Several weeks ago, my sister's coworker, Jon, went to a man's house to sell him car and homeowner's insurance.
As Jon was assessing the house, the man's wife went up to him, a bit frazzled, her eyes enlarged with fear, and said, "Don't sell him any insurance. He's going to burn this house down and then kill me." No doubt, Jon was startled by the statement. What do you do in that situation? Do you take her seriously or blow it off as her being crazy or paranoid? Jon decided to shrug it off and sold the man the insurance anyway.
He didn't think too much about the lady with the large eyes until he got a phone call two weeks later.
It was the man.
"You can take my wife off the policy," he said. "She committed suicide a few days ago."
Jon, concerned, called the police to let them know what the man's wife had told him but they refused to look into it, saying the case was officially closed.
.
.
.
So...he killed her.
Happy Halloween.
Monday, October 31, 2011
Friday, October 21, 2011
pentagrammatical error
“And it’s not just obvious things, he said. It’s not all possessions and hauntings and black shadows by the bed. Satan can come knocking wearing a more mundane coat. The Ouija abuser could have health or personal problems, or their luck could just turn rotten. Most often, the afflicted simply find that their faith in God mysteriously drains away. The invisible world of the undead, the world of ghosts and spirits, is the world where the devil lives, he told me calmly. And if you go looking for the devil, the devil will find you.”
-Will Storr vs the Supernatural by Will Storr
When I was a little boy, I used to hang out with my gay cousin, his sister and their dead relative in their haunted mobile home. Well, at least they told me there was a dead relative that lived with them. Although I was around ten-years-old and naive, I was still skeptical of the trailer's transparent tenant. It was hard for me to imagine there was an actual presence, a ghost, that walked (floated?) among them.
I'm pretty open minded so it wasn't that I didn't believe in ghosts but I was also the type of person that needed to see things with my own eyes in order to truly believe. Also, my cousins had tried to trick me with unbelievable stories before.
My uncle had a pond across from his trailer and the eldest cousin, J, once told me it contained a gigantic fish as large as the pond itself. His name was Chester. I was probably about seven at the time and dumb and knew nothing about fish. If wales could get huge, could some species of fish as well? Although I had never heard of a gigantic catfish before, maybe Chester was a freak accident of nature.
My little brain spun with the possibilities but there was never any physical evidence, never any indication of a fin skimming the surface of the shimmery gray pond. I wasn't sure what to make of J's claim but his sister, K, backed him up. J liked to be dramatic and spin salacious stories but K was more down to earth and so if she agreed with him, maybe it was really true. Maybe there was a fish as big as a house floating around in the murky water.
Eventually, I came to my senses and realized my cousins were just screwing with me. Chester the catfish was a hoax, unless some toxic waste had somehow spilled into the water, genetically altering the scaly creature's DNA, turning it into the Godzilla of redneck cuisine. But if that was the case, how come they never told the press and made heaps of cash off their freak-sized pond monster?
The ghost thing was a bit trickier. J said it was one of their relatives, Vernon, who used to live in the trailer before his father moved in. Vernon might have even possibly died there, which would have bolstered the validity of the story and also made it somewhat more believable and spooky. To me, at least, it was more logical there was a ghost in their house rather than an enormous fish with a pituitary problem. It didn't help matters that the trailer was pretty creepy as it was.
The whole trailer was small and cramped. The interior wasn't well lit or ventilated and was always hazy with cigarette smoke. My uncle and both cousins smoked so there were ample amounts of ash smeared on the tables and cracked ashtrays among the coffee-stained copies of Cosmopolitan. The smokiness could have easily been misinterpreted as an unnerving fog that had just rolled in to announce the presence of something unholy.
There weren't many sources of light, either. And what little light they had was dull and mustard yellow in color. There were also rooms in the house I never entered, such as their bathroom and father's room. Knowing there were unseen rooms within the tiny confines of the place prodded my imagination. Those rooms were mysterious. What was the mobile home hiding in those rooms?
That other half of the house where the unexplored rooms were located was connected to the den and kitchen by a short, narrow hall. A door leading outside was on the right of the hall and was covered by a makeshift drape made from what looked and felt like a burlap sack. It was the only light source in the hall. It filtered the sunlight into jagged brown shafts that splintered off and dissolved into the darkness, leaving an inky black hole...or wall...or entrance to another dimension that floated ten feet in front of me. I had never gone past the inky darkness so I had no idea what was back there. Technically, it was my uncle's bedroom but for all I knew, that might have been were Vernon died.
And then dwelled.
