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Shouuttt outttt to Elizabeth for the catttt facccttt dayyyy Thurs|03.28 Foul mood. I feel the ability to kill using only my eyes. Lucky coworkers, that I don't set my eyes upon them. Lucky world. Feel my wrath, world. FEEL IT??? DO YOU FEEEEL IT??? Bastards. How about now? Feeling my wrath? Now? Ohhhh yeah. There it is. Anyway. Maybe I'll shave my head. That solves a lot of problems I hear tell, shaving your head. Well that's what they say. IT IS! Do you know what today is? Respect your Cat Day. On this day in 1384 England's King Richard II issued an edict forbidding the consumption of cats. Good old King Richard! No you CANT eat that cat! Put it down and hug it, you bastard. That's the way. Tell your friends and neighbors. Okay then. Penguins. Penguins. Penguins. Sliiiiiiiiiiiiiide. I keep on fallin....i-i-i-i-iiiiinnnnnn Wed|03.27 First time I saw Butch he was hitchhiking and Mena said, "I think I know him," and pulled over. He got into the back, thanked us for the ride, and she said, "Are you Butch Franco?" "Yeah." He leaned forward to look at her. "Holy shit." They'd gone to elementary school together, like six or seven years previously, and they recognized each other. They reminisced for a while (Did I know Mena could beat all the boys arm wrestling? Did I know how CRAZY Butch was? Didn't surprise me, and no, respectively.) We were nearing our turnoff, and Mena invited Butch over. Her parents were working, it was summer, we were about to get high in the backyard, would he care to join us? He sure would! He sure would care to join us. Butch had just gotten out of prison, we discovered. He had some stories. He was living up the road with his father, in the Whachamacallit Apartments on the hill. Nope, wasn't going to school. Quit. Well, went to prison. You know. He detailed a fight he'd seen in jail, which culminated in an eyeball popping out, and then being popped back in. We suspected our neighbor of listening by the bushes; Mena said something rude and we all laughed. I don't remember what he looked like. I know he had dark hair, and was my height, about 5'7". Maybe I'm wrong though. I picture BUTCH tattooed on the fingers of his right hand but I might be making that up. I was wishing Mena hadn't stopped for him, but she didn't express any regrets. Next day or so, we were up at his father's apartment complex, in the front yard. Talking, I guess. Someone walked up to us and tried to hand Butch something. "No way, I ain't takin' it." "Come on," the guy said. "I gotta serve you." "If I don't touch it, you never served me." Big eyeroll. "Just TAKE it." Mena took the paper and the guy walked away. "What is this for?" Turned out he'd "seen something" in prison and had to testify, but thought he'd be killed if he did. He wouldn't tell us what it was. Mena flicked her lighter and we watched the summons burn. "This never happened," Butch probably said. I knew he was exaggerating. The summons was real enough, but who knew what it was for. We hadn't read it. Few months later, I was working the register at blahblah's department store at the mall, and Butch came through my line. "Gotta talk to you," he said, and I said, "Yeah? Go ahead." Or something cool like that. Who knows. All I really remember is me trying to go into the breakroom to get away from him and him following me, saying, "You have to testify! You have to say you never saw him hand me the summons!" and me saying, "If I testify I'm saying what I saw, so you really don't want me testifying," and then, "You can't be back here!" Wow, exciting stuff. Okay, not really. I remember that smock I had to wear, and how every time I stuck my hand in the pocket my pen wrote on me, and by the end of the shift, I'd have small blue lines across my fingers and palm. I was never really scared of Butch, though I felt like I should be. Couldn't talk myself into it, though. Fast forward to a temp job at a hospital for the criminally insane, in the medical records department. I spent my spare time looking at names, the rows and rows of people who'd been in the facility at one time or another. Eventually I noticed a file in the "F"s that was labeled Franco, Butch. I thumbed through it. Yes, I really did. Surreptitiously. I sure did. I wondered if he'd really "seen something" that put him over the edge? Was that what had sent him here? Or had he just been an angry and desperate 18-year-old, tired of being enclosed in a small space? I don't think I read past the "oriented in the three spheres" of the first page. If I did, I don't remember what it said. The last time I saw him was also the last time I saw my good friend Conner, at a party at the apartment complex. Conner I'd love to see again. He's dead though. For all I know, Butch is too. take my breath aaa-hwayyyyyy Tues|03.26 Sometimes I go to Walgreen's because that's where I get my prescriptions filled, not that I take any prescribed medication, but if I did, right, and if I got it at Walgreen's, right, I would have this receipt that says I'm JEFF, I'm here to serve you with our "7 Service Basics" Ohhhhhhhkay. Thanks. This was actually funnier in my head because I thought the receipt said "I'm here to serve your 7 Basic Needs" and you gotta admit, that could be funny. Oh well. It's sunny and chilly outside and I can't stop coughing again, I mean I stop to breathe, but it's out of control the dry cough. LBEKCKLJ:> I meant to put a cough drop in me mouth but then I saw the Orbit gum and I decided to chew a piece of that on account of I really, really LIKE IT. I have nothing much to say. Move along. Clicky-clicky. let mE OWWwwtt I'm nOt going to haaarrrRRM aNYonnNE Sun|03.24 Oscar day! Reminds me of my friend John, who I miss. JOHN! First got me into the Oscars by associating it with money. Mmmmmm. Money. Ten years ago, when we worked together, John started an Oscar pool. Twenty bucks a pop. I entered but didn't expect to win, but I DID I DID WIN! Because I was the only one who picked Mercedes Ruehl. I remember how much I loved her and how much I loved that movie, The Fisher King. So began my Oscar excitement. John of course taught me the proper etiquette of tipping the person who runs the pool. I was not a pool expert. Later that same year I won