Calling It a Night (Blog #590)

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It’s 10:30 on a Saturday evening, and I’m at home with my parents. I’ve been here with them all day and was here with them all day yesterday too. I don’t mean to brag about my social life, these are just the facts. Earlier this evening I took a shower for the first time in–I don’t know–several days. I shaved and everything. Now I feel like a new man. A friend just sent me a text and–because we were talking about weddings–said, “Let me know when yours is. I bet it will be a great party.” And whereas my first instinct was to think, That’ll never happen (because I’m single AF), my second thought was, Hey, wait a damn minute. That could very well happen! It’s not like I’m dead yet.

I mean, people do get married every day. People just like me.

This afternoon I worked on my photo organizing project, mainly going through already-put-together albums and trying to wrap my head around what I’ve been doing with my life. Two things struck me. One, I’ve been doing quite a bit–going places, seeing things. Even way back in my high school and college years, I put a ton of miles on the road. Two, I’ve said a number of times on the blog that I was fourteen when my dad got arrested and fifteen when he went to prison. But after looking through dated pictures and talking to my parents today, I realized I was fourteen for the entire ordeal. Dad left home two weeks BEFORE I turned fifteen. I know that’s not much of a difference, but still, I’ve been wrong about that little detail for a long time now.

All those years are such a daze.

As I’m only able to dig through my memories for a couple hours at a time (it’s not bad, it’s just “a lot”), I spent the rest of this afternoon watching two movies on my laptop–the animated film Coco and Crazy, Stupid, Love. And although Crazy, Stupid, Love was enjoyable (well, looking at Ryan Reynolds was enjoyable), Coco absolutely won me over. It’s about a boy who LOVES music but feels like an outsider because his family HATES it (because his great-great grandfather left his wife and child in order to “follow his dream.”) Anyway, it’s glorious from start to finish and even involves dead people (skeletons) dancing and singing.

I definitely cried.

Honestly, it feels like a movie night. It’s cold outside, and the idea of closing this laptop and crawling back in my warm bed with ANOTHER film sounds simply perfect. I don’t know–I’ve been reading serious book after serious book lately and flipping through all these memories/emotions, and I’m tired of thinking, thinking, thinking and processing, processing, processing. Plus, my stomach has been upset pretty much nonstop for a few months now, and movies are a good distraction, a nice way to “get away.”

So I’m gonna do that. Go watch a movie. Call it a night. Try again tomorrow.

Quotes from CoCo (Marcus)

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All your scattered pieces want to come back home.

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Too Late, Too Tired (Blog #588)

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It’s just before midnight, and I’m at my friend Justin’s house. His wife Ashley (who is also my friend) has already retired, and I think Justin’s playing video games. I’ve spent the last five hours here at their kitchen table using their internet and changing every online and social media password I have. (Apparently I have a lot.) This is a project I started a couple weeks ago after a minor security breach on my laptop (I got a virus) but didn’t finish because I spilled hot tea on my keyboard (whoops). Anyway, I think I’m done now. Finally.

I just counted. 75 sites/passwords total. No wonder it took so long.

This afternoon I worked on my photo organizing project. Not organizing the photos–that’s already been done–but organizing my brain. I’m putting together a timeline of my life, like in a document. Super nerdy, I know, but last night I watched a 60 Minutes feature about rare people who remember every day–every second, really–of their lives. Like, what they had for breakfast on September 3, 1976, and what happened in the news that day. Anyway, there are like ten of these people in the world. Crazy. And I don’t need to reconstruct my ENTIRE life, but I would like to get some of the basics on paper. 1999: Graduated high school, worked at summer camp, started college, got first “real” job.

Today I concentrated on my first few summers at summer camp, 1997-1999, and took notes about things I remembered as I flipped through pictures. That was the summer I had one of the worst sinus infections ever. My temperature was 103 degrees, and the camp nurse wouldn’t let me see a doctor. (I was pissed off but didn’t know what to do or how to stand up for myself at the time.) This is the most fascinating thing about this project so far, that I recall so strongly my impressions of various co-workers and campers. In some instances, although it’s been twenty years, I still remember first and last names of people I barely knew. Just like that.

Weird how memory can be so randomly selective.

Here’s a picture from 1999, my first year as a counselor. (Before that I was an “assistant” counselor.) Boy I wish I had that fire now; my feet are freezing. They always freeze during the winter. Every year it’s five months of constant toe-frost.

So many memories come flooding back as simple information–that thing happened. But many others come back as information plus emotion. Like, I remember feeling pissed off, embarrassed, disgusted, turned off, turned on, whatever. I guess it strikes me now because at the time I wasn’t one to either trust my perceptions or acknowledge my emotions. And this is the fascinating thing for me, that although I wasn’t consciously processing what was going on back then, my body was still taking it all in, still storing the data in the background the way my computer saves my passwords.

I’m ready to call it a night. My feet are cold, and my brain’s all over the place. Just twenty-four hours ago, right before I went to bed, my dad knocked on my door to tell me that a dear family friend of ours had passed away unexpectedly. I think I cried myself to sleep. Today I’ve been in denial. I want to write about him because I think that would help, but I can’t tonight. It’s too late, I’m too tired, and I won’t do him justice. So maybe tomorrow when I can think straight and take my time. I don’t mean to be start a topic and not finish it. I’m simply–done–for now.

Quotes from CoCo (Marcus)

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We don’t get to boss life around.

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America, My Mom, and My Memories (Blog #586)

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This morning I got up early, like at seven, because my mom had a thing at the hospital. And whereas I’d planned to make breakfast then leave with my parents, I decided to vote instead. That’s right, America–I VOTED–instead of eating. You’re welcome.

