lines

I guess I’m supposed to write now.

All I have is time.

No job. No kids. No responsibilities.

So, I sit and stare at a television instead.

Or I attempt to read a book. I made it to page 10 of 447.

I ate some cheese and peperoni on corn tortillas.

Drank some water.

Watched a dog stare at me.

Watched another dog roll around in the freshly cut grass.

Now the dogs are asleep.

And I’m staring at a computer screen.

My carpel tunnels doesn’t hurt as much since my job ended.

I need to go pack up the rest of my stuff. But my girlfriend seems to want me to hang around here.

Doing nothing.

I wonder how long before she’ll start to get antsy.

We love each other. I know that. But when one of the two is being a bum, it grows old.

Fast.

I have money to survive for quite a while.

It’s weird feeling that way.

I won’t get unemployment this time.

And I think that’s for the better.

I didn’t get hungry enough to lower my expectations until the checks stopped coming.

Of course, the irony was, the day after I took a job, the checks started coming again.

I guess the checks never actually came. I got a debit card.

They charged you for checking the balance on it.

That made me laugh.

I checked the balance once.

It had more than two dollars on it when I stopped using it.

I wonder where that money ends up?

Does someone get it?

Or do I always have an account with two bucks and some change in it?

The card is expired. So you can’t use it anymore.

Maybe there is some guy in a cubicle who has figured out his Superman III/Office Space way of a quick buck?

He’s collecting all the scraps off of expired debit cards from unemployed folk. Most of which probably never got a decent job again.

I see friends and former friends and never were my friends who have taken jobs not doing what they used to do.

Some do contract work.

Some flip burgers.

Some sit at home and lament the fact they didn’t network better or get the right skills for the current economy.

I said it’s all bullshit.

If you know someone who runs a company, and they like you, you’ll get a job.

If you don’t know anyone in a company, you probably won’t get a job.

Unless you’re lucky.

Or God damn good.

And that usually doesn’t matter.

I have been bitter before.

I don’t want to be bitter again.

I’d rather be better.

Ugh.

If you think, you live better.

If you just exist, you don’t live.

I want to get in my car and drive west. See a state I haven’t seen. I think I may do that. Just to stop the monotony of life.

I applied for a job as a security guard today.

I probably won’t get it.

I most likely won’t get a call back.

If I do, I won’t channel Chinaski.

Unless the person interviewing me has nice legs.

Then I won’t be able to help it.

Television is numbingly bad.

It always has been.

It’s not like there was some great time in the past when it was a good thing.

It’s always been an opiate for the masses.

Something to placate them.

Keep them inside.

If you go outside, you’ll see just how bad things are.

Except on your cul-de-sac in the suburbs.

Two cars and three kids.

A dog and a cat that get along.

Sex once a week.

Sounds like a prison to me.

Except for the sex.

If I was in prison, I’m pretty sure I’d have sex more often.

Not that I’m pretty or anything.

But I ain’t tough.

It’s why I’ll live in a box on Broadway in Hopewell, Virginia, before I do anything to go to prison.

Of course, being homeless can get you sent to jail. Which seems very odd.

Land of the free and all.

Why can’t I be free of a residence?

A job?

A career?

A family?

A dog, cat, snake, etc?

Maybe it’s because you don’t believe in God?

Nah, lots of people don’t believe in God. Even when they say they do.

If you actually believed, you’d do more. You’d help. You’d be selfless.

But, instead, you buy stuff at Best Buy and ignore the homeless guy right outside.

You keep your sunglasses on so he can’t make eye contact.

But he knows.

And so does He.

If he exists.

I don’t think He does.

But I can’t be sure.

Until I’m dead.

Then I’ll know.

It’ll suck if I was wrong.

But, it’ll suck if I’m right.

Maybe if I had done a porno when I was younger life would be different?

I could Google myself and see it.

Just like an employer.

I got rid of my Myspace page because of that.

But I leave up a blog. That isn’t kind to me or others.

And I don’t care.

