We are, all of us, in a hole of shit. I mean, I have my own problems, and you have yours, but as a group, things look dark indeed.
Now look, I can write all kinds of gibberish, from warmongering propaganda to articles on high school volleyball to the demons that hound yours truly.
But today, it’s going to touch on - and I’m going to pull straight from my man Jon Stewart on this one - the 2008 cluster-fuck to the White House.
Yes, indeed. The reason for this sort of turnaround, this regression into the basest kind of political discussions? Disgust. Gleeful rage. Insane loathing for the general electorate.
I mean, election politics? Presidential Primaries? Who needs this shit? But it’s true, and it’s right in your face, even if you’re not paying attention. So look around you, Rube. Feel the burn. What are you going to do? The Titanic is going down, Rome is burning and the only swords within your grasp are the feeble power to vote and the ability to be informed if you want it.
If you want it. In some countries it’s mandatory. At least we still have the freedom to deny ourselves the only power we still have left. Ain’t America grand?
I remember once a flatmate of mine in college told me she didn’t vote.
“What?” I implored with confounded rage, as should be expected.
“Yeah, I don’t read the news enough and I don’t feel like I’d make an informed decision. So I don’t vote,” she told me with a look so stolid it made her posture stiffen.
I looked at her in total and complete disbelief and launched into some kind of rant about there being no excuse to not vote, and how others were never given the chance and even others were forced to do it and so on and so on. I don’t know that she listened to me. Thinking back on it, I hope she didn’t.
Had she taken my advice it would only have compounded the problem. America’s issue with voters isn’t just the indifference caused by a large middle class that is too comfortable and therefore too complacent with the status quo. It’s more complicated than that. When you get down to it, there are 3 kinds of voters:
- Those who are easily stirred into action (i.e. swing voters)
- Those who are naive enough to care (some of them are informed enough to be angry)
- Those who are extreme enough in their views to be passionate (dangerous)
The other 55% of the nation doesn’t even show up, so who cares what they think?
Well. It’d be interesting to know what percentage among them fall into the 3 categories of non-voters:
-The responsibly uninformed
-The wholly indifferent
-The informed enough to be angry and too disillusioned to act
I guess there is also the blissfully ignorant and some of these vote as well but they tend to fall into the first category up top. If only the ignorant ones didn’t vote. Then, at least, we’d have a meaningful election (assuming we could trust the counting machines, which we can’t, but that’s another day’s topic). In any case, this does not bode well for the politics of the country. I could get into a whole flurry of why the media is largely to blame since as the 4th branch, they are responsible for informing those who wish to be informed in the first place thereby creating an environment conducive to the principles of a unified and productive democracy… and they’re not doing that. But then it would start sounding like I’m preaching and only a jackass would do that, so what’s the point?
The point, since we’re getting back to it, is that I then told her something I believed in at the time but see now that I didn’t understand entirely. I told her what a lot of people think: that you should always vote.
This is a lie.
The rule is not that you should vote. The rule is that you MUST - without liberty to ignore your duty, without fail to feel the responsibility or the shame to fail - be informed.
After you’re informed you do what you want. Ride a boat upstream into the Congo if you think that’s the right course of action. But for fuck’s sake don’t vote if all you watch is CNN or anything on TV for that matter. Yes “The Daily Show” is included in that; you can’t just watch Jon Stewart. God, I bet he had a fit of fucking desperate terror the first time he realized that he was some people’s sole source of news, and he literally calls it the fake news. Although if you watch both “The Daily Show” AND “The Colbert Report”… well, that’s something…
But seriously, don’t vote if you don’t listen to the radio or read at least 2 or 3 publications, at least one of which is not owned by Rupert Murdoch or Pat Robinson. Don’t vote if you base your decisions on what Oprah or your neighbor says and certainly don’t vote because Mitt Romney thinks you should. Or, just to be safe, anyone from Florida, for that matter.
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After many trials, much deliberation, constant interruptions and no less than 3 death threats the search is over. I have new flat mates. And not a moment too soon.
