First Day of Cuddling

I am 18 years old (at least for the next eleven days), and I feel like this is a milestone in any aspiring adult's life. I am officially considered an adult in the eyes of the government. I can die for my country, I can smoke cigarettes, I can buy all of the kinky lust-infused pornographic content that my puny little not-fully-grown-and-all-too-sexually-repressed mind can imagine. But most importantly to me, right at this moment, here and now, is this:

I can sign my social security card.

So here I am, sitting in the lounge of my dorm floor (which, I'm also realizing, I probably haven't actually made a blog post about in all of the time that I've been here), staring at my social security card with a pen in my hand that I stole from a church somewhere (just in case my homosexuality was not enough to ensure my place in hell, I figure stealing a pen will do the job with finality), and for some reason I cannot muster up the nerve to sign my name on that goddamn line. (Pardon my French--no, wait, I don't know how to speak French. Silly idioms).

 F@$#%^er.

Part of that is my usual helping of social awkwardness: anything that has any ounce of finality to it causes my brain to scream out with all of the expletives that apply and several that don't. My irrational side tells me that maybe I'll do it wrong, there's no taking it back, if my hand slips then I'll be down one social security card and I'll be, as they say, fucked from here to eternity. (That darn French again. Someday I'll get a handle on it). Or a million other things will go wrong--I'll press down to hard and rip the paper, I'll sneeze when I'm writing and the pen will go everywhere, the friction of my pen against the paper will cause the card to burst into flames that will travel up my arm and onto the table and spread to everyone in the room, killing them all in a glorious yet fatal Hollywood-style explosion the kind that mankind had ever seen--and my brain makes its case for why I should just put my pen down and pretend that the card is just as valid without my signature. But even when I manage to ignore my brain telling me that the end is nigh, I still can't get around the feeling that I'm not ready yet.

"Burn I say. BURN."

I realized today that I have this habit of creating "rites of passage" out of nowhere. My graduation from high school? Rite of passage. My last debate tournament? Rite of passage. Signing my social security card, even though it makes no sense whatsoever and has no significance in my life other than me putting a pen down onto the paper (and potentially lighting the world aflame)? Rite of passage (somehow). My brain twists every experience into something significant for my life. Except not everything has some sort of significance. Today I went to the first day of a new book club (don't judge me, they were giving out free pizza). Will that change my life? Maybe, I dunno. Will the world burst into flames and/or musical numbers because of it? Probably not.

Conclusion, my brain needs to take a chill pill. You might say it needs some brain freeze, amiright?

Pictured: A perpetual state of brain freeze.

Ice puns aside, though, I tend to overthink things. It's like a storm going on inside of my head, and all of the different arguments are brawling with each other to escape the storm but none of them are really fast enough so they get swept away. Or something along those lines.

This may sound like a sudden revelation, but it isn't really. I mean, this entire blog is built around the idea that each post is about the first day of something, but that's kind of misleading. In fact, I already discovered this about myself over winter break, when I was at home and thinking about all of the funtimes that were to come with my newest semester and first day in classes that are in my actual major and--aw, to tell with it. Nothing that big was changing, and my rational mind knew it. So my rational mind fought back, and as I was packing my suitcase, I slipped a stuffed dog into it.

His name is Paunch, and I've been cuddling with him nightly.

I figure it's a good bit of rebellion against the irrational voices in my head: do something irrational enough that even my irrational mind didn't see it coming. Plus, it's just childish enough to convince my brain that I'm regressing instead of progression in my development (at least as far as maturity goes), so I think that counts as double points. Level up!

Bowser, digivolve to... SKULLGREYBOWSER. 

Paunch doesn't judge me for my childish tendency to look at every new day as a turning point in my life. Paunch just cuddles. And he's good at cuddling, too. He's a great cuddler. Paunch understands me. Shut up.

But in all seriousness, I'm not really sure what possessed me to think hey, I'm in college, now's a good time to pick up that old habit of sleeping with stuffed animals that I kicked when I was 7 but whatever it was, I pat that little maniacal genius on the back.

I kind of just wanted to use this picture again. Feel free to draw some sort of meaning from it.

