Nick Miller

I am extraordinarily delighted to share the wit and wisdom I have recently acquired in my absence from writing with all you fine people. The sheer originality and unparalleled magnificence of my thought-provoking epiphany is enough to send waves of discourse, drama, and equally inspiring realizations throughout the minds of my readers. So here it is: It is… Nothing. You should probably stop reading now to avoid being largely disappointed.

I have come to realize that our lives mean nothing. The optimist bears no chance for survival in this world. True love? Please. A richer, fuller life? Not going to happen. 

See, life as we know it within our own minds is a false reality; an illusionary paradise. You are not as good looking or smart as you think you are. You are probably not going make as much money as you think you will. Yes, she probably cheats on you, and yes, he’s just not that into you. 

Such a realization has not come with ease or grace, but rather it has slowly manifested itself into a position of power within my own mind after years of hoping for something better, something more…idealistic. See, I have always had a thirst for finding the finer things in life: a hot wife, high-paying job, good family, etc. I guess you could say I was invested in taking the path most traveled, but it was not until recently that I have become acrimonious over chasing a mirage. 

It all came to fruition when I graduated from Cal and had to start putting some serious thought into my future. I took a job as a business research analyst for a firm in Southern California; I am sitting here now in my piece-of-shit cubicle typing this rant. Well, every week all the other cube-monkeys would rally together and join in the festivities of a little tradition called “Taco Tuesday.” It wasn’t long before I jumped on the band wagon, and what a ride… 

We would sit around an outside patio in our work attire and just get hammered. All the guys would come together and gawk at all the fine women who were ostensibly betrothed due to the rather large rocks that resided firmly on each of their left hands. Sometimes they even brought their babies in with them. 

At times, all of us would end up mixed into one large group of mingling generations with, as I came to later find out, many of the same things on our minds. Since I was new, I remained aloof. However, it appeared that it was the sole hobby of all the hot mommas to try and get me out of my shell. Were they flirting with me? No… that can’t be. No, yeah well they were; a select few even more so than the others. 

Let’s get something straight before I continue: I am by no means a “great” looking guy. I sit around on the weekends and chain-smoke cigarettes, drink hard liquor before noon, have a developing beer belly, and rarely shower. 

But apparently, these women were digging my “I don’t give a shit” attitude. It wasn’t long before I was fucking one of them in a beach-side mansion while her husband was on a business trip. And it wasn’t too long after that before I was fucking one of the other ones in a hammock in the back-yard while her husband had a late meeting. I never really thought about what I was doing until, well until about ten minutes ago when I started this piece. 

The bubble finally popped when one of my male co-workers/bosses, who is also married, found out what I had been doing. He called me into his office one day and I prepared for the worse, but when I walked in, he had a smile on his face. He looked at me straight in the eyes and said, “It’s okay, everybody is doing it.” 

We live in a sick, sick world. A world in which there remains no hope. Yes, I am partially to blame for perpetuating this sickness, but if it was not me, it would be somebody else…and her husband and children would still never know. Then it really hit me… I have been in relationships before where I probably did not know half the shit going on. Love is a veil of ignorance placed on all its participants. 

My ex-girlfriend is now dating some dude who wants to propose to her. She apparently loves him just as much, or so I heard. But then I got a call from her saying she wanted to meet up and… maybe…stay with…me. I started laughing and hung up the phone. Are you kidding me? 

If you don’t drink, you smoke weed. If you don’t smoke weed, then you smoke cigarettes and drink. If you don’t eat carbs, you eat a lot of salt. If you practice abstinence, you masturbate like hell. If you don’t lie to your spouse, you’ll lie to your kids. If you don’t cheat on your spouse, you’ll get a divorce. If you don’t steal material things, you’ll commit tax evasion. It goes on. Hypocrisy is the only consistency that resonates in our lives. 

So, I have officially given up. I think the only way out of this mess is out early. So I am becoming an expatriate and I plan to James Dean my way through life. Goodbye.

