Sitting Here Like…

Around 3:15 in the morning I reopen the store. The coffee is fresh, the music, still stale and stagnant and on repeat like it has been since I started here. I don’t see many people in the next hour and a half, but in that time I’m able to get most of my work done and somehow find my peace of mind.

For the last few years I have been in and out of places that I call home, but only temporarily because I know that it will eventually come to an end. I’m not talking about my life, although that does fall into the same category as the temporary housing I have found myself bouncing around in and out of.

Until now. Now I choose to stop bouncing.

I’m not going to accomplish this feat by getting a really well priced room in someone’s house. I’m not going to clear this task by finding the best priced apartment for my budget. In fact, I’ve already had my apartment for two years. It’s just that it’s not very big, doesn’t really have a lot f storage space and it also is on four wheels.

How did I end up choosing to live in my car for the next few months? Have you seen the rents here in Santa Rosa? You have to take out a loan just to come up with the security deposit and first and last months rent. I’m being facetious, but it is a very hefty down payment to move into a place for an entire year lease and know that you can’t get out, because if you do, you’re gonna lose everything. And by everything I just mean money. I don’t mean my possessions, although that could easily be something I left behind many times before.

While you are waking up, I’m getting ready for bed. And when you’re asleep, I’m sitting on the curb of a gas station at 11:30 on a Saturday night writing a blog about my life and hoping that you can relate to some part of it .

I’m not lost, but I’m not found either. I’m still trying to figure out my way here but while I’m doing it I shouldn’t have to work to live, and only end up living to work. I don’t think I’ve seen my girlfriend between the hours of 10 pm and 6AM for three months now, and I know that’s not very healthy for our relationship, but I took the first job I was offered after I quit the bar, and I don’t regret that decision.

And I mean I don’t regret quitting a bartending job that paid me over $50,000 a year to go work at a gas station that pays me less than $45,000. At some point, my sanity and my way of life is more important than an extra five or $6000 every year.

I can’t change my hours right now and honestly I don’t want to. I can count on one hand how many blogs I have written since October of last year and I’m not happy with the fact that it’s literally only four. But I needed this time, and I need more time to think and to figure out what I’m doing here and I’m going to end up doing it sitting on a curb at a gas station at 20 minutes to midnight on any given day of the week from Tuesday through Saturday.I’ll keep doing it until I get interrupted by a car pulling in to get gas, like I am right now.

I got to go, but in the meantime I’m not totally disappointed with where I ended up I just wanna know why. I still am still loving my life here, but I don’t have a clue as to where I’m going.

I guess it could be worse I could just not be here.

Im Gonna Shoot The Whole Day Down.

Today is just another Monday where I would have had the day off from work and I probably would have not really been able to accomplish everything I wanted to do within those 24 hours. I would have to prepare for the next workday and even though I have two days of free time following, somehow it never really seem to work out that way.

I think for two years I put on a fake smile and a cheerful disposition and made myself believe that money and good compliments were able to sustain my lifestyle years past the time I would work there. I got to be honest, I didn’t realize how shallow my needs are in life, if the only things that I really desire are legal tender to buy a bunch of shit I won’t really need ,and compliments from alcoholics who probably go home at 8, fall asleep maybe cheat on their wives. Who knows.

I defined myself by that job meaning I knew who I was because of how much I was appreciated and how hard of a job that I did there, that the members noticed…. that isn’t until 9 one day they didn’t notice.

I’m not saying that I am not memorable, I am not saying that my job there was more or less important than anyone else’s or that my absence would create such an uproar that people wouldnt stand for it, but I am saying that I never wanted to do that job to begin with. I did it because I had to. There was no one else.

There especially wasn’t anyone else who cared that much about the bun on someone’s lobster roll, and there wasn’t anyone else who committed themselves as much as I did, but in June of this past summer, I knew I couldn’t continue this. I couldn’t keep the charade going.

We are all tested at certain levels and moments in our lives that we sometimes don’t even realize what’s happening. If something terrible is falling down, its not the end of the world, it is making its way for something better to be built back up. Yet, we sit there picking up the pieces of what’s left wondering how we defined ourselves without the puzzle pieces all in the right place that we figured out so long ago.

You are not your job, nor are you the problems that you face when you’re there. You are not stuck in any situation that you cannot just walk away from physically regardless of how much financial debt you may think you’re in. You can walk up to your boss tell him to go fuck himself, or herself in the face and walk away legally. Whether you choose to do that or not up to you. But when somebody says to me their life is spiraling out of control, I don’t know what to do other than think… I wonder how did they let it get that way?

If my life is spiraling out of control, and I am saying this out loud to somebody, it has already gone too far for me to do anything about it.

I used to hate Mondays. I used to curl up in my bed like Garfield and muddle some sarcastic negative comments, pull the covers back over my head, and go to sleep .

Now that I am free to do whatever on whatever day I can’t sleep past 9 o’clock in the morning on Monday without having the feeling like I gotta do something .

It doesn’t matter what it is now. It really doesn’t. It’s just that sometimes I wanna shoot this whole day down cause I’ll be honest with you. I don’t like Mondays, and I never will.

Action and Actions

There’s something off about today. I went to bed with all the confidence in the world but no idea what I was going to do with it. I made a decision to simplify my life and that decision complicated someone else’s life. Of course they are just guinea pigs but they deserve better than what I can give them.

And simultaneously I am sending emails to corporate HR which I don’t want to do but I feel is the only way to get what I want. And what I want is to get back what was rightfully mine. I don’t know if I have to go through this to keep myself entertained or maybe there is a higher purpose for me to be where I’m at but I can tell you right now that no matter how high of a position I might climb to, I don’t know if I’m gonna be able to stand up once I get there.

I got these animals because I felt I was mature enough to be able to have a pet and to be able to be responsible to take care of them which I did in glorious fashion and fed them organic lettuce, carrots, cucumbers, peppers watermelon and pampered the hell out of those things and all I got in return was squeaks and two guinea pigs always running away and hiding.

Then two weeks later I took a major risk. One that I said I would never do but one that at the time seemed more possible then it ever had before. And also at some point I just couldn’t fight it.

I have never been pursued before in my life but I got to tell you, the longer I waited the better it has become. I have somebody in my life that loves me for who I am regardless of what my past may say or if my tone gets slightly frustrated when when the world starts becoming too much for me. She’s there to talk me off the ledge she’s there to trying to find my crazy, she’s there to talk to me and bring me back to earth.

I started off this journey almost 20 months ago and everything I owned fit into a suitcase and a messenger bag both of which I don’t own anymore, but I have certainly made up for the things that I didn’t have by now collecting too much stuff that I find myself getting rid of things more often than not.

I feel genuinely bad because I’ve never surrendered an animal but I knew it was the right thing to do just like I knew it was the right thing to be with her even though I was jaded and celibate and my mind kept telling me not to.

I don’t know how but I think I found the right formula for being me and getting what I want. And in the process I might’ve made some mistakes and I might’ve said some things I shouldn’t but I know this; Every mistake that I made, I couldn’t of made without you.

But I promise I’m never gonna make them again.

Is There Something Wrong With Me?

I sometimes wonder about the things that happen in my life. I mean, I know I didn’t choose the traditional path to get to where I am, and to be honest, I didn’t ever plan on this part of my life being a final destination, yet here I am. Spilling coffee on the carpet of my room on a Monday has become the standard. It’s like the setting sun, but with absolutely no happiness or warmth involved in the process.

Today though, today so far has been the most outrageous Monday morning I’ve ever had. Aside from the spillage, my cell phone somehow flew out of my hand as I tried to catch the falling water bottle in my car. I was unsuccessful and my car paid the price. As the water bottle exploded onto my passenger seat, my i-Phone spun out of control and lodged itself into the crevice between my dashboard and my windshield, fracturing the glass from the inside.

From the inside? I find it hard to believe a phone can crack a windshield, but here I am, in a place I never planned on living with the floor of my room reeking of French Roast, and the floor of my car soaked it what would have been the liquid used to hydrate me which I so desperately need, all while staring at a spiderweb crack in the glass that protects me from the elements.

This can’t possibly be normal, so I have to ask, is there something wrong with me? Did I do something in a past life that is coming back to haunt me now, because it sure feels like I’m paying the debt of someone I used to be. It does make me think, and thinking is what gets me agitated and overwhelmed. I used to love how creative and forthright my mind is, but when I can’t get to sleep at night because I’m dwelling on the present situation I’m in, it makes it a bit more difficult to live. When I’m having dreams where I’m chasing my car, my luggage and my safe down the street as I’m running from the police, and sharing an apartment with some girl I work with, I wake up in a state of confusion and remember I’m alone in my bed and that every fear I had was imaginary.

Sometimes I hate being me, so I try to turn off my mind, and I hope that it somehow makes the stupid things like spilling shit all the time stop happening, and I wonder if I keep doing this how long can I last before whatever it is I’m running from catches up to me.

Or maybe it isn’t even happening at all. I feel like no amount of therapy or drugs is going to be able to cure this sickness and even if I was free of whatever this thing is, what’s to say it won’t manifest in some other form in my life? Maybe it already has, because in forty seven years I have never been more clumsy, yet well off in my life. I’ve never had it all together and neatly organized behind door number one, and my clothes, shoes and coffee grounds all over the floor behind door number two.

This is the price I pay for loss of control, but there are only so many things in the world I can control. Clearly, water bottles, windshields and thermal coffee mugs aren’t any of them.

Wanting What You Get Is Different From Getting What You Want

I have grown accustomed to getting what I want in life. Whether it’s a specific ice cream at 2am, or if it’s a calculated uprooting of my life from the East coast to the West, I find a way to make it a reality.

That’s not a bad thing at. In fact, it’s a very good thing but some people would say you can’t always get what you want. I disagree. I can and I do always get what I want but only if I am specific, careful and sensible with what I ask for. Those last two things …..I’ve not always been great at in the past.

I struggled for a long time with this gift I have. I call it a gift because to be able to manifest anything you want is a gift that comes with responsibility. In the past I would get what I wanted, but then I would change my mind…or, I would fuck it up or break it down, or it would all fall apart. Everything would always inevitably fall apart. Until it didn’t.

Thing is, I loved my life back then. When I first moved back to Jersey I truly wanted it to work out. Contrary to popular belief, I didn’t want to destroy it, but destroying it is sometimes the only way to completely understand it, and maybe it’s a way to be able to have it again.

So I went out and bought the same kind of chair I had in 2016, wearing the same kind of clothes I had worn before while leafing through the same kind of magazines and smoking the same kind of weed. I listened to old and new music in the same kind of genres and in some sense, everything was like it used to be, except someone had come along and edited out almost everybody I knew before I got arrested.

However, just buying a gold pair of Nike Air max Zeros that I used to have five years prior isn’t enough to change me back into who I was, and honestly I didn’t want to be him, so much as I wanted the life he was living before he got all fucked up. I wanted to wake up without using an alarm clock, and I wanted to feel like I could do anything I wanted to without having to clear it with anyone. Then one day, I had it all.

I was ecstatic to be me again or should I say a newer version of me and I really wanted to share this news with anyone who would listen, but in another sense I have become less trusting and more cautious with whom I share details of my life with. I didn’t want anyone to pop my balloon or bring me back down to earth. I wasn’t sure if I would only end up feeling the way I felt in the past, which was misunderstood and doubted beyond belief. By the way, that fucking sucks. There is nothing worse than trying to convince someone that it’s raining outside who clearly can see I’m soaking wet, but refuses to look out the window at the weather. It’s like when I told people to buy bitcoin back in 2017 and they all just laughed at me and thought I was crazy. I may be crazy, but I was definitely not wrong at the time.

I have learned the hard way to just let some things go. I really do not care what people think of me now, but I did for a very long time. I cared so much to have someone validate me and say “you’re doing a good job” that I might have lost sight of who I really need to hear those words from. And that someone is me.

