17/05/2010
I-45 just south of Dallas is a flat straight piece of road that cuts across flat, straight and amazingly uninteresting terrain.
Call it the visual equivalent of Muzak.
Heap many moons ago, I subjected myself to this stretch of asphalt while on a brief road trip with my friend, Hector. Once we had exhausted all our small talk and chitchat about women and work, I turned my attention to the blur of landscape that streaked past my window. It wasn’t long before my mind began to wander.
I remembered a conversation I was having with a girl I used to work with. Sometimes, I’ll forget conversations outright. Sometimes, the memories of the content or people I have them with all blur together.
This one I remember.
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10/05/2010
Something from the Way Back Machine, updated just a skosh.
I remember it was a Sunday afternoon many years ago as I sat on my bed, somewhere between heaven and hell, briefly wondering what belt went well with a single man and khakis.
Really, it wasn’t a difficult choice; it was one I made day in and day out, but today as I looked at myself in the mirror, I was stuck. I was stuck somewhere between the brown and the black, somewhere between the desirable twenties and the stable forties. I could go either with the brown belt, which like Angie, fit one particular situation or I could go with the black belt, which like Elizabeth, went with everything or I could even go with none at all.
I wish I could say that the analogy about women came to me then but I’m not nearly that clever.
At least I wasn’t then.
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9/05/2010
One from the Way Back Machine, c. 1995
Another Friday night was winding down at Johnnie’s. It was a few minutes after one in the morning and a steady, light rain tapped impatiently against the big, front window. It added soft percussion to the guitar’s plaintive cry from the club’s speakers. Scott Henderson was behind the bar cleaning bottles and emptying wells. As the newest bartender, he drew all the late weekend shifts. This was his second. And while it was more or less a death sentence to his social life, he didn’t mind. He’d spent most of his bartending years in meat markets watching the pretty people all but copulate on his bar. This small, neighborhood bar, where wood and brass reigned, was a far cry from what he’d been used to, but he welcomed the change.
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9/10/2000
It was a moment made in the movies: I saw her from across a crowded room, an angel with golden hair and stormy-blue eyes. In that moment, the world around me was gone; there was no world except for her. And so, without rational thought, without fear, I approached her. I couldn’t not approach her.
This time was different.
This time magic was present.
This time was the end of my life as I knew it.
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