Secret Window And The Daylight Savings Conundrum...Part II: What About Me?

"Dude, you're emotional, like a woman."

"I'm having a problem with medication."

"You're on medication?"

"Well no, that's the problem."

I have three hundred DVD's yet today I dozed through a $4.95 VOD viewing of Secret Window. I can't explain it either.

I think I realized my worst nightmare tonight...I lived through the same hour twice.

There is an answer to every question. A right to every wrong.

I was ready to go again. Ready to disappear. But things keep happening that stop me. I can't go now because it will look like I went for the wrong reasons. So I put my hand down and return to my seat and wait again for an opportunity to catch a break.

I don't like Mondays anymore.

Tuesday is the end of so many different stories that I haven't figured out just yet how to deal with it all. There are so many exciting things happening to so many different people I know that it bothers me how excited I am for them. There is no good reason for me to feel even remotely happy, but there it is. I just like to see people do well.

At the same time though I don't understand. Here are all these people shooting for so much, and getting it in large gobs. Here I am, wanting only one thing, working my ass off to show God I deserve it...and I just can't seem to catch a break. Maybe I should have aimed higher, so that when I missed low I still hit something worth hitting.

I've grown paranoid. Grown tired. Grown old. My body's catching up to my soul, and my mind is already long gone. The journey is coming to an end. But I already know the sad truth...

There's no way out. Nowhere to go.

There is no light...we run on.

Good Evening Mr. & Ms. America & All The Ships At Sea

"I can feel them you know. The ones who are out there." - Palomba
"What about the ones who aren't?"-King
"I feel them too."- Palomba
"How do you tell the difference?"- King
"That's the problem, I can't."- Palomba

I can't tell anymore. You're all starting to feel the same to me. If you're from Norman, Oklahoma or Palisades Park, New Jersey...I can't tell the difference. I know there aren't as many of you as there used to be, but that's to be expected.

I know this gets worse and worse. Seems like less and less. But...

I never promised you anything. Never made any guarantees other than to say that I will be here until I don't need to be here anymore, and then I'll be somewhere else.

Manhattan, Montgomery, Mobile, Morocco, Madrid...they all feel the same.

The Brunswicks do too. New Brunswick, North Brunswick, South Brunswick, Old Brunswick...you get the picture.

Hawthorne blows my mind. But then again it's running together with Haledon, Wayne, Wyckoff, etc., etc.

So look...I know someone's here, sometimes, occassionally, rarely. But I can't tell who, at least not exactly, not anymore. From Chappaqua to Britain to Singapore and back you're all starting to smell the same to me. No offense meant, but I just can't feel you like I used to. So I guess I'll have to work on seeing you.

It's just about time for the sun to rise...all the better to see the world with.

Isolated Memories And King Size Dreams: How About For Once You Find Me ?

"Come on kid, you know me better than that. Now get out of here. I got a world to save." - King

"Maybe it's because I'm not other guys." - Palomba

I drifted off to sleep sometime after four this morning, trying my hardest to fight The Afflictions. Lately they've let the world beat me down on its own, but last night they felt the need to help and while The Darkness was fairly weak The Fix had me for hours.

Before I fell asleep I thought of a night not too long ago where I asked God not to let me dream, because I was convinced nothing I could dream of would do anything but further sour my disposition. I believe he obliged that night, so last night I begged another favor.

I asked God to let me dream big. King size dreams for a king size guy.

And as I felt myself slipping away for the night I was thinking nothing but good thoughts, as pure as they were pleasant, not a wicked thought in my head.

Now I've seen what God can do with my good thoughts, and I'm frightened enough that I may never think of them again.

Last night I dreamed of my life being perfect. I'm not ready to tell you how, because I'm not sure it's at all possible and wouldn't dare focus any more energy on things that can not happen.

Dreams are the honest part of us. They tell us what we want, what we can get, what we deserve. Your dreams can't lie to you, you won't let them. So what does it mean, when you think you want something so badly in real life, only to have your dreams tell you other wise. In real life I lie to myself and say I don't feel a certain way, even though deep down (and not so deep down) I know that I really do feel that way. Except that in my dreams I really don't feel that way. And I'm not lying to myself, or tricking everyone else. I just feel the way I pretend I feel out here...in the dream it's genuine, and I'm happy about it. In the dream it really is that way. But what's real in dreams...

Last night we meandered through a world that I'm sure will never exist, but one I would gladly trade this one for lock, stock, and barrel.

It would have been nice to say that these dreams came from my inner most desires, or that God projected the future right down into my head. But in the last second before I slept all the other thoughts were chased from my head...leaving only one.

Jean Daste, wearing all black, sprinting across a beach of white sand. He's just realized what he's lost. And now he means to get it back.

A whole night's dreams from a single scene in a movie none of you will ever see.

"It's a fuckin' barge man." - Kong

"No, it's my life in a nutshell." - Palomba

The Walking Wounded: Death

"I don't know why you bother trying, you don't have much of a chance do you?" - T.O. Hob

We are those who have lost, those who are missing.

We are those that you think about, but have no feelings for.

We are those that are left over...but have never really understood why.

We are those that are lonely.

We are those who are yet to discover why life is worth living.

"It's not much of a chance. But it is a chance, isn't it?" - Rigby

It Is Written

"When a man expects anything to happen, nothing can surprise him. When a man expects nothing to happen, anything can become a pleasant surprise." - T.O. Hob

We play this game again in the dwindling hours of our collective consciousness. Soon we drop off, finding new ways to express ourselves, or retreating back into our old guises of cold and aloof cogs in the mechanics of society.

There is no light...we run on.

But there is...something.

Today it is the fact that I fell asleep last night thinking of reassuring words and grandiose speeches meant to stoke fires and rouse a little rabble. Last night I went to sleep thinking of how cold I was going to be soon.