-Will Storr vs the Supernatural by Will Storr
When I was a little boy, I used to hang out with my gay cousin, his sister and their dead relative in their haunted mobile home. Well, at least they told me there was a dead relative that lived with them. Although I was around ten-years-old and naive, I was still skeptical of the trailer's transparent tenant. It was hard for me to imagine there was an actual presence, a ghost, that walked (floated?) among them.
I'm pretty open minded so it wasn't that I didn't believe in ghosts but I was also the type of person that needed to see things with my own eyes in order to truly believe. Also, my cousins had tried to trick me with unbelievable stories before.
My uncle had a pond across from his trailer and the eldest cousin, J, once told me it contained a gigantic fish as large as the pond itself. His name was Chester. I was probably about seven at the time and dumb and knew nothing about fish. If wales could get huge, could some species of fish as well? Although I had never heard of a gigantic catfish before, maybe Chester was a freak accident of nature.
My little brain spun with the possibilities but there was never any physical evidence, never any indication of a fin skimming the surface of the shimmery gray pond. I wasn't sure what to make of J's claim but his sister, K, backed him up. J liked to be dramatic and spin salacious stories but K was more down to earth and so if she agreed with him, maybe it was really true. Maybe there was a fish as big as a house floating around in the murky water.
Eventually, I came to my senses and realized my cousins were just screwing with me. Chester the catfish was a hoax, unless some toxic waste had somehow spilled into the water, genetically altering the scaly creature's DNA, turning it into the Godzilla of redneck cuisine. But if that was the case, how come they never told the press and made heaps of cash off their freak-sized pond monster?
The ghost thing was a bit trickier. J said it was one of their relatives, Vernon, who used to live in the trailer before his father moved in. Vernon might have even possibly died there, which would have bolstered the validity of the story and also made it somewhat more believable and spooky. To me, at least, it was more logical there was a ghost in their house rather than an enormous fish with a pituitary problem. It didn't help matters that the trailer was pretty creepy as it was.
The whole trailer was small and cramped. The interior wasn't well lit or ventilated and was always hazy with cigarette smoke. My uncle and both cousins smoked so there were ample amounts of ash smeared on the tables and cracked ashtrays among the coffee-stained copies of Cosmopolitan. The smokiness could have easily been misinterpreted as an unnerving fog that had just rolled in to announce the presence of something unholy.
There weren't many sources of light, either. And what little light they had was dull and mustard yellow in color. There were also rooms in the house I never entered, such as their bathroom and father's room. Knowing there were unseen rooms within the tiny confines of the place prodded my imagination. Those rooms were mysterious. What was the mobile home hiding in those rooms?
That other half of the house where the unexplored rooms were located was connected to the den and kitchen by a short, narrow hall. A door leading outside was on the right of the hall and was covered by a makeshift drape made from what looked and felt like a burlap sack. It was the only light source in the hall. It filtered the sunlight into jagged brown shafts that splintered off and dissolved into the darkness, leaving an inky black hole...or wall...or entrance to another dimension that floated ten feet in front of me. I had never gone past the inky darkness so I had no idea what was back there. Technically, it was my uncle's bedroom but for all I knew, that might have been were Vernon died.
And then dwelled.
Saturday, October 8, 2011
in bed, breathing
"Only the lonely
know the way I feel tonight
only the lonely
know this feeling ain't right..."
-Roy Orbison, Only the Lonely
For the longest time, I thought I had risen above love. I thought I had defeated loneliness and felt content with just being by myself. I didn't fool or force myself into believing it. I genuinely thought I was over love, better off even. Naturally, the pangs of loneliness would pop up on occasion but I always shrugged them off. They never lasted long enough to cause permanent damage. I felt I was already about as hurt as I could be so how much more damage could they cause? I knew I'd never be able to get rid of the loneliness completely but I was confident I could control it.
But now, I feel the loneliness is crushing me like a trash compactor. Several factors, such as my crumbling faith in God and realizing the youth at work have close knit friendships, have contributed to my ever-increasing isolation over the past several months. I looked around at work and realized I was one of the older ones, an outsider coming into this group of teens who all started together. On the other side of the spectrum we had the older supervisors with families and 401Ks. And I was this glob with nothing to grasp, too old for the young crowd, too young or the older group, suspended in a timezone that no one could relate to.
When I had people to talk to, I could keep the emptiness at arm's length. I had people I could connect with while in college. They were in the same situation as me. We could all relate. We were wide-eyed and working toward something. My roommates were good. I had a few ginger ladies I enjoyed. And then there was my special gal Chasity, who was with me from the beginning to the end. And someone else who was with me long before that. But my roommates got jobs, the gingers stopped talking to me and Chasity got engaged and moved out of the country. And as for the other one, well, that just didn't end too well...
And slowly, I dropped off everyone's radar.
