Couple anecdote.

I took a break around four today and went to the Petro-Can for some snacks. I quickly grabbed some barbecue flavor Doritos, a can of Coke and one of the new caramel Mars bars. I met eyes with an attractive woman behind me in line and I smiled, immediately feeling shame for what I was about to consume. Here was this woman whose face was round and appealing, not unlike an apple or a plum. She was a little stout but certainly in the neighborhood of fetching, and I was about to stuff my face with a trifecta of wretchedness. Just when I was leaving though, feeling pretty damn bad about myself I might add, I overheard the woman say, “I’m looking for the manager, I’m the Rothman’s rep.” Now, isn’t that a juicy piece of irony, right there? Here I was feeling like a world-class ass because of my appalling dietary indiscretions, yet I was dealing with a woman in the cigarette biz. On a side note, Rothman’s cigarettes are the brand my father smoked and that eventually took his life, which perhaps peppered the situation with a bit of insult to injury.

When I got back to work it was time to pass my work by my boss. Jim’s a rather ornery guy who I’m reluctant to bother unless it’s absolutely necessary, and when I sheepishly entered his office he was scrolling thru someone’s photos on Facebook. One of the photos showcased a large painting of Alfred E. Newman on someone’s living room wall. Lurking over Jim’s shoulder I noted, “I’d hang a painting of Alfred E. Newman in my home, for sure.” To which Jim responded dryly, “who wouldn’t?”

Anonymous practice tweets:

1. I get insecure when I wear my Queers shirt to the pool. I’m a fan of the band and the demographic, but when I’m around other naked men I only want to make my allegiance with the former known.

2. I didn’t finish reading Revolutionary Road; it was feeding a very pessimistic part of me pure poison.

The pool.

Me and my best bud have been hitting the pool almost daily and boy does it feel hot! I want it to get to the point where I’m slicing thru the water with such precision it feels like I’m skimming across the surface. I wanna swim so fuckin’ fast people give me looks that say, “take it easy bud, you got crazy eye.” I have so much unresolved anger and frustration that I really need to just sweat it all out. And what better place to get real sweaty than the pool; it’s self cooling and self cleaning! I dig the feeling of my arms powering thru the water, while my legs correct for balance by pulsing in perfectly timed intervals; it’s an art I’ve yet to master but it’s important to have dreams.

Response

I've thought about it all evening, and I respectfully disagree. Does our finding interest in few things in the world relative to what there is mean we are rejecting the rest? It's not active rejection, so how can it be a verb? And why should it make us feel better to believe acceptance is a rarity? Acceptance or rejection of people is really the issue, and it's the acceptance of all people that's the catch phrase. I believe I accept and am accepted by most people around me already, and it feels very good to think so.

And I think rejection's personal for both people. It's just hard to remember that we ourselves might like someone we don't want to date, respect someone we don't want to work with, and that people need different things from love; when confronted with throbbing inadequacy, amaranthine loneliness, or having your heart splattered all over the bed.

John Coltrane is buying groceries, a hawk sits on a lamp post over a freeway, four women push baby strollers into a tiny cafe, a man with a fish hook earring pleads his case through the glass at the welfare office, a voice actor specializing in movie trailers steps into the sound booth, a teenager walks to school hiding a rose in his jacket, a baby chews on the corner of a paperback, the driver of a car covered in action figures swerves to hit a cyclist and drops his joint between his legs, sun streams though a barred bedroom window, a fat uncle calls his niece a cunt at a barbecue, a son comes home at sunrise wearing a polka dot diagonal mohawk, someone unpacks their lunch in the parking lot, the tide encroaches on a snowman, someone's mother says, "Be gentle with him", a woman receives her brother's ashes in a plastic bag, a girl un-stitches her fingers from her boyfriend's, no one notices a shy college student enter the party, a tambourine discharges from a third floor apartment window, a reunited couple dances to, "There aint a man today who could tear me away from my guy", a woman trains her dog in the rain, wind leaps into a somber phone conversation, in a bar a man describes the sound of afternoon glaciers shifting on the Himalayas, pedestrians watch a cat chase a crow with a broken wing, someone gets a sliver from a picnic table, a condom floats over a flooded storm drain, a man cuts the cord on his wife's call with a kitchen knife, a kid watches the pulsing guts of a dying mouse, a priest descends from the pulpit laughing, the dawn advances on a frozen horse, strawberry flavored rat medicine is brought up in conversation, a man fancying himself to be an out of work boxer salutes a prostitute, the fist twin is born, the bulb on a taxi burns out, one man says, "We're surrounded," the other one says, "Who's we?", and the lights come up on the only guy left in the theatre.

Just a thought.

