Plates n' Things.
Here are two new sections to Spinning Plates. And I had a flash last night...a thought that maybe some well done illustrations would be cool. You know, if one of us knew an artist who could do pencil drawings it would be nice at the beginning of important chapters to see what I see when trying to write this thing. Oh, wait...I know a very talented artist. Would be cool. You know Thompson had Ralph Steadman...Kesey had his own drawings...just a nice touch. I am going to bring this up tonight with that talented artist.
anyway.
The beginning, as it were (Wednesday)
The Sun. A line drawn between shadow and light on my face. I'm awake. What time is it? This is no early morning sun. This is that sharp and angry late morning sun. Move, roll over, go back to dreaming. The strength to move, barely. Moving away from the encroaching daylight, deeper into the shadows. Closer to being trapped. The day will have me, soon enough, not yet, though. Not yet. Still to sleep, to rest, to dream.
Awake, again. The sun methodically chasing me farther and farther to the wall beside my bed. I know it's time to rise when the day's light is just about to crest, when I can move no farther.
Trapped between my wall and the light cascading in through the cracked Venetian blinds. Only then does the escape become possible. At daylight's peak can I finally get out of bed. Only then, when I know the day is receding back into darkness can I muster the strength to rise. Only then.
I think today is Wednesday. I think. Not a special day except for the fact that tonight, in just a few hours I'll be less alone. I'll be with friends, soon to embark on that long last chapter of this thing. But, the day, it begins like any other. It really began, or rather, it's been going on like this for months now. One day bleeding into the next.
How many months has this been going on? How long has this day lasted? The ebb and flow of a static life. How long?
It's cold in my apartment. But still it seems stuffy, so I open the window above my bed. The cold air rushes in, greets me. I like to sit and watch my little town move and breath without me. I'll sit there, on many mornings, or on many days, when finally I have risen, and sit cross legged, smoking a cigarette, my face weary and rough. Sitting and watching the town rock gently to and fro. I'll be sitting there, like now, and catch a glimpse of who I have become in the mirror opposite my bed. I look, and am startled, I know not that person any more.
I'll sit there, and let the cigarette dangle from my mouth like James Dean, and crack my hands, my neck, my back, and my knees. What a miserable routine I've made for myself. But, I am in the depths of it. I am stuck, trapped, here. Seems like forever. I finally look at my watch. And remember that it stopped working a couple of weeks ago. It doesn't matter. I guess it's somewhere after two. The first school busses are starting to crawl up and down Main St. Kids, so full of life are sitting in plastic desks, squirming, just waiting, itching to get out of school to make the most of the little sunlight that they get to play in. It is March. But, the trees, still bare, the air, still frigid. And the light wasted on people like me. To sleep through most of it, and to curse it when finally forced to face it.
I smoke my cigarette down to the butt. I don't want to waste it. I keep sucking at the thing until I can taste that horrible burnt plastic taste of the filter. It's about all I have the money for these days. A pack a day and a couple a beers at night. What little I eat is charity from my mom or a meal here and there bummed from Pat or Francis. I am hungry, but my addictions are more important. Hell, I'm something like two months overdue on rent. I've been living off of Francis' half of the rent and utilities. Bargaining and begging my way through the last few months. Some how, I still have a home, and friends, and cable and a phone. Some how.
My head hurts. Am I hungover. No. Maybe a tumor. Man, that'd be good. No. Ignore those thoughts. I pad through the empty apartment, shadowed by my lonely little dog. Stand there in the kitchen. What am I looking for. None of this food is mine. Francis wouldn't mind if I took some. But, I can't. Don't want to without asking. Take the only thing in the fridge that belongs to me, a half empty, flat bottle of diet coke. No glass, no ice, just drink it out of the bottle.
Log on to the computer. Looking for salvation in my email. Look for inspiration. Find none. Go to the inevitable last stop. Porn.
The television tells me it's now four. I should shower. Should put some kind of face on for my friends tonight. Francis will be home in about an hour. Be a little bit alive.
Half past four. Take the dog out. Walk past the bike shop. The guys are beginning to assemble for an early season training ride. I should join them. No, too out of shape. Tell them, yeah, I've been training all winter inside. Gonna be stronger this year than ever before. At least I look it. Have lost nearly twenty pounds since last season. Tell them that I'll be there on the next ride, but not today, have things to do.
Poke my head out of the window after I'm back inside. Making sure that the guys are gone from in front of the bike shop. Hurry to the 7-11 for a pack of smokes and another two liter of diet coke. See Francis pulling his little red car into the still snow covered parking lot behind the apartment. Waving and grinning, I am glad to not be alone, now. Glad to see a friend, a friend more like family than my real blood.
`How was the old salt mine today?' As I light another cigarette.
`Not bad, not bad. Gimme' a hand with this stuff huh?'
