For the Betterment

As I have aged, my treasured logic has repeatedly excused itself, drifting off to mindless monotony, while recklessness grabs the reins and gallops me through meadows of drunken debauchery, banana split boats, cigarette cravings and bottomless cups of strong coffee. I cannot be here with this sober body. I must submerge into an altered state. There, I will be better than I am. I will be funny and lax. I will be coveted company with more interesting things to say and the courage to say them. A bottle of merlot. A box of pinot gris. A shiny pint of cold ale that wets my pink palm, eases my body with warmth and hinders me as I walk crookedly toward dimly lit bathrooms in barroom basements. The dick jokes ensue: vulgarity and the hilarity of vulgarity. Crude crass and the excuse of drink as we yell over electric record players, competitively cacophonous crowds or lusty local bands. I crave cigarettes. I imagine licking little pieces of paper, spreading the dry leaves, rolling them into scrolls, striking matches, cupping butts and sucking smoke. I'd be like James Dean. Pass the whiskey and I'll sing like Tom Waits. Get me drunk and I'll strum like Johnny Cash. How sexy it is to have a callous regard for one's devout liver, blood, skin, stomach and lungs. We'll sleep when we're dead, we say grabbing at the cuffs of our baristas for large coffees with splashes of cow cream and paper packets of saccharin. Coffee for breakfast. Beef burgers on chemically engineered buns for lunch. Deep fried fish and bourbon for supper. Sleep when we're dead because we'll be dead by nightfall anyway. Besides, I could die today, we say. Hit by a bus, brain aneurysm, dropped A-bomb. Duffel bagged eyes, hours of carousing and the stink of excreting bacon and eggs. What stink. What miserable belligerent stink. It's like the end of Thelma and Louise. We never see the car crash into the canyon. Instead, we are left with a freeze frame of freedom in flight. No crashing metal, no burning engines, no bloody guts splattering the orange dusty rocks below. We are not devastated by their double suicide, but inspired by their courage. We don't imagine retired rock stars in hospital beds, rehabilitation centers or weekly support groups. Instead we look to magazine photographs of pyrotechnics, lines of cocaine, and gaggles of groupies. Let's drink until dawn! We cheer, though by 3AM, we're on the kitchen floor stiff with indigestion and impending diarrhea. Ignorance is sweet bountiful bliss, however is it still sweet when we're sweating out last night's french fry oil or belching up mayonnaise, margaritas and mozzarella sticks? Is it still sweet when I go from sober to drunk to hung over all during the course of one house party? 

Over the years, I have ordered different prescriptions for pleasure, but the problem is always the same. Eventually I piss out the pills and am left nauseous, unfulfilled and sadder than before. Temporary bandages that fall off in the pool, clog the drain and disgust all guests.     

That's not to say, I can't enjoy the works of drunken musicians, coke head writers and cigarette smoking actors, but that I don't have to mimic their methods. I don't really want to be like Waits, Cash or Dean anyway. I'd much prefer to be like Geena Davis in A League of Their Own. Top of my game, smart, and strong. So, for the betterment of my body, I have abandoned my position within the norm of popular American culture. In December, I quit coffee. In February, I quit the consumption of animal products. In June, I quit all excessive alcohol. I feel whole for the first time in years. Like my body has just relearned independence. Every day, I have clarity, unyielding health, and strength. My only aversion is how others respond. Some are curious, some supportive, some make jokes, and many are completely clueless. What do you eat, grass? Looks like they don't have leaves or tofu on the menu. You're not getting a drink? I'm learning to not be so shy and sensitive about my lifestyle. I quit the popular poisons of my past and there should be pride in that. There will be pride in that. 

Scott tells me that he loves how impressionable I am. I had always thought that it was a bad thing. "No," he assures me, "it's a great thing. You are effected by something and you actually change because of it." 

"Where does this trait come from?"

"Why does it have to be from somewhere?" 

"I don't know, because I want to know why I am this way. Why I care so much."  

Why others appear to care so little, which is an unreasonable assumption to make. I've just changed and others have not changed with me. I can't blame anyone for that. All I can really do is take care of myself, which I am. 








No, I'm not pregnant.