Ten years ago, on Easter Sunday, two of my best friends died.
In the decade since, I’ve lived several lives. Different homes, jobs, driving a lot. Thinking out loud to myself on highways through Wisconsin and Minnesota and Iowa. I was this person, and that one, too. Cut my hair, trimmed my beard. Looked in a mirror and watched myself grow up. I live 180 miles away from where I did back then. I have a fiancé, a house, a yard that I mow with an electric mower. Cats and a dog that I feed and pet and look in their eyes.
Two of my best friends died, and each life I live holds onto that. I can’t help it. It’s a wound that has never quite healed.
It feels bad and I don’t like it.
I miss my friends. It is sharp on weekend afternoons, when I’d like to see them. When we would daydrink and chainsmoke and listen to punk rock music. Hit golf balls. Watch the 1960s Batman show while drinking coffee and make jokes. I remember the last time we hung out. We were sitting in an El Camino and smoking weed and watching the moon. It slowly climbed over the clouds. It didn’t feel like a Last Time, but why would it? It was another great memory in a growing anthology. But now that book is closed. It has all been written. I’m sad.
I’ve talked to each of them after they died.
Cory came to me in a dream, a couple of weeks later. In the dream, I was sitting in my car on my lunchbreak, smoking cigarettes. Nothing remarkable. He knocked on the passenger side door and asked to come into the car. “Yeah, dude, yeah!” I said. He told me he was kind of fading in and out between the world and something else. Which is weird, right. That’s more like how he would phrase it, and not how I would think of it. In my dreambrain. He said he was okay. I woke up and felt like it was significant.
Not long ago, I had a very weird dream. I was on an airplane, and as we were about to take off the stewardesses suddenly had all of us get out of the plane and go back into the airport, because something was wrong mechanically with the plane. We were all milling about in the boarding area, very agitated, and then I saw my old friend Tyler. He was heavily scarred, covered in blood. I think that was my brain reminding me he was dead? And I was like “Oh shit, man. So good to see you!” and we laughed and cracked wise for a couple of minutes and I said to him ” You know we all still love the hell out of you, we give you shit a bit, but everybody loves you,” and he was crying and smiling. He was happy and sad.
Ten years evaporates so quickly. I learned to be bold. To kiss her when the moment feels right. Courage in the moment. I’m a person still. A lot of the ink in my story was scribed by these friends. I was made in a rural Wisconsin manor. I hear punk rock music when I walk down a sidewalk. I’m so glad I knew them.
she returned to her home deep in night the familiar form of the house striking somehow foreign, ominous interior was black and occluded, a single light bulb on the porch burning all of its 80 watts into a corona over the steps
she held her keyring like a weapon, as she’d been taught long key tucked between the forefinger and the middle in case she had to stab somebody with it
She unlocked the door hurriedly, Into the mudroom and slammed the door behind her, locking the handle as it closed Darkness there, and nothing more?
The windows were left open
Chilled and damp, like the morning was uninvited something outside slithered into her home and the kind of air that doesn’t belong indoors felt like dew on the countertops and doorframes
Room to room, she switched the light on to check and then switched it off behind her Trepidation in the misty spring She switched the light on in her bedroom and stood there Waiting, maybe Checking a few minutes
When the coast was clear, she changed into her pajamas and crawled into bed. Pulled heavy blankets over her body. She fell asleep.
The night was alive with sickle-eyed cats. Creatures ambling along fenceposts and knowing the moon so much more intimately than the sun
She woke the next morning, feeling rested A coffee on the porch The sun was red and low behind the neighborhood homes it drank slowly The cool, damp night had left her bedroom And caught a current of breeze, to the place where cats look when they chase imaginary things
It is the far-flung future: The Year 2031. Ever since The Anomaly appeared between the Earth and the Moon, things have been fucked. The affairs of humanity have been scattered to the wind, much like the mercury-rich dust of the Florida Desert. The best laid plans of mice and men have been cornholed into oblivion.
We all noticed The Anomaly at different times. It overlaid the moon, seeming to stay perfectly centered between our world and our natural satellite. It took the form of a glowing, blood-red dodecahedron. Well, at least to the human eye. If you looked up in the sky, night or day, toward the moon in whatever phase it was in, there was The Anomaly. An unnerving red geometry, seeming to pulse with your own breathing patterns. But it was completely undetectable by all of our scientific instruments. Spectrometers, radio telescopes, hell, even everyday cameras would show no sign of it. It was invisible to everything but the naked human eye. Regardless, it sat like a wound in the sky, pulsing crimson to everyone who dared behold it.
Since it’s inauspicious but undeniable appearance, the world has gone kittywampus six ways from Sunday.
The oceans have become a murky greyish goop. Mountains have become pockmarked and granular, particulating into little more than oversized anthills. Wisdom teeth are just gone; dentists have lost a major revenue stream. The First World governments have collapsed. It was spectacular and almost instantaneous once The Anomaly took hold of the world. Heads of state tried to give serious addresses to their terrified constituents, but their words tended to lose meaning once their teeth transformed into earthworms as they spoke. It was mostly moist slapping noises, which are not exactly reassuring to a panicked populace.
Now, speaking as one of the unlucky ones who lived through the Change, I can report on the current state of things here in the Divided States of America. I have been tirelessly chronicling the characteristics, origins, and lore of the gangs that now rule North America. I think of myself as a scribe. An instrument of History, cautiously optimistic that humanity will eventually have a need for records. From New New York, to New Los Angeles, I have been studying the gangs of the end times.
CHRIST’S ARMY
Demographic: Previous Evangelicals, who are super-psyched about the state of things. Formerly well-to-do white Southerners who feel like they’re a whisker away from vindication. Strength: Great in numbers, but mostly overweight and elderly. Stronghold: The formerly affluent suburbs around Atlanta. Weakness: Putting up a sign that says “Free McRibs this way!” with an arrow pointing toward a cliff. They will walk of the edge of the cliff every time and then fall to their death while asking to speak to a manager.
