023: Delusions of Coherence

It's you, it's me, it's SWP, let's go.

We're working on moving. That's the big deal lately. I have to admit I'm not proud of my behaviour during the big clean up portion. I get pissy when my stuff gets messed with, even when I know it's for a good reason. I still remember - hell, I still feel annoyed by - the state of my room after I got back from New York in September. It's one of those things about still living at home, where I don't wanna have to remember I live at home.

When mom cleans, stress radiates outward from her and I pick it up and it makes me not want to help, it makes me actually want to be obtrusive or leave. I can clean on my own, actually. It's not that I don't know how to straighten things up, it's actually part of my job. However, I have this flaw where I don't straighten up things I know are destined to be messed up. Before we started showing the house there were things I knew were never going to be in "the right" place.

But now we are showing the house. We started before last weekend. It's stressful. I try to leave the premises when I know people are coming, not usually hard because of work. But there's the guys and Bella and food. One time we had to order dinner and finish eating it before people came for a 7:00 showing, and the delivery cut it close by taking an hour and a half. All my problems are first-world problems, but they're my problems.

Last weekend was Grandma's birthday. It was a strange gathering, conversation tended to be bleak. Grandma just put Xena down after a long period of uncertainty and suffering. And Aunt L was just about to put Brewster down. Nearly every time our family gets together we end up talking about dog death (this probability multiplies when in the presence of our cousins.) It's... therapeutic, it's natural, but it's a drag, man.

On Family DAy, the day after, Eric and I went to Toronto. Originally I was hoping to corral Manda into a trip to the CN Tower similar to how we went to the ROM on Thanksgiving, but she was busy. So I mentioned to Eric I still kinda wanted to go to the city and he was up for it. The weather was decent too. We walked up Yonge, then headed down Bloor through the Annex looking for somewhere to eat. Now, the downtown area is replete with eateries, but Eric had this vision of a deli-type sandwich in his head and we just didn't know where to go to find one.

We wound up at Sneaky Dee's, where instead of such a sandwich he ended up copying my order of a grilled cheese sandwich with bacon, the same sandwich I ordered in Brooklyn. It was pretty brilliant, with the right cheese and everything. It was a nice day.

Actually, just a few days earlier, Eric and I had one of our best nights out ever, and I say this because at no point did I feel embarrassed to be with him (because he was drunk and rambling.) He was actually in perfect form, or at least seemed fine since I was as drunk as I've been in months. we were out with Chantelle, Shannon, and two of Chantelle's friends I've met before. The girls took a number of smoking breaks, leaving us to talk amongst ourselves (at one point about philosophy of all things, as one had majored in it at U of T.) After the guys left, we all played pool and talked. Kyle was meant to join us but couldn't get in because he lacked I.D. The dynamic worked, though. Although I was initially hesitant, back in the day, to bring Eric into the work-friend dynamic, he gets along with them fairly well.

Things are strangely good, but I keep wondering to myself what it's going to take before I finally feel motivated to shake myself out of this stasis. I could coast as long as I need, but what I want is not to want to. Y'know?

Well that's my business. Keep on rockin'
-Scotto

022: I'll make you his

As anyone who regularly talks to me knows, I don't have a lot going on lately. This is just one of the many reasons I don't let it out on SWP much lately. There's simply not much there. I work and I fret about my writing output, I drink coffee and I listen to music and I write about the music I'm listening to. The music blog is going well. I do have other outlets... Tumblr has been very good to me since I joined over a year ago, largely because of the community of people I've found. But I don't spill my guts there as much as I ever did here. But as I crawl through my 20's, I also have less guts to spill.

The other night I finally got out of my house/rut, braving the cold to go see Martina before she goes off to England for an internship. I considered not-going, despite my sacred Facebook RSVP, because of the inclement weather and generally feeling assy all day. But by the time I got home from school, I hadn't decided not to go. The pizza we ordered got here quickly and I had time to watch a few episodes of Eerie Indiana, which I recently bought, so I took it as a sign that I could go out and actually enjoy myself.

