Crazy is as Crazy does; or, It comes from your side of the family

When I was in junior high my older sister involved me in a project she was doing for her high school psychology class. She was to act as an interviewer of a mental patient. I was that mental patient. I was to be anorexic. I dressed up in one of my dad’s large sweaters, my sister flipped on the video recorder, and we tried not to giggle through our dialogue.

Aaaaaaaaaaaand that was the last time I was the craziest person in the family.

As my siblings and I have grown everyone seemed to really delve into the particulars that make up a crazy person. When it is time to get together for a birthday or graduation or hospital release the flow of conversation will always move toward the unusual.

“So, I’m on a new drug.”

“You are? How long?”

“It’s been a couple weeks. I like it but I just don’t have much of an appetite anymore.”

“Oh really? What is it?”

“(insert unpronounceable medical name)”

“Oh! I know that one. I’ve taken that. Yeah. I hardly ate anything on that.”

“You know (certain health food or supplement of said health food) is supposed to really help with your (particular version of crazy).”

“I’ll have to check that out. I usually feel better when I get on my treadmill.”

“Oh yeah. You gotta exercise.”

“Yeah, it’s great.”

“Have you heard about the new research they’re doing?”

All the while there I sit. Just staring. Staring into the nothingness. Into the existential abyss. What is this life about? Are we living only as god’s lab rats? Why am I the way I am? My eyes wide and unfocused.

Now as far as I know my mother told us all that she loved us. We each got an equal amount Christmas presents. My father was not absent. He made it to nearly all of our special events with loud, giant camera in hand to videotape himself breathing over someone’s choir performance. So how could this be? How could only ¼ of the children come out with little to no depression or social anxiety or self-deprivation?

I’ve spent so many years, trying to figure it out so I can make sure it doesn’t happen to me. I looked for outside assurances. I'd make a friend! A regular friend? Nope. Friend turned out to also be crazy. Add it to the bunch. I’ve felt as if I was dog paddling through Hades’ river of lost souls with my head barely above the insanity, searching for land.

But that was never the case. Only recently I realized there may not be sane and insane. It was when I got information second hand or only on the bad days that I thought there was some kind of virus going around. Once they themselves opened up to me I could see it clearly. I see that they aren’t crazy. They are normal. I don’t feel like the outsider. My sister’s arm is broken and she needs help lifting things. Or my brother’s ankle is twisted and he needs someone to lean on. My other sister’s eye is inflamed and she can’t see as well so it makes her nervous. That’s what it’s like now. Truly.

And I was never in Hades’ river. I was just acting crazy.