New Years Err-ve

Your last few minutes before the imminent actuation of 2012 were probably expended on the disintegration of your own liver through [a hopeful] self application. Or, as I had, had done anything else inconceivably bland. Like disassociating reflections irrelevant to a conducive purchasing of a new calendar, because you had spent the afternoon voraciously venturing anywhere the free trains found a track to roll upon,  while a concealed half-empty booze bottle blackmailed my thalamus to transform my more tranquil temperaments to those that thwarted the terror of singing aloud to my Regina Spektor playlist in the style of Jonathan Richman with a veracious sincerity to move passengers. Of this endeavor, I’ve an obligation to impart a word of advice; “project your voice as thunderous train rails will big-league your thunder on principle. Try the candid musical at Whole Foods! …My concert didn’t move anyone. Expect to move their narrow-mindedness away.” 

Of my last minutes of 2011:  spent swallowed supinely by a subterranean silver serpent, spanning seven serially spacious cylinder-shaped stomachs. Counting down the demise of 2011 with unacquainted patrons on L.A.’s Metro Goldline, was a disproportionately grievous but accurate reckoning of my lone dejection. I had already been privy to the dejection. And I hadn’t stigmatized an opposition to gang-related public countings. …or chantings. 

It was a reminder of the dejection to be on that train anxiously wanting to negate it by being somewhere among people I just met but knew the signature laughs to, subconsciously suffocating because of the possibility of 2011′s implosion engrossing the train into an ink-blackness, billowed broodingly the looming nebulous darkness deflating downwards mocking the touchdown of a buoyant balloon toward the pinch left of that little white promise. Fostered, finally by my indolent yet conscientious cerebral constitutions. I had no wishes to be reminded of these or other things behind the sun before I had my coffee from the fresh pot of the new year. …But their merriness know no mercy! Further exasperated by an unflinching off-key acapella belting of Auld Lang Syne in the key of ‘Contentedly smug assholes’, whilst the more musically declined of intoxicated invalids, will have exponentially expressed evident existential enjoyments to a greater degree than my own, as their overwhelming voices slurred every other word of theirs into my charitable coherence. Finally, they impart insensitively echoed  cheers and chants condescendingly commanding me to “have a happy new year…” 

“‘have,’ is an interrogative!” I’d always wanted to clarify. …cavalierly!

I prayed midnight would not catch this train. Moments before my physical boarding of the train, I’d sent my roommate a text asking his fetching of the phone number to the coffeehouse of which, laid at the ends of my cross-hairs of my steel serpentine missile. I warned them of my impending tardiness. “By 2 minutes”, as specified by my infallible meticulousness.

I had gone to work earlier that day which, coincidentally, was also a coffeehouse. The difference between both cafe’s was a corporate dictatorship, of which mine had lacked warranting my merriment as opposed to counting down the cooking of 2011′s goose behind a cash register. An earnest elation emanated from not having to tiptoe around an invisible ladder of hierarchy. But during my shift New Year’s Eve easygoing-ness, I inadvertently noticed a pattern, perpetuated amongst peculiar patrons; their collective consensus to adorn an indifference to the induction of the new year, 2012.

Ironically, I’d have imposed an indifference of my own caliber towards the discovery of a mass banality under ordinary circumstances, but this banality had especially fingered my fancy as it inconspicuously instituted intelligibility. Indifference was the answer. The essence of life was a dim corridor of endless possibilities to be revealed by the light. But high-up above the essence of existence, the chandelier of chaos swung subversively, illuminating innumerable flickering candles of curiosity infinitely over innumerably transparent possibilities, indifferent to a possibility’s consequence coveted by your necessities.

Having expectations sprouted a salacious susceptibility to somberness. Frowns and grimaces issued. But not having expectations didn’t do that. And contrary to popular banal belief, not having expectations did not prohibit our capabilities to comprehend cheerfulness. Flashy smiles and grins! An indifference instigated an honest humbleness alongside an extinguished egotism.

Upon arrival to the stop, my watch had sweetly slipped some spare minutes to me. But it wasn’t enough to implore my running. My evening’s habiliments included a trench-coat, of which, a contraband whiskey water bottle cooperated with, a sweater vest, fitted slacks and,  finally, pointed Italian boots which merited a significant level of respect, possibly higher than the deterrence of my lone dejection.

