19.6.12

lazarus tl;dr's

i'm not dead. anymore. i feel like i have been. didn't move, didn't eat, didn't talk or communicate with anyone but Muad-Dib, barely even that. i couldn't remember what month or year it was or when anything was. i didn't go to the doctor or the psychiatrist except to mindlessly collect drugs. i didn't open my planner or my logs. i couldn't touch my phone. i don't even have any real memories from beyond about a fortnight ago, not since finding this place last-minute in early March and the rigmarole of getting it paid for and putting enough shit inside to make a house.

i had to stop there and go puke my guts up again. that's been happening for a while now but once again, the NHS thinks i am a skaghead and besides i already have a fuckton of antiemetics. the bowl under my bed is full of blood and all this green bitter shit i think is bile but might be stomach weeds or something since i haven't eaten the last few days. it's fucking gross, but it's better than being dead.

i also have some tramadol (legit!), which, predictably, has fucked me up. not in the good way either since i can't keep it down. i wish i had some goddamn intravenous doses. can't get the cyclizine to stay in my system long enough to take action.

veering off track again - apologies. my mind still isn't what it was yet. i'm losing the struggle to even fucking name what happened. i'd like to say depressive episode, but never in my life has it been that bad, never has my whole consciousness been reduced to catatonic coma like that. it's been so much longer than a normal episode, too; i can't really tell but i know i've been like that for months after i should have surfaced. i know i planned to die after i realised it was eating away at my mind, because i wrote it in an OO.org file i found amongst my documents about a week ago; i had the tools close at hand, but i didn't even try this time. in hindsight that's probably good, since what i built was more or less foolproof and does not allow for second chances. one breath would have deoxygenated this carcass in milliseconds and wiped me from its shell like rain off goretex. i shudder to think how close i came to this, and how close to its effect i was in life regardless.

no, i dismantled the assembly, and i must have discarded the components, because none are here and Muad-Dib would have done something memorable even to me, i think, even then, had he found them. for the first time i had the capacity to do it quickly and cleanly, and as the cliche goes, i couldn't. or must not have been able to, i've no real record of what happened. i found myself shackled to life by the simple existence of the man i love, and by weaker chains to everyone else who gives a fuck, Unqualified and my blood kin and Max and Usul and everyone else there is, all of you.

Muad-Dib said at some point that he didn't want to be what kept me there on life support. i remember saying that there wasn't a choice in it, and remembering what he had told me when he first knew: that my loss would rip his life to shreds, and he wouldn't be able to end that pain by following me. a lot of the time when your mind is crumbling like that all you can think of is the easiest of the hard ways out, deleting yourself. you forget that it would leave a wake of destruction in the lives of those you know and care about such as you can't even imagine, such as would fuck them up permanently just like you, reduce them to the same state you want to escape so badly - only without that escape, because they saw what it did and they won't spread the damage out any further. i know what it would do to Muad-Dib, the strongest person i know. i don't even want to think about the crushing blows my suicide would have dealt to my mum, my nan, my dad.

so i lived, half-dead, and after a very long time i woke up. i don't know what did it. the week before, i was prescribed an additional drug, Seroquel, although i don't seem to have taken more than three or four doses. maybe it was that. maybe it was Muad-Dib's hard work finally paying off, since he's been doing literally everything for me since i fell into catatonia. he quit his degree, took a full time job with one of the giant zaibatsu corporations that run this city, left at seven every morning to come home at five and cook something with meat and bread and try to coax me to eat it. he'd download episodes of a couple of TV programmes during the day and put me in front of them in the evening and watch them with me, he installed simple games over Steam that he couldn't really afford and set them running to try and get me to play. he did the dishes and cleaned the house and took the rubbish out, talked to my mum when she couldn't get hold of me, filled out the council tax forms and doctor's letters and sent countless emails to Prof. V trying to explain what the fuck happened. i owe him everything, again.

shit, i type too much. tl;dr then - it seems i cannot be trusted not to disappear when this channel of communication is simply me talking at you. i'm pretty sure that one of the contributing factors to what happened is that this is the first time ever that i have had absolutely no friends at all while an episode is ongoing; even the presence of B, who didn't really understand the whole depression thing and thinks suicide is an act of "ha! now they'll be fucking sorry," helped a lot more than i thought. so, i'm asking anyone who still reads this for a favour. i would like you to remind me of... well, anything. life. since my anonymity is far more cosmetic than concrete, i am going to give you every possible means to do so. i need contact from people or, it seems, i really do go insane. the details i will place in a second post for visibility.

i understand that maybe nobody except spammers will take me up on this, but the data haemorrhage is worth the risk to me. i'm fucking sorry i didn't do this before. i'm sorry i left you all. i'm sorry i didn't answer your messages. i'm sorry this has happened so many times, and that i wasn't good enough to stop it. i'm sorry i wasn't awake before. i promised you knowledge and i have not yet delivered.

it is my goddamn duty to hold up that promise as well as my life.

