2 Minutes. Go!

The edge of the hedgerow was the edge of everything; I gave you safe passage, invited you to come and dance as the honeybees toiled. You told me that your Dad was a bad man, and I believed you. I picked you flowers while you cried and said you couldn't say anymore. Smell of BBQ from down the shore. Lawnmowers and cut grass. Everything smelled vaguely of kerosene. I wanted to punch your Dad to death for making you cry, but I didn't. I just picked flowers and told stupid jokes and that was enough. Summer turned to fall and we met by the hedgerow, shyly.

My Dad didn't do anything bad. He didn't have it in him. My Dad was like freshly starched laundry smelling liniment. I asked what he did that was so bad, but you only cried harder. For the sin of men.

Teachers feared us, flip and arrogant. I was the jester and you, the heir apparent. You spit your light like a gasoline fire, arrogant. You were dangerous, but no one knew or suspected shit. They never realized that you would grow up to be the kind of person who serves on committees and boards. A person with influence.

And now that I think about it, rainbows and beaches, crooked joints pulled from tubular sweatshirt pockets. Yeah, it's all there. Nitrous flashes be damned, I'm telling you that I heard something with my eyes and you're straight fucked. You might as well never breathe again. No one can help with your problems unless you talk about them. Sitting and crying don't do shit, Slim.

I can taste electric citrus. You are just the devil's mistress. I caught the shit, but the fan just missed us. Dissed us, kissed us, sunshine blissed us. And yeah, of course I love it when you call me Big Poppa. Now pop a couple more because we're headed for the dance floor. All you suburban kids. Hands in the air, life on the line, pop another Percocet and have a good time.

And you age and grey and get old if you're lucky. Look, you're a mom, and you're a point of civic pride and nobody knows about the fucked up games that get played in your basement. How you make the poor folks dance and prod each other. Anything for your amusement. It's just money. They're just bums and drug addicts. This is life. This is fucking theater. I saw a drunk junkie, and I threw a TV at her.

The smoke climbs the wind and the evening fawns over all of us. Degenerates rejoice. Paranoids shut their blinds. Saints keep right on dying. Me and your mom are done trying. But you can still call me Daddy and not be lying.

2 Minutes. Go!

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Let me tell you a story about a plastic milk jug. I sent it to Alabama empty, and it came back filled with a gallon of fire. And what the hell do you do if you get your hands on a gallon of fire? It becomes a burden. It gets heavier than eight-something pounds.

It’s embarrassing.

Yo, I got this liquor that no one wants to drink. You can try to cut it. It is uncuttable. It will burn your insides. But you feel obligated. Boy, you ever drank real shine?

So, I used it to clean the air filter on my motorcycle and it worked better than kerosene. I used it to get tape residue off shit. It worked. Goddamn, it worked.

But I felt like I should drink it. And I did. Mixed a teaspoon into a can of coke and hated myself for hours. Some of that jug went down my throat. Most of it made my old shit sparkly and new again.

What have you ever gotten in a milk jug? Milk?

Square.

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2 Minutes. Go!

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Shoes on. Teeth brushed. Scraped the rust off my disposition. I punched myself in the solar plexus for good measure. Chest out, Comrade. We're on a search for buried treasure. We're circling round the pole - balance as best you can. 

The night is coming, and it's a fucking doozy. You'll see.

My central nervous system is down for maintenance. I am sitting on the top of a cliff-side rock, and the earth is shaking. I want to get off. 

The animals are weary. They are tired of our bullshit and they aren't going to take it anymore. Yeah, right. They've been taking it for years, and they will take all we got, praying that we all die before we take everything with us. 

Jet black hair and teeth sharp. Tongue darting, you are the viper queen. Your saliva is caustic and acidic. You've got it all, sweetheart. Except a heathy septum; that thing is fucked. 

So where does this leave us? Chin up, son. Chin up. It will only make you stronger. 

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I don't have one cliché to play. I'm tapped out. My pain tubes are empty. All my fake people called in sick - the plot is thinner than usual. It's non-existent.

I spent the last two days wondering if I was finally going to break as a human being. I was kind of nervous. Things got hectic there for a while.

My brain is tossing smelly fish; why are you giving me attitude? Just try and remember we're on the same team here.

My ears are ringing like someone threw bells down a fucking staircase. There are chips knocked out of the stone.

There are all kinds of noises. There is the slap of warm meat and a high keening sound of despair.

There is magic in the air.

Just let it happen, man. Let the words fall like corrupted snowflakes. Affect a haughty attitude and stand in the shadows - no one is going to tie the wool over your eyes.

But now, it's time to move on. Trade my truths for silly lies. Buck up, boy, the carnival ain't ever leaving town.

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I was tired. Tired of repetition and meaningless bullshit. The world is drenched in it, and you can’t escape the smell. No one wants to hear that, but it’s true. You play the cards you sneak into the game. You don’t want to corrupt the process? Doesn’t matter. Someone else will do it if you won’t.

