“Reality
is a crutch for people who can’t cope with drugs.”
– Lily Tomlin
----------------------------------
I cannot write today.
I cannot write today and I will not write tomorrow and then I’m going out of town on Thursday, so things are going to be pretty dead around here for as far as I can see.
I tried to write
today. I walked around Montrose, sober, trying to plan this week’s blog, but I
just keep thinking about how my leg itches and how I’m cramping and how I don’t
want to think about that project I’m starting at work on Monday.
All good reasons to
drink, by the way. Not that a reason to drink ever needed to be very good.
I count sixty-eight
hours since I had so much as an aspirin.
I do this
sometimes: I try and ride that crest between Hunter S. Thompson and stone cold
sobriety, but usually I fall on one side or the other.
Right now, I need
to be sober for a little while.
So I cannot write
today.
I cannot write
today and I’m thinking about dead parents and lost girlfriends and maybe my
eldest daughter is dating and there are lines around my eyes and I’m not where
I should be in life. And aspartame’s eating my brain, the Republicans are going
to win next year and I really should see a doctor about whatever’s going on
with this toe. And then there’s every
embarrassing thing I’ve ever done and that one time, back when I
was homeless…
I’m not going to
drink today.
No matter what
awful thought pops into my head, I refuse to use it as an excuse. Really.
Really.
And I’ll write again whenever I can write again. For today, I’ll just make a cool gif of my head:
It happens. Just like what I found out last night, as unbelievable and shitty as it was, it happened, as part of reality we are forced to live with. Shit happens to everyone, isn't it.
ReplyDeleteTo me the only thing matters is what we do with it today and tomorrow.
Well, sure, everybody has bad days.
DeleteThe Flaming Lips once claimed to have a solution for that: "You have to sleep late when you can / And all your bad days will end."
Best advice I ever heard.
yeah... I also had a beer free weekend. It's amazing how much "extra free time" I have...
ReplyDeleteA massive sugar rush helps me with the "funky times"
It's the small things that matter... " Please! PLEASE! take us to the rice paddies to dance with the grey strokes, before our baths" - Bipole (the crazy dog)
That's hilarious. That's exactly what I think every time I sober up: "Where did all these hours come from? What do I do with them?"
DeleteBeer in hand - dodge a big one - Thai Mothers Day - unexpected FREEDOM
DeleteSome brain food for you...
"When did somebody decide to replace the word “Atomic” for “Nuclear”, anyhow?"
Atomic sounds so much more …. well…. Atomic
Rocken the Puppy Party! CHEERS
I think "nuclear" is an umbrella term that can bring in both atomic and hydrogen weapons.
DeleteI prefer to believe they starting using the term "nuclear" just because scientists wanted to laugh at politicians trying to pronounce it.
Writer's block hits us all. Some deal with it by posting garbage, others deal with it by not posting at all, and some people post awesome gifs of their head. You could definitely be doing a lot worse. You could have lazily taken us through the equivalent of a clip show.
ReplyDeleteSome weekends I sit here and think, "Too many words," and it just feels obnoxious to throw more words at people.
DeleteAnd then a few days later, I'll be thinking, "A 1,500 word blog post about scientists competing to Frankenstein horses? This NEEDS to be said!"
Sooooo you need to drink to write? WELCOME TO THE CLUB! So good to have you. Hemingway will be along shortly unless he's super dead. Have you thought about smoking illicit substances? That could help.
ReplyDeleteI can't write while drunk. However, I seem to come up with better ideas while under the influence. I'm way too practical sober.
DeleteSo write sober, dream stoned.
Hang in there kid........Republicans may not win after all.
ReplyDeleteIt seems to be their turn.
DeleteI know I keep saying this, but I looked up old Presidents, and it turns out we've NEVER had 4 consecutive 2-term Presidents. In fact, the Clinton/Bush/Obama run ties our old record of 2-termers, Jefferson/Madison/Monroe.
So I am confident the next President will be a 1-termer.
This means we'll only have four years of Trump.
Great. 'cause I can't comment today. I woke up with the stifles this morning and no matter what I do I feel like I just want to shut up. Maybe another post on another day I'll comment... but not today. Today I'm'a be QUIET! with drugs
ReplyDeleteThis was as great a non-comment as my post was a non-post.
DeleteMy advice? Go back to bed. Stay there. That's never steered me wrong.
Although I feel pain for your pain, I have to say that this is a nearly perfect post. I wish I could reach across the Internetz and give you a big hug and tell you I completely understand and you'e doing it all right. Because yeah. <3
ReplyDeleteThank you!
DeleteI try not to complain too much in my blog, but sometimes I have to whine just a little. I'm not naming any names, but some people I know and read are going through a lot more shit in their lives than I am.
I think I will go to sleep now. Tomorrow, I may do great things.
ReplyDeleteOr tomorrow I may die.
Either will be fine.
Much more concise than I am.
DeleteBut yes.
For a person of few words, you sure have a lot to say. I recommend a rum cosmo, over ice, with a slice of lime. Or not. Sobriety is way overrated, according to everyone I've asked at the bar. And they should know, right? They've been there, and didn't like it any more than you or I.
ReplyDeleteNo, no, rum can make me disappear for months, maybe years. I have a couple years I don't remember because of rum.
DeleteI don't find sobriety particularly necessary. I just like to make sure that I don't get so deep that I can't make it back to the surface when I run out of air.
Okay. We'll take that.
ReplyDeleteGracias.
DeletePeople generally like my short filler stuff as well as my giant pieces that take me forever to write anyway.
Everyone needs a palate cleanser sometimes.
Aspartame's eating my brain too, so 3 cheers to that.
ReplyDeleteI'm thinking of switching over to coffee for my caffeine-delivery system of choice.
DeleteIt doesn't address the caffeine addiction problem, but I would be able to cut loose from the bastard child of Donald Rumsfeld and Monsanto.
Katy. When I start to feel writer's block, all I need do is think about my pecker and the thoughts and ideas flow like the mighty Mississippi. Maybe you should try thinking about my pecker.
ReplyDeleteFuck Walmart!
Mooner, the more women think about your pecker, the more women I'm going to have to choose from on this side of the fence.
DeleteKaty. Maybe you can send me prospects of your choice for the conversion. Pickings are slim up here to the thin mountain air, but I do have an infestation of Black Widow spiders out to the garden. Squirt tells me the spouse-eating, yet beautiful, webinators are a metaphor for something. I think we've had a rainy summer and have a resultant bounty of BW spider food.
ReplyDeleteYou are the expert- what sayeth thou?
Not sure about black widows, but you'd see more tarantulas than normal after a rainy summer. The rain drives them up out of their burrows.
DeleteI went to a tarantula convention/conference (not sure what the difference between those words is) a few years back, and they told us that the southeast corner of Arizona and southwest corner of New Mexico has more species of spiders than anywhere else in the world.