You're a Refund

Just finished estimating my tax returns. While a good portion of this country dies a little inside when tax season rolls around, I eagerly await it. As an unemployed loaf money has reached a near sacred status to me, clinging onto any bit of shell with the fanaticism of a zealot, & hot-diggity, am I excited. Sure, partly my enthusiasm has to do with how easy my taxes are, no sorting though year old receipts or itemized deductions, no hope credit or special forms, just fill out that one page, lick the postage stamps & rub my hands together anticipatorily, grinning like a twelve year old with the recompense of one summer’s worth of mowing lawns & washing neighbours’ cars burning a hole in his pocket & still two weeks before school starts. Wait, did I say postage stamps?!? I use my comp as an entertainment center, downloading MP3s as I watch the special features of a DVD, checking my email every ten minutes, I read my news online, I use keyboard short-cuts on a pc, I blog for god’s sake. The only time I use the term ‘postage stamp’ is in conjuncture with ‘tap water’, ‘land line’, or ’16 bit’, & other such archaic phrases one uses to define & date the crude & oafish standards which the previous generation employed to gauge the worth of their life. Of course, I’m going to e-file, of course. Postage stamps, geez, I collect the scanned replicas of postage stamps & that’s only to be retro-cool & sorta as a joke.

47 Monroe Doctrine & How it Relates to the Medical Field

My knuckle is still screwed. It's pathetic. I'm an old man for god's sake, bad back, arthritis, achy muscles, & now this damn knuckle...
Also my sleep pattern is all kinds of messed up. Anymore now, I get my last two hours of rest in the afternoon, taking a cat nap around 12, after I've been awake five or six hours. Here I am at 5.30, when the rest of my unemployed gits for peers are fitfully sleeping off last night's debauchery & I'm wide awake, purposefully sober, restless, blithley blogging & considering sitting down to a good book & a spot of tea. I'm a little TOed that my living room is currently inhabited by two said peers, so I'm obliged to stay in my bedroom/closet, which is near anathema to me. They're lucky they have jobs & such, a good reason to be asleep, or I'd be there in a heartbeat, writing obscenities on their foreheads & in general making them wish they hadn't slept in the freaking living room.

Had a whack dream last night. Not going into detail, suffice it to say that I was thrity something & contemplating visiting a doctor, a specialist, one of those MDs that focus on aspects of your life that while not life-threatening may become cause for concern, like you snore too loudly & it is waking your domestic life partner, so you go see this specialized doc, & while snoring is completely natural in your case it is just a bit too extreme, or at least it is felt that way, by you or your DLP, doesn't much matter in those types of situations now does it, & so you go see this doctor about your snoring but it wasn't snoring in my dream, oh no. I could only wish it were snoring.
Most disturbing characteristic about the dream is that to my thirty year old mind going to see a doctor about something completely non-life-threatening seemed the most commonplace & expected thing to do & then here I am in actuality, a twenty-three year old with certain medical ailments that could probably use some attention, have been begging for just a little attention for some time now, & I have a hospital pact with my friends. A hospital pact is a simple concord: never under any circumstances, unless it is one of those life & death situations which we hope to only hear about second hand & never have to experience, are we to take one another to the hospital. Full stop. End of story. Unless I've consumed two gallons of alcohol, have hemorrhaged three & a half pints of blood & have bitten off my own tongue during a seizure that's making good on beating the record of longest seizure ever seized, then & only then are you to take me to the hospital, anything less & you won't be my friend anymore & I'll have no qualms over writing obscenities on your forehead while you sleep.

