LA and some of her people

Recent developments in my understanding of Los Angeles and her people have put me in the mind to record one or two of same, at some point in time, perhaps now, perhaps later.

the apartment is a mess, clothing covers the floor, empty pizza boxes litter most surfaces, and a grey Chinchilla has been loose for weeks, his droppings everywhere. We play pranks on people on the street, filming from above as one after the other reaches down to pick up the seemingly innocuous dollar bill, only to discover that the “down” side is covered with fresh, human shit. The preparations for this stunt included many instances of near vomiting, much gagging, and the supercautious air people take on when handling others’ fecal matter.

Having been picked up and not taken the bus this time, my skateboard is not with me, and the prospect of having to bus it home, and not thrash the four odd miles all downhill does not excite me. Buses in Los Angeles are doable, they actually aren’t that bad, but still, you’re taking the bus. Immediate major negative cool points. Not that anyone’s counting, but Everyone’s counting, and that’s all that counts. The good and bad of this city is that everyone is watching you, judging you, talking about you at all times while trying their hardest to ignore your very presence. Strange. Hard to pull off at the best of times, impossible to remain outside of it once you’re here long enough.

As a compromise I take my friend’s board, a brand new deck with sick trucks and Bam wheels, which is slipperier than I’m used to, which almost costs me my collarbone on the corner of La Cienega and Santa Monica, but I get the hang of it, and don’t crash once. Back home, I make my way about things for a few hours, then get a call that my buddies are on the Promenade, and that I should come. Dutiful as ever, I find myself on the bus, heading west at a healthy clip, skateboard in hand. People can’t seem to stop looking at me, must be the new shades or something, so I pretend to be very distraught but trying to do my best to hold in the fury, which is a lot more fun than just sitting there. The anger creeps up behind my eyeballs, cuts the waste from my movements, and sees me through to my stop.

None of us really buy anything, besides jock shirts that look good but really aren’t normally part of the wardrobe, and we jokingly question our reasons for coming so far for basically nothing. The question seems irrelevant, so we drop the subject, and head for the beach. We smoke a joint by the life guard stand, and I watch him on his binoculars on each hand off, just to be sure. Hungry, we decide on Bubba Gump’s on the pier, get a shitty table in the back, are seated without a waiter, and I finally get up and let the oblivious wait staff know of our predicament. Apologies come grudgingly, but a young guy comes up to serve us, and we browbeat him into serving us drinks without checking ID. Doesn’t matter in my case, but my companions are both underage. Dinner’s alright, especially with three boilermakers apiece.

We finish our food, pay, and take our drinks to the bar, so they won’t card. They do, but luckily she asks the only guy who’s packing a fake. Time, about five pm. Closing time, about ten pm. In the ensuing five hours, two of us including myself have another dozen boilermakers, bringing the total in six hours to fifteen, or the equivalent of about 30 beers. We’re so drunk we each spill at least one drink, but the tenders keep ‘em comin’ and we don’t complain.

The shopping bags are abandoned three separate times within the eatery, I lose the skateboard and a pack of smokes with the last green in it, Brian gets the hot tender’s number without even asking for it, and Danny almost gets slopped up by some girl sitting next to her fiancé who’d been all up on his junk all night.

They finally kick us out, but by that time, another five of our people have showed up, we acquired a football, and I’m blacked out. The bartenders kick us out, locking the doors behind us but watching us through them , and Brian, in an attempt to impress the hot one, throws the football hard at a couple walking by, then proceeds to hoodslide a cop car parked out front. We play football on the pier, and catch, smoke more, and I’m abducted by a friend who convinces me to buy 40s, which some guy actually sells to me. I’m in t-rex mode, where shiny things catch my eye, the speech centers are on idle, and I can’t approach something without first aligning my whole body toward it, then stumbling over.

One of our old friends shows up, saying we can stay at her house. She lives with her mom and sixteen year old sister in Venice, and there’s no drinking in the house. Staunchly ignoring this warning, I sneak my half finished 40 into the house on the third try, and promptly pass out in someone’s room. Luckily it’s the old friends’, but in the night, supposedly in an attempt to forgo pissing myself, my body wakes me up and leads me to the bathroom, where I regain consciousness for the first time in ten hours.

I have no idea where I am, whose house this is, what time it is, what city I’m in, where my wallet, cellphone, and keys are. Still very drunk but awake, I tiptoe from room to room, finally locating my buddy on the floor in the younger sister’s room. It seems like a good spot, so I grab a stuffed animal and curl up next to him. I wake up to sunlight and the shakes, I’m so cold. I see that the girls have left, so I take my pants off and get under the sweet smelling covers. The old friend’s mom comes upstairs to get everyone to come down and have some pancakes, but I’m so painfully hung over and her heavy French accent is annoying so I hide under the covers, and fain incoherence and partial sleep when she discovers me. The pancakes turn out to be bland and undercooked, but the younger sister is chainsmoking at the table, so that lightens things up.

Finally someone comes upstairs to wake me, and we leave, but not before I puke all over the bathroom while trying to take a piss, catching most of it in my hands and shoveling it into the toilet. Ten minutes later there are no traces of recent pukage anywhere to be found.

All of my most valued items (cellphone, wallet, &c) have been kept safe in a shoe box, and are redistributed to my various pockets. The old friend’s mother insists on seeing us outside, and on giving Brian some things he had left behind at the old house, which he must take or else they will be thrown out.

We make our way toward Westwood, debate going to class with our old friend, but I veto the notion, as I can barely see and have one of the worst headaches in years. So we make our way toward our respective bus stops through UCLA. One of us asks everyone he meets where he can score meth, weed; I’m highstepping along checking out every girl who passes and voicing my opinion; we all look like homeless guys with shoe boxes, bags, and few brain cells left.

Having thus terrorized the campus, we enter our buses, and are swallowed up by the vast capillaries of LA Metro.

Selah. JP

In memoriam

9/11/2001

RIP

Love. JP

THE RESULTS ARE IN

Thanks for tuning in. if you’re reading this, I express my thanks. Thanks for taking the time to get a glimpse into the inner workings of me.

Confrontation. Today. Not more than an hour ago. All my fears confirmed. In order not to become physically violent (psychological violence already in progress), not to break things, and to stop myself from punching my face any more, I just skateboarded three miles, fast. Sweating, angry eyes blazing out of cheap, see-through aviators. The preppy, surf-themed t-shirt a friend gave me very recently, now drenched in sweat. The anger boils just below the surface. And why?

Because she told me at the beginning that she couldn’t be in a relationship right now. But that’s not true. Because we had been together, we just hadn’t called it by that name. Minutes after we spoke, it came to me:

It’s not that she can’t be in a relationship right now, IT’S THAT SHE CAN’T BE IN ONE WITH ME. And why? Cash fucking money baby. I can’t afford to swoop her in my car, and finance a trip downtown, to go shoot guns at the shooting range. And that’s about all she fucking wrote. Cash fucking money. Or maybe it’s the major design flaws that I see permeating my system right now. My niceness, often confused with pushover syndrome. My empathy. The fact that I chew my fingernails. My inability to fully appreciate the sexual encounter unless my partner can fully appreciate it herself. My apathy toward anything I decide not to care about.

Except for the cash flow situation, I got everything else pretty much covered. I love her, even if she never really believed me. I have loved them all, and will have an empty place in my heart for each and every one of them, till it stops beating. How many more holes can I take? How many more empty places will I be able to bear before LOVE stops coming, before everything is just a fucking illusion? Just a lie?

I wish you the best, beautiful Bostonian. I hope your man now, the one with whom you CAN be in a relationship, makes you happy. I hope he keeps your belly warm, and your bed rumpled, and gives you what you need. I hope that the respect I have for you as a person, for you as a friend (?), shows in today’s call. In today’s attempt to reach closure. I think I understand your decision, why you decided NOT to go with my offer, and upgraded instead:

The average relationship lasts, what, about 14 months? And not having money sucks anywhere, but in L.A. especially. Plus, if things are going well, and you see yourself being with this person for a while, you want the assurance that your life isn't going to be a miserable, poor mess for the forseeable future. Plus, you start thinking about kids, and they need cash, you can't be poor for that shit.

