January 27, 2009
I’m really not sure how to begin this journal. My doctor (my psychiatrist, Dr. Bronn) suggested I start keeping one at our meeting last week. I think she thinks it’ll help me get through the “dreams”. I don’t think they ARE dreams, though, even though she and my wife keep insisting they are. I don’t know what they are, though. I just can’t explain
Maybe I should start at the beginning. I guess that would be a week and a half or so ago. Around the 15th, during that weird warm spell we had in the middle of winter. Not that winter really gets cold here in California but 90s in the Bay area in January is weird no matter what. I was up late one night, working, and took the dog out for a last pee before bed. Normally I just stand out in the front yard with him but I decided to head over to the Iron Horse Trail this night. It’s a nice trail just a half-mile or so from my house. We walk there a lot during the day but I don’t usually go there during the night. I guess I’ve always been a little spooked in the dark. Probably has something to do with growing up in the country, maybe.
I’m rambling again. OK, taking the dog to the Iron Horse Trail. Like I said, it’s about a half mile there, all residential until you get to the trail itself. The trail is surrounded by houses but it feels pretty secluded when you get on it. It’s strange. You can see tons of stars, even though you’re in a city, and that night was especially bright. The trail was empty except for the dog and myself. We walked in the scrub (Jon calls it “the pucky brush”) so the dog could do his business and I was watching the sky.
The trail goes on for a long way. I’m not really not sure but I think it’s around 20 miles from end to end. Anyway, we wandered up the scrub for a ways, almost to the turn-out for the nearby park. That’s maybe another quarter mile, but I doubt it. There’s a big tree there that’s been knocked over. Actually, I think it was cut down because of storm damage or something. Anyway, it’s laying on its side right next to the path back to the park. The dog finally decided to crap once we got back there so we stop and, again, I’m looking at the sky, watching stars and the moon.
It was a warm night, like I said, but suddenly I started shivering. Not like the shiver you make when you’re cold, either. Or, not really. It was more like the shiver you get at the end of a good long piss. Pleasant but still out-of-bodyish? I really don’t know how to describe it. Maybe it’s not something everyone has. I couldn’t stop!
A hundred shakes later, I finally stopped. I’m not sure how long it was, actually. Everything still looked the same, the stars, the moon, the dog hunkered down next to me, so maybe it was an instant, but it seemed like an hour – a lifetime!
My dog, Buck, was whining. Maybe he was doing it while I was shivering, but I don’t know. I’m not even sure if I heard him right after I came back to myself or if, again, it was hours later. It wasn’t just his normal whine, though, like when he really wants to go out. It was
I can’t even say what it was. It was a death whine. I had a dog when I was little that died of cancer, Anne, and I remember her whining and crying when it was finally getting so bad we had to have her put down. Buck was doing that but he was slobbering and foaming, too, with his hackles up and his eyes rolling around.
The first thing I thought was that he found something bad in the grass. A sharp piece of metal or some poison or something. I was panicked, of course. Dr. Bronn asked my why I didn’t pick him up and rush him home or to an animal hospital or something and I don’t know why I didn’t. I couldn’t even think to do that. My thoughts were
My thoughts were to stomp his skull flat.
I – I can hardly bring myself to write that down, even now, a week or two later. Not that terrible thoughts get less terrible over time. But for some reason, right then, I just wanted to kill my dog.
I shivered again, just once, and the thought went away. I stooped down to see if Buck was OK and he was back to his normal Golden Retriever self. His hair was laying flat and he wasn’t slobbering or anything and he gave me a big lick when I got down to his level. Nothing was wrong. I hugged him and stood back up and we started walking back to the street to come back home. We didn’t walk in the pucky brush, this time, but on the paved trail.
When we reached the sidewalk, I stopped and looked back at the trail. I saw a bicyclist out for a late night ride coming down the path. The light on the front of his bike lit up a stray cat on the side of the path. Nothing weird.
We came back home, I put Buck in his kennel, and went to bed myself after brushing my teeth. My wife and son were already asleep and I read for a few minutes and then went to sleep.
I think I’ll have to wait until the sun comes up tomorrow to write down the dreams I had that night. Those are what made me go to Dr. Bronn in the first place. I want to stop having these dreams.
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January 28, 2009
Called Dr. Bronn about these journals. I don’t want to write them but she thinks I need to. Thinks I need to come to terms with what I–with what happened. We’ll see if I can.
January 31, 2009
Turns out I couldn’t bring myself to write anything down after my first entry. It just brought up too many memories. But why would I have all of these memories? I couldn’t have done any of the things I remember. There wasn’t enough time and, besides that, my family is OK anyway. I didn’t hurt them like I remember. Thank God!
I guess these entries are good for something, though. I remembered something I left out of the other entry. When Buck and I got to the sidewalk and I looked back, I did see something other than the guy on the bicycle. There was SOMETHING by the tree. There’s a small wood there, maybe twenty or fifty trees in the part of the park near the trail and there was something else, too. I–I didn’t see it but I FELT it. Just something wrong.
These last few days have felt wrong, too. Not the same kind of wrong, though. I’ve been having–dreams. Nightmares. Visions that I can’t wake up from of hurting my wife and son. And then, the next day, I don’t remember them as dreams. It’s like I really did the acts I imagined and there’s this horrible sick shock of seeing them healthy and walking around. Seeing my son play with his toys is like some sort of dream instead of reality. I haven’t been able to kiss my wife without feeling like I’m kissing a corpse.
Last night was the worst, though. I didn’t do anything to my family. But last night, HE called to me. I laid there and listened. I couldn’t move. And he told me, over and over, what I was going to do. To my wife. To my son. To myself.
I think I need to be committed. I don’t think I’m safe. I think I might hurt my family. Oh God I don’t want to hurt anyone
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February 8, 2009
It’s gotten colder again. Not that the temperature seems to change anything when it comes to my dreams.
I thought that maybe getting out for awhile would help. It’s Valentine’s Day soon and my wife and I want to go on some sort of date. I think my brother-in-law is going to watch our son for us. Maybe going out somewhere with my wife will make me stop thinking about hurting her.
Speaking of my brother-in-law, James, we went out the other day to some woods up in Marin County. Some open area a friend of his told him about. It was nice, if a little chilly. I snapped a few pictures (I really need to use my camera more) but nothing I really liked. But I saw something in one of them.
I’m not sure what to make of it, but I feel like I’ve seen it before.
This entry is going to have to be short, though. It’s late and I need to get back to sleep. The only reason I got up was because I was tired of the trees tapping on our bedroom window.
("MonkeyMaker")
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