With one Katie gone and the other soon bound for the grey Isles of Britannia, I was left wondering how to replace such characters in my life. That and their respective rent payments. They’d become such dependable friends and I knew I would miss them so.
Remaining-Katie helped me to shed some light on the matter from her usually helpful female perspective. Her reliable company by the window was just as appreciated with our almost mandatory tumbler of whatever alcohol sat on top of the fridge. Already-left-Katie, bless her heart, could do little from the heart of darkness, the war-and-disease-ravaged lands she currently assists in raising to civility. She wrote to me of her daily issues - problems of blatant and rampant racism, crossing war fronts in the line of fire, outrageous palm beaches with hammocks for the evenings, savage kitten-spewing cats, missing pants and large rats that were somehow responsible for the absence of the pants in the first place. Suddenly my issues of not having flat mates seemed pale in comparison.
But everyone has their problems, and large or small, I had to deal with mine.
So let’s get to the hunt for new flat mates. What this city holds in terms of dubious characters and outright weirdos is understood by some and well-known to most. I imagine almost any place on Earth with a large enough population of humans will have its fair share of shady types so know that I recognize that and am not here peddling in insignificant judgments. There’s no need to get all self-righteous or defensive and protective of your own town of wayward freaks. I know they’re everywhere. I’m from San Francisco and I have friends in other strange places like Portland, Manhattan, Las Vegas, Fairbanks, Brussels and Tilburg. I know these things.
But Amsterdam, friends… it’s a housing mess. This is true. Sure, New Yorkers pay 3 grand for a studio apartment in Manhattan and Parisians have to deal with the French - but do they have to worry about squatting mafia connections and large porn kings returning from a 2-year long flight from the cops?
Rhetorical questions, of course.
But seriously, you’d think that for an apartment in the center that is practically a living postcard with canal-side natural light, an absurdly large living space, a large kitchen, a sink in the bathroom and a decently normal flatmate with all of his teeth would attract good people so fast you’d wonder where they had all been living before.
But lo - the oddities of humanity are larger in number, and they love to answer them some Craigslist ads. They came in droves.
The first two girls that replied were from Spain and came as a pair. Ideal, I thought, and they seemed interesting. Red-and-blue-hair-kind of interesting - true - but interesting nonetheless. That is, until they asked about the possibility that I dye my hair green so that the mood would feel more rounded and we could project ourselves better across the continuum.
“What continuum?” I asked, naively. I shouldn’t have.
“You know, the essence of ‘x’,” said one of them.
“What?”
“Ecstasy,” she corrected me. “It’ll be more soothing when we all do ecstasy.”
It went downhill from there.
All in all I received:
- 21 responses from people living abroad who wanted the place no matter what.
- 12 promises to deposit all necessary funds into my own account no matter how strongly I pointed out that we might have mice and maybe they should see the place first.
- 10 Jesus freaks.
- 8 propositions of marriage for a visa. Eight.
- 6 responses from people whose names were so unpronounceable it was impossible to know their sex. 4 of them wouldn’t say. What’s up with that?
- 6 replies in languages I could not identify.
- 4 requests that I stop posting ads on craigslist because of global warming.
- 4 Nigerian Bankers.
- 2 accusations that I was actually an ex-missionary in Africa who should burn in hell or else pray there’s no afterlife. Apparently there’s an explanation for these on the craigslist website, but damned if I’m going to read it.
- 5 responses from ex-professional athletes in their late 30’s who did not seem to read the HUGE part about how I was looking for young students/professionals between 20 and 30, and not large ex-linebackers for the Flevoland Flounders.
- 1 pet chicken.
- 1 proposition that I help a couple raise their child.
And as I said, no less than 3 death threats.
…what? I don’t always know how to react to people.
Along the way I got, of course, numerous tugs on the sleeve and side-lip-whispered rationales and explanations out in the corridor for things ranging from criminal records to massive debt to schizophrenia. Naturally, I’ve left out the handful of otherwise reasonably normal people that I actually let come over and see the place. But even among these I had:
- 5 exceptionally boring people.
- 4 cases of clinical B.O.
- 2 people with interpreters.
- 1 violent allergy to peanuts AND ketchup.
- 1 more Jesus freak
ughh.