Yes, things did peter off. Things kind of just stopped, after you carved me out of your life a few weeks ago. The one thing though, the thing that really pisses me off, is that you said you were my girlfriend, just not by name. then, you met him, and he was great and wonderful and well connected and had fucking cash, and then the feelings stopped along with the close contact. THAT pisses me off.

That you just let me fall by the fucking wayside, and confirmed my fears that I was just a placeholder all along; just a stopping point, someone to get you back into the rhythm of dating, of having someone close. I was a stepping stone, to get you from isolation back up to speed, back up to where you could net a hot, nice, rich guy, and have him provide for you, and make you happy.

So. Enough. If you’re reading this, please know that I’m not mad: I saw this coming from the beginning. Don’t believe me? Read back a few posts. I’m just sad that it actually happened, that I dared to hope, dared to love. But, fuck it. There’s no money in a pity party. So, godspeed, faire thee well, welcome to the fucking dollhouse.

Out. X

post-RelationshipSlowDeath

“You must be a traffic ticket, because you’ve got ‘FINE’ written all over you”.

Ha. Good times. For the most part, a good weekend. Three whole days of nothing more, really, than self-stimulation and not too well deserved rest. But the underlying question of the weekend remained.

How will things progress from here? What will happen with the groundling, infantile relationship that had blossomed briefly before the advent of her friend? Not too long into the extended visit of her childhood companion, she had, for the most part, broken things off.

It had happened slowly at first. Of course, she wouldn’t want to hang out too much. Of course, things would be awkward with a third wheel around. Of course, he wouldn’t be able to share her bed any longer. At least until the friend was gone.

Then, however, the death knell had come. The step that would surely lead to ruin. It had been an otherwise normal phone conversation, but when she stated that he would not be welcome any longer in her friend’s presence, it had killed. She had claimed it was because the friend, so long from her last physical encounter, possessing so fully of the hidden and dark secrets that made Her her, subtly put her down, made her feel bad, when he was around.

Well, you can’t very well get rid of the friend, so, out with the temp bedbuddy, the soft and the niceness, he who would give so much, but who knew, deep down, that much of himself was a lie.

Not a really terrible lie; not one crafted malicious. But one brewed slowly from the fundamental misunderstanding between sexes, from the years of agony that had lead up to his first encounter. So often had he bungled things just before the moment of triumph. So often had he slipped, saying the wrong thing at just the wrong time, and turned the reaching, green tendrils that bore an end to pure auto-eroticism into the curling, snagging vines of embarrassment, rejection, shame and defeat.

So the lie had, for him, been born. Necessity had led him down the path of deceit and coercion, into the realm of auto-induced affection. It had spoken with his mouth the words that would bring a girl close, that would win over her confidence, and warm her to the thought of lying with him. And now…

What now? What had the years taught him? For one thing, he had never seen the lie through his current eyes, with his trove of experience. At least not until now. And was it really a lie? Or was it simply another one of the masks he wore? Was everyone capable of shutting off love, of twisting shut the pipeline of happiness and wonder, leaving behind cool indifference and hostile neutrality?

In that case, at the root of it all, his whole life was a lie. Always putting on the different masks, always adjusting to others, sensing their needs, calling up the files of past conversations with them, putting them at ease. Being ever the confident, capable, sometimes almost prescient, friend.

He had wanted to be close, loving, sharing of everything his. EVERYTHING HIS. He would have given her his life, had she but asked.

But everything for him, now, was nothing.

No cash. A broken tooth causing underlying annoyance edging on aggression, which would not be fixed until cash was available. A smoking habit. A penchant for self-pity, which was, thankfully, after years of nearly unconscious evaluation and probing, soon to be under more control. A taste for the random, risky encounter.

A propensity to give*. Money, love, feelings, advice.

Love…

But when you give, and don’t truly receive back, you slowly become annoyed with the recipient, and the giving morphs almost imperceptibly into resentment and indifference. Story of my fucking life.

But just last week, maybe the week before that, we had shared something soft again, on one of the now infrequent work breaks. We had stood outside, in the warm afternoon sunlight, and held each other as we had at the start of things. And that had given me hope. And hope, like love, spring eternal, and curse and praise them for it. For if the pain of heartbreak did not burn so darkly, we would forget the blinding inferno of love at its peak.

And so, it has come to pass that she now makes frequent references to a certain “friend”, with whom she has obviously spent many happy hours over the past fortnight. And guess what: his tooth ain’t broke, he’s got cash, and a fucking car, and is probably a really nice guy.

But he isn’t me, and it’s not fair, and I just want to be with her, and be nice to her, and give. And give. But life is pain, and the lords of credit are waiting with blood on their hands. So, let not in to self-pity. Stay the course, even if it seems crooked, and not like the grooves of others.

For I am the lie. I am the dark face of the skilled womanizer. But I am also the soft, bright face of unrequited, undying love. And to my final rest will I bear this tryx, this prong of opposites. And I will learn to bend it better to suit my will. And the slings and arrows of this comfortable life I live will not drag me down.

Indeed, they will drive me to see my future as I wish to see it, and grant me the tools to place myself in fate’s way; to make it so.

* This propensity to give is not simply that. It would be impossible to explain it fully as it extends so far back into my psyche that I cannot find its root, and it permeates so many daily, automatic functions that it seems an indelible part of me. Anyway, regardless of who asks, I will give to them. I will do my best not to let them know I have given to them, and refuse steadfast any attempt to pay back. Oh, I will accept compensation, should the other press hard enough, but such as they, for better or worse, are few and far between.

hope springs eternal

I feel lethal. On the verge of frenzy.

But at the same time, I am sad. To the core sad, like that dog in Japan waiting for his master, who had died weeks before at work. Still waiting. Ever faithful. Recently, I found myself at an internal crossroads of sorts. I was ready to abandon, actually I was deathly afraid I had already abandoned by goodness, my inner purity and selflessness. In a sense, this is true. I have had to abandon much of my innocence to make it this far, but last night I found myself able to abandon more. I hope I kept what was left. To lose that too, to become self-centered, selfish, oblivious to others’ feelings, to lack empathy, would leave me a shell.

I am sad for the girl I wish to make happy, but can’t, because I’m poor. It hurts when she won’t be close, when she keeps herself closed, guarded. I stand there, unsure what to do with my hands, wanting so badly to hold her, to stroke her hair, her face. But the vast majority of my tender advances of late have been met with indifference, a tense patience. So after a few tries I stop, cursing myself, whipping myself inside for pushing too much, for not being the cool motherfucker who doesn’t fucking care that she exists, that she is hurting too. Would I be that person? I could, but I chose not to. Oh, I hope I chose not to.

And I cannot change it. While her old friend is here, her time is taken, and I can only so many times tell her I love her without her saying it first for a change. So I stop. Stop saying it. Turn off the pipe again that makes me want to say it. And that makes me saddest of all, sometimes.

Sad at myself for feeling sad about this. Sad for not having the stuff to keep my job, for losing it, for having to find a new one. Had I only done so many things differently, had I not binged and blown thousands of dollars on drugs when I first got to this city of such vast potential. What would have happened? Would I be happier now? Will I know not to make the same poor decisions in the future? I hope so.

There it is. Hope. But hope dies in the face of humanity, in the harsh breath of selfishness. Hope should be altruistic, communal. Hope is the bread of those who cannot feed themselves off of the flesh of action, who cannot bring themselves to look beyond the moment, and see the forest through the trees. Hope is a crutch for those incapable of seeing action through to a desired end.

I hope. Still now. And hope springs eternal. Mahalo. Be safe. Love JP

TempusFugit

And so I find myself here, once again staring into the abyss of uncertainty and doubt. Doubt feeds depression. Lack of money feeds doubt. Lack of control and restraint drains money supplies. Depression, and the desire to free oneself of control and restraint brings momentary happiness, but only for a short while. Then, they lead back to doubt. Vicious fucking cycle. Circle de Diablo.

And all that.

It is up to ME to find the way out of this, to take responsibility for my actions, to strictly limit expenditures. To eat cheap. Not to go out. Save… save… save…

But how do you do that in the middle of a teeming metropolis? With friends who want to see you, whom you want to see? How does that work with a girlfriend? God. How does that work with a girlfriend? Which fucking chick is going to want to be with a guy who can’t even take her out to fucking dinner? Ah, there’s the depression…

It set in hard while running today, three miles up La Cienega to Sunset and back. I cried, had to stop running. Had to summon the fear, the disgust at myself, the Engine. The Engine, that fountain of anger, pity and spite that chimes in, sometimes loudly, sometimes not. It dulls the edges, hazes out right and wrong, diminishes pain. It keeps me in a constant state of despair, focused, driven anguish that somehow keeps me going.