THE DOG TOWN BARKERS
Overview: The employees of various dog shelters and pet stores, who because of The Anomaly have been merged with their dog counterparts. Half-human, half-dog humanoids. Strength: Being very alert. Barking at anyone who approaches their stronghold, especially mailmen. Treats: Yes please. Territory: Wherever they manage to pee, after sniffing around for rival gangs, and then pissing right on top of their marker. That’ll show ’em. This is MY yard. MINE.
SILENCE COVEN
Racial Bias: No. Philosophy: That we should have probably anticipated that subjective reality would overwrite the objective. Powers: Creating an interminable paranoia in those who are not initiated. Weakness: Communication. They’re silent, after all.
NAMELESS BABY ARMY
MAKEUP: Not so much a gang but an inchoate horde of marauding babies. A force of nature comprised of 0-3 year old humans, who have all of the instinctive needs and ambitions of humans, but none of the empathy or decorum. Easily one of the most terrifying forces ever unleashed on this earth. MUTATION: Yes, they are all 4-5 feet tall but just still act like babies. FAVORITE BEVERAGE: Milk. BATTLE TACTICS: Using their really sharp little fingernails and teeth.
THE SNAKEMEN OF WAUSAU
MAKEUP: Eight guys from Wausau, Wisconsin, who for some reason became immense godlike naga creatures. QUEZTLCOATL: Perhaps. TYPICAL CONVERSATION: “Oh hey dere, do ya tink we oughta go out dere and do a big cullin’ of da weak, er no?” “Oh yaaah, I s’pose it’s ’bout dat time.” “Yaah. And it’s so nice outside today. Be a shame if we just sat on our keisters dis whole day.” “Oh yaah. Gotta cull da weak on a day like today.” FAVORITE APPETIZER: Cheese curds.
PHOENIX SOCIETY
Leader: An impossibly positive man, one who can’t admit defeat. Project: To restore the old world order, Capitalism and all. Dress: Polo shirts and buzzcuts. Easily the worst look of all time. Adherents: The easily duped, the get-rich-quick type who quickly check out whenever questions of mortality or morality come up.
Eventually, one of these gangs will inherit the earth. We’d like to imagine the eschaton coincides with or own death, but this is probably not the case. The end of the world happens very slowly, and it’s laborious. The world has in fact ended several times, but its’ so gradual that we don’t even realize it’s happening. The Anomaly watches into us as we try to go about our day to day lives. The strange becomes familiar and we watch the sky as it loses answers, tries to tell us that we’re not equipped to understand it.
The world has ended many times. Maybe once it will end for the better.
You ever find yourself in a strange place and with strange thoughts? Like in a terribly sun-filled laundromat at 2 PM on a Saturday afternoon. And of course there’s a family in the corner doing a heap of laundry that’s seven feet tall, and the mom is talking on speakerphone with someone while not paying attention to her five kids, who are chasing each other around and eating handful after handful of years-old Reese’s Pieces from the little vending machine. In the corner there’s a TV mounted up by the ceiling that is playing like, ESPN4. And for lack of anything else to occupy yourself, you end up watching it. It’s playing something so narrow-interest and odd that you are a bit dumbfounded that it even exists. Something like “The 2024 Medium Craft Motorboat Racing Finals Presented by Liquid Death.” And you go “What?”
The announcers are talking like it’s a real thing, too. “Here we are in beautiful Clearwater Beach, Florida for the time-honored tradition of the Medium Craft Motorboat Racing Finals, brought to us this year by our friends at Liquid Death Premium Beverages. Of course the atmosphere is electric here, as the great Swede, Wolter Ruhndt tries to win his unprecedented fourth consecutive championship. But nipping on his heels is Italy’s favorite son, Vincent D’nofrio. No relation.” The water a harsh contrast of blue and blazing white reflection. All the boat racers have on jumpsuits with corporate sponsor patches and also sunglasses and spiky gelled hair. On the shore there are bleachers, and people are in the bleachers? People go to watch this shit? Who buys a ticket for a motorboat race? Surely, this are all just like, immediate family members of the participants, right? As the camera pans over the crowd, you can see all of also sunglass, spike-haired family members lean to each other. If you can read lips, you would see they’re asking “How long does this go for? This is like a 2 hour deal right? Are we gonna get something to eat after?”
Who is this for? And how do you even discover that you’re a world championship caliber boat racer? Maybe I am. Who knows? Maybe I have the prototypically perfect genetic disposition to be an elite boat racer. But I just never tried it. Instead it’s all these strange European trust fund kids. These fourth generation descendants of some long-dead aluminum baron from Brussels, who made his fortune selling low-quality canteens and chow trays to both sides of World War One.
Which reminds me, did you know that the Illumanti have a weather control machine? The power elite who secretly run the world have some sort of a mechanism that can control the weather around the globe. I’m not sure how it works, but they use it for nefarious means like to start the wildfires in Los Angeles, and to direct hurricanes at cities like Houston. Makes me wonder, though. Who, exactly, is in charge of it? I mean, it’s the New World Order, sure, but like, who has final say? Or is it like a conference room in an office building, where you book it by making an event in a shared Microsoft Outlook calendar? Like some dipshit son of an arms dealer tries to reserve the weather control machine with a note like “I’m taking my mistress to Madrid from May 3rd through the 8th, so I need it to be about 75-80 degrees, sunny, and with whatever humidity is comfortable (I don’t know that shit I’m not a nerd lol!) Thanks in advance!” And then can he get overruled by some higher-up in the world Satanic cabal? Like some Canadian tech billionaire who is higher in the ranks can be like “No, I can’t let you take the weather control machine for those dates. I need it. This jackass that I was in Skull and Bones with who always made fun of my weight is getting married in Aspen that weekend, so I need to make it freezing rain. Request denied.”
Makes life interesting, I guess. Interesting in the way that so much is mundane, but there is always something just a little bit out of sight that is truly strange. Know what I mean? Like there’s a lot of boring, ho-hum stuff but then every once in a while something completely novel shows up and you go “Woah!” That’s terrifying! That’s beautiful! Aaah!
