I don’t know where my path will lead me but I do know that it lies ahead, not behind.
I’ve been in recovery from alcoholism for a little over three and a half months. I’ve been working the twelve steps of Alcoholics Anonymous. It’s working but I sure as hell don’t have everything figured out. I’m also not in any rush to get there. I’m just trying to enjoy the moments as they pass and grow through the process. I”m doing it my way which apparently is pretty disconcerting to a number of people close to me. After all, doing it my way is what got me in this predicament in the first place, right?
Now that would be a pretty compelling argument for not doing things my way if I thought my current predicament was somehow bad. I’m not going to say that everything is perfect by any means but considering the alternative I”m really grateful for where I am today. I certainly don’t think that being in recovery is anything to be ashamed of. Obviously I wouldn’t be in recovery if I hadn’t done a lot of crazy fucked up shit but I wasn’t going to get here any other way. That’s not to say that I would recommend my method to anyone else. Of course, I’ve heard a lot of stories from other people about how they got here and I wouldn’t recommend any of those methods either. Of all the options for getting where I am today, I’m pretty satisfied with the way I did it.
Still, it’s hard to look back on where I was without some level of regret. It’s impossible to get better without acknowledging that you once weren’t so good. I can take comfort in the fact that I always did my best. I’m not perfect and sometimes my best sucks… but so what! I’m getting better, right? I’ve been wrong and I’ll probably be wrong again. I’ve never gotten better by doing something I was already perficient at. I get better by doing something I don’t know how to do. Along the way I make mistakes, I fuck up, I learn and I get better. That’s how I got to where I am today. Of course it’s hard to be on a path of self-improvement without realizing how much I must suck right now compared to some future version of me.
All I know is that I have to keep going. I will stay on this path as long as it continues to work… and probably a little bit longer just to make sure. That’s my way of doing things. I’m kind of stubborn like that. I like to be thorough. But have I learned everything there is to learn from my past? I don’t know but I have my doubts. I may have done the best I could have done at the time but that doesn’t mean that I did the best I can do now. I can’t go back and relive those moments but I can continue to learn from them. I can try again with the wisdom I have gained. I’m pretty sure I’m done with the drinking experiment though. I’ve actually lost the desire to go down that road. I know it works, I’m just not in a rush to get where it will take me.
As my life is becoming more structured I want to get back to trying to write everyday. There are so many thoughts and ideas floating around in my head that I really want to get out. I have an opinion about just about everything; I just haven’t felt that I have the moral authority to speak about them. The more I read other people’s opinions the more I realize that I shouldn’t let that stop me. It helps me to see that the crazy thoughts in my head are shared by great thinkers who have actually garnered respect for their ideas. When I find myself still disagreeing with people whose ideas I highly respect I come out thinking that I may have something original to offer. This doesn’t mean that I am right and they are wrong, only that I have a perspective which is uniquely mine. Some people will probably like what I have to say and some people might not. I hope you will let me know either way. I think the conversation is a good thing in and of itself. My thoughts and my beliefs are constantly evolving.
I want to try and tackle some of the big issues even if I can only do it in a small way. I want to share my musings on subjects like, god, meaning of life, good and evil, human evolution, fame and success, morality, inspiration, creativity, society, government, punishment and love. I also want to write my thoughts on the more mundane topics of the day like marijuana legalization, global warming, income inequality, gay marriage, the Arab-Israeli conflict, religious freedom and politics.
I’m sure that I will continue to intersperse some stories about my life but I don’t want that to be the focus. I’ve been using this in-the-moment memoir approach because my memory sucks and I wanted to have a way to remember what I’ve been through. I also figured that if anyone was going to be telling my story, it should be me. What I’ve found is that I don’t find my story all that interesting. I remember what I want to remember and the rest I am more than happy to forget. If someone else finds my story interesting, they are welcome to write about it. I need to write about what interests me.
My hope is that I will be able to develop a structure and framework that will make it easier for me to write. I also want to get to the point where I can write comfortably without the use of alcohol. I simply am not going to have the time to drink like I have been and there are some consequences to drinking that I would like to avoid. I know this will be a challenge for me. I’m much more self critical when I’m sober. I also have a hard time focusing on a single thought. I find my brain racing three pages ahead when I’m still struggling to find words to complete the sentence at hand. It’s really frustrating and time consuming but I need to find some other tools to help me focus.
That makes forty-seven that I have had so far. I”m not a big fan of birthdays. I feel it’s a lot of pressure to put on one day. But, it is a good excuse to get drunk and spend money so that’s what I did. It was actually a really fun night. I could tell you all about it but I don’t want to . If you really cared you would have been there. Hopefully you are living your own life and don’t need to live vicariously through mine.
