how will i feel next january

i walked into a bathroom.

i first surveyed the layout, the cleanliness.  adequate, usable, unconscious.  i made sure the door shut on it's own, i didn't want to seem too eager, i wanted to play it cool to the invisible human, the one who's always watching me, the one who's hovering over my shadow.  after a soft organic 'click', i pushed the button on the knob that i knew would most likely keep the knob from turning.  however, i had no way of testing it, as some doors don't line up and latch correctly, or some locking actions don't adequately keep the knob from turning.  the only way of knowing is by being outside the door with the knob button pushed.  so i used the bolt latch as well, luckily i had one available in such a situation.  i had immediately done this in darkness, as i knew where the location of the knob button and bolt were as habit in this particular bathroom, and had done it before i hit the light switch.  as i hit the trigger for the annoying fluorescent lights to illuminate, i also turned the fan on, which was a knob that clicked to denote it's functioning, and seemed to get louder with a clockwise turning; i left it in the middle.  i walked over to the toilet, though i'd been standing at the spot long enough messing with the fan that the urinal flushed, which happened because that same spot was directly in front of the urinal and it was a proximity-sensor flushing one.  what a waste, what a surprise, what a mistake of engineering in choice and location of urinal.  nonetheless, i walked to the toilet, looked at myself in the mirror first, fixed my hair the the invisible human, still there, always there.  i cleaned off the toilet seat by wiping it off with toilet paper even though it was spotless.  as i sat, i noticed the sink mirror was directly in front of me, which made me feel that the invisible human was watching me, it felt uncomfortable, i turned my head to the side and ignored it as best i could. 

i then did what i came into the bathroom to do.  afterward, i checked over my entire body in the mirror, my pants back, my shoes, my hair, my teeth, my skin blemish that had appeared a couple days ago but hadn't done much but fester under the skin.  i extracted some fuzz from my sweater.  i made sure my pants hung correctly and comfortably down past my knee to my shoe top.  i washed my hands with warm water, turning on the hot side first, then just a little of the cold side, mixing them to perfection.  i used light soap, as i didn't like the feel and smell of this soap as compared to my home's soap, the way it dried out my skin and made me smell just barely perfumed.  i used just enough soap to feel 'cleansed'.  i dried off with two paper towels, even though one would've sufficed, but i decided that i'd rather be overly dry than not dry enough, for some reason.  i put the soiled towels on the trash bin, but the bin had a top door that wasn't triggered by the slight weight of the towels.  so i pushed down to make sure the towels went into trash with ease, but felt slightly dirty about it.  before unlocking the door, i flushed the toilet again to further clean the toilet, giving it some time to soak, and leaving it just a little cleaner for the person who would come after me.  i flushed the toilet this time with my shoe'd foot, as previously i had done it with my hand.  before unlocking the door, i took one deep breath in, then a quick one out, then another one out.  i unlocked the doors and turned off the light, left the fan on.

i wonder what the year will bring.

adept & adrift

SOBRIETY AND IT'S ACCOMPLICES:

clarity)  an understanding of another point of view!  and i searched so long for one in a bottle!  it was definitely down there, but restricted in glass and airflow.  held breath.  now just dropped down into a campsite in damp weather, with the readiness in mind for the elements but without any goddamned gear.  but i'll figure through it, i'll make it work, because now i'm here, now i'm breathing the vast tree-filtered air, now i'm regulating my own thought, my own life, my own decision and action, the senses are all i need.

health)  well it felt like fucking health just drained right out of me, and kept leaking from my body with every fucked up dream and shitty night and morning headache and half-stare into my own depressed chemical, my own bullshit excuse for a brain think thing that made something some dumb.  but days turned into hours, luckily, and drug turned to exercise, thought to flight, words to metaphor, breath to action.  shit came, as it will, again just keep faith in my own body, it's my own, it's my own, it's my only vehicle.  

platitude)  the same speech you've heard about 8 or 38 times from friends after they've fucked up again and again, well, it comes up out of your mouth like stale vomit but fuck it feels good.  it smells great, like life, like breast milk if you can remember that far back - but you can't.  it's the ending to the movie that you saw with the girl you liked, but instead of the break-up being averted at the end of the plot, you actually get the girl at the end, in your own life, and YOU wrote the script, and YOU got fucking paid for it! yet it's SO bad, and it's such terrible art, but hey: it's yours.

