Straight White Male

 Fear.

It's a pretty easy emotion to connect to. To latch on to. Fear for safety. Fear for others. Fear of others.  Fear for the future. Fear of the future.  I've seen a lot of that this week. It's understandable. We are beginning a march into a project 2025 future that promises to wreak a bit of havoc for a lot of people.

And a lot of people voted for it.

Anger.

It's a pretty easy emotion to connect to. It's right there. It's on the surface. You can grab it, and use it, and hurl it at others. Anger is fire, and the fire feels good.  Especially when that rage is oh so righteous. That spurs the fight, and you know you can say or do anything because you're right.  No one can take that away from you.  Hook that shit to the veins, amiright?

And with that oh so righteous indignation we can get rid of the devil himself. Delete. Erase. Ostracize. Cancel.

For the past couple decades we on the left have leaned into a very clear narrative. Every good hero needs a villain, and if we telling the story are the hero, then we also need a villain.  And boy howdy did we give ourselves one.

The Straight White Male.

That's all I need to say. 

Straight White Male. Slavery. Racism. Sexism. Greed. Power. Rape. Institutionalized...well...everything. The person of privilege who created a system by which no other person can hope to achieve. Can hope to thrive. Can hope to maybe even survive.

And every person reading this knows at least one good Straight White Male. A person of compassion, and caring, and empathy, so obviously not ALL men.

But you can't even say that.  To say the words "not all men" has become it's own special slur. Because of course not all men. That's not what we're talking about.  We're talking about the Straight White Male. Hell, even me writing this...you reading it...probably connects you to that anger, especially that righteous anger that is so easy, and feels so good. That villain is real. He the embodiment of evil. He is the bad guy in our narrative, and the passing of the last week has done nothing to disprove that.

Here's the problem, and trust me it is a problem. I have intentionally been capitalizing the words of the name of our villain Straight White Male. I am a straight white male. So even saying that with the lower case appellate I'm still easy to pass off. Sure...just another straight white male defending the Straight White Male. Because that's what it is right. No matter how good I may be...or perceived to be. No matter how bad...or badly perceived, the fact is I am a straight white male. I don't have a place in the conversation when talking about the injustices in the world. I am part of the problem. I am part of the problem because I am straight. And white.. And male.

Straight White Male has no face. He has no specific feature. He is simply the embodiment of evil.

Every straight white male has a face, and care, and ambition, but for nothing more than words alone every single straight white male is Straight White Male.

The worst thing the left ever did was create, and then lean into, and then embrace Cancel Culture. The left leaves no room for sin. No room for forgiveness. No room for change. If you're not perfect like me, then you have no value, and you have to leave. Leave forever, and leave in shame. The left fucking LOVES to signal their virtue. They love words like love, and empathy, and compassion...inasmuch as those words are only applied to victims or less privileged and marginalized. For the sinner there is none. There is only cancel. There is only ostracism. You are no longer welcome here. There is for you, no community here. And we all win, because everyone is safer now. Now we can heal. Now the bad person is gone.

The problem is cancel culture is cancer. It grows and grows and grows because that righteous indignation feels so good, and soon...every sin is equal to the worst sin. Any error, will get you removed. Say the wrong thing. Laugh at the wrong joke, watch the wrong show that was written by the wrong person who did the wrong thing twenty years ago, and you are no longer welcome in this circle. And our circle may be smaller...but at least it's safer.

You didn't have enough pity for victim? Didn't empathize enough for a marginalized group? Didn't donate enough money to the proper cause? Weren't sex positive enough? Thought someone's kink was weird? You weren't open minded enough? Didn't understand trans life and made fun of someone?  Yer out. OUT.

And now our community may be a bit smaller...but at least it's safer. One less Straight White Male.

Smaller, but safer.

But oh shit...

Fuck...

Now everyone is paying attention to how righteous and open minded I am.  I better signal that shit. I better put it up on every social media sight just how safe I am. How much I DO care about the community. I like it here, so I better sure as fuck make sure everyone knows just how right, and true, and perfect I am, and how I like the rest of this community am filled with empathy and compassion, and honor, and nobility, but I also need to include a little line about how imperfect I am, but also I'm not a sinner like...like...I'm not at all like Straight White Male. That guy's an asshole and we should definitely not show him any empathy or compassion, because I'm too open minded and blah blah blah fucking blah.

And so we signal our virtue. And we advertise our empathy and compassion, while we purge any and every intolerable. Without question. Post haste. Due Process is for the real courts. Court of public opinion? Guilty. 

When someone in your community commits some sin, in some way violates your little moral playbook, you really do have two choices. Cast out, or Love in.  There's only one right answer.  I'll give you a hint. It's the one with love in it.

Casting out will almost always have worse results, and not work out as intended.

And now the crux. The real problem. The perhaps (hopefully not, but almost certainly) insurmountable problem.

The left incredibly and effectively, with almost surgical precision, villainized, and then ostracized the Straight White Male. Once removed from a community. Once informed that they are no longer welcome in one space, they will inevitably find a community that accepts them. The bigger problem there is that once accepted by a new community, why in the fucking goddamn world, would they ever return to the community that threw them away like garbage? Why?

So what did the left do?

