Unwell 0.2

While I mention this throughout later writing, I’d just like to say why I’ve put “train horn” or “car honk” into my pieces. It’s because I notice patterns and those specific sounds are part of a longstanding pattern of me seemingly being listened to, monitored, followed and terrorized in addition to the license plates that show up around me with my address number, dog's name, birthday date and more that I'll probably discuss in later writing. I remember seeing a TikTok that got a lot of popularity of a child trying to record a video, but every time they were going to speak, a train horn went off in the distance, cutting them off. The child looks in the direction of the train, exasperated, and goes to speak a final time, only to be cut off by the train horn once again. It would be funny if I didn’t notice that actually happening in my own life.

The car honks are the same scenario where I’ll be thinking, reading or listening to something and then, seemingly randomly, a car honk goes off. Sometimes it’s the car’s alarm, but, mostly, it’s a honk. It’s even done in a rhythm, like a 3 count, or in succession with multiple other cars. Same thing with the train horns where they'll blow their train horn in count with the 2 syllables of my name.

Despite it happening frequently, I tried very hard (car honk) to consider it as nothing more than a coincidence. About the same time that I started to pay attention to the dogwhistles in license plates as they materialized around me was the same time I started to pay attention to the horns and honks. I especially tuned into this when I started to hear it in the background of the videos of other people and when I started to hear them seemingly going off in response to me as I was sitting in my cousin’s home one night in 2021.

Seemingly, it’s not just the honks of cars or train horns, either; it’s the sirens of ambulances, fire trucks and police cars as well. I don’t think would’ve paid much attention to it if I hadn’t had lived through the Black Lives Matter protests of 2020. During that time, I saw this tactic of sirens blaring at all hours of the night and day (sometimes in processions that went up and down blocks) being used as a form of psychological warfare on the communities that claimed the phrase. Maybe I was (am) connecting dots where there are none (is that my confirmation bias?), but, as of 6/12/2023, this is still happening to me. It has happened as I’ve been typing and editing today, it happened yesterday as I was listening to an audiobook and preparing my garden, it happened last week as I was meditating to myself, and I think it’s going to keep happening (unsurprisingly, as of 10/9/23, it has kept happening).

I don’t know what to make of it, to be honest. Life seems rather surreal right now. Not only does it make me feel like I’m constantly being watched and terrorized, but like they’re in my mind? The number of times when I’ve just been thinking a thought and then, seemingly randomly, a train horn or a car honk goes off in synchronicity, is eerie. I’ll be meditating, and a deep, heartfelt thought comes to me and then I hear a train horn in the distance; even just me sitting down to meditate may start a flurry of car honks and alarms to go off. I don’t want to be an aluminum foil hat wearing conspiracy theorist, but it has made me wonder if they’re onto something.

Two other things have seemed to solidify this thought process inside of me: this video of a woman with long eyelashes and the revving of engines. There’s this video I saw on TikTok once (watch it come back up on my [or y’alls] feed in the next few days) of a woman (I want to say she was black to confirm my bias that this stalking and terrorism is being done mostly to black women, but I really don’t remember the race of the woman) with long eyelashes coming out of a store to see a car with lashes that were long like hers. Sure, it seems cute in the moment like “what are the odds, lol?”, but it made me feel uneasy. Had someone noticed this woman from before and followed her to that store in order to try and do a joke? Like “twinsies, bestie!”? Or was it really just a coincidence? It hadn’t seemed like she’d seen the car before, either, so what are the odds that she would go to the store as she did and a car like that would pull up after her for her to see as she was leaving the store? In that way, I’ve been left being like a conspiracy theorist wondering “how deep does this go?”.

Then there’s the engine revving. Sometimes they’ll zoom past me as I’m walking down the sidewalk or they’ll be in the parking lot behind my home (like right now as I'm typing this, there's a car that started and stopped revving), but, almost certainly, it’s a motorcyclist. Sometimes it’s a truck, an ATV or just a car with a very loud engine, but they all seem to have the same task of intimidating me by letting me know of their presence. I could even be inside and, much like the horns and honks, thinking to myself, watching a video, writing something down or listening to an audiobook, podcast, symposium or discussion, and then I’ll hear the engine revving outside. This all started May 25, 2020, when I was driving through a city in Connecticut and found myself surrounded by motorcyclists. After that day, it was like they followed me back to my home and were terrorizing me all summer by driving around my block and directly behind my home. It’s creepy when I’ve just been walking around and, next thing I know, a vehicle with it’s engine revving and a dogwhistle in their license plate zooms past me out of nowhere. Sometimes they’ll have decals or stickers that show their allegiance towards one group or another that leaves me feeling like I’m not welcomed here, and I don’t know what to do with that.

If I’m not welcomed here, where am I welcomed? Because, to be honest, it doesn’t matter whether I’m up in New England or down in the South, these people with their trains horns and car honking and engines revving seemingly follow me everywhere I go. I can’t even go and spend time with family without being crazymade and weathered by it. And they want to hear nothing of it because they just want me to act “normal” or just ignore it. But mix this in with the stares, glares, following, terrorism and dogwhistle license plates, I don't think I can perceive it in a vacuum as individual actions happening around me; it’s all too much to just act like nothing is happening when there’s clearly more than "nothing" happening. I want to believe it’s a coincidence but, like many people in this city and this state, I’ve given it the benefit of the doubt only for it to come back and bite me in the ass. Also, once I notice something like this, similar to how one may notice when someone doesn’t like them in particular and treats them as such with microaggressions, hazing and/or ostracism, I can’t unnotice it. Oh, sure, I can put up a front like I don’t care, imagine it's "all in my head", I may even begin to start to not care as much, but, eventually, the pressure becomes too much and I can’t handle it. I’ve not had enough sleep, I’ve had a stressful day or I’ve received bad news and then I hear a horn or a honk and it sends me over the edge; like a single negative comment that shatters ones' already shaky foundation.

Just felt like I needed to explain that because, as I’m writing Unwell, y’all will see that I often include “(train horn)” or “(car honk)” and I’m sure some folks won’t get it. Basically, in writing Unwell, I know I’m not well. I feel like I’ve been crazymade by this place, these people and this entire system of things, but some, if not most, people will probably just assume that I’m out of my mind and have been out of my mind my whole life. I guess including them is a way to bring y’all into the moment of writing with me. It’s not just that I’m writing something and I hear these sounds afterwards but, while I’m writing my thoughts down and even while I’ll be thinking about what to write out, there will be a train horn or a car honk going off, seemingly in confirmation or anger at what I’m thinking or writing. I don’t know what they mean, by the way. It could be something positive, meant to encourage me, but it almost never feels that way. If I could articulate what it feels like is meant by them, it seems like a malicious way to say “Yeah, we’re watching and listening to you! 1984 up in this place! At all times! 24/7, 365, baby! Everywhere! You can’t escape us! Stop doing what you’re doing, NOW! We mean to (car honk) drive you insane by doing this because no one is ever going to believe you! When you tell them that these horns and honks are going off simultaneously as you’re doing something else, EVERYONE will ONLY think you’re crazy, further isolating and ostracizing you! WE HATE YOU, SO END YOURSELF ALREADY!”

It's a theory that runs throughout my Unwell writings so, keep an eye out for it.