boredom)  motive.  chase.  digress.  sleep.  second guess.  RELIEF.  constriction.  cages.  boredom. creativity?  cell phone?  breath.  eyes closed.  eyes open.  eyes closed, eyes open.  eyes.  eyes.  eyes.  eyes looking at brain.  looking.  waiting.  waiting for nothing.  action.  doing.  waiting.  constriction.  steping, chasing, running. leading.  walking.  just walking.  listening.  waiting.  sleep.

rebound)  at least an interest in something new.  you told yourself how new and exciting the world was when you were young and first went walking into a brand new city on your own, you told yourself you'd never lose this feeling.  well you lost it.  but you can find it, with change comes stability, with rebound comes anything. remember when you were happy with anything?  you're still happy with anything.  this type is anything, this type doesn't fucking matter, you know this, and you love this.  you illustrate this, and you love such an idea.

post oar

closed eyes open; immediate blast of air and color bring them to a magnetized squint.  streaks of white light, undefined sharp shape, a complete exit of molding that my physiology cannot contain.  overload of experience.  after hours of this, like collects with like, things start to make sense, turn upright, borders seem legitimate to my own interpretation.  hues and shades sharpen.

left, right, left, right, spring, spring, spring, spring, that's what i tell myself as each foot leaps to catapult and i reward myself with a higher heart rate sustained for at least 30 minutes.  my eyes blur left and right to keep myself safe every block or so.  i get back and breathe deep and stare at the wall and it seems like it's moving slightly, bowing in barely, pumping out just enough to notice, like the wall is breathing but knowing i'm watching and trying not to be obvious about it.  the electric toothbrush cleans real well, super well, but it joggles my insides, reverberates my something-in-my-brain and makes the numbers on the digital clock in my bathroom move really funny.  like i didn't believe the way the numbers moved at first, and had to stop, and stare, and then try it again, and have now just resigned myself to the fact that they bounce all weird when i'm brushing my fucking teeth.

as i lay, i wonder if i'm unconsciously only turned on my left side to try to get blood to that half of the brain, to keep myself from imagining what could be and to just logically lock myself into a rigid set of breaths, an unquestioning, an ignorant blink.  like a limb kept low and gravity collects the blood, my brain is sensitive to motion these days since my myriad accidents.  i stay still except for my constantly moving legs.  i more often than not drift to sleep and am jarred awake within moments by a quick raging dream of losing my step and trying to catch myself, by an object coming at me that i must catch but can't, by an imminent conscious moment where i must act quick and rescue myself but am unable to.  colors appear in my eyelids as about 5 different shades of black, with amoeba-like shapes and drifts, my eyes close and feel like they're crossed, i try to straighten them because it seems healthy and it seems like i do, but i can never really tell.  the lights my vision create flutter and pulsate, and return as they were burned all day long, and it takes all of sleep to put them back into poor working order again by sunup. 

WHERE DO YOUR EYES GO

different patterns:  jutting out from the walls is paper and ink, things that are creative and pleasing!  my eyes go there by instinct, but i chastise you for your eyes landing there.  regular colour is like sleep and breath and death, it leads to little cognition and zero orbitals, no melodies; we search for coercion and flannel and explosion into.  anything that's different anything that is different

familiarities:  well, we come back to the usual, to make ourselves feel better.  to apologize for giving in to the difference.  we resign to comfort.  we are sorry.  we look for someone who might be our friend, who we could nod at, what would wake us from feeling solitary, asleep.  we're so used to looking at moving pictures on screens that it hypnotizes us, me, sorry, me, i, me.  i continue to come back in gaze to that solid screen on the pinball machine, it's a face, it's close to the mirror, i understand it somewhat, i pretend like it's entertainment, like it's something to do.

attractive people:  your face is so adorable, i even like the pores on your nose.  i'm VERY sure that you hate those slightly enlarged pores, but i think they make you more human, all the more beautiful.  your small blinking eyes glow with purpose.  your curls radiate the creamy skin within.  frailty is your hesitation, as is mine, and that silence draws me more, to you.

away from:  shrug shrug dart dart dart dark close feign feign pretend to check phone pretend to think about something shrug shrug yawn fake yawn, close gaze in on paint, wall paint, artwork, that which pretends to have such intent and purpose.