Let me explain by way of example; The Sandown Clown incident occurred on the Isle of Wight in the UK back in 1973. Most people haven’t heard of this bit of High Strangeness, but it’s up there with Mothman for one of my favorites. See, these two little British kids, who were no doubt quite pale and had bad teeth, were playing around in the woods one day. They ventured a little bit farther into the wood than normal, and crossed a wooden footbridge over a stream. There, in a clearing, they saw a very unusual being.
He was like a psychedelic wiccan Tinman. “A cross between a clown, a robot, and an alien,” according to the reports. About the size and shape of a man, but with a perfectly spherical head on which his facial features seemed crudely painted on with bright primary colors. His “skin” was like off-white paper, and his clothes were like a ramshackle scarecrow’s. A motley of vibrant mismatched patterns and patches. His hands and feet were round, with only three long digits protruding out of each, like a child’s drawing.
The freakish British children approached this equally freakish creature and cautiously asked who he was. The creature replied “Hello and I am all colors, Sam.” He seemed to speak through some kind of a microphone or vocoder type thing which he held up to his mouth, and then the speaker was in a satchel that was slung over his shoulder in a little messenger bag. The children described Sam’s demeanor as one that was reserved but friendly. He was shy, but not cagey. They interacted with him for about a half an hour. The children left, going back to their house, hoping to get their equally pale and freakish British parents to come meet this fourth dimensional harlequin. But when they brought their parents to this magical clearing, Sam was gone. No trace of him was left.
I’m giving a very brief rundown of the Sandown Clown mythos, but it is really interesting. The kids were trying to work out what exactly he was, and one of them asked “Are you a ghost?”, to which he apparently replied “Well, not really, but I am in an odd sort of way.”
Now the logical part of me knows this story is probably hokum. A story made up by some goofy kids. That’s probably what it is. But I do think it’s interesting in two ways. One, there’s a lot of detail in it. Two, there’s a relative level of restraint if it’s a kid making stuff up. Like, at no point does Sam take the kids on his rocketship to the moon where they meet a bunch of giraffes and eat ice cream, or whatever. Know what I mean? It was probably just an imaginative kid spinning a well-told yarn. But maybe it wasn’t. That maybe is what’s lurking just outside of the mundane day-to-day.
It’s just like the other day at work, I went to get a cup of coffee. I went to the machine and it was empty. Now the impetus was on me to make a new pot. As a new employee, who doesn’t now the foibles and charms of this coffee machine, it means a lot of guesswork. How many scoops of grounds? Do they want me to use the filtered water out of the Brita in the fridge, or is this iron-rich tap water good enough? Can I just stick the coffee pot back in it’s normal place, or is there some trick to where the coffee-drip nipple has to be aligned a certain way? I imagine burbling black water pouring like tar over each side of the coffee pot onto the nice hardwood breakroom floor, the overhead lights flickering just because, and one of my coworkers turning to me with disdain screaming “How could you do this?!” as I helplessly gasp like a shorecaught trout.
So yeah that’s why I’m glad I don’t have to go to the laundromat anymore.
Clearly, a squirrel jumped from the fence, down into the snow here. There can be no doubt. You see the impact crater in the snow of a squirrel, tail imprinted into the white powder and all, with no footprints leading to it. This crazy little rodent belly-flopped down onto that snow from the fence behind him. There’s no other way to get that impressive front arm/back-of-body/tail splay like that just showing up right there.
Clearly something like this.
Then he ran down toward the porch, got maybe a little discouraged by the rough snow pile caused by our shoveling, made an about face and hopped his way back southeast a few strides, before noticing the tree branch in our brush pile. He considered this maneuver only for a second, then veered to his left, to approach it at an optimal angle…
Like Family Circus only funny.
The squirrel, realizing that dragging your hairy belly across 7 inch deep snow sucks, decided to go airborne again, and to ascend the tree branch back up to the fence. Gotta get up into the sky, use that third dimension, gotta have a higher vantage point to navigate this cruel February. The tracks lead to the branch, and then disappear.
Well thanks for stopping in, little squirrel man. Next time you’re in my neck of the woods, just ring the doorbell and we’ll have some beers and pizza man. We can listen to some squirrel music, which I can only assume is insane. We can crack a couple of acorns open and reminisce about the old times. I know all of our cats and our dog will try to kill you but I can just yell at them. Stop in man, it’ll be chill.
Thanks for being a Beard Bite Man reader. I really appreciate you. I’d put my hand on your shoulder and say “Yeah, thanks, brother.” Or whatever. I’d like to take you on a tour of BBMHQ (Beard Bite Man Headquarters) now, and show you the backrooms of all this stuff. Sometimes, I will write something and it doesn’t make the cut. It happens. I get the germ of an idea and then the antibiotics of common sense squelch that fuckin’ thing. But I haven’t written a new thing in a few months, so I’ll dredge up this old crap and submit it. Why not? Please give me money. You can tell I’m a real artist because I am constantly begging for money.
SPOKEN WORD
The casino on the reservation is a house of lascivious and licentious mirth and whimsy of an un-Christian sort Spades and hearts foretell Your body going underground with a shovel and you walk into a club wearing diamonds
wishing for something anything everything it all
But the house only brings booze and bad odds A man can thirst and drink and only end up more dried out as he tries to call “hit me” his lips purse into puffs of talc and it clouds to obscure everything it all
The roman soldier Vaginus flopped on the riverbed, turned in his guilt wishing that river would wash him wayward
he hoped it would all be over
but the mollusks and clams and other bivalves rested against his pale skin as he awoke
clearly oyster season
i’d love to have another chance he said i’d really like to wet my whistle back there at The casino on the reservation
MEDIA THAT MISSED ME
We’re living in an era that the media has called “Peak TV”. A sort of golden age, where there are seemingly limitless options of streaming services and each one is competing to be the head honcho. And movies, well, honestly, movies have seen better days.
But there’s myriad choices for streaming content for you to put on when you get home from work, as you decompress on the couch and fart and relax.