They ostracized THE BIGGEST FUCKING VOTING BLOCK in the goddamn nation.  The left told Straight White Male that they didn't want him, and there was no place for him here...so he went to the other side. Want to get him back? Of course you don't...because your cancel culture, and your narrative of villainy has convinced you that you're better off without him.

After all of the worst elements of project 2025 are implemented, tell me again how we're better off.

INTERLUDE: A SHORT SCENARIO

A large group of friends sharing lunch, when it is discovered that one of them doesn't share a value.

"Oh my god. You like that book by that author who said that terrible thing on twitter that time? I'm sorry you can't sit with us anymore. No...sorry...sorry. You clearly feel a different thing, and it's not the right thing, and I don't feel safe and you have to leave. GO."

"Thank god he's gone. We're so much safer now."

Next day. Same friends. Smaller group.

"Oh my god. You liked that comedian who told that joke that was kind of funny, but also hurtful and was not inclusive to all ideas, thoughts, styles and ways of life? I'm sorry you can't sit with us anymore. No...sorry...sorry. You clearly feel a different thing, and it's not the right thing, and I don't feel safe and you have to leave. GO."

"Oh look. He's going to go sit with yesterday's castoff. Well good riddance. They can just sit there and be evil, and think about what they've done. We're so much safer now."

Next day. Same friends. Smaller group.

"Oh my god. You liked that movie that was directed by that guy that said those racist things and made one of his actors cry? I'm sorry you can't sit with us anymore. No...sorry...sorry. You cleary feel a different thing and it's not the right thing, and I don't feel safe you have to leave. GO."

"Huh. I wonder why he's going to go sit at the horrible people table. They'll probably sit there and stew in their misery and wish they were good people like us and definitely learn their lesson. We're so much safer now."

And on.

and on. 

and on.

Until it's almost election day. And the candidate on one side the professional politician with very clear ideas solid background, and viable leadership skills, verses the Devil himself.

Same group of friends, just much much smaller now.

"Oh my god the choice is so clear. She's so brilliant, and so good, and she'll save us all from the Devil himself. I don't even understand how anyone could vote for him. He can't even speak in coherent sentences, and his gameplan is clearly written out for anyone to see the entire dismantling of a system of checks and balances. This is so easy and obvious and we'll hardly even have to do any work at...wait..."

"Why is the Devil himself sitting over at the bad guys table? Wh...Why are they letting him. Wait...they're...they're laughing at his jokes. Why are they laughing at his jokes?  Why are they having a good time? Why can't they see that it's the Devil himself?  Hey guys...GUYS...come over here...come sit over here with us."

"Why are they laughing at us?  I don't get it, why are they so mad at us? Why are they flipping us off and hate us so much?  I don't...WE'RE THE GOOD GUYS"

"At least we're safer now."

End Scene

One of (and only one of many, but that's seriously a full other blog), Kamala's biggest mistakes was not going on the Joe Rogan podcast. I understand her reasons. Did he invite her in the 11th hour? Yes.  Would he have asked her pointed, and difficult questions? Of course he would have. Did she have a million valid reasons why she shouldn't do it? Absolutely. Anyone and everyone can easily explain and justify why she didn't do that show, and every one of those explanations is one hundred percent valid, but excuses aside, that's not the message that was received.

I'm no fan of Mr. Rogan. I have a litany of perjoratives I could use to describe my feelings for the guy, but here's the thing. Joe Rogan has 14.5 million followers. His primary demographic is Straight White Male. When Kamala declined to do his show, regardless the reason or how valid that reason was, 14.5 million young voters got the message loud and clear. Fuck you. You're not worth it. Millions of Straight White Male were constantly and consistantly told...over and over again...that they were low impact voters. They weren't a focus. They didn't matter.

So they went to the guy who told them they did.

And we refuse to fucking learn the lesson.

Instead of realizing their value. Instead of recognizing their humanity. Instead we call them Nazis.

Yup. Nazis.

I guarantee you, I know this almost for absolute certain. You know a kind, good, person who voted for Trump. You do. You either call that person Nazi, or you make an exception for that one.

Thing is...if even half of project 2025 is implemented, Trump will be running again in 2028. If not him then someone just like him. Or worse.

If there is any hope of getting even part of the largest voting block in the nation back on the left, (and i'm not sure there is. Why come back to the people who spent the past decade villainizing) probably the first place to start is to stop calling them Nazis.

If we want them in our space, then we need to make space.

One more brief illustration of my point and I'll wrap this all up.

Some comedian I've never heard of told a shitty racist joke at the Madison Square Garden event. Even if you didn't watch the convention, you know the joke. A lazily constructed, poorly delivered joke about Puerto Rico being garbage. The left loved it. Not because of the joke itself, that was disgusting right? But because surely that would drive any sane person who heard it straight to the arms of Kamala herself. 

Guys...

Really?

Listen I'm not defending the joke but jesus...

I grew up my whole life hearing jokes about New Jersey being garbage.

Everyone knows that the entirety of West Virginia is nothing but hillbilly cousin fuckers.

Utah, is not but quaker dressing polygamists marrying children in order to make more children...

We all hear these jokes all the time.

It's okay though because those jokes are about white folks.

It's only unfunny when it's not white folks.

Right?

Trump even won the popular vote this time.