I've been kicked around an awful lot in the past year. On the day I started this blog I said it would only run for the last few months of college and straight through the summer. I've overshot that a bit for my own personal reasons but I know that in a few weeks I'll be faced with a decision. Do I keep this going? Can I?

I've told most of the stories I ever meant to tell and while there are always new ones, they aren't always interesting. Were they ever?

With college now in the rear view and an uncertain and unfullfilling life coming up on the horizon I have to buckle down and decide how to play the hand I've been dealt. Decide how to get what I want. Decide how to not be alone, but still be myself.

It's getting harder and harder to harness the emotion I used to be able to draw some sort of defiant strength from.

It's just getting colder and darker, quicker and quicker.

So here we go...staring down the sunset and wondering what's next. Wondering where I'm going when I'm still trying to figure out where I came from.

I've done it before and I'll do it again. I'll write about today...

"It was a good day. Not spectacular in any particular way, but pleasant in every little way. He said the right things, saw the right people, and when he closed his eyes at night he knew he'd done right by the world...and the world had done right by him. It was a rare day, of the sort that makes life worth living."

Never would have guessed I could still be an optimist, would you?

Last night was full of dreams, both old and new. A night where my inner demons stood up on their soap boxes and shouted me down as both a saint and a sinner. It was odd how many people appeared in my dreams last night, how I interacted with them, how they didn't just pass through. Odd in a way I'm getting used to. One of those little dream vignettes reminded me of something I imagined Hob once said. Fucking A', it's Tuesday.

"You know what kid, you win half the battle just by showing up." - T.O. Hob

Stone Cold: Unflappable

"I am well aware of your concern sir but can assure you that I have not had a drink in the past thirty-seven minutes and am therefore both exceptionally capable and shockingly overqualified to be driving a vehicle as such." - T.O. Hob

It's never good when you're the scariest thing in a haunted house.

Last night I met Crago in Bayonne and shot out to Philadelphia. No, not for cheesesteaks (damn vegetarians) but to go to the famous haunted house at the old Eastern State Penitentary. We were meeting a few of Crago's friends but since I tend to drive really fast we left Bayonne a little before they left New Brunswick and we beat them to Philadelphia by an hour.

Turns out Crago's sister was there, so he calls her and she says it's a bit crowded. We get down there and begin to understand how crowded is an understatement. This place is several city blocks long in every direction, and the line goes all the way around the building. We pay for our $25 tickets ($25 x {Thousands of people waiting on line in the cold}=someone made a shitload of money) Then end up waiting outside the prison for three hours. But we're not alone, there are a thousand miserable people to commiserate with.

Finally our section of the line makes it into the prison...only to find another line. This is where they tell us that we can either pay $5 more to skip to the front of the line or wait for another hour. We wait on line in protest of the general unfairness of the situation. We wait for a very long time.

Finally (again) we actually make it to the main entrance of the place. Now we all expected it to be a ghost tour like thing because this is an old abandoned haunted prison. Instead it's a cheesy Halloween haunted house that you can go to anywhere and pay $8 to get into...except it's bigger.

Originally everyone decides I should walk behind the girls so no one sneaks up on them, but before we even get into the entrance the guys have moved around so I'm in front. Big man goes first. There are a lot of blind corners, pitch black hallways, and seizure inducing strobe lights. But I just wander through the whole thing completely unfazed. Never understood how people could be scared at things like that. But it's absolutely hysterical when someone jumps out at you...and you end up scaring the hell out of them.

We get through what seems like an endless array of minimum wage tour guides with faux bloody wounds popping out of blatantly obvious mock walls with minimal screaming from the others and zero reaction from me when we come to what we know is the home stretch. I haven't even flinched but as I round a corner a particularly well disguised wall drops and this gore covered girl jumps out at me.

She's half hanging out the door and less than an inch from my face. Every ghoul and goblin in that place blinked when they ran up against me, not a single one got me...but this girl wasn't backing off. She just hung there, so close I could feel her hot breath on my face. I was holding mine, not just because she surprised me, but because she was easily the prettiest girl I've seen in a month. Not in the classic movie star sort of way, but I could tell under all that gore and grime she was flawless. And she had balls because she just hung there...so damn uncomfortably close it was painful. She just hung there and didn't flinch. It couldn't have been for more than a few seconds but we locked eyes and did battle...and neither one of us blinked. Crago laughed behind me because seeing a 6'3" 300 lb. shit ugly monster staring down a girl dressed as a zombie must be pretty damn hysterical. I could feel everyone behind me moving so I moved on, and she didn't retreat until I walked away. Good for her.

Last night was just one of those funny nights. I went from having nothing to do, to hanging out at an abandoned prison and not getting home till 5:30 in the morning. Only me, only me.

But I had one of those strange feelings last night. That something was going on, something I should know about. Something I could have changed. But something I didn't...

Odd.

I was standing in an old prison and felt at home. I was wandering the streets of Philadelphia and felt at peace. I was driving at 95 mph up the Turnpike and thought that maybe I should slow down a bit...because maybe crashing and burning would be a bad idea.

Funny how things can change so many times on one night. Even funnier how it can happen over and over again.

"I don't know. Sometimes I just know things." - Palomba

Legends Walk The Walk

"You hung a man who was meant to hang. What's so wrong about that?"- T.O. Hob

"Everything Hob, everything." - Palomba

"Fools rule the night kid." - King

The option of compromising your youth to secure your future is a tempting one. One that all too many of us fall into. One that all too many of us are eager to avoid...but rarely do.

All these great things coming and going and all we ever really manage to get hung up on is what we're doing wrong and how it's going to screw up what we do next.

We are such fucking fools.

But we are so much better than that.

This is where I do what I do. This is where I can tell you what I know.

We're all in this one together. All of us twenty-somethings who are just getting "started" in this world. We're living and dying in all the same ways. We're fighting the same fight.

So why can't any of us seem to win it?