i sometimes wonder if i'm slowly being poisoned or if that's just the way i view the world

i wandered outside to switch up my surroundings.  envisioning all the possibilities, i froze just outside my front gate in the mild 40 degree weather.  i could go to a movie?  my mind rode the train to the theater, looked at the movies, couldn't decide, came back, saved money still frozen.  "i'll walk to buy the day's paper, a hot drink, some black ink for my rubber stamp," a scale of need vs want tipped in the direction of want, shot down still frozen.  collecting my tips from last night brought a quick, decisive vision of 'put-it-off-until-tomorrow', pockets empty stand still remain frozen on the sidewalk.  i looked at birds, interesting graffiti, questioned phone documentation, cheapening my direct experience, frozen seems so clean and present in comparison.  laundry tomorrow frozen.  sell car -- why not -- because i like it -- frozen.  contemplate change by not changing anything, starting to thaw.  with this thaw, i return inside, sit, type, stand by heater, stretch.  reheat leftover chinese food as a switch to my routine, because i usually have eggs and spinach at this time, and chinese only after 4pm.  reheat leftover chinese food to prove to myself that there is still something spontaneous and interesting in my movements and moments.  such spontaneity is a nail sticking up from the vast floor of earth, i scratch my foot on it, don't even draw blood, but seem annoyed, hammer nail down.  cold.

focus and forget

if there were a language that i knew you all didn't know, i would speak it, type all of these words in it, and tell you simple things that sounded beautiful.  you'd admire the sound, the collection of letters, the visual flow, the feeling that i truly wanted to convey something to you, yet was unable to. 

i would explain your fears in ways that trivialized them, you'd stuff them in your bottom lip and spit them out, you'd grow them and pluck them as soon as they appeared.  i'd put words in aluminum and watch you consume them, and after you easily fell asleep i'd collect them, recycle them, so when you woke you wouldn't have to deal with them.  i'd build paragraphs that you kept in shoe boxes in the closet, that you tried to forget but couldn't, that your partner was now slightly scared of, that you meant to throw out when you moved-in last year but couldn't.  the punctuation wouldn't even be recognizable or distinguishable, but you'd still keep it in your wallet, put it in your coffee every morning until you started to feel a dependence on it.  just reading it would make you space out in the shower and perhaps even sit down until the water was uncomfortable and luke warm, hearing it would calm you while standing in line.  i'd be speaking it to you and only you, you'd know this through tone, through innate spacial cues, through eye contact, through what you used to think your understanding of love was when you first understood the feeling of 'love'. 

it'd speak with statistical reason and confidence.  like if you heard that it had happened 95% of the time given the same circumstances, and you'd feel comfortable that it would happen again if you wanted it to right now.  and you wouldn't have to over think it, though, you'd just know that confidence without the numbers muddying it.  the language would be the texture of oil at rest, of newly dried concrete, with the smell of fresh cedar and the crush of dried pine cone.  it'd be nose to neck.  i could speak it without hesitation, i could speak it without thoughts of recourse, i could speak it without inhibition of personality, i could speak it without any kind of offense, i could speak it free of stutter, and steady of faith.

but i don't know that language, and if i did i'd probably just take it for granted.  it'd be a commercial on mute, a crumpled up receipt, a shiny nickel on the sidewalk.

i want a girl who forces me out of my habits

i want a girl who forces me out of my habits

i want a girl who forces me out of my habits

i want a girl who forces me out of my habits

i want a girl who forces me out of my habits

i want a girl who forces me out of my habits

i want a girl who forces me out of my habits

i want a girl who forces me out of my habits

i want a girl who forces me out of my habits

i want a girl who forces me out of my habits

i want a girl who forces me out of my habits

i want a girl who forces me out of my habits

i want a girl who forces me out of my habits

i want a girl who forces me out of my habits

ready when you are

i constructed thoughts of what to write from a slight hangover headache remedied by ibuprofen, coffee, tv, mariquopa.  they tied together like a birthday package that had been unwrapped, large shiny ribbon pulled violently apart, ornate paper torn with surprise and irregularity, gift peered at, then recreated and rebuilt around it again, for transport, for a show of nicety and convenience to the gift giver.  my thoughts sutured without the help of tape, but only a clearly seen and recognized rip, pieced together.