“Meant to be…” Three small words that when combined become one of the most hoped for and sought after meanings in human life. You can see those three words hibernating in the eyes of young girls and older women. You can see those words resting deep in the eyes of playboys, and you can even catch a glimpse of them within the “real men,” or within those that solemnly vow against them. You can even see them freshly blooming in the eyes of those who have been through a nasty divorce. Hollywood makes a living by portraying its own versions of those three words. Everyone made rather impressive efforts to find that one person who could bring meaning to those three words; some made a lifelong effort. As for him, he wanted to explain to the world what he had learned: 

I am just not normal, he thought. I mean who reads A Walk Down Wall Street and The Great Gatsby in the same week and is thoroughly entertained by both? You can’t like Gatsby and like reading about bulls and bears in the stock market. You had to pick one, he thought. You can’t have both. Sure, maybe Gatsby was a bad example because everyone had read Gatsby. But that is beside the point, he thought. There were the Gatsby people and the business people, and they lived amongst each other mostly in peace. But they could always point out their own kind, and they would secretly despise the other. 

It was a huge tragedy to be despised by both kinds, he thought. Where could you go if you didn’t fit in with the Gatsby people or the business people? Nowhere, he thought, and that is where he began to understand. 

Everything he thought about was part of one massive paradoxical web that seemed to be cleverly woven with similar truths. The answer had been there from the beginning; he just did not know how to grasp it or interpret its meaning. And now, he understood. 

See, she was beautiful. He had been struck by her beauty ever since he first met her when they were 17 years old. Now he was 23 and he had thought about her nearly all that time. There was just something about that girl with her thick strands of light brown hair and eyes with enough blue to fill up a July sky in Southern California. She had a perfect face that got even better when she smiled. The innocence that blanketed her when they first met had now grown into a savvy and sexy maturity. She once wore a necklace around her neck and he told her that he liked the way it looked on her. She smiled and shot him a quick look with those beautiful blue eyes. God damn, he remembered the feeling. That look killed him. And her hands, he had always loved her hands. They were just so feminine and attractive, he thought. She was smart and fascinating too. She did things like study French and read Pynchon’s The Crying Lot of ‘49 in her free time. 

They had spent the summer together; the greatest summer of his life. It was a summer on the sand; a summer driving on the coast highway with the windows down listening to music. The warm air would carry in the smell of the beach: a subtle, intoxicating scent that lured you in and drifted you off to some far off place. She liked to lean back and put her feet out the window and hold his right hand as he was driving. It was perfect. 

And when their friends were around, they got by with those secret glances or he would walk alongside her ever so smoothly and graze his hand along hers. It was better off when no one knew. It would have never worked if people knew. They both seemed to understand that summer was going to end. 

And it did… 

Another summer had drifted away, and their relationship was swallowed by September waves and washed out to sea where it would drift among all of the other world’s summer secrets. 

It was okay to be doing nothing in the summer time. It was fine and nobody gave a damn if someone else was doing nothing during the summer time. But when September reared its ugly head, you’d better be doing something. You can’t be doing nothing in September. Especially, he thought, when you are 23. 


After he finished that last thought, a deep feeling of relaxation swept through his body. It was both a mental and physical sense of calmness and suddenly he had the deep urge for sleep. When he was with her, he never worried about September or what he should be doing. But now, it was September and she was gone, and he knew now what that meant. He walked back upstairs and lifelessly collapsed on his bed without undoing the covers. 

He knew that when he awoke he will have moved on because he had just uncovered the single most important truth in life: It’s not about finding that person who is “Meant to be”; it never was about that. What people never realized, he thought, was that it’s about soaking up a lifetime of love, adventure, and spontaneity with all those who were never meant to be. That was the trick. There is no one person that is meant to be, but there are many who were never meant to be. And that was how life was supposed to be lived. He knew that he would be with another that was “not meant to be” next summer, and he looked forward to it. 