I started an on-line career assessment test yesterday.

After getting half-way through, I gave up.

I don’t want a career anymore.

I want to get paid to do something cool.

Even if it’s standing on the curb and selling Coronas to tourists.

There are worse things to do.

Like working for a newspaper that hasn’t had news in it for years.

Lots of press releases and opinions by “writers” who can’t tell the difference between “your”, “you’re” and such.

Eating a sandwich on a sunny day is not sultry.

Fucking a watermelon isn’t going to give you AIDS.

How come it’s so hard to lose arm fat?

And spare tires?

But legs get skinny fast?

Boxes will sit full for months. Never looked at. Never touched.

They are full of memories and money spent.

Is that all there is?

Is this all there is?

Are you all there is?

Am I all I am?

Scary to think it.

Not pretty at all.

a shtick

Haunted is the right word.

I was awoken today by thoughts of that day in New Orleans. I was probably dreaming about it. Just remembering it. Certainly my conscious knows that I need to deal with it. Face it.

I just remember thinking I wanted to look, so badly, but I didn’t. I’d promised her I wouldn’t.

I’m glad I didn’t for her. I wish I had for me.

It seemed to cold. Too clinical. Uncaring.

He deserved better.

I should be extremely tired right now. Instead, I’m well rested.

My nights should be short and interrupted. They’re not. They’re endless.

Should we have done what we did? In hindsight, no.

Were the doctors setting us up for the inevitable, but not telling us flat out? I believe so. And I hate them for it if it’s true. I won’t bother with finding out, because I don’t need another source of hatred in my life. It’s wasteful feeling any hate. But very few people actually pull that off.

I wish I had a way to figure it all out. To make sense of it. There’s a reason behind it right? Probably not. We just end up the way we end up. Choices, yeah they play a role. So does dumb luck. So does genetics.

We’re all ticking time bombs. Some of us wake up and become millionaires or porn stars. Some of us wake up and buy a gun to blow our own heads off, or maybe strangers sitting in a movie theater or walking across a campus somewhere.

All of us have great ideas. No matter where we are on the food chain. It’s what we do with them. Some jump full hog into making the idea come true. Maxing out their credit cards, borrowing from friends, eating Ramen noodles and then – BOOM! – the idea either blows up successfully, or just in your face.

Others have an idea and tell someone else. That person takes the idea and runs with it. Leaving the idea person behind in the dust.

Some, we just burying them in words. Layer upon layer upon layer piled on top until the idea is lost in the mass.

I wonder sometimes if going to church really helps folks. I mean, if you can choose a religion, choose a God, why does it have to be some wise, old man? Why can’t it be some frog-looking dude. Or William Shatner? Or a vagina? They all make as much sense. And hell, wouldn’t you rather die and wake up in the arms of a vagina? Well, some of you no.

KISS founder Gene Simmons probably wouldn’t mind. He’s been in more vaginas than most gynecologists. It seems odd. Such an ugly person – inside and out – gets so much pussy. Further proof of the thesis that people are plain stupid. Me included.

At this very moment, Stouffer’s frozen meals popped into my head. They’re always bland, they’re always under or over cooked – never just right. Yet at some point that Stouffer guy made a lot of money off of them. I’m sure if any Stouffer’s are still involved, it’s just cashing a check now. Investing what grand-dad did, or great grand-dad. I’m sort of glad I wasn’t born into money, it gave me my independence. Of course, I took my independence and swiped it all away. So, maybe being born into money isn’t so bad.

Most of those folks don’t go to a job they hate every day. They may go to a club or a country they don’t like much, but all things are relative.

Do you have any more gum? More gum? More gum? … Do you have any more gum?

I used to think a little bit of Billy Madison could get me through anything. I was wrong. Mainly because Adam Sandler has become filthy rich by playing Billy Madison in every movie  he’s made since.

Here comes the jibberish part! Oh, he’s going to be some kind of man-child, redeemed by a child.

Fuck.

I need a shtick that makes money.