Maybe it's time we realize a joke is just a joke. No matter how racist or hurtful it may be, it's not a fucking nuclear bomb that's all of a sudden going to change the minds of the masses.

There are literally millions of people who heard that joke, who probably even hated that joke, and still voted for Trump.

If the left is ever going to want to win again, they're going to have to do the dirty work. They are going to have to climb down from the top of virtue mountain and meet the other side halfway.  I'm not saying sink all the way down. I'm not advocating become Trump to beat Trump. I'm saying there are a LOT of normal everyday people out there....who are certainly NOT Nazis, who don't necessarily see the world through the same lens.

I get that we want to be the good guys. But if we EVER want to win again, we're going to have to stop telling the other side that they're the bad guys.

I get it.

I really do.

Fear is easy.

Anger is easy.

Righteous anger is a fucking drug, and really really easy.

We're going to have to work through those feelings. It will hurt. It won't be easy. That's why it's called work, but maybe, if we want to dip into even some small percentage of the nations largest voting block, we need Straight White Male.

Maybe it's time to stop villainizing that guy. 

Maybe...just maybe...it's time to reach into that bag of empathy and compassion we keep advertizing, and extend it. 

If we want them in our space, we need to make space.

Or not.

We could also just keep making our space smaller.

It's just

we may be realizing way too late...

Not safer after all.

A bathtub play.

I've talked about it a lot. Hell, by now most ya'all probably getting sick of hearing about it, and truly, I'm just getting started.

I first hear of a bathtub play only a couple years ago. It was a foreign play. Russian, or Turkish, or something. I'd heard of Kitchen plays, and Dining Room plays, and Living room plays. Bedroom plays. Never before then had I heard of bathrub plays.

Since then, they've sort of become a thing. I'm reading one now called Harlowe.  I'm not far into it yet, but so far, it's pretty good. What's fascinating to me, is the idea of telling a story that is character, dialogue, and character driven. Not a lot of action you can get from that specific a setting. The power is in the words. And boy do I love some well placed words. Sometimes I even get lucky, and place a few good ones myself.

I've been writing plays for, well, close to a couple decades now. Minus the huge amount of time I took off, and stopped writing all together. Since 2016 though, I've been back at it in full force.  It's been good.  I love it.  I love everything about it. I love crafting stories. I love how characters step into my imagination, and start talking to me. Telling me secrets. Unfolding their mysteries, and asking me to share them with others. And that's kind of exactly what happens. The best, only way to explain it. I'm sure it's different for anybody who writes...but that's how it is for me. The characters visit me. We have...

well...

I was going to say conversations, but that's wrong. We don't really converse...but we do have communications. These people. All of them. Male, female, gay, straight, they become alive in my head, and they tell me things, and I write them down. They are alive to me...but...

also...

They are not alive at all.  Of course. They are imagination. And I tell the stories, and then they are silent. Until the story is told them, they scream. Oh how they scream. They need to be heard.

Not Chloe though. Chloe is different.

So I found out a few years ago that a Bathtub Play was a thing, and almost instantly it was a thing that I had to do. I loved the challenge of it. The idea. The quest for words, in a single defined, isolated, intimate environment. It was a thing I had to do, but...

Well I know how to write a play, but I didn't know how...in...huh...

I didn't have a story. I couldn't come up with one. A story. How do you tell a story with very little action? How do you tell a story that doesn't physically travel? How do you get from point a to point z when point a and z are the exact same place. How can a character take a journey, without going anywhere?

I know there are more esoteric answers, but none that I had, or have, much experience with. So I was stuck. A strong desire to tell a story, but having no story to tell. So I did what I do. I put it on the back burner. Never once forgetting about it, but giving it no priority. I'd talk about it on occassion. Tell people about this little idea...desire...that I had, but always indicating that it would happen whenever. I had an idea with no story to back it. I had the case, with nothing inside.

I talked long about it one night with another writer friend of mine. We hung out, and chatted all sorts of things. Writing a bathtub play among those things. We half joked about sitting in a tub together, and brainstorming this idea. We never did that...but we did push the idea, of pushing each other to write this play. And then we didn't.

I did what any other writer would do. I wrote other plays. Other stories. I worked with other creators on making those stories happen. It was fun, and exciting, and fulfilling, and a positive reminder of all the reasons I do what I do. What I will always do, until my body or brain stop working. I am never going to stop being a storyteller, until I stop breathing altogether. I can't not do it. It is what's inside of me. It's the thing I do, that I can share with the world.

I did it again this year. I told another story. It was a fun story. A story that I really enjoyed telling, and really enjoyed the telling of with the people I got to tell it with. Soon after that, it happenend.

That brain explosion that sometimes happens. I wasn't even really thinking of my Bathtub play. I was thinking of something else entirely, but then, there it was. Not fully formed, but fully formulated. I knew the structure. I knew the course. I knew how to tell a story in a bathtub, and I knew what that story was.

I know what that story is.

Two characters. Zach, and Chloe. I won't tell much more. Not here. Not now. Spoils the surprise and all that jazz...and I think there are some surprises. There is a course. There is a flow. There is a front, and back, and everything in between.

And then something happenend. I started writing it. The deeper I got, the more it became apparent. This is more Chloe's story than I originally though, which surprised me, because it was always her story. She's the goddamn title character.