I was 2 minutes from the coffeehouse which of whence commenced the hooting, hollering, honking, whistling, clapping, slapping, hugging, kazoo-ing, laughing, screaming, crying, burping, dragging, lighting, spitting, facebooking, smoking, splashing, calling, texting, twitting, screeching, emailing, singing, scratching, clawing, brushing, caressing, kissing, …to the consistent clicking pair of Italian heels on the pavement.

Pacing perfectly, obstinate to stay on-beat, the clicking was immune to twinkling notes in the crowded chords. Perhaps it were the chords who saw no twinkling in the clicking? The enchantment of the crowd’s casual camaraderie seemed inexplicably indiscernible to the piano’s careful chords, chaotically conforming celestial crescendos. The stark clicking continued as the chords always twinkled it’s keys behind his lead. It only click with absolute certainty in time. The meticulous metronome clicked consummately but had always leaded clicks ahead of the keys. The clicking time of which it was a virtuoso, but the chords twinkling of keys gracefully followed behind wherever it went, cursed only ever to hear them nearby, never beside their grace. Never else, besides the clicking.

I found myself mangled among a crowd of friends at the coffeehouse and had forgotten to devise an exit strategy. The sight of it illustrated the clustered cords collected behind an affable entertainment center of a living room of which my disentanglement deplored dusty discouragements. The schemed departure was a quirk of which I’d conditioned myself to prepare aiding my avoidance revelation of my really being a fleshly incarnate of ineptitude abominable in crowds. In hindsight, allowing myself to fall victim to such a state to begin with, exemplified a higher degree of cowardice in comparison to the requisite of a delusional vindication for a fallibly foreshadowed flee of your own prevarication. (enter dream sequence below!)

I stood, shuffling and fidgeting anxiously around sipping my water bottle of whiskey a few minutes in repose,  while they indecisively deliberated among themselves about going to a bar, to which they decidedly went after all. Confessedly, I wanted to join them. But embarrassingly there was a longstanding fear I had inhibiting my being among a group of real nerds. I had the mental aptitude and meticulousness for detail that real nerds possessed, though it demanded more. The preconceived shortcomings I had among them germinated from never having dedicated the incomparable amount of time they mantra’ed into endlessly effortless eccentricities.
I was afraid my arrest would be demanded to justice, or the hauling to the gallows of my malnourished flesh-bagged bones, and spilling of my blood would be chanted for if I had, say,  mistaken their dismissal of my presence to be subtle acceptance and, out of a displaced sense of courage, expounded an obtusely vague reference in regards to some sort of basement pop-culture wonder, errant of a minor detail, I’d be tossed to the repressively enraged mobs o’ subordi-nerds in which they’d have a frenzy inthe defiling of my body!! And those nerds! They will defile me with an overt courteousness, I’d have an inclination to shake they’re unsatisfied hands as I picked up my shuffled, tattered remains of my wits! And poker cards! This floor was filthy! …no it’s not your fault, Craig. I forget the nerdy public brandings! Imagine it! being forced to stand publicly in place! My posture is guaranteed to receive not an smidgen of envy! …and the nerds that setup  the display of your sickly body! They say ‘please’ and are dressed stereotypicall-y! Real nerds are to lazy to have a big bang theory! …or a little bang! …sorry, it wasn’t directed… yeah, I know… well how would I…? Digress now! Okay! I will if you promise to continue wearing large t-shirts! with the logos that can’t be paid a single cent  for it’s lack of sense! …and it’s pastel shade from overwashings!

Digressed. ‘would you mind‘?! They ask me! the nauseating formality! Certainly not! It was implied I had no choice! but your tone! So gentle and exudes a gracious politeness! …I feel bad for not having a choice!”  AND THEY STAMP!  Stamped with such stamping! The atrociousness absent! …fingerless fingerpointing! Devoid of detriment! you misunderstood monsters!  fraud!  They say…? at me? poseur!  one of them murmurs, but he’s hiding his face! I can’t tell if he’s actually trying to talk to the guy next to him.  infadel!  Bravo! I yell back at him. I did not not anticipate your originality! ‘Why thank you!’  he yells back a moment later. and stamped with black sharpies the exact opposite  fury exemplified during the holocaust. A full-blooded nerd could be compared to a German Nazi to some degree.

