A Life Blog about My Life, Dawg

  • 162: cleevus (tubs)

    [weird vagrant on the side of the road, surrounded by various tubs, of the bath and non-bath variety.]

    TUBS. a bounty beyond compare. tubs is a small word encompassing so many different sizes of, well, tubs. what else can you call tubs? containment devices? things that hold other things? there is no word better for tubs than tubs. buckets? buckets, ha! a bucket and a tub are two completely different items, my friends. pails? just another name for a bucket! but a tub … a tub can hold anything. water, food, jelly, a HUMAN BEING. tubs are so miraculous, it is as if god himself created them and gave them to us to use as a thing to put things in. my name is cleevus. yes cleevus. i was born sixty-two years ago in a tub. imagine that! my mama birthed me into a clawfoot bathtub, by herself, with the tub fulla water. i’ve been a swimmer ever since. ha! why else you think i live in this rainy city? half of these tubs are fulla rainwater, gotta empty ’em out every few hours or so. but this is the life i want to lead. i got all these tubs! this is the real life, people. the real life. the tub life. the tub life. hey does anybody have a few bucks? nah i don’t want to get drunk, i just wanna buy more TUBS.

  • 161: kev

    kelsea, for fuck’s sake, stop wasting all this food. look at all this shit in the fridge i had to throw out, leftovers and shit. this pizza box with one slice taken out? look at all this pizza you wasted! i know it was you because nobody else eats this weird sriracha pizza you like. why do you do this? i know you hate leftovers, i know it! just don’t buy so much goddamn food, it’s a huge waste! buy a slice of pizza. buy, get like half a chipotle. stop buying all this food and then throwing it out. jesus fuck. i hate to be cliche but there are children in africa who are starving to death. you know? children in africa. i’m gonna start eating your leftovers, okay? the moment you’re done with your food let me know and i will eat it. and if you don’t like that, tough shit, i’m not letting you waste food anymore. you’re basically buying me dinner at this point. thank you for buying me dinner, it saves me a lot of money in the long run. stop leaving all the lights on in every room in the house, by the way. you turn the lights on when it’s broad daylight streaming into the room. what good does that do? you keep doing all these behavioral things and everyone in the house is like STOP IT. i hate to harp on you but fucking stop it. your actions affect other people. don’t forget that.

  • 160

    last night at therapy i was reminded of a lot of things. it’s cliche at this point but shit that happens in your childhood sticks with you. it really does. i was dealing with this concept of being a “burden,” which, by the way, is a very visceral word for me. a really gut-wrenching word. i said it to my therapist and felt, i don’t know, this mix of fear and sadness rustle up in my gut. but it’s true, i feel like a burden more often than not, especially with regards to friends and relationships. i think i’m a trouble to be with, like, a, well, a burden. she told me to think about the feelings associated when i feel burdensome, and that’s a tangled web to unweave. so … that’s why i’m here, because i need to be with you and not feel like i’m burdening you. i’m not sure how to do that, but it’s important for me to be in your life but not suffocating your life. i can’t do these things alone because then i’m alone, and i’m just reinforcing this feeling i have, of being a burden. i know i’ve been difficult to be around and i know every fiber in your being is telling you to leave, that it would be better for the both of us but i … really … think you should stay. because of all the people i know here, i know you the best, and i think you know me the best too, and despite our weird parts i think we’re a good match just bogged down by some bullshit. some of that is my fault, and i’m working on it. some of it is your fault, and you’re working on it. some of it isn’t anyone’s fault. but i think we can make it work. i kind of need for it to work. [beat] christ. this isn’t working at all. this doesn’t make any goddamn sense. the only way to not be a burden is to not be around anyone, ever. i’m sorry. i’m sorry. go, just, just go. it’s fine. i’ll be fine. please.

  • 159: buddy

    to the most gorgeous woman i’ve ever seen.

    my mind takes moments, post implosion, to comb through the wreckage after i met you, sifting through detritus for the angle of your lips, the corners of your cheeks, the fire in your eyes, your breath hot against the windowpane of the bye & bye, where you drew two curves connecting in the condensed fog. a heart. for me. for you. for us.

    i’m slogging through boilerplate conventions, convection ovens of heat and love contained inside my frail frame, a cage of rib bone protecting my life force from floating off into the universe. i am driven to live in the cool shade of your shadow, glancing up at your ass and ancillary beauty. words, they are things that i could speak but they bounce off your tanned skin, and you scan the room for any oasis of astute friends you can conjure up with your sultry eyes.

    admittedly, i know my place, perched upon the sidewalk curb kicking cans across the street. the lights shine a little bit brighter around your body, casting me in darkness, but who needs to see me anyway, when they can see you? i’d like you to see me. i’d like that very much, for the edges of your lips to curl in a coy smile of recognition, reciprocated appreciation of my body in proximity to your body. alas, this is darkness in which i reside, not light, and all you see is figures. figures.