I wasn’t sure who I was or who I would end of being when all of the bullshit had subsided, and I didn’t think happiness was a possibility anymore. But here’s the thing…I AM happy and I DO love it here, and even though my social circle has dwindled to barely a three point curve, I wouldn’t trade my life now for any life I may have lived before.

I don’t care if you dangled a billion dollars in front of me, or a lifetime supply of Wawa diet Iced Tea, no amount of money or any single possession would get me to trade my life now, for any other, and I think that would make the one person I miss the most proud of who I have become. I know I am.

Only In Dreams

It’s some time before 9am on Saturday. I woke up with some recollection of a dream I can barely remember because life always starts out that way. Needing my attention immediately for some trivial act or noise I couldn’t help making this early in the morning. It seems like lately every thing I have to do somehow becomes a major issue to everyone else around me, and right now tbh, I wish there weren’t anyone around me.

I have not had the easiest time assimilating myself back into society. I come from a broken social scene, one where we express how we feel about something like I was taught to, but my words seem to fall on deaf ears, or impatient minds that can’t take a second to listen to what I’m saying or even allow me to finish this goddamn sentence in my head.

So I write it all down just in case the cancer that is forming in my brain needs an avenue to escape from. I wish there was a road I could walk down where I felt confident in the direction it’s taking me, but I seem to be stopping every now and then at almost every exit wondering if that’s the way I should go right now.

Not everything in life that works for me now is a sustainable act that I can keep up for a long time. It feels like the new challenge is living in a situation that is bearable, but could use some improvement that I know would work, but I can’t get the words out before I need to be able to pivot and keep going on.

I just wish I knew where the road is taking me. If I’m going to be one year older in one months time I want to be able to look back on the past year and really feel like I have evolved, and made some solid connections, and that the issues I had then were just faded memories now. I guess in some way it is like that, but why does it always seem like when one problem gets resolved, another murder mystery pops up begging for me to solve it.

Is there no one else around who is able to figure things out through deductive reasoning? Am I ever going to find peace of mind and body at the same time, or is this just a pipe dream that someone sold to me back in the day when I used to believe in my dreams?

The truth is, I kind of believe my dreams more than I believe my reality. Maybe that is an adolescent or immature way to live, but this is coming from someone in their forties who looks like they could be in their twenties, but who has enough life experience to convince someone that I’m in my thirties.

BTW, have you met anyone over the age of thirty lately? I have. They are like big kids who refuse to eat their vegetables but who also have mortgages, responsibilities and children, but who still refuse to listen to reason from another human being, unless that reason comes from that rectangle in their living room.

My dreams don’t lie to me, they have no idea what a lie is. My dreams don’t keep things from me, like what they are thinking, or the reason why they chose this course of action. They do, however create a cypher in my head that I spend the next few hours trying to decrypt, but by then the obstacles of the day have taken center stage and I stand there wishing I could just go back to sleep.

The Trade Off

It’s been about a year since I moved here. I can’t believe it’s only been, one year. You would think I have been living here for awhile since I know my way around,I have friends who think I’m a good person, and I hold a job where everybody knows my name. It takes ten years to become an overnight success, is what they say about Hollywood, but it only takes a year to be a success in Santa Rosa.

I don’t know how I’m doing it, but I think it’s a choice I have to make every day. Thing is, my life is good now, maybe even great, but even though the big things fell into place quite quickly, it’s the little things that fall to the ground, with help from gravity.

You might see me smiling at nothing when I’m stopped at a red light, or tapping on my dashboard to the beat of the song on the radio, or perhaps I’m holding hands with an attractive girl in the mall and you might think I’m happy, but don’t think for one second I didn’t earn it, or that I don’t have to work for it, because I do. I work for it, by making the little things a challenge. A challenge I don’t remember choosing to accept, but at this point I think it’s a trade off.

Yes, the struggle is real, and as soon as I can grip the tips of a plastic grocery bag and open in less time than it takes to write out this sentence, I will continue to have issues with the every day obstacles life puts in my path. Have you ever bought a box of band aids at a CVS, only to lose them in your car on the way to the Safeway, after you spent a good ten minutes looking for them with the flashlight on your phone and been unsuccessful? Then, when you finally give up the search and go into the store, you come out fifteen minutes later and the box of band aids is laughing at you from the dashboard where you swore you looked. That was just earlier tonight for me. Just one debacle in a series of simplistic routines that go awry more often than not.

Still…I can’t complain. And that’s not good for a blog with complaining in the title of it. I mean, truth be told, I’d rather have not much to write about because I’m out living the good life, then stringing together a bunch of depressing words and phrases to try and explain the pain, hurt, and aloneness I’m feeling. I guess it’s hard to feel like a loner if you don’t really feel alone.

I can remember a few months back where I asked to be shown the way. It wasn’t like some scene out of a religious scripture where I got down on my knees and prayed to God, but it was kind of the modern version of that. Maybe I asked the question out loud, or I sent God an email, I don’t know, point is, the last few times I’ve come to a cross roads and don’t know where to go next, I’ve been shown the way to go by someone coming into my life. And for the record, most people have exited my life the last few years. I didn’t understand why, they all left, but I get it now. It’s how we change as people.

I have stayed out of the spotlight for many years now. I went underground at some point in 2017 and since then I kind of got used to my life. It was safe, and controlled and only I knew the combination to the file cabinet with all the bad stuff in it that can hurt me. You know what stuff I mean, talking about things, human interaction, a healthy social life, love, trust and hope. All of those things were absent from my life until these last few months. So I don’t know when I went from being a loner to not having to be alone to know who I am, but I’m sure as hell never going back there anytime soon.

There’s something about this life that won’t let me go too far without knowing the safe word, and there’s something to be said about that. I guess for the first time in awhile I feel safe, and I feel ok with how it all went down. But I still have to work at it, which is why I have had to adjust the position of my laptop twelve times in the last three paragraphs.

I know what you’re thinking….Is it worth it? Is having the perfect life, one that you have always thought was possible but not a reality until now worth the trade off of dropping things on the ground or having them fall into your lap just because you moved an inch to the right a bit? Yes. It is worth it. It’s fucking great up here, and it feels good because I don’t miss anything or anyone anymore. I’m in it.

No Alarms and All Surprises

I woke up coughing in my bed, unable to get anything other than my own saliva out of my throat before I could breathe again like a normal person. I haven’t woken up choking on my own bodily fluids for a long time. I think it happens when I’m in a deep state of sleep, induced by the quarter gram of alprazolam I bit off some time in the middle of the night. It’s not my favorite way to be woken up, but at least I woke up.

Just saying that out loud is a good thing for me to hear. In fact, it wasn’t too long ago that I didn’t care if I woke up at all. I don’t know if that surprises anyone, or if anyone even gives a shit if I wake up or not, but I’d hope there are a handful of people who are still alive today who do care, but I wouldn’t bet on it.

I have had to put on a good show these last few months, and by that I mean exactly what I said. I’m literally living a three act play, or musical starring me, my alter ego, and all my drama which up until recently has been taking center stage. In between the scenes you might catch me backstage puking my guys out, or yelling into the mirror at a stage hand for doing absolutely nothing instead of something which is really all I wanted them to do.

I was going through the motions of life, yet I felt like I was far from living it. There is a difference between living life, and allowing life to happen to you, the latter of which I am trying to transition to. The simplest explanation I can give between the two is, one requires you to plan out every move you make, leaving nothing to chance. This method is practiced repeatedly in eighty five percent of people. They prefer and gravitate towards a routine. Wake up at 6am, make coffee, eat breakfast, get the kids ready for school, go to work, come home, make dinner, watch TV, go to bed. All alarms, and no surprises.

Then there is the second, less popular method of living life which is allowing things to happen to you that you don’t plan for. This method requires you to be flexible. It needs for you to let go of preconceived notions and realize that the only thing we really have control over in life are the actions we take towards the things in our lives, and the reactions we give out when things in life happen to us. It requires you to be more in tune with yourself and the world around you that you don’t even set an alarm anymore. Somehow, since I’ve been practicing this method I have been late for something, zero times.

For example, going through the motions of life would be I’m driving to Target and suddenly I am rerouted because of a road closure, so I follow the detour to get to where I want to go, not paying attention to anything else along the way. The second method starts the same way, but when I hit that detour I ask myself, “Do I really need to go to Target this bad? Or can I just get what I want somewhere else?”

Ironically, in that moment is usually when something pops up out of nowhere that has been there the whole time, but perhaps we hadn’t been able to see it because we were so focused on getting to Target. Had we looked up prior to this moment we might have seen that there was another store on the way that had exactly what we wanted, without making the whole trek through the detour.

There is nothing wrong with taking the detour to get where you want to go. Nine times out of ten, that’s what I do, but every now and then I look up and I happen to see something I wouldn’t have seen if I wasn’t so focused on this one task that I got blinded by it. It may not always be a golden opportunity, but I have to at least find out if it is or it is not. At least, that’s how I choose to live my life now. No alarms and all surprises.

The truth is, I’ve been a lot happier lately because I’ve redefined what happiness is for me. It’s not getting what I want, nor is it waking up every day without choking to death. For me, it’s seeing where life takes me naturally, without me having to try so hard to make it go in this direction, rather than that direction. There are still plenty of challenges and ups and downs, but I’m not deterred by them anymore, meaning if I can’t go forward right now, I’ll wait until I can go forward.

However, if there is a possibility of going forward by moving to the side slightly, then I’m going to go that route instead, and I’m not going to look back, ever. There is something about looking back while moving forward that is conflicting to my life and it does no good for me. Maybe it’s because I haven’t liked my past these last three years, but I’m starting to really enjoy the present. And that’s where I want to be right now.

You Can’t Go Home Again, But You Can Try

I guess I’ve always been good at moving on or letting things go yet to some degree, I can understand why it’s such a difficult task for people to endure. Maybe they need more time. Maybe they aren’t ready to see the other side, or maybe, they feel like IF, they see the other side, it would negate the stance they have been poised in for quite some time. Either way, it’s a difficult pill to swallow, especially if you’re dying of thirst.

I just got back from a nightmare of a road trip where everything I had planned on doing, ended up getting ruined by something I did or said years before which I can’t go back and change now. I thought I had cleared the air, or at least put those issues to rest years ago, but as I mentioned earlier, it is not an easy task for everyone to let things go. Even though one might say out loud, I’m over it, or I forgive you, or I’m sorry, just those words alone aren’t enough to make things better. They are nice to hear and it’s ultimately what we want to hear, but sometimes words alone can’t fix the damage that had been done.

I hadn’t been back in Los Angeles since the summer of 2018. During that time I was high as a kite, destructive, and angry at the world. I had just been arrested two months earlier and my life as I knew it was over and I took it out on a couple people who had nothing to do with it, myself, and my car, which broke down somewhere on the 405 before I had to leave it and all that I couldn’t carry with me at my old mechanics place in Hollywood.

I would eventually have to jettison most of the material possessions I brought with me to get home, and I had to go through hell in a suburb of Phoenix Arizona for a week with no ID, no money, and no phone. There I was dumping ecstasy pills and ketamine in a trash can outside of a Circle K because I knew I couldn’t take them with me on a plane. The flight took off without me on it due to TSA regulations. However, I swore one day, I would get all my stuff back. Not the drugs per se, but the blanket I had to leave on the side of the road, Madonna issue of Playboy in mint condition, the pillow I dirtied up while riding a Lime Bike through the city, and the fifteen or so articles of clothing I dropped off at a laundromat in Scottsdale and never picked up.

The people in my life at the time were understandably confused by my actions. How could it have gone so wrong for me? How was it possible that just a year ago I was having a goodbye party with twenty or so friends of mine at a bar in Los Feliz and now, I was getting blocked on social media and my phone calls and messages weren’t getting returned. I may have been physically in the same body as I was when I left, but I was not the same person inside and that was something I had to deal with for the next four years. It was not an easy road back to L.A. But when I got there, I realized something I hadn’t thought of before.