i thought of how the thought could become creative, translate to others, drip onto paper.  how it could be sung in song, hiccuped over beer.  how it could be cooked with potatoes and garlic, how it could be smoked or flushed down the toilet.  but it'll probably just get driven over multiple times, scraped against the worn curb as i parallel park repeatedly, if i could only get it on the first try.

coffee is my tired and expected metaphor, "coffee is my inspiration".  windex is my eyes, clear tape is my curiosity.  a good stapler is my curiosity, a good stapler is my creativity.  new curtains are my future.  slight pains in my foot, my knee, and the side of my left leg are my challenge, my buoyancy.

she is annoying and i am alone

i go through torrential downpours of need
    and want

and suffer the droughts of cups unfilled.

i try to use third person,
to talk at myself, to make things more tolerable,
but i use the same words, locked, repeating

he stares at beauty from mind’s eye, he feels repose and lack of creativity by the mold of sex drive
he tracks
he folds
he whines with turning of gears.

he fights restriction, he feels creative, he postures his hands accordingly in the mirror so that i can see.
i feel creative; i wash with desire. i wriggle in bed and bother no one.

spacial attitudes

the following is an illustration of what i see as the 'seattle attitude' mixed with the 'chicago attitude'. this is a true story.

I WENT to my most local bar, that is, the closest bar to my front door, down to the foot, for one beer. i was tired and there was a pretty annoying open mic, which didn't help much. i brought a book, as this particular bar is an easy place to read in, and the general noise level usually drowns out the marginally talented performer anyways. i took the last seat at the bar, which is only significant because a couple kept reaching past me to get drinks, often hitting my arm, which i didn't care much about. i eventually scooted over, gave them more room, and the folks next to me eventually left and gave up their seats to the couple.

I PAID, finished my beer, and upon getting up from my bar stool the drunk yet well dressed man (of the couple) asked me "what you reading?" i politely showed him the book, which he replied "can i see it?" i let him see it, which he immediately asked about the author, sam mcpheeters, who i gave a brief introduction to. i was obviously on my way out. he then opened the book, but in the way that bends the front page back and opens the spine, you know? THAT way. i only asked asked him to not do that because it was a book that my friend had loaned me (it was new to her), and i knew she wanted me to keep it in good condition.

I ASKED him politely, yet loudly due to the bar noise, to please not open the pages that far, because it ruins the book. i explained that it was a book that i had borrowed, so i was taking very good care of it ("i haven't even opened it that far myself yet, to be honest," i stated to him). he continued to open it, saying "you care more about the book, or the content," accusingly. i said, "i actually don't usually care either way, but i care about my friend and wish to respect the way she cares for books, because it's her book." he asked if he could read the first page, i consented. i think he read the first sentence and gave it back to me: "so that's how it is?" i said "yup," and walked out the door after taking the book from his hand.

I KNOW i was slightly rude, but it was for good reason. i honestly felt like i could have easily punched him in his fucking face. perhaps if the seattle/chicago spectrum was more to the east, i would have done so. perhaps this was because the book is about an angry man who is neurologically incapable of any emotion but rage. anyways, that guy was a fucking drunk idiot, and i have no sympathies for him and feel sorry for his poor girlfriend. now my friend's book cover bends slightly up when placed on it's back. i'm only one man.

(a slight dramatization of the seattle/chicago split, but i feel it draws a nice, real-life picture.)

struck by

"struck by deadly rhythm! of the production line!" maching g g g g g g g g b u z z z z z z z z z z z z t t h h - http://youtu.be/8clGuSJLP5w - w w w w w w w w w w w w w w w w w w w w w w w w w w w w w w w w w w w w w w w w w w w w w w w w w w w w

copy paste enter repeat, between the dashes. upon personal retrospective of my time loving the refused, a sweedish hardcore outfit that changed my ears and my heart, no doubt. they're playing a couple reunion coachella shows, and goddamnit i want to go. as their songs used to fan my flames of discontent, i've stopped listening as of the years and have become enslaved in routine, likely story. upon re-listen for the first time in at least a couple years:

we are, i am, struck by deadly rhythm, of the production line. the refused sing post-punk ballads of alienation, a marxist critique of our daily lives run by machines, technology, the rote repetition of tasks that feed our capitalist ideal, that which is fucked and unsustainable and "organized crime, and we are all the victims." i've always been conscious of working machines, or my lack thereof, and how my hands connect to things, and i've stayed away. though machines are not machines, our selective and seductive services are our sector, our rote words, our repeated thoughts, our over and over actions, are what we sell in our lives for money, our minds labor rather than our bodies, and our existence as a whole is lagging behind our manipulative technology, as it skyrockets to a point beyond our imaginable sight. that said: WE ARE NOT MEANT TO DO THE SAME TASKS OVER AND OVER. WE ARE NOT TICKING CLOCKS, WE ARE FUCKING FLESH, WE ARE WONDERING AND CURIOUS AND LOVERS. AS WE FORCE OUR MINDS TO THINK THE SAME THOUGHT OVER AND OVER, TO PUSH THE SAME REGISTER BUTTON OVER AND OVER, TO TYPE THE SAME REPORT OVER AND OVER FOR NEW CLIENTS, TO MEASURE GROWTH BY YEARS IN A COMPANY, TO FIGHT FOR SIMPLE WORDS TO COME OUT THAT MAKE US HAPPY, WE CANNOT SAY THINGS WE MEAN WHEN WE WANT TO SAY THEM, WE FIGHT FOR WORDS AT PLACE AND TIME? (we creatively collapse). WE ARE MEANT TO CREATE AND BE CREATIVE, TO FLOURISH AS THE MIND DESIRES. TRAPPED IN CLOSETS OF TIME AND OCCUPATION JUST DOES NOT FUCKING CUT IT. the refused are fucking dead, as to mean, we are alive. (i'd rather be alive).

"We are meant to be here // without an answer // with love and with fear", under ourselves, we are meant to awaken and change this.

i remember and consider having a refused shirt, which i wore when i got arrested in 2001, the only time i've been arrested, for shoplifting. i remember some hispanic dude in there, who i didn't know, who talked to his lawyer for a while, and came back, and then i talked to that same lawyer and saw the hispanic guy's case papers, which had "refused" written all over it, with a star, the same star that was on my refused shirt. i think it was a direct reference. i scraped my name, and the word "refused", with my nail, into the paint on the door in the holding cell. i also played tic/tac/toe with a guy who i knew who'd also been arrested that day, who i played poker with a year before that. i had paint in my nail and it kind of hurt, but it felt really good to do, and i knew i had to do it.

[This is laden with many refused quotes and references, but that quote in the second to last paragraph was from Brian Gianelli - RIP.]

we can be open, we can be sober

a friend asked, amidst twelve gin and tonics, platonic, "do you like to dance?" i explained my situation, my body, with coded eye blinks, i think she understood.

we went up to the room i rented previously, we kissed. it went pretty quickly. clothes didn't matter all of a sudden, dicks were limp before i knew they were there. she was everywhere. i asked questions, eased hands along curves of her body, kissed the parts that weren't private but that no one usually looks at. i found a dimple in her hip. she asked me for something that turned me on a lot, but something that also couldn't be done. i came on the floor i think, rested, apologized, kissed her more, sighed, rubbed her body, kissed her more, took a deep breath, fucked her for reals a bit, stopped, kissed, door knocked, she left. slept.

a foe asked of future, "how do you think that show'll be?" i thought of previous bands that she'd been in, the venue, ticket price, time and date, various other shit, like what i had to do the next day.

i texted that i couldn't sleep, and she should come over. she did, after the show, i gave her minimal directions and buzzed her in. we k***ed, i t**ched her arms, then k***ed her arms lightly with the end of my limp lips. she went d*** on *e, i w**t do** on *er. then * p***t**ted her, many d*ffer*** way*, s*e *am* a co**** tim*s, t*e* **e w*n* *ow* o* ** *gai*, * *ame *n he*, on **r. it **s mos*l* ve*y ***fi***g. s***t.

