so much pain

Corrosion of Conformity was a band that caught my eye as a teenager, exploring the fringes of the punk/hardcore scenes. Before they became generic alternative metal band, they were a lousy hardcore band. I wasn't a fan in any case, but I liked the name and their nuclear skull logo. The point of the reference being that this "on the spectrum" bit is a different way of framing what has been a lifelong theme for me. My distaste for the band making it all the more apt.

What we have in common, in this grouping, is a negative. Not a value judgement, but the absence of a function neurotypical people have. As such, it says nothing for what we might have in common with each other. It says very little about who we are or who we might relate to.

I can't get to the gym here. It's one problem after another and then I get sick and my immune system is crap because I'm so depressed, so I can't get to the gym some more. I worked out on my own today. I keep trying, but I keep failing. Life just goes wrong and then more wrong. I'm drowning and no one can do anything but watch.

It took me years to get where I was in Vermont. I don't adapt to moving, because I'm alone and fragile, desperately trying to form roots such that I make progress against both of those problems. Only to be uprooted and tossed elsewhere, again and again. Now I'm stranded here. Failed and broken, crying when people from my old gym post to Instagram.

That was more progress towards feeling connected to people than I've made ever, but now it's just more pain. I hate myself for being helpless to do anything but suffer at the mercy of such a clearly uncaring world.