A Crack is But a Crack, The Darkness is But a Cloak…(2nd Draft)

She ran her hands along her wall.

It was “her” wall, it was “her” place.

It was the first place she could call her very own. She had worked hard to get here, to reach this point in her life, and she was proud of herself.

The same could not be said of others around her. She was “proud of herself” but others questioned her. Her father nagged her that it was too soon and told her to stay at home. Some of her friends pestered her that she had become too responsible and didn’t come out and party with them anymore.

She heard these things and wondered why they couldn’t see what she saw: that she was an adult now. It was time to put away the childish things and spread her wings. It wasn’t that she didn’t want to see her parents or have them in her life, but she had to leave home one day. It wasn’t like she couldn’t still have fun, but she had to make provisions for herself, do what needed to be done before she did what she wanted to do.

She turned her mind away from these frustrations, and began to decorate her new bedroom. As she placed a picture upon the wall, she ran her hand across the bare wall…and found a crack.

There was a crack in her wall.

It wasn’t a large crack, but she could feel it as she ran her fingers along the wall.

She found herself, almost by compulsion, running her fingers along the whole length of the crack. It felt deep. She could imagine the crack as like a chasm, a canyon formed by some river of time that had bourn down upon the wall, digging, entrenching itself within it. She could feel that same weight in her mind, baring down upon her, digging, entrenching itself within her.

It was doubt.

Had she worked hard enough? Was she ready? Perhaps her father was right? Maybe she should indulge her friends? Had she made herself ready enough for whatever lay ahead? These doubts sprung up like weeds in her new garden, this apartment.

Running her hand along the wall more, “her” perfect wall, in her new apartment, she could feel the doubts taking root, and blossoming into anxiety. It blossomed now from the valley, that canyon, in the bottom of that crack.

She could feel herself tensing, her anxiety growing. Compulsively now she ran her fingers along the crack in her wall. She ran her fingers as one does upon a scare to draw out faint remembrance. But that scare in her perfect wall was not something of remembering. It was but the seeds of doubts, of anxiety, and panic. It felt like a cloud, a darkness casting itself upon her new endeavor, her new future, her new happiness. Now, all her world felt as if it were collapsing in on this place and time…past and future…collapsing in upon the crack that in her once perfect wall. It was a breech in her life, a break with what once was and an expression of all the fears of imperfection that might cloud and blind her future.

Her apartment now felt small, closed off…and empty.

She could see now, as if for the first time, how bare the walls around her were. She could see how dirty the floors were. She could see how little of all of this, all around her, was truly her’s. Would it ever be her’s ever?

It was empty.

There was no family here, no friends either. It wasn’t even really her apartment, it was just an apartment that she rented. She let her fingers run along the crack again and swore it felt bigger than before. Soon, it felt as if the crack would grow. She felt as if it, like a cancer, would grow and swallow up her joy, all her future joys, in darkness.

She was alone, in the dark.

She was alone, in her own mind.

She was cast out adrift upon the sea of life, and the sun, the light of hope, had been swallowed within the darkness of that crack that scared her once perfect wall.

This sudden darkness upon her future, this doubt, persisted. She made herself think that this would pass. She removed her fingers from the crack and placed them upon her lips. “Don’t panic,” she told herself. It was only a crack in the wall, nothing more, just a crack. And this darkness she felt upon her was merely an eclipse of the sun, temporary, and it too would pass.

It was upon that last thought that she remembered a story she had heard of Pericles of Athens when she was younger. She remembered that the story was one her father had shared with her, by way of Plutarch, when she had professed of being afraid to sleep in the dark.

She remembered that Pericles, having put out to sea on a ship with some men, was confronted by darkness as the sun was eclipsed. The men with Pericles became frightened by this event and began to panic. The steersman at the helm particularly, standing next to Pericles, appeared on the verge of abandoning his post and fleeing below deck in fear and panic. Taking control, Pericles removed his cloak and placed it in front of the steersman’s gaze so that it was all he could see. He then asked the panic-stricken man if he could see or imagine any harm or hurt in the darkness of the cloak before him. The man replied “No.” Pericles then asked, “Why and what does that eclipse differ from this cloak? Is the darkness created beyond any more so than that created by the cloak?” To this the steersman understood that darkness was but the same.

