Keen Perception Of The Intolerable

Merry Christmas..... or else

2011-12-23T22:31:00.001-05:00

Sol y Estrellas - a haiku

2011-12-10T22:21:00.007-05:00

He's her kept secret
paragraphs and monologues
but scared to say "hi"

Lunch

2011-12-10T18:53:00.004-05:00

85% Bullshit

2011-12-09T22:12:00.003-05:00

1. I have a parking spot with my name on it. Not my job title. Not "Reserved". My name.
2. I have proposed a total of four times to two different women with a 25% acceptance rate (and a 0% actual marriage rate).
3. I lived in my car for a week when I was younger.
4. I wanted to be a serious author, but I now I just write for an NBC sitcom
5. One of my most prized possessions is a 60 year old bottle of Muehlebach beer
6. I was adopted as an infant by 2 high school math teachers
7. The only Olympic event I can't watch is gymnastics
8. I lost my virginity the night the Mike Tyson won his first heavyweight championship by KTFO Trevor Berbick.
9. I hate, hate, hate, HATE Apple products.
10. I lettered in lacrosse all four years in high school.
11. Speaking of school, I skipped third grade.
12. Wines from West Virginia are surprisingly good.
13. I'm in love with an Asian woman.
14. I've partied backstage with the bands Load & Radio Baghdad at the concert in Atlanta.
15. I once tried to kill myself by hanging myself with an extension cord tied to a stair bannister.
16. I collect snowglobes from the differnt places I've visited.
17. I pledged Delta Phi when hazing was still accepted practice
18. I've stayed the night in 5 of the 6 Frank Lloyd Wright houses available to rent.
19. I took the MCAT but never applied to med school
20. I cried at the end of Titanic

Tuesday @ the Corner part deux

2011-12-04T01:27:00.002-05:00

Now Accepting Applications for the Position of...

2011-12-03T18:54:00.005-05:00

Mrs. Assclown.

Well, not literally. I'm just reaching the point in life where being unbetrothed stops making people think I'm just too complex for one women and starts making think I must be gay. Or a pedophile. Or a gay pedophile. Not that being gay would be so bad. I'd like to think that if I was gay, I would be all like "Rupert Everett" gay. Or "Anderson Cooper" gay. But really, you'd have to think that I would be the polar opposite as I am now. So I'd probably be more like "Quentin Crisp" gay or "Alan Cumming" gay.
But I digress.
So I'm beginning to wrap my head around the fact it would be good for me both mentally and physically to assume the chains of matrimony. So that naturally leads me to start thinking about the kind of woman I'd want to be bound to for all eternity. And not to be overly naive, but it would be important to me to get it right the first time. I don't want to get ten years into it only to find out I can't really get along with someone who prefers oranges to tangerines, or the like. I'd be committed to it. As Napolean said, "When you set out to take Vienna, TAKE VIENNA". Nothing halfway about it.
So then I started to think about the available women (or more realistically, women who would make themselves available)in my life now. You know, women I've dated or slept with or that had a thing for me or made subtle inquiries to friends of mine asking about my "situation". So I make a list; Melanie, Christine, Cathy, Sarina, Julie, Traci, Michelle, etc , etc, etc. I go through trying to think of which one would work best. But then I think, "Well,I like her personality best, but I really like this other girl's intellect and this other girl's sense of humor and this other girl's body". So then I realized it just made way more sense to just start from scratch and write down the qualities I was looking for rather than just scrolling through candidates.
So here's what I came up with.....
1. Be good at something. Anything. I was dating this girl in college and she dragged me to a bar where her roommate's band was playing. I had met her roommate a few times before. Never thought that much of her. Kinda plain. Kept to herself. So we get there and she's up there and the tiny stage playing bass.
And she was..... amazing. Just amazing. And totally oblivious to anyone else in the room. Black hair that rained sweat whenever she shook her head in time. I was wrecked by her.
But it doesn't have to be the bass. It could be watercolors or restoring furniture or archery or speaking German. But be passionately good at it.
2. Have a job that means something. I know this is kind of arbitrary and unfair, since not everyone can be an astronaut or social worker, but it is what it is. The last woman that I could really see myself with longterm was a pediatric nurse. WE both kept separate residences but we pretty much lived with each other for a year to maximize the time we spent together given our conflicting schedules. I travelled on and off for business and she worked the night shift in the NICU which, if you weren't aware, is the shittiest shift to work (not that there's a good one). The kids that get admitted at night don't do so because they have cancer or birth defects. They get admitted at night due to blunt force trauma or 3rd degree burns. It was always amazing to me how she could deal with that for 8-12 hours and then come home and still function in any way whatsoever. It was humbling.
So do something that makes a difference.
3. Have your own thing going on. I used to work with this woman who was a runner. Ran everyday, sometimes over lunch. 10k's or marathons seemingly every other weekend. I really liked her but was hesitant to ask her out because, well, for two reasons really. Number one, I didn't think she'd like me because I wasn't a runner. I don't even have a runner's frame. More like a 3rd Baseman's frame. Secondly, even if she did like me, she would want to turn me into a runner as well. And since I only run when chased, that represented a problem. But we started dating anyhow. And I cringed when I saw her running shoes poking out of her overnight bag the first time she planned on sleeping over. I just knew that she'd drag me out of bed first thing in the morning for a jog. I was totally distracted the whole night in dreaded anticipation. I woke up to her sitting on the edge of my bed in her sweats tying her Brooks running shoes. Then she got up, walked around to my side of the bed, bent over, kissed me on the ear and said, "I'm going for a run.. be back in 45 minutes or so". Turns out she didn't care if I shared her passion for running. As a matter of fact, she liked that I didn't. It was her time alone. It was nice.
4. This one's kind of difficult to articulate, but don't see things through a camera lens. I was competely into this girl I met in Cheyenne, Wyoming. Just insanely beautiful, painted like Tuma, and just a total freak in bed. Did you ever see the movie Kalifornia? Remember David Duchovny's girlfriend? That was her, except with a more Rocky Mountain vibe. So anyways, we had been dating for a couple of months when it came up in conversation that she'd never seen the ocean. She's been to Florida once as a kid, but only to go to Disney in Orlando with her parents. So I got the idea to fly her down to Acapulco (yeah I know it was cheesy but I was in my 20's, so don't judge me)for vacation and to show her the Pacific. So I get her on a plane, in a cab, do the whole blindfold thing so she can't see the water on the way to the hotel and closed the blinds in the room as she changed into her swimsuit. I was kind of disappointed that it was raining, but it still going to be worth it. I take her down to La Quebrada, take my hand off from over her eyes, and she's like... "That's nice". The she takes her camera from her bag and snaps a pic. "So you wannna go down and get in the water?" I ask. "Nah, it's raining", she responded. So no frolicking in the sand. No "From Here to Eternity" sex in the surf. She had seen the ocean. She could check that off her list of things to do. That was that. I couldn't process that. We just hung out by the pool the rest of the weekend.
So don't be like that. If you're having a moment, then enjoy the moment.
5. Be pro-PDA. I don't mean like all public indecency, but it's nice to know you're there. (side note - Ok, I'm just realizing that this is getting waaaaay longer that I thought it was going to be. I was just planning on one of my usual listy themes, but bear with me). A few years ago I was dating this woman who was in the process of getting divorced. I had known her pre-marriage, and you could definitely tell that her relationship on her personality had taken a toll. She was still fun and pleasant, but she just didn't seem to be quite so... I don't know... so... her. But we start dating. Really, it wasn't even dating to start out with. Just friendly at first (on the surface anyhow - I think we both knew where we hoped it would go). That whole fist night after we officially became a thing was just... nice. Saw a movie. She squeezed my hand during the scary parts as we shared the center armrest. She rested her head on my shoulder during the girly parts (I can still smell her shampoo). And afterwards when I was leaning forward against a railing while I waited for her to use the ladies room, she snuck up behind me and wrapped her arms around my chest. Not clingy or anything like that. We just liked just a little bit of skin contact. So be pro-public displays of affection.

I guess there are a few other criteria but, as I said before, this is running a tad long already. But it would be nice if she was comfortable with my decorating style. My house is pretty much how I like it and I'm not really looking for any decorating tips. An accent would be nice too. Southern or English (though not London West End - I love Adele's singing voice, but her speaking voice sounds like a monkey raping an accordion) or SoCal or Russian or Japanese. Must prefer dogs over cats, obviously. And don't buy me clothes. Ever. I have my own wardrobe and it works for me. But feel free to wear my shirts or sweaters.
So if you know anyone who may be a good candidate, feel free to have them submit an application.

Husband, pick-up truck, kiss

2011-11-10T23:59:00.006-05:00

Normally I would write this in some dime-store poetic/esoteric fashion, maybe via a seemingly random list of things (insert 3 of the following - brand name liquor, popular late '80's girls name, lipstick color, mid-selling fiction author, female recording artist, hotel chain), but I'm currently incapable of drawing a plausible analogy. So here's the deal;
I had the same dream 3 times 5 years apart. Ok, not necessarily the "same" dream. More like a very similar version with the same themes. Different locations, characters and backstories, but the same general storyline: I meet the husband of a current female co-worker for the first time, I end up in a pick-up truck with said female co-worker, we have a moment and end up kissing. Not "consumed in a moment of hunger and passion" kissing, but more like "neither of us knows if this is right or wrong, we've definitely crossed a line we can't uncross but we also don't know if it will ever be anything more than that kiss" kissing. And it's not necessarily a random female co-worker. ll of them have been married. All of them have the same general body type: slender, semi-boyish, straight shiny hair, late 20's-to-early 30's. But they have different characteristics as well; ethnicities, reporting relationships, personality types. We just end up in a pickup truck and tenderly kiss, hesitant and impulsive at first, turning into mutual want, her right hand on the back of my neck and my right hand on her cheek/neck.
And it's not like I had any inkling of a romantic relationship with any of these women in real life.
I have nothing more to offer.

Click here for the audio version

Quote of the Day

2011-10-11T18:04:00.001-04:00

Sometimes people carry to such perfection the mask they have assumed that in due course they actually become the person they seem.
W. Somerset Maugham

Instead

2011-08-21T14:55:00.004-04:00

She dreamed of backpacking Hemingway's path
Pamplona, Key West, Cojimar, School Creek
Reading & writing every mile along the way
She took 8 community college courses Instead

She envisioned skin & sweat & passion
Two bodies intertwined and afire
Nothing existing beyond themselves
She accepted an accountant's proposal Instead

She wanted to save a piece of the world
One sick and deprived soul at a time
Nothing so pure as a woman with a cause
She took a job selling condos instead

She still always kept two books in her purse
On Writing Well and Slaughterhouse Five
Trying to finish a rough outline of her novel
But she got pregnant Instead

Refocused and her life reprioritized
Intent on raising a gentleman & scholar
Museums, culture, sport and charm
She started drinking at noon Instead

She met a man who lived her unlived life
Bitter, jaded, diseased, and unloved
Who longed for the things she had
But she envied him Instead.

Oh, The Places You'll Go (An Very Un-Suessian Tale)

2011-08-21T14:16:00.004-04:00

Between dinner & dessert behind Shooters in Orlando
Amtrak lavatory between Pittsburgh & Newark
My cousin's dorm room at CU
The world's nastiest motel room at the world's nastiest Travelodge in DC
An under-construction beach house in Isle of Palms
Parking garage stairwell behind The Quaff in Kansas City
The Bachelors Suite overlooking Lake Michigan at The Drake
Storage closet in the basement of a college rec center
Rental car outside a concert in Tinley Park
Laundromat bathroom in Virginia Beach
Party van coming back from a wedding in Naples
A very cold creek that ran behind my house

Kewpie-Doo Haiku

2011-08-06T12:26:00.002-04:00

I get her reasons
She drives by my empty house
But why does she wave?

Betty Lou Haiku

2011-08-02T20:48:00.003-04:00

She smiles, the sun rises
Correlation? Causation?
She knows, but won't tell

The Smerdyakov Pickup

2011-07-21T20:18:00.005-04:00

You don't have to be good-looking or funny or smart or obviously wealthy to pick up a woman in a bar. Living proof right here.
Get there about 7. Early enough to find two empty stools at the bar. Sit down in one and place your blazer over the back of the other. It's not necessarily required that you do this while on a business trip, but it's what seems to work for me.
Then order a drink and ask for two menus. Scan the menu, check your watch, fiddle with your shirt buttons (top button unfastened... no, better keep in buttoned), check your phone to see if you missed any calls, glance toward the door every time someone enters.
Things will start to get busy. The bar will start to fill up.
Eventually, someone will ask if the seat next to you is taken. Maybe its a man. Maybe its a woman. Doesn't matter. Just apologize and tell them you're waiting for someone.
Order another drink. Maybe 30-45 minutes have passed by now. Check your watch a little more frequently. Another beer. Then order an appetizer. Look at your phone again. Pretend to leave someone a pathetic voicemail ("Hey, just checking to make sure I heard you right - 7PM at The Charterhouse. Please give me a call when you get this.... oh, and if you're on your way, let me know and I can order for you so you don't have to wait. I was running late anyways, just got here. Ok?"). Another drink.
She'll have started paying attention by now. She will self-select.
She'll probably be with a group of friends. All of them will be sneaking glances and whispering back and forth, but she'll be the one with the look of empathy and concern. Do NOT make eye contact. You're just focusing on who is NOT there rather than who is.
She will ask if the seat next to you is open. Pause before answering. Look towards the door. Check your phone again. Exhale barely audibly, remove your blazer from the stool and say "yeah, I guess it is".
Immediately summon the bartender and order another beer. This is when you stop glancing towards the door and looking at your watch. You will feel her looking at you.
She'll eventually break the ice, saying something like "Maybe she's just running late" or "Don't feel bad. We've all been stood up before" or "She must be an idiot". Flash a quick smile, a little laugh at most.
Say something self-deprecating.
By now, the following thought will have already crossed her mind;
"This will be such a cute story to tell people about how we met - he was stood up by his date, we started talking, hit it off".
Much cuter than "we met in a bar on a Thursday night".
After a few minutes, ask her to save your seat while you go to the men's room. Don't refer it it by anything other than that; the men's room. Not "the little boys room". Not "the head". Not "the bathroom".
The men's room.
Take a couple steps towards the men's room, pause for a second, then turn around to ask her, "hey, if you see a redhead, about 5'8" walk in, can you please tell her I'll be right back?".
Pathetic.
You'll come back. She will have saved your seat. Don't sit down though. Reach for your jacket, thank her, and tell her that you're gonna take off. She'll grab your arm and ask you to stay, maybe just have one more drink. Her treat.
Slowly open up. Share a joke. Let her cheer you up. She'll say something bad about the girl who stood you up. You say,"No, no, no. It's no big deal. I'm over it".
That's it. Yours. Without fail.

5:37AM

2011-04-22T20:33:00.005-04:00

She had left her wineglass half-full
on my copper topped coffee table
from the night before, before bed
directly beneath the vase centerpiece

a tulip petal had fallen perfectly
and settled into the Bleasdale Shiraz
like a disembodied cupped hand
a ringless finger as the apex

Addict Basic 253 on the rim
formed a streaked opaque heart
more are scattered round the room
the mirror, a pen, my neck

Unfinished Blog Post #27

2011-04-16T23:26:00.005-04:00

We had only exchanged a few work-related emails and talked on the phone a few times. She had a very Irish-sounding last name so I had pictured her as some red-haired & freckled ginger with a pleasant U-Dub speaking voice. I only painted this mental image as an intellectual exercise, not to facilitate any sort of inappropriate thoughts. But anyways, I thrown off a bit when we finally met because she was actually very very Asian. Very much so. "From Taiwan" Asian.
She sat next to me at the conference table which struck me as kind of odd because we were two of the first three people there and she had a dozen other chairs to choose from. My first thought (probably highly egotistical) was that she was interested in me. I really wasn't even put off by her ring. I mean, stranger things have happened. Actaually, that probably solved the mystery of the Asian girl with the Irish-sounding last name. Her husband is probably the ginger. So I spent the next couple hours trying to picture what her kids, if she had any, looked like. I don't know if I'd ever seen a half-Taiwanese, half-Irish offspring.
But I reconsidered my "she totally wants me" theory when I noticed her earrings, three little diamonds forming Mickey Mouse's head. It was my experience to that point in my life that women with cartoon character earrings simply do not cheat on their husbands. But then again, they were diamond Mickey Mouses. I wasn't sure how that factored into the equation.
But anyways, I was wrong about the last name thing. The Irish thing was actually her maiden name. She kept it after she got married and planned on hyphenating the last names of any future kids she and her husband may have. She had been adopted from Taiwan as an infant by two school teachers. They were incapable of having their own kids and she became an only child. That's why she kept their name even after she got married - to carry on their name.
She had told me all this as we were eating lunch. They had catered in chicken wraps so we could work through lunch and maybe cut out early. I poured the last of the morning's coffee into my cup and walked back over to my seat. She said something I didn't quite catch, so I said "Pardon?".
"Do you want to warm that up?" she repeated. She had about a half cup left and walked me down to the breakroom to microwave both our cups. That's when we started talking and eventually she got around to the adoption/husband/kids thing. We kept up the chatter for the balance of the day during breaks and team activities. At the end of the day, she went home and I went to my hotel room.
She wore a pink silk blouse the next day, a marked change the

Guarantees

2011-04-16T22:14:00.005-04:00

I guarantee...

That everytime I buy something from a store and the clerk forgets to deactivate the security device on whatever particular item I have purchased, which in turn causes the alarm to sound as I try to exit the establishment, I will, without fail, take off running in a dead sprint towards the parking lot, causing store security to chase after me. I have done nothing wrong. It is me that is being inconvenienced. The least they could do is indulge me in a bit of chicanery.

That if a woman is brandishing cleavage (or is sporting particularly low-riding trousers while wearing a thong) and bends over in front of me to tie her shoe or to pick up a dropped chapstick or whatever, I will look. Without fail. Every time. It doesn't matter if she's flat-chested (or flat-assed). I will look.

That if its 2:30 in the morning and I've had at least one alcoholic beverage in the last 4 hours and the thought of the movie "Snatch" crosses my mind for even a nanosecond, I will drop whatever it is I am doing and dig through my boxes until I find my DVD and watch it (at least until the point that Bullet-Tooth Tony's 'Desert Eagle .50 vs. Replica' monologue).

That the day after I've watched "Snatch", I will do one or more of the following things; take a gun to the firing range and pop off several magazines full of 9mm shells, shadow box like epileptic monkey, talk in a lame pikey accent, and/or visit a pawn shop.

That if I'm wearing a light sweater over an oxford and under a blazer, it's because I didn't feel like ironing the entire oxford and only the collar and shoulders of the oxford are actually ironed. Or that I'm trying to be all like, 'I'm not as stuffy as those marketing reps at that end of the bar, but a little more upscale than those union electricians over there'.

That if you sit a chair with your right leg crossed UNDER your left knee and your right elbow resting on the arm of the chair and those corresponding fingers resting gently on the back of your neck with your head tilted just a tad to the side as you read a well-worn paperback copy of The Fountainhead, I will try to have sex with you.

That if I'm walking down that aisle in the grocery store, I will pause in front of the Just For Men boxes of hair dye and wonder just for a second if those dozen or so invasive white hairs justify an onslaught of dark brown chemicals. And then I will continue shopping.

That the most accurate description of who I am came from a woman I don't think I even technically dated (and was directed to a woman I was actually dating at the time); "Alex is like New Orleans - great place to visit, but you wouldn't want to live there".