I've actually started getting more sleep. I don't know why, but it helps me relax. And college produces a lot of unnecessary stress. I'll be the first to admit it: I'm an English major, I don't really deserve to have stress. But the lack of work-related stress gives way to life-related and insecurity-related stress, enough so that my work suffers and everything morphs into work-related stress in a cycle that I'm sure was invented by college administrators so that they could take our money for two years before we drop out and make room for a new group of unsuspecting young freshies.

So if it helps you to explain my behavior, let's just say that I've picked up my new 'sleeping-with-the-dogs' habit due to my irrational thought processes that are tied to my lack of sleep, all stemming from my inability to see normal days as anything other than monumental. 

I figure if I keep taking giant leaps backwards like this, I'll be able to sign my card in about four years. Maybe faster if I can work up the nerve to wear a diaper, but I doubt the likelihood of that particular one. Until then, I'll just stare at my card, pen in my hand, sobbing uncontrollably. Or maybe I'll just throw a party to celebrate the placing of the signature. I think I like that one better.   

First Examples of the Written Word

I realized that, oddly enough, no matter how much writing I've put on here, I haven't actually posted any writing samples for anyone to take a look at. I might open up a separate blog to hold all of those (probably not, I barely post on this single one as it is), but maybe every once and awhile, when I feel like gracing you all with the spectacularity of my scribblings and stylings, I'll just post something I've been working on up here. I was going to post my zuihitsu on here, but I realized that might be an issue. One: no one actually knows what a zuihitsu is, and I would be completely lost in trying to explain it because my easiest definition is that it is whatever I want it to be because I said so. Two: I kind of mention a few personal things about other people that would probably not want me to share those things, and to the people who know them it would be easy enough to identify them. I'm all for sharing personal stuff about myself, but I gotta respect my friends so that I can delay them realizing that I'm a complete and total ass.

Anyways, instead of that, here are some things I've written over the past few days for my poetry class, plus an oldie that a lot of my friends have seen already that people seem to like. Enjoy. And by that I mean read them. Repeatedly.

The Second Night of Halloween

It is 5:08 in Pittsburgh on a Monday, one day

after Halloween and the trees know it, yes it is

2011 and the leaves stop clinging to their branches

because it seems like a good time to hit

me in the face, Halloween is gone and people

are no longer smiling.

The girls go out as crayons,

colored dresses with black electrical tape around

just enough of the dress that it won’t

come off if they pull at it. Before

they go we brainstorm because there are so many slutty

clichés you can wear that we can’t choose, sexy witch, sexy astronaut—no way would she survive

in space—sexy pirate gets less sexy if I think about Jack Sparrow, and soon we have

to start getting creative, wrack our brains up one by one

to think about the next day, when everybody takes their walks

of shame, when the girls who thought the morning

after would be a clever costume shuffle along the streets

in nothing but a white shirt and cowboy boots

and the wind pulls up goosebumps on their

slick pale legs and I stand by watching, wearing

flannel for fuck’s sake and scribbling in a notebook

thinking that maybe the girls were right, no matter how

much we joke about how the girls have options on options on options

the guys have it easy.

As the Milk Falls

There is no such thing as lunch

on the weekends because Sundays don’t

like it when you do things.

There is a bag of chips in my hand,

flaming hot that I got just because

it’s my least favorite. They have an aftertaste

of ashes. Burn my tongue.

There is a Sun, barely shining, but I

almost wish it would leave me alone

because wouldn’t it be awesome if I had

one of those personal

rainclouds hovering over my head, leaving

that couple walking in front of me

fingers intertwined but silent as I used to

be when I tried to laugh, leaving the clouds

to focus on me. I wish I had an umbrella

because that scene keeps playing in my head

and as the milk falls on Gene Kelly’s head

he just can’t help but sing and that’s exactly how

I want to feel right now right here.

The Poetry of Football on a Sunday Night

Tonight, there will be men and women watching television.

Maybe the men will look up once in a while or

            the women will spend the night knitting

            hats for their children to wear during the winter months and

            maybe the children will be sitting

            far too close to the tube and

            their eyes will cross to the point where

            the pixels can only barely form shapes but

            maybe the children will still smile

            and maybe they will feel like a family or

            at least they will feel what it is like to be a family

Or maybe some of the children will be watching

from their bedrooms and the men

            will drink alone at sports bars while

            listening to the cheering that engulfs them while

            the women watch wondering what all the fuss is about or

            maybe a boy will sneak up to his room

            so quiet

            to play with a barbie while

            his sister wears her bears jersey on her fathers lap and

            his mother shakes her head knowing how little they know

            about the world

            or maybe they will take a deep deep breath.

