Thursday, April 30, 2009

Discoveries

Ancestors

While digging through my grandmother's house, we uncovered a number of old treasures, some of the most exciting of which were photographs dating to the 19th Century.

The girl on the far right in the above picture is my great-grandmother, Ella, whose personal story is the kind of stuff that adventure novels are made of. A half-Danish, half-Swedish aristocrat born in what is now Landskrona, Sweden in the late 1800's, her family immigrated to the United States around the turn of the 20th Century.

Her father, my great-great-grandfather, was a sailor, while her mother came from a long line of sailors who had been lost at sea. Determined that husband would not suffer the same fate, she ordered him to purchase land in North Dakota, which was as far away from the ocean as she could imagine being.

My great-great-grandfather obliged, buying three hundred acres and commissioning the construction of a large home before crossing the Atlantic. Unfortunately, he came down with sickness and died immediately after their arrival anyway, when Ella was five years old.

In his last days, Ella's father suffered from terrible thirst and begged her for a glass of water. She granted his request, then watched him die after taking a long draught. Ella's mother ever after claimed the girl had killed him.

Ancestors

For the blue blood living on America's frontier in the late 19th Century, life took a very unexpected turn. My great-grandmother bartered with local Indians, once escaped a hungry winter bear by throwing a sandwich over its head, and developed a lifelong affinity for pistols, remaining an excellent marksman well into her eighties.

One of the pictures we found, which I will upload if ever I get digital copies, is of an elderly Ella defiantly aiming a firearm at some far-off target.

According to family lore, she once met and out-shot Annie Oakley.

In 1907, more wild twists were in store for my great-grandmother. While in Nevada, she happened to meet a vacationing Eastern aristocrat by the name of Leroy. This man, twice her age, was infatuated with her, and within a year she had married the heir to one of the largest fortunes in the United States.

Playing Tennis

The couple on the far right are my great-grandparents, playing tennis at an estate in Independence City in the early 1900's. My great-grandmother, only fifteen at the time of her marriage, would continue to bear children for roughly two decades. Among these was my grandmother Weird Family, born in 1927.

Grand Ma Weird Family as a Young Child

Grand Ma Weird Family is the shortest child in the above photograph. Her resemblance to Yoda, which Powell and I have agreed on for years, was even more pronounced at this age.

In 1929, when my grandmother was two years old, her father hemorrhaged $300 million in the stock market crash.

Ella had urged her husband at the beginning of the crisis to place their main estate, Knowlton, in her name so that if the banks went after him they could not take the home. Leroy thought this was a ridiculous idea, and what followed was inevitable.

"My mother was every inch the Scandinavian," my grandmother once told me. "Cool, emotionless."

In 1924, an assassination attempt had left Leroy gravely injured, his life only narrowly saved.

"How did she react to that?" I asked.

"Well, I wasn't there," my grandmother said. "But from what I've heard, the same way she reacted to everything: not very much at all."

The loss of Knowlton was one of the only things that breached her Teutonic reserve. As things began to fall apart in 1930, my grandmother's family moved from Knowlton to a more modest Hick State estate. That Christmas, they were forced to dismiss their cooks and housekeepers, some of whom had been with the family for decades.

"We were sitting in the library," my grandmother said. "And she looked more furious than I can ever remember her being. She said, 'Leroy, this is all your fault.' And then she picked up a silver tea set, threw it right at him, and walked out of the room. It's the only time I ever saw her lose control."

My great-grandparents continued to sell properties and bleed gold until 1935, when there was nothing left to take. The Great Depression wiped out a millennia of wealth in the space of six years.

My grandmother, aged only eight when the money finally ran dry, grew up in poverty, as did her own children.

That poverty did not extinguish a richness of spirit, though, a fact that we found ample evidence of.

Uncle Artist's Painting

The painting above was done by Artist Uncle in his youth. Born with spina bifida, Artist Uncle nonetheless became a prodigious painter, graduating from an eminent art school in Independence City. He died of leukemia in 1996.

Anne in the Newspaper

The girl in the newspaper clipping above is Anne, an innocent seven-year-old girl enchanted at Christmastime in 1971. I had never before seen any photographs of my birth-mother from her childhood, and it was strange and intriguing to view them now. I find it difficult to imagine her as she was then, before bitterness of spirit and frailness of body, both borne of poverty, took over her life.

At one point, she and my Aunt Smugly Superior uncovered some old report cards, and Anne nearly became emotional reading them.

"They all say things like, 'When these kids are actually in school, they do so well,'" she said to her sister, with all the regret of a woman who had only a sixth-grade education.

"I know," my aunt sighed back, still rueful of a travesty long passed.

Anne was beautiful once, beautiful in a way that even her detractors could only marvel at. She was ruined by her circumstances, and by a family who never cared, never showed her the appreciation she deserved for her talents and labors. In this, I do take issue with my grandmother, but with a woman so close to death what would be the point in voicing those grievances? They're not really mine anyway.

All the same, I pity Anne more than I do anyone else, Anne with her shattered beauty and shattered body and shattered spirit.

A Childhood Dress

When my grandmother opened a trunk that had been sealed for twenty years, Anne found a costume she'd worn as a young child, another relic of a bygone era.

There was so much there, so many stories that we'll never even hear.

I don't call them Weird Family for nothing.

Wednesday, April 29, 2009

Jam-Packed Weekend

Grand Ma Weird Family's House

Last weekend was the kind that amazes you with the sheer amount of activities that can be crammed into it.

I skipped school Thursday and drove the two and a half hours up to Decaying State, getting stopped along the way by a Hick State state trooper who let me go with a warning, despite the fact that I was driving eighty-two miles per hour in a seventy-mile-per-hour zone, when I told him the purpose of my trip.

When I arrived near Anne's Town, I stopped at a rest area and stuffed my mouth with McDonald's. I usually only allow myself this treat once a month, a rule I've flagrantly violated this April. Between my regular McDonald's day, my 21st birthday, one afternoon when Mom brought home double cheeseburgers for lunch, and my fast-food-laden visit to Decaying State, I've had it five times since April 1st.

The high caloric intake seems to have jumpstarted my metabolism; on the morning I left for Decaying State I weighed 129 lbs, and on the morning after my arrival I weighed, astonishingly, 129 lbs. Similarly, I've been eating like a pig at night but so far this week my weight hasn't climbed over 130 lbs. Still, I need to be more health conscious.

Oh, willpower.

Grand Ma's Cluttered House

I spent Thursday and Friday cleaning out Grand Ma's dusty, cluttered, 300-year-old house, in which she's accumulated junk for the last three decades. I'm almost certain that the experience gave me another cold.

I'd meant to stay Friday night as well before I realized that with the combined treks from Anne's house to home and from home to school totaling about four hours, I'd have to get up around five in the morning to meet my Major University friends on time at eleven.

So I drove home, exhausted and starving, on Friday night. Before I left Decaying State, I did try and get Grand Ma to reveal to me the truth behind some family secrets. She wasn't telling. She said we'd just have to do the digging ourselves.

After arriving home Friday, I took one of the most thorough showers of my life, probably using half of my shampoo and conditioner bottles.

Then I woke up at nine on Saturday and drove the hour and a half to Major University, from which I departed with a group of five on the hour-long drive to Amusement Park at about noon.

Our posse, eventually augmented several times by fellow Major University students we met at the park, consisted by the end of the night of me, Friendly Guy, Friendly Girl, Bald Guy, Creepy Guy, Regular Guy, Muscled Guy, Prematurely Balding Guy, Pale Blonde Girl, and possibly one other person who I'm forgetting.

I did not get on any rollercoasters, but had a fun time nonetheless.

The best part of the night on a personal level came when I, at the head of our group, happened to pass right by ROTC Boy and the whole gang who I lived with my Freshman Year. Surrounded by friends, I shot the most derisive look I could at the people who'd excluded me as I fell into severe depression, whose apathy was so cruel during that hard time.

When ROTC Boy--intelligent, handsome, impossible to hate--called out my name, I gave the smallest response I could--nodding my head and saying, "Hey"--and walked on.

I doubt that any of them even noticed--they didn't notice when in my loneliness and despair I became suicidal--but it felt good to me. It's the best revenge I can imagine. I love having friends. I want even more.

We left the park at around eight-thirty, and I got home after eleven.

That night I slept nine hours. On Sunday I was thankful to just relax.

Tuesday, April 28, 2009

Selected Entries: May, 2003

I have selected the entry for May 26, 2003. On that day, I spent most of my time playing with Lacrosse Boy and Half Canadian Boy, and it is a happy memory. It was also the first time I shaved.

Lacrosse Boy

May 26, 2003

Mom came home from Hick State yesterday with a vengeance, although fortunately for me I was not here to experience most of it. Yesterday was one of the absolute best Sundays that I can ever remember.

I woke up around eleven o’clock in the morning, although I suppose that I should backtrack. Sunday started with me on the couch watching television. Powell’s friend was spending the night. At one o’clock, I went into our newly-finished basement to watch “She Spies,” which is by far one of my favorite television shows. In between, or, I mean, during commercials I watched CNN news. The man who, Paul McCartney (duh) played Red Square recently, singing “Back in the USSR.” “She Spies” was a repeat, but it was still good. I wonder if it will be renewed for a second season. I hope so. It’s a good show, although not very popular, not because it’s disliked, but because it isn’t well known.