Am I becoming too bitter?

Have I passed the point of no return, and am now incapable of really being happy? I hope not. I hope that all, no, I will work to make sure that my worst fears do not come to pass. That I retain a working position, or attain a new one, one that will allow me to ease the strain of massing debt, instead of steering me slowly toward it.

Not to point fingers, and not REALLY to misplace blame, but I never truly learned how to deal with money. Hell, I didn’t know what the fuck credit cards actually were, how credit card debt worked, until I was three grand in the hole. And then there’s the giving nature, the desire to see everyone having a good fucking time, fuck the expense. Wait, bro, until you can afford to do that. Don’t risk your whole future on this coast, don’t jeopardize everything you have, have worked for, for trifle friends.

For that is what many of those I met early on have turned out to be. Not worth the steam off my piss. But, eh, was fun while it lasted, right? It was, but not that fun. Maybe within the fog of drugs and delusion, inside the faux warm underbelly of communal society.

But it has given me the means to find myself out of this financial predicament. By writing about it, by putting it to word, making it fun, hard to read, I can claw myself out of this mess, and live the life I wish to live. Write, fain soul. Please. Eschew Them for a while. They can take it. Use this month without Her to write. Get it out. DO IT. Fucker. Just fucking do it. Time waits for no man, death rides your coattails, and love conquers all. Bouyah. Lv JP

The great treatise

The great treatise, the grand answer of life is nothing. Not in a negative way. Simply, it is that point between one moment and the next. It builds with the lover awaiting word of a war removed mate. It lies in the deep valleys of fear. Of pain. Vast fields of pain.

From keeping yourself at the point where you don’t truly love her. Something is kept back. And maybe down the years she’ll cry, and, knowing, will ask you why you never fully loved her. And you tell her, that if you hadn’t kept some back, there’d a been no spark. No mystery. No reason for fights.

Because unconditional love is precious. It is not to be given to one and all. It is to be shared with all who fit into its vast embrace. But, at the core of things, at the very base, perches the everlasting fact that you die alone. There is no such thing as redemption. Perhaps things go on, or perhaps the grooves of existence will simply go on without you.

And so the uncertainties of the word, the painful unfulfilled desire to write, interrupted by this so wonderful of a quagmire. But perhaps soon the tap will be turned off, the pleasures of companionship and life coaching (hehe) with it. And love. Love would leave. Goodbye love. For king, for country. Fuck the king.

What kind of god would be so cruel as to make her. To show me all the qualities that make a woman great, then wave her in front my face, before taking her again from me. Into the hands of one equally, if not more, worthy. But I remain by far the most worthy. I have put myself in the face of destiny, and let my instincts flow.

I was myself. I am someone I’ve never met before. Someone bad. Someone who is really not a nice person, buried in grief and anxiety, grinning wildly as she broke my heart, again. This time, it was in the living room. Perched atop a tan couch I watched her turn, hearing her confirm her open options policy. And me riding the fine line of a long term options policy.

Because you really have got to think about that, these days. Fuck. 29. it’s just a slump. Keep you head up legs closed eyes open. What pressures stress induces on the soul of the pessimistic.

pain.love.fear.trust

Goodbye, for sure. Goodbye to hope. To the knowledge that you are somehow good enough, even if you are. Sometimes, it boils down to the fact that you simply do not have the resources to give a girl what she wants, thinks she needs.

Pain blood fear pain slash burn hurt hurt pain. Let them go. Waste them not, please for the love of everything good and whole and pure, stop slicing away at your soul. Stop getting yourself into these kind of situations. Sure she enjoys your company, and needs someone like you around, someone with a level head, who can grin and walk into their cannon fire. She might not know it now, may never truly admit the truth to herself, but she knows.

Become again calm, a pillar of sincerity, a void of trust. Let loose the forces of generosity, the driving biting urge to do good. Let it out. So what if people abuse it, see it for what it is, and say NO THANKS. Their loss. But don’t let them go, keep them close, let them know that they are in fact your ward, yours to protect, shelter and guide through these rounded boulders of western living.

Hurt hurt die not good enough not good enough. Stop please. Stop. Stop it. Sto flood drown slice crush heart breaking nothing good enough. Never good enough. Too nice fucker. You’re too nice. Suck at this, she’ll never love you. Never let herself, because you’re too nice. Too giving. Not aggressive, actually care for her, her feelings, her loss, her wellbeing. Can’t ride the fine line. Can’t be everything. Not good enough.

Due to global warming, the US’s glacier national park, in fifty years, will just be a national park. At the time of birth a baby can swim. It looses this ability within a year. The once pristine Lake Managua has been turned into a death zone by industrial runoff from the Kodak company. Cane toads swallow with their eyes. Bread is legally considered a food in Germany. Love is a chemical process that takes place in the brain very similar to eating large quantities of milk chocolate. The average human body holds blood equivalent to roughly a twenty four pack of beer.

Why does she not want me? I know why. Money. Money. Money. Money. Sugar daddy I am not. If I had a million in the bank, there’d be wedding bells. Now, she won’t even be my GF. Ah fuck it. Plenty of fish in the sea. But no, there aren’t. not fish like this. Not ones that share so much, yet are divided by such differences. It’s one in a couple hundred thousand, and she’s hot. Fuck. Never learned. Never understood how to simply be fucking egotistical. To look out for ME. Never had that. No cash, fucked and drank it all away. Job at a standoff, questionable.

Can’t even write coherently. Stay positive. Remain in the center. Become nothing. Leap to the quick, be happy, angry, but not self pitying. Never. Because you are the master of your own destiny, hope springs eternal, love will live another day, and…

At least you got to have her. If only for a bit. If only for a moment. Miss Mom. Miss her. So much. Just wish I could cry. Can’t let myself. Can’t tell her my true feelings, lest she cut me off from everything. Lest what little we share leaves too. Stay calm. Bright side. Think nothing. You are nothing. Nothing matters, you wait long enough. Never wait. Keep moving. Keep loving. Keep hurting, hating yourself, flensing the soul. It all comes down to something in the end. Be more loving. Tell those around you, those you miss dearly, you love them. Never stop loving. kill love. Never trust. Never stop trusting. Find good everywhere. Sacrifice good at all cost. Stop being greedy. Embrace greed.

It ain’t fair. But who said it was gonna be? At some point, things will fall into place, then get wretched back out again. All men fall into their groves. Will I be stubborn and refuse to fall into mine own? Hm. Time. Time. Time. LV to H. JP

Rake up some shake and buy me a cake

Rake up some shake and buy me a cake. Make it pretty on top, with cherries and chocolate, split what is mine between those I love and those who claim they love me, equally. Before that, split half between my brother and sister. Dad, sorry. My gift to you all these years have been grief, heartbreak, trust, love, nothing.

So what do you do on a weekend, when you’re juggling trying stay employed, out of trouble and in poon? Well, for starters, you could enjoy a wonderful, harrowing time with a new friend, just missing the sun rising, in a new and confusing place. Then, wander through Los Angeles steadfastedly toward that temple of mass transit, Union Station. If you have time, veer to the left having just entered through the west entrance, and give a glimpse to the magnificent side ship that hides there.

After that, spend some time in the garden a little further down on the same side. If possible, get yelled at by a seventy year old grandmother for taking a picture of some hanging brass lanterns and upside down Japanese umbrellas. Then, make brief friends with a Japanese girl, letting her call her black Marine boyfriend on your cellphone. Do not under any circumstance let her borrow the phone, in case he calls back, while you go to do something else with the last fourty minutes before the train south leaves.

Cross the street to the west, heading for the park, where many times you can come upon world music festivals touting the best musicians from through the Americas. Dance some meringue, walk directly in front of the stage to take a picture of a worn brass statue that catches your eye. Furiously down a bottle of water, then a can of Diet Coke, trying not to scope the older hotties too conspicuously.

Arriving in San Diego, hail a cab, and hightail out to the Coronado Naval station. The guard most likely won’t check your ID, so hop on a shuttle with a bunch of people who COULD be going to the same wedding you are. Join in their conversation, become a little too friendly, watch the fairly older hottie in front of you start questioning your voice, not really recognizing it. Fear from the unknown.