Remembering this story calmed her mind and gave comfort to her own panic sea.

She was not alone, in the dark.

She was not alone, in her own mind.

She was not cast out adrift upon the sea of life, but sailing still with mastery and the sun, her light of hope, was only temporarily out of view. For she knew that it was set or go behind a cloud, her joy and happiness, but it would return, it would rise again. She remembered now that this was “her” wall, her apartment, her new beginning…and the crack in the wall, was simply but a crack.

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Whatever happened to the superheroes that slipped into the white gutters between panels?

Whatever happened to Jason Walker?

He once had two lives…

He a superhero, a kid’s hero, trapped on 2D lined notebook pages, carved out in graphite. But really he was someone else all along. He was just a normal guy who grew up, met a girl, got married, and thought that was what his life would be.

And then it happened one day, somewhere between the panels of his life, he didn’t make it to the next panel – he fell through. He didn’t know he’d fallen through.

He didn’t know he’d fallen through, not at first. Perhaps he was just in one of those in-between moments that happen to everyone. His marriage had fallen apart, because he had made a selfish choice. Jason didn’t make selfish choices. His life was not that important in his opinion. Jason only cared about helping others, making others happy, because that’s what superheroes were supposed to do, right?

The problem was that Jason Walker was never really a superhero.

Jason walker was just a man who had lost his way, and didn’t know it yet.

A Beautiful Deconstruction (2nd draft)

This was a story I wrote about 7 years ago and recently revisited. I decided it was about time to revise it and post it, again. Enjoy.

A BEAUTIFUL DECONSTRUCTION

by Jonathan Evans

 

            Someone told me once – I cannot remember who – that all love is unrequited.

            I have always wondered if that was true. 

Part of me never wanted to believe it was “true.” Part of me wanted to believe that love meant something and that somewhere, someone, would see it and return it. However, as I grew up, my idealism for this perception of love faded and I came to accept the facts about love:

All love goes unnoticed and unwanted.

I truly believed this too, until the day I met Jenny.

            Jenny Thurman was a girl, no, she was a woman and to me she was gorgeous. She was not your standout-type of beauty, but to me she was everything I had ever wanted. We first met one day while waiting for a class, an art class, I think.

You see we were both students at State College.

She was a marine biology major and I was a psychology major. How we both came to be taking an art class, who knows? I guess it looked fun.

            To cut to the chase, you could say we hit it off as “friends” instantaneously, as if we had known each other for years. You might think that weird, but that was the truth. It was kind of, as if you had caught up on a lifetime of memories in just a few short weeks. Again, realistically this seems absurd, but it happens and whatever the bends in the space-time-continuum that were made, oh well. All of this made me believe that such things as kindred spirits and soul mates; stuff I had never given much thought to before this. As for Jenny and I, those first few weeks was just like several lifetimes…I wished it could have never ended…

            However, like all things, good things too run out and you have to change sides of the tape.

About one month after we met, things changed…in a big way. The main change came in how I felt for Jenny. For the last week of the “good times,” I had begun to struggle with what, for me, were strange emotions that I felt for Jenny. This was more than the kind you have for a friend…this was more, I could feel it. 

How much more you might ask?

Time would tell, and I will tell of it. 

Trying not to psychoanalyze and freak myself out, I attempted to bury those feelings in a deep dark place of my mind. I tried to forget about them. Yet, sometimes you can never bury things deep enough.

One night Jenny came over to my apartment to watch movies and to hang out. Before long, Jenny (who was tired from work) fell asleep on me – literally, on me. It was not a bad thing, I did not mind one bit personally, why would I? Not wanting to wake her, I rested her head on my lap and let her use me as a pillow. Unfortunately, the side effect of this was that I was now stuck…

Go ahead and laugh.