So I ventured out, arriving at the location after 9 PM. I had a few drinks, caught up with the gang. It's always the same collection of random folks, some of whom I know, some of whom I never really talked to. Marti, Rosie and Jamie have always been good at collecting friends, mostly Cinema Studies people, and what appears to be an inordinate number of gay dudes (not that there's anything wrong with that.) I was a bit awkward in catching up, not really wanting to talk about myself... like I've said, I don't have a lot going on and it's getting to the point where it's even embarrassing to embellish on my various projects, such as they are. Jamie gave me a lecture on how I needed to start a writing blog. First I need to start writing, though.

The night went on and I flipped from conversation to conversation around the table and had many periods of silence. Which is nice, because this is a group that understands introversion, even being the three girls that basically forced me to be friends with them back in second year. I also disrupted Charlie's hipster flirt-off (when Philip Glass and Tilda Swinton get name dropped you know what territory you're in) just to be a dick. And because I knew Charlie could take it. And to be a dick. No, I don't know what's wrong with me.

A large portion of the night was an attempt to settle up the bill and move on to another bar, which is tough when you have a giant unwieldy mob to move around. I ended up paying extra just to get us out of there quickly, and to spare some of my broke student friends the pain.

We nearly went to one bar, which was very loud and karaoke-ish, then switched out for a quieter venue, where Shane engaged Paolo in a lengthy lecture on the moral impossibility of basing a film (Extremely Loud & Incredibly Close) around 9/11. Personally, I disagreed but wanted no part of the discussion. The rest of us drank and played what turned out to be a very lame "truth or dare" type game on Rosie's iPhone. Then the others got some Tequila shots and I noticed it was after 1.

I sprinted to the GO station. We were at King past Duncan. It was pretty brutal, but I made it to the last bus of the night in time to more or less catch my breath. I dozed off on the road back to the sound of Tokyo Police Club. I woke up just as we were getting to Oakville Station, and walked home in a snowfall. It was about 2 AM when I got in the door, and spent 2 hours attempting to tidy up, because hey, why not.

The truth is, we're moving in a few months. We're getting the house ready to sell, which is a big job because it is lived-in as fuck. We kinda went to town on it over the years because we assumed it would never come to this, that by the time mom was ready to leave, if it happened, we'd be long gone. Nope.

So, we've been needing to clean the basement. Personally, I have a psychological block on cleaning. That's my problem. When you live in a mess, you get comfortable. I'm not a hoarder, I know what garbage is. It's just a matter of moving it around so it's not so problematic. We've been dragging our feet, but we know it needs to be done. Then there's the fact that every time she says "Clean this up," it makes me want to do it less, because... well, it's a hang up. I'm in my mid-20's and I live with my mom, I'm allowed a few hangups. That all said, I know what needs to be done and I know it needs to be done soon. I just don't wanna be told and I don't want it done for me. I guess I want a chance to prove to myself that it's in my own hands.

So yesterday we spent on a massive cleanup mission, clearing out $21.40 deposit worth of beer, wine and liquor bottles that have been sitting around over the years (the beer regularly goes back, the wine and liquor is what's been sitting around.)

Then tonight there was a whole thing about leaving dishes. I haven't seen her that mad since Eric was having problems. And I understand, we're not the greatest sons. We don't take care of the place as much as we should, keep things as neat as she'd like. She was muttering to herself about how sick she is of cleaning up after us, and I understand and I feel bad, and I apologized, not that she acknowledged.

Last time there was a conflict of this sort of thing was in September when I got back from New York and she had washed my sheets but not put them back, meaning I got to bed at 2 AM (on a work night) after a 12-hour bus ride and had to slip my own fitted sheet back on. And it seems incredibly minor, but it was not what I wanted to see, and I flipped, and I pouted about it for a whole day and balled it up with all my other issues about boundaries. And we had this really bizarre fight where she tried to explain to me why I shouldn't be mad, and I refused to take anything she was saying seriously until I heard to admit guilt, admit that she had done wrong in the situation, that she understood why I was mad. We both walked away from that one mad.

