I'm Disconnected By Your Smile

The aeroplane stops over the sea, I can hear the roar of the engine, it seems it's gonna crash, I feel so excited, I sense the end of my world, the end of all my frustrations and my rage, and I cannot stop thinking about a fatal accident, the sea is so close, I know I can die, I feel so excited.

Out of nowhere, I remember that Smashing Pumpkins' song, that song I used to listen to when I was such a moron, when I was in my first year of Psychology, when I really didn't want to study Psychology, when I just wanted to become a beatnik... 

I close my eyes. I see myself back then singing in my mind...

I'm disconnected by your smile

I'm disconnected by your smile

I'm disconnected by your smile

... and I remember myself feeling so heartbroken for this girl, Lily, the one I loved back then, she was older than me, she was everything I wanted, she seemed so mature, she was so enigmatic, so distant, so smart, so cold, she looked like Cecilia Suárez, she was my everything, and one day at school I spoke to her and we sort of started a relationship, I asked her for her telephone number, we started talking about The Beatles, she was a big fan of The Beatles, and I called her sometimes on the telephone, and then somehow she became interested on me, and then she started calling me on the phone, and we spoked many many times thru the night until the dawn, and then two months later or so she quit school and we became some sort of girlfriend and boyfriend, she was sort of dating a guy older than her and she told me that she was confused, he was a dancer, and then one day after school I went to her apartment, she lived so close to the school with a couple of roomies, and it was so fantastic, I felt so excited, we ate pizza and we drew as we spoked about Van Gogh and Monet, and then we sort of freezed for a moment –we were alone, her roomies were at school–, and I remembered one of our recent calls on the telephone. She had told me What would you think of me, if I told you that I have a boyfriend and that I want to kiss him and that I want to practice with you? and it was so clear that it was gonna happen, and then I looked at her, I hadn't ever felt so connected to anyone in my entire (brief) life, and I took her beautiful hands and I kissed her and it was so silly, I felt we were some sort of robots or sister and brother or something like that, but the entire situation was so great. I felt my dreams had come true, I couldn't believe it. Then she went to live to the beach. She was a dancer. We used to write, she sent me tons of letters. I sent her tons of letters. We saw each other again years later, she was pregnant, she loved someone else, I'd had a girlfriend, an amazing relationship that turned so toxic, we had broke up recently, I was about to start my PhD, we were the same but we were not the same. 

In my dream I look at the sea thru the window, the night is so dark, I think of that Beatles' song.

Bright are the stars that shine

Dark is the sky

I know this love of mine

Will never die

And I just know that I am in danger, that I can die, and I start to record everything on my cellphone. 

Then I wake up from this dream but I am still dreaming –I am still on the plane next to the window– and I have a blackout, like if I'm so drunk that I cannot remember anything. I looked at the window again. The plane is still flying over the sea, the night is so dark, the water is so clear that I can see some dolphins and algae, and then I realized I do not know where my cellphone is. I feel so attached to my cellphone, my cellphone (in my dream) is some sort of Lily, my cellphone is my everything, and then I started looking for my cellphone here and there, and I feel so desperate, but somehow we just landed and people start to getting off the plane and I see a cellphone on the floor and I know it is not mine, but I feel that I am not alone, that someone else has lost his cellphone, too, and this is a metaphor of my life. I'm not talking about cellphones and airplanes –my life is like being on a plane about to crash–, I'm talking about your cellphone, the one you were checking at when I saw you yesterday at the dining room, the one you left for a moment on the table when you got up from your seat.

I pound on the computer keyboard. I think of myself at the dining room, yesterday. 

Dawn is breaking, my wife and my cats are still dreaming, I am listening to this song and I cannot stop thinking about your smile.

I'm disconnected by your smile

I'm disconnected by your smile

I'm disconnected by your smile 

And I don't know what's going on. And I don't want to think about it. I know this isn't real. I sort of sense that you're not real. I don't want to think about your smile, but I must admit that this song has taken on a whole new meaning. What's wrong with me?, I am just this moron...? Are you acting or are you as lonely as me...?

