the devil and god are raging inside me

"And over the sea in a warm sunny place 
men and women sit watching TV 
they say, 'it's a shame anyone has to die
but it was either them or me' 
all safe and snug, tucked away in our mansions 
we smile feeling comfortably safe 
and over the sea there's a dark cold place 
out of sight, out of mind, out of reach, washed away..."
-Showbread, Escape from Planet Cancer

"The death, the rape, the tragedy

the world is an ugly place

what's capable inside of me

is going to rear its ugly face..."

-DIES, Aesthetics of Violence 

"And in my best behavior 
I am really just like him 
look beneath the floorboards
for the secrets I have hid..."
-Sufjan Stevens, John Wayne Gacy, Jr.

Several years ago at my former job, I sat down at my makeshift desk, which was really just a folding table propped up against a wall.  I was a temp, hired on to help the company catch up on their paperwork and they had no proper office to give me.  So they made due and assembled a desk from extra parts they had in storage.

As I sorted through the stack of files, I noticed the room grow dim on my right side.  I looked up and saw the florescent light on the ceiling had gone out.  I looked at the wall three feet in from my face and saw the light and the dark encompassing the same portion of polystyrene.  To me, it felt like the technological equivalent of the angel and devil on my shoulder.

When I was a child, as I came to understand myself and the world and people around me, I realized I wanted to help people.  I lived in a small town with small minds.  Religion reigned over everything.  God was not at the center of people's hearts but at the center of social normalcy.  And with that warped sense of religion came a warped sense of right and wrong.  They did not look to the Bible but to their biased pastor to see who should be shunned or celebrated and a mess was made of everyone.

Fortunately, I was able to avoid such brainwashing.  I did not grow up in the church and it spared me from being taught to discriminate (disclaimer: not all churches teach hate, just all the ones I attended).  I wasn't told to hate the gays or keep my distance from the blacks and shun the atheists and fornicators and underage drinkers.  In fact, all these "bad" people comprised the majority of my friends.  I liked them and I was a good judge of character.  How could they be bad?  And how were they any worse, open with their vices, than those who hid their sins on Sunday and resumed their wicked ways the rest of the week?

Although this "Christian" behavior was hypocritical, it didn't anger me at the time.  It only inspired me.

I realized I wanted to help people. I wanted people to love each other, to realize we are all the same underneath our skin and sexuality. I wanted people to know we all have the same desires and defects. I wanted to use my art to inspire and incite revolution. All I really wanted to do was open people's eyes.  I just didn't think I was good enough at the time. I wasn't quite ready yet.

I was a child, still developing my skills and message. What did I want to say? How was I going to change the world? I had lofty ambitions and I didn't want my life to go to waste. I grew up deformed in several ways and I felt so much pain inside because of my feelings and fears. I didn't want anyone else to go through that. I didn't want anyone to feel as alone as I did. Despite my personal demons, I thought people were basically good. The world was bad and we would get corrupted but we could be saved. We were worth saving.

give it to me straight

My mom called me at work one day and said a family friend's boss's son needed an assistant for three businesses he was juggling. The family friend put in a great word for me (and they respect her so her recommendation is gold) and he agreed to meet with me. Bam. Just like that. The work seemed decent and best of all, no more working with the public. The only drawback was the pay wasn't great and there were no benefits. But I kept leaning toward no more working with the public.

I kept thinking how it all worked out so well. An office job with recommendation from an insider. And I had a day off from working coming up so I could take that day to do the interview and it wouldn't interfere with my current job. Perfect.

I met the man at his father's restaurant. It was empty because they weren't open for lunch yet. The man, M, was short and overweight, a roly poly kind of guy with a round, young face and closely cropped gray hair. His cheeks and chin jutted out when he smiled. His skin was shiny and ruddy around his hazel eyes. He did not walk but waddled. He wore a shirt and jeans and dirty white sneakers.

We sat down and he told me a little about his businesses. He has three and he also deals with his family's personal finances. His family is rich and they have several sources of income and I guessed he needed someone to help him keep everything in order.

It was apparent from the beginning of our conversation that M wasn't articulate but he was extremely southern. He spoke with a grating country cadence and often raised his voice toward the end of his sentences. He paused several times as if he were trying to collect words from his head before he said them. He mentioned the job didn't necessarily have a title since I would be doing a little of everything. I wasn't worried about job titles, only the duties. Fortunately, they were duties I had done during previous jobs or duties I felt confident I could do if given the proper instruction. It wasn't neurobiology we were dealing with here. I was going to be faxing and using Excel and taking out the trash.

He asked me to tell him about myself and I did and then he sat back, his squat, chapped face stretched into a mischievous grin. He stared up at the florescent lights, again trying to find his words.