All I know is that at the end of the night I took a cab home alone. Last night I was pretty pissed off about that. Today I am grateful.
Today I can remember that a year ago I did have someone to spend my birthday with. I also know that what happened that night was so disturbing that I couldn’t even write about it factually. I had to write it as fiction.
Today I feel grateful to be alone.
Tomorrow… who knows how I will feel. It’s a funny thing about time.
Oh, that reminds me. I did learn something last night. I learned that time itself is a made up concept. I might have to think about that for a while.
Yesterday could have been another boring day. It was really too cold to go anywhere. I had no reason to even get dressed let alone take a shower. I managed to write about two-hundred words for my blog. It was nothing that great but it inspired me to see if I could hammer out this song idea that had been floating around in my head for the past four months. I pulled out my guitar and started writing the words. I combined ideas expressed in yesterday’s post with one I made back in October, along with something from a meme I saw recently, added a melody and chord progression and I soon had the framework for a song. I had hoped that writing this blog would have inspired me to be a better songwriter but the reality is that I hadn’t written any music in over a year.
Half way through the song the words stopped. It was time to put it down and let it settle. Just then the phone rang offering me reprieve from the need to figure out what to do next. The following hour and a half were spent listening to my friend share the struggles and successes in her life while I barely uttered a word. My head was spinning, running every situation through my own lexicon of problem solving strategies and world perspectives searching for tidbits of advice although never having a chance to share them. It wasn’t advice that she needed anyway. She was living her life and dealing with her problems her way. She just needed someone to share them with. When I finally had a chance to speak I chose instead to just share a couple of the situations in my life. There were many commonalities between our stories yet our perceptions of them couldn’t have been more different. I began wondering if my way of seeing the world was completely wrong. I have no problem understanding another person’s perspective but try as I might, I can’t seem to shake my own.
While on the phone I managed to polish off the half glass of wine that had been sitting dormant for the past week in the bottom of a box of Shiraz. After that I cracked the lone remaining tall boy of Grain Belt Nordeast sitting in my fridge. This was not nearly enough to alter my state of mind. I contemplated placing an order with the liquor store but instead chose to battle sobriety a little bit longer.
Nighttime fell and I began to pondered whether I could muster the energy to go see a friend of mine whom I hadn’t seen in a while and was missing terribly when I recieved a text message from her. Hoping for inspiration in her words what I found instead was more despair. She too was frustrated with the cold outside and while she wanted to go have some fun felt prevented from doing so. My initial thought was to offer sex as a good cold weather activity but for some reason thought that might be inappropriate. Instead I suggested whiskey. Alcohol lowers the body temperature reducing the perception of cold and drinking can be fun.
I don’t think that she took my advice but I did. I mixed myself a strong gin and tonic and in no time sobriety had completely left my body. I picked up the phone and called her seeking the encouragement I needed to get out of the house. During our conversation I continued to poison myself with alcohol and she grew increasingly frustrated with my intoxication. I would not find what I was looking for and I would not be seeing my friend that night. I returned to my songwriting and quickly wrote the final verse.
Now bored and alone I decided to make a random post to facebook; a common strategy for me when I’m looking to stir up trouble. This led me into a chat with a friend who was going through a difficult time. Once again I found myself in a situation where my worldview seemed completely counter to that of someone else. Still, we managed to find comfort and encouragement in our shared differences. After spending the day in bed moping he decided that he would get out of the house and surround himself with people. I decided that this would be a good idea for myself as well and set forth to try and meet up with him.
I hopped in the shower and got dressed. I decided that I could make it if I did a combination of biking and busing so I checked the bus schedule. The universe however, did not seem to be on my side with this plan. I managed to miss two busses; the first because I had forgotten my phone and needed to return home, the second because the bus arrived a minute early and in my struggle to get out the door I cut my timing too close. I was ready to throw in the towel but the thought of letting fate win seemed unbearable. Armed with liquid courage and the mantra, “never give up” stuck in my head, I persevered.
My friend arrived at the 19 bar shortly after me. It had been ages since I had been to what used to be my favorite bar but it still felt like home. My friend and I discussed many things but we couldn’t completely avoid the dilemma of day. His struggle, which from what I can tell seems all too common, is how to discern good people from bad people; how to avoid trusting the wrong ones. I wasn’t able to offer much insight into that but I was able to share my thoughts about how we all come off as assholes sometimes and also gave him some insight into how the process of adoption and that sense of abandonment can affect a person. Apparently he found this helpful.