Of course, that statement would be pushing the boundary, but you wouldn’t think so after witnessing the kind of passive, unobtrusive contempt so mercilessly managed, it’d flabbergasted you to anomalously deteriorate into a state of catatonia to which even the thought of suicide seemed as feasible as cutting down a tree with a piece of bark. Fuck that shit! I’ll spend New Years alone with the shitty whiskey in the water bottle.

Even the whiskeyed water bottle in solitude to the fantastical Pulp albums on New Years morning presented a deficit in the standardized quality of torment my fearful fortune favored. I counseled a relationship till 4. (Rather than embellish the rest of that in full detail, which included hours of hysteria, a secret cave off the train tracks, a search for a little girl’s stuffed animal, and a chocolate breakfast burrito, I’ll summarize.) 

Notes from counseling (I basically had to reiterate these few lines multiple times in order to get the message through. I think they’ll help someone… if you listen to the words you use.)

-Irrational arguments are ones you make excellent points… that are irrelevant to the topic. They only sandwich more layers into your shit sandwich, but with gummy worms and waffles. (Plus, you sacrifice validity and maturity by reintroducing an already digested topping.)

-pedantic arguments are the ones where the past is brought up as ammunition for a new argument, which is also a repeat performance. And sometimes, this is done accidentally and will snowball into something else if you have Stubborn’s Disease.

-childish arguments are pedantic arguments, but have become childish because of your employ of, “I wasn’t the one who started it.” or the ‘shut your mouth when you’re talking to me!” and my favorite:

“you did this to me once remember, I’m doing the same thing back.”  the ol’ i get a freebie because this fight had already been had, but we’re not going to learn from it, nor any of the other fights we had and will ever have. -Then followed by the consequent, “how can you be mad at me for doing that?! I was going to use the freebie i think you know I technically justified.”

I don't know how to optimize my content with photos.

the lost and found

There is a peculiar kind of love I have for Christmas. A kind of unconditional, peculiar love not applicable to my parents nor of or for the usual benign gift-wrapped associations of which accompanies the holiday. It blooms from my belief of it’s being the only time of year reprieve from moral abjection is granted to the City of Angels. Los fucking Angeles.

Among the fertile, fecundate shit, piss and squalor on the gray city sidewalks, the laughter of children is the sole constituent that could resuscitate the earth’s earnest, human altruism. At the least, be the foremost leap towards it’s ideology. Pershing Square at Christmas time must be the expectant epicenter because it is the only place within Downtown L.A. safe enough for a congregation of cheerful children.

By children, I refer not only to the short, pedantic, underdeveloped, revokees of roller-coaster access, chilli-drens, but also their taller, geriatric, intellectually regressive, one-night-standing-around-without-a-clue, a-dull-ts. Young, old, and in-betweens will find no segregation of brand-name decades there because there, and only there, we are all the children of our epoch. Malice is granted no quarter and offered no solace there. Of course, house-rules always answer to chance. Fortunately, the worst thing that can happen here would a few bruised cheeks of asses. The ice should help! Maybe a sprained ankle if you forgot to pack sensibility in your lunch.

No one was capable of disappointment, depression, or discontent. Supervised liberty. Like that time you didn’t make a big thing of telling your parents of the first friend you’d made at school, or the night you couldn’t sleep because of a scary movie you were told not to watch but did anyway because it was your first co-ed sleepover, or the way you were rude to some kid you liked being around for inexplicable reasons but later realized the kid was your first playground crush. -Every kid was rich with wonder and uncertainty. A magic trick I don’t know the trick to! Every person, essentially kids, on that ice rink reached into their private accounts. And hidden in the safety deposit box of a soul was that shiny, tiny bit of visceral vigor of youth they’d presumed washed away with the deluge of adulthood.

There on that frosted Los Angeles ice-rink, nestles the fleeting innocence of which we were all once wealthy with. Pershing Square, the lost and found.