Personally, nowadays I would never take away someone's right to be angry. Back when Occupy was happening, I read a brilliant analogy: You can't tell someone they shouldn't be angry. It's like trying to tell them they're not thirsty. Don't argue, just get them a drink and listen. I admitted to her I did wrong and said sorry. I told her where I was coming from in hopes it would be a mitigating factor. She went to bed mad, I think. Eric surmised her dinner with Ross didn't go well. I think that's possible but I don't jump to conclusions. I was perfectly happy from my New York trip before I found my sheets folded on my bed.

I've got issues, which crop up whenever I'm reminded I still live here, years after I feel like I should have left. I was pretty good at convincing myself it was for the best while I was in university. Now I'm working and comfortable and unhappy about it. I feel like as long as I'm here, there will always be this unresolved bitterness about the situation. That's my issue and it's not logical. There I go making it about me, but this is my blog and it's my perspective you get.

Keep on rockin'
-Scotto

021: Spread far and wide

I was a bit down on New Year's. Every so often lately I've gotten mad at myself for my station in life, limitations I perceive myself as having. Observations and magnifications of things I don't like about myself. A couple of nights ago, I remembered in great detail probably the worst single night I had all year, which might actually rank amongst the worst nights I can remember. It was the night we all went out to Monaghan's to say goodbye to Trevor, and the guys were forcing me into situations I wasn't comfortable with and I felt like I wasn't being heard, I was being boxed into this grotesquely negative interaction with this girl who didn't give one damn about my existence, and who I wasn't particularly interested in at the outset. What bothered me about this night was that they were not hearing my objections, that I wasn't into it and didn't wanna play. They were obsessed with trying to help me and it made me feel like a chump. Now really, that's not such a bad problem, it shows people at least care a bit to meddle in my business, even if they're too thick to tell that I don't want their help. That night kinda underlined a lot of things I don't like about myself and about the situations in which I find myself.

You'd think -- or hopefully you wouldn't since you're not reading this, and it's just me -- it would be Cary's birthday, when I once again struggled with my limits and ended up being completely blown off by the end of the night, but that had a few mitigating factors and honestly, got taken to such ridiculous extremes that I felt like at least, if I felt bad that night, I was still left with a bit of a story.

Anyway, it's all self-pity, all woe-is-me, playing the victim. I had some opportunities in 2011 and either I squandered them or I fucked them up or ignored them. Despite an outward failure to reap material rewards for my little efforts, (a handful of dates that went nowhere and the continued sneaking suspicion that everyone around me is just putting up with me) the trend of 2011 has been positive. I noticed by the end of the year that 2011 was the year I seem to have stopped worrying all the goddamn time, which makes sense.

I mean, the first half of the year, I felt like a mess. Stress at work was really magnified by stress at school, starting with the burnout I felt after the holidays, and the shock I felt when I found out I wasn't graduating when I thought I would. I mean, that one hit pretty hard, and rolled up into a ball of angst about myself and the world around me, including certain sociopolitical issues that I took to heart, which just haunted me for months. I don't know, dude, I was a wreck.

This all culminated in an event that pretty well splits the year in half for me, the replacement of Karen as manager by Bev. Honestly, that was a sheer pressure-dropping moment for me. Looking back I don't feel like the same person who was afraid to come into work and see his boss. The guy whose boss constantly felt the need to deliver bad pep talks and guilt trips about my performance. Honestly, I do think I had them coming, but the environment was negative anyway. I'd hesitate to say Karen was the reason for negative feeling, but her presence, the whole dynamic, did not help it. The situation did not make me want to perform my best work, nor that I could really live up to my potential no matter how hard I tried, because I didn't feel like I had it in me or that I really knew what I was. I was lost.

