-{ redgeek.net }-

Sometimes, I follow my advice. Sometimes, I forget what I said. Last night was an example. I was logged into the office from the coffee house, getting some work done for a massively important deal I’ve been busting my ass to meet requirements. I’m between emails, kind of zoned out, thinking about the periodic freezes we’re experiencing and trying to mentally enumerate a prioritized list of potential sources for the error, when I notice a cute girl looking at me as she walks to a table near mine. I smile, she smiles, and she sits facing in my general direction.

Something jolts in my head, and I decide to try a new angle on the problem. Ten, twenty, thirty minutes later a I get rule out my solution as a viable one. I’m zoned again, and I catch her smiling toward me, and I smile again, although make note that she’s leaning in close to the boy sitting next to her. Boyfriend, methinks.

I grab a glass of Cabernet to counter the coffee zipping through my glands and settle into work again. Another half hour slips by, and I can see I’m not going to resolve this tonight. Time to meet up with the boys and see what’s happening over at the lifeguard party. Packing up, I catch her looking at me again from behind these gentle curls of sandy bland hair, still leaning in close to the boy. She entices another genuine smile out of me. Well, even if she’s with a boy, it’s nice to be appreciated.

As I’m walking out the front door, she waves, and I instinctively wave, and think “what the fuck” as I plop in my car. Of course, once I pass the threshold to the on-ramp, I realize, once again, how much of a dolt I am. That wasn’t her boyfriend, that was her study partner, and they were sharing a book. Cue the Simpson-esqe “Doh!”

This obviously isn’t the first time this has happened to me, and it’s perhaps the caveat to my previous advice: don’t get so wrapped up in what you’re doing that you forget your environment. I’m not completely blind – I’m still aware of potential threats, objects, and allies, in the martial sense, and looking at whatever I’m doing from multiple angles, but I tend to to gloss over the benign, attractive, or otherwise interesting things that aren’t related to the task at hand. Perhaps evolutionarily, I have a practiced ability to to completely engross myself in all aspects of that’s either important or enjoyable, but I need to expand the awareness include that which may not be applicable to my focus. To be aware without compromising my attention, just in case I should change foci. This is where I require work.

Well, hopefully she studies there often.

After reflecting on the coinciding phrases from the previous post, I found myself thinking about another synthesis of past and present. One of the big things between A– and I concerned our respective outlooks on the world. A– prefers to be completely engrossed, the entire self lost in the moment, submitting to blinding passion. While I respect that and think it’s entirely valid and enjoyable, I have different outlook, as alluded to in this post. I’m half in the moment, and half observing myself in the moment. Both parts of me are there, present, at time same time, but with two points of view. After enough practice, you find it happens without cerebral pressuring, it just happens. Or, perhaps, you just slip fluidly between states, however you want to apply linearity to the brain. Doesn’t really matter, it’s the effect, the manifestation, the affectation of perception, that’s important. To me, this is trying to “gather more of the world, to experience more, to suck more marrow out of everything.”* Experiencing the world from the outside and the inside at the same time, opening myself up to more of the world. I do not see this as a lesser experience, merely a different one, one which leads to richer experiences from my perspective. After A– read this post, she told me she laughed out loud. I thought she’d find it funny, considering our divergent paths on the issue. I brushed it off.

When I look back on recent events such at this, I realize that I’m a little frustrated with A– that she doesn’t even see such a fundamental part of myself as valid. Normally it wouldn’t bother me, but she’s still important to me and her opinion counts, and I dislike having her discount the way I experience the world, that somehow I’m “not really here” or that everyone else is picking up some depth of emotion or existence that I’m continually and voluntarily missing. Particularly when it appears to manifest in such a manner that other people notice indicators that I’m not missing the world, in fact, I appear to be quite engrossed in it (the previous post isn’t the only example, but is the only one I’ve blogged about), enough that I don’t think I’m just a crazy nut-job. I think that this way works (for me), is valid (for me), but make no claims about it (for any one but me.) But at least give me a little credit (for what works for me.) I give you credit for what works (for you.)

And, since I know A– reads this, I’ll probably be getting a call tonight.