I knew communication wasn't a one-way process so I did try to keep up with them. I called, texted, IMed and Facebooked. And they reciprocated. For a while. And then they all slowly faded out. I suppose without the college connection to keep us together, none of us really had that much to talk about. It was a cycle I had began noticing early on. Fellow students talked to me while in class but once the quarter was over, I never heard from them again. The trend continued when I started working. As soon as one of the lucky few were able to move away to college or find another job, they stopped talking to me. I suppose I'm a good coworker or classmate, but nothing more, nothing anyone would want to continue a relationship with once the job ended or the class was completed.
And even earlier than that, I didn't talk to anyone from high school after we all graduated. I keep up with one or two people but their schedules are so busy it actually is more convenient for them to get in touch with me since I never have anything going on. It's not that I don't try but they are too busy with their pursuits, which I understand. I suppose this is what it feels like to grow up and lose contact with people who once held a special place in your mind. Maybe there isn't such a thing as lifelong friends. The beauty in being connected to such a wide variety of people is that they open your world to so many different things. The beast is that, because they all are so different, they end up going in different directions, scattering out and leaving you alone. And while it's the natural order of things, I believe I have stumbled on my part of the deal. Friends come and go and usually people make other friends to fill the spaces of those left behind. I haven't quite managed to fill those voids.
A big problem with living here is there's nothing to do. I live in a redneck infested cesspool of pregnancy and narcotics. Girls grow up to become nurses only because it's a relatively simple job to get into. And the guy's grow up to drill offshore. And there is nothing wrong at all with either occupation but the sad part is how people can't see beyond the small bubble of their residency. And so they take those jobs just to remain inside the bubble. Dreams and aspirations usually fall by the wayside as soon as they graduate high school because it's time to be an adult, to grow up and raise a family and pursuing dreams doesn't fit into the picture. And those who do pursue their dreams often leave their bubble and never come back. I feel I'm in a weird predicament because I am one of the dreamers yet I'm trapped in my bubble with those I have no interest in getting to know.
Most of the girls my age are already married or pregnant. Most of the guys are douche bag hicks. I have nothing in common with any of these people. And therefore I have no friends. And romantic entanglements are even harder to come by. As mentioned earlier, most girls are knocked up or knocked around by their boyfriends/husbands. So, there's not a great selection as far as romantic prospects go. And at this point in the game, what do I even want out of a relationship? What am I looking for? To settle down? To have a few flings? And what kind of person will it take to revive me? Friendship? Romantic relationship? Sexual compatibility? Same cynical attitude? I've wanted it for so long that I didn't put much thought into envisioning what form it would take. I always assumed a certain way but now I'm just not so sure.
The lack of friendship, as well as romance, has caused a rekindling of that ache, that need to be someone's number one. I feel more alone than I ever have in my life. I have no friend to lean on, no partner to stay in bed with, and barely a God to pray to. I am immeasurably lonely. In fact, I think it's hard for most people to comprehend it. Sometimes I don't think I can, either, but when I say it, people don't seem to realize how deep it sinks into me.
Maybe this feeling is just another pang, just more intense and longer-lasting. Maybe this, too, will pass. But I can't help but thinking by acknowledging it, I'm opening the way for more pain. I also can't help but to think how I'm missing intimacy in my life. I need to know someone else's lips and love and life. I haven't had the best opinion of people in general for a while now but I know there's got to be more than what I've observed. I want to explore that, to feel something more than surface flushes of heat. I want to be able to talk to someone on the phone or hold them or have them go with me for a drive. I want someone I can watch horror movies with and talk about death and dreams. I want someone I can show my writings to, someone I can share a book with, someone I can kiss and cry to. I've never had that. No one has gotten to know me past casual chatter. And that's driven a wedge between me and everyone else. My blog knows me more personally than anyone in my life and I think there's a great deal of sadness in that. There's just no one to turn to, physical, spiritual or electronic. That's not to say I haven't ever come close. I've almost had that. But almost doesn't assuage the agony.
I can't deny it anymore, can't turn it away despite my rejection of love. I'm lonely. As much as I thought I was beyond human emotions, I'm not. When I died, I tried to bury all of that while attempting to remain above ground myself. I'd love to be in love. I'd love to have someone to love me. I walk this path singular, solitary, sick. I wouldn't mind having a hand to hold along the way. But that doesn't mean it will happen or that I am capable of having it happen to me. I'm too selfish and full of unjustified bitterness and hatred to have a fulfilling relationship. I'm too insecure, too indecisive, and too paranoid. I can't have it all but I crave it so much. I want to be loved, supported, recognized. I just don't want to fall into the fire without anyone ever really having known who I am.
