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Recreational Schizophrenia
By Paul CampbellRegrettably I can't take credit for this. It is humiliating that I didn't think of it first! I am chagrined and ashamed that I have only just encountered what is arguably the most delicious expression ever brought to life by the genius of human language: recreational schizophrenia! Dreamers and poets, writers (yours truly), lyricists, painters and sculptors, actors (the good ones), every respectable artist ever to live and embrace the Bohemian lifestyle qualifies! We can all now form a club, go to weird cocktail parties, wear bizarre facial hair (even the chicks) and stand around smoking foreign cigarettes and acting snooty talking about our art in fake Euro-trash accents!
Yes it's true, you don't have to be clinically nuts anymore to share in the wealth that is recreational schizophrenia. And it has the advantage that you can turn it off . . . hopefully . . . during psyche evaluations or Senate Subcommittee Hearings on Deviant Behavior. Come on, everybody's doing it. Can you honestly say you've never been sitting in your cubicle and drifted off to your "happy place" where, truth be told, you are completely separated from reality? By definition schizophrenia is the "split with reality." So, if you're in your "happy place" you're already practicing recreational schizophrenia. Hang around a while and see what else is there.
So listen to those "little" voices in your head. Okay, not the ones that tell you to burn things, they're probably more messed up than you, but the one telling you to stand up on your boss' desk and urinate on them may be onto something. Once you're fired you might end up the next James Joyce or Vincent Van Gogh. Okay, maybe those aren't the best examples as prospects, but you get my meaning.
Recreational schizophrenia, just think of the possibilities! It's free, it's easy, and it can take you anywhere, be anyone, do anything . . . do anyone for that matter! And best of all you can surround yourself with whatever collection of "imaginary" friends you want. Hell, Vapid Fendermonger has been my closest companion for over two decades, and to date there have been no confirmed sightings of him. Note the operative word there is "confirmed." Although he did used to annoy (or frighten, I'm not sure which) my colleagues at meetings when I worked in engineering. Well, in all fairness he didn't annoy them nearly so much as I annoyed them talking to him during meetings.
And the cool thing about "imaginary" friends is they are stuck with you. I'm mean, where are they going to go? Unlike corporeal friends that get fuzzier and fuzzier with each cocktail, imaginary friends become increasingly corporeal! I suppose there is a point where that works against them and they start to fuzz out too, but then by that point conversation has lost all sense of lucidity anyway.
Creative writers; novelists and the like; lie for a living. Everything they commit to the page is, by definition, fiction. They make it all up and the world pays them for the privilege of consuming their psychotic meanderings. It requires losing one's self in a world completely divided from reality. Readers know this, and they pay for it anyway! Who's the real nut-case here? The guy lying, or the guy paying to be lied to? And the bigger liar you are the more money you make! That's right Dude, I'm talking about you! Last scion my ass! You're nuttier than the guys that wrote the original!
Sadly there are no treatments for recreational schizophrenia. Although I can tell you the stuff they give you for it causes "writer's block." What a downer! Be cautious. While recreational schizophrenia is intentional, it is also slightly more addictive than nicotine! I mean, what could be more addictive than voluntarily departing the horror that is the monotony of day-to-day life. Unless you're a pirate, which is exciting enough completely onto itself.
But enough about me Franz, let's talk about my new book . . .
Yo ho, yo ho, and so it goes . . .
What's next?