After that I took my little early morning bath. I dressed in my pajamas, read my Bible, wrote in my journal, cuddled with Midnight, said goodnight to Powell, and went to bed.

I awoke at eleven o’clock that same morning. We had an excellent breakfast of eggs, scrapple, and corned beef hash, although I chose not to eat any of the corned beef hash and most of the eggs were gone when I got down there, I still enjoyed it. I had plenty of scrapple, which, by the way, is delicious. I then went outside, pajama-clad and all.

Lacrosse Boy was outside, and we spoke on different matters for probably about half an hour before we went into my house to get some drinks. Then we watched something on MTV. Then a Disney movie came on. Lacrosse Boy said that he wanted to watch it.

By the way, one of our conversations outside was based on what we would do if we were famous. I was talking about having a party, and Lacrosse Boy and I were conversing over who exactly we would invite to the party. We came up with Mariah Carey, Christina Aguilera, Britney Spears, Jennifer Lopez, the Olsen twins, Hilary Duff, Shaquille O’Neil, P’Diddy, Kelly Clarkson, and (although just to be funny) Aaron Carter.

Lacrosse Boy said that he’d come up to the door, and I said we’d put on the music and tell him that the party had been canceled. We said that we definitely wouldn’t invite anyone like Eminem or Marilyn Manson (ew). I think, though, that maybe we could invite Eminem. We would have to invite Michelle Branch and Vanessa Carleton; and who else? I don’t know.

Anyway, Lacrosse Boy decided to watch that movie and Dad came home from the store. He said that he had secured a job interview for me on Tuesday, and that if I had to cut my hair I would. Annoyed, I told him that it could easily be gelled back and look presentable enough.

I then went to get a shower. Lacrosse Boy told me that he’d wait in the living room watching that movie. I stepped into the steamy, hot shower. For me, taking a shower is sensual in a way that goes beyond sex. It’s like a bit of paradise, almost. I feel enthralled and peaceful, sensuous, but not aroused, all at once. I feel natural and protected. The shower is a sanctified place. No one can touch me there, and no one can take that time from me. I’ve figured, quite naturally, that this feeling goes far beyond the natural shower. It could’ve been applied to any place, because really it’s a state of mind. Although, there is something comforting about standing in your most natural state, nude, while the steamy water pours down onto you.

After my shower (“Oh, my gosh, you take a thirty-minute shower!” Lacrosse Boy said to me) I quickly gelled my hair straight back. I went down and asked my father if it was presentable. He said no. I became very angry with him and said that if that wasn’t presentable then nothing was. However, he hadn’t been referring to my hair (well, not exactly). He was referring to my facial hair (however sparse it is). He said that I needed to shave and then he advised me to comb my hair just a bit more to the side. I did both of these things. The combing was easy. The shaving was a bit more difficult. In the end, he had to come and help me.

Lacrosse Boy waited patiently throughout all of this, at one point playing with Thomas’s miniature basketball hoop. Finally, Lacrosse Boy and I played Risk. He’d never played before, and he was thrilled with the game. It was actually quite funny. The game really can be addictive, it’s so fun, although I was genuinely tired of it.

I got some Doritos and Lacrosse Boy got some, too. I cautioned him heavily, though, to not get any food on the floor, as we were eating in the formal dining room, where the game was. My mother would have a fit if we made a mess out there. So, we played some more. I went to get more Doritos, and Lacrosse Boy blocked the box from me. So we fought (not really) over the Doritos. I won, and I took a bag into the bathroom with me. I suppose I was really just feeding the fire, but oh, well.

Then I chased Lacrosse Boy around the house, trying to pop the newspaper bag before he could, and, once again, I won. We concluded our game of Risk, even though we didn’t really finish. I told Lacrosse Boy that we’d play again later. We went to visit Part Canadian Boy, who broke his arm recently.

I heard from both Powell and Part Canadian Boy that the bone was making a bump in his flesh. He didn’t cry at all, not even when they had to bend the bone to fit his arm into the cast. Part Canadian Boy deserves a lot more credit for being a really great person than we ever gave him before.

We played some tennis in front of Part Canadian Boy’s house. Then we went inside and watched “The Man Show.” There must’ve been a marathon yesterday, because there were very many “Man Show” episodes. That show (albeit in a very crude way) is funny. Then we went outside again. Then we went into Part Canadian Boy’s backyard and into his next-door neighbor’s backyard. Then we got permission from my father to spent the night at Part Canadian Boy’s house.

Lacrosse Boy couldn’t get permission from his parents, but before he had to go we made some prank telephone calls, although they weren’t very successful because almost everything in Beautiful Town closes early.

Probably the most successful prank telephone call of the entire night (and it wasn’t even that funny) was a call to a local restaurant during which I pretended to be an eighty-five-year-old woman seeking employment. I asked if my age or any previous criminal record would be a hindrance to being hired. I told the woman that I’d been charged a year earlier, when I was eighty-four years old, of armed robbery. She quickly figured out that it was a prank telephone call and she asked questions that visibly voiced her suspicions. I began to laugh and she hung up on me. I said, at the end (after she hung up on me), “You want my number? It’s 1-800-KISS-MY-ASS you stupid bitch!” Lacrosse Boy was practically hysterical. He laid on the couch and rolled with laughter.

We put in the movie “Pitch Black” into the DVD player. Lacrosse Boy had to leave in the beginning of it and we walked to his house with him because he was frightened that someone would jump out and grab him. He told us that one night he and a friend were walking down my street when a man in a trench coat began to approach them rapidly. Lacrosse Boy said that they ran very quickly. I would have, too. Ever since, he’s been more cautious. I really can’t say that I blame him.

We stood on his porch talking until about midnight (I was in my pajamas once more), talking about school and who we disliked (Annoying Boy came up in that conversation) and different teachers. We also spoke of scary things, and all three of us became frightened. It was fun.

When Lacrosse Boy went inside, Part Canadian Boy and I walked back to his house, a bit more aware of our surroundings than we otherwise would have been. Part Canadian Boy fell asleep before the end of “Pitch Black,” which I took out. I was going to go to bed, but (embarrassingly enough) I couldn’t bring myself to turn off the light. I read part of a book of questions designed to teach you about yourself. I finally turned off the light.

Journals Section: May, 2003

May 1, 2003

One year ago today, Aria’s Royal family issued false reports to the Arian public of news coming in from Country Music State, Native State, and Decaying State. This report said that Olympia, Renaldi’s capital, had been burned, and Crown Princess Innocent and Queen Perfect had been besieged there. Other reports told of a rebellion in San Antonio and of the resultant invasion of Santa Abuela Dominica Lucia, an Imperial palace reserved for one of the Dowager Empresses and Dowager Emperors. Gudalajara, the capital of Nicholia, was also invaded, and the surprise attack was said to be so bad that fighting was going on on the lawn of Nikolai Palace, the Nicholian king’s compound. The report also alleged that an extensive Imperial military base in the Decaying State Territory had been attacked and completely destroyed. Also purported was that two attackers were caught trying to enter Athens (or Copenhagen, later called Athens-Copenhagen) and attack the Cristalian Queen. The release of this news to the public was enough to send the entire Beautiful Town Cluster into a massive panic. Although the reports were completely fictitious, the average citizen had no way of distinguishing between government lies and the truth. Aria had just annexed Gorgan and Beryllium that day, and things fell into chaos. Almost all cities were evacuated. Many had little or no inhabitants, but San Francisco and Philadelphia, the two major Arian population centers, were also evacuated. This caused a major panic. All of us fled into Beryllium, into what, just hours prior, had denounced its sovereignty. Beryllium City, just one of the many cities in the large Imperial province of Andrea. This is, along with the Revolution that would take place just a day over two months later, one of the most important historical events in Arian history. There were rumors here that people had actually died in Renaldi. The Imperial government vehemently denied them, and, obviously, they weren’t true. The Arian World War II, which ended in the Revolution, began sometime around May 1st. It has been monstrously hot of late. Except for the end, today has been a wonderful day. There was one girl in Drama who cruelly said to me, “Please go away now.” Later in the day I promptly and decisively defeated her in Spanish during a game. She has sided with me before on different occasions, so I can’t understand why she’s suddenly be so blatantly and maddeningly rude. I put another young girl in her place using a more vicious method that same period. This girl constantly belittles my opinions and today in class she gave me a look when I suggested something and said, “Just be quiet.” Or something like that. So I did what I normally try to avoid doing. I raised my voice just enough to fill the room but not screaming, and I exclaimed, “I wasn’t talking to you, you dork! Shut up!” She turned around, rosy red. The entire class burst into laughter. She did not care to reply. The blow was successful, and she should no longer be a problem. Next period I worked with Dumb Boy. This boy is a bit stupid, but he seems genuinely kind (although I really don’t know him that well; he’s barely an acquaintance). He began to tell a lewd joke, but then he laughed and said, “But there’s some things you shouldn’t say in front of ladies.” This old-fashioned, chivalrous notion was charming, and one which I share, although most “ladies” today can match men in their vulgarity. Today it was after school that was terrible. Well, not terrible, but certainly unpleasant. I did homework for the longest time, wanting to watch television and eat. I thought, by mistake, that I would need a Periodic Table to finish my homework. I asked Powell for his Periodic Table. When he ignored me I found it myself. When he saw me, he started throwing punches. Screaming at him, I began a defensive strike. He retaliated. When verbal arguments escalated, he seized the table from me on his way into the shower. I ran into his room and got it again. His stupidity and his unfounded anger caused him to lunge at me, attacking me even as he was in the nude. Now I really screamed, pushing him from me. Mom ordered Powell to bed. I realized that I didn’t need his Periodic Table, [so I dropped it] onto his bed. She falsely accused me of throwing it, and sent me to bed (not that that would have been a legitimate reason anyway)—before 8:30p.m. The ensuing tirade has lasted for hours. I’ve offered by far the fiercest resistance, sometimes subtle (slowly cleaning my room) and sometimes not so subtle (singing, “I just want to get away/Saving all your bullshit for another day/I’m the only one that can rescue me from me…”). But as the fighting itself escalated verbally, her tactics sank just as swiftly. She knows that I look forward all week to Saturday Night Live, and that’s the first thing she took. That’s okay, though; I can easily arrange for someone to have that taped for me. Then she sank to an even more unbelievable level of depravity, threatening to delete the novel that, laboriously, I have spent more than a year working on. Fortunately, I predicted long ago that this might be used as a last-line dirty tactic on me, and all important work is saved and hidden—well. But, although I’d known it could happen, I was still shocked. My father should be home around eleven o’clock, and if I know him will enough I should imagine that he’ll be highly angered. She has shown an utter disregard for the time and effort that have gone into that book, and the thought of its loss troubles me greatly. And she knows that. Psychological socialist warfare and oppression goes on in this house. It’s time that justice prevailed, and I will rush to Dad when he arrives home. Not only that, I have been deprived of a shower. There must be justice.