"So, tell me this...hm...so basically...well, let me tell you where I'm coming from...what my concern is...it seems to me like you're going from A to Z. You went to college to be an artist and you've got this degree. And now you wanna be a secretary. You see what I'm sayin'?"

I basically explained the best I could, downplaying my crazy, that I had a change of heart after I graduated and wasn't sure if I wanted to pursue art and decided to change my direction. He said he encountered a similar situation after he graduated from college so he understood but he was concerned, if I took the job, I would pack up and leave after two months or so. I assured him I wouldn't do that. I pointed out I've been at my current job for three years now. And if I didn't get that job, I'd probably have to stick with it for another three years because these opportunities rarely come along.

In some ways, I could understand his concern or just curiosity over why I made such a radical change. But in other ways, it made me feel bad, as if he were implying that I was downgrading myself or that the job was beneath me. First of all, nothing is beneath me. The job might be beneath my education but not beneath me. I'm just not uppity like that. And I told him I enjoy being organized and doing office work. It's easy and I don't have to deal with the public and it wouldn't be so stressful that I couldn't work on my writing or even pick up art again on the side.

The problem with my job now is that it's so stressful and dealing with the public gives me such bad anxiety that I'm emotionally and mentally exhausted at the end of the day and have no creative output within me.  I wasn't necessarily aiming to move up as far as a job goes, but just to find something to lower my stress levels.  And that seemed like the kind of job to do it.

And then he said if I were hired, he'd have to get into the mindset of a man doing the job because he envisioned a woman filling the position. I was slightly irritated by that but it wasn't a deal breaker.

The deal breaker came a week later.

santa claws me in the face

Thursday afternoon, I put on my frayed trainers and headed out the door.  The weather was perfect for a good walk to I had to go out and enjoy it.  I knew I only had a few days of good weather left before the air turned too cool to go outside.

Things were great.  I wasn't too hot.  I wasn't too sweaty.  Ear buds were firmly in place, pumping music into my extremities.

And then the school bus passed me.

It's always awkward when vehicles pass me.  I can see people crane their necks to look through the rear view mirror at the bearded stranger walking down the dirt road.

It's worse when it's a bus filled with curious and obnoxious children.  That particular bus has passed me a few times and I always caught glimpses of smashed noses and oily forehead prints on the smudged glass.

Being the beautiful day it was, the bus windows were down to allow the sweet little bastards angels to enjoy the cool breeze.  As the bus rolled past, I saw a white ball whirl by me and hit the blades of grass at my feet.

I looked up and saw glowing brake lights as the bus skidded to a stop.  Through the blasting music, I heard the bus driver's booming voice spill over the open windows.  I surmised he was yelling at the littering little snot.  I was only feet from the bus so I slowed my pace.  I didn't want to pass by and risk being pelted with more paper or insults.

"What the hell is this guy doing?" I asked myself about the driver.  The bus just stood in the road, the brake lights illuminating my embarrassment.

Finally, I just turned around and walked in the opposite direction.  I heard the squeak of the tires as the bus started up again.  I didn't look back until I was down the hill.

Oh, why do I always find myself in these awkward situations?  I kept thinking what the kids must have been thinking.  "Hey, John, let's throw this piece of paper at the fat loser walking in the dirt road!"  I don't like being "that" guy, the one people think they can push around or make fun of.  Especially when it's a bunch of middle school shits playing the bully. 

I looped back around to the spot where I was almost hit with the wad of paper and found it on the ground.  I picked it up, smoothed it out and saw it was poorly colored paper Santa.

By the way, you did a crap job putting that Santa together, Pablo Prickasso.

I just wanted to burn some calories and clear my head, not catch a paper cut from Kris Kringle.  Thanks for the holiday cheer, Timmy. I hope you get coal and canker sores for Christmas. And people ask me why I don't like kids! 

thoracic cavity

Wind separated leaves from limbs in the darkness.  They pirouetted down onto the boy and girl as they lay in the grass beneath an old tree.  Ligaments wrapped together, he supported her neck with his shoulder and she slid her hand underneath his shirt.

"You're not as dead as you think," the girl said.

"Oh yeah?  How do you know?" the boy asked.

"Because of this," she said.  "Us here.  Now.  Sharing this moment.  Connected to the earth.  To each other.  Isn't it beautiful?"

"It's sufficient," he said as he brushed a fallen leaf from the girl's hair.  

"You can't fool me.  You wouldn't be here with me, like this, otherwise."

The boy shrugged.

"It's all of us," the girl said.  "You are alive because I am.  Because the world doesn't spin for the dead."

"Oh, God," The boy rolled his eyes, stifling a laugh.

