Post by "The Last King" on Oct 4, 2013 19:51:13 GMT -4
Dreams of an Absolution
“We will be raised in glory…”
It’s a funny thing, funerals. I’ve never been able to get used to the cognitive dissonance. In my mind Jake’s still here, he and I are sipping beers on the beach at night, we’re jogging next to each other, wordless for miles but heartened by each other’s presence. We’re 22 again and stupid and joyful and careening through our lives from one late night to the next. Now we’re 25, now we’re 30, now I’m best man at his wedding, now I’m pallbearer at his funeral, now he’s in a box.
Jake in a box, me at his funeral. The priest speaks and it’s warbled noise — the teacher’s voice from Peanuts. I can’t make my mind stop swimming and get a foothold in this moment, because my mind simply chooses not to. Choosing instead declare this moment in time invalid, because how could this moment even be happening, because how would this happen to a good man?
“Eternal rest for our departed brother…”
I want to take comfort in the cliches. To take solace in the fact my friend had a good life, a full life. He lived, he loved, he worked, he had a family, he met the girl of his dreams. He paid off his college loans and bought a house and had a 30 year mortgage. He found joy in the little things and enriched the lives of those around him. That’s all true, but it’s all bullshit, too. Because he’s in a box, and tomorrow the Sox will still play, the papers will still get delivered, the nightly news is on at 6 and everything will go on, on, on, hurtling ever forward towards nothing at all.
“Through Christ, he will live again…”
Through Christ we are born, through Christ we die and through Christ we will live again — that’s more bullshit. Because for all the grappling I’ve done with God through the years, all the time spent lapsed and faithless, all the times I’ve returned and rejoined the church, Catholicism and it’s rituals and dogma an old, warn, worm sweater fitting just perfect every time, I’ve never found the answer to the one question I’ve always kept in the deepest part of my heart: if you’re there, God, why the fuck are you such a goddamned fucking asshole all the time?
“Ashes to ashes…”
Samantha is in the first pew, weeping; her mother trying to console her with one hand and hold her crying grandchild with the other. Their baby, Brandon — my godson. He’s 14 months and will never meet his father — and there’s another strike against you, God, you brutal sadist, you heartless piece of shit. I haven’t seen her since the accident because I have nothing to say. It’s like the part of me that knows what is expected of me is just switched off; it’s not even apathy, it’s a lack of recognition. I know I’m supposed to be there for her and Brandon, and shrug off the weight of my own loss because theirs is so incredibly more deep, but I don’t know how to start. I don’t know how to put one foot in front of the other and just do it.
“And now we will have selected readings from the dearly departed’s closest friends and family…”
I start the walk up to the pulpit, not knowing what I’ll say in the least, but I’m not worried about that. The words will come, I’m more worried about them stopping.
“I'm here today to tell you about my best friend.”
People mill about, holding their breath subconsciously. The hot August night suffocates; I breathe in and the damp heat of it just sticks to my ribs, weighing me down. Its a Friday night -a Summer night -in Boston, and the undergrads have invaded. Like cicadas, the season marks their return, their coming foretold by the buzzing of a thousand family vans lugging sensible dorm furniture from Target and Ikea. A hundred thousand futons named RIKTIG or GRÖNK all alike, from Northeastern to Suffolk to Harvard to Simmons.
I've been in this city for years now, and whether or not I was born here is irrelevant: it's permeated my being. From getting in fights on Bruins game nights to wandering Cambridge, breathing in history to stuffing myself like a sausage amongst the droves at Revere Beach on Summer nights, all of us miserable but sticking it out for reasons beyond our understanding. Never dropping my, though -that would be putting on airs, and what the fuck am I, a New Yorker?I'll never get tired of it watching the city flow before me, a thousand tributaries of youth and kinetic energy and passion going from one bar to the next, from one band showcase to the next shitty basement party, all of it just screaming Hope, Hope, Hope. Look at us, we're vital. Look at me. I matter.
