I heard that.

"I HATE UNCLE SAM."

Agreed.

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(get up), you're borrowing time.

If it doesn't hurt, you're probably not learning anything.

I spent the entire day with my brother. Mom was discharged last night (and I don't actually know where she is now) and MeeMaw had the operation for her hiatal hernia today, so I took Brent out to get our minds off of it all.

I took my sister to work, then wrapped her and Brent's Christmas gifts. Brent and I decided to go and see 'The Day The Earth Stood Still'. I enjoyed it, but I can understand how some critics might not. I get very emotionally riled up when a film or television program addresses humanity's collective stupidity when it comes to environmental issues. Anyone willing to produce a movie about it is a friend of mine, even if the script is weak and there isn't a clear arc of progression. Afterwards, we went to Bass Pro Shops (which is my brother's personal heaven) and then to Lynnhaven Mall for H&M (my personal heaven.) After picking my sister up from work, we just now got home. MeeMaw's surgery went well, my mother's phone calls are less grating. It's all fine, I suppose.

Spent all of the busy time trying to sort through this all. There's a lot to sort through.

I suppose, per usual, it all comes down to purpose (or my lack, thereof.) Don't really have one right now, which I remember used to get me down in college. I actually found the journal entry from the very day that I decided to give up singing classically. I'm a ball, and I roll on only because I'm pushed. Not taking pictures. Not singing. Not making memories, I plan on purging this all anyway.

It's comforting, in a morbid way, to know and believe that in all aspects of life, what goes up must indeed come down. I will be much wiser in the execution of all things in the future. I have examples numerous of that mantra; financially, emotionally, physically, musically. Everything that was built up is collapsing back down. I have nothing to stand behind, now.

Fortunately, I'm a terrific actor. I can fool anyone. Unfortunately, I'm a wonderful actor, and I sometimes fool myself.

I believe that God directs Fate, and that Fate is giving me the note to get the hell out of this. I'm bored of feeling this way. Can't get my roots firmly in anything...yeah.

Blah blah blah stream of gloomy consciousness nothing is good enough what do I do now blah blah no one even knows what the fuck i'm talking about blah blah blah there's a broken blood vessel in my right eye blah leave me alone end.
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Better pray for your sins

Because the gay messiah's coming.



Also, it doesn't really feel like Christmas.
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Slobber.

I'm drenched in it.

Pavlov conditioned his dogs to salivate when they thought they were going to be fed. All of the feeders wore lab coats, so when the dogs saw a person in a lab coat, they started drooling. Later, Pavlov rang a bell immediately before feeding the dogs, so even when food did not follow, the dogs would salivate upon hearing the bell.

I've realized this week that I'm one of those stupid dogs. Maybe it's not fair to call them stupid- they were, after all conditioned to think that certain factors guaranteed them food. My stupidity presents itself in that I am not, in fact, a dog. I'm a sentient human being, and after all of these painful false alarms, I still haven't learned that the bells and lab coats are all a cruel joke.

I've been on outptut overload, lately. I have love- so much love- that I'm mailing out in record amounts. I'm emailing cryptic pleas for love and attention, messaging 'no worries' that are more appropriately 'please-worry-about-me's, calling desperately praying to hear that I've already been called, and my step back from it all has shown just how William H. Macy in Magnolia of me this all is.

How sad that I've been foisting my love on people. That's not like me. I'm an absolutely interesting and kind enough person for there to be a reasonable give-and-take, but with matters as they are, I have all of this love and nowhere to put it.

So I realize that it will all come to me. Because I deserve that, for once. No more emails and code. No more endlessly refreshing my Facebook and checking the answering machine. I deserve so much more than that.

I deserve an immediate response, a drink on you, the extra concern, the glance and smile, the intimidation and deference for my talent and my passion and my love. I deserve to be sought after and looked for, pined over, cried over. I'll demand nothing less because if I didn't, I'd be wasting me (and I've spent the last few months doing just that.) Wasting me. Wasting gold.

I am no man, I am dynamite.

I guess that all means that the discount season is over. Sorry, boys. I've been making things way too easy, and I'm not going to do it anymore. All of this canine drooling ends here.

Gmail is my new boyfriend. At least until you all man up and get smart.
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Eastern State

Had to drive my sister to Richmond today to get her replacement birth certificate- the Department of Health Records is there, so we made the hour trip to start filling in gaps. I was in such a good mood when I left this morning, but came home to that heaviness that I knew would start to settle here.

Karma has started catching back up on his appointments. It would seem that most everyone who had it coming has started receiving 'it' in the worst way. I hear that I'm supposed to glean more satisfaction from this than I am. Instead, I feel guilty. Not sure how that works...

I'm just so tired. So completely exhausted. Aside from the fact that I have a habit of creating and establishing connections with people who aren't poised to reciprocate my emotional downpour (see: "I'll Get you He-Man" and "Ready When You Are...Except Not"), I spend a lot of my time hoping for necessity.

This portion of my life has proven to be pretty stupid.

I'd write more, but there really isn't more to say. Except maybe that I love Rachael Yamagata. And that I miss Cassie and Daisy. Like...so much. And that thunderstorms are, to me, like aural hugs. I'll probably sleep so much better with the window open tonight.

Screw you, VA.

PS. I am sleeping at night again...which is awesome. Baby steps I suppose, no?
PPS. My mother's probably being committed long-term to Eastern State, a mental hospital in Williamsburg. The irony is overwhelming and unfortunate.
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heritage hilarity

from the den, where they're both staying right now:

My sister, Gabrielle: Brent, your feet stink. Like, really bad.
My brother, Brent: Maybe it's your mom.
Gabrielle: Maybe it's your mom.
Brent: They're the same. You're stupid.

I'm not going to lie. I do kind of miss this stuff.
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I'm a proud papa.

I've become a regular face to Cindy, the clerk at the 7-11 down the street from my house. It's literally not even a block away from the house, and I stop there probably once a day with my huge 'Double Gulp' cup for a refill of Diet Coke. We talk whenever she's ringing me up, and I've been in there a few times with my brother. I found out last week that she thinks Brent is my son. I've gotten that I look like I could be in my late twenties, but never that I look old enough to have a 15 year old child. I don't have the heart to tell her that he's only my brother, but I can't help but laugh inside when she asks how my son's hunting trip went or tells me that he'd probably rake the leaves for me if I asked, since he's such a nice young man (for which I get the credit.)

