Meanwhile...
Nov. 6th, 2006 01:20 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
jack_babalonTired of waiting to die alone in a cold room: I got up, got dressed, got drunk and crashed my friends girlfriends housewarming party.
My friends girlfriend is one of those bright eyed fresh faced young women whom almost everybody instantaneously falls in love with. I must admit it's hard not to. Filled with that delightful mix of candide, piss and vinegar unique to the under 21 white suburban punk set, equally comfortable talking about how Camus remains relevant to the reader of post-modernism as she is in discussing the seminal influence of the Clash on early 21st century pop culture. She looks like Clara Bow in the face but dresses like a Vice Magazine model: all faux-metal & electro-clash.
I'm there two minutes when I realize that there's almost a hundred people here easy and i'm one of the only three of them over the age of 25. The other two would be my friend ( of the 'my-friends-girlfriend' fame) and a mutual associate of ours, Jodie, a long legged amazon of a woman with a grounded charm and a disarming smile. The three of us 'senior citizen types' decide to bridge the generation gap with an ancient method of diplomacy known to the layman as 'Getting Shitfaced'.
Here in the kitchen one of her roomies pours us a shot. The concoction is made out of any available alcoholic beverage to be found within arms reach. It looks like lysterine, tastes like Kool-aid and leaves an after taste resembling a hobo's ass. Most importantly it does the trick: The ears pop-pop-pop, the lungs clear with a cough, the gut rumbles in protest and my confidence skyrockets into the stratosphere. I nod the bartender a thanks and pour myself a big cup of Wild Turkey to wash it down with.
This is all part of the plan. The 'plan' is relatively simple. Just let the alcohol do what alcohol does best: Kill!
First it'll kill off the remaining germs that have tried to gentrify my lungs into some horrible condo-lofts for the hip and happening virus set. Next it will kill off the flocks of inhibitions that nest in my ego. The alcohol will poison the well of doubt they regularly drink from and allow me a few hours of non-self-hatred. Finally it'll kill the pain. Not just the muscle and blood pain (well... that too now that you mention it), but rather the crippling pain of loving a woman who lives too far away.
The Turkey burns the throat and forms a knot of nausea in the stomach. I feel the burn, I take it, I own it, I ride it out, it's mine and mine alone to deal with. There's nothing else for it. I take another swig... in for a penny, in for a pound.
*******************************************
Hurry up or you'll miss the band playing in an empty living room!
The lead singer stands in the corner. Confident, bearded, tattooed, energetic, well muscled and mean: I can almost smell the wet panties from the swaying doe eyed girls watching him in awe. He is growl-shouting into the mic. The lyrics are apparently a hybrid between Klingon and Dobberman and understood only by the other three members of the band. The lead guitarist is the glam-goth-guy and as such has one of those carefully groomed hairstyles designed to look like he doesn't give a fuck about carefully groomed hairstyles. Sleepy eyed, looking down at the ground the whole set it's not hard to peg him for the 'beautiful dreamer' of the foursome. The polar opposite of the singer, this is the guy who writes the love songs and tries to get the band to do political benefits for 'food not bombs' and anti Bush rallies. The bassist steps out from behind the wall for a moment, strums the strings hard and steps back to let the singer pick up the refrain. He's the heavy guy with the trucker hat and glasses - a kind of Cabbagetown lite I feature. He's the funny one i'm betting. He's the Hurly character. The one who you'd think has the hardest time getting laid but actually is up to his ass in tweenage lovage. Finally there's the drummer and like all good drummers should be the only guy in the band to be as close to naked as possible. This kid is a scarecrow made of bone and attitude. He's a four armed Hindu god laying down the beat in a blur of motion. He has this big speed smile slapped on his face, he's tweeking hard into overtime and you can hear it in the pounding of the drum.
The music ain't bad. Shit, thinking about it, i've paid for worse back in the day. It's old school hardcore. I'm reminded of early Agnostic Front, Sick-of-it-All and The Cro-Mags. There's that chugga-chugga-chugga bass line that segues from each song. There's the incoherent barking. There's the distortion squeal of the amp screaming like a police siren being tortured to death. There's the key that's so badly off it's got to be calculated. There's a raw anger that rips it's way out of the songs with the desperateness of an exorcism.
There's me now. There's me then. It never ends. Tomorrow never comes because tomorrow is forever.
I'm waiting for a pit to start up so I can unleash a little of my own rage, I start bobbing my head aggresively, i'm looking around for any likely conspirators to start some mayhem with but then, as suddenly as it started, the set stops. The bassist is too drunk to play and the drummer won't continue without more beer. Every one files away from the door and drifts back to the party.