Or at least gets laughs. You know, laughter does help.

Unless you’re one of those people who laughs at everything. Nervously. As a defense mechanism. You might as well tell people that your either not listening or you don’t understand.

I can’t hear much in crowded places anymore. I’ve destroyed my hearing. Too many days with headphones cranked all the way up. Too many Lucero shows in the front row – never with earplugs.

You don’t get smarter. You get wise.  You don’t get dumber. You just stay put.

I guess Frampton could have come alive here...

I heard she found God.

I had to go and find out for myself.

We fucked a lot when we knew each other. And honestly, I don’t remember having a conversation about God with her. Never. I mean, we said grace when we were at her mother’s house, but that’s pretty normal stuff. Even for Atheists or Agnostics. You kind of do what is expected of you in someone else’s house.

Which is why when I heard the rumors swirling about that she’d gone completely to Jesus’ side, it intrigued me.

I’ve dabbled in religion from time to time since the day my mother asked me at the ripe old age of nine years old “Randy, do you want to go to church anymore?”

Like most nine year olds, I said “No,” of course, and other than an occasional wedding or funeral – or sightseeing trip – hadn’t stepped in a church since.

I took some religion classes in college. I sat down one lonely night in a hotel and tried to read the Bible, not a page turner that one. And I’d prayed a few times, but mostly for silly things like the pain stopping in my teeth or kidneys, or maybe to win the lottery to pay off my student loans and credit cards. By the way, praying didn’t help any of those things.

So, God had been around me, just not part of me. I try to believe in God. I don’t think he’s a guy up in the clouds with a long white beard and a bunch of others with wings hovering about doing good things.

No, I think if God exists He’s a spark of light. An atom. A protein. Something like that. That’s why we’re all God, really. And if I didn’t think I’d be labeled “Douchebag” I’d probably be a Rastafarian. They seem to get it closer to right than most.

Anyway, I walked into the church, not knowing what to expect. It was one of those gigantic monstrosities you see on the side of the road. Huge buildings with parking lots so big you’d think that Peter Frampton, circa 1977, was playing there every night.

It smelled funny too. Not like old ladies and dust. That’s what I remember church smelling like.

Instead, this one was filled with the smells of coffee and cinnamon buns.

“How weird,” was the only thing that stuck in my head.

There were also kids. Everywhere. Now, when I was going to church, there sure weren’t any kids around. And when we were, we were in Sunday school. Being shown pop-up books about Noah’s ark or other calamadies.

These kids were running around being kids. It was strange to see. No suits and ties. Instead, mesh shorts and awful shirts from Wal-Mart that said “baseball” or “Daddy’s boy” or even fucking Betty Boop.

At once, I wanted to get out of there. But my curiosity got the best of me. As did her eyes. When I saw here smiling at me, I knew I was in trouble. Her eyes had a power over me. I’d like to think now, so many years removed, that they wouldn’t anymore. But, most likely, they do. A good reason as any to follow the path so many take – avoidance. So much easier to not be troubled by something if you just stay away from the source of the trouble.

She came up to me like she always did. Giggling, smiling and almost skipping. It had been that way the first time we met in a bar, back in the other times, and it was the same now. I could feel my legs weaken. She had that effect on me.

“You’re going to enjoy this,” she said as she handed me a flier and led me to a seat. A band was setting up on a giant stage in this cavernous place. I guess Frampton could have come alive here.

“Sit here,” she said.

I started to say something, I don’t remember what, but she was already skipping away.

A few minutes later, the audience was filled to capacity. I had an empty seat next to me, saved just in case. But she never came back.

I watched the band take the stage. A couple of songs later, I didn’t know the words, but everyone else seemed to, a man with glasses took the stage. He was bald, shaved bald, and muscular. He was trying very hard to look younger than he was – fashionable clothes and designer glasses. But he sounded like a preacher. You can take the look away, but not the feel.

His sermon was good. Not specific enough to really mean anything, but generic enough to touch everyone – including myself. He was good.