I think about the majestic qualities of love, how it bubbles up and grows on a grand scale. I think about the power of love and how it can change lives. And that's nice but sometimes I crave the simpler aspects of it. Really, all I want is to be one of two bodies in bed, breathing. I don't know what the warmth of someone else's skin feels like. It's strange to me when I hear it on television or in the movies, how people curl up together and comment on the comforting warmth. I guess I forgot that bodies can be that way. I had simply become accustomed to mine running cold. I just want to know someone else, to experience someone's chest rising and falling next to mine, to share such a small space, to breathe in the same air, to cradle, to be held, to feel connected to something for once. I want to feel the function of a heartbeat, to know that something is alive within myself and someone else, to feel it speed up and slow down, a crashing thump thump thump against my ear. A laugh. A breath. A sigh. I want to tap into the most basic of human needs, desires. And that's a need to feel warm with someone else, to love, to be loved, to be wanted and cared for.
To not be so damn alone.
I want to dive into humanity, to revel in feeling alive again. I want to be a part of the population. To love and be loved is not to make a connection with just one person, but to connect with whole world. You know what everyone else feels, needs, fears. Even if the feeling doesn't last, if the person walks out or is taken away, you've been there, you've felt it and smelled it and tasted it and had it wash over you and cleanse you and when you walk down the street or shake someone's hand or smile and wave as you pass by, you know them more than you might realize. You understand them, have been there before, might be there again, can sympathize with their plight. Because it is your plight as well. It is the plight of every creature that breathes and even some that don't. It is love. It is lust. It is an intense attraction. It is the need to feel, the urge to belong. It's built into us like our blood. And once you've known true love, I think you are irrevocably changed. I've stayed the same for far too long.
I go to bed and breathe in the fan to give my lungs something to do. I stretch out and bury my face into the pillow, tunneling away from the world, waiting until the darkness sweeps over me for one more night. And I wonder what it would be like to be escorted into dreams, to have a hand pull me into sleep instead of the television, wonder what it would be like to drift back from dreams, ascend to the surface of consciousness, buoyant in my bed and bound by flesh and bone instead of being flanked by microfiber and flannel to warm me.
know the way I feel tonight
only the lonely
know this feeling ain't right..."
-Roy Orbison, Only the Lonely
For the longest time, I thought I had risen above love. I thought I had defeated loneliness and felt content with just being by myself. I didn't fool or force myself into believing it. I genuinely thought I was over love, better off even. Naturally, the pangs of loneliness would pop up on occasion but I always shrugged them off. They never lasted long enough to cause permanent damage. I felt I was already about as hurt as I could be so how much more damage could they cause? I knew I'd never be able to get rid of the loneliness completely but I was confident I could control it.
But now, I feel the loneliness is crushing me like a trash compactor. Several factors, such as my crumbling faith in God and realizing the youth at work have close knit friendships, have contributed to my ever-increasing isolation over the past several months. I looked around at work and realized I was one of the older ones, an outsider coming into this group of teens who all started together. On the other side of the spectrum we had the older supervisors with families and 401Ks. And I was this glob with nothing to grasp, too old for the young crowd, too young or the older group, suspended in a timezone that no one could relate to.
When I had people to talk to, I could keep the emptiness at arm's length. I had people I could connect with while in college. They were in the same situation as me. We could all relate. We were wide-eyed and working toward something. My roommates were good. I had a few ginger ladies I enjoyed. And then there was my special gal Chasity, who was with me from the beginning to the end. And someone else who was with me long before that. But my roommates got jobs, the gingers stopped talking to me and Chasity got engaged and moved out of the country. And as for the other one, well, that just didn't end too well...
And slowly, I dropped off everyone's radar.
I knew communication wasn't a one-way process so I did try to keep up with them. I called, texted, IMed and Facebooked. And they reciprocated. For a while. And then they all slowly faded out. I suppose without the college connection to keep us together, none of us really had that much to talk about. It was a cycle I had began noticing early on. Fellow students talked to me while in class but once the quarter was over, I never heard from them again. The trend continued when I started working. As soon as one of the lucky few were able to move away to college or find another job, they stopped talking to me. I suppose I'm a good coworker or classmate, but nothing more, nothing anyone would want to continue a relationship with once the job ended or the class was completed.
And even earlier than that, I didn't talk to anyone from high school after we all graduated. I keep up with one or two people but their schedules are so busy it actually is more convenient for them to get in touch with me since I never have anything going on. It's not that I don't try but they are too busy with their pursuits, which I understand. I suppose this is what it feels like to grow up and lose contact with people who once held a special place in your mind. Maybe there isn't such a thing as lifelong friends. The beauty in being connected to such a wide variety of people is that they open your world to so many different things. The beast is that, because they all are so different, they end up going in different directions, scattering out and leaving you alone. And while it's the natural order of things, I believe I have stumbled on my part of the deal. Friends come and go and usually people make other friends to fill the spaces of those left behind. I haven't quite managed to fill those voids.