Almost too much. So much that a lot of it just goes right on past your awareness. I’m not going to sit down and start watching an 8 season TV show just because somebody said it starts getting kinda good in season 4. Are you crazy?
So this column is about that. I’m going to bring up various TV series and movies that I have heard about, but have not consumed. Consumed. Christ. I mean viewed. Imbibed. Drank, whatever.
Because of general cultural osmosis, because of the connecting viscera that is the internet, I probably have a baseline knowledge of most of these intellectual properties. So I will make an educated guess about the plot, tone, and general vibe of the thing. If you are a fan of one of the things listed below, and you want to give me some feedback on my guess, please send a telegram to Beard Bite Man Headquarters, care of Beard Bite Man, in Two Harbors, Minnesota.
Shrinking, Apple TV 2023
Jake Harding (Harrison Ford) is your everyday man, more or less enjoying retirement. He was a psychologist in his working days, but he’s glad to have moved on. He can tend to his lawn and watch his re-runs of Cheers. His world is turned on it’s ear when he discovers he can read mind. That’s right. Not a typo. he can read mind, not minds. His daughter comes to Thanksgiving with her new beau, Jimper Flousette (Ryan Gossling). Jake can read Jimper’s mind, but only when his daughter is not close. Oh yeah, and Jimper is unfathomably wealthy; the heir to the Flousette Mayonnaise empire. He’s an earnest enough man, but he’s dumber than a dog. In an iconic scene, Jake says “You’ve got more dollars than sense!” and Jimper says “Haha, yeah.” Then ten minutes later, Jimper follows up “Actually, I have more cents than dollars, because there’s a hundred cents in every dollar, so I have way more cents.” Jake tries to mold Jimper into his perfect son-in-law, but he has to take him away from his daughter, so his mind-reading will work. This leads to fishing trips, poker games, and other wacky things while he secretly hates the guy. He always can tell that Jimper truly loves his daughter though. Cause he’s psychic for him.
BLOOD
wait like lightning mother of gods with blood in her teeth the silence cannot hope to reach what is coming
it will not hold the animal ignominy pause before the thunder clenched teeth seeping blood this thing will end it all
it is the new universe it is blue
PAPAL CONCLAVE
THE PAPAL CONCLAVE OF 2324
Cardinal Khloe Uno shifted uncomfortably in her chair. It was probably one of the last wooden chairs in the world. The Vatican had kept a stash of them, like they stashed all kinds of antiquities. Mostly useless but somehow priceless relics. Fingerbones of saints, strips of cloth that an angel supposedly farted on, and now little wooden structures that survived the Beetle Plagues of the early 2200s. Frankly, it sucked. The chair was uncomfortable. She would have much preferred to be conferencing in from her home on Cathedral Station 434, her ass floating on her new I.O.Flo Suspension Grid. But if anyone clings to old traditions, it’s the Catholics. They were all ordered to come back to Earth, back to Vatican City, to sit in congress on these shitty wooden chairs to elect a new Pope.
Cardinal Catprince Dunkers, a man whose skin was somehow visibly flaking and still shining with oil, was droning on and on and on. He had the floor, and was pointing out how Cardinal Dreef McDougal was not fit to be the new pontiff because of his stance on Space Abortion. He much preferred Cardinal Riffik Qibbin for the post. Riffik had never wavered in his convictions, and had shown nothing but compassion for the Afflicted.
Khloe Uno was about sick and tired of hearing about the Afflicted. You made you own bed with those brain implants, she thought.
Maybe she was just crabby because she had to sit on a solid chair. Maybe she was just wishing she hadn’t inherited her position in the church when her father died. Maybe she was just a bit hungry.
She had a pack of Skits in her robe pocket. Skits, of course, was the new name for what was once called “Skittles”. We all know that the suffix “-ttles” is now highly offensive because of all the horrible, horrible speciesist things that happened around it, but anyway. Khloe wondered if she could sneak a few Skits in this very solemn and serious Papal Convention without anyone noticing. Her F.U.K. interface gave her a 79% probability of being able to sneak a few of the candies without being found out. So she blinked twice to summon them from her pocket to her hand.
ALL GOLD PLANET
an all-gold planet don’t mean a dick in a divot if you can’t sell it to people
he said, rubbing his hands together
so you go out there and you tell the people they want it
clapped his hands, standing
they gotta have it!
CAMERA OBSCURA
Camera Obscura
The highway is a hundred yards away I hear the trucks through my cracked window the sound carries in the cold Interstate driving is good for thinking I could drive somewhere far away Let’s see how much gas I can afford
I could quit my job change my whole life Every morning i wake up and look in the mirror chapped lipped and bag eyed Sunshy mornings of dry heaves Downdraft
Each day my darling is a gift A white elephant I want to see into you I want empty roads and Your thoughts escaping my lips The sun may never come back Pellet rain bounces off the windshield as we hammer over the roads toward whatever destiny we make up
The window is cracked and the light from the outside upside down on my wall I have to get up to go to the bathroom to puke Oh darling we’re only happy every now and then because of brain chemicals the rest of the time it’s tough sledding time cannot be loved only earned I say as I kiss you on the forehead and we wait for the next chapter
“This sandwich will have three slices of chimkin, and three slices of roast beef,” I thought to myself. Yes, a combination sandwich. For the road. The long journey ahead. Each sandwich I prepare will have a slightly different combination of ingredients. Chimkin or roast beef as the meats. Cheddar or muenster for cheese. Mustard or mayonnaise for goop. All on wheat bread. I will not compromise on the bread. White is for babies. Wheat is the Adult Bread.
A tiny swirl of anxious and unctuous thoughts spiraled around my brain pan. Too shallow to ladle any sort of deeper meaning but deep enough to redden nerve endings and dendrites in the gulliver. I had taken long road trips before. To the west coast, twice. I flew on an airplane from Minneapolis to London. I took a boat from Florida to the Bahamas. Traversing the globe was not a new thing. I recently had a birthday. Turned 37. I didn’t think I was the type to settle into a routine, put on a pair of slippers and drink a hot cocoa and fear the wider world. So what was this little tingle of dread? Why did a finger of unknowing work it’s knotted knuckles into my brain’s bum? Was it because I was travelling with my girlfriend and future wife? I wasn’t the freewheelin’ Bob Deelan of my younger days? Was it a cultural memory of a Wisconsin boy travelling to the Confederacy, but without the fearless leadership of Sherman?
