Frozen
That’s what the Big Apple has become.
I am writing this email to let those who I have yet to verbally contact. I am alive, and well (other than a slight cough). As for the others in my midst:
Those who are definitely safe:
Allen
Chuck
Minna
Robert
Carolyne and John
Those that I'm not yet sure of:
Erik
Lisa
**If anyone has heard from these two, please let me know.
My cellular phone was barely of use before the one decent cell tower toppled to the Manhattan street-top (it sat upon the World Trade Center Tower 1, the first to be hit, second to fall), now it has become a paperweight. So, many of you have yet to speak with me. I'm writing an email instead.
I was nowhere near the towers as they were attacked. I just finished up my packing, preparing to catch my noon flight out of La Guardia Airport. I was making myself a nice, health-free egg, cheese, and raspberry jam sandwich as the news was announced.
For those of you unfamiliar with where I've been staying: Greenpoint, Brooklyn (Northern Brooklyn). Greenpoint is too far from the Financial District of Manhattan for me to hear any of the explosions. I watched the live film of the first hit: Tower 1 was on fire, when another plane appeared out of the corner of the screen. The newscasters became hysteric, and I had the misfortune of viewing the second hit on live TV. "Surreal" is a useless word to describe how it felt to watch that. Confused, shocked, confused, distressed, confused, angry, confused, doubting, confused as hell. While "WHAT THE FUCK??!!!" is not a proper, or acceptable way to describe a feeling, it fits best.
From there I ran outside to the Pulaski Bridge (a bridge between Northern Brooklyn and Queens, just across the east river from midtown Manhattan) to see if this was really happening.
The view was fabulous. What I was viewing was not.
The smoke from the fires stretched for miles. The bridge was packed with honking cars, and cursing or crying people. Strangers were hugging and praying, if they weren't too busy listening to radios.
After a few minutes, the mood of the crowd seemed to be turning a bit nasty. The traffic was thick, cellular phones weren't working, news was coming in that other strategic locations were under siege... it was an emotional pressure cooker. On top of all that, there were very few police on the bridge. It felt like the beginning of Bedlam. I left out of discomfort.
As soon as I returned to the house, reports came in that a third plane was in route for another Manhattan landing. I ran like hell back to the bridge to see if this was true. I don't know if another plane was indeed on its way, but upon reaching my viewing spot, there was a muffled BOOM and Tower 2 crumbled to the ground like a kicked sand castle. People began crying, praying, screaming, grabbing the chain-link fence that lined the bridge, and running around like lunatics. Cars were flying down the only open lane on the three-lane bridge, honking and careening as if suicidal. The sound of sirens, in every direction.
About 15 minutes after that, Tower 1 dropped in much the same manner as its "twin". Most of us just sat there, staring at rising clouds of dust which ruthlessly pushed north from ground zero. The insanity ended. Everyone tried to comprehend that the World Trade Center had instantly become nothing but a memory, right in front of our eyes. The only noise was the continued sound of sirens. Everyone slowly dispersed. I walked home, looking only at the ground. I didn't want to cry. I didn't want to see anyone else cry.
We don't have cable, so we only watch the local CBS station. They constantly talk about how well the city is pulling together to get through this. They aren't kidding. Based on my previous experiences here, that bridge should have erupted in raw violence. Instead, everyone prayed for each other's loved ones, asked where they could go to donate blood, and discussed the ramifications this event will have on US relations, worldwide. For once, I was impressed with the intellectual side, and capacity for compassion shown by New Yorkers.
The Polish inhabitants of my neighborhood are in "WAR MODE". The neighborhood is pitch-black. Not a single light was on after 9:30pm. Quiet... Our neighborhood is playing night-time hide-and-go-seek with terrorists, holding our breath and remaining perfectly still, so as to not give away our position. I suppose they are worried about another air attack. I don't blame them. But I'm more worried about the potential for certain elements in this city to take advantage of the fact that most authorities have their attentions on Manhattan, leaving the outer boroughs vulnerable. This city was built, maintained, and will proceed through the acts of opportunists.
If Brooklyn survives itself the next two nights, along with the possibility of subsequent attacks, I'll be thoroughly impressed by the strength of those living in New York on September 11, 2001.
The only memories of this that I would like to purge are those of the desperate souls who found it more fitting to plummet 100 stories to the pavement rather than succumb to the inferno. It was reported that some were jumping in pairs, man and woman, holding hands, all the way down. I hope CNN chose to leave that footage out of their reports. It will visit me in my dreams, to be sure. I'll be back in Austin, soon. I'm just glad I booked a flight for noon out of La Guardia today, instead of earlier out of Newark.
>> Craig
Monday, September 11, 2006
Thursday, September 07, 2006
Tribute to the [Original] Jack Black
This time the lights will shine on to him like the gods themselves aimed wildernessed lanterns to catch him, the snipe. The drifter from days of rail riding, scripts, and bonfires fueled by gallons of confusing gin. In and out of the houses, property under arm, talking of clouds and the wherewithal to transcend those filthy walls, built around himself with more robusted gusto than the prison cells he has squared off against on so many occasions.