Hey Buddy,

You know your theory about there being no real way to botch up your life short of committing some heinous crime? I’ve been trying to get on board with that line of thinking. And, as I mentioned to you earlier today, I think the concept of rejection needs a good overhauling, perhaps as a companion theory. Sure there’s a use for the word rejection in the English language from time to time, but what I’m proposing is that we try our best not to take rejection too personal. Rejection is the world’s default mode, what’s special-and rare- is acceptance.

Yours truly,

Blankity Blank Blank

My wife's hazel eyes changed color in the night. This morning they are green. Why the changed neither of us can figure, but we both agree it is an improvement. Today I'm going to buy her a nice green sweater to match her new eyes, and she is already hinting at emeralds. Emeralds are fragile and don't set well into jewelry. I made mention of this, and I hope that will be the end of it.

The fat whale overslept and missed his bus. One more day like this and I'm going to see the buzzard, he said. The next morning same thing. That's it, the fat whale said, off to the buzzard with me. At the buzzard's apartment things were a bubblin'. He stood before the front steps, alarm clock in hand, and looked up at the third floor window, where from he could hear turkey's arguing, proud-fish sobbing, a lion overcome with loneliness, and what sounded like a buffalo stomping around in indignation. Maybe another day, the fat whale said.

It's two days before Christmas and as is my custom I am overslept and down to the wire for present buying. I'm stressed. My sister's mix tape is taping and I'm a prisoner here until it's done. Then it's up to a bead shop on Main Street and over to my friend Charlotte's house to catch the ferry. OK. Conventional wisdom says don't fight being depressed if you have reason to be, and don't dwell. Don't dwell, but be depressed? I have to admit I don't understand. I MISS MY BABY. C'mon. Pearl of wisdom.

At this stage (stages for me are abundant, fickle and erratic) I have a solid footing and a poor to pathetic personality. I am comfortable with this. I worry that no woman will ever again find the time to think the pulp of me appealing, but then I can't predict the advancing stages. And anyway, women are not on my radar. The whole idea of second loves waves at me like a sail from the cavern of the storm. Every woman is a question and a definite answer. Truth be told, my affections are going nowhere until she comes back and I get another crack at it. I'm dedicated to my purgatory. I'm getting on with my life, but making all plans around next summer. Every day I pray she doesn't meet him before then, and then remind myself of the chief importance of her happiness. I feel her eyes on me every time I play with the dog, am kind to a friend, or think I look good walking. I'm a terrific mess.

But my next stage might find me hilarious again, charming, thoughtful, considerate, caring, clear minded, friendly, not easily angered, humble, successful, widely liked and respected, engaged, excited, adventurous, confident, grounded, replete with new, practical talents, sober, employed, possessing a cell phone and an automobile, unencumbered by anxiety or secondary disturbances, having taste, tact, and tenderness, with libido unharmed, bursting with stories, basking in future endeavors, happy, and otherwise totally fatherhood material. By summer.

Some thoughts(full of contradictions, no doubt).

I think I’m on the mend. Or at least I’m on an upswing and -with any luck- my next plummet won’t be as dramatic as this last one.

I don’t like socially volatile scenarios, scenarios where I have to navigate through the zoo of human emotions.

I’m sick of thinking about myself all the time. When I say I’m sick of thinking about myself it’s a round about way of saying I’m sick of thinking about other people and how their sadness affects me.

I saw so many girls downtown today that made my heart flutter. I have no choice but to believe in love at first sight because I fell in love like six times today.

I don’t really have that much trouble attracting girls; I mean I don’t have any glaring impediments in that department. Other than my unusual level of fear, of course.

I need to work on my self-confidence, accept my limitations and work within them to better myself.

I’m a little hazy these days, but not enough so that I can’t do my job properly or have a little fun from time to time.

My dangerous lows are an unfortunate inevitability but I mustn’t break under their weight, I mustn’t be fatalistic.

I think I’m finally coming down to planet earth after several years of total romanticism and fantasy.

I think central to my problems is a strong desire to be understood.

I never used to expect so much from myself; I’m displeased with myself but I don’t think I was ever much better.

It’s a confounding conflict in me that I want to meet a girl who A. doesn’t want to change me and B. makes me want to improve myself.

Sexually, I probably need to discover some freaky new thing that’ll make me wild. But until then, I’m gonna be pitchin’ notably fewer tents.

It seems lately that you are whatever you think you are. Because the only person paying attention to your slight behavioral changes, is you.

God only knows what kind of impressions I’m making as a sad twit who hates himself, but I’m sure they’re no worse than the impressions I’d be making as the egoist I’m always wishing I was.

Artists need to spend a lot of time by themselves; making art, introspecting and investigating other artists and their methods. These are areas I’ve been neglecting lately.

