HELLO AGAIN, ADAM

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Last night I went to an open mic event at a writers group in the Hudson Valley in New York. It’s a monthly event. This is the third time I’ve been there to read. The meeting is held nearly 80 miles from where I live. But with all the driving I’ve done in my life, 80 miles is a mere jaunt across town. I like the virtual anonymity of the group. No one knows me. No one remembers my name. There are at least 20 or more writers who sign up to read each month. Some are very good. Some show signs of promise. Some… well you end up wishing that a few would run out the back door and dive into the chilly Hudson River. Each reader is allowed five minutes. They say that everyone gets 15 minutes of fame in their life. I drive over an hour for 5.

Participating in the Hudson Valley writers group (and another group in the Lehigh Valley in Pennsylvania) has become part of my better writing strategy. It has been good to brush shoulders with several talented published writers. The encouragement and feedback after reading is also helpful. For instance, even though no one remembered my name, a few did remember that at last month’s meeting I read a piece that I wrote in 2004 while my father was suffering with cancer. It was called “It’s Not Like the Movies.”

My opportunity to read was nearly foiled last night. As I entered the town in which the meeting is held I looked at the passenger seat of my car and realized that I forgot my reading material at home! In my hurry to get out the door and on my way, I forgot to grab the folder with my printed article. My heart sank and I almost jammed on the breaks in the middle of the main street. But a thought came to my mind. I remembered that the writers group has an office in the building where they meet. They would most likely have internet access. Backup copies of my writings are stored on a top secret web server. Thankfully, I uploaded the latest revision of the article I intended to read. With a little luck the group’s director would allow me to use their computer to access and print the article. Luck was with me and I was able to print it. Ah! The wonders of modern technology! Forget your papers at home and they will meet you 80 miles away in a matter of minutes!

The article I read is titled “Adam.” Some of you might remember it. I wrote it at 4 AM after sitting in a New Jersey bar all night. One thing I noticed just before I got up to read last night was that this article was originally written on February 14, 2003 – Valentine’s Day. How appropriate! For those who would like to read it again and for those who did not read this article before, I am including it here. I remember when I first wrote this, one good friend of mine emailed me and asked, “Are you okay? That was pretty intense!” I told her then, “Yes, I’m okay. It’s the other guy in the story that wasn’t.” Funny how life goes. At this time in my life, over the past few months, I’ve become “the other guy” again in certain respects. I’ve become “Adam” to a certain degree. If you ask if I’m okay, I’ll still say, “Yes.” But I might not be able to answer so quickly and confidently right now. I guess what I should say is, “I will be okay.” These things have a way of working themselves out.

Read the original “Adam” article here.

GIVE ME RAGE

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Do you know what band I miss? I miss Rage Against the Machine. I know that Audioslave is the same band with a different singer. But it’s really not the SAME band. There’s something missing in Audioslave. It’s not in the musicianship. Tom Morrell is still amazing. Chris Cornell is one of the best rock vocalists ever. The musical ability of Audioslave is tremendous.

Well, let me qualify what I just said. Audioslave’s musicianship is tremendous. But it’s lacking something. I think that something is the RAGE. Audioslave is all sanitized and warm and fuzzy compared to Rage Against the Machine. For instance, “Born of a Broken Man” by Rage just played on my iTunes. The guitar riff, the vocal passion, the urgency of the song were all intense. Compare that with “Doesn’t Remind Me” by Audioslave. See what I’m saying? “Doesn’t Remind Me” is nice. It’s warm. I can relate to it. How many times in my life do things remind me of some lost love or some long gone circumstance that I wished never passed? Yeah, I can relate to the idea of liking some things in life because they DO NOT remind me of anything. That’s nice. But how does that compare with a song like “Broken Man” with lyrics such as these:

My fears hunt me down
Capturing my memories
The frontier of loss
They try to escape across the street where
Jesus stripped bare
And raped the spirit he was supposed to nurture
In the name of my
In the name of my

Born of a broken man
But not a broken man
Born of a broken man
Never a broken man

No, I don’t completely understand the complete meaning of the song. But I FEEL it. “My fears hunt me down, capturing my memories.” In my opinion, and that is all this article is about, I’d rather be hunted down by my fears and FEEL the affect of that than to be temporarily numbed by thinking of things that don’t remind me of anything that I FEEL. Do you see what I’m saying?