Nothing like Tweedledee and Tweedledum, but trouble all the same. I tell you, looking for a place to live or for flat mates to share your own is one hell of an exercise in getting to know humanity, assuming you’re into humanity. So you can imagine my glee when 2 girls of caliber and seemingly normal levels of decency showed up at my door with registration papers, phone numbers, passports and a fun and friendly demeanor. Hold on to them, Pete!
I snagged each of them by the arm, one at a time, and yanked them into the apartment, thrusting the contract and clean dishes at them with promises of respectful living conditions and no more than 1 mouse at a time since, you know, it’s Amsterdam. You can’t keep those little fuckers out forever.
Tibi Dabo, I told them, so long as they didn’t have pet chickens and didn’t set fire to my books.
And wouldn’t you know it? They signed on the dotted line and paid up. Jelena with her thorough accountant style and Maryla with her indifferent nonchalance to anything that might bother her. You can tell high caliber when you see it, I’ve been told. And that night, we all saw it.
Good times lie ahead, I think.
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Deeper and deeper we go.
With the proverbial (and actual) hang-over of the new year steadily gaining distance behind us we’ve turned our attention to more important things like retaining gainful employment, fostering meaningful relationships, maintaining steady exercise and continuing the hunt for new flat mates.
Note that following the presidential primaries is not included.
And why should it be? Everyone else seems content to reiterate over and over a hundred times about the lack of experience this and $400 haircut that, and here is The Anti-Christ. And now, Oh My God how could the Nevada Primary possibly go that way? It’s a wonder there’s any news on at all. And then Heath Ledger goes and takes enough sleeping pills to wreck a pony, and now every female under the age of 50 is lamenting another babe gone down to the party beyond, joining the likes of James Dean and River Phoenix, and possibly one of the Baldwin’s, because, why not? They have enough.
Jeez. Slow down. There’s no call for that kind of thing.
Which is true. It’s too soon for that kind of talk. But no dreamy girl will be wed to ol’ Heath, that’s for sure, unless necrophilia makes a turn for the popular, which I don’t see happening. On no tabloids will pictures of Heath and Matthew McConaughey be shown getting out of shallow beaches, abs brimming with manhood and oodles of charm coming out their pores, sometimes mistaken for talent.
Sometimes. Which is a shame. Dude was beginning to make good films, and sleeping pills on a Hollywood heartthrob? Tragically cliche, no?
But there’s plenty to talk about. And yet, the impression I’m starting to get is that news, at least today, is not what is, but a reflection of what people want to hear. Televised politics, a sport in and of itself, like a perpetual Super bowl that no one pays serious attention to. And that’s terrifying given the education, attention span and critical thinking skills of the typical and average yoke in America. And if something as harmfully unimportant as the democratic presidential primaries steals the thunder of any story bigger than Heath Ledger’s suicide, it’s worrisome.
Which is not to say that Heath Ledger is more news-worthy than the election. Just that when the talking heads have been saying the same thing for 3 days on end and can still blot out a tragic actor’s death, then people must be really yearning for the promise that maybe today CNN will give them some meat.
Because, seriously: politically, these primaries mean nothing. Any democrat will sign the Kyoto Treaty, and not a second too soon. Any one of them would almost certainly refrain from bombing Iran. None of them will start WWIII before tackling immigration, health care and Iraq, and not a single one of those has any chance of being resolved in the next 30 years anyways. So as far as issues go, every candidate is identical. The fools who want Hilary because she’s a woman or Barack because he’s black, or even Edwards because he looks like a sitcom character from the 80’s are wasting time and energy.
Remember: there is nowhere to go but up.
But don’t mind my ranting; I’m disenchanted. I’m informed enough to be angry and foolish enough to care. Statistically, though, you’re probably not all that different from the rest of the electorate, so don’t take any of this personally. Just figure out if you’re one of the majority that forms political opinions based on the fluctuations of your heartbeat when you hear Hilary’s voice or if you’re in the minority that make sense when talking about it. If you’re a voice person, consider working on that. Or consider getting neutered. It’s the same to me.
