Antisocial Network

So Facebook wants to know what's on my mind. I'm pretty sure that's a disingenuous question. Sure, everybody loves my photos of the delicious, ten dollar grilled cheese sandwich I had for lunch, and the link to the cute dog in a Santa hat that I posted, but what's really on my mind? I suspect not. Does it want to know what's on my mind when I wake up at three in the morning with a knot in my gut like a monkey fist? Does it want to know why I almost had to flee my company Christmas party? Does it want to know why, sometimes, I just sit in the dark and think about the scars left by knife wounds of regret?

I don't think so. There are things which are best left unsaid. We all have stories we will never tell, and with good reason. The real trouble begins when we start to think too much about who we will tell what. Who gets what secrets, and what secrets do we take to the grave. Should we take any secrets to the grave? Who are we hurting if we do? Who are we hurting if we don't?

We all want to talk. Sometimes we want to yell, to be heard and understood. Who do we want to be heard by? Who do we care about. Maybe it's just easier to let it go. To tell Facebook that you love mashed potatoes as opposed to the woman whose hand you are holding. That the new CD by your favorite band is amazing and the fact that you were able to get out of bed in the morning isn't.

There are so many things Facebook will never know.

12/12/12

12/12/12, 7:47am
Ran into Barron Von Terror while getting my morning cup of joe at Grind Buds on Haight. He got a latte with no foam (WTF man?) and commented that it was fine weather for dirigibles. I am suspicious.

12/12/12: 10:37am
Got a text from Dr. Atomic inviting me to his Christmas party. Sometimes I feel like he only invites me to these things because I always bring a nice bottle of Scotch. And that one time I saved his life at the Battle of the Somme. Googled dirigibles.

12/12/12, 12:22pm
Got an email from agent Fox asking me if I could lend a hand with the situation on Mt. Lava Island. Had to remind him that it’s EOQ and I’m slammed. He apologized and said he totally understood. He’s an OK guy. So, turns out that dirigibles are just blimps. What a pretentious asshole.

12/12/212, 1:14pm
Went to the bookstore to pick up a copy of DeLillo's new book, Cassius Clay on Dinosaur Island. Hope he's finally figured out how to end a novel. Who the fuck buys a blimp?

12/12/12, 2:19pm
Thank god for Facebook! I totally forgot it was Patriot Lad's birthday. He's not a lad anymore so I suppose I should stop calling him that. It's just so hard to think of him as anything other than the scrappy young go-getter who helped me defend the world from villainy. Still not sure why he moved to San Francisco though. Probably wanted to get some distance between himself and The League of Justice Hero's after "the incident" with Hypno-Clown. What the hell is good blimp weather anyway? A lack of other blimps so as to render blimp related accidents an impossibility?

12/12/12, 3:12
I quit quitting smoking. I'm not even sure why I stopped in the first place, it's not like it's going to kill me. The doctors called it a "happy accident". I remember once eating some rotten food to see what would happen. Nada. Where the hell do you get a blimp license anyway?

12/12/12, 4:20pm
Decided to ditch work early and hit happy hour at the Golden Horseshoe. Jack is working which makes the end of my day even better. He's a nice guy and makes for good conversation. Also, he buys me a drink every now and then. I wonder if Terror's blimp has a wet bar.

12/12/12, 6:16
Jack told me that his greatest fear is growing old and becoming irrelevant. I told him I knew the feeling. I didn't tell him that I have been irrelevant since the invention of the atomic bomb. Who needs somebody who is stronger and faster than anybody else when you can remove a city without even seeing it?

They try and throw me missions every now and then, but we both know it's just a pity job. I'm nothing but a man to humor as he tries to push his way through a life that is going to last too long. A life that will see people grow old as I stay a picture of youth. I have done my best to accept it. To be the opposite of Baron Von Terror, an impossibly old man that has nothing left but blimps, steam powered exoskeleton's and a hope that the world has not changed.

I can hear sirens now, and what I imagine is the low hum of dirigible engines. I order another drink.