I can change everything about me from the way I look to the way I walk and the way I talk, but I can not change the perception of me that other people hold true. No matter how many storage ottomans I had to give away or buy back, regardless of all the court hearings and the months of probation and the certificate I received saying I have been successfully integrated back into society, if I said or did something to hurt or alienate you four years ago, it doesn’t matter what new person I have become. All you’ll ever see is who I was before.

I’m ok with that now. It sucks though, especially when you’re trying to turn over a new leaf, but as much as I wish people would be able to let go of those things I did or said which I expressed and remain remorseful about, I can’t make them let go of those feelings. I wish they would, and I hoped that they could, but as it turns out, not everyone is capable of letting go of the things that happened, and I don’t have the power to speed up the process. I would even venture to say that it is futile to try. I would be engaging in a great disservice to myself if I allowed their preconceived notions of me to become my reality now.

For a long time I envisioned myself going back to Los Angeles and having things go back to the way they were before. I thought, I could get my life back again just like I was able to get back that gold pair of Nike Air Max Zeros I used to have. Unfortunately, I was wrong about that life and like Thomas Wolfe once wrote, “You can never go home again, but you can try.”

He was right. I tried, but not everything can go back to the way it used to be, and I think I’m ok with that now. Truth be told, I didn’t like who I was four years ago, and apparently, neither did a lot of other people. I like who I am now. I like who I have become and I take with me all the responsibilities of that person I used to be, it’s just that, I’m really not him anymore. I wish other people could see that, but they don’t. They’re not ready, and I don’t think they ever will be. I’m learning, with a slight air of familiarity that I can only control what I put out into the world, not what people take from it.

I know they are just material possessions and they can never replace the relationships I’ve lost, but it does feel good to put my feet back into that pair of gold Nikes I used to have. I sleep well at night with the plush blanket I bought last week, and even though it’s not as comfortable as I remember, I can easily sink into that club chair I got off Amazon which replaced the one I accidentally left in the back of my car when I sold it three years ago.

As for my lost friendships and the unwillingness to let go of those hurt feelings, it’s a shame, but it’s also what I deserve. Even though it’s healthy to let go of who I used to be, I never let go of the desire to have the things I used to, which gave me some level of comfort during that time. Those things have been replaced, but not everything in life is as easy to replace as a pair of sneakers. But I can try.

This City Is Killing Me

This City’ Is Killing Me

As I rounded the corner of Sunset and Argyle, I noticed yet another business I used to frequent that has changed names, or remains an unoccupied building with no lessee in sight. There was something about the energy in Hollywood that made me feel like I was somehow in the middle of movie where corpses were walking around with no agenda, and lacking any sort of spirit. The town looked different, but even the perfect twilight weather and the most amazing Mexican food couldn’t blanket the feeling of emptiness that has now shrouded this neighborhood I used to call home.

“You can’t swim in a town this shallow.” are lyrics about L.A. from a Death Cab song called Why You’d Want To Live Here. When I first heard that track, way back in 2004 I understood the lyrics and kind of agreed with them, but for thirteen years I overlooked them in the hopes that maybe Ben Gibbard just had a bad few days in LA. But as much as I would like to keep living in my fantasy world about this place, Death Cab was right. It just took me another 18 years to feel it.

I could also include the track “Los Angeles” by Sugarcult or System Of A Down’s “Lost In Hollywood” as subtle hints as to what I would eventually find out, but again, my optimism was blinding me to some degree I’ll never let it get to again. “Phony people come to play. Look at all of them beg stay. You should have never trusted Hollywood.” says Serj Tankien of S.O.A.D. So true. But you can trust Hollywood to be exactly what you think isn’t.

The thing is, not only did I see that local business have turned into a Chipotle-JambaJuice Star-Target Mart, the people here are walking around oblivious to how it used to be and acting as if there is nothing wrong with a shallow existence in a soulless town just a few miles from the beach, the desert, Disneyland, the ocean, and the mountains. How ironic that so much beauty on Earth is located in the most vapid 90 square miles in the country.

On paper, it’s a no brainer. You’d buy this dream in a heartbeat and maybe you would even do things you didn’t want to do to get where you wanted to go. Maybe you’d make excuses for the truth, taking into account how you never wanted to admit you were wrong, or you never wanted to admit that you had seen this display of entitlement all along but you believed one day it wouldn’t matter……but that day never came, and it most likely never will.

I had heard from a few people how different it was, and I believed them, but I really needed to see it with my own eyes, and feel it in my own heart. And what I saw was a perfect illusion. A smoke and mirrors display on the biggest stage in the world, and I clapped at the end of it because it was so mesmerizing. But what I felt, was something worse than disappointment. It was the emptiness and the stubbornness that you thought people would have outgrown by now.

You know, I have spent the last year going through my life and wishing for the first time ever, that it could be “like it was before.” Someone might say that’s a foolish way of thinking, but although I agree now that they are correct, I couldn’t just take someone’s word for it, I had to see it for myself.

I’m not saying L.A. is a terrible place. If you are happy with complacency, and somewhat attractive, and don’t mind driving a lot everywhere, and paying for parking even when you know you didn’t have to, and have some dream of being famous then yeah, this place is for you. But if you have a big heart, and a conscience, or you like to help people, but don’t mind them never helping you, or stabbing you in the back, then I can only this. I don’t see why you’d want to live here.

How To Avoid Looking Like A Dumbass While Driving

It’s around 2:30 in the morning on Monday the 12th of September. I decide to drive to the 7-11 for a few late night snacks and maybe if I’m lucky, some cheaper gasoline. I’m listening to my latest playlist entitled “Summer is Back with a Vengeance” and even though there are less than two weeks of Summer left, the title still resonates with that terrible heat wave all last week. My music is loud, and there’s no one on the road and it’s perfect. I love it. I like to totally immerse myself in music when I drive, and usually that results in me blocking out the rest of the sounds of the world around me.

The whole ride there I feel good. I have the next three days off, I’m stoned, and I hear the lyrics to the song say “I Just Wanna Go Fast Baby” and that’s exactly what I want to do, but 40mph is as fast as I drive nowadays. I pull into the parking lot, and I pull up to the gas pump, rock out to the last few seconds of the song and then I turn off the engine, realizing I’m on the wrong side of the pump, but I decide not to get gas tonight anyway. I get out, and I accidentally bump into my own car. I’m sure that is the result of a mixed bag of THC induced stumblization, and a little fatigue so I laugh out loud cause it’s funny to me when I lose my balance.

However I can’t say it’s amusing to everyone, especially those two guys hanging out in front of their SUV’s who are dressed in police uniforms and who I can only assume heard me coming down the street and watched me almost fall down when I got out of my car. I immediately stop laughing, and clear my throat and walk into the 7-11 unable to think of what to do or say next.

It’s too late to apologize, and even if I did, that would be drawing more attention to myself, as if I didn’t have enough being drawn to me in the first place. I make my way down an aisle and I wonder if I have just given them probable cause to search me and my car, which would be a futile attempt to catch me doing anything illegal, but also an activity I would rather just avoid all together.

I proceed to take about fifteen minutes to do ninety seconds of shopping while I look for a back door to escape out of. I’m killing time inside the 7-11 just to wait them out, and I forget that I haven’t done anything wrong, but my paranoia comes full circle and it always stems from the three dozen or so incidents in New Jersey when I was pulled over for anything and everything and then ticketed for pretty much the same anything and everything, none of which mind you, was ever a traffic violation.

In my head I’m running through my checklist of things that I have on me or are already current on my car so as to not give them any reason to ticket me, or pull me over if that were to be the likely scenario once I leave. If, I leave that is. Perhaps I’ll just take a nap next to pump #6 until they leave first, but it’s in that moment when I realize I have forgotten something at home that I might need in this situation. My driver’s license.

I’m paying for my items with the cash I grabbed from the car, realizing I only have $10 on me. The total has already reached $10.75 when I ask the clerk to stop and not ring up those last two packages of cupcakes. I look at the price, I apologize for being short, and then I ask him to wait a moment because I remembered all that coin change I have in my car outside. Outside… in the parking lot… where the cops are going to be…. most likely watching every step I take back to the car and then back into the store, only to come back out again a minute later.

I had no choice now. I was seventy five cents short, no debit or credit cards on me, much less ANY form of ID, and I had already ate one half of a pumpkin spice muffin and had gone back for another one when I decided to leave everything on the counter and go get those three quarters so I could go the fuck home, hopefully while not being tailgated or watched by the police.

Now, I know some people might say my paranoia was the result of inhaling the smoke from a marijuana cigarette which then proceeded to fill my brain with inaccurate thoughts of this particular situation, but no, that isn’t the case at all, Me blasting music at 2:30am while driving and bumping into my own car when getting out of it and looking up to see those two people were actually Rohnert Park Police is ALL my fault. Don’t be blaming the weed. As I have said before, I take full responsibility for everything that happens to me, good or bad and I own it. But I’m having a hard time owning this one, without fearing what I know might happen, but which also is most likely not going to happen.

In New Jersey, if you breathe wrong or look like me you get pulled over and bullied and if you aren’t smart enough to talk your way out of it, or if you don’t have you’re shit together, they’ll find a way to give you a ticket. I haven’t had a moving violation in a decade but in the four years I lived back there I acquired four tickets that also required me to go to court to pay them, instead of just being able to pay online. Failure to obey traffic signals, Invalid License Plates, Failure to make repairs, Cracked windshield, and oh yes…failure to possess ID documents are all the tickets I had amassed in less than eighteen months in NJ. Even though I lived there for four years, after the last ticket, I had to sell my car cause between the repairs and the tickets, it was bankrupting me.

So I’m naturally paranoid when I see cops, let alone when I stumble out of my car like an idiot in the middle of the night, in front of two officers who, I’m sure probably thought I was drunk as fuck. Yet, I almost forgot where I was for a second. I’m in California, and I wasn’t doing anything wrong. Foolish? Maybe, but I don’t get pulled over here for stupid shit because the cops aren’t corrupt. Well, IDK for sure but I do know that as I walked back to my car and got in, I made eye contact with one of the policeman and I nodded, and I think he understood.

What that nod was meaning to convey was how sorry I was for acting like an idiot in their presence, and in no way does that reflect on my driving ability nor does it mean I am impaired in any way, shape, or form. I don’t remember if he even acknowledged my attempt to level the playing field, but I started my car, and drove off into the night unfollowed and without a ticket. That would have NEVER happened in Jersey.

I’ll take that as an unwritten warning, one which I won’t need to endure again because at the end of the day, I learn from my mistakes now, and I don’t repeat them for obvious reasons. Will I ever be so relaxed that I wouldn’t have even seen those cops in the parking lot before they saw me? Maybe. Maybe not, but either way next time there won’t be any need for me to think about it because it just won’t happen again. I’ll still be driving around blasting my music and I’ll probably stumble over my own sneakers again, but it won’t be probable cause to be pulled over and searched, it’ll just be some dumbass thing I do when nobody is looking, and I can live with that.

The Routine Of Not Having A Routine, Is My Routine.

I have had several routines in my life over the last four years. Not all of them would I choose to repeat though. You couldn’t pay me enough to wake up at 6am every morning, have me make my bed and stand outside my cell, NOT holding my morning cup of instant coffee right before I sit on a cold steel table and watch a movie with no sound. That was my jail routine. Never need to repeat that again to know I don’t want to go back there. But what it made me realize, amongst other things, was the advantages to having a routine, just with a few slight changes to it. First of all, our story doesn’t take place in a jail, at least not a physical one, but life can be jailing if we let it. I should probably mention that it would be in your best interest to think outside the box here, and pretty much in all of life if you want to know a secret.