May 2, 2003

I am actually enjoying this rather ludicrous punishment. There is light enough by which I can write, and I’m very cozy. I can listen to music and read and have all sorts of little activities. Dad promises to have a talk, he, Mom, and I. That’s good. I was outside for hours and hours today, playing soccer and basketball, among other things. I went for a walk in the construction site and down the rather isolated path just as it was getting dark. It was very scary. My computer has been rendered inoperative, something that I must fix immediately. This was done to me on purpose. I should have [unsure what I meant here; the sentence is a fragment]. The weather is happily cool and windy. I am tired and comfortable.

May 3, 2003

Well, despite numerous promises being made, my father, mother, and I did not have a talk tonight. Her ludicrous punishment still officially stands. Mom has gone to bed, and Dad is asleep in the living room. Saturday Night Live awaits, although Thomas is an obstacle. He’ll probably fall asleep halfway through it, though, and by “She Spies” he’ll be out like a light. I found out today that Black Comedienne is originally from Dirty County. This came as a great surprise to me, as we generally look down on Dirty County, and, I believe, with good reason; having lived there for more than a decade, my impression and perception of the overall culture (or lack thereof) isn’t flattering. Powell, Thomas, and I (but especially me) were blessed with not having acquired the Dirty County accent, along with its slaughtered intonation and errors that defy the English grammar system. They don’t all talk as if they’re poor, though; really it’s their rudeness that gives it away. There’s a rather stupid girl named Mean Girl who I was able to pick out almost immediately after meeting her as being from that area. That county is a disgrace to this country. A talk with Uncle Liar today did more to disturb me than to do anything else. I’ll go into that later. I have to go now.

May 4, 2003

I saw Saturday Night Live last night. I also saw “She Spies.” I actually enjoyed “She Spies” more than Saturday Night Live, because I was constantly worried about being caught watching Saturday Night Live. I became so tired of the anxiety that, to gain a somewhat better knowledge of my mother’s movements, I put a book in her door. As her door opens, she wouldn’t even see the book before the opening door caused a huge release of pressure on the book, which would, accordingly, fall to the floor above me with a bang, alerting me that my mother was up. Even with that precaution, I still did not enjoy Saturday Night Live as thoroughly as I would have. I thought that I heard it several times, however my employment of this more effective tactic enabled me to avoid direct discovery. My own stupid error led to that, although I suffered naught for it. After watching Saturday Night Live and “She Spies,” I went up. By the way, “She Spies” was very funny. They went to a spa exclusively for federal government employees. I like the idea. They really should make one of those.


May 8, 2003

Today is the eighth. I should note that Thomas’s birthday is in four days. It will be celebrated (on a small scale) this weekend. Unlike his seven prior birthdays, which were all celebrated in kind with sizeable (for a middle class family) parties, this year will be a very small coalescence of people, only about five, and all of them family. This ends almost a decade of injustice of the party system. Even in theory this system was junk from the beginning. Once implemented, its inequalities and injustices proved more audacious and monstrous than would have been thought. Every five years we were able to have a party with more than just about three friends present. During the years that interceded within these years, what should have been festive birthday occasions were restricted to family, and, if we were lucky, three friends. Over the years, this system, this machine of deprivation, was rigidly maintained with Powell and I. Thomas’s sixth birthday came as a slap in the face; roughly twelve boys stayed for a sleepover. This year, the eighth, has broken the cycle. I suggested to Mom the name Name I Wanted for the baby. She doesn’t agree; she says that she doesn’t like two middle names. I still think that it’s a pretty name.

May 9, 2003

No matter how many times I see the photographs from September 11th, they still amaze me, they still leave me in disbelief. It’s not really so much the pictures from the World Trade Center; those are just incredibly sad. But you can relate that to London during World War II, and you’re not so shocked, because you’ve seen foreign cities get attacked. It’s the pictures of the Pentagon that always manage to instill an incredible surreality within me. The Pentagon is a very specific American symbol and image. When I look at the pictures and I see that huge explosion roaring up from the building’s west side, it never ceases to phase me. I am left absolutely amazed to see our nation’s defense center, the very embodiment of the military power of the greatest international power on fire. For all of our might, we couldn’t defend our core. And I always think that this couldn’t possibly be happening. The world’s most powerful nation (history’s most powerful nation, in fact) couldn’t be so cripplingly, devastatingly attacked, not with such ease. No land invasion of the United States could ever be possible. Canada and Mexico could easily be made American territories (if the United States desired it) and they wouldn’t dare attack us. Any sea invasion would be potentially successful, because America’s coasts are vast and cannot all be defended. But even then, if American territory was ever occupied the invader would be in very serious trouble. Also, in all likelihood, no foreign fleet would ever reach an American base before it was detected on radar and crushed in the ocean. Any air raids on American cities, if the planes could even entire our airspace, would be retaliated against so fiercely that the entire world would weep. It is true that no sane nation would ever attack the United States. So a band of renegade, rebel terrorists was sent instead. They blended into our society and subtly made their plans. There was no large army, navy, or air force to be detected, so their attacks (except, of course, for Flight 93) went successfully. They attacked us mercilessly and caused incredible damage, then, like the cowardly bastards that they are, they then took their own lives (thus avoiding retaliation) and left no nation directly responsible. American vengeance had to be satisfied, though, and two nations, Iraq and Afghanistan, have fallen to American might for it. Now that the war in Iraq is over, I wonder what’s next. President Bush says that the war isn’t over yet. I wonder who’s next? North Korea, maybe? I doubt that, at least for now. Perhaps Syria or Iran, although I really don’t see anyone who we can even pretend to now have legitimate reasons to invade. It’s odd. Since September 11th, there’s been a bit of a war mentality across the whole nation. First, we were the victims of this horrific attack. Then, we were the avengers, forcing our anger and grief onto the world through multiple invasions and conquests. First, our legitimate war in Afghanistan took that nation. Then, though, like Rome, we made up an incredible excuse to invade an enemy, from which we pursued. Although I’m glad that we invaded Iraq. They now think that Saddam Hussein might possibly be alive. What would that mean? I wonder, what does our victory in Iraq mean? Is the war over? Despite what the President says, I think that the war really is over. The conflicts are over, and if we’re lucky this will never go beyond an American war and evolve into something more. I had the most horrific dream last Wednesday night. In this dream, a very large bomb detonated inside of my school. I survived the blast, but I was trapped with a large number of people. The explosion had caused the floors above us to fall over most of A Wing and then to about the midpoint of the lobby. Some of us were bloody, and we were waiting to be rescued. As we sat round in a circle fathoming the damage across from the rubble. We were talking about the massacre at Columbine High School and how only about twelve people had died. We were hoping that only a handful of our fellow students had died.