* Yeah, I’m lame and I quoted myself from Shinsei Blossom, but I don’t expect you to read to whole damn thing to get to that part.

After the Fashion Whore show on Saturday, I met up with Frenchie and Lutz and The Pub to hang for a few. It was already late, closing in on midnight, and the two were already well on their way to blotto. I’d had a couple beers over the last few hours, but was otherwise sober and starting to tucker out. Lutz nudges my elbow.

“Yo, Barclay, go talk to those girls. Those four over there.”

I make a quick scan. Two reasonably cute girls and two not so cute girls. “Me? Why me?”

“‘Cause you got game, man, you got game.”

“No, I don’t have game. I have anything but game.”

Lutz is swaying, and slurring a bit. “No, you’re right, you don’t have game. But you know what? You’re comfortable in your own skin. Girls like that, you’re comfortable in your own skin.” He says it simply, without production or drama, just his own little observation.

I was immediately swept back to the first time I met A–‘s father, who, contrasting me with A–‘s previous boyfriend, said to A– that “Barclay’s comfortably in his own skin, isn’t he?” The exact same words. Something poignant about that, hearing it again from a completely different source, someone antipodal to A–‘s father’s personality.

But I don’t usually think about it. It took someone, or two people, to remind me that with a little luck and a lot of work, I actually am comfortable with myself (or the evolution thereof). So next time you’re thinking some kind thought about someone, tell them, plainly and simply, and it’ll probably penetrate farther than you expect.

We met at a Sunnyslope party, one of the other public high schools in Phoenix. She was slender and a little taller than most of the girls I’d been out with. Large eyes with a softened Eastern European face. I most vividly remember her hair, half-coiled locks playfully falling past her shoulders, flaxen and iridescent, conspiring to reflect glimmers of summer lemons and autumn beiges. It was light, playful, and seductive all at once.

I didn’t think I had a chance with her. Everyone was flirting with her, and much more successfully than me. I allowed myself to float to the periphery, interjecting occasional jokes or comments when appropriate, or wandering about the party to see who else was about. Definitely not imposing my presence. In my detached joviality I somehow impressed her, and just before leaving, I capitalized on my departure and set a date with her for the next weekend.

In the days to follow, we’d talk on the phone while I’d deperately fight a horrible head cold. I was torn between rescheduling and following through. The thought of missing an evening with such a beautiful creature haunted me, so I just jacked myself on Sudafed and picked her up.

We had coffee, and saw “Interview with a Vampire,” hand in hand. We may have sequestered ourselves in the corner of a party later, but the next prominent frames of memory arrived during the drop-off.

“Uh, yeah, not much.” I know what’s coming.

“What? She looked into you.”

“Yeah, so I really started digging this girl, and I’ve got this wicked cold, right? So when I dropped her off, I just kind of bit her neck in a sort of sexy way, you know, long and slow, like a vampire, but I didn’t want to kiss her and saddle her with this cold. It’s awful. I think she wanted the kiss.”

“You what? You dumb fuck.”

“Yeah.”

“When a girl you dig wants to kiss you, you kiss her. She knew you had a cold and she still wanted to kiss you, so you fucking _do_ it. Fuck, that girl would’ve rocked your world, she would’ve been off your lips and on your crotch in no time flat.” Gil has a sort of vulgar elegance to his logic.

“Yeah. I know. I’m a dumb-ass nice-guy. Too nice.”

“Yeah, you gotta fix that.”

“I know.”

She never returned any of my subsequent calls. This is why nice guys never get the girl (or more accurately, overly nice guys) – they never step up, even when it’s patently obvious they should. Yeah, I missed out on who-knows-what with a wonderful and attractive girl, but I also learned a hell of a lesson at a relatively early age. No, I didn’t turn into an asshole (I don’t think) – but I definitely learned to read when I needed to put on my aggressive hat. Just ‘cause you’re nice doesn’t mean that you should be everyone’s mum; people make their own decisions. Sack up and take a swing, let others deal with the consequences if they’ve already decided that they want to so.

Damn, I was an idiot.

Sometimes I still am.

