It’s hard when people start getting laid off, you know, because they don’t want to go live in any old shelter, they want to eat something other than soup, something hearty like hamburgers, they want to mix a little hamburger with salt and pepper and onion and put it between two pieces of toast, and they want to have a nice beer and just sit back on the sofa, maybe watch the news or Sister, Sister and not answer the door when people start coming around, just ignore the knocking and eat their hamburger and relax because they deserve it.
Archive for January, 2009
Your personal life philosophy is snaggled as your beard, labyrinthine and at times contradictory, but it has saved you from two dire personal crises which would have—had your self-identity not been so well mapped-out—pulverized your existence into the dirt like a cigarette butt under a jackboot’s twisting heel.
Many attempts have been made to articulate this convoluted and procrustean-based logic. These nights are full of wadded-up paper, whiskey, and moonlight which coats the surface of the Pissouri Bay like shoe polish. So far nobody gets it.
You will keep trying, though. That is the essence of the thing.
Jack’s story began when he met Nancy in a bar. He seemed fidgety, but she loved him.
The second act involved these things:
1. drugs
2. paranoia
3. a Florida vacation
4. Jack saying he was going off for a swim, just past the breakers
5. a fake death (Jack’s)
6. real tears (Nancy’s)
Then Jack got pulled over for speeding twenty years later in a small town outside of Omaha, and you know how these things happen. The end of the story hasn’t happened yet, but it will certainly involve another death (Jack’s) and possibly a second arrest (Nancy’s).
I was in a band, but the band didn’t get any gigs and never found a drummer, and then I was a music critic, but no one would publish me, and then I taught trumpet lessons to fourth graders, but the parents complained about my Goldie Hawn tattoo, and then I got a gig staging lights for another band fronted by this guy who used to be my stage manager, but I got fired for a reason I cannot legally disclose. And then I became an investment banker and was like, $#^@ you, world, you can’t stop me from rebelling.
Hi, I’m selling vacuums. Can I interrupt you for a minute?
Hi, I’m a saleslady. Can I have a word with you?
Hi. I just happened to be in the neighborhood. Can I see your carpet?
Hi. Have you ever seen a vacuum this big and powerful before?
Hi. Want a free vacuuming?
Hi. I was walking by and I thought to myself, I bet this house is lined with dirty floors.
Hi. Is your mommy home?
Hi. Beautiful day, isn’t it?
Hi. I noticed you are watching my favorite daytime soap.
Hi. Ooh, pretty sweatshirt. Can I come in?
You’re a corrupt politician, or an underhanded lawyer, or a pedophilic priest, or some other stereotype.
But you know what, you contain your moral abandon to your profession, and outside of that you’re actually a really nice guy—a good cook, a generous uncle on birthdays and Christmas, a patient listener. You hold the door open for old ladies and never yell out the punch line to someone else’s joke, even when they’re taking forever to tell it and getting it all wrong.
Most people don’t know what to make of you, so they just hate you. It’s simpler that way.
Be happy until you’re depressed, depressed until you mope, mope until you drink, drink until you have a problem, have a problem until you hurt others, hurt others until you feel guilty, feel guilty until you go to church, go to church until you become a nun.
Be a nun until you fall in love, stay in love until you marry, be married until you separate, stay separated until you mope, mope until you feel gutsy, feel gutsy until you bungee jump; fall, until you bounce back and feel gravity rush upwards for once, from your toes to your forehead.
One of the worst parts of being a professional tennis player is that dumb Ukrainian she-lion on the tall chair who makes all the calls. “Jou were ober the line,” she tells you from underneath her orange plastic visor. She waves her hand to your opponent, who whoops and thrusts a golden fist in the air.
“I was not,” you say.
“Jes, too,” she says.
“Not.”
“Jes.”
“No.”
“Jes!”
The court falls silent and you look around at the open-mouthed faces in the stands. A heavy awkwardness descends upon the sweat dribbling down your short dress, like prom all over again.
The best part about breaking up is going to stay in a monastery and they don’t let you use your cell phone there, or check facebook, or eat a bucket or fried chicken, or drive a car past anyone’s house at 2:00 a.m. to see if there are lights on, or drink a thermos of vodka/Gatorade and drive past the house again at 4:00 a.m., or get arrested on three criminal acts of trespassing; at the monastery, they make you garden instead, so you stay busy rubbing your palms together and watching the wet earth flake off in ant-sized pancakes.
Advice columnists have to know these things: how soon do you send out thank-you notes after your wedding, what’s a normal resting heart rate for an adult, is it normal to feel slightly grossed out by the baby for the first four months after its birth, is it normal for the baby’s poo to be purple, how do you deal with a nagging mother-in-law, how do you forgive your wife for cheating last year with Earl from Earl’s Auto Body Shop, and which side does the fork go on.
(Answers: three weeks, 60-90 bpm, yeah, no, counseling, counseling, and left)
