Down a Hole

‘Shine On You Crazy Diamond’ may not have been the best choice on the drive I just took. I take drives, sometimes. I drive and I think. And I don’t think. I drive around this little town…which is so little that there aren’t even any cops out at this hour. All the people I see in the day time are nestled in their beds. I drive past the place where she and I used to live, frequently. It’s sort of in the middle of everything. Sometimes, the people who live there now leave the curtains open and I can see straight into the kitchen. It’s….a very odd feeling. Like I think I’ll see myself standing inside. I’ll see her too, the two of us fighting…we had a lot of fights in that kitchen. Or kissing. We did a lot of that, too. Hell, we had sex in there several times. And every other room of the house, including the basement. She danced around while I played guitar in that basement. Then, we fucked on an old couch.

This isn’t good. At all. I’ve been in a hole the last couple of days. Worst part: I can’t get drunk to numb the hurt. Too much happening tomorrow.

alonealonealonealonealonealonealonealonealonealonealonealonealonealonealonealone

*sigh*

I thought about going to the cemetery and sitting by her headstone. In the middle of the night. Shit like this is cliche’ and stupid, but there’s a reason you see it in movies and all that. Because it really is what you want to do. Mother’s Day this weekend. Bright Eyes wants to take something to her.  We’ll take lilies. Sweet little boy.

He really is. I try to ask him how he feels about mom being gone. His answers are all the canned sort. Sometimes, I can get him to say what he thinks beyond just ‘yeah, I miss mom. yes, she was the best mom. yes I remember the time we did such and such.’ Most of the time, I think it has just become normal for him and he doesn’t think much about it. But, I remember when I was his age. And I thought a lot about things. And I know his mother did, too. I just didn’t know how to say what I thought about. I doubt I’ll ever know what he really thinks. And that saddens me. I hope I do find out how he truly sees things one day.

Somewhere else, I’ll post The Voice. Later. But, I listened to it last night. And fucking cried my goddamn eyes out. Couldn’t do it again tonight. Music is such a powerful carrier of memories. To explain, The Voice is a song by the Moody Blues. She loved it. And it was a strange song for her to love. I loved her for loving it. She used to hear it back in the days when she would be on the road with her dad. She told me all about it…and for some reason, it became a song I have fastened to my memory of her. There were lots of other songs. She was an avid Red Hot Chili Peppers fan. She lusted for John Frusciante’s bod like I don’t even know what. Don’t ask me to explain. She even had his lousy solo albums.

When I hear The Voice now….I mean…I swear…it is like she is speaking directly to me from beyond. And I fucking turn into a puddle every single time. I can’t explain it. I just love it and hate it at the same time. there are songs you have to creep up on carefully, because of the memories they evoke. The Voice is the strongest of these. I just…can’t listen to it any other way. It physically hurts.

Some of her writing is below. It’s a sore subject. There are remnants of her in old email accounts. When I want to torture myself, I’ll go through them…like tonight. I should not do this. This is bad for me.

She wrote it after returning from a conference she went to for work. The irony is, it was in Dallas, where I used to live before I moved to be with her. While she was there…well, some of it is self explanatory. She went with her boss. The bit below leaves out what happened after she and her boss got back to the hotel. They had sex. Then, she had sex with him again a week later when he came through town. The woman liked sex.

People read this and probably think I was a fool for staying with someone who would do that. If it doesn’t make sense, I can’t force it. All I can say is that I loved her and I don’t apologize for it. There are many far better examples of her writing. She wrote all her life. But, this was written both about being drunk and while she was drunk.

I fucking miss her.

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“Let me just preface my tale with this:     *clears throat and gets serious*

I am contractually bound to ask that you suspend disbelief; as all good writers (and company-men) do….but, mostly because I like to think of myself as a good story-teller…I would also request that you imagine me sitting in a leather recliner, cloaked in a silk,smoking jacket….cigar in hand.  There’s a glowing fire in the ruined hearth and outside?… Temperatures have dropped…the wind has picked up and all you can hear is the rain being hurled against the glass….and then….THEN???….well, then there’s a Raven….and he’s a…

Well, fuck all that….

Y’know what??

Ends up….

Corporate sponsored conferences are THE SHIT!!  Here I thought I was flying 1000 miles to be tucked into my silk shirts and uncomfortable shoes for a three day bore-fest.

Turns out that Israeli-nerds who make it big with retail-oriented software solutions are God!! At least for small to mid-level grocery store chains.  Plus, they know how to party….which is kinda weird….?….maybe, kinda creepy??….but, amazingly enough. these guys  know how to have fun….(That’s a whole other story involving my thesis on why Poverty lends itself to KICK-ASS partying) Anyway, maybe this is how all these “business” conferences are. If you’re asking for my opinion, then yeah…I would not be surprised if there was a conspiracy afoot…Some tightwad with a pocket protector wedged tight up his ass……All of a sudden, he’s the guy in front of the teleprompters. He’s got the words down, but you know what he’s saying…..He’s saying I’m the dude you want to throw your money at! I’m THAT guy…but really what he’s saying is:  HOLY SHIT!  I made it into the fucking VIP room. From here on out, my two priorities will be this:  Make money by staying mean and lean…and never, NEVER… let the little guy know what The Man is doing. And ESPECIALLY when the Man is having some good, unadulterated fun.  But, little known fact:    What he’s REALLY doing is trying to distract you from his booze.