We were headed down there for a wedding, and for a vacation. One of my girl’s college friends was getting married to her longtime beau, and we were also going to explore another part of the country with our paid time off.
The next sandwich I made had six slices of roast beef and cheddar cheese and mayonnaise. “I feel like I’m forgetting something,” said my beautiful wife as we were about to disembark. “Probably nothing that we can’t go a couple days without or buy while we’re there,” I replied. She nodded. We left.
We rented a vehicle for the drive. A mighty steed, a great black beauty of a Jeep. We didn’t want the miles on our own vehicles. I sat in the drivers’ seat. My daily vehicle is 20 years behind in technology. This thing had a tablet affixed to the dash, and many buttons. I sat high-up, as though upon a horse. My mighty steed had very touchy brakes. Well, probably normal brakes. My car has a very different sensitivity. The giant black Jeep even had little lights in the side view mirrors to indicate someone was in your blind spot. We listened to podcasts as we departed Minnesota into Wisconsin. We had a paper bag of snacks (chips, trail mix) and a cooler full of snacks (sandwiches, beef sticks).
We drove through the familiar Northern Wisconsin wilderness. The pine unknowing. Unknown. However, because of our lifestyle of being long-distance lovers of nigh-unto two years, we were quite well-acquainted with this coniferous plantation stretch of US highway 53. The first several hours were routine.
Somewhere around Tomah, cop lights started flashing in our rearview.
“Is this fucking fascist pig, this fucking instrument of capital, this goddamned foot-soldier of the Shit Empire attempting to detain me?!” I asked aloud. At least, that’s what I felt in my heart. I actually asked my wife “Is he pulling me over, really?” I looked down at my speedometer and I was going 73 miles per hour. I rolled over to the side of the road, in a very cool way. I opened the windows and waited for the cop to address me.
“Hey,” he said, rosy-cheeked and probably 24 years old.
” Hey,” I said. “What’s up?”
” Your tail lights aren’t on.”
“Oh, okay,” I replied.
I started fumbling around on the steering column of this rental. Jeri explained that his was a rental, and we didn’t know the workings of this machine yet. He was grinning and shining a flashlight around in our car. I eventually found the lights. He went to the back of our car to make sure our back lights were on. He smiled, cutely, and then told us we were free to go, but also he printed out a written warning for me. I could write a written warning for him for being a fucking buzzkill. But then as he was walking away, we made sure he confirmed our booty lights were on. You’d probably imagine my mood was all sorts of fouled-up by this encounter with the police. However, I was relieved. Because he didn’t arrest me for being Too Punk Rock. I didn’t have any warrants for being too much of a rebel.
And darling, I’d love to tell you that was the nadir of the journey. However Hurricane Helene was riding the Appalachian ridge and circumstance was about to bite my buttcheeks. I had eaten about 3 sandwiches by this point. They were pretty good. I think Jeri only ate one of the six sandwiches I made. The mustard was good. Hot in the way that horseradish is, not that jalapeno funk.
The night turned into day, and the rain was falling hard. I had been awake for a long while. We stopped at a sketchy gas station somewhere in the middle of Illinois. I wanted to get gas and smoke a cigarette. Some methed out weirdos appeared at the gas pump next to ours, and I waited for them to leave before going in to pay for my gas. Why? Because I was certain they would ask me for a cigarette, and then also try to sell me some heroin. That was the type of gas station we were at. This was a place where the hard liquor was behind locked cages and there were rolling papers in a display stand at the front counter. You understand.
The rain fell like Noah’s deluge. I drove on. Jeri and I listened to the audiobook of The Mothman Prophecies as the pancake of middle Illinois rumpled up into Appalachia. I only hydroplaned a couple of times for a couple of seconds in our big fat black Jeep.
As we rumbled on into the former confederacy, passing towns with names like Peach, Grampaw’s Pipe, and Black-People-Don’t-Deserve-It, we eventually found a slight clearing in the rainstorm. A six-lane highway met me, and some goddamned trucker’s blown tire sat in the middle of the road. I swung wide of the obstacle as best I could, but a coil of wire somehow found our tire, and we got a goddamned flat tire on our 2000 mile road trip.
The modern Jeep is smart enough to alert the driver “You are losing tire pressure,”. “Fuck,” said I. “Goddamnit,” intonated Jeri. Not good.
We were losing about 3 pounds of pressure every half mile. I calculated in my mind that we could probably make the next exit and ask Enterprise for help. Jeri wasn’t so sure. We managed to bomb our mangled Jeep into a Speedway parking lot and call the owning company. “Hewp,” we said. ” Some wires fucked up our whole thing,” It was again raining hurricane shit, there in that bullshit town. Were we going to make it? Well yes. Obviously yes. Obstacles tasted like candy to me at this point. “We’re gonna make it,”
We went to a new Enterprise location after a beer-bellied boy put a donut on our Jeep. Just to clarify, I know how to change a tire. I could’ve done it, given the proper tools. But we didn’t have a jack, or jack-shit in the back. I was fucking soaked at this point. I’d been outside in a lot of rain.
We went to a new Enterprise location and the guy there was like “We have a very small, tiny, little, itsy-bitsy car for you, if you want it,” Yeah. Whatever. I’m fine with it. And it was some gold-colored little Mazda thing. It was incredibly small.
“Oh, Jeri!” I ejaculated, and then I exclaimed, ” It’s low to the ground, a quick little fucker, like my everyday vehicle, except not shitty.” Jeri was not in love with how small it was. But it still fitted all of our shit.