We're afraid and we're stupid and we're falling faster than we have any right to.

We don't know how lucky we are. How great you all are. How sure I am that it's all going to turn out ok. You read this and you doubt. I know you do, because I do too. But I know. I know. I swear to God I know. If I didn't think this was all going to shake out alright then would I still be playing the game?

You know me better than that.

We're not alone. How can we be? How can so many people going through the exact same things ever think they really are? And shit, when it's all said and done, I'm not going anywhere. I'll always be here. So when you start to doubt, when you start to wonder, when you're just about ready to give up. Know that you are not alone...how can you be when I'm waiting right here?

"A legend ain't a legend just because you say it is. Legends walk the walk." - King

Black Coffee And "Dirty Assfuckers" Creme Donuts

There's some foul logic about bad nights that dictates they can only get worse, never better.

I was pissed off already, the Yanks were trailing 2-0 and the bases were loaded. My two-way starts to go off, so I mute the TV to answer it. It's one of my managers.

I ask what's wrong, and as they reply Javier Vasquez throws his first pitch. Let me break this down for you.

Manager: Bus number seventeen (Johnny Damon swings the bat) is on fire (Damon connects the ball flying hard off his bat) on the parkway (the ball is high, it's deep...) with kids still on it. (and fucking gone.)

So I'm out the door before my manager's done talking and before Damon can do his victory dance around the bases.

Long story short...

Thank God (and this is the only silver lining on this horrendous night) the bus wasn't on fire. A defective heater coil was giving off smoke and causing something to overheat causing the condensation from several damp days to turn into steam.

Where there's smoke, there isn't always a fire. But that didn't stop me from having to spend nearly two hours making phonecalls and double checking that the rest of my buses weren't having problems.

So I head home, but I'm kind of hungry and a little pissed I couldn't go out, so I stop at Dunkin' Donuts to get a Coolata and a donut.

I order my coolata but instead get a black coffee (par for the course at this D&D). I wanted a Boston Creme donut. But the way this night is going I just couldn't bring myself to say the word Boston.

Me: Yeah can I get one of those. (Pointing at the boston creme's).
Retardo Counter Guy: These? (pointing at glazed).
Me: No one of those, the ones with the creme.
Retardo Counter Guy: These? (Pointing at the absolutely cremeless sprinkled donuts)
Me: No, no. One of the B-*coughing*-on Creme donuts.
Retardo Counter Guy: These? (Pointing at a fucking bran muffin)
Me: Fuck it I'll take a kruller.

So I left with my Black Coffee and slightly stale Kruller, knowing that I wouldn't get a parking spot again when I got home and would therefore have a parking ticket in the morning, knowing that I would spend most of tomorrow placating angry parents whose kids were on a bus full of steam tonight, knowing that the Yanks season was just about over and I hadn't even gotten to see the game...but also knowing that all things considered tonight could have been much, much worse.

And in a lot of ways I'm sort of lucky.

Ain't that some shit?

Amazing Acts of Self-Restraint (or Not)

"Hotel bars. That's the best place to meet women...and it's convenient too." - My Father (giving me advice on how to score women when I was a senior in high school)

"God bless you brother, I mean you no harm." - Eddie (The Checkers Bum)

I find a story in anything that happens to me. I always have. It's part of wanting to be a writer. Without time to write my stories anymore I write here. Everything that happens to me becomes an entry. I've been trying really hard not to post everything I think of here, it would get too cluttered and be horribly boring. I've spent the better part of the day fighting the urge to post things here. So instead of posting whole entries here I've turned every entry into a one or two liner.

Here we go:

Half-day Wednesdays rock. Today I took my lunchbreak before I even went to work.

We went from having seven shows left, to no shows left, to having no idea when we'll be done. I wouldn't have it any other way.

Everyone I write about here is a character in my story. In the stories I write I background my characters so eventually I'll do that here as well.

In six months I went from having money, to being broke, to having money, to being broke, to having money...etc. etc.

There is one thing in particular that I would really love to do, but my better nature and common sense goes against it.

In the past year I have changed quite a bit, and think of a lot of different things. I can't remember what I used to think before I started thinking about the things I'm thinking about now.

John Kerry can take Ohio and Pennsylvania but if he loses Florida Bush can still win the election. If George gets elected again I might start a revolutionary movement.

People stopped leaving notes on my blog. It makes it seem like I'm talking to myself and that's really friggin' depressing.

I can make people smile, I can make people cry, I can make people think. But I can't make people like me.

In April I predicted the Yankees and The Astros would meet in the World Series where the Yanks would win in seven despite Roger Clemens winning three games for the 'Stros. As of right now it could still happen.

I've never been in love, but somehow I still know what it feels like. I've never been dead, but I can tell you what that feels like too.

I find new and interesting ways to get into trouble every single day.

I have to fire a seventy five year old man because his drug test came back positive for Cocaine. Being the boss is neither easy nor fun.

I'm going to start riding random trains even though I have nowhere to go and somewhere else to be.

It's frightening when you have the same dream as someone else, even more frightening when you know they'll have it before they do.

I'm terribly easy to find...in a crowd, on the internet, anywhere in the world.

I can hear what you're thinking, and feel what you're feeling. But I can't do anything about it unless you let me know you want help.

I know you're out there. Even if you won't admit it.

This entry is entirely too long to be about absolutely nothing. But since people won't comment...this is what they get.

Run Of The Mill

There are no ordinary entries here.

Nothing that can be taken for what it is.

Nothing that you can miss and still follow the story.

There's nothing simple here.

Or at least that's what I would like you to think.

I don't know anymore. I just don't.

Why do I do this?

Why do I keep on putting so much precious energy and emotion into this?

Camus once said that normal people will never understand how much effort some people put into simply being normal. That's me in a nutshell. So why then put so much energy and effort into proving that I am as normally abnormal as they come?