This kind of tired wraps around your bones. I wish to hell people would stop telling me to smile. I can manage my own emotions – it took a while, but I finally learned how. And my expression is my business. I am not a human billboard; my face is not an ad campaign; it is a reflection of what’s inside. I don’t believe in putting on a pretty face, Ace.

And, sure, what’s inside is affected by what’s outside, but how and why? That’s for me to know.

Check it. There is a petite woman spinning as the crowd expands and contracts around her. She is moments from disaster – she doesn’t know it yet. She has crossed too many lines; she’s up, down, sideways. You could save her, but you would have to lay everything wide. She’ll die while you think about obligation.

No? Tell me that you don’t see the veins collapsing. Tell me that there isn’t a shit-star at the top of the tree, sprinkling filth all over me … that woman was counting on you. And you. On humanity. Y’all just watched her spin until her beehive imploded. Then, talk about how it’s a shame. It’s a fucking shame.

Shoot an endangered animal. Buy a car that gets 12 miles to the gallon. Talk shit and rail against people who look and speak different than you. Or you. Or you…

This soapbox is making my legs tired. I need an easy chair. Stuffing under denim, three feet square. I want to fall into a mushy Dilaudid dream, but I know how it ends. I almost wrote the ending once. Then I decided that life was made of pain, and that I wasn’t special.

I was just spinning in the crowd.

If you can keep your eyes open, then you’re doing better than most of us. So many try to lie and hide, profit from slow-motion suicide. Look far. Look wide.

Keep spinning.

There once was a clown with orange hair. Said we’d win so much we’d get tired of winning. That’s just the soundtrack of the moment. That’s the world spinning, scattering pieces all over the playing board.

Me, I’m regular bored. But, for now, still spinning.

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2 Minutes. Go!

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The blossoms fell, curling into the swirl of water before an old, weather-beaten log – the boy sat patiently on a large boulder, his rod beside him. He studied the water. 

The sun also fell, in long, golden rivulets that seeped around the boys' resolve. It was mid-afternoon, and the soundtrack of birdsong and burbling water eased the roughness of the terrain, dulled its edges. In the distance, a crow called his indignant cry into the breeze, where it danced across the top of the pines.

For thirty minutes, give or take, the boy did nothing but watch and study. By watching the water, he could make a pretty good guess what it looked like under the surface. He saw old tree branches and stones that twisted the water in its course. In time, he also saw fish, imagined them – he knew where they would be.

With slow, quiet movements, the boy picked up his rod and cast a small salmon-egg hook – just the right size for a kernel of niblets corn. He did not use salmon eggs. Never had. Wouldn’t recognize one if he saw it. Didn’t know what color they were. He knew only that the small golden hooks were cheap – and the perfect size for fishing corn. Whether the fish liked corn or salmon eggs given the choice, the boy did not know, nor, did he care.

He was in no hurry and, one finger on the line to feel for bites, he let the corn float through the eddies before lifting it and recasting it farther out. Sometimes closer. If he had been old enough to drive and city enough to drive on freeways, he might have seen this as a kind of merging. He knew when the currents changed and he directed the corn through the churning water. After some time, the boy twitched the tip of the rod briefly whereupon, it doubled over. He let the fish tire itself out before bringing it to the bank. From his back pocket, he pulled an old Barlow knife which he used to kill the fish. A hard rap to the head, so as to prevent it suffering. Then, he wrapped the fish in wet cloth and put it in the shade.

It was then that the tranquility of the scene was destroyed as a middle-aged man in waders, vest, fishing cap, and wool shirt used his fly rod to part the branches in front of him as he walked. He stopped when he saw the boy, raising an arm in salutation.

“Howdy!”

The word sounded off, like it was coming from the wrong mouth. Like he was putting on an accent. It was a pregnant ‘howdy’ and the boy answered cautiously.

He nodded a greeting and stared at the water. The man came closer, closing the distance between them.

“You live around here? You fish here a lot? Where are the good spots?”

The boy looked at the toe of his tennis shoes and mumbled. He did not know how to answer the questions. They were questions that didn’t deserve or warrant answers. He did not want the man to know anything about him or the water. He did not want the man to know that this spot was a cathedral. Fishing was communion.

“No sir.”

“You don’t know anything about this place? Come on – I only have five days to fish…”

There was a lilt in the request – the boy could see that he was trying to ingratiate himself, the funny guy. Teasing. He didn’t like it. It felt like a game or like he was the butt of a joke and everyone was laughing. He didn’t want to talk to the man, and he certainly didn’t want him fishing close by.

The man stuck a cigarette into the corner of his mouth, but didn’t light it. The sun seemed too hot, and the boy squirmed before deciding this was an OK time for a small lie. He did not like lying, but he didn’t like strangers either.

“Fishing isn’t too great unless you’re willing to walk. Up a few miles it widens out – that’s where the big ones are.”

The man smiled.

“You didn’t feel like walking?”