Vater O! Vater

It was the chore itself of having to live with him that dejected me. Or rather, having to acknowledge his existence as a father figure. Only illustrations of the valiance in his youth embroidered as stories into my mind by my mother. That drawing itself may have been a premeditated aggrandizement because I saw no resemblance between the picture and the man. Fathers. It wasn’t as though he were scurrilous or mentally bedeviling during my nascence, he simply had no ballot in the matter. However, the symbolism of his being was indispensable to my own fruition.

It’s a befuddling effort to embrace the long lost father theory (rather, a cliché) that our regressive pop-culture had imbued into our minimum-wage consciences. To apply anything less than an immaculate, spiritual pregnancy to a fathers role was trite to the point of atrociousness. Nonetheless, the emancipation from fathers, just as well mothers for that matter, had always been the resolve of our mandatory youth, and taking with you the modifications they’ve bequeathed into your days of development despite delinquencies. A father could be there and not be there. The attendance of flesh merited much less than the attendance of meaning.

Only when one becomes free of that patriarchal despotism could one learn to appreciate ones own life and tip them 15%.

I did not feel the least bit bereaved at his passing. I wasn’t despondent nor somber. Deflected the phosphorescent blue blasts of melancholy and found the imagination and courage to accept his affect on me. Peace comes from being, not having as Miller said. And his unorthodox portraiture will live on inside me with a four star Yelp review.

“He was more to be envied than pitied, for his sleep was not a lull or an interval but sleep itself which is the deep and hence sleeping ever deepening , deeper and deeper in sleep sleeping, the sleep of the deep in deepest sleep, at the nethermost depth full slept, the deepest and sleepest sleep of sleep’s sweet sleep. He was asleep. He is asleep. He will be asleep. Sleep. Sleep. Father, sleep, I beg you, for we who are awake are boiling in horror.”

-Tropic of Capricorn, Henry Miller

poetry

I have never liked poetry.

period.

Don’t misunderstand.

intro to alexandrian condor

The reason Coral meant something, the only reason, was because she wasn’t supposed to be real. She was the modern embodiment of the poetry in prose that was so very absent today. It was strange. She was the last guiding light of art in the universe. And I couldn’t touch her for an atrocious reason. It’s brilliant. She was the light I always wrote alongside my words that contradicted and condescended the darkness I saw constantly and consistently. She was not supposed to exist. She wasn’t supposed to be real magic. “She” means I’m real too, and I never wanted that. Coral was fact, rationalism, logic, art, thought, ideas, presumptions; eclipsed into a straight line, and extended just outside of my arms reach. As all dreams should. Otherwise, what the fuck else was heaven supposed to mean.

Commitments

The thing about commitment is that a commitment is a commitment. It does not have an expiration date. Brushing your teeth every morning with your wife or husband for 30 years is a commitment. People who avoid a big commitment are the only ones who know how big a thing a commitment really is.

People talk behind people’s backs in A flat. If I didn’t speak to you condescendingly, it my give you the false impression of my having any respect for you. At least I care enough to talk about you.

Why, hello! I’m Mr. I-had-no-friends-growing-up-so-I-only-watched-t.v.-and-can-now-make-countless-pop-culture-references-that-makes-no-sense-to-anyone-else-but-me. You must be Ms. Commitment.

We need to arrive at a strange detente because we’re like two dogs circling each other at the park about to bite each others eyeballs out. Now, I say that with all the love in the world. Wait, didn’t I share half a pastrami sandwich with you in the back of the washroom at a truckstop in Bakersfield? No? Man, it would have been really funny if you said yes. Two answers and you pick the unfunny one. I’m being childish and not taking this seriously? Why do people say that with such pleasure? I have feelings, you know. Hold on, I gotta take a dump real quick.

Done. My large colon took your lunch from the lounge. I’m was in the bathroom negotiating it’s release.

Someone considered too nice, is considered a naïve idiot. Dostoyevsky said this. Voltaire said this in Candide. Demonstratus! (I wrote in Latin because I don’t hide how much of an ass I am when I’m writing). People call nice people, idiots, because they remind them so much of who they aren’t. Like a flu. And before they know it, that person has made them a better person. No, I don’t want to have sex right now, I’m in the middle of a dumb idea. Mel Gibson movies aren’t going to get me into the mood! Where’d you study?! Do I love you? I love parts of you, but we’re getting closer. I’m an idiot? I’m not disagreeing. But don’t blame me for being vulgar, and having naughty fantasies… blame my gender!