May 10, 2003

A man going around the school to free people poked in from the rubble. We asked the bloody man if he knew how many were dead, and we told him that we hoped that it wasn’t many. He told us not to get our hopes up, saying, “About fifty people are dead behind that wall.” As we were led away from what was left of our school, we had to walk around the building’s remains. We were able to see the massive explosion’s impact on A Wing. The top three floors’ walls had been completely blown out, creating a sort of cross section of the building. Bodies littered all three stories. I remember looking up as bodies on the edge fell out. Some survivors were pushing bodies off, making more room to be rescued. I remember vividly the body of a boy I know from the bus falling all the way down from the fourth floor. The body landed in front of me, causing me to let out an immense scream. I began crying. The dream ended. Three days later, I had a fair spasm when I saw a news report of a Beautiful County boy threatening to hold our school hostage with strategically-placed pipe bombs. He had planned to use the ransom money to build a hydrogen bomb. That would explain the massive destruction in my dream. Thank goodness he was caught before that dream could evolve into a nightmare reality. Also, has Aria been reborn? A year ago today, the economic aftermath of the alleged horrific attack on that country and the following incredibly successful military strikes was already beginning to wear off. Two months later, the country was already locked in its painful death throes of anarchy. Four months later, it had collapsed. Now, things may be changing. My brother, Powell, has accepted the Arian throne. He has agreed to hold it until a conference in the Decaying State Territory in July. This is also when I will be recording my demo album.

May 12, 2003

Thomas’s eighth birthday was an even more downplayed occasion than I would have thought, and more than I would have liked. Although Thomas is a horrendous brat, and he probably deserved such a small birthday, I’m still not sure if I agree. If I have money, my children’s birthdays will always be large celebrations, thanking God for such an incredible blessing and celebrating the child as a person and the life that they’ve lived thus far. Such is certainly not the attitude here of late. A new, unexpected, and unprecedented wave of socialism is beginning its disastrous sweep through this house, much to my dismay. A brief history of this would go like this: From the time of my birth on April 10, 1988 until about 1999, violations of our liberty and socialist standards dominated our lives. Beginning in 1999, these oppressive tactics increased, peaking in their repressive nature in the period between October and December of 2001. This was almost true dictatorship. Totalitarianism is another accurate term. Then, we made a complete, modernizing turnaround. In December, 2001, incredible reforms and promises were made. Liberties came in their legions. All the way through 2002 this almost democratic lifestyle became more and more open, and by December of 2002 we had reached a height of liberation that we had only dreamed of. Until April of 2003 this continued relatively uninterrupted. In April, the repression came, slowly. So slowly that new far-reaching reforms were still being added to the long list that had transformed our family. One of these was that I wouldn’t be made to cut my long hair if my grades remained well. I applauded this move. As you can see quite clearly from the last few weeks’ entries, these democratic reforms are being repealed in a succession of each other. About two days ago, the bedtime reform (guarantee of nine-thirty to ten time up in room) was swiftly taken. A day ago, my father all but announced that the hair reform would be repealed. I’ve made a concession for layers but I will try diligently to keep my hair long. We have to do another reverse and bring back the democracy.

May 17, 2003

America has been attacked again, on a smaller scale this time, but still attacked. In both Saudi Arabia and Morocco (Riyadh in Saudi Arabia and Casablanca in Morocco). In both countries, untargeted innocents were also killed in the attacks. I don’t think that another 9/11 will happen, though. Dad says that he thinks that the war’s over. Also, there is great news. Mom’s baby is scheduled to be born on June 18th. We found out this week that Pie will join us on June 18, 2003. Since I’m not trying to get a job until this summer, I’ve requested that the layering be postponed so that my hair won’t be as short as it would be.

May 21, 2003

Today is Mama Bear’s thirtieth birthday.

May 24, 2003

For Mama Bear’s birthday, I wrote her a poem called “Once There Was a Mama Bear.” It is part of a story called “Marie Our Family.” I’ve thought often of my mother, and what she did. Virtually her entire family was opposed to the marriage, and they weren’t all too fond of us. We were poor, and she could have been on her way to college. She sacrificed everything for us, and we weren’t even hers. She didn’t even like the story. There was too much in it about the System. This is still a bad subject with us. I fear that she will be angry with me for the entire day. Oh, well. I told the truth. I suppose that she can’t handle the truth. Perhaps I’ll do something else for her, something that she’ll like. I’m not sure what to do, though. Our Terror Alert Level is on Orange, or “High,” again. This is the fourth time since the system has been instituted that we’ve come to Code Orange. I wonder if we’ll get to Code Red, or “Severe.” It’s not quite as hysterical as it was last time, when everyone bought duct tape and gas masks and stuff like that. I’m sure that if we went to Code Red, though, there’d be a massive panic throughout the nation. This weekend is Memorial Day weekend, and we don’t have any school on Monday. If I ever needed a weekend, it was now, too. I’ve been so stressed this week. I’ve had so much homework that I have not even had the time to write. Well, we’ve been attacked in Morocco and Saudi Arabia. A bomb went off at Yale, but no one even got hurt and they said that terrorists were not involved. I got a haircut on Mom’s birthday. I got a whole ¾ of an inch taken off of my bangs.

May 25, 2003

It is nearly three o’clock in the morning and I’ve just taken a hot bath. Midnight is cuddling with me, I’m tired and content. Life is good. I’m going to bed.

May 26, 2003

Mom came home from Hick State yesterday with a vengeance, although fortunately for me I was not here to experience most of it. Yesterday was one of the absolute best Sundays that I can ever remember. I woke up around eleven o’clock in the morning, although I suppose that I should backtrack. Sunday started with me on the couch watching television. Powell’s friend was spending the night. At one o’clock, I went into our newly-finished basement to watch “She Spies,” which is by far one of my favorite television shows. In between, or, I mean, during commercials I watched CNN news. The man who, Paul McCartney (duh) played Red Square recently, singing “Back in the USSR.” “She Spies” was a repeat, but it was still good. I wonder if it will be renewed for a second season. I hope so. It’s a good show, although not very popular, not because it’s disliked, but because it isn’t well known. After that I took my little early morning bath. I dressed in my pajamas, read my Bible, wrote in my journal, cuddled with Midnight, said goodnight to Powell, and went to bed. I awoke at eleven o’clock that same morning. We had an excellent breakfast of eggs, scrapple, and corned beef hash, although I chose not to eat any of the corned beef hash and most of the eggs were gone when I got down there, I still enjoyed it. I had plenty of scrapple, which, by the way, is delicious. I then went outside, pajama-clad and all. Lacrosse Boy was outside, and we spoke on different matters for probably about half an hour before we went into my house to get some drinks. Then we watched something on MTV. Then a Disney movie came on. Lacrosse Boy said that he wanted to watch it. By the way, one of our conversations outside was based on what we would do if we were famous. I was talking about having a party, and Lacrosse Boy and I were conversing over who exactly we would invite to the party. We came up with Mariah Carey, Christina Aguilera, Britney Spears, Jennifer Lopez, the Olsen twins, Hilary Duff, Shaquille O’Neil, P’Diddy, Kelly Clarkson, and (although just to be funny) Aaron Carter. Lacrosse Boy said that he’d come up to the door, and I said we’d put on the music and tell him that the party had been canceled. We said that we definitely wouldn’t invite anyone like Eminem or Marilyn Manson (ew). I think, though, that maybe we could invite Eminem. We would have to invite Michelle Branch and Vanessa Carleton; and who else? I don’t know. Anyway, Lacrosse Boy decided to watch that movie and Dad came home from the store. He said that he had secured a job interview for me on Tuesday, and that if I had to cut my hair I would. Annoyed, I told him that it could easily be gelled back and look presentable enough. I then went to get a shower. Lacrosse Boy told me that he’d wait in the living room watching that movie. I stepped into the steamy, hot shower. For me, taking a shower is sensual in a way that goes beyond sex. It’s like a bit of paradise, almost. I feel enthralled and peaceful, sensuous, but not aroused, all at once. I feel natural and protected. The shower is a sanctified place. No one can touch me there, and no one can take that time from me. I’ve figured, quite naturally, that this feeling goes far beyond the natural shower. It could’ve been applied to any place, because really it’s a state of mind. Although, there is something comforting about standing in your most natural state, nude, while the steamy water pours down onto you. After my shower (“Oh, my gosh, you take a thirty-minute shower!” Lacrosse Boy said to me) I quickly gelled my hair straight back. I went down and asked my father if it was presentable. He said no. I became very angry with him and said that if that wasn’t presentable then nothing was. However, he hadn’t been referring to my hair (well, not exactly). He was referring to my facial hair (however sparse it is). He said that I needed to shave and then he advised me to comb my hair just a bit more to the side. I did both of these things. The combing was easy. The shaving was a bit more difficult. In the end, he had to come and help me. Lacrosse Boy waited patiently throughout all of this, at one point playing with Thomas’s miniature basketball hoop. Finally, Lacrosse Boy and I played Risk. He’d never played before, and he was thrilled with the game. It was actually quite funny. The game really can be addictive, it’s so fun, although I was genuinely tired of it. I got some Doritos and Lacrosse Boy got some, too. I cautioned him heavily, though, to not get any food on the floor, as we were eating in the formal dining room, where the game was. My mother would have a fit if we made a mess out there. So, we played some more. I went to get more Doritos, and Lacrosse Boy blocked the box from me. So we fought (not really) over the Doritos. I won, and I took a bag into the bathroom with me. I suppose I was really just feeding the fire, but oh, well. Then I chased Lacrosse Boy around the house, trying to pop the newspaper bag before he could, and, once again, I won. We concluded our game of Risk, even though we didn’t really finish. I told Lacrosse Boy that we’d play again later. We went to visit Part Canadian Boy, who broke his arm recently. I heard from both Powell and Part Canadian Boy that the bone was making a bump in his flesh. He didn’t cry at all, not even when they had to bend the bone to fit his arm into the cast. Part Canadian Boy deserves a lot more credit for being a really great person than we ever gave him before. We played some tennis in front of Part Canadian Boy’s house. Then we went inside and watched “The Man Show.” There must’ve been a marathon yesterday, because there were very many “Man Show” episodes. That show (albeit in a very crude way) is funny. Then we went outside again. Then we went into Part Canadian Boy’s backyard and into his next-door neighbor’s backyard. Then we got permission from my father to spent the night at Part Canadian Boy’s house. Lacrosse Boy couldn’t get permission from his parents, but before he had to go we made some prank telephone calls, although they weren’t very successful because almost everything in Beautiful Town closes early. Probably the most successful prank telephone call of the entire night (and it wasn’t even that funny) was a call to a local restaurant during which I pretended to be an eighty-five-year-old woman seeking employment. I asked if my age or any previous criminal record would be a hindrance to being hired. I told the woman that I’d been charged a year earlier, when I was eighty-four years old, of armed robbery. She quickly figured out that it was a prank telephone call and she asked questions that visibly voiced her suspicions. I began to laugh and she hung up on me. I said, at the end (after she hung up on me), “You want my number? It’s 1-800-KISS-MY-ASS you stupid bitch!” Lacrosse Boy was practically hysterical. He laid on the couch and rolled with laughter. We put in the movie “Pitch Black” into the DVD player. Lacrosse Boy had to leave in the beginning of it and we walked to his house with him because he was frightened that someone would jump out and grab him. He told us that one night he and a friend were walking down my street when a man in a trench coat began to approach them rapidly. Lacrosse Boy said that they ran very quickly. I would have, too. Ever since, he’s been more cautious. I really can’t say that I blame him. We stood on his porch talking until about midnight (I was in my pajamas once more), talking about school and who we disliked (Annoying Boy came up in that conversation) and different teachers. We also spoke of scary things, and all three of us became frightened. It was fun. When Lacrosse Boy went inside, Part Canadian Boy and I walked back to his house, a bit more aware of our surroundings than we otherwise would have been. Part Canadian Boy fell asleep before the end of “Pitch Black,” which I took out. I was going to go to bed, but (embarrassingly enough) I couldn’t bring myself to turn off the light. I read part of a book of questions designed to teach you about yourself. I finally turned off the light.