She smiles with superficial saccharine in her eyes. “Can I pull you pull away from here for a few?” I’m not even facing her, I’m looking across the club to another stage.

“Pardon?” I heard her, but I’m buying time, trying to figure out how to be polite in my refusal, trying to justify why I’m at a strip club when I’m not buying.

“Private dance, honey?” toying with her brunette curls.

“No, thank you though.” I make sure she sees me turn my eyes toward another barely clad girl, a blond one, to make her think that I have my eyes on some other prize. I don’t.

Another approaches, although in jeans and a button up. She’s off duty, just hanging at work in her off hours. “Are you bored or something?”

“No, just tired.” In a way I’m lying, in a way I am bored. But if I’m looking for something else to do, it’s going to bed. I’ve never been a fan of strip clubs unless you’ve got a girl you’re there with or returning home to. Since I currently have neither, I see no reason to be at a strip joint with four guys. If I drop twenty bucks at a bar, at least I might get some interesting conversation out of my investment. I’m tempted to get a private dance, and just retire for a few minutes in a secluded area to talk, to see what makes her tick – but I’m under no delusions that these girls are doing anything but working. This is how they pay the rent, appearing salacious through some invisible wall of detachment, and I don’t want to pierce that veil. It seems more invasive than grabbing her inappropriately, violating her mind as opposed to her body.

The question could have been innocent enough, however. Perhaps she thought I was bored because she was bored, because of her assessment as this place being uncharacteristically dead, because I have this implacable face when no muscles are being used. It’s a slick blank slate, unwilling to wear whatever emotion is painted upon it, the colors sliding off and down to my feet, but inviting the attempt. I’ve been told this by many people over the years – that when not smiling, frowning, or otherwise projecting, my expression when completely relaxed is a difficult read. You can tell there’s gears turning, but there’s no noticeable manifestation.

Of course, it’s closing in on 2 AM, we’ve been all the way from Del Mar (hoping to manually stimulate serendipity, but without luck) to downtown. The driver is sober, the rest are not, and I’m somewhere in between. I’m already looking toward tomorrow, toward the December Nights and a birthday party. I don’t really want to be here, so I’m not letting my eyes linger on the women as they saunter past, I’m not smiling invitingly in their direction from across the room. I’m trying to keep from wasting their time as I know I’m not spending any money. Keep walking ladies, some other guy will be paying your rent tonight.

So my mind wanders, I fabricate stories for the girls, I create pasts and presents and futures. I wonder whose in school and what they’re studying, whose on drugs and what kinds, whose married and divorced who has boyfriends or girlfriends. I wonder what part of me is in them, and vice versa. I’d recently met a girl at UCSD going for a Bachelors in Mathematics who danced for a living, and I scan the crowd looking for hidden contemplations of Laplace transforms and non-Euclidean geometries.

I think back to my first divorce – well, not my divorce, but the first time one of my married friends got divorced, nearly ten years ago. I look for the pale skin of a wedding band removed on the girls’ second to last digit. Could I be married to a dancer? Could I be married at all? Most of the unions I’d witnessed had fallen, the only people I knew that recommended marriage where those in their first few years of marriage. I recall a line from my second novel-in-suspended-progress, _Andre thought all relationships had a ten year shelf life. If you made it past that, at least half of the couple was privately despondent, or you married a Twinkie. I wonder if I believe that.

Is a lack of desire to get married closing out opportunities, sheltering oneself from the possibility of the pain of divorce? Is it a refusal to live and experience life? Escapism, a lack of maturity, a fear of commitment? Or, alternatively, is it merely a recognition that things will always change, that life is a serious of mutable experiences, and marriage an artificial brace attempting to stifle change, an insufficient force against the juggernaut of personal evolution?

The lights go up, the bar cleared, and we’re kicked out let our fantasies weave us home through the early morning mists. Tonight, I don’t dream.

I have a very low threshold for drama. I don’t indulge in it and I don’t like people trying to suck me into theirs. Now, there’s stress, catastrophic circumstances, sorrow, grief – all sort of things that are part of dramatic lives – but in this respect I’m referring to that which is artificially manufactured.

