starryeyed77

searched online. they're a huge conglomerate. like HUGE. they own a bunch of subsidiaries. neural interface research? idk "cognitive science" stuff.

very corporate. very legitimate looking.

but i KNOW i've heard that name before. recently.

checked my emails. my files. my bookmarks. nothing.

it's like it's right there in my brain but i can't access it.

anyway.

i called them back. told them i'd do the assessment.

appointment is thursday afternoon.

i made them email me confirmation with all the details. got the researcher's full name (Dr. Patricia Kemper). looked her up - she's real, has published papers and everything.

told sarah where i'll be and what time. told her if i don't text by 6pm to call me.

she said i'm being dramatic but agreed to do it anyway.

probably nothing. probably just a normal research study.

but i'm bringing my pager just in case.

spent most of the day working on layouts. took a break to go to the bookstore. bought three books i definitely don't have time to read.

saw someone i thought was conspiracy coffee shop guy from behind. same jacket. same posture. got excited for a second. turned out to be a completely different person.

still haven't heard anything from my doctor about the harmony situation.

been thinking about that symbol again. the one from the dream. i put the drawing in a folder on my desk. keep pulling it out and looking at it. still don't know what it means.

everything feels slightly off lately but i can't pinpoint why.

sarah asked today if it's helping. i lied and said yes.

because how do i explain that i feel NOTHING? no change. no calming effect. no emotional smoothing. nothing.

i'm still anxious. still obsessive. still seeing patterns everywhere.

everyone else who takes it becomes... calm. even. content.

i'm still just. me.

maybe i'm broken. maybe my brain chemistry is weird. maybe that's why i'm the only person i know who seems stressed all the time.

called my doctor's office to ask if the dosage might be wrong. left a message.

still taking it every day. at this point i don't even know why. habit? hope?

maybe some people just don't respond to it.

just woke up from the most vivid dream i've ever had in my life. not even a dream. something else.

there was a symbol. a cross but not a normal cross. geometric. precise. the arms were different lengths. circles at the ends of each arm. a perfect square in the center.

it was spinning. rotating in 3D. i could see every angle. every measurement. and i KNEW - the way you know things in dreams - that this shape was important. that it was DOING something.

it wasn't just floating there. it was... active? alive? i don't have the words.

my hands are shaking.

i got up and drew it. or tried to. i'm not sure i got it exactly right but it's close.

i've never drawn something from a dream this clearly before.

where did this come from?

WHY did i dream this?

tried counting sheep. tried reading. tried listening to music. nothing worked.

finally fell asleep around 5am and had to wake up at 8 for a client call. i probably sounded half-dead on the phone but they didn't say anything.

made way too much coffee today. hands are shaking. probably should eat something besides coffee and anxiety.

been thinking about taking sarah's advice. about seeing a doctor. about the harmony thing. i don't know. i'm just so tired of being the only person who seems stressed out all the time.

everyone else seems fine. maybe i should just... try to be fine too?

went to three different places today:

• post office
• pharmacy
• grocery store

at the post office, the clerk smiled at me. specific smile. friendly but not too friendly. helpful but not too helpful.

at the pharmacy, different person. SAME SMILE. exact same expression.

at the grocery store, the cashier. SAME. SMILE.

i stood in the parking lot after and just... stared at my car for like five minutes trying to process this.

it's not that everyone is being nice. people are nice. that's normal. it's that they're being nice in the EXACT same way. same facial expression. same head tilt. same tone.

i feel insane writing this down.

called sarah to talk about it and she said "people smile when they're happy. isn't that nice? everyone seems so much happier lately."

and she's RIGHT. everyone DOES seem happier.

but happiness is supposed to look different on different people. right?

i asked if she'd noticed everyone acting similar and she just said "similar how?" and i couldn't explain it in a way that didn't make me sound paranoid.

so i dropped it.

maybe i AM paranoid. maybe i'm so used to people being stressed and anxious that normal calm happiness looks weird to me.

but i don't think that's it.

sarah works in IT. she used to talk about the potential computer problems CONSTANTLY. now when i bring it up she just says "it'll be fine. everything will be fine."