Yes, that’s right. Those feelings I was having…yes.

Listen to the sound of my emotions as they slam into a brick wall.

This was me, on the inside. On the outside, I simply sat there and watched TV while she slept. Every once and a while, when Jenny would stir, I would look down at her sleeping face and watch her for a time. It was during these moments, these little bits of in-betweens, while Jenny slept there peacefully that my “feelings” flooded back on me, like a tidal wave. Right then, at one of those moments, one of those “in-betweens,” as the waves of my emotions poured over me, as my emotions slammed into the brick wall, I realized what I felt for her.

I was in love with Jenny.

            Now, let me digress. At this juncture, a normal person, one with some experience, would simply tell the girl/woman how they felt and ask her if she felt it in return. Then you just let the dice role and see what happens.

What did I do?

With all my vast storehouse of relationship experience…that was empty.

Nothing.

I did absolutely NOTHING.

“What the hell?” some people might ask when you hear that. 

Well, let me try to explain my logic. Let me explain the little I can, because some of this was just completely born from naivety. There was one big problem.

Jenny had a boyfriend.

He was in the military and was not around a lot but that is not the point, she still had a boyfriend. However, despite this, as she lay there sleeping peacefully in my lap, I felt closer to her than I ever thought I could be to any other person. With these thoughts on my mind, these emotions sloshing around inside my heart, I somehow managed to fall to sleep that night.

            The next morning Jenny apologized for “inconveniencing” me the night before. I told her it was alright and not to worry about it. After a few awkward moments, in which I more than likely should have realized was an opportunity to speak up and say something, Jenny left to go back to her own place and get cleaned up (her boyfriend was coming in that night to see her).

Right after she left me I felt a “ping” of jealously surge through me for Jenny. I tried to let it go, to distract myself the rest of the day in hopes of getting all of this out of my heart and off my mind. I did not work at all. Later on that night, while Jenny was probably out somewhere having a great time, I got drunk instead and passed out on my sofa around 11 PM.

            Over the following couple of weeks, Jenny and I continued to hang out regularly and remained close. I continued to hide my emotions and feelings for her while trying to remain a good friend to her at the same time. I tried hard to keep things from being awkward or weird, though I think there were times she might have caught on (though she never openly showed it). There were times I think she truly saw past my façade but she never confronted me on it, so it all just continued at a “status quo.”

            Some of my other friends were not so casual about dismissing the changes in me that they saw. They saw through my façade, they saw my increased drinking, and they saw my mood changes when Jenny would leave.

I think they could see my pain.

Even my teacher’s started noticing changes in me; a couple pulled me aside and talked to me about my slipping grades, always asking “Was I okay?” 

Of course, I always played it off and gave them some excuse.

I knew how to answer the question.

When someone asked me, “Was I okay?”, my answer was “Yeah, I’m okay.”

I lied, a lot with that one.

However, soon those who cared about me most began to increasingly question me about my drinking and tried to stop me from spiraling out, but they could not stop it.

Only I could, and I no longer cared.

            There was one area of my life during this time that I actually became more productive in, poetry. It was my outlet for all the emotional pains and turmoil I was putting myself through. My poems were the only doorway through which my tattered emotions found form or took any rational shape. They were the bearers of my secret love; they were a glimpse of into my hearts aching and desperation.

            Almost poetic, those last lines, right?

            Yeah, pure torture when the audience you want will never read them.

            After about three and a half weeks of this “spiraling out,” Jenny brought the issue out into the open. Though it was as indirect as you can get, she simply asked me directly, “Was I okay?” 

Ah, that familiar question I was getting used to at this point – lying about my answer at least. 

Of course, I gave her the standard answer, the lie: “Yeah, I’m okay…just tired.”

I was lying of course, again. 