Fuckin' A.

It's Tuesday.

We're Gonna Die Like This You Know...

"Not dead, eh? Bit surprised I admit. Spot of luck on your part don't you think?"- T.O. Hob

I think this was a good weekend. I spent most of it bored and alone, battling an array of my most vicious demons, but it was still a good weekend...really, stay with me on this one.

No one was around Friday night, so I stayed home and just thought for awhile. I watched Shaun of the Dead...twice, and then fell asleep for the first time on my new couch. Apparently God still has dominion over my bedroom and wasn't comfortable with the idea of sharing.

I worked all day Saturday, and well into the night. By the time I got over to North Haledon to visit the kids it was almost their bedtime. So of course I took the opportunity to get them completely riled up. Think indoor arena soccer in the living room and a hermit crab deathmatch in the lanyard ring of doom. My mother must be so proud.

I got home in time to duke it out with the demons, spending the better part of the night so deep in thought that I almost missed it when The Afflictions caught me. They wrecked me per usual, but somewhere in there, just for a second I went so deep that I actually touched some of those old feelings...and it felt so good to feel that it simply chased The Darkness away. But I was distracted...and it disappeared, leaving me wondering how those feelings could flee so quickly.

I watched the Yankees trounce the Red Sox then fell into a rather dreamless sleep.

I woke up early this morning and we went ATV riding. Tim fucked up my brand new truck, had an allergic reaction to a bee sting, and got pulled over by the cops on the way back. He ain't heavy Father, he's my dipshit brother.

But the day was fine, we had fun...and we didn't die. Which, sometimes, is a plus.

"We're gonna die like this you know, miserable and old." - Taking Back Sunday

"Well yeah I thought she looked like you. But that was before she took her clothes off." - King

Night's Like These

I never forget a face.

But then again there are a lot of things I can never forget.

When I was a little kid my father used to take me to this Chinese restaurant. A little dingy place that any rational person wouldn't have looked twice at. Even then it was covered in a fine layer of grit and grease that made everything smell of eggroll and even freshly cleaned silverware a little slippery. Everything was red. From the walls to the floor to the faux leather seats in the booths. We didn't go there often, but we went there often enough that every little detail from the chips in the bricks to the tears in the seat covers was engrained in my memory.

When I was about twelve we stopped going there. No reason, my father just stopped taking me to a lot of places around then.

Flash forward to yesterday. My father and I are driving (on business of course). He asks me if I want lunch in that way that lets me know he's hungry and can't eat unless I do, and since I'm sort of hungry I agree. We drive past the little chinese restaurant with no intention of going there, but then he mentions, and suddenly it sounds like a good idea.

The windows still haven't been cleaned and the minute we step in the door the air we're breathing feels a little bit heavier. Nothing about the place has changed. The same old man is working the door, sure he's a bit older, but he wears it well. The seats are torn in all the same places, and a few new places as well. The floor is slick and slippery and reminds me of the time I toured the kitchen at Brower Commons. Eleven years later the lunch buffet still costs $4.95.

Everything is still red.

Some things never change.

I was driving home from work today, passing through a rather unseemly part of Paterson, when I saw a girl walking up a hill. She was beautiful in a way that most people don't notice, that most people don't care about. But that wasn't what got my attention, it hardly ever does. I recognized her. I'd seen her somewhere before.

This wasn't a part of town where I would have any reason to recognize anyone. Not the part of town where outsiders spend a lot of time. But here was this girl, as out of place as I was, who I knew that I knew from somewhere. Then she looked at me, she stared at me...I couldn't figure out why.

And then I realized...I was staring. She was staring at me, because I was staring at her, and I could tell from the look on her face she didn't like it. I'm not the type to stare, or leer, or even sneak glances at a beautiful woman. I just don't have it in me. But in that second where she fixed me with that gaze of pure hatred, I recognized her. Not two weeks ago I'd seen her, she was the girl from Other People's Mistakes. I knew she didn't recognize me, but I sure as hell recognized her. Coincidences. Maybe someone is trying to remind me of something. She looked at me today, the way she looked at me that day, it made me feel sick.

Some things never change.

And other things do.

I suppose we have a fighter's chance. That's about all I can hope for. About all I ever really wanted. It might just be all I need.

I can't forget it. Can't forget them. Can't forget her. I guess I don't want to.

Tonight I set out to undo The Jesus Lobotomy, not sure how, not sure why.

I can't explain why I need to get those feeling back, I just know if I want to keep on feeling anything, I have to. I feel as stupid as that sounds right now. But fuck it. In the end a man's gotta do what a man's gotta do.

And...

In the end we do portend that made of might are mighty men. And willow trees on bended knees do bob and sway with awful ease. The king, the queen, the pauper too do tell the lord what he shall do. Till God awake and then he sees... That men are made on nights like these.

Temporary Holding Pattern

To Whom It May Concern,

I AM STILL HERE

Sincerely,

ME

Very Good, Carry On. Nothing to see here.

I'm here, I'm there, I'm everywhere.

There goes that monster who haunts your dreams.

Someone's always watching, and sometimes it's me.

There is no light...we run on.

Poppin'

Tonight's magic word is tomorrow.

As in:

Tomorrow we decide.

Tomorrow we learn.

Tomorrow we forget...about today.

Yeah, tomorrow.

Issues: Or How I Need To Learn To Take A Joke

"You haven't really lived until you spend all morning vomiting up orange juice and stale granola." - T.O. Hob

Issues. Hmmph.

I think we've played this game once before, someone makes a joke, a genuinely funny joke of which I appreciate the humor...and then I spend all night thinking about it.

So last night Matt made a joke about me having issues. I said something about how if no one called in to the show I would go home and be depressed and sad.

I was kidding.

Matt counters with (completely losing his gameface) "Oh, so that will be your issue THIS week?"

