Introspection on an Empty Apartment

When we last left the “Chas Show”...

INT. ABANDONED WAREHOUSE – EVENING

Light is barely visible in an open, spacious, abandoned warehouse. The railing of an old wooden staircase can somewhat be seen. The SOUND of GUNSHOTS outside ring and vibrate the aluminum siding walls. In rush CHAS and EDUARDO.

CHAS

Where the fuck did they come from?

EDUARDO

You got me, amigo.

CHAS

And what the fuck do you think that you were doing?

Trying to 'cook some fools' or somethin'?

EDUARDO

(catches his breath) Sid is dead.

CHAS

I KNOW Sid is dead. What about Eric?

EDUARDO

Taken hostage by Wendy.

CHAS

Wendy? Dammit!

Chas takes out his piece and racks the 9mm's slide.

CHAS

This shit just got real...

EDUARDO

Gonna make a deal?

CHAS

In fuckin' blood, buddy.

EDUARDO

You can always talk with Norma...

CHAS

And sell my soul? Nuh-uh compadre.

It's mano e-mano time and someone's not comin' home for the holidays...

And now Part Two of “Buechel Livin'”

Hope you enjoyed that one, folks. Always love to leave my audience captivated :)

I'm sitting on my futon in the living room of my new living space: an apartment I'm sharing with my uncle. We'll see how things go. Right now my bedroom feels like the leftover closet that people forget stuff is in. I have to literally make my way through a maze of stacks of stuff to get to my bed which is now a single. I kinda miss my queen-size mattress (which wound up being slashed within minutes of leaving it next to a garbage bin). I'm listening to Martini in the Morning (great jazz channel you can find online. Look it up.) And just trying to think.

Clearly. I can't remember when I last thought clearly.

I'm getting sleep which is good. I can go to sleep by 2am and wake up at 8 feeling better than when I was in Buechel. I'm attributing that to moving away from Bardstown Road. My stress level has significantly lowered but I'm still having problems dealing with my job.

Okay, this is the thing: my job killed two of my relationships (not THE reason but it didn't help them). Why did I spend so much time destroying myself? Inquiring minds might like to know but the truth is change. My mind works on patterns and once something becomes accepted, no matter how bad it is, I just get used to it. I'm more an intellectual person than emotional per se so I don't consider a job good or bad -it is whatever it is. I stay as long as I need the money to survive and then leave at whatever point I generally want to. I shouldn't be this way. I still go back to Deanna asking me if I wanted my life to pay for my art or my art to pay for my life. I would like my art to pay for my life but I have to have faith in it. To believe in what I'm doing. And I feel damned lost on that notion.

Sorta misplaced. Living on the outside. Like no one is letting me in.

So there's a lot of things going on right now. First off I'm still blogging for entities and I've been seriously cutting back on that because of frustrations with the rules, software platforms, etc. That and the fact that I need time away and so I'm figuring an article here or there won't hurt. There's not too much film stuff in Louisville to expound upon so I'm limited on Louisville.com and I like my more “intellectual” blogs to be on WLKY uLocal. I haven't even kept up with other blog stuff.

Which brings me to another point: getting back into the swing of what I want to do. I need to setup my own website which I will operate the Neverending Highway blog through, as well as my photography and even a side thing for reviews. I'm planning on taking a course through MatadorU on travel writing and photography and that's what I'm looking into right now.

However, my friend Dean brought up an interesting point: how long will his last? I've been fighting the whole “hiatus from the world of film” for a while (note: too much bullshit) and went back to the basics of what I enjoy: writing and photography. Generally this leans toward journalism but I'm not a fan of the cynicism; that “well, it's all crap anyway” nudge that's the undercurrent of journalistic sentences. I just wanted to tell stories and be good at it. I wanted to explore the world and find myself. I wanted to be cool.

Right now I'm detoxing from my previous life here; the last 3 years. I'm probably not going to go to the Gardiner Lane Heine Bros. (aka Chas' coffeeshop) until Saturday or Sunday. This is probably for the best seeing as Jennifer (aka The Ex) is there on Tuesday nights studying. I think back to all the exploits at my place and... yeah. The times. I think the next few weeks are gonna be rough but I have to get my head on straight and just deal. Figure things out. Know what I want and what I won't put up with.

To be continued...

Goodbye Bardstown Rd...

Blink. Blink. Blink.

This cursor stares at me while I try figuring out what to say, how to elaborate the goings-on of my life. Outside the world is dark. Quiet. The Sunday night before Turkey Day and a calm permeates the storm I sit in the eye of.

Strike that. Not a storm. Change.

I think back to when I ran into Julia at the Borders. I was going to grab a mocha from Heine Bros in the Gardiner Lane plaza and saw her enter the bookstore. Making a beeline over to it I went inside and struck up a conversation with her and told her I was moving. I relayed how my entire childhood revolved around this area. She said that she understood and if she were still living in her hometown she wouldn't be able to stand it either.

Growing up in Beuchel. The Showcase Cinemas, where I first saw “Bram Stoker's 'Dracula'” and a score of other movies as well as working there as a janitor one summer, is now rubble being carefully combed-over by construction vehicles since it couldn't be made into a viable movie theater again. Bashford Manor Mall where I would go see what was new in Something To Do or play in Aladdin’s Castle (the arcade) was intentionally ran down and eventually imploded. Now the land is occupied by a Lowe's, Wal-Mart, Taco Bell, and Burlington Coat Factory. The Bon Air Swim Club where my cousins worked during the summer closed down due to the contract with the owners expiring and the ones leasing the land not wanting to rent the parking lot to the pool. Now it sits like a forgotten warehouse surrounded by low-income housing on the cheap side of gentrification.