A nice young man, indeed. Arguing with him over who's better at Rock Band prompted me to spend the last two days holed up in the den practicing. Yours truly can definitely now play 29 of the 58 songs on expert on guitar, and all of them on expert bass, thank you very much.
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no, it's actually not ok.

I will not be convinced by this.


I am not the villain.



"Sorry" doesn't erase the wrong. Especially when I know that its just the southwest edge of this ionic zig-zag.




I will not concede to this.
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persecutor--victim--rescuer

We're in a lunch break right now. We've been at my mother's townhouse since 9 this morning moving all of her furniture into a moving truck and hauling it over to a friend's empty house for storage. Her eviction goes into effect next Tuesday, and seeing as she is still hospitalized, the responsibility falls to me and my siblings and grandmother to see to it that all of her belongings are removed from the house by then. I've been using 'her' as a pronoun, but this is also the house that my brother and sister lived in before all of this started happening. That's an important part of my fury.

Needless to say, I am not happy about having to be here, working to clean up this absolutely unlivable wreck of a house while she is sitting calmly, quietly, cared for, on the psych floor of Norfolk General, claiming to not 'remember' why she's there and what's been happening.

We had a family session on Friday afternoon. She started it off rather cheerfully, espousing over and over that she just didn't really remember things. She said that Brent was 13 (he's 15) and that she was 39 (she's almost 41) and that she had only had one ECT session (she's had 3). I'm completely non-plussed by that sort of talk these days- I'm a good enough liar to see right through the lies of others. And she was and is lying.

But as the meeting progressed and she started to realize that I wasn't going to acknowledge her supposed memory loss, and that recollection or no, she was solely responsible for this financial mess (among other things), she became very hateful. She started spewing hateful words at my grandmother and me, talking about how neither of us love her or care about her, lying about how we try to steal her money and how she can never do anything right.

Then she asserted that when she's released, Brent is coming to live with her wherever she ends up. She could end up on a 'street corner' or in 'a shelter' and Brent would still go with her. I assured her that he would not, in fact, be going anywhere and that incensed her, because Brent is HER child and how dare I tell her where he'll end up. She then continued shouting, gnashing her teeth, accusing me of things and being generally unpleasant and confrontational. At some point, I looked at the social worker and it was if she had never seen anything like it. My mother's rage came out of nowhere, which was a surprise to the nurse and social worker because she had been deliberately guarding that aspect of this conflict. Until that meeting, she was going to be released on Monday (tomorrow). The social worker assured us that after the incident on Friday, that would not be the case.

She is utterly insane. She has resorted to making up new and creative but ultimately untrue hateful things to say to and about us, and she has found new horrible ways of trying to inflict guilt upon us. I learned from the sw on Friday that 'suicide is an angry act, committed to inflict guilt upon someone else'. If I know my mother, I know that she most definitely intended to harm us by harming herself.

So here I am, in the nearly empty living room, listening to my sister try and make excuses for my mother because their role reversal has triangulated to the most unhealthy degree possible, listening to Jerry and my grandmother discuss a plan of action for the remaining belongings and mess, listening to my brother bicker with Gabrielle about just how bad this house actually is, wishing that I was in my queen sized bed in Polos on Park, curled up with Iago and Golden Girls in the comfy sheets and comforter that Michael bought for me for my birthday two years ago. I want to go back there. I am beyond repair here.


At first, I thought that I would want to record all of this. I remember the night that my mother 'fell down the steps because she heard a voice' and ended up at VA Beach Psychiatric. I remember thinking, this is so bizarre that I need to write it down so that I'll remember it. But I didn't write it down, and I most certainly haven't forgotten it. It's still strikingly fresh, and the fact is, the situation has become ... I don't know... otherworldly. I've never seen a story like this one in a movie or on TV. I've never heard friends or acquaintances talk about a situation that even vaguely resembled this one--- and I'm hardly seeking pity for my superlative family situation, instead seeking to find some way of, without going through the entire (and inevitably VERY long) discourse, to convey just how consuming, serious, infuriating, unfair and terrible this whole thing has become.

My mother is a monster, and according to the social worker, will most likely succed one day in killing herself. People who are obsessed with dying usually find a way to participate in the act. And all of this will still have been for nothing.

That's a cheery forecast, idn't it?
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Sell. Cell. Fish. Phish. Sell fish? Cell fish.

Selfish.

How often do you say that word aloud? Say it now. 'Selfish'.

Doesn't it kind of get stuck in your throat? I find that the very construction of the word is gooey- a kind of sticky, mushy sound that gets caught up in your gums and in those holes where your wisdom teeth used to be.

Selfish.

Such a negative sounding word, and hardly ever used to describe anything good. Etymologically, I think it should be noted that it more or less means 'self-focused'...'self-defending'....'self-preserving'?

It certainly becomes two completely different and substantial words when you look at it from a situational perspective. But, as I learned today, the word more often than not has little to do with what I've done, excuse me, what one does to preserve...um...one's self, and more to do with how horribly self-centered (usually to the detriment of someone else) one is being.

I would argue that few people, in the course of their lifetimes, sit through interactions like the one I sat through today. And the last thing that I'd want or expect is sympathy, or even understanding. To expect the understanding of those close to me would mean that I expect them to, even in minuscule doses, ingest, digest and regurgitate the flaming hatred and unchecked confusion that I was subjected to today. God knows I would never wish that on anyone.

So what do you do? Do you lie? Do you blog about it? Do you phone a friend? Do you don the eye-shadow and lash marks of your fellow-martyred acquaintances? Or do you allow the mush to slowly, awkwardly, clumsily make it's way down your esophagus where it sits (deliberately, maliciously) in your stomach, then your intestines, waiting (patiently, smugly) to be expelled? I suppose, in the matter of Diaz vs. Selfish Mush, the claimant will just have to swallow it whole.

I think, unfortunately, my teeth are rotting from all this viscous nonsense.
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love is clear...like...transparent

I've been especially careful to reserve my feelings about the Prop. 8 debate, only because I have very moderate views about it and don't want to paint myself into a corner either way. Of course I feel that everyone should have the same rights when it comes to love/marriage/unions, but I feel that we're largely fighting a semantic battle, one stemming from the use of the word marriage to prescribe a list of regulations about love as an abstraction and the legal rights associated with said 'love'.