Anyway, back to this routine that has changed a lot for me. See, I never liked routine when I was younger because I associated it with boring. “Don’t you get tired of doing the same thing everyday?” I often ask people of routine. “Isn’t predictability the step son to a wasted existence?”

It would be correct to say I shied away from all of those things, however as much as you resist some thing in life, you in fact, cause it to persist. So, eventually I found my way back to routine again and I think I get it now. I would like to first mention I’m still not an advocate for boring, or predictable, but a routine can and has fit into my life now, and if I were to describe any part of it to you, those are not the feelings I hope you would get after reading about it. But, if you do feel that way, why are you reading this blog in the first place?

Speaking of, writing this blog actually IS part of my routine. I mean, I haven’t had the longest streak lately of doing the same comforting things over and over again, and that’s probably why my nerves are shot, and my patience when I’m alone and no one can see, is laughable and quite non existent too. I know what is causing it all, and this week feels like I’m finally passing the hazard on the side of the road and it’ll be in my rearview in 3, 2, 1.

I’ve had to adjust my life to fit my surroundings multiple times since I moved here. First, it was living in a trailer with not many possessions and looking for a job and a car and getting my California license. Then it was adjusting to the sleeping schedule my roommate kept which I had to adopt as my own being that I shared a room with the kitchen, TV, and living area. Then it was moving all my stuff which had grown exponentially to cause me to rent a storage unit and keep other things in my car. Then, just when I got used to that routine, I moved into a room in a shared house where for four days last month, I finally was able to put all my things and settle down, only to have to pack everything up again and move it somewhere else.

Here’s a thought, perhaps my routine of not having a set routine is in fact, my routine. I don’t want that routine though. It’s not one that I find benefits me at all. It’s annoying, and unsettling and I hope the next move I make will solidify my life into a structured set of things I do, and will be the last time I have to adjust my residence to fit my surroundings…at least for another 6 months or so.

Next week I will begin a new routine. I’m moving again, my work is restructuring some things and I’m on for more days than I asked for. Something I have wanted for awhile. I guess to get what I want right now, I have to act like there is another option out there and actively seek it out to get the thing I really want to take notice and want me. It’s almost like dating in a strange way.

Ok, maybe I’m not going out and having a drink with my wants and needs, but I’m flirting with the idea of what else is out there, and what seems to have happened this week is that the thing I originally asked for is going to be what I get. Look, I don’t care how I get it, as long as it comes relatively soon. The only thing I would want to know now is next time, how do I get it faster?

Oh right, patience. Patience, is also part of my routine and so is making coffee at 10am when I wake up, and drinking it out of my thermal mug on the patio while smoking a cigarette and scrolling through Reddit. When I don’t have that small, predictable, yet needed routine, I just go crazy. Not even in a way that makes sense, but in that way that only I can understand because I know what it’s like on the other side. I’m sure we all do things when we’re alone that couldn’t be justified or understood by everyone. Maybe we scream at inanimate objects, maybe our frustration causes us to forget to pick up our keys, wallet, or phone, or maybe we cry at stop lights because the pressure is too much. It doesn’t matter, because those moments are needed to balance us out.

The next routine I get into will start soon, and this one, where I complain about it will be ending, and I can stop tripping over all my belongings I have piled in the center of my room. It looks like I live in a storage right now. A lovely, carpeted 10×10 foot storage unit with electricity and wi-fi and all of my shit packed up in the middle with a bed laid out in the corner.

Could be worse I guess, but never something I want to get used to. I’m ready for the next phase of my life. And after that, I’ll be ready for the next one. I’m just gonna make sure my little routines never get broken again.

I’m The Bad Guy

As I am packing my belongings up again, for the second time in two months, I am simultaneously ok with this unexpected move, and also completely annoyed to the point where every piece of tape or pushpin I remove from the wall is driving me crazy. I didn’t want this to happen, but I’ve come to accept in life, 10% of it is shit that happens to me, and 90% of it is how I react.

If I can be totally honest, I’m giving the middle finger to my slumlord who conveniently flip flopped on our rental agreement, but only, of course AFTER I paid rent for the month of August. I ignored the red flags in the very beginning because I needed out of a horrific situation where I couldn’t sleep more than a couple hours a night, and I had no privacy. I don’t think I made a terrible choice at all, I just shouldn’t have taken someone for their word, which is a sad state of mind to be in. I just can’t understand why this is happening, how I’m going to come up with another first and last months rent in 21 days, and if my original plan of splitting my time between a storage unit and the back seat of my car is a viable option.

I’m a pretty straight forward person, and when it comes to sharing a space with people, I’m considerate because I’ve had to share a jail cell, with two dozen inmates over the course of six months, a halfway house, with 31 other dudes who were the furthest from empathetic and understanding, and a 27 foot trailer with one other senior adult, who didn’t act like one towards the end, and believe it or not, the trailer was the toughest challenge I’ve had to date.

Somehow, I find myself in a situation where I’m always the prime target to be painted as the bad guy. I’m never the victim, I’m always the passive aggressor, but ONLY when it fits their story and ONLY if you ask them what happened, without asking me the same.

Am I really the bad guy, or is it just a convenient label and easier to point the finger at me, some forty something punk kid with a record who never grew up and who somehow catches flack for working less than 40 hours a week, but who still pulls in decent money and never is late on rent or strapped for cash.

I’ll be the first to admit I am not the easiest person to share a confined space with, but give me my own room, and I’ll be fine and you won’t even know I’m there unless of course, you’re looking for something to go wrong, which at that point is on you. Why would you want something to go wrong, unless you’ve been conditioned to think that is just how it is.

I don’t live like that. At least not anymore. It’s beneath me. Sure, there was a time when I couldn’t enjoy the moment and I was always waiting for the other shoe to drop, but the cure for that mentality, at least for me, was to lose every material possession I had in the world, the two people I cared about most, be stuck in a place I didn’t want to be and have to work and build my way back to a life I feel was somewhat familiar to what I had before.

Where’s the selfishness in that? Has everything in life been given to you, or have you had to work and sacrifice to get what you want? If you’re like me, I had it easy for awhile, then I lost it all and the dark clouds hung around my life for four years. But, now that I have it again, I appreciate it more than before and don’t think for a second I’ve forgotten how hard it took me to get back here.

Maybe I’m not the bad guy, but maybe I have to be sometimes because those people pointing the finger aren’t strong enough to look inside and ask themselves what could they have done differently, nor are they confident enough to speak up about something that bothers them until its too late.

I spent a lot of time restless in my bed thinking along those lines, and now I sleep through the night, and I don’t feel bad about who I am and where I came from. At the end of the day, sometimes I have to play the part of the bad guy. It’s fine. Sometimes you need to appear one way just so someone else can make sense of their story.

I just wish I wasn’t so god damn good at it.

Who Am I, Where Am I Going & How Did All This Stuff Get Here?

Eight months ago I knew the answer to all three of those questions. I was a youngish man about to start over in life for a third time, on my way back to California and the only stuff I had, was the suitcase I bought and packed with all my clothes in the world, my two pairs of shoes, and the backpack I carried with me which held my computer, some documents, odds and ends, and a bag of weed I held onto for a few weeks before and after I arrived
here.

I was confident for the first time in awhile because I knew those three details about me, and after two years of trying to fit a square peg into a round hole, I no longer felt constricted.

But life is ever changing. Not everyone knows the answers to those three questions all the time, and if they know the answer to one, who’s to say in a month or two, that the answer will be the same. I was pretty sure of who I was and where I was going because I had a ID card, and a train ticket. However, there wasn’t much “stuff” in my life that I owned like physical things. Whatever material possessions I had in the world fit into that suitcase or that backpack, or were in the custody of the NJSP but I would get those back eventually.

Life was simple then. I didn’t have much, and I didn’t require much, but I had the means to survive without a job for two months during this transitional period thanks in part to the small weekly investments I made in bitcoin over the past year, and the sudden ability to save money that I never possessed in the past.

Almost two weeks after my move to Northern California, I was a licensed California driver again, with a modest $3000 Nissan Sentra sitting in the parking lot, I was about to start my new job right after the Thanksgiving weekend, but something was off. Sure I had been a bartender for many years, but during the last three, my social skills had not gotten the workout they needed, and, I was, in a sense a little rusty like a metal garden rake which had been left out in the rain since the beginning of the fall.

Then the inevitable happened. I stopped knowing the answer to those two questions. When I got off the bus November 10th, I could tell you exactly who I was and where I was going, and the third question didn’t really apply to me at the time, but that would change with every week that went by and with every paycheck I suddenly found myself in the middle of an identity crisis, with plenty of ways to distract myself by purchasing things I thought would make my life a little easier and more able to be defined.

The stuff we own, ends up owning us said Tyler Durden, but if you don’t have any stuff at all, then who owns you? At this point I was thinking short term, plus I only had about 35 square feet of space to “decorate” so I did what I knew was the most convenient and cost effective, I printed pictures of the people I cared about and the celebrity women i wished I could have dated but never did, and hung them up around my area, which was furnished with the plastic milk crates you find behind 7-11 stores that are marked with the phrase, “its is unlawful to possess this milk crate for personal use.”

I was getting back into my character, which is a little rule breaking bad ass attitude east coast kid who shows up to town and is planning on….leaving as soon as possible. Honestly, I couldn’t tell you what the fuck I was doing here or who I was. For months the unfamiliar feeling of not knowing who I was became a familiar feeling that I couldn’t get used to. I started trying to plot my escape back to a familiar backdrop like Seattle or Los Angeles, but phone calls to friends and associates had proven to be less promising than I had anticipated. It felt like something was keeping me here for now, and this time I just went with the flow, like when you turn onto the 101 South on ramp and it’s bumper to bumper.

I didn’t need to touch the gas for awhile, so I just cruised.

Spring time would come and I would be met with the challenges of suddenly outgrowing my thirty five square feet of space. I wasn’t able to sleep very much as long as I lived in the trailer, nor was I able to keep most of my possessions with me, unless I spread them out to include the space in the trunk of my car, and to a lesser extent, the backseat. I had suddenly dropped fifteen pounds and the shirts I bought 100 days ago didn’t fit me anymore. I had storage containers in my car, and I had just got back my old laptop which had been out of my possession for four years, and for weeks I searched those files in the hopes that I would find some more forgotten bitcoin, and perhaps a clue as to who I am now, because I could answer only one of those questions I asked myself when I got here,

Who was I? I didn’t really know.
Where was I going? I knew the short term answer, but I had no idea where I was headed, and I knew exactly how all this stuff got here. I bought it, I have always been a person who feels better when he buys something he wants, over something that he needs, so when my roommate saw my collection of sixteen rolls of colored duct tape she couldn’t hep but ask, why?

Simple answer, before I lost everything and went to jail, I had a collection of duct tape that rivals the selection at Target. I had dozens of memories encapsulated inside of moderately priced picture frames, and furniture that I loved but lost or gave away in the move/downsizing of 2018. I also had a wardrobe that was color coordinated and contained upwards of 125 different t-shirts, with only twenty or so in my regular rotation. I had eight pairs of sneakers, three external Hard Drives, two computers, and the list went on, but I didn’t have any of those things anymore, yet I was determined to get them back in the hopes that they would help me to define who I am now, because the only other things that felt familiar to me was the pain and loss and anger I carried with me on my back like a cross which I would have ended up nailing myself to if I weren’t careful.

So I started with the duct tape. At $4 a roll I could easily afford to pick up two new colors a week and it helped to make me feel more like me. Now a somewhat healthy size medium, I started slowly searching for my favorite t-shirts I had back in the day, and I looked at all the photographs I took before I got arrested. I was thinking these pictures I hadn’t seen for years would cheer me up and give me a clue about me, but I ended up feeling like I was trying to build something out of false memories.