Arrive as pictures are almost finished. The ceremony long over, most everyone seated already. Shit. Stay calm. First item of business: greet the mother of the bride, immediately admitting that you missed the actual act of marriage. Something changes in her face, and you know things will never quite be the same. Something clear, good, pure, gone. Bastard.

Find your seat, and greet old friends. Make small talk, thinking all the while of rolling up and smoking a fresh one somewhere. After a few minutes, get up and make your way from table to table, shaking hands all around, kissing all the beautiful cheeks. Make them love you. Make yourself visible, so they can see you. Hate you. Judge you. Question you. Create images in their heads that they will carry around all evening.

As the dancing gets underway, about eight drinks deep, get down and dirty with the hottie cousin, who is an absolutely fantastic girl, and who’ve you long ago fell to an extent in love with. She dances like a snake, and, after a bit, starts rubbing your hands ever closer to herself, exciting her nerves, happiness, a giddy headrush keeping her loving it. Take her outside when it gets dark, and kiss her on your back on the grass. Naughtily caress her, driving her into a frenzy.

But then, as those things go, a delicate balance shifts, and things become less fun, somehow tainted. Could it be you? Are you the catalyst of this change? Perhaps, but perhaps the desire to have a perfect wedding overshadows the ability to have fun, and the pure and simple fact that someone willing to try to steal the show shows up, and it’s just the way things were bound to go.

Make the mistake of taking external advice, and force the hand, removing the girl from her mother, taking her out of the soft drunk cushion of happiness she’s riding, as she helps to clean things up. Back at the main hotel, you don’t have a room, which ruins everything. All she wants to do is be away from her, somewhere else. She leaves, and you corrupt a group of kids. The grownups find out, and break up the party. Quietly you vacate the premises, changing clothes by the side of the road.

Then, wandering about the dark, deserted streets looking for cash and a cab, everything seems just fine. Because even though you really wanted to fuck her, wanted to ravish her nerve endings, it would have destroyed whatever goodness and truth you currently share. Find a cab driver, tell him your story of failed conquest as he takes you south, past the low scrub and dunes of the peninsula.

Forcibly wake up the night manager, and get your key. TV sound keeps cutting out. Fuckit. Pass out. Wake up sweating. Make coffee. Roll up some smoke. Leave with a minute to spare. Walk a mile and a half to the trolley station.

North now. Downtown San Diego. Town still sucks. Nothings’ changed. No new bars, restaurants, no movement. Town gonna die. Town dead. Get on the train heading north.

Back at Union Station, detrain, wander the streets of downtown LA. At times, you’re the only white guy for four blocks at a time. Good to be not in the majority again. Like in NYC. Search for the bus heading west, saunter up to a stoplight diagonal from some CHPs, holsters fit about their sides. Post up for the light, see the red banner of rapid municipal transportation. Rejoice openly.

At the top of the hill, by the bus stop, you’re stopped by a man with a clipboard and badge, who tells you to just look natural. To by no means acknowledge the camera crew in the heli directly overhead. Is the bus coming, you ask. Should be running shortly, the reply. Think this guy found a golden goose. A man sprints into traffic, veering down the center lane. Light a smoke. Feed on the energy from the staring castmembers, then ask again annoyedly about the bus. After the second take, the bird almost clipping the tops of the streetlights, as the crew wraps up, accept a free day pass from a somewhat reluctant Latino, then haul for the subway station, hopping down granite planters all the way down the sidewalk.

Train. Up the stairs, two at a time. K-Town. BUS taking it’s fucking time. Maxin, i.e. being just sexy enough at all times, as the minutes pass. An older German gentleman meanders over a manhole cover, which suddenly decides to belch air three times, snapping open like a mouth, spitting out a single, small rectangle of black shopping bag. Laugh hysterically, then agree with the man that the city should weld those fuckers shut. New York and Belfast know what they’re doing.

As you’re getting on the bus, a fight erupts in the back, three on two. Then they’re out in the street, but everyone’s watching some kid get his face stomped in, and not moving to the back to let the hoard trying to fucking pay and get in on. Sit back, enjoy the show. Blood splatters on the ground, shirts are off, and the cops are fast approaching, telescope batons out to max.

Make the first push, get people moving, force them to react to your presence. Herd…

Home. But not for much longer. Please, take me from this sty, from this place of disorder and dirt. Give me mine to clean, to nurture. Bamboo. Knives distributed for easy and immediate access. Maybe a shotgun above the door. To get the drop on them. My metamorphosis is nigh complete. I believe. Not that this will be the last. Or, it could be, quite simply, a ripple in time.

ode to thursday

Bone. Gristle. Maim. Kill. Lust. Fear. Pain. Slice. Flense. Kill. Blood.

These are the emotions I must let boil just below the surface. These are the substitutes for outward frustration and anger. For a brief time, when no one at work is looking, I think these thoughts. They rush and burn behind my eyes, filling me instantly with an inhuman desire to rend flesh.

Then, as suddenly as they arrive, they leave. And once again I am the picture of corporate responsibility. Always wearing black socks, dress shoes. Always in a collared shirt. Hardly ever letting the various violent and mischievous urges even out to play, merely hinting at them at times of stress.

And to have the stake thrust through my heart today, that almost did it. I almost snapped. Almost put my fist through the drywall. And why? Well, because of the most recent in a long line of girls known as Her. Once again, due to what can only be some sort of fucked up joke, I got the following line:

“oh, I don’t think we should do anything together at work. I really want to, but, I don’t ever do anything with guys at work…”

and then, THEN, you know what the fuck she’s going to do? She’s going to go out and fuck some OTHER fucking guy from work, because maybe he’s more aggressive, more fucking loaded, more prone to treat her like fucking shit. Not that I won’t, but I’ll give her just enough shit to keep her in line. Not to degrade her, not to run a major power play, but to keep my fucking head above water, and her ego at a comfortable level.

And why I know this, and don’t just kill the fucking emotions for real, lobotomize myself against any sort of future love, beats the shit out of me. Sitting there today, hiding the self pity and anguish behind layers of corporate blankness, I knew that I MUST do this. I MUST never stop loving. Never stop giving. For the bad man is the charge of the good. And the good man the bane of the bad.

Most people don’t care if they don’t do the right thing, as long as they don’t get caught. I know it’s wrong, and I know that if I don’t do it, someone else probably will. But if you keep your fucking head up, and just walk calmly into their midst, grinning as their slings and arrows whiz by you, then, maybe, just maybe, you will come out the other side something more than you were when you went in.

Because that’s what things seem to be about right now. They seem to be the culmination of some process of evaluation and readjustment. Some fulcrum point at which I CAN move on. I can die, and be reborn. I can love those around me, become a better friend, learn about my limitations, and how to conquer them.

I can give, and expect nothing in return. I can hurtle ever forward into the warm unknown idea of Future, and know that I will, I MUST, become the king I was meant to be.

thoughts on contemporary women

Well, things started out on Thursday, as I was coming home on a bus from work. And right now I really can’t fucking concentrate because there’s a tv on in my room, so let’s just wing this.

When do you decide to buy into the overall idea that circulates, and when you do, what effect does it in fact have on your whole basic frame of reference? Take for example the underlying subtle idea or notion that, as a man living in LA, you somehow will hook up with gorgeous women, and have sex with them, and find yourself smiling a smug little smile the next morning lying next to her in her gorgeous bed.

Now this sounds like a pretty fucking good night. But one thing that makes things a bit weird, is that the girl probably didn’t do it because she likes you, or because you’re particularly witty or smart. She probably did it for the same reasons you did:

Because fucking beautiful people is what Los Angelans do. If you’re beautiful, if you work hard on your body, and wear nice or, better yet, somewhat outrageous clothes, and you’re fairly intelligent and have a stunted sense of guile or shame, you can have sex with more women here, I hazard, and hot, sexy women who have money or fame, no matter how moderate, than you can most other places.

I fucking love it. On the one hand that is, because I get a fucking redwood just thinking about the fabulous possibilities of sex life in this city in this foul year of our lord, second millennium, year six. And as the doors part on yet another club or bar, and my mind is dulled to any of the titillating scenes of flesh and nubileness flitting about the room. I scowl, refusing to acknowledge the fact that I could in fact turn into a blubbering, giggling fool at one word from one of these beauties.