mike works at a bank. he's not worried at all either. says "the systems are stable."

my mom called today panicking about whether to stock up on water and canned goods and i was like "yeah probably a good idea to have some extra supplies just in case" and she agreed.

then she mentioned that her doctor recommended harmony for her stress levels and she started taking it last week.

cool cool cool cool cool!

i'm probably going to be the only person awake at midnight on new year's watching the world maybe end while everyone else is completely calm about it.

went to the coffee shop (my safe space at this point) and conspiracy guy was still missing.

thanks for making me feel worried about someone i barely even know, random coffee shop guy.

sarah's been on that medication (harmony) for about a month now and she just seems really... calm. which is great! she used to get so anxious about everything. like she'd stress about being five minutes late or whether she said the wrong thing at work. and now she's just. even. about everything.

we went to this new restaurant and they completely messed up her order. brought her chicken when she ordered fish. old sarah would have been so uncomfortable about sending it back. but she just smiled and said "oh this is fine too" and ate the chicken.

which like don't get me wrong it sounds great. i'm happy for her. but it's also... i don't know. it doesn't feel like sarah? sarah HATES chicken. i just feel like she usually would have said something.

mike says he's thinking about starting harmony too. his doctor recommended it.

i'm probably just being weird. change is good. people should be less anxious.

right?

i'm charging him triple and he didn't even blink.

so i guess that's the upside of difficult clients? money?

been listening to a lot of violet crown while working late nights. there's something about her voice that makes designing at 2am feel less lonely.

ordered pizza. ate half of it. will eat the other half for breakfast. this is what adulthood looks like and nobody warned me.

BUT i started watching the nothing show. it's so good?? why did nobody tell me to watch this sooner?? maybe i can actually learn to cook some decent food

aerial footage showed a lot of emergency vehicles. the reporter said "equipment malfunction" and "minor structural damage" but "no danger to the public." they kept emphasizing everything was contained and under control.

the whole segment was maybe 45 seconds. for a major facility incident that required that many emergency vehicles? seems like it would be bigger news.

the reporter seemed nervous. like she was reading a script she didn't quite believe.

went to the coffee shop this afternoon because i wanted to ask conspiracy guy if he'd seen it. he wasn't there. asked the barista and she said he hasn't shown up for his shift in over a week. nobody's seen him.

just. hasn't come to work. hasn't called. nothing.

super weird.

sarah suggested we do a group thing but that requires coordination and the three of us can barely coordinate getting dinner together so.

been having really vivid dreams lately. last night i dreamed i was back in my high school but all the hallways were wrong and i couldn't find my locker. classic anxiety dream i guess? except i graduated six years ago so my brain needs to let it go.

made really good pasta tonight. feeling domestic. might delete later.

you guys know that guy who's always there? older dude, always reading like three newspapers at once and muttering to himself? he actually started talking to me while i was waiting for my latte.

he started talking to me about this anxiety medicine everyone is on and how it's apparently connected to some crazy corporate occult conspiracy.

OH and apparently there's this whole conspiracy theory about some research campus on the other side of the country. saint... something? saint juniper maybe? he said it's supposed to be like an endurance research facility but he thinks they're doing "classified government experiments on people." he kept saying "they take people and they never come back"

i was mostly just nodding and waiting for my drink but he seemed REALLY convinced. said his nephew's friend went to work there a few years ago for a company called miter inc or something and the family hasn't heard from him since. just like... stopped calling. stopped visiting. and when they tried to go see him they got turned away at the gate.

which like. that IS weird. but also maybe the guy just didn't want to see his family? idk i get it. i didn't say that though because he was clearly very invested in the story.

he also mentioned something about people going missing from the nearby towns. said there's been like a bunch of disappearances over the past few years and nobody talks about it.

anyway he finally got his coffee and left and i felt bad because he seemed genuinely distressed about it. but also... i don't know. research facilities do research. sometimes it's classified. not really that big of a conspiracy bud

sarah says i need to stop engaging with every random person who talks to me but honestly it made my afternoon SO much more interesting than staring at my screen for six hours.

back to work. this logo isn't going to design itself.