I digress. Check this out: this is why I feel so privileged to know and love the people that I know and love.

I need to ask you something. As a gay person, and as a black person. I know you don't like the term gay, blah blah, but still. How you choose to live your life does not go along with society's "norms" and so I will still think of you as someone who may participate in homosexual activity, free love, open love, whatever you want to call it.

This was in the Metro today (the free "T" newspaper):

"Black is the only black--forever."
'Re: "Gay is the new black": If a person is homosexual, it is a lifestyle - being black is not a lifestyle - from birth, it'/s a lifetime! Furthermore, if a person is homosexual, that person can choose to conceal their lifestyle. As a black person - I cannot conceal my existence. I can't hide my full lips, hips, locks, and complexion. Moreover, homosexuals have never been used as animals, raped, sold from families, identities stolen. I truly applaud the gay community's causes, bnut do not dare compare your pain to what my people have been through from centruies past."

I'm REALLY mad. Like, mad enough to write an editorial. I already did.... Gays have TOO been persecuted (holocaust, anyone?), raped, used as animals, and we don't even get an identity. We don't have the same privileges.

How do you feel about this? I'm asking because, do you think this, do you find more problems being gay or being black? I read an article once by a black female politician, and she stated that she has always felt more of a minority as a woman, instead of being black.

This person who wrote this could very well be an ignorant sommabitch, but, maybe more people think this way? You're my only black friend. Help. No, I'm kidding. I just know you're open and can talk about this, and I value your opinion.

Hm. This is a tough one (I should x-post this to FB to help our numbers...haha)

I agree with both ends, because I participate in both 'lifestyles''. The response to the editorial is on to something- there is indeed, in my opinion, something to be said about differentiating between the two civil rights struggles. I think that on a deeper, more instinctual level, blacks still feel a subconscious need for reparation, even just from what we've read in history books. I mean, if you've ever seen Amistad or Glory or Roots or Color Purple, then you know just how deeply those feelings run. Sure, gay people have been persecuted for hundreds of years, but they've never been slaves and they've never had, until now, outright assaults on their liberties documented and lamented over the way blacks have. Of course some blacks will be up in arms about, essentially, a 'lifestyle' choice being compared to a question of someone's unaffectable race and ethnicity.

That said, persecution like this doesn't always have to include slavery, rape, stolen identity, et al., because I think that we, especially as Americans, have become really good at quietly persecuting everyone who's not an upper class White male. Women, for instance, have been treated as second class citizens in MOST Western societies for MOST Of the Modern Age. Jews, Irish, Blacks, Gays, Women, Poor, Sick- we've pigeon holed pretty much everyone at some point, with the overwhelming exception of the 'Joe the Plumber's out there (and he can suck my cock). I don't think that the comparison 'Gay is the new Black' is really even necessary- because the outrageous assault on our rights as humans deserves its own memories, its own documentations, and its own fury. I think we have a different battle here, because 'the gays' walk silently among us, do everything that 'the straights' do, and are facing- EVEN THOUGH YOU CAN'T EVEN TELL WHO WE ARE- the limiting and removal of basic rights. That is ridiculous and sad to me, and deserves to be categorized in its own way. At this point, I'd feel more comfortable with 'Gay is the new Woman'. "Sure, you can walk around and be a normal citizen in EVERY right, going to and from work, caring for families, participating in the economy as doctors, writers, and teachers, but you can't vote." Wait, what?

So basically, I'm saying that I understand that person's anger, but don't necessarily share it. Hate, as far as I'm concerned, is hate, and I think it's a little tired to be comparing one persecuted groups' trials to anothers at this point- 'well wweeeeee were slaves, so we had a harder struggle'...oh buh. You're not slaves anymore, and YOU can get married to ANYONE you want to, so chill. You know?

And to answer your last question, I haven't really found much trouble in my life being either gay or black. Sure, its harder for me to find a date than the average straight guy, and sure, maybe I need to put forth an extra polished first impression at job interviews, but with small exceptions (like that one time I got arrested in Apalachicola...boo), I've not faced persecution for my color or sexuality on a serious level. Instead, I've faced every generalization and and limitation because of my socioeconomic status, which just goes to show that you can be a second class citizen because of ANYTHING these days. I've been snarked out of more friends, jobs and situations like that because of money more than anything else.

So boo to intolerance. It really is sad about Prop 8, but its only a matter of time before we as a society have to take yet another look back, to realize that really none of us comes from any semblance of pure blood. We're all a little poor, gay, black and Irish somewhere back there...


One more thing-
having read through the original Advocate article, I'd like to point out something that I don't agree with:

'Suddenly we were faced with the reality that a majority of voters don't like us, don't think we're normal, don't believe our lives and loves count as much or are worth as much as theirs.'

I hate that generalization. I think it's just as ignorant to assume that because you don't support gay marriage, you hate gay people. They don't all hate us. We're largely talking semantics here- 'marriage' is indeed defined as the union of a man and a woman. Clearly, we're splitting hairs in many situations- in states that rescinded civil union rights as well, its a different story, but to say that a vote for Yes on Prop 8 means that you don't like or value gay people is nonsense. Typically, ignorance isn't as smart or calculating as that.

That said, I really think this guy hit the nail on the head. The future of this argument is not about lashing out for our frustration, but in showing people that love is love...and that it looks pretty much the same across the board.
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It's me or the dog.

Dear Victoria Stillwell,

Whenever I need a pick-me-up, I always know that you'll provide a smile on It's Me Or The Dog on Animal Planet. You're amazing sense of style, shameless updo's and ponytails, random outbursts and totally practical training methods have made me realize something very important- I am in love with you. And I don't even have a dog. You're like a female, dog-training Rocco DiSpirito and I'm hott for you.

If you're ever in Southeast Virginia, please, for the love of all that is good, look me up.

Cordially yours,

X-topher

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For What It's Worth

Good News

I've been so remarkably busy up to this week. A trip to New York City that was a huge ordeal in and of itself, the subsequent trip to Baltimore ended up being a bigger ordeal and finally the trip to Raleigh for SoJam, which was an eye-opening experience to say the least, have all kept me reasonably busy for the past month or so. I've been around people most of the time, feeling important and necessary and all of that. Most of my duties at SoJam could only be completed by me, and there was a really rewarding feeling of having done something that others can't do, which adds to personal value.