L

86 comments:

pepijn said...

I'm sorry I didn't reply before. I know it won't help much, but just know there's another soul out there listening, and caring.

Anonymous said...

Lepht,

Oh my logical mind, you're alive! I'm not quite sure how to express how happy this makes me. Your apparent abscence felt like the loss of a close friend and this post, once again, reaffirms that i must meet Muad-Dib, just to shake his hand. So, hey , welcome back, and may your days be forever better.
-Joe, the hopefully no longer silent reader

Rag said...

Very glad you're still around, Lepht. I can't claim to know you well, only having found your blogspot recently, but I am glad you exist, and persist in doing so.

Thank you for every insight you've given us into your life and thoughts.

I've very quickly become attached to the idea, in the abstract, of a person like you living somewhere out there. As happy as I am that you are--increasingly, I hope--alright and recovering from this latest cataclysm, I'm even more excited at the prospect of assisting that recovery, and of more bilateral communication in the future.

The more I revise all that, the more dry and horrible it sounds. Thank you for coming back to us; I would be thrilled to be a friend as well as an adherent.

chris janowiak said...

Lepht,

I can't presume to speak for you, or any other person; neither can I presume to know how you feel, but I believe I have experienced the general qualia. I will look for your next post and hopefully will have thought of something better by then, but until then, let me just remind you that:

The enemy's gate is down.

Aleph-Null said...

Welcome back, Lepht. I came across this blog some months ago, and have been poring over it since. Thank you for sharing what you have with us, and know that there'll always be anonymous confidantes.

It's relieving to hear that you are lucid once more, and I wish nothing but a hasty recovery for you.

Kind regards to both you and Muad-dib,
SynthEtiquette/Aleph

hat said...

In case you don't see twitter these days, you can always email me or hit me up on AIM at wobblywallaby or googletalk me or skype me at drethelin.

Usul said...

I'm glad you've resurfaced. Was a bit worried (as possibly illustrated by the e-mail I sent you a couple of days ago.

As per usual, words fall short. I'm much better at listening than I am at talking. You know where to find me should the need to talk arise.

If you lived a tad closer, I'd drop by for a hug (looks like you could use one), but that's a bit difficult, so you'll have to make do with a virtual one. *hug*

Take care, sape!

Your sib,

- Usul

Anonymous said...

+1

melladh said...

We're still here and listening. Though perhaps many of us may not be very socially apt, some of us are willing to try ;)

Naib said...

Hey Lepht,

Its really good to hear from you. You're here and reaching out, that's a great place to be. It sounds like thinks are still at least as rough as ever, but I'm glad that some combination of MD, time, games, and drugs have gotten you this far. You have an email from me, lets chat, argue, rant, or just BS something. Chris takes the gold star for the Ender reference so I won't try an inspirational quote. Just remember that it doesn't matter so why people care, but that we do.

Anonymous said...

Still reading what comes up in my feed, leaning into the screen hoping for good news from you!

Hope you're on the up, get out in the sun for a second if you can.

Anonymous said...

holy shit lepht is back!

thoughts on this?
http://www.grindhousewetware.com/projects

werwolf said...

still here. lurking usually, but this time i'm going to reach out, if you think that's what you need.

ThomasEgi said...

Welcome back Lepht,

once again, glad you are still with us.
Should you ever feel like chatting don't hesitate to drop by on ##biohack on freenode. I'm looking forward to read more.

regards to you and Muad-Dib,
ThomasEgi

Unknown said...

i haven't comented before, but i am now, cam across you because of a article you did for hplus magazine, loved it, love the blog too

Unknown said...

I'm glad you stuck around, Lepht. The world is already lacking brilliant people, we don't need to be losing more.

-Gaffeizil

"Happiness is only real when shared"

Max said...

Nice to have you back, boss.

I kind of understand why you're trying not to spill too much information into the public sphere, especially with all the prejudice that's directed towards female hackers these days, but you have to admit: you need communication. You need social ties to tether you to life. Meatspace friends don't seem to work very well as your social environment isn't friendly enough towards the kind of people you'd wanna hang out with, so I think you'll have to open up via the net. I'm tehmillhouse on twitter (I think you've already got my mail address), so *do* stay in touch. I'm waiting for that next blog post, you know.