*******************

boy seeking girl who is bored and constantly dry-hungover. must have a wrecked conscience and mind, though not through experience. must like fugazi, at least a little bit. a dismal plot on life with a good base of friends, family, and comfortable money (but not excessive). politics and body type are minimal, yet must meet slightly leftest qualifications, though not too radical. girl must also know what these words mean. i know, it's asking for a lot, but hey: you deserve it.

restaurant reviews

men eat whatever is placed in front of their faces; i swim for thoughts that can be kept in my head for any conceivable amount of time. if nothing is enabled, all will retain to complete horizon and resting. the best reflection is no reflection.

the family squeezed into the small booth. the side with 2 children had plenty of room, the side with 2 adults was comically uncomfortable. they all ordered soft drinks. 2 seats down, a man asked for a drink with bitters, which fell on foreign ears. he then just asked for honey and hot water. he asked what the soups were, in response to 'tortilla' and 'chicken', he said "my stomach is kinda acting up, i'm not very hungry." he continued to talk a lot as i choked on fried ice cream.

.worst part of knowledge is fact of it .try think to create but try think to sleep it's it's it's .numbers and statistics .try hard and fail .random occurrence breeds interest .everyone pays for most things with cost benefit time relation to thoughts worthlessness .wood glue .professionalism in an empty restaurant is wasting valuable interaction space .every house walked by witnessed the loss of energy .spaced out to sound of spinning .energy to machine .energy and consciousness given to all repetitive motion that involves .fan and air conditioning unit lulls to sleep .fan and snore given credence and precedence in dream and meaning .only due to state, non-energy, non-occurrence .on off on off completely takes all function time to in in in breathe



[don't support anything]

metal seeks safety

the sharp and complete shapes of metal grow towards the softness of clouds. they amass at human junctions and intersections of commerce. species interstate with port and transport, prestige and numbers; the results scrape sky. large buildings with windows like diamonds put arms around each other as if to rejoice at victory. naturally, every human takes pleasure in and subsequently owns this victory and feels the need to name these buildings, to revel in their strange alien glory, to feel like their sight of such buildings embodies scene, spectacle, emotion, happening. as homage, every human carries a small box and contraption, one which contains a perfect and manipulable eye, perfect due to it's construction, it's mechanistic structure, it's malleable and change-based function. every human (well, most humans) tend to flock their sight and light capturing machines towards these large buildings, almost in a way that makes flesh and chemical reaction a conduit for metal communique. the living and respirating just can't get enough of fucking downtown.

my mouth yearns for the touch against skin, the simple pressing of lip's satin surface against a cheek, an earlobe, an unsuspecting neck well received. it's the dull outer surface comprised of such an amount of dead skin, with some nerve connections but muted close to pause. but it's still able to feel. when these lips connect with others, the conduit they travel to reach each other encompasses words, traditions, scents, gestures, currencies, feelings, awkwardness, shaking, time, frustration, sobriety. the leading up to this dam deconstruction and obliteration seems so endless that it's spray painted on every wall i walk by. once this happens, it seems like it's been happening for so long, that i'd only just realized that i haven't connected for like 8 months. 8 years of sundries. i close my eyes as i lie in buildings comprised mostly of plastic, metal, wood, brick; i slowly lose the desire as i forget about touch, only as i pull away from another's skin once again. i like and lie in buildings.

my sick history

i was seventeen and cookie monster eyes were looking at a creek. i puked in the creek. i tried really hard to send the signal jumping around my brain to my feet, the signal saying, "step over the creek, step over the fucking creek, it's so thin, you can just step right over it, it's no big deal," completing bodily function. i stepped directly into the creek with the right foot of a thick skate shoe, following my fucked-up friends back home with a wet, soaked shoe.

i was twenty-two and halloween; i was blacked out at an apartment that punk band 'strung out' was playing at. don't remember a thing. got driven home by my straight-edge girlfriend just before the cops came, dressed as a fairy (wand and all) for the festivities. went home to bed, puked on the bedroom door. laid in bed, puked in bed, everywhere. got cleaned up by said girlfriend, clean clothes, clean sheets, put back in bed. puked all over bed again. girlfriend slept on couch and was very pissed. woke up and did laundry while listening to hip-hop group 'atmosphere'.

i was twenty-seven and with my brother, rolling to stimulants and rick ross to the casino for the night. i was up, then way down, lost about a hundred, went to bed with intentions to work with my brother in the morning. couldn't wake up. couldn't get up. got up at noon, puked in the sink, laid back down. got up an hour later, puked bile in the sink, mostly dry-heaved and tasting of aspirin, shitty dry white chemical. laid back down. got up an hour later, puked bile in the sink, mostly dry-heaved and tasting of aspirin. laid back down. felt ok by 5pm, went to a lobster buffet that i'd earned the night before by staying at the casino for over an hour.

