Untitled #37

There’s pornography on the bench in the subway station. I’m staring through the haze of ten pints of mistake and regret trying to figure it out. Is this a gift from a benevolent pervert or a twisted, sticky middle finger to the quiet ease of an empty subway station?

The train is late. The train is always late.

My hands look far away, knotted and twisted and crusty. I flex the fingers and feel the scab on my knuckle pull tight and ache. I wonder how whatever is under my fingernails got there. I wonder about how I’m going to get it out. Some things work their way in deep. They burrow down and hold on. They are hard to get out. You try not to think about it so much and put the devils to work on lighting a cigarette you don’t really want or need.

The train isn’t coming.

The ash burns down to the filter as smoke wafts through the bent digits, and I’m trying to remember if I ever did more than light it.  I’m trying to remember if I lit it at all. If the evidence suggests. The butt end burns a hole through the chest of a naked woman caught in the throes of feigned ecstasy. As more of her torso incinerates it looks more like she’s screaming. Help me. It burns.

Sometimes help doesn’t come. Sometimes the trains with all the heroes on board are late.

What I’m Doing When I Should Be Writing

Making beer.

College

Remember college? What the fuck was that about?

 

I was looking through Facebook and it dawned on me that I don’t remember college. At least I don’t have that feeling of remembrance. It’s more like I’ve memorized the stories that happened there, and those have replaced my actual memories. I don’t remember what my college friends look like, not really. I see pictures of them and it registers that they’ve changed but changed from what? Some nebulous idea partly lodged in the part of my brain that wasn’t killed by the binge-drinking I’m pretty sure happened.

Ostensibly I went to college to learn skills toward the end of getting a job and being a real human. I don’t think I ever learned any skills toward that specific end, but I remember absorbing the ins-and-outs of person-to-person interaction that had escaped me in high school. I know that communicative ability is probably the only thing that keeps my paychecks showing up every two weeks because it certainly isn’t the “Hello, World!” Java program I wrote in 2004.

The people I went to college with have kids now. Some of them have more than one. Some are married. Some are divorced. Somewhere in my brain is the memory (or memorized story) of when they started fucking. Or when they were fucking someone else. Or when they were going down on a girl in my roommate’s bean bag chair in my room which I forgot to lock (good story). I remember the story more than I remember standing outside my door going, “what the fuck?”

I think my orientation leader propositioned me for a threesome (the good kind), but now the story is: my orientation leader propositioned me for a threesome. It’s a subtle difference but with each telling what actually happened becomes less clear in my mind. Not through some willful attempt to make my past more interesting – it was more interesting than I wanted – but through a greater need to have stories than to have memories. I mentioned communication earlier. You can’t communicate memories. Memories won’t cause paychecks to appear. A few good stories might. In the all-too-rare case of my paid-for writing, they do.

You don’t remember average days and you don’t remember completely. There’s just details. Certain looks on certain faces surrounded by a haze of unimportant background. I remember that I lost my virginity in college and I remember the story I tell about it. But I don’t remember it happening. No sights, no smells, no sensation. Just the story.

All of college is like that for me now. It’s just a story, told in four parts. It’s a pretty good story, as they go. There’s love, there’s loss. There’s highs and lows. The ending’s kind of harsh but the (anti-)hero lives to drink and fight another day.

I just wish I could remember it.

Got Ya

#BostonStrong

Words When There Are None

So quite obviously I haven’t been updating this blog at all.

The major reason is that I’ve been busy and my writing urges have been satisfied elsewhere. I’ve been steadily contributing to Serious Eats, and have given some thought to expanding my freelance writing operation, such that it is (or rather, isn’t). Since I don’t get paid to be sorta-funny for this blog, my energy has gravitated towards the things where I am sorta-paid to be sorta-funny.

Regardless, I have had some ideas kicking around in my head that are largely more Fun (capital F) than serious. Which is to say, they probably have the artistic merit of a hot turd. But I’m intrigued by them so you may seem more updates coming soon. Possibly even a serialized work of fiction… but let’s start with updating the blog more than once every 6 months, huh?

The other reason(s) I wanted to post something is related to what has happened the past few days. My girlfriend has decided to make the biggest mistake of her life leap forward in our relationship; she’s going to be moving in with me sometime in the next few weeks or month. Naturally this is both exciting and terrifying. Speaking of terrifying, I’d be remiss if I didn’t mention the events that unfolded yesterday in my home city of Boston.

