January 18th, 2008

Note to the reader: The creation date on this file was January 18th, 2008, but on reading it this it is obviously from around 1996. Enjoy...well, at least get something out of it...

One night. Tonight. It's like every other. It is itself and alone. I won't wrap it up for you like a Christmas gift so don't bitch me out later. I'll tell you where you can stick the bow. And don't tell me I shouldn't be feeling this way, I'll slap you silly with words so twisted and biting you'd feel the breath of my thoughts upon your soul, tearing you down like a broken doll from that seat of illusionary authority.

Get real. Sit down with me. While I sit here, ass falling asleep on this uncomfortable mattress which sits on the floor without a frame for support and let us look upon the wall and listen to the roommate in the next room bang his girlfriend, both trying to be quiet as if we don't live in a box. Let us look upon the ceiling and watch the marijuana smoke dance slowly as it makes its way in from under the door, from my other room mate's daily orgy with a weed packed bong. And the cheap window vibrates from the next-door neighbor's music.
It is 1:30am. I have a final in psychology at eight.

I'm sure you'd like to hear how I've been studying all night but I tell you there is no point. Maybe you say I should get some sleep-have you been listening to anything I've said? Yeah, yeah, school is important. Grades, grades, grades! After all, you are going into debt for them so get off your lazy ass and put on some nice clothes…okay, so the nicest clothes you have are over five years old and from high school band-so put on those torn up levis, give them skinny knees some air, and rush to campus like it means something, number two in the air and a smile on your face cause grades are everything! That's what I thought until I realized that no one gives a shit about your grades, particularly those idiots who hand out scholarships-unless you're last name is Jock.

Finger nails are getting a little long. They feel grungy and I've never been able to figure it out, they'll be clean in the morning but when I can't sleep they suddenly become dumps for the planet's extra dirt and I stare at the little black clumps of scum wondering how it all got there, though I know it's a dumb question to ask when I know I'm just too lazy to stretch a mere foot, open the desk drawer, and grab the damn clippers. But maybe that's just it, dirt. Sometimes you know where dirt comes from and that is enough to make you want to use something sharper. And maybe I should.

One hand down, the other to go. Brittle finger nails fly in my face, at the walls, stick into the carpet, edges sticking out like broken glass. I'll pick them up later.

There once was a man, long time ago. I think his name was Gage. Finious or something. It was some name most people would think of as faggoty nowadays, but whatever. Stupid bigots. Anyway, that's just a rant of mine, people are stupid assholes and the more they got going for them, the bigger assholes they are. Fuck 'm.

I digress. Gage worked for a mining company or something, hundred years back or so. Some dynamite went off and a spike shot throw his left eye, Pow! through the grey matter and out his skull. Lucky bastard survived, but was never the same. I won't explain all the physiological ramifications or use big words and confuse you, don't you fret! But this guy's personality changed, he became Mr. Hyde and the good doctor was gone for good.

Get a spike through your head so fast no one can see it happen and people will notice. Have one rammed through your soul for over two decades and people call you a deep, thoughtful, and eccentric antisocial non-comformist. Oh yah, people call me sweet too.
I fucking hate that.

By the way, did I mention I choose not to be baked right now? And I choose not to have the company of a beautiful woman at my side? And that I really enjoy being alone and people walking around me like I have the goddamn plague just because I dress a little different and dye my hair black? It's so true, I get up in the morning after two hours of hard won sleep and the first thing I say when I look in the mirror, "I can't wait from some ignoramous to judge me today! Woohoo!! That would be grand!!!"

Yeah, I hear you. Don't even try to hide your thoughts behind a stolid face. I'm bombarded with your feelings now, the real ones, the potential ones, and the ones of your friend on the right and the one on the left. It's all clear. You've just been wearing boots so long you can't remember the feeling of sand beneath your feet, racing between your toes. You're soul is wrapped in bandages so thick they bind.

And you accuse me of being blind?