Knowing that I would not survive the bike ride home I wandered down Nicollet Avenue is search of a taxi. With thoughts still burning in my brain I decided to pose a question to three young men that were standing outside Asian Taste. To my relief they also believe that there are no good people or evil people; only people. While this is still a fairly uncommon sentiment it does seem to be more prevalent among the Millennial Generation and that gives me hope.
As I approached the cab stand in front of the Millenium Hotel I became worried as there were no taxis waiting for me. Just then I noticed a cab driving towards me. I managed to get the drivers attention by slipping and falling into the street. I thought for sure that I had lost my chance as taxis don’t typically like picking up drunk people laying in the middle of the road.
But I was wrong. He did pick me up. He was actually very nice. Maybe there are good people.
On the ride home we discussed our kids. The cab driver like many cab drivers in Minneapolis was from Somalia. He has been separated from his kids for five years but now had saved up enough money to fly them to the United States. I’m always curious what it would take to get a man to leave his children and move to another country. In his case, it was for money. Even though Somalia has a wealth of natural resources, most of the money derived from it is not staying in Somalia. Much of it comes to the United States so here is where this man decided he needed to go. He was pretty angry about this situation. He blamed George Bush Sr, the jews and white people in general for the problems in his country. I could understand why he was upset. Maybe there are evil people in the world. Maybe I am one of them.
Maybe my desire to believe that there are no evil people is because it’s a convenient belief for me to hold. I don’t want to be evil but would I know it if I was? Maybe I’m just too stupid to figure it out. I mean if I was stupid, would I know it? I make a lot of assumption. I hold a lot of beliefs. Do I believe these things because they are right… or only because they are right for me?
I haven’t really written much about what has gone on in my life since getting back from Mexico a month ago. Part of that is because not a lot has been going on. It’s winter and I haven’t been doing all that much that I consider all that exciting. A better answer is that I have been living in my head so what has been reflected in my blog has more to do with what I’ve been thinking than with what I’ve been doing. Neither are completely accurate however. The truth is I write about whatever I want to write about whenever I want to write. And even more accurate than that would be that I write whatever I write whenever I write because most of the time what comes out when I sit down at the computer is not quite what I had in mind when I decided to sit down at the computer.
For now I want to abandon the thoughts in my head and recap what I have been up to the past couple of weeks; let’s say going back to Christmas. It’s been an extremely chaotic time with the holidays and weekends and birthdays and random shit thrown in but in a way all of that is pretty run of the mill for me. I just want to capture the essence of what I’ve been up to so that I can move on. I’m expecting this to be a pretty boring post.
For starters, I’ve been spending a lot of time laying on my bed watching Netflix – mostly documentaries. Here is a boring ass list of said documentaries and historic dramas:
The Billionaires Tea Party – A left wing view of the Tea Party.
The One Percent – A billionaires view of the very wealthy.
Park Avenue: Money, Power and the American Dream– A comparison between Park Avenue in Manhattan and Park Avenue in the South Bronx.
Surviving Progress – Our progress may be a trap.
Ayn Rand & the Prophecy of Atlas Shrugged – The life and philosophy of one of our most popular thinkers.
The Secret of Nikola Tesla – One of our greatest inventors who claimed to have never invented anything.
Lovelace– A dramatization about one of our greatest porn stars.
Future by Design– The story of futurist and engineer, Jacques Fresco.
Escape from Suburbia– What are people going to do when we run out of oil?
Pedal-Driven– Mountain Bike riders work with the government to solve problems.
Unborn in the USA –A non-bias view of the Pro-Life movement.
Zeitgeist: Addendum– A non-political propaganda film worth paying attention to.
We Steal Secrets: The Story of WikiLeaks– An interesting expose on Julian Assange.
Occupy Unmasked– An extremely right wing view of the Occupy Movement.
Better This World– A remarkable tale of left wing radicals in my home town.
The Big Buy: How Tom DeLay Stole Congress– A story of power and corruption in law and government.
Runaway Slave– The story of one man’s move beyond the race paradigm
Let’s Make Money– A propaganda film that should make you think
Color Me Kubrick– A dramatization of the life of the man who pretended to be Stanley Kubrick
American Addict– There is more money in pharmaceutical drugs than in street drugs.
Patriocracy – A look at the political divide and the unspoken majority who just want to get along.
The People vs. George Lucas – The love/hate relationship between the man who created Star Wars and it’s fans.
Hungry For Change – What happens when we stop eating food and start eating drugs.