But now that all of that is done- the traveling is done, the interactions are over and the duties fulfilled, I'm back in VA still in between jobs and now, more than ever, so lonely.

There's a strange penitential quality to my life here. Since being here, things in my family situation have all turned towards the remarkable worst. I got a job, then had to leave the job because of family situations. Have no money. Have no real goals.

But more than that, I feel, in some sense, as if I'm paying an emotional price for something I've done. I feel it more in a social sense, as if I'm being forced to be alone because it's something that the powers that be know I handle less eloquently than most things. In my previous few years, I've thrived almost entirely on my ability to entertain, my ability to exist as a social being, my talent at grasping and holding attention. Now, none of those talents matter in the least. They aren't helping me get a job, they aren't helping me find friends, they aren't affecting my musical work, and they aren't making me (independently, at least) happy.

How trite and cliche this tired old internal dialogue seems to me now. I've spent years- literally years- in which I've agonized daily over this same confusion about self worth. I've wasted so much time finding worth solely based on my own abilities, but I realize now that my friends and acquaintances have taken the same place that my romantic relationships used to fill. I need them to feel worthy and necessary, and the sooner I can detach myself from that unhealthy co-dependency, the sooner I can fully participate in the stupid business of 'finding myself'. Blah blah blah.


I got towed in Baltimore last weekend. It was actually early Monday morning- I went downstairs to walk to Peabody and meet Jeefy for class when I noticed that my car wasn't there. I had intended to leave Monday afternoon, but after calling the towing place, I knew that I wasn't going to be able to come up with the $265 in one day- they didn't take credit cards and were about seven miles out of downtown towards the East end, which is, to paint the picture, the backdrop for the show 'The Wire'. I finally figured out the money for Tuesday morning, but most city offices were closed for Election Day. I ended up not being able to leave until Wednesday.

My time in the towing office was terrible. I firmly believe that for people like me, that place is what Hell would be like. Hours of waiting in an unreasonably small, poorly circulated office, with angry, tight-lipped, hairsprayed clerks mindlessly and emotionlessly vomiting the same infuriatingly calm, scripted responses. The number I drew when I entered remained perpetually five or six more than the number on the electrical counter, and each new person headed up to the window leaving more upset than the last. When I finally did get called, the rude, loud-mouthed woman who dealt with me informed me that because I 'waited' an extra day, the fees had gone up thirty dollars. No amount of haggling could dissuade her from charging me extra for the Election Day time, and because I had to pay cash, I was short the thirty dollars. She told me to come back to the window when I'd found it.

These two guys were a window down, claiming a junked auction car, and they heard what was going on with me. They were both shorter than me, both layered for the cold, both dirty and unshaven (mechanics, would be my guess), and were having their own set of issues with their respective clerk. After the woman upset, I stormed outside and sat on the step trying to figure out what to do. One of the guys came out and asked me how much money I was short, I told him, and he mentioned how shitty it was. Then he left.

About half an hour later, he pulled up in his pick-up truck and hollered for me to come to the window. He asked me again how much I was short and then pulled $40 out of his wallet and gave it to me. I told him that I couldn't possibly accept it, but he told me that he could tell that I wanted to leave Baltimore, that he could see I was having a hard day, and that he had it to give so I should take it. I asked for his phone number and his address so I could pay him back, but he declined and told me to 'pay it forward'. I told him my name was Christopher, he told me his was Mike, and he drove off.

I paid for my car, got it back, and called my friend to tell him what had happened. Then, I sat in my car and sobbed for about five minutes, because even though I'd had such a terrible experience with it all, God literally provided me what I needed and showed me that there are still genuinely kind people in the world. I didn't think that things like that still happened.

I only write about this because I think on it now when I feel lonely and gross. There are people for me, and they're around- where I am in life is largely about circumstance, and it will hopefully change soon.

I should write more. I'm having a hard time organizing my thoughts the way that I used to.
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cellophane, mr. cellophane...

...should have been my name, 'mr. cellophane'.

you can look right through me-
walk right by me-
and never know I'm there.



Figure it out.

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bottle it up, christopher:

I know that it's your soul, but could you bottle it up
And get down to the heart of it, no it's my heart,

you're shit out of your luck

:no one listens to your whining, anyway.

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Random Travel, Part 6

Manhattan, New York City, All day (YUHZ) 10/24/08

I’m on a train right now on my way back to VA. I’ve never taken the train to/from any place except when in a theme park. I’m not going to lie, it’s kind of exciting having all of these firsts happening so close to one another. The downside? Trains can’t move nearly as fast as planes, so I’m going to be on the train for another 8 hours…and that’s not as exciting as other things that I’ve encountered on this trip.

So Friday was my free day. By free day, I mostly mean ‘the day when I was free to go around and look at things and buy things and not feel at all guilty about it’. Nobody needed anything particular done at the theatre, and I had no other responsibilities, so I took the day for myself to do and see things that I wanted to do and see. Awesome.

I slept a little bit late which was wonderful after the exhausting day that I had had before. Between helping at the theatre, getting lost in Brooklyn and driving the rental truck back and forth, I was really tired and slept until about 11:30. I got up, got dressed, and took the subway to Manhattan for a fun day.

The funny thing is that even though there is so much to do in New York City, it can be really difficult to plan out what it is that you want to do. I wanted to do everything; see a show, meet up with friends, have delicious sushi, buy cute clothes, see sights I hadn’t seen before- but when it came to actually doing things, it was hard to choose one. So as I was walking from the theatre more towards midtown, I saw a Sprint store and decided to take care of order number one: getting a new phone. Of course, I’m hardly a rich guy, so its not like I walked in there looking to invest in something serious. But we’ve all seen the commercials for the Rumor and everyone knows that if you’re going over your text messages by the hundreds, have switched to a plan to accommodate that and are seriously hampered by T9, its time to move into the slide phone age. Hence, my cute little Rumor. She’s black with a blue stripe, and I lovingly named her ‘Brooklyn’, Brook for short. I have this thing with naming electronics, and since I don’t often own cars, I’ve transposed that naming desire over to electronics. And since I’m talking about it, I’ll just take the few seconds to say right now that I completely love the thing. This phone is completely awesome. I can create my own ringtones out of my own songs (currently All-Night Yahtzee’s Hey Jude serenades me every time my phone rings), I can text twice as fast as I could before, it’s a new phone so the battery life isn’t completely lame, and it slides open so that I have access to a plethora of new features (not to mention the QWERTY keyboard makes my phone-internet life a lot easier, something that was virtually impossible on my last phone.) Brook is awesome, and I’m so glad that I got her (for almost HALF price, no less. I *heart* New York, indeed.)

