A story, or a brainstorm. For my book or despite my book.



His teeth protrude from his mouth like shards of porcelain in a pool of blood. The color of said teeth and his pallid complexion are almost indistinguishable, were it not for the transparency of his skin. It is what bruises would be like if they were white instead of purple. It sits loosely on his body like a garment of clothing, moving not as him, but with him. His nostrils sit in the skin, a pair of holes in the middle of his face, not on the underside of a nose. They sit symmetrical below a pair of small, beady black eyes, sparkling with some sort of sadistic gleen that would send shivers down my spine had I not stared into those eyes nearly every day for the past few years.



He smells like whiskey. Or is that me? It's hard to tell these days, but one of us smells like whiskey, and the other smells like dust. And considering my drunken state, it's probably safe to assume that he is the dusty one.



I can hear him breathing, although I was previously unaware that hallucinations had the vital organs needed to take a breath, nor that it was necessary that he should. And good lord, does he ever wheeze. In fact, I can hear his sighs from here on the stage, and he is in the projection booth upstairs. His long limbs visible moving slowly but not lethargically, you would see that his spindly arms are like intertwined tree branches, and while thin, they do not give off the impression of frailty. You can see the strength as his hands run over the length of the projector.



His eyes flash and the lights in the theatre dim. A scuffle of footsteps brings my gaze to the seating below me... and standing there is the girl.



She regards me with a startling apathy, which when I think about it shouldn't have been surprising -- after all, she is dead. Her hands lay limp at her sides and her chin is raised to look me straight in the eye... as well as she could. Half of her skull was crushed and her left eye was somewhere beneath a flap of skin hanging bloody in front of her face. The blood pouring from where her brain once was, before it was on the terrazzo in front of the Fremont, coats half her body like she is a fur coat at a PETA rally.



And I am inexplicably drawn to her, just like the first time we met. Her eyes are still beautiful with the life sucked out of them. She exudes as much grace as a dead person ever could. I loved her, I love her, and I don't know why she is here.



Outside of my mind, I am screaming at her. What are you doing here? Why are you doing this to me? Leave me alone! Let me grieve! but I am moving toward her with my hands outstretched. I am putting my arms around her broken body. I am kissing her bloody mouth.



A light flickers on from the projector as our lips touch and the sound pops and large scratches pull down the screen like someone was trying to destroy the print -- for as many times as He watched me work, he never could keep the film off the ground. It plays black and then images come, memories. From the first time we met in the lobby of the theatre, to that night on the roof... the sound of her voice in Dolby Digital Surround sound. There is a sickening thud and then the sound slows, the image on the screen eats itself from the inside out, melting and burning into a bright white light, and my arms are empty now. She is gone, and her blood is on my hands.

When I was 13, I visited Europe. Since then, it haunts my dreams and pulses through my veins.

In Prague, I walked the same streets as so many influential authors. I ate ice cream from a shop in a house on Golden Lane and bought trinkets out of a suitcase from a man who probably lived there when Franz Kafka lived in house number 22. Wandering the streets, I heard a children's choir sing Czech folk songs from a festival being held in Old Town Square. My eyes wandered over a million tiny glass animals -- you see, in Prague, every other shop sells Bohemian glass. I bought a pair of fat polygonal cats for my grandmother. I stood atop the archway on the Charles Bridge, looking down on the Vltava river hugging the buildings and imagined that below the water's surface, in the bowels of those buildings could be rooms filled with secrets I could never fathom. My friend and I drank wine in a cafe across from the Jewish cemetery, the maple chairs upholstered with a fabric the color of the strong bitter red wine in our glasses. I marveled at the stained glass of St. Vitus Cathedral, and the chapel of St. Wenceslaus inside it. I giggled with friends in regards to the torture museum, favoring the amusement given by a pole that people were impaled through the rectum and out the mouth on.

We stayed in a hotel outside of Prague 1, the section of which I am unsure, and I will never know. My knowledge of the trip is limited to my memories, which when you are 13 is not much. The apartments near our hotel were many stories tall, and no more than big slabs of concrete. It was almost depressing, and somehow much more charming than the townhouses and luxury apartments that cover our country.

When I go back to the Czech Republic, I am taking a lot more pictures. And going to the Sedlec Ossuary in Kutna Hora, the chapel adorned in human skeletons.


I will post with more memories from Europe tomorrow.
I wish I could go back again.

"Stagnant" is one of those words where it makes you feel it's meaning. It's almost uncomfortable to say. Everyone who reads this, say it out loud right now. Stagnant. Say it again. Stagnant.

What an awful word. It is almost as lackluster and annoying to speak aloud as the situations it describes.

It is what I have been feeling lately.

I keep getting into this vicious circle of "Oh, I will be happy when ____ happens", or "I just have to wait for ______ to get life going." I am having a hard time actually getting myself to live.

I am writing music, and letting it sit on my computer, going to waste. I am creating story lines, and leaving them to rot in my head. I am painting pictures that never get to canvas. My creativity is nearly nonexistent. I feel like a lesser version of the person I thought I was.
I intend to finish one song before the month is through. Chris, you're the only one who reads this. So, hold me to that, okay?

Anyway, I'm hoping something will pry me from this weird mindset I'm in. Do they make a mental jaws of life? I need that.

There is really only one thing that I value above anything else, and that's a good day's work.
No really, I love working. There's something rewarding about finishing projects, moving up, helping people, just generally getting shit done.
Unfortunately, my current job gives little reward, no matter how hard I try.