On Living Quarters

I live in a closet. A 10x8 space which once roomed a w/d, a litter box, shelving full of miscellaneous junk, the type of junk that one accumulates living in the same spot for three years, & tools, hammers, soldering gun, ratchet sets, drills. All crammed into this dusty, moldy room with linoleum for flooring & two water heaters shoved in a corner, one for our apartment & the other for 47½ Monroe. The architects who designed this room had no intentions of anyone living here, of anyone spending even more than a few minutes here. When I moved in the washer & dryer were gone, most of the junk was donated & the litter box relocated. Remaining still, to this day, are the tools, the water heaters {whom I have named & imagined life histories for}, the prodigious mold & the ubiquitous & pervasive sentiment that under no circumstances should one live in this pimple for a room, unless they desire a crippling blow to their ego. And I’ve only been making it worse recently. Bearing in mind the clothes strewn all about my dresser, the typewriters & four track on top of those piles of clothes, I’ve now moved most of my musical equipment in here as well, guitars, amp, a keyboard resting atop two boxes, & I’ve just enough floor space to sit at this chair, type at this computer & run screaming when my claustrophobia takes hold. There is a small space near the door where I could lay in a fetal position to sleep but any more now I take to the couch in the living room.
Yesterday we were blessed with an unseasonable warm day & I took a long walk along the Willamette. It was near the rose gardens that I had an epiphany {& I’m off to join a freakin’ intentional community right now, Christ...}, something along the lines of considering most facets of my life right now, living in a squalid closet, being unemployed & living mostly on credit, never showering, my thaasophobia {yeah thesaurus}, that I should be a raging drunk right now. Some self-serving, idealistic, wino, drinking throughout the day, typing manically on my 1920s German machine at god-awful hours of the morning, competing with Mike for ownership of the night {see previous blog}, writing poignant songs on my geetar which I can never reproduce the next morning, walking through Sladden park menacing threateningly at the frisbee golfers, chortling insanely over nothing & frightening my friends, etc. Fulfilling that romantic notion society has of the drunken artist. I’ve even been there before, in Madison most infamously.
I’m a bit amazed that I haven’t gone that route. As I know it the “drunken artist” bit is in fact just a way to get drunk, a lot. & that in turn is just a way to alleviate & escape the fact that life is tough, licking your own wounds with a bottle of courage. My typical escape routes now: a bachelor’s night with cardboard pizza, a bag of Doritos & some lame western; blogging; recording muzak in this closet; & my girlfriend, who, have I mentioned, is the paradigm of overachieving.
& on top of all of this I’m attempting to quit smoking. God, I need a drink.

MLK & Half Addresses

One thing I haven’t before mentioned in this blog hqed at 47 Monroe is its arch nemesis, 47½ Monroe. Sharing our eastern-most wall is another apartment, a cramped studio, maybe 12 feet by 20, inhabited by a fella we know only as Mike. A short, stocky man, middle-aged, fronting a crew cut & business tattoos, Mike moved in last summer & was quite hospitable. He seemed of the easy going, neighbourly variety, sort of kept to himself but wasn’t one to shy away from conversation & when he did converse with you it was open & honest, to the point where within the first week of moving in he told us that he had just recently been released from ‘work camp’, which I know to be synonymous with jail, penal institute, prison, where he had served a notable twelve months. Still, everything stayed respectable. Our largest concern when he moved in wasn’t that he’d break in in the middle of the night, cut us from ear to ear, violate our cat & run off with our electronics to hawk for crack money, but only that he not complain whenever we had band practice. Which he didn’t, & in recompense we didn’t complain when he left his five year old parrot outside all alone when he was at work, squawking & squealing for hours on end. So it went for months, the only variance coming when the weather went south & the bird went indoors. Then Mike found himself a lady friend. & oh, was this lady friend a catch. Drives a ran down ‘vette, with one head light always out & a rattling muffler. Mopish, bleach blonde hair, wears white-washed denim which she tucks into her off-white ankle boots. Mike didn’t seem offer much to the world & the first thought I had upon seeing here was ‘bar whore’. I’m not putting any money on it but I’d give an educated guess that a good majority of those spending a year in Lane County’s ‘work camp’ are probably there for domestic violence. It didn’t take long before the arguments started. Mostly arguments between Mike & his girlfriend, but there were also those between Mike & his ex-wife. Mike & his telephone. Mike & his kitchen lino. Typically late in the evening, when he should have been out careening drunkenly in the dark, explaining to strangers in overly polite language the procedures taken to rip your enemy’s arm out of its socket so you could then beat them with it, he was at home, screaming obscenities at some faceless foe, waking Brian or I, & being all around a straight up dick. I bring Mike up now only because as I write this he is outside, screaming & being a dick to his ex-wife & she’s finally standing up to him. Ex-wife: “I hold the keys to your worthless life so give me a check & help me out or you are going back to jail!” Yeah, ex-wife.