Crystal Water Covers Everything In Blue

I hate it. I just wanted to fall asleep. Had a hard day. I woke up early, got to the university, taught my neuropharmacology class at 8 am, spoke about LSD and Ken Kesey and T. C. Boyle and the Dark Side of The Moon and “Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds”, spoke about pharmacokinetics and pharmacodynamics, absorption, distribution, proportion of water in the body, blood, plasma, serum, typical and atypical neuroleptics, Oliver Sacks, Awakenings, alcohol, benzodiazepines, applied an examination, go to my temporary office –would you believe me if I told you that I just received the distinction of National Researcher Level II of the SNII, almost ten years ago I was obtaining my PhD, I have almost 20 published papers but I've been always on the run, I've never had the opportunity to have a definitive tenured track position...?–, I read a paper of THC and dopamine –next Wednesday I will give a talk about brain mechanisms of marijuana consumption– and I felt so tired and empty, like if someone kicked out my brain, I evaluated some examinations, I read another paper, I received a few WhatsApps, I ate with a colleague, I returned home, the Uber driver drove a beautiful car, I got out of the car, I ate again, I drank a couple of Jack Daniel's, I listened “Alone + Easy Target” and “Resurrection Song”, I took an Uber to a concert, Madame Rita –the first band– started playing at 11 pm, Seattle Supersonics started at 12 am, the show was great, I drank three Victorias –1.2 L each–, I came back home and I fall asleep and I dreamed of you, Todokoro.

Why do you appear in my dreams?

I've only seen you twice in ten years. You are my worst nightmare. It's getting boring.

Let's Do Something Crazy, Absolutely Wrong

You were there, it was real. You didn't know I had been daydreaming of you, in the fog of my thoughts. I had been sick for almost a couple of weeks. Then when you asked me on the phone if I wanted to join you at the dining room, I thought “Ok”. And then we talked for half an hour or so. You spoke a lot, I told you a few things. Basically I told you how sad and frustrating it is to be like me. Like having this big desire of writing, a thousand ideas filling my brain like bees inside a swarm looking for air, and then to make a thousand mistakes while beating up the wrong letter in the computer keyboard. Basically I told you how bittersweet it is to be who I am. You know. I am experienced, I love my job, but I should have an opportunity to stop looking for temporary contracts. You know, I've been looking for opportunities my entire life. Ten years ago I was having my PhD dissertation, so far I have almost 20 published papers, ten years of teaching experience, I am National Researcher Level II. And in the near future there are no opportunities for me to stop looking for temporary contracts. These kind of contracts give me the opportunity to teach, but they're so short –from 3 to 6 months– and I can't perform my own research. Besides, they will not last forever. 

Of course I told you these things differently, not as I am writing of them right now. I am tired, Saturday morning is about to come. As I am waiting for the miracle to come, as Leonard Cohen whispers thru the headphones. I am asleep. It's 6: 30 am. And I've been wasting my waking time for almost an hour. 

As we spoke a couple of days ago in the dining room, I felt you were interested in my talk. It was weird. For times I remembered the way I had been daydreaming of you, when I was sick, in the fog of my thoughts. Sunlight irradiated your face. I hadn't seen the color of your eyes, neither the color of your hair. But sunlight made them look so warm. And you smiled all the time, and I couldn't stop telling myself that I was an animal, that I couldn't stop thinking that I would make it with you, that I would like to discover what kind of woman are you. Then you told me that you cried in a meeting. That you felt awful and silly. Then we talked about diseases.

I felt you sort of admired me. And I sort of remembered how it was our first meeting, 3 years ago. Then I was so sick of being some sort of academic outsider. I had 3 years working in the same university, but I was stuck. It was not the best time of my life. Then you appeared out of nowhere and you walked beside me and you ignored me. I saw you were so tall and I thought you were sort of conceited. I sort of hated you. 

Sunlight irradiated you face. You spoke about a couple of students that told our Department Head that they didn't like you. That they were not the biggest fans of psychoanalysis. I told you I understood your point. I told you about my own experience with a few students in the Covid-19 pandemic. When Zoom was the only way we could teach classes. When I had no recess, when I worked from 8 am to 10 pm on a daily basis, when students were some sort of ghosts behind the closed cameras of Zoom. 

I need go back to sleep. I have a terrible headache. I am tired. I am listening to Leonard Cohen, in particular this song I used to associate with an ex, but now I know I will associate it with you. I will remember this meeting we had a couple of days ago in the dining room of the university, as students walked and talked and ate around us. I wonder what did they think about us. I will remember how you behaved. The way in which you seemed to admire me. I don't know your age, I just kinda sensed that you're younger than me by the way you hear me and look at me, and I also kinda feel that I'm at this age in which people like you seem to know that I am not nobody. I don't know if I am being clear enough. I sense that people like you look at me as an experienced guy. Like if I were in an 'interesting age'. That I know something. That, if I wanted to, I could make it happen, that I could make it with you, that, ironically, I could make the biggest business of my life.

But I am just waiting for the miracle to come, as Leonard whispers thru the headphones.