A few months ago I alluded to an extremely draining experience I couldn’t talk about. I still can’t give particulars, as I gave my word, but my friends also deserve to know that which keeping me from being with them. Basically, the scenario was thus: an acquaintance was on the brink of suicide. Definitely dramatic, and not drama. This was real life. She was emotionally scattered, physically emaciated from malnutrition, causing a variety of secondary ailments and injuries. She’d been admitted and extricated from hospitals, both physical and mental. I hadn’t known her too well prior to the emergencies – I actually knew her through her ex, although we’d hung out in the same group every once in a while over the years.

For whatever reason – valid or not, I’m not the one to judge – she decided that there were three people in the world she trusted: her father, myself, and another person that lives several thousand miles away. She needed to talk, she needed someone to listen and just sit at the other end of the phone (I live a good hour or two from her), and there were some things she didn’t want to talk about with her father, which is understandable. So, Far Away Guy and myself took turns spending hours on the phone. I also drove up to visit her at the very beginning, when hysteria was at it’s peak. My theory was, if she’s still talking, she not dead, so let her talk.

Staying up late at her place, talking on the phone, taking breaks from work to speak with her were the start of the siphon – of course, I was more than willing to do it, I didn’t want to see her off herself and I thought there was genuine chance she might do it – but between the hectic work schedule and the emotional drain of listening to hours of convoluted, depressing tales every day took it’s toll. I was missing my martial arts classes – my own anchoring tool – to speak with her, or more often than not, just listen.

At one point, before leaving her house late one night, I just hugged her and held her for a while. Her face skin was sallow and she’d lost an unhealthy amount of weight; I could encircle her bicep with my hand. Her muscles had atrophied to the point that stairs were difficult, her gate was rickety and she spent most of her time on the couch. She threw up most of her meals.

She said it’d been a long time since anyone had hugged her; I thought that absolutely terrible. Everyone needs affection every once in a while. She asked me if I could just hold her there on the couch, just stay there for a bit. I acquiesced.

She snuggled in closer.

I was less comfortable.

She snuggled in even closer.

I got even less comfortable.

She absent-mindedly stroked my chest.

She sensed my apprehension: “Why are you tensing up?”

“I just want to make sure you know I’m here as a friend.”

“Of course. What else?”

“Nothing else. I just want to make sure we’re clear about that.”

“What, do you think something’s going to happen?”

“No, nothing will happen; I wouldn’t let anything happen. I just want to make sure we’re both on the same page.”

“So there’s nothing to worry about, so your shouldn’t be holding back.”

“Listen, I’m just getting a little uncomfortable with this. I should go.”

“You can stay here tonight.”

“No, I don’t think I should. I’ll call you tomorrow.”

She seemed somewhat pissed at me for a while, but eventually the calls returned to normal. I had to start ignoring them, though, when they starting coming in at two or seven in the morning, or several times during my work day, when work starting to notice my prolonged absence during business hours. If I have to find a new job, I’d have even less time to help her. I reserved phone calls for the nights.

As time passed, the inevitable evolution germinated. I’d hear the same story once, twice, five, eight, ten times, each time more exaggerated, each time increasing the derision of San Diego and everyone in it (except me, appended quickly), how she could get back at everyone if she wanted (including me, appended quickly), how she has a far superior understanding of just about everything than anybody (she’s smart, but nobody’s that good), and how she has no capability to change her environment.

I’ll agree, yes, she was stuck between a rock and a hard place, and although I didn’t, I wanted to yell and scream at her and tell her Damn it, you are not that powerless. Take your self-indulgent wallowing, drink it up, let yourself become self-absorbed as long as you need to, then vomit it up. Reject it, expel it, destroy it. You’re strong, you can do this.

When the contradictions starting flowing, I excused myself from the entire scenario. When she began giving reasons as to why she couldn’t do something because it might endanger her well-being (“too weak to bathe or drive, I might drown or get in an accident”), but would still threaten with suicide (“If you gave me a gun right now I’d kill myself”), I knew she was past the hump. She wasn’t well, but she realized there were dozen of ways she could do to kill herself had she truly wanted to. She was opting for attention over death, a good sign. But I had no attention left to give. Dramatic was turning to drama, real issues to manufactured ones.