CHLOE AT 3:08

And she has come into my mind, like all of the other characters before her, in various forms, and guises. She comes to me and asks me to tell her story, as all the others before her, except...

Not screaming.

She is laughing.
She is crying.
She is tired, and triumphant.
She is full of mystery.

She is woman. Female. Feminine.
She is mystery.
She is taunting me.

With things I could guess at. Things I may even guess right. Isn't that what imagination is for? To create a scenario, and guess our way out of it? To wonder ultimately what would I do if...

And that is the problem I've encountered. I always wonder what I would do, and Chloe is not me. She is, I think, the farthest from me, that any character I've written previously has ever been. Because she is truly, completely, not male.

And so I thought to myself, I should talk to my female friends. I am INSANELY fortunate that I have many of them. I should present to them questions, and conversation, that would give me insight into this character. Maybe one...or all of them can help me know why Chloe is whispering instead of screaming. Laughing instead of begging. Maybe they can tell the truth of her, that I can't find inside of me.

I thought I should seek more and better sources.

And then because I am who I am, I thought back to my conversation with my female playwrite friend, and how we talked about having that bathtub play conversation, while taking a bath together, and I continued thinking, (because I never really stop thinking), why not combine all those things. Ask my friends those questions, while taking a bath about it. This gives me other writer insight.

I'll not get into it much, but at the top of the play Zach, and Chloe are perfect strangers. How uncomfortable must that be?

Why not try to find out?

I threw this idea out on facebook.  I've had some response, and this may be something that happens.  It's an (at least to me) interesting idea. This forced intimacy, that may or may not contribute to a deeper kind of intimacy. That kind that can only come from open conversation. In an unusual situation. One of my friends called it a hairbrained idea, and I love that. It may be a bad idea. Hell, it may be a terrible idea. Some of my best ideas have been. Course I'll never know unless I try. If you'd like to be part of this hairbrained idea with me, please let me know. I am not looking for any particular age, or type, or anything. I'm looking for stories, and...

Perspective. Decidedly and ultimately female perspective. A way of looking at things, that I am absolutely incapable of doing, because of my Y chromosome.

Wether this happens, or doesn't, the play will. The play is the thing. The thing inside my head. Chloe is in there, and she wants out. I will let her out, but...I think...

She'll be happier, she'll be...more... if you help me.

Hi again.

It's been a while.  Let's see if I remember how to do this.

Words words words, and all that jazz. The stream of consciousness flows into the river of digression. I used to write, in order to sort out the pieces of the puzzle in my head.  See if I could somehow discover, or translate the bigger picture from the tiny fragments. I thought of it as therapy.

Yet here I am, all this time later, and still fucked up as I ever was. So obviously the therapy didn't work.  I still write.  Other forms. Different mediums. Just closed a play, but this particular vomit of venacular won't go into that.  That one's for later.  Maybe tomorrow.  Maybe not.

I quit smoking almost a year ago.  That's gone well.  I'm still quit, so I guess that's a thing, but damn if I didn't feed the pain of it with crisco, and put on about 30 pounds.  Now I'm working to get rid of that...but this post isn't about that either.

So what is this post about?

Fucked if I know. 

Except I do.

Except for a guy who knows more than a few words, I sure am shit at using them when it comes to putting what's in my head, in to some digital coherence that only 6 people ever will read anyway.

And even though I know that this will accomplish nothing, mean nothing, and achieve nothing, I do it anyway. Oh well. Isn't that the nihilistic truth of all things?  But even if it does mean nothing, does it really mean nothing, if it means something to me? Is there value in the takeaway that even if there is some residual pain, loss, emptiness, there was at some point at least a joy that preceeded it. Perhaps the value is where we place the perception. Do I remember and celebrate the joy that once was? Or the emptiness that remains now with it's loss? Is there some way to place both on the scale and see which side weighs out?

Does it even matter?

Is it really better to have loved and lost...and all that jazz?

I find myself a bit quixotic in my little emotional adventures. Tilting at emotional windmills, that would be giants, if they were real. I seem to find myself in known quandries, of known quantities, of no means to no ends that cannot possibly end well, and diving in with full knowledge of inevitable outcome, willingly paying the cost for a few moments of...I dunno...

Reality.

I am the one thing in life I can control.

Except maybe I can't.

I'm willing to wait for it.

Except I know that the wait is eternal, and will never bear fruit.

And I do it anyway.

Because I can't not.

And my god how I love. I love. I love.
And before I even let myself begin, I know the price of it. I do. I know.  I know the end before it begins, and I begin anyway.

I will let my heart be broken every day.  I will sleep alone, with the memory of every her, who could never be.

My heart has broken.
My heart is broken.
My heart will be broken a thousand times more, and I will fucking cherish every one.  And every name.

And every fantasy, and every dream, and you and you and you have scratched your name into a piece of me that will turn to dust with my skin and bones.

And that moment you gave me.
It is in me.
And I'm selfish.
You can never have it back.
And I will always wish for more moments. I will always want more. I am insatiable...

But that one is with me.
And I am grateful.

Thank you.

Thank you for that kiss in the dark.
Thank you for that secret touch.
Thank you for that single moment of vulerability...because...

even though the lights are on now,
and reality has returned,
and that moment has passed,
and we are once again all the things we have to pretend to be...