Hometown

2011-04-02T23:13:00.007-04:00

See that junior high over there?
2nd floor, 3rd classroom from the left?
That's where Mrs. Nax kept me after school
So the social workers could talk to me
voices of concern, pity and uncertainty

And the grocery store down the street?
I used the men's room to clean myself off
on the way to my girlfriend's house
after I visited with Dana Chapman
reeking of sex, Organza and pride

That chinese restaurant used to be a Denny's
halfway between the bars and home
3AM Moons over My Hammy & coffee
before the days we designated a driver
wrecking Barb's car, Barb's leg and Barb

And that little shitbox motel right there?
you'd think it used to be cute & cozy
but its been rundown since the day it was built
I tried to drink myself to death in Room 26
surrounded by bottles, vomit and photographs

That housing development used to be woods
dark, secluded & perfect for two 17 yr old kids
fumbling with belts & zippers & bra straps
unknowingly making a baby, never to be born
costing me $300, a day of school & a friend

She knew she could never live anywhere near here
Addresses all belonging to someone else & me
Not a single place that could be truly ours
She smelled every sin as we drove down South Ave
warm and intrusive, like a strangers breath

Easter Shenanigans

2011-03-27T11:21:00.005-04:00

I have precisely one Easter tradition in my house. Hell, it's probably the only actual holiday tradition I have.
The house I lived in about 14 years ago backed up against a winding creek that formed the border of my little town. The creek made a fairly straight run through my property but then made a sharp right turn as it headed east. So the patch of land between my house and my neighbor's house was a 3/4 acre triangle swatch peppered with oak trees and tiger lillies that had spread from the roadside path. During the summer, the trees were full enough to form an impervious curtain that provided total isolation between the two properties. But starting in late fall and lasting until mid-spring, I could sit on my back deck and see my neighbor sitting on his though the bare trees.
It was on such a early spring Saturday evening when Robyn and I were laying in the chaise on one of the first semi-warm nights of the season. We began to watch as our neighbor, Ron (maybe in his mid-50's then), walking around his backyard in with no discernible pattern or purpose. He'd walk behind a tree, bend over, walk across to the flower garden, bend over, and so on. This went on before we figured out what he was doing - hiding little plastic Easter eggs for his grandkids to search for the next day.
Now for most people, this might seem a precious & tender moment to be enjoyed and savored. After all, I lived In a town seemingly painted by either Norman Rockwell or Thomas Kincade, depending which side of town you were on. But for us, it was an opportunity for some slightly more, well, not-quite-malicious activities.
"Would you like some Peeps?" I asked her as my neighbor headed inside, task completed. She playfully slugged me, but I knew her thinking was along the same lines as mine.
We drank a bottle and a half of Louis Jadot Bourgogne until we saw the lights go out next store. We crept though the woods until simply planning on stealing some Peeps and Cadbury eggs neatly contained in a small plastic egg. But then we found the first egg, it's outer shelled scribes in block letters, "Audrey". The next we found was labeled Ethan. It turns out all were marked with the names of one of his 5 grandkids.
We crouched behind a tree plotting our next course of action. The fair thing to do would be to steal candy equally from each child's egg. The evil thing to do would be to steal all the candy from only one child's eggs, thereby sentencing him/her to a lifetime of low self-esteem and feelings of familial inadequacy and alienation.
But then Robyn asked, "How much cash do you have?".
I pulled out my money clip and she extracted a fifty dollar bill.
"Which name is your favorite?", she asked next.
"Hmmm, let's go with Nora".
She walked over to the bird feeder, picked up an egg labeled "Nora", opened it up, inserted the fifty, re-sealed it, placed it gently where it was, grabbed my hand and led me back home sans chocolate or Peeps.
We woke early the next morning and drank coffee on the dock along the creek where we had a full perspective on the festivities next door.
A "ready....set...GO!". Five kids, toddlers through elementary, scramble through the yard. A 5 year year old girl (presumably Nora) squeals in delight. The four others, seeing her bounty, now dash madly around the property looking for their own $50 egg..... To no avail. Confused parents. Ron in a state of complete disbelief. Kids begin to cry. Nora fiercely protecting her priceless egg. Parents begin to argue.
While Robyn and I drink hazelnut coffee, blissful and contented.
Nora got fifties for the next two years with the same results. The following year Ron tried to head off the holiday disaster by putting one $50 bill in each of the kids' eggs. I replaced Nora's fifty with a $100 bill.
The kids stopped getting eggs when they hit about 14 years old, but the older kids would be replaced with younger ones, one of which would always be selected at random for added cash from me. I think Ron began to suspect I was involved, but abandoned that theory when it continued after I moved away.
So early in the morning every Easter, I sneak into Ron's yard for another round of holiday shenanigans.

Mandingo - A Haiku

2011-03-24T12:04:00.004-04:00

She never felt so...
Powerful, free, unchained, strong
Than when beneath him

Dumped for Galifianakis

2011-03-22T21:09:00.005-04:00

I did my undergrad at Northwestern
finished my Masters at Cornell
Eleven point nine Q on my MCAT
but she dumped me for Galifianakis

Completed a 1/2 triathlon at Sarasota
in a shade under six hours
Starting scrum half for the Oneida FC
she still dumped me for Galifianakis

Junior Achievement, Red Cross, ASPCA
passed out blankets to the homeless
I run a rescue shelter for greyhounds
Got dumped for Galifianakis anyhow

I surprised her on her 25th birthday
flew her sister in from New Zealand
bought her a signed 1st edition Lagerlof
Yeah, dumped for Galifianakis

I live in an 19th century firehouse
restored with my own sweat & two hands
the firepole just where she liked it
The bitch dumped me for Galifianakis

I would keep her going for hours
breathless, bordering on unconscious
regardless of my own carnal needs
but now she's banging Galifianakis

Uninvited

2011-03-20T14:25:00.008-04:00

I heard footsteps walking up the path to my house
But I had sent no invitations
I had made no appointments
No welcome mat in front of my door

Then a delicate knock on unstained oak
and a silhouette against the frosted sidelights
She had no way of knowing anyone was home
No lights, no sound, mailbox overflowing with postcards

Her frailty calmed my unease
What danger could she possibly pose?
I unlatched the deadbolt, removed the chain
Cracked the door and let her inside

She said she's driven by this house for years
always wondering what it was like inside
finally worked up the courage to knock
Grateful to find someone inside

I hadn't wanted/expected company
But still I said nothing
as she walked through the first floor
and began to turn on all the lights

She seemed to know her way around
Removing two mugs from the pine hutch
and brewed coffee for me, tea for her
as we sat on opposite ends of my couch

Obviously incapable of doing any harm
to a calloused, caustic man like me
I didn't thank her for her warmth
But I didn't latch the door when she left

Afterwards, she came and went as she pleased
sometimes I was home, other times not
Though aware of one unspoken rule
Make yourself at home, but respect locked doors

My bedroom, the basement, the garage
All else was hers to explore, to wander
For which she appeared to be content
Even when I wasn't there to police

But then I arrived home, worn & humbled
Things seemed slightly out of place
my nightstand, my wine cellar, my keys
She lied and said it wasn't her

I didn't invite her in my home after that

Mariinsky Hospital

2011-03-05T18:51:00.009-05:00

"Hello?.......... Hello?..........Hello?........"
I can only hear her, having only glimpsed her
as she shuffled by the cracked-open door
No way of knowing for certain
but I have no doubt she's old & frail
And black. And spitting up bile.
And too stupid to figure out the "Call" button

The goateed nurse is distracted by the show
Ghetto Rosey Grier encircled by Security
Bare ass prominently displayed behind his gown
"Either change in your room or go outside like that"
Says the guard, no gun or taser or mace
"Ima git the mayor here in fie minute"
Who would have thought he was so well-connected?

The resident enters with the ER CT scan cd
"We can't get this to open on our computers"
Luisa wheels me downstairs for Act II
"I may have a metallic taste in my mouth"
"and feel like I'm wetting myself", I said.
She smiled and said "I take it you've been here before"
As I stared up into the fake blue sky in the drop ceiling

She parked me in the corridor instead of a room
next to the attendants' station
Negotiating work schedules to accommodate vacations
and (most importantly) the upcoming Lil Wayne concert
Which struck me as odd
They seemed too fem for "Me & My Drank"
Gangstas during the show, Billy Porters after

I leaned up to pull down my shirt over my stomach
It's the Bichette jersey I keep in my car
(I don't do crinkly paper hospital gowns)
Four hours, thirty minutes and counting
Dinner & an off-off-off-Broadway play
All this for a fifty dollar co-pay

90% True

2010-10-23T22:30:00.004-04:00

1. I live in a mobile home
2. I've had the same haircut since I was 9 years old
3. I've had sex with D-Lister, Kathy Griffin
4. I've been arrested twice
5. I haven't voted in 3 years
6. I've played guitar for spare change in Jackson Square in New Orleans
7. I drive a Hummer
8. I've spent more than 85 nights in hotels in the last 4 months
9. I own more than two dozen suits
10. I've earned three canoeing trophies
11. I tried (and failed) to learn to play the harmonica
12. In the last year, I've slept with a woman who spent time in a mental institution
13. I sleep with a shotgun under my mattress
14. I've passed out in vomit on a beach in the Dominican Republic
15. I stole $32 in petty cash from a real estate office in Kansas City
16. I'm saving up to buy a dune buggy
17. I've met (in person) one woman from my blog
18. A 65 year old woman is trying to seduce me (she could pass for 50)
19. I went 20 years without riding a bike
20. I earned $50 a week running a football pool in high school

A Good Day

2010-09-17T15:29:00.005-04:00

Ever since they started
including my carbon footprint
on my airline itinerary,
I've started measuring my day
by my progress
toward destroying the universe.
Three hundred and eighteen point two pounds
of CO2 today.
Decent enough but not remotely close
to my personal record.
Maybe I should burn some garbage
or pour some used motor oil in the sewer
to make up for it

The Girl From Memphis

2010-09-17T13:43:00.004-04:00

Her father worked for the company that made those big gray plastic bins you put your shoes in as you go through security at the airport. In Marketing, I think. He sent her to college out of state, hoping to expand her horizons and maybe meet a pre-med soccer star. She had other intentions, slightly less innocent though not altogether depraved. A tiny little thing, she would often leap towards me, fully expecting me to catch her in mid-air. I would groan in mock discomfort and she would giggle in delight. I was a nice solution for her - being very presentable to unsuspecting parents but dangerous enough to leave a little bruise.
"Wouldn't it be hilarious if we got married?" she'd propose. I was never quite sure what my reaction should be "nah, I'm just in it for the sex until your rack starts to sag" or "if we leave right this second, we can catch the redeye to Vegas". Though honestly, I think she'd have been ok with either one.
She was a HORRIBLE painter. Combined oils with oatmeal with Popsicle sticks with earthen clay. I was always surprised when she sold another painting, though I never acted that way in front of her. Just took her out for victory drinks and sex in the cab back home, maybe creating an argument to make it more carnal.
But it was just play-fighting and play-fucking and play-loving. Her friends would only see my tie and $75 haircut. My friends would only see her pot brownies and great set of tits. She figured it out before I did. She did the smartest thing, really. Just stopped coming around. Definitely made things easier on me.

But I'm still in Memphis every now and then.

Subtle

2010-09-12T00:06:00.005-04:00

Its the little things
that let me know she's been here
(when she not supposed to be)

still-warm water droplets in my tub
the scent of a cologne I haven't worn in a while
Diorskin Nude inside the collar of my favorite shirt

My bed a little too well-made
her silhouette barely graces my pillow
my robe hung a little too neatly on the closet door

HF Saint upside down in my bookcase
Damien Rice at the top of my playlist
Prescriptions aligned in the medicine cabinet

My notebooks, dog-earred and well-read
a cigar missing from my humidor
(not one of the good ones though)

Maybe I shouldn't be away from the house for so long
maybe I should keep all the windows locked
but then who would keep me company?

The Pill

2010-03-01T15:45:00.002-05:00

Sulphur in her mouth
cursing the physician
so sickened by the treatment
she doesn't even realize
she no longer has the disease

XC90

2010-02-25T16:39:00.002-05:00

We had taken turns driving
But to be honest
she'd done more than her share
Maybe because I needed more sleep
Maybe just because she wanted to get there faster
But you couldn't tell by her pace
five miles above the speed limit
middle lane, no worries about being stopped
She would sing along softly to the radio as I slept
then laugh at my jokes when I took the wheel
I'm not sure when she slept
She followed the GPS's commands to the letter
I shut if off and stopped at every tourist trap
I was never entirely sure when we'd get there
unsure if the destination would be better than the ride

The Facade

2010-02-24T21:18:00.002-05:00

I just happened to be positioned behind her as she mingled at a cocktail party, a drink in her right hand so she could be demonstrative with her ringed left. She was halfway through telling a woman ten years younger about the roses her husband had bought herfor her birthday and the "just precious" construction paper card her son made her in art class, concluding with "and the he hugged me and told me I was the beautifulest mommy in the whole world!".
I just shook my head, thinking about the last time I'd seen her - checking her re-applied lipstick in my passenger-side visor mirror before she returned to work. I offered her a piece of gum as she reached to open the door.
But her decade-long marriage must have improved over the last three months.
I took my time pouring myself a drink as she continued her soliloquy, no audience in particular, oblivious to my proximity. Now talking about her job, how embarassed she was when her boss singled her out for praise for her "invaluable contribution" and he "wouldn't know what to do without her". I reflexively shook my head, knowing her role to be a faceless administrative drone, reviewing paperwork and spell-checking other's work.
I was courteously apologetic as I brushed by, spilling my drink down her dress, name-brand but purchased during offseason clearance. Her face went from shock to anger to recognition to surprised to unsure to uncomfortable over the next few seconds. Had I overheard her well-rehearsed script, her smoky mirror?
She looked down to the floor, then back at me and cautiously gestured to the back door. I brushed some invisible lint from my lapel, grabbed the hand of a younger woman and walked away.

Particle Board

2009-06-12T22:16:00.004-04:00

You stood two steps behind him
as he unlocked the door to his 2nd floor apartment
with a partial view of the pool & the highway
Carrington Place or Crane's Landing or The Meadows

He walked in, flipping the light switch
a black halogen pole lamp illuminates the foyer
you step cautiously onto the neutral linoleum
your heels sticking a bit, leather on plastic

He walks four or five steps into the kitchen
opening the cabinet, you know the kind
tan pressed wood that swells when wet
he withdraws a bottle of peppermint schnapps

he rests the bottle on the laminate countertop
youre still wearing your charcoal gray peacoat
as he gestures to Sanyo cd player
and asks you to put on some "mood" music

Flipping through his random collection
The Killers, Creed, the Crue & Chili Peppers
"hey, just push play" he calls over to you
Sex of Fire begins to play from the tinny speakers

He sets down two plastic schnapps-filled glasses
on the black particle board coffee table
that he bought in a box & assembled with an allen wrench
water rings & ciggy burns scattered randomly

he makes room for you on his futon
you remove your coat, draping it on his gamer rocker
he leans over as you sit beside him
his goatee tickles your chin as you kiss

you look around while he squeezes your breast
aluminum, particle board, plastic and polyester
a lack of permanence and perspective
all of it garbage within five years, maybe less

Is that where you really want to be?
hooked up with some random who smells like Axe
while I'm at home on my leather chaise
making out with a waitress from Applebees

Tuesday at The Corner Bar & Grille

2009-05-02T21:42:00.006-04:00

i should have known better
i had no business being there
but she laughed when i hesitated
"as if you could still charm my pants off"
"you know we're not 18 anymore"

she said she could only meet at lunch
she worked evenings at Ballys
spinning class til 5, pilates at 7
she'd be at the Corner after her shower
just to talk & hear about the Alison

i was cautiously cautious at first
we had a past and she had a present
married a decade, 3 kids of her own
one played the piano, 2 danced ballet
she lulled me into apprehensive optimism

the conversation flowed then ebbed
she paused then asked if i was happy
"youve known me since i was 16"
"you ever know me to be happy?"
i noticed her eyes were as weary as my own

right then i hoped we could be friends
and she told me she decided to be happy
right after her dad died last year
it got closer to 7 and she had to go
sometimes her husband brought her lunch

i stepped up to hug her goodbye
as we stood shivering outside the bar
i swear to God i wanted to be friends
but the our lips somehow met
our bodies somehow embraced

"lets go sit a minute in my car"
she said as she took me by my hand
i should have known better
i had no business being there
but it was cold & maybe i could make her happy

she drove a few blocks away, quiet
she was going to be late anyhow
her tiny hands in mine, it began
slowly at first, then with a hunger
then with a longing, i began to drown

she unbuttoned my shirt, 6 buttons down
then my belt as she unzipped her pants
i looked around to make sure we were alone
both of us half-naked under the streetlight
the windows fogged, streaked by fingerprints

i saw the truth as she crawled in the backseat
leopard-print bra and laced black thong
no way she'd wear that just for work
it should have been boy-shorts & jogging bra
she knew we'd be here when she woke this morning

i should have seen this coming
i should have known better
theres no way i should be here right now
but i still crawled back to be with her
next to the child safety seat and bookbag

we couldnt be friends after this
we would be something else entirely
stolen glances as we past in the street
she'd be someone to give me what she wanted
me not man enough to give her what she needs

Shallow Grave

2008-07-04T18:56:00.005-04:00

Ts my second time out to the woods this year
well-worn shovel, maglite and a burlap sack
she got too close & I can't take no chance
bury her good so she ain't never coming back

Chorus
Gonna bury my baby in a shallow grave
that'll teach her I'm no one to enslave
I know this ain't no way for a man to behave
but I buried my baby in a shallow grave

Seven wilted roses atop seven mounds of earth
I say seven prayers to soothe each restless soul
though I know I can't be forgiven even once
Their lips like velvet, my heart like coal

Chorus

The dirt won't come clean 'neath my fingernails
razor-sharp splinters sink deeper into my skin
the rain won't wash away the foul stench of death
No god can absolve this lifetime of sin

Gonna bury my baby in a shallow grave
that'll teach her I'm no one to enslave
I know it ain't no way for a man to behave
but I buried my baby in a shallow grave

Smerdyakov - March 2002

The Lockless Door - Robert Frost

2008-04-29T10:11:00.003-04:00

It went many years,

But at last came a knock,

And I thought of the door

With no lock to lock.

I blew out the light,

I tip-toed the floor,

And raised both hands

In prayer to the door.

But the knock came again

My window was wide;

I climbed on the sill

And descended outside.

Back over the sill

I bade a "Come in"

To whoever the knock

At the door may have been.

So at a knock

I emptied my cage

To hide in the world

And alter with age.

I Could Tell You

2008-03-31T19:36:00.005-04:00

I could tell you that I went to Mexico
rented a little place on the beach
drank Pura Sangre from the bottle
hosted giggly black-eyed senoritas
all of us soaked in agave sweat

I could tell you that I hit the road
bought a twenty year old Winnebago
steering clear of the highways and cities
map of Nebraska across the dashboard
and my dog in the passenger seat

I could tell you that I flew to Europe
passport, Visa and a fistful of cash
La Posada de las Almas y Tibur Hotel
walked in the footsteps of Moors
lit a candle for you at La Seo

I could tell you that I went to Vegas
Subsidizing hookers and strippers
Losing track of what was lost & won
sharkskin jacket and boxer shorts
Ben Sanderson had nothing on me

I could tell you that I met some girl
whirlwind romance & a trip to Elkton
Sundays spent reading the banns
gumball machine rings & impromptu vows
marital bliss with Sara (or was it Stella?)

