They chain chairs to the floor (Patreon)

I lied to you. I said I would talk more about the psychiatric ward in my next letter, but every time I sit down to try, I can’t get past the sick feeling of that first “interview room” with no windows on the door, battered walls, and all the chairs chained to the floor. Nurses, residents, doctors, who had question after question after - well. I don't think I can write about that place. 

Jello. I had forgotten about jello though.

So let’s change the subject to something equally horrific! I am taking the first steps toward getting on disability assistance. It is very overwhelming. The stupidest procedural things overpower me. So, I’ve been “going to go on disability” since spring of last year. I am friends with a man who holds a sign outside the grocery store. He’s helping me. He told me that if I promise to stop cutting my face, he would get me the right number. Did you call them yet? He asks me every time. 

I did call them. It is as overwhelming as I thought. But I know the first step now. Fifteen years worth of taxes. Fifteen years that I have no records of, that I barely have any memory of. One of these days I’m going to the Tax Accountant place and I am gonna tell them- I’m your new client, you’re fucked! I hope that works. 

The sooner I can do it, the sooner I will have more than $400 in the whole world. I just have trouble leaving the house. 

Except for when I don’t! When I burst out the door into the world and money means nothing! I walk down streets I remember. Go to bookstores all the way downtown, and comic book shops, and the CANDY STORE. Last year I was walking home from a day like this, and I saw a man up the street asking for money from a couple, they kept walking and he yelled “CUNT” at them. Cunt Cunt Cunt. He just kept shouting at himself. He looked so angry. I had seen him before. Always angry. Screaming obscenities. 

Imagine how hard would that be, to need help but be stuck behind a wall of obscenities, nobody thinking you deserve anything. Anyway, diagnosing strangers is weird and useless. Cold hard cash is the real answer to systemic failure of the mental healthcare system.  I had just spent 100 dollars of my rent money on books. I went and I got $200 I could NOT afford in cash. He hugged me! He hugged me and started crying. And then I started crying. And then he told me how he got kicked out of the shelter for sexually inappropriate behaviour.

Joey