They’ll probably make a statue of you one day, but probably with your pants pulled down and a giant Kick Me sign taped onto your back. Hold on, I need to tell my editor something. “So the rabbit goes aroooound the tree in a loop, theeeeen it goes down the hole.” Okay, where was I? Again, two answers and you’re choosing to be dull. I’m being childish again?! Okay, okay. It’s bargaining if you want something isn’t it? It’s begging if you know you’ve nothing to sweeten the pot with. This kind of thinking killed our lord. At least once.

Life is scary, and dangerous and complicated and going down like a plane. Hope is for sissies. I’m going to ignore you now because you make me sad… you lesbian! Well, I know you’re bisexual, I was just rounding up, Ms. Commitment. Am I kidding, you ask? If I was kidding, I’d be dressed like you. Wait, are those… Givenchy’s? Nice. Did you know hallucinating is the way for the brain to work out a messed up problem…. and that your brain is bleeding. That’s what happens when a bus hits you, when I say bus, I mean a passive aggressive commitment keeper.

huzaaaaaaaahh

I’m sure the way I was maimed from childhood was no worse than your getting raped. My parents traveled a lot when I was growing up. They’d leave me with grandma. Oma, I called her. Dutch for grandmother. Too terrified to screw up when she was around. I couldn’t screw up because I was too scared to sleep in the yard or take a bath in ice. I kept calling her Oma because it would arise suspicion had I not. Plus she was still my grandma, and still Dutch. This story is true. Maybe not for me, but for someone it is.

 

What happened to you may have been horrendous, but you can’t base the rest of your life on it. You can base your moment on it, but that’s because that’s what life is. It’s a series of waiting rooms, and who we got stuck in a room with adds up to what our lives are. Now, you’ve found out you’re pregnant and want to keep a rape baby. Are you more or less “not okay” than you were 5 minutes ago? Probably not. If you want to talk to me, talk to me. Don’t quote me bumper stickers. The problems with exceptions to rules is the line drawing. It might make sense to the asshole that did this to you, but where do we draw the line? Which asses do we get to kill? Which asses get to keep on being asses? The nice thing about abortion debate is we can quibble over trimesters, but ultimately there’s a nice clean line; birth. Morally, there isn’t much difference. But practically, there’s a huge difference. I can’t have a normal conversation about dumb shit like our favorite music or t.v. shows, but this kind of conversation, I do best. And hate the most. With personal subjects, there aren’t any answers, only opinions. In the end, you don’t care about it, and I sure as hell don’t either.

 

People can do good things, but their instincts are crap. When we’re left with our own devices, we make dumb descisions. Either god doesn’t exist or he’s unimaginably cruel. Like, God doesn’t exist and he let you get raped and is letting you carry a rape baby. Maybe he’s testing you. What kind of grade does everyone else get? Do they get the same test? What you believe doesn’t make too much sense. If you believe in eternity, then life is irrelevant. If I don’t believe in eternity, then what I do to make this world a better place doesn’t matter either.

 

My beliefs lead to no ultimate consequence, and nothing matters because of it. Is it a comfort? Or does the moment mean much more to me than it does you? (that isn’t really my belief either. Then again, neither is the former, think about that.)

 

I don’t care about the answers to your questions, but I’ll give them. But I would much rather ask why you’re asking questions. Because the answers you’re looking for, will never change. They will never be definite. But your motives for wanting to ask certain questions, tells me everything. The story about my grandma was true. It wasn’t my grandma, but it was true. It was my dad. But that really doesn’t mean anything. I’m who I am because of it. Without having to base the rest of my life according to the moments I was in the room with him.

 

I know my answers aren’t what you’re looking for. But you know how I would answer. Knew I would answer. And socially, I’m required to say something to help you. Except I can’t. No one can. We’ll drag out your story, tell ourselves it’ll help you heal and then feel good about ourselves. But in the end, all we’ve really done is make a girl cry. Today will never suck anymore than it did yesterday.

 

Doing things; changes things. Not doing things; leaves things exactly the way they are. Time changes nothing. We’re all base animals that crawl along the earth, and sometimes, just sometimes, we aspire to do something that is less than pure evil, and extrapolate to all of humanity. We need reasons, everything has reasons, and the one thing our reasons have in common, are that they’re stupid. All the time. Well, most of all the time.