           

All at once now.

            and the father will cheer with his daughter.

            and the mother will look up from her knitting.

            and the son will snuggle up in bed so close

            so close to a fluffy stuffed bear

            his friend will smile at him and with him.

            and maybe that is okay.

First Night of Gay Movies

I was watching a gay movie tonight instead of reading my homework or writing my novel (and I'm writing this post instead of doing both those things as well, so consider yourself thoroughly used and abused for my own procrastinationary purposes). And, at the risk of sounding like a complete dumbass, I should probably explain what a gay movie is.

There's no such thing as a gay movie. I made the name up, because I just do that and I'm just that awesomely brilliant. I control the English language. Bow down to me.

But seriously, it was a term that I made up to refer to how Hollywood deals with the subject of homosexuality. Usually, that means not well (as much as I find this funny, it kind of proves my point). A gay movie is a movie that is typically made outside of the big L.A. movie razzmatazz and portrays a more honest attempt at broaching the subject with class and some sense of respect. I say attempt because, honestly, they aren't usually good movies. I spend a lot of time picking through the bowels of Netflix Instant Watch to find some of the putrescence that I watch on a regular basis. Netflix has the unfortunate ability to drag some of the worst movies ever created from the core of the earth where they had been resting peacefully, harming no one, and giving them new life by recommending them for my viewing. Naturally, I help it along its way by diving head first into the swamp in my attempts at finding something worth my time. I rarely succeed.

Most of the gay movies I have watched--this is a generalization, but, well, this is my blog post so I can do whatever the hell I want--open up with some sort of sex scene. Usually it's homosexual in nature, but one extremely classy movie decided to juxtapose the two in an attempt to show just how similar they were. Either way, it leads me to the obvious conclusion that the first thing two gay people do when they meet each other is have sex. Obviously. Usually after that, the straight guy or gal runs across the gay guy or gal, and the typical drama ensues. You can see some variations (the gay one is the main character? GASP!) but typically they follow the predictable plot line.

Now, the premises are cliched, but maybe the movies can are more than their opening scene! They probably have good dialogue, terrific acting, a few surprises around some strategically placed corners, or--haha, no, that doesn't happen. My personal favorite opened on a man driving down the road. He stops briefly, and another man, younger, gets into his car. They appear to know each other. They then drive into the woods and have sex rather quickly. They finish. The driver asks the other man if they could make this a regular thing, implying that they have never spoken before. There is a pause. Silence fills the audience with tension. The second man headbutts the driver, who begins to bleed profusely from his broken nose. The second man runs away.

That's the quality of them, but really that's all just the set-up for tonight's happenings. Something strange, wonderful, and interesting happened to me. I was shocked when it happened, but it took me a bit to catch my breath after I had punched myself repeatedly to ensure that I was not, in fact, dreaming.

I found a good one.

DOUBLE GASP. I know. But stick with me, it's just starting to get interesting.

It was called The Gymnast, and I almost didn't watch it because Netflix had given it such a low recommendation for me that I automatically assumed that it was going to be worse than the headbutting one, but it wasn't half bad. It followed the typical plot outline above, minus the sexual opening, but it did it with class. It respected the emotions of its characters, it didn't throw them into any boxes, and only twice did I cringe at the dialogue that no actual human would say. The starring actress (omnisexual playing straight) drove the movie home for me, and her opposite-of-affectionate husband was equally brilliant. The cinematography of all things soared far above the bar (hehe gymnastics pun) and the ending respected both the audience and the characters even though you could tell where it was going. Successful.

I'm sorry to have wasted your time, but none of this is my point.

After a successful movie with not a single name-brand actor or actress, I had to do me some research. I hunted down each and every cast member and I found everything they had ever done ever. I found some interesting tidbits of info (the leading lady I liked was only really in one other movie), but, of course, it was the last one I found that caught my attention. The husband.

He died, a few months after completing principal photography. I researched farther, and I started crying.