The constructed confines of the confused mind.
Six bucks and a pocket watch need to be stowed for future times where hunger will be his most common bedfellow. The broad expanses that exist between track lines are the gaps where his life takes its cues. These are the places where the beggar becomes king. These are the places where property is but a concept used only to describe their means to their ends. Other people’s property. Other people’s available property. The trade for the means, the gin, the opiates, the soup, and the rope. That’s what the concept boils down to out there. And those are the only measures which require thought. Those are the points he works to make. At least until yesterday.
This morning is different, and he knows it. There has never been a real sense that the beginnings of his days have ever been the beginning of anything really significant. Just another short-lived opportunity to build a short-term opportunity.
Or to shoot it into his veins.
But today has its very own feel. Something different. Something about the lights, those lights that will find him and show him for what he knows he really is. The ‘him’ he’s been running from for so long. The ‘him’ that will not be understood when they come calling with their incessant “who”s and “how”s and “why”s. He knows he will be lost in their attack. Their push for answers to questions he has never bothered to ask himself. How can a man answer questions they’ve never posed to themselves? How can this be done? How did it come to this?
Worse than that, they’ll ask about the stains on his hands. And he’ll have to ask himself about those stains on those hands. The hammed hands of a man who has spanned his time with no damned plans.
The constructed confines of the confused mind.
Six bucks and a pocket watch need to be stowed for future times where hunger will be his most common bedfellow. The broad expanses that exist between track lines are the gaps where his life takes its cues. These are the places where the beggar becomes king. These are the places where property is but a concept used only to describe their means to their ends. Other people’s property. Other people’s available property. The trade for the means, the gin, the opiates, the soup, and the rope. That’s what the concept boils down to out there. And those are the only measures which require thought. Those are the points he works to make. At least until yesterday.
This morning is different, and he knows it. There has never been a real sense that the beginnings of his days have ever been the beginning of anything really significant. Just another short-lived opportunity to build a short-term opportunity.
Or to shoot it into his veins.
But today has its very own feel. Something different. Something about the lights, those lights that will find him and show him for what he knows he really is. The ‘him’ he’s been running from for so long. The ‘him’ that will not be understood when they come calling with their incessant “who”s and “how”s and “why”s. He knows he will be lost in their attack. Their push for answers to questions he has never bothered to ask himself. How can a man answer questions they’ve never posed to themselves? How can this be done? How did it come to this?
Worse than that, they’ll ask about the stains on his hands. And he’ll have to ask himself about those stains on those hands. The hammed hands of a man who has spanned his time with no damned plans.
Friday, August 11, 2006
Now They Done Fucked With My Freedoms
GODDAMNIT. Fucking terrorists have seriously ruined life for the rest of us this time. When they were just bombing buildings and randomly murdering whoever they felt would forward their shitheadedly self-absorbed “Me-me-me! Look at me! I’m being repressed!” cause, I honestly felt comfortable ignoring them. Sure, my card could get drawn at any old time, and I could be killed by some chick whose family needed the cash, or she was developmentally disabled and easily convinced, or perhaps she even met me one time at a Burger King back in 1995 and didn’t like the cut of my jib.
Whatever.
I was cool knowing that there are (still) random assholes out there who have nothing better to do than complain about their plight with explosives as their voice. Humans are really, really stupid that way. Plus, we’re extremely self-destructive, even without the whole “martyr”, “I’M THE VICTIM HERE”, “by any means necessary”, “jihad, bitches!”, or “Operation ____-ing _____” as a catch phrase.
But this whole no-carry-on-luggage thing is total bullshit. Total. Bullshit.
The “terrorists” have crossed the line now. Shit’s gotten personal. Mad-personal, yo. [That’s ghetto-speak, only used when one is “fittin’ to RAISE UP!”.] Do these terroristas have any idea how often the jackass companies, who own the planes their trying to destroy, LOSE my goddamn luggage? Once is too often. But anyone who has traveled would be ecstatic if they had only ONCE experienced the maddening dealings with douche-balloon airline carrier agents over how exactly one’s luggage could manage to end up in a more interesting destination than the owner did.
Having had some important shit get re-routed on a couple of occasions, I started carrying anything of actual value (if you actually GET your luggage back, and find it has been pillaged, you’re pretty much shit out of luck unless you complain for fifteen years and the value of your crap is below their pain threshold: the approximate value of a used Timex Ironman watch) in a carry-on so as to avoid getting stuck in a foreign country with NOTHING but my dick in my hand.
This is solely because airlines LOSE luggage. It’s somewhere in their Corporate By-Laws. Their charter with Federal Aviation. It probably has a well-known and well-worn term in their industry: “Baggage Attrition”, "Cyclical Mishandling", "Fuck It Man, Reading Isn't Fundamental" or some such nonsense.