Sure my Mom and cat were solid ground to build on, but they aren’t here anymore. The pictures of my friends from high school, the weddings I went to, and the life I had in Seattle and Hollywood all seemed like the right places to start rebuilding my identity, but after weeks of rifling through folder after folder of the past which I thought would save me, I had come to the realization that those memories were nothing but hollow bricks that I used in the past to support myself, but I know I can’t build a foundation out of air and filler and expect it to last. So I had to start over, again, to find out who I was, now that I didn’t need to feel validation from anyone about my life except for me.

I think is was around May 16th when I started to realize I was about to face an all or nothing type of decision in my life. I don’t like the, all or nothing at all mentality, per se, but it is a definitive way to figure who you are and what you can handle. I chose to put out the effort at work, and change the course of my life by accepting the fact that work is merely an exchange of our time for money to live the life we want to live.

That’s the dream. For me it’s not about having a lot of stuff, its about having the stuff that I appreciate which makes me feel like me again. So when June came around and I was now keeping stuff in my car, in the trailer, and in the storage unit I was renting, I knew that this was a transitional period in my life that would soon be over because the only thing I despise more than not knowing where things are, is knowing where they are, but also knowing that they could be in one of three places.

On June 28th of 2022 I was rewarded with a new schedule and a night to bartend all by myself, a very lucrative paycheck that went to the first, and last months deposit on my room rental, the sudden and surprising Walmart Visa credit card approval which I used to help buy my bed and bed frame, and the familiar, yet forever fleeting feeling of confidence I used to have knowing who I was now.

July 1st was the first time since November of 2021 I could tell you who I was, where I was going and how all this stuff got here.

It’s easy for me to define who I am when I have material possessions. I can point to a picture on my wall and remember that I never thought I’d spend two hours staring into a hole in the desert called the Grand Canyon, but I did. More than one time actually. I love that memory and I like that picture which I’ll post below. Starting over in a new town is like getting a second, third or maybe fourth chance at reinventing yourself, and when you do that, you start to find out who you are, by remembering who you are not.

Today, I’m just a guy who knows how to get what he wants in life and who isn’t scared to try something new, because I’m not afraid. I’m not afraid of failing, and I’m not afraid of doing something only to find out it’s not for me. I would rather try, fail and try than never try at all.

At the end of the day, no one handed this life to me. I claim responsibility when I destroyed in it 2018, but I also spent the last four years building it back up from nothing. I’m surprised at how easy life has been for me lately, but it’s not because anyone gave me a golden ticket. It’s because the only way I know to make it through this life, is to take what’s in front of you. If you don’t, someone else will.

Today I know all the answers to those questions, but that doesn’t mean I’ll wake up tomorrow and still know the answers. However, I’ll never forget who I am again. Not because I have the same t shirt and shoes I was wearing the night I got arrested, but because I know all the memories I have are inside me, and no one can take them away from me. Although, I will say, it’s nice to look up and see them hanging on my wall everyday. It’s where they belong for now. That may change tomorrow, but I can only live in the moment. And right now, the moment is good.

IDK If I like Living, But I’m Happy I’m Still Alive

Friday, July 8th 2022 1:30am

I can’t tell you why it happened this way, but I’m learning why as I go, and it goes whenever it wants to, so I can’t make anything happen until I have waited for my opportunity, and then grabbed whatever olive branch life was handing to me. I don’t know if I’m happier than before because I don’t measure my life in terms of plus one or negative one. I just go with the logical and most times obvious choice, and I think staying here for another few months, working a lot, and moving into my own room in a shared house is the right step for me.

I gotta admit, it feels good. It feels good to be alive for the first time in awhile. I don’t know if I like living, but I’m happy I’m still alive. To not have something like privacy for the second time in five years really makes me aware that I constantly will now work towards there never being a third time. Being in jail and sharing a single wide trailer with a woman born in the sixties is all it takes for me to be appreciative of the fact that I’m sleeping on my new bed, on my new bed frame, no box spring either, in my room with the door closed writing this at 1:30 the morning.

I admit it. I missed my past life before I got arrested and I never looked back at my life before and felt that way. I missed feeling free. I missed my Mom and my cat too, but I know they aren’t coming back, yet there I was going through all my old files and pictures and it appeared prior to April of 2018 life was OK. I could have used some extra money, but I was golden. I was moving back to L.A. I had a job there, and I had furniture. That is, until I didn’t.

I did go back to L.A. but I only could stay five days before it all fell apart and I found myself clinging to a ripped plastic bag somewhere in the Arizona desert using my t-shirt as socks and completely lost and alone and at that point, I realized, if I did ever make it out of there alive I wasn’t going anywhere for awhile.

And in that time I dreamed of having just one picture back so I could remember what it was like. What was it like to be me before it all got so fucked up and unnecessary?

Thing is, it kind of HAD to go that way eventually. There was no other logical culmination of events that could have taken place. If it all is meant to work out a certain way, then I literally created this struggle I went through, to learn to appreciate life’s simple things, like the 8 hours of sleep which I got Wednesday for the first time in seven months.

I’ve been doing similar things as before. I still frequent a CVS three times a week and use those coupons for shit I might not need, but it makes me happy to have it. I feel like I am more myself now than I was before.

That is to say, I am more like the me I wanted to be then than how I used to be. Maybe I’m a little materialistic, but what really makes me happy is to get the little things I had before, back in my life now. That’s why I’m writing this on my laptop that the police took from me 4 years ago, but returned to me, last year. It’s satisfying and almost comforting to buy the exact same club chair that I had in my apartment in Jersey in 2017, in a different color. It’s blowing up a picture I took at the Deadmau5 show back in Seattle and hanging that print on my wall again that made me feel like it was home.

Material things don’t necessarily make me happy, but these particular items I’m bringing out of retirement, so to speak are things I never wanted to let go of. It’s simple when you just decide to see what you want to see, and know what you really know. And that is how I got through this and came out almost spotless on the other side.

It took four years to get back to this point. Four years where I had to do something else, to get to the point where I’m at now which is the best place for me to just sit and wait for the next opportunity to arrive.

I’ll be ready for it too…even if it takes another four years to get here.

Poison The Well

No one is as good as I am at two things in this life. Number one, I’m the best at over thinking any situation at any time of the night or day. I proved that theory immediately with this blog that I didn’t want to write about a situation that I don’t want to be in. But, life is always a constant trade off of doing things you don’t want to do, in order to do the things you do want to do, so here it is.

The second thing I do better than anyone else is sabotaging my not too distant future, by making a shitty decision or decisions in the immediate present or a few minutes ago. I think I’m making a smart choice by eating that handful of goldfish behind the bar as I’m working, but I forgot that I have to chew them for at least 25 to 30 seconds and there is no way to hide what I’m doing without a mask on, or without moving my big ass lips. Which of course, I immediately have to do as I turn around and see that a guest has walked into the restaurant,

“Hello there!”

I say from a muffled position next to the sink. And if it’s not a guest coming around the corner, it’s my Jim, the other bartender I work with three, ah, two nights a week now. He is the complete opposite of me in almost every aspect of the job, except we both have twenty plus years experience doing this job. In fact I think Jim has 30. Recently I have been made aware of an issue I did not know I was having at work.

I guess being in your head a lot has it’s advantages. I’m always prepared for anything, especially when someone else is trying to sabotage me. I can smell that from a mile away and it has been happening for the last month or so, at my work, and the Toad, err, Jim is responsible for the saba-tagie!

Thing is, he picked a pretty horrible time to try and get away with it. I’m the master of self sabatoge, so when I’m making a conscious effort to change for the better, any sort of distraction or negativity towards that effort sticks out like a sore thumb, and it’s even MORE obvious to me now when I just caught that Toad blatantly talking shit about me to a guest while I was in the back. Luckily, I appear seconds before either one of them realized I was in earshot so I’m able to catch the last few words of a conversation, which immediately goes quiet when they see I’m closer than they thought.

So, if you haven’t figured it out, I’ve been having some issues with one of the bartenders I work with. He is older, and rounder, balder and sadder than me, yet he isn’t jolly nor do I even think he has a sense of humor. I wonder sometimes if it’s a good thing that he has 32 years of bar experience, or if he just hasn’t evolved since the early 1990s when he first started mixing drinks and nit picking his workspace.

So, here I come with my sense of familiarity blazing, because I’ve done that trick before where I’m talking about someone I work with just as they re-enter the audible space we’re in. I’ve had my hands resting on the bar and tried to signal the other person I’m talking to by waving a few fingers in the air. I know it got way too quiet when I walked up at the right time to hear, him say

“Yeah, I have problems trying to manage some of the people I work with as well.”

Yet still, even though I called him out about talking shit about me he, then tried to sell me on the lie he was just “waving goodbye” to that guest. The guest who was still sitting at the bar? When was the last time you waved to anyone who is still sitting directly in front of you and not a few feet away, which would constitute the need for a wave.

It’s so ridiculous that it’s not funny. Its perplexing and confusing. The reason why is because when I started there I was not up to speed with my walking and drink making skills. It had been four years since I tended any bar and now I found myself in a private golf club establishment on a mountain in Santa Rosa wine country California where everyone has a name, a member number, and is that unfamiliar shade of white privilege. Rich enough to afford to bitch about the little things, but dependent on them because the little things are what keeps you in balance.

I get it now. I used to get worried and stressed because I wanted to make a good impression. After all, these members literally pay my salary, so when I had the chance to sharpen my skills so to speak, I took those tips the Toad gave me and I ran with them. I bought the little notebook, I left the bar and took some tables, I laughed at jokes that weren’t funny, and I made a few myself right before I walked back into the kitchen with their extra ramekins of ketchup, ranch, bleu cheese and garlic aioli. I gave 110%, I didn’t complain about anything or so I thought, and I started becoming almost happy to be there.

The funny thing is, it fucking worked. I started implementing these suggestions he gave me and within a week or so I was getting extra tips on top of the gratuity. People were handing me cash or coming in to see me Friday night and maybe sit on my side of the bar instead of the other side and I could tell they noticed a change in me because they were smiling and not giving me a hard time just to see how I’d react.

I did what I needed to do. I stepped it up and I got noticed and I took advice from this person who now, suddenly is being so petty that he has resorted to micro managing me while I’m drinking a glass of coke through a straw behind the bar. He was once giving me tips on how to make a black manhattan, until I guess I started making the drink too well. I made it so well that I didn’t need him anymore to give me help, although I appreciate it, I think I got this now.

What started out so meaningless for me, actually became something I looked forward to. Work. I wanted to be there. Honestly I thought he’d be happy that I got to be a better, stronger, more confident soul behind the bar, but it appears that not everyone liked my new found popularity and my success has only made him bitter, like the bottle of Angostura I put in each and every Old Fashioned.

There are only two explanations for this sudden about face. I’ve thought about this for a week now waiting for this chance to have a sit down with the him and the managers, and the only two things that make sense are if this is about money, or if it’s about spite. And, believe me, I hope it’s about money and popularity because that would be easier to stomach instead of knowing you’re acting like a bitch and poisoning the well for selfish and childish reasons.

If it’s about money, I really don’t think two hundred dollars here or there makes that much of a difference in how you treat someone, but its it does, take it. My life isn’t complete or falling apart if I don’t make a certain amount of money every week. It used to be that way, but I’ve grown up.

I wish I could say the same about you.

Four Days In L.A. (Part 4)

I wake up in Tasha’s bed after a quick three hour nap that I wish was longer. The fan is blowing on me because it is hot as fuck in the San Fernando Valley, and ever since early May I haven’t been able to go to sleep without the sound of a fan blowing in the background for some reason. We have plans to meet our friend Dave for dinner, which was originally supposed to be lunch, but had to be changed because of the massive amount of sleep that I did not get the night before, coupled with the copious amounts of alcohol I ingested.

