"Bridge Fiend"
Autor: O Bernardo | Publicado: 2011-08-30T01:51:00-03:00

[I like the style of the Catcher in the Rye]I   By the time I reached the bridge, I was pretty damn sad already. You see, I'm in love and that's why I've been feeling terrible on my way home, even before I got to the bridge.  I never really want to admit that I am in love, and I don't like to admit it, but when I do, I want it to sound as stupid and mundane as possible, because that's what it is: I could fall for any interesting woman I saw if that hadn't made me so tired in the last few years; I mean, if I catch a woman staring at me and she smiles I will probably think about her for another mile or so -- in the end just to tell myself that I should've spoken to her but it was not going to work out anyways when she really got to know me. That's because I'm a jerk, you see. I'm not a douchebag like many guys out there who end up picking up some chicks for whatever reason. Rather, I am a sack of all that kind of social crap a polite person can be so as not to be attractive -- only I never even thought of being like that; I was more informed by everyone else that I'm that way, and, well, I don't disagree. Neither do women, of course.  This falling-in-love business is whatever it is to other people, like some sort of chimera or white rhino they are supposed to chase, [shoot down,] and take home to use like some kind of trophy or pleasure button, whereas to me it's plain and simple. It's like when you are about to throw up, or to have a seizure, that's what falling in love feels like: you sense it, you know it's about to happen, and then you pray "please don't..." but it happens anyways --  no one listens --, and you are left with that lousy feeling afterwards, you feel like you've been worn out (as in used underwear). It's also sorta like having a sore throat, except that there's no medicine -- only, maybe alcohol, if it doesn't get you killed. It does get you killed if you are a sad person like me, not a gloomy person and all, I mean; I can laugh and tell jokes and crack myself up even when I am miserable like a pile of crap and just want to bend every sign post on the street because they are on my way and maybe if I leave them a little bit like me I will feel a little bit less like I do. But this sort of thing -- getting yourself killed -- happens in days that don't look like it, you really think it's going to be a good day, you say bye to your mom to meet your friends and take her recommendations lightly, as if you were the wisest guy in town. But sadness is like this big river running inside you, and you don't notice it because it's silent and you are not really looking at it even though you know it's there, and you pretty damn well know, so when you drink with your friends, and you get happy and all, the massive body of emotions overflows -- it doesn't even need a reason, it's just raw sadness, and you still feel it even if you've drunk like a freaking skunk, you feel it stronger than ever and you just cannot ignore it anymore, and you drink like crazy to hold it back but it's all over the place already. Damn flood, that's what nearly killed me.  By now you are probably convinced that I must be also a terrible son. I am a sad person with loving parents and they are worried about me, but I am just wrong. I turned out wrong, you know, like the days that get you killed; no one ever pointed me the index and said "you are gonna be a heap of trash", no, they were always saying how successful I was going to be and all, and lo and behold: they were terribly wrong. People are so awful at predicting the future that I don't even know why they keep trying -- maybe it's something as natural as falling in love, and they don't really notice until after it's started to happen.  II  I'm not always that sad when I reach the bridge, and it doesn't always look the same to me, even though I realize in my reasonably educated mind that the massive black structure I can see from my window doesn't change much from one day to another, but it is definitely as long as how much I really care about my life. If I am afraid of losing it then there are all sorts of thugs hiding in the shadows, all sorts of menacing heights I might fall through beyond the fence, and it takes ages to reach the other side which seems at least safer and is at least not as dark and windy, but otherwise if I am dragging my emotional crap all over the place it just takes a few steps to cross it. I don't even think about jumping down the river, and that's because when I think of dying I know I don't want to go that far -- falling down and banging your head on the riverbank is far more frightening when you don't want to fall and the thought keeps torturing you, but otherwise it's more like going to Burger King, it's something you can do, but you don't want to, and the reason is quite obvious. Screams. Cars that pass with people screaming at pedestrians. They scare the crap out of me because it's all silent and then there's this noise that sets all your senses on fire, and then there's nothing again. I hate when they do that, all I want after they scream is to open fire against them, shoot down their stupid cars or something. I always see me doing that because I want to ruin their moments like those bastards ruined mine, but all that's because I don't have a gun. If I had one I would just keep going my way home and not do it. I don't do that sort of stuff. I say I'd do it, but I wouldn't. I also hate those people who actually make you feel bad about yourself when you say that sort of stuff, like shooting a car, and they actually pull a gun out of nowhere, hand it to you and say "Go ahead" dead serious, those fuckers, or they say "No you wouldn't" and start listing all the reasons why you would not do that; they just make you feel stupid and powerless, a damn coward, a wuss. I hate them but I wouldn't stand up against them either, because that's how I am -- I just talk too much. I guess what I would really like to shoot is the feeling of being scared like a dog, or the feeling of powerlessness.