This has not always been the case. Over perhaps the past four years, through the course of many embarrassing and painful liaisons and flings, I have learned some things. Mainly I understand to curb my emotions, to squelch the feelings of love and affection that arise immediately when talking to a superhot. I have learned to lock them away, ignore them, and generally abuse them until they are quite fed up, and really want to just go have a snack somewhere away from the more abusive synaptic functions.

But now to thinking with the head, with the cold hard heart of logic that shines forth everbright through the moving canvas of my prefrontal projection screen. The head tells me that beneath the scanty specs of clothing, under the finely adjusted makeup, hidden in the long, flowing locks of pristine hair, lies nothing. Not nothing in the sense of void, but nothing in the sense of substance, and I know that were I to wake up next to the girl the next morning, I would feel only slightly less revulsion at the sight of her delectable form than I would waking up next to a fatty slutbag.

But, as they say, fat girls need loving too, and after a while, you kind of take what you can get.

Now, the point I think of this brief missive is to say that BOTH sides fighting within are right, and have their valid reasons. I really do enjoy, on one level, the chase, acting out scenarios, reciting lines and generally playing one cool ass motherfucker, until this superhot is quite attracted, and I have the opportunity to be more aggressive, perhaps leisurely kiss her, or slap her ass, or refuse to buy her a drink.

On the other hand, the futility and absurdity of the whole situation makes me angry, and I just want to stop having to act, and just have a fucking intelligent conversation with a beautiful woman, then lay with her. I want to wake up next to her, and have her smile at me, and do stupid shit together, and have me fall in love.

Ah, that is when things get really shitty. Because, out here, in fact anywhere, if you fall in love, you’re fucked. You’re fucked unless you’ve known them awhile, or you’re friends of friends, or you have her parents tied up in a Brooklyn basement. Face it, I’m filthy, can’t seem to find a relationship that’s wealthy. But fuck that, why would I restrict myself like catnip to a cat?

Which is better, to be a hunter, or a fucking farmhand? Guh. Time will tell. Until then, I’m for goddamn sure not going to let my underappreciated ass go falling in fucking love.

Break. Some weeks later. Oh god, it’s pretty much happened. Kinda crept up on me. Of course, when you meet a gorgeous girl who bears all the characteristics you find attractive in a woman, things may get a little hairy. And all I have to do is to get myself away from constantly thinking about how she reacted slash is still reacting to our interactions this past week and some.

Flensing, cutting away at the happy smothering kindly self-pitying moods that highjack my senses. The deep, underlying urge to just try to fucking make shit happen with a woman I enjoy being around, that is what is killing me right now. And she loves it. And I know how she feels, because she has somewhat of the upper hand, and I’m not squirming too hard, just hard enough to scowl a lot and get really angry from time to time to maintain control. I’ve been there, seen girls go through that, basked in the harsh, uncaring glow of power and control.

And I’ve loved it. But after a while, it gets old, and the chick generally realizes that it’s worthless. I. Shit. I have tried to KNOW that it was worthless from the start. But her energy, and the feelings she was leaking that first night, and the other since then, those she can’t hide. And they give me hope. Hope springs eternal. Hope is a hellish poison that blinds.

On the one hand I hope that she will just give in. Hope that my not being TOO aggressive with her, not trying to force her into consensual sex may just in fact prove the fucking basis for something good, maybe even lasting. Fuck those random flashes in the pan. Short term pleasure, a temporary repose from the madness that comes with extensive lack of sex.

I want to understand that she would potentially be with me, and eschew random hookups, at least until one or both of us started drifting away. I wish that she were not as good at repression, that she was not as good as I at simply burying her urges, her desire to get down into wild sweating passionate biting pure lust. At hiding that powerful attraction, that love of closeness, that burning passion I sense off of her briefly at times, to hide behind the façade of cool calculation, of practiced indifference.

Maybe it’s that she’s been fucking random people so long that it’s gotten to the point that I’m just another steppingstone on the way to something better, on the way to the next conquest. Not to mean it in a cruel way. It’s just kind of what happens when you’re in the dating slash random hookup world for too long. Short attention span. Adult ADD. The transition to modern TV generation having already robbed us of our ability to fucking commit, and, with our similar mindsets, possibly similar self-perceived multiple personalities, we find ourselves alternately yearning for and despising commitment, love and a functional adult relationship. God this is a mess. I love it.

I just hope she’s going through at LEAST SOME OF THIS. Maybe not. Probably not. Shit. She probably was just running on booze the other night, and really didn’t enjoy the hugs, your light kisses on her forehead. Yeah. When all else fails, hit low. Aim for the balls, for the blinding goodness growing inside you, and kill the fucker. Show him what for. Take him down piece by piece, for nothing good can come out of this most likely, only more heartbreak. But, oh, if it could.

And it’s not like you didn’t do it to enough young innocent beautiful things yourself so a good many fucking times. Why the fuck are you so honest with her, and she with you? How is it that you’re comfortable around each other like old friends? Conditioning? Perhaps. Both used to being around many persons of the opposite sex, flirting, acting, hinting, luring, crushing? Maybe.

One option of course is that a little part of her wants to just fucking try, and her rational self told that part to go fuck itself. Kicked it in the ass down the stairs, for any number of reasons. Past boyfriends. Suckerfish fucks who told her she was gorgeous, then fucked her for what it was worth. Really great guys who just couldn’t find the courage or the angle to make it out of Friendsville, always delegated to the sidelines, bearing her grief at the next failed man. Secretly hoping that one day she’ll pick them. Wait for it, and die sad.

Carpe diem, make it happen, create your opportunities, stay focused, and move when the time is right. Take the pain, take the confusion and love for her, ride it out, see where it goes, but stick to your guns, and don’t go down without a fight. For this one, she is, simply put, beautiful.

the dying chronicles of LA madness

As such things go, it turned out to be pretty full of chaos. Chock to the brim with random acts committed by those intrinsically yearning for the release that comes with the knowledge that you’re riding the fine line between sanity and a stable mind. Between love, and hate. Peace, and agitation.

Love, and Hate. But, then again, it’s all pretty relative. The property destruction. Hurt feelings. Abused relationships. It’s all pretty Gonzo, when you think about it. The kind of Gonzo that gripped Mr. Thompson and his companion in the depths of their deepest binges. Or is it? For to perceive the self is to peer through any number of lenses, each distorting the inalienable, pure form that is truly YOU.

Many hide, finding solace in the realities they perceive as true, their self image as they perhaps wish it were. And rightly so. If you can, if you can fight off the smoldering urge of doubt, the deep, keening thrust to doubt everything, then do so at your own risk. For to hide the dark and lethal rage that skitters so, perhaps not so brightly in all of us, then certainly within mine bosom, to toy with intelligence, that delicious fire rained down upon us by Lord Prometheus, is at times to grasp the limits of potential buried within us all.

Potential. Define quality. Define right. Define passion. Could I, I would. Now I see them within the context of certain indoctrinated, other willfully obtained fundamental beliefs about reality, the human existence, and my potential within the future of the human race. Perhaps I can shed these layers, to find a more pure notion of existence.

We were three, again, that most stable and malicious of numbers. It’s true that three people can keep a secret if two of them are dead. Three, though, as long as you have the right three, can also cause ten times the amount of chaos and anarchy than one or even twenty men together.

Look for a lack of initiative; seek the chronically depressed; find those who can easily bypass their moral compasses; perhaps stumble upon one standing in a hallway, talking to himself benevolently. For the benevolence and purity with which they lead their lives allows them alternately to unleash savagery and chaos at the drop of ten pounds of quarters in a pig stomach sack.

And if you find those fine feathered folk, wrap them within you, mesh your persona with theirs, suck up their intricacies and faults, play with them awhile, then let those unfit slipslide into nothingness. Then, proceed as follows, your gods willing.

First, miss work on Thursday, having stayed out not too late the night before, but certainly missed the alarms the next day. Preferably, make out with a decent but kind of chunky chick in the hallway of a closing bar, having passed up the hotter chick for some reason. Availability is a bitch.