I love the kids, the shitheads just off the Fung-Wah, bright eyed and awed at being here. I love the grim lifers, chugging along from their jobs down in the Financial District, pushing into the T to get home to their high rises in the Back Bay. I love it all. I grew up in -if not the sticks, a close relative of it. The bustle keeps me present.
It helps, my love affair with the city. In my line of work, you need to be watching, watching, need to pick up on things that tired eyes, weighed down by boredom and the apathy of years grinding them down just wouldn't catch. That's what I'm doing tonight. Watching, waiting.
I'm waiting for her, for the promise of a cryptic message being fulfilled. "I heard you're the kind of man who can help people out with difficult problems have a problem." A meeting place picked out for what I have to believe is a faith in anonymity-in-plain-sight. An open air bar smack in the middle of Downtown on a Friday. No one will give us a second glance, or so she hopes.
I see her before she sees me, cell phone in one hand, the other digging through what's stuffed in her impossibly small clutch -money clip, bluetooth, work ID badge on a lanyard. I glimpse the blue and red logo of Gregori Industries, a defense and securities lab out in Burlington. She's a commuter, then -but that was easy to pick out, from the way she navigated the sidewalk. Movement a little too cautious, steps a little too unsure. The rest of us who live here, we're too inured to care about our footfalls.
She finally glances up from her smart phone as she reaches the small line queuing up in front of the bouncer. Her shoulders stiffen as I approach, as she puts on what I'm sure is supposed to pass as a calm air and brushes a strand of hair from in front of her eyes.
"You're Scott Wilson....?" she trails off, leaving it a question. I flash her an easy smile.
"Sure. Yes ma'am, I am. You didn't leave a name, Ms..."
"Meyer. Rebecca Meyer," her handshake is limp wristed and damp, her nerves palpable. I try to keep my smile easy and reassuring, and lead her by the elbow past the bouncer- James, a guy I play basketball with sometimes, when my ankle isn't being a bitch. He's a beast, a marathon runner who can bury me right into the asphalt- but my three pointer, and lets be honest, probably a little bit of pity on his part keeps me in his pickup games. Frat guys moan behind us at the unfair treatment.
"Let's go inside, shall we? I'm sure the music is loud enough that no one will be able to hear us, including ourselves."
It seems that you have lost control of your life there, huh Mitchell? No one cares about you or your opinion. While everyone else is out having fun, you are sitting alone, pondering what you have done in your life. I get it. You're a man. It is every man's intent to feel superior. But you have long since felt power over another being. You have long since given an order, and have it be followed. And believe me when I say this, I do feel sorry for you. Every day, you lose more of your manly stature. Everything you have built up to this very day has begun to crumble. Your manhood is depleting. That manly building that you built a long time ago? It has grown very dilapidated and you have no one to blame but yourself.You can’t put the blame on APW. You can’t but the blame on Asylum. And most importantly, you cannot put the blame on me.
I heard what you had to say about me. Your little cut about me and where I am from. It was pathetic.
Do you think those petty insults about how I am not the Last King and asking me where my crown was, was supposed to phase me? Do you think those petty insults about my hometown were supposed to phase me? And it is rather sad that you throw those insults around and claim to be superior over me. You do it to make yourself feel superior. You’re trying to force the feeling back into you. Your self entitlement of being a rabid dog scooping up every last bit of spoils in your mouth will prove to be futile. Your proclamations of capturing a win over me will prove to be futile. I have been all over the world. From my five year run in EHWF to my short time in EWC. I have proven to be a King in that ring. I have proven to leave my opponents weak and broken. Because when I wrestler someone, whether I win or lose, they never walk out the same.