We’re supposed to meet him at 7pm, but of course it’s closer to 7:20pm when we finally arrive at Delancey on Sunset. We say hello, and I apologize for Tasha’s tardiness which always seems to surprise me even though the girl has made a career out of being late. At one point a few years back, we were headed to Jersey for one of my friends weddings. Our flight was set to take off at noon, but to make sure we got there on time, I had to lie and tell Tasha that the flight was taking off at 11am. Needless to say, when it was 10:15 and we were driving in the car to the airport, she thought we were going to miss our flight and was genuinely concerned.

“I’m sorry I took so long. Are we going to miss our flight?” She asked

“Nope.” I replied

“How are you being so calm about this?” she asked

“I lied. The flight doesn’t take off for almost two hours.”

“Asshole.” she says with a smile.

Asshole maybe, but I’m an asshole with good intentions.

Tasha and I sit across from Dave and we start to eat and drink and talk about the last few months. There is a history between the three of us that goes back to the Trent & Tilly days from 2012. After we wrote, shot, and edited our first webisode, our director quit on us because he was afraid of being sued cause we were using a Beastie Boys song in our opening credits. It made absolutely no sense to us because once we uploaded it to You Tube, it recognized the song and wouldn’t allow us to use it, so we had to change the music to something non-descript to avoid music licensing infringements. Instead of getting all upset (which we did) the next six episodes were directed by Dave Parker who is more known for his work in the horror genre than the comedy genre. We went on to make some really funny episodes and believe it or not Dave’s sick sense of humor really helped in the process.

I’m not impressed with my glass of Malbec, but the pizza and the penne alla vodka are delicious and as we stuff our faces we reminisce and talk about the last few months and what we’ve been up to. Dave is working on a new project, Tasha is starring in Clown Motel, and I’m slinging drinks 987 miles north of here. If you would have told me that’s what I would have been doing three years ago, I probably wouldn’t have acted surprised, but if you told me I’d still be friends with Dave whom I met on MySpace 12 years earlier, that would have been a shocker. I guess back then the internet was a little more safe and infested with less creepy people than today.  Thing is, regardless of where I met him, Dave is a great guy who has helped me through some real difficult times during those 12 years. He is a true friend and he might actually be slightly more dramatic than me, if that’s even possible.

We pack up our pizza and we head outside to say goodbye. I finally feel a little more normal and Tasha and I head back to Beverly Hills to watch Boyhood and get some real sleep. Occasionally during the movie we hear the sound of ticking across hardwood floors of the apartment. It almost sounds like someone is wearing high heels and running through the house, but in reality it’s just Rocco who is in desperate need of getting his nails cut running back and forth between the living room and the bedroom and sometimes stopping to look out the screen door. I eat another slice of pizza, and head to bed.

Monday morning starts out with a trip to Starbucks for coffee, which if I can be totally honest I hate about myself. I hate Starbucks, but they have saturated the coffee shop market so much that I’d be an idiot not to buy into the convenience of having one on every corner in every neighborhood in the country. Where else am I going to go for coffee anyway?  Congratulations corporate America, you won.

“Can you drive me into Hollywood this afternoon?” I ask Tasha

“Yeah, for what?” She asks.

“I want a new tattoo.”

“Cool.”

I have gotten four new tattoos in the last 10 months. Up until recently, I hadn’t gotten any new ink since 2006. That’s like 10 years without getting a tattoo and that’s just too long. Why did I take such a sabbatical from the needle?  Well I thought more tattoos would hinder me from getting any acting jobs in L.A., so when I finally decided I was going to leave, I ceremoniously went out and got a bunch more on my arms. In retrospect, I don’t know if more or less tattoos has anything to do with my acting ability but my mother must be soooo proud that I’m getting another one. (blatant sarcasm)

I’m actually really excited about this new one because it represents a mindfuck that Hollywood played on me. There is this constant pressure to stay young as fuck and to try your best not to age at all. I used to lie about my age on dating websites, but that’s just because although I may BE 40, I certainly do not LOOK 40, and what type of women are on dating sites looking for 40 year old men? Not the kind that I would date. I guess for awhile I wasn’t owning up to the truth about myself. Ever since I left L.A. I don’t really give a fuck about how old I am. Truth is I’ve been on this earth for forty years and only now am I ready to really own it, that’s why I got “Copyright 1975” on my wrist. No more lies.

I walk into True Tattoo on Cahuenga as they were playing an old punk song I like by Propagandhi. I know I picked the right day to do this. Tasha comes in and sits there while the needle buzzes my skin with permanence for what seems like the thirtieth time in my life, even though I only have sixteen, pardon, now seventeen tattoos. Maybe I’ll stop at twenty, or maybe I just won’t stop. It’s my body and this is what I chose to do with it. Oh my God, I sound like the title of an episode of some shitty day time talk show like the View.

The artist finishes up, swabs me with green soap and a paper towel and wraps up my wrist in a bandage. I’m simultaneously happy I got this tattoo and concerned that for the next hour and half when I’m wearing this bandage on my wrist, everyone who sees me is going to think I tried to kill myself. Oh well. People have probably thought worse about me before.

Tasha and I go to St. Felix a few doors down for drinks and a little appetizer. I hadn’t eaten anything for breakfast, but I’m also going to meet my friend Rosanne in an hour for drinks and appetizers, and then later tonight I’m going to meet another friend, Abby for drinks and dinner. Pretty much all I’m going to be doing today is boozing and grazing. It’s at this point that I wish there were more than twenty four hours in the day and it’s at this point that I realize my time in L.A. is almost over.

 

Four Days In L.A. (Part 2)

I got off the plane at LAX around 3pm on Saturday July 23rd.

I stop in at the International terminal, and I immediately think how I am going to be surrounded by anyone other than Americans so I should watch out for European families on vacation, dressed in tacky print shirts, khaki shorts, fanny packs, and middle-aged men wearing sandals that have no right to do so. It’s the only terminal that you can just walk into and get a drink at a bar without having a ticket to board a plane, so I sit at some pizza restaurant and order a skinny bitch, otherwise known as a vodka and diet coke.

I know you’re probably laughing at the fact that I sometimes order that drink, but it tastes good to me, and even if I’m hungover the next day  I surprisingly still enjoy drinking diet coke so that says something about the truth of my addiction to diet soft drinks. Probably not the worst thing in the world. I mean, it’s not like I’m a heroin addict.

I text Tasha that I’m on the Departures level of the International terminal because it’s less busy and easier to pick up people than on Arrivals. Thirty minutes later as I’ve been waiting outside on the top level for her to pull up, and after I specifically text her two more times to make sure she chooses the Departues lane when she gets to the airport, she calls me to tell me she’s on the Arrivals level. Of course she is.

I’ve known Tasha for over 9 years now, and the fact that I made a point to make sure she knew where to go, and she ended up not going where I told her to go doesn’t surprise me at all. That’s just Tasha. There are some people who can connect the dots when driving cars and multi task like a pro and who also have a good sense of direction. Sadly, this is not Tasha, but she makes up for it so many other ways that it doesn’t really bother me. I remember when it used to, when we dated almost 7 years ago and we were the pinnacle example of a hot and cold couple, which probably had everything to do with how dramatic we both were. I’m sure it was no accident that Katy Perry had a song out that year by the same name.

Thing is, Tasha is one of my favorite people and the only ex of mine that I became best friends with after we broke up. It was almost like life wouldn’t let us NOT be friends. After the relationship we worked together, we lost a pet together, we went to all my friends weddings together, and then we created a televison show, sold it, and then lost the deal together. She’s my best friend and we’ve been through some good times, some difficult times, and some shit times, and all of that has led up to this momemt, me returning to L.A. after six months and her pulling up outside the terminal in her pearl white Fiat Abarth.

“Welcome back, bitches!” She screams as I open the door.

I’m excited to see her. She looks great, but Tasha always looks great. She’s fabulous and takes good care of herself and has these big features and this natural beauty that doesn’t even wain when she wakes up from a hangover. I start telling her about my drink at the bar with Anna Faris, and she starts telling me about this indie horror movie she’s up for called Clown Motel.

Not Clown “Hotel” which I imagine would come with a continental breakfast and free Wi-Fi, but Clown “Motel” which is most likely located on a creepy, desert road with a gravel parking lot, two vending machines and an ice bucket. We laugh but of course I tell her I’m proud of her because I know that she’s is way more talented than this town has given her credit for.

We make our way back to her new apartment in Beverly Hills, but it’s not as glamourish as the Walsh residence from 90210. Tasha has just moved into this sublet with her rabbit Rocco after 6 months living at my old Hollywood apartment. We have to do the final walk through tomorrow, but now all I can think about is this little bunny in front of me who got me through some hard times the last year or so when he frequently lived with me in L.A.

I tell him that my cat Dapple who he lived with for three years has passed away, but I’m pretty sure he already knew somehow. It’s great to see him, but it’s also time for Tasha and I to freshen up and go get ourselves some dinner and many many drinks.

We Lyft to Kabuki on Sunset and Vine which was always our go to place for business meetings, happy hour, (aka jappy hour) and gorging on sushi and wine. I walk in and accidentally kick the glass door with my foot. The host makes a funny comment and I realize I’m back in a town where people just speak their minds.

“If you break my door, we’ll just add it to your bill.” he says.

I laugh because it was funny and we get seated at a table and I immediately request a bottle of wine to start. We order three different types of rolls and a garlic steak, Tasha and I start catching up from the last six months.

I left L.A. because I felt like there was nothing left there for me. I was exhausted mentally, physically, emotionally and financially and I was tired of the struggle and the competition and I had been there for thirteen years and even though I aged gracefully, there is this enormous amount of pressure to stay young and defy the laws of physics. As an actor I had a small amount of success in my mid thirties, but by the time I turned forty, I was so over the rat race and the mental traps that I would seldom fall into that it started to take it’s toll on my confidence.

“You’re so much more confident now than when you left. I can see it in you.” Tasha says

She’s right. I used to get panic attacks in L.A. cause I was stressed as fuck, and my dating life was non-existent because seemingly the first and only question that everyone asks you on a first date is “What do you do,” which implies that the answer you give next will decide whether or not this person is interested in you at all. Everyone is a writer/actor/producer in L.A. but somehow if I told the truth that I tended bar at the Palladium and Wiltern it wouldn’t come off as an impressive field of expertise.

We talk about the drama that I had been through up in Seattle and how it started off so fucking great as I landed a lucrative job, was dating a hot girl I work with, was ready to plan out my future, but then I crash landed back to earth when we broke up in June and my cat Dapple died a few days later. That is a lot for someone to go through that quickly and I’m amazed that one of the only casualties of that debacle was the temporary loss of confidence I felt for a couple weeks and the erratic sleep patterns and highs and lows I felt along the way.

I guess a part of me understands myself enough to know all I really want in life on a daily basis is to feel like I do a good job, I’m appreciated, and that people like me. I’ll admit it, part of the reason I moved to L.A. was to follow that dream of having someone somewhere tell me that I’m good at what I do, but trying to live out that dream in L.A. along with the 2 million other hopefuls with stars in their eyes is just like being a small fish in a big pond trying to get a piece of bait.  Somehow though, living in Seattle and working at the bar is like being a big fish in a small pond. There’s less stress, the money is good, I’m doing well, and I work with a great bunch of people that I would like to think appreciate me for who I am. When it comes down to it, I really just want to be happy and stress free although those two ideas are easy to visualize and difficult to manifest.

“Are you happy up there?” Tasha asks me.

I think about this question a lot. Everybody in life just wants to be happy, I mean I said it myself three sentences ago, but I don’t think that happiness is something you feel constantly day in and day out. It’s a fleeting feeling that comes and goes like the seasons. Sometimes I can’t wait to get out of bed in the morning and start my day, other times I just want to sit on the couch and eat a whole pizza and not leave the house at all. Sometimes I’m depressed or sad, and other times I feel content as if nothing really bothers me. Sometimes I’m up, sometimes I’m down, and yes I realize that what I’ve been writing sounds like the lyrics to a pop song that has been playing over and over again in my life.