  • 158: marvin

    jon took every piece of furniture out of this house and burned it. burned it! fucking burned it that son of a bitch. well now he’s definitely on my shit list for sure. what the hell do we do with that guy? besides call the police, i mean. obviously we have to call the police. this guy is no longer our friend, and even if his arson was related to his weird head disease, it doesn’t change the fact that we no longer have furniture. or a friend, for that matter. shit. what do we do? change the locks? we should change the locks. call the police first, then call a locksmith, then if jon comes by maybe we could try talking to him. i don’t want him to go to jail or anything but we should make sure he knows that burning our furniture is a bad idea. he’s a good guy, really. right? he’s a good guy? i mean, we can’t–he’s our friend, he’s been our friend for over a decade. just because he’s got a few screws loose in his noggin. right? we have to be there for him. right? come on. he probably sleeps on the sidewalk for chrissakes, maybe, maybe he was upset because he didn’t have any furniture. he’s hurting inside, guys. he’s hurting. no it doesn’t excuse what he did but we should at least give him a chance, right guys? right?

    [beat]

    right?

  • 157: queen goswin (padora)

    darling, come sit at the table, stop staring out the windows. i’m sure tyverion has shown you all you need to see. that land out there is yours, by divine right, but there are those who oppose divine right, and those who do not believe in padora’s grace. this is true of all civilizations–there are those who believe, and those who don’t. padora was wise to grant us the ability to question her existence, to give us the skeptic’s path toward enlightenment. for what good is a goddess if she cannot be held accountable for the things she does, or does not do? the exhalers would lead you to believe that padora does not even know of the world she has created, much like we sometimes forget that we are breathing, even while we do it. not knowing implies not caring, or rather, that she is not aware of our problems, nor does she try to fix them. this is justification for the wars with the outer lands; that because the unbelievers cannot be shaped by padora’s grace, we must shape it for them. but because padora strictly forbades violence, we direct the peacekeepers to fight in our stead. many of them do not return, and it is becoming difficult to replenish our forces of able-bodied men who willingly defy padora to protect tersus. it is difficult to defend your divine right, logos. but i will do whatever i can, whatever is within my power, to keep you safe until you are of age to reign. until then, please heed my words: tyverion is a good man, but easily swayed. he fought in the war of the ancients and has seen much death and destruction, and it hurts him, as he believes he is no longer connected to the breath. he is swayed in favor of the outliers and will protect them when the time comes, and he will use you to help him. you must not let that happen, for if you do, your lineage will come to an end. believe me, my love. i would never do anything to harm you. i love you and will protect you to my dying day.

  • 156: larry

    lovely day outside, isn’t it? all the, ah, leaves, things, all over the place. and the, uh, wind. lovely wind. look, are you–ahhh, i should–hello, my name is, um, uh, larry, that’s right, and i … well we’ve sat at this bus stop together nearly every day now for what, six months? seven months? eight? eight months? i guess it’s unimportant–i started at the button factory on october 18th, so it’s been seven months and three days i guess–seven months! that’s a lot of time to be sitting next to each other without introducing ourselves, you know what i mean? so i’m larry, i work at the button factory. you know when you buy a new shirt and there’s a couple of extra buttons sewn on the tag, you know, in case you lose one? i sew those buttons on. i do it with a machine, a button sewing machine, maybe you’ve seen them before i don’t know. it’s pretty cool. i mean of course you’ve seen a sewing machine before, but, i mean, not because you’re a woman! oh damn it larry you’ve done it again, talked yourself into a corner. what i mean is, everyone’s seen a sewing machine, unless they’re a little baby in which case they’re not going to remember seeing a sewing machine whether or not they’ve seen it. but i mean we all know what it looks like, and mine looks like one you’d buy at sears, except more industrial. i bet you think they’d have it done by robots but nope, it’s me. i also inspect buttons sometimes but i got in trouble because i would take the defective buttons home to use as eyes on these little rabbits that i like to sew in my spare time. here. [he produces one from his pocket.] i made one for you. her name is sammy and she is a special little bunny. she has a little question for you, if you just look in her mouth. do you … not want her? here let me show you. [he pulls a slip of paper out of the mouth and reads from it.] “larry wants to know if you’d like to go to dinner with him some night.” well sammy! i didn’t, how did you, you took the words right out of my mouth! ha ha. here, i want you to have her, she’s not covered in anthrax or anything. if she was i’d have anthrax on my hands and i’d be a dead man! ha ha. here. take it. come on, take it. hey! where are you going the bus is coming! okay well, my name is larry! that’s l-a-r-r-y! two rs! remember that! bye!