i was twenty-eight and i went fishing on the pacific ocean with my father and my brother. i took dramamine to stave off sea-sickness, though perhaps i didn't take it early enough. quickly i was puking up my morning muffin, banana, coffee. then came water, then came air, bile, neurotransmitters. i puked 8 times, like, 8 rounds of heaves, that is. i did catch 4 fish, though, which was more than my brother or father caught. i felt great upon docking. we shared a lovely meal that night.

i was twenty-four and i was walking home from the bars, i separated my foot into 5 parts long-ways, and stepped on parallel cracks on each part of the foot separation. i swayed as i hiccuped, i looked up to find a restaurant reflection of a friend and a hunger of death, a racing heart that couldn't be felt. i puked in a bush, once, quick, maybe to say 'fuck you' to that drunk self, to deprive him of better sleep. the only swimming position is face down, still, pronated, at rest.

i was eighteen and it was christmas night, i did shots of vodka repeatedly at my brothers place in phoenix, to the point of blackout and boxing gloves. puked in a small trash can, puked under the pillow i was using. replaced those items one year afterward as a christmas present to my brother.

"as complicated as relationships with people are, relationships with chemicals are so much more complicated and tricky."

you must show fatigue

You must join all on their own level. Everyone fatigues in due time. You must set the bar at a lower level than you can jump, to decrease expectation and increase the perception of performance. The feeling of weakness, tired, bloating, degradation, erosion, shamefulness, uneasy, distance from locus of control of body, these are all things that are bound to happen to some extent to all forms of life. One must feign these often in order to connect with those around them, but over exaggerate, exonerate, bluff a shitty hand and then show your cards as better than those around you. To show fatigue is such a necessary moment, our common thread of weakness, but always reveal it while holding the rope that is pulling upward, to then elevate from your fatigue, your weakness, your perception that you are the same as others (which you just felt!) and into your reality that you are the only one around you, therefore, you are much better than anything else. You are the pedestal, you created the rope, you are the everything that everyone talks about (of course). But you MUST be able to tactfully show your insides and insights, your ball of destruction and fright, just before you can come up for air.

i can't

I can’t conceive of life as a competition, though I learnedly know it is. Every principle of growth and development, from words to wealth, from plants to personality, from attention to knowledge, they all function on principles of evolutionary economy where competitive entities battle it out for the reproduction of themselves, living or otherwise. Yet I hear of such a thing and I back off. The most beautiful girl in recent memory alludes to others and I run away in my mind. I find something doing well and I stop my hand from reinforcement and move on, turn to something else. I can’t compete, as it only seems to be “trying too hard”, to be “all talk” when really it’s only action that I’m afraid of. My perception of evolution and growth through engaging subjects, opportunities, seems to only come from other sources, as I’m a conduit of forces that I can’t control. To reach out towards what I want has only been fucked in the past, has been a product of misperceptions and miscalculations. To sit and soak forces that come at me is to acquiesce to competition while not engaging it. The bottom line is who fucks who, I guess, who produces the word at the end of the paragraph. Ultimately, I write these words, but I don’t pretend to know where they came from or claim that I created them. For I can’t.

bold bright feathers

There are certain people that translate their moments with you into a dense conversational economy. They see every interaction as a window into piquing your interest, and hence put everything on the table as soon as you walk in the door. So as you know it’s on the other side, as you put your key in and turn the lock to click, your mind kind of takes a large breath in because it knows of its needs beyond your control or comprehension.

The odd thing about mental illness is the way in which it is socially spread, seemingly. Ill thoughts heard from others are contagious in that the more one is exposed to them, the more they remain in the back of memory, a repeated reverberation. For instance: one who works with acute mental illness hears about suicide (grandiose thoughts of self-harm) often in a typical week from those around him. He then has a few thoughts go through his head that imagine suicide, where none were present before. This comes to consciousness, bringing the thought, “Did I just think of that only because I was exposed to the possibility more often lately? Who’s to say that having these thoughts [as the reflection on these thoughts brings a multiplying effect to such thoughts] is abnormal, and why is that thin line between thought and action such a huge leap from distraction to diagnosis?” Minute cracks of distressful thoughts get their foot in the door, and only the strong and educated avoid dysfunction, danger, deviance. The drugged and marginalized still live within a frame, but cracked and weathered.

