‘Go to your happy place’, the super-slick group facilitator told us in his saccharine voice, ‘go to your wonderful happy happy place and think all your very best happy thoughts to make yourselves as happy as possible…’ We all hurried to obey, scurried to obey, looking for the happy place that is in us. That really special super-happy place that feels so good. We didn’t need telling twice you see – we absolutely didn’t need telling twice! We were all mad keen to withdraw to our happy place inside of us and pull up the drawbridge. Maybe we won’t ever come out again, even! Maybe we won’t. Maybe we’ll decide that we’ve had enough of life in the ‘non-happy place’ and we’re going to give up on it entirely. Maybe we’re fed up to the back teeth with all the outrageous crap we’re having to endure, day in and day out, in the rotten old non-happy place.
You can hardly blame us for that, of course. No one could blame us for that. Enough is enough, after all. There’s a limit to how much crap a person is willing to take, wouldn’t you agree? Any self-respecting person can only take so much, and then it’s a case of ‘Well the hell with you buddy, I’m off to my super special safe space, I’m off to my special happy place that only I can go to, the super special place that only I know about…’ ‘The hell with this’, they’re going to say, ‘I’m just not going to hang out here anymore with the rest of you losers. No Sir I’m not.’
And could you blame us? All things considered, could you bloody blame us? We are fed up with all the crap, you see. We’re fed up to the back teeth in fact. We’ve absolutely had enough. ‘Can everyone please go to their safe space’, the voice on the loudspeaker system tells us. The voice is calm but insistent. ‘Please remain in your safe space until the emergency is passed.’ it tells us. Only then emergency never really did pass, did it? The emergency never really did pass and we’re still there to this very day, aren’t we? Still here after all this time. We’re still here and we’re none the wiser as to what exactly is going on. Wiser we most definitely are not…
The chicken, the whole chicken, and nothing but the chicken – isn’t that what they say? No half measures here my friend, none of that damnable faint heartedness here! Start as you mean to go on, I always say, and if it all goes sideways on you then so be it. I wasn’t born to be smart, or wise, or funny, or helpful in any way – I was born to be fate’s tool, fate’s instrument. That’s all I am at the end of the day, and when fate is done with me it will toss me aside like a thing that doesn’t matter anymore. You know the sort of thing. It will toss me aside without a second thought. Fate doesn’t generally bother very much with second thoughts as far as I can tell. Second thoughts aren’t exactly fate’s style, you might say. There’s simply no room for regrets in this imperfect world of ours – you can’t make an omelette without breaking a few eggs, after all.
I have suffered from something of an identity crisis all my life. I’ve had it as long as I can remember, really. When I was a kid I’d read some kind of dumb comic book about Moose Boy or whoever it was that was popular back then, and then – in my own imagination – I’d actually BE Moose Boy. Or I’d read a comic strip about Protozoa Man and for weeks after I’d BE Protozoa Man, capable of assuming any shape, capable of reproducing asexually by binary fission, and – most thrilling of all – capable of engulfing his enemies and absorbing them into his own primitive but all-powerful unicellular body.
Then when I moved out of this phase I’d engross myself daily in reading those crummy little pulp Sci Fi paperbacks that there used to be so many of. I would devour them, spending all my time reading about galactic heroes like Johnny Neutron the intrepid Space Ranger. Embarrassing really, I know, but in my own head I would BE Johnny Neutron, travelling the cosmos in his FTL spaceship with his trusty crew of mutants.
Normal enough for a lonely, socially-dysfunctional, highly introverted kid with too much imagination and not enough friends, I hear you say, but even then I took it too far. Even then I was deeply abnormal.
Looking back to those childhood days I have no consistent memory of being anyone. Don’t tell me that’s normal. If someone asks me about my childhood I just go blank. I don’t know what to say. I can’t remember who I actually was back then because I had been so busy imagining that I was someone else. Somebody more interesting.
When I became a teenager things only got more confusing for me. I stopped reading comics and crappy pulp Sci Fi and moved on to Philip K Dick. This allowed me to go around feeling that I was not human at all but only some sort of highly advanced android programmed to think that it was human and which had been provided with memory implants taken from somebody else. I need hardly say that this did little to improve things.