After getting the phone, Brandon took me towards Mid-Town via a route that would take me by the World Trade Center crater. This is the fourth time that I’ve been to the city since the towers collapsed, and I’ve never seen the site. It was, for some inexplicable reason, very important to me to get to see it before construction began on the new towers intended to take the place of the old ones. We walked by and I got to look on it from a park across the street. The funny thing is that there isn’t much there. I mean’ of course there’s the absence of a building where there used to be one, but aside from that there isn’t a huge to-do. It’s like any other construction site. It was kind of haunting to know that hundreds of people died at that very spot, completely randomly, completely unprepared. It was strange and somehow profound to think that I watched it happen on the television, and that for as long as I lived the memory of so much faceless death would be seared in my brain, having occurred at the very spot I was looking over in real time. As morbid as it was, it was also rather fascinating.

I feel a little dizzy, but I can’t tell if that’s the drinking that Dave and I did before I came to the train station or the inevitable motion sickness. I can’t say I’ve ever tried typing while in motion.

Anyway, after my WTC moment I was starved. It was past noon and I hadn’t had breakfast. What did I get? Sushi, of course. I got Bento Nouveau sushi at this corner restaurant, and it was, in a word, DELICIOUS. I’ve had a lot of sushi, but this ranked at the top. So good. I had to fight the pigeons while eating it in the park, but I ultimately won and had a delicious lunch.

While I was eating, this very kind round-faced African woman asked me if I would take a picture of her in front of this flower bed with bright yellow flowers. She asked me to take it on her manual disposal camera, and I found something charming in her possession of the already-antiquated disposal camera. Taking her picture though, her bright white smile contrasting her dark skin but complementing the bright flowers, set upon me that internal floatiness of a genuine New York moment. I’ll probably remember that until I die. I wish I’d thought to get a picture of her and the flowers on my own camera.

After lunch in that park I decided to get walking to see what else I could find. I took the train to Times Square to walk around and sort of feel things out. I doubt I’ll ever get sick of the place. It’s tried, yes, and it’s touristy, yes, but even if I lived there, I think that I would enjoy being able to visit a place so full of life. I actually like being bumped into by people bustling to and from work and home and lunch and meetings, and I really like the possibility of at any moment seeing someone I know. (On Sunday afternoon I ran into Natalie Caruncho, a girl that I went to school with, RIGHT outside of the Ohio Theatre. Strangely enough, she also knew one of the guys from Surrender. It’s such a small world.) I walked around and randomly took pictures of things like any good tourist, and after the window shopping had gotten my salivary glands properly juicing, I found H&M. Now I’ve learned not to have a country boy attitude in that store. Typically, I’d rush in and grab everything I liked and buy it right then. Today, I went in, grabbed everything I liked and walked around with it for a little bit. In the end, I went with this beautiful dark green sweater with a high neck, a plum T-shirt to go with it, and an ivory colored knit cap with a brim. There were also these great black pants and a white sweater with a half hood, but I had to edit my choices to feel better about myself, and am glad to have done so.

That took a few hours, and after that I had some time to kill. I got my sister and grandmother scarves from one of the vendors near Bryant Park. $5 for the ‘pashmina silk pashmina silk!!!’ scarves that I bought them, and later in the day, only six bucks for the neon green ‘I *heart* NY’ shirt that I bought my brother. Not a bad run if I do say so myself (considering I also bought two scarves for myself.) After all of this (and a LOT of time wondering if I would be allowed to rest inside the library), I went back to Times Square to contemplate either seeing a show or a movie.

I know it seems lame to see a movie when in the center of Manhattan, but after my talk a few nights previous with B and Hartley (‘everyone should see a movie in Times Square at least once. It’s like a question and answer session’) I couldn’t resist. I saw ‘Synecdoche New York’ at the Times Square AMC. Um…wow. Firstly, the audience was SILENT. Not a peep, except to laugh at the amazingly morbid Charlie Kaufman jokes. This movie was really a rather incredible feat. You ever read a book that it takes you days and days and sometimes weeks to properly digest and to some degree understand? This movie was that way. It was long and confusing but riddled with incredible performances and a darkly hilarious screenplay that essentially asserted that no one’s suffering is unique; that we all share our misery via some existential invisible emotional pipeline. Though there are things that I still don’t understand (the house on fire that never burns down…?), I highly recommend engaging in the total mindfuck that is ’Synecdoche New York’ (pronounced ‘sih-neck-duh-key’…I didn’t know this until just tonight. In retrospect, how embarrassing it was to have asked for one adult ticket to ‘cynic-doshe’ NY…) There were street dancers outside that were really entertaining (even though they were wearing UF colors...gross.)

After the movie, I was starved (because though I’ll pay nearly any amount of money for a cold Diet Coke, I will NOT pay five bucks for a small popcorn) and decided that I needed to stop and eat at some place that would allow me to gorge myself in the good-old fashioned carnivorous style. Luckily, Golden Buffet was right down the street from the movie theatre. Let me preface all of this: I’m not really an ’All You Can Eat’ sort of guy. I typically think that buffets are a marketing scheme, because honestly, who can eat enough to actually put a dent in the supply? You pay them an increased amount of money for ’all you can eat’ when you and most consumers ultimately eat exactly what you would have anyway. That said, I thought that I might be buffet hungry and went for it.

I don’t know that I have ever, ever eaten as much Chinese food in one sitting as I did that evening. Plate after plate of pork fried rice and General Tso’s chicken, fried shrimp, noodles and DC, followed strangely but complementary by peaches and those little circle cakes. It was delicious. The servers thought I was weird for taking pictures of my dining experience on my teeny tiny laptop, but I didn’t really mind. As you can see, the picture came out weird and split anyway. At any rate, they refilled my glass and took away the numerous empty plates all the same…

After that, I headed back to the theatre for the end of their rehearsal and then to Brandon’s for sleeping. While at the theatre, the Asst. Dir. Melissa (who is wonderfully kind and really hilarious) and I got to talking about each other’s school, family and living history. Turns out, we’ve traveled similar paths, and when she heard that I am no stranger to the theatre and have a bit of experience with directing/stage managing, she asked me to fill in for her on Saturday until she could get there. Of course I said yes. How cool to essentially stage manage a show that I’d only first seen two days before! This was, after all, part of my trip experience and I was happy to do it.
A fun (and hilariously fast) car ride to Brooklyn ensued, and then a great deal of sleeping occurred. This was good.