Wow… twenty-three movies in fourteen days!?! How could I have had time for anything else? Okay, I cheated a bit. That list went back to December 13th but I really wanted to get in the name Ayn Rand. I know that simply being able to tag her will give me a hit or two and I think she wants me to have that. She has given rise to a political movement that is completely counter to everything I believe in but I don’t think most of her followers really understand what she was saying. They just picked up on what they liked.
But that’s the way it goes.
People seem to like Ayn Rand because she gives them justification for being a selfish prick. I say just be who you are! If you are a selfish prick then own it. No one needs to give you permission or justification. I think she would agree with that. But then you can’t complain when all the people around you care more about their own needs than yours. Birds of a feather flock together, bitch!
If you do want another view of the future I would really recommend watching Future By Design by Jacque Fresco. Actually, I would recommend watching all of these documentaries. Some are more biased than others. Some are more opinionated but all have the potential to get you thinking and I highly recommend thinking… in moderation.
So knowing that I can’t simply live inside my head, what else have I been up to?
I went to my sister’s for Christmas. With my parents out of the country I had really hoped that I could just take the day off but when my sister decided to do something at her house I figured it was important to attend. I’m sorry that my other sister was not able to attend but that is the way it goes in my family. We are a group of very diverse people but clearly… somehow… we still love each other.
Usually I spend Christmas night at the bar commiserating with others who either don’t have family in town or just survived another awkward family diner. This year I just felt like going home.
The following night I had rehearsal for our show on Friday. The show was fun. The show was fantastic. The show was what I do.
Hexagon – 27 Dec 2013
My son’s mother’s sister, who lives in Canada, was there. I helped raise her when she was in high-school and she totally loves me. It was so wonderful to see her again. Also in the audience was a woman who used to live with me and while doing so taught me a great deal about the toxicity of anger and the fear which comes with it. It was really good to see her again after getting past all of that. I also talked with a fan who told me that he could never do what I do but by watching me on stage he feels like he was living vicariously through me. That is one of the greatest gifts I can give as a performer but the truth is, I too am living vicariously through the audience.
The day after a show is usually just a day of rest but I got tired of just sitting around. The weather was nice but I knew it was going to get really cold so I wanted to get out of the house while I still could. I had no plans but I needed a back up battery for my e-cig so I hoped on the bus and headed to Smokeless Smoking in Northeast Minneapolis. My friend works there so I got the “family” discount.
As I left the store he asked, “So, what are you going to do now?”
I said, I have no idea but there will probably be whiskey involved.”
I needed food so I headed to the Spring Street for nutrients and libations. After that I headed to the 331 Club for a beer or two. Next thing I knew there was a dance party going on and I was shit-faced wasted. A friend of mine had sent me a text to see what I was up to but I didn’t notice it until two hours later. I still wound up crashing at her place. Forgiveness it the key to happiness.
The next day was hard. My friend gave me a ride home but I still didn’t know whether I wanted to be alone. It was my daughter’s birthday and I hadn’t seen her face or heard her voice since September. I tried calling her that morning but could only leave a message. I figured it would be a good day to just be alone and do nothing. I made myself a screwdriver to ease the hangover but still having my doubts about being alone I reached out to my Facebook friends. Within thirty seconds I had a phone call from my friend at Smokeless Smoking offering to come pick me up. I spent the day and night in the loving company of him, his partner and their son.
When his partner dropped me off the next morning I said, “Thank you so much for being there for me.”
To which I was replied, “No, it was you who were there for us.”
Seriously, this is how my life goes but I think it is how life goes when we are willing to humble ourselves to ask for help.
The next day of significance was New Years Eve. Once again I had no plans. If I could have done it I would have done nothing on New Years Eve. It’s fucking amateur night but I needed my peeps. I called a cab and headed to the Cabooze to see WookieFoot. I knew the show was sold out but I hoped that the lovelight would shine on me and I would still be able to get it. It didn’t and I was’t. Luckily there was another cab waiting so I grabbed it and headed to the 331 Club where my friends in the band Rapedoor were playing.
There was a great line up at the 331 that night and it was free but it was still my second choice because one of the bands has a tendency to get naked on stage. Now I have no problem with nudity but as a stage gimmick it seems over played, especially for a band with so much talent. For some reason that didn’t stop me from stripping off all my clothes and prancing around totally nude when I was brought up on stage.
I got a ride home that night but I couldn’t find my keys to get in my house. Luckily the people who dropped me off knew well enough to make sure that I got in my house. It was cold enough to where I could have froze to death if I spent the night out doors. Instead I spent the night on the couch of some friends in South Minneapolis. By morning I was sober enough to find my keys and make it home.
