My to-do list for the weekend.
Write more memories like yesterday's entry. The pyro years, the school trips and the rest.Clean the bathroom and kitchen.- Start breaking down the big list of dreams by year and put them on their respective pages.
He lived next door to Lori Larzleer. One day when I was in first grade she offered to walk me home. She asked me what was the worst word I knew and I whispered "fuck" into her ear. This was the first time that I realized chicks are the devil, per Jaybird. She ran ahead and kept chanting about how she was gonna tell on me and I would be in so much trouble. By the time I got home, my mom hugged me and asked me what was wrong and was happy that nice girl told her that I was crying and just a block away.
Richard Yablonsky, as mentioned in yesterday's entry had an older cousin who lived in my neighborhood. I never associated with the kid but it's because of Bruce that I discovered I have some very dark tendencies. One time he was boasting about how he doused a cat in gasoline and lit the cat on fire just because he thought it was funny watching it run around. Even at a young age I knew that I wanted to slit his throat, set him on fire and crush his fat fucking skull with a cinderblock. Every time I'd bike past his place, I'd imagine setting it on fire for the sole purpose of killing that monster and it would be so justified. Now it's frightening but deep down I can still feel that fury. Now it's fires are stoked by the fact that I actually had those kinds of thoughts when I was seven.
While I'm on the topic of fire, there's Robert Feinberg. We hung around each other in seventh and eighth grade. Rob, Nick Cataldo and I would go down to the Rahway river and light fireworks or play with fire. February in eighth grade Rob and I would start a fire in the 50 gallon drum that served as a trash can so everyone could be warm. One day we were caught and got three days of in-school suspension. I remember Mr. Hack, the science teacher, yelling at me that I should be doing my science workbook when it was time for science class rather than doing it out of order. Mr. Hack always smelled like cigarettes but he never got cancer as far as I know.
Petty crime and vandalism can forge strong friendships. Rob and I were good friends until ninth grade when I left my hometown's high school for another high school in Berkeley Heights which was part of the regional school district.
One of my friends at the time used to be one of my tormentors. David Schwartz lived in Bridgewater but since his parents worked in my town, they had him attend school there under the lie of living with one of his aunts. Whenever he got on my nerves, I'd think about ratting him out but I never got around to it since it would be too much work and the fact no one would believe me. I can't stand him and he faded into the background radiation sometime in high school.
After my first year in Berkeley Heights, I met Jill Vardalis who is now Jill Cinege. At first I couldn't stand her then we became friends and I wanted to bang the ever-living shit out of her. She lived in Kenilworth, part of the regional school district, and in retrospect she was rough around the edges. One of the warning signs was the fact that she would always feel a need to bring up how she's a recovering addict and alcoholic. Being naïve by nature, I was unaware this was the verbal analogue to the protective bright coloration of Amazonian tree frogs. Of course all logic went out of the window when she came to school wearing this tight white t-shirt with no bra. Curse you for putting me in that "you're like a brother to me" category with your other "brother" Paul Fonseca.
Paulie was a former druggie. One time we were at Jill's place and hung out on the porch while he smoked a joint and Jill got ready in her room. I got my first contact high and it was hilarious. She drove us to the video store to pick up a tape but we couldn't decide on anything because everything was funny and had some sexual innuendo. Jill got fed up and told us to go home.
One of the reasons why I remember Jill is that she'd show up on her own volition at my place. That one simple act always hit me right in the ego. Rachel Shapiro was one of the few people who did that even though we weren't even close to spittin' distance of being legal back in the day. One July night, she showed up in her Duster beater car with the big rust scab on the car's trunk. My father was besides himself because his son was getting attention from a real live girl. My kneejerk reaction was "Dad, pleasepleaseplease back off" but then and now I know his heart was in the right place. He got a bag of fireworks from the basement and we drove off into the night in hopes of finding someplace dark and secluded for our own pyrotechnic display. Every place we went, there were scary older kids hanging out and I didn't want them stealing my fireworks or shooting them at me or worse, making me look more like a douche. So nothing happened at all. Now I'm relieved that I never tried a thing with her.
After high school, she joined the USMC but left after cutting her wrists. She met her current husband at some recovery meeting, got knocked up and they were married because she was with child. Last I heard, she had pumped out a litter and was living in Barnegat Light. When I did hear from her, she'd tell me that she was working at some radio station called The Bee in south Jersey.
It was around this time that I met Brian, Chuck Kleinberg, Bill Pope and his brother Mike and actually had a set of normal friends.
When I'd come in and process on those days, I'd end up not being able to verify employment or unable to reach the customer which means I have about twenty pending applications for Monday. Mondays are always the busiest days. and what I want to do most is get cracking once my ass hits the seat. Completing work from the weekend puts me behind by thirty minutes. Let's not mention that it takes me about thirty minutes to get my engine running at top speed.
I asked her if it's still fifteen an hour and why it was, she said that the president chose the number and figures it's okay because it's voluntary. After that she stated a few times that my job was not in jeopardy because I wasn't signing up for working after work or on the weekends.
If only they knew that overtime, voluntary or not, is always time and a half.
That's when I found myself at an abbey. The idea of becoming a monk seemed attractive to me and I was going through the motions to become a member. When I was nearly done with the initiation process I realized that I was being really selfish. What about raddidge? What about Spot? Shit, I'm not even a deist or a theist. The abbot was annoyed but understood my decision to leave the abbey.
At the bottom of the abbey's hill was a long lake bounded by thick, unpassable forest. I hopped into a rowboat with some other people and began rowing across to the other side and home. All of a sudden there were splashes on the water. Looking back, I saw that rocks and flaming balls were being launched into the water towards me. I knew the monks weren't responsible. The rest of the dream was spent navigating the lake avoiding the projectiles.
raddidge wanted to see the quandranium in the big dipper but she admitted that she made that up. We did spot the very faint star called Dupek.