I suppose I could tell you the truth
the bad & the ugly, not so much good
but illusions have gotten us this far
why start now with brutal candor?
Just pick a stanza above to believe

She

2008-03-13T10:10:00.005-04:00

Shi has always been my closest companion
my confidante, my lover, my judge
touching the lives of the people around me
her hand so close to grazing my own
I can feel the warmth of her fingertips

Shi whispers her name in my ear as I sleep
I'm unsure if it's a tease or a prophecy
uncertain if I want her to lay down beside me
taking me in her willowy arms
embracing me as the candle slowly burns

Shi comes and goes as she pleases
but never quite leaving me alone
reminders of her presence litter my room
a murder of crows, a salt-pepper ram
keep me company until shi returns

Shi promises me comfort & redemption
alluring in her matte black dress and veil
a vision of fate and relentless certainty
her broken watch oddly out of place
but still keeping perfect time

Shi goes days without a single word
then blusters on for weeks on end
"hominem te esse memento" & "memento mori"
repeated until I hear them in my sleep
never knowing if she'll be there when I wake

Show Me Where It Hurts

2008-03-02T20:40:00.010-05:00

I was going through some boxes and I came across and old gig case for a guitar I no longer own. It was just folded up inside along with a few zippos and 18" x 12" unframed canvas painting. The initials "R.J" scripted neatly at the bottom right in black oil.
Regina J. was an art student I dated a long time ago. A million years ago, it seems like. She had this exquisite tattoo on her shoulder of Alice gazing through a looking glass to see herself reflected as the Queen of Hearts. She sculpted mostly. Industrial stuff - definitely not marketable to anyone mainstream. But she didn't give a shit.
We dated for a few months. Actually, "dated" would be a rather generous term. We fought some. A lot. About politics, about movies, about art, about other men or women. We would literally scream at each other at the top of our lungs while our faces were inches apart. But it would only be a matter of time before I'd grab her by her hair or she'd shove me against a wall.
Needless to say, it was a fairly frenzied couple of months.
Anyway, I unzipped the guitar case and found a sheet of spiral notebook paper with a song I'd written for her. It was from my early "three chords of crap" period. Not quite power-ballad, not quite bubblegum punk. Just self-important bullshit.
But I humbly present to you "Show Me Where It Hurts". For Regina.

Don't hide behind that bandage

Can't numb it with that pill

I feel a little greedy

but I promise I won't kill

***

Take your finger off the trigger

I'll take my hands off your throat

Who are you trying to fool?

I read your suicide note

***

(chorus)

Show me where it hurts
tell me where it bleeds
let's take off all our clothes
and find out where it leads

***

Don't you like it when I scratch?

Do you like it when bite?

candle wax and razor blades

I love it when you fight
***

(repeat chorus)

***

Let's get you in the shower

and wash off all that pain

some of yours & some of mine

half-naked in the rain

***

(repeat chorus)

Beautiful Without Me

2008-02-28T09:33:00.005-05:00

I had found the place by accident. There are a few thousand acres of woods behind my house and I used to spend a lot of my time walking the horse trails that meander through the trees. Though quite primitive, the paths had always been lifesavers for me becuase of my uncanny sense of misdirection. Once you get a hundred yards or so beyond the treeline, it's difficult to find your bearings. A 30 minute walk could easily turn into a two hour domestic replay of Lord of the Flies.

But being the gadget man that I am, I invested a couple hundred bucks in a handheld GPS unit. Voila - I was no longer a slave to the tramped dirt pathways. I could mark my house on the GPS and use it to to find my way back without leaving a proverbial trail of breadcrumbs.

The forest was now mine.

So I set out, GPS firmly in hand, determined to discover the outermost reaches. Through clearings, crouching under branches, snagging my shirt on thorns. For almost an hour before I found it - a place where the rock ledges intertwined to form a natural cathedral of stone, accessible only through an almost invisible three foot wide crevice.

Emboldened by explorers of the past - Desoto, Magellan, de Leon - I walked through the opening to see........... crushed beer cans and broken whiskey bottles littering the leaf-covered floor. So apparently I wasn't the first to grace this virginal outpost. It must have had a 20+ year history as a hangout for underage drinking and general mischief.

But beyond the spray-painted graffiti and discarded trash lied a truly beautiful, almost majestic, place. The sunlight broke through the trees above to form a thousand spotlights, each one framing a a dark corner in a bath of light. The main 25 foot wide opening was encircled by a dozen or more rocky outcrops. And the intersection of each one of those formed an almost unpassable exit to yet another smaller opening. Definitely a place to be explored rather than defiled.

I marked the point on my GPS and filled my backpack with as many cans and bottles that I could carry.

I go back to that place every now and then, each time trying to scrub and little more paint off the rock walls or disposing of a little more litter. Not for myself - I think I can see past the traces of refuse and appreciate the sublime for what it is, before it was besmirched by inconsiderate shitheads. But maybe I can make little easier for the next guy to realize how beautiful it is. Even without me.

Schismatist

2008-02-22T10:33:00.005-05:00

Even after I stopped doing some serious drinking, I still made a habit of spending a lot of time in bars. It was probably good for me to get out in a social atmosphere, even if I wasn't directly contributing to the fraternization. I suppose that my theory was that I would somehow absorb the ability to mingle via osmosis.
But mostly I just found myself clinically observing other people.
And I spent one night observing one person in particular.
She was drunk even before she walked in. It was a hotel bar, so my first thought was that she may have been a prostitute. But that belief quickly faded away. I knew a hooker when I see one, and she was no hooker. Though she was a little under-dressed for this particular bar. Her clothes a little too tight & cheap and her shoes much too Payless.
Just a drunk whore.
I'm surprised they even served her. She was visibly wobbly and obviously alone - a combination that's usually a prologue to trouble. So I watched her out of the corner of my eye as I nursed my sidecar. It wasn't so much a predatory gaze, but rather how one would look at a car careening out of control on a winding mountain road - something bad was about to happen and I didn't want to miss it.
As my eyes volleyed back and forth between her now slumping figure and my melting ice cubes, I noticed another man in the corner doing the very same thing. But he wasn't merely looking on in grotesque amusement. He was patiently waiting for opportunity.
He was about my age, maybe a little younger, well-dressed and sober enough to know exactly what he was doing. And planning. An unintentional predator salivating at a target of convenience.
He waited 30 seconds or so after she gulped what remained in her glass then stumbled toward the door before he left a twenty on his own table and followed her out. But not before scanning to his left and right to see if he was the only one eyeing the unsuspecting girl.
I watched them both through the picture window facing the street, their bodies now framed between Bass & Guinness neon signs. She was attempting to sort her thoughts, obviously in vain. Maybe trying to figure out how she'd get home, remembering the bus schedule or calculating what the cab fare would be . But much too engrossed in her ephemeral thoughts to notice him approaching.
I saw the whole episode acted out in mime to the jukebox soundtrack of Stevie Ray Vaughn's Tightrope. He was trying to give off the impression of a helpful stranger, offering her a ride home. Or maybe just walk with her a while to make sure she was ok - there were a lot of crazies out in the streets that late, right?
She clutched her purse tight against her ribcage, perhaps sensing that he wasn't as he seemed. She drew back as he reached his hand out to rub her shoulders - just a warm, friendly gesture, right? Her apprehension didn't deter his physicality. To the contrary, he must have liked his women with a little fire in their bellies. He stepped up his tactile offensive by wrapping his arm around her waist.
I'd seen enough. I left money on the bar to cover my tab and strode through the door
"Leave her alone, you piece of shit", I said.
Perturbed at being interrupted, he placed his hand on her breast and told me to mind my own business.
I asked her if she wanted me to call her a taxi. She looked at him before answering in the affirmative. I held out my hand for her to take and led her away from the dirtbag.
And he was pissed. But he didn't move from in front of the building. Just watched us walk halfway down the block to the hotel entrance and to the curb as I hailed a cab.
I opened the back door and made sure she was in safely as I handed the driver 2 twenties and told him to take her home. She looked at me without a 'thank you' as the car pulled away.
I started heading back to finish my "conversation" with the scorned shitbag. Since he clearly wasn't interested in going back in the bar, he must have wanted to have a few words with me. And by now, I couldn't help but notice a few patrons watching us through the window, waiting for the discussion.
But then I heard a car honk from the street as the same taxi pulled back next to me after circling the block. The driver rolled down his window.
"She's too drunk. She won't tell me where she lives. Told me to take her back here. I don't have time for this" he said, frustrated, as he handed me back one twenty.
She opened the door, nearly falling to the pavement face-first, and exited the car.
"Sorry", she apologized. "I don't remember my address. I guess I'll just have to go home with you".
I was suddenly disgusted by her tequila-slurred words and clumsy attention-seeking.
"Look, there's no way you're coming home with me. You better get your ass back in that cab before you do something really stupid or before someone does something real stupid to you", I spat out.
What the hell was the point of helping someone who was pretty much deadset on self-destruction?
"Come on, guy. Just take me home, ok? I just need to sleep a little then I'll feel better in the morning. I swear I'll be good", she pleaded.
The spurned suitor was watching this all in amusement.
"I'll take you home, sweetheart" he offered with a smile, ever the helpful gentleman.
She looked at him then she turned back to me.
"So what's it gonna be, huh? Are you going to make me go home with him?" she asked, almost daring me to take advantage of her.
"You're going to have to find yourself another hero, little girl" I told her as I walked back into the bar for 8 or 9 more drinks.

Does He?

2008-02-21T09:29:00.004-05:00

Does he make you smile like I used to do?
whispering a dirty joke in your ear at a funeral
then glaring at you in mock disdain
as your cashmere lips form a resisted grin
Does he?

Does he make you laugh like I used to do?
when you're alone in your car, me miles away
but you titter thinking about the time
I painted happy faces on my nipples
Does he?

Does he make you come like I used to do?
turning you on like a switch
my finger tracing gently on your hip
as my teeth sink into your neck
Does he?

Does he make you feel like I used to do?
hunger, madness, longing and desperation
all before I finish your song
my fingers raw against the steel strings
Does he?

Does he make you scream like I used to do?
as I peel back your scabs
and probe your wounds with my finger
not sure if I'm a healer or a masochist
Does he?

Does he make you cry like I used to do?
wiping your tears before I walk back in the room
pretending everything couldn't be better
as if I never said the things I did
No he doesn't, does he?

Yet

2008-02-13T15:32:00.004-05:00

Grown up to be a woman
yet still a little girl inside

Settled for a boy
yet still longing for a man

Found her purpose
yet not the one she hoped it would be

Living with uncompromising honesty
yet still hiding one dark secret

Content to wear jeans and a sweater
yet gazes longingly at the gown in the window

Pleased with her life
yet holding out hope for another

Grasped hard-learned lessons
yet feels like a schoolgirl next to him

Sees the beauty around her
yet dreams of somewhere else

Intoccabile

2008-02-08T11:24:00.002-05:00

I exited the lobby of my hotel
temporarily blinded by the reflection
off the glass highrise across the street
I had to quickly jerk myself back
to escape being trampled by commuters

I stood motionless waiting for my chance
to merge with the industrious crowd
not wanting to be absorbed by the bustle
shrinking myself to fend off their touch
practically leaping into an approaching void

I skitted to the right and left
nearly colliding with oncoming traffic
not even wanting to be casually brushed
nor inadvertantly bumped, tapped or rubbed
content to be tactually invisible

Then I noticed a strange phenomenon
just before I would flinch to dodge a passerby
they would move away from me instead
the more I condensed myself
the bigger the buffer they allowed
until I was surrounded by an ethereal halo

It was warmly comforting..... at first
unconcerned with their brutishness
lengthening my stride, slowing my gait
brazenly immune to my environment
my own aura of sanctuary

But as I reached out my open hand
to aid a fallen pedestrian
her purse strewn across the pavement
she suddenly withdrew from me
with a sickening churlishness

And she wasn't alone in her revulsion
a colleague refused my handshake
a grandmother dismissed my embrace
a lover spurned all intimacy
as my sanctuary became a prison

Égoïste

2008-02-02T11:36:00.002-05:00

I used to have a real job. A real boss, 401k, bi-weekly paychecks - the whole 9 yards. And because I wasn't bound by the constraints of family, friends or a social life, I used to work relatively long hours. The only problem with that is, at that time, I lived about an hour commute away from the office. So working until 10-11 o'clock 5-6 nights a week, then driving 40+ miles home, sleeping for 4-5 hours, then getting up and driving another hour back into work got a little old after a while. So I was left with 2 basic options - either sell my house and get a place in the city OR find a cheap little studio downtown to crash after working late.
I opted for door number two.
I found a place about 2 blocks from my office. It was an unfurnished loft in a converted bottle factory (glass, not baby). Nothing extraordinarily special about it - about 600 sq ft of open space with ladder access to a raised sleeping area, but it was perfect for my needs. And it had a lot of good light, which was unfortunate because I didn't think I'd see much of the place during the day.
I signed a 6-month lease with an option for month-to-month after that. I bought a cheap couch, a platform bed and stashed a week's supply of clothes in the closet. It was pretty sweet for a while. Kinda like my own little private hideout, a safehouse that only I knew about.
Until I made the mistake of letting someone else in on the secret.
There was this admin in Finance. We had exchanged pleasantries and innuendo for a few weeks until one night when we were the last two people in the office. I was working late. She was working late. We went for drinks afterwards. We wanted a little privacy.
You get the picture.
This went on for the better part of 2 months. We'd work late, get drunk then go back to my place and have at it. We even took advantage of the close proximity to have a few long "lunches" as well. We'd come back to the office with our hair mussed and clothes wrinkled, but I don't think anyone suspected anything nefarious.
A little background on her - early 20's, graduated from a private catholic college in Texas, tight swimmer's body, dating a 3rd year med student. It would be fair to say that she didn't have a lot of bedroom experience up until that point in her life. And the experience she did have wasn't much more than the drunken-frat-boy "grope'n'poke" variety. Since her boyfriend spent a lot of time at school, they didn't have much of a chance to spend much time together. So she really came of age bedroom-wise while we were together.
So anyway, this goes on a bit longer until she starts feeling guilty about her boyfriend and decides that she needs to spend more time with him. She tells me that she can't do this any longer and breaks it off. She even gave her notice at our company and started working for the census bureau. I was definitely ok with it because I was getting even less sleep than when I was driving all the way home each night. And it wasn't like I had anything invested in her except the physical thing.
So I stopped seeing her...... for about a month.
She developed this habit of hanging out with her friends at a downtown bar and getting too drunk to drive home. So she'd walk over to my loft and knock on the door to see if I was there. This happened once every couple of weeks. I'd let her in, put her to sleep in my bed then I'd go sleep on the couch. Then she'd come over to the couch and start kissing my neck. I'd tell her to knock it off because I had to go into work early. Then she'd start rubbing my chest. So we'd end up making out for a while. Out of a convoluted respect for her relationship with her boyfriend, I wouldn't go any further than that.
A few months of this goes by. It starts getting pretty old for me. I got the place so I could get some sleep after working late, but now I was sleeping way less if at all.
So she comes over late one Friday night. After her engagement party. Smashed as she could be. I tell her that she can sleep on the bed but she better stay there. I lay down on the couch and go to sleep. I wake up about 7am when I feel her on top of me, completely undressed. I tell her to cut it out. She starts doing certain things to me (for the sake of decency, I'll leave it at that). I push her away and tell her to get off me. She starts doing something to me even more provocative.
I'm a man. I have weaknesses.
I roll over on top and enter her. Nothing intimate. Nothing affectionate. Just going through the motions to get it over with.
I look down to see her avoiding eye contact with me as her eyes almost start to tear up. I couldn't freaking believe she was pulling that shit. I roll off her said things that I regret. Pretty much a total prick. Things like "what the hell did you expect me to do?" and "what's your f-ing problem?".
You know, being the sensitive guy I am.
She stopped coming over after that.

Top Ten Reasons Why Assclown Might NOT Be Gay

2008-02-01T08:07:00.006-05:00

10. He doesn't employ a Guatemalan houseboy named Enrique
9. He has restored an old Ford Bronco
8. He has never had sexual intercourse with a man
7. He prefers Norman Mailer over Truman Capote
6. Although he owns a pair of leather chaps, he used them exclusively for motorcycle riding
5. He really wasn't all that into Six Feet Under
4. He only spends 10 seconds on his hair in the morning
3. He knows how to drop the transmission on a 1984 CJ-7
2. He prefers Marco Island over Key West
1. He takes his coffee black

The Redline

2008-01-27T17:11:00.002-05:00

When I was younger, I used to take the train into the city to buy my drugs. It was a real pain in the ass, but if the cops saw a nice car with suburban plates in that part of town, they'd pull you over every time. Not that they'd have probable cause for a search, but that rarely stopped them. Fortunately, I learned this fact by proxy when one of my college roommates got busted for possession when he was pulled over in his Lexus one block away from a crackhouse.
So I'd drive to Union Station then take the Red Line to Logan Circle (this was right before the area started getting gentrified) then walk four blocks around the back of this 3-story brownstone. It was one of the only places I knew about where you could get both coke and heroin. Moonrocks was my thing at the time and it was a real pain to go to two different dealers.
I'd made this trip a couple dozen times maybe. This was over about a year and a half, so it's not like I was a complete junkie or anything.
So, I'm sitting there on the train in a pair of A&F cargoes, an Eddie Bauer rugby shirt and my Timberland leather jacket. It had been a good month since I'd really let loose so I was getting a little heavy, counting the minutes until my stop.
We pulled into Metro and I noticed this black dude, a younger kid - maybe just old enough to drink, wheel himself into my car in a beat-up old wheelchair. I was surprised that his transfer was almost... well, graceful. I figured he must have been in it for a while to the point where this was second nature for him. He got himself settled in as the doors closed and the train pulled away.
He was a big guy, even to me. Not "fat" big. Just substantial. Massive even, to the point where his frame looked grossly disproportionate to the chair that supported him. He was nattily dressed, sweatsuit and cap, but it was clean and in good repair. A 7-11 nametag, Ruslan, was affixed to his chest so I assumed he was on his way to work.
I found myself silently theorizing how he ended up chairbound. Aside from his shrunken, degenerated legs, he didn't have anything else obviously wrong with him. Car accident probably. But as he backed himself into the handicap slot, the sleeves of his sweatshirt worked themselves up to reveal a telltale one inch crater scar bullet wound on his forearm and I assumed that wasn't the only one.
He was directly across from me when he took off his redskins Starter cap, placed it upside-down in his lap... and began to sing.

I call, You hear me

I’ve lost it all

And it’s more than I can bear

I feel so empty
You’re strong I’m weary

I’m holdin’ on

But I feel like givin’ in

But still You’re with me

His voice was... soulful, heartbreaking, joyous, triumphant and broken all at once. I've never been one for gospel, but he was simply amazing. I mean, after the first note, every single person in that train car stopped whatever it was that they were doing and just gazed at him in awe.

And even though I’m walkin’ through
The valley of the shadow
I will hold tight to the hand of Him
Whose love will comfort me
And when all hope is gone
And I’ve been wounded in the battle
He is all the strength that I will
Ever need
And He will carry me

The words "wounded in battle" struck me and all of a sudden I knew exactly how he ended up in his chair. Might've been a drive-by. Might've been a deal gone bad. Might've been ice-driven frenzy. But one was the same as the others. And the outcome was sure the same.

I know I’m broken
But You alone
Can mend this heart of mine
You’re always with me

He breathed out the last word and stared right into my eyes. Not because he saw me as a fellow broken soul. But because he saw me as a predator. As a killer. His killer.

And he was right. I pulled that trigger. Not literally, but it didn't matter. I hadn't picked up a gun in years, but the bullets in his arm and his back were mine. Or maybe even meant for me. My money bought the gun, loaded the clip and squeezed the trigger.

The train stopped at Farragut as passengers drifted by and filled his cap with singles and a few fives.

The train moved on towards Logan Circle, but he didn't sing again. He just looked at me with a sense of.... I wasn't sure at first. But then I knew. He was sitting in judgment, waiting to see which stop I'd make my own. Would I get off on the next stop or would I stay on until Bethesda or maybe Rockville. If I stood up too soon? He'd find me guilty. And he'd be right.

The train slowed as it pulled up to the platform. He stopped looking at me only long enough to gather his things in preparation for his own departure. But he glared back at me as I began to stand up myself. He was about to say something, spit out some invective perhaps, when I reached into my jacket pocket and pulled out my wallet.

I placed 7 fifty dollar bills in his hat and sat back down.

Sprache Lektion

2008-01-25T21:52:00.002-05:00

Es ist dieses Mädchen, das ich zu wissen,
Ich erinnerte mich an sie zu vergessen, heute Morgen
Morgen werde ich vergessen, sie zu merken
Ich sehe, ihr Versteck ihr Lächeln
Sie wird nicht vergessen, mich noch recht

Top Ten Reasons Why Assclown MIGHT Be Gay

2008-01-23T13:35:00.002-05:00

10. He owns a convertible roadster

9. He's a single guy in his mid-30's and he owns a fully populated china cabinet

8. His shoe closet would make Imelda Marcos weep

7. He knows the difference between the colors fuschia and magenta

6. He owns 26 sweaters

5. He cried at the end of "Terms of Endearment"

4. He lets his (male) dog lick him in his mouth

3. He keeps a photograph of another guy's crotch

2. He has spent an hour trying to get a perfect inside corner on his crown moulding

1. He owns a Michael Buble CD

Are You Experienced?