Shit. And now the foreign “terrorists” are in cahoots with the domestic "air carriers", combining forces like the Wonder Twins of Fucktard Evolutionomics in a concerted effort to send my shit to Trinidad every time I fly to Chicago. And I can't even bring a fifth of bourbon onto the flight anymore? Have you ever tried to drink enough of those $5 thimble-sized bottles to ENJOY a shit-stank flight on Northwest Airlines? Have you? That's easily four million dollars in cash you'll need to be carrying with you, and you can no longer carry it in a goddamn bag.
Thank your Allah, Baby Jesus, Fred Flinstone or whoever you cry to every night, for me.
Fuckers.
Whatever.
I was cool knowing that there are (still) random assholes out there who have nothing better to do than complain about their plight with explosives as their voice. Humans are really, really stupid that way. Plus, we’re extremely self-destructive, even without the whole “martyr”, “I’M THE VICTIM HERE”, “by any means necessary”, “jihad, bitches!”, or “Operation ____-ing _____” as a catch phrase.
But this whole no-carry-on-luggage thing is total bullshit. Total. Bullshit.
The “terrorists” have crossed the line now. Shit’s gotten personal. Mad-personal, yo. [That’s ghetto-speak, only used when one is “fittin’ to RAISE UP!”.] Do these terroristas have any idea how often the jackass companies, who own the planes their trying to destroy, LOSE my goddamn luggage? Once is too often. But anyone who has traveled would be ecstatic if they had only ONCE experienced the maddening dealings with douche-balloon airline carrier agents over how exactly one’s luggage could manage to end up in a more interesting destination than the owner did.
Having had some important shit get re-routed on a couple of occasions, I started carrying anything of actual value (if you actually GET your luggage back, and find it has been pillaged, you’re pretty much shit out of luck unless you complain for fifteen years and the value of your crap is below their pain threshold: the approximate value of a used Timex Ironman watch) in a carry-on so as to avoid getting stuck in a foreign country with NOTHING but my dick in my hand.
This is solely because airlines LOSE luggage. It’s somewhere in their Corporate By-Laws. Their charter with Federal Aviation. It probably has a well-known and well-worn term in their industry: “Baggage Attrition”, "Cyclical Mishandling", "Fuck It Man, Reading Isn't Fundamental" or some such nonsense.
Shit. And now the foreign “terrorists” are in cahoots with the domestic "air carriers", combining forces like the Wonder Twins of Fucktard Evolutionomics in a concerted effort to send my shit to Trinidad every time I fly to Chicago. And I can't even bring a fifth of bourbon onto the flight anymore? Have you ever tried to drink enough of those $5 thimble-sized bottles to ENJOY a shit-stank flight on Northwest Airlines? Have you? That's easily four million dollars in cash you'll need to be carrying with you, and you can no longer carry it in a goddamn bag.
Thank your Allah, Baby Jesus, Fred Flinstone or whoever you cry to every night, for me.
Fuckers.
Wednesday, August 09, 2006
I Don't Know. I Just Ran With It.
The following is a story I wrote for a contest. A McSweeney's contest. The point was to utilize a writing prompt to build a little short story. There were 13 prompts from which to choose, and I have no idea how many winners will be involved. I assume 1 from each prompt will be chosen as a finalist, and then the best of those 13 will get all the beans.
Actually, I have no idea what their plan is. I just liked the idea of the prompts. So I ran with it.
Here was my chosen writing prompt:
Here is the story that won for that prompt:
My WORD. Honestly, I REALLY like it. It's one of those stories that you read and you're like "it says so much with so little, or the other way around or whatever. Damn, I wish I wrote that."
Here is what I wrote (I was a tad more wordy, and far less witty. And that's awesome.) Ignore the formatting, as it is for a much more narrow column layout.
----------------------
Puffs of greened paper shot out of the passenger
window of Shelly’s ’82 Le Sabre. Understandably, she
was extremely upset at the loss. “Damnit, Charles!”
She only called him ‘Charles’ when she wanted to fry
his scrotum. In calmer moments she referred to him as
‘Upchuck’. But not this day.
“You’re just on a bad trip, thas’ all! NOW ROLL THE
GODDAMN WINDOW UP!”
No response from Upchuck, who continued his mission to
evacuate the cash.
Shelly fell to her most common state of being:
resignation, ingrained from her playground days of
defending her questionably retarded sibling. Watching
with continued resignation as the money went out the
window, “you got to be fuckin’ kiddin’ me here.”
But this time he seemed far worse than normal.
Shelly was never the sharpest of shed tools, but
certainly more capable than those with Upchuck’s list
of afflictions. Her hair was post-wrestling-match
ratty. Skin marbled like strawberry ice cream. A
wardrobe that consisted chiefly of beer
advertisements. Her twenty-six years on earth took
double that from her body. But she was a survivor,
and whatever she was: she meant it.
Upchuck, two years her minor, was little better. He
too suffered from lack of proper pruning and the mats
in his curly dark hair were sure signs that he had
never worried about floss or voting. Whatever limited
possibilities were once in his grasp had been swept
away by a healthy diet of corner store liquor.