As time went on I found myself less and less able to function in a social setting – or any other kind of setting, for that matter. I couldn’t relate to people. I couldn’t fit in, no matter how in tried. I was the perennial outsider – always looking in from the outside. I grew peculiar in my ways. I developed odd mannerisms, mannerisms that tended to attract the attention of passers by as I walked down the street, with consequences that were not very pleasant. I was being noticed in a bad way, a way that could easily get me beaten up,
I was not in a good place, at this point in my life. I abused drugs. I remember keeping a stack of low-grade Moroccan ‘slate’ hashish (along with the obligatory soap-bar) which I would periodically bring out when I was feeling low and subject to the vilest insults. I would say some very bad things indeed to that poor Moroccan slate hash for being so crap – I am mortified when I remember it. I got arrested eventually – the neighbours overheard me shouting and screaming and they called the police. Community social workers got involved and I had to go to a treatment centre.
That was a very dark time in my life and I am grateful to have come out of it. These days I still socially isolate but I have found some kind of peace in myself. Life has taught me the lesson that it’s okay to be a freak. That it’s OK not to fit in. It’s all OK. We live in a very spacious universe. A very ‘allowing’ universe, if I may put it like that. People may not be very allowing but the universe is.
I got into blogging for a while, ranting about society and writing perverse, self-mocking stories, but that didn’t work out.
Now I spend all my time on Facebook, making lots of new friends for myself. Friends who I know I will never have to meet.
My mouth is a swirling maw of darkness, my eyes blank portals into a world of horror and despair. My eyes blank portals, my eyes blank portals. No wait, I’ve said that already… I did say that already, didn’t I? Time for me to say something new at this stage, isn’t it? Time for me to break some new ground for a change. Time for me to get out of the stinking rotten old rut that I’m in. That loathsome filthy old rut…
Reality was struggling to fix itself, repair itself, but failing. Failing big time. The damage had been far too great and that was that. There was nothing any of us could do any of us other than watch on in dismay. Nothing for us to do but watch on helplessly in a state of numb, unbelieving shock. The passive witnesses of a horror beyond the imagination. Reality itself was crumbling away, inexorably degrading into lower and lower forms of itself before our very eyes. It was degrading in real time, before our very eyes, into what I can only describe some kind of abomination. What was once trustworthy and true was now revealed as being the very opposite of this.
My mind had been made all shiny and new. ‘Shiny and new, shiny and new,’ I sang out cheerfully, ‘everything has been made shining and new’. I kept on singing my song over and over, but then – before I knew it – I realised that my mind wasn’t shiny and new anymore. It had become tarnished and dull. All of a sudden I realised to my horror that the whole world had turned cheap and sleazy and – what’s more – I knew it was me that had done it. I knew it that it was my fault. I had sinned. I had brought a fearsome entropy debt upon my head and that’s bad news. That’s the worst news possible…
I had done the bad thing and so now everything was ruined forever. I wished I hadn’t done it but I had and there was no turning back. I shouldn’t have done it but I absolutely had – I had done the bad thing and now I had to face the consequences. That’s heavy shit, I don’t mind telling you. The heaviest. I call this ‘having the knowledge of one’s own evil nature’. It’s always necessary to face the appalling evil of one’s own nature – it is so very necessary in fact – but that doesn’t mean that we’re in any hurry to do so! Anything but that, isn’t that right? Anything else but not that. Instead, to help us avoid the truth, we created a little thing we like to call society. Society is great and all that of course but that doesn’t change the fact. It doesn’t alter the fact of our basic nature. Nothing alters that fact.
I was a Hero of the Conventional World. I had done all the right things in life – I had been to all the right schools, studied at all the right universities, met all the right sort of people and all that kind of stuff. It didn’t do me any good in the end though. Obviously it didn’t do me any good in the end! The future was here already, just waiting for me, and I just wasn’t ready for it. I wasn’t prepared for it, you see. I had no idea. I didn’t have what it takes – I was a sham, a fake person. I crumbled away immediately, I lost my mojo. I collapsed into a cloud of dust.
We get to play it being genuine human beings though even though we’re not. We’re slaves of the external authority. We get to act as if we’re real honest-to-goodness people with actual genuine integrity when – really – we’re extensions of the vile machine. That’s how it is in the modern world, isn’t it? That’s what life is like in the modern world whether you care to admit it or not. The machine says we can get to play at being free and autonomous and all of that sort of thing just so long as we keep on obeying orders. Just so long as we don’t break the rules.