It didn't come all at once. And it wasn't happy ever after, as my recollection of the events from October suggest. But slowly, as I've grown into my own as a responsible person, feeling like I really am doing the best work I can (and getting frequent unsolicited reassurances from the manager) helps put a lot of that negativity behind me, and keep my life in perspective. Finishing school helped: ultimately, the classes I hated myself for having to do were a bit of a good time, although yes, I could've done without needing to do them, I'm happy with the way things worked out.

I'm in a better place right now than when I began last year, or even for a lot of last year. 2011 was the year I evened out some. 2012 will have to be the year things change, somehow or other, maybe not all at once. I do expect to be in a different place in my life in 365 days' time (assuming we make it out of this year alive) and if I'm back here next January telling you "Boy, what a crazy Christmas at the store" I'll probably be miserable about it.

OH God I just cursed myself. I take it back! This job is a wonderful fallback job! I enjoy it and I'm good at it, the co-workers are great, I could totally see myself still here in a year!

(cough cough)

Keep on rockin'
-Scotto

020: Snap

And just like that, there goes the Holiday.

Well, in a sense. Tomorrow's Boxing day, and we begin the rapid tapering off of Holiday stress. Last year, on New Year's eve, I worked, and things were so dead that I went home early for one of the few times in my life.

I got Eric a job at HMV for the season. I had my doubts, but I took a leap of faith, because I knew I wouldn't have been able to live with myself if I hadn't offered. We're getting on well, but I feel like there was some friction generated with certain co-workers, not because he was not cool to them, but I did feel like there were communicative misfires. And there was one incident where he was almost fired for being late. That was a fun day.

I was thinking earlier about how times have changed, how I'm suddenly really aware of how I've left the stress and insanity of school behind. It's manifested itself in an unexpected way. Now I'm in the store and I just... don't see it the way I used to. I remember last year, my mind reeling all the time, split between places. I felt like shit. Now it's just... my job. I show up, I work, I go home. Nine to five. I do occasionally get stressed, but it's not a falling-apart-at-the-seams, collapse-to-the-floor, get-me-a-drink type of stress, just a light headache, "ugh, what now?" kind.

The past two months have been rather eventful. There was one incredible night where Chantelle and I went to Hamilton and met Joel Plaskett, who is utterly incredible to his fans, even when they geek out at him. It was one of those rare nights where everything went perfectly. We even got home as planned.

Then there was the beginning of December, when I left my iPod at the family gathering (which also went rather better than you'd think, aside from not getting the iPod back nearly as quickly as I should have.) We had a whole issue of family drama that was very rapidly and miraculously put aside and, from all appearances, things just worked out. And of course, the work Christmas party where Chantelle and I had a nice moment reflecting on all that the last two years have brought us.

Christmas was nice enough. I noted to anyone who would listen, this was the first Christmas Eve since I started working here that I didn't take a shift... although re-reading my entry from Christmas Eve 2008, it's different from how I remember, so I guess we must have missed out the Christmas Eve Chinese food that year. But that, and other traditions were in place, including midnight wrapping while drinking and watching Christmas movies. We watched both the Blackadder and Muppets Christmas Carol (which really seemed to his Eric) as well as Cooper's Christmas, a warped Christmas movie we discovered a couple years back, featuring some good Canadian comic actors like Jason Jones and Sam Bee from the Daily Show.

Christmas day began with Eric waking us up early because something had woken him up early and he thought it was 10 when it was 9. So he caused the rest of us to miss an hour of sleep because he couldn't double-check his clock. Anyway, after opening stuff, we went to Dad's for a nice afternoon, talking about old times and times before our times, thinking of Grandma and Granddad and eating grilled cheese. We looked at old Christmas photos and watched ourselves age a decade. In particular, I go from a gawky teenager to a gawky twentysomething. But my skin improves, anyway, and I figure out what to do with my hair a bit.