2008-01-23T10:16:00.002-05:00

Has it ever hurt so bad that you didn't care what happened
90 miles per hour down Suicide Hill
seatbelt unbuckled and The Cure full volume
Not quite deliberate but not quite unplanned
Reckless and surrendering to chance?

Have you ever fallen so hard that you plan your breakdowns
laying a Franklin and a Jackson on the bar
your address scribbled on the twenty
to (maybe) get yourself home
as long as you don't puke in the cab?

Are you consumed by the past that you risk your future
hiding her painting in the trunk with your old trophies
her first initial and last name in the bottom corner
an excuse already prepared if someone finds it
"Oh, I didn't even know I still had that old thing"?

Have you ever felt so alone, lying next to someone else
just as beautiful, just as passionate, just as kind
holding out your arm to keep her at the right distance
close enough to invite her inside
far enough so that she won't stay?

Ever want the pain to stop so much that you........
still refilling your prescriptions
but no longer taking your pills
full honey-colored bottles with childproof caps
lining the inside of your medicine cabinet?

Because if you haven't felt what I've felt
desperation, anguish, rage, wretched longing
then no amout of caring or desire
will countermand the difference
between my past and our future

She Doesn't Deserve Me

2008-01-16T19:46:00.002-05:00

I can give her a good five minutes a day
I'll be there for her most of the time
Her birthday is next week, I think
I'll try to get her some flowers
She doesn't deserve me

I kinda have my own thing going on
Things I'm trying to work out
Maybe I'll figure it out this year
She's got time to waste, right?
She doesn't deserve me

I'll always love someone else more
but she's right up there, top 5 at least
She really means something to me though
I say "me too" when she says she loves me
She doesn't deserve me

There's that guy that likes her at work
who brought her soup when she was sick
She ate it as she ironed my shirts
I didn't give her a hard time when she spilled
She doesn't deserve me

I should probably call her tonight
She's seemed kind of down lately
especially when she left this morning
I thought last night was great though
She doesn't deserve me

Chapter Two

2008-01-14T22:19:00.002-05:00

Even before my recent hermitage, I haven't been working all that much. Technically speaking, I still have an office, but I eased back my schedule to less that a half dozen sessions per month. Bridge sessions - deaths in the family, temporary job woes, ex-clients who need some quick reinforcement - that sort of thing. None of them are long term. If I see them heading that way? Immediate referral.

Pretty much everyone here knows this. I'm effectively out of business. Then they had that mall shooting in Omaha last month.

I have these friends, David and Dahlia ("Dolly" to friends) with a 17-year old son, Seth. I saw Dolly for about 4 years, so I was well aware of Seth's issues - self-harm, drug use, violent behavior, etc. I was there when he was involuntarily admitted to residential care after a suicide attempt a couple years ago. The kid has been in a pretty dark place for a long time. A lost cause if there ever was one.

So anyway, after that kid in Omaha shot up the mall a couple weeks before Christmas. David and Dolly call me and tell me that their very worried about Seth. They had found a box of shotgun shells in his room. No gun, but they were alarmed nonetheless. They couldn't get over the fear that they would see him on the news after he shot a dozen of his schoolmates. They just wanted to know if I can just talk to him and get a feel for what kind of path he was on. He was already in court-ordered therapy (group and individual) after his last legal run-in, but unfortunately it was with a court-appointed therapist. And a kid like Seth can easily manipulate most of those types. Real life isn't like Good Will Hunting.

So I'm back at the office.

He walks in, pretty much exactly as you'd think he'd look. Black on black on black.

I started by asking him if he knew why his parents were so concerned. He was fully aware that they saw him as a ticking bomb. In fact, he took pleasure in that role. It empowered him. His parents weren't the only people who saw him as a potential threat. He said he had heard the same thind, directly or indirectly, from his teachers and classmates. "Freak" and "psycho".

"So do you think that there is an appeal to something like that? I mean, is there a temptation for yo to fulfill that?" I asked.

"I can't tell you that. If I talked about wanting to hurt people, you'd have to report it to the cops", he replied.

"Actually that's kind of a gray area", I answered. "Technically speaking, there's a relatively fine line between mandatory reporting and therapist privilege. It's even more nebulous in this particular instance. Your father is a attorney, correct? More importantly, your father is YOUR attorney - he represented you when you vandalized the school last year, right? There was a case a few years ago, New Jersey I think, that found that psychologists contracted to evaluate a client by that client's attorney now fell under the attorney-client privilege and were not legally required to report past of future acts of violence or abuse. It's probably splitting hairs, but I'd be in as much trouble for not reporting anything as I would if I actually did report it. But if it makes you more comfortable, you can just talk about it in hypotheticals - you hypothetically thought about taking a gun to school - that sort of thing."

He seem a little confused.

"What kind of therapist are you?" he asked.

"The kind that's been around long enough to know that you're probably going to do what you want to do regardless of how well I do my job".

So he talked about "hypothetically" buying a gun from a kid at school who "hypothetically" stole it from his father. He wasn't planning on doing anything with it per se. He just liked the way it felt in his hand. Cold, substantial, powerful. He was oppressed, after all. Picked on at school. Beat up on a fairly regular basis. So sure, it crossed his mind to take the gun to school, "hypothetically". But he doubted he would ever do anything with it.

"I guess there's one thing I don't get", I stated. "School shootings, aside from being totally passe, actually accomplish the opposite effect of what the killer is trying to accomplish".

"What do you mean", he asked.

"Well, these kids take their guns into school and shoot up the people that have somehow wronged them - the bullies, the girl that jilted them, the teacher that gave them an F. Or they shoot up the place thinking that they'll somehow gain some eternal infamy. But what actually happens is that they martyr the people they mean to harm while they themselves become soon-to-be-forgotten footnotes. The victims will get plaques, statues, posthumous book deals, while the killer gets a few days of the press talking about what a loser freak he was. I just don't see how that's anything that anyone would want. Especially if they're willing to kill themselves to do it.
He shook his head. "That's not true. People remember the school shooters", he responded.
"Really now?" I said. "Let's try an experiment. I'm going to give you some homework. You ask 20 random people to try to name the person who shot those kids at Virginia Tech, or the kid that shot his classmates in Arkansas or Columbine. Heck, see if they know the name of the kid who shot up the mall in Omaha. That was just last week. If 20% of the people you ask know them, then I'll get you out of your counseling sessions".
He came back two days later. One person knew Robert Hawkins from Omaha and three knew Klebold & Harris from Columbine.
"So what does that tell you?" I asked.
He thought his answer would startle me. "It tells me that if I want to be infamous, I (hypothetically) need to kill even more people."
"Wrong" I said. "If the goal of this 'hypothetical' school shooter is to be remembered, then he needs to forget about the quantity of his (hypothetical) victims and start thinking about the quality of his victims. These killers have just targeted innocent people. Like I said last time, that's totally passe. But if you (hypothetically) want to be remembered when you go out in your blaze of glory, why not take out those that deserve it in the process?"
He sat up straighter in his chair.
I continued. "Take child molesters for example. They have all these laws that prohibit them from living within so many yards of a school, playground, etc. So they end up clustered in these little shitty apartment complexes filled with their own kind. They're easy to find. All you have to do is look in the online database and check for a bunch that have the same address. If someone were to (hypothetically) shoot a place like that up instead of their school, then they'd be remembered. Forget being called a loser freak. They'd call that person a hero. A vigilante. A martyr for justice".
Seeds of thought began sprouting in his head.
I didn't stop. "And it probably wouldn't stop there. There would be copycats. Maybe even an entire movement. If a person were to do something like that? They'd be remembered. Revered even".
There was a minute of silence between us.
From there, the conversation gradually segued into his grades, his relationship with his parents, his friends, etc. But I could tell that the seeds were taking root.

It won't happen today. It probably won't happen next month. But it's going to happen. I'm certain of it.

Time Trials

2008-01-03T20:20:00.004-05:00

Sunday Night:
1 large veggie pizza with pineapple from Dominos - $13.59 plus tip
Time from initial call til knock on my door - 46 minutes

1 Asian or Hispanic masseuse under the age of 25 - $235.00 plus tip
Time from initial call til knock on my door - 41 minutes

Tuesday Night:
1 order of General Tsao's chicken & one egg roll - $9.88 plus tip
Time from initial call til knock on my door - 53 minutes

1 recently divorced redheaded ex-girlfriend - no charge
Time from initial call til knock on my door - 36 minutes

Wednesday Night
Half rack of St Louis ribs and 6 hot wings - $17.45 plus tip
Time from initial call til knock on my door - 64 minutes

One mid-40's stranger (self-described MILF) from Craigslist - 2 Bass Ales
Time from initial call til knock on my door - 53 minutes

Tonight
1 large Reuben with horseradish and coleslaw - $13.26 plus tip
Time from initial call til knock on my door - 26 minutes

2 female escorts, one older & one younger, both athletic - $775.00 plus tip
Time from initial call til knock on my door - 31 minutes & counting

Venetian Plaster

2007-12-28T22:20:00.002-05:00

I was eighty-five miles away
close enough to think about driving home
far enough away to justify staying the night
a ring not quite on my finger
her ring not quite on hers

Reading Freaky Deaky in strip mall B&N
She was doing a Q&A for her book
an anthology of local murders, I think
it wasn't something I'd ask about
I just overheard every other question

She walked by twice, hoping I'd stop her
before she said that Leonard seemed light for me
I asked her what my middle name was
She said "I don't know, I don't know you"
I sneared "And don't you forget it"

Dean Koontz was her brain candy
I couldn't read him after Lightning
but we both liked DeMille
me for Cathedral & her for Charm School
It would be easy to get her home
but hard to get her undressed

I left my car in the parking lot
she drove a Prius or an Insight
I can't tell them apart
to an upscale cookie cutter flat
Minimalism could have been her style
but she was probably just poor

We drank cheap wine out of Riedel Sommelier glasses
She talked about Proust
I pretended to listen
until it was my turn to talk
about Lennon's nigger and The End
She ruined my favorite sweater
I got hard anyhow

She said she needed to change
I waited a half hour
then opened her bedroom door
she slept with a pillow between her legs
in a bra and panties
her alarm set for six ayem
I took 3 Ambiens from her cabinet
and fell asleep against her bathroom door

I woke when the pool opened at noon
her long gone for work, presumably unshowered
I went through her photo albums
the same boy at her prom
and again from just last year
I ripped out all his pictures
then burned them in the sink before I left

Si Usted Me Necesita...

2007-12-27T22:01:00.002-05:00

I won't be easy to find
alcoholico de pueblo
in Salsipuedes
middle of nowhere, Mexico
far enough down the baja
where you run out of beach
and run into rocky inhospitable coast
not even in una casa
more like una choza
wearing a perpetual week-old beard
where the coast looks like...... hmmm
upside-down senos (not to be coarse)
but I'll be around

Well, there or in town
for cervezas and arroz
my dog in the truck
I'll be the one
with Doc Martens & guitar
no phone or address
just ask for the gringo chistoso
they'll know who you mean
and point you down a long dirt road
towards Fin del Mundo
both in name and in purpose
waiting for perdon o muerte
whichever comes first
or maybe both

You'll be expected
an extra cup, an extra plate
but only one cama
just for me
so you can't stay long
probably not even worth the effort
to talk to a broken old young man
no good to anyone anymore anytime
except my dog and my bartender
but if you're in the area
within a hundred miles or so
and you want to say 'hello'
I promise to kiss you goodbye

My Calling

2007-12-27T19:45:00.002-05:00

If you asked me eighteen years ago where I thought I would be today, I would have told you with near-certainty that I would be a mission specialist preparing for my first shuttle launch. Yeah yeah, it was a goofy sappy aspiration but I pursued it with single-minded determination and fervent resolve.

If you told me that instead of working at Kennedy Space Center, I would be strapping an unconscious & naked 66-year old man to work table in the basement of my house, I would have had you institutionalized.

But I'm getting ahead of myself.

My father was a psychiatrist, by training and sometimes trade. And as I still am now, I am my father's son. When I was young (10 or so), my dad's job fascinated me. Back then, my dad has his office downstairs at our home. We had a walkout basement and his patients would walk around the side of our house and through a set of french doors into an anteroom outside my dad's den/office. It wasn't a large room, maybe 12' x 12', but it was nicely appointed and had a wood-burning fireplace against the west wall.
During the summer when I was supposed to be outside playing, I would instead sneak around of the side of the house, quietly open the exterior ash cleanout door of the fireplace and eavesdrop on his sessions. And when my parents would go out for the evening, I would creep into my father's office, steal one or two of the cassete tape recordings he made of his appointments as well as his post-session recorded notes. I would get into bed and listen to the tapes on my Walkman until late into the night.

I don't know that if it was that I was getting more mature and subsequently more capable of recognizing nuance and subdued verbal cues or if my father was just becoming more calloused, but the tapes seemed to reveal a progressive degradation in the attention he placed towards his job. Initially, he would spend about 45 minutes after each session recording notes to himself, summarizing the appointment and preparing his approach to the next scheduled session. It was very detailed and meticulous. But as the months and years wore on, there was a subtle yet inarguable shift in his approach to his work. Where he was once proactively probed and questioned his patient during their session, he now just randomly interspersed some "hmm"s with a few "uh-huh"s. His once voluminous post-session recordings now became "Patient feeling more and more sorry for himself - I should make an effort to blow some smoke up his ass next week".

It was right there laying in my bed listening to those tapes that I decided that I didn't want any part of an occupation that numbed your soul and jaded your compassion.

I was in the Physics club in high school (sexy, I know). I went to college with a relatively prominent physics program. I was a physics major..... until midway through my sophomore year.

I am my father's son.

I was a psychologist way before I was a psychologist. Free will never had much to do with it.

You see someone hurting, you see someone lost, you see someone in pain - if you have the means and ability, then you have to do something about it.

When you're in you 20's, that sounds noble and righteous.

When you're in your mid-30's, you realize that it's a Sisyphean task. You never run out of the hurt, the lost or the pained. You start out naively thinking that you can immerse yourself in the depths of human misery without succumbing to despair. If, day after day, you hear about abuse and self-harm and adultery and incest and failure, it wears on you. You're faced with three distinct courses of action;

you either become my father - calloused to the torment of the people who place their trust in you

you let yourself sink deeper and deeper into a bottomless pit of sordid misfortune

or you walk away

I walked away about a year ago. My thinking was that I would allow myself to be powerless - unable to help a stranger looking for directions, unwilling to pull over to help an old man change his flat tire, unqualified to talk a jumper down from a ledge. I was going to be selfish. I was going to ignore any plea, any cry for help.

So almost a full year passes.

I'm still alone. But now I don't have the excuse of an emotionally-draining job for my isolation. I'm still thirteen hundred miles from any close family member. But now I don't have the excuse of the tempestuous relationship with my father to blame for it.

I was lost. Didn't know where I was going and now I wasn't even sure where I had been. Worse still, there was still no escaping the pain and grief - you turn on the TV and it's nothing but little girls being raped and killed by meth addicts, little boys being kidnapped and molested, wives being murdered and dismembered. At least when I was younger and saw someone in need, I had the means and ability to help them.

Then it came to me.

My calling.

I DID have the means and ability to help the raped, the molested and the murdered. I'm relatively financially secure. I live alone in a fairly remote house and property. And perhaps most importantly, I'm already convinced that my lifetime of inflicting pain on others has reserved my spot in hell.

It first hit me when I was watching Court TV. They were running one of their cold-case docudramas about a woman who had gone missing in 1975. She tucked her two kids into bed one night then was reported missing when she didn't show up at her job the next morning. There was wide concensus that her recently estranged husband was responsible for her disappearance. He had been a real dirtbag, a history of domestic violence against both his wife and his kids, alcoholism and drug abuse. The police had some forensics evidence from the house, but without her body, they never had enough the press charges. He was still walking free that day. The last shot of the show was him walking in to his front door with a smirk on his face.

So I was watching this show and I couldn't help but thinking that somebody should just take a 2"x4" to the husband and smack that smile clean off his face. Then I looked across the room to the hall bathroom where I've been doing some work to see a half dozen 2"x4"s leaning against the wall.

The means and the ability.

THIS is my calling. I have never been so certain of anything in my entire life. I am vengeance. I am justice. I am the reckoning.

Given enough time (and a strong enough stomach), it's relatively easy to get somebody to talk. Interrogation is all about psychology. When I was in school, we learned about a few different "interviewing" techniques most of which were modification to what's now known as the Reid technique - a nine step methodology for eliciting confessions. But what I needed to do was a bit different, essentially just steps 1, 3, 4, 5, 6 & 9 with welding torches substituting for 2, 7 and 8. And I didn't necessarily care about a confession per se - I needed evidence - the location of a missing body, a murder weapon or anything else objectively incriminating.

But you know what? Maybe I didn't even care about that. Maybe I'm just trying to assign nobility to the sociopathic. Maybe the only difference between him and me is that my victims deserve it. But does it matter to you anyhow? Do you really care if my motivations are honorable or if they're demented? Would you care who saved you if you were drowning? Fuck it all.

I snuck into his house while he was at work and bought an Amtrak ticket to Salt Lake City in his name with his Visa Card.

I tailgated with him in the muni lot before the football game.

I offered to drive him home as he stumbled back to his car.

I placed his cell phone in an open boxcar as he lay passed out in my passenger seat.

I strapped him to the workbench in my basement with cargo tiedowns.

I burned his clothes in my bedroom fireplace.

I scorched the soles of his feet with a soldering torch so he knew I was serious (and so he couldn't run).

I ignored his muffled pleas for mercy.

I burned his tears as they ran down his face.

I smeared Vaporub on my upper lip to cover up the smell.

I felt nothing as he lost control of his bodily functions.

I placed the tape recorder closer to his face when his voice lowered to a whisper.

I listened as a godless man prayed for forgiveness.

I think he was relieved when I placed my fingers around his throat.

I laid down on the couch as my dog licked my hand.

I buried a husband next to his wife.

I said a prayer for absolution.

I said a prayer for guidance.

I began to plan.

Baby, It's Cold Inside - A Scheherezade Project

2007-09-30T07:29:00.002-04:00

This is one of those stories that requires a substantial prologue. So here it goes;

Growing up, my family wasn't big on the traditional holiday experience. I don't mean this in a judgmental way, in terms of bad or good - they just weren't. Specifically, I don't ever remember a time when I actually believed in Santa Claus or the Easter Bunny. That illusion was just never perpetuated in my household. The one symbol of yuletide jubilee that we did tolerate - the Christmas tree - became nomore as we started spending the holidays in south Florida when I was a teenager. Most of my birthdays consisted of a drive into town so I could pick out something from the mall.
I went to high school out of state. I went home during the holidays of my freshman and sophomore years, but after that? I just mostly hung out at school.
Even now, with my family scattered between the west, midwest, southeast and western Europe, I usually just take the holidays as an opportunity to hole up and relax.

And now on to the story.....

I spent most of the year 2001 doing some contract work for pharmaceutical company. As far as the nature of the work went, it was pretty mindless for me. Even then, I just wasn't well-suited for rush hour commutes, cubicles and performance reviews. Just not my thing.
But there was one thing that I DID like - the company softball team.
Now, I wasn't technically an employee of the company, but considering that 90% of the people who worked there made Stephen Hawking look like Mark McGwire, they made an exception for me.
It was pretty much a beer league - not very competitive by any measure. But it was coed.
And that's where I met Leah.
At the time, I was working exclusively in HR while she worked in Research. So the only time we ever crossed paths was on the softball field. It was hard for me to get a bead on her. The contrast between her jet black hair against her pale pale skin made it hard to tell if she was Snow White or Meg White. But that was kind of my thing at the time. I was a fool for the goth chicks (which sucked for me since I was about as attractive to goth chicks as a Touched By An Angel marathon).
And she just worked me. I'd catch her eyeing me from across the infield as she played second and I played third. She'd stretch out right in front of me before our games. She'd sit just far enough away from me on the bench. And she'd brush by me to grab a beer at the bar afterwards.
But she never approached me. She never came on to me. She never dropped a clue.
She made me work for it.
And right around the start of the playoffs, she finally broke me. She completely wrecked me.
I asked her out. She said yes.