But what’s certain is that it’s insane to discuss the candidates as if any of it mattered, unless you’re high or drunk, in which case either no one will pay attention to what you’re saying. Either that or else they might just elect you into the White House. Not all that far fetched, when you consider what America has done twice in a row now.
And since the rest of our attention is enthralled with things like doing numerous push ups and running countless kilometers every day, making sure my job isn’t forgotten by the payroll department, paying the rent with people that don’t put me to sleep and fueling the fire of passion even if it’s across the mighty At-a-lantic, it’s not altogether surprising that we might miss something like that. We get so tired of the bullshit that we sometimes can’t filter it from the background noise of stupidity. This too, is terrifying, but alas: reality.
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Jesus, what a weird night. Things have been hazy in the past couple of days, the return home dropping itself fully on top of me like a large bag of oranges or some other citrus. At first I thought it was jet lag that was keeping me awake through all hours of the night, forcing me to go to bed at 2 or 3 and waking up alert as all hell at 5, knowing that what you need is a 5k run.
Yeah, that’ll do it. What kind of bipolar maniac would think that’s ok? And then be so schizophrenic to wonder why you’re tired as hell come 10 in the morning and again at dusk. 3 days later the pattern continues.
Then someone sent me an article about a drug they’re trying on these monkeys, something that doesn’t just postpone sleep, it replaces it entirely. Fuck, I thought. That’s an elegant solution to my jet lag problem. I could USE some of that.
Then I thought about how the last thing this world needs is another sleep deprived, over-evolved chimp - least of all one who writes in that state. No, we don’t need that.
Now, late into the night, the bottle of Jameson almost gone and the two blunts my flatmate left me still sitting on the table for a lack of a lighter or anything resembling heat in this ancient building, I’m forced into all kinds of complicated things like answering emails about the apartment I’m trying to rent. What hope did I think I had? Craigslist wasn’t made for ads like this:
Death of an Era: 2 rooms available to share postcard apartment with occasionally drunk migrant
That doesn’t work, Pete. You’re only going to attract more degenerates with that kind of talk. Leave it off the papers, man. Get a grip. Sit down. Think. Maintain.
Or maybe just get some sleep.
But how? Later, one of the Katies, due to leave in less than a week’s time says there’s a film I must watch. It’s an oldie, and it’s scary, she says.
Ok. Maybe I’ll get some sleep. Good. Put it on.
“Don’t Look Now”, with Donald Sutherland and Julie something is, for the record of fact, a horribly confounding, twisted and in all other ways terrible movie. Its strangely placed camera angles and scene transitions do enough to trip you out throughout the whole movie, and at one point you start to think that none of it is an accident and that some brilliant art students must be behind all this razzle and dazzle that you haven’t quite understood yet. “I’m sure it’ll all tie together before the end,” you tell yourself.
Wrong.
Imagine that after all the confusion of the 6th Sense it turns out that instead of being a ghost himself, Bruce Willis is actually a Trafalmadorian spy sent to gather toy soldiers from autistic boys. What if THAT were the twist? Would you be pissed off that all the imagery and symbolism had gone to waste. Would you be confounded at WHY any art student would do a thing like that? Would you wonder what sociopath funded a movie of that sort?
Well, now you know how I feel. Sort of.
Because I sat patiently and confused through seemingly pointless scenes that halfway assured me they would make sense later, some creepy shots of blind old ladies and a half hour of a far-too-intimate sex scene showing Donald Sutherland’s hairy white ass. That is NOT a part of well-balanced breakfast.
And for what? The red-coated midget has NOTHING to do with his dead daughter? The murdering old lady dwarf dressed like a European little-red-riding hood and packing a meat cleaver has absolutely NOTHING to do with ANY imagery of the film? Her only purpose is to suddenly turn a drama flick into a horror movie with a single hack of his jugular? What?
Naturally, you’d have to watch the flick to know what I’m talking about in its entirety, but trust me: not worth the time. If you want to waste your time without being pissed off, just watch Transformers with the sound turned off. At least that way you won’t have to put up with Shia LaBeouf’s unwarranted antics and you can enjoy Megan Fox without the winging.