The car swerved its way along a rural highway to the
house of a cagey chemist of particularly ruthless repute,
Thomas Landry. His confidants and associates referred
to him as ‘Paul’. No one knew why, and no one seemed
to care about the incongruity.
People owed Paul money for various reasons. Shelly
and Upchuck were two of those people. The money, and
the reasons.
“Snakes! The snakes! SNAYYYYYKES!” Chuck repeated
as he feverishly shoveled the currency from the
floorboard to the passing outdoors. Pointlessly
scattering the small fortune into nearby stalks of
poorly tended wheat. An empty bottle of Mad Dog 20/20
slid in and amongst the dwindling pile of cash by his
feet, periodically getting caught up in Upchuck’s
handfuls, but always finding its way back to the
floorboard.
The money would soon be lost to the wheat.
An hour prior, things were looking much better for the
pair. Decidedly better.
They were near the end of a broad-daylight robbery of
the peeling-paint, dirt-lot, outskirts-of-town
laundromat where Shelly usually earned minimum wage
night-managing illegal immigrant labor. She figured
it to be the easiest target in town. That, and she
knew the hotel accounts paid their monthly bills in
cash earlier that morning.
Ignacio, the day manager who accomplished little more
in his life than time for pedophilia in neighboring
states, was on duty. His small gut hung over the line
of separation between a pair of brown pleat-less
corduroy slacks and a tan Western short sleeve shirt.
A brushed cowboy hat topped his head, its brim
mirroring the lines of his mustache. He always talked
about getting spurs for his boots, though he’d never
ridden a horse.
Even though Shelly had no real weapon for the holdup,
she did have her wildly unpredictable brother in tow.
To their desired end, Upchuck was wielding an ancient
stapler like a hand grenade in his left hand, and with
his right he was swinging a clutch of detached metal
coat hangers with furious menace.
While fairly unimpressed with their efforts, Ignacio
was doing his best to comply with the demands. “Are
you sure you want to do this Shelly? I mean, your job
is gone now.”
Shelly, somewhat shocked at the stupidity of his
statement, “well, yeah Ignacio. I kinda figured
that’d be the case.”
Upchuck suddenly ceased his curious offensive, and
without a single effort at a smooth transition of
mood, began to whine pathetically. “Hey, Shell, I got
uh awful headache an’ I need some Bayer or somethin’.”
“Damnit Charles. You get drunk and you get hung over.
No surprise, so shut up.”
Quietly, “but my face hurts, Shell.”
“Christ. Ignacio, you got any Tylenol or whatever in
yer desk?”
“Uh, no.”
The three of them, swimming in their own frustrations,
stared at each other for a few muted seconds. Then
Upchuck started threatening to cry. Shelly and
Ignacio shared a brief exchange of agreed annoyance,
until Upchuck dropped the stapler and put his hand to
his face. The right hand, still armed with a dozen
strips of cheap wire, began swinging wildly, knocking
items off of the counter near the already opened
register.
Ignacio, more out of frustration than a desire to
help, cut in. “But I hear coffee helps with those
hang-over tremors.”
Before Shelly had a chance to respond, Upchuck broke
in with authority, “well then go make me some of that,
then!”
Ignacio turned to Shelly, “can I?”
“Well, shit. But don’t think about callin’ anyone or
nothin’ because we ain’t leaving without the money.
Got it, you per-vert?”
Ignacio lazily walked back to the rear office,
curiously without chaperone. On his way, he picked up
a box of individual rat bait packets. When he opened
the door to a dreary, un-air-conditioned room that
contained a desk, small bookcase, and dented filing
cabinet, Andrea was sitting shyly at his desk.
Barely twelve with a makeup job befitting a circus
entertainer, light acne, and retro-80s garb, Andrea
wore more the mood of a captive than a welcomed
visitor. She was obviously uncomfortable with his
entrance, and though rather timid, she spoke almost
immediately.
“Your myspace page said you were eighteen. But you’re
not. You’re old.”
With hand-waving dismissal, Ignacio grabbed a small
can of Maxwell House off the bookshelf next to his
coffee maker, and poured the packet of rat poison in.
He shook the can with calm vigor, opened it, and
handed it to Andrea.
“Yeah, eighteen. Whatever. And you’re not sixteen.
Now piss in this.”
Actually, I have no idea what their plan is. I just liked the idea of the prompts. So I ran with it.
Here was my chosen writing prompt:
Write a story that begins with a man throwing handfuls of $100 bills from a speeding car, and ends with a young girl urinating into a tin bucket.
Here is the story that won for that prompt:
A Day in the Life of R. Kelly.
By Jenny R. Thomas
- - - -
"See, girl? Those bills ain't nothin' to me, plenty more where that came from— No, no, not in the bucket; I got people to dry-clean the upholstery! Shit."
My WORD. Honestly, I REALLY like it. It's one of those stories that you read and you're like "it says so much with so little, or the other way around or whatever. Damn, I wish I wrote that."
Here is what I wrote (I was a tad more wordy, and far less witty. And that's awesome.) Ignore the formatting, as it is for a much more narrow column layout.