His name was David De Simone. He took acting classes when he was studying dancing at Julliard (seriously?) at the age of 16. New York gave him the acting bug, and he started to pursue it until a cut on his hand gave him a staph infection that severely weakened his heart, barring him from both dancing and acting. 20 years later, he walked through the door at the auditions for The Gymnast, with no real prior experience. He has two other credits on IMDb, and one uncredited role from 1986 during his first run as an actor. He took the part with ease, and he nailed it. He gave it his all. And then he had a heart attack, at the age of 46, just after finally realizing his dream.

Well, that's a showstopper, isn't it? Just kind of ruined my night, and I've been sitting here trying to figure out why. I think I've settled on the fact that it basically outlined my worst fear to me, alongside a big neon sign in my head that's been flashing IT COULD HAPPEN TO YOU in varying shades of orange, purple, and hot pink.

I've been asked before what I'm afraid of. Usually, I don't have an answer. My sister's afraid of spiders. One of my best friends is afraid of butterflies. Another one of my best friends is afraid of sentimentality (just kidding, Claire) but I never had an answer. Nothing really scared me. This, this story I just told you, scares the crap out of me.

I have no idea what I want to do with my life. I mean, sure, being a writer sounds good. But the question "what are you going to do with an English Major" has been asked by puppets much smarter than me, and they didn't really come up with an answer. I've been trying to pick up a to-be-determined second major to "round out my options", but that's doublespeak for I don't know what the hell I'm doing in four years. I kind of figured this general feeling of inadequacy would fade after a bit after high school. Yeah, that happened.

Worst comes to worst, I could always write the screenplay for a gay movie. That has to pay, like, at least $15. Maybe $20 if I promise not to speak while the director changes everything I wrote on the page. I think I'd like that.

Second Day of Nothing

I like girls. I like guys. I have dated both.

So, here's the thing: I don't really want to make this into a big thing. I mean, I kind of do, but I really really don't. I've been slightly resisting making new posts on here, because none of the posts were really what I wanted to talk about. I have a few pending posts about wearing masks in front of different friends (that one is pretty interesting, you'll have to look forward to that one), about the grim skies of Pittsburgh, about the dramatic effect of rain upon writing style, the values of non-fiction/poetry hybrids. But all of them only touched on the issue that I was actually dealing with in my head the whole time. And, really, that's kind of what this blog has been helping me deal with. (You've just been inceptioned. Yes, that is a word now.)

This blog, for a long time, has been about the transition between adulthood and non-adulthood, about not being sure about what comes next. Well, ironically enough, I still have no idea what comes next. That much hasn't changed for me. Even being in college (yes, I have been woefully out of contact on this blog, and as my consolations I offer you one hundred million apologies, or two hugs, whichever you prefer) has only given me a slight reaffirmation of some things. (I like writing. Yay. I already knew that. Huh.) I'm still wavy on some other things. Like how to talk to someone you look up to. Or how to function in today's society without coming off as a twisted combination of a condescending prick and a socially awkward leper. Kind of like Jesse Eisenberg, but slightly more ethnic.

I feel like I've been hiding a bit of myself for awhile. In my poetry class I wrote a zuihitsu (I'll be posting that on this blog in a bit if you want a glimpse at my mind, slightly edited to protect some identities) about my experiences with masking a faction of myself. I was never changing my personality, but my answers to questions always varied slightly. I was never really honest about things, even if I avoided direct lies. It's like in sitcoms when the character comedically changes their words to skirt around a topic that one of the other characters conveniently can't know. But the world doesn't really work like that. I don't want it to work like that, at least. I have to break that cycle, if I ever want to be able to be happy. That's what this is.

Anyway, I haven't changed that much. At least I don't think so. If anything I've regressed. I fell back into my old pattern of wearing quirky t-shirts because that's how I felt comfortable. I got to remind myself that I was clever every day. I'm trying to break that habit, because I feel much better when I wear something that I like instead of what the people like, but things are slow going. Only a few things are constant.

I love my friends, get to know me and I'll do anything for you. I love my parents, and my sister, because despite their disfunction and occasional inability to stay in the same room, they are more than supportive of everything I try. I love my old team (you know who you are, We're what Willis was talking about). I love writing, because that's what drives me, through everything. And I'm queer.

That's me. No big changes. Nothing to see here.