For a moment, I saw in her eyes that she did not believe me, but she quickly changed the subject and moved on. She confided in me some problems her boyfriend and her were having…Agh! Somebody could have bludgeoned me right then. I simply listened and played the “good friend” for her instead. Here’s where it gets even worse: next, I attempted to help her find a way to resolve the problem and give her some advice to help. The only way to describe how I felt afterward was to say it felt like I was stabbing myself in the heart… poetic?

            All of this continued on and on, like a sick cycle of torture for myself. One minute I would be with Jenny and be okay or happy, then she would leave and I slumped into a miserable depression.

It was like a roller-coaster, when you’re sick and you want to puke your guts out.

The only consistent thing in my life, at this time, was my ever-increasing crutch of alcohol. Friends soon began to get worried and they would pull me aside more and more to try to get me to quit all of this (the drinking, the misery, the depression…the whole bit).

As if I really had control over it…or did I?

I no longer knew.

I could not tell anymore. 

I would listen to them and then never follow through. I was getting good at that too. I was in love…at least I think I was, and my life was falling apart all around me for it. It was a beautiful deconstruction. It was my little mini-meltdown that I wished did not belong to me. I am quite sure it could have passed for modern art though.

            You might look at this little cycle of mine and think it could go on and on forever, as long as I let it, or until someone interfered (Jenny, my friends, anybody). Then again, I was human, how much longer could it go on until I just fell to pieces.

Well, someone did end it, but it was not someone I expected, it was Jenny’s boyfriend.

I think he had been suspicious of me, maybe jealous even of how much time we spent together, for a good while. I think he disapproved of how close we were and the time we spent hanging out. So, he did something about it finally…he called me. It was one of those awkward phone calls between two people who really do not know one another, or even like one another. The call was filled with the two us dancing around the subject. There was a lot of innuendo and hints, but I got the message loud and clear…

”You Need to Stay Away from Jenny!”

            I got the message and the next day I made plans to start distancing myself from Jenny. I did not want any trouble for either of us and I thought this would be easier, if only for me. However, Jenny was of another mind on this altogether. She was an obstacle I did not count on and every move I made to back away, she just moved closer. I quickly realized that her boyfriend had acted independently, so I did nothing to stop her and the cycle simply continued, but it had changed. The change was Jenny’s boyfriend. He would increasingly and periodically show up and “interfere,” making me uneasy and sometimes even jealous.

            Jenny and I both had a passion for 80’s music. There is one song that really began to spell out my current situation to me.

Can you guess which one?

Well, it’s not to difficult – “Jessie’s Girl” by Rick Springfield.

The song fit me so well that I really started to hate hearing it. It was like having someone spell out my self-destruction for me…in a song.

            Self-destruction, now that was the name of my game now in truth. My frustration became ever more physical and manifested itself in me physically punching walls and total loss of temper over little things. Friends began to become so worried for me that they told my parents of my behavior to see if there was anything they could do. That really pissed off, but in hindsight I understood that they did because they cared about me, at the time though, I resented it and isolated myself even more.

            The summation of my life was truly a self-made, self-destruction: I was failing classes, drinking heavily, becoming increasingly self-abusive, depressed, and was in love with a girl whom I had no idea whether she felt anything in return.

In general: I was fucked up. 

I still did not know how Jenny felt, but I knew I could never tell her.

I had no right… I did not even know if I even wanted to. I simply wanted her to be happy, even if it meant without me, even if it meant my pain. I wanted to run away and hide from her in the hopes that it would end, but how can one run away from what makes them happy? It was the worse kind of pain, one that ate at me slowly…slowly, breaking me apart, brick by brick.

            Then one night, it all changed again.

One night…one night, that is all it took to bring it all down. After months of hurt and slow, monotonous pain, it found an ending.

At around 7 PM, just as I was pouring the first shot of the evening, I got a call from Jenny. She was upset and crying to the point of being practically incoherent. Springing into my usual “good friend” mode, I was well rehearsed by now, I told her to stay where she was (at her apartment) and that I was coming over.