A few more songs sang and then the hat was passed around. Envelopes came with your program. I put mine in the basket like everyone else. But mine was empty, theirs were not.

Afterwards, she found me. Still skipping around with a big grin on her face.

“What did you think?” she asked.

“Interesting,” I replied.

She shrugged and wandered off again.

I thought I should leave. Never see her again. But, I came back. Two more times.

She got my hopes up.

All I got was let down.

Again.

This time didn’t hurt as much as the first. But it still hurt.

“You live and you learn, son,” my dad said to me the other day.

He doesn’t know the half of it, being married 48 years now. Of course, I don’t know the half of it either – never been married and all. Despite my best efforts.

So, I come home tonight, turn on some classic rock and pop the top off of a beer.

“Do. Do. You. Feeeeeeel like I do?”

Not really Pete. Not really

The white Lando Calrissian

“Wow,” I said out loud, kind of thinking saying wow is sort of dorkish, “I’ve never gotten into a fistfight over Star Wars before,” at once realizing that the rest of the statement made it all a moot point.

She looked at me and patted me on the head. It hurt a little. Not my pride. No, my head. It’s where the guy who insisted on telling me that “No, Return of the Jedi, was never actually called Revenge of the Jedi” had hit me on the noggin with his chair. It bled a lot. But in the end, he bled more. And he was wrong.

Thankfully, no one had a smartphone. It would have kept the whole thing from happening. It also would have kept me from meeting Rose.

She’d been sitting off in the distance while I was eating my pastrami sandwich. I’d driven 113 miles for this sandwich, so I was going to enjoy it. And while I was, indeed enjoying it, I noticed Rose sitting by herself in the booth next to the jukebox. She had long red hair, curly red hair, and deep blue eyes. She was wearing a Hunter S. Thompson t-shirt and a pair of oddly orange plaid shorts. I actually think I have a pair very similar to them. So, I decided to go up to her and talk about those orange plaid shirts.

It wasn’t normal for me to go up to strangers. Especially women. Except on the job. There, I talked to just about anyone. Even if in “real” life I’d never have the guts to do so. I’ve always thought that somewhere in my mind that’s why I became a journalist. Because it forced me to talk to people, and I wasn’t going to do it any other way. Unless they came up and talked to me. And how often does that happen to a guy like me? Not very often, I’ll settle on.

I finished my sandwich a little quicker than I would have liked, but I had a new goal. It was now I drove 113 miles for a chance to talk to this redheaded beauty. She couldn’t have been sent here by anyone other than God. Well, by fate, at least since I don’t really believe in God so much.

I took my final swig of lemonade – don’t drink carbonated sodas anymore – and walked up to her. I stood in front of her and stalled. My mind raced about. “This is not what you want to be doing,” I thought to myself. “She’s going to freak out. You’re some random dude with a shaved head and a long-ass goatee standing and staring at her.”

“Yes, you would freak me out if you did that,” she suddenly said without looking up from her book – “The complete history of Star Wars”.

“Did I say that out loud?” I asked.

“Yep, you sure did,” she said, putting her straw to her lips and sucking up a swig of Diet Coke. I’d noticed earlier what she was drinking when she got a refill.

“Whoops. Well, now you know why I don’t talk to strangers.”

“Did you just say that to the beat of Rick Springfield?” she asked.

“I don’t think so, but I did hear that in my head as I was saying it.”

“So did I,” she laughed. Good sign I thought. And I waited a second to make sure it was just a thought, not an utterance.

“May I sit down?” I asked.

“Only if you tell me exactly what you were originally planning on saying to me when you so awkwardly approached me,” she countered, taking another swig of Diet Coke, this time staring me down as she did.

“Well, I was sitting over there,” I pointed to the table I was at.

“And you were wolfing down that pastrami sandwich …” she said spinning her hands in the air as if to tell me to speed it up a bit. Kind of like Peyton Manning does when he’s trying to run through plays in the no-huddle.