Thimble

There's a needle in my chest, which points to my heart. Every time it beats, it approaches the the tip of the needle, just avoiding it each time by the slimmest of margins. I imagine the cartoonish "POP" sound it will make on the day my luck runs out. It makes me feel les anxious each time my ventricles open and close? I don't know, it's hard to tell.

Sometimes I wonder what will happen when the wall of my heart reaches the event horizon. Will my heart fly around the inside of my chest in keeping with the cartoon theme, releasing its lifetime of blood? Maybe something else will come out? An ichor which has been building over a lifetime, pushing at the walls of my heart since my life began perhaps? Maybe it will be emotions tangible. Feelings made manifest will fill me until I burst. A pinata of joy, hope, despair, longing and love. I don't know, it's hard to tell.

What does it matter? That I have a heart? That I have a needle? Neither has served me well as I slip through the cracks of this world. Then again I suppose it's better than nothing. Or maybe not. Every time I push through one layer there's another waiting for me. Every day is a day where expectations are adjusted. There must, of course, be a moment where all the layers are gone and I can finally rest right? I don't know, it's hard to tell.

Killing a man just to watch him die.

For awhile now, in an effort to entertain myself, and continue to be able to pretend I am a "writer", I have been posting supper short short micro stories on my books of face. Because I am lazy, some time ago I decided to pick a single name to always use for my male and female protagonists. As an unintended side effect most people assumed that I was writing an ongoing narrative. Some sort of story in stages. That wasn't the case, but I decided not to disabuse anybody of that notion.

A few weeks ago I found myself thinking of my male protagonist as though he was, you know, a real person. Thinking about where he was going. So it was I found myself talking to a friend of mine over drinks who happens to be one of the few who followed my scribblings and found myself telling her that I thought it was time my male protagonist got himself a drug problem.

"Maybe," I mused "It's time to kill him off."
"You totally should," She said. "It would fit in with the overall dark story you have been telling."

With that I knew it was time for Malcolm to die. I quickly decided that it was going to be suicide and on Wednesday began laying the ground work. By Friday he would be gone. I was surprised to find that I was kind of excited by his imminent death. It felt like the right, though oddly sad thing to do. Friday morning I was at work, writing the final scene in my head when I realized I couldn't do suicide. The reasons are complex and not for this blog, but I found I had painted myself into a corner. I won't lie. I panicked.

There was only one thing to do. Go to a bar after work and drink my way to an answer. Whiskey, thankfully, brought inspiration. As I began to write Malcolm's demise I began to feel bad for him. His time had come, and yet I wondered if there was an out. Maybe he could find salvation at the last moment? I was writing out the scene where he had been struck by a car before I knew it and realized that was that.

Malcolm was a good guy who just got a bad lot in life. I'm gonna miss him.

Two sides of a coin

I was unemployed. I mean bottom of the barrel unemployed. I had cashed out my 401K for 13.74 and half a tube of stale cool ranch Pringles. I did, however, have Jr. Employee status at my local bar so could still afford to get drunk. And on that night I was a viking. As I made way home I realized I needed some supplies from the grocery store. Stumbling through the aisles I grabbed only what I needed, and only what was the cheapest they had. Fixins' for baloney sammiches and toilet paper. It was a classy night all around.

I made it home safely (thank you lizard brain!), put my things away, and passed out. Having no obligations other than the occasional weeping jag, I slept until lunch time. Rubbing the sleep out of my eyes I went into my kitchen to make coffee, ramen, and a tasty baloney sammich. As I pulled out the pack of mystery meat I was confronted by the manufacturer of my generic brand of...stuff. "Red Dot".

So it was that I made my soup and sandwich and watched my stories. A few hours later it was time for me to make a lil trip to the bathroom. Sitting on the toilet, I reached for the toilet paper I had bought the night before. As I began to rip it open I saw the generic logo. "Red Dot."

Those bastards got me coming and going.

It's what now?