"No, seriously," she said with a giggle.  "Your eyes sparkle like the shooting stars above us.  Your stubble is gritty like the dirt beneath us.  And your chest," she said as she gently pressed on his sternum, "is warm from the blood rushing through us.  I know you're alive because I can feel it in you."

"Actually, I just had a sip of this white chocolate mocha," the boy said, raising his Starbucks container.  "What you actually felt was it pass into my stomach.  That's all."

The girl stared with blank eyes as the boy drained his cup.

path

I'm not even an outside person but the cool breeze has been so nice I honestly felt guilty for not going outside and soaking it up.  It seems it's hot the majority of the year, freezing for a portion of it, and then there's about two good weeks of perfect weather.  I didn't want it to go to waste so I have been walking outside more.

There's a dirt road next to my house that I walk along.  Sometimes the foliage gets a little overgrown and it does a number on my legs.  Lately, they've been breaking out into a rash (even when I wear athletic pants to cover them) and there's also the occasional douche bag that doesn't slow down when they pass me and it kicks up dirt into my eyes.  But when the weather is cool and the sweat is flowing and no one is around but me and the cows, it's great.

of god and football

"On the East Coast, football is a cultural experience. In the Midwest, it's a form of cannibalism. On the West Coast, it's a tourist attraction. And in the South, football is a religion."
-Marino Casem

Football is in full swing around my way.  At work, we are allowed to wear football regalia on the weekends.  I see co-workers and customers alike wearing their favorite team colors, washes of red and white or blue and orange.  It's how they show their loyalty.  They also express their team pride vocally by switching the usual salutations with team mottos "War Eagle" and "Roll Tide" as they pass each other in the store.  I just stand there and shrug.  I don't understand their passion for the pigskin at all.

I'm not a sports guy.  I don't like playing sports and I don't like watching sports.  Of course, I try to be neutral and understand that I won't always share the same interests as these people and so I try not to hold it against anyone.  However,  my tolerance for the consistent in-your-face fanaticism is low.  I don't go around pushing my passion for zombies onto others and I wish they'd keep their football frenzy to themselves.  I'm constantly asked what team I root for and I always respond by saying I don't care about football.  I get weird looks in return, expressions that ask how I could live here and not be in love with the sport.

One day, a lady bought a toddler-sized Alabama team jersey.  As I bagged it up, I wondered what the jersey meant to the lady and what it meant to the toddler.  He doesn't realize the gravity of the garment he's going to wear.  He doesn't understand what it represents or how much it means to those who put it on him.  What if he grows up to root for the other team?  What if he grows up to dislike football all together? 

It's kind of the same with religion.

We raise our children in the church and in the football stands and teach them to yell out "Amen"/"Hallelujah" and "Roll Tide"/"War Eagle" but do these children ever know what it all means outside of their parents' and pastors' influence?  Can they separate what they've been told from what they want to learn?  And how do you introduce God and football into a child's life without making it seem like it's only way to live?

Many Christians would argue that God and Jesus is the only way to live.  I'm not disagreeing.  But there are people out there who do disagree and what if your child is one of those people?  Don't they have the right to believe or not believe what they want?  And the more you push God onto someone, the harder they will push back, even to the point where they might give up on God entirely.

I've seen it happen with me and with others.

But how do you really learn about God?  Someone has to teach you, right?  But what if the one who teaches you has it wrong?  And what if the one who taught them had it wrong?  It further complicates matters when we are taught not to question God and his mysterious ways.  But I think it's vital to question.  We don't want to be handed salvation.  We don't want to be told we are wrong or evil and given vague instructions on how to fix it.  We want to know for ourselves, to feel in our hearts that we are moving toward something divine and not delegated.

Through questioning, we see why things are the way they are.  We can develop a deeper appreciation for them and can explain ourselves when faced with questions and opposing viewpoints.  It's good to not only be enlightened, but educated about it as well.   

But that's hard when all you have to rely on is a collection of books written by man (who put their own spin on the word of God, surely) and a slew of individuals who consider themselves fit to decipher damnation.  No one knows for sure who or what God is, although we've tried.  We've conceived this image with these rules and systems of rewards and punishments.  But God is not what man conceives.  Where is God buried in the b.s.?  How do we dig our way through a Christianity perverted by man and get to the heart of Jesus?  Who do we turn to to guide us in the right direction and when is it possible to come up with our own conclusions?  And when we do, how do we know we got it right?  Will we pass down our erroneous prayers the way they were passed down to us?

We sit on the bleachers and in the pews and see the wave approaching, the clusters of undulating bodies standing and throwing their hands up in praise and sitting down in unison and soon we find ourselves swept up in the sea of bodies, standing and sitting because we think we're supposed to.  It's what we were taught.  We go along with it because it's all a part of the game.  It's how we show we believe.  We reach up and touch the excitement, the thrill, the electricity and we feel united.  But you begin to wonder if it helps the players at all.  With the bright lights and ever looming threat of being tackled, does the quarterback even notice us in the stands? 

