Here is an essay I wrote about Flesh Simulator and posted to Xitter. Nuked the Xitter because unlike Fleshy I am capable of learning from my mistakes. I did a bit of editing before posting it here.
Simulated Floundering
"And I will remember your name and face on the day you are judged by the funhouse cast, and I will rejoice in your fall from grace with a cane through the sky like none shall pass." - None Shall Pass, Aesop Rock
When I introduce people to Flesh Simulator I refer to him as my 3 am intrusive thoughts given physical form. If that makes sense to you then you probably have a good idea where this is headed.
Once upon a time, when I was a younger man and still sought to align myself according to the counsel of others, I lived with an uncle. He was a very intelligent, spiritual man. No wife, no kids, solitary life in an apartment in Austin, Texas. He wrote epistles no one will ever read, songs no one would hear. Collected acoustic guitars he never played for anyone else.
There is a romantic notion here that I think we need to disabuse ourselves of right up front. My uncle's isolation was not due to conscious choice, it was due to fear. I suspect that what he feared was rejection by others, so he had preemptively rejected himself, isolating himself, ostensibly seeking God above all other things because he knew God was the only person who would ever truly see and accept him. Though I am perhaps being overly generous with this interpretation.
But he was still human, and a right silly bastard. My father, flawed but insightful man he was, once referred to his younger brother as "the silliest man in the world." This was meant at the time as a light, humorous rebuke due to my uncle's repeated derailing of a serious conversation the three of us were having about my father's estate before he was deployed to Bosnia in 2002. My uncle, very much aware of my father, a career first sergeant's intent. Instead of reading the room and learning a valuable lesson my uncle formally adopted the title of The Silliest Man in the World and wore it as a badge of honor even after my father had passed 3 years later.
He earned that title every day that he carried it. A scant few weeks before my father died, my uncle, who I no longer lived with and actively avoided, indulged in some suicide baiting of me in an effort to force me to continue to try and align myself with his idea of how I should live my life. I had, subconsciously at least, weighed and measured his life, decided his path was not for me (or anyone else for that matter) and rejected it. His persistence culminated in him claiming to me over the phone to have taken 21 tablets of Lorazepam. This happened late at night, likely around midnight. At the time I worked 6 am to 6 pm and was plagued by insomnia. My uncle was very much aware of those things. Unsure of what to do, since I was fairly certain the dose was small enough to not harm him but wanting some advice, I called my dad.
My father's response was exactly what I needed. He told me to call the police, tell them what happened, then call him back. He was furious.
Proper authorities duly notified and my obligation discharged, I called my father back. I do not remember what all he said to me but I remember one thing he said very clearly: "Son, someone needs to tell your uncle to shut the fuck up." A few hours later my uncle showed up at my door and asked for help getting back to his place. He had vomited the ipecac all over the wall and floor in front of my apartment, it was still stained black when I moved out 8 months later.
My dad, however, was dead within a couple of weeks. My uncle once more disturbed my rest to convey the news. As should be expected from the Silliest Man in the World, he didn't just tell me what I needed to know, he insisted I ride with him in his car so he could tell me all about it in his way. I was forced to sit in the car with the same idiot who had literally just darkened my doorway with his faux-suicidal vomit a scant few weeks earlier. His attempts to force his way back into my life as a paternal replacement began in that moment and culminated in him being utterly exiled from my life a few years later, after a final attempt to assert some biblically-inspired illegitimate authority over not only myself, but my mother and younger sister as well.
He died alone in Tyler, Texas a couple of years ago. I didn't go see him before hand despite ample opportunity and I don't regret the choice. I had given him enough comfort over the years. often against my better judgement. See, I can learn from my mistakes. The last measure of kindness I felt towards him was discharged in my not telling him what my father had told me a decade prior: that he really just needed to shut the fuck up.
Now you may be wondering why I spent so much time talking about my uncle rather than Flesh Simulator. That's because my uncle, with all his flaws, is a better man than Flesh Simulator will ever be. See, on some level the Silliest Man in the World knew that he was, in fact, not to be taken seriously. Instead of asserting himself onto life he kept to himself. I saw something of my uncle in Flesh Simulator almost immediately, and realized not long thereafter that, like my uncle, all of his suffering was self inflicted. And like my uncle, what Flesh Simulator really needs to do is shut the fuck up.
For better or worse it does appear the mantle of Silliest Man In The World has been passed on, and may Flesh Simulator have much joy in the title. My only advice to the Fleshy One would be to have a care with what he chooses to engage with lest he, too, find himself homeless, penniless, and desperate, after alienating everyone who tries to help him.
Selah.
Quick note to Fleshy: I shouldn't have to say this, but I did reach out to you by DM at one point and offered you some compassion. You have my name and phone number. I know you lack the sense to have retained it, but just in case you had a spasm of good sense and kept it: I am no longer available to help you. Should my personal information somehow be released it's going to hurt you a lot more than it will hurt me. I fucking guarantee it.