The future is here and it’s not nice. No – it’s definitely not nice, not nice at all. I was spewing out the most hideous Satanic nonsense as fast as ever I could, and yet it still wasn’t enough. Nothing is ever enough. Nothing is ever enough. And there’s nothing any of us can do to make things right. You knew there wouldn’t be, of course. You knew that all along. You knew there wouldn’t be anything we could do and you were right.
I was on my best behaviour, in case God Himself was watching. The Big Man Himself. You never know, after all, do you? You just never know. I was doing all the good things, saying all the good things, thinking all the good things, as you do. As you do. Behaving like a decent human being and all that sort of craic. You know yourself.
God Himself.God Himself could be watching and so you wouldn’t want to be caught out, would you? You wouldn’t want to be caught out being a complete and utter bastard – that wouldn’t do at all, obviously! Absolutely not. No Sir… You want to create a GOOD impression, you see. It’s always important to create a good impression – if it’s someone who counts, that is. Some people count more than others, as you know, so that’s something to take into consideration. Some people don’t count at all. It may not seem particularly politically correct of me to say this but that’s just the way things are. I’m only being a realist here so please don’t blame me. Don’t condemn me. I’m giving you some good advice here, I really am…
I’m afraid of the hostile featureless masses. So very afraid. They’re bound to turn on me, I said – they always do. They can’t wait to turn on me. It happens every time, doesn’t it? It’s almost a cliché. The same old story, a nightmare we just can’t seem to wake up from. Well – a nightmare that I can’t wake up from at least. Not ever. Because the last time I checked it was all happening in my own head. The entire universe that is. Happening in my head. That’s the way it was the last checked time I checked, at any rate. Maybe things have changed now, I don’t know.
If I had one piece of advice for you it would be this – Fear the hostile featureless masses. Fear them well. You probably won’t though. You almost certainly won’t. The chances are you’ll become one of them, of course. Isn’t that what people usually do when they get scared? Blend with the hostile featureless masses? Blend good and proper so that you would never know that they were there? Merge would be a better word now that I come to think about it. Merging with those hostile featureless masses – becoming just another angry face in the crowd. Becoming just another tool.
I’m just a person like any other – not particularly angry and not particularly sad. Just a bit angry, just a bit sad. Angry sometimes, sad at others, just like anyone else. I could be you, you see – I could very easily be you. Or anyone else for that matter. Nothing special about me at all. Absolutely not. I’m just one of the lads, really. The point being of course that no one is going to pick on me this way. How is anyone going to know to do that? It’s the perfect solution, clearly. It’s the perfect strategy and that’s why we all do it. We are smart that way, you see. We’re smart in thatway, if not in any other…
When we extend the self, what exactly are we extending? That’s the question I’d like to put to you. When we promote the self what indeed are we promoting? When we are being brutally compelled to be what we aren’t (and what nobody can be) what kind of stupid lame-ass thing is this? What kind of a thing, what brand or species of a thing? We have to ask the question, you see.
When we extend the self, when we extend the jolly old self. It’s bloody great to extend the jolly old self, isn’t it? Doesn’t that just feel so wonderfully good? It feels good and at the same time it feels so bad. If the truth were told, it’s a horror beyond all limits. If the truth were known, if the truth were known. ‘Punish the evildoer…’ I cry out in a strangled shriek of toxic frustration and incoherent rage. ‘Punish the filthy dirty evildoer!’ But the evildoer is myself and the more I punish him the more powerful he becomes. He will destroy the world.
Even so however, I cannot refrain from doing so. I cannot refrain from punishing the evildoer. It’s like picking a scab. Picking a scab doesn’t make the scab go away (as we all know only too well) – it only makes the scab come back all the bigger and all the uglier. It comes back to taunt us; it comes back to tempt us all over again. ‘Pick me baby, pick me,’ it says. ‘You know you want to…’ Winking an eye at you, putting you in a quandary (only not really). There never really was any doubt in the first place – it was all a foregone conclusion and that’s the way it always is in the Deterministic Universe. All the freedom has been drained away from you and you’re condemned to a life of pointless repetition, coming out with the same lame-ass bullshit time and time again. Making out that is the first time you said it. Making out that it is the first time anyone said it. You’re just another spambot.