There’s a really cute bookish Columbia ginger seated in front of me and a really awkward and adorable dark and floppy haired cook/chef sitting behind me asking me questions and being generally charming. These things make public travel totally worth it. More tomorrow.

PS. If you don’t own Feist’s Let It Die, you’re incorrect. Own it.
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Daytime Drinking

Alright, so I have a lot of updating to catch up on, but because I'm busy with my SoJam duties and other things in the city, I'll hold off and tell you these two things:

1. Dave Brown is a godsend, and staying at his apartment IN Manhattan has been great. We talked the night away and it was awesome. He's pretty much my brother from another mother.

2. He lives. Right across. From H&M. The view from his living room window:

Eat your hearts out, bitches.
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"A Ridiculous Comparison, With All Due Respect..."

And can someone, anyone, please explain to me why any poor conservative is even a bit worried about the redistribution of wealth?

It's infuriating.

Rich people will STAY rich, you assholes. No one's trying to take anything away from you. But if you can afford to pay taxes, then you ought to. You make more, therefore you should give more. And don't even get me STARTED about the basic selfish moral implications of any person who could honestly say that they don't think hard working middle-class Americans don't deserve a break. Clearly, none of those people have ever had a family member die because they couldn't afford to keep them alive. Nonsense.

It's just so infuriating to hear particularly wealthy young people talk about how Obama is going to 'steal away' all that they (read: their parents) have worked for. Even if we were to become a big, red, scary Sooooooccciiiallist state, it isn't out of necessity or unfairness that our society would crumble, it would be from the raged greed of those feeling punished.

I'd like any one of the worried parties to talk to me about not having. I'd like any one of them or you to talk to me about your mother being released from a mental hospital prematurely and then trying to kill herself again --- and all because her health insurance 'ran out'. Apparently, only people without money think that its not a matter of greed or fairness that every person deserves to eat and to not die when they're sick. Have one singular person talk to me about real life issues--not about whether or not they can afford another car, house or iPod -- THEN we can discuss the negative implications of this whiny, indignant, self-righteous Socialism tripe.

Dear America,

Read more books and grow a fucking heart.

Love always,
Christopher
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Random Travel, Part 5

New York City, all day, (10/23)

So this morning I got up and got to the theatre to do what I could to help in the theatre. At first there wasn’t very much to do, but I put my obsessive compulsive to use and got to organize some costumes and things like that. Actors are sloppy- I know this, I am one. It was really exciting and relieving to be back in a theatrical environment again, getting to work and be in the theatre at all… there are some chances in VA, but none of them are really current. While I was working on all of that, I got a phone call from my grandmother about the family session that they (my sibling and grandmother) had with the doctor and social worker.


Per usual, I was blamed more than usual for things that are either completely out of my control or completely not my fault. This is an ongoing issue…and to think that there was talk of releasing her. If the family meeting ‘set her back a bit’ (because the social worker was ‘harsh’ with her), then what exactly does she think life is going to be like once she’s out and confronting me directly about her issues? I think it’d be unethical and unfair to release her before she’s ready, because that would essentially seal the deal for my sister and I becoming her permanent watchdogs and guardians. That is a job that I don’t think either of us should feel obligated to do when she’s in a hospital supposed to be getting better and away from this kind of destructive behavior.

My sister says that they’re going to be trying shock therapy on her. I don’t know exactly what that means, but things must have gotten pretty bad if she’s not responding to all of the other conventional methods of psychotherapy. A big, sloppy mess is waiting for me when I get back to VA, and I’d be lying if I said that I was looking forward to deal with it. I know that every time I ever talk about it, I just seem cold and heartless and unwilling to be sympathetic and caring. But that’s very much not the case- I’ve been trying my hardest to be there for her and my family, but I’ve been lied to and about so much that I can’t possibly give anymore. A line had to be drawn, and everything that we’re dealing with now is being dealt with in post-line-drawing rhetoric.


I digress, for lunch B and I went on a long walk to find something nommy to eat. We walked for blocks and blocks and settled on this little Italian place on Greenwich. I had a delicious sandwich, and while I was eating, a mother and her two kids came in. They were really cute, really precocious kids and they were adorable. Mama bought herself and the both of them a slice of pizza and seated the kids at a table right by ours. While she was paying for the food, the kids started talking back and forth about how much they love salt and pepper (keep in mind that neither is more than four years old). From here, they begin a salt, pepper and red pepper siege on mommy’s pizza. They poured TONS of this stuff all over her and their pizzas, and it was so cute not because they were being mischievous, but because to their little brains, they were really doing the right thing for the taste of the pizza. Mama was surprisingly patient with them when she realized what’d gone down, and just scooped all of the nonsense off of their pizzas and let them know that it would taste yucky while commending their creativity. I thought it was nice. That’s how I hope to deal with my children one day.

Back to work. One of the things that I volunteered to do was return the rental truck to the place in Brooklyn. This was a huge adventure.

Firstly, it was due back by five PM. I got there at about 5:15, and the Jewish man who owned the place was very frustrated with me about keeping him from getting home to his family for dinner. He went through the checklist and asked if I’d filled the gas tank back up. Shit. We’d forgotten to do that. He gave me directions to the closest gas station (and there aren’t many in New York) and five minutes and told me to make it quick. I flew to the gas station a few blocks away and filled the tank back up on my credit card… but the machine had an error printing my receipt and the man inside was METICULOUSLY poring over lottery tickets, so I just left without one. I got back to the rental truck place, the man finished the checklist and we came to find that we’d ALSO forgotten to remove the palettes that the boots had been on. I told the man where the house was (only a block away) and he said that he’d take me there and drop me and the palettes off. After I signed for the truck, I got in the middle of the cab with him and his friend (I don’t know if I metioned this explicitly, but these were big, flushed, frustrated Chasidic Jewish men) and they drove me (rather roughly) to the house where I took the palettes and got out.