“And I was wolfing down a fantastic pastrami sandwich that I drove 113 miles one-way to have, when I noticed your shorts. Well, I noticed you first, and then your shorts…”

“Just the shorts?” she interrupted coyly.

“Well, and your hair and eyes.”

“Nothing else?”

“And the Hunter S. Thompson shirt.”

“Nothing else?”

“Um, and you were drinking Diet Coke.”

“Nothing else?”

“No, that’s about it.”

“Continue then…” with the same waving arm motion.

“So, I thought, ‘Damn, I love those shorts. I have a pair just like them. This is a sign to at least go up to her…’”

“And make a bloody fool out of myself.”

“Yes, and make a bloody fool out of myself. And may I say, I love that you use bloody.”

“Why thank you,” you may sit down now.

We laughed and joked for another five minutes when Return/Revenge guy walked up.

“Hey Rose,” he said. “What are you doing with that guy?”

“Having some nice conversation, Charlie, that’s what I’m doing,” she replied angrily.

“I see,” he said, sizing me up. Charlie was about 5-foot-9 and weighed in at 225-230 pounds. None of it was muscle.

I looked at Rose, she looked back. Not showing her cards, I thought.

“You guys know each other well?” I asked.

“She’s my step sister,” Charlie said. I felt better. I looked at Rose for confirmation. I got none.

“Why are you talking to this clown,” he said, motioning at me. Obviously, this was not a brother-sister conversation.

“Because he’s sweet and charming and handsome. So, everything you aren’t,” she said. “Plus, he knows more about Star Wars than anyone I’ve ever met.”

I was a little shocked by that comment. We hadn’t mentioned a word of Star Wars in our talks, at least that I could remember. I hadn’t even mentioned the book she was reading. I looked at Charlie, and it dawned on me. He was dressed up like Lando Calrissian, blue shirt and all.

“No shit?” he said looking at me, then her, then me again.

“Yep,” she said. “I think you two should do a quiz off!”

I looked at her with desperate eyes. I knew a lot about Star Wars, but I didn’t know that much. Probably not as much as someone who dressed up like a pretty minor character in a popular eatery near the college.

“You’re on!” Charlie said, plopping down in the seat next to Rose. “And the loser has to eat whatever the winner wants out of her shoes!”

I found that a pretty odd request. I found Rose’s reaction to it, even more odd.

“Yes! Yes! Yes!” she screamed, taking off her shoe – a green Adidas running shoe that had seen better days.

She finally looked at me and winked.

“May the best man win,” she said.

Soon we were reeling off questions to each other. Each of us started off with what we thought were softball questions, and we were both right. The answers being Ewok and 1138. But the questions instantly got harder.

After 25 minutes, we’d both stayed perfect. That’s when I started to get bored. I wanted to talk to Rose, not some guy. And I let an easy one slide. “What was the original name of ‘Return of the Jedi?’” I asked.

Charlie snickered. “You think you can trick me?” he said. “Of course not! They never changed the name.”

“Ha!” I said. “It was Revenge of the Jedi. They even made posters that said it, sent them out, and had to recall them at the last minute.”

“Bull shit!” Charlie yelled.

“Nope. You lose jack,” I said, looking at Rose’s shoe.

Then a punch. It hit me square in the ear. It didn’t hurt as much as Brad Pitt made it seem like in “Fight Club.” But it did startle me. Enough to fall out of my chair. I got back up and threw a punch back, right into Charlie’s nose. It started to bleed. He lunged for me, but missed as I stepped aside. He grabbed a chair and leveled it right on my head. I fell in a heap. Blood everywhere.

I got up, staggering and kicked the fucker right in the balls. He fell. I kicked his face. He bled some more. I turned about and grabbed Rose’s shoe.

“Let’s get out of here,” I said, breathing heavily.

“Second best idea you’ve had all day,” she said.

“And what was the first?”

“The urge to eat Pastrami,” she said.