Which of course is funny, except that last week I had a lot of "issues" and it put me in a rather raw mood. Coming into a good mood this week the last thing I wanted to hear about was last week...or to suddenly find out that maybe people knew about my "issues".

(Not that I try to keep any of my issues secret...in fact apparently I put them all up on the internet for both acquaintences and complete strangers to read...yeah, I'm talking about you.)

It's funny though because I can't tell if he actually did, or was just making the obvious joke. The glaringly obvious stare you in the face joke. It's hard to tell with Matt sometimes, whether he's taking the easy joke or working the complex one.

See last week I couldn't make it to the bar with the news crew, and I said something to Rob about me not being in the mood for it. It's egocentric of me to think that I would even come up in a conversation once I've left the room. I'm one of those out-of-sight out-of-mind sort of people where people don't pay me much thought unless I'm sitting right in front of them.

But all it would have taken was for Rob to walk into the bar and say to Matt and Julie, "Chris isn't coming because he's fucked up." And for either one of them to respond in a way that belies exactly how little they've ever thought of me, exactly how much they loathe even my simplest presence, exactly how bothersome they find me, "Yeah, that guy has fucking issues."

End of story.

I'm a pariah all of a sudden. Furthermore...what exactly would they think those issues are? How easily can any of a million things that have happened in the last few months be completely miscontrued as being something they are not? Hate to break it to you pal, but around here that happens an awful lot.

Of course it's probably all in my head. But...

Paranoia? Ain't that a pip?

I think the only thing that could have been worse then making that obvious joke would have been not making it. Because then I would have spent all night wondering why the joke wasn't made.

You starting to get the picture folks? I'm completely out of my fucking mind.

But last night was still fun...we still kicked ass.

Ain't that some shit?

A Shout Out To The Blog-Ocracy: An Open Letter To The Blog Community

"You don't dull a knife because its blade is too sharp, you simply find tougher things to cut."

- Palomba

The first blog I ever read shut down this week. Posted its last entry and disappeared into the sunset.

It belonged to someone I'd seen around, and the only reason I read it is because I was amazed I had stumbled upon it. It was just one of those strange coincidences. Whenever I think of something profound, I do a websearch to see where my mind stole it from. Sometimes the thoughts really are mine, and sometimes they're not. Sometimes it just happens that someone else was thinking the exact same thing I was. I did a web search for something else...and there she was.

I've been reading it ever since, and along the way I picked up a few dozen others. I've read hundreds of these things now. There are some I read every day, others I stop in at when I'm bored.

The thing is somewhere along the way I started to feel like it was wrong. I didn't know, or hardly knew most of these people and here I was sharing little bits of their lives with them. Their highs and lows, their victories and defeats, their make-ups, break-ups and everything in between. Reading about other people's lives without them knowing it, it made me feel guilty. But of course they put those things out there on purpose, they wrote those things because they wanted them to be read. Much like I do here.

But they would feel odd if they knew I was reading them. Anytime someone tells me they read my "thing" I answer the same way, "You shouldn't." Not because I don't want them to, but because this tends to bother people. I know because other people's blogs bother me, and this one is slightly more fucked up than other people's blogs.

So what brings about this deeper look at what I've begun to call the Blog-ocracy, a loosely tied together series of webpages that are essentially public versions of people's private journals?

A rather minor incident from Tuesday night, of course nothing is minor on Tuesdays anymore.

On Friday morning I posted an anonymous comment on Julie from WRSU's blog. She had posted an entry that seemed uncertain, made it seem like she was getting down on herself. It made me feel bad that someone who has always been so nice to me was feeling down, so I did what I always do when someone is feeling down...I said what I was thinking, in this case it turned out to be something nice and reassuring.

Of course she read this and even commented on it in her next post, and I never thought it would come up again. Except that I underestimated the average persons penchant for a good mystery. The anonymous tag made the note something of interest.

So how did it come up Tuesday night in the radio station?

Simple...or not. There was a single copy of the Daily Targum left in the rack on Tuesday night. (I always take a copy of the Targum into the restroom with me, you know in case I run out of toilet paper, old joke, still not funny) Usually I just leave it next to the sink for the next guy to read, except when I came out of the can Mr. Belding from Saved By The Bell was standing there, stopping for a quick break between the Cap & Skull room and his apperance with Screech downstairs. So I took the Targum back to the newsroom and dropped it on the desk. Where three hours later Julie picks it up and reads in her horoscope that someone from her past is going to give her good advice. Since I'm the only one in the room she reads it out loud to me. She seems surprised that her horoscope is actually accurate and says as much. But by the time she brings up the post by the anonymous commenter I'm already halfway through writing this entry...in part because I already knew where the conversation was going.

I was halfway through writing this entry while she was still telling me about the comment because, for a second, I actually thought about not confessing that I was the anonymous commenter. It's irrational, but for some reason I was actually embarassed that I had been reading her blog. Embarassed that I read all those blogs I read. All of a sudden I was doing something wrong, something I shouldn't have been doing. It was like I had some sort of scopophilia (please let that be what I think it is) except it involved blogs, a blog-ophilia if you would. Suddenly, just by doing something I've been doing for a long time, I was doing something wrong.

I had to stop her from explaining any further, so when she got to the point where she said she had no idea who could have posted the comment I interjected. Except I couldn't actually say it, so I went all Koko the Gorilla and twice jabbed two fingers into my own chest. She stopped, and besides being utterly shocked I couldn't tell whether she wanted to hit me or hug me.

Of course that wasn't the end of the conversation, I had to explain that I've been reading her blog for awhile now, which means two weeks ago when she was telling me about all the things that had happened to her since we'd last talked...I already knew them. And I had to explain how I'd found her blog.