Thursday I had a therapy appointment. I wanted to spend some time with my friend who let me crash at her place after the first 311 Club night. We actually had a nice evening snuggling on the couch watching movies until four in the morning. Unbeknownst to me this was much later than she wanted to be up. She was pretty pissed off that it had gotten so late and to be fair it was largely my fault. I was a pretty talkative movie watcher that night. Sharing two bottles of wine and a six pack of beer will do that to me… especially since I drank most of it.
She stormed off to bed and I took a cab home. There was a time when I would have had no choice but to sleep on the couch. I feel quite grateful to have the financial resources to take care of myself when these conflicts arise because they will happen… drinking or not. By the way, we are just fine now. In fact we were fine the next morning.
My plan was to go back and retrieve my van but I never got sober enough to drive. I thought that my son would be coming home that day but it turned out he wouldn’t be back until Saturday so I just kept drinking slowly throughout the day. That night I had a meeting with the full cast off Venus’ performance art project. I’m doing the music for it. The meeting was great and I’m looking forward to it but that is about all I have to say about it at this point.
After the meeting Venus drove me to the Spring Street where two of my friends where celebrating their birthdays with an incredible line up of bands in the basement. There is much more that I could say about that night but I’m really trying to keep my posts under two thousand words. Suffice it to say I wound up at the after party and a really cute boy brought me home.
We can also say that I didn’t do much the next day other than welcome home my son, who I haven’t seen since we got back from Mexico.
It wasn’t until Sunday that I managed to retrieve my van. That took walking over a mile in sub zero weather but my van still started up just fine. I spent that night at the bar with my friend; the one at who’s house my van was previously parked. Remarkably, that night went much better.
Monday I drove my son out to see his sister and step-mother. Today I went to retrieve him. It sounds like my daughter is doing fine and at the end of the day, that is all that matters to me.
As I rode my bike to therapy yesterday I pondered the question that I know would be awaiting me.
“So, how are you doing?”
To be honest, I had no idea. I wasn’t happy but I wasn’t looking to kill myself either. I felt like I was making progress but I was still no where near where I wanted to be. I’d been concerned with how much I’ve been drinking but I’ve actually been drinking less that I had expected; with a couple notable exceptions.
So I’m somewhere in the middle. Things aren’t fantastic but they aren’t completely falling apart either.
Should I be feel grateful about that or disappointed that things aren’t better?
My first clue is the word “should”. I’ve always had a problem with that word. The fact is it doesn’t matter how I feel. I can feel either way or both. I can feel however I feel. I can be grateful for the things that are working and disappointed in the things that I wish were different. My feeling don’t change anything. The situation is still the same.
So I decided that the situation is exactly as it’s meant to be. Some things work and some things have room for improvement. But hey, that’s life! In that moment I just decided to be okay with it.
After my appointment I decided to go for a little bike ride. I didn’t really have a choice. I was over ten miles from miles from my house but I wasn’t really in a hurry to get home. I just wanted to ride around for a while.
I wound up stopping in at the 331 Club in NE Minneapolis for happy hour. I realized that I hadn’t been to a bar just to commune with people all month. This is actually a really important part of my life. I haven’t missed it which is probably good. I don’t need to be hanging out in bars everyday but in moderation, there is a reason for me to hang out in bars.
I met these two computer programmers. I want to go on record as saying computer programmers are highly under appreciated. Okay, I think most people are under appreciated but a computer programmer’s job is to not be noticed. Most of the world these days runs on software but the only time we even think about it when it doesn’t work. A software developer’s job is to create something that we can take for granted. Fuck, I’m glad I got out of that field!
I also talked to a guy who is trying to create a better battery than anything currently in existence. Yup… that’s what I do at the bar.
After that I went and hung out with a friend who had just gone through a couple of rough days. I couldn’t fix anything but I still think I made things better.
I was awakened this morning by a phone call from one of my dearest friends. She was feeling lonely and depressed and wanting to drink. She knew that I had a show last night so she didn’t want to call and wake me but after going through every name in her phone she had no choice. I’m glad that she did even though I wasn’t quite awake and didn’t have much to offer except a sympathetic ear.
I’m still waking up but I’ve decided to try and write something. I still may decide to say, “fuck it” and just drive over and see her. In any case, I do need another cup of coffee so here we go…
As I’m making this transition from summer pedicab driver to winter hermit I’ve found myself living in my brain.
[And that’s as far as I got before the phone rang again]
This time the call was from my best friend who is now living out in California. She is the number one reason why I am on the verge of exceeding my monthly allotment of cell phone minutes, but given that this is the weekend there is no harm in answering. It was quite literally the least I could do. Given that she is now two thousand miles away, it’s kind of the only thing I can do.
