Writing, for me, has always been a lot like dating. In both instances you invest time and energy to pursue an unknown end that will either delight or destroy. Sometimes an oddly satisfying combination of the two. The only certainty is that you'll never stumble across anything worthwhile unless you explore every opportunity—even if it seems like nothing at the time.
So, what's my unsolicited advice to those still floundering in the shallow end of the dating pool? Just remember that time heals all wounds; antibiotics handle most anything else. In short, jump in. After all, I'm happily married; take from that smug comment what you will. By my count, I've got one up on Tiger Woods—never thought I'd be able to say that.
When it comes to writing however, I'm still wandering around in the dark with my pants down, clueless—like an undergrad fumbling to unclasp a woman's brassiere for the first time (I was a late bloomer). My only advice to fellow writers (myself included) is to remember that every cockamamie idea, every next word, every blank page and, most importantly, every failure holds creative possibility. If anything, I've found that inspiration strikes at the most inconvenient times, so just roll with it. Sure, there's also the chance that you'll scribe the literary equivalent of Syphilis—but it's a risk worth taking.
What follows is technically an excerpt from the novel I'm working on, tentatively titled Desperately Seeking Suicide. While I originally envisioned what follows as a prologue (of sorts), it ended up being nothing more than a brief glimpse into the mind of the protagonist. This epiphany occurred after my wife (then girlfriend) read an early version of the passage, paused for a moment, then turned to me and asked,
"Are you depressed?"
Considering the state of the as-of-yet-unnamed character, I took it as a compliment. I then quickly reassured her that I was completely safe around sharp objects, tall buildings and unattended piles of pharmaceuticals.
Her inquiry, however, gave me a new perspective on the piece and upon rereading it, I discovered that rather than the tightly knit, tone setting narrative I believed it to be, the passage was actually the dark, personal, introspective ramblings of a suicidal lunatic—so I have that going for me. In other words, a fairly solid character sketch, but not quite riveting prose.
Because I'm stubborn I still plan to work this into the novel itself somewhere (in one form or another), but I've come to terms with the fact that in the format presented here it simply does not work. Cheers to productive failure. Um, enjoy?
Desperately Seeking Suicide [an excerpt of sorts]So that is...well...that. Round and round it goes, where it stops...well, that beats the shit out of me. I'll keep peering into dark corners with the hope of finding a sliver of light.
Mine means not yours to envy.
Lollipops, rainbows and sunshine strumming warm fingers down your face. Ugh.
Paper cuts, bedsores and glass shards sunk beneath fingernails.
Perfect family? Average everything? Passable anything?
Fuck. That.
That repugnant six-bedroom, five and-a-quarter bath, Tudor-inspired nightmare with two wet bars—that bastard abortion of modesty you call home—those hallowed, Roman numeral-tagged offspring named after Shakespearean twits you gleaned from baby name top ten lists forged in the gloomy recesses of the Internet? These are my darkest visions of hell. During my weak moments when I succumb to emotional masturbation, a five-room, one bath refrigerator-inspired compartment—that familial petri dish brimming with Cord, my widowed mother's withering husk and the ghost of my cancerous father—is an orgy of sentiment and cheer.
That's my money shot.
My treasures are not yours to appraise. Keep your fuzzy puppies, fanciful cars and functional families. Carve my heart out with a silver spoon.
I’m still smiling.
Henceforth, is the last will and testament of [REDACTED]. To the world, I leave the knowledge I now impart to it. Genius musings or just one more shit stain on this abused porcelain planet? Decide for yourself.
Thirty-three seconds. That is all it takes. That is all it took.
A goddamn time-fart in the vast scope of eternity and my life changed forever. Is the idea of eternity passing gas ridiculous? Maybe you need to reexamine the big bang theory for the creation of the universe.
Sleep tight peach blossom, your nightmares are real.
As I understand it, a few hundred trillion years ago all matter in the universe compressed into a tiny, super dense, boiling crumb. This state of existence resulted from any number of seemingly random events: inertia; gravity; interplanetary war between leather-clad cosmic space-vixens; the catalyst is inconsequential.
Everything that was existed inside this one lump of matter smaller than a paramecium’s prick. Even more perplexing, this solitary little Dot wasn’t just sitting in the middle of the universe with its thumb up its ass; it was in and of itself the universe in its entirety; thumb and ass included. Not bad for a Dot.
The foundations and ingredients of everything that was squished into a colorless pudding-like soup inside the amazing, incredible, all-being, all-knowing, cannot-live-without-it, call-now-and-use-your-credit-card-to-order-and-we’ll-throw-in-a-second-omnipotent-Dot-for-just-nineteen-ninety-five, cosmic turd. A period, in quite the literal sense, encompassing not only the very sentence it ended, but also every sentence that has been, is now, or ever shall be (world without end a-fucking-men). In short:
The universe [drawn to scale]: .