May 28, 2003

I went home around eight-thirty or nine o’clock to find that my father had left for work. Thomas was over at Pole Humper’s house, having been there the night before to sleep over. Mom was home, still in her pajamas, quietly cleaning. As I arrived home she was in the midst of emptying the trash cans and cleaning out the cat box. This is my chore, and I felt a stab of guilt as I watched her. But she was near completion, and I thought to just let her finish. She then started making announcements about divorcing my father and moving to New England State and the division of the family and the sale of our house. By evening it had rolled over between my parents, but she is still being cold with me, which greatly angers me. Although it hasn’t been said outright, I am almost certain that my written thoughts on the System, which strongly looked down upon corporal punishment and referred to my mother’s own childhood, were the spark needed to ignite the accumulating gun powder. She also told her entire family about my writings. These writings refer once to my Aunt Ostentatious as fabricating a story to my father, which resulted in a vicious beating. This is true, of course, however people are still offended by its acknowledgement. I now fear to go to Hick State; my mother’s family is rash and quick to anger, and I’m not really sure if I want to take the risk of their retaliation for what is true. Initially relations between myself and that family were already stiff. Actually, they were terrible. Years have erased that, and perhaps I was wrong to invoke the past, however I never could have imagined that it would be put into such easily-enraged hands. According to my mother, Aunt Ostentatious has now forbidden me from setting foot on her property, which could very well be my mother’s exaggeration; I don’t know, I’ve sent Powell to ask. He hasn’t returned, and I doubt that he’ll ask. Mom could be exaggerating, however I could easily imagine my aunt doing such a stupid thing. By the way, Aria is apparently back. Negotiations between Cristalia and the capital were going on recently. Relations between my mother and I remain artificial and cold, and maybe it’s time that I stop trying. If she doesn’t care, why should I? Well, I suppose that one of us should move first toward peace, but that’s what I’ve been doing and there hasn’t been a very significant positive response. I suppose that the truth really does hurt. These people are insensitive and inconsiderate.

May 29, 2003

It would now appear that I spoke (or rather, wrote) too soon, Her family didn’t really care that much (so she says), a reaction which greatly surprised me. It was she who forbade me from going to Aunt Ostentatious’s house, which I find unspeakably stupid. I have to get a microphone and get some of my songs on tape. Pie will be born twenty days from today, on June 18, 2003. It still thrills me every time that I hear it. I can’t believe that in less than a month I’ll have a sister. Nine months went by so quickly. I can’t believe that in eleven school days my Freshman Year of high school will have ended. In four months I’ll be a Sophomore. That’s incredible to me. Everything is speeding by. As fast as the rest of the school year went, these last few days seem to drag on and on, although I know that when I look back on them I will feel as if they passed just as rapidly. My birthday, April 10th, seems as if it was only yesterday, and sometimes I’ll catch myself accidentally giving my age as fourteen, when I am actually fifteen. Does all of life go by this fast? This summer excites me with its possibilities. I get to use a recording studio! For free! I doubt that it will lead to anything professional this summer, though. Who knows, though? I had my first vocal lesson on Tuesday, and I absolutely loved it. My range is from C to high F, which my teacher says is fairly good; an octave and a half, or twelve notes. She wants to try for G next week. She says that she believes my range will expand, and we’re also to work on the bit of nasaly singing that has creeped its way back into my voice. We’re writing, memorizing, rehearsing, and producing our own thirty-minute play in Drama class. I am so excited about it, and Dad has said that he’ll try to come to school and videotape it, although I’ll have to describe it later because I’ve got to study for Spanish and memorize for Drama (they are, in a sense, the same thing really).

May 31, 2003

Tomorrow will be the first day of June. How fast it’s come. I have to finish my three songs this weekend! We have to buy a microphone, too! Oh, wait. My friend actually has a microphone that I can use. It’s a good thing, too, because I seriously doubt that my father would ever really have bought me one. Funnily enough, this May has been largely uneventful. I went to the carnival last night with Blonde Girl. I’ll go into detail, probably tomorrow.

Sunday, April 26, 2009

The Best Part

Under the Trampoline

The best part about living in the South is that at the end of April one can behave as if is the middle of July.

It was 91 degrees here yesterday by early afternoon today the temperature had reached 88.

Peruvian Girl and I went down to the ice cream stand outside of town and brought delicious frosty confections back to my house. She suggested sitting underneath the trampoline, where we could have shade. So we did, staring out at the sunny grass and eating our ice cream.

Tuesday, April 21, 2009

The Birthday Weekend That Was

Though I won't go into a detailed account of my 21st birthday celebrations, I did want to make some record of the weekend.

On Friday afternoon, my mother came home with a bag of presents for me that included clothes, flip-flops, candy, and balloons.

Gifts

A delicious cookie cake, which I shared with my mother, Thomas, and Pie, followed.

Happy Birthday!

That evening, I went out to dinner with three friends to a great local restaurant where I bought my first legal drink (a rum and coke).

After that, three of our group of four went out to the movies.

The next day, I drove to Center Town to Hippy Guy's house, where I stayed Saturday night.

At Hippy Guy's House

We went out to dinner, then to a bar, and then back to somebody's house.

On Sunday I came home.

The care that Hippy Guy showed me, the efforts that many friends took to ensure my 21st birthday was safe and fun, made me feel blessed.

Monday, April 20, 2009

A Weekend Not Spent in Decaying State

I had every intention of driving up to Decaying State on Friday afternoon to pay a last visit to my grandmother, who is dying of liver cancer.

Unfortunately, the lingering cold that had sidelined me on Wednesday persisted through the weekend, and Anne, during a telephone conversation Friday morning, told me to stay home.

"BB, listen," she said. "You can't be coming up here sick. In her state she's very vulnerable, and even a cold could turn into something really bad. I want you to get in bed, rest, and see how you feel tomorrow morning."

I did not get back into bed. Too ill to drive north but with the day already taken off of work, I hopped on my bike and rode to the bank, savoring the 75-degree weather of the year's first really warm weekend. (Our first 80-degree day, by the way, is due to be Sunday, April 26th, if CNN Weather can be believed. It's a milestone I always look forward to.)

After I deposited my paycheck I went home, then left my house for a walk in the sun. I took a path to the field behind our neighborhood, to which during the 2006-2007 winter a group of friends and I retreated on a regular basis to light bon fires in pits we'd constructed beneath a ridge in the hill.

