Fear And Loathing in Candyland
Living alone ain't easy.
At least not for me. I'm one of those people who has to have someone around in order to keep from going completely and utterly bonkers. This I learned on my third night of trying to live alone, when after getting out of bed for the fifth time in three hours because of a "strange noise" (that turned out to be nothing more than my friendly neighborhood serial killer idly sawing away at my doorknob -- and there I was thinking it was, I dunno, a cat) I realized that maybe -- just maybe -- it would be a wise course of action for me to:
a) Stop watching movies like this one all the time.
b) Grow a pair.
Notwithstanding the fact that nature already saw fit to bestow me with a pair (a pair that, sad to say, is rather uncomfortably bigger in actual physical reality than in the metaphoric "Boy's got some kay-jones on 'im!" sense of the word), I still believe that I could do well with another one (here I am again speaking metaphorically). The other night, for example, as I was walking to my car after a visit to a friend's house (he lives in a downtown area where the streets are paved with piss and the bourgeouis can't pass by without snorting rhythmically at all the "townie rats and lowlives") a member of the International Lunatics' Coalition, dressed in the trademark black coat and hat, started following me drunkenly down the echoing streets, every so often stopping to rattle off loud glossolalic pontifications that bounced off the stone buildings with a slap like a beach ball hitting a puddle. I vaguely heard him say something about me speeding up my step, but just then I turned the corner and was able to frantically shuffle the rest of the way towards where my car was parked. I'm sure my pulse was somewhere in the vicinity of your average gabber hardcore tune, and the rest of my system was giving me basically the same signals I'm indeed faced with when I hear that type of music. They're called flight signals, and they're your body's way of telling you that it really doesn't want you to be where you are right now because it would really like to stand a chance at going on with this little thing called living if you don't terribly mind thank you very much.
The thing is, while flight signals are a perfectly sane and rational response for a human being faced with gabber hardcore, an old shouting drunk shouldn't be something that strikes mortal dread into the hearts of strapping young men. Nor, for that matter, should fast-moving shopping trolleys, screaming children with face paint or inch-long buzzing things with yellow and black stripes. But all the things I get scared and nervous about have been magnified and expanded in my mind since I moved out of my parents' house not so long ago. It's almost like now that the security blanket for my most basic needs (roof over head, food in belly) has disappeared (or at least been swept from under my feet and placed in the next building), all the things that only vaguely bothered me before now send me screaming in abject terror for the nearest water fountain.
Still, I wouldn't have it any other way. When you gotta deal you gotta deal, and I'm glad I'm dealing. Or at least trying to.
Just keep the hornets out of my way and we'll get along fine.
At least not for me. I'm one of those people who has to have someone around in order to keep from going completely and utterly bonkers. This I learned on my third night of trying to live alone, when after getting out of bed for the fifth time in three hours because of a "strange noise" (that turned out to be nothing more than my friendly neighborhood serial killer idly sawing away at my doorknob -- and there I was thinking it was, I dunno, a cat) I realized that maybe -- just maybe -- it would be a wise course of action for me to:
a) Stop watching movies like this one all the time.
b) Grow a pair.
Notwithstanding the fact that nature already saw fit to bestow me with a pair (a pair that, sad to say, is rather uncomfortably bigger in actual physical reality than in the metaphoric "Boy's got some kay-jones on 'im!" sense of the word), I still believe that I could do well with another one (here I am again speaking metaphorically). The other night, for example, as I was walking to my car after a visit to a friend's house (he lives in a downtown area where the streets are paved with piss and the bourgeouis can't pass by without snorting rhythmically at all the "townie rats and lowlives") a member of the International Lunatics' Coalition, dressed in the trademark black coat and hat, started following me drunkenly down the echoing streets, every so often stopping to rattle off loud glossolalic pontifications that bounced off the stone buildings with a slap like a beach ball hitting a puddle. I vaguely heard him say something about me speeding up my step, but just then I turned the corner and was able to frantically shuffle the rest of the way towards where my car was parked. I'm sure my pulse was somewhere in the vicinity of your average gabber hardcore tune, and the rest of my system was giving me basically the same signals I'm indeed faced with when I hear that type of music. They're called flight signals, and they're your body's way of telling you that it really doesn't want you to be where you are right now because it would really like to stand a chance at going on with this little thing called living if you don't terribly mind thank you very much.
The thing is, while flight signals are a perfectly sane and rational response for a human being faced with gabber hardcore, an old shouting drunk shouldn't be something that strikes mortal dread into the hearts of strapping young men. Nor, for that matter, should fast-moving shopping trolleys, screaming children with face paint or inch-long buzzing things with yellow and black stripes. But all the things I get scared and nervous about have been magnified and expanded in my mind since I moved out of my parents' house not so long ago. It's almost like now that the security blanket for my most basic needs (roof over head, food in belly) has disappeared (or at least been swept from under my feet and placed in the next building), all the things that only vaguely bothered me before now send me screaming in abject terror for the nearest water fountain.
Still, I wouldn't have it any other way. When you gotta deal you gotta deal, and I'm glad I'm dealing. Or at least trying to.
Just keep the hornets out of my way and we'll get along fine.
posted by fnoonf at 00:01
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