Things went well, to say the least. Given the nature of my job at the time, we had to keep things on the down-low at work, but I think that only served to add to the intensity of out relationship. The simply act of passing her in the hall turned into... I don't know. It was something else. She just had a way.....
So this goes on for a few months. Through September. Through October. Through November.
Then came December.
Were were laying in her bed when she asked me to spend Christmas with her at her folks house outside of Charlottesville, Virginia. I don't think we had talked about my predisposition for non-traditional holidays, but it seemed like she knew in advance how to sell it - we'd just spend Christmas Eve and Christmas day at her parents house, then we'd spend a few days at Greenbriar all by ourselves. No big deal, right? Besides, I didn't have any other plans.
So we went.
Looking back at it now, she spent the whole drive down there preparing me for what was going to happen - her parents were kind of old-fashioned so I was going to sleep in her brother's old room, there will probably be some of her aunts & uncles there too, she was the only daughter so her brothers were probably going to give me a hard time (but they mean well), etc.
So I should have seen it coming.
What I pictured was something out of a suburban Addams Family, but what I got was something more out of a de-pigmented Cosby Show.
I spent the morning of Christmas Eve playing "flag" football with her brothers, cousins & uncles. Well, not so much "flag football" as it was "throw the ball to Assclown then let everybody pile on top of him". But it was kind of a blast. I got my ass beat, but I was a good-natured ass-beating. After we showered and changed, Leah and I ran into town real quick to do some last minute shopping for a few of her cousins that she didn't know were going to be there. We were looking through the boys clothing at the Abercrombie & Fitch when she took me by the hand, led me to a corner in the back, pushed me against the wall and put her right hand over my mouth.
"I'm going to tell you something, and you're not going to say a word in return, ok? You're just going to listen and shut up about it, right?" she said.
Before I could even nod out a yes, she told me that she loved me.
I started to say something......... but she raised her eyebrows, muffled my words with her hand and led me back into the store.
When we got back to the house, there were even more family there. Grandparents and nieces and Aunts and in-laws. And I had to be introduced to every single one. What did I do? How did Leah and I meet? Where do my parents live? Did I go to UVa? Etc, etc, etc.
I spent most of the night catching glimpses of her as the swinging butlers door opened and closed. A half second of her licking a mixing spoon. A momentary glimpse of her whispering in her mother's ear. A flutter of her looking towards me.
We sat next to each other at dinner. We held hands under the table as her father said grace, giving thanks for the blessings of his friends and family. About 20 minutes into the meal, he father gives me a smile and says, "Soooo, Leah tells me that you're a consultant. How does that work - do you just go from company to company, doing your thing until a better offer comes around?"
She shook her head in his direction, but I answered the question he was really asking. I hoped he took comfort in my answer.

We went to the candlelight service at their church, then came back to put the younger kids to sleep and go downstairs to just have a few drinks.

Or so I thought.

Until her aunt busts out the karaoke machine. It was worse than I could have possibly imagined. Her goateed uncle sang Bad to the Bone. Her Dad sang Luck Be a Lady. My heart stopped as Leah sang Killing Me Softly. Her mom wanted to a duet with her father, but he was too tired to get up from his chair. So she drug me up to the microphone and we sang Baby, Its Cold Outside.
It was about as Norman Rockwellian of a moment as I've ever experienced.

And I spent the entire two days alternating between sheer bliss and unbridled fear.

I waited two weeks after we got back to break up with her.

I just don't know if I could be that person. Certainly not then. And maybe it's too late for me now.

I'm Not Anymore

2007-08-21T11:17:00.002-04:00

I'm not 10 years old anymore
eyes freshly opened
newly aware of others pain
but still keenly naive
of my own ability to hurt

I'm not 14 anymore
feeling rage instead of grief
no desire for comfort
no use for condolences
running anywhere but here

I'm not 18 anymore
so stupid to think I was a man
that my hands could wash clean
a cacophony of bullshit
hiding my tattooed back

I'm not 22 anymore
getting feeling back in my extremities
not quite so numb
taking pleasure in pleasure
and feeling pain with pain

I'm not 27 anymore
a thousand ways to blame myself
chanting the tired mantra
Gentle Lady, Do Not Sing
doesn't deny me my own hell

I'm not 30 anymore
losing track of whores
Amy and Lil and whats-her-face
they're remnants in my bed
unwilling to sleep alone

I'm not 34 anymore
the path behind me now dark
only glimpses of the road ahead
waking to see a half-sun on the horizon
uncertain if it's dawn or dusk

I'm 35 years old now
still no use for pity
save your tears for yourself
there are no victims here
I'm just the sum of my days
not a slave to my hours

The Rest Of The Story Vol. II - Things I Keep In The Box

2007-07-28T13:45:00.002-04:00

The only thing I knew about Scott at the time was that he was an Art Kid. Our school was much like any other (as much as it could be). We had stoners, preppies, burnouts, geeks, jocks.... and Art Kids. That was Scott.
The only reason I was aware of his existence was that he went through regular fashion phases as he attempted to fit in with some clique. He did the skater thing, then the goth thing, then the uber-geek thing before finally settling in with the artsy thing. This was made all that more amusing with the fact that we had uniforms and a fairly strict dress code dictating haircuts, color, jewelry, etc. So any attempt to stand out was fairly obvious (and in vain).
So I was, at best, vaguely aware of his existence when I broke my wrist skiing (not playing football). I only noticed him (and his older cast) when I caught him staring at mine the first morning I had it in class. At first I thought it was kind of strange. he wasn't paying attention to anything else - not the instructor, not the fellow students, not even me - just my cast.
It was only then that I noticed that are casts, altough similar in size and location, were completely different. His had one thing scribbled on it in ballpoint pen, while mine was pretty much covered with autographs and doodles. I'd stopped by my girlfriend's basketball game on the way back from the emergency room and she had all her friends sign it. Then some of my buddies signed it when I got back to the dorm as we hung out in the lounge. But he'd had his on for at least a couple of weeks. Nothing on it.
All of a sudden, I felt like shit.
As stupid as it sounds now, crap like that mattered back then. It mattered how many people signed your yearbook, it mattered how many letters you got girls back home...... and it mattered how many signatures you had on your cast.
I had dozens. He had none.
And we both hated it.
I didn't sign his cast after class to make him feel better. I did it to make me feel better. It's not like we started hanging out together after that or became lifelong friends. But I think it mattered to me and maybe it even mattered to him.
But there are people like him all over the place even now. All they need is a "hello", a smile or even just the smallest recognition that they exist. And I've been guilty of walking on by, not even cognizant of their presence, too wrapped up in my own life and my own stupid problems to even notice.
So hello.

The Sins of My Fathers

2007-07-19T14:25:00.002-04:00

You probably couldn't tell just by looking at me, but I'm the last in a long line of semi-harmless rogues and semi-charmless outlaws.
My great-great grandfather spent some time in jail for selling phony deeds to government land to Irish immigrants fresh off the boat. An "involuntary guest of the federal government" as the colloquialism went in my family. Rumor has it that was the least of his crimes. He had a legendary reputation as a unrepentant swindler and a world-class avoider of all physical labor.
My great-grandfather was the product of an ephemeral relationship with the "touched" daughter of an Baltimore Lutheran minister. Given the unsuitability of his parents, he was sent off to live with a distant childless aunt in Cheyenne, Wyoming. He soon overcame the distinct disadvantages of the absence of any bad influences by becoming something of a scalawag in his own right. He made a decent living collecting the rewards from "lost" horses and livestock as well as working short stints as a dentist/doctor/undertaker (slightly unlicensed, of course).
He was shot dead as he was climbing out of someone else's bedroom window.
But not before he could leave his seed in the belly of a widowed Denver schoolteacher.
She raised my grandfather on her own. She'd had seven children who were mostly grown by the time he was born. They grew up to be fine upstanding citizens - lawyers, bankers and college professors. But my grandfather missed out on that gene and was cursed with the wayward blood of his father. Though he became very educated, it seemed to just make him a more effective crook. "Embezzlement" is probably too strong of a word, but he definitely leaned toward crime of a more white-collar variety. He was arrested (and acquitted) four times for "accounting errors" at a steel mill, coal & gold mines and a Methodist church where he served as a deacon. As the legend goes, the witnesses just liked him too much to testify against him.
It would have been a pretty safe bet that my father would have broke the chain of lawlessness, but it wasn't meant to be. He grew up straight as an arrow in Eisenhower's America, but soon regressed back into the shadowy crevasse between illegal and unethical. "It's just pot" soon became "I just need something to take the edge off" which in turn descended into search warrants and Ethics Review Boards.
Me? I've managed to stay out of jail and outside the crosshairs of wronged husbands. But not by much. And I couldn't tell you how long the streak will last. I don't presume to know when the pirate blood pumping through my veins will come to a boil.
Gentleman or charlatan.
Faithful or adulterous.
Honest or corrupt.
Pious or immoral.

It's still too soon to know for sure.

Why She Went Away

2007-02-21T14:38:00.002-05:00

I spent hundreds of hours trying to reach level 70 in WoW
I didn't ask who she was talking to while I watched TV
I offered her a drawer when she needed my entire home
I convinced myself that what she wanted was what I wanted
I pretended to sleep while she cried next to me
I turned away when she showed me who she really was
I took her to the same restaurant where I'd taken all my ex's
My only present to her wilted in the cheap plastic vase
I waited patiently on my couch for her to come over
I touched her where my last girlfriend liked to be touched
The only ink on my birthday card to her was Hallmark's
I thought my wants were more important than her needs
I cooked her dinner in the microwave
I thought she was ugly when she was never more beautiful
I wrote about inanity when I should have been writing to her
I let her think she wasn't important to me
I fucked her when she needed to be loved
That's why she went away

The Lie - A Scheherazade Project Entry

2007-02-14T12:02:00.002-05:00

I told her I was tired and really didn't feel like going out
she seemed ok with it but asked if she could just come over
just for a little while, maybe order Chinese & watch a movie
I felt better knowing she was on her way over

She unlocked the door, key in one hand & groceries in the other
"I felt like cooking. Is that ok?" she asked before kissing my neck
and stroking my back as I sat working at my desk
"Sounds perfect. Let me finish this one thing then I can help"

We maneuvered around each other in my under-construction kitchen
grilling chicken, boiling noodles and slicing tomatoes
like we've done dozens of times before, our tasks unspoken
she gives her "naughty boy" look when my hand lingers on her thigh

She tells me about Mrs. Thaelus at work, matchmaker for her gay son
knowing that I don't care but only talking about it to make me laugh
and it works as I try to hide my smile, but she sees it anyhow and grins
by now wearing only a camisole, her blouse draped over the chair

We eat as she pries out the details of my week, labors unrewarded
knowing that I need to tell them despite my half-hearted reluctance
it feels better getting it all out, but I'm sorry she's bearing the brunt
on her slight wispy shoulders and graceful musician's hands

She leans her back against the arm of the couch as I rest my head in her lap
her fingers interlaced in my hair as we half pay attention to The Guardian
drinking a bottle of wine she brought back from Asheville, saved just for me
she slides down in front of me, facing away, as I wrap her in my arms

I feel her breathe dance on my wrist and her pulse throb in my hand
no more talking as we take pleasure in this fleeting peaceful moment
A moment that I'd rarely allowed myself before her, before this
smelling her hair and perfume as I draw her even closer

The credits roll as she turns to face me, bliss and contentment in her eyes
placing her hand on my face as our lips and bodies come together
"I'm going to stay the night, ok?" she asks as if it was even a question
she takes my hand and leads me down the hall to the bedroom

So why couldn't I stop thinking about you?

A Few Of My Least Favorite Things

2007-02-01T22:42:00.002-05:00

Def Poetry
McDonalds
Spandex
Hats
"Insert Opressed Peoples Here" Rights
Sarah Jessica Parker
Gamers
White sneakers
Dredlocks
Senses of entitlement
Personalized license plates
People
Non-Tour de France bicyclists
Robin Williams
UFC
Drivers who block right hand turn lanes
Movies where non-retarded actors act retarded
poor quality cotton swabs
Eddie Murphy
Rudy Giuliani
Chain restaurants
Fosters Lager
Bill Belichick
Razr cellphones
99.996% of poker players
Male strippers
Self-righteous pot smokers
Junk drawers
Tank tops in public
The name "Barbara"
Solar energy
White collars on blue dress shirts
Cheap suits
Hip huggers
Fringed leather jackets
Apathetic waitstaff

A Few Of My Favorite Things

2007-01-25T20:52:00.002-05:00

Women in knee-length skirts
High quality garbage bags
Oral-B Sonic Complete toothbrush
Women who play bass guitar
Those ebay "It" commercials
Watching my dog fall asleep
Peace Kills
The first 15 minutes of Desperado
Quoting Army of Darkness at inappropriate times
MST3K - I Accuse My Parents
Pot Roast
Mouthwash that leaves a real good burn
Women driving a Jeep
The "WHHIRRRR" of a freshly charged cordless drill
That perfect tenth of a second nap while I'm driving
Hazelnut
Watching my dog try to run through ten inches of snow
Fresh wiper blades
The Country Boy Breakfast at Cracker Barrel
Singing "I Just Called To Say I Love You" to telemarketers
Jambalaya with lots of okra
The bookstore in my town
Revision Pore Refining Pumpkin Mask
Being slightly over-dressed
The theme song to King of the Hill
The "Girls Gone Wild" commercials (not the videos - just the commercials)
Spicy Chicken Burritos at Taco Bell
Glimpses of skin
Hotels with bathrobes
A perfectly mitered corner
Watching old drunk people trying to do the Electric Slide
Kevin Spacey as Mel Proffit
My mini-fridge at work
Jamming a q-tip so far in my ear that it comes out the other side
Mike Tyson vs Trevor Berbick
MXC
Slicing portabello mushrooms
Despair.com

The Rest of the Story - 1511

2007-01-17T21:36:00.004-05:00

I have a confession to make - some of my posts are completely 100% absolutely true (more than you probably know) and some of them are little slivers of truth surrounded by metaphor and bullshit.
1511 was one of the latter.
I was in Seattle three years ago for a week's worth of work. Actually it was about a day's worth of work but I was given a week to do it. I'll spare you my itinerary for the first few days and skip to the good part. I was staying in room 1511 at the Red Lion right downtown.
I almost ordered room service my last night in town. I had eaten out every night that week and I was just tired of it. I laid there on my bed for about an hour while I tried to motivate myself enough to either dial four numbers on the phone for some Extreme Nachos or put my pants back on and walk to the restaurant downstairs.
The pants won out.
At that time in my life, I was really into the black thing - black slacks, black cashmere sweater and black blazer - quite the brooding ensemble. So I slunk (slunked? sloonk? Somebody help me out here) down to the elevator and into the bar. But as I turned the corner, I saw that the place was jammed packed. I really really really don't do well in crowds. That just wouldn't do.
I should have walked back to the elevator.
But I walked next door to the Rock Bottom Brewery instead.
I paced to the end of the bar, vaguely aware of the three or four other people already there. I was halfway through my first beer before I noticed her four stools over. She's was like a woman but also like a little girl. I'm sitting here now trying to think of how to describe her, but I just can't. A little "Meg Ryan in DOA"-ish. A tad "coffee shop clerk with the scars on her wrist"-ish. She just made you instinctively want to protect her.
She was talking with the bartender like they knew each other. They were talking about the Mariners, about the Seahawks and about her fantasy football team (I wish it was something more poignant or impassioned, but it is what it is). I interjected something stupid and she looked over at me like I was trespassing. But I couldn't help it. The stupidity flowed out my mouth until I made her laugh.
The bartender slipped away and left us talking across four barstools. She asked/told me to move closer so we wouldn't have to yell to be heard. I moved over three seats leaving only one between us. She then looked at me like I just backwashed into the sacremental wine. I moved over one more.
She was 35 and recently divorced. A 17 yr old golf-playing son and an eleven year old daughter. Ex-husband is a suburban cop. They split because he cheated on her. I lied about what I did - probably told her I sold insurance or something. Everything else was the truth though.
I asked her if she'd been shopping - she had a Gap bag down by her feet. She looked at me nervously and said no. I thought that was kind of weird but I just dropped it.
As we talked I thought to myself that it was too bad we hadn't met a few days before. That would have given us some time to click while I was in town. As it was, I was probably going to go home never knowing what could have been.
As it got later, we played a little pool and put about eight beers on my tab. It was getting late and I offered to walk her to her car. She said that she took the bus into work that morning, but that she'd just go home with me that night.
Look, I'm no prude. I've had my share of "short term" relationships before and I really wasn't averse to another one.
But it just didn't feel right.
I kind of laughed it off and changed the subject to something a little less nerve-wracking. But that recess only last about ten minutes before the subject was broached again.
"I think we need to go to your room now" she said plainly.
"But don't you have to work tomorrow" I protested.
She smile mischievously and opened up her Gap bag to reveal a neatly folded blouse and skirt along with assorted undergarments and toiletries.
She planned this before she left for work that morning - she wasn't going home that night.
Needless to say I was a little taken aback as to how inconsequential I truly was to the equation - I was merely a means to an end. It wasn't my subtle charm or disarming good looks that seduced her - I just happened to be the guy that sat down next to her.
But I knew where she was coming from. But I also knew that the last thing she needed was to fuck some random guy. She just needed to be away from home for a night. Maybe feel a little attractive, a little wanted, a little desired. But mostly she wanted to feel safe. And if she had to give out a liitle sex to feel that way, it was something she was willing to live with.
I thought to myself how incredibly lucky she was - I looked around the bar and tried to figure out who would have been the chosen one had I stayed in my room. But she was lucky precisely because I did walk into the bar. She was lucky because I wanted her to feel needed. She was lucky because I wanted her to feel safe more than I wanted to get laid.
We held hands for the four minute walk back up to my hotel room. As we walked, I hatched a half-assed plan to get her back home - I was going to go back to the room with her, have a couple diet cokes while I sobered up enough to drive her home.
But things went awry once we got inside.
The first thing she did was open my curtains. I'd been there all week and I'd never even looked out the window. We could see the illuminated top of the Space Needle across the downtown skyline. We laid on the bed and talked for about an hour.
What did we talk about? Nothing really. Certainly nothing that we could have or should have talked about. Just her family and my made-up job and her kids and my dog. Everything but us. Then she shut up for a second and asked me if I was going to kiss her.
"I promised myself I wouldn't" I answered. She leaned up, took off her earring and turned around to place them on the nightstand. And as she did this, her blouse rose up in the back revealing and six inch patch of soft white skin.
I stopped breathing for a moment before she turned back around and kissed me.
It wasn't the kiss of a drunken woman unaware of what she was doing. It was the kiss of a woman knowing exactly where she was and doing exactly what felt right. And I kissed her back for the same reasons.
I woke up in the morning to the image of her looking out the window past the city as the day broke. She was wearing nothing but my sweater from the night before and I could almost feel the soft wool against her skin.
That moment was the most afraid that I've ever been in my entire life. I was scared because I knew I was about to lose something I never really had. I was scared of how intense I felt after only nine hours. I was scared because I'd never had a problem walking away before. I was scare because I'd never wanted anything that badly.
I watched her with my eyes half-opened for ten minutes. I closed my eyes in pretend sleep when she picked up her bag and walked to the bathroom to shower.
It actually ended better than I thought it would. I got up and drove her to work - fifteen blocks to her office building. I met her for lunch and we went to Ivar's for fish and chips. I gave her my number before heading to the airport.
I honestly thought she'd call.
A month passed before the thought of her drove me to distraction. In a fit of stupid curiosity, I googled her name. The third entry down was from a registery of legal announcements. I opened the site to find that it was a court record of divorce proceedings. The date next to her and her ex-husband's names caught my eye - her divorce became official six hours before I met her. That's why she wasn't going home that night. That's why she needed to feel safe.
I really wish she would have called.

