A Reoccuring Dream

A Reoccurring Dream: I'm a little boy, at the age when first memories begin to form...the youngest I ever was. Not yet fully aware of myself. I'm sitting in front of a television. A commercial comes on - for what, it doesn't matter - starring another little boy. He's blonde. He's handsome. I know because my babysitter says so.

A little boy thought: I'm blonde! So I am handsome!

I run to the bathroom to look at myself. I see the boy in the mirror.

A little boy thought: I don't look like the boy on TV...

...I must not be handsome.

My first memory; my first disappointment.

There is an element of this dream in every day that's happened since.

If You Can't Sweeten Your Green Tea, My Bad

I'm slowly making this Starbucks Splenda-less, two or three packets at a time. It's stealing really, because I don't use the sweetener. In fact, I hate it. My girlfriend swears by the stuff, however, and I'm clinging to anything that reminds me of her: Christmas presents, pictures, checking Manhattan's daily weather, and swiping extra Splenda from Starbucks just like she would(though she takes two or three handfuls).

We've been long distance for almost two years, and leaving New York gets harder and harder. With every visit, my Greyhound Bus deadline inches across the clock. It started at the ground level of three in the afternoon(I need time to grocery shop!), sunk to five(Monday's great for grocery shopping), hit bottom at six, and now has dug it's way up to the other side of the world, resting at nine o'clock(I'll take a taxi, straight to bed). I'm gathering hours like pennies underneath couch cushions; I'm desperate and there are never enough.

Inevitably, no matter what side of the world I'm on, the time comes. A year ago, when the ridiculousness we call our relationship started, I never cried at leaving. That bothered her(at least a little). She wanted me to wipe away my own tears with my shirt sleeve. And that never happened.

Instead, I tried to imbue her with a comfort - this pain is temporary, my love - by repeating it over and over. Looking into her big brown eyes, I tried to reason with the pleading, begging pain behind them. Soon, baby, soon I'll be back. Don't cry, two weeks will be over before you know it. What, it's going to be more than two weeks? Three, three weeks isn't that long either. And to me, for a while, it never was.

Then, the gloom of the bus ride home started to stretch far from it's beginnings at Gate 71 in Port Authority, through the Lincoln tunnel, past the gray and bleak New Jersey landscape, over the Delaware bridge before finally resting with me in my Columbia Heights basement apartment. It faded with a phone call to let her know I was home safe, only to reappear in the emptiness of my bed.

Still, I never cried.

Occasionally, she coaxed out a single tear(an informant let lose from prison, sobbingly spilling his guts), but crying means many tears, or at least two. Otherwise, it doesn't count as crying. I never cried.

Last Monday, I cried. A cloudburst too, not my two-teared bullshit technical definition of crying. You see, I failed to fool myself into thinking my bed wouldn't be empty when I awoke, or that her hand would be under mine during long Subway rides. It's going to be two(or more) weeks before you see her again, you know. A thousand times before I brushed away similar thoughts, but not this time. Two weeks is fine, two weeks make sense. No, it doesn't.

Anyone can go two weeks without seeing a loved one(I'll bet some of you are up for two months, if you're married). I have a habit of visualizing things, problems, and putting them in a vacuum. Inside my thought bubbles the problem floats alone, bordered by vast expanses of blackness. I imagine this is how communists think. There, in a vacuum - free from any temporal considerations - my solution makes sense: two weeks apart isn't a long time, so bear with it.

In real life, spending two weeks apart - over and over for more than a year - wears you down. It tires you out, bursts your bubble, and pushes you bawling like a baby into your girlfriend's lap. It fucking sucks.

I miss her.

So I'm taking little yellow packets of artificial sweetener - that I abhor - and storing them in my right coat pocket. I'm desperate, and I'll never have enough.

A Late Weekend Recap

Friday

A Foosball table cut my wrist up good this weekend. It looks like I tried to kill myself with a slab of concrete, skinning my wrists instead of slitting them.