            As I pulled up to her apartment, I saw a strange car in front of her place. My first guess was that it was her boyfriend’s.

I braced myself for a shit storm, got out of my car, and walked to her door.

Jenny answered, her eyes swollen and red from crying, her face was flush. It looked to me as if someone had slapped her across her face, my heartbeat jumped, anticipating a confrontation.

I asked her if someone had slapped her and she shied away from the question.

She didn’t have to say it; I knew the answer was “yes.”

I also knew who did it, her boyfriend.

As I examined Jenny, making sure she was okay, her boyfriend came through the door to her bedroom behind her. He yelled at me to get away from her, he reached over and pushed me away from Jenny. Then he turned to Jenny and accused her openly of cheating on him with me. He said he knew she liked me and that while he was away she spent time with me for that very reason.

As he shouted at her, he jerked her arm, throwing her around like a doll. I yelled back at him, told him to stop hurting her, he just ignored me. When I tried to grab him, to make him stop, he turned quickly and hit me. The force knocked me back to the floor.

            Sitting there, I looked up at Jenny. I could see she wanted to help me, but she was afraid and her boyfriend was in the way.

She managed to blurt out “Don’t hurt him!”

Her boyfriend then turned and raised his hand to hit her.

As he did, I leaped from my place on the floor and grabbed his arm. Then, with my free hand, I clocked him…knocking him across the room and into the arm of the sofa.

            As he lay there in shock, Jenny looked at me in confusion and shock at what at just happened.

It was then that I finally just spilled it all out, let it all go, and told Jenny everything.

What great timing I have.

Then again, I did not have anything left to lose at this point.

I looked at Jenny and said the words that had been in my heart and on my mind for months now: “I love you.”

I went on to say how long I had wanted to be with her, to say those words to her. I told her why I had not said something sooner and that I really wanted her just to be happy. I told her every detail, explained it all the best I could while tears began to come from my eyes.

When I was done, hearing no response from her in return, only blank looks of shock on Jenny’s face, as well as her boyfriend’s, I said my peace. I told her that if he (her boyfriend) made her happy, then she should be with him. I told him that she never cheated on him. I had never been with her, no matter how bad I wanted to.  I told him that since I was a problem, I would make it easy on him and leave, they would never hear from me again.

            At that, I left Jenny’s apartment and walked out of Jenny’s life.

Walking away I began to feel sick, like I was dying and I began to cry harder. I took my sweet time getting back to my apartment; I took as many detours as I could find.

When I did arrive back at my place, I got out of my car and slowly I walked toward my apartment.

When I got there though, I was shocked to find Jenny was waiting for me.

She was sitting there in front of my door, tears still on her cheeks, waiting for me to return. Without saying a word, Jenny got up and walked over to me. Putting her arms around me, she embraced me.

We stood there for a while, just like that, in each other’s arms without saying a word. I finally broke the silence; I asked Jenny why she was here? Her answer was as short as it was surprising:

She was here because she was in love with me too. Then she kissed me and time felt as if it simply stood still.

            After a while, we both decided to go inside and sat down on my couch where Jenny told me more. She told me how she had known for a while, how I felt, she had read my poems and been paying attention to me more than I had realized. Before I could ask why she had not said something, she told me she had been confused and hoped maybe it would just go away. She said that had been wrong of her and recently she had discovered that the reason she was confused was that she loved me back. She too had hidden it from me. We both apparently had been mishandling this whole thing, but that was now over. Tonight she had realized her feelings and mine deserved better than silence. We both hugged each other and kissed. Sitting there in each other’s arms, we talked for hours until we fell asleep…right there in each other’s arms.

 

Epilogue:

 

My beautiful deconstruction had stripped me down until I was nothing, but only then could I build myself back up again; build myself back better than before. Only then was I able to find what love really was and find happiness without false pretenses. I now know that not all love is unrequited, sometimes it finds you and shows you that it did notice.