Hee….   (Sorry…..I was free-stylin there….)   Taking a big drink of ice water here….  *Ahem*

That said, I won’t give you the blow by blow. Not because it’s tedious (Amazingly enough, there was very little tedium) but because it could very easily turn into a novel…okay… a Novella….and in any case, I’m somewhat discreet (and invested in keeping my J.O.B.)    Let’s just say that even the “breakout sessions” were fun. Here I am with a bunch of other mid-level to upper-level management dudes (with the occasional chick thrown in…) and I end up learning a little; (I did SO!…quiz me later…) but mostly I was just amused.

There I was…sitting in some beige room, reeking of bureaucracy, and then I’d  recognize the girl two rows ahead of me as the one who fell off the barstool the night before.  And then, while processing this rather ridiculous reality, I’d walk right into a new four-walled fiesta where another greasy haired ought-yuppie would look up and grin knowingly at me. Immediately, I’m fingering through last night’s foggy files….”God, no!!…not HIM…. I didn’t say anything to that dude, RIGHT??

Moving on…

It wasn’t until our last night there that we went “OUT”. I mean, why should we? The Hilton Anatole has five bars, several up-scale shops, a spa, and a fucking night club on the second floor. Yeah….I’d hunker down there for a good six months without missing the outside world at all. EVER!

In any case, venture out we did…….

Where to? Well, much to my chagrin, the driver for whatever car service T-Jr finagled was not thrilled with my directions. I wanted to go to Deep Ellum…but, apparently, Deep Ellum is now the Ghetto….or whatever passes for such…which just makes me want to go there even more. But, damn…Radiohead played at Trees back in the day!!! There’s a club called the Gypsy Tea Room!!!…But, alas,  sweet talk and enhanced cleavage seem to do nothing in these situations. Instead, Mr. ‘Abdul fucking aMERICA!!’  proceeded to take us on a hell ride from….well, HELL!!!   Let’s just say there was a lot of one-way streets and flashing lights involved. Plus, I’m fairly certain one of my companions grabbed the suicide bar and screamed. And just between the two of us, this was definitely not a girly scream though it did come from someone who was definitely NOT A GIRL. I’m talkin’ the scream you’d rip if a fucking Humvee is barreling down the blacktop aimed straight for your teeth. And jus’ sayin’, it wasn’t me or K. Those girls were just rolling with it.   

I dunno…Not casting aspersions or anything, but if you’re asking me, I would call you Dead if you did anything other than SHRIEK like a crack-addled banshee when you’re facing the end of All Known:   AKA fucking DEATH.   Anyway…

Eventually, our wild car ride ended….mostly related to the fact that as we rounded the corner (illegally) on that aforementioned one way street we ran into a black and white canted to the curb right in front of us. He started flashing his strobes at us and the cop inside was pointing to the gutter. I interpreted his gesture as ‘Come get your ticket, you foreign motherfuck’….but apparently, our driver interpreted it as a challenge and, half a dozen near misses later, Mr. Scaredy Cat finally pulled over in front of the first happenin’ Bar in official downtown D (aka: the two blocks of Dallas that is NOT family friendly)   We stumbled out of the car with much gratefulness….(I think K kissed the sidewalk)….the driver comes up to me and puts his arm around me….I’m not lying about this next part, Scouts-Honor….he seriously asked me if I’d give him  “10 for the experience?….for the wild introduction to Dallas??’  Uh, yeah, buddy, (assuming that’s 10 dollars and not bj’s….I’ll give you 10 to take me to the next margarita and that’s about it. (And guess what, dude….I’m not the one paying)   Hee……

In any case, we hit about 6 or 7 bars. Towards the end of the night, we closed the most interesting bar and our accommodating bartender (a hot 40-somethin’ blonde chick who probably wanted to be one of the C’boy Cheerleaders) took us to the next. It was a three-fer. Her (I’ve forgotten her name),  H, (black and very, very gay) and his divorced, career alcoholic, white guy friend.  His name was J.

Through drunken convo, I eventually deduced that they both worked at some telemarketing company. (I forget what they were pitching but it was mid-range horse-shit; somewhere between meteor-insurance and customer satisfaction surveys about sex toys)…I made fun of them for a while (how could I not??,,,,I forced them to give me their spiel while I rained a variety of insults on their heads). ANYway…upon realizing that even fuckin’ Dallas doesn’t have a place to DANCE on a Monday night, I proceeded to settle into the Moment.

You know that place, right?   That sweet spot where you stop giving a shit? Heh….not gonna get into that…Let’s just  say that  the sum and sorrow of our experience ends up being a whole hell lot more than the spiel we spin for the people we have to face in the morning.

I don’t know about you, but I want to explore that particular equation before I die.    The given, of course, was that Jeff  (remember him??)….Yeah…Mr. Drunk, White, Divorced and Horny followed me around from table to table with this infamous (and blue, tried and true) pick up:  “I don’t mean to touch you, baby”….(bear in mind, while he’s slurring these words he’s tracing the contours of my body with his hands…..I’m mouthing SOS to K across the table and she just fucking smiles at me!!

Bitch!  Still…I’d give blood for that crazy Mi Vida Loca chick any day.

*flashes gang signs*    (I crack myself up)

K, then.

I used up a whole fucking email on one event! What the fuck??  Guess it’s the writer in me. Always groveling around in the dirt until I find a little rock that I can polish. Shine it up enough that you forget the carbon and grit. Still…there’s more to say.  (Remind to tell you about the rest of it…k?)

Anyway, here’s my soliloquy…just a chapter of the whole.

And…because you were curious, a picture of my Midget-self.