He's got his sleeping supplies. His ever present beige duffle bag. His fan. His pillows. And a box of booze. Yeah, he technically lives with me here in the apartment on Main St. but, in all reality he spends his time in three places. His Dad's house, his girlfriend's, and here. I think here, more than anything as a favor to me, or some kind of one last time gesture. Without him, I probably would've been evicted by now. He's been keeping me alive. In so many ways. Always has.
We climb the rickety ice covered stairs in behind the building. Both, with arms full. Entering the back door to the apartment, through the kitchen, the dog so excited that we've not abandoned her she pees on the floor. I just took her out. Oh well. Francis gives her some love, I just glare at her. Not having the heart to punish her. I know. He takes his stuff to the closet he calls his room. I clean up her mess and give her a treat. Glad, that she is there. Small things, to get through the day.
He calls Pat, talks about food. Asks me if I'm hungry. I say no. (A lie.) Says Pat'll be down in a little bit and that they'll be making ramen noodles and beans and rice and that there will be plenty extra in case I get hungry. I appreciate the offer but know that I will take none of their food and that they will finish it with or without me.
Pat arrives at about 6. He comes bearing gifts. Food and beer. The beer I will accept. The food I will not. While they prepare their beggar's feast I slip out of the apartment and back to the 7-11 for two dollars worth of snack cakes. This will be my food for the day. I feel guilty about it. I don't really have any money to spend. But, I know someone will pick up my drinks tonight.
I smell the incense before I reenter the apartment from outside in the hallway. I know what they are doing. Back into the living room, scattered with books, magazines, beer bottles and two pots of cheap carbohydrates. They pass back and forth the pretty glass. Inhaling deeply between mouthfuls of food. They offer me a hit. No. Thanks, I am fine. I want to. But, the last thing I need is to get down into that kind of state. I will never reemerge. Not, tonight, at least.
A little before 8 now. Moving from beer to liquor. Francis playing bartender. Thanks. I feel a little looser. A little lighter. A good thing. Yes. I mute the television and put on some music. A tap, tap at the door and Francis' girlfriend and some of his college friends greet us with hopeful smiles. I let them in and the night begins.
This (above) is the new beginning to the book.
To leave...(forever)
An answer that I've forever been struggling towards is the same that I've never been able to approach, honestly. Why leave behind the only truly good thing ever known to me? Why run? Why go to a place that is so far removed from what I know, from what makes me secure, from what I am? Why do I feel so compelled? I'm running scared, and I don't know why. Fuck me.
We've been going nowhere for a long time now. That I know. But, so many people our age are stuck in a similar pattern. Just time killing before diving into the deep end. Just trying to cling to those dying embers of youth, trying to make the most, or the least of our time before facing the facts and growing up. Becoming adults. That's not it though, that can't be it. I am in no hurry to end this prolonged childhood. That can't be it. It's more, or less, or is it that I really don't know?
I have no grand illusions of coming to terms with things, of growing up and moving on. It is more. But, to be able to do this thing, to leave them, I need something tangible. Something to grab onto. Something to absolve me of this horrible sin.
It's just time. Time to move on. There is no tangible thing, no real reason. There are no absolutes. There is no great rift. No great anything. Shit just happens and the reasons come afterward. And that's how this wonderful, horrible, hopeful, crushing event came to be. One of those so many sleepless nights, with the blare in my ears, and the glow in my eyes. I found the way out. The flash. I knew, it was time.
But what reason? Now, now that I've done it, give me the reason. The why? Do I have a why? What can I possibly say to make it all better? What can I possibly do? To make it all right, to end this insomnia and this worry, to end this and move past it. What have I done? Am I not happier with them than with any others? Than any other way? Even, alone? In the depths, even then, I cannot help but have them flash to mind. Deeper than that, they are inside me, and I in them. We.
But, fuck, it wasn't anything even close to rational. Just a flash between the eyes, a flash and I knew that I needed to leave. I felt it, couldn't, still can't rationalize it. Of all the miserable doubting moments in my life where the questions wouldn't come to an answer, this answer came without the question. It just appeared and I knew. I needed it even more than I needed them. I needed to force the end. If for no other reason then to see if I could swim without them.
I don't even know if it's possible. If after a week in the desert that I'll realize that I was wrong to leave. That I cannot survive with out them. Maybe after all those years of pretending that I didn't need that weird little sphere of people constantly surrounding me I won't be able to fake it anymore. But, but, this job, this move, this horrible step is the chance to do something worthwhile. To matter outside, to other people, to be a part of the world. No matter how small. I have the chance to step out of who I have been for the last ten years. I have the rarest of chances to shed this skin and try on another.
Though, it's never as simple as it seems. Or is it, that it is just so much simpler. Maybe I'm just bored playing this role. I'm dancing around the obvious. These people, they've always been able to hold my attention, to keep down all that bubbling black tar noise inside. But, now, now it didn't work anymore. It came up and out, and dragged not only myself, but them too down into the depths. Maybe, I just needed somewhere, someone new, something to distract me, to let me breath. Our oxygen was running out.