That day, IM in sick, for you cannot locate your boss’s number, but can get to him through the fucking glorious wonders of modern fucking mobile techmology. Proceed on an aimless walk into town, then hop into a movie, cry like a bitch if it happens to deal with father son relations and you’ve had a pretty interesting score odd years with yours, all the while tasting from the fruits of that most ganjanous of plants.

Spend a nervous and early night with friends, taking her easy. Sleep for three hours, missing a late night call from a serious hottie who had practically begged you to call her. Work from three to six in the ante meridian as security for the cofuckingoperative place you live at.

Sleep a few more hours, get on the Friday bus, where you eat old vegetables, nickel taste on your tongue, and shred one whole cigarette onto them. Puke right out of the bus, walk in looking and feeling green. Sell the boss on the sickness story, mention something about late night vomiting and sudden bowel movements. Remain calm. Coolly walk the halls, sneering occasionally, and max on some serious scopeage of the hardbodies roaming the lobby. Dive into work, isolation behind Rachmananov, Chopin, Paganini, Bach.

The random energy flowing into the music, the urge to kill way low, complete confidence and cold drive. Own it. Then, leave. GTFO. Thank fucking god.

I should go pay these bills, but I’m just gonna go freebase with my friends.

Meet up with your boy, Armtatt your best mate, one of the three, smoke some more, drink some 40 Oz. Malt liquor, baby. Bullshit, checking myspace. Make a shirt that says FUCK FRANCE in big boxy black letters across the front, susses mis bite across the bottom, and a drawing of American troops nuking the Eiffel tower on the back. Say fuck it and take a cab into Hollywood. Check out a few bars, slam some drinks, hit on at least three chicks, straight maxin. Get a call about a party down the way as friends walk in.

Go to the party, almost blacked out. Run into probably the hottest girl, Greeneyes, you’ve ever been most likely, but probably only fairly minorly, involved with. Get taskmastered into slapping her ass repeatedly, by the Tattmaster, one solid yet of potential broseph, as she alternately topples onto the couch and tries to turn up the volume on some song she supposedly likes.

Party till the cops show, and if the rookie first in looks at the france shirt and proclaims his love for it, braces flashing, you know everything’s pretty clear. Pick up some random girls. Cab it north to your friend’s place. Necktatt’s getting getting slopped up by the little halfbreed asian hottie, while your Armtatt, also with a hottie halfbreed asian, tries to work the blond chick.

NOTE: If her brother’s there, and she’s a pretty open girl, she might not him to know it. So there’s no sex in the fucking champagne room.

Anyway, sleep under the AC vent for five hours, shivering violently awake under a bedsheet. Immediately smoke weed with the young lad, then all head for some packed amusement park. Ride two rides in five hours, getting to know the girls, showing forms of violent attention deficit disorder, yelling and dancing, spitting, grinding, anything. Lick the seat of the ride when you’re on, causing various reactions, including disgust, delight, despair, bouncing in anticipation, after having made pretty eyes at some blonde hotties in the VIP line.

Anything to combat boredom. Anything for attention. On the trolley back to the parkinglot, sit next to the blond hotties from the ride, and tell them that you used to skin goats in Turkey, but then have to eat the fuckers, too. Get them swooning, eager for more. Necktatt may decide to exit the vehicle at speed, a grin of pure glee spread on his face, hitting and rolling, running back and jumping back on. The trolley should stop, so GTFO.

Blow kisses back to the gorgeous girls as they leave for ever.

Get ditched by one car, and climb into the trunk, reminding the girl at the helm to please not kill you.

At CPK, street ballet with the other two of potential, make children smile, spike up your hair and sag your pants below your ass. Wear sunglasses. Inside, scowl behind your shades at the hottie waitress, feeling mildly angry that there are no hotties in range that you can taunt. Head home for an early night. Heavy drinking, Salvia, grotesque Japanese films. Lots of sex in the bedroom, but you’re not in line. Shit.

Sunday. Wake up, bounce around, smoke a bunch of cigs, out of the good stuff, the girls leave, lounge around, then catch a cab around five, headed for a boat party way south. Take the cab three miles out of the way to the wrong dock, at dusk, get directions to the right place, fail to pick up any of the many cabs along the way, street balletting on the way, try to hitchhike, frantically searching for an ATM. You get calls every five minutes that the boat is waiting.

After an hour, get there, shove eighty bucks into someone’s hand, blinders on for the bar, chomping at the bit by the doormen, jonesing for the lovelies you see milling about inside. Wait at the packed open bar for drinks. Make your acquaintance rounds, see Greeneyes, who’s looking gorgeous. She’s giving off an indifferent vibe, but has been quite fleety in the past.

If you think some midthirties hottie is pushing in line, call her an asshole. When she gets mad, dismiss her with a wave, sneering at the look of shock that passes briefly across her fair but somewhat plain visage. Get as many Budweisers as you can hold, and go mingle.

DO NOT SIT DOWN. Sitting down is the kiss of death. If you’re down, you’re out of line of sight. No one can see you any more. No more making pretty eyes at the ladies. Additionally, you are in a less defensible position in case of attack. Always expect attack. Do not let your guard down for one second.

If there’s one thing that riding a motorcycle at high speeds for tens of thousands of miles teaches you, it’s that the slightest fucking mistake, a few pounds of mass miscalculated, wind resistance gone suddenly in a freak pocket, and you’re bouncing meatloaf. So never let your guard down. Even for a second.

Stumble upon the girl you called an asshole, and fess up to the act immediately, subtly daring her guy friends to go ahead and start something. They squeak, but don’t budge. Shrugging off the accusations and complaints of her girlfriends is hardly worth mentioning. Wander around the two story ship. Avoid dancing while on the dancefloor. Make conversation with hotties when something, anything happens. Just don’t stop drinking.

At some point, you may find yourself on the steps leading up to the dancefloor, blacking out, talking to god knows who. If a gay man pauses to say something to you, then leans in and kisses you, spit as hard as you can in his face. He’ll most likely get pretty upset, and start making a scene. Calmly tell him all the while to punch you in the face, cursing him quietly, calmly. Security should come and take him away. That’s probably because he’s the louder of the two. It’s not wise to kiss a drunk. Especially one you’ve never met.

At some point, the port cops will show up. Join in the chanting demanding them to let everyone drink, even those underage. Once they leave, on good terms, make your way to the dancefloor, having caught Greeneyes’ backward glance. Shuffle about, grinding in the press of bodies. Proceed to grope her, despite her constant removal of your hands from inappropriate places. You most likely will be pretty drunk, and quite uncoordinated, and lustless, so don’t take it too much to heart when she blends into the milling bodies, not to be consciously seen again that night.

Once the boat docks, take a while getting off, and stumble into the parkinglot. If everyone’s gone, but one lone cab is pulling up to pick up a somewhat distressed girl, see if you can get a ride. If it’s the girl you called an asshole, most certainly get in. Then, when you get to the bar where everyone is meeting, ditch her with the cab fare, and go off with Necktatt for some mischief.

At a taco place, block a carfull of chicks’ passage to the drivethrough, should they denounce you two as fags. Try to order food, and, if turned down, proclaim that if you’re not getting any, no one will. Then watch as Necktatt launches himself into the standalone speakerbox where you order you food. If in an attempt to stumble away after your slowly fleeing friend you crash into the screen with the food types and prices, damaging that too, then run. Run.

Hide in alleyways, peering out to see people searching. Jump some fences, violate someone’s yard on the way through, then emerge by chance by the bar, and quickly get inside. If your friends try to get in one after the other, using the same ID, they will most likely get denied. Send poor called an asshole girl to the back, where she lets them in, buying them beer for some odd reason.

If things get pretty hazy at this point, and you only can rely on third person accounts, that’s ok. If possible though, spit on a girl’s face; have her put a cigarette out on your left cheek, supposedly because you were being an asshole. Proceed to harass the bar, and at some point get kicked in the face by a girl, possibly outside, perhaps in line for the bathroom, who knows. Roam the bar with blood running down your chin, but do not under any circumstances stop trying to work the ladies.

Call in the girls from the amusement park, have them come pick you up, as Armtatt speeds off with his hottie girlfriend. Spend an awkwardly conscious and freakishly sober ride back to Necktatt’s, where you once again crash on the floor.