–
I am understandably upset. I imagine the scene in the meeting room where the art students that made this contortion of images at the moment when things go astray.
Lead art student: Ok people, they’ve cut our due date by a few days, so we’re going to have to wrap it up. No more scene additions.
Gabe: But I had this great idea for this symbol around the red candle that would…
LAS: Sorry, Gabe, we don’t have time for it.
Gabe: Fuck.
LAS: Ok, now we need to finish that scene in the dark and fog smitten building, right? Ok. So the midget in the red coat is standing, facing the corner, Donald approaches her, thinking it’s his daughter, the suspense is building, the music is climbing, she sniffles, he says “it’s ok, baby, I’m here,” he reaches out to touch her aaaaannnnnnndd…
[silence]
LAS: Mitch!
Mitch: yeah?
LAS: Wasn’t that your scene?
Mitch: Wasn’t MY scene!
LAS: Loni?
Loni: Don’t look at me, man… I did the weird scaffolding scene.
LAS: Joe?
Joe: Nope.
LAS: Really guys? Really? NObody knows what’s under that red coat? The entire movie has to be based on this. NObody?
…
well, do we at least have any ideas?
Joe: how about an old lady?
LAS: What old lady?
Joe: no, no, the red coat. There can be an old lady under there.
LAS: you mean like the spirit of the daughter aged a century in the afterlife?
Joe: I don’t know. Sure.
Mitch: Won’t work. We’ve been showing a child running through the streets of Venice.
Loni: It could be a midget old lady.
LAS: will you guys listen to yourselves? A midget old lady? Does she look like the blind woman? Or her sister, maybe?
Joe: No, no. Just some scary-looking, creepy old lady with dwarf face.
Mitch: Are you stoned? What the hell is dwarf face?
Joe: Are you drunk?
Mitch: Shut up.
LAS: Look, I’m not following this but let’s say ok, what then?
Loni: Meat cleaver.
LAS: What?
Loni: Meat cleaver. She turns around, looks at him randomly and while he’s trying to figure out who she is, she hacks his jugular with a meat cleaver.
LAS: Guys, c’mon! We’re artists. We’re better than this. Don’t we have any better ideas?
Joe: Well, Donald Sutherland could undress himself and…
LAS: Meat cleaver it is! Done.
–
Or something like that. Shit christ. What a terrible experience. Like that time Aaron told me the “Mr. Green” joke.
Ridiculous.
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“Here,” says Nate, “drink this.”
“What is it?”
“It’s a cheeseburger.”
“What?”
“A cheeseburger.”
“It looks like a beer. Shitty too, from the smell of it. And what the fuck is that red thing floating at the bottom of it?”
“It’s a cherry; a cherry and a lemon.”
“What kind of mad combination is that to put in a beer?”
“Just drink your beer normally. When you get to the last gulp, I swear to God, it’ll taste like a cheeseburger.”
“… What?”
“I don’t think it works at sea level, but I think we’ve got enough altitude here,” Henry offers. Shak looks suspicious. I’m confused.
“I’m confused,” I say.
Nate nods. “Drink.”
I drink. I chug a bit at first, looking at his pale face turned golden through the horrible bite back of Pabst on tap. God, I needed this. And this shitty, well-lit and mostly empty Portland bar was the place to do it.
I pause about halfway through. “Last gulp, huh?”
“I’m telling you, man. A goddamn cheeseburger. You’ll see.”
Dammit. As if things weren’t weird enough lately. 4 months into my European stint I hadn’t seen as much as a hair toss in any bar in Amsterdam. No drugs to speak of, just loads and loads of lonely whiskey, vodka and pea soup and to boot, a rigorous exercise schedule that had put my gut at sophomore year levels. Sophomore year in high school. Without sounding like a narcissistic bastard, can I say a thing like that? What can a thing like that even mean?
Then suddenly a trip to Spain and Morocco explodes right in my face and it earns more than its fair share of hookups and romances, none of them expected and all of them exciting and forbidden by rules left unwritten in all but the most distant and turbid corners. Friends suddenly came to visit and the craziness started.
“How’s the pot here, man?” Dave asks me.