Which is a remarkable coincidence in and of itself. See there's this blog I've been reading for a long time now, by a girl named Sarah. I've been reading it since before I even knew Julie, which is strange because Sarah happens to be one of Julie's best friends. Now her blog is one of the best I've read so I read it fairly often, and somewhere along the way she linked to Julie's. So now I'm not just reading the blog of someone who knows someone I know, now I'm reading the blog of someone I know.

Out of the millions of these things out there, and the hundreds of these things I read it took two clicks of the mouse to get back to someone who actually knows me. And only a half dozen strange coincidences for them to find out about it...on the same week that the first blog I read (and first blog of coincidence) went away.

Now not to seem that I'm making mountains out of mole hills here. Tuesday night's oddities alone didn't give birth to this entry, nor did that original blog going away. Talking to someone about my blog last night had a little to do with this as well. But the real trigger wasn't what happened in real life, but what people have written.

I've always been obsessed with Dante's Inferno, a story which at its core is about a man chasing heaven through the depths of hell. Purgatory and Paradise are splendid, but I've read Inferno so many times at so many different points in my life that it means a lot to me. I own a half dozen different copies of it, and I almost bought an old rare copy of it a few months back. To compensate on losing out on that one I bought an illustrated modern interpretation from Barnes & Noble. The rare edition would have cost over $1,000. This one cost me $22...and did the trick just fine.

The original opening lines as writ by Dante always fascinated me:

"Midway on our life’s journey, I found myself

In dark woods, the right road lost."

But the new interpretation of those lines by Birk & Sanders struck me twice as hard:

"About halfway through the course of my pathetic life,

I woke up and found myself in a stupor in some dark place.

I'm not sure how I ended up there; I guess I had taken a few wrong turns."

And, yeah, that's me.

And this is my Inferno. All these other people share their lives with me through their blogs, and here I share mine.

People have told me time and time again that they've started to read this, and ended up, without intending to, reading the whole damn thing. I figure people like that know me just about as well as anyone in my life. And the people who know me that read this know me far better than they ever would have liked.

It's a new week I'm about to get through that nine day stretch and see what happens next. Tuesday might be my last show at WRSU, but I've decided that I'm going to try and stay in touch with the people I met during my time at Rutgers. I may never see New Brunswick again, but a little bit of me will always be there.

So much has happened, so much has changed, but somehow things are all still eerily familiar.

If you've kept up, now you're caught up.

This is where I am at, I'm not sure how I ended up here; I guess I've taken a few wrong turns.

But...

"Everything does happen for a reason, and sometimes the reasons have reasons all their own."

- Palomba

The Disclaimer: This is one of those long winding entries that no one will have the patience to read. I don't just know that, I'm counting on it.

These Are Not The Droids You're Looking For

I am so confused.

This is not me.

Not me you're hearing, not me you're seeing, not me at all. I'm not me, not right now, not anymore.

Questions don't always need answers, like poems don't always need to rhyme. But in time a rhymeless poem will grow on you, an unanswered question just festers. It still won't hurt as much as the questions not asked.

I am lost. I am tired. I am angry and afraid. I am bothered. I am tormented.

I am so confused.

IS SHIT

Why ruin a perfectly good streak of blogging with this little message?

Because it's 4 A.M. on a Saturday and I'm getting ready to go to work.

That's right.

Is Shit.

Goals

Starting today I am going to play the game a little differently. Not permanently, just for now.

Starting today I will wake up every morning with a goal. Something to accomplish that day.

I will wake up in the morning knowing what I want, and go to sleep knowing that I've gotten it.

No matter how small the goal this will be my silver lining.

Some days will be fun. My goal will be to laugh a lot, or go see a movie, or buy something nice.

Other days will be more work. My goal will be to finish all my paperwork, pay all the bills, organize my affairs.

There will be days where my goals are about other people. I will make someone smile, I will make someone cry (in a good way of course), I will make someone feel something they haven't felt in days.

There will be days when my goals are about me. I will make an effort to see them, I will make an effort not to think about her, I will think about nothing but her (no effort required).

When my day looks to be tough my goals will be simple. Show up for work on time, eat lunch without interruption, go for a nice relaxing drive.

And when the days look to be easy, well then the goals will be too. Afterall, why ruin a good thing?

There will be days where, no matter how hard I try, even the simplest of goals will stay just out of reach. But there will be days when even the impossible is just an arm's length away. Either way...

If I get through the next two days I will have bested one of the rockiest nine day stretches of my life. Monday no longer holds my salvation, and Tuesday could be the end of a good run...who knows what that will do to me. Nine days could become ninety, and it all could disappear. But...

I will wait for them in the high grass...and they will come. I won't be ready, and I'll only know of one thing to do. It's simple really.

A man stands up.

And starting today...that's my goal.

Elephants Never Forget

"Any question to which I am the answer, is a question you probably don't want to be
asking." - Palomba

"This is going to really creep you out, but..." - Palomba (at least three times on any given night.)

The fourth and final entry of the day...unless I go mad again between now and midnight.

I know I'm moving too quick here...by the time anyone stumbles upon the newest entry, the three previous ones are already buried. You can go back and read them...or not.

So I can't yet make you understand why last night wrecked me in the ways it did, but I can guarantee you that it's not what you're thinking. With me has it ever been that simple?

Paranoia. Paranoia. Nobody is coming to get me.

I never forget a face. Never forget the way those faces look at me. I never forget what people I care about say to me. I never forget the way I feel, but sometimes I do forget why I feel that way.

I don't think I can ever forget why I felt the way I felt last night.

They say there are ways. Ways to make yourself normal. Ways to control how you feel, how you act, how and who you are. They have ways. They say they can make you the person you're supposed to be...Nuts to that I say. I can make me the person I'm supposed to be...maybe I'll need some help, but not that kind of help. Not me, not yet.

I'm getting there guys, I swear to God I am. I'm not there, I'm not even close, but I'm closer than I ever have been before. I'm afraid. I know it doesn't make any sense, I know I shouldn't be, but I am. I'm more afraid right now than I ever have been in my entire life. I think I could explain it, and someday maybe I will.

