Writers Block = Sugar High

In trying to write a blog today, I’ve managed to eat 2 fun size snickers bars, 3 fun size butterfingers, a bag of New York Cheddar Kettle potato chips, and a handful of mixed nut.

Four hours later, and this is all I’ve written.

Lucky for me, I’ve still got a bag of Reese’s and a bag of Baby Ruth’s on standby.

So you don’t feel completely let down on this waste of space entry, I’ll leave you with a video I saw on the news yesterday, two woman on the chinatown bus arguing over a seat.  I love it, this bitch goes CRAZY.

Some old stuff….

Below is a short “story” I wrote a while back.  Nothing too special, but I thought I’d post something while I’m working on other things to write about.

What I find funny is the fact that I’m so SUPER excited to start this blog, but yet, the second I sit down to a keyboard, I’m at a loss for words….and that NEVER happens.  Once I get going things will be fine, so in the meantime here’s a little piece of my past.

Let me preface this as well by saying I am not a writer, but I love to tell stories.  If the grammar is incorrect, or punctuation horrible, my apologies ahead of time.

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I used to attend a band camp every summer through middle school and high school (no, this isn’t a band camp story.  I’m saving that for another time.  But stay tuned all my BLFAC friends!).  While at band camp, I had auditioned for the International Choral Ensemble, and though my virtuosity lied in my trumpet playing, I somehow managed to secure a spot to tour Europe that following summer.

You can imagine my surprise, getting the acceptance letter in the mail after waiting almost 3 months without a word.

“MOM!!  DAD!!  I FUCKING MADE IT!!!  I MADE IT IN THE CHOIR!!!  I’M GOING TO EUROPE!!!”

My parents looked me with the usual look of a proud parent, happy to see their queer son following his dreams, yet wondering how much this trip is going to set them back.

“So, did ya win a scholarship to go with this trip to Europe?”
“Not really.”
“How much does is this little trip going to cost?”
“It say’s that the first payment of $900 is due in two weeks”

Now, I don’t know if any of you have had anyone laugh in your face, but it might just be one of the worst things in the world, next to chewing broken glass.  But let me paint a better picture for you.  My parents didn’t laugh, they guffawed.  I watched my dreams fall to the floor as their eyes welled up with tears from their laughter, holding their stomachs as they doubled over from the cramps.  It was what followed that has resonated with me ever since.  Those dreaded words.

“Well, you better get a fucking job!”

And that was the beginning of what has become a life long journey.

It was only that night that Carol, a friend of the family, had visited and announced that Mitchell’s Market was looking for a new deli boy.  Mitchells was Hartfords version of a gas station / deli / grocery / liquour store, just on the outskirts of town.  It also had a reputation of employing some of Hartfords most down and out white trailor trash women.  Think something along the lines of “Trading Spouces” meets one of those documentaries on Showtime late nights about Atlantic City prostitutes.  You know the kind, when asked not to use teeth, they take out their dentures.  Nothing beats a $25 blow job from a dirty A.C. girl.

“Deli boy.  Shit, I can cut some meat” I thought to myself.

The next day I went down to Mitchell’s and met with Dewey Mitchell himself.

“I hear you’re looking for a new deli boy”
“Yeah.”
“Well, are you still looking?”
“Yeah.”
“Well, I’d like to apply for the job.”
“Yeah?”
“Yeah.”
“Yeah.”
“So…………….?”
“Can you start right now?”
“Yeah.”
“You’re hired.”

Regardless of wether or not I was the right candidate for the job, I was hired.  Dewey was known around town as an alcoholic, and I think he was sick of standing behind that counter without a beer in his hand, so because of his addiction, I would now have a chance to see the rest of the world.

It hadn’t taken me 5 minutes to call my dad, let him know I had the job, and that I would be here the rest of the afternoon.  But, in that short time, Dewey had managed to finish off 3 tall boys of MGD and put a sizable dent in his fourth.  “This is the slicer.” as he motions to an industrial grade slicing machine, that incidently hadn’t been cleaned for the better part of what looked like 2 weeks.  “Careful, it’s sharp.”

And that was the training course at Mitchell’s.  Shortly after learning the slicer was sharp, a regular, who I would later come to know as “Boomer” strolled in and joined Dewey in the cooler.  Dewey’s cooler was a sight to see.  Empty kegs used as seating sat around milk crates that formed a nice coffee table of sorts.  For extra money Dewey would skin and butcher the kills of local hunters, and the deer carcasses hung like mighty tapestries, the blood slowly draining from the bodies and trailing to the drain that was strategically located beneath the coffee table.  It was ritualistic in a way, sitting around, drinking a brewski, while trails of blood forever came to meet in the middle ice cold cooler.  I felt like I had joined an underground Hartford cult, being privvy to information not even the Mayor had.

I worked nights, and some weekends, being paid $5.35 an hour, under the table of course.  Imagine the shock of learning that later I’d have to pay part of my earnings in taxes to a government that I could give a fuck about.  Those assholes.  But, that’s neither here nor there.  The point is, I was making my coin.

Truth be told, the employees of Mitchells ran that place into the ground.  There were always two employees on shift at once, one to run the register, and the deli boy.  I worked with a guy, Joey, who taught me how to do my first line of coke, off the front counter none the less.  Others would take liquour off the shelves freely and just drink on the job.  I remember one amazing night of shopping cart races while being fucked up on caffeine pills.  I soon learned that anything goes when you have an alcoholic as a boss.

My position at Mitchells helped me to gain much needed respect from  my classmates.  Already armed with hip parents that let me throw killer parties, now I was able to roll kegs out of the back door, right into my friend April’s station wagon, and enjoy true Homecoming festivities, keg stands and all.  Those were the days of Hot Damn and Peach Schnopps, drinking Jack Daniels straight from the bottle, and finding out what limits really were, always a little too late.

Mitchell’s went bankrupt just around the time I had saved enough money for my trip to Europe.  My timing could not have been anymore impeccable.  I felt sorry for him, as well as a little guilty.  I knew that I had added to the debt, no where near as much as the other employees, but I had had my hand in the cookie jar a few times.  And boy those cookies tasted good.

Dewey now works as the head butcher at Meijer’s, a Walmart of sorts indigenious to the great lake states.  I’ll see him every once in a while when I go home for the holidays.  It takes me back, seeing him behind the counter, those glassy, bloodshot eyes, the bright red Meijer vest worn proudly over his blood stained uniform.  You can still see those gear turning, counting the seconds till his pallat is smothered with the crisp taste of Old English.

I wonder if he and Boomer have walk-in cooler privileges.

Welcome to my world!

I can’t wait to share with you the stories and images that reel through my mind on a daily basis.

However, now is not the time.

Now is not the time to tell you about how I helped my dad skin a deer , me pulling the skin down as he clumsily cut into the meat.  Now is not the time to tell you about some of the best friends a nine year old boy could ever dream of having, and how their adventures would rival that of the movie “Stand By Me”.  Nor is it the time to tell you about band camp, traveling Europe, acid trips, fraternity parties, Showplace Ice Cream Parlor, stomach ulcers, playing right field, The Exorcist, jerking off with butter, life in New York City, wetting the bed, string theory and quantum mechanics, life in San Francisco, so many great books, 2012, running from the cops, or gluten free cupcakes.

There will be plenty of time for all of that later, but now is not THAT time.

Right now, I’d just like to thank you for visiting my blog.  Stick around, bookmark this page, and check in often.  I promise you’re in for a wild ride.

Pinky swear.