You mentioned something about feeling a sense of duty towards the hacker scene: don't. I've personally heard from people who also had this sense for duty how consuming it can be. (Namely, Stephan Urbach (@herrurbach), member of the Telecomix movement. There's quite a few articles about him. He was really close to suicide and was pulled out of the abyss at the last moment.) You might wanna check out bluehackers.org (haven't taken a look at it myself, I'm acting on hearsay here).

I'm not good with words today. What I wanna say is: there's things to live for that are more rewarding and "truer" than hacker ethics, more respectful principles than "you are your work". Hacker ethics as defined "back in the day" have done a great deal of damage to the attitude and self-respect of every hacker and every wannabe hacker since. Don't fall for it.

P.S. I was really surprised when you said the people on here have an impact on you. I'm glad you know that there's people out here who care for you and who don't like to see you down in the dumps.

Max said...

There's a whole lot I wish I could say in these comments, but I'm not good enough with words for that. Just make sure you carry on.

Esc said...

It looks like I've picked a hell of a time to start reading your blog.

I'm speaking up because you seem to be one of the more fascinating individuals I've ever discovered and to hear that you've returned from the brink of death is... well, it gives me hope. Which is perfect, because I live off of that exclusively.

I'll hang around. Because your story looks like it will be going places. So stay alive, I want to write a biography.

Director X said...

Glad to see you back!

There are some shitty shitty things about human biology, aren't there? I'm glad to see that you fought the meat and won. Further revenge is required.

Anonymous said...

Glad you're back, Lepht.

Dan Campbell said...

This is truly a relief, LA.

When you're relatively sane and together, then you can apologize when you screw up, if you want. But when you are suffering with a depressive or related disease, you don't have to apologize.

For those times when you really can't or won't communicate, hopefully it helps to know that you have a fan base, that values your existence.

Personally, I think that you are going to make it. Partly because you have someone in your life cheering for you, but also because you have this awareness of your own frailties, which shows up in your writing.

Awareness of internal problems, of the need to change, doesn't guarantee that you will come through your depressive hell. But it sure does up the odds, in your favor. You're going to make it, Lep.

Keep writing. We'll keep reading.

Lock said...

Apology accepted. Good to have you back, Lepht.

Motoko Kolster said...

O! Lepht! i can feel it too!

i had a whole poem here that i wrote for you. then my computer crashed and it dissappeared

listening to: So long to the day, from "La Bella Stella"(2012)

eyeing: "Against the Day" by Tomas Pynchon.

praying to: Lepht Anonym, my darling.

(and then "A little Girl of My Own" By Julie Chapman, on the album Please Stay A Baby- a collection of toddler's lullabies, but a beutiful song, nonetheless, crying)

Motoko Kolster said...

...i'm sorry about the poem- it fell between the cracks. it was one of the most beautiful poems i've ever written. i had it all ready and typed in, and i was going to post it. and i got the bsod. thank you for your being. thank you for being alive. i revel in you. stay lucky, we should learn greek. spread the love to muad-dib, the roots of your growing being- the poem said that. please don't ever kill yourself again. you have brought a king to tears and whimpering. again.

yours always and forever, undying
motoko K, the prince of wales, and last emperor of scotland, and king of new york.

Motoko Kolster said...

p.s. when i finished the poem, someone oustside lit three fireworks

Elwood said...

stay, please.

also, don't feel obligated to do anything. just live.

m1k3y said...

Hang in there Lepht! Love to have a proper chat when you're feeling up to it.

lichen said...

I've been following your blog for a while now, thanks to the talk and the subsequent rapid formation of biohack.me early last year. While I can't speak for the entire community, I think it's safe to say you have more people who care about your well-being than you are aware of. I'm relieved to see that you're back amongst living, that another brilliant person hasn't been lost.
Feel free to stop by our irc channel (##biohack on freenode) sometime for a chat. Just please don't feel obligated to do any more biohacking work because of us all though. You certainly don't owe the community anything. Just do what you want to do, care for those close to you, and keep on living life one day at a time.

ottomagne said...
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ottomagne said...
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ottomagne said...

Lepht,

I just recently (read: about a month ago) discovered your blog here - I stumbled upon your video from the 27C3 through some other forums, and I absolutely loved the talk. I loved the DIY attitude, I loved the subject, and I love the "curiosity comes first" mentality that you showed then and still show through your blog posts here.