----------------------
Puffs of greened paper shot out of the passenger
window of Shelly’s ’82 Le Sabre. Understandably, she
was extremely upset at the loss. “Damnit, Charles!”
She only called him ‘Charles’ when she wanted to fry
his scrotum. In calmer moments she referred to him as
‘Upchuck’. But not this day.
“You’re just on a bad trip, thas’ all! NOW ROLL THE
GODDAMN WINDOW UP!”
No response from Upchuck, who continued his mission to
evacuate the cash.
Shelly fell to her most common state of being:
resignation, ingrained from her playground days of
defending her questionably retarded sibling. Watching
with continued resignation as the money went out the
window, “you got to be fuckin’ kiddin’ me here.”
But this time he seemed far worse than normal.
Shelly was never the sharpest of shed tools, but
certainly more capable than those with Upchuck’s list
of afflictions. Her hair was post-wrestling-match
ratty. Skin marbled like strawberry ice cream. A
wardrobe that consisted chiefly of beer
advertisements. Her twenty-six years on earth took
double that from her body. But she was a survivor,
and whatever she was: she meant it.
Upchuck, two years her minor, was little better. He
too suffered from lack of proper pruning and the mats
in his curly dark hair were sure signs that he had
never worried about floss or voting. Whatever limited
possibilities were once in his grasp had been swept
away by a healthy diet of corner store liquor.
The car swerved its way along a rural highway to the
house of a cagey chemist of particularly ruthless repute,
Thomas Landry. His confidants and associates referred
to him as ‘Paul’. No one knew why, and no one seemed
to care about the incongruity.
People owed Paul money for various reasons. Shelly
and Upchuck were two of those people. The money, and
the reasons.
“Snakes! The snakes! SNAYYYYYKES!” Chuck repeated
as he feverishly shoveled the currency from the
floorboard to the passing outdoors. Pointlessly
scattering the small fortune into nearby stalks of
poorly tended wheat. An empty bottle of Mad Dog 20/20
slid in and amongst the dwindling pile of cash by his
feet, periodically getting caught up in Upchuck’s
handfuls, but always finding its way back to the
floorboard.
The money would soon be lost to the wheat.
An hour prior, things were looking much better for the
pair. Decidedly better.
They were near the end of a broad-daylight robbery of
the peeling-paint, dirt-lot, outskirts-of-town
laundromat where Shelly usually earned minimum wage
night-managing illegal immigrant labor. She figured
it to be the easiest target in town. That, and she
knew the hotel accounts paid their monthly bills in
cash earlier that morning.
Ignacio, the day manager who accomplished little more
in his life than time for pedophilia in neighboring
states, was on duty. His small gut hung over the line
of separation between a pair of brown pleat-less
corduroy slacks and a tan Western short sleeve shirt.
A brushed cowboy hat topped his head, its brim
mirroring the lines of his mustache. He always talked
about getting spurs for his boots, though he’d never
ridden a horse.
Even though Shelly had no real weapon for the holdup,
she did have her wildly unpredictable brother in tow.
To their desired end, Upchuck was wielding an ancient
stapler like a hand grenade in his left hand, and with
his right he was swinging a clutch of detached metal
coat hangers with furious menace.
While fairly unimpressed with their efforts, Ignacio
was doing his best to comply with the demands. “Are
you sure you want to do this Shelly? I mean, your job
is gone now.”
Shelly, somewhat shocked at the stupidity of his
statement, “well, yeah Ignacio. I kinda figured
that’d be the case.”
Upchuck suddenly ceased his curious offensive, and
without a single effort at a smooth transition of
mood, began to whine pathetically. “Hey, Shell, I got
uh awful headache an’ I need some Bayer or somethin’.”
“Damnit Charles. You get drunk and you get hung over.
No surprise, so shut up.”
Quietly, “but my face hurts, Shell.”
“Christ. Ignacio, you got any Tylenol or whatever in
yer desk?”
“Uh, no.”
The three of them, swimming in their own frustrations,
stared at each other for a few muted seconds. Then
Upchuck started threatening to cry. Shelly and
Ignacio shared a brief exchange of agreed annoyance,
until Upchuck dropped the stapler and put his hand to
his face. The right hand, still armed with a dozen
strips of cheap wire, began swinging wildly, knocking
items off of the counter near the already opened
register.
Ignacio, more out of frustration than a desire to
help, cut in. “But I hear coffee helps with those
hang-over tremors.”
Before Shelly had a chance to respond, Upchuck broke
in with authority, “well then go make me some of that,
then!”
Ignacio turned to Shelly, “can I?”
“Well, shit. But don’t think about callin’ anyone or
nothin’ because we ain’t leaving without the money.
Got it, you per-vert?”
Ignacio lazily walked back to the rear office,
curiously without chaperone. On his way, he picked up
a box of individual rat bait packets. When he opened
the door to a dreary, un-air-conditioned room that
contained a desk, small bookcase, and dented filing
cabinet, Andrea was sitting shyly at his desk.
