August 21st, 2023 - The End is Only a Beginning

Dear TNY,

Monday.  “The End is Only a Beginning”.  And what a title that is, both in its truth and its complete uselessness to the people who really need it.

What kind of people?

Me (prepare yourself for a self-centered pity party, as I have been known to do, because narcissism is real).

I’m having trouble getting out of bed these days. Or cleaning myself in the shower (I get in the shower, but I just stand there). I’m not going outside except for groceries. I don’t cook anymore. Or do the dishes. I’m fucking struggling.

Like, what’s the point, you know? 

I got back from the writing conference and tried to have a relationship again.  A fresh start, as she would put it.  And man….man.  There was a night last week, we were sleeping next to each other, cliché spoons, and my arms were her arms, and my body was her body, the bridge of my nose on the back of her head and I cannot describe to you how much I was okay.  I was fucking okay.  I wasn’t worried.  Or sad.  I wasn’t upset.  Or awake.  Or crying.  I wasn’t anything.

And that’s gone.  Ben, he’s gone.  The boys, they went home too.  They took all their shit with them so the apartment feels empty.  And my special lady?  I asked for her to go too.  And geographically she’s gone as well.  What else is gone?  Lahaina.  My father.  Most of my friends because I moved away.  The money is going away.  Phil and Maude (not their real names), the Chinese couple that lived in the duplex with me, they are gone too.  Back to China.  The house is for sale and I need to get the fuck out of here.  I’m more isolated than maybe I’ve ever been in my whole life.  And all I want is for her to hold my fucking hand and understand this. I want to be taken care of too, you know? Swept off of my feet. I’d like to be the damsel one time, guys. Who doesn’t?  And I could write a hundred and fifty negative things about why that’s not possible (hyperbole, okay?!).  But I won’t.  What I’ll say is that inside her is a person that knows.  A knowing person. That inside, there’s a person that is plugged in to the source of all of this.  The main nerve.  The love dust sadness madness.  I can see it.  Plugged in the same that I am. So close I can almost feel her feet finding mine in the dark. So close that I can feel the presence of her hand just past the end of my fingertips. 

For some reason we just couldn’t do it.  We tried.  And we couldn’t do it. I remember being in Tacoma, just before coming here, sitting on the floor in my sister’s kitchen listening to “Over Oceans” and crying. I was so overwhelmed with hope. Because I found someone who figured out how to talk to me in way a I could hear. And man, I got off that plane…

I know the person I found is there. She wanted to come to the airport. She wants to grow flowers in the darkest parts of me. I know all of that still exists. We’re just inside two adults who keep prioritizing other shit. And that’s okay too. That’s just being an adult. There’s no manual for this shit. No one knows what to do.

Heartbreak is what I’m saying here.  I’m sitting in this apartment all alone.  Everything is gone.  This feeling of hope that used to live here in this little Palolo apartment is gone too. It doesn’t even feel like the same house. It’s a hotel room or something. A way station. And all that’s left here is beer.  And, guys, I gotta tell you:  I’m worried.  It’s now very real that you can drink yourself to death.  And now it wouldn’t even be original.  Fucking Ben.

Ben,

Hey man.  It’s me.  So the other day I was in San Francisco and I was in an Uber talking to this fellow from Morocco.  You’d have liked him.  He was a hard worker, funny, and just a nice dude.  Anyway, we were nearing the place I was going, a pinball place, and we drove by this huge brick building and I said, “Holy shit, is that the armory from kink.com,” and wouldn’t you know it, the guy said, “Yeah, that used to be the porno palace.”  And I saw a lot of shit that night, my first time in SF, but I was more starstruck by an old brick armory with a chainlink fence around it than anything else.  And I had no one to tell about it, man.  Because you fucking died.  We were all having a rich conversation about life and you just got up, without excusing yourself, and exited stage left.  And yeah, there are others.  I’ve got a few friends left, but none of them are you, man.  None of them are you.  So in addition to all this other shit that’s gone, now I have nowhere to put a very selective subset of shit.  I’m a freak again because my validation up & vanished.

Fuck am I a piece of shit, feeling sorry for myself all over these pages.

You just think it’s going to be easier.  This life.  You’ll be a kid, have a fun childhood, grow up and meet an angel and you’ll consistently be surprised by how much you can love her and how she just gets more beautiful with age and then you’ll have some kids together, all of which will be geniuses, but in completely different ways, and they’ll grow up and prosper and you’ll fall even harder in love with your angel, you’ll have good jobs along the way where people will genuinely respect you and your opinions, there will be barbecues in the summer and sledding adventures in the winter, and then, when your time comes, it will be painless, surrounded by your family and the families they have made.

Yeah, except your life blows up at 15 years old and then keeps doing that every 5-10 years and now you’re in a vacuum up on a hill and feeling sorry for yourself, listening to the Turnpike Troubadours “Pay No Rent” on loop, realizing you fucked everything up, and that you’ll always fuck everything up, because Dan’s right, you aren’t nice to yourself, and after this we’ll do Father John Misty and that, my friends, will really break you.  Great.

There’s a spot of period blood on the underside of the toilet seat.  I don’t know how to clean it off.

And what to say about a stupid fucking COVID story by TC Boyle.  You know, I used to think he had it figured out.  Had the formula for writing the perfect short stories (the formula was perfect, the stories always wind up lackluster).  And I read this one and…man…her fucking name is Caroline, the MC resorts to slipping through memories for transcendence, and those memories are of swimming and breath holding…

Goddamn it, it’s like why does TC Boyle have a fucking career and I don’t, and really that’s not it at all because I have nothing against him (he’s prolific as fuck), this is really about me, and it’s not even about writing, it’s like why can people seem to make life work but I can’t?  Like I’m some faulty piece of equipment just short-circuiting my way through life, fucking shit up.

Anyway, the story was overwrought.  I highlighted multiple passages that seem to exist to make the writer happy.  And it’s hard to care about COVID at this point.  Not because it didn’t and doesn’t matter.  It’s just the past, man. 

Also, I need to shut up.  What a weak bitch.  This is all nonsense.  I’ll go cry on my own.  Save some shred of dignity.  As if there was some to save.

Later.

Nick