1:48am. The music has stopped.

Cigarette red and dancing, burned down to my knuckles. I'm just watching to see if it will do anything different this time. If the flames form a face or lyrics to my one of my favorite songs, "Don't look so frightened, this is just a passing phase, one of my bad days." Don't worry, I'm not thinking of doing that, just thinking about the smoke. It would mean everything in the world to see physics go out the window for a brief moment. It would make the difference. And that's all I'm asking.

Is that too much to ask?

I throw the butt in a half empty big gulp. Or is it a half full big gulp? Either way, it's shit now. Would you like a drink?

2am. No more sexcapade from beyond the cardboard wall. Pot still steaming in from under the door. I pull a second Camel out of the pack, almost light, then decide I'd rather go out onto the balcony. Sometimes I feel like the walls are laughing at me, closing in on me. I know they aren't, but it's the only way to describe how I'm feeling so don't get the fucking idea I'm a schizophrenic or having an acid flashback. Walls talk back when you're alone. If you don't believe me, ask yourself why so few people can spend a whole day alone in a room without human contact. When you find one who can, let me know. I have met very few.

No. On second thought there's just me. And the walls keep pushing in.
Click. The doorknob creaks. No amount of grease seemed to ever fix it and I hate being the resident insomniac. Call me a caring fuck, but I don't appreciate people waking me up so I sure as hell don't go out of my way to wake them when I'm wandering around like the walking dead.

When I hope no one will see my eyes.

And to show you I care, I'll set the scene. There's a sliding window just outside our kitchen that leads to a wooden balcony just over the neighbor and our garages. Chipped brown paint everywhere, dead ivy on the sides, a rusting barbeque and old beer cans. At least they aren't shitty beer can's or I'd be tempted to kick them down to the street, maybe hit one of those pubescent bastards driving some beat up Civic missing a muffler VROOOM up the hill and waking everyone up within six blocks. And wouldn't you know it, as soon as I clear the lawn chair of leaves, sit down, and have my smoke lit up there's one up the hill, stop a moment in case cops are hiding around the stop sign then VROOOOM down back towards town.

Inconsiderate cock sucker…

Wanna hear a story? Somebody like that punched in the back passanger side window in my car. Wanna know why? Well don't ask me, they didn't take anything though there were tapes on the seat and a set of $200 box speakers in plain view. Wanna hear another good story? Two weeks later someone ran into the back of my car, bashing in the hatchback-for those of you who don't think twenty something's don't drive hatchbacks, remember I'm poor and stupid and not with the groove. Wanna hear another story? Two months later someone jammed wood in the lock, busting it.

So I'm staring at my cherry burning brightly at the tips of my fingers, smoking running out my nose, and what I can't figure out is who convinced James Bond a twig would make a good lock pick.

But enough of that. Let me put this out and light another one. Bear with me. I know it's a bit chilly out here but if you can't take it, fuck off. Do you think I care? You can always get warm. Put on a jacket. Turn on a heater. When you find a heater for my soul, you let me know. Until then, shut the fuck up, stop behaving so goddamn spoiled and pay attention. You might learn something.
I use "might" in the most loose of ways, mind you.
But you know, they always tell you that when they're lazy fucks who have nothing to share. But I have something to share with you. And it's so rotten you'd do better to turn and walk away without saying anything. In fact, don't say anything because anything that comes out of your mouth will be ignorant folly and frankly, I don't need your damn sympathy.

Look at my wrists, goddammit!!!

I don't need your sympathy. I've survived without your arms and if you don't have the courtesy to extend those and keep my soul warm, keep your damn sympathy to yourself or have it bitten off by teeth that have been sharpened by decades of pain. Don't act so fucking surprised. You insult me then expect me to simply sit back some fuzzy stuffed bear, "Yeah, that's okay. Never around when I need ya but hey, if you need me to repeat meaningless rambling about how much you hurt, I'm here for ya!"

Don't you dare.

