774 ft., one sunny morning and headed west for Denver and the beautiful majestic Rocky Mountains. After passing through Topeka the monotonous terrain began to cause my eyes to droop and my spirits to sag. With each mile it became increasingly hard to stay awake and it took every ounce of will power to concentrate on the driving.
My body began to feel sluggish and I had to fight to stay awake. I yawned, I squirmed, I opened the windows and turned the volume up on the CD player and then switched to the radio searching for some upbeat music. Nothing helped and the noise of the music was more an irritant than a benefit, so I turned it off. And then I turned it on again. Off again,on again. I just wanted to crawl into a warm cocoon and go to sleep for a long, long time.
For hundreds of miles of unbearable boredom I battled the overwhelming desire to snooze. I tried gallantly but unsuccessfully to fight off the sinking spirits which were threatening to consume the whole of my body and mind. As hard and fast as I tried to drive there was this little black cloud that seemed to be weighing down the car and its driver and pulling them back. The speedometer read 80 mph but it felt more like a sluggish 35.
By the time I reached Colby the little cloud had turned into a huge black turbulent mass that sat on top of bright blue skies. Perfect conditions for a tornado. The car automatically headed for the little town out in the middle of nowhere and to the well-known motel that I already knew offered solace in the way of solid food, lively music and drinks as powerful as the ones at the Denver Press Club. I had a good time with my old friend Jack for a few hours before crawling into that cocoon I had longed for all during the day.
The sky is endless in Kansas and the next morning the sun shone brightly as I headed for my car. Just as I was getting in I noticed my little black companion hovering nearby. I knew I was looking forward to more of the same and sank into the driver’s seat feeling totally deflated. More boredom. More tediousness. More flat land. More depression.
Over 200 miles later, I stopped in Burlington, Colorado for gas and a bite to eat. The man behind the counter bragged about their historic carousel. “Not bad for a tiny town on the plains with an altitude of 4,219 feet,” he said. An altitude of 4,219 feet? Who was he kidding? Not once did I feel I was gaining in altitude.
Even though eastern Colorado is a mirror image of western Kansas, I began to feel a tingle of excitement as I started out once again. My spirits rose higher and higher with each mile and the little black cloud began to dissipate. I slammed down on the gas pedal and soared toward Denver. No longer did the car feel sluggish. No longer did I feel lethargic. No longer did I feel flat. I was flying. I was in control.
Several hours later I could see the snowy peaks of the Rockies and became even more excited but didn’t dare drive any faster. And then the Denver skyline started taking shape and I could hardly contain myself. I was about to burst wide open and began singing at the top of my lungs with Willie, “On the Road Again.” God, it felt good to feel good.
Since I had a few days before I had to report back to work I recklessly decided to head for Estes Park, the "Gateway to Rocky Mountain National Park." I couldn’t contain my energy and impatiently honked at Sunday-go-to-meeting drivers as I barreled past giving them the International Sign Language. Once I got through Boulder the traffic thinned and I was Queen of the Road. I drove up steep curvy mountain roads as if I was back on the flat straight interstate in Kansas.
I was euphoric. I was energized. I was as manic as a gerbil on a perpetual motion machine. My mind was taking off in flights of one fancy after another. I was going to do this, buy that and create this, that and the other. In the meantime I kept increasing my speed. I was no longer in control.
The crash was sudden and hard. I went careening down a steep embankment into a big black hole where the sun didn’t shine.
NOTE: Congress declared the first week of October as Mental Illness Awareness Week in 1990. Because of all the voodoo surrounding this subject I am going to dedicate a few posts to bipolar illness over the next few days. It is what I know best. I hope I can bust a few myths for anyone who cares to read about it.
I've done that same drive. Good lord, that's a flat chunk of ground. If your suspension tracks straight, you can doze off between towns and there isn't a problem.
ReplyDelete(If it helps, the Trophy Wife has done that drive, and the one through Nebraska some miles north, and claims Nebraska is worse, from a "boring scenery" standpoint.)
That long, with nothing new to look at racing past, could conceivably set your mind into a fugue state that might be conducive to ending up where you don't want it. Add to that the fact that you're a mile above sea level, so the oxygen is a bit thinner - just enough to fuck you up without you noticing.
It all adds up to a scenario that could easily add into any available issues, and take you someplace you hadn't planned to go. (Eventually, in this case, a ditch...)
Good luck with it.
There's only one other drive that I've taken that is worse - not even fields of grain waving in the wind. Up in NW Colorado it looks like a virtual moonscape. Awful.
ReplyDeleteIt's been a bit bumpy from time to time, to say the least, but it's never ever been dull, not as dull as the drive through Kansas anyway. Thanks.
I would like to help dispel some misconceptions surrounding bipolar disorder. Some of our most brilliant actors, artists, entertainers, musicians, scientists, and writers have struggled with BP-I and BP-II, and it is worthwhile glancing at a list of those who have written public accounts. Some historical persons whom it is believed struggled with bipolar disorder: Beethoven, Emily Dickenson, Goethe, Van Gogh, Abraham Lincoln, Gustav Mahler, Mozart, Isaac Newton, Tennyson, and Mark Twain, as examples.
ReplyDeleteWhen you look at a list of people who have given us so much, it helps remove some of the stigma. Another major mental health issue is depression. Octopus knows something about depression: I have struggled with it for years.
