I guess it’s cool I didn’t end up like Griffin Dunne?

It’s early morning – 11:24 a.m. – when I crack open my first beer. The bottle cap makes that sweet “chicaaaaa” song upon opening.

I tried to be good last night. Played the part to a tee, I believe. Yet we went home separately. It was supposed to be the night I proposed to her. A walk down by the levees. A couple of drinks. Maybe take in a show somewhere.

Instead, we fought. Long and hard. In public. For all the world to see.

Sometime during the night, we ended up over by the Superdome. How we got there I have no recollection. We were at Nick’s, drinking Miller Lites and listening to the jukebox. She was talking to the bartender. I generally just stared into space, thinking of how to remember details without pulling out a little notepad like my best friend, who happens to be a great writer that never took the chance. Me, I’m a mediocre writer who took the chance as a newspaperman, but never got up the confidence to try his hand at fiction.

She was laughing and talking and pretty much not saying a word that she meant. She had a talent for that. Covering up what really was going on inside, but always appearing to those unaware of being in complete control. That part of her intrigued me. But it scared me just as much.

Soon, I was chasing her through the streets of New Orleans. This was pre-Katrina and many of those streets were as dangerous as any you’d walk in in America. But there we were, me chasing her staying ahead of me – loudly proclaiming my lack of love for her. Or something. The details never stay with me unless I write them down. Something, obviously, I learned late in life. Eventually, we went back home. I don’t remember what calmed her down. Or me down. Neither of us dead. Neither of us happy.

Looking back, years later, that night always stands out. Not for what happened or what was said – honestly, I don’t remember any of that. Instead, for the grand view of the Superdome that I got for an instant. I’ve seen that building hundreds of times since – when a game was going on inside, on television during Katrina when it was at its worst, and now in its newly decorated state of endorsement for Mercedes. But that moment is the in my mind of that building. It almost reminds me of the Martin Scorsese movie “After Hours.” I guess it’s cool I didn’t end up like Griffin Dunne?

Why that moment popped into my head just now as I finished up my morning beer before heading to my dull job as a copy editor I do not know. I liked it though. It reminded me of a time. A much simpler time that while a tough time, was certainly more fun than what’s going on today.

Not that I want to go back. There were awful times to go with the “mythical” ones. Everyone’s memories are clouded with how great things were, when in reality that weren’t so great. You tend to hold on to those great moments, and forget the ones where you wanted to kill someone or kill yourself. At least my mind works that way. Really, it works as a bottle of liquid paper. It just covers everything up as best as it can. Sometimes, you can read through the whiteness and remember, but most of the time it’s just a muddied, blurry mess. Unless you took a picture.

I took a lot of pictures in the 2000s. Not so much the few years before and the years since. Except for 2011. I took some photos that year. Until I started dating again.

Much like writing, I have a hard time taking photos when I’m happy. I want to, but I get too distracted by living to do it. It took a tragedy to get me to start typing again, and every letter is a reminder of what happened. There has to be something that comes out of it, right? Something that changes me for the better, hopefully not the worse.

A second beer is not an option today. A friend, who seemingly is an ex-friend now, wants to be off work today. He publicly proclaimed that on his work account. Which is ironic, seeing he “un-friended” me due to a public “calling out” as his wife explains. I hate social networks and the god damn internet. It’s worse than going to a high school reunion every day of your life.

People come into your life for a reason, the old saying goes, but they get the fuck out of it for one too.