Just as I’d rather listen to Rage Against the Machine and lament their break up than listen to Audioslave, I’d rather FEEL something in my existence in this passage we tenderly refer to as LIFE. I’d rather feel the pain and the fears, the cutting and bleeding. I’d rather bang my head along with Rage than smile along with their new incarnation. I want something that’s relevant. I want something that feels like it matters. I want the feeling of the sword through my chest as I spit in my enemy’s eye just before giving up the ghost. I want THAT more than I want to sit in my slippers and robe and collect my pension one day.

All of this talk reminds me of some obscure piece I wrote almost a year ago after drinking. I admit, I was driving too. Please hold your Mothers Against Drunk Drivers lectures. Let’s stick to the point here. What the hell is the point? Oh yeah, getting drunk. No, the point is FEELING something, something that MATTERS. Here’s what I wrote (and I apologize in advance for lacking the necessary writing ability to make what I want to say clearer):

Sometimes you just have to punch the person next to you in the inside of their arm so goddamn hard that they yell, ‘What the fuck did you do that for??’, then smoke a big joint and listen to Pink Floyd’s “Dark Side of the Moon” with headphones and learn what dysfunction can teach you.

Is the status quo all that it’s cracked up to be? Is politically correct always correct? Fuck. I don’t think so.

There’s something to learn from CHAOS, something of order in the disorder. Something to claw into. Something to rip your heart open and implant something of essence.

Just drink your big ol’ bottle of booze, hop in your car and drive your brain right out of your skull. (Just make sure you only kill yourself, dick.)

Or maybe you just need to crank up some Madonna and dance until you bleed, slam yourself into a wall and convulse in a fit of laughter.

See what I’m saying? It’s the correctness of it all that’s fucked up. It’s phoney. It’s bullshit. I’m so tired of it. I’m so tired of LIFE AS USUAL. I’d rather have the chaos. I’d rather have THE RAGE. At least then there’s the possibility of something significant, something that MATTERS. Is it possible that society is so scared that it has insulated itself from CHAOS and DYSFUNCTION? Have we really tricked ourselves into believing that politically correct is actually correct? Have we merely LABELED that which we don’t understand and that which prevents the system from functioning the way we have grown accustomed to? Aw! To hell with that! That precludes PASSION. Without passion what can you feel? NOTHING. And that is exactly the point! Give me passion. Give me chaos. Give me rage. Give it to me any day, especially TODAY.

I’M TOUGH. BUT NOT LIKE THAT.

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Do you like the thrill of being in a crowd? Are you in need of bodies slamming against yours? Do you like the rush that goes through you when a mass of people moves suddenly and you are lifted right off the ground and carried several feet before landing? Do you like the pleasure of a cute, sweaty girl jiggling all over you and her hair all in your face? (It’s no problem if you keep your hands up at least by your chest so you don’t inadvertently grab anything you shouldn’t, if you know what I’m saying. You need to keep your hands up anyway to protect yourself from the moshers.) If you are craving any of what I just described, than there is only one thing you need:

A Primus concert!

My good Buddy O, my son T, and I went to Roseland Ballroom in New York City to see Primus last night. (Yes, I’ve reverted to using initials instead of full names again. Remember, I’m incognito here.) Buddy O is a huge Primus fan and he’s a fantastic bass player. If you know anything about Primus, you know that their music is driven by the song writing and bass playing of Les Claypool. It is no wonder that Buddy O loves their tunes. He and I have played some of their songs together in the past. So, I knew that he would definitely appreciate going to this concert. And my son T, he likes Primus a lot too. See, I’m raising him right!

We three bumpkins from New Jersey attempted to use the trains to get into the city instead of driving this time. We took the Path train from Newark to 33rd St. in Manhattan. Then we got the R subway up to 49th St. From there it was just a short walk to Roseland on 52nd St. Once we figured out just how to use the machine to purchase Metro cards, the trip into the city was a smooth one. The subway between 33rd and 49th was completely packed at 6:30 when we got on it. We couldn’t even reach the bars to hold onto. We had to press our hands against the ceiling to keep our balance. There’s one problem being a tall guy. As soon as I lift my arms over my head, my armpits are right in someone’s face. Luckily for my fellow passengers, I had applied copious amounts of Ban deodorant to the old pits just before leaving home.