For now though...just understand, the people I've known and loved. The people who have meant the world to me. People I see everyday and people I will never see again. The people who have made up my entire existence. Just know, that even once you've forgotten me...I will always remember you.

Afterall...elephants never forget.

"You have that uncanny ability to surprise and scare the shit out of people at the same time, don't you?" - T.O. Hob

"Yeah, ain't that something?" - Palomba

The Stand: 24 Hours

"Everybody has it in them to make a stand...it's figuring out what to do next that proves to be the real challenge." - Palomba

I knew from the beginning that last night was going to be a tough one.

Pulling into New Brunswick was awkward. It was like visiting a house you used to live in only to find that the people there were using your bedroom as a bathroom. Like they just didn't understand how it was supposed to be.

The world seems to have taken an affinity to dropping bombs on me as of late, and I must admit I'm beginning to do the same out of sheer resentment.

Last night's surprise came early. Matt, in between Karl Rove jokes, mentions that it might be our last show...catching me only a little off-guard because I go into every show assuming it will be our last. But I don't think my reaction was what I intended it to be, because Matt spent the rest of the night trying to convince me we'll have at least one more show. He's a good guy.

We kicked ass by the way, and Julie joined us live in studio to add the much needed third voice to the program. As we were in the newsroom listening to the new guys do the News at Ten she starts reading The Daily Targum. She reads her horoscope, and it says something about someone giving her good advice. And she laughs and says something about an anonymous comment on her blog...which of course, I wrote. And now have to admit I wrote because to discuss it as if I didn't write it would be like lying. And we all know how I feel about lying, particularly to people I like to consider friends.

So then everyone is heading down to the Branch, and of course I want to go because I'm bored out of my mind, but as we head down The Darkness catches me and I know if I have a drink it will only make me feel worse, and feeling worse right then is not something I think I could deal with very well. So instead of going into the bar I end up explaining to Rob that I'm not feeling very well and must, unfortunately, beg out of the night's festivities.

I head home. But the whole time I'm thinking about how I barely can think and hurt all over for no good god damn reason and all I want is for it all to stop just long enough for me to pull my shit together and figure out how I plan on getting to sleep that night.

I can't find anywhere to park, I've found the only Dunkin' Donuts in the world where no matter what you order you get black hyper-caffeinated coffee instead, my head is shaking. I've vomitted twice and can't stop my nose from bleeding. The whole world is spinning, but refuses to go black.

Then I have to go to work...and tell my father exactly how little I trust him. And since no one ever stands up to my father but me he doesn't know how to react. Sometimes he gets angry, sometimes he just laughs. He never understands. Today he just laughed. And assured me I had nothing to worry about, of course I could trust him. Somehow I think he missed the point. If I don't trust you old man, than how can telling me you're trustworthy possibly make a difference?

Ok, yeah so I had to cancel ATV riding on Saturday because if I'm still in this sort of mood I'd most likely just run the damn thing off a cliff...and that would be a bad idea. Because I have one more radio show left, and there are a whole lot of people who I would like to see again...when I'm feeling somewhat more human.

Chapter Five, In Which Our Hero Blinks

"I run. I fly. But no matter how far, no matter how high everytime I close my eyes... I'm stuck back in this fucking room. This fucking room where the whole world looks at me like I'm somebody I'm not. Somebody I swore to God I would never be. Maybe if I could stop closing my eyes...yeah that's it. I'm never closing my eyes again." - Palomba

"Like all good shows this one starts with an admission...I admit, I almost quit." - Palomba

Today, for the first time in a long time, I blinked.

I know you don't know what that means. But I do.

Today Part Four ended. It didn't even last a full two months. The chapters are moving quicker than I can fill the pages now. It's all getting a little ahead of me.

Tonight I knew I was in for a tough one, so I folded before the game even started. And I'm still kicking myself for it.

I am so much better than that.

The Darkness started creeping up and I opened the door and called for my boys. They came back quick, and hit me hard, but they knocked it down for a bit. And for that I'm grateful. What they did next I will never forgive.

Rigby talks too much. King thinks too much. Kong doesn't think enough before he talks.

It would be so much easier if those three were real people...then I could be angry at someone besides myself.

I didn't realize everyone was going to the bar. I really didn't. I thought everyone was sticking around for a minute to watch the game. If I had known they were planning to go drinking I would have begged off saying I had to hurry home to get to work. But since I'd just been standing there like an ass watching the game I couldn't rightly say I was in a rush. So I waffled, flip-flopped, did a complete 180. First I said I was going, then I said I wasn't. But now I had to explain myself. And I did...but I couldn't lie, I had to tell the truth. I said I couldn't go beacuse if I did would have a drink...and drinking in the mood I'm in is a bad idea. A little bit of booze would only serve to exacerbate my current condition.

So the The Darkness and The Trio kicked my ass before I could even make it into the Olive Branch. Which means that I started Part Five much like I started Parts Two and Three...scared and alone. Which is sort of odd when you think about it. Shouldn't things be getting better?

So this is my story...and it just keeps going on. I play my part in other people's stories, and in a way they play their part in mine. I should have gone to the Branch tonight. I'm running out of time to do things like that, hang out with people like them, feel like I felt before it all brought me tumbling down on this otherwise perfect October night.

If you're reading this...no matter who you are, know that my story just became a little part of yours. And know this...

No matter how many times it starts and stops your story will always have one more beginning than it does an end. Everything that ends has to start somewhere...but not everything that starts really needs to ever end.

It's All In Your Head

Or my head more appropriately.

Tonight's challenge? Keep it all together.

It's the first time I've flown completely solo in awhile, and if things go badly the trio will be back quick...and with a vengeance.

Maybe just because it's been my kind of October day, and it's shaping up to be my sort of October night.

