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2016 has been a bit of a shit show in my opinion, not just for me but for humanity in general.  I mean hell, Donald Trump could be president and we lost Prince.  Regardless of all the crazy, there is (and I say this sparingly) a bright side.  One of my (facebook) friends died and you know what?  It hurts.  It hurts pretty damn bad (before you jump to the most fucked up conclusion, please keep reading).

I didn’t know how much I cared about her as a person until I found out she was gone. We weren’t bosom buddies and I can count all the messenger exchanges we’ve had on one hand, but I cried pretty bad when I thought about her girlfriend having to raise their two kids alone or not reading another of her posts and laughing, or being able to comment.  I’ll never see her drawings or paintings again, and it stinks.  For about 6 years now I felt like I was going numb. My dad died, I got over it pretty damn quick, my mom, probably quicker. The person I thought cared the most ducked out on me, no surprise.  Even the unexpected kindness that’s been shown to me recently was taken with a grain of salt, outside of a few genuine moments it just feels like I’ve been going through the motions…but when I heard my friend had taken her own life froze up a bit, I teared up later on.  I actually felt something I couldn’t verbalize, something deep and ugly honest.  I hate that she’s gone. The only good coming out this is that I know I can still feel something.  It’s weird to talk about.  One of those rare instances where I can’t find the right words.

FOR KIM AND LINDSAY

All tears run the same.

Ten feet away or oceans

Apart, I cry too

--Ryan

I just want to live: A late night rant

I don't believe in in first impressions.  Not in the since of making the first encounter lasting or memorable or positive, but in the since of just walking into the room like someone squeeze lemon juice down my butt crack.  I've never been the type schmooze.  I hang out with my wang out and to hell with anyone that doesn't care for it.  There's seven billion people in the world.  I'm not the only one they can talk to.

I've had one or two friends that look at me a tad peculiar due to my taste in music, women, and use of language, both poetic and profane.  For the most part they've learned to deal with it.  But I doubt they truly understand it, or that they want to.  Well this is their lucky day (and yours)...

10 years I've lived in this pit called the bible belt, and the one constant I've had to deal with (besides incurably religious friends and family) is death.  In the past decade I've been to an average of one funeral a year.  Among the first were my grandmother and the youngest of my older sisters, the one I grew up with.  Over the next few years it was uncles and cousins and finished out with my mom and my dad.  When you have to stomach THAT MUCH loss, when you're knocked back that many times, you can either wolf down your meds, ball up in a corner and die (a thought that still crosses my mind at least once a day) OR you can get up and live.  Pull yourself out of bet, and find another reason to ride this bitch until the wheels fall off.  And that's pretty much what I've doing the past several months.  No time stamp, no apologies, no fucks given.  Fuck what friends have to say about it, fuck what family has to say about it, fuck the bros, fuck the girlfriend.  And that cunt of a waitress on the other side of the room who can't keep her nose out of the conversation, along with the simp nigga next to you that co-signs on her bullshit and laughs in your face on YOUR FUCKING BIRTHDAY, fuck them too.

It's really that simple.  Not the most cogent thing I've had to say, but it's honest.  I feel like that's all I can give lately.

I'm so full of hate it's not even funny

I hope they never stop protesting in Ferguson...I hope the violence escalates.  I hope the body count rises and all this hate and murder bleeds into every surrounding state including this one.  I hope every single southern state wipes itself off the map and when I hightail it to the north west I'll look in my rear view and laugh like a maniac...Any part of the world OOZING with this much STUPID deserves to be destroyed completely.

Depressed? Maybe...A little...I don't know.

8/11/14

A comedian died tonight.  Just found out Robin Williams is dead.  63 years old.  My dad was a year older.  Both died within a week after my birthday.  There is no correlation between the two, I just wanted to point out that lately my birthday isn’t that great an event…who am I kidding, it never really was.  When I was a child I at least got a cake and a VERBAL happy birthday.  Can’t even say I got a card this year.  But I digress.

Williams’ death was reported as a suicide, as he had been grappling with depression.  Anyone that manic and funny in his performances, anyone who gives that much of themselves to their craft has to be fighting more than a few demons.  I’ve had the same suspicions about my mom.  Years and years and years spent trying to be happy, trying to make herself happy.  Hard to do when you have a boorish husband and spoiled, nerdy, self-absorbed son.  She’s been piling up losses for a while now, but that’s another story. 

I am now 32 years old, the exact same age as Bruce Lee when he died.  I thought to myself, ‘what a good age,’ still in your physical prime; handsome, strong, still able to something, anything, everything.  Robin Williams, twice my age, accomplished everything he set out for (and a lot of things he didn’t), and then some.  Bruce Lee, arguably the greatest pure fighter of his time, and one of the most revered martial artists of ALL time, at 32.  One died unexpectedly, his best years and work still ahead of him, the other a seasoned showman, possibly weary of life, weary of the world around him and didn’t see anything more he could do.  

Bet you can figure out where this one is going.  No?  I’ll spell it out for you.  Yesterday (August 10^th) was my birthday.  I wound up getting a fuck-ton of face book posts wishing me happy birthday. I thought it was convenient more than anything.  For the well-wishers I mean.  If not for the reminder on their timelines I doubt ANYONE would remember another human being’s birthday anymore (just how I feel).  I received a few unexpected and cheery phone calls.  Hearing from them did make me smile a bit.   Regardless of this, all that ran through my head was that I was 32, still not enough done, not enough to say that I am be wholly self sufficient. Not enough to say ‘this shit fucking matters in the long run’.  Life will always be a zero sum game, one that even at my relatively young age I am growing weary of participating in.  Another year…of what?  Worrying where my next meal is coming from? Worrying if my work is good enough to build a solid career?  Worrying if I’m going to have to break down and get some shitty nine-to-fiver, or worse actually LIKE IT like everybody else around me seems to do...

I was seriously contemplating taking ALL of my blood pressure medication along with my dinner yesterday, and wound up deciding against it.  Then I hear about Robin Williams…Along with that come thoughts of my dad on his deathbed, my mom in the hospital, this kid I knew in the 7^th grade that drowned and how my neighbor came to me and delivered the news in tears, Kurt Cobain Chris Benoit, and Yukio Mishima’s beautifully written short story Patriotism.  All you accomplish, all you give…All I can think is ‘I couldn’t go through with it, but someone did.’  They ran their race then decided not to run anymore, they’re decision and no one else’s, the conscious decision to no longer exist.  I spend days, DAYS on end wondering if it could ever get that bad for me.  Could I ever make that choice? It scares me.  

-Ryan Scales, 2014