I am not a natural salesperson. I lack the bubbly, flirtatious personality that sales requires. My dealings with people are overcourteous, and not in the least bit as sleazy as my corporate wants us to be. The place I work, selling shoes, wants us to pretty much harass our customers. Annoy them into a sale. Convince them to buy things they don't need. This isn't my first sales job, but it's the first where I've been asked to do things that I feel are immoral... I know they're not, but if you know me at all, my politeness outdoes my drive to succeed, by far. I want to help the customers, not trick them into spending all their money.

I am a firm believer in the Golden Rule. Treat others as you wish to be treated. But even the Golden Rule is selfish. So, let's get philosophical in this.

Immanuel Kant's Categorical Imperative was an answer to the metaphysical question What Is Moral?

And, here it is:

1st: "Act only according to that maxim whereby you can at the same time will that it should become a universal law."
2nd: "Act in such a way that you treat humanity, whether in your own person or in the person of any other, always at the same time as an end and never merely as a means to an end."
3rd: "Therefore, every rational being must so act as if he were through his maxim always a legislating member in the universal kingdom of ends."

If I'm going to compare this to sales, I should probably explain this for the layman.

The first formulation is saying that you should not do anything that it would be irrational for EVERYONE to do. Like suicide... it would be irrational to have everyone off themselves (although that can be debated, ha-ha.)
The second formulation is basically saying don't treat anyone as a means to an end. If you don't actually know what that means, the "end" is the goal, and the "means" is what you use to achieve that goal. So, it isn't okay to use someone... unless you also value them intrinsically, that is.
The third formulation is just a conclusion.

Those of you who are in sales are probably seeing the problem already.

Now, the first formulation doesn't really apply... well, I could make it apply, but I'm mostly concerned with the customer aspect of this. So I'm going to skip it.

Like I said, the second formulation tells us not to use people to benefit ourselves. But isn't that what retail sales are about?

We're using the customers to make money, and often trying to convince them to spend more than they had intended. We use them to better our position at our job. We use them to receive a shiny gold star on our charts, basically. The only reason customers are there are to present a challenge. The ultimate goal, to empty that wallet. Corporate companies sit below big fat white men in business suits whose biggest concern is colored green -- not the fleshy pinks and browns that the customers come in. Their focus is of course passed down to us, the lowly serfs, and with that comes the pressure.

Where, in any of this, are we treating the customer as an end? Are we acting morally in our extrinsic milking of the cash cows that roam our stores?

I try very hard to keep up my duties as a salesperson without acting immorally. My number one aim is to find the customer something that works for what they need. It's not hard to tell who just wants something frivolous and who is looking for the best value they can get. And maybe growing up without money for unnecessary things has ruined me, because I still shop with the idea that every dollar I save is another dollar I can eat with. Every customer who looks like they just need shoes without holes sparks my sympathy, and I wonder about the mothers that come in -- if they're struggling like mine was, to raise kids on one meager paycheck. How can I try to push more items or higher price tags on them? And I probably read people completely wrong, too. It could be that that mother has a rich husband who gave them his Visa Infinite card to get them out of his hair. Should I feel bad about pushing everything I possibly can on that person? I would still be treating them only as a means.

I am pretty terrible at what I do, simply for the reason that I can't rationalize doing this to people. And even in the self-centric ways of the Golden Rule... I know I hate it when I am pestered while I shop. But I guess that's my job.

Speaking of, I'd better get in the shower. I have a long day of swindling ahead of me.

I'm putting this here because Chris e-yelled at me for using myspace bulletins instead of this blog.
So without further ado, gettin' a little personal.

I'm afraid that every single word I say is just an echo of the pain that you put me through.
For every letter, it's me (not really) sleeping all the way on the edge of the bed.
For every word, it's you screaming about what a horrible person I am.
For every sentence, it's my body thrown to the bathroom floor.
For every paragraph, it's you still to this day reminding me that I am worthless.
I used to tell myself that there was good in you. And for every one time you were nice, I forgave several times that you were awful to me.
I never knew I could be so stupid. I stayed with you long after I fell out of love with you. I kept telling myself that you were the best I could ever get. That I deserved the way you ignored me... that I was always asking too much. It was too much to ask for you to wake up when you told me to wake you up... that's why you screamed at me. It was too much to want you to trust me... that's why you accused me of cheating on you every single day. It was too much to ask for you to stop doing things that upset me... that's why you "got frustrated" and pushed me, and blamed it on some pills.
I was sure that I had earned everything you did. Which is why I ignored it for so long.
It wasn't until 3 weeks ago that I finally stopped giving you more credit than you deserved. I excused the entire awful relationship just because we laughed together every now and then. Just because you told me you loved me.
My naiveté is appalling.
I need to stop the empathy train that I've been running on my whole life. I make excuses for everyone around me. I have a hard time believing that ANYONE could be a bad person. No matter how much disrespect they show me... I always try to rationalize it. They're just dealing with their own problems! It was just some bad medication! They just don't understand how their actions affect others! But no. I can't do this anymore.
I dated a bad person for over a year. He destroyed my self-confidence, completely obliterated my ability to trust, and is just a general douche. He says awful things about his friends behind their backs, and I'm fairly sure they all know it and still put up with him. He lies, a lot. And yet I still want to say that he's not at fault. I want to say he just doesn't get it, because he has the mind of a 7-year-old.
But that's it. I know I'm far from perfect. I know I overreact. I know that I get kind of neurotic. But it's time I realized that I did NOT warrant the way he treated me. What happened was NOT my fault. I can't keep blaming myself for someone else's lack of consideration.

As a post script just for this blog, I have a few more words to say. Advice, if you will.
If you're unhappy in your relationship, get out of it. Don't stick around because you love them. If you honestly have to convince yourself that it's all worth it, it's not.