And that, my friends, is the rest of the story.

The Truckee Greyhound Station

2006-11-28T21:09:00.002-05:00

For the second time in my life, I woke up on a bench in a bus station. The latest incarnation was a result of a series of very very poor decisions. What started out as a glorified plan rapidly devolved into an ill-conceived scheme over the extended Thanksgiving holiday.
But as I woke, I wasn't thinking of my current circumstances but rather my original walkabout twenty-some years ago.
I was fourteen years old when I stole eighteen hundred dollars out of a secret compartment in my dad's office drawer. I'll give you two guesses as to why he'd hide that much cash in his office. Both guesses are probably right.
By that point in my life, my parents had grown used to me taking off sometimes for a couple days on end. We lived out in the boonies so camping was only a half-mile hike away. I'd walk out the door with my backpack and tell me folks that I'd be back later. They'd nod and mumble something in reply. As long as I didn't miss any school, it was never a big deal. I only went camping about half the time. The other half was spent riding a Greyhound bus no where in particular, usually as far as half of whatever money I had would take me.
But this time I was going to take the train. I had the eighteen hundred plus about three hundred of my own lawn-mowing and babysitting money. I caught the Zephyr just outside of town (it's discomforting how easy it is for a fourteen year old to buy an out-of-state train ticket). I was going to take it to Truckee then hitch to Westville where my grandfather had an old hunting cabin. It was pretty much a shitbox - no electricity or running water but it was isolated and perfect.
It was scheduled to be a 19 hour train trip through some of the least scenic landscapes on planet earth. Not that it mattered much because it got dark a couple hours after we left the station. I past the time planning the next couple months - buying sundries, a fishing pole and a bunch of toilet paper. I figured the money would last me about six months before I'd have to think of something else.
I estimated that we'd be passing through Elko before anyone would notice that I wasn't where I was supposed to be. Not that they'd start looking or anything. My dad would think that I was with my uncles and my uncles would figure that I was over at some friend's house. I could probably get pretty near my final destination before anyone would start to panic.
But they'd be too busy getting ready for my mom's funeral. When I'd left, my sister was trying to decide what to wear, my dad's secretary was parked down the street after spending the night at our house (a year later she'd be complaing that I refused to call her "mom") and my grandmother had drugged herself catatonic.
The blizzard slowed us down quite a bit and it took nearly three hours to get to Truckee from Reno. I didn't have much luck hitching from there. I-70 had been shut down for about an hour by the time I got there. Semis and station wagons lined the streets with their engines running to keep the occupants warm. This wasn't part of my plan.
It's only four or so blocks from the train station to the Greyhound station so I trudged through the snow dragging my Yankees duffel bag behind me. I figured the bus would give me a better chance to get me close to where I wanted to go. It was close to 10PM by the time I got there and I had 9 hours until the next departure.
I fell asleep on a bench next to the window.

Conflict Of Interest

2006-11-16T09:17:00.002-05:00

I was understandably startled as he walked into my office. We'd met once before (inFormally) but he never seemed as imposing as he did right now. At least three inches taller than me with a rugby player's body, but that failed to mask his brokenness and insecurity.
My mind raced as I tried to proactively prepare a response for his inevitable questions. I should have known this day would come but I wan't even close to knowing what to say.
"I'm sorry for walking in and I know I don't have an appointment, but the receptionist wasn't at her desk and it's really important that I talk to someone" he said.
I offered him a seat but didn't feel right reaching across for a handshake. Strangely enough, he seemed even bigger as he sat down in front of my desk.
Then he launched into a plea which I was sure he had rehearsed all morning.
"I never thought I'd be up for something like this but I don't know what else to do. I tried everything else I could think of, but things just seem to be getting worse and worse. You see, it's my wife. She seems to be moving farther and farther away in the past year or so and it's almost like she's slipping through my hands. She just seems so distant. At first I thought it was just a temporary thing, hormones and such. But the more I tried to make it better, the worse it got. I took her an a second honeymoon. I bought her a diamond necklace. I sent her to the spa for the weekend. But nothing I've tried has worked.
I've talked to a couple people (mutual friends) you've worked with before and they can't say enough good things about you. And I figured since both me and my wife know you, maybe we'd be more comfortable talking to you instead of just some random name from the phone book. So I was wondering if you'd be willing to provide us with marriage counseling until we get this thing straightened out"
I caught my mouth before it could drop noticeably agape while I tried to compose a cogent reply.
"I'm very very sorry for your situation and I'm sure it must be troubling to feel so powerless. But marriage counseling just isn't something I typically do. I do more counseling of the one-on-one variety. But I'd be happy to give you the names of some excellent therapists who specialize in what you're looking for - they're very good."
All business.
He seemed to sink lower in his seat.

"Hey, I understand if this isn't any area where you have a lot of experience, but it would really mean a lot to me if you could do it just this one time. I don't think I could feel comfortable talking about these things with someone I didn't know or trust. I wouldn't even be here if I didn't think my marriage was at stake. I don't know what I would do if I lost her.
Please?"

The last word slipped out between his lips so desperately pathetic that I almost thought he was going to cry.
Trust? He trusted me? There was no way I could tell him that I was the last person in the world he should trust. There was no way I could tell him that I was in a room down the hall from him while he was on his second honeymoon. Or that instead of going on her solitary walks on the beach every morning, his wife would walk the one hundred feet to my room. And that I would watch her sleep as she wore nothing but the diamond necklace he had bought for her. And I couldn't tell him that she didnt spend that weekend at the spa alone.
I couldn't tell him that the farther she was moving away from him, the closer she was getting to me.

I insisted on referring him to another therapist, one I went to school with. He took the number and walked with his head low back out my door.

I haven't decided yet whether or not I want the marriage counseling to work.

One Of These Nights

2006-11-15T08:21:00.002-05:00

One of these nights
I'm going to knock on your window
even if no one else is home
you'll giggle in your pajamas
while I tell you to "get dressed, let's go"
you'll be half-hearted hesitant
just for a second though
before you toss on some jeans
and run a brush through your hair

You'll slide it to ride shotgun
and ask "so where are we going?"
I'll just smile and head south
avoiding highways like we were on the lam
getting warmer the farther we go
top down, stars out, chance of rain
caring less the faster we drive
no responsibilities or concerns
the only souls we're saving are our own

We'll pass a tattoo shop at 3AM
an exchanged glance, an illegal u-turn
you'll get a butterfly on your shoulder
I'll get "Tragedia Hermoso" across my back
we'll make "Dude Sweet" jokes
the rest of the way down
and snicker at the names of the towns we pass
Red Lick, Hardwood and Kleinpeter
like we were fourteen years old

We'll pick our aliases before we get into town
you can be Veronica Lucretia, socialite from Rome
I'll be Roscoe Steele, bronc rider from Waco
ridiculously bad accents and even worse lies
we'll buy you a sequined black cocktail dress
with slightly-more-than-appropriate cleavage
I'll wear a Stetson and ostrich skin boots
and walk pigeon-toed and bow-legged
we'll count how many people point and stare

Everything and nothing has changed in a year
the Lions Den is gone but Irma's still here
Mudbone's still driving his carriage
and the angel still stands in Jackson Square
that record shop is back open on Decatur
we can roll the bones at Harrah's
as you kiss the dice for luck
we'll either go home rich or go home broke
but no regrets and no promises to break

Fuck It, I'm Going To Mexico

2006-11-02T19:52:00.002-05:00

Ten degrees too cold for my Shaft jacket
six degrees from where I want to be
Rafters and studs and drywall and mud
fuck it, I'm going to Mexico

The doctor's never seen what I have
she'll never know what I don't
Stitches and pills and iodine and bills
fuck it, I'm going to Mexico

Running 'round to keep every door closed
light creeps through the keyhole
Sitcoms and news and cigars and booze
fuck it, I'm going to Mexico

Chinese takeout, three days in a row
Li Ma doesn't even work there anymore
Styrofoam and soy and dim sum and koi
fuck it, I'm going to Mexico

Same conversation, four hundreth time
the more they talk, the less I listen
phobias and shame and repression and blame
fuck it, I'm going to Mexico

Four things left from my room back home
survived countless trashcans and gasoline
letters and veil and pesos and shale
fuck it, I'm taking my dog down to Mexico

Better

2006-10-30T08:44:00.002-05:00

I know it's just the same old wine
a nineteen dollar bottle of Louis Jadot
but it just tastes better on your lips

I know that I've heard it before
two syllables a million times
but my name just sounds better when you say it

I know your sister wears it too
that paralegal from work does too
but Amarige just smells better when you wear it

I know it's just my white dress shirt
sleeves rolled up, collar unbuttoned
but it just looks better when you wear it

I know it's just a spot on the small of my back
I've been around the block a time or two
but it just feels better when you touch it

I know it's just the same old house
been here for eighty-some years
but it just feels better when you're in it

Mon Rêve

2006-10-16T09:03:00.002-04:00

In my dream you were walking down the sidewalk
in front of my house wearing a breezy cotton sundress
As you passed my fence, we shared a stranger's smile
a momentary love affair foreshadowing things to come

I waited until you turned the corner to unlatch the gate
on the off-chance that tomorrow you'd let yourself in
I planted tigerlilies around the side of the house
and pulled some thistles that had rooted in the beds

The next morning you came in holding an empty leash
looking for your dog who had worked himself loose
we found him as he leaped into my pond, barking at ducks
we drank espressos in the yard while we waited for him to dry

You walked home without a promise, just a little hope
that maybe tomorrow would bring more of the same
thinking about me as I sat on my couch thinking about you
my hands still shaking and warm from when you touched them

The next morning you didn't need the lost dog charade
just walked over and sat down next to me on my porch
your leg touching mine on the swing as I tried not to stutter
laughing nervously, watching dogs chase deer through the yard

I set the kitchen table after you left, lunch - nothing serious
picked out some non-committal, unpretentious music for ambience
I stayed up all night thinking of things to talk about
that would seem spontaneous and wickedly clever

You seemed at home at my table, comfortable in new surroundings
still there were so many things left unspoken and undone
clumsily dancing on the tips of our tongues and fingers
we bathed in so much uncertainty and premature regret

Still we were left with the cautious promise of another afternoon
I trembled and laid fresh linen sheets across my empty bed
then the next morning I peered through my basement window
and watched you walk away after finding the gate to be locked

The Long Walk Home

2006-10-08T20:15:00.002-04:00

If you've ever been down to Church Street Station in Orlando, you'll know what I'm talking about.
Church Street Station is the little entertainment district of downtown Orlando. Every Friday and Saturday night, the OPD cordons off two square blocks and open the streets to drunken tourists and college students. People mosey in and out of Rosie O'Gradys, the Cheyenne Saloon and the Orchid Garden.
But my favorite part?
At about 12:15AM, there's a CSX freight train that pulls directly through the party.
The first time I ever saw it, I was amazed. One minute there's hundreds of people carousing around the track, the next minute the RR crossing signs start flashing and barriers drop signalling the coming train. For several minutes the partying is put on hold while the freight train inches through. Once it's gone again, party on.
I was there with some friends of some friends of some friends. How I got from here to there is another post altogether. But anyways, on Friday night my group had met up with another group. I can't recall exactly if they were TA's from Rollins College or RA's from UCF, but I'm pretty sure it was one of the two.
Out of the new group, I had my eye on two or three women. Back then, my theory was to cast a wide net just in case one or two wiggled their way through the net. But there was one that I hadn't paid much attention to. Our only interaction had been when she finished one of my jokes. So we shared a laugh and little else.
We'd all decided to meet back up there the next night with the intention of getting stupid drunk then go driving go-karts at one of those places off International Drive (if you slip the guy at the gate an extra ten bucks, he'll turn a blind eye to any extracurricular bumping and slamming).
But by the time the next night rolled around, several people from both groups had found something (someone) else to do, so only about a half dozen of us were there on Church Street. Given that we now lacked our designated drivers as well, we thought it best to just hang out there for the evening. Drinking, flirting and general stupidity ensued.
A couple hours passed before we heard the tale-tell DING DING DING and saw the flashing lights. So we stood there drinks in hand as the train crawled through the intersection. But after about 10 or 12 cars, I noticed that many of them were empty and the sliding doors wide open. Now, maybe I'm just weird but when I see a slow-moving train with a bunch of open box cars, only one thought was crossing my mind;
I gotta jump on that bastard.
So I look to my left to see my friends standing there completely oblivious to the once-in-a-lifetime opportunity staring them in the face. Then I turned to my right and locked eyes with my joke-sharing compatriot. She had this evil little mischievous smile on her face and, without a word, I could tell that we we thinking the exact same thought.
I raised my eyebrows and tilted my head toward the train. She nodded and we both ducked under the barrier and paced the train until we could hop in through an open door. Howls of laughter and raucous applause could be heard as hurried inside and out of view of any police.
The inside of the car is pretty much what you'd expect - plank wood floors, girded metal walls, some scrap iron littering the deck. I guess it was around then that we first gave thought to a couple of fairly obvious questions - what do we do know, where the hell is this train going and how are we going to get home?
After laughing our asses off for a few minutes in pure idiotic glee, we answered the first question.
As the train finished it's trek through downtown Orlando, it began to gradually build up speed. The resulting rocking motion forced us to sit down against the forward wall. She turned to me and said," So are you going to kiss me or what?"
I guess when you're young and stupidly irresponsible, you haven't learned of many ways to communicate feelings of joy, passion, excitement, etc. If this had happened now that I'm older, I would have told her how amazingly brave and wonderfully crazy (in a good way) she was for jumping on the train with me. We would have spent that time telling jokes and exchanging antecdotes, finding out about who we were, building a foundation for later on.
But I was in fact young and stupidly irresponsible, so I just kissed her.
And she kissed me back.
The trained cruised through Winter Park, Maitland, Altamonte Springs and over the inland waterway before finally slowing down 100 miles later in Palatka. We jumped off a few hundred yards short of the railyard and sprinted behind an old metal shed to make sure we weren't caught. We hadn't planned on riding for so long, but.......
She held my hand as we walked a couple miles or so to a 7-11 for coffees and directions to somewhere we could rent a car. Then we huddled together down in the Enterprise parking lot while we waited a few hours for them to open. She sat to my left with her head on my shoulder and both arms wrapped around my one. I tried to think calming thoughts so she wouldn't feel my heart slamming against my chest.

First Day of School

2006-10-04T10:55:00.002-04:00

If I hadn't paused to scan through CD's to find the right song
I would have made it in front of the bus on my way to work
I had forgotten that this was the first day of school
and I should add ten minutes to my commute

My delay was made worse by parents, camcorders and hugs
wishing kindergarteners love & luck with long goodbyes
Crying kids and tearful moms, clinical separation anxiety
But by next week they'll be glad to see them go

I was barely paying attention by the third stop, a safe distance behind
A woman hand in hand with her raven-haired son
her grip preventing him from racing towards the school bus
I hadn't seen her in almost five... no, six years

I heard that she had moved shortly after her wedding
Married an orthodontist or an oncologist, I can't remember which
I was at home drinking myself unconscious as they exchanged vows
Jim Beam in my right hand and wedding invitation clutched in my left

We'd never even officially broken up, just both knew it couldn't work
she met him sometime as we were fading away from each other
I secretly wished she'd find someone to take my place anyhow
Any excuse to blame my failure, my disease, my weakness on her

I wondered where she was working now, her hair done & mostly dressed
When I knew her, she'd grown weary of nightshifts in the NICU
One too many times coming home to me in blood & tear-stained scrubs
She was barefoot now beneath her tasteful skirt and blouse

They embraced then she checked his backpack - pencils, glue, scissors
He wiped her kiss off his cheek as he darted onto the bus
She waved while he stumbled his way to the empty back seat
Then he turned and looked at me with my eyes, my face, my lips

The Slow Sort Of Bad - Scheherazade Project

2006-09-29T10:37:00.002-04:00

He used to think that flooding at test depth would be the worst way to go - a massive surge of pressure as the ocean overwhelmed the submarine would cause the men within to essentially implode. An instant yet ultraviolent death.
But waiting to die? This was much worse.
It had been 17 hours since a torpedo hot run had filled the forward compartment with cyanide gas, the faint scent of almonds lingering in the air. The subsequent explosion irreparably damaged the seals on the hatch separating the torpedo tube from the compartment.
It had been 14 hours since the knocking on the airtight door between the forward compartment and engine room had stopped. It had started out as a cacophonous banging but slowly degraded to an almost inaudible tapping as the men on the wrong side of the hatch succumbed. Only one of the remaining 11 crewmembers on the right side of the hatch made any effort to open it, but he was quickly restrained by the others. Opening that door would only slightly extend the life for the few lucky enough to survive the initial blast but would mean certain death for everyone else as the gas and smoke filled the only compartment not yet inundated with them.
So they sat there and listened to the banging turn into knocking turn into tapping turn into silence. None dared make eye contact with anyone else as the waited for their comrades to die.
Alexei dreaded the impending shame he would feel in the event they were rescued. How could he look into the eyes of the wives and children of the men he let die? How could he face his own family, his own father knowing he was a coward? He had been trained to fight fires and combat flooding. He had been drilled on every conceivable casualty scenario. But he had never been trained on how sacrifice other lives so that he may live.
Their initial expectation was that rescue was imminent. They could hear the emergency beacon reverberating of the sides of the hull and transmitting a signal to the other ships in the area. Surely it would be heard.
Hours passed before beacon faded to nothing as the ship's battery weakened, it's output now a trickle as the lights began to slowly dim. This was among other signs that their situation was getting worse rather than better - the aft section rising as the bow filled with water, the periodic bursts as the forward compartments & tanks collapsed under the intense pressure, and the undeniable diminishing of the ever-present hum of machinery and electronics.
The only officer present assigned teams of two to alternate pounding on the hull with wrenches, weighing the importance of signaling their position with the inescapable fact that the more energy they expended, the more oxygen they consumed. The sound would resonate through miles of seawater in hopes of reaching the sonar arrays of rescue ships.
They kept this up for 11 more hours, their efforts sustained only by drinking handfuls of water from the bilges and eating packets of sugar found in one of the lockers.
The monotonous sound of wrenches pounding against the bulkheads began to be interspersed with the sound of grown men weeping - weeping for sons & daughters never to be seen again, weeping for words unspoken to their wives, weeping for wasted years and weeping for their impending doom. Some began to write letters on whatever scraps of paper they could muster. While not knowing how much time they had left, the notes were rushed and absent of any extraneous thought or emotion. One was even a remorseful confession to his wife for infidelities too numerous to mention.
Then it began to happen.
At first it was the overweight diesel mechanic that drifted off to sleep. Then it was the 42-year old electrician. Not a word was spoken but every single one of the remaining men was secretly relieved - more air for them.
But the distress beacon MUST have been heard. Or at least some ship must have heard the rhythmic metallic beating against the hull. It was only a matter of time before they were rescued. They just had to stay awake.
But now gathered in the aft-most bay and surrounded by silent machinery, the men slipped away one by one. Some attempted to only inhale tiny amounts of air at a time, hoping against hope to buy just a few more minutes. Others discreetly took slow deep breathes, consuming more so that others would have less.
But not a single person moved. Not even an inch, fearful that any wasted movement would mean wasted air. But no matter how they tried, they couldn't stop their own hearts from beating faster and faster, racing away in panic and knowledge that rescue efforts would come too late. The more rapid their hearts fluttered, more oxygen was stripped from their lungs.
Then there were just eight left.
Then seven.
Four others went in rapid succession - one moment with tears running down their cheeks and the next moment..... nothing.
Alexei watched as his officer's eyelids began to slide down, pause for just a moment then continue all the way shut.
"I don't want to die. Please God don't let me die", begged his last remaining comrade.
Those were his last words, repeated over and over again until they became a whisper.
Alexei reached over and removed the philanderer's letter from the grip of his lifeless fingers. Pulling out his lighter and fully understanding it's oxygen-burning implications, he lit the note and brushed the ashes into the bilge below. He scribbled "I'll always love you" on a page ripped from his bible and put it in place of the original goodbye.
Then he held his breath and waited - waited for the slow sort of bad that robbed him of tomorrow.

