There’s a folkloristic idea of “common knowledge” that I sometimes think of when I try to remember what Marcus and I actually talked about when we discussed our projects. A lot of it was just pressured assent. Not exactly pressured by one another, more like pressured against an absent voice, the voice of the art world or perhaps the world-world, which we thought had the wrong ideas about cooperation, the wrong ideas about appropriation, the wrong ideas about authenticity, the wrong ideas about the lives of artists. At the same time we were still romantic about what we were doing. There was a quest-vibe to it. But there weren’t a lot of proper nouns.

At first, I thought my mental illness was considered a mark of belonging. I thought I was destigmatizing something by describing my new medication to any coworker who asked; now I’m not so sure. Maybe it was brave, weird, exhibitionist, socially suicidal, or all of the above. Maybe I just felt scared and alone, and thought that talking about it would make me feel less disconnected and better understood. I wanted the sustenance of friends looking on and knowing that I was imperfect and touched by the devils and angels of madness.

Our friendship was like stilts.