A big problem with living here is there's nothing to do. I live in a redneck infested cesspool of pregnancy and narcotics. Girls grow up to become nurses only because it's a relatively simple job to get into. And the guy's grow up to drill offshore. And there is nothing wrong at all with either occupation but the sad part is how people can't see beyond the small bubble of their residency. And so they take those jobs just to remain inside the bubble. Dreams and aspirations usually fall by the wayside as soon as they graduate high school because it's time to be an adult, to grow up and raise a family and pursuing dreams doesn't fit into the picture. And those who do pursue their dreams often leave their bubble and never come back. I feel I'm in a weird predicament because I am one of the dreamers yet I'm trapped in my bubble with those I have no interest in getting to know.
Most of the girls my age are already married or pregnant. Most of the guys are douche bag hicks. I have nothing in common with any of these people. And therefore I have no friends. And romantic entanglements are even harder to come by. As mentioned earlier, most girls are knocked up or knocked around by their boyfriends/husbands. So, there's not a great selection as far as romantic prospects go. And at this point in the game, what do I even want out of a relationship? What am I looking for? To settle down? To have a few flings? And what kind of person will it take to revive me? Friendship? Romantic relationship? Sexual compatibility? Same cynical attitude? I've wanted it for so long that I didn't put much thought into envisioning what form it would take. I always assumed a certain way but now I'm just not so sure.
The lack of friendship, as well as romance, has caused a rekindling of that ache, that need to be someone's number one. I feel more alone than I ever have in my life. I have no friend to lean on, no partner to stay in bed with, and barely a God to pray to. I am immeasurably lonely. In fact, I think it's hard for most people to comprehend it. Sometimes I don't think I can, either, but when I say it, people don't seem to realize how deep it sinks into me.
Maybe this feeling is just another pang, just more intense and longer-lasting. Maybe this, too, will pass. But I can't help but thinking by acknowledging it, I'm opening the way for more pain. I also can't help but to think how I'm missing intimacy in my life. I need to know someone else's lips and love and life. I haven't had the best opinion of people in general for a while now but I know there's got to be more than what I've observed. I want to explore that, to feel something more than surface flushes of heat. I want to be able to talk to someone on the phone or hold them or have them go with me for a drive. I want someone I can watch horror movies with and talk about death and dreams. I want someone I can show my writings to, someone I can share a book with, someone I can kiss and cry to. I've never had that. No one has gotten to know me past casual chatter. And that's driven a wedge between me and everyone else. My blog knows me more personally than anyone in my life and I think there's a great deal of sadness in that. There's just no one to turn to, physical, spiritual or electronic. That's not to say I haven't ever come close. I've almost had that. But almost doesn't assuage the agony.
I can't deny it anymore, can't turn it away despite my rejection of love. I'm lonely. As much as I thought I was beyond human emotions, I'm not. When I died, I tried to bury all of that while attempting to remain above ground myself. I'd love to be in love. I'd love to have someone to love me. I walk this path singular, solitary, sick. I wouldn't mind having a hand to hold along the way. But that doesn't mean it will happen or that I am capable of having it happen to me. I'm too selfish and full of unjustified bitterness and hatred to have a fulfilling relationship. I'm too insecure, too indecisive, and too paranoid. I can't have it all but I crave it so much. I want to be loved, supported, recognized. I just don't want to fall into the fire without anyone ever really having known who I am.
I think about the majestic qualities of love, how it bubbles up and grows on a grand scale. I think about the power of love and how it can change lives. And that's nice but sometimes I crave the simpler aspects of it. Really, all I want is to be one of two bodies in bed, breathing. I don't know what the warmth of someone else's skin feels like. It's strange to me when I hear it on television or in the movies, how people curl up together and comment on the comforting warmth. I guess I forgot that bodies can be that way. I had simply become accustomed to mine running cold. I just want to know someone else, to experience someone's chest rising and falling next to mine, to share such a small space, to breathe in the same air, to cradle, to be held, to feel connected to something for once. I want to feel the function of a heartbeat, to know that something is alive within myself and someone else, to feel it speed up and slow down, a crashing thump thump thump against my ear. A laugh. A breath. A sigh. I want to tap into the most basic of human needs, desires. And that's a need to feel warm with someone else, to love, to be loved, to be wanted and cared for.
To not be so damn alone.