    

The Rhetoricians – The Golden Age – Eloquent Four

What is Rhetoricians were superheroes?

I think, as a student of Rhetoric, I have a right to ask that question and to ponder, what if? Questions are my business.

Let’s envision the Golden Age:

Think of a Avengers/Fantastic Four core for this group. Who would they be?

Easy —

Aristotle – the logical scientist, calculated and calm. I can imagine an Iron Man/Batman motif for him

Cicero – the eloquent orator and statesman. I see here a bit of a Captain America/Superman. Someone of high principles and beliefs but capable of getting in the midst of it

Socrates – the questioning teacher. Here we have the Henry Pym/Bruce Banner/Dr. Jekyll or the group. He is so intertwined with Plato that its hard to imagine one without the other.

Plato – the arch defender. The Hulk/Mr. Hyde to Socrates’ Banner/Dr. Jekyll. He is strong and overbearing, ready to tear apart those who stand in his way.

Standing in Queue…Draft 1

Standing in Queue

By Jonathan Evans

 

We were first.

We were first in line.

It was 7 AM, a Saturday morning in the middle of March, and we sat, first in line, on the concrete floor.

Waiting in line is important, sometimes. It’s more important than many realize. It’s even more important when one knows where the line begins, and where it ends – it’s a linear thing after all.

The sign next to us read, “Queue line starts here.” The phrasing was a tad confusing, because, where is “here” exactly. It had been the same way the day before, when we had waited in line, and it had been confusing then too. It was something about the phrasing of the sign that was causing all the confusion. Did it mean that where the sign was represented the “beginning of the line” or “where you entered the line?” I mean, maybe we were over-thinking it a bit, then again, we did care about getting it right…with lines beginnings being important to us as linear creatures and all.

There were four of us: a fanatic, a collector, a novice, and myself, an academic. Sounds like the beginning of a bad joke, I know, but the titles fit with us in concern to those who are “collectors” of “Captives of the Cosmic Ray, The Big Freeze, Land of the Golden Giants” aka Comic Books. Yes, we were waiting on a comic book convention.

We had a game plan, you see. Then again, though, we needed one too, if only to throw it out in coming mad pitter-patter rush that was coming when the convention doors opened. The Novice had the easiest job of fall – stand in lines. He was our universal placeholder in the forth-coming lines that awaited us inside the convention hall. The Fanatic and Collector made sure to give him a hard time for his lack of “place-holding” the previous day, when he had vanished. He claimed to have gotten lost. The simple reality was he wandered off and did his own thing.

When the chiding was done, the Novice found a way to try to lighten the mood by translating the Fanatic’s comments about the lack of an early crowd on this particular Saturday morning into a rendition of the lyrics of Billy Joel’s “Piano Man.” This was kind of his thing and not unusual. It was so “usual” that we told him to stop it, and he did.

Around 7:20 AM, the Collector made a mocking/joking comment that the Fanatic was now on Facebook. The Fanatic said, “I better not be, I have a low-profile to keep.” The Collector appeased the Fanatic’s worried face by assuring him that the reason he was on his iPhone at that moment was to upload a picture to his profile, not creating a page for the Fanatic. The Fanatic decided to go ahead anyway and remind us all that since he was in the military, and an officer, that he would never have a Facebook page because of the fact that he did not want to deal with the hassle of the website and its interference on his career.

“This is boring,” the Novice blurted out a few minutes later as he sat upon the concrete floor, waiting in the queue.

“Well, next time I won’t buy you a ticket to come,” replied the Collector with sarcasm in his voice.

The Fanatic had gone to the bathroom, leaving the three of us sitting in the queue line, it was 7:25 AM. I sat there, writing and reading. The Novice played with Magic cards, while the Collector played on his iPhone…all of us in the queue line still. While I read, the Novice and Collector started talking about the girl from the day before, one of the one’s handing out promotional stuff for a booth in the convention. They were talking about how cute her leggings, and legs were. We all talked about the cute girls, the costumes, pictures we had taken, and other random stuff from the previous day…as we continued to wait, it was 7:30 AM.