I know I'm new to your blog and the idea of DIY transhumanism, but already you've had an effect on me and my thinking - I'm already wanting to try implanting a magnet myself and I talk about how cool this idea seems all the time. I know it probably seems insignificant, but thank you. For your work, for your insight, for your advances, and for being you. I appreciate the update, and I'm looking forward to reading more.

Leynos said...

You're one of those rare people that open our eyes and allow us see further. Nothing makes me feel better about the future than the idea of people taking the future into their own hands. It's good too hear from you again. I hope that everything will mend for you.

Anonymous said...

I could live outside the cities
with sunshine and wind and silence.
I would live in a desert workshop,
to build machines and share them with the world.
I've lain on prickly grass and pointy rocks, and found transcendent comfort.
And sun-baked trailer people seem happy
with their quiet, sparse, and private lives.
The sky is purest blue.
the land is baked and blasted tan and red.
And everything is quiet.
I could live outside the cities
with sunshine and wind and silence.
But my wife would be unhappy,
so I don't live there yet.

... a little slice of the world to think on, as requested.
... though I am an engineer, and not a poet.
http://www.flickr.com/search/?q=trailers%20in%20the%20desert

malces said...

Oi Lepht!

Glad to see you're booting up again. Don't be too hard on yourself for not living up to your own expectations-- you've already done so much to promote bio-hacking all around the world. Take your time and tend to the fragile hardware. There is always time for more squicky empiricism tomorrow.

Unknown said...

Hi Lepht,

Glad to see you back!

I'm watching your blog for some time, even translated one your interview to Russian. Was a bit worried of your absence last time, really. And now I'm happy to know such a like-minded person is still there!

+1 to you don't owe anything to anybody, just be yourself and get back to life! (and of course, my respect to Muad-Dib!)

Tasha said...

So pleased you're back. I worry when you disappear from here.

Anonymous said...

Just to say Thanks.

Anonymous said...

I'm glad you are improving. Things will get better! A lot more people care for you than you may think.

Anonymous said...

Lepht,
I'm so glad you are still out there! I came by to check your blog every few days, but as time passed, I was increasingly concerned and afraid that you would not resurface. Not knowing you at all and having stumbled upon your blog only about a year and a half ago, this might sound strange, but I felt the need to come out of my usual reading passivity to state: I think you are a great, gifted person, and you WILL eventually get better. Furthermore, rest assured that there are a lot of people out there who care about you, regardless of whether or not you "deliver" knowledge anytime soon.
Hang in there!
F
(Sorry for eventual flaws, this is not my mother tongue)

Anonymous said...

Hey there Lepht,

something for you: I attended your talk in Berlin on the Chaos Communication Congress years ago and I am listening to the talk/video again from time to time. I missed to say "hello" to you in person, unfortunately, but I "follow" your blog every other month. Well,... "follow".. whenever there is new content ;-)

Your talk scared people like me like shit, but it was kinda cool. It was great to see you so,.. well, .. alive :)

Hope your doing better again, soon(er or later). Just want to let you know there are more people out there interesting in you(r blog) than people posting comments here :)

Best wishes from Germany,
L. (klaus(dot)42(at)g.....com)

Anonymous said...

I just got thunderbird up and going after a reinstall and lo and behold...a post from lepht! Oh, how I'm glad to hear you haven't succumbed to the abyss! Please do take care of yourself and give my thanks to Muad-Dib for caring so well and so much for you. I look forward to more posts from you as time and energy allow.
Kind reguards,
Zer0

Anonymous said...

<3, unconditionally.

Anonymous said...

That was the perfect definition of why don´t commit suicide. The fear of hurt the ones who care about us...

(you can´t imagine how this idea shaked my stomach and make me cry)

The deep state you are now allow you to understand better a broken human soul and some aspects of it end up being universal.

What can I say? You must enjoy the (bad) trip. Explore the shitness, even if this fuck you up. If you´re already there, experience how does fell to be really and trully broken.
And then, at the end of all, extract the good thing. Belive me, because they ARE there, somewhere!

Thanks for exist.
It´s good to have you with us.

Anonymous said...

I've been going onto your blog once a day hoping for an update from you. I honestly feared the worst and I can't express how glad I am to see that you're alive.

Am I being weird for giving so many fucks about some person I don't even know? You and your blog have inspired me into the biohacking movement and I've been keeping myself busy, saving up some cash and preparing some nifty projects. Some practical, some aesthetic (turning my skin blue via Silver Chloride overdose). It has given me a new, progressive perspective of myself.

The world needs people like you. :)

MicroBalrog said...

Hold on there, Lepht. We love you.

MicroBalrog said...

Hold on there, Lepht. We love you.