Barely twelve with a makeup job befitting a circus
entertainer, light acne, and retro-80s garb, Andrea
wore more the mood of a captive than a welcomed
visitor. She was obviously uncomfortable with his
entrance, and though rather timid, she spoke almost
immediately.
“Your myspace page said you were eighteen. But you’re
not. You’re old.”
With hand-waving dismissal, Ignacio grabbed a small
can of Maxwell House off the bookshelf next to his
coffee maker, and poured the packet of rat poison in.
He shook the can with calm vigor, opened it, and
handed it to Andrea.
“Yeah, eighteen. Whatever. And you’re not sixteen.
Now piss in this.”
Thursday, July 20, 2006
Enough with the quiting already.
I’m not saying that I want to “quit”. That’s far too final. Claiming to “quit” something when deep in your colon of colons you KNOW that isn’t the honest case, is akin to steeling. Steeling nerve, if nothing else.
So I’m stopping for a bit. For a spell. Some time.
I haven’t had a smoke since June 20th. Maybe the 21st. I forget.
Damn, that totally takes the steam out of it, doesn’t it? Like a wedding anniversary where they’re both like “well, let’s just go to The Radisson for a weekend the first week of November, because I remember it was sort-of cold when we got married, brisk and breezy, but the leaves were still pretty much on the trees. Pretty much.”
Almost, or exactly a month to the day.
It happened rather easily, to be quite honest. I simply didn’t want a smoke for two whole days, and on the third day I HAD TO HAVE ONE. A rather violent desire to stick a burning fag of dried tobacky into my maw. It was beyond compulsive. It was obligatory and I honestly didn’t feel like I would enjoy the smoke as much as I NEEDED it.
And that’s where the desire to smoke is now lost on me. Now that I realize the form of my addiction, which is more humorous than anything else, it pisses me off. Irony lives there somewhere, but I don’t care to dig for it.
It pisses me off because not but a month and a week ago, I smoked for the pure pleasure of it. I FELT like those magazine ads for Newports LOOK. Alive with goddamn pleasure. I smoked because it tasted good, and that flavor happily complimented the sweet tints of my coffee, beer, or absinthe. Because I felt it benefited my soul to partake. Just like one might periodically enjoy a truffle, hang gliding, or rough ass-play. I considered myself a dabbler, rather than a mechanical addict to the thing.
And for that, dear lungs, I apologize.
However, I would like to make it clear that I am not QUITING. Far from it. My intentions are to wait it out. I will hold off on smoking until such time as I feel I will be capable of having a smoke without NEEDING another. Because I want to ENJOY smoking again. I want it to compliment my morning coffee. My evening nightcap. My long-distance car ride.
It might be years before I have that confidence though. Maybe decades. In fact, I may never, ever-ever-ever feel that I can honestly handle a cig without desperately demanding another. And if that’s the case, then I’ll wait all the way to my grave. So be it.
I’m no prisoner, except to myself. I willingly jump for no entity outside of my own whim (many times at my own folly). And I just can’t stomach the idea of some inanimate object bullying me around like that. Not when we used to be so affectionately intimate.
Tobacco and I have been through much together. Many hard times. Good times. And hopefully we’ll meet again someday under better circumstances. Until then, well, fuck it.
[Emotional mania has been the raving flagship of my life-fleet for the past month. And that’s awesome.]
So I’m stopping for a bit. For a spell. Some time.
I haven’t had a smoke since June 20th. Maybe the 21st. I forget.
Damn, that totally takes the steam out of it, doesn’t it? Like a wedding anniversary where they’re both like “well, let’s just go to The Radisson for a weekend the first week of November, because I remember it was sort-of cold when we got married, brisk and breezy, but the leaves were still pretty much on the trees. Pretty much.”
Almost, or exactly a month to the day.
It happened rather easily, to be quite honest. I simply didn’t want a smoke for two whole days, and on the third day I HAD TO HAVE ONE. A rather violent desire to stick a burning fag of dried tobacky into my maw. It was beyond compulsive. It was obligatory and I honestly didn’t feel like I would enjoy the smoke as much as I NEEDED it.
And that’s where the desire to smoke is now lost on me. Now that I realize the form of my addiction, which is more humorous than anything else, it pisses me off. Irony lives there somewhere, but I don’t care to dig for it.
It pisses me off because not but a month and a week ago, I smoked for the pure pleasure of it. I FELT like those magazine ads for Newports LOOK. Alive with goddamn pleasure. I smoked because it tasted good, and that flavor happily complimented the sweet tints of my coffee, beer, or absinthe. Because I felt it benefited my soul to partake. Just like one might periodically enjoy a truffle, hang gliding, or rough ass-play. I considered myself a dabbler, rather than a mechanical addict to the thing.
And for that, dear lungs, I apologize.
However, I would like to make it clear that I am not QUITING. Far from it. My intentions are to wait it out. I will hold off on smoking until such time as I feel I will be capable of having a smoke without NEEDING another. Because I want to ENJOY smoking again. I want it to compliment my morning coffee. My evening nightcap. My long-distance car ride.