7:45 AM…still talking about the random and previous of the past day

7:50 AM…time continued to tick by, slowly, and we, all of us, continued to sit on the concrete in the queue line. While we waited, the Novice, in his boredom, made a little box out of paper. He showed it to me and tossed it to me. I commented saying, “Cool, now go fill it with all your hopes and dreams” as I tossed it back to him. The Novice joked as if he was going to crush it in his hands then and we all got a good laugh.

After the laugh, the Novice ended up leaving the paper box on the ground by us and see what happened to it, there, on the concrete floor. While we continued to wait, the Novice segwayed into a story about when he was young he wanted to learn origami. His mother had bought a kit for making origami, but sent it another of his brothers by mistake. He told us that, “These kind of things happened more than once” in his family. I told him, that “that was a sad story” and lay back down on the concrete floor to wait some more.

As I lay back down, I managed to drop my iPhone that was in my lap and it fell against the floor. No worries, it had a protective case, an Otter box case, so, no big deal. However, that started up a completely new conversation thread among us concerning expensive phones. The Collector commented that if you broke your “$400 phone” no one was going to replace it and even an Otter box case should not be an excuse to try to tempt it. The argument and discussion boiled down to the point that: just because it has a protective case, does not mean one should try to test the limits of that protection, as the Novice jokingly suggested.

8:00 AM…the Collector says he is disappointed with all of us after whistling the tune of “pop goes the weasel” and none of us getting his reference when he messed up the inflection in the whistling. He explained that it was a reference to Data from Star Trek: The Next Generation on the holo-deck in the pilot episode. He chided us for not getting the reference and we just stared at him. God, we were bored. The Novice then asks us if we want to hear another “sad” story at that point.

Right about then, a guy passed by us with a cart and barely missed running over the Novice’s paper box lying on the concrete floor. We all stopped and took notice as if it was magic trick…we were REALLY bored.

“You need to get a job,” the Collector inserted as comment into our boredom, directing it at the Novice. “That’s what you are doing come Monday.”

“No. I’m tired, I’m going to sleep on Monday,” the Novice replied.

“You will…” the Collector continued.

This lead to a long discussion about the Novice, who had just moved up here to live with the Collector needed to get to work on finding a job. The Fanatic interrupted this discussion with an interjection about the issues and comics he needed to be signed today, which sparked a random question from the Novice:

“What makes a comic book rare?”

This started a completely new conversation and discussion thread that ran from there. It eventually ended with a pointed criticism of both Marvel and DC comics, their prices, and the use of summary/synopsis pages…still; it was not yet 8:15 AM.

8:15 AM…while the Fanatic and Collector hold a brief discussion about the movie Batman and Robin and the Novice jokingly side comments with the chime of “Red Robin…Yum!” No one notices or laughs, but me.

8:30 AM…bathroom run and discussions about learning to live a healthier lifestyle among the group. This consisted mainly of me leaving to use the bathroom and the Fanatic lecturing the Novice about getting into shape. Around 8:45 AM, people move out of the line to go line up for the Q&A session with the actor playing Thor in the upcoming Marvel movie. While people shuffle past, someone kicks the Novice’s paper box of dreams, oops.

By now the Novice has broken out his harmonica and starts playing tunes. He plays “old Suzanna,” “baby bumblebee,” and the theme from Super Mario Bros. The things we do to entertain ourselves. A guy walks by to dump a bag in the trashcan next to us and says; “I thought I was having a stroke when I heard that harmonica.” We all laugh.

It’s 8:55 AM.

Time is moving slowly, if you haven’t noticed yet.

We move on to discussions of fire safety, theatres, and prostitution. If you can figure out how all those are interrelated, awesome, you have entered into our stream of consciousness. Moving on, we circle back to issues of fire safety and terrorist alert protocols of major corporations. The Collector describes to us the absurd nature of these policies at the major corporation he works for in Chicago. The overall summary is: retarded.