Unknown said...

;D I'm rooting for you Lepht

Anonymous said...

Lepht is back! It's like Chirstmas and my birthday all rolled into one! I've been reading your blog for about a year and a half or so and always look forward to a new post.

I'm really glad you're back and that you're okay, depression sucks hard and so does feeling suicidal. I've been there and it's not a good place to be but it helps me a little bit just to think that things might not get better but they'll get different and sometimes that's enough. I also really like these two poems by Bukowski, The Laughing Heart and Show Biz, I think he got it.

I rarely post comments anywhere but I just wanted to say hey.

Unknown said...

Lepht,

I don’t know whether or not you’ll actually see this, you already have well over fifty comments to this post; and there probably really isn’t anything I’ll be saying here that is at all unique or interesting compared to what anyone else is saying. I have been following your blog for several years now; my name is likely unfamiliar to you because I have never posted here before, I...never really considered it necessary to post anything here before because I never really felt like I had anything to add to whatever it was that you had said. Much of the insights you have given into your life have sounded eerily familiar to me; I am also someone who doesn’t really “fit in” to whatever this fucking world is that others have created around me. Despite being separated from what you have experienced yourself by a large degree of space and time, I feel like much of what you have often described about your life could have been a description of my own struggles. Like you, not only has the rest of humanity often been quite cruel to me due to a basic lack of understanding of what is often perceived as my “alienness” to Western, judeo-christian, heteronormative society; my endocrine system has been waging a long war against my mind in more ways than one. The simple fact that I have apparently poorly conformed to what the mainstream views as acceptable behaviour for the social categories I was coercively placed under early in life has often lead me to all sorts of philosophical contemplations about what it truly means to be “human”. Most of these contemplations have lead me to shitty places, I have slowly been robbed of what precious little trust I had towards any figures of “authority” in my life, and have generally come to view the better part of my species as little more than a particularly clever and prolific strain of vermin. I have never been a violent person; I view violence as little more than a sad perpetuation of the same failures I see in those around me; so I have (much like you) often taken the high road in this shitstorm of a reality, and turned toward chemical means of detaching myself from the brutality and poverty of the world at large; it used to be all those shitty little “happy pills” that the people in charge used cram down my throat when I was a wee little one, then it was the liquor, and then humanity’s finest pharmaceutical inventions, the gifts of the poppy goddess (mostly some oxycodone I had in surplus from a surgery when I was teenager; some brilliant “doctor” mistook a swollen lymph node for bone cancer and proceeded to tell me I was almost certainly going to die an exceedingly agonizing death in a few months time; that was nearly four years ago, so you can see how much that fucker’s word can be trusted). I wanted to live in a world far away from the daily hell that was inhabiting this body in this society; and some days, I won’t lie, I even craved the sweet nothingness of none-existence; matter of fact, I was once only one family-heirloom bottle of Darvocet away from joining the vastness of the void; but for some reason, I carried on. One of my only friends hung themself, I saw first hand what it did to everyone around them; unlike you, I don’t exactly have a “Muad Dib” of my own to keep me from destroying myself, so I just have to labor on with the lukewarm hope that someday, something will happen that will inject a tiny parcel of meaning into my lukewarm existence.

Unknown said...

But know this, reading your words has often helped me in times of extreme blankness; you may not think much of yourself or what you have to say, but I think that you are one of the most important people alive in the world today, even if you don’t know it. Like I said, I don’t know if my word even means anything to anyone anywhere; plenty of people consider me a nutjob when I talk about things like putting magnets in my body, or taking weird drugs nobody’s ever heard of to try and see new colors, or even just trying to fix all the fuck-ups of the natural processes that created me, but I think that what you are doing is good, very good; and if you leave this world, I feel like one of the chords that binds me to it will be cut and the terrible oblivion from which I have been trying to escape will be left to consume me. I hope that someday, that ultimate kernel of meaningfulness will find you in the endless fog just as I hope it will find me...

P.S.: I chose the name of my gmail account before I realized you existed, so my use of "anonym" in it is purely coincidental...

Anonymous said...

You're fucking awesome. Lots of us appreciate who you are and what you do.

Wouter Groenewold said...

Your an inspiration. Good to hear your up and running again. Take care, chin up! =)

*Wouter

Anonymous said...

Your work is too important for you to die prematurely.

dox11reborn@yahoo.com said...

it's not the falling down that's important we all do some times hard and with help the only important thing is that we get back up no matter how slowly just that we do. welcome lepht you have been missed, that said now the obligitory sarcasm "insert your least wanted phrase here" sorry couldn't come up with some thing clever.