the football pool, thanks to the Jets. I picked them because they were from NY and because of that song, WHEN YOURE A JET YOURE A JET ALL THE WAY FROM YOUR FIRST CIGARETTE TO YOUR LAST DYING DAY and I won 85 bucks and I bought myself a vacuum cleaner. It's fabulous, I still use it. To vacuum. It works. I really need to change the bag though. John is the kind of guy you call from jail, he's your one phonecall. He might say things you don't want to hear, he might piss you off and convince you he's an asshole, but through it all you are still friends, because he believes in friendship and so do you. He might remind you of your brother. He might have a parakeet and he might smoke Marlboro Lights (John, not the bird), and he might have a great one-bedroom apartment that you thought burned down one morning when your alarm went off and you heard that a building on his corner was on fire. So, even though you weren't speaking at the time, you called him and he answered and said no, it was the building across the street. Then you both hung up because you weren't really speaking, but you felt better, because you loved him and certainly didn't wish him dead, or homeless. Maybe when he was out of town and you were feeding his parakeet, you went over there and his bird was dead. Maybe you'd already gone over this very possibility, because you had a feeling the bird would die and you wondered what John's wishes would be. Keep the bird in the freezer? Have him buried in a pet cemetary? Discreetly remove the little body and clean out the cage? I bet you felt really bad, like you killed the bird. But John was understanding. John thought the bird was getting older and didn't seem as chipper as he used to be. Still, the bird died on your watch. Not much changes that. It feels good to be forgiven. Not for the bird, the bird wasn't my fault. And to hear a sincere apology, to feel it as it's said, not much is like that. I don't think he'll win this year, he never has, but I wish he would. JOHN! Pick the right picks already. annDD meall STArrRy EYEYEYEYEDDDDD Sat|03.23 Today is the wedding anniversary of my parents. They've been married for 56 years. That strikes me as a very long time. So I called them, we talked, I thanked them for getting married, and so on, and so forth, and they reminded me that the 21st had been the wedding anniversary of my brother and sister-in-law. Fifteen years ago, a few months before they married, they (Jay and Gina) and a neighborhood friend drove me back to Boston after my winter break. Brookline, technically. College in Boston though. ANYWAY, it was mid-January, the snow fell heavy and thick, and we passed a bad accident on the Mass Turnpike. I was warm and with people I loved and my brother was a great driver. Good music played. I felt as safe as a little kid who doesn't know about accidents. But I looked out the window, and I saw the crashed cars, and then, as I watched, another car slid into them, slowly. There was no way people weren't bleeding in those cars. Still, I asked my brother. "They could be okay, right?" He took a while to answer. Finally, "No." We drove on. Now I think it affected me so deeply because it could have been us, but it wasn't, and it never had been. We'd been in acccidents, but we'd always been all right, always. How long could that keep up? Eventually, wouldn't we have to be the ones with irreparably changed lives, with cracked foreheads, with missing limbs or dead passengers? Statistically it seemed unavoidable. I wonder if it keeps happening to the same families over and over, and skips others. Have there been studies? I smoked Marlboro Lights back then, and Gina smoked some menthol brand that she didn't have because she was trying to quit. She bummed mine and Jay would look at her, and she would say, just this one. This infuriated me and I launched into how Gina could do whatever she damn pleased and he was not the boss of her! I'm not sure how many times my brother had to hear that over the next few days but I'm surprised he didn't hit me. Okay, he wouldn't really hit me, but it was a lot. Not only during Gina smoking, but when she drank. Guess why? Oh yes, my niece was on the way. Okay, I didn't know! I surely would've taken the other side if so. Today I would mind my own business, but at 20 I don't think I knew about that option. I'm reading this over and seeing how Wagneresque it is. See? And it's unintentional. Maybe I should make up a word. Kerflooverflahzen. That night we went to a bar in Harvard Square to hear my sister's band. We met my cousin and her boyfriend there, and my cousin complimented my haircut. I remember this because of my brother's sneer when she did it. He really couldn't harrass me enough about my haircuts. They looked normal in Boston, but not in our small town. (Digression: during my brief flirtation with meditation, no alcohol, and vegetarianism, my mother asked me in a concerned voice at the dinner table if I was still a Christian. I guess the combo was too much for her. I stared at the big space on my plate where the pork chop would be if I were eating the pork chop and I really had no answer. My brother defused the tension by saying, How could she be? Look at that hair! And then we all laughed. End digression.) We drank quite a bit that night, and I lifted many cool glasses from the bar. I had a big purse just for such occasions. Now I see that that wasn't cool to do at my sister's gig. I was blind to many things. Oh well. Sorry, sorry, sorry. The next morning Gina couldn't hold anything down and that's when we learned she was pregnant. They told us they were getting married. They remind me of my parents in two ways: married (at least in part) due to pregnancy, and still married. But they're not my parents, only my parents are my parents, and I raise my water glass to them. HEY! All righty. If I had a scanner I would show you the 8x10 sepia photo I have of my parents on their wedding day, sitting at a bar with my aunt and uncle. My mother is gorgeous, smiling, my father is dapper and looks like trouble. His mouth is caught mid-word. Cigarettes dangle from their hands and short dark drinks are in front of them. They belong to me, these people from 56 years ago. Maybe I don't know them, but they're mine. aRcHiVeS |