You let me see you.
and taste you
and get the sense of you that maybe you don't share with many people...

but I am one

and you are one

and we

Well...

We will never be one...

and now we chase the giant windmill
the noble quest
the endless search

For the next heartbreak.

One Week

Sunday, August 6th, we closed our fringe show.  That night has some bittersweet memories that are mine, and I won't go into, but there was a beauty in it.  And a sadness.  We'd put on our show, and had some small amount of success with it, and now it was over.

I found myself alone.  Members of the cast and production team, each gone their separate ways, and there I was.  By myself, as I so very often am.  I couldn't bring myself to leave the place yet.  I sat in the empty parking lot of the Fringe Factory, staring into the night sky, and smoking my cigarette.  It was calming.  As smoking so often had been over the past decade.  It soothed my troubled soul, and allowed me to melt into something else.  And so I melted.  Lost in though, and the tragic romance of the whole thing.  (There is always tragic romance, if you don't bother looking for it.)

In that moment, something strange happened.  I...I dunno.  I can't explain it.  I was exactly the same, and forever changed.  I didn't want to be a smoker anymore.  I didn't have a reason.  There was no compelling argument.  There was no motivation behind it.  There was no stimulus, or promise of reward.  I just...

I didn't want to be a smoker anymore.  So I quit.  Right then and there.  I quit smoking.

And then I immediately felt the panic that happens when you quit smoking.  Even though the nicotine was still fresh in my blood, and the smell of cigarettes not yet gone from the air...I felt that thing, that you can only know if you are an addict.  If you have been there.  If you don't know the feeling, I can't tell you what it is.  I can only say it's one of the most horrifying feelings outside of imminent threat.

So I started smoking again.  Not ten seconds had passed between quitting smoking, and starting again.  And I felt better.

And I felt worse.

I still wanted to quit. I was ready to quit. I didn't quit. Instead, I did something else.  Something I decided would be just for me.  Something that went unannounced, and without fanfare.  Instead of quitting, I gave myself a quit date.  This helped appease both the part of me that wanted to be done, and the part that was nowhere near ready to be done.  I sat there in the night, overwhelmed with a variety of emotions that I won't ever discuss, and told myself that August 31st, would be my last day as a smoker.

This was all just me.  I never...not once...discussed this decision with another person.  I didn't talk about it.  I didn't let anyone know.  I left myself room to fail, knowing that since I was accountable only to myself...I was most accountable of all.  I didn't want anyone else to know, because this was something that could be mine alone.  And I carried it with me every single day, in my back brain pocket.

Once that decision was made, it was really very easy.  I never felt anxiety leading up to my quit day.  I didn't ever feel like I had to extend it, or change it, or change my mind entirely.  I was still ready to not be a smoker anymore, and soon after, I actually began to look forward to it.  The internal fear that comes with letting go, never came.  I was going to quit smoking on August 31st.

The day arrived, and I had a not quite full pack.  I smoked at my normal rate.  I didn't change or adjust anyhing.  The only thing I didn't do, was purchase the next pack on my lunch break, as I normally would.  I still went ito 7-11. I bought a soda.  Probably chocolate...because there should always be chocolate.  The lady behind the counter knows me, and my habits, and when I didn't ask for a pack of my normal brand, she offered.  I simply said no thank you.

That evening I went with a friend to another friend's house.  Just to hang out and visit.  I only had one cigarette left.  Just one.  One lone nail, sitting in its near empty box...and I was never not aware of it.  I knew that it would be my last.  It was a wonderful evening with friends.  Finally the time came to go home.  Upon arrival, I went to the back patio, as was my daily routine, to smoke.  I didn't make a ceremony of it.  I didn't try to draw it out, or take it slow.  I didn't romanticize it, as I am prone to do with just about every goddamn thing I ever do.  In fact, I was largely distracted with a home project, and worked on that while smoking...hardly paying attention to the cigarette at all.  When it was done, I put it out, and emptied the little bowl I'd been using as an ashtray.  I finished the project for the night, and went inside.  And that was that. 10:30 p.m., Thursday, August 31st, I smoked my last cigarette.

My first true make or break moment came the following morning.  The entire drive in to work, I fixated on just stopping at 7-11, getting a pack, and saying fuck it.  It'd only been about 9 hours since the final smoke on the back patio.  At this point, it wouldn't even be as though I'd quit.  it was just a night of sleep without, and nothing would have changed.  I wanted it.  I wanted to make that stop so bad.  It's been a VERY long time since I've exercised that kind of self discipline, but...

I didn't want to be a smoker anymore.  I watched the 7-11 pass by through the window.  I went to work.

That first day was awful.  I knew it would be.  All I could do, was look forward to 10:30 p.m., just so I could say that I'd made it a full 24 hours.

I made it.

I am still getting nicotine.  Some people quit with the help of gum.  Others the help of the patch.  I have a vape pen, and it's working.  Some may call it a cheat.  I don't fucking care...it's working.  I am grading my nicotine levels down...and will eventually put that away as well, but until I'm fully off the cigarettes...it's what I have.  I am not a smoker anymore.

The second day was rough.  Not as bad as the first, but...pretty rough.  The third was actually...well...I could feel it getting easier.  The fourth day was okay.  The fifth was amazing.  Almost easy.  Habits were starting to die.  Times that I would typically light up, were passing by unnoticed...until I noticed that I hadn't noticed.  There was a certain thrill that I just may be able to get through this.  Day six was hard again...frustrating after the ease of five, and today...