I kept tabs on her indirectly, ensuring she was doing sufficiently well – and she is doing better, although I don’t have specifics – but we haven’t been in direct contact for over a month. I truly hope she’s improving, I truly hope she’s able to work out the rest of her issues. I can say with absolute certainty that I don’t want to see her dead or broken; I want to see her doing well.

Even when it’s the darkest, there’s someone there to support you, someone you might not even expect it from. You’re never alone, despite what it seems. However, you can only receive support, you can’t demand it. And when you receive it, you can’t become dependent, you can’t expect support. But you can appreciate it when it comes your way. She reminded me of that.

“Since you’re my boys, if you see anyone out of line or breaking shit or whatever, just kick ‘em out. I don’t give a fuck, just toss ‘em.”

“Whose party is this again?”

“My little sister’s, but it’s at my dad’s house. Should be mad little girls there, like, eighteen, nineteen, twenty years old. Some high school, some college. It’ll be banging.”

We’re just leaving the suburban outskirts of San Diego. As we dig deeper into the forested hills, the temperature begins to drop and it starts to feel like a real November evening. We’re hauling six thousand pounds of steel over two lanes on a twisty road to Ramona, to the house Joey grew up in. We start to slow when we see cars lining the side of the highway for hundreds of yards.

Joey sighs. “Fuckin’ amateurs. Like the cops won’t notice this.”

We pull on into the extended driveway, cars packed so tightly we have to pull back the mirrors of the truck in to pass. As we approach the automated gate, a drunk teenager stops us.

“Yo, five bucks to get in.”

The truck cab erupts in laughter from Joey, Carter, Adam, Matt, and myself.

“What, you guys aren’t going to drink? Five bucks for a cup.”

More laughter.

Smiling, Joey explains, “Little dude, this is my place.”

“Oh, shit, you’re Jane’s bruddha! Snap! Here’s some cups.”

“Yo, thanks, keep it up.”

We pull in through the gate, farther up a steep incline past more cars, past a pool and hot tub teeming with drunks, up farther, to the top of the ridge line near the house. The overnighters have pitched tents, and it looks like some might already be occupied.

We mosey down the road, past the spa, into the throngs. There’s an mediocre band jamming near the pool, amidst three hundred or so kids, grouped by proximity to the kegs and fire pit. We trail through the crowd, amused, realizing most of these people were born in the mid to late eighties, and don’t know how hold their liquor, or properly tap a keg, or even poor a good beer for that matter.

A bubbly blond little eighteen year old runs up to Joey: “It says V.I.P. on my ass! Want to see?” She unbuckles her jeans, dropping trou while bending over. She pushes out her ass while adjusting her red thong. Cocking her head around, she barks, “Take a picture!” Matt slaps her ass, Carter whips out a camera phone, taking a picture of Adam licking the letter “P” emblazoned in sharpie on her right cheek. Joey shoots me a pleased told-you-so look and bellows a laugh.

A girl walks unsteadily up to me, extending her palm. “And what’s your name?”

“Barclay.”

She cocks her hips and coils a curl around her finger. “How old are you?”

She too drunk and I’m too quick. “What was your name again?”

“Oh, I’m Kaitlin, I’m friends with …” trailing off into a brief conversation.

She’s too drunk to notice my dodge and I’m too sober, for now, to lie.

I catch snippets of conversation, from a little angel that just had the lights switched on her while screwing some guy in the pool house “… we we were totally going to have a threesome, but I ran out of condoms … yeah, sucks …”

Fuckin’ amateurs.

We continue to mingle, shooting the shit with each other and meta-laughing about while we meta-flirt with the girls. Every once in a while we have to calm down some asshole who gets too drunk and angry and stupid, by we’re there more to just hang than we are to play security. We’re just security by default, as we’re friends of the older bruddha – and ‘cause of that martial arts thing.

Every once in a while we get some straggler tailing us, someone who doesn’t know how to act at a party so they loosely follow around others: “Don’t you go San Diego State?”

