I can’t seem to unloose the depression. I have been unable to come out of it. There are things that need to be done-and all I can do is look at them.

I’m told it is a chemical imbalance-I believe it is set off by memories and anxiety. As a matter of fact-I am exhausted because of the anxiety and that cinches  the chains that anchor depression on me. I feel the fear of doing the simplest of things-sitting for an hour or more trying to muster up the ability to move on doing them.

The recent season of holidays is guilty of most of my low. I dwell on the memory and the losses always-but it seems more compounded as the holidays approach. I can’t miss but thinking of it.

I’ve begun to notice my clothes are becoming worn-my jeans are getting past the desired status of faded and are becoming just plain loose and my shirts are shameful with stains and holes. I noticed that a few weeks ago and realized it has been nearly two years since I’ve been in a store to shop-the stress of having to go in that booth and remove my pants to try new ones. I have no way of describing the fear and hurried manner of how I do end up doing it. I find the size that fits-and every time it seems choose the wrong size. Returning goods is hard too.

It’ll be a week or two before people stop saying ‘happy new year’. I know I have to be polite and say it in return-but my mind reels back to barracks D and what happened. It always has-and always will. I think about it in my sleep-in my nightmares of prisons. Every time that annual greeting comes forward I am reminded even more.

The officer I reported my rape to told me to “get used to it”. He chuckled and then in reference that I was going to be spending some time in barracks D he said “get used to it”. I’m always wondering what part he meant? This morning as usual every morning I woke and went to the bathroom. I am reminded every time I go to the bathroom. Also in the shower. Those following some nights of dreams like nightmares of being locked in some prison-forever. That followed by waking into an instant recall of what happened….and it happened 39 years ago. What part of “get used to it” am I going to have?

I wish every time I sat down to write something that it would always be something inspirational. I wish I could say-healing is there and think happy thoughts and all would be well,but I can’t say that it is that easy. Twice this past month I’ve had two different folk say to me “when you’re unhappy and feeling depressed-think of something happy”!  That does not  cover it folks.

I remember the man that issued me my bedding just moments before I entered barracks D. He was a large man-but yet he spoke like a woman. He said to me “Welcome to barracks D…Drugs,drunks and degenerates” in a feminine lisp and less than a minute later I was set to my own circumstances with an expanded metal gate closed behind me.

When I sized up my where I was I had no previous experience being in a place like this-a detention barracks. In seconds I saw empty bunks way back in the back-past other empty bunks. I chose one of those and made my way through the rows of men and past until I got as far away as I could. I know now that might have been a mistake. Like the following morning when the officer told me to “get used to it” I only had just short short moments to make decisions. I had already been raped when the officer told me to “get used to it” so I knew something of what was yet to come. It only took a minute to walk from his building to barracks D next door. I had only that much time to think of what to do. But , checking into barracks D I had no idea what my world was going to be like-then and forever. I only had mere seconds to find a haven in this confusion. Just days before I was having a good enough time with my friends on board ship and had plans for a future…never could I have imagined this.

When I returned from my meeting with the officer and the expanded metal gate closed behind me and I faced those same men-by then many had to know I had been attacked,I felt like I was walking through a pit of snakes.

My body ached from being punched and my rectum burnt from the attacks-my mind raced about collecting everything that had happened, how vivid many of those memories are at this moment. I laid there in my bunk wanting to cry and wanting to wash but too afraid to do either-like the fear from the night before,I wanted to go to the head but could not.

There was a hero-a guy named Bob, he showed up later and ended  up keeping watch while I showered. That was about the only good thing that happened new years eve 1969-70.

Happy New Year?