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 You can have all the best intentions, and still fuck up. It's like making pie crust. Seems simple, and it is simple when your Grandma does it, but then you try and do it on your own, and you end up with soupy bullshit. So, you buy the pre-made pie crust and lie about it because, what the fuck? Doesn't matter. No one will know. Why would you want to make it from scratch when they have it already made and packaged, sitting on the shelf?

Same thing applies to personalities. 

I mean, yeah, they sell a bunch of different kinds at the mall. You can be a rebel or Live, Laugh, Love! your way into Chardonnay oblivion. You can walk into the mall a computer programmer and leave a fucking gangsta. Dad to Special Ops Ranger. Grandma to muscle-head. Grandpa to Lothario. You just change clothes and roll. Buy the appropriate soundtrack. Find your flunkies. Post up. 

But it ain't gonna fit right. Some people will be fooled, but never the people you're so intent on impressing. 

You can walk into REI a scared suburban wanker and leave ready to conquer the Amazon, climb Mt. Everest. At least aesthetically. 

Or you could try to find out what you really think. How you really feel about things. What's really important to you. It may not be a popular answer, but it's YOURS. Shouldn't that count for something. Chameleons are charming, but I don't trust them. Just feed them bugs and bullshit on my way to the dumpsters. 

Just because you can buy it doesn't mean you need it. No matter what the talking heads say. 

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It's hard, rowing against the current. It's demoralizing. Your arms burn, and your shoulders ache, and you barely make any progress. Thing is, if you stop rowing, you're screwed. Even for a second. You'll lose so much, and it will hurt so much more to make up the distance you had already covered. You can just flat quit, lay down in the bottom of the boat with the half inch of tobacco water and old bass rubber, but it stinks down there. You never get dry. You catch a chill when the sun goes down. 

Everyone else is dealing with their own boats. And hell, some of them got two big old outboard motors on them. They create so much wake it's a miracle they don't capsize all the wooden boats, but it is what it is. They must just deserve those big motors, and it's none of your concern. Just keep rowing. Watch out for the wake. Don't question anything. That's what the authorities are for. 

If you need to reach them, they're drinking sweat tea and bourbon on that big party pontoon. 

You can't see ahead of you that well when you're at the water level. Those big bass boats and pontoons have a better vantage. You can stand up and try to catch a peek, but don't fall in. 

Only socialists need help out. 

Now, if you row your boat, don't make no wake with the oars...be happy working your way up to a john boat, and don't expect no more...

If you are willing to ignore the folks paddling their canoes like mad, not to mention the poor bastards already half-drowned, trying to keep their heads above water...

If you make sure you're focused on the advancement of YOUR team....YOUR allies...

Man, if you just shut the hell up and row...

...you won't drown at least until the falls. 

We call it retirement. 

Deadly.

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It was a Tuesday when I decided to head on down to the holler and drink myself to death. All you squares worried someone is gonna find out you jerked off or snuck a few snorts of liquor. You ain't a murderer fucking your cousin; I had real problems. Problems that couldn't be solved except with silence and an unending supply of shine. The holler had the silence; I figured I could provide the moonshine. So, I traded my truck, my shotgun, and my dog to the kid down the road, got me about sixteen full jugs of shine. More than enough. 

I figured it wouldn't be quick, and I was prepared to puke a lot of it up. Spill some. Whatever. Two was more than enough. The sold truck and gun and dog were insurance. I knew I couldn't get 'em back. Now, there was nothing calling to me. 

I cracked the first jug about noon and it tasted like battery acid and fire. It hurt. The first half of the jug hurt, really, but after that nothing hurt for a few days. Then, all the hurt in the world came to me. But I was only down three jugs and there was plenty of silence to shut up. 

I started losing track of time, then. Not just how long I'd been in the holler, but my place in time. I started taking trips back to my childhood and shit. Saw my old man clear as he was sitting beside me, and he blew his brains out ten years ago. Saw my first girlfriend. I swear I could smell her.