I was helping my friend Jamie unload the table at his house; he's storing it for our friend Aaron who is moving to an apartment too small to handle his table. One of the sides caught my wrist when we turned it over. I didn't even notice cut for a while.

Jamie picked me up at the Greenbelt Metro, in a truck, with a small wooden table in the passenger seat. That I was expected to have in my lap for the drive back to Baltimore. Not exactly the ideal set up for having good conversation ("Sup, table bitch!"), to say anything about safety. So I shoved that fucker in the back, despite Jamie's reservations about being decapitated.

"Well, before I would have been decapitated."

"Yeah, but I was fine with that."

On the way to Baltimore, we stopped at my parents' house in Laurel. They were painting the kitchen(they means my brother Scott, which is the real reason I wanted to stop by; I hadn't seen him in at least two months). Now, the last time I saw the kitchen it was in a series of re-paints. I had misunderstood my mother's explanation on what part of the stage they were at, and I thought the color I was looking at was the old color. I said it was hideous; then she told me that was actually the color they had settled on.

"Oh...well, it's dark in here. I'm sure it will look great with all the lights on." I said this in the midst of broad daylight with a straight face.

Anyway, the room Friday night looked great. The hideous color actually looked gorgeous once it dried and was set against some white trim.

Scott seemed a little out of it; I learned later he was taking sleeping pills because he had been staying up for 40 hours at a time the past two weeks. Jamie, Scott and I admired my parents new HD TV for a while, talked some bullshit about football and I agreed to be at my parents house to watch the game with Scott and my Dad.

Jamie and I went the rest of the way to Baltimore with the table still in Jamie-decapitating position; thankfully we made it without any heads rolling. Our friend Paul met us for dinner at a nice Chinese restaurant, were we learned that Jamie and Paul were born in the year of the Monkey, and I was born in the year of the Horse. According to the calendar, I should marry a Dog. Which, according to my ex-wife's birthday, I did. The description of the year of the Dog said Dog's were known for their loyalty.

What do the Chinese know?

Afterwards, the three of us and Jamie's wife Cheryl played a fun game whose name I can't remember. It involved playing roads, castles, and churches(some with roads, and some in the middle of nowhere I guess). Paul was hyped and couldn't stop from looking at his piece before his turn and come up; I was forced to hide the box with the pieces in it.

I slept on a couch in the basement and had a dream that Flea from the Red Hot Chili Peppers was force feeding me the world's worst chili at the DC 101 Chili Cook Off. This reminded me I had to buy some cans of Turkey Chili Sunday when I went grocery shopping(I forgot, and I'm terrified of what dream Flea will do to me now).

Saturday

"Your face it dances and it haunts me
Your laughter's still ringing in my ears
I still find pieces of your presence here
Even after all these years"

- Colin Hay, I Just Don't Think I'll Ever Get Over You

Saturday morning I awoke to Flea's voice morphing into Jamie's. It was 10 am; time to head over to Aaron's to help him move. We stopped at McDonald's for some breakfast. The cashier in training had a unique way of handing me my change: she just stuck her open hand out, palm up - evidently expecting me to snatch it out of her hands. Jamie observed the trainer of the trainee struggling with removing his ordered milk without spilling the coffee creamers that were piled on top of the milk.

"She'd be a shitty Jenga player," he observed.

We arrived at Aaron's to find his parents, his sister and her husband were already there. Aaron raised his hands in exasperation at our time of arrival, which was curious because he must of known there was no way we would be there any earlier that 11 am on a Saturday.

Things went very smoothly. We loaded most of Aaron's stuff into a large crate for storage; the care was being picked up later and driven to a warehouse. I was completely unaware that such a service existed.

The only thing that went wrong was when Jamie, Aaron's brother-in-law Glenn and I dropped Aaron's mattress in a puddle. It was only one corner, but it was very noticeable since we dropped it right in front of Aaron, in the parking lot. Technically, Glenn lost his grip and it caused his and Jamie's end to drop. However, whenever Aaron referred to the incident again, he eyed me and Jamie exclusively. Such is family loyalty.

