Perspective

noun

• [mass noun] the art of representing three-dimensional objects on a two-dimensional surface so as to give the right impression of their height, width, depth, and position in relation to each other
• the appearance of viewed objects with regard to their relative position, distance from the viewer, etc.
• [count noun] a view or prospect.
• Geometry the relation of two figures in the same plane, such that pairs of corresponding points lie on concurrent lines, and corresponding lines meet in collinear points.
• a particular attitude towards or way of regarding something; a point of view
• [mass noun] true understanding of the relative importance of things; a sense of proportion
• an apparent spatial distribution in perceived sound.

Origin:
late Middle English (in the sense 'optics'): from medieval Latin perspectiva (ars) '(science of) optics', from perspect- 'looked at closely', from the verb perspicere, from per- 'through' + specere 'to look'

http://oxforddictionaries.com/definition/english/perspective

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At 3 AM, pain is terrifying. When I wake during the 3 AM hour, as I have the last few evenings, curled into myself with my abdominal muscles (yes, even my fat body has them somewhere under the rolls) and my upper and lower legs in tight cramps, I'm terrified. I don't wake as though I've had a nightmare. I don't wake remembering anything from the dream I'd assume to be the cause. Still, I wake anxious and upset and hesitant to go back to the sleep I'd like to have assuming I'm able to straighten my body out in a way that the cramps can be eliminated.

When the alarm goes off at 5:55 AM, and I stand for the first time, I'm given an instant reminder of 3-something AM, courtesy of the then-tight muscles from a few hours before. I still don't have a sense of what started them curling in the middle of the night. I wake exhausted.

As I near 10 AM, sitting at work or doing whatever the weekend plans dictate, anxiety sneaks in.  Like the cramping, I don't have a sense of where it comes from. All I want to do is lay down. The 3-something muscle tightness is replaced by a pervasive dance of negative thoughts and fears and it becomes a 10-something tightness in my breathing. I find a full breath rather difficult unless I deliberately make an effort to breathe one. Shallow, nearly non-existent breathing is the default. It isn't that I can't breathe, it's that my body won't let me have a breath until I somehow will my body over my mind.

As I near mid-day, something in me eases. That ease becomes exhaustion by 2-something. By 3 or 4, the 10-something is back again and it fluctuates for the rest of the evening. As I start to feel sleepy, it eases, pushing me to get changed and head to bed. As soon as I lay down, 10-something is back until my body wins over my mind and the victory lasts until I wake up with it replaced by 3-something, when my mind controls my body against my conscious will.

From the lens I attach to my attempt at understanding, various pictures develop.  But what does one do when the camera that is your understanding is defective?  What if the tool to which you attach those lenses--the same tool you've been using since you've been 5--doesn't do a good enough job?  What if its perspective is too narrow or too toy or too old or too colored by someone else's vision? 

In truth, what happens is that a perspective emerges--a familiar perspective--and the familiarity of the perspective is comforting but the picture from that same perspective is upsetting. 

While I look for a new tool, I attach various lenses to the old one. 

Lens #1-- The sick lens
Lens #2-- The fat lens
Lens #3-- The flashback lens
Lens #4-- The overtired lens
Lens #5-- The you're-not-worth-more lens
Lens #6-- The mental-patient lens
Lens #7-- The bad-mattress lens
Lens #8-- The maybe-it's-job-stress lens
Lens #9-- The I'm-just-like-my-mother lens  
Lens #10-- The you're-just-dehydrated lens

When I look at 3-something AM through each, the images hold at least partial truth.  Almost without variety, though, the image snapped using each looks the same.  All capture something closer to waste film than an actual image.  And I recognize the familiarity of waste.  I collect them, add them to an old album, and turn page after page after page after page seeing the same thing.  It is this constant backdrop-- a constant story where dates and ages and times don't seem to matter as much as they should.  I view waste film. 

When the tool you have is defective but you're still looking to fix a problem, you first try different lenses.  When the different lenses don't work, you remind yourself the tool is broken and you set out for a new tool.  You carry the album with you.  Your body and mind try to find something in the waste film images, each working to different degrees at different moments, but nearly always resulting in the same picture. 

And believe me, please believe me, I do look for different tools.  I do look to be taught how to use different tools.  When I find them or use them they feel so wrong and I worry about offending the new teacher as I express doubt and so, I try to stay silent because offending opens options for the offended to retaliate against the offender and I am that person unless I'm quiet. 

Say nothing...always say nothing... or say it and then take it back.  Go back to your old tool.  Keep playing with different lenses... and remember insanity, doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results, means you're either looking through lens #6 or lens #9.