I sometimes fear I don’t know enough about the world around me to hold the interest of a good woman for more than a few fleeting weeks.

I’m reading this tedious book because I had a brief interaction with a pretty girl who liked it.

I had a conversation recently with a girl I was once infatuated with. Thankfully I’m now capable of thinking of her as just an ordinary human being with flaws and blemishes; she’s no longer above scrutiny. She still seems funny and thoughtful, but lots of people are.

Two computer geeks sit across from each other in a crowded deli, one has a mustache and the other has the kind of smirk on his face that can’t be controlled.

“The thing is,” says the one with the smirk,” I wouldn’t have acted the way I did around her if you hadn’t told me you liked her.”

“You’re an asshole.” Says the guy with the mustache.

“I’m serious, human relations are so weird, I was deliberately acting aloof around her so you would seem like a nice guy. Usually I’m pawing and fawning like an idiot when they’re that pretty.”

“I don’t want to talk about it.” Says the guy with the mustache, his sternness at odds with the comical amount of mayonnaise in his mustache.

“And then at the Christmas party she starts flirting with me like crazy. I’m sorry man, but girls who look like that get to make all the decisions. We’re all just witless mules waiting to answer to their whims. I mean what am I supposed to do?”

“For starters you can choke on your tongue.” Responds the man with the mustache.

I don’t have anything to do at work and I sit in a really high traffic spot. So, everyone can see I’m not doing much of anything all day. Today I drew uninspired doodles of anxious people on post its. If they’re not gonna give me any work to do they at least could have stuck me in a cubicle. Then at least I could pretend I was busy, but no, I’m right in the middle of all the action. Everyone else has work to do so they’re all pretty unreceptive to my weird jokes. The lack of affirmation makes me resort to ever-more childish antics until I end up embarrassed. Then I sit there silently listening to Adam Carolla on my Ipod, I like that guy a lot, I tend to enjoy the loudmouth-types, the ones who say audacious things without feeling any shame. I like Adam Carolla, John Kricfalusi, and Ben Weasel; I live vicariously thru their self-assuredness. I daydreamed a lot today about having magical power over 18 year old girls, they would be defenseless against my charms for the entirety of their eighteenth year. The day they turned 19 though my spell would be over and they’d be left to decide for themselves: is this guy worth a damn or have I lost my mind? I imagine it would be sad as hell ‘cuz invariably they’d all leave me after I’d grown attached. Until one day maybe one of them would stay on for her nineteenth year, of her own free will no less. What a treat that would be and then her twentieth, twenty first and twenty second years would follow with any luck. If this failed to happen at least I could continue spending my days and years in the company of charming young women at the doorstep to adulthood. Oh people would talk, they’d say, “that creepy old buzzard has some kind of a scam going, he’s not charming, handsome or even polite.” Let them talk I’d say, the men would all be jealous and the girls would all scornfully mock and pity me, but what a life I’d lead! As years progressed and my body grew tired and old, I’d yearn for the girl who'd love me past her magic-induced year of devotion. I’d have less and less in common with the youth and one day I would die, essentially alone save for a beautiful young girl I’d known for less than a year.

I used to read this blog and feel sorry for the anonymous people behind all the moaning contributions about the elusiveness of love. I thought, 'you only have to be open to it and to work hard on being lovable'. Now my heart is vapor. I want to tear it out of my chest and give it to a bum. When I talk to people I feel like the mouth of a terrible cave. And all I have to look forward to is to joining you.

Oct 29th 2005(unedited for your reading pleasure)

I forewent Ellie O's party this evening in lieu of a night with Meg Ryan and Billy Chrystal.  You might say that time spent alone watching romantic comedies is a little on the self-important side of the sadness spectrum.  But, let's be realistic, that's the side you want to stay on 'cuz the other side is where all the fatalities occur.  I did a bit of drawing today but my hands were lazy and my mind was soft.  

I should be able to spring back from rejection with alacrity, reminding myself of my enormous creativity and unparalleled charisma.  But, until I shape said enormous creativity into tangible matter and/or display said charisma to appropriate audiences, love will remain elusive.  

You know, you really do have these high hopes when you sit down to write.  You think to yourself, "this time, this time I'm gonna nail it."  But alas, ambiguity takes control-as she always does- reminding you that you really know very little and any moments of clarity you may have are just annoying little glitches that seem like answers but are really just questions masquerading thru the fancy dress party in your mind.  Whew! Not the hottest rant I've ever been on but I've had worse audiences, the type that just sit there, mouths agape, looking around for an escape route;  surveying the crowd for someone normal to interact with.  Someone less intense, less hostile, less self-obsessed.  Less is more.