Men are made on nights like this...and boys are broken. The clock's ticking kid...

Funny, I Don't Remember Eating That: The Old Hob's Words Of Wisdom

"Beware, O' Gentle Reader, and take this to your heart. If you ponder too intense, your mind will fall apart." - The Old Hob

"Chianti is not an acceptable substitute for bourbon...but it'll sure do in a pinch." - The Old Hob

What a strange week, topped off by an unbelievably strange day and an oddly pleasant night.

My only regret is that I didn't have the foresight to buy a new bottle of Knob Creek and am therefore stuck sucking down a bottle of Chianti.

King took a lunch break, Rigby and Kong went with him. That just leaves me...and my guest for tonight, a fellow old soul named Hob.

So without the trio, Hob and I will sit back and polish off this bottle of red shit and try to chase The Darkness away. Something tells me that, for at least tonight, that won't be a problem at all.

Other People's Mistakes

It's such a beautiful day out.

My father got back from Florida last night. He was gone for over three months so, being the good son that I am, I made sure I had time to go see him today. It's the first time in my life that I walked into a room and felt that my father was genuinely happy to see me. He had so many questions about what I've been doing while he was away...it only took me a moment to realize he was only interested in how much money I had made him. I'll take what I can get though when it comes to fatherly affection.

He offered to buy me lunch in the way that let me know he was really hungry and couldn't go eat unless I went with him, so I relented and we grabbed a bite to eat at the Empress down the block from my apartment.

We talked business the whole time and I was pretty eager to get home and watch some football by the time we were done. 'Course nothing can be so simple in Palomba-world...particularly not on such a beautiful afternoon.

I was walking up to my car when I saw this blonde girl leaning on the front of it. My first thought was that she looked like she'd been crying. My second thought was that she was awfully pretty. As I got closer though I could hear that she was still crying, and then as she heard us approaching she started crying even louder. Within moments she was hysterical. There was an old man getting into the car next to us, but he and my father hadn't noticed there was something wrong with the girl just yet. Then I saw she was bleeding.

It looked like someone had beaten on her something awful. Her arm was all bruised up and her elbows were scraped like she'd been thrown to the ground. The tips of her hair were caked with dried blood and she looked like she'd been holding in a good cry for a long time...and was letting it all out right now.

I wanted to help her. Make sure she was all right, it was all anyone would have wanted to do in the situation. But before I could take another step towards her she whipped around with this fire in her eyes and shot me daggers intended for any man not old enough to be her grandfather.

She hated me. Hated me with every ounce of emotion left in her. I've never seen anything like it. Here was this scared little girl who probably wanted nothing more than for someone to tell her it would all be ok...but the hatred she had for me at that moment was without bounds. It was like just by wanting to help her I was doing her some egregious wrong.

I've been looked at a lot of ways in my life, lots of horrible, horrible ways. But very little has come close to this. I don't ever remember anyone looking at me with such malice because of something someone else did.

What seems like a long time ago now someone looked at me like I was the bad guy. It twisted me, killed me, made me feel about as small as I ever felt in my life. In that second today when that girl looked at me...I was there all over again.

She brushed past my father and the man in the car next to us and ran crying into her mother's car. The car pulled away and as it did I could see the girl still crying, and the mother just shaking her head. The man in the car next to us made a comment about "stupid fucking kids" saying that the cops had just told him the gilr had gotten whupped on by her junkie boyfriend.

And all I could think was "stupid fucking people". This girl was just a kid, no matter what she'd done wrong she couldn't have deserved what had happened to make her feel that way, or feel the way she did about other people at that moment. She deserved better than scraped elbows and a bloody lip, better than the way her mother looked at her when she got in that car, she deserved coincidence putting someone better than me there...someone who would have tried to comfort her even after she looked at them in that way.

And it was such a beautiful day.

To Sing A Song: Why I Wish I Could Sing

"See the months they don't matter it's the days I can't take
When the hours move to minutes and I'm seconds away."
- Taking Back Sunday, The New American Classic

People like to quote lyrics. We rarely ever get them right, and almost never use them in the way the songwriter meant them to be used. But we use them anyway. They sing, and sometimes we sing along and try to make the words our own.

"And I don’t want the world to see me,
’cause I don’t think that they’d understand
When everything’s made to be broken
I just want you to know who I am."
- Goo Goo Dolls, Iris

Lyrics are just words, but there's something about being able to put a word to a beat in your head that makes them so much more. People have a hard time memorizing poetry. The words rhyme but your mind provides a beat. With lyrics the beat is already there, you just let your mind put the two together.

"Vindicated
I am selfish
I am wrong
I am right
I swear I'm right
Swear I knew it all along
And I am flawed
But I am cleaning up so well
I am seeing in me now the things you swore you saw yourself."
- Dashboard Confessional, Vindicated

They know. Songwriters that is. They know what we're thinking about because they are just like us. They can take that, and turn it into the most beautiful song you'll ever hear. See they know things, and more importantly they know how to use them. I don't. No matter how hard I try I can't do what they do with the things I know. I can write here. Get it all out there, but anyone who got out of fifth grade can do the same. Maybe I have a way with words, maybe what I write can make you understand how I feel, but I can't make you feel like I feel. A song can, this can't.

"But there's still tomorrow
Forget the sorrow
And I can be on the last train home
Watch it pass the day
As it fades away
No more time to care
No more time, today"
- Lost Prophets, Last Train Home

There are songs to tell you that life isn't easy, songs to tell you how great it could be. Songs to tell you all sort of things. That's what gets to most people. They think these songs talk to them.
And maybe they do. That's now how it is for me. Not how it is at all. These songs don't say things to me, they say things for me... because I can't say them myself.

"I've got the time,
I got the hours,
I got the days,
I got the weeks.
I keep saying to myself I've got the words but I can't speak."
- Modest Mouse, Black Cadillacs