Unknown said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
Anonymous said...

Just wanted to chime in. Glad to see you still on the Earth. I've just deleted a pile of pithiness on the subject of maintaining hopefulness; seems that you're demonstrating your ability in this respect through some very difficult times, so how about, just keep it up please?

Unknown said...

Welcome back. As everyone else has said, I'm glad that you didn't go through with the suicide.

I haven't seen the contact info post, but about a week after the initial so you may have removed it already. It's always good to have more friends and i'm suffering from a lack of contact too (not quite the same scale, but no matter).

Shoot me a message at john.m.e.potts(at)gmail.com if you're looking to talk. Hopefully I don't pick up too much spam either.

Unknown said...

Lepht-


I can't explain WHY I'm reading your blog. I saw that video of you putting stuff inside you, made years ago. Since I sometimes build hardware, I wanted to know where you'd gone with it.


That said, what I came across seemed to be a cautionary tale about a girl who got herself addicted to pain meds. Someone who rolled the dice, betting balls against talent, and lost.


I can't explain why I feel like I can relate. I came from nothing, buried myself in programming and built a life from it. I guess I always looked around at the talented and thought 'maybe if I just keep fucking digging, my lack of talent won't matter'.


It's hard feeling like there's this thing you want to be, and feeling like maybe you just weren't born into it. Maybe it's just not your destiny.


The thing is, and pay attention to this part, most of those people have no passion at all. I think, in the end, I learned that I didn't have to have talent, so long as I had the passion to keep me pushing. I might never be the smartest guy in the class, but that guy doesn't have the will to create, and so he won't. Maybe what I create will be shoddy compared with what he could have created, but he lacks the will, creativity and passion to do so.


Anyway, I'm much older now ... age has a way of filling up your life, until you are just a small part in it. I hope you make it that far.


I might not check back here for a while, but if you want to email me, by all means, please do. I'm curious about exactly what happened between the interview with that girl who seemed so much on the edge of something, and this woman who seems to have fallen off that edge.


Feel free to ask me about code, recovery, building a life, motorcycles, rock climbing ... Anything, really. I feel like I know far too much about you, to deny you any answers.


I hope you read this, and it gives you some kind of hope. Life can be so long, that you find yourself splitting it into 'lifetimes'. I lived a lifetime as a poor kid, with no future. I lived a lifetime in my car, university courses and uncertain future at best ... Who I am now wouldn't recognize me from before.


Get a hold of me. I'll tell you how, sometimes, everything shifts, and your life becomes something you forgot was possible.


Email: bishop@coredumpproject.com
or
coredumpproject@google.com

AIM: bishop1786

Anonymous said...

It amazes me how many of you so-called loyal and long term followers are managing to misgender and disrespect Lepht's identity in these comments.

For shame, you careless inattentive fuckheads.

Stay breathing Lepht.

Unqualified to speak said...

@Anonymous: well said, boss.

Anonymous said...

Lepht,

First, so glad that you decided, unconsciously or not, to stay.

Second, such beautiful textual expression even with the pain and uncertainty.

I admire and respect the adventures you pursue in spite of the scares along the way (I've battled depression with mixed success my whole life - fortunately I'm getting better at it; it's no longer the most likely thing to kill me).

By the way, I'm writing a novel in which one of the two most important characters, inhabiting the near future, holds you in high regard as her inspiration, an experimenter _in extremis_ (as in Newton and his eyeball investigations).

Thank you for pursuing what many can't or won't.

Kesho Zeto

Anonymous said...

i'm glad you're still here. [:

Anonymous said...

i don't really read your blog on a regular base, but i've stumbled across it today, again.

i've watched your talk at the ccc some years ago and enjoyed it, as it showed a whole new section of hacking to me. one i have not thought of in that depth before. thank you :)

Caveman said...

Hey Lepht,

I'm glad you came to your senses again. Listen, I'm not one of those mushy, teary-eyed, I-love-you-so-much-Lepth, group-hug fellows. But I'm willing to listen, so drop me a mail at top-rob(at)web.de
I probably won't be able to offer you much advice... or good advice... (Here is some: Don't fucking kill yourself! It's bad for your health...) On the other hand, before you get stupid again and try to off yourself, you might as well give me a try.
Cheers, girl

Imran said...

You don't have to be sorry. You just have to live. I know depression and I also know there's a path out of it too. Hang on :)

Meticulous Geek said...