A Hard Truth - Scheherazade Project

2006-09-18T14:10:00.002-04:00

It's easier than you might think.
By the time I volunteered to do pro bono counseling at Mansfield Correctional (not to be confused with the Mansfield reformatory, site of Shawshank Redemption, Tango & Cash, etc - it's been closed down for over 15 years) most of the work had already been done. By then I already had a fairly comprehensive list of all the inmates, their crimes and sentences. From there it was only a matter of developing a profile for just the right target. God bless the internet.
You'd also be surprised at how easy it was to get inside. Prisons are so desperate for counselors that the background check consisted of little more than a basic criminal history (I didn't have one - my record has been expunged) and a set of my fingerprints.
Done.
Within two weeks of my initial offer to volunteer, I was counseling inmates in my own non-tape-recorded office. It was pretty much what you'd expect - anxiety over their wives fidelity on the outside, feelings of hopelessness, rough facades replaced by tears, etc. Not that I gave a shit about them or their problems. That wasn't what I was there for.
I started out hoping that one of the prisoners I had targeted would just walk right in, but after a week or so I started to get a little anxious. Thinking that I'd have to settle for less than desireable, I started amending my plans.
But I didn't have to. Because that's when I met 50 Grams. And he was perfect.
He was nicknamed 50 Grams because that's the smallest amount of pure methamphetamine that will trigger the harsher mandatory minimum of no less than 20 years. He was busted after a routine traffic stop turned up the meth in the trunk of his car - boom, first offense. The subsequent search warrant for his apartment turned up another 75 grams - boom, second offense & twenty to life.
Already 51 years old, it was essentially a death sentence and he knew it. He was going to die behind cinder blocks and razor wire.
I meant to work him along slowly, but I was just giddy in anticipation. I turned every session towards his feelings of remorse and regret for not being able to take care of his family. Week after week after week, I fed his inner turmoil until he was ready to explode.
"You have a daughter graduating high school this year, right? Is she planning on going to college" I asked innocently.
He answered that she had done well in school, but there was no money for college. Personally I found it remarkable that she even made it that far. I'd already searched the county records to find that she'd been in and out of foster care as her biological mother fought her own drug demons. The kid certainly deserved a better fate.
"But there are all sorts of scholarships and grants out there for deserving students, especially if there's a financial need. She'll find something". I just egged him on. "As a matter of fact, I give a $5,000 scholarship to children of inmates. I've done it for the last 3 years".
His eyes lit up.
Criminals know another con when they see one. It's just an awareness they have after having lived the Life for so long. And he knew right then that something devious was in the books.
I continued - "She really does sound quite deserving. Plus, it's not like you're some lowlife kiddy rapist. You know, kinda like the one living right down from you on the block - the guy that molested all the pre-schoolers. That guy is a real scumbag and deserves something else entirely."
His shoulders squared to me as he responded.
"So what would think he deserves?", both of us NOT having the same conversation.
"Oh, I don't know. But if it were me, I'd want him to get some of what he'd been giving to those little kids. A taste of his own medicine. Then I'd want him to bleed out as slowly and painfully as possible. Too bad he's locked up here though".
We both walked a little farther across the line.
"Well, things like that have been known to happen here behind bars. Guys like him usually don't make a lot of friends" he said, tacitly agreeing to his half of the deal.
"Frankly I think there's a certain honor in dealing justice like that. It's scary knowing that he's up for parole in 16 months. I don't see how he got 4 years while you got 20. It's just not right. But I'd bet that someone will take care of your family while you're in" I said as I tacitly agreed to my half of the deal.
We did one more session before he stopped coming. I did another month before I told the associate warden that I wouldn't be able to volunteer anymore. It was just becoming too big of a burden on my professional life.

A child molester was buried in scarcely marked grave on the prison grounds a few weeks later. The daughter of a meth junkie started community college four months after that.

And my pain still hasn't gone away.
Not after the molester.
Not after the punk that shot a gas station attendant for 27 bucks.
Not after the babysitter that shook an infant to death.
And not after the drunk driver that killed my fiance.

But maybe after the next one........

What We Needed - A Scheherazade Project Entry

2006-08-29T11:01:00.002-04:00

Disclaimer - I wrote this in the window seat on a red-eye flight to Florida after a long day and a few drinks. I take no responsibility for it's shittiness.

What We Needed

The three of us originally planned to go island-hopping in the Caribbean for 10-12 days to celebrate college graduation. Not that our commencement was in any way praise-worthy. In fact, we’d all cruised through our four years with minimal effort and fanfare. So I suppose the vacation was really just an excuse to drink Red Stripe by the caseload in our best attempts to convince comely exotic beauties to recreate the Lancaster-Kerr beach scene in From Here To Eternity.
But after reviewing my finances, I knew that we would have to scale back our trip if I was going to be able to afford to go. I was a scholarship kid and the money would be coming out of my own savings. The cost wasn’t a factor at all for Travis or Derrin. They were both trust fundies and seemed to have unrestricted access to their fathers’ bank accounts.
So we decided to limit our trip to one island – Puerto Rico. There would be plenty to do and see to keep us busy between the beaches, rain forests, bars, etc. Besides, Derrin had said he had a Puerto Rican housekeeper as a kid and had a thing for that type ever since – soft eyes, raven hair, winsome bodies. I could tell that the opportunity to fulfill some prepubescent wanderlust was very appealing to him.
Our original plan was to spend the first four or five days touring the island and taking in all the tourist sites. But after we missed the tour bus on the first day, inertia kept us at the bars of San Juan pretty much the whole time. The nights were blurs of dance clubs, giggly island girls and empty Cuervo bottles. Mornings were spent stumbling back to our rooms, sometimes alone and sometimes not. The afternoons consisted of each of us filling our ice buckets with a three dollar bottle of Captain Morgans & a two liter of coke and slowly emptying them as we recuperated in lounge chairs by the pool.
It didn’t take us long to figure out that the discos weren’t the safest places to loiter after about 1-2 in the morning. Cash-soaked, liquor-drenched Americanos were prime targets for muggers, pick-pockets and bad characters in general. Fortunately for us, we were able to find a few places we could drink, relax and fraternize in relative safety after hours.
The bordellos.
Now it’s not necessarily what you think. They’re actually very nice establishments with bars downstairs and bedrooms upstairs. The working women chat you up as you drink and, if you’re interested in that sort of thing, lead you upstairs for a little stress relief. But if you just want to sit and drink, there weren’t a lot better places to do it. The Lucky 7, the Hawaiian Hut and the Black Angus were our favorites, the latter in particular.
We had three or four days to go and morose melancholia was beginning to set in. You can only drink so much before you drown in introspection or regretful contrition. Travis & Derrin dealt with it in their way and I dealt with it in mine. They had requisitioned a handful of girls at the Black Angus for a few hours of depraved gluttony. I had requisitioned a bartender to keep my glass filled downstairs.
I watched her descend the stairs through rum-filled eyes. It wasn’t just her natural blond-hair that made her stand out from the rest of the native women working there. It was just a clumsy gracefulness that seemed more than a little out of place. And I couldn’t figure out if she was smiling at me or just in spite of me. It wasn’t even a smile really. More of an upturned lip acknowledging me acknowledging her.
By now, I’m sure that everyone who worked there realized that I was only there to drink, but she sat down next to me anyhow.
“Is it ok if I hang out here while they clean my room?” she asked without regard to what my answer would be. She said it would be about a half hour and ordered a drink on my tab.
“You probably want to hear my story. How I got here, right?”
I’m sure she had a story, well-rehearsed and completely false, that she repeated to different men every night, explaining how she went from rural South Carolina to Puerto Rican whorehouse. Probably filled with larger-than-life characters and tales of rebellious (mis)adventure. I imagined the real story had more to do with a sexually abusive father and parasitic “boyfriends”, but neither of us really cared at that point.
“It depends. Do you want to tell it?”
“Not really” she conceded.
So we talked about personal nothings. She drew on a cigarette, leaned back in her chair to exhale, then leaned back in to draw me nearer. As if affirming some secret only the two of us shared, unspoken. Every few minutes she would take my left arm, pull it towards her and look at my watch, mindful of how much time we had left until she had to go back to work. And every time she did, I was filled with more and more panic that I was about to lose something I’d never had. It never occurred to me how little sense it made.
A khakied Brit walked across the room and placed his hand on her shoulder.
“How bout we go upstairs for a bit, sweetheart?”
I followed her eyes as they went from mine, to his hand, to his face, then back to mine again.
“A little later. I need to finish this conversation first”. Docile yet subtly assertive, he got her point and sulked over to the girl at the next table.
Effortlessly she took me by the hand and walked me over to the bartender.
“How long you gonna be?” he asked.
“The rest of the night” she answered for me as she took my wallet from my pocket, extracted four crisp one-hundred dollar bills and handed them to him.
Placid serenity washed over me as she led me to her room and laid me on her bed. Using the chair in the corner to support herself, Lillian leaned down and slid off her surprisingly casual heels and began to remove her stockings.
“No, that’s not what I want” I protested.
“I know, but I just don’t want to wrinkle my dress” she replied, seemingly amused by my chaste resistance. She turned around and knelt in front of me so that I could unzip her dress. It was only when she pulled it over her head and laid it gently on the chair that I noticed her become nervous, self-conscious. But it passed in a moment and she was herself again.
Now clad only in her bra and panties, she straddled my body and placed her lips next to my ear.
“Trust me” she breathed.
Using her left hand, she deftly unfastened the buttons of my shirt, unbuckled my belt and undressed me. She carefully folded my shirt and pants and placed them next to her clothes before lying down next to me. Her lips pressed against my ear as we wrapped our arms around each other and drifted off to sleep.

I was awoken by Travis the next morning. We were being “asked” to leave by management and the faster the better. I looked around groggily to see she was gone. Not a trace of her remained except for a faint scent of perfume. Travis tossed me my clothes, I got dressed and we left.
Before falling back to sleep in my own hotel room, I found a pink envelope in my jacket pocket that hadn’t been there before. In it were 4 fifty dollar bills and a note scribbled in eyeliner;

“Here’s my half. We both got what we needed – L.”

Things I Keep In The Box - Part One

2006-08-07T16:23:00.002-04:00

Growing up, I was kind of a bookish & sickly little dork. I didn't have much in the way of a social life outside school and the only friends I had worth mentioning were the handful of guys I roomed with.
When I was around 15, I was in my dorm and the weather was getting a little chilly. The building was very old and the windows usually stuck open or shut at the most inconvenient of times. This was on of those times - I pulled, pounded and pushed until it finally closed...... right onto my right thumb, breaking it in two places.
The plaster cast went from the first knuckle of my fingers to halfway up my elbow.
I was two weeks into the month I was supposed to wear it when another classmate (let's call him Archie Costello) had his own accident - he broke his wrist at football practice when he was tackled by the biggest guy on the team.
Now Archie was the kind of guy who just pissed you off by being so fucking perfect - effortless valedictorian, president of every cheesy extracurricular club, captain of the football team - your basic posterboy for pubescent heterosexual sublimity.
So he walks into our trig class the next morning, right arm clad in a cast identical to mine in every way, save one - in the 13 hours he'd had his cast on, he had managed to get it covered in signatures, well-wishes and lame platitudes in an assortment of fonts and colors. One glance and I could tell that a majority of these had come from female hands - all the more of an accomplishment since it was an all male school.
After I looked at his cast, I looked down at my own older cast - the only writing on it was from myself, a scribbled reminder to finish my term paper by the previous Monday. Talk about a perfect microcosmic description of my own existence up to that point in my life.
I couldn't stop thinking about the stark contrast even after class had started. So damn unfair! Like I needed another reminder of how unpopular and anonymous I was. Completely ignoring whatever lesson the teacher was trying to cover, I withdrew into my own private cavern of self-pity and abasement.
So I barely noticed when the bell rang and the class began to empty... except for Archie. I only realized he was there when he lifted my casted arm and started to write in bold red permanent marker -

"Get well soon

Your Brother In Arm,

Arch"

"People are going to think that we're trying to start a new fashion trend" he said with a smile as he called a few of his buddies over. I sat there mute and brainless as they doodled, drew and autographed on my own cast until soon it was a veritable replica of Archie's - minus the girly script.

My cast lasted longer than Archie's. He cut his off on his own after a week and a half in order to play in the Homecoming game. Mine came off a week later.

I still have it in a box in my attic.

All Talked Out

2006-08-02T09:49:00.002-04:00

Don't say a word when I walk in the door
don't say "everything is gonna be all right"
I wouldn't believe it even if you did

I know there's a lot you want to say
words of comfort, words of compassion
but I'm just not ready to listen

I'm sure there's a lot you want to know
questions about my day, my week, my life
but you just caught me at the exact wrong time

because right now I'm all talked out

I'll loosen my tie and lay on the couch
leaving just enough room for you beside me
but that's all the invitation you'll get

There's not a word that can console me
Irma Thomas is the only voice I want to hear
so just speak with your eyes, your hands, your soul

I'll tell you "I love you" by brushing your hair from your face
I'll tell you "I need you" by bringing your head to my chest
but that's all I can afford to give

because right now I'm just all talked out

Tomorrow may not get any better
I won't promise to share anymore later
some things will be left unanswered

Sometimes just being there is all I can give
other times you won't even have that
I've been used up by those who needed me less than you do

I'll understand if that isn't enough to keep you here
I doubt it would sustain me if roles were reversed
but I still wouldn't whisper a word as you walked out the door

Can't give you more because I'm just all talked out

Emptiness - Scheherazade Project Entry

2006-06-23T09:59:00.002-04:00

She had to stand tiptoed on a dining room chair to even be able to reach the heating vent. Her foggy recollection of a stashed bottle drove her frenetic search. The butter knife bent just a little as she unfastened the two retaining screws holding the cover in place, reaching inside and pulling out a blackdust-covered fifth - mere ounces left. The amber liquid served as a prism as the light from the chandelier filtered through the rum and danced on her face.
She drank until it was empty.

Ungracefully climbing down from her perch, she continued to the kitchen. Callously knocking over cereal boxes and Tuna Helper, she knew it was there somewhere there amongst the bottles of vinegar and salad dressings. Cooking sherry. Never opened. Bought under the suspicious eye of her husband (there was a new recipe she wanted to try, she told him). Her trembling hands slipped on the foil cover, unable to gain enough grip to twist off the cap. Undeterred, she grabbed the bottle by it's body and broke the neck over the edge of the marble countertop. The shards bloodied her lips as she up-ended the bottle.
She drank until it was empty.

Redness dripped down her chin and neck as she tried to organize her thoughts. The garage. Her gait a little more awkward now, she rambled down the hall and through the door. Unzipping each pocket of her husband's golf bag and probing until she found what she was looking for - his flask, given to him for serving as a best man at his little brother's wedding (the night she hit four mailboxes on the drive home). Past the point of being able to taste the scotch inside, she let every drop fall from the silver vessel.
She drank until it was empty.

With a new-found clarity of purpose, she returned to the kitchen. The refrigerator. The thirty-two ounce bottle of real vanilla bought for fifteen dollars during their vacation to Jamaica (his idea - he wanted to celebrate her six months of sobriety - she ended up unconscious at the bottom of Dunn's River Falls). 35% alcohol. Her apathy morphed into a reluctantant smile as the cool sweetness burned her bloody lips and coated her screamed-raw throat.
She drank until it was empty.

Now that she had drunk enough courage, she walked the mile down the hall and into her bedroom. Leaning up against the headboard, she pulled three things out of the nightstand drawer. The first, a pack of Newports - she slid one out, snapped off the filtered end, lit it and drew the delicious smoke into her lungs. The second, the note her husband had left on the dining room table - she read it one last time, folded it back up and laid it on her lap. The third, the S&W revolver her father had given to her when she turned 22 and moved out on her own - she placed it in her mouth.
She drank until it was empty.
She drank until she was empty.

Serenity

2006-06-19T08:50:00.002-04:00

The first time I tried to kill myself
I inched forward towards the lip of the cliff
until I could almost feel myself falling
the perfect sensation of reckless control
Then I remembered this was "our" spot
and how could I be so selfish to taint that
and replace our memories with this one?
so I took a step back

The second time I tried to kill myself
I collected all the old Percocets
that I was supposed to have taken for months
but suffered through and saved for today
Then I looked at the empty spot on the bed next to me
where you used to sleep and cry and laugh
Then it was almost as if you were still there
and I couldn't bear to be numb to that

The next time I tried to kill myself
I could feel the trigger move ever millimeter
the blissful intersection of Certainty & Uncertainty
waiting for the inertia to be shattered
But the lingering touch of your lips replaced the cold steel barrel
on the spot on my head that you used to kiss
when you joked that you didn't love me
I placed the bullet in bottom drawer

The last time I tried to kill myself
I'd never driven that fast with my eyes closed
empty black highway with the bridge up ahead
such a peaceful calm, my heart near still
But I felt you sitting next to me, your hand on my knee
your perfect half-smile and hair dancing in the wind
our drive down to St Simon's we never got to take
I down-shifted and headed south

Tonight I'm going to kill myself
walking into the ocean until the water stings my lungs
feeling it surround my body in its cool embrace
too far from the shoreline to turn back
no memories of us left to rescue me from sleep
hard to believe you're not here beside me
hard to believe you've been gone for so long
Just ten feet of water until we're together again

Not Quite Drunk Enough

2006-06-12T13:06:00.002-04:00

Not quite drunk enough
to give her a call
to say her name out loud
to leave my door open
to throw away the key
to tell her I'm sorry
to explain why I'm an asshole
to ask her to come back
to tell her to stay away
to send her the letter
to remember her touch
to forget her voice
to stop picking her scab
to delete her number
to run to her
to make it better
to make it worse
to finish this bottle
to pass out in my chair
to open the childproof cap
to let her know how I feel

Predator

2006-05-09T20:45:00.002-04:00

I watched you dance through the rain-streaked window
swaying to a song only you could hear
oblivious to the danger just beyond your door

I crept up on your porch, thunder muting my steps
still watching you glide over the tile floor
I wondered if you were in there alone

My hand is against the glass now, shadowing your neck
the chill down my spine not from the cold
my claws scratching against the window pane

The latch barely creaked as I slipped inside
your back still turned facing the wireless
nothing between us but a thin cotton sun dress

Our eyes met in the stainless steel reflection
but you weren't alarmed or frightened
but casually reached for your sharpened blade

Damned

2006-05-08T14:11:00.002-04:00

I was damned the moment I let her walk away
from the moment I didn't say a word
I didn't call her back

I was destined for hell the second I sat next to her
the second I let her drive me home
I walked her upstairs

I surrendered my soul when I made her push me away
when I left the door open for her to leave
I left it open for her return

I became lost when I returned her letters unopened
when I pretended I didn't care
I didn't say goodbye

The die was cast when I saw her across the room
when I saw her with someone else
I died a little inside

The tumor became malignant when I laid down with another
when I thought about her when I did
I thought about her when I did

The Hotel Room

2006-04-29T10:09:00.002-04:00

Warm champagne spoils in a bucket of water
one lipstick-ringed plastic cup
three broken french manicured nails
black cumberbund draped over the back of a chair

silky petals sleep on the carpet below
Tuxedoed groom slumped unblinking in the corner
his shirt slowly turning from red to brown
scattered envelopes litter the bed

Her never-worn teddy stuffed in the trash
the morning sun peeks through the drawn curtains
both key cards tossed on the dresser
"Do Not Disturb" sign hastily hung on the knob

Overturned lamp next to the still-made bed
neighbors still upset from the newlywed's vigor
two calls to the front desk complaining about the noise
six-inch stiletto dropped thoughtlessly in the sink

Simple yet beautiful wedding dress hung up with care
jeweled heels placed perfectly beneath
a note scribbled on a napkin & pinned to the pillow
unconsummated air grows stagnant in the room

Just In Case

2006-04-21T08:01:00.002-04:00

I noticed it only because of the deathly quiet
it's wings moved the air & the air moved the leaves
I looked to see it land in the crimson maple
the night heron's crest stark against the twilight sky

Curious as to how it wandered so far
I froze, not wanting to frighten it away
the bird's head swiveled across my gaze
Not certain if it was in danger or in sanctuary

I silently wondered about my winged guest
why my tree? why my plot of earth?
was it flying towards a safe secluded hideaway
or flying away from winter's wicked wrath?

