State of the Nation Sept. Version

It's been almost two years since i left what is commonly referred to as the Rat Race, it's a proposition that many would seemingly jump at if say you were independently wealthy and didn't need to work, in my case i've just never been that much of a success in the straight world, fucking shady dealings? i'm like the Warren Buffet of that shit but in the legal and above the board shit i've always been nothing more than a laborer, never made shit as far as wages and since these days the corporations want to suck the soul outta you and bleed you dry i didn't have to think twice about what to do next so i took to taking caring of the boyos and these days i'm getting pretty good at it, toughest job i've ever held but easily the most rewarding...

But you see i was born on Patriot Day, a day i didn't even know existed until just recently but on this last one i was summoned by the courts to appear for my civic duty and do my best to get out of sitting on some jury... and so it was that i got in the car early and headed towards my old stomping grounds of dahntahn, now it's been a while since i've sat in the morning commute clusterfuck and as i sat there i began to wonder how people did this every day, this soul sucking existence and i understand that most probably had families or ambitions and the former i understand perfectly and the latter not so much but as i looked around i could not help think of that lyric from Synchronicity? i believe, "packed like lemmings into shiny metal boxes/ contestants in a suicidal race..." it seemed to me it was the face of capitalist slavery everywhere i turned, spurned on to earn more and buy more and be more though i think that none of it makes sense and i'm not naive enough to buy all the hippy-dippy bullshit and hell i'm just as guilty as anyone of capitalist impulse buying and hoarding when it comes to vinyl records and literature i just believe there has got to be a simpler way of getting on with life and living it instead of wasting it in the pursuit of what? i don't know and though this may sound like somewhere along that commute i found the Jesus i can assure that i have not, though if i ever do i hope he has a pot of gold at the end of the rainbow and is riding a unicorn...

And so i spent the next 5 odd hours sitting in a room with a bunch of strangers, Nick Disaster told me later that he was sad that i had to spend my birthday downtown and stated he hoped i didn't get picked, the I-mac of course chimed in that he agreed and added that he hoped we could eat some cake soon, lovely those boyos, so i sat and studied that faces round me, a very butch lesbian who looked like the Bob's Big Boy mascot, a closet hipster in a cheap suit and pierced lip, the young urban professionals, the old ladies and angry old men, i brought along a book of Hemingway's short stories that was given to me in college by a friend, inscribed that she'd hoped i went far with the writing thing and of course i could do nothing but laugh when i saw it, sat and read Up In Michigan, A Big Two-Hearted River pt. 1, A Clean, Well-lighted Place (which is still one of my favorite stories of all time and only grows in importance as i get older) and a few others and when i had dodged the bullet and was released from my civic duty i walked over to the courthouse and collected my $11.38 and bought a sandwich and a soda from a street vendor and sat in the park and ate it, the sun shining and not a care in the fucking world, watched the worker bees flit back and forth and talk of office drama, shoo-ed pigeons away, listened to taxi drivers honk and holler as they fought for space at the hotel across the street and when i was finished i sat a bit longer, thought about grabbing a beer but instead strolled through the city in a round-a-bout fashion on the way to my car, all in all it was not a bad way to spend the first half of Patriot Day...

And later that day i would finally eat the cake that Nick D. picked out and open my present as the boyos danced around me smiling and giving me hugs and telling me they loved me and even an old bastard like me could do nothing but grin like an idiot, and so i put them to bed, each with a story and then headed off to the new local where i drank some strong coffee and oatmeal stout before switching back to the cheap and easy to drink PBR, watched a shit football game of the local heroes getting waxed by the most hated team in the league to us ex-Clevelanders and then i ambled home, looked in on the boyos and listened to the sweet sound of their sleep and then sat in silene and gazed out the window at the stars, a fine day indeed if ever there was one...

Of course a couple of weeks before this i had the yearly trip to the doc, i always find it fun what questions they ask as you get older and though i don't feel that old i guess i am, still closer to 40 than 50 but not by much, he asked how my erections where to which i replied rock solid which got the good doc chuckling, i almost told him that sometimes i'm a bit of a teenager in that department and can manage to pop random boners but i figured i'd save that info for the lounge, he told me he crunched some numbers and ran some tests and stated that since i'm "getting up there" he analyzed my risk of heart attack and stroke for the next ten years and put my risk at exactly 1.3%, to which i replied that i'd most likely keel over on the way to my car then right? he laughed once again and was amazed at  how much i'd changed since i first walked in his office many moons ago, and i almost told him that many moons ago i didn't care if i made it this far but now i have a couple of reasons to keep on getting out of bed... and so who knows? with any luck i might be writing another one of these posts next year, i won't worry about it to much but i'll keep my fingers crossed, besides i still have some more shit to get written down...