Stephen Hawking, eat a brief history of your fucking heart out.
This Dot contained the genetic notes and blueprints for entire ecosystems, civilizations, and species—the prehistory of the prehistory to the alleged divine musings that bore our nuclear civilization. From the first prehistoric bacteria to the cutting edge of Internet porn. The framework and foundation for everything confined to a microscopic prison; cosmic sperm coagulating inside the swollen left testicle of the universe. The physical beginnings of history in its most fragile and infant state, slipping, sliding and frolicking around in an orgy of everything behind the swelled purple pup tent of a universal erection building steadily toward one huge climax.
John C. Holmes eat your still, rotting heart out.
Finally all the pressure of this orgy contained in THE microscopic Dot became too much. Everything that is, was, and ever will be, hung with muscles taut and breath bated, teetering on the edge of a razor blade facing the supreme existential question: Existence or non? Evacuation or implosion? The lady or the tiger?
Naturally, everything that is, was, or ever would be rushed forward, oozing toward existence in an unruly hoard. The unimaginable energy exodus comparable only to a flock of hormone-crazed tweens flooding through a doggie door to smother the latest industry-manufactured, politically correct, racially diverse, comfortably rebellious, parent-approved, musical juggernaut with economically calculated love. So it exploded.
.
. . .
. . .
Big bang [not drawn to scale]: . . . . .
. . .
. . .
.
Matter dispersed in all directions; showers of heat and searing debris simultaneously hurdled through and created the universe, expanding the cosmos on ad infinitum. Somewhere along the line on an insignificant chunk of molten rock, primitive life belched forth. Ta-fucking-dah. Sorry cosmic Dot, your time has passed. You’ve gone the route of rotary phones, audiocassettes, meaningful relationships and riveting network television.
To make a snoozer story short, the cosmos blew hot greasy chunks setting in motion an epic chain-reaction, like a flame devouring a short fuse, that eventually erupted into this very moment. It continues to this very day, adding links in all directions until my ending combusts into someone else’s beginning and so on and so on with each passing microsecond.
The beauty of creation runs parallel to the life cycle of clogged pores. If you’ve been putting off suicide, now is the time to reconsider your procrastinative ways.
Mankind, the politically incorrect acne on the Earth’s back, born from the stinking flatulence of eternity; science always did have a knack for making me feel special. The top of the food chain is a long way up and I’m clinging to the bottom like a special barnacle…but I digress. The point is that life, stripped down to its most basic nude-amoeba essentials, consists of just a few seconds; a full minute if you’re a born-lucky bastard. And in that case, may you choke on the silver spoon that feeds you.
There are no moments. Hallmark holds the creative rights to everyday moments, emotions, feelings, occasions, celebrations, seasons, holidays, and non-denominational milestone events.
New Year’s®; Valentine’s®; St. Patrick’s®; Birthdays®; Halloween®; Thanksgiving®; Christmas®.
They are not real. Accept it.
Love©1915; Lust©1969; Anxiety©1939; Fear©1941; Birth©1; Death©2012.
Rinse and repeat as needed, making sure to omit relevant details which drastically alter the context or meaning
I'll admit, it’s sick. Sick like staring into the black flower of a wart as it blossoms through the flesh on your fingertip. Sick like walking in on your parents making hot monkey love and they ask if you would like to join them. Sick like the possibility that fruit feels pain but bares it in stoic silence.
Think about that next time you slice into a kiwi you masochistic fuck.
Routine is not life. Routine wastes the precious minutes of our wannabe sitcom lives. Wake up in a fishbowl one-bedroom apartment with a rapid-spawning mound of dishes festering away in your rented, rust-stained, once-white porcelain sink that reeks like a rotting corpse in July to the blaring horror of a 6:45 a.m. alarm that might as well be a truck grinding down your spine. Life is pretty bleak when your sink is a rental. You’re up this early to shuffle onto the condensed soup cans masquerading as subway trains wriggling back and forth beneath the city streets and infested with unhappy travelers who would rather stomp you out of existence than quit elbowing you in the ribs as you stand pressed next to them on the way to work each morning. Work is a countdown until you leave; eight hours (if you're lucky) in a voluntary prison masked by computers, suits, ties, shiny black shoes, money, clients, meetings, projects and thinking outside the box in order to be a good little proactive helper monkey struggling endlessly to change the goddamn paradigm.