I spent the holiday with my wonderful girlfriend, Aliza Kate Fones, at the fones’ beach house in Lincoln City. It was so nice to get out of town, just the two of us, relaxing & necking. Honestly it was great, sorely needed. Aliza has now acquired herself a third & hopefully final job, which now means she is working all of the seven days the dear lord has given us, so we will only have occasion to take a trip whenever there’s a federal holiday. At times I think she’s crazy, a time bomb, but still she’s swell. & the coast was amazing. Not long before we left I jammed a knuckle of one of my fingers & it is still swollen & painful. Now it’s even worse for all the typing & I’m off to ice it.

Three's company?

Subject A: Brian
Subject B: Mary
Subject C: Bernie
Subject D: Myself
Subject E {not present}: Aliza
Subject F {rotating spasmodically between Sub. A, Sub. B & the outer rooms (not charted) }: Dolly, the cat

Three quarters of the team is spread out across the length of the living room at 47 Monroe. Sub. A is on the couch, his usual position for an occasion of sitting around & putting back a few. Sub. B is bouncing between a chair & Sub C {Ah... Sub. C is our electric radiator. It was decided a few nights back that due to Sub B’s inclination to locate herself as close to the heater as possible, even at times going so far as to sit upon it, that it has grow to be as dear a member of the team as each of us are & thus it needed a name. Sub B: “well it burns me sometimes so... how about Bernie?” & so it was.} with the same frequency that she is switching between beer & H2O. Sub E is, sadly, at home, probably resting fitfully, dreaming of penguins or female pop stars or co-workers having sex. Whatever she’s doing she is certainly smiling. I’m here at the far end of the living room from Sub. A, silently observing, acting as research scientist, waiting & itching for that moment when the consumption level has finally reached that point where the interesting & exciting interactions that 47 Monroe St. can provide are in full form, whence I will begin documenting {via this blog, in real time} all that I see & hear, mostly for all of whose who haven’t the opportunity to witness these relations but also for the sake of prosperity. Oh, & science, yeah, can’t forget science. Imagine a sort of twisted mix of reality television & the Discovery channel, & so here we go:
      Sub. A & Sub. B are quiet & seemingly subdued. From my experience observing these animals their tranquil composure is typically a ruse, a trap lying in wait for an unsuspecting victim to blunder into innocently at which time they will pounce upon their prey, ridiculing, mocking, and ripping it apart {always good naturedly it seems, but still vehemently}; in other instances their composure is a silent regrouping of inner forces, a recharging perhaps.
      Sub. F is circling Sub. B’s left hand & emitting a low hum.
      Currently conversing on the subject of shaving. Sub. A: “the stupidest place I’ve ever shaved is my armpits. Man, I’ll never do that again.” Sub. A then begins weighing the varying levels of stupidity &/or pain involved with shaving different areas of one’s body. Assumingly shaving the legs is at the bottom, the armpits at the top with all other areas falling between these two polarities. Sub. B practiced shaving as a young girl without first consulting a tutor & thus shaved dry, i.e. without any gel, cream or soap, & had many horrible experiences regarding the shower & razor blades. One such experience: “I nicked my elbow really bad & didn’t tell my mom, god what was I doing, practicing how to be an abused girlfriend?”
      Again, quiet.
      Current topic: braces. Sub. A had to wear head gear as a youth during the evenings; Sub. B has never had braces. I attempt to get a good glimpse of both their teeth but am at too far a distance to notice any difference. Sub. A begins mentioning sleep; he has to work in six hours; Sub. B is yawning frequently now; & I might be imaging this but I feel that they both are taking quick, accusatory glances my way. Realizing that my presence is now causing a disturbance in their natural habitat, & that there are some things one cannot justify documenting, even in the name of science, I pack up my research tools & proceed to my private dwelling at the outer reaches of the living room, saying my goodnights to the jungle that is 47 Monroe.

