whiskey.
I keep spilling whiskey on my shirt, not because I am missing my mouth or anything like that, but because the glass I am drinking from has a little hole in it, and I like the glass too much to stop using it.
Roberta used to drink whiskey, when we were 17. I didn’t understand it then, and she doesn’t drink whiskey anymore. She doesn’t drink anything anymore. I used to pray, when we were 17. She didn’t understand it then. She prays now, and I don’t anymore.
Shawn and I drank whiskey together in January. We were watching Bruce Springsteen, live at the hammersmith in ’75. Carmen got me a poster of a photo from that concert. That concert changed music, it changed rock and roll. 10 years before I was alive and it changed me.
When I called Carrie to tell her I was gay she told me she already knew I was gay. And so we talked about whiskey instead, mostly.
I am funnier than I am being on here. But I don’t know how to prove it, so I won’t try.
1234.
I was 3. We were driving. Leaving Toronto to move back to Vancouver. I learned how to wink on that drive. My Dad was watching me in the rearview mirror. Good job he said, you did it.
I was 5. We needed a house that fit my parents’ growing family. We moved ten minutes away. I had to switch schools. On the first day of grade 1 the other kids were talking about who their kindergarten teacher was the year before. My kindergarten teacher was not important. No one knew who Mrs. Wells was. It was the first time I had that feeling that I didn’t belong, and that moving is never as much fun as your parents tell you it will be.
I was 10. We left Vancouver for Seattle. Everyone was older than me, kids in America start school later. And I didn’t know why printing was handwriting and handwriting was cursive, or why pencil crayons were colored (sic) pencils and felt pens were markers. I wanted to hide under my desk. And cry.
I was 14. We moved back to Vancouver. I didn’t know anyone at my school. And it felt like everyone there had known each other since they were 5. I ate lunch in the library that year.
I was 17. I moved to Edmonton. I was 20. I moved back to Vancouver. I was 21. I moved to the UK. I was 22. I moved to the Philippines.
I am 24. And I still want to hide under my desk. And cry. Because I don’t know how to be in this world. I don’t know how to be in the place I am in. But I have these friends, who I like a lot. And I know them because I moved to where they were when I was 3 and 10 and 14 and 17 and 20. And they crawl under the desk with me sometimes. And we laugh because none of us know how to be in this world. But we’re here. And we have each other. And we have music. And we have art. And we have books. And we have today.
This used to be about sobriety. But it isn’t anymore.
back to the start.
11 days. And that was it. I drank beer on Friday. Wine on Saturday. Beer on Sunday.
Sometimes I make bizarre rules for myself to encourage sobriety. Like I cannot listen to Bruce Springsteen on days that I drink. But I always break rules like that. I didn’t make any bizarre rules this time.
What I do want to do is write a couple of papers. One on legalizing drugs and another on legalizing prostitution. I need access to a real library. These things have been on my mind.
come stand with me.
I have a psychic. Not in the way I have a therapist and an acupuncturist. But in the way that there is this psychic and I’ve seen her twice.
She likes to talk about powers. About which powers I do and do not have. The soul books I read like to talk about powers as well. But they don’t tell me which powers I do and do not have, not like the psychic. I have an ability to manifest what I want into reality more powerfully than most people can. But, she said, I numb this power with alcohol and with a job I am not passionate about and with how much I am afraid of love and intimacy and people who want to touch me with their hands and bodies and hearts.
I can see what she is saying.
10 days.
monday. circus. danger.
Day 6 was uneventful.
Day 7 is Monday.
I just need coffee. Monday will be okay.
I have these two cats.
Circus Zarathustra.
Danger Zosima.
7 days.
no title.
Sometimes I want to go back to before January 2007. Because that is when everything changed.
I started drinking every single day. I knew that I was falling for a girl. I felt feelings for the first time since before insomnia and migraines distracted me from feeling any real feelings. I let my job become my entire life because I wasn’t happy at home. And I started drinking every single day.
It isn’t January 2007 anymore. It’s today. 11:03pm on Saturday. It’s been over a year since I went a weekend without a drink. But it is never just a drink. I don’t understand those people in restaurants who can order one glass of wine and take the entire meal to drink it. How do they turn their minds and their feelings off without more? How do they breathe without the rest of the bottle to help them get air into their lungs?
Sometimes I want to go back. To before everything changed. Only I will keep the part about falling for the girl.
5 days.
when i get a little scared. when i get a little. run, run, run.
“…And Dean told Carlo of unknown people in the West like Tommy Snark, the clubfooted poolhall rotation shark and cardplayer and queer saint. He told him of Roy Johnson, Big Ed Dunkel, his boyhood buddies, his street buddies, his innumerable girls and sex-parties and pornographic pictures, his heroes, heroines, adventures. They rushed down the street together, digging everything in the early way they had, which later became so much sadder and perceptive and blank. But they danced down the streets like dingledodies, and I shambled after as I’ve been doing all my life after people who interest me, because the only people for me are the mad ones, the ones who are mad to live, mad to talk, mad to be saved, desirous of everything at the same time, the ones who never yawn or say a commonplace thing, but burn, burn, burn like fabulous yellow roman candles exploding like spiders across the stars and in the middle you see the blue centerlight pop and everybody goes ‘Awww!’.”
-Jack Kerouac, On the Road
When you read Jack Kerouac (and you should read Jack Kerouac, everything he’s ever written ever) you should drink whiskey at the same time. He’s just that good.
4 days.
i wish i knew which button to push.
It is getting harder to breathe. I am taking huge breaths and they never manage to fill my lungs with enough air for me to stop taking huge breaths. I can handle the headaches and the nausea but not being able to breathe is my least favourite part of this whole thing. My pilates instructor (who is never willing to admit that pilates is designed to improve sexual performance despite how obvious it is) would not be impressed with my breathing. She would tell me to slow it down BUT I CANNOT SLOW IT DOWN BECAUSE I NEED A BEER LIKE RIGHT NOW.
I watched an episode of Fringe last night. I have had a crush on Joshua Jackson since those duck movies. If I wasn’t spending all my spare time watching The Sopranos (EDIE FALCO IS THE QUEEN OF SEXY BY THE WAY) I would get into Fringe. It will just have to wait.
And now some advice, when in Tokyo and ordering off an all-Japanese menu it is important that you are clear on what type of beer you are trying to order…
alcohol content fail, october 2009.
3 days.
this feels like the first time.
Today is Wednesday.
I obsessed over conjunctivitis today. I had to send someone home from work because he came in with pink eye. PINK EYE IN THE OFFICE ARE YOU SERIOUS? I sprayed lysol on everything on/near/around his desk/chair/everything. I don’t even know if that is what I should have done. I just don’t want a pink eye outbreak. It’s gross. I wonder what Veronica would have done (BETTER OFF TED I LOVE YOU).
Day 2 has not been too difficult so far, probably because this being sick thing has me distracted from how much I want a beer. I want to breathe you know, and not having had a drink since January 11 is making it hard to breathe.
2 days.
this is how my cat sleeps. he is unique.
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