Just a fucking room.

I can’t give up this room. It may mean nothing to you, but it’s more than just a fucking room to me. The apartment is under my name. The gas bill is under my name. The electricity bill is under my name. Location, city, neighborhood; I worked my fucking ass off to find this apartment. I sacrificed a fucking lot to get this apartment, lost a lot of fucking things (not superficialities) to get this room. Including my goddamn mind. I’ve almost lost my life trying to keep the place. My room is still just a goddamn room to you all. It IS NOT just a fucking room to me. It is a symbol. It has been leased to me under a new life. A life after the desolate one ravaged and pillaged the soul I had. That is why I have two names. I have died once before, and this apartment, this room, is that life’s epitaph. It is not just a room.

 

They’ve promised my room away to some person I’ve never met before, (we’ll shed some light on this person in a moment), what little soul I had left, I laugh condescendingly, but was a drop in the bucket to their laugh. Let me give you a tour of the boat. The Ship! There is a room downstairs, the only room downstairs, the hazing room. We judge and size the new roommates down here, and it is a place where the newcomers move into. They prove themselves here. We discover how narrow their souls are, and we have discovered plenty o’narrow ones, and are okay with letting them stay here. That’s the kind of place we are, everyone deserved a chance. It is not just a room.

 

There are three rooms upstairs. J has a room upstairs. J‘s name has been added on the lease, next to mine, and R‘s. R drifted away into oblivion, lost at sea, mourned his own existence in the process. I, myself, was apart of the original crew. Plank Ownership, is what they call it, and I have never once exercised my right as owner. Never. Not fucking once.

 

M moved in after R‘s replacement moved in, and bunked together. The captain’s room. I never had a desire to be in the captain’s room. The largest room. Still don’t. It isn’t just a room. It simply isn’t my room. Then the replacement moved away, leaving M in there, and out of simplicity’s sake, she was allowed to keep it. I can’t speak for the other members of the ship, but I didn’t consider that room as just a room. I liked M, she needed a place to go, I was in the position to help her, the jigsaw pieces fell into place. Exuding cordial hospitality, was an understatement in how she was welcomed.

 

Then there was my room. Not just a fucking room. This was mine. My space. My face. My castle tower. My dungeon. My escape. My resolve. My room. My fucking room. I am sitting in the living room writing this, because I am, now, living there. T was moving out, and I teetered from moving onto the streets, New fucking York, and staying. Of mutiny, as mutinies go, the newest member, in the captain’s quarters, had promised an upstairs room away. Not my room. Not my fucking room, I begged and pleaded. A scornful gale of ferocious gall battered me, telling me my begging and pleading (be mindful of my having being whimsical the entire time) was manipulative. NO QUARTER for ye who holds plank ownership! Thy doth do drugs and listen to the same three songs anyway! But I rebut, I haven’t been able to afford any drugs! But mine medication doth none of thine concern! My room. My fucking room, had been deemed just a fucking room to them.

 

It mattered naught who took ownership of my room. The only, the only, time I had asked for anything of the crew, was shot down in a mammoth hail of cannon-fire. I was ordered (via text) to strip my life and badges off the walls. My walls. Ingrateful scaliwags! I shouted inside my mind. But I had no strength to shout it aloud. I never do. I had spent the last month living off bananas, always fucking bananas, to work my ass off to find a new living, to stay out of New fucking York, my ass was worked off of it. Again Contemporary jazz bands! Kicked out of my own band! The gales of Santa Ana were quite rough that evening, so rough, my vestigial snakeskin balls had to take cover. My room had become just a room, and the beast rests in the lobby of purgatory. A petition was signed! They shout. I chose never to register as a voter, was never overbearing enough, gall was too much work, not like a kitten, not how I was raised, and my father’s funeral occupied my plans of the weekend, but I voted not to go to that either. Spare my snakeskin bits. They chant, it’s just a fucking room!

Life is a series of fucking rooms. Who you get stuck in those rooms with add up to who you are.