When the Bruins won the Stanley Cup in 2011, I had to watch from a hotel bar in Rocky Hill, CT because I was travelling for work. Yesterday, I had to watch the city where I grew up, where I live and where I hope to raise a family fall victim to a senseless act of violence… again isolated at a distance. Not being present, both for the great joy and the great sorrow, makes the whole event seem all the more surreal. Like maybe it’s not actually happening. Maybe I’ll wake up tomorrow and it’ll have just been a really vivid dream. The stark reality of the situation is so far removed from the unbelievability of it, and the feeling of inauthenticity.

I didn’t know anyone personally who was hurt in the Boston Marathon bombing. Luckily my family, friends and girlfriend are all safe. Or at least, they weren’t involved. I’ve been having a hard time imagining what “safe” even means anymore. We live in a world where the only certainty is entropy. Everything is breaking down. Irreparably and unstoppably. Which just makes the altruistic attempts of total strangers all the more poignant.

Boston is a tough city. For my money, the toughest city. It’ll take more than some coward’s sucker-punch to knock Boston and its people down. The outpouring of help from good people and of good will from bitter rivals has only served to strengthen the resolve of a very fucking resolute city.

And it’s all the more reason I feel inclined to write something Fun (capital F). Hopefully I get around to it.

Peace*,
{V}

* H/T: Martin Richard. RIP.

That Writing Thing I Do (Sometimes)

A long time ago – most likely in a hotel room much like this one – I started this blog as a place to work on my writing.  And despite my infrequent posts I managed to land a pseudo-job doing pseudo-writing. Fortunately or unfortunately depending on your scotch intake level, my other writing has less to do with having no control over your life and more to do with abusing alcohol while watching television.

I write a drinking games column for Serious Eats: Drinks website called “Let’s Get Drunk Watching.” So if you ever wondered what I look like in an ewok-looking hat, enjoy.

{V}

Everything In Its Time and Place

Red-bearded raconteur. Purveyor of cynicism. Goon-tender. Cube jockey. Beer lover. Rap song shout-out receiver. Wrap sandwich inventor. Repentant blogger.

The above “quote” is from my Twitter profile. I’m posting it here to make a simple point: no one man (and by “man” I mean “person” but I like brevity so apologies to any feminine readers for not caving to the PC Stylebook) is any one simple thing. Look at the generic tombstone: “Father, Husband, Brother,” et cetera. We are all an accumulation of our many pursuits, careers, hobbies and so on. Which is my personal spin on the saying, “Common sense is the accumulation of prejudices we have by age 18.”

I have been neglecting this blog to some extent due to my lack of recent author-y authorings. Which is to say I’ve been too busy to write fiction for public consumption, but not to say that I’ve been too busy to write. I’ve been writing a lot, actually. I’ve been writing about my weight-lifting and dieting. I’ve been writing snide comments about the Jacksonville Jaguars. I’ve written beer reviews, fart haikus*, and plans for my new house. I’ve written all this while playing hockey 1-2 nights per week, keeping up with the pro football Joneses, working 10 hours a day, travelling 4-5 hours per week (in a car where time can, and should, only be spent on one thing: driving), lifting weights 3-4 nights per week, and organizing repairs to my house (new windows on Monday, new floors on Tuesday!).

Which is a long way of saying I hate the advice of “write no matter what.” No one is a non-stop production machine (except maybe John Updike, but he’s dead now). Creativity is like a raging bull on a cocktail of meth, Red Bull and Four Loko. You don’t try to steer it, you just hang on and see where it takes you.

For me, recently, it’s been away from writing-writing and back into beer and exercise. Beyond the tag of “aspiring author” I’ve also been wearing removable name tags of “Hello, I Am: an aspiring home-brewer” and “…trying to get in shape.” While these are somewhat counter-intuitive goals, they’re critical for me as someone who 1. loves drinking craft beer and 2. doesn’t want to get a beer belly. Finding that balance has been one of my priorities recently, and in examining how to balances those two parts of my life I’m beginning to learn how to better juggle all the metaphorical balls I have up in the air right now.

My hope with learning this new juggling act that I’ll be able to best allows myself to pursue all the different hobbies that I enjoy without spreading myself too thin. For example, I love snowboarding in the winter. When I go on weekend trips, there’s no chance to hit the weight-room so I rely on snowboarding for my exercise. Those trips are also a great excuse to explore local craft beer; and maybe when everyone goes down for their 4-5pm nap I can work in a little writing, or maybe skip a day on the slopes (save some money for the house) and take a day to write and go for a hike (exercise).

Anyways, I’m rambling now and football’s on.

{V}

* Silent but deadly / It sneaks past the defenses / Sweet Lord! Light a match!