August 2nd, 1971

Gulfport, Mississippi

I truly don’t know at what point to begin writing. This entire summer whirls through my head as a totally incoherent jumble of psychosis. In fact, my entire life since Oklahoma City has been insane. All it has been is confusion, fear, loneliness, and despondency.

I feel as though I am now standing in a blind alley in my life. Everything that has ever happened to me, everything I have ever done, everything that has even touched me has led me to this point. And right now I feel as though I am in some horrible night– and the day seems so far away.

Life itself, the simple act of existing, has, for me, gradually in the last few weeks and months become a terrible exercise in madness. My days have become nightmare dramas of insanity.

I have got to pull myself together. I have got to stop, get my breath, and view my life in some integrated, whole concept. This madness has got to cease.

“I am sick of being sick.”

But where do I begin the analysis?

“Let us begin at the beginning”