“I am right now.” I said.

And I really am. I’m back in the town that I spent most of my adult life in, I’m sitting at the table drinking wine and eating sushi with my best friend who I haven’t seen in six months, and I’m about to close the door on a chapter of my life that will hopefully help to open up another door to the next chapter, whatever that may be.

“Good.” She says. “It sure seems like it.”

We order another glass of wine each and I text a few of my friends to see where they’re at. Ironically they are just down the street getting out of the movies at Arclight so we all plan to meet up in a little bit.

For the first time in awhile, I don’t feel stuck, I don’t feel stressed, and I don’t feel like I need to be someone I’m not. It just feels good to back in Hollywood.

Four Days in L.A. (Part 1)

I got off the plane at LAX around 3pm on a Saturday. The air was dark and smokey, probably because of the wildfires that had been raging in Santa Clarita the night before. I immediately take a picture of the ominous sky and the sun that is barely shining through as I wait outside of the International terminal for Tasha to pick me up.

I think about how I haven’t been back in L.A. since January.  On Monday it will be exactly six months to the day that I moved up to Seattle. Was it ironic that my trip back happened to fall on the six month anniversary of me leaving southern California?  Probably, but I think everything happens for a reason and here I am back in Hollywood after having gone though a roller coaster of emotions since June. I guess I needed a little grounding and I’ll be the first one to admit I didn’t think that such a toxic place like L.A would have been able to offer me that, but that’s exactly what it did.

It all started a few hours earlier while I was sitting at a bar in Sea-Tac airport having a drink with a stranger from Alaska, and a well known celebrity from California.

I got to the airport with an hour before my flight was scheduled to take off, and being that this was a well needed mini vacation for me, I started drinking early. I went to one of the bars in the terminal and found nowhere for me and my bags to sit, so I ventured further past the parents and kids flying everywhere and into uncharted waters and found a seat at Anthony’s Fish Bar. I ordered a bloody mary and some chowder, and stared at my phone like most people do in airports.

Sitting to my right at the crowded bar was a guy in his early thirties with tattoos and a bald head, and to my left was another guy who I never really spoke to. I settled in drank my drink, and ordered another bloody mary. Right around the time that my second cocktail  was delivered, I hear a woman’s voice ask the bald dude next to me if anyone is sitting at the empty stool next to him. Naturally, I look over and when I see this blonde woman in her early thirties, I immediately recognize her from TV and the movies, but I can’t remember her name to save my life.

What was that movie she was in that I never really watched but I kept seeing trailers for it waaay back in 2005? Oh right. It was called “The House Bunny,” and sitting two stools to my left ordering a pinot grigio was none other than Anna Faris, well known actor and wife of the immensely popular Chris Pratt. I guess this is how the trip is going to start.

A few minutes go by and I can hear the dude next to me and her conversing and even though I’m not in the middle of the conversation, I really want to be, but how on earth do I segway myself into a private conversation between two total strangers at a bar in the airport? Does this guy even know who she is, and if so, is he ever going to let on? Not three minutes go by until she leans over, and asks the bald dude a question.

“Who’s your friend?” Anna asks as she motions to me.

At this point, the truth comes out that neither one of us know each other, but apparently, we are all about to. She introduced herself as “Ahh-Na,” not “Ann-uh” which I already know is the preferred pronunciation of her name because I watched that episode of Entourage when she played herself and crashed into the back of E’s car in the Hollywood Hills wearing nothing but a towel.

Anna is extremely nice and sweet and at this point me, Anna, and our new friend Dustin all clink our glasses and cheers and start having a three way conversation about life, love, and tattoos.

Anna is considering moving to Seattle and not living in L.A. anymore and she asks me why I chose to move up here and without letting on that I know who she is, I’m honest with her and I tell her hey, if you don’t need to be in L.A. or you can fly in when you have work, there is really no need to live there, especially since the air and the view in Seattle is a lot cleaner and healthier for your mind and body and soul.

We talk about Dustin’s job in Alaska on a oil rig and how it’s a difficult position to be in a truck with a guy for 14 hours a day in the middle of nowhere drilling for oil and whatever else riggers do. He’s a really nice dude and he tells a story about how he recently got divorced from his ex wife but they are still best friends and they have a 21 year old son. Anna chats about how she once worked the coldest job ever in Canada in a city called Regina.

“When I got there, I saw a billboard that read “Welcome to Regina. It rhymes with fun.”

Now we’re all laughing because we know Regina actually rhymes with vagina and I’m trying to figure out when the director is going to call cut because what is happening now reminds me of being in a movie where you meet a celebrity at a bar in Sea-Tac airport, but then I realize that this is just my life, drinking alcohol at 12:15pm with two strangers, one of whom happens to be famous.

Dustin takes out a picture of his son and somehow we start talking about tattoos and he shows me and Anna the ink his offspring just got. It’s a new school tattoo of a green alien sitting indian style on the floor wearing Birkenstocks and giving the double middle finger while a big fat joint protrudes from his mouth.

“Yeah, he’s gonna regret that one.” I say

And believe me, I would know because I have a tattoo that I wish I never got.

“Show us!” Anna says.

And this is the point when I caved into the pressure of my new friends at the bar and rolled up my left pant leg and showed them the most regrettable tattoo I have on my body. A cat getting electrocuted

“Wow, what is it?” Anna asks as she pokes my leg with her finger, trying to figure out exactly what I’m showing her and I’m somewhere in between a little nervous that she just touched me in the worst tattoo ever, and slightly impressed that I currently have a celebrity poking my leg and none of us think this is weird at all.

I go on to tell her that when I was 18, I had a guy who used to do tattoos out of my kitchen back in Jersey and that I must have been pretty young and stupid at the time to get a multi-colored cat having electro shock therapy from sticking a fork in a power outlet.

“But you know what, you should never cover it up because it will always remind you not to make impulsive decisions in life.” Dustin says.

He’s absolutely right, and he makes a good point, and it’s at this time that Anna asks me why I’m going back to L.A. I tell her the truth because that’s what people do when they first meet each other in airpot bars and I explain how the last month in Seattle was kind of rough on me as I lost my cat and my ex within the same week, and before I know it I’m showing Dustin and Anna pictures of both of them. But what am I really doing in L.A.?

I’m going back to take care of an apartment I have had under my name since I moved to Seattle almost six months ago, and I’m going to see friends of mine who I’ve missed these last 180 days and who have been there for me for years. I’m going back to get a sense of where I came from and perhaps get an idea of where I’m headed next and believe me, even though Los Angeles can be a toxic city, I think I’m able now to avoid the toxicity of the Hills and the San Fernando valley even though the the news reports are saying not to be outside for very long because of the smoke from the wildfires.

It’s nearing the time that I have to board my flight, but if I can be totally honest I kind of want to miss it and continue this random conversation I’m having at a bar in Sea-Tac airport with an oil rigger and a comedic actress, but I know that there is something waiting for me 967 miles south of here.

I say goodbye to Dustin and I tell him it was nice to meet him, then Anna extends her hand and as I shake it she reminds me that her name is Anna, as if I still don’t know who she is, but perhaps she likes that level of anonymity, so I never let on that I know.

I grab my bags, wish them both good flights, and I head over to gate 38 and board the plane for Los Angeles, but not before I text three of my friends telling them that I haven’t even landed in Hollywood yet, but I already have a great L.A. story to tell them.

Leaving Los Angeles

Another one of my friends left Los Angeles recently. One by one my small group of East coast transplants that were living in Hollywood with me since the early 2000’s have come to the decision that the city of Angels just isn’t for them anymore, myself included. I had my own reasons for leaving, but the similarities as to what life path we took after we moved have been astonishing.

It seems like all of my friends have moved away, found good jobs, a level of happiness, and have gotten married, had kids, or got “wifed up” since they left Southern California, and even though it was never my plan to follow suit, it appears that I’m well on my way.

I am an artistic and creative person at heart, but a part of me knew how difficult it is to swim in the shallow waters of Hollywood. You can have all the talent in the world, but in the last 5 years, being rich and famous for nothing, has become the new being rich and famous for something. After a mediocre amount of success that allowed me to pay my bills without having a “in the meantime” job, I had to go back to bartending and it made me feel like a failure, even though I know I’m not. It got tougher on me as I watched every one of the friends I love leave southern California only to meet someone special and start a new life with them, until I chose to do the same thing.

I had a vision in my head of what I wanted my new life in Seattle to be, and even though I’ve only been here a little over three months, it has all fallen into place like some form of poetic justice. Sometimes I wake up in disbelief of how easy it has been and how smoothly things have worked out, but then I remember to stop thinking like a negative fatalist and just accept the fact that perhaps this time the other shoe is never going to drop, because I won’t let it happen.

When I lived in L.A I was stressed out all the time, and I felt the weight of the world on my shoulders. I was sad and depressed more times than I was happy, and I got used to having panic attacks because I felt like that was just part of the game. I did it for so long because I really believed in what I wanted to do with my life, but it never dawned on me until recently that even if I DID succeed and I sold that TV show, or I DID land that big role on Criminal Minds, would I have really been happy with coming home to an empty apartment and no one to share my life with except for my cat?

Would I have been able to look into the eyes of my bank account and know that it loved me too?  Would I have gotten into my car and felt alive and free stuck in traffic going eight miles per hour on the 101 at 11:54 pm on a Wednesday night? Fuck no! There is nothing about any of those scenarios that would have made me happy if that turned out to be my life. I think I just needed to admit that to myself, even though I knew it all along.

I know that this isn’t everyone’s experience in L.A., but the reality is that those examples I mentioned were what I was looking forward to. How fucking dismal would that life have been? What does it say about me that I couldn’t wait for the day when I didn’t have to struggle to make ends meet, or how I couldn’t wait for the night when I finally felt validated for all the time and effort I put into my career? I deserve better than to look forward to a life that is defined by how much money I can make.

I know a select group of people who are more talented writers, actors, and producers than half of the people who are actually making a living from it, but it’s kind of morose that talent doesn’t get you very far in Hollywood. I don’t want to feel like I wasted my talent in life, but what if my talent is to do the right thing and be a good person? What if I could be the best at being a great husband to my wife, or being the father that I never had? What if those things mean more to me now than a fleeting chance at fame ever did?

Even at 40, I’m still growing up. As I have watched and continue to watch my friends leave that town to follow their heart, I can’t help but be proud of all of them, including myself. Believe me, I understand it takes a lot of perseverance to stay in Los Angeles and to follow your dreams even after you are repeatedly rejected and told no.  I wish nothing but success for my friends who are still there who I know are going to make it, yet, at the same time, I feel like it takes a shit ton of guts to look around at the palm trees, the pretty people, and the 334 days of sunshine and tell yourself that this just isn’t for me anymore.

For me, it’s pretty simple. I left L.A. because all I’ve ever wanted in life was to be happy. It’s just that for the longest time I thought happiness was one thing, when in reality it has turned out to be something else.  And that something else looks a lot like my life right now.

California, Don’t Let Me Down.

I had always wanted to move to California ever since I was a 13 year old hanging from the rafters of my basement townhouse in southern New Jersey.  I knew I needed to be out there, but I didn’t know why, or what I was going to do once I got there.

Now, in six short months I will be celebrating my 13 year anniversary living in the Golden State, but if I can be completely honest, I still don’t know what I am doing here.

I know why I moved here, and I know that for a good handful of years I thought I had it all figured out. However, over the past six months my life has re-defined itself and made me re-think what I thought I knew to be truth.

I’ve entertained the idea of moving back to Seattle, where I lived for two years and loved, but I haven’t got a clue as to whether or not that is the right answer.  I’ve thought about starting over in a new place, but I’m almost at the age where starting over somewhere new seems immature, unpredictable, and too costly to my wallet and the people I’ve met in my little support group.

I’ve even thought about moving back home to the East Coast, but to me, that feels like I’m giving up on my dream.  Maybe it’s time to redefine that dream.