Around this time of year the area becomes overgrown with weeds and vines, and the possibility of snakes makes venturing far back dangerous, but I walked in anyway, wanting to absorb the sunlight from the green that soaked it up.

I've always wished that I could meld into nature, that I could be a part of it. I have this fantasy of lying down in the middle of a field at summer's peak and coalescing into it, my body becoming the rolling plains and swaying stalks. When gray-black clouds rumble with the promise of a July downpour, my soul longs to erupt through the air and drench my grassy feet with water.

I sat and clicked my camera, taking pictures of the place. I'll post them soon.

On Friday evening I called my manager and told him I could work Saturday, so he scheduled me for an abbreviated five-hour shift.

The only down side to this was not being able to see Book Store Girl, the nineteen-year-old who'd asked me to stop by a used book store where she works one day a week. Book Store Girl is a lesbian who doesn't know I'm gay (or at least didn't until a Facebook message I sent literally while writing this post), and I'm hoping that by making more friends in the gay community I can meet other people.

As I open up more and embrace this aspect of my personality, I find a very small part of me turning into an adolescent girl.

For example, today while driving home from school I nearly had a heart attack upon catching a glimpse of two track team members, one dressed in nothing but the skimpiest of black underwear, running and jumping down the sidewalk. The boy in the black underwear in particular caught my eye. His stomach was flat as a board, his arms so lean, his legs so lithe, his smooth back arching into a perfect butt.

It was enough to make me seriously consider going out for track.

I'm just ready to beging dating and meeting people, even if it does intimidate me a little bit. I'm not jumping into sex, but I want to jump into something. I'm having my sixteen at twenty-one, but I don't particularly mind.

I still have a lot to learn, but it's a process I'm trying to enjoy. A tidbit I picked up this weekend is the fact that there is actually a word in gay culture for people like me: twink. I was referred to as such by someone online, and after a quick trip to Wikipedia figured out what it meant. I'm not entirely sure whether or not I should be insulted.

On Sunday I was invited to a barbecue at Peruvian Girl's house in honor of her sister Shy Girl's seventeenth birthday.

Peruvian Girl and I spent most of the time in the kitchen while Shy Girl and her friends, all of whom are significantly younger than me, laughed and played video games in the basement. I may have felt a bit awkward in a house full of strangers, but the advantage of hanging out upstairs was having unfettered access to the ceviche, an awesome Peruvian dish of raw fish, lemon juice, onions, and spices (it is far better than it sounds).

After returning home last night, I stayed up late typing up a letter to my grandmother, what will likely be the last piece of correspondence I ever send her. It went out this morning, so hopefully she'll have it by the time of my arrival in Decaying State on Thursday, a trip I'm skipping school to make.

I tried to make the letter as tender as possible, to express in a page and a quarter at least a small measure of how much she's meant to me. I think it was a fine attempt. Her positive attitude has made all of this so much easier for everyone.

I can't wait for school to end.

Saturday, April 18, 2009

Hair Update

Is it that time of month again? It certainly goes by quickly. This is what my hair looked like in March, when I last did an update:

My Hair

Ponytail

Here is what it looks like now:

My Hair

Ponytail

Last month's photos were added to Flickr on March 22nd, while these went up on April 19th, meaning the two sets are actually less than a month apart.

In that time, my hair has grown significantly longer. I'm constantly surprised by its length now, every time I catch a glimpse of myself in the mirror, every time I go to brush something off of my shoulder and find blonde waves touching there, every time I swing my backpack on and feel a sharp pulling as long locks are caught under its strap.

I am well aware of what the risk is here: that my hair will be the physical trait people strongly associate me with.

The thing is, it's already happened.

"Without long hair, you wouldn't be BB," a co-worker recently said to me. "It would just be weird."

In high school I was referred to all the time as "that kid with the really long hair," and at one point was actually dubbed Ponytail Boy. A combination of length, thickness, waviness, and color made my hair the thing that even strangers remembered me by.

"I recognized you by your ponytail," a fellow student confessed to me upon making second acquaintance my Freshman Year of college.

Everyone has one feature, be it hair, eyes, face shape, nose, or overall build, that stands out as dominant in the eyes of others.

When I cut my hair very short in 2006, I wondered how I would be identified. My feelings were hurt when, my first day back at school, I said hello to several friends and was completely ignored. This happened a few times before I realized the truth; people I knew didn't recognize me. It was then that I became "that skinny kid" for lack of a better title to be given.

I guess now I have to get used to being the Boy With Long Hair again, but there could be worse things.

I can't imagine what it will look like by June, or, what's more, by August, when I'm next scheduled for a trim.

That appointment, thankfully, is four months away.

Thursday, April 16, 2009

This Weather...

I have been sick, on and off, for about a week.

On the day following my twenty-first birthday, I consumed so much alcohol that I couldn't feel the symptoms of my illness, but all week it's been nagging at me.

Yesterday my cold made a spectacular resurgence, coming on with fullbodied aches, pains, sore throat, and congestion. I was so miserable yesterday that I actually stayed home from school, and would have skipped today had I been able to make myself miss two days in a row.

Yesterday, as I sat on my couch clutching the flannel pants, tee-shirt, hoodie, and bathrobe I'd wrapped myself in against the cold rain rapping our window panes, I came up with a theory: it's the weather.

Many of you will remember that a year ago I was bragging about temperatures in the eighties and the glory of a Southern spring. This year, it's been cold, rainy, and gray all April, a last vestige of winter that lingers like an unwelcome houseguest.

I can't wait until June, when the heat will overwhelm us. Until then, we suffer.

It will be 75°F here on Saturday, but I'll be in Decaying State, seeing my grandmother.

Summer can't come soon enough.

Wednesday, April 15, 2009

My Grandmother

Grand Ma Weird Family Cooking

My grandmother Weird Family is one of the most amazing people I know.

Last night I attempted to call her, but didn't hold out much hope of getting through. Her line had been busy, the same annoying beeping, since the news had broke earlier that day and everyone from lawyers to doctors to relatives to friends had rushed to get ahold of her.

When the phone actually started ringing, I felt a thrill of excitement go through me. I'd spoken with her that morning but had had to cut the conversation off, and I was eager to finish up--not that the talk we need to have can ever really end.

The phone picked up.

"Grand Ma?" I asked. No one answered.

"Grand Ma?" I repeated, thinking maybe she'd been distracted by something else in the room. I heard voices talking, but it became apparent within moments that they didn't know I was there.

"Hello?" I called again, very loudly this time. "I can hear you talking!"

No one noticed. They just proceeded with their conversation.

"But, Mom, what's going to happen?" a distressed voice broke through the din. "What's going to happen?"

That's when I stopped yelling and just listened. The voice was that of my Aunt Heroin.

"I'm going to die, H, that's what's going to happen," my grandmother responded. "In about four or five months' time."

"Mom, why do you keep saying that?" my aunt asked, verging on sobs. "Why do you keep saying you're going to die?"

"Because, H, I am," my grandmother insisted. "That's the reality, and I need you to accept it. Everyone else has, including BlackenedBoy and Powell Our Family. I need you to help me in these coming months to get everything in order, to finish what I need to finish. I especially need to sell my house."

"Sell your house?" was my aunt's scratchy reply. "Why?"

"Because, H, I have to, so that I can get some money and divide it up between you all," she said. "I just hope that whoever buys it will allow me to stay there until I go."

A male voice in the background added something to the effect that that would be very nice.

"Isn't there anything they can do?" my aunt pleaded.

"H," my grandmother said, a definite tone of annoyance in her voice now. "My entire liver is cancer. Don't you understand that? I am going to die. Can't you understand?"

"Mom, why are you throwing in the towel?" Aunt Heroin asked.

"I'm not throwing in the towel," my grandmother answered. "I'm eighty-one years old. I'm tired. I'm ready to go. I've lived a full and happy life."

"What about a liver transplant?" H continued, desperate.

"H, for god's sakes, I'm eighty-one years old!" my grandmother exclaimed. "If a fresh liver comes in it should go to someone who's in their thirties, not an old lady!"

"But you beat it before!" my aunt protested. "You beat it before!"

"It was different then, H," my grandmother said. "The first time [of four] I had cancer, I wasn't yet thirty, and I got down on my knees and asked God, 'Lord, please let me raise my children.' And He did. He gave me that. My time now is up. I've done what I need to do. I'm ready to go."

My aunt continued to remonstrate, and the man in the room, a family friend, reassured her.

"Can't you see, H," he said. "She looks good, she feels good--"

"I feel great," my grandmother interjected.

"--she's accepted it," the friend continued. "You need to, too."

This is my grandmother, a resolute, brilliant, flighty genius who remains at eighty-one one of the most dangerously-intelligent people I know.

Though we rarely saw each other because we lived in different states, we spoke often on the phone about family heritage, history, politics, sex, religion, books, writing, our personal lives, and everything in between.

In the years of my adolescence, I came to truly value her as a friend, not just a relative who it was obligatory to love. How many people can say that about a grandparent?

With her wild stories and encyclopedic knowledge, she filled my childhood with magic and mystery, allowed me to believe in the unseen and in something greater than myself.

Her life has been a long and varied one.