I sit here tonight in the remains of my last days in Beuchel. Like Billy Pilgrim becoming unstuck in time I am unstuck in my memories. My life ended here in 1996 but became resurrected between 1999 and 2004 and then died again to be brought back in 2007. And for everything I've had to learn, every bit of life that I've been force-feeding myself because I just didn't pick it up during Round One, my friends, I have to leave this place.

I'm glad at the same moment of being sad. I've rallied my life against creature comforts (okay, yes, the movie geek setup I confess to having) and this place grew on me. The more I wanted to go the more it seemed to pull me in and I would find reasons to stay instead of moving on. As fate or fortune would have it my uncle moved back into the area and offered to help me out by letting me move over to his place. I thought about it, the good outweighed the bad, and said “Yes.”

The remains. Books. Some DVDs. Trash. Dishes. Stuff in the fridge most of which can be thrown away. I'm giving myself until Saturday to vacate.

And the change isn't just moving to a separate side of town. It's me figuring out what the next move is. I don't know if I'm done with dating in this place or dating period but it seems the more I try to find somebody the more I miss Jennifer. Maybe because she was the smartest woman I've had an extended relationship with. Maybe it's because she gave me my freedom to be me. I've just not found those qualities in any woman since her. And no I'm not expecting any or every woman to measure up to her (because the rules vary per person) but my checklist is becoming more defined and seeing what's out there has an interesting set of misadventures which leaves me thinking about her. And yes I'm sure several of my friends would gladly punch me in the face should I backtrack and go back to her.

The change isn't just about figuring out what I want from a relationship if I have any. Entertainment blogging burnt me out and I just ceded away from it. In fact my job has me burnt out and I've been ceding away from humanity a bit. This isn't an afront to anyone so much as when I think I understand it all everything changes again. People want to know what I want and my answer has been “Let me out. Let me go.”

I've been asking myself what it is that I truly like or even love. Aside from music and movies. Travel. No, I'm not rich but I miss being on the road, taking pictures, and writing/blogging back about my adventures like you don't know. Maybe that IS my purpose...

So I'm proposing an idea which is quaint in humor because I seem to ask people what they think of my good ideas as if they are bad and vice-versa. I'm going to go on a sabbatical in June and hopefully going to spend 2 months in New York City (“New York City?!?”) and taking a course in travel writing from an instructor and learn how to get into travel writing/photography. The Neverending Highway...

I'm trying to piece together how I'm going to pull it off (donations anyone?) I'm not so much scared to go as how to make it work in NYC for 2 months. Maybe subletting or finding a hostel to stay in. The overall truth, if it does so exist, is that I have to hit the road again.

And I know and realize there are no guarantees which is easier to write and say than actually quantify. Or rectify if need be. I know my problems of when I went to stay in California but going to NYC is not to stay as it is an opportunity I want/need to make for myself. Maybe the answers I am looking for are there. Maybe not. But it isn't just about finding answers as it is something to kickstart me into something I think I'm good at doing that I miss. And it's not forever but the highway IS neverending. I just have to get back on it.

Goodbye childhood memories. Goodbye Buechel. Goodbye Bardstown Road.

A Smile From the Girl With the Dragon Tattoo

“It seems like yesterday

But it was long ago...” -Bob Seger

Tuesday night. I had just gotten off work, dropped off my badge and stuff at my apartment and had a little bit of time to grab some coffee from Heine Bros. up the street. 6:50 I walk down to my car and go up to the coffeeshop. The first entrance was too crowded so I took the roundabout second into the lot and drove down to it. As I rounded a group of cars to find an open parking space I spotted a car.

Blue Hyundai Accent. Indiana plates. Really familiar.

I parked and walked up to the double glass doorway but saw her before I was even 100 feet from my car. Jennifer. She sat alone at a table looking through a book; was probably doing homework. I got up to the doorway and stopped. My heart pounded like the diesel engine of a U-boat evading capture. I wanted to turn around. Maybe take the drive-thru. I decided against it and opened the door. Briskly I beelined to the front counter and gave my usual order: medium mocha, no whipped cream, hot. While they were making it I cooled down for a moment and made a decision.

I had to talk with her.

It didn't matter what I was going to say. John wasn't around or there as far as I could tell and I had no idea if I would ever see her again. Call me crazy but it had been eating me up not talking with her.

My coffee was done so I grabbed it and walked along the wall and turned toward her table. I think she saw me and delved back into her book, writing in the journal beside her. I went over to her table looked down and said “Hi.”

(I'm going to interject here for a moment. We all have that “If I saw this person again I would...” moments. It's only human. God knows I've had multiple imaginary conversations in regards to her...)

She looked up and responded. I asked what she was doing, how she was doing, etc. I told her that I was on my way to see a movie and stopped in for some coffee. We were cordial. She smiled a few times and I told her that I had to go but it was nice seeing her. She paused for a moment, looked up and said, “You too,” and went back to doing her work. I left and looked back once or twice to see her attention on what she was working on.

And so I can close this book for now. She wasn't livid when she saw me; she was actually being nice. I think she was happy to see me. She's one of the smartest I've ever been with.

As I've said before: take the good things.

“And her memory is all that's left for you now...” -Fleetwood Mac