Wait a sec. Piece of shit ninety-nine cent lighter's out of fluid. Matches on the kitchen table. I'm into get them, now I'm back out on the porch. There, all good. Do you mind if I smoke through you, my friend? Do you care? Do you dare tip-toe through the light cherry haze of the city night always one step away from waking the demon?
I'm sorry. I probably shouldn't throw rhetorical questions in your face. True, you asked for me, said you'd walk beside me from day one. I know you leave sometimes, when I sleep, when I'm doing well. But you're always here when the proverbial fan and feces come face to face with a smattering of personalities leading to an exchange of sight and smell…well, you know what I mean.

You know everything before I say it, positive, negative, whatever. It irritates me. It irritates me that I cannot see you, I don't know your name, I don't know what you look like, who you were. And most frustrating, I don't know why you choose to support me before I was me when no one else would or will or even can. Do you get something out of it? Does it make you feel good to know I've past beyond the pain of tears? And the answer is always no, it's in my gut. Irritating but true, you are the most compassionate per-whatever-that I've ever met.

Lets stay on the porch for awhile longer. Let me get my jacket.

Do you remember that book I wrote? You know, the one in the blue cardboard binder, picked it up from Kinko's because I knew she'd like the colour? I remember buying it with spare change, probably from soda cans I'd found on the street. Well, soda and smelly beer cans, but you get the point. Grabbed that and spent half an hour going through the specialty fruity paper people get for stationeries or whatever. Five cents a sheet. I carefully picked out thirty or so different designs, themes that were ready for everything in my soul to write upon, words to be set down on paper for the rest of time. Words of love, of sorrow, of regret, of hardship, and yep, all that stupid shit. God, I hate this I want to scream but I'm mad because I'm a romantic in a cold world where everyone's questioning, asking the wrong questions, asking, asking, judging, running. And nobody likes a fucking romantic. That's what movies are for. In real life, people are out to getcha.

You can't run, my friend. That's your curst, your pact. So listen and I won't bore you with too many details. I'm not Stephen King so I won't tell you the year by indicating what I was listening to or eating or drinking while I wrote my poetry. I won't tell you what kind of pen or printer I used on each sheet, each poem, each story.
At first, there was only one page. She didn't know what to think of it. Then there were two, then three. Every day I would give her another page. Soon there were over a hundred. All the best and the worst of me, everything that I am, everything that I wanted to be.
So when Kurt Kobain blew his head off, you remember that day? Just got back from riding the bus from classes out at LCC. There were two people I felt understood me and both I'd never met. Kurt was one of them. I feel like an idiot telling you this, not that you don't know already but here goes: Kurt was one of my best friends. He brought solace to my hardest days. Just hearing his words and his pain and knowing someone out there knew and could not escape the demon kept me going. That didn't change after I heard. I knew it was coming. It didn't change after I saw the pictures of his body, his head split into a thousand pieces on the floor and fucking brains everywhere.

I'd already seen it happen in my mind a thousand times.

I don't want to come across as some sort of brain dead groupie. I wasn't. Groupies have to conform in some regard and I didn't. I just got the message loud and clear. I understood the words. Someone else said some words I understood all to well, "Goodbye cruel world I'm leaving you today…Goodbye all you people, there's nothing you can say to make me change my mind. Goodbye."

And you know what? After all these years I still hate that prick from highschool who wanted those lyrics as his epitaph. And I hate how stupid shit like that is branded into the demon. It glows in the dark.

Another jerk VROOOMs up the hill. Lets go back inside.

I'll bet you in ten years the computers they have will make this one look like a piece of junk. Sure, bought if for two thousand bucks at graduation, but even now it's behind the times. Everythings getting faster. Everything. I'm too stupid to keep up. And we both know it.

So why am I a computer science major?

Oh, I've played the sympathy card. Played it well.
Don't want to. When will I stop? Today tomorrow? Years from now?
What will my hand look life if I give up my only aces?