u s e y o u r h a n d s

His cart had a bum wheel and it turned right into the shelf. But even it if had been freshly oiled, Clover would still have knocked down the row of tomato paste. Nobody peeked their head down his aisle, even though surely someone had heard the crash. The store was that small.

Clover was suffocating. He needed the alcohol to live. But instead of the boozy peace he used to attain, now he felt restless and ashamed inside, while his body became this bumbling shell which was dying, literally rotting away. And he began to cry. Nobody could really remember how long he had lived in the town, because even though Stockton Falls was small, nobody paid attention to the past. He couldn’t remember how long he’d been doing his shopping like this, so drunk he couldn’t see. So drunk that sometimes he wet his pants. Clover didn’t want this life, but it seem to have found him all the same. Town drunk. And neither he, nor anyone else, chose to remember any other incarnation he may have had.

She peeked her head around the corner and her face nearly broke when she saw his unabashed weeping. Clover didn’t notice her taking the list out of his shaking hand. He didn’t notice that she found all of his items and placed him in his cart. And he didn’t notice that she put a twenty in his front shirt pocket.

When he felt cried out, he started pushing the cart again and saw it was full. He didn’t know how. Clover chalked it up to being drunker than he thought.

I’m just about to the age when waiting in line for several hours to get good seats at a rock concert is just stupid. But not quite. And that’s why my feet hurt after two nights of Morrissey. Two nights, the first at Chicago’s Aragon Ballroom, the second at Milwaukee’s Eagles Ballroom.

Morrissey’s nearly 50. On his recent album, he says “You knew I couldn’t last.” And that’s what we are afraid of. Many of the people at this weekend’s shows had seen him before, 10 years ago or so. I remember everyone going to go see Morrissey when I was a junior in high school. I didn’t go then, but I’m glad that I could go now and get so close to him. And though I prefer to keep Morrissey more myth than man, but I got to channel my not-so-inner angsty teenager just feet from the legend himself.

Many thanks to: Morrissey for two great performances; for the Milwaukee crowd for being badass; and to the fine folks at Nokia for inventing a way to steal a few blurry memories.

Here are some photos from the Milwaukee show, taken with my cameraphone, the only thing I could sneak in. The Chicago show was a total gestapo experience.

There was a period of time that, when I was a child, I played cocktail waitress. And while lots of kids bring their dads drinks, I actually had a waitress’ costume that had been an old work uniform of my mother’s.

My dad would come home from a 12-hour salesman’s day and park himself in an oversized La-Z-Boy recliner to start on the several hours of phone calls he had to make each evening. And this was my cue to prepare his array of ’50’s-style bar snacks. I’d arrange handful of each of the following: cheddar cheese (cubed), a few wax peppers (I forget the brand, but I really liked the logo), and some green olives. I used the same platter, a ’70s square wooden job.

This tray of nummies was in addition to the drink. Fingers of booze, fingers of mixer, some ice cubes.

I’ve been thinking and talking about this often as of late. I just started a new job a few months ago and, as usual, I’ve made quite a splash among the funbunnies. So I’ve taken to organizing the happy hour.

I have organized the happy hour at nearly every job I’ve ever had.

I’m sure that if I still had sessions with Dr. Burroughs, my former tiny Belgian psychiatrist, that he would draw a parallel between lots of parts of my personality. And he’d probably be right on so many levels. But knowing why doesn’t really help living with a situation, does it?

This legacy of drink-love leaves me feeling mixed. On one hand, I am generally the most popular person in my office. I am a hoot, drunk or sober. And in my real life, I throw bomb parties and keep the conversation going. But on the other hand, I always worry if I’m going to be looked at as a silly party gal. It’s a difficult balance to strike, for me at least.

However I figure this out, let me just implore you that you shouldn’t train your kids to be servile, skittering bartenders-on-the-spot. Because you never know what’s going to happen fifteen years later.

Movable Type tells me that I have written 290 blog entries. And between you and I, I can’t believe I kept up the blog this long. It’s frankly pretty fucking incredible. Although I am a bomb planner, my follow through sucks. To watch this blog — that I’ve kept up for over two years — hit a milestone (even though 300 is a fairly meaningless one) makes me feel like I can accomplish something someday.

Here is my promise to you, blog-reading public:

These next 10 entries will be motherfucking awesome. Starting tomorrow.