I laugh and keep walking. This is too funny.

I have to step in the middle of some altercation, but the two guys don’t want to fight, they’re too busy posturing, willing to forego the fight if they can both walk away while saving face. I let them, making my presence known but not interfering. I see the quick nervous flicks of eyes over to me then back to the commotion. Later in the evening, one of the two gets himself riled up again. I’m there, I was up at the hot-tub with a birds eye view, I could see the group off to side, agitating, angry, and slide down the hill unnoticed.

Before he reaches his target, I’m there casually, as if I just happened to run into me. He recognizes me and tries to enlist me, “What’s your name?”

I lie. “Paul.”

“Man, Paul, this guy’s been talking shit about me all year, would you let someone do that to you?”

Ah, an emotional appeal. Get me involved. Get me answering your questions. A simple ploy. Bruddha, you’re not good enough to play that game with me.

“Let it go, bro. Look at all these honeys here, would you seriously rather be fighting than fucking?”

“I’m already fucking a girl, but this guy’s been talking shit ALL YE—”

“You’re fucking a girl? Right now? Like, the invisible woman, ‘cause I don’t see her.”

He cranes his head, scanning the crowd, looking for her. Yup, he’s under my control now. He’s thinking about what I want him to think about – his girl, and the things he wants to do with her, not some asshat that called him names.

Her spots her and points her out. I don’t follow his finger.

“She’s cute. So why don’t you take her home and fuck her silly?”

He appears to weigh the options and capitulates, retreating to his crowd of friends, but retaining enough ego to call me a “pussy,” on the way out, from the “safety” of his group of friends. Bruddha, unlike you, I can let it slide.

Fuckin’ amateurs.

I’m pissing in the woods when the cops arrive. Carter walks up behind me, “You thinking what I’m thinking?”

“Yup.” I zip up.

We start creeping through the woods, testing our stealthiness, putting our outdoor training to use. The cops are out at the highway, directing the flow of cars from the base of the driveway since cries of “5-0” rang through the party. There’s a lot of dried leaves about, and we’re a little tipsy, but there’s great contrast of light and shadow and enough noise from the party to mask our approach. We crouch, just off the side of driveway, listening. People walk withing feet of us and don’t see us. Carter and I snicker, drawing a line across our neck with an index finger, denoting when someone enters the range of a quick and silent kill.

A new police vehicle pulls up, the sheriff. Over the bullhorn, he commands “I want to talk to the organizer of this party or we’re coming in, and we’re going to start checking for things you don’t want to check for.”

We sneak back to the pool, to warn Joey and Jane. The party’s still two-fifty strong. There’s no way the bullhorn could have been heard this far away and over the substantial din.

“Joey, time to clear, or they’re coming in.”

Some drunk girl chimes in. “No, no, everyone should stay! That guy other there said they need a warrant to come in!”

“Honey, all they need to see is one drunk, high, or otherwise fucked up minor to come stumbling out of this place, and they have probable cause. You think that hasn’t happened yet?”

Even in high school, we knew how to tap a keg. We knew what a release valve was for. We always had enough condoms. We knew not to rely on legal advice from some drunk guy from our English class. We knew that when the cops came, everyone should walk away, not try to barricade yourself in. If you walk away, they let you. If you force them to come in, they’ll pat you down and find whatever beer, smokes, weed, or whatever you have stashed on or near you.

Fuckin’ amateurs.

Joey makes the call, “Alright, clear ‘em out, Jane, grab a bunch of your hot friends, take ‘em up to the house, and we’ll keep a smaller shindig going after the cops leave.”

We wander, gently prodding suggestible psyches. “Dude, the cops are here, I’d take off if I were you.” “Dude, they’re gonna try to come in here, where’s my ride?” “Dude, dude, dude….”

There’s a group near the back that’s not moving. The yeah-I-heard- you-but-I-think-I’m-entitled group. Walking up, I wave non-chalantly toward the exit and shake my head slowly, like your kid has just drawn on the wall and lied about it, and you’re too tired to deal with explaining the logic of how you figured it out.