The boy did not answer. The man grabbed the bill of his cap and tugged on it in a contrived, mechanical way. Then, he lit his cigarette and headed in the direction the boy had indicated. He was a carnival – a parade of noise and flash. The boy began to feel bad for the water. For the fish. They didn’t deserve this.

The boy got his line back in the water, but something ineffable had changed. 

To be continued...

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2 Minutes. Go!

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I’m not the one you’re looking for, and I get that that might be a disappointment. I do. I wish I could be your salvation, your inspiration. I wish I could inspire some sensation, but I’m numb, man. I talk a good game, but right now I’m just trying to stay in it. It’s hard walking around numb – there are so many things to bump into. So many store displays to be China-Shop-Bulled into disarray. I don’t like it, this turtle shell, but it’s better than nothing. Hell. It’s better than having my heart shredded daily. I don’t want to cross you, get on your cross – I don’t want it. I want to be in the shadows until the light comes back.

Imagine for a second that you are standing on the roof of an old Victorian at 24^th and Mission. You’re drunk and throwing gravel at the busses with your roommates. They jump the gap between the buildings and so do you. It’s all fun and games, but sometimes you wonder: ‘would I care if I fell?’ Became a bloody bone sculpture in the alley? Is that what you want? Is that what I want? Any of us. Do we know what the fuck we’re doing? Are we playing a part that was prescribed for us, or hacking our way through the bullshit jungle with a broken machete?

I’m being too abstract. I’ll break it down – get ready.

Quiet desperation never felt so loud. The country is stuck in the sticky fly-trap of hate. We decry hate and hate the haters. We hate our lives that will get fixed later – they won’t. You’ll never be whole. You just need to decide what kind of compromise fits best. You try to be you, but it don’t pay worth shit. So, you act like someone else for a little bit – get used to it. Swallow all your truths – you’ll be set. Not jet set. Rich enough not to die and leave your TV lonely.

I know this is a bummer trip; I don’t know how to force a positive spin on it – don’t know why I’d want to. I’m not your monkey. I’m nobody’s monkey, not even my own. 

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2 Minutes. Go!

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They sat in silence, passing stories with their eyes - three months on the trail and they didn't need words; the snow fell steadily and Slim was trying to drink enough to die. He looked dead. He wasn't. He wasn't alive either. He was caught in the empty space between the two; his eyes were rheumy, his skin pale, and he did not know that this would be his last ride. They would kill him, leave him bleeding - they would kill him for nothing. Boredom. Spite. Profit. Most likely the last.

The fire spit sparks into the night, sending them to dance with the stars. There was a wind that smelled of coyote - the night rang with their song. Dawn was far off, and the men had a long way to ride in the morning, but no one felt like closing their eyes. Death was in the air. It choked them; they knew the taste but could not place it. 

The dogs were half dead and long past caring. They would soon run off in a cannibalistic sprint; now they sniffed for coyote and pretended they were brave. 

The miners would find the body and they'd wonder. Love or gold. It always came down to love or gold. Or hate. But hate doesn't fill the belly. Hate isn't something you can wrap your frantic arms around. Nope, they would know. Love or gold. 

In country like that, you can have one or the other. And neither comes cheap.

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2 Minutes. Go!

Write whatever you want in the 'comments' section on this blog post. Play as many times as you like. #breaktheblog! You have two minutes (give or take a few seconds ... no pressure!). Have fun. The more people who play, the more fun it is. So, tell a friend. Then send 'em here to read your 'two' and encourage them to play.

You can wipe off that frown; the silicone twins are here to entertain! Two bucks to wrestle and five for marrying - that's what they call an investment. Your teeth have never been so white. You've never slept like this before. You will have more energy and feel less lethargic throughout the day. You will cut your coffee consumption in half. 

You will become a degenerate who never leaves the house. The neighbors will gossip about you. You will not be asked to attend PTA meetings, even if you're willing to pony up. No one wants your pony. Your pony is looking in the mirror and he can't even see himself. 

You did that. 

Step right up and donate an organ - I'm not a doctor; I'm just hungry. Side effects? Sure. Mild. You may sprout hair on your face. Your asshole might fall out. You might shit hot blood. You might wake up in a complete panic convinced that Jay Leno is trying to steal your chin. 

He can never get enough!

Think about how fantastic and amazing and fulfilling your life could be. Think about tucking yourself into some non-sentient arms and motorboating the fuck out of the rubber tata blubber. You'll have the kind of erection you haven't had since middle school. The kind that won't go away and humiliates you in front of the class. 

You don't want to miss this once in a lifetime opportunity. You'll spend the rest of your life hating yourself. Your dick will hate you because it can't get painfully erect. You may black out unexpectedly, but that will make you a hit at parties. 

This is a call to action! This is an opportunity that is dwindling by fractions. Come on and get you some satisfaction. Unless you're poor. Then no one wants your business. Go watch TV. Leave the postmodern love infractions to those who are worthy.

Call today! 

1-800-TRU-LOVE

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