Do we do it for his benefit or our own? 

rabbit, rabbit (and its many variants)

I've been working on writing an entry for the past couple of days and I just haven't been able to articulate it the way I want to so I thought I'd post several pictures that I've taken over the last year.  I apologize for the profuse use of Instagram but I think they help the pictures look a bit better (an obvious n00b photographer fallacy, I'm sure but IDGAF).  Just...just enjoy the pretty colors, okay?

haute coffee

While I was sitting in Starbucks, I looked over my shoulder at the group of people knitting in a corner.  And I wanted to belong to that group.  It was an all female group lead by a masculine looking woman with black glasses and a map of the world on her head in the form of dyed blue and green hair.  Their multi-colored yarn and threads were scattered across multiple tables, the needles in their hands dancing and catching light from the florescent lights.  And I wanted to belong to that group.

Well, not that group necessarily.  Knitting is fun and all but not my favorite subject.  The point is I wanted to have a group that I could go to on a Friday or Saturday night, and a place we could all converge to hang out and share ideas and laughter.

There is no such a place in my town.  Or the town over.  Or anywhere near.  I had to drive nearly an hour away to another state just to go to Starbucks.  Our area is just not set up for youth.  All I see at work are old people, women buying clothes for their bedridden husbands.  Women buying suits for their dead husbands to be buried in.  Blue veins and rinses.  Cheap perfume and arthritis.  Liver spots and slipping dentures.

And those who are born here endure eighteen years of pain and monotony and then get the hell out when given the chance.  That only leaves a few young ones left, those like me who tried to get out and failed and those who were never given the chance to escape.

And so I feel lost because the young are a rare breed here and those that are left are all scattered.  There's no coffee shop or building for kids to congregate.  There's nowhere for ideas to spark and flourish, for talent to transcend one individual's temples, for friendships to form with frappes and fritters.  There's not even a place for one individual to rest or write or read a book in a chill setting.

I've been expressing my frustration to a couple of people and they keep saying we should all pool together our resources and open up our own coffee shop.  We all joke and say it should include an internet cafe with state of the art computers and a snack bar with high quality breads and cheeses and truffles and cupcakes flecked with gold.  It would be really upscale and we'd call it Haute Coffee.  It's a nice idea but not one I think anyone would take seriously.

As I said, there's not a lot of youth here.  Haute Coffee would probably be bare most of the time.  Our typical eighty-two-year-old resident would come in and have no knowledge of Macs or macchiatos.  They wouldn't recognize the music unless it was Elvis or Hank Williams Jr.  They wouldn't know how to turn on the computer.

"Hold the mouse?" they'd ask.  "Y'all got mice?  Better call an exterminator or this place'll be shut down!"

It's just best for me to leave.  The town will probably never change.  It's best suited for those winding down their lives instead of those just trying to start them.  Then again, if I stay here much longer, I'll probably begin the process of winding my life down, too.

The Internet has sufficed so far.  I've met some talented and creative people through this outlet and it's been nice but it's still not the same.  Blogs don't equal bodies.  I want a real time connection, a flow of ideas that feed off one another, tiny seeds we plant inside each other's heads, watching as the eyes sparkle and the mouth moves in recognition.

I think I also crave the physical aspect of belonging to a group, something I've never truly felt.  I'd like to know there's a place I could go where I could sit among like-minded people and say that's my book club or knitting circle or Buffy fan club.  I'd like to feel wanted.  Safe.  Occupied with something constructive and motivating instead of taking up my time eating garbage and hating myself for it.

If there's nothing like that here and I can't make my own, the only choice is to leave.  But where would I go?  How would I cleave myself into a community?  Do I just go up to the gal with the Coke bottle glasses and green hair and sit down with my knitting needles and ask her to put on some Tegan and Sara while she showed me how to whip up a cozy winter scarf?

Or what if I started my own group.  The qualification would be pretty simple.  If you don't suck, you can show up.  I guess I've been so starved for quality conversation that my standards might have slipped a little.  I think trying to find people similar to me would be a bit of a quest so if they could just not be intolerant rednecks, I think I could work with that.  If they'll provide the conversation, I'll provide the coffee.

twenty cows and a kitty

I know in my previous entry, I complained about being stuck in the country but there are some good aspects.  Low crime.  Sweet tea.  And lots of pretty cows.  These guys were chilling in the pasture out past my backyard.

And I shot a small clip of these gorgeous creatures grazing, too. With special guest star, Miss Kitty, who also thinks she's a cow.