Saturday Mornings

I vaguely remember that as a kid, I used to actually get excited about waking up on Saturdays. It was all about the cartoons, of course. Back then, it didn't take much to get me out of bed.

Now, no matter what time I wake up (and as a night person, I like to sleep in), I spend most of my Saturday mornings hiding out at home, being generally cranky, and waiting a few hours for my brain to realize I'm awake.

But, this past Saturday morning, one disgustingly cheerful and alert "morning person" was bringing me home from his house and we stopped somewhere for breakfast. Somehow, he forced me to really look around. And, I noticed something.

"Everyone here looks so happy."

I suppose I was like the deaf man hearing the sound of sound for the first time.

Then, something else struck me.

"Not only do they all look happy, but everyone seems so pleasant.....You know, I think I like humanity, right now."

And so, he tells me, "You really need to get out on Saturday mornings more."

Maybe, I should.

Emasculation

I know of a photographer who ended his career for a woman. Once they got serious she decided that it was no longer okay for him to be around models all the time. And, he agreed.

So we're clear, I don't personally know this photographer. I only know about this because he put it on his online portfolio to explain why he wasn't in business anymore. Wow. Not even a little embarrassed by this. Is there a point where you are just so whipped that you don't even care who knows it anymore? Fascinating.

I don't try to make men change their careers or lifestlye. I'm not crazy enough. I believe that this not being crazy is a choice, not necessarily something you're born with. But, sometimes I wonder....I know some women who are crazy but seem quite happy that way. And, their hen-pecked men seem happy. I've seen long relationships like this and though, everyone will say they feel sorry for the guy, I think maybe they shouldn't feel so sorry for him, because he doesn't seem like an unhappy person.

I can't get that image out of my head, of that photographer, so humbled and proud of the fact. Sometimes, when I find myself being annoyed by some asshole who's out to prove something about himself, I think it would be nice to strip a man so completely of his masculinity. Goddamn it, why do I have to have a conscience?

Appetite for Self-Destruction

When I was a kid, I really liked Guns N' Roses. ( Yes, I know YOU probably either love or hate them in retrospect. ) I was loyal all the way from Appetite for Destruction to The Spaghetti Incident ( Does anyone remember that one? ), even towards the end when the alternative trend was starting and they weren't really cool, anymore. I even let them string me along for awhile while I waited for their promised new album. ( I still every now and then hear rumors about its release on the radio. ) And, as tends to happen at that age, I had elevated Axl Rose to hero status, despite the fact that he was obviously completely nuts.

In every article I ever read about him, I noticed that the people who knew him well always said that he could be scary one day and a sweetheart the next. I used to be very attached to this idea that if I could see some good in a person, I needed to hold onto that and try to redeem them. It was a theme for much of my life until I learned the hard way that it often doesn't work out like that.

Is it really that unusual for someone to be like that, to be so sweet sometimes and still be violent and full of rage at others? Definitely not! There are lots of people out there like that. At this point in my life, I know this and I know that I have to just accept that that's the way it is. But, I still think it's fucked up! People shouldn't be able to have two completely different personalities like that. It still baffles me. It makes it hard to know who to trust. And, people can still shock and disturb me when they reveal that other side to their personality.

Troy, Mi circa 1980s

Once upon a time, I thought of this as Normaltown, USA. They actually have malls and 7-11 and Taco Bell. Neighbors are...well, neighborly. They'll talk to you from their front yards and their kids will ride tricycles down the street. This is the town I lived in for awhile when I was very young, before my family moved to Bloomfield Hills. ( And, after I was born in Ann Arbor but only lived there until I was 2....Goodbye Naked Mile and Hash Bash, before they had a chance to corrupt my infant mind. )

It's a place I often like to go back to in my mind when I wonder what it would be like to stand in someone's sunlit kitchen, maybe drinking something wholesome like orange juice. I would be talking to someone who...okay, maybe she would have had some lipo, but she wouldn't be asking me to feel how realistic the saline her husband bought her for Christmas feels. And, in this fantasy, I would never question anything, again. I would know exactly what my purpose was in this perfect world and I would just be living it. I never let myself stop and think that I might be bored. That would ruin the fantasy, you see.

In my memories of that place, it seems like the sun was always shining, but I know that can't be right since this is Michigan. The neighborhood was so idyllic, of course, that one day a man who lived down the street shot his wife and then, shot himself, leaving behind two small kids that I think went to live with their grandparents. This is where reality intrudes on my memories.

But, since I've moved back here, I wouldn't say Troy is all that different from Bloomfield Hills, anymore. It's getting harder to tell the two places apart. And, of course, I know that the place I remember was never real, anyway. It was just my childish perception of things.....yeah, what was I saying? Maybe, it really is time for me to go to sleep!