I figured I wouldn't know when death came, but I did. I knew it clearer than anything. I felt a calm peace take over my whole body, and I knew that the next time I tipped the jug, it would be the last. I would return to the dirt, become part of the holler. So, I smiled and tipped the bottle, drank a toast to secrets and the woods that keep them.  

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We have to stop meeting like this. They're going to get wise to you. You aren't toeing the line sufficiently, or you could do better if you just rubbed these essential oils into your eyeballs. Read your bible. Bible. Sorry. 

Take this assault rifle and go bust some bottles out back, son. We need you ready for when the queers and abortioners attack. Put this confederate flag on your truck. Not the white one they waved at the end of the war...the one your cousin has tattooed on her taint. 

You hear about that kid who sold lemonade to pay off his classmate's outstanding school lunch bills? That's fucking socialism, and it's disgusting. Me? I'm making more money than ever by not planting the crops the gubmint don't approve of.  My Deddy got rich not planting soybeans. The government takes care of farmers, you know? 

The people who pick and work in the fields, not so much. 

Did you take the sticker off your new phone? The one that says it totally wasn't put together by sterilized Uyghur women. You're supposed to leave that shit on. Let people know it's official. 

I'm gonna head on down to the Walmart. Yell at some people. Like a real American.

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You didn't have to take it. You didn't have to wrap your dirty fucking fingers up in it, tug it, screw with it, worry it. You didn't have to act like you had no options. You had options. You took the path of least resistance cause it was easy, and you're surprised that it didn't lead anyplace interesting?

No one's going to pay any attention to you if you never speak. And I'm not talking about opening your mouth. I'm talking about actual speech, communication. You know, original ideas, controversial opinions. Why would anyone want to hear you parrot shit you didn't understand or question in the first place?

Call me friend, call me team. Stab me in the back and watch me scream.

Then, tell me I'm making too much noise. Thing is, I actively try to take the road less traveled. Leads to some flat tires, U-turns, and lost hours, but it's more fun than being on tracks. The tracks are safer, don't get me wrong. 

But you don't get to guide your own ship.

Talk about obligations, but remove the self-imposed ones. Reach for the top shelf, even if you might spill what's up there. I mean, otherwise, what's the point? 

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Dear World,

I'm a little tired. Not gonna lie. I don't feel any nice words inside myself. I do not feel like constructing metaphors. I feel like withdrawing from society altogether. I feel like closing my eyes and never opening them. I feel like I can't take another morning of being snapped into paranoid anger as soon as my eyes open. I need perspective, but the light keeps changing, throwing mad shadows. 

The thing that's killing me? Everyone is so damn small. Like, everybody. Everyone has their shit twisted up and their guts in knots. How can you be so blind, so many of you? I'm not saying I'm some great ascetic Saint, but I understand that people are in pain and try not to judge them too hard. 

Maybe if we all took a break. From everything. Not just from restaurants, but from each other. Some governmental mandated hermitage. Every man, woman, and child alone in a cave for a year. See what kind of shit we come out preaching. See how sure we are.

So, I did this. Put these words on a page, and I know there isn't any point, but it's something to do. 

Have a nice day,

JD

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Go ahead, son. Shimmy on out on that branch, way down to the end where the tippy tippets dance. Don't worry, son, I got a firm grip on your belt. Skin on out there, boy. You're gonna be fine. I'll just sit here with both fingers crossed behind my back, listen to the branch snap, listen to the sound on the ground when you SPLAT.

I got your back. I'll support you. I'll be back afterwards to report you.

Step on up to the counter, man. Buy three balls to throw at a can. If you can hit 'em, you can take home this embalmed child from a third world country. Don't get all up in arms Ma'am, the thing is rigged. The cans are glued down. The balls are weighted strange. There are mirrors and light tricks. Of course no one can actually win the little mummy, Dummy; that would be absurd. My word.

I told you what for, son, don't tell me I never said it. I've got something to sell you that you should buy on credit. And, here's the moral to the story, if you think you need it. There's nothing that can't be fixed by some happy-handed horseshit. 

Amen.