Two jars sat next to each other on the counter. A man had things to save in them, and he tried to, but the jars had no lids, so everything spoiled. A woman next door had two lids, with much to save as well, but could not fit much into a jar that wasn’t there, let alone a mechanism for tightening thread. Just like water meets earth and sun meets skin, symbolic symbiosis is as substantive as anything tangible; we live in the metaphor. Hence, a man and a woman lay next to each other, stifled, wanting, waiting, but get captured by sleep and tortured inconvenience before any release can occur. A man and a woman touch skin, hand to shoulder, lip to lip, cheek to back, but still succeed in their curiosity, if for no other reason than failure and cessation bringing the two closer to each other. To know someone’s thoughts is to know their timidity and their trappings, as well.

"this place sucks without you."

A bartender; a bartender is not your friend or your brother, or your confidant, or your television screen. But it feels like it sometimes, and if that vision in front of you cooperates with your dreams, it makes the line become a square. but a bartender, and this one who is a thousand, yet still my own, who has the most amazing cheeks and hipline and quips and eye contact and stories and teeth and SMILE and, well, tactical smile. and personality and “personality” and discounts and gifts and just the act like she really cares about my reaction to her stab at consistency in nicknames for me, me being the occasional bar patron. A bartender who solidified my attention more than the drinks did. A bartender was had, named [sonya].

A bartender was lost. I visited only sporadically, mostly Sundays, when she worked. And then I was out of town a lot, not drinking a lot, but thinking still of her a lot, doubting my thoughts of her as much as I doubt my own sense of sex. I keep going in now, seeing other people, people who can’t mix drinks well, people who focus on themselves and their own shitty ironic tattoos, people who focus on their own relationships as if we give a shit what came before. “It’s my birthday next week, and I’M WORKING…of course! I’ll be TWENTY-FIVE! Well, it’s ok, I’m single now, and I haven’t been single since I was 15. Yeah…” From her I ordered a gin drink that was weak and tasted of sugar. She poured another for a separate customer, the lead bartender saw it, took it back, made another. A song came on that I didn’t like. I was polite and I paid, and I just realized what I had taken for granted.

The walk uphill: 8 blocks of steep sidewalk leading from the Broadway bar to a more comfortable place on 15th. The wood in this bar has a dull glisten that is perhaps more perceptible to our skin and arm hair and breath than it is to our eyes. The rubber of my feet met sidewalk continually, skidding often for feel. I was very comfortable in the night air, the place and sense of direction; the more at home I feel in a walk is the more I feel I’m in a dome, even the atmosphere seems closer and more attainable. I stated years ago while in the depths of home: ‘my room feels like my skin, and this town feels like my room’. I don’t think I want to feel that again, because it feels like a betrayal of the moment I had. Yet I can’t go back, because I no longer feel that same sense of home in that exact place. Seattle is a shell of a city, but the alienation of change keeps me comfortable.

The fucked up thing is that I wanted that bartender so bad that I couldn’t show any affection whatsoever. The fucked up thing is that I can’t even call the friends that I want to talk to the most because a phone conversation just won’t cut it. The messed up thing is that I censor myself out of the consideration of no one. The thing is that I don’t care enough to keep up any kind of drive for preference, and I actually think that’s beautiful, reconciling, a return to an all-we-have.

[I can’t write what I think. I can only write what I feel. I get lost in the night scene, drink to sleep, wake up with coffee and find myself staring out of the kitchen window.]

Twisted naked tree branches sprint out of main trunk, at a much darker rate than sky behind. Sky is dark as far as sky is concerned, but still much lighter than the tree. The rapid and overbearing tree limbs spray out until the window’s threshold stops them with a clean off-white barrier. The light from above slowly filters into the window, lying on drapes and table, but steadily declines with the drink upon such surface. The phone rings and throws off the balance of contrast. The wind outside in the natural environment encases ideas of movement, but a thawed inside seats frozen warm muscles. The only fast movement is that of blood, and movement of blood mimics highways, street legs, only a mechanical basis of function, not blue oxygenate to any neuro-chemical center, only the traveled upon routes, just to keep a place awake. Photos cover inside walls, late winter shadows on black and white pictures equate space, not busy, but soft straight layered sugar.

We all want a place that is completely our own.