Day seven...

One week exactly...

Has been the worst day yet.  I don't know why.  I don't know the psychology, or biology, or anyology behind it..but...

Today was actually worse than the first day.  Most likely because I expected it the first day, but thought that after a week, maybe it'd ease up a bit.  Especially since day five was such a cake walk.

There are very real, very physical reactions.  I am experienceing those things.  Headaches.  Shakes.  Anxiety.  Tight chest.  Stomach tightening anytime I even think of eating.  On edge.  Oh my fucking christ am I on edge.  Little things driving me crazy.  I'm forgetful.  Not because I'm forgetful, but becuase my mind is so goddamn focused on one thing, that nothing else is getting any mental attention. I need distraction, from the distraction of severe drug deprivation.  It is literally the ONLY thing on my mind...and I can't fucking stop thinking about it.

I've been sucking the ecig, like a goddamn newborn on mama's tit, and I can't get enough.  I can't stop the pain...both physical and mental.  I wan a cigarette.  I don't know that I've ever wanted anything so badly in my life. I know...in my stupid stupid brain, I KNOW, that with just one puff....all of those things will go away.  I will no longer be on that edge.  I will be calm.  I will be relaxed.  I will be able to think again.  I will stop thinking about how much I want one, because I will have had one.

But...

But...

As badly as I want one...

(and sweet mother of god, I do)

I don't want to be a smoker anymore.

It's a funny thing.  I've been asked many times, since I went public with quitting...why?  Why am I quitting?  Why now?  What made me want to do this...now?  And the answer is...

I have no fucking clue.

It isn't a health thing.

It isn't a money thing.

It isn't a self improvement thing.

There is no girl I'm gonna get...or reward I'm gonna achieve.

It isn't an anything.

I've never been able to give satisfactory answer to those questions...because I don't have one.  Under that August moon, I told myself that I don't want to be a smoker anymore.

And so I'm not.

It sucks.

It sucks real bad.

I very literally had to lock myself away from humanity tonight, and that was very much the right decision.

I don't know what tomorrow will be like.

I don't know for how long I can keep not buying a pack...except...

I think maybe forever.

This is the worst thing I have ever done to myself, and I do fully aknowlege that I did this to myself...but....it's just what I have to do now, because...

I can't really tell you why.

I don't know why.

But I don't want to be a smoker anymore.

So I won't be.


Also...

Fuck you.  Because I hate everything and eveybody forever.

Or at lieast until...

You know...

This also passes.

Ready to roll for initiative.

If I have ever hurt you, I am sorry, and please know it was not with intent. I have been hurt, and I know that hurt was not the intent.

I will hurt again. I will be hurt again. I will once again set myself up for the pain that is inevitable with breathing... and not talking. I'm very good at that.

What is, is.

The foundation of reason.

I have been very involved lately with the thoughts in my head. Some I will share. Most I will not.  I am not intentionally enigmatic, if you find me so. I just... prefer to not share the more significant parts of me,  and so I therefore elaborate and exaggerate the insignificant.  That IS intentional.

It has been a very very long time since I've wanted to let someone else have that.  There were a couple times over the past while I thought I may want to let that out again.  I was wrong.  So back in to me I go.

I've been thinking lately. (A terrible pastime, I know.) Most is for my brain stuff,  but some I'll share.

I've been thinking about the merry-go-round... but that...

That's going in to the play I'm writing,  unless it gets cut in final edit.  So you'll just have to come to the fringe fest this year for more on that.

I've been thinking about lies.  The lies we tell other people,  because they are the lies we have told ourselves, and believed. I've been telling a whopper for about a decade now.  Until I found my truth.  This one's gonna  sting for a while,  and the end result will be invisible.  Tarnished thread in my own little tapestry.

I've been thinking about decades.  How each for me is like some strange chrysalis, and I'm now very near my ten year mark in SLC.  I feel transformation  coming. I'm not yet sure I'm comfortable in this new skin.  It's different.  It's neither pretty, nor shiny, but it's mine, and I must wear it.

New realities I must adjust to, and as I've always done,  I set the emotion aside, and go in to my head.  My head.  My stupid lying to myself brain, that thirsts for epiphany,  yet closes its own throat when epiphany arrives.  That's a neat trick.

And there's more... So much more... and I know the tone of all this is maudlin, but the tone is perhaps as misleading as everything else.  There is no pity in this self.  Only discovery,  and a charmed, if not overly romanticized sense of selves colliding.

I've been thinking about all the times I've died.  Killed myself, or by myself been killed. Been reborn, once more with new illusion. Do I rise each time stronger? Wiser? Or just with a new map of lies with which to navigate this altered reality. 

Is my frustration born of new doubt, or lessons not yet learned.  Or once learned now forgotten to be learned again... and is there a difference.

Is this heartache new? Or a newly opened old wound? Is this longing mine? Or does it belong more to the fantasy of who I wish I was? Or used to be?

Can necromancy be used on only the best things we've left behind, leaving still to rest those parts we intentionally murdered?