Born in Independence City in 1927, she began her childhood as a daughter of fabulous wealth and privilege, a member of one of the most storied dynasties in the United States. In 1929, when she was two years old, her father hemorrhaged $300 million in the stock market crash.

Throughout the early 1930's, their situation dramatically deteriorated.

"I can remember when I first knew that the Depression would change our lives forever," she once told me. "My father left the house in the morning with a Pierce-Arrow, and he came back in a Chevrolet. I hated that ugly car."

The sale of estates across the country wasn't enough to fill the hole of their gaping debt, and after the last of her mother's diamonds were stolen at the Chicago World's Fair in 1933, the family descended into destitution.

She has expressed happiness that events took this turn, for if they hadn't, she said, her life would have been awfully boring.

Her parents, neither of whom had ever worked, found what employment they could, and my grandmother attended public schools in Native State and Hick State, the latter of which she still has a strong attachment to.

She was a schoolgirl of fourteen when the Pearl Harbor attacks took place in 1941, and can remember her entire school gathered in the auditorium on December 8th to listen to President Franklin D. Roosevelt declare the previous day "a date which will live in infamy."

In 1948, when she was my age, she moved to Washington, D.C. and worked for a while as a waitress.

"It was the happiest time of my life," she told me. "I was on my own and free."

For as long as she lived, she maintained a perfect balance between proudly embracing her aristocratic heritage and readily accommodating herself to the realities of a middle class existence, which she never looked down upon.

"My father always told me that if you know how to eat and you know how to speak, you can dine with kings," she was fond of saying. "That's all that matters."

She married my grandfather, a Naval Academy drop-out, in 1950, and began having children shortly thereafter.

Anne, the last of nine siblings who would live past infancy, was born in 1963, when my grandmother was nearing forty.

The family remained in Independence City until Anne was about nine or ten years old, living in a legendary house that I was finally able to see last summer, a large Victorian where one disappearance and at least two separate incidences of levitation were rumored to have occurred.

"That house was haunted," Anne insists to this day.

In the 1970's they relocated to the rural area of Decaying State where many of them still live, including my grandmother. She spent her later years caring for mentally retarded and other disabled patients from her home, a practice she believes was her life's calling and that she continued even after my grandfather died in 2002.

Throughout her life, she's been hit by a car, caught on fire, and stricken with cancer four times, all experiences that I'm sure she would say "built character."

"I was telling Anne earlier today," I said to her on the phone this morning. "That knowing you, you're probably excited about it."

"Oh, yes, I am," she said, a touch of undeniable giddiness making its way into her voice.

"I'm sad, though," I said.

"Oh, don't be sad," she replied.

"I'm not sad that you're going," I said. "I know you want to and I know it's your time, and I'm happy for you in that. I'm just sad because I'm going to miss you."

"Oh, well I'll miss you, too, honey," she said. "But I'll drop in from time to time. In every snowflake, in every rain drop, I'll be there, I'll be there."

Sunday, April 12, 2009

I'm Here

A full birthday post at this point would be impossible.

I went to bed at four o'clock this morning and got up at nine. Here it is, 11:09p.m., and I'm still awake.

To summarize, I did not visit a strip club, but I did get kicked out of a bar. I also broke my own record for most drinks in a night--by more than double.

In addition to this, I learned that even when I am too drunk to stand up, I sing on key. The birthday boy scored an 89% on Rock Band, and he was hammered.

When It Snows in April



This was the scene at my house on April 7, 2009, when snow flurries fell.

The last April snowfall I can remember occurred in Native State in 2003.

Friday, April 10, 2009

Tuesday, April 7, 2009

After a Year

I have a tradition that goes back to when I was about thirteen years old.

I first began journaling on January 10, 2001, when I was twelve, and sometime in early 2002 it dawned on me to look back and see what I'd been doing a year before. It's something I've done ever since, though not on a daily basis.

I'll typically leaf through an old journal once a month or so, forget about it, and then come back later and read all of the old entries that have lapsed since I last looked in.

It's always so interesting to see how you've grown, physically, spiritually, emotionally, and intellectually in one year's time, and to see how much your life has changed.

Sometimes, very little was different from one year to another; on New Year's Day of 2008 I realized with disappointment that I was in roughly the same place I'd been in on New Year's Day of 2007 (and that place was not an especially happy one).

Other times, I've been amazed at the incredible alterations that one year can bring. Between New Year's Day of 2005 and New Year's Day of 2006 I transferred schools, moved twice, and left most of my friends hundreds of miles away.

In 2009, with eight years of of journaling behind me, I can look back across eight years of development and marvel at the way my life has rearranged since I was twelve. In hindsight, I see plunging lows and soaring peaks, whole eras with clearly delineated borders that were unclear to me when the events were taking place.

Until today, however, I have not been able to engage in this tradition with blogging.

It was one year ago today, on April 7, 2008, that I began to blog, and in the time since then it's become such an enriching part of my life that I can't imagine how I ever went without it.

On that day, I introduced myself as BlackenedBoy, a nineteen-year-old with three siblings at home, one of whom was about to graduate high school.

A lot has changed since then, and so I think it's time to review.

My pseudonym is BlackenedBoy, for reasons that by now have become apparent, and you can still call me BB.

I am twenty years old, and currently a college student at a major university in the American South, where I’m studying Government and International Politics. I used to imagine that after graduation (which is yet one or two years away for me), I'd probably be a journalist, but I realized I didn't like that very much so now I'm trying to figure out what kind of career to go into.

I love to read and write, and want to go into a job that allows me to do that, but what could that be? I've been thinking about book publishing or working for a magazine, but the career office so far has offered me a couple of websites and that's it.

When I first began writing here, I was an on-campus student, but during the 2008-2009 school year I've commuted the hour and a half back and forth to school. I love living at home because of the ready access it gives me to great food, great facilities, and family, but I miss campus life and am applying for housing to serve me during the 2009-2010 year.

One of my worst fears is that I won't be granted a spot--enjoying the college experience is something that's very important to me. I didn't used to care about that, but going through all I did taught me that life is a series of stages to be treasured and savored, each special in its own way. Missing out on any one of those periods is a bad thing.

I still live in Mountain Town with my parents and two of my siblings, Thomas (13) and Pie (5). Powell (19), however, lives in Decaying State with our birth-mother, Anne. My parents and the rest of us had finally had enough, so now he stays in Anne's Town and works at a grocery store, hopefully saving up money to go to college.

He started community college this Fall but missed so much class that he failed for the semester, and he's not showing any signs of planning to start soon. I told him it would be better to begin now than later; he'll turn twenty in December, and when you're twenty you don't want to be stuck in a dorm with a bunch of eighteen-year-olds.

At the beginning, I promised a Journals Section every week. That's definitely dropped off (I'm lucky to post one a month now), but in other areas, like Flickr, I've greatly improved. Speaking of which, you may have noticed that I've changed my profile picture.

The swirly-faced photo of me that became my identifying symbol was great, but I decided that after a year the time had come to update it, something I will do once every year. I like the one I've chosen for this year, but next year it will be replaced by another good photo.

2008's was very special, 2009's is as well, and 2010's will be, too.

I've been part of this community for a year now, and it's been a great experience that I intend to keep with. I wonder how long I'll continue blogging on this site, how far into the future it will take me?

Will all of you one day be reading about my first house, my first love, my first child, my career?

A year ago this website was one of the few spots of joy in my life.

Now it, and the online friends it has given me, is one of but many bright lights, and this blog is becoming what it was always supposed to be: a reflection of a full and happy life.

Things have improved so much since April 7, 2008 that I almost can't believe it's been only a year.

And now, a year in review:

April, 2008: I began blogging and celebrated my twentieth birthday

May, 2008: I started having serious difficulties with my parents that intensified when the school year ended and I was unable to find a job

June, 2008: I took a trip out to Movie State with Grand Ma Normal Family, Aunt Crazy, Cool Cousin, and Powell. I hadn't come out yet, and I wish I'd been comfortable with my sexuality at the time so that I really could have appreciated Gay City.

July, 2008: Out of a job and still friendless, I sank into severe depression that brought me to the brink of suicide. Being hired by Western City Movie Theater late in the month began a process that gave me comrades and literally saved my life.

August, 2008: The 2008-2009 school year, my Junior Year of college, began. Gone from Western City Movie Theater for the semester, commuting back and forth to school, and with few friends on campus, I became depressed again. I came out to my mother.

October, 2008: As Fall began, I was rehired by Western City Movie Theater and began to come out the blackness I'd fallen into two years before.

November, 2008: Thanksgiving was a happy time.

December, 2008: Christmas Break was welcome, and on New Year's Eve I found myself unexpectedly joined by Powell and his friend Blonde Boy.

January, 2009: After three hurtful ones before it, I welcomed the New Year. An internship at Western City Newspaper convinced me not to pursue newspaper journalism as a career. The new semester began. I came out to my blogging friends.

February, 2009: I found myself, inexplicably, with friends on campus. Hippy Guy, Asian Girl, Friendly Guy, Friendly Girl, and other make me feel so blessed.

March, 2009: Spring began. I came out to Sacajawea, my ex-girlfriend.