After the bed, Aaron's bedroom was barren save a few discarded items from his desk on the carpet. Aaron asked me to get a box from his room. It was near his closet, and next to it, out of the corner of my eye, I caught something peculiar. A flash of some familiar colors. Two pictures were partially concealed beneath a sheet of printer paper. Through the paper I could make out one of the pictures.

Me and my ex-wife, on our wedding day. Probably the last thing I expected to see while helping my friend move. She looked beautiful; I looked happy. I wish there was a word for all the sorrow, foolishness and grief I felt. Only for a second. I wiped away a few tears(thankfully I was alone), asked if I could throw them away, and that was that.

Sunday

I went over to my parent's house to watch the game. The Redskins lost 20-17 to the Bucs, and Scott, James, my father and I screamed at the TV the entire time. It was a frustrating loss.

Afterwards, I helped Scott move a couch and love seat into his girlfriend's house. He and his girlfriend both work at Outback Steakhouse; the furniture was generously donated by a regular. An older, almost sad regular who was giving three waitresses some furniture because he probably gets a thrill getting some bought attention from young, pretty girls.

Sunday night I worked on some record reviews(that hopefully you will be able to read soon), bought some songs off of iTunes(including the Mad World cover from Donnie Darko and the Gears Of War commercial).

A Pattern Developing

I don't know if I could take it if another girl, after telling me how I'm the best thing to ever, ever happen to her, leaves me for not being interesting enough. The downside to dating artsy types I guess.

The beautiful people, the beautiful people,
It's all relative to the size of your steeple,
You can't see the forest, for the trees,
You can't smell
your own shit on your knees!

A Fall Funk

Every year the coming of autumn finds me falling into a funk. A tired, inert state involving sleepless nights and groggy days. The change of the seasons does something to me I guess.

Is it the sudden weather change that makes me feel frustrated with and tired of everything? A repressed memory of bad Septembers that makes it harder just to get out of bed?

Work, play, even sleep seem harder. Sleep, for Christ's sake. How can you be tired but not be able to sleep? I lay in bed perfectly still. Then I move to get comfortable, because my left leg just doesn't feel right. Or my right side wants to be covered by the blanket. Then it doesn't. Before long I've moved too much to be restful anymore. So I try to be still again. Inevitably, after countless different laying configurations and blanket arrangements, I give up. Staring at the alarm clock, I dread the morning. It's getting closer, and the red numbers floating in the dark don't let me forget about any minute of sleep I've lost.

I turn the clock away.

Eventually, whatever part of my mind that is too apprehensive to sleep gives in. Morning comes, and I wonder how I will find the energy to get through all the things I have to do, let alone want. I need to go to work. I want energy to exercise, to fix dinner, and enjoy some of the day. Instead, all I'm in a day-long funk.

Funk is the perfect word for it. Weighted down, covered, sticky, unable to do anything about how fucking uncomfortable you are in your own skin. Break out, break out! and shatter your shell! you scream at yourself. Go do something. Anything.

Tonight I'll run at the gym. I know how to fight off the blues. Work, play, and sleep will come easier. I hope.

P.S. Music can help us get through some "tough" times, so here is my recent Rap/Blues playlist for the Fall Blahs:

Talib Kweli - The Proud
Albert King - I'll Play The Blues For You (Parts 1 & 2)
B.B. King - The Thrill Is Gone
Common (feat. Kanye West and John Legend) - They Say
Nina Simone - When I Was In My Prime
Eminem - Cleaning Out My Closet
Ray Charles - Nobody Cares
Bill Withers - Ain't No Sunshine
The Coup - Tiffany Hall
Bettye LaVette - Down To Zero
Otis Redding - You Don't Miss Your Water
Tupac Shakur - Life Goes On
The Streets - Stay Positive
Talib Kweli - Roll Off Me