I’m at my best early. And four am is such a cliché. I remember our shared, casual sadness, bathed in a hope that cried for the sun to rise. This human condition is weird. Defined by its humanity. Your body. Where the skin was so soft and where the bones were hard. Those determinations were not yours. And what they wrought was sometimes choice. I like to think of you as soft. But I’m not speaking about touch.
Binary determinism
When I was younger, better looking, and dumber, and still knew everything, I was convinced in the indisputable truth of binary determinism. All problems could be solved algorithmically. Broken down into its smallest components, every problem could eventually be converted into yes/no questions that always had a correct answer of yes or no, 1 or 0.
As I’ve gotten older and not-so-wise, I’ve realized, “Hey, not so fast.”
Some questions have proven irrefutably, repeatedly, exasperatingly, and counter-intuitively to have not just more than one answer, but impossibly, every possible answer.
How profoundly that changes life and how it’s lived. More accurately, it is this realization that causes perceived change because what is always was and will always be
He penikala melemele
You know, when I’m holding a pencil and my hand hurts and I don’t have a computer to type in because last Thursday I got drunk and walked away from my laptop in the park? Run-on sentence. You probably don’t know. I’ll tell you what happens, and you act incredulous. Iʻll try not to say the things alcohol would say. But you can’t tell the truth and tell people what they want to hear. Am I happy? Fuck no. Are you happy? I don’t know anyone who is happy for the next five minutes after they smile. It’s an inconvenient truth how much it hurts to open your eyes in the morning. I look at my son. I look at my daughter. And there is a true respite, however brief. Then my son cries because something hurt him. What is the correct response? Kill what did it? Here’s the truth about life. It’s mostly really boring. Some good shit happens that you planned for, some happens just because. And some shitty things happen. It can’t be avoided. People lie. People die. Nihilism is an easy choice. It’s very easy to wander, and the conclusion that nothing matters is within arm’s reach. You know, I look into my girlfriend’s eyes, even after a fight, even after she just said, “I’m not your girlfriend.” In her weird European accent. And it makes me smile. Those eyes are so beautiful even when they’re crossed. You know what? No matter how much I hope for the contrary? I will die. Everyone I love will die. And if I’m alive when it happens, I won’t like it. What are you going to do?
Boulder 1991
So I can sit here full of rage. Or I can put the fire out. The last time I was fat was at the Cuervo (beach volleyball) in 1991 in Boulder with Kep and assorted hot girls. I had tweed, multi-colored board shorts with a thread unraveling to my left knee. It’s funny what you remember.
A voice from the pretty crowd said, “Sit down, fat ass.” Quiet calls for calm and respect mocked in four syllables. Da da da DUH. And I was embarrassed. I pretended I saw who said it. I feigned anger. I felt shame.
Two months of steeped fear later. I lost all the weight. Then I lost more. And I was pretty like you’re supposed to be. Happy is a long-term find. It doesn’t just land in your hand because you did what you were supposed to. It’s a ghost whispering at sunset, fleeting. It is a smile clenched. It is never again and probably never was. It wins six nights in a row on Jeopardy. Hollow.
Yes, you understand pain. But it’s different. You were born beautiful. You hurt because people don’t act like you expect. I hurt because they are what they are.
7-11
I don’t feel lucky, I feel saddled. I feel trapped within this bubble of “supposed to be.” I played along. I really did my best. Best is never enough. There’s always better. There are past mistakes for everyone. Eidetic and see them every time you close your eyes. Close your eyes, but your mind is 7-11; always open, taking anyone in. The power of pathology is difficult to explain to people who function as people. Get married, have 2.3 kids, buy a house, just be happy. There are those of us who look like you. Went to the same schools. Eat turkey at Thanksgiving. We look the same. But this cognitive dissonance between what I see and what I feel is undeniable.
I get to judge
There are two kinds of hard rock fans. The first enjoy Brian Johnson’s vocals, as do I. We all loved Back in Black. The second, remember when Bon Scott came out with bagpipes and a kilt, and I’m in the group too. He gave zero fucks. And Angus Young was thrashing half-naked even as a boy dressed like a schoolboy because he was one. Then Kiss blew up and merchandised everything that a logo fits on. And Ozzy was snorting ants in the parking lot on a dare because he said he would do anything, and he certainly did even more than that. I understand that impulse. “You can’t possibly swallow that whole thing.” “Give it to me. Right now. Give it to me.” “I don’t think that’s safe.” “Now you’re the voice of reason? Give it to me.” Oh yeah, Mötorhead opened and Lemmy never looked down from the microphone and made punks look like hippies, which in a way they are. I have the word punk tattooed across my neck. I get to judge.
Unreliable narrator
I am an unreliable narrator.
I make no pretense to disinterest. Everything I use to fill the vacuum of this life is done by choice. Consciously or subconsciously, I am neck deep in my interests and biases. So are we all. The difference is my memory. It is eidetic. I can often remember things exactly as they happened. The trick to being unreliable is the interpretation of these events to suit the argument I am making, which may or may not remain consistent. It really depends on the moment. It depends on the audience.
Now for the hard part. Sometimes I am the sole member of this audience. And the cognitive dissonance that occurs during the process of packaging a situation is far more dissonant when the package is for self-consumption. It’s not impossible, clearly. And by what I’ve witnessed, I’m not the only person doing it. You see it in a color-by-numbers, kindergarten-simplicity when the law becomes involved. Statements are taken, snap judgments are made, then all evidence that fits a hypothesis is hoarded, while anything that subverts the accepted idea of “what happened” is summarily dismissed as coincidence or superfluous. In our personal lives, we do this shit on a whole other level. Why? Because we are fighting for our perceived actualization and the definition of our capital-s Self. That is a constant battle waged from cradle to grave, and everything is sacrificed in its effort.
The few individuals who can subvert this compulsion, or rise above it, are pointed to as heroes and anomalies of selfless wonder. Again, I don’t include myself, even remotely, among these beautiful freaks of human nature.
Pi revisited
Pi is a never-ending unfolding of an unlimited process. To the right of the decimal point, the numbers appear never to settle into repetition. For all intents, it is random in a way no intelligence, organic or artificial, can improve. In these ways, pi is a perfect proxy for what can never be known. No matter how long we look.
Perfect
What do you want? Perfect? Perfect shames and mocks you constantly. Should I bother spending half my life learning how to spell words that no one ever uses? Would that be perfect? Would a perfect score on the SATs make me perfect? Dial down a little when you judge me. Full disclosure? I’m almost the opposite of perfect. My brain articulates well. Don’t confuse that with I know what the fuck anything means or what I’m talking about. I’m the same sapient primate that you are.
Silence
Now watch me move the middle. I eat beauty all day, and then I reckon it a mess. Secrets, lies? They can’t be trusted in my ears or mouth. I’m good at lots of things. Silence is not one of them.