  • 155: tyverion, right-minder to the prince royale (padora)

    glorious, isn’t it? take a look at it all, let it all sink into the depths of your eyes. this is your land, all of it, from the earth beneath your feet to the tops of those mountains in the distance, and beyond. smell the flowers blooming in the valley below, feel the wind against your cheek. this is yours. a river, about 70 miles past the mountains ahead of us, is the end of your reign, majesty. imagine, anywhere from here to there is yours to roam, to do whatever you wish in. and for this you only have two people to thank: your mother, and padora, the goddess herself, who has infused your body with her breath. the land of tersus is yours by right of divinity, yes, all of it, even beyond the river, but currently your mother the queen has suggested to the peacekeepers to wage war on the sinners of the other lands, who use the goddess’s breath to craft nefarious magics, which they use against us. she does this for you, young one, so that when you take over the throne you will have little to worry about. all she asks for is your patience and your unwavering loyalty to padora, your goddess-mother, whose breath was instilled inside of you and will be passed along to your offspring for a thousand generations, until mankind dissipates into the cosmos with the great exhalation.

    it is important to remember, dear prince, that your ascendancy into royalty came from nothing, from the sheer will off the goddess, and only in the goddess will it continue. your mother, she … is a fine queen, a glorious queen, praise be her name, but her council … is worried. we are worried about her grand designs for tersus and the surrounding land. not about conquest, per se, but … her alignment with the peacekeepers. by law she should not be allowed to even speak to them, as they are the embodiment of war, chaos, destruction, the evils the goddess forbade. but we turn a blind eye, because she is afraid of what those in the other lands have devised to use against us. she is in a precarious place, and one wrong move could strip her of her divinity. we do not wish that for you, dear prince. i need you to promise to me that, no matter what happens with your mother, you will never speak with the peacekeepers, nor be a part of any of their dirty work. there are intermediaries–myself, for example–who are equipped to deal with them and their secular nature. there is dogma attached to all of this, tenants brought down from the angels. when you are older, you will understand. but for now, i need your promise. please promise me?

  • 154

    sometimes, when i’m feeling low, i like to imagine the president taking a shit. think about it: the most powerful man in the world taking a shit, just sitting there in the whitehouse bathroom, reading the new york times, dropping a deuce into an impeccable toilet. no matter how powerful or important you might be, you still gotta shit. this is nature’s great leveler. the pope? gotta shit. kanye west? probably has IBS. everyone at some point in their day has to take a dump, they have to push out waste material from food they’ve consumed earlier. and, and! you do it too. you shit. i shit. we all shit for ice shit. we all do this simple, gross, hilarious thing. so once you get that in your head, how the hell could you ever feel low? you’re no better than the president, or no worse, because you both have to dispose of poop in your body at least once a day. we’re all just human, we all have blood and skin and hair and worries and fears and sometimes we eject waste from our bodies. how nuts is that. you can think someone is the most amazing person in the world but they still gotta shit. from that perspective, i can’t believe people don’t talk about their pooping habits more often. it should be the most ideal icebreaker!

  • 153

    i am beholden to no one. i owe you nothing. and nobody owes me anything. i am a consciousness struggling to survive in the weighty meat bag i have been delivered into. every day i wake from blissful sleep, the one time in my day where i can disconnect from the corporeal world and rest in the world of the collective consciousness–i wake and move my meat bag through this world of time and space, pushing through trillions upon trillions of atoms, everything is atoms. i long for sleep because that is where my consciousness thrives, grabbing onto the collective unconscious and providing my waking state with copious amounts of ideas for creation. the real world bores me, i guess you could say. there are all of these cultural concepts and ideologies, dogmas, tenets, etc, which are interesting for a week or so, but mankind has all this time to think now, lots of time to think, because machines or immigrants do all the difficult labor, so we overthink these concepts into the ground. an ideology needs a little bit of leeway, some room to fluctuate and adapt, it can’t be a static extreme idea, as there will always be exceptions and loopholes. all of this bores me now, this desire to create perfection within an imperfect world. i long for sleep and the brilliant chaos of dreaming, the connection to the collective, the release from the limitations of the meat bag help up by bones. when i remember that i am just a selection of chemical reactions and subatomic particles representing life, i also remember that i am beholden to no one, that my consciousness is simultaneously miraculous and mundane. this concept if amplified and personified in the figure of christ and the mystery of the man who is also god. i am only man in mortal flesh, but in my mind … i am the god of my own consciousness. it is a lovely thing to be.