They were everything I needed, they were everything I wanted. They were. No longer can this thing nourish me, satisfy me. No longer can I wear these blinders. No longer can I submit to this path. No matter how right I know it is inside. I've asked no more from this life than to believe in something without doubt. But, that's all I have in my life, it is all consuming, doubt.
Here's the fucking kicker though. With them it feels so right, like where my life led me on purpose, like this is how it was supposed to be. With them, the doubt is gone. And I am warm and secure in my life with them. Without I am naked, and prone, and vulnerable. But, alive. Maybe that's what I want. To be scared and alive. To expose myself to the elements, to feel the cold and the heat, and pain, and elation that comes through only barely, with them. Subdued, trickle down, almost affected, that way that I am so used to with them. Once the world is filtered out by 5 other people, when it finally reaches me for reaction, I get only what is let over. I get only a partial view. A fixed, subdued picture of the world. I am only partly alive. For the last ten years, this is how the world and I have stood together. It and I only knowing each other through the lens of this friendship. Only bit players to each other.
I hope that this step does more to bring life than to bring death. I hope that by destroying the group that it's individual parts can live more. Can live life unfiltered. No longer do I want any of the people I care about, myself, to continue in this horrible waking dream.
I hope that they understand. That they get it, that they know this is as much for myself as it is for them. I hope when that day comes, not too far from this point, that I am greeted by the rising sun and the great Western whole of the country with arms wide open. And on turning to look behind me, to the east, to them, to my memories, I can only hope that they are back turned, walking, running, skipping, into the future. To know something new. That's all I want. That's why I do this.
There's just nothing left here. This connection has been made and the path is now overgrown because of the tightrope walk that we've been doing for so many years. The world spinning, without. And not caring, and we, not caring about it. But, fuck, what's the point? I feel so completely trapped and content, both. Yes, both. How can that be? To do anything different is sacrilege, it is blasphemous to try to break free of this path. This is the holy scripture, so it was written in early, early adolescence and so it must be done. Must. Fuck, let me out. Feeling so stunted. Forever, I fear, am I going to be this painting, this picture in the loneliest of hidden corridors. The bulbs overhead slowly burning out, decaying, the walls melting, plaster flaking. And I hang there in the corner. That pathetically, sadly touching bluegreygreen canvas. Fewer and fewer come to view the thing hanging there. Me. Eventually no one comes any more. And only then can I be taken down, given new life somewhere else. And, the picture is the same but completely different because those eyes seeing it are new. I am then new, only then. To perceive and to be perceived. New. Rebirth? Reborn. A new path. A new hope?
This (above) came to me in a flash the other night...I had to hand write it...very tough to decipher Draper scribble a bottle of wine into the night. Anyway.
Draper
Posted by thynkhard
at 6:03 PM EST
This is my LEGO version of a Madvac street cleaning machine. The driver is modeled after Tony's stepfather, who used to drive one of these things. 
LEGO has stunningly validated the Orndoff Principle by changing at least four of their traditional colors, supposedly based on consumer research, focus groups, etc. Nevermind that these colors have been in use for years (over 20 years in the case of light gray). Fucking idiots.
In other cartoon news Family Guy may be returning for a new season next year, based on the strength of its cable ratings and DVD sales. (Thanks loyal reader E. Nelson of Baltimore, MD) If it happens, it will be the first time ever a show comes back to air based on DVD or video sales.
(I've been warning you guys about this for some time, but this Sunday is the night. Miami will don the orange jerseys, pictured on the right.)
First, I said that Al Michaels would be the lead announcer for ABC's coverage of the NBA. I was told that although ESPN does cover NBA games, ABC does not. Well, I'm right and you're both wrong. By the by, I'm so glad Michaels and Madden are working together. Not because it necessarily improves the production of Monday Night Football, (that will always depend on the quality of games) but because now Michaels is finally paired with someone who's as good at their job as he is at his. I mean, Dan Dierdorf, Dan Fouts, Boomer Esiason? Come on
Next, I asked whether TCU deserved a BCS bowl bid if they won out. I was told that, seeing as they would have to win the Big XII championship and in the process defeat No. 1 ranked Oklahoma, winning out would guarantee them a BCS bid. NO, YOU'RE WRONG. TCU plays in Conference-USA. 
Mel Gibson has been taking some heat about his rather bloody movie "The Passion" about the last days of Jesus Christ, filmed in Latin and Aramaic. The controversy surrounding the film involves some Jewish leaders who are prepared to protest it over the depiction of Jews as being primarily responsible for the death of Christ. The Rabbi in the article notes that there is some real anti-Semitism out there, and this movie should probably be left alone. By the by, this thing is suppossed to come out next Ash Wednesday, and I am very curious to see it.
Yesterday would have been Len Bias' 40th birthday. Bias died in a College Park dormitory of a cocaine overdose some 17 years ago. At the time of Bias' death, I was not following College Basketball like I do today. However, Wilbon remembers the emerging star as a man who could have altered the course of history in the NBA.