Soon as we left and got home, it was off to Toronto to have dinner at Aunt Karen's. More gifts, some dinner and playtime with the kids. Cam still hasn't outgrown babysitter, a game where I basically yell at them until they get tired of taking my abuse and want to switch roles. I say this all the time, but I can't wait until they become uninterested teenagers who don't want anything to do with their big cousins.

After some fun with the Christmas Candle Ghost, we said our long goodbyes, then came home to watch Doctor Who. This whole thing has been patently ordinary, compared to other years. It was only two years ago that I woke up on Boxing Day to the news that Eric had drunkenly wandered downtown and left me a rambling message about it.

I don't know how to take any of this anymore. All I have is my uncertainty. I was having stress dreams for a while (being attacked by a customer with a knife, being trapped in another co-worker's nightmare) but they seem to have subsided. Now all I want is to relax. To have a breather and plot out my next move.

Do I have to say it? I miss writing in here regularly. So many things seem to have happened and slipped my mind, my life has less focus than it used to. It's all in my hands, so I don't know what to say. But there's also less to write about and of course way, way less to desire to write it. Which is sad, because the blog has always been a nice way of housekeeping, getting shit in order to get real writing done. On Tumblr, where I generally kick it nowadays (aside from the music blog,) I'm constantly stopping and considering whether anything overly personal is worth sharing. Here, I'm back to not caring because if there's an audience I'm not aware of it and they don't make themselves known.

I'm glad for that. I should come back more often. I feel like I say that every time, but these are the stories I'm left with. This is me.

Keep on rockin'
-Scotto

019: More time for misery

Despite the title of this entry, and the events it describes, I don't think the tone of the writing will be overly morose. I only seem to get on here, to write at length about my life anymore, when I feel like I've got something to say, or at any rate have cause to ponder how uneventful my life is. I've been dormant a while, working, head down and going. Status quo. I get really depressed when nothing happens. When stuff does happen, even if it doesn't go so well, I can't help but appreciate it.

This weekend has been crazy. Owing to (having better things to do with my time) I put off getting my whole convocation together, getting tickets, organizing my parents (always difficult) etc etc. It's a nightmare, because, well, it's one of those scenarios where you have to put a lot of time and energy over something you really don't want to do to begin with. Which was sorta supposed to be the benefit to graduating. Hurm.

Add to that, I worked all day yesterday. I was only supposed to work a half day; actually I wasn't supposed to work. Then Chantelle tagged me to switch out for my Thursday, and then Shannon asked me to take the morning instead, and who am I to say no to anything? That's just my character.

It was a busy shift. The holiday shoppers are out. Near as I can figure they're in a literal sense the same people as the regular-season shoppers, but there's already a detectable shift in mood, in attitude. I wouldn't say it was an altogether stressful day, but it was a grim signal of things to come. Still, it proves business is healthy for the time being, our sales tactics are effective.

It was Cary's birthday this weekend. He was unable to get me into his Law School party this year, leading to my first Halloween in many years where I had absolutely nothing going on (and usually, it involved Cary.) It kinda upset me, but it was nobody's fault. It was nice, though, to get the invite out to the birthday. Seemed like a perfectly good trade-off, although for Halloween I always appreciate the built-in icebreaker of a costume.

So, Saturday night, after swinging by home and grabbing my man bag, I jetted to the station. On the ride over I read 90's X-Men comics I had in the bag (don't ask why) and listened to some of the recent music I've reviewed. When I got to Toronto around 9, I made a stop at the only LCBO whose location I know off by heart, at Yonge-Dundas, which took me out of my way. Then I took the subway to Spadina and began a measured search for Cary's place. I wrote down the address and the basic whereabouts, but I hadn't had the foresight to look it up on a map site any more than I'd had the sense to look up a better LCBO location. I had just given up and texted Cary for directions when I happened upon his street. I got through the door at 10.