There’s a lot of chemical upheaval going on in my body and mind. And because of this (or maybe it’s just coincidence; really, i don’t know) the old anger I’ve tried very hard to keep at bay has come creeping back. Irrational, blinding anger that I tamp down into annoying irascibility.

Like feeling rage bubble up when you see the bourgeois Metra rider toss a huge mound of newspaper aside for the conductor to pick up. Like at the annoying concertgoer who decides to smoke in the middle of a packed crowd, or talk at a volume above a whisper during a quiet set, or do crazy hippie-inspired dances.

It’s a general anger at the bullshit of life that gets stuck to your shoe. But instead of scraping off the shit and walking on, I’ve taken a seat on a curb and chosen to scream my fucking head off about the injustice of the shit. And who cares?

Why is it that we’re taught to find the volume of a trapezoidal solid but aren’t given lessons of how to grow up? Adult Education is a nice term for what really is the crap shoot of sanity.

What’s been making this anger better are some new musical loves. I’ve been playing a lot of k.d. lang and Rilo Kiley. And I’m getting ready to see Morrissey twice this week, Friday in Chicago and Saturday in Milwaukee.

There is no better way to conceive catharsis than bathing in Morrissey twice in two days. Or so I’m hoping.

Just in case, take away the razor blades.

Oh, you silly bitches! Like I could ever go away. There’s nothing that will make a blogger recommit to blogging like the threat of saying no to cgi. You dig?

Anyways, updates:

I bought some Roy Orbison off iTunes. This should be illegal, or it should come with booze and a ‘57 something. Because it just makes me feel like I’m a depressed extra from American Graffiti. Which, coincidentally was set in the next town over from mine.

Have you seen American Graffiti. NetFlix it, motherfuckers. Almodovar will wait. AG is a laudable George Lucas-penned flick staring Ron Howard. It is lovely. And it is set in Modesto. I grew up in Merced. For you Chicagoans, this is like being from Morton Grove and seeing a movie set in Skokie.

I have seen a totally non-ironic statue of some George Lucas characters (including Opie) frolicking. Yes, yes. It is next to a Denny’s and a gas station, this homage to cruising in el Valle Central, land of mine and Lucas’ birth and rearing.

Have you ever dropped a, well, drop of something on your clothing and watched it absorb? The geometry of it! Quadrants of absorption, a poem about surface area and cotton. Notice the inherent beauty of seeing something, even a drop, go to nothing. Like watching an advanced-motion film of sunrise to sunset.

I recently received a comment on this here webbity about how I used to say such things (!) before this fella came along. And this got me to thinking (and all other things -ing). Has my creativity been stifled by this man?

Or has it been stifled by the appearance of a certain tiny Belgian psychiatrist we’ll call Dr. Burroughs?

In the meantime, and before I answer whatever question I can think of, I will tell you about the songs that have assaulted me today:

Black Velvet by Alannah Myles - I walked into my cubey thing after working out and found a nearby radio playing this piece. It reminded of me of a family who lived at the base of the hill. Down the hill from the family who owned the turkey farm, in the house where we all knew the turkey farmer’s wife had been raped repeatedly by an intruder. A house I had vomited in. Once, the wife of the man who had rented this accursed home had picked me up from school. This was on her radio. We listened to it in front of my stuccoed school by the cemetary.

The Shining, Badly Drawn Boy - We have called off our wedding. Though this would have been a nice song to dance to, in a lovely gossamer dress (in which I no doubt feel Kennedy-thing) and dance and dance. A co-worker recently told me that a Muslim can divorce by saying “I divorce you three times”. I feel that you can be married by dancing barefoot at the foot of water while people watch you and weep. It’s all about water and rhythm. And I am afraid I am off the beat. One, two, four.

That one song from Liz Phair’s sophomore effort (Dance of the Seven Veils) - Because I have always thought of this song when I can’t figure out the boys. Because I spent no time dwelling on this in high school. Or in college. Or in ….

Deep Red Bells by Neko Case - We saw Neko Case with Nick Cave. I always,always refer to Nick Cave as Nick Drake, upon which timie people say “Isn’t he dead? Didn’t he kill himself?” Yes, Nick Drake did. And Nick Cave is Australian — and alive. Neko Case opened for him at the Chicago Theatre. She was drowned by echoes.

I will conclude this long, blah-blah entry by saying that the Verve’s Bittersweet Symphony is playing. And I lament that they had to shell out to the Stones. Because when did the Stones ever have to do a good video?

And when did you?

Except for those you create every day when you hum and walk at the same time.