We got to the wedding venue, and it was really nice. I had been hallucinating just a little bit on the long drive, the red warning lights on radio towers far in the distance turned into angry eyes, as the divots in the landscape were jagged tooth mouths, etc., but eventually we made the scene in Tennessee. The couple that was marrying were cute and sweet like a fine peach cobbler. The husband ranted an 8 page typed speech that he swore he pared down from 17, and the wife had a speech explaining her vows as well. But it was cute, you could tell they were in love and destined for each other for a long while. The venue was a little valley in a wooded area you could only get to by gravel roads.
I ate some fried chimkin and Jeri had the brisket. It was a dry wedding reception, which explains why 90% of the crowd had left by 9 PM.
The next day arrived on schedule, and in our little yellow dart of a car, we went to Rock City, Tennessee. Or no, I think it was Georgia. It straddles the border.
We tried the regular road to the place, as described by our GPS. However, what with the hurricane and all, a giant tree was splayed across the road, making it impassable. “Jeri,” said I, “Try a different typing in that machine. Let’s go up north of here and then swoop back down,” Jeri held her lip in consternation. “Fuck this tree,” she seemed to say, “And it’s road-blocking shit.”
We made it to Rock City within an hour, and in doing so had bombed around little weird streets the likes of which I have never encountered in a proper city. A big ass tree was laying across the road and they just chainsawed it in half and spraypainted orange on either end, like “yeah, whatever.” “Don’t hit this tree limb, we are not paid enough to move it off the road.” The road names were seriously things like “Princess Blvd.” and “Fairy Wy.”
We got to Rock City before anybody else. We were the only people in this place. It was foggy, a mist obscured everything. It was an interesting mixture of geographical oddity and curated camp. The landscape was great slabs of stone and twisting trees. We walked down into moss-hewn caverns. Hidden speakers played sparse acoustic guitar music. I was walking into a dream. Each earthen step lead to more grey crevasses, and we walked up and down the trails to find lichen and swooping trees over the trails. Blinking red lanterns hung in places just out of sight. I felt the mystery of the world again like when I was a child. Something wonderful and profound was happening. I crossed a hanging rope bridge. I stood at the edge of cliffs. I squeezed my body between great walls of grey stone and all the while I was looking back into the beautiful blue eyes of my wife.
Then there was some trippy weird fairy tale underground hell world
Don’t want to talk about that much
The next day was beautiful as well,
Makes sense to have Giraffes as the first animals you see in a zoo. They will necessarily look down their nose at you. Look a bit like they are judging you. They are telling you they are not amused. You’re there to see them, they’re not there to impress you.
I also had beef with an exotic bird, and felt a humanoid connection with a gibbon. We ogled their many tortoises and turtles and terrapins and Teenage Mutants. It was a good time.
We drove back home, many hours. A thousand miles in one crack. I’m not afraid of it. I’ve found I can drive a long time if I’ve got the right circumstances. I need to break about every three hours for a smoke and to stretch my legs. I need a really great person in the passenger seat. I had the best co-pilot on this odyssey. I’m lucky to know her. I’m lucky in a lot of ways.
“Do not condescend to me, Nickelodeon,” I sneer, As I chew my flouride tablet over my bowl of cinnamon toast crunch “The other kids think this fucking goop is funny, they get their kicks from it,” I like the Adventures of Pete and Pete I like the more adult fare
I’m 33 years old and I accidentally shit my pants while I’m smoking my morning cigarette. “Damn,” I think. “Went a good long time without shitting my pants. No way will that record be broken. Went about 27 years.” Thought it was a fart, 100%. Had no doubts. Then it happened.
Am I never going to shit my pants again before the age of 60? No chance. That was it. That was the non-pants-shitting record.
Back in the 90s, I sat outside, waiting for the bus to pick me up. The beautiful orange and yellow and brown leaves were frosted in little crystals. A backpack full of paper hunched my shoulders. Burnstad’s bags served as bookcovers for my schoolbooks. What was life saying back to me? I was subject to so much, very little choice. If I could turn back time, I wouldn’t.
If I could turn back time, I wouldn’t, except to throw some punches.
I’m 50 years old or however old I am now. I can see that I have wrinkles, and they take the shape of whatever expressions you’ve repeated. Not sure what mine are. Looks a bit like confusion, a little like concentration. Gimme something. I’ll purse my lips to taste it. I’ll suck down that Nickelodeon goop.
Something like fear keeps kettling up around my periphery, but I don’t know if that’s quite the word. Could be more like awareness, something. I think I’ve moved beyond breakfast cereals, mostly. The interstitials of Nickelodeon are laregely forgotten, but they just change shape in the firbous web that is my subconciousness. We are more input and output machines than we’d like to admit.
Olmec was the big foam head on the legends of the hidden temple. I do not yearn for those days. They were not better. I remember them. There is a difference. Throw a punch and shit your pants. It’s all good here in the present. You’re accountable to yourself.
The King of Football belched loudly. His wet throat-rattle echoed throughout the banquet hall. It bounced into the dimly lit corners of stone, across the heavy oaken tables arrayed in rows before him. His mouth fart was so mighty, some swear it flickered the torches hanging from the pillars.
He slouched slightly in his throne. All these fucking people here. The Duke of Third Down. The Count of Safeties and Onside Kicks. Even the insufferable Taunting Penalty Princess was there. Heavy is the head that wears the crown, he remembered the aphorism. The crown was also made of pigskin and kicking tees, so it was quite uncomfortable.
The King of Football knew he must address these rubes. These gawping simpletons. He farted now, but it was a silent fart. He roused slightly. His robes were made of mink, fox, and beaver pelt. All of the muskiest animals. He smelled royal. His beard was a nightmare of red wine and chicken. That bastard Pope’s gonna have my balls in a vise before the year’s up, he thought. The money’s dried up. I was a goddamn fool for converting all of our gold reserves into cryptocurrency. And in this instance, cryptocurrency was bits of rock that were chipped off of crypts from graveyards, because they are in Medieval times, you see. The Pope lent him tons of money, and the King of Football had no way to pay it back. He picked a chunk of chicken out of his beard and put it into his mouth. Fuck it, he thought. I can kick the Pope’s ass. It’ll be okay.