I want to stay here in California.  I love it here 98% of the time, and the other 2% I’m only complaining because it’s in my nature to do that when it’s 99 degrees in the middle of October and my A/C has been running since early September.

I’ve asked for guidance from the big spirit in the sky, and I’ve prayed for an answer to come because I just don’t know what to do anymore.

When I started this life out here, I knew it would bring me something I truly loved and believed in, but have I gotten so comfortable in the middle of my early-mid-life crisis that my not knowing what to do might have been covering my eyes from an answer that could have just passed me by?  I don’t think so, but how would I know?  Ignorance is bliss.

Things haven’t worked out the way I thought they would, but it can’t all be for nothing.  The premonitions I got back in ’88, ’92, & ’97 have promised me that there is something out here for me and there is a reason I am still here today.

There is no way I believe that my time here is in it’s twilight, because I won’t allow myself to think that way.  I believe in what I’m doing, and I believe it will all make sense if I just let it all go, and have a little faith.

California, don’t let me down.

Listening to:

 

The Girl From California

I met Kathryn in a chat room during the fall of 1994, some 21 years ago. We couldn’t text each other, because that technology didn’t exist. We couldn’t send each other a snapchat, cause that app hadn’t been invented yet. All we had was a 14400 bps dial up modem, a keyboard, a computer screen, 3000 miles in between us, and a little internet service we used called Prodigy.

I was 18 years old, I just finished graduating from high school, but I didn’t immediately go to college. I decided to stay at home for a year and explore my options. One of those options was sitting in my Mom’s basement at night and going on-line and talking to people from all over the country. When I started talking to Kathryn, I never knew it would take me all the way to Southern California, but it certainly did just that.

After a few weeks of chatting online, we mailed each other pictures of ourselves. One day I opened up a letter with the postmark from La Jolla and I saw for the first time what this girl I had been talking to for weeks actually looked like. I was stunned. She was gorgeous. She was so much not what I thought a southern California girl would look like, which was blonde hair and a surfer vibe.  She looked so much better. She had light eyes, and dark flowing black hair and she had an edge to her that manifested in every other girl I have been drawn to. She was the mold that created the standard of the type of girl I am attracted to. Mysterious, dark, and edgy. When I looked at the pictures of her for the first time, I knew I had to meet her.

Financially, I was well off back then and I was a good embellisher, therefore I could afford to tell my Mom and my friends that I was planning a trip to California to “look at colleges” when in reality, I was flying there to meet her. I hadn’t been to Cali since the summer of 1987 with my family, but I figured I could make my way around with a keen sense of direction, and a little help from strangers. I boarded a plane at Philadelphia International Airport that was headed for San Francisco, and I never looked back.

I spent the first two days in San Fran walking around the city, pretending to be someone famous while eating at the Hard Rock Cafe, and bumming a ride off of a 56 year old man who I sat next to on the plane ride out. I had never been this far away from home by myself, and I was loving every minute of it.

After a few days of hanging out and not checking out a single college in the Bay Area, I flew down to Los Angeles where I stayed in a motel in Burbank where the Americana shopping center now is. I took a cab to USC, and walked around the campus, but I couldn’t get very far because I wasn’t a student there, so I grabbed some pamphlets, and I had the cab driver take me down Hollywood boulevard to see the stars’ hand prints in the cement on the sidewalk that I live half from a block from now.

It was all kind of surreal for me. I was 18, all by myself in the third largest state in the nation and even though I looked at UCLA later that afternoon, I knew I didn’t have the grades to get into ANY of these schools at all. I didn’t really have a game plan as to what I was supposed to do, or what I was going to do once I got to San Diego where Kathryn lived, but when my flight left LAX for the short trip south, I felt this sudden rush of nervousness mixed with complete and total confidence.

I arrived in San Diego, and I had rented a car from a place that allowed 18 year olds to rent cars back then. I don’t know how that worked exactly, but for a few hundred dollars I jumped into a black Chrysler LeBaron convertible, and I found my way to La Jolla where I checked into my hotel room at the Holiday Inn.

I called Kathryn around 4pm and she answered and was really excited to hear from me. I told her I was in La Jolla and she told me that she had school tomorrow, but she couldn’t wait to see me. We devised a plan where I would show up at her high school the next morning (yes, she was in high school at the time) and she would sneak out during 2nd period and we could go anywhere as long as she was back by noon. I was going to meet her later that night at her parents house for dinner, but a secret rendezvous in the middle of the day where we would have some unadulterated time together was exactly what teenage boys and girls dream of doing if the situation ever arises, and that’s exactly what we did.

The next morning, I woke up bright and early, had some breakfast, and drove a few miles to Torrey Pines High School in San Diego, and I waited. About five minutes later, I see her. She’s a tall, attractive brunette wearing a jean jacket and she makes her way down the quad, onto the sidewalk, and into my convertible which was parked on a street right outside her school. It was the first time we had seen each other in person. I was enamoured at her smile, stunned that our plan was working, and overjoyed that we had the next few hours to ourselves. We took off and headed back to La Jolla via the I-5 freeway.

Some asshole cut me off at some point on the ride back to the hotel and I gave him the finger out the window.

“What are you doing? Don’t flip people off out here, they’ll shoot you.” Kathryn said to me as I changed lanes.

Apparently, it was true. A few months back someone was shot and killed on the freeway in California for doing exactly what I just did, giving someone the finger for doing something stupid while they were driving. Regardless, I kept my fingers to myself, turned off the freeway, and made our way back to my hotel room, which was the only place we could go to be alone.

We had talked about this a few weeks back. There was the obligatory sex conversation that occurred over the phone and in the private chat room we used to go to…….then back at the hotel room, the obligatory sex happened, for a full three seconds.

I wasn’t very good in bed that day, I realize this but it didn’t seem to matter. Kathryn was in high school, and I had just graduated, and neither one of us had a lot of sex beforehand to compare it to. Looking back now, I think the whole idea of this trip centered around the mystique of the two of us meeting each other in person, and not so much what happened when we met.

We put our clothes back on, talked for a little while, and then I dropped Kathryn back off at school, which DOES seem kind of weird now that I’m in my 30s and writing this. Still, I was going to see her later that night but I had some time to kill before dinner. So I did what anybody visiting Southern California would do in late 1994 when they had a few hours to kill would do. I drove to Mexico.

It was pretty easy getting across the border back then, it was slightly more difficult to get back, but still pretty easy. I remember driving into Tijuana, looking around at how impoverished the city was, and remarking at how every little Mexican person was trying to sell me a knock off Mighty Morphin Power Rangers doll. I wanted no part of it, because I hated the Power Rangers. They were campy, and I wasn’t into campy at that time. I was into flying across the country, lying to my Mom about my intentions, and aiding in the corruption of a sophomore in high school by coercing her to cut class and meet me for “lunch.”

As I made my way back to the United States, I gave a dollar to a little Mexican kid who cleaned my windshield, but in reality totally made it streaky and unable to see out of for the next 45 miles back to La Jolla. Unfortunately, I didn’t have any washer fluid in the car, but luckily, I had a convertible so I stuck my head out the side of the window and drove back to my hotel.

That night around 5pm I headed over to Kathryn’s house for dinner. She lived in a gated community somewhere on a hill in La Jolla. I drove up to the gate, hit a few buttons and made my way into the world of the white, rich and privileged.

I met her parents who were sweet enough to buy us some Chinese food for dinner, and then Kathryn and I went to the movies to see this new film every one was talking about called “Pulp Fiction.” I bought the tickets for me who was of legal age to see the movie and I handed one ticket off to Kathryn, who was NOT of legal age to see the movie. I was definitely racking up the unethical acts with her that day, but it didn’t seem to matter to either of us. I had to have her home by 10pm, which I did abide by. We went upstairs in her room and took a few pictures of me pretending to choke her which I now realize was a very strange thing to do, I know, but then we also took one of us making out while her cat laid on her bed in the background.  I stared into her eyes, and I ran my fingers through her hair, and I hoped and prayed that this wasn’t going to be the only time in my life that I would see her face to face.

I was leaving the next morning, headed back to NJ because as much as I loved being in California for a week, it costs a lot of money to stay in a hotel and rent a car. I said goodbye to Kathyrn that night, and we promised each other we would keep in touch and maybe, hopefully, I would find a college out there I wanted to go to. After all, she still had two years of high school, and I still had plenty of time to figure out what I was going to do with my life.

When I got back home, we talked almost every day online and we chatted on the phone twice a week. It was going really well, I mean as well as a 3000 mile long distance relationship could go. We talked about me moving out to California at some point, and we were planning to see each other again in a few months when the summer started and she would be out of school.

About a week or so later I logged on to Prodigy to talk to her, but I couldn’t find her anywhere. People didn’t have e-mails back then, so all I could do was wait and see if she showed up in one of the chat rooms. A couple days after not seeing her online, I tried calling her and left a message. Then I tried calling her again, and left another message. I never got a phone call back. I didn’t know what to think.

I knew something must have happened, but I didn’t know what. Did she get a boyfriend? Did she change her phone number and not tell me? Did she move out of the country for legal reasons? We did break a lot of rules when I went out and saw her, but I don’t think we did anything unconstitutional that could have resulted in her being legally banned from talking to me.  A week later, I got a letter from her in the mail.

I read the letter three times before I totally could comprehend what it said. As it turns out, Kathryn and her Mom went to the doctor for her yearly check up a week before. At the appointment, the doctor asked her if she had been sexually active in the last few months, and Kathryn just couldn’t lie. She told the doctor about the sex we had, and she told the doctor right in front of her mother who was absolutely livid…. at both of us.

Her parents took away her computer, told her to cut off all contact with me, and she was never allowed to talk to me again. In a way, I understood that, being that we undermined their trust and also the fact that she cut school, I took to an R-rated movie, and I was a little bit older than her and they probably saw me as a threat and as a bad influence on their teenage daughter.

I wrote a letter to her parents shortly thereafter and I apologized for what had happened and I begged them to let me talk to her again, but I never got a response back. In fact, I haven’t heard from Kathryn since that letter arrived at my house in the Spring of 1995.

I was depressed for a little bit. I really liked this girl, and not only was she beautiful and cool and witty, but she represented something bigger to me than just a girl from California that I met on the internet. She represented hope. She was a belief that maybe I could get out of NJ once and for all. Being that this was the mid 90s and meeting people off the internet wasn’t a popular or safe thing to do, it felt right and it made me feel like there was something special between us because I’ve always wondered about her and here I am writing a blog about her 21 years later.

There is a part of me that knows I didn’t do anything wrong, even though I knew some of what I did WAS wrong in the eyes of a parent. I really cared for her, and I took a chance and went for it. I wasn’t a scumbag or a kiddie corruptor, I was 18 years old, my heart was on my sleeve, and there I was sitting in the basement of my townhouse spending night after night becoming infatuated with the idea of love and how it brought me all the way from Marlton, NJ to Southern California. There is a part of me that forgives myself for being such a weirdo creep to her parents, and there is a part of me that still thinks about her as I write this from my one bedroom apartment 80 miles from where I picked her up that Wednesday afternoon in November of 1994.

My memory is pretty good, but 21 ago years is a long time to recall without the details becoming too cloudy. I remember she was the first girl I met off the internet, but she wouldn’t be the last. I remember how much fun we had for those few hours we were together, and I remember the weeks and months leading up to us meeting in person when I had so much confidence and never let a doubt creep into my mind about anything. But most of all, I remember that moment when I was able to combine the words she wrote me and the voice I heard on the phone to a picture she sent me that I stared at for hours. The first time I saw this picture, I couldn’t get a word out. I was speechless. Dark hair, light eyes, incredibly beautiful and edgy as fuck.  It’s no wonder that every girl I’ve fallen for since then has looked somewhat if not at least a little like Kathryn did.

I wonder where she is today.