When I came home today, it was snowing, the latest snowfall I can remember since living in Native State (and very unusual for this part of the country).

As my second year of blogging begins, I have a tremendous amount to be thankful for. I can't wait to write all about this year.

Monday, April 6, 2009

A Conversation With Good

I walked into a room this afternoon and saw Good.

“Oh, hello,” she said, turning to me. She’d heard me come in.

Good was a pretty blonde woman. Her round, kind face was young but already worn, as if she spent a lot of time worrying. She smiled a warm smile that lifted her bumpy cheeks and crinkled her eyes.

I liked her, but I had some questions.

“So tell me,” I said. “Why is there so much suffering in the world?”

She sighed and patted a red leather chair that had suddenly materialized next to her.

“Sit down,” she said. “It’s complicated.”

I took my place and listened.

“When I first made the world, I intended for it to be a happy place,” she said. “And at first it was. Then Evil appeared out of nowhere and started mucking things up, and then he made his helpers and I made mine, and we’ve been fighting ever since.”

She looked up at the ceiling and opened her palms in a gesture of frustration.

“When I created humans I didn’t account for the presence of Evil, seeing as he wasn’t there yet,” she said. “By pure coincidence, there’s something in your composition that makes you, as a species, very susceptible to him. It’s really a terrible design flaw. Ah, Luck.”

She clucked her tongue.

“I would call her up to ream her out about it,” she continued. “But she’s horribly unreliable. Doesn’t answer her phone half the time, never there when you need her, always showing up late, running off with other people.”

“Wait,” I began in confusion. “What’s the difference between Luck and Fortune?”

“Fortune?” Good asked, her brow creasing. It made her look even more weathered than she already did. “Fortune? Oh, God, I’d forgotten that she used to call herself that. She went through an ‘artistic’ phase back in college and thought it would be cool to change her name.”

“What about Fate?” I asked.

“Cousins,” Good said. “They’re cousins. They help each other out, but he gets a bit irritated with her after a while. I can’t say I blame him.”

“Well, back to what we were talking about before,” I said. “You said humans are susceptible to evil?”

“Yes,” she said, suddenly sheepish. “Yes, you good ones are actually defective. Each one I’ve ever made came about when I was in an altered state of mind. You, for example, were the product of a delicious caramel frappucino I drank one evening about twenty years ago.

“Barack Obama happened at one o’clock in the morning after I’d eaten an entire bag of jelly beans. I was hyped up on sugar, bouncing off the walls, and next thing I know, poof!—there he is. Several amazing authors have come out of lovely dreams of mine. J.K. Rowling popped up on the tail end of an exquisite custard I ate right before bed.”

“Wait,” I interrupted. “Do you mean to tell me that every genuinely good person who’s ever existed has been an accident?”

“Well,” she stammered, avoiding my eyes. It was clear this was an embarrassing subject for her. “Yes, pretty much. I made the formula for humans before Evil came around, and something in it leaves most of you wide open to him. For some reason the handful of people created out of my cock-ups have an inborn resistance to his power.”

“If that’s true,” I said. “Why don’t you just mess up all the time, on purpose? Eat pie every night before you go to sleep, down coffees, go running naked outside through the snow and get sick. You could try staying up a few nights straight and see what happens.”

“That’s just the thing!” she exclaimed, her eyes widening. “I can’t figure out how I’m doing it! Every time I’ve ever once tried to do that intentionally it’s gone awfully wrong. Adolf Hitler, for instance, formed himself as I was dealing with the flu. George W. Bush was the result of nothing more than indigestion.

“And had not Evil intervened, nothing would have happened in either case. It’s not that most people are born bad, it’s just that they have a fatal weakness that could be exploited in any of them given the right circumstances. Occasionally my mistake humans have less rather than more resistance to Evil. For goodness’ sakes, all I ever intended Hitler to do was paint landscapes! I was hoping he’d do some pretty drawings and maybe lighten up someone’s day.”

“What about Bush?” I asked.

“Who?” she returned.

“Bush,” I repeated.

“Oh, him,” she said. “He wasn’t supposed to do anything really. Just wander around Texas, not bothering anybody. Some people are only made to fill things out. If I’d had any idea he’d become President of the United States…

“But that’s the thing; Evil has been very good at seducing your species. It hurts me very much to see it. And while he and I continue to battle, along with our allies on either side, I often feel as if he is perpetually at the advantage. He has such a wide field and mine is so small…”

Her face brightened.

“Of course, recently I’ve had some good victories,” she said. “You’ll know about Obama, naturally. If he makes it through, he’ll do a tremendous amount of good. If he makes it, though.”

“Will they try to take him?” I asked, aghast.

“Yes, they will,” she answered. “They will. They tried to take you, too, you know.”

Now it was my turn to look down.

“Yes, I know,” I said. “I remember.”

“It was awfully close,” she said. “You had me worried for a while.”

It took me a while to answer.

“I still cry sometimes,” I said, looking into her face. “Did you see me this morning?”

She nodded.

“I really am sorry about all that,” she said in consoling tones. “You got plunked down in a whole sea of evil, one little white speck surrounded by black. I felt guilty about it for a very long time. I do try to help you out, though, particularly of late.”

“I know,” I assured her. “I’ve noticed, believe me. You’ve done so much.”

She smiled.

“Tell me, though,” I said. “You’ll eventually win, right? Even though the war goes on, you will win out in the end, won’t you?”

I expected the usual spiel about Good triumphing over Evil, but she shrugged her shoulders instead.

“I don’t know,” she said. “If we’re actually keeping score, he’s quite a bit ahead. I haven’t been in the lead since the dawn of agriculture, and my last big thing before Obama was ending World War II, which I only had to do because of him anyway. Well, no, that’s not true, I did bring down the Iron Curtain. I had to use Reagan to do it, though, so that one’s probably a draw.”

Catching the horrified expression on my face, she rushed to bolster my spirits.

“Don’t get me wrong,” she said. “I’ve had a couple of slam dunks. Music; Martin Luther King, Jr.; line dancing; snow. And have you ever really tasted an empanada? I was smug for a whole month after I came up with that one. Still, these things coexist in a world with racism and the Macarena, both of which mortify me to this day.”

I stared at her in disconsolate shock.

“So there’s no answer?” I tried, hoping her response would be different.

“I’m afraid not,” she said. “I wish. I’m trying my best, though.”

“I know,” I said. “Could you do me a favor, though? I’m coming out soon, telling everyone I’m gay, so if you could work on homophobia a little I’d really appreciate it.”

“I’ll do everything I can,” she said. “There’s a lot going on, though. Evil’s been working the hell out of greed lately, and now I’m left with a whole lot of hunger to clean up.”

“My aunt works for AIG,” I admitted.

“Don’t worry,” she said. “It wasn’t her fault. She’s a malfunction, too. A very raucous baby shower preceded the creation of your Aunt Meggy.”

I laughed.

“Well, I have homework to do,” I said. “So I’m going to go.”

“Alright,” she said, pulling me into a hug. “Come back whenever you want.”

“I will,” I promised.

Sunday, April 5, 2009

What Actually Happened

Several days ago I told Thomas how touched my readers had been by a blog post I'd written involving him and Pie.

"What about?" he asked.

"How you and Pie asked me to sleep with you the other night," I replied, beaming at what a wonderful and tender relationship we had as siblings.

"Oh," he said, looking up at me from his game of Rock Band. "I didn't want you in there. We had no room."

The myth is shattered.

Thursday, April 2, 2009

In the Dark

Sometimes when dealing with Thomas and Pie, I feel as if I am half-parent and half-sibling. The age range between us is so huge, particularly where my sister is concerned, that in one instant I'm reprimanding them and in the next we're playing dodge ball in the basement.

Last night was typical of this dual relationship.

We hurled foam footballs at one another in the basement until my mother screamed for us to stop, and then Thomas and I went out to the hot tub, where he confided in me his worries about starting high school and I did my grown-up's best to use my own experiences as a way of helping him.

"You're not going to lose your friends from middle school," I said. "You're just going to make lots of news ones."

We went in, and around ten o'clock my parents summoned the two of them for bed. Because Pie is scared to sleep by herself and Thomas's bed is so small, the two often bunk in the room that Powell vacated when he moved to Decaying State.

I'd gone upstairs to get a load of clean laundry from the dryer when I saw my father sitting in Powell's bed, scrutinizing a hidden-image book with my brother and sister.

I walked in and sat on the bed until they finished, and my father bade them goodnight. I stood to leave, but Pie beseeched me, "BB, stay here! Sleep with us!"

After insisting that I would do no such thing, I laid down and surrendered to my tiredness.

Thomas and I talked for a few minutes, singing made-up country songs under our breath and giggling before his laughter subsided into one long sigh after another.

I was going to get up and leave then, but the parent in me wanted to stay, to see that they were off to sleep, to protect them.

I took my sister's tiny hand in my own and kissed it as I lay with my eyes closed, hearing the small sounds of night.

I knew I had to get up soon, that I had other things to do before I could actually go to bed myself.

In that moment, though, I just stayed there, looking at the boy and girl sleeping side by side and listening to the steady breath of the two people I loved most in the world.