“Gitthefuckouttahere.”

Some drunk little whore is offended by my presentation but not the hand down her pants. “What the fuck, man, you don’t have to be so rude.”

“Honey, I’m doing you a favor. Just get the fuck outta here.”

“You’re doing us a favor? Right.” She looks at her boy. “What a dick.”

I shake my head again, not willing to explain to them how I can smell the joint and they really don’t want the cops in here.

“Like I care. Fuckin’ move.”

They begin to exit, fifteen people in one big offended mood. The last guy up, the guy in the leather jacket, the guy who stands up last to show how cool he is, offers his sage advice over the cherry of his cigarette. “You should care, dude.”

I actually laugh.

“Whatever. Haul ass.”

I meander over to a another crowd. Johnny Punker saddles up next to me. Cracking open a beer while looking at him over my shoulder, I make a suggestion. “I’d leave if I were you.” People give me looks. Yeah, that’s right, I’m old enough to drink and kick people out of a party at the same time.

He assumes a hard-core attitude. “No way man, I leave this party when the cops bust in and handcuff me and drag me out.” Yeah, way to stick it to the corporate man, way to find something important to fight for.

I look back at him and swivel my body square with his.

“No, you’re leaving. You understand me?”

“Uh, yeah, I’m leaving ‘cause you’re telling me to. Uh, later.”

He high-tails it out the back. At least he catches on quick, quicker than his friend, who pronounces to his remaining friends, “The cops aren’t really here.”

“Uh, yeah, they are. Walk twenty yards that way,” indicating with my finger, “you can see the red and blue flashes through the trees. I may not have been around much, but usually just cops have those.”

“Yeah, right, the cops aren’t here.”

“You think I’m sending dozens of hot little girls away for no reason? Are you an idiot?”

He turns back to his friends, mumbling, “There’s no way the cops are here.”

“Alright, dumbass, just go. Leave. Right now. You’re not smart enough to be at this party. Get the fuck out.”

“Who do you think you are?”

“I’m your guardian fuckin’ angel.”

“I–”

“No, fuck that. Just leave. Bye. Go. Now.”

“But–

“Nope. Go.” I wave him off and walk away, leaving him to to escort himself out.

Fuckin’ amateurs.

When we’ve got the party down to a decent size, the police pull away and we start up the DJ. There’s male and female nakedness at the hot tub, and things are relaxed. We share the more interesting anecdotes of clearing three hundred people without incident with five somewhat drunk assholes. I lay back on the side of the tub, thinking of how stupid I was when I was eighteen. I watch the stars of a rural night sky dance and dip and hide behind the silhouette of a pretty young thing dancing above me, and I am content, even thought I too am still, a fuckin’ amateur.

Out with some friends, in a partially crowded bar, I’m navigating from the patio to the restroom. Two girls ensconced in some private conversation are oblivious to the blockade they’re providing. It may be important, who am I to say.

My bladder urging me onward: “Pardon me.”

He eyes jog slowly to mine, heavy with intoxicants.

“Do I know you?”

I’m looking past her, only my voice is directed toward her. “No.”

She doesn’t move, I turn to look at her.

I want to tell her I’m not picking up on her. I’m not interested. I’m not drunk, I’m not checking out her ass, my hand is on her shoulder to guide her slightly to the side and allow me passage to the head. But I don’t, I can resist the urge to tear down her inflated ego (at least until I write about it later, which she’ll never know about, and really doesn’t yield any reprisal or warm fuzzy for me.) I can let her assume I’m aborting a poorly executed pick-up. Fine, whatever, as long as she moves and I can pee.

She rolls her eyes over toward her friend, casting rays of annoyance through the arc. I nudge her to the side, passing without further comment.

Everyone has shitty days, and every day there’s people undergoing more hardship than most of us that have access to the internet will ever experience. But most people, people I respect and can have interesting and intelligent conversation with, people I enjoy hanging out with, don’t automatically assume that everything revolves around themselves. They have an expanded view of the world and see themselves as just a part of it. Is it the insulation from adversity that allows one’s focus to drift from the world to the self? Is it a lock of maturity or upbringing?