So great, the truck was back, I avoided TREMENDOUS clean up and refueling fees, and got back to the WowHaus in Brooklyn. Great.

Except now… I’m in Brooklyn…without a car….and I have no idea where I’m going. I’ll ease up on details here to tell you that I basically walked for over an hour, trying to find a subway station. Every person that I asked wasn’t able to help me (in English). After a while, I’d wandered into a place I didn’t even know existed. A community consisting almost only of Chasidic Jews, and I felt very out of place. They were all very busy, rushing to and from whatever they were doing. And it made it very difficult for me to stop one of them and ask for directions.

I walked for about an hour and found a G train stop somewhere on Flushing. From there, I was able to get help getting back to the theatre, but at this point, I was very cold, very tired, and very annoyed at having gotten lost on foot. I hate getting lost period, and getting lost on foot is worse because the correct path is going to take an especially long time to get to.

I helped out in the theatre as best I could, but was just so, so tired. Got home and crashed. I crashed knowing that I was going to be able to visit Heaven (aka H&M) in the morning, and that no pain or weariness could bother that joy.
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Quotes from the Ohio Theatre

"Ingrid is like an electronic clam, with a glowing pearl sparkling in her abyss-like clutch."
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Random Travel, Part 4

On-The-Road, 5pm 10/21

The rest of the drive to NYC rocked. I came to find two things that I love about driving in the North
a. aforementioned Service Houses, named after people like James Joyce and James Finemore Cooper, and
b. bridges.

If you know me, you know that I hate bridges. I hate water. I hate oceans. And I hate bridges, because they put me in touch with the water that I hate so much. But bridges are your friends if you spend less time looking down at the evil water below and more time looking at the cool structure of the bridge above.

See?

And just so you know, for anyone who hasn’t been to (or at least driven through) New Jersey…you’re not missing anything. It was grey and overcast the whole time, and the one time that I stopped at a rest area thingie to pee, the people all looked sullen and hungry. And I haven’t mentioned their very unfortunate attitudes about driving…

But history occurred when I left the New Jersey turnpike and crossed into NY.

New York City YEAAHHHH!!!! (rush hour, 10/22)

I drove in the city. I drove in Brooklyn. I drove in Manhattan. I DROVE during rush hour in New York City, and I think that I am a ROYAL bad ass for having PWNd the roads and not crashed or been honked at or any thing. I rock.

Anyway, I went to B’s house in Brooklyn, and from there drove over the Brooklyn Bridge to the theatre in SoHo. Again, awesome driving skillz. When I got to the theatre, I was really tired, but everyone was really excited about the boots. I kind of just vegged out in the back of the theatre and watched the rehearsal. I have a lot of interesting perceptions about this show, but I’ll save those until Sunday when I get to actually go through the whole thing. It’s a really, really exciting idea.

Anyway, I was sleepy. Quite sleepy. Met some cool kats, watched the rehearsal and then headed back to Brooklyn with Brandon and the truck for some sleepy time.

Day one in NYC, tiring but good. Day two? More tiring, less good. Will get to that ASAP.
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Random Travel, Part 3

Baltimore, MD 10:30pm, 10/21

I’ll start by reiterating that once you get into VA, the drive on I-95 is SO much better than before. The downside is that as you approach the Northeast, the metropolitan areas get bigger, and the traffic- and road systems- become exponentially more intense and thus, dangerous.

I’m no stranger to driving through downtown Richmond, I had to do it last month while I was working with Eagle. Lots, and I mean LOTS of city driving, and the way that the roadways loop above and below each other (and are so poorly labeled) is exasperating, but ultimately rewarding to have conquered. Driving the big truck through there wasn’t much fun, but I can say with some clarity that I conquered it like a regular badass. Even that, though, didn’t prepare me for the absolute concrete clusterfuck that is 95 and all of it’s children as you close on Washington, D.C.

Ideally, I’d put a picture here, but I can say with some clarity that if I had taken a picture while driving the fucking Jetsons inspired death paths, I would not be alive to blog about it. I couldn’t possibly find the words to completely explain it, but suffice it to say that every exit and every sign includes the number 95 in some way. I-95, I-295, I-395,I-495, I-895...see? After a while, they start to look the same to you too, don’t they? These overpasses were unreal. At any given moment I was driving HUNDREDS of feet above the ground on two-lane overpasses at 65mph- in a HUGE, loose, temperamental 10 ft. moving truck. If you know me, then you can understand the degree of anxiety inherent in this portion of the drive…

Aside from the roads, time seemed to stop here. I felt so accomplished for having made it through the day (including a phone call asserting that my mother would be coming home tomorrow…yeah, right), but I was so excited to finally get to Baltimore and see Jeefy that I felt like time was standing still.

But eventually, Baltimore rose from horizon and I got to see my Jeefy! Baltimore is an actual city, unlike any of the other places that I’ve lived, so naturally there was nowhere to park Dot. I parked her temporarily in a grocery store parking lot, but needed to go and get Jeefy to find me.

Perfection. I got ambushed coming out of the elevator on her floor!

We found some place to park the truck (kind of illegally) and then got to spend time drinking a few beers and just enjoying each other. We thought about going out, but at this point in my life, I’m content to just enjoy my friends’ company. It was nice to sit with someone who understands my humor and the sounds and faces I make, and what kind of beer I like (the nugget bought me Red Stripe!) and what my phrases mean. It was low key, but such a breath of fresh air. And, to make things better, Jeefy’s new roommate was really sweet and a lot of fun, as was her other new friend Paul (see below: we got a little drunk and went on an adventure to move his car.)

Strangely enough, it was even harder saying goodbye to depart for NYC than I thought it would be. I’m going back to Baltimore next weekend to play with Jeefy and her friends for Halloween- but still felt tears well up as I dropped her off at Peabody (that’s right, I dropped my little puddin’ off at school…I was so proud…). I think I might love her way too much.

After dropping off my Jeefs, I went to Wal-Mart for some things and then got on the road. I got a little bit lost on an exit trying to find gas, but I found the ultimate date spot for Jeefy and I, so it was worth it (just wait mah frin, you’re going to get so romanced next weekend).

And I’ll state again that I-95 is AWESOME once you’re in Maryland and beyond. AWESOME.

Service Houses FTW.

P.S. Did you know that there is a Brooklyn in Baltimore? I saw this sign and was fairly certain I'd actually manifested my teleporting abilities into something commercial. Then I realized that I was just delirious from copious amounts of caffeine and McDonald's.