But I will give you credit, Peter. You did have something useful and correct to say about me. I did run away from my past. I did run away for the better. Had I stayed any longer, I wouldn’t be here now. But that is none of your business. That is nobody else’s business but mine. It concerns no one else but me. But enough of the past, Peter. Let us worry about the future and what it holds for you. I come here not to promise victory here in this match. Unlike the lies you have spit, I don’t know of your wrestling history with this sport. I don’t know if you have pure in ring skill or you are a hardcore weapons expert. Do you wrestle clean, or do you cheat to win. These are things I don’t know. These are things I will find out when we do battle on Asylum.
I can admit wholeheartedly that I have not done my research on you. I can admit wholeheartedly that I chose not to do my research on you, simply because you are not important enough to take up my valuable time. You speak of yourself as if you are actually of significance, yet in all actuality, you aren’t even worth the shit on the bottom of my shoes. You speak as if you know me. As if you know what you are going up against. You couldn’t be further from the truth. But I am not going to talk as if I am the greatest entity to walk this earth. I am not the greatest wrestler to grace this company. If anything, I am far from it. With all the talent here like Level-One, Terry Marvin, and an assortment of others, I have a long way to go. But it is okay. Because I Dream of an Absoloution. I dream of a better future, where blame no longer exists and everyone can prosper, guilt-free.
But we are still in the present. And we have a long way to go, right Peter?
But back to those lies you have told to everyone. You claim to know of my history, yet can’t name anywhere I have been. You claim that I beat up on high school rookies, yet you know I am famous. One thing I do not accept is liars, and you are a perfect example. Though, I am unsure of whether you are a liar or if you are prone to talking nonsense. But either way, the situation will be redressed one way or another. Whether it be I walk out of Asylum the victor of our contest, or you walk out the victor. And honestly, I wouldn’t mind the loss. While it wouldn’t benefit me, it wouldn’t kill me. However, I doubt that I will be the loser between us. I am not the weakest link in this contest. I never have been the weakest link, an today is not the time to start. So be prepared Mr.Shelly. Because when it is all said and done, you truly will have lost the minute amount of superiority and manliness left within you. And when that day of reckoning is to come, you will be cast aside, along with all the others who thought they could compete at my level.
Just like the rest of them……
But don’t fret. You have nothing to lose anyways, right?
It’s a funny thing, funerals. I’ve never been able to get used to the cognitive dissonance. In my mind Jake’s still here, he and I are sipping beers on the beach at night, we’re jogging next to each other, wordless for miles but heartened by each other’s presence. We’re 22 again and stupid and joyful and careening through our lives from one late night to the next. Now we’re 25, now we’re 30, now I’m best man at his wedding, now I’m pallbearer at his funeral, now he’s in a box.
Jake in a box, me at his funeral. The priest speaks and it’s warbled noise — the teacher’s voice from Peanuts. I can’t make my mind stop swimming and get a foothold in this moment, because my mind simply chooses not to. Choosing instead declare this moment in time invalid, because how could this moment even be happening, because how would this happen to a good man?
“Eternal rest for our departed brother…”
I want to take comfort in the cliches. To take solace in the fact my friend had a good life, a full life. He lived, he loved, he worked, he had a family, he met the girl of his dreams. He paid off his college loans and bought a house and had a 30 year mortgage. He found joy in the little things and enriched the lives of those around him. That’s all true, but it’s all bullshit, too. Because he’s in a box, and tomorrow the Sox will still play, the papers will still get delivered, the nightly news is on at 6 and everything will go on, on, on, hurtling ever forward towards nothing at all.
“Through Christ, he will live again…”
Through Christ we are born, through Christ we die and through Christ we will live again — that’s more bullshit. Because for all the grappling I’ve done with God through the years, all the time spent lapsed and faithless, all the times I’ve returned and rejoined the church, Catholicism and it’s rituals and dogma an old, warn, worm sweater fitting just perfect every time, I’ve never found the answer to the one question I’ve always kept in the deepest part of my heart: if you’re there, God, why the fuck are you such a goddamned fucking asshole all the time?