After a quick stop for a slice of tasty New York pizza, we arrived at Roseland to find a mile long line waiting to get in. There was a leftover hippie-type guy frantically canvassing the line looking to buy a ticket from someone. Too bad I sold an extra ticket that I had a few blocks before we got there. I should have waited and made a killing off the hippie! He probably would have paid me a pretty penny and maybe even thrown in his hemp bracelet and John Lennon glasses. Later I saw him inside making his way through the boisterous crowd, unaffected by the chaos. It must have been the mushrooms helping him.

The opening act of the show isn’t worth mentioning. They did have a unique creativity going on with two cellists and a drummer comprising the band. However, the singer’s pseudo-political comments before a few songs make the band unworthy of mention by name here. Buddy O even turned his back to the stage after one of her comments. That same comment prompted the crowd to throw things at her through the whole song. I just wanted to tell her she was a big, fat, pinko Communist. But that wouldn’t have been nice.

It seemed like it took an eternity for Primus to take the stage. It always feels that way when I’m waiting for a band I really like to come on. The stage hands tuned guitars and checked mic levels and all that jazz. Then they left the stage. People cheered expecting the show to start. But the stage hands came back. This happened several times. Once when the stage hands came back, a group near us started chanting, “You’re not them! You’re not them!” Finally they left for the last time and the house lights went out. That was when the crowd surged. I got shoved from behind and thought I was going to go down when my feet got tripped up. Then we surged backwards, then sideways. As soon as Primus began kicking out the riff to the first song, “Harold of the Rocks,” the place went berserk! People were jumping up and down, slamming into each other, screaming. There was nothing you could do to resist the currents running through the crowd. I soon realized that to try to stand still and hold my ground was a seriously faulty plan, especially when I was lifted right off my feet while wedged between several people. Then I thought that if I bounced and jumped a little like everyone else I would probably fare much better. But that activity became weird as soon as I realized that by jumping I was humping some sweaty dude in front of me! I stopped. I’d rather get plowed over and trampled into the floor than give any guy the impression that I had some kind of affinity for his cheeks. Yes, there were girls mingled into the whole mess. But while that was attractive, it also made things more difficult because I didn’t want to hurt any of them. At one point I felt someone’s hands grab onto my shoulders. I turned to see a girl hanging onto me and jumping her little rock-n-roll heart out. That was nice and all. But at another point, after getting slammed into pretty hard and losing my cool, I grabbed the people in front of me and pushed them forward as hard as I could, plowing them through a few rows of bodies. Then I realized that one of the people I had a grip on was a girl. Damn! I beat it out of there and hid in case her boyfriend was nearby. I didn’t want to get hurt. Wait. To be afraid of getting hurt by a girl’s boyfriend while in the midst of a frenzied mass of Primus fans where one was bound to get hurt anyway seems to be an unnecessary anxiety.

I did get kicked in the head by a girl who was crowd surfing over us. And a guy in front of me that was pumping his fist in the air along with the music whacked me in the forehead. But I didn’t get hurt too badly. My feet got the most abuse. Remind me to wear steel-toed shoes for the next Primus concert. I came close to getting hurt a few times by some guys that were doing some pretty violent moshing. One tough looking bald guy seemed out to intentionally hurt people by running into them. That wasn’t cool. It’s all fun and games until someone loses a head. Speaking of losing a head, one ingredient that the managers of Roseland Ballroom should have left out of the Primus mix was beer. People were trying to pass through that crowd with cups of beer raised above their heads. It was just my luck to get doused with beer at least three times. My shirt was soaked and dripping. I hate beer! Please, please, please! Pour rum on me! Spare me the beer!

There were two things about the show that disappointed me. The first was that the show had to be stopped after about 20 minutes because the crowd broke the barricade in front of the stage. The stage hands interrupted the band, turned the lights on and took 15 minutes to nail the barricade back to the floor. The second disappointment was that Primus only played for 90 minutes, including the down time for the barricade replacement and one short encore. When they walked off stage and the house lights came on, it just didn’t feel right. Everyone in the crowd just stood there looking at each other with a look on their faces that asked, “Is that it? What do we do now?” It was as if the lights suddenly exposed us in our foolish aggression and we all stood there with sheepish grins wondering if we should apologize for hurting each other. Then we made our way to the coat check, fetched our belongings, and five minutes later we were calmly strolling the streets of New York.