I can never poop when I'm on road trips, so my stomach is in a perpetual state of owie.
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Random Travel, Part 2

Warner Robins Air Force Base, 8:30am, 10/21

I got a little bit lost getting to the base, but it was ok in the end because I got there right as they were opening up. I went to the wrong gate a few times, but what surprised me most about my obvious lack of knowledge when it came to the protocol of the base was the generally pleasant demeanor of everyone who helped. I was really put off by all of the weaponry strapped on everyone- there were handguns and rifles galore, and though the made me anxious, everyone who I talked to was very nice to me. The auction yard where the boots were was any engineers dream world. It looked like Watto’s junk shop from Star Wars-half pieces of cars and military trucks, palettes loaded with tents and military garb, huge tanks and turrets and a massive claw that was moving and dumping trash. It looked kind of like those 50 cent games at Wal-Mart where you try to grab the iPod with the claw that very obviously doesn’t have the strength to grip anything.


There was a really calm aura about the base- I’d expected everyone to be rigid and uptight, but it was mostly young people just going about their business. I had an interesting time explaining to everyone why I was getting boots, and where I was from, and what they were for, but nobody gave me any trouble.

I got back on the road with the boots in the back of the truck and realized that I-16 must have been paved recently just for me. There wasn’t a soul on the road. And that’s when I HAD to stop, because the prospect of falling asleep on the road is scary in and of itself. The prospect of falling asleep on the road in a rented truck with an out of state license and two massive palettes of military issue combat boots in the back of said truck seemed even worse.


I'll take this time to introduce you to my accomplice on this trip, Dot. She's kind of a badass bitch and she's been good to me.Except for her 12 miles to the gallon gas mileage, and inaccurately marked 35 gallon tank. And her lack of cruise control. And her extremely constricting seatbelts. And her loose steering. And that whole thing about her not having a tape deck, cd player, or any other means for me to get music aside from the regional Top 40's (I've already memorized Pink's new single and want to stab Daughtry in the ear for his.)


But I napped, got back on the road, and got to Baltimore in a little over 12 hours. A few things to note:


I-95 SUCKS until you get to Virginia. From VA up, its nothing but rolling hills, the autumnal changing of the leaves and these delightful rest areas called ‘Service Houses’ which start to pop up in northern Maryland. There a lot like the stop at Okahumpka near Orlando- food, gas, restrooms and the like. Really, there great places, and everyone who works there notice the ETA to any other place the whole way up I-95. They were little oases after the hellishly boring and rough trip up the bottom half of the interstate. Georgia and both Carolinas consist of little more than the same kind of tree, the same bloodied stumps of deer, and the same rude and infuriatingly entitled drivers for about 600 miles. But I’ve jumped ahead- visiting with Jeefy was one of the best things that’s happened for the past two months, I think.
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Random Travel, Part 1

On-The-Road, Stop 1. (1:15am, 10/21)


Just outside of Florence, SC in a very colorful, very bright Taco Bell attached to a Pilot gas station. I think that WiFi not being free is highway robbery, though I remember reading the other day about the potential setbacks of a government plan to make vast, countrywide WiFi networks available to everyone. Anyway, being here reminds me of the many, many Yahtzee trips that came through Florence, and of my roomie Kristen. I thought to call her and let her know that I missed her, but it’s kind of late (1:15am.)

The nice cashier ladies said that gas is 2.40 in GA. Yes plz.

Driving alone has been a lot easier than I remembered. The time has been zipping by, and for some reason, I’m not tired at all. Got to listen to some music (though in my headphones, which is super illegal, because this greasy old truck doesn’t even have a tape deck that I could use for iPod adapter…) The trip has been, thus far, wholly unexciting. I kind of expected as much considering that I opted to do the first leg of the driving overnight. I don’t care for daytime traffic on I-95, especially in this big cumbersome truck. But I know that this first half isn’t the exciting part. Tomorrow night, I’m going to be sitting down to a late dinner with Jeefy, and currently there’s nothing more exciting than that prospect.

I need a new phone. The battery on this one isn’t worth shit. I suppose I better do more driving while I’m awake and willing. More to come on the truck I’m driving, which I’ve lovingly named Esther. She’s a loose old broad.

On-The-Road, Stop 2 (6:20AM, 10/21)

I stopped about ten miles from the AFB where I’ll be picking up the boots, thinking that some place so out of the way out here in the ‘Heart of Georgia’ would have a room for me to stay in. I was wrong. I stopped at a Best Value Inn (across the street from the Huddle House I’m eating and charging my phone in now) where a very unpleasant little Indian man told me that the only single room he had was a smoking, handicapped room and that it wasn’t available. Clearly, he’d just woken up to assist me and was annoyed. I’m certain that this is the only real reason there were no rooms available.


My thought was that because I doubt the AFB will open to give me the boots for another few hours, I’d sleep for a couple of hours and then head down there. Since that’s no longer a possibility, I suppose that I’ll just camp out here at this Huddle House until 9. The Diet Pepsi I’m drinking tastes like it’s got some kind of cough syrup in it. I’ll switch to coffee. There is a disappointing teeth-per- mouth ratio compared to other places, I think.

One of the only exciting (albeit morbid) things that I’ve encountered thus far is the really disturbing array of road kill in this area. I’ve been driving rural roads for a long time now, but I’ve never seen what I saw today. I was changing the song on my iPod and I looked up to see, literally, half of a deer in the middle of the road (I-16). The bottom half of the deer was splitting the road, and the rest of him was strewn all about for nearly half a mile. Aside from the widely distributed deer parts, there was a massive trail of blood that went for about the same half mile, like something from a horror movie. I ran over some part of the deer with the truck, and I’ll spare you a description of the sound. I was freaked out, needless to say, because I’ve never been witness to such a gratuitous highway mangling of an animal as big as a deer. Very disturbing.

Ugh. I hope this base opens soon. If not, I won’t be Baltimore till after midnight, and that’s simply won‘t do…

On-The-Road, Stop 3 (3:45pm 10/21)

OMG.


WIFI AND SUSHI!!!!!

NOM NOM NOM NOM!!!


Edit: The gratuiutous pictures of me nom-ing are probably here to stay. Just saying. There are a TON of delicious looking restaurants in this neighborhood in Brooklyn...
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