He stood now, not sure what to say, but the charge of a royal is leadership. “Good evening!” he boomed. His voice was deep and loud and badass. That’s probably why he was king to begin with. “Friends, countrymen, referees,”
“Tonight, we celebrate the Kingdom of Football. This feast comes but once a year, and it is always my favorite day of the year!” The crowd’s response was somewhat muted. The Prince of Third Down Bootleg Play Action Passes was particularly nonplussed, shaking his head in disapproval. They all knew the Pope would have his gentleman’s apricots between two pressboards before long. This Pope was not forgiving.
Then a mandolin chord cut through the air. It shredded the dull heat of human bodies, ringing crisp and true. More mandolin notes began filling the air, a sort of contemplative, walking the scales sequence of notes. Up through the middle aisle of tables walked Grimgoop, the Jester. He plucked the mandolin as he walked, the music filling the hall. The King of Football stood agape, his mouth slackened and ringed by chicken and red wine, remember.
“Grimgoop, I can’t believe it,” the King of Football mustered, all the color draining from his face.
The mandolin plucking touched each note of music in different places as the jester paced steadily toward the throne. “My liege,” Grimgoop said, his voice sounding like a chorus of men, “I’ve come to tell you the future.”
The King of Football collapsed back into his throne. He drew his many-ringed hand to his forehead, took a breath. “I saw that donkey kick you in the head. You died. We painted dicks on your forehead before we threw you in the swamp. How are you back?”
Grimgoop smiled rictus, a revenant trick. “Jester’s privilege,” he answered. “This is what will happen this football year:”
NFC
EAST
Dallas Star (3) Dallas is usually good in the regular season, but remember when the Packers royally fucked them in the playoffs last year? I ‘member. It was cool. Dak Prescott is in his last year under contract, and they’ll probably move on from him after this season. What a clown show, a boner. He’ll lead another team to the playoffs over and over again. Zeke Elliot is back in town, just to showcase the ravages of time. Washington Warriors Washington has a hotshot new rookie quarterback, a cool running quarterback drafted at #2 overall. Does this sound familiar to anyone? Jayden Daniels will probably do well and then die on the field. Their defense might actually live up to their pedigree this year though, given the coaching change. Philly Cheesesteaks I’m baffled by how many NFL media heads think Philly is going to be good this year. Did you watch them at all in the second half of last season? They were absolute pig shit. A good draft doesn’t turn around a franchise in one year. Maybe they’ll be good when Kopmala Harris is our president. I dunno. New York Blue Pork The only franchise that picks their QB based on how much of a Nice Boy they are. Eli Manning, Daniel Jones, nobody seems to give a shit that they are horrible at the sport.
NORTH
Green Bay Packers (2) Jordan Love is a golden god, a beautiful man. He is the Chosen One. The wide receiver room is overflowing with talent. We got Josh Jacobs, a runningback who won the rushing crown 2 years ago. The defense has athletic freaks everywhere, and the new defensive coordinator loves an attacking defense. Wake up and smell the roses babe. The Pack is back. Motor City Madmen (5) Sam LaPorta has a bad teenage mustache and I think it’s because he’s trying to emulate his new father figure, Head Coach Dan Quinn, and that’s just adorable. Grizzlies Bears fans continually gaslight themselves into thinking their team is good, now, finally. I don’t understand it. They went through it with Cutler, Trubisky, Fields, and now Caleb Williams. They try to do Magick, and speak into existence a good football team. It doesn’t work if your team fucking sucks. Sorry. The Bears Still Suck. Minneapolis Norsemen Injuries have already gullywumptered this team. However, their pass rush should be greatly improved. They got Andrew Van Ginkel, Jonathan Greenard, and drafted Dallas Turner. My wife is a Vikings fan, and I will tell her just to close her eyes when they are on offense. But they did steal Aaron Jones from us. Bastards.
SOUTH
Barbara Streisand (4) The Barbara Streisand have tons of talent. They have been drafting in the top 10 for the last like, dozen years and have always used that pick on an offensive player. You’d think it’d eventually pay off. You’d think. But then again, you’d think a retarded reality TV show host with no soul could never somehow could win the Presidency, so who knows what could happen. Tampon Gay Fuckin’ Queers (6) Baker Mayfield, assuredly bullied by clever bullies, probably called Gayker Gayfield, is a better QB than people think. The defense still invests in fast, rangy LBs, which is something that wins games. N’Owleans Po’Boys One of these years, I am going to talk about how N’Owleans finally bit the bullet and ate all of their contract money that they kicked out to future years. But today is not that day. Carolina Vagina Carolina is a victim of a billionaire owner, as are most NFL teams, but this dummy thinks he knows about football. He’s used to walking into a room and everybody acting like he’s the smartest guy in the room. Hey, you’re rich, you must know a lot about everything! Nah, this is proof that capitalism is a failed system. Carolina might win like 3 games this year, and that’s optimistic!
WEST
San Fransisco Illicit Disco (1) San Fransisco is a good team. I won’t deny that. I do think their fans are like, I dunno, wine-slurping millionaires. You can probably buy a hot dog at their stadium with bitcoin. You know what I mean? The dot com bubble burst, and then they keep trying to sell us shit that just kinda sucks. Like Brock Purdy. Drops his eyes when pressure comes. System quarterback. Los Angeles Curlhorns (7) Los Angeles will never be a football city. Too warm, too nice. No factories. All their fingernails are clean. Arizona Redbirds Arizona has been trying to rebuild for about 12 years. They keep doing it in the wrong order. Please build an offensive line. Seattle Spermbirds The gum-chewer is finally gone. Seattle feels like a defeated enemy. Where do the wins come from?
