God is manic

“I wonder what it would take to live your life hypomanic all the time,” I pondered openly as I smoked a cigarette gazing out from the fence clad balcony with a cup of coffee sitting next to me and John sitting across the table. 

“Would that be good?” John asked without moving his gaze from the brick wall behind me. 

“That would be great, wouldn’t it? I mean think about it, hypomanic all the time, all that energy all the time.”

“All the misery too,” he added and looked at me with dark bags under his tired blue eyes and he brushed his hair aside and stood up and stretched after one of my cigarettes and I nodded for him to go ahead. 

“Well the misery is interesting. See you and I are here, that’s interesting but we are here because people thought we couldn’t hack it right, right?”

“I assume so, but you couldn’t could you? I mean when they brought you in you had just bought a horse for all your money”, John smiled, that story never failed to lift his spirits. 

“Right but you confuse mania and hypomania my friend, I am talking about hypomania, I am talking about that sacred state of existence where everything just clicks and is sanctioned by the universe because it arranges the atoms in an ultimate way, a divine permutation.”

“It always spills over, you know that.”

“It didn’t for Roosevelt.”

“For who?”

“Roosevelt, Theodor Roosevelt, he managed.”

“The president?”

“What are you talking about boys?” Anne sat down next to me and took one of my cigarettes and lit it. 

“Living the ultimate life,” I said. 

“He is crazy,” John said.

“Obviously,” Anne said and brushed my hair, “a true nut.”

“I’m going to figure it out, with or without your help, it has to be done, I believe it all boils down to morals and energy preservation. Morale is the only thing that can dampen your spirits, or feelings of shame. When I bought that horse I thought it was the best investment I could make and besides I thought we belonged to each other, me and the horse.”

“You probably did, and maybe you were a horse in an earlier life,” Anne said. 

“He was probably an ass, and how do you intend to preserve energy?” John asked, he was now sitting upright.

“I intend to implement a system of slow progress. Mania is obviously when the controls let go and the dopamine flows all too freely in your mind. That is when it starts to feel so insanely good, that is when it feels divine, that is what connects you to God, to the sphere and we all want to go back there but you should implement a slow progress, a slow release,” I lit another cigarette feeling energetic now; closer to God, further away from here. 

“So you should feel sad at intervals?” Anne asked. 

“No, not sad. But keep your enthusiasm under control. You must believe that you will see God once again, but not in the same way as through a manic explosion but that you will do so through hard work, hard hypomanic work.”

“Good luck,” John said and looked across the balcony where George was talking to himself making drawings with his hand on thin air. 

“I don’t need luck, I have this covered”

“What if everyone thinks you are a dick for being so controlled in your enthusiasm?” Anne stood up and started stretching her long legs with the cigarette between her lips. 

“They probably already do,” John said and I glared at him angrily. 

“Just joking man, I love you, you are nuts but I love you and I wish you all the luck on your endeavors.” 

“What are you going to do then? Just live life as an ordinary depressed person? Seeing God once every decade and every time older, thinner, weaker?”

“I am going to get out of this place and hopefully my wife wants me back and my kids won't hate me for spending all their money.”

“What did you spend it on, an ass?” Anne asked and stood straight up and her long auburn hair flowed back, her eyes looked intense. 

“You could say that,'' John said and looked at the wall again with a lethargic stare.

Feeling enthusiasm return and my spirits lift from my own discourse I took another sip of the stale coffee and tried to formulate my idea on energy preservation:

“See, you burn out, it is all about energy. When I bought that horse I had been up for two weeks. Barely any sleep at all. If I had preserved my energy this wouldn’t have happened. It went too far, too far out, too extreme, God never lets you see his face but you are thrown back straight into the circus whenever you are about to define it, it can’t be defined, just felt.”

“Have you seen God?” Anne said. 

“I am not sure, but something, I have felt something, it was something, it could have been God, whatever it was it was beautiful and kind and strong, just like I imagine God to be."

“And you want to go back?”

“No! I want to walk beside him, not go back to look at him like I did, but to be near his presence, his hypomanic presence.”

“God is hypomanic now?” John asked.

“No he is manic, most definitely, all the time,” I said and waved my arms frantically around.

Anne laughed and George walked by us saying: 

“If you manage to do that, let me know how it works, all right? I’ll try anything but this shit, I am sick and tired of that fence man, I am sick and tired of being called out.” 

“I will George, I will,” I said and smiled. 

“All right, medicine time people, medicine time, come in for your meds and get some snacks, tea, sandwiches,” the big guy from the staff stood by the door and looked at us four. 

“You’ll never know unless you try,” Anne said standing on her hands walking towards the door leading to the hallway and the medicine and the tea and sandwiches and maybe even God.