9:20 AM.

As a pregnant woman walks by, the Novice comments, “That’s the last time that kid will ever see a vagina.” Wow! We all laughed hard at that, poor kid, born to be a nerd. Right about then, I accidently take a step back and crush the Novice’s hopes and dreams…his paper box, it’s 9:22 AM. This incident somehow segways us into a raunchy discussion of sex, exercise through sex, and the fact that there was 14 year old boy standing nearby us…oops. The summary of it, in comic book nerd terms: Reed Richards is an ideal sex toy (really random).

9:45 AM…chatting with Spiderman

10:00 AM. FINALLY!

Doors open, escorted in by Spiderman and Mary Jane, and now, now it begins…no more Queue line.

 

Scholastic grudge

I find it rather annoying, personally, in a purely “I’m an academic nerd way,” that Medieval scholars and writers constantly reference Cicero by his very little known middle name, Tullius. I mean, I know it’s him but it’s strange and elitist to me to here him called that constantly. His name is Marcus Tullius Cicero, just call him Cicero you scholastic snobs…that’s you Aquinas, I’m talking to you.

Random thoughts, ideas, and statements of the past 4 days…

‎”went to a concert in Texarkana and was shocked when I realized I was the only black person there. Then I realized, I’m not black. That’s when I got scared.”

 

‎”his ringtone sung ‘I want to do bad things to you’ and a hot blond walking into the library checked him out and smiled”

 

“you know your cats are really neurotic…we don’t need neurotic cats. You need to get them high on cat nip and throw them in with a bunch of children…that should do it.”

 

I would like to feed you some 1950’s garbage:
“On the basis of wide experience and many years’ research, Dr. Wertham flatly states that comic books:
Are an invitation to illiteracy
Create an atmosphere of cruelty and deceit
Stimulate unwholesome fantasies
Suggest criminal or sexually abnormal ideas
Create a readiness for temptation
These are only some of the points raised – and documented”
– Dr. Fredric Wertham, Seduction of the Innocent

 

“I do not fear the Ides of March, for the following reasons: 2055 years later, I’m not in Rome, I have not been recently made dictator for life, I am not engaged in massive reform program, and my name has not become synonymous with autocratic power…. Hey, you know what really bothers me? Why don’t I have these things?”

 

Rachel to her boyfriend Casey on why they will never have cute children: “I have too many Jew genes, and you have too many ‘you’ genes”

 

I thinks this is odd and rather disturbing…after looking at NFL.com and seeing an ad about Kim Kardashian possibly dating Vikings running back Adrian Peterson and all I can think of is this: Since when did Kim Kardashian become an NFL pass-around dating doll (nice word for slut)?

 

Caesar: “The ides of March are come.”
Soothsayer:” Aye, Caesar, but not gone.” – Shakespeare, Julius Caesar (Act 3, Scene 1).

The ides of March have come and gone now, rest easy all you cynical autocratic want-a-be’s, least for another year.

 

Inappropriate moments of the night: “hey Tim’s going home with him tonight,” “I’m twitterpaited,” and public gropping of a boyfriends crotch by a girlfriend and the phrase, “I’m ready, if he is” but what was meant was, ready to go.

Thoughts on the current NFL CBA dispiutes and comments

I would like to say something about the NFL: I love the players and the game, but really!?! Those of them out there complaining about it being “slavery” or trash talking the owners (mind you I’m not for them either), really? You mean you didn’t think and realize what it was you were getting involved in front day one, I call “bull.” Don’t smother yourself in the cake and devour it only to tell your friends that you really hated it and it was awful. Bull-crap! You get paid, well the big names, tons of money. You’re right, it’s indentured slavery that pays well, deal with it or get a real job.

Boom Land!…only in America (perhaps?)

Cigarettes, Fireworks, and Gasoline…same place, same time. Smoke’m if you got them, I guess?