******************************
My friend is talking Buddhism with a 'Genius'. The Genius is wearing a brown coudroy jacket to prove his general state of geniusness. The Genius also has his training beard fully grown and speaks with a vaguely hysterical surfer-stoner nasal tone that would sound retarded on anyone who wasn't either a teenager or failing that, at least a surfer. They've been talking for the last hour and I realize that the Genius has an annoying habit of saying you're wrong, completely wrong and then saying the same thing you just said back to you only in his Professor Shaggy Voice: "Like no way man... you see what you're forgetting about is that the waves and particles is that they're both the same thing man, y'know? They're both just different states of the same thing..."
"I didn't 'forget' anything. I was talking about Schroedingers Cat and how waves and particles .."
"...Same thing man... same godamn thing!"
The Genius is a genius though. Why? Because the small parade of pretty young women with thick black glasses on and tight tight sweaters drift into the conversation periodically to remind us.
"He's a genius y'know?"
"Yeahhhh?"
"Uh-huh... he just says things and i'm like.... 'wow'!"
"Heh. I heard they used to say the same thing about Sartre..."
My buddy elbows me and we step outside to the front porch for a much need cigarette.
"Thank Eris" I say pocketing somebodys lighter into my jeans.
"What's that?" My friend asks staring into the night sky.
"That shit like this still happens..."
"What?"
"Shitty garage bands with more energy than talent. Drunken punk rock philosophizing. Young men mumbling bad poetry to young women in the hopes of getting laid... I gotta be honest wit'ya I find it a relief."
"Knowing that it's still happening?"
"Yeah... knowing the next generation isn't just a bunch of X-Box zombies waiting to be plugged in, temped out, outsourced, dumbeddown, downsized and supersized into a vast generation of retard cattle almost too stupid to even be drafted into whatever fucked up war tomorrow will bring..."
"Try saying that three times fast."
"Try saying what?"
"Nothing man." My friend laughs flicking the remnants of his smoke into the dead lawn, "Let's get you home..."
***********************************
I climb the stairs back up to my attic apartment. The hallway reeks of cat piss as always and I stumble around in the dark looking for the keys to the front door. I get in. I strip down. I pick up the phone. I think of how sweet your voice would be right now. I think how everything will be fine if I could just hear you say 'I love you' once. I scroll down to your name. I click it and your name lights up with options. All I have to do is hit 'call'.
But I can't call and we both know why.
I put the phone down. I put out my last cigarette with a jagged cough. Tired of looking at nothing I turn off the lights. The alcohol has dried up along with the blood, leaving only the ghost of a hangover to come drifting around my skull like a nomad fart. The illness has crept back in as well. I can feel the lungs heavy with phlegm and my nose is flooded with snot. I lay down and this is where you came in - with me waiting to die alone in a cold room.
My friends girlfriend is one of those bright eyed fresh faced young women whom almost everybody instantaneously falls in love with. I must admit it's hard not to. Filled with that delightful mix of candide, piss and vinegar unique to the under 21 white suburban punk set, equally comfortable talking about how Camus remains relevant to the reader of post-modernism as she is in discussing the seminal influence of the Clash on early 21st century pop culture. She looks like Clara Bow in the face but dresses like a Vice Magazine model: all faux-metal & electro-clash.
I'm there two minutes when I realize that there's almost a hundred people here easy and i'm one of the only three of them over the age of 25. The other two would be my friend ( of the 'my-friends-girlfriend' fame) and a mutual associate of ours, Jodie, a long legged amazon of a woman with a grounded charm and a disarming smile. The three of us 'senior citizen types' decide to bridge the generation gap with an ancient method of diplomacy known to the layman as 'Getting Shitfaced'.
Here in the kitchen one of her roomies pours us a shot. The concoction is made out of any available alcoholic beverage to be found within arms reach. It looks like lysterine, tastes like Kool-aid and leaves an after taste resembling a hobo's ass. Most importantly it does the trick: The ears pop-pop-pop, the lungs clear with a cough, the gut rumbles in protest and my confidence skyrockets into the stratosphere. I nod the bartender a thanks and pour myself a big cup of Wild Turkey to wash it down with.
This is all part of the plan. The 'plan' is relatively simple. Just let the alcohol do what alcohol does best: Kill!
First it'll kill off the remaining germs that have tried to gentrify my lungs into some horrible condo-lofts for the hip and happening virus set. Next it will kill off the flocks of inhibitions that nest in my ego. The alcohol will poison the well of doubt they regularly drink from and allow me a few hours of non-self-hatred. Finally it'll kill the pain. Not just the muscle and blood pain (well... that too now that you mention it), but rather the crippling pain of loving a woman who lives too far away.
The Turkey burns the throat and forms a knot of nausea in the stomach. I feel the burn, I take it, I own it, I ride it out, it's mine and mine alone to deal with. There's nothing else for it. I take another swig... in for a penny, in for a pound.
Hurry up or you'll miss the band playing in an empty living room!
