Abandonment. Disappointment. Fear of those prevents me from proper relationships. Fear of negative response to those — inevitable — instances of not hearing from, misunderstanding of, etc. It is painful. To the extreme.

It was a cut, a long time ago, on my cheek… I had this image in my head of it. Spirals. Spirals of images and memories and one of my cut cheek — one of the spirals — went forth from the past until now.

Or something.

I don’t know.

But now, I have a thought, turning into, the more I think of it, a compulsion, to cut my cheek. And underneath the thought is a reason: to remember a specific terror that could have been avoided if I where stronger or smarter or more experienced or had more wisdom.

So the cut, this cut, is a reminder of that. This cut is wisdom. Learned but not remembered other than by the cut. By that I mean that I did forget the pain I went though, suppressed, like many other times before, leading me to make the mistake yet again.

I cannot this time forget.

For if I do I shall repeat the pain.

Trauma teaches one to forget. Not remembering though, these little but painful social “mishaps,” means repeating behavior — painful behavior that ultimately leads to other self-destructing behaviors.

The first cut this time was lame. Funny I think now to use that word: “lame.” For I hate machismo crap. One does not cut to be macho in any sense of the word. Fuck no.

I cut to scar. Which is to remind. Which is to remember.

A small cut will heal quickly and not leave a scar. My first cut would not scar. My second would not either. But the third…

Blood drips and trickles and then flows down my neck and immediately I feel relief.

It is like a drug.