I want to dive into humanity, to revel in feeling alive again. I want to be a part of the population. To love and be loved is not to make a connection with just one person, but to connect with whole world. You know what everyone else feels, needs, fears. Even if the feeling doesn't last, if the person walks out or is taken away, you've been there, you've felt it and smelled it and tasted it and had it wash over you and cleanse you and when you walk down the street or shake someone's hand or smile and wave as you pass by, you know them more than you might realize. You understand them, have been there before, might be there again, can sympathize with their plight. Because it is your plight as well. It is the plight of every creature that breathes and even some that don't. It is love. It is lust. It is an intense attraction. It is the need to feel, the urge to belong. It's built into us like our blood. And once you've known true love, I think you are irrevocably changed. I've stayed the same for far too long.
I go to bed and breathe in the fan to give my lungs something to do. I stretch out and bury my face into the pillow, tunneling away from the world, waiting until the darkness sweeps over me for one more night. And I wonder what it would be like to be escorted into dreams, to have a hand pull me into sleep instead of the television, wonder what it would be like to drift back from dreams, ascend to the surface of consciousness, buoyant in my bed and bound by flesh and bone instead of being flanked by microfiber and flannel to warm me.
Wednesday, October 5, 2011
bad romance III: the wedding
"There goes somebody's miracle
Walking down the street
There goes some modern fairy tale
I wish it could happen to me..."
-Liz Phair, Somebody's Miracle
The girl I mentioned in my first Bad Romance entry, the one who found herself a boyfriend, married the guy yesterday. It was weird to imagine her getting married. I think she had one boyfriend in high school and two in college, one of them being the guy she eventually married. That's not to say that someone should have a lot of boyfriends or girlfriends before settling down but I guess for me, because she hadn't been involved in many relationships, I just never saw her as a relationship kind of girl. Much less marriage material. But, there she was, dressed in white and exchanging rings and the whole scene felt so surreal.
I wasn't thrilled about attending the wedding because she and I had grown apart since we both moved away to college. She and I used to be pretty close in high school and community college but after we both moved from our home town, life happened, as it always does, and circumstances weakened our bond. It was almost like we were estranged or something. I hadn't spoken to her in probably a year and so in some ways it felt like I was a wedding crasher, sitting down in a pew among strangers, watching foreign people unite in the face of God. Plus, I had no idea who her groom was. She met him in college so the first time I shook his hand was during the reception. I surely didn't know him and I felt like I wasn't too sure I knew her that well, either.
The idea of sitting through the whole atmosphere of holy matrimony was also unappetizing. Love and marriage is such a foreign concept to me now that I sat there, baffled, as the groom's father took over preacher duties and talked about God and love and the unbreakable bond the bride and groom were about to form. Pictures flashed and tears were splashed and I just felt out of place. My usual empty. But there was this weirdness that found itself creeping up inside me. I watched my high school classmate get married. And I kind of wanted that for myself. It was a celebration. It was a big day for both of them, maybe one of the most important days in their lives and I wanted that, too. I wondered if I'd ever have a big day like that, if I'd ever get to go on stage and put a ring on it and have people clap for us and beam and cry and bring out a three-tiered cake with whipped frosting and kiss her in front of friends and family and not feel so alone and show people that I wasn't an unlovable freak, like, "Hey, I can be loved. I can be cared for. And I'm capable of caring, too. I can be normal."
But I'm not normal. And I'm not okay.
For the longest time I had given up on that white wedding scenario for myself. I mean, I still had given up on it but the wedding was one of the only times I had let myself think about such a thing. You see, not only had I given up on love and romance years ago but I hadn't let myself even think about it because I knew I was just putting myself in a bad place. It's never fun to fantasize about something you can't have. I could dream about living in a mansion with with a pooper made from platinum but that will never happen so why should I set my heart on it? It was the same with love.
Then I thought more about it and realized maybe I just wanted the show, the celebration, the ceremony of it all. But after all the food had been wrapped up and the gifts have been opened, I'd be left with a wife and a future with her and I don't even know if I want that. I guess I'm a bit confused. When I was younger, all I wanted was love but one day I realized that I was never going to get it and then upon further introspection I realized that I wasn't even sure I wanted it. I think the concept of marriage is nice but I also think a lot of people don't fully understand how huge of a commitment marriage is. It's wonderful but it also takes so much work. It's like a second job. You have to transition from taking care of yourself to help take care of someone else. That's not to say you shouldn't take care of yourself but what I mean to say is you have someone else to consider rather than just yourself. Marriage is tricky sometimes. And it's forever. And forever is not for everyone.
Is it for me?
The ceremony pretty much went how I pictured it: I went with a mutual friend of mine and the bride's. We sat down and made fun of everyone and then had some cake and left. I was mostly concerned that I'd see a lot of people from high school. I wasn't looking or feeling my best after my weight gain so I had hoped I wouldn't run into too many people looking as run down as I did. But, really, it was mostly just her college friends so I felt relatively safe. It didn't help the sense of being among strangers, though, because I didn't know anyone except the bride's family.