The lead singer stands in the corner. Confident, bearded, tattooed, energetic, well muscled and mean: I can almost smell the wet panties from the swaying doe eyed girls watching him in awe. He is growl-shouting into the mic. The lyrics are apparently a hybrid between Klingon and Dobberman and understood only by the other three members of the band. The lead guitarist is the glam-goth-guy and as such has one of those carefully groomed hairstyles designed to look like he doesn't give a fuck about carefully groomed hairstyles. Sleepy eyed, looking down at the ground the whole set it's not hard to peg him for the 'beautiful dreamer' of the foursome. The polar opposite of the singer, this is the guy who writes the love songs and tries to get the band to do political benefits for 'food not bombs' and anti Bush rallies. The bassist steps out from behind the wall for a moment, strums the strings hard and steps back to let the singer pick up the refrain. He's the heavy guy with the trucker hat and glasses - a kind of Cabbagetown lite I feature. He's the funny one i'm betting. He's the Hurly character. The one who you'd think has the hardest time getting laid but actually is up to his ass in tweenage lovage. Finally there's the drummer and like all good drummers should be the only guy in the band to be as close to naked as possible. This kid is a scarecrow made of bone and attitude. He's a four armed Hindu god laying down the beat in a blur of motion. He has this big speed smile slapped on his face, he's tweeking hard into overtime and you can hear it in the pounding of the drum.
The music ain't bad. Shit, thinking about it, i've paid for worse back in the day. It's old school hardcore. I'm reminded of early Agnostic Front, Sick-of-it-All and The Cro-Mags. There's that chugga-chugga-chugga bass line that segues from each song. There's the incoherent barking. There's the distortion squeal of the amp screaming like a police siren being tortured to death. There's the key that's so badly off it's got to be calculated. There's a raw anger that rips it's way out of the songs with the desperateness of an exorcism.
There's me now. There's me then. It never ends. Tomorrow never comes because tomorrow is forever.
I'm waiting for a pit to start up so I can unleash a little of my own rage, I start bobbing my head aggresively, i'm looking around for any likely conspirators to start some mayhem with but then, as suddenly as it started, the set stops. The bassist is too drunk to play and the drummer won't continue without more beer. Every one files away from the door and drifts back to the party.
My friend is talking Buddhism with a 'Genius'. The Genius is wearing a brown coudroy jacket to prove his general state of geniusness. The Genius also has his training beard fully grown and speaks with a vaguely hysterical surfer-stoner nasal tone that would sound retarded on anyone who wasn't either a teenager or failing that, at least a surfer. They've been talking for the last hour and I realize that the Genius has an annoying habit of saying you're wrong, completely wrong and then saying the same thing you just said back to you only in his Professor Shaggy Voice: "Like no way man... you see what you're forgetting about is that the waves and particles is that they're both the same thing man, y'know? They're both just different states of the same thing..."
"I didn't 'forget' anything. I was talking about Schroedingers Cat and how waves and particles .."
"...Same thing man... same godamn thing!"
The Genius is a genius though. Why? Because the small parade of pretty young women with thick black glasses on and tight tight sweaters drift into the conversation periodically to remind us.
"He's a genius y'know?"
"Yeahhhh?"
"Uh-huh... he just says things and i'm like.... 'wow'!"
"Heh. I heard they used to say the same thing about Sartre..."
My buddy elbows me and we step outside to the front porch for a much need cigarette.
"Thank Eris" I say pocketing somebodys lighter into my jeans.
"What's that?" My friend asks staring into the night sky.
"That shit like this still happens..."
"What?"
"Shitty garage bands with more energy than talent. Drunken punk rock philosophizing. Young men mumbling bad poetry to young women in the hopes of getting laid... I gotta be honest wit'ya I find it a relief."
"Knowing that it's still happening?"
"Yeah... knowing the next generation isn't just a bunch of X-Box zombies waiting to be plugged in, temped out, outsourced, dumbeddown, downsized and supersized into a vast generation of retard cattle almost too stupid to even be drafted into whatever fucked up war tomorrow will bring..."
"Try saying that three times fast."
"Try saying what?"
"Nothing man." My friend laughs flicking the remnants of his smoke into the dead lawn, "Let's get you home..."
I climb the stairs back up to my attic apartment. The hallway reeks of cat piss as always and I stumble around in the dark looking for the keys to the front door. I get in. I strip down. I pick up the phone. I think of how sweet your voice would be right now. I think how everything will be fine if I could just hear you say 'I love you' once. I scroll down to your name. I click it and your name lights up with options. All I have to do is hit 'call'.
But I can't call and we both know why.
I put the phone down. I put out my last cigarette with a jagged cough. Tired of looking at nothing I turn off the lights. The alcohol has dried up along with the blood, leaving only the ghost of a hangover to come drifting around my skull like a nomad fart. The illness has crept back in as well. I can feel the lungs heavy with phlegm and my nose is flooded with snot. I lay down and this is where you came in - with me waiting to die alone in a cold room.
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no subject
on 2006-11-07 01:27 am (UTC)Needed some good prose today. Thank ya, sir.
no subject
on 2006-11-07 04:31 pm (UTC)The X-Box generation... I love it!
xxx