Aren't I too old for identity crisis? Or is this the crisis that comes at mid life? Is it really a crisis if it's all in my head, and my outward appearance remains the same? Is it crisis if I can still sleep at night,  or is it the same crisis that has plagued my entire life with lack of sleep?

And most importantly, how can I justify the new discoveries, with the existing desires?  It is said that a true contradiction can't exist in nature.  There is ample philosophical diatribe to support the thesis,  but on the other hand Freud said everything is dicks, except cigars, and I'm pretty sure Freud was full of dick shaped shit, and maybe everything that is said is contrary to everything else that's said and there is no such thing as objective truth, but if that's true, then one could argue there's no such thing as objective lies, but that can't be true so there...THERE...is a goddamned rhetorical contradiction, which if nowhere else exists in my brain, which to my knowledge is natural, and ergo a contradiction does exist in nature so fuck you hypothetical semantician. I think two things, therefore I am two things.  Very very contrary things.

I am my own best hypocrite. A veritable Janus on the rock, and both faces are true. And both faces lie.  And so...

I will hurt.
And I will be hurt.

And I am I am I am

Absolutely
Resolutely
True to all of my selves.

Without apology, or exception.

Because this is what it means to be human.
To be alive.
To be open to new experience
And new truth
And because tomorrow I may be different than I was today
Does not mean that I didn't mean every single word I said yesterday.

I simply, and absolutely refuse to be limited in my experience by stagnation of principle.

The grey Jedi.
The chaotic neutral.

The Paladin of disorder.

Christ does it hurt.
My god how I laugh.

Just because your truth is not my truth does not mean we're dishonest.

And as always...there is the quest.  The hero's (or anti hero's depending on perspective) journey. 

Love in every step.
Beneath every breath.
Under every star, and atop each grain of sand.  The motivating agent on every decision... truth or lie... laughter or tear drop, all of the words spoken...

And not...

Is the oh my god you've stolen my breath by simply existing...

Love.

Someday that love will kill me.  It will.  I will supernova because I've lost the strength and ability to contain it any longer.

But until then...

My god, you've stolen my breath by simply existing.

A lot of unrelated paragraphs.

I'm much more a road hazard when listening to the classical radio station, than any other. No really.  Any normal station, I only have to sing along.  When it's the classical station, it takes both hands to conduct the orchestra.

There are a ton of things in my brain, and I can't seem to wrap around any single tangent and give birth to true cohesion, so here's to no sense and nonsense.

There are currently three unwritten plays, and one needing revision, all fighting for front and center, and the one needing most immediate attention is dozing in the back.

I think a primary reason I don't online date, is because I don't have the energy to prove to strangers that I'm not the dirtbag they kind of have to assume I am.

Also I don't date.

I also have an uncanny ability to blow it with any woman within 2.5 conversations.   So as long as I keep my time and attention with them under that, there's still a chance.

I think the greatest indicator I'm a horrible person, is that I actually really look forward to saying, "I told you so", to Trump supporters.

Last week I tried quitting smoking.  I went 37 hours before I quit quitting.  I learned nothing new about myself from that experience.

I used to think I was a very patient person, but then it occurred to me that it's not patience if you're not really waiting for anything.

My thoughts are far less pornographic than my social media presence might indicate.

Maybe.

I also have WAY more fun.

And laugh.  A lot.  Every day.  If you don't, you should try it.  It's fun and easy.

The intricacies and delights of my life are defined by accident, and bad timing. I almost never get what I want, therefore by extension I've gotten everything I ever wanted.

I've also learned a lot about love.  Not really though, but what it is to me...and that's enough.

Things I like:

Outside nighttime smoking sans shirt and shoes, mid March.

Easter candy.

Ice cream.

Playful kittens.

Telling stories.

Listening to people talk passionately.

Words.

Meaningful looks in crowded rooms.

Emotional bonds that transcend description.

Acting.

Script analysis.

Music.

A gajillion (that's not a real number, that represents the impossible nature of listing all the things I like).

But mostly I like being alive.

This is my favorite fucking thing of all.  Every second of every day that I have awareness, I am aware that I am doing my favorite thing, and lately I've been far too painfully reminded that this is not an option for everybody, and will someday no longer be an option for me.

So while it's still an option, I'll do the things I like.  I'll do all the things on my impossible to realistically number list.  I'll do those things with people who would like to do them with me.  And if they don't want to...that's okay.  Won't stop me.

Make your list.  Or do your things.

Or don't.

I ain't gonna listen if you try to tell me how to live my life, I'd be a hypocrite if I told you how to live yours...but...

I hope there is joy.

Goddamn I hope there is joy.

And I hope you know that if I love you, well...

There's not a damn thing you can do about it.

This little piggy...

A woman is more convinced by what she guesses, than by what she is told.  He remembered this only after he had told her everything.

In my youth I had more than ample opportunity to attend county fairs, and rodeos.  This was simply part of life in Wyoming.  A reality I grew up with....I grew up in.  It is no longer a part of the reality I exist in, but the memories remain.  These events are fraught with the most entertaining combination of child and animal abuse. The mutton busters were great.  Little kids in football helmets on sheep.  Always a good time.  My favorite though was the greased pig chase.  This is, well...exactly what it sounds like.  Some asshole would grease up a pig, scare the shit out of it, then turn it loose while a bunch of kids tried to catch it, all while drunk parents stood outside the gates screaming, "Come on Dusty,  go on catch that sumbitch", and sipping on Pabst signature Blue Ribbon from a plastic cup.