While talking to California for an hour I got dressed and drove to my friends house in south Minneapolis. Since I wasn’t going to be getting any writing done, I might as well be helping my friends who really need nothing more than a friend. I didn’t actually know whether my friend in Minneapolis still wanted or needed me to come over but I figured it was worth the risk.
It turned out to be a good call. She was still disappointed that she didn’t get a better response to all of her efforts at reaching out. I said, “it only takes one and I’m here.”
As it turned out she actually had two. Shortly after I arrived another friend came over to help. They talked for a while and I did some dishes. After that, the second friend left with my friend’s son so the we could have some time without the boy. We wound up heading to the studio so I could pick up my bike and then to the tanning salon. Go ahead and give me all the shit you want about how evil tanning beds are, but when you’re suffering with seasonal depression, ten minutes in a tanning bed can do wonders. We also got Chinese food – basically the best day every!
But this is how my winters go. Everyday I just try to do the best I can and usually the best I can has nothing to do with moving my life forward. I’m just trying to maintain. If I’m lucky, I will be able to help someone else. If I’m really lucky I’ll be able to make someone else’s life better.
That day was last Monday.
Last Sunday I went to a friend’s house to hang out and watch a movie. When I arrived I took off my coat and put it on the coat hook by her back door. Immediately, the entire fixture pulled out of the wall and fell to the floor. My mission for Monday was to make sure that never happened again.
I’m not the greatest handy man in the world but I can drill a hole and put up a shelf. I just have no passion for doing any of this when it comes to my own house. I was excited to do it for someone else. I not only secured the coat hooks, which I felt somewhat responsible for breaking, I also put a coat rod in her closet.
Knowing that I’ve been struggling to get my life moving, my friend wanted to do something to help me out. I’m not the best at asking for what I need but I’m working on it. I still haven’t filed my paperwork to receive the property tax refund I have coming to me. It’s not that hard and I can totally do it but for some reason I keep putting it off. I asked her if she would come over and help me get it filled out. This is something that is right up her alley.
So it worked out. My life moved forward. I couldn’t do it for myself but I was able to help someone who could help me. I think that is how things work most of the time. We can’t do it alone but when we come together we can do more that the sum of our parts.
But if that was enough, my life, your life, everyone’s life, would be working perfectly and it’s not. When I really need help it’s at a time when I feel like I have nothing left to give. That’s why I give regardless of whether anyone can give back to me. I just know that giving is the key to getting what we need.
Of course I could be wrong. Maybe taking is the key to getting what you need. I know that it is a successful way to get what you want. I just really doubt it can help you get what you need.
[At this point I’m tempted to retitle the post “wants vs. needs”. I would but it’s already so disjointed with no clear point that I don’t think any title could capture its essence.]
The only point I think I can make is that my life is still not working perfectly. I mean, it’s working. I’m not dead yet but it’s still not anywhere like I’d like it to be.
Let’s take Tuesday, for example. I did my best. I gave what I had to give. I wrote a blog post that I thought would appeal to both rock-n-roll and sci-fi geeks. That’s not an easy thing to do. I should have been sitting on top of the world.
Instead I felt more alone than I have ever felt before. Actually, I don’t even know if that is what it was. Really, it was loneliness but a kind of loneliness that I’d never felt before. I was physically in pain over my longing for human contact. Now, I’ve had my heart broken. I’ve had my stomach in knots because I missed someone so much. But this was different. This was just generalized loneliness manifesting as physical pain.
I waited in agony until 8:59pm when my free nighttime minutes kicked in so that I could call someone… anyone! Actually, I called T-Moble earlier, in part to find out exactly when my free minutes started, but mostly just to have someone to talk to. Yup, I was that desperate.
I stayed up until four in the morning talking to anyone who would answer their phone. When you give as much as I give it’s remarkable how many people will answer the phone when you call. Still, life would be a lot easier if I didn’t need people so much.
When I finally woke up on Wednesday and I felt like shit again. I went to my refrigerator and learned that I had drank an entire three-liter box of white wine – that’s four bottles worth, all by myself. It was a beautiful, sunny day but I wasn’t going to be able to enjoy it at all. I was fucking hung-over!
Granted, I didn’t feel as bad, nor did I cause the embarrassment, as the last time I drank an entire bottle of whisky in one night. I love whiskey, but wine is still a better friend.
[At this point I feel the need to post this video. Go ahead and watch it. It’s pretty fucking awesome!!!]
