Stumble It!
Old Habits Die Hard, I Know I Kill Them
Wednesday, August 20, 2008 at 09:25AM 
Habit Killer Self-Portrait
Maybe being addicted to the sound of their necks snapping like crispy twigs is itself a habit, in which case I would surely be my own greatest enemy. I can't tell you when exactly it started. I just know that the second my old friends, slothful Comfort, Familiarity and Inertia come around to visit, the beast within me rises.
Some people don't admit they're capable of committing such atrocities. They like to think its that they're a 'renaissance soul' or a 'scanner' always moving on to a new interest and having such a multi-task-able-and-ever-open mind - They commend themselves for being varied in interests, but really its that we're murderers.
We like to take that newly found virgin habit, exhaust it, master it, shake it up and turn it inside out, drink all of its blood, swallow its life-source, until it has nothing left to give. Until it lays there motionless. We kick it and wonder why it doesn't dance for us anymore, then we have the audacity to say 'I'm bored'. And once that invocation is spoken, there is no leashing that wicked killer in me. Who must then pluck off that old habit's limbs to erase it, until it exists only as a memory of something you once had. Gruesome I know - its what I am, what I've been, hey at least I'm honest. I don't settle.
Oh yeah, I know there is that habit, but people are different kinds of habits...for one, their life span is a whole hell of a lot longer. Still here is a classic piece of advice: Keep your marital door locked from old friends that might want to come visit - like Comfort, Familiarity (these days I hear she's had a couple of abhorring kids) and Inertia. If you hear those guys come a knockin' you better start switchin' things up or simply accept the murderer in yourself.
Reader Comments (12)
I enjoyed the darkness of this piece. Nice write!
you yourself are a wicked beast of a writer...i love the honesty and grittiness of your prose my friend. good luck taming the beast or sending it away or harnessing its inherent power.
Wickedly dark. I am a true fan of wickedly dark. I like this very much.
This was excellent. Dark with a kind of acceptance of the 'evil' within us.
Honest and sinister.
Love the personification in here. So quirky and different! We've had a problem with ants at our campground this summer and I squish them in the same way. Your words made me squirm! So well done!
Yikes! Dark, yes, and a bit angry and self-righteous. Which works.
Welcome back! It's good to see you posting again :)
This was dark, but sometimes the world is dark.
oooh DARK bitter Amaraetto! The most delicious kind!
I love the picture too!
I've been watching too much murder from Sylar as I sink my teeth into season one of Heros.
I am hooked. This brought that to mind, but THEN the metaphor of stale marriage as the murderer...
LOVE this!
I like it. Dark and macabre!
Writing style meme
i have spent an eternity fighting the familiar,, and running when things begin to feel to comfortable.. and for me,, the time has come for the three of us to get to know each other.....
i wonder sometimes,, just how much spark is necessary to maintain a flame??
off topic:
did you see my post stains i finally was able to use that lovely picture of the "stained" woman i loved so much... hope it pleases you....
ahh, cant keep them out if the doorz open...a most joyous entertaining post of old friends...i've met them too...i like the murderer in me...
old habits do die hard. How can they not.If we don't kill them some one will, There will always be a side of us that someone made us that devil.So we need to kill it before they do.