“I don’t know man, I don’t smoke,” I told him.
“Why not?” he asked. A fair question, especially here.
“Just haven’t.” I said. I don’t like fair questions.
“Never even been curious?”
“Have you ever wondered what it’s like to be gay?” I asked him.
“You insensitive fuck, I AM gay!” He retored. Oops.
“Fine, fine, whatever,” I said. “Have you ever wondered what it’s like not to be gay?”
“Fair question.” He said, and thought about it. “Yeah.”
“Have you tried it?”
“No.”
“How do you know wouldn’t like it?”
“And what if I did like it?”
“Exactly.” I said, winning the debate.
“What about shrooms?” Brooke offered. “No wait, shrooms won’t work for you.”
“What? Why not?” I asked.
“You’re a shitty drunk, Bird. You talk too goddamn much,” she said. Which was true.
“I usually do anyway.”
“Yeah,” Brooke responded, “but when you’re drunk and someone mentions their weed is from Oregon the first thing you say is, ‘oh, like Ken Kesey,’ and then you launch into romancing the American Northwest and things like hunting wild mushrooms and logging…you weirdo.”
“So what?” I asked.
“Bird, who the fuck besides you, Trevor and Nate even knows WHO Ken Kesey is? And of those who know - who cares? And what kind of shit-faced book junkie would even bring up Ken Kesey at a time like that?”
“So what’s this got to do with doing shrooms?” I asked her.
“Well…you’re also too self-confident with your talents, and possessive too. I’m just saying that, on shrooms, some people light fires, some see the Earth breathe and some people jump off balconies. You’d probably behave like Jack Kerouac and go rummaging through old stacks of paper looking for a long enough scroll to write enough crap on to last you your entire high. And while no one could even read it, you’d claim it a masterpiece until you woke up 2 days later in the Van Gogh Museum.”
“No, you can’t do shrooms,” Dave agreed.
“What’s left?” I asked.
“C’mon,” Dave said. “I saw sign back there that said they served Absinthe.”
“Guys, wait,” I said. “This is the kind of talk that is going to lead to a series of events that will end up with one of us in a Belgian prison while the other one lies dead or worse on the frozen deck of a tourist boat in Budapest.” I know it sounds bad, but I was right, dammit. I know about these things. But that’s another story.
In any case, the friends came and went. Other business trips came and went too and were well enjoyed. All of them yielded much craziness, tempestuous women on the margins of the civilized world and fast shots lit on fire, some of which were absinthe. And I was right.
And ye gods - none of it was a good idea.
But who cares? These are the years for miscreant behavior of this kind, and I’ll be damned if the wild animals of Amsterdam OR Portland were going to stop our golden youthful age. Not these horsemen, sister. A mini-fridge full of fireworks, a perfect mountain covered in fresh snow, a cold city filled with meth freaks and vegan law students and enough scotch and bourbon to wreck a pack of camels, we did the New Year thing right.
Just ask T.
–
In any case, last year started off like a god-damned… what did I call it? Like a god-damned Dear Abby column. That is NO way to start off a year. Years must be started off with epic tales of surviving deathly hangovers in Oregonian forests of gleaming beauty, with explosions of childish glee, with drunken hordes and merry times, and with friends yelling, “SHIT, NATE SHOT A BOTTLE ROCKET UP MY SHIRT” while their girlfriends stare at them and me with abject terror and utter disbelief.
That’s how this year started, my friends. What could go wrong?
Indeed.
My girl left me sober
I don’t know what to do
I turn the bourbon upside down
but she’s across the ocean blue
These are my At-a-lantic Blues…
Oh Lord, my At-a-lantic Blues…
I call her: trans-atlantic
Confusing dusk with dawn
We talk for 20 minutes sexy,
But now my minutes are all gone
I’ve got the At-a-lantic Blues…
Yeeaaah, the At-a-lantic Blues…
The problem’s geographic,
And understood by few,
I don’t know how I’m gonna solve it,
But I’ll just keep playin’ ’till I do
To fight the At-a-lantic Blues…
Hoooaaaah, the At-a-lantic Blues…
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