 

Thanksgiving for the King’s Crossing

The words we implore can sometimes persuade things to go accordingly. Then there are moments where words maim and cut deep into what meaning of existence we have left. The thinner the yarn holding up your reality, the sharper and more true your words become. My yarn is thin. Anorexic, even. And when you congregate contentment with the futility in arguing against god, or the universe, or the chi, or what have you, the yarn will still hold.

It is an argument against an opponent of whom uncertainty is key in their manifest. The roll of the filthy dice, can land at evens or odds. This only insinuates a displaced hope that keeps your yarn holding. It is when hope is taken away that the tie is severed. Hope is reality, that is why we push. We push and push and push until our insides are out like the trash, our hearts on our sleeves. Care. To care is to love and back, making care a proprietor of hope. When you have nothing, you have nothing to lose. Nothing but hope, if it’s warranted. But how do we discern what is warranted? What do you care about in life that keeps you pushing? Your children? Your families? Your wives and husbands? Your friends? If you have none of these, you’ are permitted to go all in, nothing but to gain. But if you do have these, I have something to say; “Never will you feel the kind of loneliness you feel when everything you care about hasn’t an ounce of hope to spare you.”

You’ve tasted it before. When you’ve mustered enough courage to ask for something you need, and their first response wasn’t a yes or a no, but a hesitation. It tastes rancid to the point where it feels like the twisting of a blade after it has stabbed you. If you ever want to know who your friend’s were, ask them for a favor even you would deny. Watch the dissipation into thin air, the faith you thought they had in your being.

It’s Thanksgiving. Caustically fitting to my manifest. I do not write this in a bitter tone, I do not write this to maim. I write this because you realize somewhere down the line that you’ve no need to escape from who you are anymore. I have come from zero to a man who had the world in his hands and back. I have lost more than what I had initially begun with. I have loved something eternally, and lost something forever. I have believed and denounced everything behind the sun. And now I’ve lost not only myself, but my mind has begun packing. I had asked for the belief in me from those I loved and discovered my worth. And though I’ve blinked through highs and lows, then result will always be, for everyone, that we will have not ascertained anything on our deathbed. The last dying gasp you give, will not be a bad one, nor a good one. The last dying gasp you give is and will always be the punchline to an unmemorable joke.

There were only four things that were ever worth anything to me. But like all things, I could not take them with me; the sound of the piano keys, the laughter of a child who hadn’t yet understood the wretched ways of the world, the tears of someone whom never wanted to see yours, and the sound of water being poured.

Again, I do not write this bitterly or to hurt anyone. I no longer have the strength to care if I did. I spent the last few months finalizing my paperwork for my terrestrial visa, and learned to appreciate life more than I had my entire life. The flowers really do smell beautiful. I wasn’t bright enough to plant my own, but it’s too late. Some people in their 60′s realized too late they hadn’t danced enough while they were young. I realized I was a cat at the end of my ninth life. Maybe that’s why they had so many. I spent too much time trying to convince myself I was everyone’s best friend, a dog, because I had never liked cats. They seemed cold and soulless inside. I didn’t like the idea of being cold on the inside and faking warmth on the outside, because it wouldn’t matter at all whether you had nine lives or ninety-nine.

If you continue to be cold on the inside with those you love, you’ll end up not giving a damn about it at all. What’s your point, then?

Excerpt deleted from Condor of the Alexandria

We were going to listen to dumb obscure shit at the party, I figured. Tom would probably tell us the singer recorded all the vocals to their songs in different cities while sitting on a little red wagon with a homemade potato microphone, or anything else the band we were listening to, did to be less obscure.

The jumps into a pool were one of the highest points of self-esteem and confidence kids could have in themselves, and made you watch because they wanted you to see how happy they were with themselves. A small handful of kids got to keep that feeling going till they became a kid again. Most will see that feeling less and less. Some weren’t given a chance at all.

Recording crappy songs through a potato was like setting up a vigil for a broken heart or a headless gummi-bear on the corner of 7^th and Flower during lunchtime. People would walk around it to get to their lunch. Those who stopped to pay a little respect, would realize the 12 seconds of the lunch break they had paid to the scam-vigil was non-refundable. Those bands might want us to watch all the ways they can jump in a pool next. If they could do it AND stay dry, I’ll watch. I’ll buy a fucking album, and listen to it!