It might be years before I have that confidence though. Maybe decades. In fact, I may never, ever-ever-ever feel that I can honestly handle a cig without desperately demanding another. And if that’s the case, then I’ll wait all the way to my grave. So be it.
I’m no prisoner, except to myself. I willingly jump for no entity outside of my own whim (many times at my own folly). And I just can’t stomach the idea of some inanimate object bullying me around like that. Not when we used to be so affectionately intimate.
Tobacco and I have been through much together. Many hard times. Good times. And hopefully we’ll meet again someday under better circumstances. Until then, well, fuck it.
[Emotional mania has been the raving flagship of my life-fleet for the past month. And that’s awesome.]
Wednesday, July 12, 2006
And Then I Toast You Out.
Between our times and the most recent chimes-
Such a bevy of levity marches and declines-
To a beat I grew to live by,
to breathe, sack-buy,
grown gun-shy,
ever cheek-dry.
Now I’m dressed of the less blessed and I’m manning my stool.
Head caressed by my messed skin cap and I’m lapping my cesspool.
The tones hum, then break, when I shift, they’ll start to shout…
And then, AND THEN:
And then I toast you out.
Such a bevy of levity marches and declines-
To a beat I grew to live by,
to breathe, sack-buy,
grown gun-shy,
ever cheek-dry.
Now I’m dressed of the less blessed and I’m manning my stool.
Head caressed by my messed skin cap and I’m lapping my cesspool.
The tones hum, then break, when I shift, they’ll start to shout…
And then, AND THEN:
And then I toast you out.
Sunday, July 09, 2006
Blackout Shmackout: The Big "Calm Down"
Man-o-man. This “blackout” post got some interesting personal responses. None of them really made their way into the comments section, and that’s okay. It’s strange, but I’m not quite sure where to draw the line on it. Wide spread on the variety of reaction. Some people are honest with themselves, some people have exceptional reading comprehension skills, and some people are both honest and perceptive. Some are neither, and that scares me more than any blackout I may have experienced.
But, I won’t dedicate any more type space to that discussion, as the only real interesting result was my own mother calling me after reading and before even saying “hello”, she immediately butted in with “are you DRUNK right now?”
And then she waited for a sincere answer. It was around 4pm on a Saturday. I was writing at the time.
Am I drunk? Shit, I wish. Are you fucking KIDDING me over here?
She gets this idea from four areas:
1. Whenever I visit my hometown, Houston, for holidays and whatnot, I always catch up with my friends who live there. These are people who are still very much involved in the social scenes, which are heavily doused in booze. I always get home long after last call, and I am usually stinking drunk because that’s how revelers get when they only see each other three or four times a year (if that). So whenever I visit home for a weekend, I am absolutely uselessly hung over for at least one of the days there.
2. Whenever I tell stories, and I enjoy telling stories, there is almost always an element of alcohol involved. This is because the probability of something noteworthy occurring increases significantly with the addition of alcohol. It’s fucking science for christ’s sake. It’s not ridiculous to understand that if I love to tell stories where I end up looking like an idiot, that those stories will involve consumption. It is also necessary to point out that I tell the same four goddamn stories over, and over, and over again. It’s not like I have a new one every three drunken days.
3. On my last, and hopefully final family vacation, taken last March, I got absolutely shit-housed in Brussels. Long story short, I got lost in the streets of Brussels after 5am, stumbling drunk and making friends with everyone I came in contact with (except for a really creepy car that followed me for a ways, but I lost it by ducking through creepy-ass dark alleys, which kinda sucked). My brother was with me for the first half of the night, but decided to retire when he deemed himself too drunk to enjoy himself. I was not that drunk yet, so I kept on it, along with another fellow whom we met at a bar, who also happened to be from Austin. Strange coincidence indeed. Short story long, I got home smelling of various bar trays and talking nonsense, totally out of sorts. Everyone but my brother and I went on a goddamn 7am morning tour of some Belgian something-or-other, because neither of us were fit to tour. My mother repeatedly referred to her disappointment for the remainder of the trip, every goddamn time I threatened to order a delicious Belgian beer, as if a single drop of the stuff would send me on an immediate werewolf-like train of destruction and drunken mayhem. I got to hear “you aren’t going to go out and do THAT again, are you?” A-lot. Far more often than any rational person deserves.
4. She reads my writing out here on the interweb. For this, I take full responsibility. I’m not yet good at portraying myself in an even light. I don’t talk about my investment strategies, much of my efforts at health improvement, charity donation schedules, or my moves to obtain higher degrees of education. I consider these things to be important to me, and of no benefit to anyone else. I discuss what a douche (typically under the influence, sure) I can be for the sake of a) anyone reading who unwittingly feels the same and needs some reassurance that there is nothing wrong with them, and b) everyone else out there who is so self-righteous as to believe that they AREN’T a douche, when they so obviously ARE. I know, it isn’t the most efficient means of helping to explain to the population that we’re all hopelessly flawed but infinitely fascinating characters who shouldn’t be so goddamned paranoid about what the other douches think of our douchey selves. But, it’s all I got right now. And until I get my own weekly talk show with international distribution, I’m rolling with this right here. For better or worse.