AFC
EAST
New York 9/11s (3) Aaron Rodgers is like, extremely talented. Probably the most gifted quarterback of all time. He is a singular talent. But also, he’s kind of a stupid dickhead? I dunno. It’s hard. World historical figures might just have that in them. I’m glad I don’t have cameras on me all the time. Look how they massacred my boy. Buffalo Soldier in the Heart of America Nobody wants to go to Buffalo. They got wings, yeah, we stole that everywhere else. Niagra Falls is probably p cool I guess. Miami Marlins “You fucking suck, you don’t deserve to be here.” That’s the kind of texts the former head coach sent to Tua Tongaloviaialailala, and man, that is really shitty. If I was a head coach, I’d tell my QB he was a good boy. Y’know? Their offense is light-speed, but their D gave up a lot of points last year. Boston Bean-Bastards How many years do the Boston Bean-Bastards have to suck before it’s okay for them to be good again? I think about 15.
NORTH
Cincinnati Spank-Me-Daddy (1) Cincinnati is continually misunderestimated, as George W Bush would say. Probably because the city sucks. They only have one thing, which is like putting chili on top of spaghetti? What? I do that when I’m high and drunk. Absolutely not a point of pride. Anyway, Joe Burrow is super accurate, he’s the new Tom Brady as far as running an efficient offense and hitting guys for 5 yard slants. Balmore Blackbirds (5) These guys try to act all cool, I dunno. Seems desperate, in some way. Shittsburgh Fucks Nobody knows who will be the week 1 starting QB. Will it be the shitty failed guy from Denver, or the shitty failed guy from Chicago? ^_^ Cleveland Steamers Again, a strong defensive team but I think the rapist QB will probably not perform well. I think I wrote a similar analysis about Shittsburgh in 2012 or so.
SOUTH
Houston Cows (2) Can’t believe the Packers vs. Texans game is a regular-ass noon game, and not a primetime showcase. CJ Stroud is a really good QB. The Packers and Texans are brother teams, wherein our offense is young and promising, but our defense is….ehhh. This game will be high scoring. Tennesse Poop ‘n Pee (7) Tennesse weirdly made a lot of really strong moves in this offseason. I saw all of them when they happened, but afterward I was like “Damn shawty, okay!” Indy Cindy Don’t play a runningback at quarterback. North Florida Retirees I don’t even care. Honestly. People in northern Florida are fucking mutants. This team doesn’t even make sense. Most of the locals are way more into the Florida Gators college team. They think Tim Tebow is good. I will not care about them.
WEST
Kansas City Arrowheads (4) I’d imagine the breakup would cause a wave of political unrest. Buildings burning. Horrible optics. Vacant Stadium Chargers (6) Jimb Harbaw is a fucking piece of shit and I hope he gets eaten by fucking bugs. South Park Cows South Park looks like they have a good QB. Bo Nix has a short name, but a big arm. He might be the future in the mountain west. Las Vegas Gamblers I’d rather be a loser team for a decade and accumulate good picks than be in this weird mediocrity that Las Vegas has been in. These guys can’t win any important games.
The Jester descends his chords, and the lights from the torches slowly flicker into nothing.
Grimgoop smiles widely, almost too widely, and he walks away from the castle.
LAR (7) @ GB (2)* TB (6) @ DAL (3)* DET (5)* @ ATL (4) TEN (7) @ HOU (2)* LAC (6) @ NYJ (3)* BAL (5)* @ KC (4)
DET (5) @ SF (1) DAL (3) @ GB (2) BAL (5) @ CIN (1) NYJ (3) @ HOU (2)
Each generation takes its slings and arrows and wants to claim ownership This is a unique trauma, it has Happened to Me As a young person, you begin to internalize the future, externalize yourself in that place And inevitably, something scuds it into termination dust The world kicks back hard, stubborn, a cruel mule. Cruel Mule is the name of my new band.
This baited-breath current events trauma is the gloss in the eyes of a blue-eyed poet. Behind every cynic is a wounded dreamer, right? Jung said no one finds conciousness without pain
Trauma of a second birth, almost. The world is not what we imagined it would be, coming from childhood and seeing possibilities ascending. Then the engine rattles, chokes, and a lot of the reassuring make believe of childhood falls off and you say simply “What happened?” “Whuh happeh?”
And at the top of the hill, we see ruination, simple, stupid, selfish, scattered arrays of tiny people made of money and fat and brain death. And constellations of these confident idiots ring the planet, and this has been so for generations. And you suspect that a human life is just a little bit too short to transmit this information to a new generation and change the thing. Life is pain.
Easy to reach a point in your life where you lie in bed all day, depressed. Dreaming commercial jingles, about your father, about walking up to a sheer cliff. Don’t know if it’s day or night. Death can take me or not, I don’t know I’d notice the difference.
I say this not with a fake smile, with whimsy or unearned positivity, but there is a better way. You are only captured by this world if you allow it. We are immutable ripples upon eternity, and if you capitulate to the suffering, you have lost sight of something True.
It’s very easy to do, it’s constant bombardment over all of your senses. It’s torturous media and culture shoving this selfish, ignoble message into your eyes and ears and mouth. Old times are quaint, funny. The future is unknowable, we can’t make anything happen. Buy shit. Become your own brand. The things you like and consume are you. Eat it. Take things. This is you. You are just a collection of keywords. Buy shit. The Cruel Mule would love to kick you into believing you are alone. Fear, anxiety. Whatever. Gotta make something of yourself. Don’t be a loser. Make money. Buy shit. Eat it.
The last two days, I was outside, and it was hot as hell. I was sitting on the concrete steps leading up to the house I share with my future wife and our pets. Each day, a tiny little bee flew up to me and buzzed around my elbow. Watching me, she bobbed around. I looked back at her. The grass is vibrant green in the yard. We have a streak of unmowed lawn that has blossomed into little yellow and purple flowers. The bee investigated me. She was smaller than one of my fingernails. She left. I was happy. I am happy.
A woman is born with all of the eggs she will have in her lifetime. This necessarily means that whatever ova came out to be me was extant in the world in 1967, when my mother was born. She was a physical thing in the world back in the 1930s, when her mother was born. And on and on back in time until we went from monkeys to people, from when we went from fish to shrews, from when we went from one cell to two. The physical matter that I am can never be destroyed, it will be reconstituted into time immemorial. This existence is not a block of concrete. Life is a wave, and the threads of eternity are woven through you. Don’t be afraid. Don’t be small. You’re made from better stuff.