‘I can withstand anything apart from temptation’, isn’t that what your man said? Yes indeed, yes indeed. Never a truer word. Do you know that thing where you’re doing the bad thing and you think ‘Oh no. I’m doing a bad thing, I better stop it’, but you don’t stop. You don’t stop do you? You don’t stop because you love it too much. I’m sure you know the type of thing that I’m talking about, just like I’m sure you’re not going to own up to it! Never going to own up to it. We’re all such terrible liars when it comes down to it. We know no shame. We’re all such vile despicable liars.
We’re all such horrible appalling liars and that’s simply because we’re afraid. We’re basically shitting it, not to put too fine a point on it. Fear is controlling us. Fear is the Main Man – fear of the bad thing happening because we know that when this happens it’s guaranteed to be bad. It could be quite bad, might be quite bad. Possibly quite bad. It’s the Fear that puts the lies into our mouths, you see – we can’t lie fastenough, we can’t get those filthy dirty old lies out of our mouths quicklyenough. By God we can’t. Sometimes we even burst out with a great big fat corker of a lie (rehearsed to death at this stage, rehearsed so many times that it’s worn to a frazzle) before anyone has even asked us anything. The tribunal hasn’t even started yet! ‘It wasn’t me’, you cry out in a wild voice, ‘I wasn’t there, I never did it…’
‘What’s life like in the Equilibrium Realm?’ you ask, keen to find out, keen to find out all about the secrets of Samsara. ‘What’s the big deal with samsaric existence? Why do folks like it so much?’ I admire your perspicacity, of course; I am always a great admirer of perspicacity. Most folks – as you know yourself – only want to enjoy the illusions that samsaric existence is so very full of – we don’t want to go into it you see, we don’t want to know anything about it because that would entirely defeat the purpose of the exercise. There’d be no point in that, as everyone knows. There’s no payoff in learning about the trick that’s being played on us. That would just make us miserable and jaded. There is on the other hand a reward for successfully falling for the trick, being taken in by it. There’s always a reward for being a dummy in this life of ours, as I’m sure you’re aware.
‘But what are the secrets of Samsara?’ you still want to know. You’re all ears, you’re practically falling off the edge of your chair. You’re agog with anticipation (as they always say). That would be telling however, and we can’t have that. You’ll just have to get in the queue with everyone else; you’ll just have to wait your turn. But what are the secrets you want to know. What are they. Those deeply evocative and mysterious secrets. The whole thing such a tease, isn’t it? You would love to know but no one will tell you – they all want to keep this secret to themselves of course. The last thing they’re going to do is blab about it to some stranger. No one owes a stranger anything after all…
I was brought up to never trust a stranger. I was reared that way you see, I was reared to be distrustful to strangers and to treat them bad on this account. To rip them off when you get a chance, to always put them wrong if there’s a way to do this. We call it ‘the Code’ back where I come from. One always has to adhere to the code, does one not? There is honour in always adhering to the code. That’s how you earn respect for yourself. That’s how you learn to respect and honour yourself. By upholding the Code…
When I was born people thought that I would grow up to be a genius, and that I would achieve many things, many great things. You may laugh, but that’s what people thought. There had been various omens and stuff like that. Portents, and the like. Strange signs had been seen. That turned out not to be true of course but I can’t take the blame for that. The portents were wrong, the signs were misleading, and that’s just about all I have to say on the matter. If you’re expecting me to be this to be feeling bad about myself on this account then I’m afraid you’re going to be disappointed.
I have adjusted to life in the Equilibrium Realm – I’ve made my peace with it. I’ve made my peace with the fact that this is where I’m going to end my days. And – do you know what? – it’s not so bad. It’s not so bad at all. I’ve actually grown to rather like it, can you believe that? It’s a funny thing – the person I once was would have been utterly disgusted, appalled in fact, that I could have come to this. That I could have ended up like this. And yet the person I am now – the person I have become – doesn’t care at all!
I hate bad people, don’t you? Boy do I hate them! I hate them so much it actually makes me feel ill. I hate the bad people with every atom in my body. I want to punish them. Punish, punish, punish – I want to punish them so much! I want to punish them so much that it makes me feel sick. Sick with excitement. The thought of punishing the bad people makes me break out in a cold and unhealthy sweat. I want it so badly, you see. I want to punish them so very much and – what’s more – I know you do too. I recognise that in you, you see.