I smiled and felt my teeth. One was chipped, I could feel it. I hadn’t chipped a tooth since I was in college. And that time I bit down on a spoon. Yep, the wild life.

We walked outside just in time to avoid the cops. A mall security guy had called them. Told them to look for a “Keifer Sutherland looking guy” and “a white Lando Calrissian.” The cops, obviously, weren’t in any hurry to arrive on this scene, so we walked right by them.

Ten minutes later, we were at a Tasty Freeze enjoying some more conversation and a couple of sundaes. I’d completely forgotten I had to be at work later that night.

eyes.

“Why won’t you ever go to church with me?” she asked in her floral dress with her little kid all dolled up with a clip-on tie.
“I don’t believe in it all,” I replied groggily from under the beat up old comforter that I won’t throw away despite the stuffing all being at one end.
“You’re god is always a foot away from you,” she sighed then slammed the bedroom door behind her.
It took me a few minutes to realize she was talking about beer. And damn if she wasn’t right. I guess that’s why I loved her, despite the Jesus thing, as I’d come to refer to it. When we met, she didn’t talk about God. She didn’t go to church. Instead, she went to bars. Listened to offensive music. Got tattoos and drank an awful lot.
Now? She went to church. On Tuesdays for lessons. On Wednesdays for “Chicks Night.” On Saturday and Sundays for the big show. We weren’t together during the changeover. She’d dumped me for being too attached to my ex-girlfriend.
That sent me reeling. I drank more after that than I had in a while. But it only lasted a little while.
We met up again months later. She convinced me she was sorry, even though I knew better. I was her constant. She knew I’d take her back whenever she came calling. It wasn’t exactly desperation on my part, but it should has hell looked a lot like that to everyone I knew.
Her eyes just did it to me every single time. She knew this. She used it. God damn they were beautiful. Still the most beautiful eyes I’ve ever had the pleasure of looking into for a long period of time. They haunted me when we weren’t together. Which, I’m guessing will be forever soon.
The first time around, the sex was great. We fucked and fucked and fucked. I didn’t fuck like that when I was 20 years old. I can’t say as a teenager, because I never fucked anybody during those prime fucking years.
She brought something out of me that I guess was always there, but no one else had tapped into.
This time, however, she doesn’t believe in premarital sex. So, we don’t. Hell, she will only give me pecks on the cheek. It’s a strange sensation. Knowing this gorgeous woman is lying next to you in bed, a woman who you know fucks like a banshee, loves every little thing about it, yet you know it isn’t going to happen.
Just like me putting a ring on her finger isn’t going to happen. Which is why this is all doomed. Doomed to fail. Like all the rest of my relationships. Except this one is a known quantity. I or she just needs to make it happen. I’m betting on her doing it before me. She’s been engaged four times. She wants me to be No. 5. I wonder what she does with the rings? I’ve never asked. A sign of weakness, for sure.
She comes back in the room.
“I’m sorry,” she says.
I don’t say anything.
“For slamming the door, baby. You know I just get angry when we talk about your drinking.”
“I haven’t drank a single drop in three weeks. There’s nothing in the fridge. I don’t even think about it.”
“But you want to.”
“If I’m not thinking about it, how can I want to?”
“I just know you do. Just like you wish she was here instead of me.”
That just isn’t fair. It’s also not true. It was true. But the one thing I’m going to take out of this relationship is that she doesn’t matter anymore. And by she, I mean the redhead that stole the best years of my life. The one who left me cold. The one who changed the locks because she thought I’d do something stupid. Funny. I never even yelled at her during our relationship. I was scared to death of fighting. A scar from another failed dance. Avoiding conflict does as much damage, if not more, than actual conflict does.
Anyway, the eyes knew they could say anything to me. As long as they looked me deeply. A master manipulator this gal was. I knew it. She knew it. And that was the worst part. When she knows she has the power, she uses it. Keeping her guessing was the right thing to do. And it was us until four months in. Then I told her. And I remember the smile that came across her face. She had me.
Just like she has me now.
Until she’s done.