“Ashes to ashes…”
Samantha is in the first pew, weeping; her mother trying to console her with one hand and hold her crying grandchild with the other. Their baby, Brandon — my godson. He’s 14 months and will never meet his father — and there’s another strike against you, God, you brutal sadist, you heartless piece of shit. I haven’t seen her since the accident because I have nothing to say. It’s like the part of me that knows what is expected of me is just switched off; it’s not even apathy, it’s a lack of recognition. I know I’m supposed to be there for her and Brandon, and shrug off the weight of my own loss because theirs is so incredibly more deep, but I don’t know how to start. I don’t know how to put one foot in front of the other and just do it.
“And now we will have selected readings from the dearly departed’s closest friends and family…”
I start the walk up to the pulpit, not knowing what I’ll say in the least, but I’m not worried about that. The words will come, I’m more worried about them stopping.
“I'm here today to tell you about my best friend.”
People mill about, holding their breath subconsciously. The hot August night suffocates; I breathe in and the damp heat of it just sticks to my ribs, weighing me down. Its a Friday night -a Summer night -in Boston, and the undergrads have invaded. Like cicadas, the season marks their return, their coming foretold by the buzzing of a thousand family vans lugging sensible dorm furniture from Target and Ikea. A hundred thousand futons named RIKTIG or GRÖNK all alike, from Northeastern to Suffolk to Harvard to Simmons.
I've been in this city for years now, and whether or not I was born here is irrelevant: it's permeated my being. From getting in fights on Bruins game nights to wandering Cambridge, breathing in history to stuffing myself like a sausage amongst the droves at Revere Beach on Summer nights, all of us miserable but sticking it out for reasons beyond our understanding. Never dropping my, though -that would be putting on airs, and what the fuck am I, a New Yorker?I'll never get tired of it watching the city flow before me, a thousand tributaries of youth and kinetic energy and passion going from one bar to the next, from one band showcase to the next shitty basement party, all of it just screaming Hope, Hope, Hope. Look at us, we're vital. Look at me. I matter.
I love the kids, the shitheads just off the Fung-Wah, bright eyed and awed at being here. I love the grim lifers, chugging along from their jobs down in the Financial District, pushing into the T to get home to their high rises in the Back Bay. I love it all. I grew up in -if not the sticks, a close relative of it. The bustle keeps me present.
It helps, my love affair with the city. In my line of work, you need to be watching, watching, need to pick up on things that tired eyes, weighed down by boredom and the apathy of years grinding them down just wouldn't catch. That's what I'm doing tonight. Watching, waiting.
I'm waiting for her, for the promise of a cryptic message being fulfilled. "I heard you're the kind of man who can help people out with difficult problems have a problem." A meeting place picked out for what I have to believe is a faith in anonymity-in-plain-sight. An open air bar smack in the middle of Downtown on a Friday. No one will give us a second glance, or so she hopes.
I see her before she sees me, cell phone in one hand, the other digging through what's stuffed in her impossibly small clutch -money clip, bluetooth, work ID badge on a lanyard. I glimpse the blue and red logo of Gregori Industries, a defense and securities lab out in Burlington. She's a commuter, then -but that was easy to pick out, from the way she navigated the sidewalk. Movement a little too cautious, steps a little too unsure. The rest of us who live here, we're too inured to care about our footfalls.
She finally glances up from her smart phone as she reaches the small line queuing up in front of the bouncer. Her shoulders stiffen as I approach, as she puts on what I'm sure is supposed to pass as a calm air and brushes a strand of hair from in front of her eyes.
"You're Scott Wilson....?" she trails off, leaving it a question. I flash her an easy smile.
"Sure. Yes ma'am, I am. You didn't leave a name, Ms..."
"Meyer. Rebecca Meyer," her handshake is limp wristed and damp, her nerves palpable. I try to keep my smile easy and reassuring, and lead her by the elbow past the bouncer- James, a guy I play basketball with sometimes, when my ankle isn't being a bitch. He's a beast, a marathon runner who can bury me right into the asphalt- but my three pointer, and lets be honest, probably a little bit of pity on his part keeps me in his pickup games. Frat guys moan behind us at the unfair treatment.