I was a bit surprised at how they geeked up the joint. The bride was dressed like Liv Tyler straight out of Lord of the Rings. They even had a LOTR cake. And the groom had a Star Wars Millenium Falcon cake, which was quite delicious. They also had a nice assortment of candy to choose from. After the couple exchanged vows, they sang Michael Buble's "Everything" to each other because they are both theater majors so they had to incorporate some musical number to seal the deal. And then they walked out to the Pirates of the Caribbean theme and the audience was treated to a five minute slide show of their lives from tots to teens to happily engaged.
During the reception, as I stuffed my face, the newlyweds played those lame "how well do you know your spouse" games. And then we talked to the bride for a bit and then that was it. I grabbed a couple of bags of candy and we were on our way out. It wasn't as miserable as I was expecting it to be and and the mutual friend even agreed it wasn't too bad, and she hates weddings. Of course, the inevitable feeling of loneliness did present itself like I was expecting it to do. And I think that's why I was so hesitant to go. Their happiness would just be another reminder of my misery. And then I felt bad because it's just so typically negative to feel that way, to not be happy for anyone. I really need to get over myself.
But I promise this wasn't some kind of cliched realization about the loss of love while attending a wedding. No, those pinpricks of loneliness were there far before the ceremony. I've actually been feeling the emptiness a lot more over the past several weeks. It'll come and go but it hasn't been too far from my mind. It kind of just sweeps in like a whisper in my ear, reminding me how isolated I am, how far away I am from love. How far I am away from God and any kind of love I thought I once had. It feels like my heart is stifled, only allowed to slip between two spots: bitterness and emptiness. There's always a low-grade kind of grumpiness inside, a dysthymia that's poisoned not only myself but my outward emotions for others. I can't seem to be happy for anyone. I guess it's all a part of being a dead and disintegrating bastard. It all fades in time. The flesh and the feelings all whisk away. But some feelings never die. Envy is evergreen. The dead are jealous of the living. They want a warm body instead of the cold dirt. They want a bouquet of flowers instead of a casket spray. They want a heart injected with love, not formaldehyde. I reach up and out with rotten hands and try to touch the face of a fantasy but it always slips just out of sight.
But the dead are discarded and life carries on for everyone else. And as everyone else carried on outside the church building, I gave the girl who came with me my keys and told her to start up the car while I stayed behind to pee. After I was done, I hit the candy spread hard. I filled bag after bag with chocolate goodness, looking forward to easing the pain later on with cocoa-dipped jumbo marshmallows. As I reached for another shovel-full of Oreo cake balls, an older lady stood next to me and filled up her own bag.
Looking over the assortment of sweets, she gave me a nudge, smirked and said, "Death by chocolate, eh?"
"You don't know the half of it," I said as I pulled the drawstring closed on the bag and then walked away.
Walking down the street
There goes some modern fairy tale
I wish it could happen to me..."
-Liz Phair, Somebody's Miracle
The girl I mentioned in my first Bad Romance entry, the one who found herself a boyfriend, married the guy yesterday. It was weird to imagine her getting married. I think she had one boyfriend in high school and two in college, one of them being the guy she eventually married. That's not to say that someone should have a lot of boyfriends or girlfriends before settling down but I guess for me, because she hadn't been involved in many relationships, I just never saw her as a relationship kind of girl. Much less marriage material. But, there she was, dressed in white and exchanging rings and the whole scene felt so surreal.
I wasn't thrilled about attending the wedding because she and I had grown apart since we both moved away to college. She and I used to be pretty close in high school and community college but after we both moved from our home town, life happened, as it always does, and circumstances weakened our bond. It was almost like we were estranged or something. I hadn't spoken to her in probably a year and so in some ways it felt like I was a wedding crasher, sitting down in a pew among strangers, watching foreign people unite in the face of God. Plus, I had no idea who her groom was. She met him in college so the first time I shook his hand was during the reception. I surely didn't know him and I felt like I wasn't too sure I knew her that well, either.
The idea of sitting through the whole atmosphere of holy matrimony was also unappetizing. Love and marriage is such a foreign concept to me now that I sat there, baffled, as the groom's father took over preacher duties and talked about God and love and the unbreakable bond the bride and groom were about to form. Pictures flashed and tears were splashed and I just felt out of place. My usual empty. But there was this weirdness that found itself creeping up inside me. I watched my high school classmate get married. And I kind of wanted that for myself. It was a celebration. It was a big day for both of them, maybe one of the most important days in their lives and I wanted that, too. I wondered if I'd ever have a big day like that, if I'd ever get to go on stage and put a ring on it and have people clap for us and beam and cry and bring out a three-tiered cake with whipped frosting and kiss her in front of friends and family and not feel so alone and show people that I wasn't an unlovable freak, like, "Hey, I can be loved. I can be cared for. And I'm capable of caring, too. I can be normal."