It's coming up on the time of the year where I realize I'm dead inside. Perhaps I should back up a bit. I used to love Christmas in a way which is illegal in a couple of states. I don't mean in just the childlike IT'S-CHRISTMAS-I-CAN'T-SLEEP-WAKE-UP-MOM-AND-DAD kind of way either. As I outgrew that phase I retained a love of Christmas. I loved Christmas music, all the classic TV specials, the tree and decorations. The whole bit. I even went nuts with the gift buying. I would spend more time than is reasonable roaming far and wide looking for the perfect gifts for my family and friends. The thrill of the hunt was my December ritual.

And then, one year, it happened. I was pleased enough to have a tree in my apartment even though I didn't help pick it out with my room mate. The decorations she put up were nice as well, but the last second shopping I found myself doing was a pain in the ass. "Good enough" was my hallmark that year. That was a the beginning of the end. Everything after that was a downward spiral. With each passing year, December became a month of chores. Eventually, having landed in a pad by myself, the collapse was nearly complete.

Christmas would come and go, and to look at my apartment one would never even know the holidays were neigh. I became a trope. The guy who thought of Christmas as just another day. I was Scrooge, but not rich or quite as huge of an ass. For a time I dated a woman who probably loved Christmas more than me, and was almost better at it than I was at the height of my powers. A bit of me always felt a little bad that I couldn't match that love, but her enthusiasm always made me smile.

The last nail in the coffin (pun intended) was when my father passed away. He was the last parent to actually surprise me with Christmas presents. I was in college and he blindsided me with a hard shell case for my guitar, some sheet music for some songs I had been wanting, and a couple of vintage barrel house blues records that I didn't know I wanted til I saw them. It sounds like nothing, but in hazy hindsight it was everything. I've haven't been much of a friend of Christmas for some time, and it really doesn't bother me, but every now and then I miss it. Whatever it is.

Time Traveler

I am a time traveler. Not the cool kind though, like Dr. Who or Martin Van Buren (little known fact!). When I travel back in time I can't save Lincoln ("Look out Mr. President! He's got a gun!" See? Nothing.) or convince Hitler that the Jews aren't so bad by beating him to death with a chainsaw. No, all I can do is go back and watch my life unfold, long and slow like a Tarkovski film. On the plus side the view is spectacular and vibrant. There are details that I can see which were lost to me then, but as an observer from afar are crystal clear.

The trick, of course, is to avoid addiction. The past, even when immutable, is an alluring place to be. It is filled with breathtaking secrets and euphoric victories often forgotten. It is a place where I can vindicate my past choices with future successes, and turn my back on the dark corners I would rather not examine. It is a beautiful maze filled with shiny baubles and tar pits. Sometimes I don't want to leave, and sometimes I can't.

Now I'll tell you a secret. You're a time traveler too. If you're lucky you don't know it. If you're smart you never will. It's too easy to live there. To set up camp in the heart of that soothing addiction. To sit down and never stop looking at the shiny baubles. To step into the tar pit and let the thick, warm blanket rock you to sleep. To forget that there is a future because the past is known, safe, and certain.

The Fear

There is nothing as terrifying as fear. I don't even know what that means, except that I do. It is not what you think when you think of fear. It's not as simple as being afraid of THE DARK, or SPIDERS, or MIDDLE AGED MEN NAMED LUCIOUS WHO WEAR TOP HATS.

It's too smart for that. It stays vague but rooted. It won't let you see it, pin it down, fix it. Yet it will come and wake you up in the middle of the night and whisper in your ear, "I have a secret, and if you can figure it out you can get rid of me. I'll give you twenty guesses." And then it smiles. A sick smile. The smile of a killer.

That is how it begins to eat at you. You begin to think of all the things it could be. You relive the fabricated failures and regrets of your past. You think not only of the things that have hurt yourself, but the things that hurt others. You expand a singularity into a new universe of mindless doubt. A single event becomes a global dread. You know how to control it, but forget what control is.

It prods you to examine, and in doing so you begin to poke daemons, and shake the cages of old memories. You begin to draw a diagram of your past. To try and connect the dots and write large a pattern that will be the solution to...Everything. When you think you are done you pull away from your work with blurred vision and trembling hands and see that you have drawn a circle.