In all honesty, I skipped breakfast because Dad said we could eat Chick-fil-A later. (Yes, I’m a gay man who eats at Chick-fil-A–it’s delicious!–get over it.) Plus, since I wanted to vote SOMETIME today, this morning’s situation worked out perfectly. I was there just after the polls opened in Van Buren, in and out in thirty minutes, and back at the house on time to pick up Mom and Dad. From there, we picked up my aunt, and the four of us were at the hospital about 8:30.

Over a year ago, my mom was diagnosed with cancer, and this last January she had a double mastectomy. Things are better now, over really, and today she had surgery to have her port (where they administered the chemotherapy) removed. Anyway, everything went great. The prep, surgery, and recovery all happened in about four hours, during which time my dad, aunt, and I visited with each other, read our respective books, and harassed total strangers in the waiting room. Well, Dad harassed total strangers in the waiting room. It’s sort of his thing.

Like, he asked Mom’s hot doctor, “Can I just leave her here with you?” Then after he wrangled the guy into looking at my aunt’s scratched/infected forearm and the guy left, my dad said, “I was TRYING to keep him over here because you’re single and he’s rich and good looking.” My mouth dropped open just as my aunt said, “Don’t you think he’s good looking, Marcus?” (So she was in on it too.)

This is the price you pay for talking to your family about your private life.

Since Mom felt all right after her surgery (they used a mild anesthetic, apparently), afterwards we ran a couple errands and went out for Mexican food. Then we came home, and because I’d spent the morning exhausted from being up early, I went straight to bed and took a nap.

And no, I did not dream of the hot doctor. (He’s married–to a woman–and I have boundaries.)

This evening as Mom and Dad watched the election results, I worked more on my photo-organizing project. Specifically, I sorted the rest of my summer camp photos into years, then placed several “strays,” about two dozen physical photos that I’ve managed to collect over the last couple years. (Everything is digital these days.) Here’s where I’m at so far–four full storage bins of photos and one full storage bin of negatives and index cards (cards with miniature versions of the photos on the negatives). The minimalist in me thinks this is a lot of photos, but overall I’m thrilled because I had eight full storage bins of photos and negatives before this project started.

Any progress is good progress.

Once everything was sorted into large-ish groups, I arranged my index cards by date (some of them, but not all, have dates on them) so I could get an idea of WHEN all these memories actually took place. I’m hoping this will help me formulate a timeline later. Like, Oh right, that summer I dyed my hair blue was the same summer I took that photography class. Or whatever. I’m not sure why this is important to me, to get all these memories organized and labeled; I just know it is. Plus, I’m not great at guessing ages–even my own–based on photos, so if I don’t do it now, it’ll be tougher later. Like tonight I had several photos of my nephew out, and I had to ask my mom and text my sister to help me decide how old he was in each one. Thankfully, they knew. Now all those are labeled. Phew.

That’s a relief.

The end.

Quotes from CoCo (Marcus)

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No one dances completely alone.

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A Big Myth-understanding (Blog #579)

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Ick. It’s 11:30, and I’m so frustrated I could spit. Earlier tonight I met my friend Justin to check the status of my laptop. (I spilled hot tea on it a few days ago, and we put it in rice to dry out.) Well, it’s a long story, but basically the keyboard works–with one small exception. It “thinks” one of the shift keys is permanently depressed. (I think I might be thanks to this situation.) THAT MEANS IT STARTS IN SAFE MODE (WHICH IS WHAT HAPPENS WHEN YOU REBOOT A MAC AND HOLD DOWN THE SHIFT KEY, MOM), SO IT HAS LIMITED FUNCTION, AND IT ALSO TYPES IN ALL CAPS, WHICH IS–OBVIOUSLY–ANNOYING AS SHIT.

After over an hour of resetting this and reprogramming that, Justin got the laptop to type in regular lowercase–SOMETIMES–but it still starts in safe mode, and one of the shift keys doesn’t work. So I called Apple, and now I have an appointment tomorrow to have a technician check it out. Most likely, I’ll need a new keyboard.

As Justin said, could be better, could be worse.

Believe it or not, none of this really upset me. I actually took it all in stride. Shit happens. It’s not the end of the world. But when I came home and tried to backup some files and log myself out of my online accounts–and couldn’t–I nearly flew off the handle. Why the hell does everything have to be so complicated?! What did I do to deserve this?

Finally, I walked away, reasoning, Just leave everything alone, Marcus. Trust the professionals. You don’t have to control every little thing.

So now I’m in bed, blogging on my phone, trying to chill out. Really, it’s been a good day. This afternoon I made progress on my photo organizing project. Check out one of my all-time favorite pictures, from summer camp (2000) with my friend Matt.

Later I went by myself to see a movie, Small Foot, an animated film about a group of Big Feet who don’t believe in humans until one of them discovers one of us. It’s super cute; totally adorable. The tagline for the movie is “There’s been a big myth-understanding.”

For no planned reason, the two photos I just posted feature one person carrying another. Hum. Maybe there’s a lesson there, in the repetition. I’ve spent so much of life afraid something will go wrong. So much of life mistrusting others and even life itself, that I imagined only I could do things “right.” This has been my personal myth, and it’s why little things like a broken laptop set me off. They force me to let go, to surrender, to accept help. This is a good thing but not an easy thing to do, to admit there’s been a big myth-understanding, that the world ISN’T a big, scary place, and one person DOESN’T have to carry its weight on his shoulders, that it’s OKAY to accept help.

Quotes from CoCo (Marcus)

"Sure, people change, but love doesn't."