I’ve known for a long time that I have a drinking problem. I struggle with it. I try to control it. I try to reduce the harm it causes. It’s never going away. Many of my friends have found sobriety. None have found it a perfect solution. Hell, I’ve found sobriety and look how it’s worked for me. The point is to keep going. I’m still on my path. There is no telling where it will lead but suicide is no solution.
If I didn’t have rehearsal Wednesday night I wouldn’t have accomplished anything that day.
Thursday I had a date with one of my oldest and dearest friends. We met when I was seventeen years old, back when I was in AA. She has now been sober for 25 years. I’m 46 now – do your own math! She knows what a drunk I am and loves me anyway. Still, I respect her sobriety and wasn’t going to drink before seeing her. Drinking still crossed my mind but I was lucky and managed to find ways to keep myself busy. Once I was with her it didn’t matter. Even though we went to a restaurant that served alcohol, I had no desire to drink.
Friday was a different story. Friday I had nothing to do except go to a birthday party where I knew that drinking would be the theme of the evening. I wasn’t even sure I wanted to go. It was a good ten mile bike ride from my house and I’m suppose to be a hermit and not going out this winter. Still, I really like this friend and my California friend’s lover/business partner was going to be DJing at the party and I’d never met him. I was determined to try my best to make it.
I finally had enough drinks in me to feel like I could accomplish anything so I hopped on my bike and headed to south Minneapolis. I realized that I hadn’t really eaten much that day so I stopped in at Cause Spirits and Soundbar for a beer and a slice of pizza.
I had no idea what was going on that night. I just needed some food. It turned out that it was the “hipster” spot for the evening. I knew half the people there. I was instantly thrown back into my old life. Back to the days when I considered it my job description to be at all the happening events. I made my way through the crowd of people wanting to say “hi” to me; being as polite as I could.
I really just wanted to get to the bar and get some food. I wound up talking to some Joe who was on his own little pub crawl. He had stopped in at this place because some girl he likes had said that she was going to be here. Fuck, that’s as good a reason as any…
I also talked to Scott Seekins. He is a local artist with a very iconic look. We have had conversations in the past about the power of an iconic look and since I had changed mine, I thought it would be a good idea to check in with him. He still thought I could make it work which made me feel good.
Here’s a picture of my friend, Scott Seekins.
I also talked to some other people at Cause. Just because it was a hipster douchebag event doesn’t mean that there weren’t good people there. I know right?!? Now who sounds like the hipster douchebag? This guy here!
Anyway… on to the party where I was a total fucking hit! All these people where half my age and thought of me as a god! No seriously, I don’t know what I said or what I did but I was told flat out that I changed their life. I had people begging for my number saying, “We have to hang out!”
Again, I should have been sitting on top of the world. But really, all I wanted was to get laid. I was still just that lonely guy. At that point, all the admiration in the world didn’t mean shit if nobody wanted to bang me.
And oh my god where there people there that I wanted to fuck. Granted, when you are in your forties pretty much anyone in their twenties looks pretty damn good but this was a party of some of the hottest looking people in the city.
And I was not getting any more sober and they were not getting any less good looking.
I may not remember any of the conversations that changed lives but I do remember this one: Towards the end of the night, after a shot of whiskey, I was talking with an extremely attractive woman and I said, “I really want to bite your face!” I wan’t feeling violent; it was pure labido and she knew that.
Her response was, ” That’s pretty creepy.”
I said, “I know, and I’m not a creepy guy. That’s just the thought in my head and apparently I have no filter.”
Suffice it to say, I realized at that point that I was probably too drunk and was not going to get laid that night so I had better go home. I still had a couple more conversations before I left. They had to do with helping other people come to terms with their own sexual proclivities but I was done trying to meet my own. I was just hoping that I could find a cab that could take me and my bike back to north Minneapolis.
That didn’t happen either. I wound up biking the whole ten miles or so back home. I did make it; much to my surprise. It was 5:43 in the morning and I had a show that night. I think I was still awake enough to make some food and make some drunken post on Facebook.
But would I make it to the show that night???
Here is the proof that I did.
Thanks for reading the longest post I have ever made. You are a real trooper. I think you are amazing!!! Please let me know who you are by liking this post if you do or by leaving a comment telling me how much you think it sucks! You can leave me a comment even if you like it – I won’t mind.
I’ve had my share of challenges in life. I have managed to overcome most of them. I have made changes where possible and adapted where necessary but sometimes the only thing I can do is surrender. That’s how I felt yesterday. I just couldn’t take it anymore. I couldn’t change it and I couldn’t overcome it. My obstacle was the weather. With five days of cloudy, rainy weather I just couldn’t do it again.