My heart leaped as it looked to take air again
then leaped higher when it settled in to stay
I slowly crept back into the comfort of my home
but left the window open, just in case

Without Saying A Word

2006-04-18T07:49:00.002-04:00

I walked in my room without turning on the lights
that's why I didn't see her lurking in the corner
it was only when the moonlight silhouetted her profile
that I saw her malicious smile beckon me to her
Without saying a word

When I got close enough, she grabbed hold of my tie
pulled me in towards her so I could not escape
her other hand cupping the back of my neck
her bare leg coiled and wrapped around my own
Without saying a word

Her fingers became fingernails ripping through my hair
her breathe burned my skin, her eyes finally met mine
it was only an illusion that kept her in control
and in a moment, that illusion was gone
Without saying a word

A gentle twist of her arm, now she's face-first to the wall
a gasp, a shudder, an electricity through her veins
exquisite surrender to whatever may come
now finally and precisely where she wanted to be
Without saying a word

Grabbing a handful of hair, my hand around her throat
flesh meets flesh, intensity meets intensity
her last ounce of authority quickly fades away
giving in to the unbridled and the uncontrollable
Without saying a word

C17H19NO3

2006-04-12T08:57:00.002-04:00

I awoke from a dream in human form
crawled out of my black bed
through my black room
filled with yellow poppies

I walked in the light and examined myself
wearing someone else's clothes
speaking someone else's words
living someone else's life

I covered the eyes of a passing woman
showing her things she'd never seen
thoughts she never pondered
sins she had long forgotten

I laid her down in a bed of Ivory
promised her treasure and love
adorned her in silver and lace
as my brother prowled in the distance

I kissed her softly with milky lips
as she drifted off to narcotic slumber
her pulse lightened under my touch
her breath slowing to a whisper

I wrapped her completely in my arms
a stranger she's known all her life
just one of a thousand sons
who leaves before she wakes

Numb

2006-04-10T09:07:00.002-04:00

I'm going to drink this absinthe
til I can't feel your hand in my hair
your lips on my neck
your breathe in my ear

I'm gonna take these pills
til I can't hear you calling my name
your accidental sigh
your heart against my chest

I'm gonna turn off the lights
til I can't see you walk in the room
take off your clothes
lay on my bed

I'm gonna get lost in myself
til I can't remember your laugh
the way you made me ache
the way I made you cry

I'm gonna take this poison
til I can't feel no pain
I can't taste your sweat
til I'm totally numb

Bathroom Creature Pic of the Day - AKA Slither

2006-04-03T07:43:00.002-04:00

So I tend to eat a lot of fiber. The upside of that is that I'm generally healthy and have a reasonably low cholesterol level. The downside is that I poop a lot.
I walk into my office this morning looking forward to a nice long meditation session on my office throne. One of the nice things about have a personal commode right off my office is that I can take a nice relaxing BM without having to worry about anyone walking in. Unfortunately I walk into my bathroom to find the morning cleaning crew still in there finishing up. Needless to say, this was very disheartening. Now I was just going to have to use the public bathrooms down the hall.
So I walk into the men's room and back to stall numero uno. I was in the process of dropping my trousers and assuming the position when I noticed something moving out of the corner of my eye. And just what exactly did I see? The biggest freakin' centipede I have ever seen. That thing must have been about a foot and a half long.

And I'm watching this thing (with my pants around my ankles) as it creeps closer and closer to the toilet. It slithers right up to it then continues on it's way.
So of course there's no way in hell I'll be able to use the toilet now. With my luck, there's a whole family of rabid millipedes living under the toilet just waiting for an unsuspecting victim to plop down so they can invade and and set up a colony inside my bowels. And since my personal bathroom is only a few yards away, I don't think I can trust it until the exterminators can be called in.
So now here I sit, clenched and puckered, waiting until lunch so that I can run home and use my pest-free bathroom.

I'm Gonna..........

2006-04-01T22:01:00.002-05:00

I'm gonna
ask you questions you can't answer
make you feel uncomfortable
touch you where you've never been touched

I'm gonna
bring out the worst in you
bring out the best in you
make you laugh, make you cry

I'm gonna
make you question what you know
keep you from your friends
make you not know who to trust

I'm gonna
kiss you where it hurts
kick you when you're down
not call the next day

I'm gonna
wipe away your tears
show you my scars
lick your wounds

I'm gonna
make you feel alive
make you wish you were dead
make you cry some more

I'm gonna
miss you when your gone
write your name on my heart
lock it away forever

Hypotheticals

2006-03-27T16:41:00.002-05:00

What if I had business in your town
just for a day?

What if my hotel was just 10 minutes
from your house?

What if I happened to mention to you
my room number?

What if you could take that day off work
and maybe that night?

What if you happened to stop by
just for a minute
just to say "hi"?

What if no one else in the world
knew where we were
or what we were doing?

What if we forgot about everything
outside that room
just for a while?

What if we tried to pretend
to be somebody else
just for a day?

What if we gave into temptation
and crossed that line?

What if we satisfied our hunger
like never before?

What if we lost our inhibitions
as if nothing else mattered?

What if your sweat became mine
and mine became yours?

What if you walked out the door
as if nothing had happened?

What if we tried to get back
to living our lives?

What if no one else knew
about our precious secret?

Hypothetically speaking, of course.

The Empty Space

2006-03-27T08:31:00.002-05:00

It followed me to the Cabo Rojo lighthouse
as I stood on the limestone cliffs
Two hundred feet above the sea
the Empty Space watched over my shoulder

It walked with me in Westminster Abbey
past the Unknown Warrior & Poets Corner
breathing in Chaucer's dust
The Empty Space's footsteps echoed

It bathed with me in the mist of Rifle Falls
then hiked to the catwalk above
leaned over the edge until we were sure to fall
The Empty Space grasping my arms

It sat behind me as I signed the mortgage
planning in our heads even then
to make the house all our own
The Empty Space lives in every room

It stood in the back at my best friend's wedding
where I was far from the Best Man
watching the last of my friends get married
The Empty Space danced alone

I've never been anywhere
I've never done anything
I'll never be anyone
without the Empty Space where you should have been

The Most Depressing Poem Of All Time...

2006-03-20T16:53:00.002-05:00

....and it's not even one of mine.

My freshman year in college I dated this English Lit major for most of the winter. It was really intense and tumultuous most of the time with fits of madness followed by fiery excitement. But on the night that both of us knew it was really over, she hung a print of Monet's Red Cape on my front door and scribed a poem on it in black magic marker - "Porphyria's Lover" by Robert Browning.
The words hit my like a sledgehammer to my chest and I spent the next two days memorizing them. Up until a couple years ago, I could still recite it by memory.

The rain set early in tonight,
The sullen wind was soon awake,
It tore the elm-tops down for spite,
and did its worst to vex the lake:
I listened with heart fit to break.
When glided in Porphyria;
straight She shut the cold out and the storm,
And kneeled and made the cheerless grate
Blaze up, and all the cottage warm;
Which done, she rose, and from her form
Withdrew the dripping cloak and shawl,
And laid her soiled gloves by,
untied Her hat and let the damp hair fall,
And, last, she sat down by my side And called me.
When no voice replied,
She put my arm about her waist,
And made her smooth white shoulder bare,
And all her yellow hair displaced,
And, stooping, made my cheek lie there,
And spread, o'er all, her yellow hair,
Murmuring how she loved me--
she Too weak, for all her heart's endeavor,
To set its struggling passion free
From pride, and vainer ties dissever,
And give herself to me forever.
But passion sometimes would prevail,
Nor could tonight's gay feast restrain
A sudden thought of one so pale
For love of her, and all in vain:
So, she was come through wind and rain.
Be sure I looked up at her eyes
Happy and proud; at last I knew
Porphyria worshiped me: surprise
Made my heart swell, and still it grew
While I debated what to do.
That moment she was mine, mine, fair,
Perfectly pure and good:
I found A thing to do,
and all her hair In one long yellow string
I wound Three times her little throat around,
And strangled her. No pain felt she;
I am quite sure she felt no pain.
As a shut bud that holds a bee,
I warily oped her lids: again
Laughed the blue eyes without a stain.
And I untightened next the tress
About her neck; her cheek once more
Blushed bright beneath my burning kiss:
I propped her head up as before
Only, this time my shoulder bore
Her head, which droops upon it still:
The smiling rosy little head,
So glad it has its utmost will,
That all it scorned at once is fled,
And I, its love, am gained instead!
Porphyria's love: she guessed not how
Her darling one wish would be heard.
And thus we sit together now,
And all night long we have not stirred,
And yet God has not said a word!

Stupid People Getting What They Deserve

2006-03-15T08:06:00.002-05:00

So I go to the same diner a few times a week. It opens at 6AM so I can stop in on the way to the office. Sometimes I have breakfast, sometimes I'll just pick up something for lunch later and sometimes I'll just have a couple of cups of coffee. There's a regular crowd that time of the morning but they're good at leaving you alone if that's what you want.
Anyway, there's this bus boy that's been working there for a while. I'm not sure what his problem is (cleft palate maybe) but he talks really funny and he scampers everywhere he goes. Annoys the hell out of me. I used to keep dropping my silverware on the floor just to watch him scurry back and forth.
So I get in there this morning and what happens? Little retarded busboy comes over to take my breakfast order! I couldn't believe it. He wasn't that great of a busboy so why the hell should he be promoted to waiter? I don't care how busy they are, I shouldn't have to listen to him try to lisp out the daily specials - "shaushage and home fwies".
But I was starving to death so I decided to just deal with it. I gave him my order but told him to make sure to wash his hands before he brings it back - I sure as hell didn't want to catch whatever he had. That got a laugh from the next table over. You could tell that they didn't want the bucket head bringing their food either.
So I watch him scamper to the kitchen, scamper to another table, scamper here, scamper there. Finally I just get sick of it. He comes out of the kitchen carrying this big ass tray of food to one of the tables in the back, heading right towards me not even paying any attention to where he's going. All it took was me barely sliding my foot out from under the table and WOOSH - the hairlip busboy flops onto the floor sending eggs & syrup everywhere. You should have seen it, absolutely hilarious.
So he's laying belly-down on the tile floor and looks up to see the whole place just laughing their asses off - he actually had a pancake on his head and powdered sugar all over his face - absolutely freakin' priceless. He gets up as fast as he could trying to clean up the mess he made - "I'm shorry, I'm shorry, I'm shorry".
Hopefully he'll be back bussing tables tomorrow morning.

It's Not Enough

2006-03-14T19:20:00.002-05:00

It's not enough to hear you say my name
I need to feel your breathe on my face as you say it

It's not enough to feel you
I need to hold you until every inch of your body touches every inch of mine

It's not enough to spend a moment with you
I need to be with you until the stars fall around us

It's not enough for me to make you happy
I need for you to never want again

It's not enough to know what perfume you wear
I need to swim in your scent, your sweat

It's not enough to love you
I need to to feel it in every synapse of your body

It's not enough to tell you
I need to show it for the rest of my life

Playing With Matches

2006-03-14T13:50:00.002-05:00

They fell out of her father's jacket pocket
as he headed out the door for work
not a smoker, just practical
you never know when you'll need them

she watched them fall to rest beneath the hall table
she didn't dare try to retrieve them
until her mother went back to bed
until she knew she wouldn't be caught

patiently minding her own business
watching the hand of the grandfather clock
playing with her dolls and makeup
scheming, plotting, planning in her head

she listened to the bedroom door close
and her mother's mattress settle down
but too anxious to wait for the gentle snoring
to tiptoe down the hall, hiding them in her sock

Shuffling by her sister's room, still asleep in her crib
silently into her own messy bedroom
Bob the Builder & Dora the Explorer
quickly locking the door behind her

Sitting indian-style in the middle of the floor
quietly shaking the box next to her ear
then slowing sliding it open to reveal her treasure
red-tipped toys lined up like soldiers

Striking the first one & watching it burn
blowing it out short of her fingertips
the next one burned a bit lower
until the heat singed her thumb

Hypnotized by the glow and the warmth
now forgetting where & who she was
just needing to let it burn a little longer
needing to feel a little more fire

She watched the last one ignite
the flame moving in slow motion down
too hot to keep holding on
letting it fall to the carpet below

Crash

2006-03-09T12:11:00.002-05:00

She'd driven winding paths before
twisted & curvy, hills and bumps
she reveled in it really
making the road her own
riding every single one
of the 280 horses
at her fingertips
under her seat
rushing through her veins

She downshifted just as she'd done
a thousand times before
left foot synchronized with the right
taking the top of the curve
effortlessly turning the wheel
down into the turn

the tires begin to slip

Her determined, self-satisfied grin disappears
and is replaced with something else
surprise, fear, excitement, anticipation
the back end starts to slide out
the car begins to scream
her knuckles are drained of blood
her pupils fill her eyes

the sky is the ground and the ground is the sky
once, twice, three times, more
her hands are jolted off the wheel
her body slammed against the door
then back to the other side
whiteness explodes in her face
softening the blow
she's smiling now

one last floating spiral
through the air, through the dust
suspended animation
and in that fraction of a second.......

a pure blanket of freedom

I Know You

2006-03-09T11:41:00.002-05:00

Aren't you too old to be playing with dolls?
to be believing in fairy tales
to wait for Prince Charming?

Aren't you too old to have a crush?
to flirt with the lifeguard?
to wear that outfit to work?

Aren't you too old to drive like that?
to dance like that?
to dream like that?

Aren't you too young to be that jaded?
to start settling for less?
to give up so quickly?

Aren't you too young to be dating that man?
to let yourself be used like that?
to be completely empty inside?

She Pretended Not To Notice

2006-03-08T16:36:00.002-05:00

She pretended not to notice
when I walked in the bar
when I sat down next to her
when I breathed in her perfume

She pretended not to notice
when I brushed her knee
when she touched my hand
when I spoke her name

She pretended not to notice
when I asked for the check
when I followed her out
when I followed her home

She pretended not to notice
when she left her front door open
when her button came undone
when I let out a gasp

She pretended not to notice
me standing behind her
my hand on her hip
my teeth on her neck

The Bridge To NoWhere

2006-03-03T07:51:00.002-05:00

We'd been running from the cops
for what seemed like an hour
both of us half-dressed and barefoot
the rest of our clothes under our arms
except for the sock & panty dropped behind us
laughing at our misfortune with every step

It's not like we planned it that way
we'd parked behind the old high school
with the most moral of intentions
just going to catch up on old times
maybe take a walk through the park a bit
and sit atop the Bridge To NoWhere

I didn't notice you steal the bottle from the head table
I don't even want to know where you stashed it
no place to hide it under your bridesmaid dress
and that look of pure mischief in your eyes
made me walk a bit faster, a tad quicker
thats when you decided to run onto the playground

I made you push me on the swingset
your dress nearly flew up over your head
as you almost made the back handspring on the balance beam
then walked over as I hung upside down on the monkey bars
and cocked my head to one side, yours to the other
and you kissed me, five years before Spiderman

That's when I knew I was in trouble

After indulging our inner seven year olds on the playground
we raced to indulge our inner seventeen year olds
your tafeta dress (or chiffon, I don't know) tore a little
as we crawled under the chain link fence
and travelled back in time ten years
right back to that night on the Bridge To NoWhere

You hopped up onto the guardrail, raised your dress a tad
as interstate traffic rushed beneath us
the whoosh of semis made your hair dance under the streetlight
you pulled me close & wrapped your legs around mine
undid my rented bowtie and silken cumberbund
when the passing cars noticed and honked their horns

unbuttoning, unzipping, unsnapping, unhooking, undressing
undoing every second that had passed us by
but feeling as if not a moment had ever slipped
since we'd seen each other last (as you walked down the jetway)
And we stood motionless for what seemed like forever
after we saw the headlights of the only police car in town

Before we ran off the other side of the Bridge To NoWhere

Viola Sororia

2006-02-27T07:17:00.002-05:00

I watched her hop on the bus
with a wildflower in her hair
Not noticing the rude jerks in the seats
she reached up and grabbed a handle
without looking away from her copy of Manifesta
I gazed from behind a stock broker

The flower was blue with heart-shaped leaves
A violet or a poppy, I wouldn't know
She must have reached a funny passage
her smile came and drifted back to a gracious moue
I wondered what struck her as funny

It fell as the bus lurched to a sudden stop
The blue petals glided slowly to the floor
unnoticed among the industrious commuters
not recognizing the exquisite beauty beneath them
Her dark hair now unadorned

I worked my way forward towards her
My hearting beating as a foot grazed the stem
then another barely missed crushing it entirely
it's brushed under a seat to relative safety
The bus clears enough for me to reach it
the wildflower seemed tiny in my hand

I looked up just in time to watch her hop off the bus
still looking intently at her book
I held up the flower against her profile as she walked away
until she ducked inside an old stone church
then I wrapped it in a hankerchief
then slid it softly in my breast pocket

And I'm Not Even Sorry

2006-02-23T08:40:00.002-05:00

I had gotten off work and realized that I really didn't have anything at home to make for dinner. Not being in the mood for anything fastfood-related, I decided to swing by the Chilis/Applebees/TGIF place that was on my way. It would be pretty quick and I could use a beer or two after the day I had.
I walked right by the hostess and sat down at the bar. Even before I picked up the menu, I saw a very familiar looking woman a half dozen stools away. She looked backed at me and smiled so she must have known who I was. I nodded and scanned the menu as I tried to figure out where I knew her from.
Ah-ha, Jeff's party last summer. Kevin's date, Sheila or Sheena, maybe Sharon. Real meek and shy girl, as I remembered. Anyway, I had seen Kevin the previous week and he mentioned that he was getting ready for a business trip to Orlando. He was a nice enough guy too, but for some reason I just didn't like him, hard to put my finger on why.
I took a second and got into The Mode, then I slid down a few stools closer.
"Sheena, right?"
"Sheila actually, but very close ****. I didn't think you would remember me".
We ordered and started talking back and forth. She worked in a daycare, she was supposed to meet a girlfriend there but she had just called to say she wasn't going to make it..... and she was still dating Kevin.
"You are? Huh. That's weird."
"Why is that weird?" she asked.
"Oh, I don't know. It's just that I was talking to him last week and for some reason I got the impression that he was going down to Florida this week to meet up with a girl he dated in college".
Her jaw dropped open just for a second until she was able to compose herself.
"Uh, no. He is in Orlando this week, but it's for work. He said he's meeting some new client down there".
"Geez, I don't know how I got so mixed up. I must have got him confused with someone else".
With the seed of doubt planted, I went to work on her.
I asked how they were getting along, what they did over the holidays, was he calling her while he was out of town, etc etc. After five minutes, she ordered a shot. After ten minutes she started talking about how she didn't trust him and how he doesn't treat her as well as he should.
Another shot. Then another. Then another.
Now that she really wasn't in any condition to drive, I offered to take her home.
"But what about my car? I can't just leave it here" she said.
"No no. Don't worry about it. I'll swing by and pick you up in the morning on the way to work and you can get it then".
I took her home and walked her inside to make sure she got there ok.
"Thank you so much for taking care of me tonight. You're a great friend" she said as she gave me a friendly hug. Without letting go of each other, we backed off a bit. She leaned back in and we kissed.
I left a couple hours later. After I went into work the next morning, I realized that I had completely forgotten about her and her car. Oopsy. I heard later that she and Kevin broke up but I never heard why. She tried to call me a few times after that but thanks to caller ID, I haven't talked to her since.

Heroin Dreams

2006-02-20T09:39:00.002-05:00