I have anxiety.
In the age of social media, I am not unique in this regard. I suppose I would argue that I differ because my generalized anxiety disorder predates the internet to when I was a child. At any rate, that doesn’t matter because the internet and social media do little to make my anxiety better and do everything to make it worse.
What this anxiety does is give me a very clear picture of my limitations. I am a human of decent intelligence, middling strength, and the same amount of hours in the day as the rest of you. I now find myself railing against the walls of those limitations.
At various times, this anxiety has manifested in different ways. At a young age it was obsession with my eating, limiting calorie intake, and exercising obsessively. Probably borderline anorexia. In college it was uncontrollable fits of impulsive behavior which eventually lead to borderline alcoholism. I’ve always been right at the very edge of something that could be diagnosed as a very serious disorder. Something threatening to my safety. This foundational part of who I am as a person has given me amazingly positive things, and also severely negative things in my life.
For those who may be curious, yes I am medicated for this and it’s probably the single factor which keeps me on the productive side of this disorder. I’d encourage anybody else struggling with this to seek out help because the other side of help is a beautiful place to be. Help can be an AA meeting, your friend or significant other taking you to a doctor to start your SSRI prescription journey, or starting with the simple step of taking a long quiet walk in nature.
Through DrunkWooky.com, the CHU forums, and various social media platforms, I’ve had amazingly positive additions to my life. However, the overwhelming anxiety this online presence burdens me with is too high a price to pay. This anxiety doesn’t arise from anything anybody else is doing. It is all internal. For some reason, my brain is wired to ruminate, obsess, and drive me to tinker with this world. It’s what helps me succeed in my professional life, but it’s also what hampers my contentment.
I love comics! Specifically, Star Wars comics, but all credit to Spidey at the Batman where it’s due. I do love them too much, though. For many, comics can be a fun weekly escape. For me, though, my brain needs it to be so much more. I can’t just read, I need to analyze. I also can’t just analyze, I need to share this analysis. Once I’ve analyzed, I need to categorize (hence WookyWiki.com).
This obsession leaves me with a sinking feeling of dread that I have mounting tasks left unperformed. The silliest part about it all is that that list of tasks is completely self-imposed. I can drop it at any moment and the world will be fine. Life will go on.
In a way, my anxiety of letting down my reading audience has kept me from writing this and pulling the plug for a very long time. It’s pretty self-indulgent for me to think me dropping these website responsibilities even warrants an explanation. It’s perfectly possible nobody will bat an eye or care. I think that’s unlikely because I think people are generally good and caring. At any rate, I could just drop off the scene and, barring some stray emails of concern, I’d hear very little about it. Yet, here I am typing this. I’ve had wonderful responses of encouragement and kind words from people saying how much they enjoy my site. To them, I say thank you and I’m sorry it will no longer be an up-to-date resource.
I’ve also had advice to just step away and come back. Unfortunately, the anxiety I sighted above gives me a really hard time allowing weeks to lapse without an update. It’s like an on/off switch to me. It’s either regularly updated and reliable, or it’s dead. (I know, another unreasonable thought process, but it’s how my brain works).
Regarding WookyWiki.com, it remains my biggest regret from this whole internet endeavor that it goes unfinished. My intent was a completely comprehensive first appearance and key issue list for Star Wars comics specifically. I maintain that I could have accomplished that goal given enough time. That’s the crux of this whole life thing, though, isn’t it? Time is the one true unrenewable resource. We spend most of our days regretting the past or pining for the future while ignoring the slice of heaven our present reality is. At this point in my life, I would argue that what we all choose to do with our limited time is the most essential decision we make over and over again every day.
There are things I want to accomplish with my limited time and priorities have to be made. As I have alluded to, my anxiety does not generally allow me to half ass anything. Whatever my endeavors are seem to require 100% of my mental obsession. I have children who absolutely deserve that obsession and there are some things I’d selfishly like to accomplish which could benefit from that drive as well. I look forward to being blissfully unaware of whether next week’s comics have a first appearance, being ignorant to the incentive ratio of a certain variant cover I like, and continuing to enjoy all the leisurely aspects of my love of comics. (Long slow breathe out!)
So, goodbye everybody. To those truly good friends I have made, I’ll be in touch. Thank you to everybody for the fun I’ve had.
The archives of drunkwooky.com will remain. I’ll make a csv file of WookyWiki.com as it currently exists available for the public domain for free. Maybe some other young buck will pick up that torch. Maybe it will flicker and die out.
-DrunkWooky