It was a nice place, full mostly of people who knew each other in the respective ways they knew Cary, whether from law school or previous university. My problem is that, as time goes by, I'm one of the few people Cary knows from high school. So I have to constantly be introduced and reintroduced, and justify my presence by being as interesting and witty as Cary claims I am (I'm not.)

I happen to be a bit boring lately because I've gotten into, I guess, a bit of a rut. "Oh, I work, and I guess I write sometimes, and I live in Oakville." Sometimes I'm good at meeting new people, sometimes I just crumble under the pressure. Lately, the latter seems to be the rule. Add to that, I've been fighting a cold all week, and I was tired from schlepping out there via the roundabout route I took. A couple of my early conversational prospects slipped away. I spent a significant portion of the party leaning against a wall quietly sipping my drink and looking out from behind the iron bars of my mind.

This is not new. This is not news. I need to be drawn out, to be shown I will be listened to, to be given opportunities. I know, it would be totally better if I could just walk in a room and start entertaining the shit out of everybody, but that has never been the case, even on the good days. Lately I've been pretty grim. I remember other parties in the past, at Cary's, or one at RyLai's some years ago when even the friends I came with were getting into their own conversations I couldn't jump into. There were times when I was invited into a conversation only to make a hash of it. That's on me.

There was Vanessa, who was the only other former WOSS kid. We had a decent conversation, catching up and discussing the relative developments of our friends' lives. She brought me into a conversation with another dude by asking if I was dating anyone. I told her no, I was mainly just having a lot of anonymous sex. Very anonymous, like "bag over the head" type sex, no names, no faces, just holes presumed to be vaginas. She asked if I was joking. We didn't really hang out that much in high school. Anyway, I alternated that with exaggerated-yet-very-real talk of how I was certain to die alone, that nobody would ever love me, etc, etc. I laid out some of my observations about online dating when she suggested I try it; it's never stopped me from crawling back eventually, however.

The whole night began to feel severely like a track off the first Arctic Monkeys album around the time we left for a nearby club, the Dance Cave. I told others at the party I was worried about stalagmites, but I was assured it would be fine. As we headed out, one of the girls at the party turned to me and asked if I had been to her house to pre-drink the previous year's Halloween, dressed as Scott Pilgrim. I had. This caught me off guard, because I'm not used to being remembered. Some days I feel like the Silence, that when nobody's looking at me, they can't remember I was ever there. That's just about the saddest, nerdiest thing I've ever said about myself. I love it.

Anyway. I struck up a conversation with this girl on the walk over to the Cave. I remembered her roommate's costume from that year, a Pez dispenser, but she had to remind me of hers: Waldo. I told her that the fact that I didn't remember meant that it was effective. We talked a fair bit more after we got in, but things happened and she disappeared, and I got into kind of a funk. Clubs are not really my scene. I don't like them, they don't like me, I'm not good at them. I'm a verbal guy, when I'm anything. I certainly don't look good on the dancefloor and, over Cary's protests, I couldn't push it out of my head that I was just in the wrong place. Plus all the accidental groping that goes on there. Okay, that's a perk.

The night dragged on and I alternated sessions of brooding in the corner with genuine (fruitless) attempts to enjoy myself. I lost track of the few people I recognized multiple times. I was recognized again, by someone I had a class with waaaaaaay back in first year. She couldn't put her finger on it, but when she said her name it all came back to me. We talked a bit, and I told her this was not my scene. The place itself was kinda neat, the DJ really knew his audience, playing stuff like "Seven Nation Army," "Smells Like Teen Spirit," "Little Lion Man" and "Someday" by the Strokes (as well as "Taken for a Fool") in addition to -- hell, mainly instead of -- traditional dance fare. During one of my attempts to really get into it, I screamed myself hoarse with the crowd doing "Teen Spirit." I haven't sounded this bad since I tried the cinnamon challenge at Neabel's, last year.

