Funny, your post made me realize that I haven't felt the presence of madness for a while.

I used to be able to perceive it like it was the old highway next to the interstate, now a frontage road. It runs parallel sometimes, then turns into the woods out of view.

I always had a lot of empathy for people on that road. Felt like "there but by the grace of God go I"... of course that was back closer to when I was taking more recreational drugs, and my brain was younger, with less calcification of the connections. Let a mind roam and it peaks into all sort of interesting nooks without fear or anxiety.

I read somewhere that we all have multiple personalities, but a healthy mind has windows between them. MPD is about losing the windows.

I can still feel the tug of it sometimes: "come try me" it says, pulling on my sleeve, it's like Carroll’s rabbit hole with the sort of vertigo-inducing trance that deep dark holes and cliff edges can exert.

I once laid at the edge of a several hundred foot cliff in the desert looking down. I wondered what would happen if the boulder I was laying on broke free. It happens all the time as part of erosion. I imagined the rock would execute a perfect 1/2 flip in mid air, like a diver, placing me on its bottom as it headed for the ground. *thud*... there would be no sign of me ever again, squashed perfectly hidden under that rock. Just my backpack and hat left up there on the top. a mystery explainable only by ufo abduction.

or madness. many people who disappear in the backcountry shed all their possession during the end stage. we explain it as the delusions of hypothermia. I wonder. people who disappear in the woods often leave little mysteries behind. "why the hell did he do that?" we are left to wonder.

Back when I could see the old highway better, I read a book by Kurt Vonnegut's son, about drifting into schizophrenia. The word "Eden" was in the title I think. Interesting account of what it felt like to progressively lose that grip.

That's always haunted me like the Sybil thing has for you. Maybe it's the betrayal. Betrayed by your own mind. Tossed on an ice flow and shoved away to drift untethered.

=====//=====

And you may find yourself living in a shotgun shack
And you may find yourself in another part of the world
And you may find yourself behind the wheel of a large automobile
And you may find yourself in a beautiful house, with a beautiful
Wife
And you may ask yourself-well...how did I get here?

Letting the days go by/let the water hold me down
Letting the days go by/water flowing underground
Into the blue again/after the moneys gone
Once in a lifetime/water flowing underground.

And you may ask yourself
How do I work this?
And you may ask yourself
Where is that large automobile?
And you may tell yourself
This is not my beautiful house!
And you may tell yourself
This is not my beautiful wife!

Letting the days go by/let the water hold me down
Letting the days go by/water flowing underground
Into the blue again/after the moneys gone
Once in a lifetime/water flowing underground.

Same as it ever was...same as it ever was...same as it ever was...
Same as it ever was...same as it ever was...same as it ever was...
Same as it ever was...same as it ever was...

Water dissolving...and water removing
There is water at the bottom of the ocean
Carry the water at the bottom of the ocean
Remove the water at the bottom of the ocean!

Letting the days go by/let the water hold me down
Letting the days go by/water flowing underground
Into the blue again/in the silent water
Under the rocks and stones/there is water underground.

Letting the days go by/let the water hold me down
Letting the days go by/water flowing underground
Into the blue again/after the moneys gone
Once in a lifetime/water flowing underground.

And you may ask yourself
What is that beautiful house?
And you may ask yourself
Where does that highway go?
And you may ask yourself
Am I right? ...am I wrong?
And you may tell yourself
My god!...what have I done?

Letting the days go by/let the water hold me down
Letting the days go by/water flowing underground
Into the blue again/in the silent water
Under the rocks and stones/there is water underground.

Letting the days go by/let the water hold me down
Letting the days go by/water flowing underground
Into the blue again/after the moneys gone
Once in a lifetime/water flowing underground.

Same as it ever was...same as it ever was...same as it ever was...
Same as it ever was...same as it ever was...same as it ever was...
Same as it ever was...same as it ever was...