"Let's go inside, shall we? I'm sure the music is loud enough that no one will be able to hear us, including ourselves."
It seems that you have lost control of your life there, huh Mitchell? No one cares about you or your opinion. While everyone else is out having fun, you are sitting alone, pondering what you have done in your life. I get it. You're a man. It is every man's intent to feel superior. But you have long since felt power over another being. You have long since given an order, and have it be followed. And believe me when I say this, I do feel sorry for you. Every day, you lose more of your manly stature. Everything you have built up to this very day has begun to crumble. Your manhood is depleting. That manly building that you built a long time ago? It has grown very dilapidated and you have no one to blame but yourself.You can’t put the blame on APW. You can’t but the blame on Asylum. And most importantly, you cannot put the blame on me.
I heard what you had to say about me. Your little cut about me and where I am from. It was pathetic.
Do you think those petty insults about how I am not the Last King and asking me where my crown was, was supposed to phase me? Do you think those petty insults about my hometown were supposed to phase me? And it is rather sad that you throw those insults around and claim to be superior over me. You do it to make yourself feel superior. You’re trying to force the feeling back into you. Your self entitlement of being a rabid dog scooping up every last bit of spoils in your mouth will prove to be futile. Your proclamations of capturing a win over me will prove to be futile. I have been all over the world. From my five year run in EHWF to my short time in EWC. I have proven to be a King in that ring. I have proven to leave my opponents weak and broken. Because when I wrestler someone, whether I win or lose, they never walk out the same.
But I will give you credit, Peter. You did have something useful and correct to say about me. I did run away from my past. I did run away for the better. Had I stayed any longer, I wouldn’t be here now. But that is none of your business. That is nobody else’s business but mine. It concerns no one else but me. But enough of the past, Peter. Let us worry about the future and what it holds for you. I come here not to promise victory here in this match. Unlike the lies you have spit, I don’t know of your wrestling history with this sport. I don’t know if you have pure in ring skill or you are a hardcore weapons expert. Do you wrestle clean, or do you cheat to win. These are things I don’t know. These are things I will find out when we do battle on Asylum.
I can admit wholeheartedly that I have not done my research on you. I can admit wholeheartedly that I chose not to do my research on you, simply because you are not important enough to take up my valuable time. You speak of yourself as if you are actually of significance, yet in all actuality, you aren’t even worth the shit on the bottom of my shoes. You speak as if you know me. As if you know what you are going up against. You couldn’t be further from the truth. But I am not going to talk as if I am the greatest entity to walk this earth. I am not the greatest wrestler to grace this company. If anything, I am far from it. With all the talent here like Level-One, Terry Marvin, and an assortment of others, I have a long way to go. But it is okay. Because I Dream of an Absoloution. I dream of a better future, where blame no longer exists and everyone can prosper, guilt-free.
But we are still in the present. And we have a long way to go, right Peter?
But back to those lies you have told to everyone. You claim to know of my history, yet can’t name anywhere I have been. You claim that I beat up on high school rookies, yet you know I am famous. One thing I do not accept is liars, and you are a perfect example. Though, I am unsure of whether you are a liar or if you are prone to talking nonsense. But either way, the situation will be redressed one way or another. Whether it be I walk out of Asylum the victor of our contest, or you walk out the victor. And honestly, I wouldn’t mind the loss. While it wouldn’t benefit me, it wouldn’t kill me. However, I doubt that I will be the loser between us. I am not the weakest link in this contest. I never have been the weakest link, an today is not the time to start. So be prepared Mr.Shelly. Because when it is all said and done, you truly will have lost the minute amount of superiority and manliness left within you. And when that day of reckoning is to come, you will be cast aside, along with all the others who thought they could compete at my level.
Just like the rest of them……
But don’t fret. You have nothing to lose anyways, right?