I read Danielle Steel's non-fiction account of her son's struggle with Bi-Polar and I read Patty Duke's autobiography, so I have a vague clue. (Very vague, I am certain, but at least I have one)
ReplyDeleteMost people still believe that mental illness is contagious, or punishment from God or something. Anything you can do to educate those of us who are lucky enough not to suffer will be appreciated.
Octy: I plan on touching on this and many other aspects. Hell, even Dick Clark is bipolar. I often wonder, since we now have meds that help control mood swings, are potentially creative people and scientists still able to contribute as much as they might have without the leveling effects of these drugs?
ReplyDeleteLLL: When I was first diagnosed I took part on a couple of bipolar l-servs. There were several who believed that prayer and their faith was the only cure. Science vs religion.
I suggest reading Duke's A Brilliant Madness which she wrote in conjunction with a medical writer. Much better.
Steele is a different case altogether. She has issues of her own, denial of her own obvious BP being a biggie, so I wouldn't put much stock in what she writes. I could tell you a couple of stories about but will save it for another time.
I care to read about it, tnlib...very much.
ReplyDeleteI teamed with psychiatrists for many years to treat bipolar illness. Bipolar patients were often the most rewarding for their intelligence, their eloquence, their creativity, and their fascinating life stories. They were also often the most frustrating, for their refusal to accept the boring mid-range of experience that successful pharmacological treatment had to offer (and who can blame them?). And they were often the most heart-rending, for the sorrows their personal losses and disappointments handed them at the extreme points on either pole.
There is no one bipolar illness; there are so many types and sub-types, the DSM-IV would have done better to devote a separate publication to it. The lesson there is that, for diagnostic purposes, there are as many pictures of BPD as there are individuals who struggle with it. That made diagnosis more an art than a science. I'm awaiting DSM-V with avid interest.
Most of all, I am awaiting the conclusions and treatments made possible by modern imaging studies. I am so hoping that there will better treatments with fewer side-effects to come from those studies. And think of the promise of individual imaging in treatment!
I haven't been keeping up with those studies and findings, but you motivate me to try.
Nance: It is indeed a very multifaceted disorder and can be incredably difficult to diagnose. But, the more we learn the more we know, right? You have described it perfectly. I HATE that mid-range. I like being creative and dancing in fountains. ; )
ReplyDeleteI am very, very sensitive to sights, sounds and closed in spaces - which is why I hate this skinny, one-column comment form. It makes me unbearably claustrophobic. : )
I added to the title because some folks who commented on my blog thought I was simply describing a trip through Kansas! I may be nuts but why in hell would I do that? Guess I should have been more precise.
ReplyDeletetnlib, when I return from Virginia, I'll check into what can done about this claustrophobic comment form. Maybe a third party plug-in that can be dressed up a bit.
ReplyDeletetnlib, about the comment form, I visited your blog to see how your comment function is set, then changed this to the same setting. Does this work for you?
ReplyDeleteIt's wonderful. Thanks. Several other bloggers use that skinny little comment form and I've seen requests from readers to change it, so I'm not the only one. Besides being able to maximize, there's that spell check crutch on which I depend so much. And it's much easier to refer back to a previous comment. I really do appreciate this.
ReplyDeleteHaving worked as a nurse for many years in a variety of settings, I have seen the down side of mental illness.
ReplyDeleteFor bi-polar people the big struggle is with medication which will eventually get them to roughly the same level as most of us non bi-polar folks. While this feels normal to us, I have heard it described by some bi-polars as worse than death. That up cycle is as addictive as any drug but so few of the medical community realize they are treating both an illness and an addiction of sorts.
I think tnlib has done a fine job of describing that bi-polar attraction to the high side.
Of course, the crash will follow sooner or later and that has all its own set of struggles.
It is an exhausting illness that deserves more research and a better understanding of how it feels and what is needed to help those afflicted. Clearly just throwing a pill at it is NOT the answer.
Rocky, Thanks. I love being manic. I write more and faster, and do everything else faster. Always loved that sex thingy when manic; still do. When deprssed, don't even come near me asshole.
ReplyDeleteI'm going to get into the controversy surrounding taking meds. I will just say here that I am totally PRO meds. More about that later, so I will just say that if it weren't for those damn drugs, I wouldn't be sitting here commenting.
I heartily agree that without medications most would not be able to function but I think that the complexity of the human pyche and the many facets of mental illness and most other illnesses for that matter, calls for more; Like a diabetic needing to change thier diet and exercise regime as well as take insulin.
ReplyDeleteI certainly am NOT advocating trying to treat an illness without medication that has been proven beneficial.
Rocky, I totally understand. While there was, and still is to a certain extint, a tendency to over-medicate and turn people into zombies, I think most psychiatrists have moved away from that approach and start out with low doses of whatever. Except in cases where a patient is so bad off and are in danger of hurting themselves or others. But even in these dire cases the doc will start easing up on the dosage once things are in better control.
ReplyDeletetnlib, thank you for sharing so honestly. I don't know the manic side. When I was younger they called it depression, then clinical depression, now they tell me I have unipolar depression or major depressive disorder. I call it the dark place. I've been visiting there since my childhood. A combination of coping mechanisms and medication keeps me reasonably balanced most of the time, however, I'm definitely loco, but then again, I sort of like being a bit mad.
ReplyDelete