Consider this for a lifetime. The average human being functions as an organism for roughly 75 years. That equals 27,375 days, or 657,000 hours, or 39,420,000 minutes, or 2,365,200,000 seconds. A typical workweek averages roughly 45 hours. That equals 180 hours a month, or 2,160 hours a year, or 162,000 hours in a lifetime. Averages are typically much lower than actual numeric statistics.
Give but not take.
This means that if you’re a typical working human, you have roughly 495,000 hours within which to push work into the back closet of your mind like dirty laundry and focus on yourself, your family and your friends—as well as sleeping, eating, defecating, recreating, reproducing, masturbating and any other mundane tasks deemed important by society and self. Sleep alone claims 109,500 of these hours—and that’s only if you're spending roughly four hours a night in Neverland. That leaves approximately 385,500 hours, or 23,130,000 minutes, or 1,387,800,000 seconds for everything else. These statistics reduce at a drastic rate depending upon environmental conditions such as war, inclement weather, being struck by a bus and/or existing in close proximity to any other organisms. Particularly those of the human race.
If I live to the age of 75 and had all of these precious seconds, I believe 33 of them could be labeled meaningful—not a good average. But I’ll be lucky if I see half of those seconds. Don’t cry for me Argentina, the truth is I've always wanted to leave you. The way I see it, I’m just raising my batting average.
Envy me.
It takes seconds for a life-changing event to occur. There are no moments. An old black shoulder bag with a broken zipper that I received as a free gift for ordering Time magazine when Oliver North was still making headlines contained my entire life.
It was stolen from me.
Most people would agree that this sucks. A select few may wonder what the bag contained that amounted to my entire life. My response to this inquiry: don’t even ask, it cannot matter. Pity is about as useful as an asshole pocked with hemorrhoids. How can a man’s life fit comfortably in a black shoulder bag with a broken zipper that you received as a free gift for ordering Time magazine when Oliver North was still making headlines? The truth is, if it is truly a life worth anything, it cannot.
Pillow for your ‘rhoids sweet peach blossom?
There was a time when my life fit comfortably into tiny sack that took thirty-three seconds to steal. Time changes everything.
For the first time ever, I am happy, an oft-misunderstood concept. Happiness is not attaining perfect spiritual creaminess or finding true love. Much to the dismay of Greenpeace, PETA, and the rest of those Earth-Day-Tree-City-USA-assholes, it most definitely is not gazing into the eyes of a fuzzy little puppy as he laps at your face with a pink sandpaper tongue.
In reality, that cute little puppy laps your face with the same pink sandpaper tongue he used to clean his not-quite-as-cute little puppy sphincter two minutes earlier.
For my money, I've always found Clostridium Thiaminolyticum to be the cuddliest of all canine fecal bacterium.
That cute little puppy shits under your bed, pisses in your shoes and inevitably decimates a favorite something. Duke’s reward for such innocent and destructive behavior—beatings, abuse, neglect and more.
Man’s best friend? Man doesn’t even like himself. Suicide, in essence, is just arguing with yourself and losing.
True happiness comes from the realization that everyone lives on borrowed time. Some degenerate punk-Picasso walks up to you, places a high-caliber paintbrush to your temple and creates abstract art on the wall with your head—it doesn’t matter. You’ve lost nothing.
It seems cliché to say that your entire life flashes before your eyes before you die; but it is true to an extent. Only the precious seconds that actually matter make that final film trailer. Behold, the great mystery of life revealed. Life, living, these precious seconds—all of it is a game of chance; you play the hand you’re dealt. Which seconds matter is ultimately up to you.
Sorry, reality is rarely beautiful in the conventional sense of the term. Besides, this is not where my story begins. All recollections are a slow plodding journey to the present. Nostalgia, memory and digression are the literary equivalent of procrastination.
Life imitates art. Art envies life.
You might dismiss me as crazy. I'll proffer that I'm more lucid than your average mediocrity hound. As it stands now, I hold the winning hand in a deck that was supposed to be stacked against me. The person holding the gun to my head is me. So if my calculations are correct, I'm one step beyond the curve.
Suicides, like the individuals who commit them, are either introverted or extroverted. Introverted suicides seek to punish themselves out of self pity, ignorance or boredom. Extroverted suicides seek to punish others through subjection to the loss of the self-departed. This of course presupposes that the soon-to-be-self-liquidated will, in fact, be missed. In both instances, there is one fact about self-snuffing that is undeniable.
Suicide is the ultimate act of narcissism.
Time to go. Looks like the media is finally here.
P.S. — To the unknown person who stole my bag from the McDonald's at Randolph and Dearborn on December 10, 2001. You're still an asshole, but for what it's worth, thank you.
Photo credit.
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