Control: 10 Things I Remember From The Aught’s (2000–2010)

I, Dalton Lewis, haven’t talked about the aughts recently. From 2000 to 2010 a lot happened. A little bit of it happened to me.

1. In May 2000 I finished college. I majored in Japanese Language and English Literature. I don’t often mention the Japanese anymore because I forgot most of my Japanese and because I didn’t memorize enough vocabulary to be fluent at the end. I spent 1998–1999 in Japan studying the language at Nanzan College in Nagoya, a very nice school. I should have tried to go to grad school and study Japanese literature but instead decided that I should get temp jobs and try to make it as a novelist. Twenty years later I am still trying to publish that bestseller.
2. I remember living in Washington, D. C. and working for the government. I worked at the Federal Energy Management Program. We tried to find ways to go green and make sustainable, clean energy for people. I answered phones and organized papers. Then I moved to Tucson, Arizona, where they needed paperwork help badly. They needed me to man a copier in the basement of an office. I went there, eagerly, on the first day, ready to make copies, make money, and help society. I sat down to work, and then the other guy in the mailroom told me the dread secret the company was trying to hide: no one needed copies made. There were maybe one or two requests for materials to be copied a week. I was paid to sit there, do nothing, and pretend that work needed to be done. I sat there, doing nothing, waiting to be needed, pretending that this job was anything but agony. It taught me that society doesn’t care about my work or need it at all.
3. After Tucson Richie and I moved to Las Vegas, Nevada, where I remember becoming schizophrenic. I had a total mental and physical breakdown there, beginning with talking to myself in my head. I talked to myself because I was telling stories in my head, and I wanted to control each character and say his or her dialogue. Then I lost control of the dialogue for the story in my head. I began to hear voices and become mentally ill. I started pacing late at night, screaming at the walls.
4. I remember going home then. I remember going home to Libertyville, Illinois, and living with my parents. I remember pacing and occasionally watching television and playing video games. I remember getting nothing done, not a fucking thing, during the aught’s. I rewrote My Little Paradise a few times but never finished it until 2015 or so. I didn’t do much during that era, just screaming at the voices inside of my head.
5. Then I moved out, brilliantly, when I couldn’t function or manage anything at all. I moved to Pennsylvania to live with Gilbert. He taught classics and I worked as a cashier in a grocery store. The other store cashiers talked about me behind my back, saying that I was a crazy person, that I was a freak, that I didn’t do a good job. That’s what I think — I don’t remember very much from that period — except that I played Oblivion, quite an excellent video game.
6. I went back to Illinois after nine months or so and quit working. I didn’t have the capacity to work any longer. I played more video games and drank some liquor. I started to drink starting at four or four-thirty pm and drink until I passed out, blacking out most evenings.
7. My mom finally convinced me to quit drinking around 2007 or so. It took six or so tries to finally quit drinking. I went to those meetings for a while. They were fine. I finally started to get some writing done.
8. Then I started a new med — the best med that I had tried. I won’t list its name because I can’t recommend meds as I am not a doctor. I felt a little better then — started to communicate with people more effectively.
9. I remember Finnegan being my rock during that era, taking care of me, helping me through the drinking, helping me when I wanted to quit. He helped me even when I couldn’t focus or finish sentences, continuing to have something to do with me. I am grateful.
10. I guess the last thing I remember during that era is that I was troubled, and yet I didn’t stop writing completely. I continued to try to be a writer and express myself no matter how low I got or how terrible things seemed to be. I worked really, really hard to become the writer that I am today.

Thanks, and take care, friends.