I didn’t give up easily although I hadn’t made the challenge any easier on myself. The night before I managed to use every available hour of my trip home getting completely shit-faced to the point where I needed assistance for the final leg of my journey.
Still, I did manage to get home. I did manage to get up. I did manage to get ready for work and was all poised to head to St. Paul when the call came in saying that I needn’t bother. They had enough drivers in St. Paul and considering the weather, it simply wasn’t worth me making the trip. To be honest, I was relieved. To be honest, I had already come to the same conclusion. As I was sitting in my van, the engine running, the windshield-wipers removing the raindrops from my view, the only thought in my head was, “I can’t do this.”
In fact, I couldn’t do anything. I couldn’t go to work, I couldn’t leave the house, I couldn’t even write about how I couldn’t do anything. I had thrown in the towel. I had given up on the day so I retired to bed with a glass of red wine. I spent most of the day sleeping or watching documentaries about the recent economic crash.
But can I really blame it all on the rain? What about my drinking, isn’t that a choice? Isn’t that something I have control over?
Drinking has been a part of my life for as long as I can remember but there have been periods where alcohol hasn’t been such a significant player. There have been times where drinking just didn’t present itself as an option. But I am a drinker. What I know about myself is that given the option, I am going to choose to drink. But I’m more than just a drinker, I’m a drunk. I actually really enjoy the way alcohol makes me feel. Once those chemicals start going to work on my brain, all of my troubles seems to disappear. I’m no longer depressed, I’m not anxious and I don’t feel any pain. As my chemist friends like to remind me, “alcohol is a solution”.
But it’s also a problem. It’s hard to deny the correlation between alcohol and aspects of my life that don’t work as I would like. The question I keep pondering is whether my connection with alcohol is a character defect or simply a character trait. My instinct is to judge and shame myself for being a flawed human being but my intellect knows the futility of this response. I can change my behavior, I can adapt to most situations, I can mitigate the negative consequences but I can’t change who I am any more than I can change the weather.
Well that didn’t work quite as planned. As soon as I had decided to call it a night I began getting text messages from a buddy who wanted to hang out. I had just enough drinks in me at the time to consider it a good idea. It was a good idea. Spending time with friends is one of the things that has gotten out of balance lately. It just meant that I wasn’t going to be getting to bed early or getting up early.
In fact I didn’t wake up until 11am and had to run straight away to deliver City Pages. By the time I got home it was 7pm and I was exhausted. I crawled in bed with my dinner and was passed out shortly there after. Next think I knew it was two in the morning. I’m still yawning and tired so hopefully I can get back to sleep and try this again tomorrow.
NOTE:This was meant to be posted Thursday, 25 July 2013 but time constraints, technical difficulties and the simple fact that life sucks has led to its delay.
At the coffee shop this morning:
“Hey, how are you doing?”
“I’m covered in cat hair.”
Yup, that’s how my day started. I woke up on my friends couch covered in cat hair. To me, that’s the sign of a good night. To me, that’s living. If I could start every day that way I probably would… but then, maybe not. Perhaps the balance of extremes are what allows the extremes to exist. Let’s face it, I kind of like the extremes. Call it what you like: reckless, irresponsible, blowing off steam, obnoxious or childish but I just call it life.
One of the random strangers I ran into last night asked me what the highlight of my day was. At this point I felt like it was still too early to say but now I can. Here are some highlights from last night:
Discussing the happy topics of post traumatic stress and suicide at Grumpy’s bar in Northeast.
Seeing Al Sabola’s current rockabilly band, The Bad Companions. I’m not a huge rock rockabilly fan but when it’s done well, and all these players have been doing it well for a long time, it’s a good time for sure.
Seeing Courtney Yasmineh perform at the Terminal Bar. She is always a treat to see perform. Check out her website and if you get a chance to see her perform live, please do. Her song “Stones” is in my opinion one of the best songs ever written. Every time I hear it, it gives me chills.
Catching a ride for me and my bike to Club Jager with my friend Justice. Just crazy timing but I love how things work out sometimes.
Remembering how much fun Transmission with DJ Jake Rudh can be and how I really do enjoy all the beautiful people there.
Eating Pizza Luce Pizza. Okay, by this time I was pretty wasted and I have no idea what was on it; pretty sure there was meat but it was delicious.
But the number one highlight of my day was receiving a text from a friend who was having a rough day. She said she spent the evening reading through my blog and wanted me know that it helped her a lot. Knowing that something I have done has helped someone else is the best news I can get.
Life Sucks, So What?!? 