Hi, it't nice to finally hear from you, I have been checking your blog every week and I am glad that you are still here. I don't have much to say to you this time.... But I just want to wish you the best of luck in getting out of it. I don't know you, I have never seen you, sand vice versa but know this, I have been touched by you and your work in one way or another, you have inspired me to do things and I cant thank you enough for that. This is starting to sound like a babble but I am saying whatever I am thinking without a filter on my thoughts here... forgive me for that... Anyway, hang on in there friend, don't do anything stupid to yourself or any of us or anyone that is near and dear to you... I know that you probably couldn't give a horse's ass about any a stranger on the internet but thats ok... I dont that from anyone... Whatever you are doing and whatever you do is awesome... please keep being awesome and I wish you the best of luck with getting back on track....

Moray Jaundice said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
Moray Jaundice said...

Who are you? You're an old friend from university! Who am I? I tried to find myself through computer programming, but I still couldn't grasp any coherence in life, so I moved on to other things. That's my own personal bullshit, but it explains why I haven't been working on the things we used to talk about, and hence how I disappeared from your circles.

It's been so long since I've seen you and I've no idea of how your self developed. Thus, here is how I remember you from long ago. Perhaps it will awaken deeper memories; find the self that is stored in long term memory.

The first occasion we met was to discuss computer hacking. I asked if you wanted to meet up to code a thing, but you shot me down. I suspected that you thought I was hitting on you because you have boobs. In truth, I really wanted to work with you on computers because you're clever. I never mentioned it, for I was poor at vocalising objections at the time; now I am incredibly fucking direct! Which is exactly the trait that you exhibited there. To be upfront and direct is entirely positive, and that's what you were.

You used to pour whisky in your coffee that you'd drink before class. No-one would know than those you would tell. I suspect you often played esoteric games, though I would have missed them as my attendance was rare. Still I mused on your habits at the time and I think you had a few reasons. Obviously, first, because whisky. Secondly, to have a secret that divided you from the rest. Thirdly, when revealed to others who were hip, they would see their hip mirrored in yours. Then you could hang with groovy people. In short, you were an absurd yet adorable hipster; too cool a cat for the square crew; sitting there with your massive head-phones listening to industrial and playing with the magnets in your fingers.

You came to my 21st. On this evening I drank a lot of booze VERY quickly, snogged a dude, fell out with my girlfriend, vomited, and felt, looked and was completely awful. I upset you in an unusual manner, I remember, when I played some piano. You voiced envy of my (shockingly abysmal) skills. Anger and envy are powerful drives. They're not always pretty, but they have indubitably kicked my arse into getting stuff done. In any case, envy is preferable to apathy and ugliness is preferable to an evanescence of your dreams. What better fuel for the ambitions of a young person with smarts?

Who are you now, Lepht?

Who am I now? I'm rather fucked up, but I now have many positive traits. Being a good person is so difficult, but nowadays I really try to be lovely. I drink an awful lot less too. I'm reaching for my musical ambitions and still doing my degree.

If you need a friend, I'm here. I have a couple of new blogs, in case that's a good starting point for banter. ne-fiasco covers the fucking disastrously stupid and hilarious things I've done. I also have a writing blog called tiny postcards where I practise various forms.

Drop me a comment, or a mail. If you want to meet up, that's cool; I still live in the city. If not, that's also cool. I don't mind, for I know I'm a difficult person.

Thanks for keeping my lyric up on your banner. You made it into another, in a jazzy number called Flattery:

“Her tattoo is a gift;
I am flattered by it.
Inked on some maddened night.
Our relationship is
meaningless and shit,
wrecked by being fucked all the time. “

Worry not, Lepht, those last three lines are about someone else. Blurring people together is a technique I use to develop more ideas.

Yours mnemonically,
Johnny.

Will May said...

Stay alive!

Unknown said...

Please stay around. I won't say cliché shit like "It all gets better", but I will say that you should hang out for a while. Lots of people care.

Anonymous said...

good luck
it's not over now you'll have to deal with life
also, read mails if you need support

Zorbeltuss said...

I cannot say how happy I am that you are here still, if you find the mail I sent you a few months ago, well I was a bit manic then, so you are free to ignore it if you wish.

I've been having that type of depressive episode myself once, we apparently had one thing in common in that, which I will tell to my doctors the next time I see them: seroquel, it is supposed to be active in your system for 6-12 months and the obvious side effects of just one are quite strong in them selves, the less obvious well, I hope that they stop giving drugs with that long a wait from that you stop taking them until they stop affecting you.

Anonymous said...

Maybe you guys are interested in this:

ISSUE #2: BIO/HARDWARE HACKING

http://peerproduction.net/issues/issue-2/

Would be great if somebody could post it over at biohack.me, as I am not a registered user there.