I don't really remember if anyone ever caught the pig.  Probably.  I don't remember what the prize was if they did.  Hell, maybe they got to keep it.  Take it to the butcher and fill the freezer.  I don't really know.  I do remember kids falling down a lot.  Getting bloody. Trampled. Crying.  Cheering. Tons of laughs to be had all around.

Maybe there's a god above, 
but all I ever learned from love
was how to shoot somebody
who outdrew ya.

I would watch and laugh with the rest of the folk dressed in their farmland finest. I would eavesdrop the conversations about the weather, and the coming harvest, and the local gossip.  Wanting nothing more than escape.  Wanting to be the angel staggering on tenament roof.  Wanting to rage against the dying light.  Wanting to be that mind, starving, hysterical and naked, destroyed by madness.  Not knowing then that the madness was in the wanting.

And I often felt like that pig.  Scampering.  Running.  All these strange hands reaching for me, to catch me. To control me.  Fuck I dunno...take me to the butcher and fill their freezer.

I still feel that way sometimes.

He watched her. She knew he was watching, but he wondered if she was aware the scrutiny.  He needed...so much he needed a way to let go of her. She had caught him. She knew.  And she knew that when she had, he immediately became uninteresting.
He knew this also, and was desperately attempting every method to escape the snare of her.

And now I share this rock with so many strangers, and have discovered that although we call it by so many different names, it's all just chasing greased pigs.  And there is trampling, and crying, and blood, and laughter, and some drunk asshole cheering us along.  What seemed novelty at the time, is now so much background distraction, on a much grander scale.

Visions. Omens. Hallucinations. Miracles. Ecstasies, Gone down the American river, but this time without exclamation.  Because we've taken this trip so many times, and now when I rage against that dying light, the guy in the window above me, tells me to get a grip, shut the fuck up, and quit thinking I'm special.  The tenament rooftop dance has ended, and my card is empty.

He made every attempt to lose his attraction.  He watched her through worlds eyes, and noted everything this existence defines flaw.  He made her voice nails in his head.  He painted her gray, and erased her from his desire.  He took from her the power she'd given him.  He knew she'd never miss it. He let it fly on the wish of other things, and closed the night alone.  Knowing the flavor of that false kiss. He left the night reborn.

One day I will find the right words, and they will be simple.  So said once a madman, and I hope he did.  I hope I will.

A pain stabbed my heart, as it did every time I saw a girl I loved going the opposite direction in this too big world.  So said once the same madman, and I still hope he found the words.  I need him to have found the words, because if he did, that means they exist, and maybe I will too.  But then again...he was a madman.

We're all mad here.  So said once a mad cat.

The pig used to squeal a motherfucker.  I might too if being chased by a multitude of strangers intent on my capture. Like that pig, I have no where to go, but I have to keep running, because the alternative is not running, and not running means I may just end up in someone's freezer.  Or my own freezer.  This world is too big.  There is too much.  I will miss all of the good stuff, but goddammit if I am not intent on not missing the good stuff.  I will see the things I want, and do the things I do, and live in abject poverty, and abstract delight.  I will watch.  I will listen.  I will jest, and my god will I laugh, and my god will I lie.  I will give you the exact fiction of me that I want you to have.  And I will keep myself for myself.  This is far more fun.

Every day he remembers her.  And her.  And her.  And her.  Every day he feels the name of her scratch the blood in him, and he thanks her.  Every day he remembers the little things.  Everyday he plants a new seed somewhere else, that will not be her, or her, or her, in hopes that the future forrest provides the shade that will hide him from her, and her and her.  He walks the days a vision of calm, while the fire inside comsumes the hope he had of her.  And her.  And her.

There are so many stories to tell.  So many little treasures to hide in plain sight.  There is in each fucking moment, of each fucking day, a new flame to fan, and fire to build.  There are worlds to build.  I'm currently building three, and it is slow, but my christ is it rewarding.  I watch these people who don't exist anywhere but inside my mind shape new words, and new pain.  Tell new secrets to old friends, and I can't do this...I couldn't do this...

If I wasn't like that goddamn pig.  I have to run.  I have to squeal.  I have to find my way away from hands that would trap me down, and fill their freezer.  I have to turn over the rocks that everyone else walks on, so I can see the bugs underneath....also running and squealing to keep away from my hands.  I have to write on this page....all the things that don't make sense...so I can write on other pages the things that do.  I have to let the words happen.  My brain cup runneth over.  My heart cup is empty.

And now I will put this one to rest, so that I may move on to another.  I'll stop chasing the little pig in my head.  In another place up in that dusty attic, are four campers who probably don't like each other as much as they tell each other they do.  Or...maybe they like each other more.  I don't know yet.

In another place in my brain in a man in a bathtub, who can't see the woman who is also in the bathtub.  Or maybe he can only see her when she is.  I don't know yet.

In yet another gray cavity is a woman mourning the loss of her husband.  He recently died, and left behind something she's discovered, that he never got the chance to explain.  It's all very tragic.  The things we don't say to each other, and the moment we realize we'll never be able to.  Really though...it probably doesn't matter....

It all ends in tears anyway. - Jack Kerouac