The next day, spend it sobering up at P.F. Chang’s, ordering far more than you can eat, hitting on the untaken blonde hottie. Get to know her brother. Work that in your favor. Never remove your shades, or treat the waiter as a stranger. Debate seeing a movie, don’t. Go back, lounging till the girls leave for points east, and you celebrate the culmination of the last few days hating life, taking public transportation.

Birthday in DEATH VALLEY

Sometimes, when near water, or far from it, sometimes, it is very good to have some along. No, really. Jest with me not. It’s kind of like never passing up food. When you’re at a person’s place, never pass up food. A: it’s impolite. B: you can never be quite sure when you’ll get to eat again.

Sure. No, actually, you might be quite certain of it. Quite secure in the knowledge that your next meal is just down the street, at the Wendy’s, drive up window open late. But, consider, should your car flip into the ditch, you not watching the wheel, hunting for the last remnants of change you need to make up the tax.

The awesome tender grasp of g-force, the fain sweep of headlights against a rough hedge, bouncing off a shallow pool.

Now, don’t you think, lying there, crushed against the dash, benzene leaking toward the battery, that you should have jumped on that plate of jambalaya at Old Dan’s place on Route 73? Can’t cook for shit, but, at least, you’d ‘ve left your pitiful excuse for an existence with a gut full of foodstuff.

The rental idles in the parkinglot as you swing a shopping cart loaded with trash against the side of some car. Puke, beer and rotting soup spill weakly against a shiny new door. Quickly, before the rest catch wind, you dart around to your assigned spot, the shitty one where your death rate is exponentially, well, from death’s perspective, pretty fucking rosy.

Inside, on the way towards possible desolation and the promise of madness, the beer flows freely, and the expanse of desert is simply fascinating. Stark promontories, massive alluvial fans, wind scoured ridgelines marching every which way. You sit, straining at the urge not to blow up, not to become too aggressive, to start cutting up the car roof, to rake the eyes. But, as quickly as they slip in from the sides, the fury are gone, hiding, for now.

The descent to five hundred feet from three thousand within the span of not too many miles should not be done under the following conditions:

- in a rental car with mediocre brakes

- with a tired driver, and/or one with a painfully short fuse whilst driving

- in the dark

- on mild psychedelics

- drunk

Ah, but sometimes, the worst conditions are in fact the best. Took the wrong exit? In certain towns, where any sort and manner of person COULD hang out, you might just come around the corner, trying to find your way back onto the freeway, and come upon a shitty looking drunk clown hitting on an eighty year old prostitute.

But only if you’re lucky. The glowing disk smacks you out of your brief repose, you pick it up, and you whip it to a stranger in the dark, some dark figure with no visible face. There is a girl there, and a handful of tired folks all sort of waiting for something to happen, or someone to come up with a really great idea like ballooning, even craps. In the light, an outsider, you may stick out… Just put on your finest acapulco shirt and try to make as little sense as possible. Perhaps they’ll think you’re insane, and welcome you into their ranks like some sort of winged foal.

But never trust them, especially not the expat British auto mechanic and his flamboyantly gothy, possibly Midwestern girlfriend, who somehow managed to bring an tomahawk, two dozen throwing knives, a high powered magnet, various stimulants, one large wrench, various large pigstickers, and a number of other blunt and dangerous objects that don’t quite stick in the short term memory banks through the fog of drugs, onto the plane.

That first night, somewhat secluded from the rest of the small group of real fucking troopers that made it out early too, take some Ecstasy, preferably good stuff. Your tendons clench like after that one time you took fifteen Adderall, nothing too bad, just a little jumpyness, just a little jacked up, the occasional happy feelings swimming around below your diaphragm.

You didn’t bring a tent, and this is Death Valley. The car gets pretty hot around nine a.m., so you and the rest head off for a wee hike to some waterfalls. If you’re lucky, you will be with people you know, and, if you’re luckier, those you love. At the falls, if there is the group of girls that came in early that morning, by all means, dive right in. If one resembles a very cute elf with straining D-cup titties, great! If another has a bit o’scraggletooth, but a sick little body with some nice ink, and an otherwise decent face, not too fucking bad. If the third is heavyset, but pretty of face, with rising ‘50s hair, and some sense of humor, you’re sitting fucking pretty.

But let them leave, if they want, and film some silliness on a camera. Try for reality animal hunter show, or withered lost hiker. Destroy some foliage, maybe toss a boulder into a shallow stream, crushing the wiggling ‘poles beneath. Prove your showing arm, and for gods’ sake, show off any tattoos you may have. Enjoy the time with your sister, too, for she’s the only one you’ve got, and a damn fine actor to boot.

Later, back at the ranch, mom’s hollerin’ for slop, and ringing that big ole brass number. But she’s really just a naked man with red pubes, who will stay that way for the duration of the weekend, standing in the sun, smiling just somewhat shyly. Leucadian, or something. Needs a trim.

Join the group listening to the first ever recording of the standup comedian who’s hosting the getaway, kind of randomly shuffling about as your method of controlling the weed-downs, a sort of hyperactive, nonsensical, witty but offensive drive, shifts you from spot to spot, never really letting you relax.

If things become foggy for you at some point, and you’ve become very nervous lounging directly in line of sight of the big guy, who’s sitting on an old foundation covered with Astroturf, next to about fifteen others. His energy is weird, so you project back, so you try sending some tentative surges of attention that curl and twist like loose smoke into suction. But they seem to flay off, not really penetrating his indifference. Nothing major, just a look here and there in between making subtle hand and facial signals referencing things you’ve shared this past quartcent with your sister. And you’re really just sitting and roaming around enjoying the day with a bunch of steadily changing people, variously talking nicely to:

one superhot Commonwealther, there with a possibly pickup driving Mister Clean, but arguably the hottest number there; an insecure, pushing the limit of controlling his weight banker or something; the ax wielding duo who fairly regularly speak of testing out methods of throwing the tomahawk; one short girl of possibly Armenian descent, whom you had espied that morning emerging from her tent in a very nice diaper, who maintains that the diaper was the first thing she could find to wear in her bag; one septum pierced, tattooed woman with exquisite breasts, which she keeps showing, who acts as if she were expecting something, trying to read you, very awkward.

When the banker guy leans in and kisses those wondrous orbs, follow suit, and get right in there, biting with the back molars immediately, testing her level of pain tolerance. If you hear her grunting with pleasure, you know you’ve probably got a winner. But, the sun, walking, drugs, alcohol and lack of sleep are really fucking killing you, so take a nap around eight. But take the lone other Ex before it at some point, in case you want to kind of fuck up the timing. Whatever.

Wake at around ten thirty, and hit the party, drinking beers, hitting the trees, kicking things back into gear. There, you’ll be lucky to run into gorgeous orbs, but maybe not that lucky. There isn’t another town in any direction for a good night’s forced march. Somehow, you come to the conclusion together, without the banality of words, lucidly exchanging various sexual and social energies, separate to the ubiquitous darkness, and pretty much start furiously making out with orbs.

If you find yourself in an empty showroom window, and are having problems getting it up, just stick at it. At some point offer to exchange her fallacious efforts, and if she says that it’s been a hot day and you probably don’t want to go down there, thank whichever gods you call your own. Winner. Fucking bingo.

But there’s something about the room that’s not right, so, you’re bold, and blinded with the raw pleasure of the BJ, and you go out, lie down on the Astroturf, which is now blindingly ringed with spotlights, and quite centrally located. She’ll go at it again, making some progress, but you’ll be a bit freaked out by the people walking places at the edges of the raw light. Slowly, at the sound of shuffling feet, you open you eyes to find a leaning, scrawny man of about fifty staggering over you, initially curious about the action, then getting a wee too happy about what’s going on. So tell orbs that it’s really not working out there, and stumble to the dark recesses of the campsite.

If you choose the park bench next to her tent, well done. Sit down, variously checking out the bonfire party going on twenty feet to your left, and your posse saddling up for the shack in front of you, as she works up for the finale. Sometimes, you’re lucky, and actually find a girl who can read your wrinkled Mr. Lincoln like a book, and adjusts the shape of her mouth to accommodate your unique fingerprint of erogenous zones. Nerves singing along your spine, on a high crest of sheer pleasure, you ride. Let her work you up for a massive, blinding, silent finish, then soil your shirt.

Get up awkwardly, mumble some kind of acknowledgement, but not thanks, to the girl. She leaves awkwardly after mumbling something back, and you go pass out in the car.