Cheers,
N.

Anonymous said...

I've only learned of your existence recently, and already you are a big role-model of mine. You are a fantastically brilliant individual and the world needs more people like you.

Director X said...

I think I know a Miami realtor who wants some black mold spores mailed to each of his listings....
Maybe some termite eggs too for good measure.

Hows that for cute information?

Alluvial said...

I tried to kill myself three years ago, and a friend said, "If we weren't so close, I wouldn't even consider you worth speaking to right now. I have no respect for people who can't handle life."

It meant more than I care to admit in most company.

Cheers.

MrWizrd@biohack.me said...

Glad to see you're still here. I'm *much* less active within ##biohack on freenode and the forums at discuss.biohack.me than I used to be due to life changing as it is wont to do, but I want you to know that you sparked a lasting interest in me and helped encourage me to make a small contribution to the community. For that I will always be grateful, because doing nothing is too easy. Life doesn't always feel worth it, but please keep going.

Ian Mackintosh said...

A little late I know, time is a funny thing, both with Internets and internal mental spaces.

Lepht hang in there, depression is both well and spring. Middle people like me watched your lecture at 27C3 enthralled and mildly disturbed. Humanity is the richer for your presence.

Ian Mack

Unknown said...

Read this just now. You are an inspiration for many of us, we would be sad to see you go.

Eden said...

oooo er ok mm lot to read here 7 months ago came across ya on the web interestin espeshaly the neo fingers that interests me thats how i ended up here wharever that is so what kind of sensation do you get from mains cables in the wall or other things how far away do you start to feal the emf looking at duin this myself shit er duno what els to say oh i put this link up for gold plated magnets as i think its ideal what you say like to no seeing as you are the only one i no who has dun it http://www.first4magnets.com/therapy-magnets-12-c.asp hope you are well an ye me spelling suks :P

Eden said...

ok had a look at the northpaw circuit it requires karnaugh mapping to get the i/o to a minimum re select surface mount components aaa to the req io
lose the motors in faver of gold micro ribon and micro led or fractal aerial pads to stimulate nervs at req voltage as to be felt encapsulate the whole thing in a gold case probable be able to use scrap jewelry to make this bit pricy but the best way to go insulated from the case a fractal printed arial on its surface would enable induction charging from a pad external to your body karnaugh mapping is deff required to miniturise this device and a full aaa surface mount rebuild along with newer smaller ic chips and aaa surface mount components it should be posable to make your southpaw hows that grab ya or am i pissing in the wind an ye am qualified to also maybe just one pad instead of 8 just for north would be even better for disine buld and sise and simpler functionality not to mention power consumption.so pot the whole thing in resin and shell made of 9ct gold is as chep and viable as u could doo it and it work and not be rejected by ya body

Eden said...

somthing els that may interest you is more for me working but i think you may like the idea a voltage detector wand for ac good quality construction already surface mount and when removed from the case you buy it in the board is actually quiet small 10mm wide by 35mm long all in minus the battery this could be relapsed by lithium cell and charge loop for induction encapsulated and replace the on/off switch in the circuit with a reed switch this could be put inside the body and turned on and off with on of the magnets in your fingers the led would light up through the skin when near an ac field as it is supost to hell the dam thing is virtually made already when bought and is say 30 quid ish also thare is a dc detector version as well is a hack worth considering if ya ask me not to mention useful

Anonymous said...

Just watched some of your talk from TheVerge article posted back in August, real cool stuff.

We all need human contact. If you need any extra I'm on steam. ghostinthecode

flamingsword said...

I have tracked you down on the internet because a friend is making an Eclipse Phase character in your image. He says your NPC will be one of the progenitors of the scum swarm our first story arc will be dealing with. You are living a uniquely leveraged life on the edges of what's possible, an intrepid explorer. Legends are now being written about you.

My depressive episodes are easier managed than yours. I can't imagine what it feels like that far down. But know that complete strangers are pulling for you to live for selfish reasons of our own.

flamingsword said...

I have tracked you down on the internet because a friend is making an Eclipse Phase character in your image. He says your NPC will be one of the progenitors of the scum swarm our first story arc will be dealing with. You are living a uniquely leveraged life on the edges of what's possible, an intrepid explorer. Legends are now being written about you.

My depressive episodes are easier managed than yours. I can't imagine what it feels like that far down. But know that complete strangers are pulling for you to live for selfish reasons of our own.

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[pls no ask about the vodka. debate is always welcome. remember, Tramadol fucks you up]