Brief Portrait

To further throw in my face my own current state of unemployment Aliza has gone & gotten another job, as in a second job, as if her job molding the impressionable minds of Junction City’s finest {those of us in the know just shivered a little bit with that thought} as an esl aid at JC High {go tigers!} wasn’t enough with all the respect & satisfaction it brings, she is now the newest Saturday school teacher {enforcer?} for JC’s middle school. After her interview Aliza & I went to have coffee in celebration. Over the best shortbread this town has to offer, other than that which comes straight out of Aliza’s kitchen, it was disclosed that when she applied for the job Aliza wasn’t aware of what, technically, Saturday school is. I’m not sure what she expected, some high-endurance after school program for the disadvantaged perhaps, but to mediate over delinquent ne’er-do-wells, making sure that they have the worst possible Saturday ever & fulfill their required penance of a letter to the vice principle {what got them Saturday school, how best to avoid said situation(s) & thus not receive Saturday school in the future & what they’d like to be when they grow up} is not what she had in mind. Which brought into focus once again the difference in upbringing between Aliza & I. While she's stunned by the simple fact that something like Saturday school even exists, I'm not only admitting to my previous knowledge of Saturday school but I also begin sharing stories of time spent in that most hellish of hells.
After coffee we went home to 47 Monroe & Brian began sharing his own woes in regards to the same, which just incited more reminiscing over the aberrant nature of junior high/high school boys, Brian & I reveling in our ignoble past with stories of sexual deviance & drug abuse, all to Aliza’s grief. Honestly I think we were just prepping her for the worst, introducing her to a world she didn’t even hear rumor of as a young girl.
Today was her first stint there & as a good boyfriend equipped with the knowledge of the evil workings of thirteen year old boys, I pre-approved what she was to wear this morning, ensuring that no angst-driven, acne-ridden, bursting-from-the-seams-with-hormones little shit was thinking raunchy thoughts about her. Of course, I’m unemployed & still think farts are funny, just like I was & did in middle school.
God, good luck Aliza.

On another note:
my musical side project to enjoy your fall..., Diets for Giants, has its own webpage now. Give it a look-see at http://dietsforgiants.enjoyyourfall.com.

Counting Eggs, Yes?

I like to think that the quarter-life crisis is coming to a close. With all the potential that I'm stacking upon this year, how I feel that last year could only be a harbinger for how great this year will be, I don't see how it could be otherwise. Encouragement is a powerful thing. I don't feel as such 'hopeful' that good things will come, that life is smoothing out its own wrinkles, as I feel it is my due, that it is just natural. Perspective is also a powerful thing, & if I thought life in years past was good I had no idea of the immensity of life, of its propensity to continually show you how you were wrong, how that small change that you brooded over so intensely, that worry that wrought your pysche, that job you didn't get & that girl who didn't return your smile, weren't so malevolent after all; these things weren't life picking on you as much as you short-changing life, & before I go any further with this & get on a sappy tangent about fate & benevolent forces I think I should just stop.

I'm confident that I'm taking the right steps to reach a more compassionate, thriving & encouraged life. I haven't felt this positive since I learnt how to speak: haven't felt like there was so much to learn, so much to take advantage of, so much proffered. {& what I said about sappy sentiments above, well it isn't even eight in the morning yet and my roommate is listening to the Postal Service, so I think I'm fine in the sappy department...}

MMV

Live is finally beginning to slow down at 47 Monroe street & we are reaching a level of normalcy again. My roommate is back from his trip to France, Mary is back from the Midwest, the family that Aliza and I spent the season with has all gone back to their respective homes or schools. 2005 was heralded in in good form and I was reminded once again on January first that I have a very charmed, blessed life. An anecdote that Aliza mentioned on the eve of 2005 caused me to reflect on this, it was something her mother said, & without quoting directly, Aliza’s mom briefly made comment on the levels that we as individuals enjoy life, from the perspective that her children enjoy it more than she does. Coming from Leah {who does seem to enjoy rather fully & a rather full life} & due to the locality of the comment {Jerry’s Home Improvement Center, because if you can’t find the hilarity of life in a warehouse full of nuts and axe handles and plumber’s tape then you are in a fairly dour mood} the sentiment expressed was exceptionally poignant. During the New Year’s party we hosted that evening I would occasionally think of this story & wished that Leah had attended, I wished that she could be there with all of us, enjoying life as much as we were. Because at times it is an easy thing to lose sight of, you can quickly get caught up in the all the drama & bullshit that life & that you acting as your own worst enemy create, & then you need the immensity of life & all its humour reinforced.
It has been a great turn of the year, the best I’ve had, & it makes me shudder in anticipation and humbleness knowing that 2005 will only be better.