We entered the subway station at 49th St. at 11:30 to begin our journey home. We waited for the R train for over 20 minutes. Two N trains stopped and left during that time. Being the Jersey bumpkins we were, we didn’t know that the R doesn’t run downtown late at night. You need to take the N instead! Buddy O finally clarified that with a subway worker and we were able to get on the next N train. At 34th St. we had a little trouble finding the entrance to the Path station. So we took a break and bought hot dogs and beef shishkabobs from a street vendor. If one sees a street vendor after midnight, in a not so busy area such as we were in, one should question the wisdom of purchasing and consuming meat products from such vendor. Learn your lesson from me. Wait to get home to eat. After a wait that seemed longer than the wait for Primus to appear, the Path train to New Jersey arrived at the station. That was a long, sleepy trip to Newark. Buddy O was kind enough to give up his seat next to me to allow a tired but very pretty girl to sit down. I made sure to thank him for that later. But I bet this dark haired beauty wished she was standing on the opposite end of the train once she sat by me. I was reeking! I was covered with beer, smoked like a country ham by all the cigarette and marijuana smoke that surrounded me at Roseland and the residue of my own sweat and the sweat of a multitude was only beginning to dry on my skin. I was one sweet smelling bouquet. Let me tell you! I gave the girl a smile anyway. What the hell. Whatever she did in response wouldn’t be as bad as what I’d already been through that night. But damn! Don’t just ignore me, baby! Ouch! I’m tough. But not like that.

We got home at 2:30 in the morning after the 40 minute drive from Newark. Being the lazy bastard I am, I merely changed my shirt and jumped into bed when I got home. I know, “gross.” I wasn’t really lazy, just exhausted. Sometimes there’s a difference. To tell you the truth, 90 minutes of Primus was enough. I could use a good massage today. It’s not so bad when a band only leaves your ears ringing the next day. But Primus seems to be a full body experience. I can’t wait to see them on their next tour! I should be able to recuperate in a year or two! Mosh on!

THIS IS REAL… AND IT’S GONNA HURT

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You know? I just can’t stay away.

I dismantled my online journal in August. The two main reasons: 1. I needed to be a little less visible to some people, specifically a trouble-making co-worker. 2. I wanted to focus on writing better. Having an online journal was making me careless and sloppy as a writer. So, I took it all down and for the past three months have been going through all the old articles I wrote since December 2000. I pulled out a few good ones and started rewriting them. Taken out of context, online journal entries can sound a bit weird. I began rewriting to make them stand alone essays based on the experiences of my life. All well and good.

However, I have found that I haven’t been writing anything NEW. Am I a writer? Or just a re-writer? Have I merely become an editor? I need to write! Too many things go on in my life. I need to tell somebody about it. My private journals are fine to sort through all the garbage in my head. And I suppose that one day someone will read those when I’m dead and gone. (Although, someone was reading them and I didn’t know it, which seriously contributed to the death of our relationship. More on that sometime.) But I need a venue for putting my writing out there for people to read and give me some feedback.

It’s more than just about writing I’ve realized. I am also missing the interaction of the online community. The feedback from readers and other journalists is a benefit that I threw out with the bathwater so to speak. There is value to that interaction, not just as a writer, but as a person. There are friends that the internet has brought into my life with whom I do not have direct, face-to-face interaction but who have been a tremendous support to me many times over the past several years. We still have email interactions. But I think I need to have the give and take of a journal again to broaden those relationships to the breadth they once had.

So, here it is. Crash Test Monkey. It’s real… and it’s gonna hurt! It’s me… incognito… dressed up like a monkey. No dot com name of my own. I’m hiding out with all the other monkeys on Diary Land. I’m already on my second rum and coke. You know how I like my rum! And drinking while writing sometimes enables a guy to express himself in free and unbounded ways. For example, without a few drinks behind me, I would never tell you that when I was eight years old I got in trouble for picking my nose and wiping the boogers on the wall by my bed. Without the influence of alcohol, I would NEVER admit that I was once eight years old! See? This online journal gig is good for us all! Uplifting and inspiring! I’ve selected several readers from my former email list to let you know about this journal, people I feel I can trust. We’ll start here and see what happens. Names and actual places may be altered along the way. But you will know who the man is behind the curtain.

Now… back to the rum!