More than your style of speech, your topic gives you away, your perspective is revealed. The high schooler tend to speak of I: I love this, I hate that, the self in relation to others, the self as the center. Through the collegiate years, it tends to be broaden to include more of you: what do you like, what do you hate, others in relation to the self, others in the center. The larger socio-political economic stage enters and exerts influence.

The high-schooler tends toward search for consonance, the latter, comparison. The world has expanded along with the scope of responses and elicited emotion. Later, the topics move away from the personal, toward larger world view and the place of yourself and your loved ones within it, interpersonal with talk of you and I. The scope of your perspective is the current of your speech, and reveals more than your language or vocal affectations.

I could attribute it to the alcohol she was drinking, or the pot she’d obviously smoked, but while the chemicals may contribute, I believe they probably just amplify. I’m inclined to attribute such a response to some adolescent narcissism, some sort of aberration in the cultivation of one’s place in the Grand Scheme, of an expansive social circle, that, regardless of our desire, we are all part of.

The world will keep spinning when you’re gone, babe. Just like when I die. We’re just not that special. What is unique, irreproducible, that which will accompany you all your life and you have the capability of cherishing forever, are is relationship with every one else come in contact with. Not me, not you, but the interaction. There’s far too much insignificance in the world to throw away that which has potential.

After Japanese class last Halloween night, I met up with Jill, Matt, and Greg down in Hillcrest to wander around and check out the local kings (or queens, as may be the case) of costuming. As Hillcrest is the “gay district” of San Diego, it promised some of the most elaborate and entertaining of projects.

Of course, there were plenty of the standard leather-clad ass-less chaps wearing village people and slutty [insert occupation here] cross-dressers milling about, but there were also some truly genius getups. Perhaps one of the most creative two guys were dressed as jellyfish: white bodysuits carrying white umbrellas draped with strips of cloth and those long skinny balloon animal type balloons sticking out from underneath. The umbrellas were low enough so as to obscure their faces, all you saw were these cloth and balloon tentacles swaying from underneath the umbrella, illuminated by strategically placed glow sticks providing faux-bio-luminescence.

Toward the close of the evening, I ended up in an interesting conversation with Greg regarding Godel, Escher, and Bach – one of my all-time favorite non-fiction books – and Catch-22. He happened to be reading them at the same time and was providing interesting correlations between Catch-22, which is, or course, entirely paradoxical, and the notion of paradox and true-but-unprovable/false-but-not-unprovable from GEB. Furthermore, he noted the similar structure of the two, of Catch-22’s devotion of each chapter to an individual and GEB’s organization into separate analogies of cognition.

We started on the topics of systems – each person in C-22 is somewhat of a “system” in the GEB sense: internally consistent, sufficiently expressive, but containing their paradoxes that can only be explained by some sort of large “meta-system,” a system that takes into account talking about itself, or as I like to say, elevated semantics. Of course, there are always paradoxes available in the meta-system, perhaps in C-22, the analogy is the book itself, (and in fact, the meta-system must have paradoxes, and it is mathematically provable.) For you number theory geeks out there, I know I’m glossing things. Deal with it.

I particularly enjoyed the conversation given that Greg understands the structure and intricacies of the Fugue (specifically, Bachs’, a major component of GEB) much better than, while on the other hand I’m much more visceral understanding of number theory (Godel) and Escher’s works (Escher, of course.) Looking back on it, we were really just two meta-systems making our own analogies about systems and cognition. We have overlapping areas of expertise as well as disparate ones, we have things we believe but are not provable, and vice versa.

In essence, our conversation was a meta-system, involving two other meta-systems, making analogies about systems analogies of systems. Meta-meta-meta-meta system?

Greg is planning on doing more in-depth analysis and comparison, using two as foils of each other, and I think the idea is fantastic.

It occurred to me on the way home that Halloween in Hillcrest is the perfect place for this conversation: boys dressed as girls finding analogies in jellyfish and village people. Systems masquerading as systems, commenting on systems, creating new systems. Kind of makes you wonder if there’s some sort of meta-system up there that encourages these kinds synchronicities.