Gradually, it dawned on me that Cary & Co had likely already left, which I'll admit, was lame, but the place was, in fairness, really dark and crowded. My main problem with that is that I was specifically trying to keep an eye out for them, and they slipped by. I would have been upset if I didn't find it so funny.

Admittedly, it was not the greatest night of my life. However, it was far from the biggest shitshow I've seen lately, and there were genuinely enjoyable moments. Hell, even the dance cave had its own appeal when I could put out of mind the thoughts of "Nobody wants me here, I don't belong!!" But the comedy of me, out on the streets of Toronto at 2:30 AM -- feeling like 3:30, because it was "Fall Back," and still kinda sick to boot -- trying to find a house I had only just been to that day, unsure if the people I'm looking for are there because Cary's not answering his cell phone... that, I find hilarious, and very... well, this shit just seems to happen to me. I just seem to invite it. At least it amuses me.

I got to the house and rang the doorbell. One of the dudes I'd met earlier in the night answered. I curled up on a couch. I might've been wise to pour myself a drink just to relax me, to put me to sleep, because it was a hard time getting settled. It was comfy, but I didn't have a blanket and it was cold. I ended up slipping my arms in my hoodie and using that as a "blanket."

I pulled the disappearing act the next morning around nine. Back home, I lived through another comedy routine as I tried to return some clothes to the thrift store (turns out I bought ladies jackets, whoops,) but they're not open Sundays.

It's been a strange few days. With this stupid convocation tomorrow it's bound to be a further few strange ones. I got my brother a temp job at the store, I have no idea what I was thinking. Terrible, terrible idea, Scotto.

I should get some rest. There are adventures in the subconscious awaiting me.

Keep on rockin'
-Scotto

018: Not technically a circle

Slipping into my old self-hate pants tonight.

Some events last week left me very pissed off for the week, a sinking feeling of bitterness toward others that, as it always does, turns into a dislike of myself. It was an innocent enough night to begin with, a farewell night of drinks for Trevor, leaving us for more hours at a store closer to his house.

It was going okay -- not great, but it was an unwieldy group of people, and Chantelle as always brought her friends along, girls I always always always end up making uncomfortable smalltalk with.

Matt's ladyfriend, a girl I'm also friendly with, showed up, completely independently, with a friend of her own. The guys have all been obsessing lately over monkeying with my non-existent lovelife. I guess my situation is pretty difficult to believe, but when you get me in a situation like that, it gets easier to believe.

I attempted to play along, unenthusiastically. They did a bad job being wingmen, I did a bad job being interesting on my own. If the girl was even aware they were trying, she was not at all willing to go along and I don't blame them. I'm not good in a situation like that, where there's someone there to outshine me, although it occurs to me that, especially of late, there are far too many situations I'm not good in.

By the end of the night, I was mad at them and mad at myself for lacking the qualities that would have made a night like that unnecessary. Of course when I'm drinking I'll take any excuse to get mad at myself (like now.) A week later I came to the realization that I'm too goddamned old to be this bad with women. Which of course is a shame, because I am this bad, and I'm clueless what can be done for a poor creature like me. Well it's my own problem and nobody but me is ever going to get it figured out.

Might in fact be beyond redemption. In any case it's hard to make others like you when you're not all that fond of yourself.

I've gotten kinda boring lately. That's what routine does to you, but on the plus side I don't fret over hypothetical problems the way I used to. I acknowledge they still exist, but I guess I've gotten that good suburban complacency. It's comfort; it's a rut, but it's a good one. For now.

At lunch I started writing again. I bought a notebook specifically to keep with me at work so I could put my lunchbreaks to good use. I mean, good use aside from stuffing myself with sushi. I'm probably gonna get mercury poisoning. See, that's the sort of thing I used to be a lot more worried about. What does that tell you?