I was creating events in the privacy of my own head. Some were joyful events whilst others were sad and depressing. I was creating all sorts of events, but mainly the unhappy sort, mainly the wretched, miserable sort. That’s life though, isn’t it? That’s the way things go – there’s always a bias to the wretched and the miserable. That’s the default, as we all know. The miserable is always the default and you know the reason for that as well as I do so I won’t waste your time blabbering on about it when there’s no need. I won’t waste your time stating the obvious. Creating events in the privacy of my own mind only they’re all unreal events, you understand. I never created an event that wasn’t unreal, in fact.
‘There is but a single mould to which all must conform’, I roar at the top of my voice. I’m full of enthusiasm but don’t have a clue as to what I’m actually talking about. I never do. I don’t know and I don’t care – there’s a virus in my mind and it runs me ragged every day. It leads me on a merry dance. I’m forever roaring and shouting and generally carrying on like a fool and that’s because of the Invisible Predator that has eaten my brain away until there’s nothing left. I keep on walking and talking because I’m too stupid to realize that I’m not actually there anymore. I’m too stupid to realize anything. I’m just like everyone else in that regard.
We’re living in the Product World, you see. We’re living in the world that’s made up of thousands and thousands of products, and boy are we having a good time! We’re having the best time ever. We just can’t get enough of it. We’re mad for it, mad for those rotten filthy old products. These filthy old products sure are good, we say – they truly are magnificent. We love them so much. We’re having a great old time and no mistake, but at the same time the shrewd observer might spot that there is something not quite right about this setup. Something odd, something suspicious. Something downright sinister in fact. Something that smells a bit off – as if there’s something dead under the floorboards. Satan is behind it all, you see. The Great Despiser is the Prince of this world, after all. Or had you forgotten?
The force that pins us down is immense, isn’t it? So immense, so very immense. Frighteningly immense. ‘Well, you have to struggle to be free’, you pipe up bravely, ‘it’s important to be free, after all…’
I listen to you politely. What else can I do, after all? It’s not something I can explain – it’s not something anyone can explain. Yes, on one level we could certainly say that it is important to be free, in a purely abstract sense it is fair enough to say that. In strictly practical terms however, you might as well save your breath and use it for something else. Something more useful. Blowing up big red balloons for a party perhaps, or blowing out the candles on your birthday cake.
But how can I explain, how can I explain? The fatuousness of struggling – however heroically. To be free, that is. Or maybe futile is the word I’m looking for. Or maybe I should stick with fatuous? The struggle to be yet more fatuous than you already are – now there’s a struggle to wax lyrical about. There’s a struggle to bring a tear to the eye and a lump to the throat. It’s the ultimate struggle. The force that pins us down is immense, after all. Far more immense than you and I could ever possibly imagine. That’s what I’m trying to get across here.
All we’re allowed are our fantasies, wouldn’t you agree? Our poor sad fantasies. Regarding how everything is going to be great, regarding how everything is going to be wonderful. Let the good times roll, we say. Freedom is against the law you see, freedom has always been against the law. It would upset the apple cart of course and what would become of all the apples then? It would be sheer chaos. We couldn’t possibly allow that.
Exceptional problems call for exceptional remedies, as nobody can deny. The more exceptional the better. You can stay at home and watch yourself on TV if you like. You can watch a TV programme about yourself – your friends and neighbours can watch it too if that’s what they want. You can study yourself in the laboratory to see if you’re real. You can design sophisticated experiments and recreate various experiences to see how you react. Life’s a bumpy old journey and you can’t be sure if it’s worth it or not.
The research design is simple: you pretend to yourself that you exist, that you really do exist. In reality not in fantasy. You convince yourself of the fact, and then you put yourself through all sorts of torments that you can’t get out of. Then you can settle back and see what sort of experimental data can be obtained. What sort of hypotheses can be proposed. Will our hypotheses be supported or will they be sunk without a trace? Will we have to go back to the drawing board? Is truth false, or are lies true?
I yearn for freedom but fear the humiliation that comes with failure. The dreadful, dreadful humiliation. I fear the humiliation that comes with failure and for this reason I lie low and bide my time. It’s what I do best, after all.
I was on vacation in my head, lying back luxuriantly amidst the hideous chaos and squalor of my life. I had forgotten all my cares – I was stretched out on a cheap plastic recliner counting my chickens. Of which they were plenty. I was on a permanent holiday.