But I'm not normal. And I'm not okay.
For the longest time I had given up on that white wedding scenario for myself. I mean, I still had given up on it but the wedding was one of the only times I had let myself think about such a thing. You see, not only had I given up on love and romance years ago but I hadn't let myself even think about it because I knew I was just putting myself in a bad place. It's never fun to fantasize about something you can't have. I could dream about living in a mansion with with a pooper made from platinum but that will never happen so why should I set my heart on it? It was the same with love.
Then I thought more about it and realized maybe I just wanted the show, the celebration, the ceremony of it all. But after all the food had been wrapped up and the gifts have been opened, I'd be left with a wife and a future with her and I don't even know if I want that. I guess I'm a bit confused. When I was younger, all I wanted was love but one day I realized that I was never going to get it and then upon further introspection I realized that I wasn't even sure I wanted it. I think the concept of marriage is nice but I also think a lot of people don't fully understand how huge of a commitment marriage is. It's wonderful but it also takes so much work. It's like a second job. You have to transition from taking care of yourself to help take care of someone else. That's not to say you shouldn't take care of yourself but what I mean to say is you have someone else to consider rather than just yourself. Marriage is tricky sometimes. And it's forever. And forever is not for everyone.
Is it for me?
The ceremony pretty much went how I pictured it: I went with a mutual friend of mine and the bride's. We sat down and made fun of everyone and then had some cake and left. I was mostly concerned that I'd see a lot of people from high school. I wasn't looking or feeling my best after my weight gain so I had hoped I wouldn't run into too many people looking as run down as I did. But, really, it was mostly just her college friends so I felt relatively safe. It didn't help the sense of being among strangers, though, because I didn't know anyone except the bride's family.
I was a bit surprised at how they geeked up the joint. The bride was dressed like Liv Tyler straight out of Lord of the Rings. They even had a LOTR cake. And the groom had a Star Wars Millenium Falcon cake, which was quite delicious. They also had a nice assortment of candy to choose from. After the couple exchanged vows, they sang Michael Buble's "Everything" to each other because they are both theater majors so they had to incorporate some musical number to seal the deal. And then they walked out to the Pirates of the Caribbean theme and the audience was treated to a five minute slide show of their lives from tots to teens to happily engaged.
During the reception, as I stuffed my face, the newlyweds played those lame "how well do you know your spouse" games. And then we talked to the bride for a bit and then that was it. I grabbed a couple of bags of candy and we were on our way out. It wasn't as miserable as I was expecting it to be and and the mutual friend even agreed it wasn't too bad, and she hates weddings. Of course, the inevitable feeling of loneliness did present itself like I was expecting it to do. And I think that's why I was so hesitant to go. Their happiness would just be another reminder of my misery. And then I felt bad because it's just so typically negative to feel that way, to not be happy for anyone. I really need to get over myself.
But I promise this wasn't some kind of cliched realization about the loss of love while attending a wedding. No, those pinpricks of loneliness were there far before the ceremony. I've actually been feeling the emptiness a lot more over the past several weeks. It'll come and go but it hasn't been too far from my mind. It kind of just sweeps in like a whisper in my ear, reminding me how isolated I am, how far away I am from love. How far I am away from God and any kind of love I thought I once had. It feels like my heart is stifled, only allowed to slip between two spots: bitterness and emptiness. There's always a low-grade kind of grumpiness inside, a dysthymia that's poisoned not only myself but my outward emotions for others. I can't seem to be happy for anyone. I guess it's all a part of being a dead and disintegrating bastard. It all fades in time. The flesh and the feelings all whisk away. But some feelings never die. Envy is evergreen. The dead are jealous of the living. They want a warm body instead of the cold dirt. They want a bouquet of flowers instead of a casket spray. They want a heart injected with love, not formaldehyde. I reach up and out with rotten hands and try to touch the face of a fantasy but it always slips just out of sight.
But the dead are discarded and life carries on for everyone else. And as everyone else carried on outside the church building, I gave the girl who came with me my keys and told her to start up the car while I stayed behind to pee. After I was done, I hit the candy spread hard. I filled bag after bag with chocolate goodness, looking forward to easing the pain later on with cocoa-dipped jumbo marshmallows. As I reached for another shovel-full of Oreo cake balls, an older lady stood next to me and filled up her own bag.
Looking over the assortment of sweets, she gave me a nudge, smirked and said, "Death by chocolate, eh?"
"You don't know the half of it," I said as I pulled the drawstring closed on the bag and then walked away.
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