So, well, I don’t really know where this leaves me. I mean, I honestly don’t know if I’m a drunk or not. No one can know that. Just like no one can know if they’ve got AIDS, cancer, or type II diabetes until symptoms lead to tests, and tests lead to absolute results. All you can do is consider the empirical evidence and work with the results. And me drinking WHILE ON VACATION (Houston, Brussels, NYC, wherever) hardly supports alcoholism. Neither do the distantly linked collection of drink stories I have otherwise.
All I’ve learned is that I am not safe from the stabbing and obnoxious rulings from highly biased sources of judgmental vitriol. Which sucks dick because it’s my own family.
My word, I have dedicated FAR too much effort to this discussion. It’s like a real blog entry or some shit. You know, the ones where the writer just babbles on and on about some really personal shit that no one else probably cares about.
But, I won’t dedicate any more type space to that discussion, as the only real interesting result was my own mother calling me after reading and before even saying “hello”, she immediately butted in with “are you DRUNK right now?”
And then she waited for a sincere answer. It was around 4pm on a Saturday. I was writing at the time.
Am I drunk? Shit, I wish. Are you fucking KIDDING me over here?
She gets this idea from four areas:
1. Whenever I visit my hometown, Houston, for holidays and whatnot, I always catch up with my friends who live there. These are people who are still very much involved in the social scenes, which are heavily doused in booze. I always get home long after last call, and I am usually stinking drunk because that’s how revelers get when they only see each other three or four times a year (if that). So whenever I visit home for a weekend, I am absolutely uselessly hung over for at least one of the days there.
2. Whenever I tell stories, and I enjoy telling stories, there is almost always an element of alcohol involved. This is because the probability of something noteworthy occurring increases significantly with the addition of alcohol. It’s fucking science for christ’s sake. It’s not ridiculous to understand that if I love to tell stories where I end up looking like an idiot, that those stories will involve consumption. It is also necessary to point out that I tell the same four goddamn stories over, and over, and over again. It’s not like I have a new one every three drunken days.
3. On my last, and hopefully final family vacation, taken last March, I got absolutely shit-housed in Brussels. Long story short, I got lost in the streets of Brussels after 5am, stumbling drunk and making friends with everyone I came in contact with (except for a really creepy car that followed me for a ways, but I lost it by ducking through creepy-ass dark alleys, which kinda sucked). My brother was with me for the first half of the night, but decided to retire when he deemed himself too drunk to enjoy himself. I was not that drunk yet, so I kept on it, along with another fellow whom we met at a bar, who also happened to be from Austin. Strange coincidence indeed. Short story long, I got home smelling of various bar trays and talking nonsense, totally out of sorts. Everyone but my brother and I went on a goddamn 7am morning tour of some Belgian something-or-other, because neither of us were fit to tour. My mother repeatedly referred to her disappointment for the remainder of the trip, every goddamn time I threatened to order a delicious Belgian beer, as if a single drop of the stuff would send me on an immediate werewolf-like train of destruction and drunken mayhem. I got to hear “you aren’t going to go out and do THAT again, are you?” A-lot. Far more often than any rational person deserves.
4. She reads my writing out here on the interweb. For this, I take full responsibility. I’m not yet good at portraying myself in an even light. I don’t talk about my investment strategies, much of my efforts at health improvement, charity donation schedules, or my moves to obtain higher degrees of education. I consider these things to be important to me, and of no benefit to anyone else. I discuss what a douche (typically under the influence, sure) I can be for the sake of a) anyone reading who unwittingly feels the same and needs some reassurance that there is nothing wrong with them, and b) everyone else out there who is so self-righteous as to believe that they AREN’T a douche, when they so obviously ARE. I know, it isn’t the most efficient means of helping to explain to the population that we’re all hopelessly flawed but infinitely fascinating characters who shouldn’t be so goddamned paranoid about what the other douches think of our douchey selves. But, it’s all I got right now. And until I get my own weekly talk show with international distribution, I’m rolling with this right here. For better or worse.
So, well, I don’t really know where this leaves me. I mean, I honestly don’t know if I’m a drunk or not. No one can know that. Just like no one can know if they’ve got AIDS, cancer, or type II diabetes until symptoms lead to tests, and tests lead to absolute results. All you can do is consider the empirical evidence and work with the results. And me drinking WHILE ON VACATION (Houston, Brussels, NYC, wherever) hardly supports alcoholism. Neither do the distantly linked collection of drink stories I have otherwise.
All I’ve learned is that I am not safe from the stabbing and obnoxious rulings from highly biased sources of judgmental vitriol. Which sucks dick because it’s my own family.
My word, I have dedicated FAR too much effort to this discussion. It’s like a real blog entry or some shit. You know, the ones where the writer just babbles on and on about some really personal shit that no one else probably cares about.
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