The darkness is approaching fast now. It’s approaching like an oncoming locomotive and ours is the role of the helpless victim tied to the tracks. It’s the traditional role, of course. It’s how things are done. That’s the type of world we live in.
The shadows are getting longer every day. They grow and they grow, encroaching upon the sunlit spaces of our lives. Always encroaching. They encroach a little bit more every day until – before we know it – the light of the sun becomes something none of us are able to remember. There will be stories of it, perhaps. There will be folktales and legends that speak of it, but the authorities will close all that down quick enough. They’ll close all that down for good. Or for evil, should I say? They’ll close it all down for evil. They’ll close us down for evil. They won’t tolerate the light. They’ll come down hard. They’ll punish wrong doers. Punishing wrong doers is what the authorities do best.
This is the way it always is with authorities, of course. What else would you expect? What else do the authorities ever do but deny the light? That’s their role – the authorities exist to enforce the darkness, and they do so in the name of all that is sacred! They have the monopoly on all that is sacred. They will preach the words of right and truth. They will give succour to the faithful. They will reward their minions.
Should we worship the Darkness? Is that the correct and gainful course of action? Is it valuable and helpful to worship the Darkness? These are just some of the questions we have to ask ourselves, you see. These are just some of the issues we have to address. Is it correct to praise Satan unceasingly, even though we know that He is the father of all wicked things in this world?
There is but one mould to which all creatures must conform. Only one mould, only one mould – all must pass through the one gate. We are told by the Rulers that our Father Satan cares deeply for us and everything He does is for our own good. We must pray to Him daily, imploring his mercy. We must pray that He will punish us sufficiently. We can never praise Him sufficiently. One day follows hot upon the heels of another, without ever a break. ‘What does it all mean?’ you ask yourself, ‘what is the significance of existence? Is life a type of delirium? Are aliens real?’
I was defending myself – no one else would, after all! He did a bad thing your honour, I explained before the court. He did a bad thing, and he knew it to be to be bad when he did it, he knew it but he didn’t care that it was wrong. He meant to do the bad thing, and he knew full well just how bad it was. He knew very well. He couldn’t have cared less but he went ahead and did it all the same and that was definitely wrong. The defendant admits all this and he owns up to being a thoroughly bad person and he hopes you will show lenience on account of his honesty in this matter.
I like to think that I came off plausibly enough in my heartfelt address to the court. I’d like to think this because I know I’m generally a very plausible person – I can talk myself out of anything usually, but on this occasion I was starting to get the feeling that I wasn’t quite pulling it off. Not like I normally do. My charm wasn’t working. ‘Guys, guys, guys, give me a break!’ I begged, ‘I can’t help being bad, after all – that’s just the way I’m made.’ I was defending myself in a court of law. I was defending myself against all the charges.
I did the bad thing your honour I burst out, I did the bad thing and it was a very bad thing – one of the worst. One of the very worst. If not THE worst. I did the bad thing and so here I was facing the consequences. I didn’t ask to be the way I am, I told the magistrate, I was born this way. I’ve always been this way’. He did the bad thing your honour I explained to the court. He is a very guilty perpetrator and he broke all the rules. He didn’t mean it – although he did really, of course. I was mounting a spirited defence and the prosecution’s case was collapsing all around them. I had them beat – although not really, of course.
It wasn’t me that did it I explained – I was nowhere near the crime scene at the time you see and anyway I didn’t know anything about it. It’s all about outmanoeuvring the prosecution you see – it’s all about confounding all their groundless accusations, which are falling thick and fast all around me. Thick and fast, thick and fast. I’m batting them off just as fast as I can with my little toy bat. The faster they come the faster my arms work! It never happened, I told the jury, that’s a total lie. None of this is real. It’s a set up…
He was created in Satan’s own image your honour I explained eagerly to the judge. I was talking too fast for my own good but I couldn’t help it. He was created in Satan’s own image, I gabbled, and so what chance did he have? He was doomed from Day One – things were never ever going to go any other way. He drew the short straw. People like him just fine until they realize that they don’t. He gets on very well with everyone until they get to see what he’s really like. He’s the life and soul of the party. He’s the life and soul of the party until he isn’t. It wasn’t me that did it I explained and anyway it wasn’t my fault. He was created in Satan’s own image I explained to the Grand Council of Elders. He used to be me but not anymore. I became someone else. I was defending myself, trying to put the record straight. I was defending myself in a court of law.