Oh yeah, writing. Yes. I've reconfigured my follow-up play once again into a form that -- knock on wood -- might actually work, entertain, and be all the things I want it to be (basically a more ensemble-y version of Half-Past.) Hopefully this one takes. They say you write 1000 pages of shit before you get to the good stuff. What they don't tell you is that after page 1000 the shit doesn't just stop like that.

I took someone's shift for tomorrow. I haven't done that in a while; haven't had to, and long since been on "my own" Mon-Fri 9-5 schedule. I used to get really bitter about taking other peoples' shifts, but she's being really appreciative about it, which is nice.

Boredom and angst.

Keep on rockin'
-Scotto

017: Lonely sayings

I don't know how I do it. Or why I do it. Or what I'm doing.

Okay, I borrowed that line from myself, but in my defense, I used it a long time ago, most have forgotten, and I still dig it.

I miss a lot of moments. I was reading old entries,a s I am apt to do (I've got plenty of em.) Sampling random moments from three years ago, Fall '08. Funny how some of those thoughts seem like they just occurred to me yesterday. Amanda and I used to talk and she'd say how perception of time speeds up as you age, and I dreaded knowing that was true and now here we are. I remember early in second year, that awful first day with seven straight hours of class, including a Film Theory class I was in no way set to handle. Eventually I did take Film Theory, and I dug it, with a different professor, after going through Lit theory, which prepared me for it. Things dovetail in University. Everything that rises must converge.

So I was reading these old entries and I wrote in detail about my day, about what happened that day and how I felt about it. Every minute irrelevant detail felt so fresh and clear, and I could put myself back in those days. And I guess that was the point.

Nowadays I don't anymore. Every individual day isn't worth talking about and I don't have the energy to sit down more often and write about it. I imagine putting more worthwhile creative pursuits first and letting SWP fall by the wayside, and yet I was much more creative when I did SWP more often. Output begets output.

Like today, I went to work. Lately, we've been on this weird thing where Trevor and I will come in in the morning, and then the deliveries will start coming and Trevor will receive them and Kyle will show up for four hours (which is a baffling notion in itself,) and then he'll be gone and Trevor won't be done the receiving and I'll be alone on the floor until the evening crew shows up. So I hardly interact with most of the other staff anymore, just Bev, Trevor and Kyle, then I have passing interactions with the others. This will change when the new Assistant Manager (the Assman) gets in next week, which will present its own issues, then we'll lose people and gain people and the circle of life will go on. Two years, I never thought two years. Believe me, believe me, there was a time not all that long ago when I thought my future tenure could be measured in weeks, not months. But let's face it. I've got some atrophying to do yet before I finally get it up to break free.

I went with Eric the other day as he handed out some resumes. He explained how badly he felt the need to recharge after his school experience, which didn't go as well as he'd liked. He spent the summer idling, but now is the time to get going and he knows it. I think he got some good leads, following many of the same paths as I did back when I had to look for work. I hope he gets something, if only because I'd be interested to see what happens when he works.

I was thinking the other day how comfortable I've gotten. This is a good and bad thing. One, it's unprecedented... I'm not stressing out over anything, not running from place to place, dividing my life, worrying about the future, it's mellowed me out. The other, however, is that it obviously breeds stagnation, an unhealthy sort of comfort. The other day dad asked what was new and I said, borderline contemptuously (with a hint of humour and a hint of truth,) nothing, like it would be absurd for something to be actually new with me right now. It was sort of a splash of cold water to myself.

But this period of peace, this interregnum... it's doing me some good.

I sense I will be moving back toward writing soon... maybe it's wishful thinking or maybe Iv need to bootstrap myself into motivation. But it keeps rolling around in my head and if I know me (and I almost do) I can't let that urge stay suppressed forever. Do I force it or wait for the time to feel "right" (if that ever happens?) Hurm. Stupid amateur writer dilemma. Stupid amateur writer.

Keep on rockin'
-Scotto