The next morning, wave at her weakly under the staggering agony of forced wakedness, and if she gets up without a word and crosses the street, not to be seen again until you leave, you’re golden, broseph.

Skip breakfast, then pack up the tent and hit the road, back towards Vegas. Perhaps you’re jaded from a childhood of growing up among things old and ancient, and don’t share your countrymen’s views of so called local “historic” sites, but you MAY want to go check out some of the touristy shit around the area. Rainbow Canyon is worth it, or hit the dunes on an overcast day, and eschew shoes. Get some tiny thorns stuck in the sole of your left foot. Perform, on camera, a badly executed jump off of a semi high dune, then follow it up with a twist, and smash your head into the ground for good measure.

Back in Vegas, convince the rest to take a fucking cab to go see the strip, to go do touristy stuff, and not the van, because it’s been a long day, and you’re all feeling a bit loopy. If they balk, keep at them. If all else fails, offer to, then actually pay for the cab yourself. Fuck. You’re only so often in Vegas, might as well enjoy it, with as little stress involved as possible.

further evaluations

It’s funny, reading over old writings I did back in the middle of last year. So much pain, so much loneliness seemed to hover in my mind. Sitting in an apartment in Mission Beach, just north of San Diego, without a social outlet in sight. No real friends, no contact, really, with the either too young, or just plain too different people around me.

And now, not four months after leaving that place, and its security, its womb-like stillness, I can’t hardly believe it. Four months after a three year hiatus from the colors and realities of real social interaction? It seems like that time never existed, that it was a void, a darkness that reached into all aspects of my life.

And what now? Now I am in a place full of life, friends, outlets for hidden and dark urges. Urges that bring out the beast in me, but not violently, at least not all the time. At least he’s pawing at the surface, providing me with the bite needed to tell people NO. To put people in their place if they’re trying to take advantage of me, to walk without fear toward a beautiful woman and talk to her like we’ve been going out for years.

The triune has been broken for some time. Since that fateful flensing that so bloodily crowned the wake of my crime, have I not understood the necessity of risk. Not terrible risk, nothing like crossing a ten lane highway on foot or shooting at cops just to see what would happen. Nothing like that. But the daily, small risks that present themselves, that keep you on your toes and your mind out of stagnation.

Example. Recently a former friend of mine went out of his way, long after a problem had been resolved, to backstab the man whom he had let himself be tormented by for quite some time. As a consequence, I have ignored him ever since, not going out of my way to be mean to him, but generally treating him like some sort of foul scum.

Before I found my claws, I would have continued being nice to him on the surface, while loathing him at every turn. It would have weighed on my conscious, and I would have felt ashamed for not punishing him in some way for what he had done. Now, my soul churns easier, without one more form of blockage.

Blockage. Neurolingual programming. Only now, almost ten years later, and after countless hours of reflection, self-flagellation, drug and alcohol abuse, and many other nasty aspects of a near complete lack of self-respect, do I find myself understanding more of what happened that night when I was broken.

To some extent I became deathly afraid of actions that would lead to further punishment. At the same time, however, I became reckless, and remain so, risking my life many times. Bones were chipped and nearly broken, skin ruptured violently on pavement, clouded rage boiling up randomly, uncontrollably.

Now, I think I am closer to harnessing that rage. I allow it to sit at the surface, keeping my wit sharp. It helps me think, and is there when I logic-guess (Socratic method) fools during conversations, turning their words on themselves.

The wolf sits by my desk as I transmutate reams of information into my adopted language. He runs with Bucephalus and me, sniffing out the track, calculating trajectories and vectors, keeping the fear at bay, allowing my body to focus on the job at hand.

With this blessed, slow return of confidence, of a deep-seated desire for terrible risk and fabulous reward, I can lean into the wind, and smile at the sea of grabbing, tearing hands all around me.

With the triune reuniting, I will be whole. Soon.

Like the wind through her hair, realization shot through her mind.
She stood, not far from where he had left her,
And wept. Not for herself, not for the friends he would never see again.
She wept for him. For his need to be loved.
For his undying urge to betray those who loved him.
For she knew he would die alone.

and gain some respect

to be thrown a crumb
i was on my knees
when you knocked me down

ween. crantastic. recently, a friend compared my writing to Hemmingway, due to its efficiency and clarity. some days earlier, I was told my sentences are two long, and that I should cut them down a bit, to save space and to allow the reader to fill in the blanks, and not be beggared by my windless prose. ah well. selah.

i smell blood in the air. not only due to recent dramatic events around me. partially of course, but the turmoil of my daily life only reflects the chaotic maelstrom which howls within. I am a man apart, torn between the routine of bingeing and partymaking, and a demanding but strangely fulfilling job.

my only refuge is here, and when talking with my broodmembers, who know how to calm the beast, and bring out the light. mahalo.

with herculean effort did I make it through the day. pushing myself on my nearly broken bycicle, matching the speed of the combustive commuters. fools all. making minor mistakes at work, pressured by my new coworker, who could be my mother. I will not demand of her respect, but force her to see the good thinking behind showing it to me.

self-destruction is the name of the game. driving to the edge of reason, of accountability, then lying and cheating your way back into the fold, until the bleakness and sheer boredom of it forces you out.

i fear to bind myself, even temporarily, to a woman, for i will break her heart. leap i will at the first opportunity, and hang not my head in shame when she curses and shouts at me, for secretly, I would have done it on purpose. the lashing and flensing of a woman in love bites and grooves the soul in such tender fashion.

when love dies, it mends. when compassion dies, it tends to limp back at some point or other.

Time, friend. live today as if it were your last. buy a gun, and shoot something living. and if you find yourself cornered, you can always say you were forced to do it by the frothing, overweight mountain of a woman who bore your first.

whatever.
X

normal

fear is the only medium. fear and pain. get a grip man. you can hardly type. and you expect to report to work tomorrow? without fear the human beast is nothing but a burnt shell, nothing but a faximile of its former self. for what are we without fear? what drives us to do better, to make something out of nothing?

fear

of the unknown. of the constant changes we face, that bind us to our decisions, as a mother binds us to her tit.

fear of denial.

fear of letting those things out that scare us the worst take hold, and consume us in their tearful envelope. of letting ourselves be conscious of the fact that everyone feels it, but some of us choose not to let it creep into our me, our most holy of fucking holies.

of betrayal.

of having some worthless whore tear your lungs out, and show them to you, as she prances away with some pretty, idolent scumbag who doesn't stand up to the flame?

of betrayal of friendship, that which lasts, and that which will never come again? and so i sit in lotathing of myself, for having wished death upon he from whom i sprung, hoping he will perish the utmost of painful deaths, because he betrayed not me, but she who bore me?

yes sir.

and with that, i, from my perished soul, wish ye, good night.
X

the third

he finally came out, the other night. we were soaked in margaritas, to the gills, and I was dancing with a fetching black French girl, whom I kissed passionately moments before she sprayed her guts onto the alabaster carpet.

the beast emerged finally when a new kid, not the brightest, had climbed over a divider on the balcony, and was staring into the neighboring apartment. our music was loud, and out of the fifteen people present, i was one of the only ones of drinking age.

my tones came harsh, cold and clear through the fog of booze, and the buffon rushed at once back to the correct side. at that moment, i could have violently removed his esophagus, and thrown his limp body over the side, for the squirrels to eat.

later, then, but before my sweet tart, who hasn't spoken with me since, soaked down the floor with stomach bile, the mendicant kept at me for ostracizing the cripple who had ratted out my one true friend out here. I told him twice to let it lie, then yelled at him with such a rage in my voice, that it caused the conversations to lull inside, and people to turn their backs on me.

since then he has lay in wait no longer. no more is he an awesome specter buried deep inside, but runs free throughout my mind, teasing me with visions of gore and violence, and digging into my ability to function at all turns.

welcome, friend. welcome back.

X

forced

he had been forced to do it.

not by those around him. not by the unseen, crushing pressure of defeat and alcoholism.

in the darkness it whimpered, for you could not realistically call it human anymore.

yet, it lived. one day, two. he began to try to feed it, but the cold meal just dribbled out of the gash in its esophagus.

finally, he cried. the one eye that remained stared up at him, dead yet alive, as the blows from his hatchet rained down on the ruined flesh.

the beast, that lived within him, was loose. god help them all.