And right before he let sleep take hold of him, he remembered something Gertrude Stein once told Ernest Hemingway. “You’re all a lost generation,” she told him. 

Then Hemingway: “I thought that all generations were lost by something and always had been and always would be…” 

Sleep.

Jake Freeman had been writing a novel; one that he hoped would define his generation. He dreamed of writing the next “On the Road,” and he wrote very well knowing that she loved him.  He wrote everyday and he worked very hard. He was going to make everyone proud. It was only a matter of time.

He remembered the summers at the lake teaching her how to wake board. He remembered the time she wanted to try kissing under the water, “like that one movie,” she had said. At night they would drink wine and lay on the trampoline for hours and talk while staring at a black sky sprinkled with light from the stars.  She would be wearing his big sweatshirt and her nicely fitting jeans and he would hold her tight as they dreamed about what they didn’t know.  They would get tipsy and fool around and giggle softy and sleep soundly.

She loved how he wrote things to read to her.  She was proud that he had a way with words and she believed that someday many other people would listen to his words. She was sure of it. In her early twenties, it was quite fine and romantic to be in love with a writer, especially one as gifted as Jake.  They never worried about money because it was always fine at the end of the day and any frustration was silenced by their connection.

He heard a car drive by and then he heard something hit the ground and it snapped him back into reality. He realized that it had been some time before he had moved from his position on the bed. He got up and stretched his way over to the window, cracked the blinds just enough to get a glimpse of the paper-delivery guy pulling away down the street. “Christ,” he said aloud in a half yawn. “What time is it?” He glanced over at the silver-dollar sized alarm clock on his dresser and saw 5:47 A.M. He remembered the time he had crawled into bed earlier in the night, around 3:30, and wondered how the time had passed so quickly. He gave up after a few seconds, walked to a cold, white bathroom, splashed some water on his face, pulled up the shirt he was wearing and patted dry.  Jake remembered how his bathroom wasn’t always so empty. He stopped and stared at his face in the mirror.  His eyes were tired looking and red. Underneath, he could make out the faintest hint of dark circles beginning to form. Another night of not sleeping.

He walked a few steps down the hall into the kitchen and opened the fridge to find it nearly empty. Even still, he stared inside for a couple minutes before pulling out a carton of orange juice. He took two large swigs and put the carton back in the fridge, and then he went out to grab the paper. He read at the table until his mind took over. He remembered a conversation he had from the night before with his best friend and co-worker while they took turns tasting a bottle of Jack Daniels.  The “Hungry Moose,” the bar where they worked, was closed for the night.

“Wait a minute Jake. What’d you expect? They were dating for two years and then they got engaged.”

“I know it. I guess I just figured it wouldn’t always be like that.”

“There just comes a point man, when you got to move on, you know?”

“She used to tell me things though, even when she was with him.”

“Does that matter now?  When is the wedding anyway?”

“Tomorrow.”

“Look Jake.  College was never meant for me, but you, you are too smart for all of this.  You went to that Ivy League and got a degree. But you work at a bar and spend your days trying to come up with the next best thing while you pine over her. I think its real cool that you are trying to be a writer and all, we all know you are good, but you are almost 30. Why not get a real damn job and get paid? Get your damn life together.  Move away from this small town and into a big city. Meet another girl. Start a family. You have all the cards in your deck man. Jesus Christ.  I  mean, I have a kid, and I am hoping to be manager here next year. Is that what you want? I mean, what do you want?”

“To be happy…”

“Christ man, why can’t you make that happen?”

His family would be attending the wedding today.  He wouldn’t go. Not a chance in hell. It was an afternoon wedding in a big church. She never wanted to get married in a church, at least not when she and Jake would talk about it. They talked about getting married on some cliff overlooking some beach where no one would be allowed to wear shoes. He would make a joke or two during the vows and everyone would laugh.  She loved how witty he could be. They would share an eager kiss and they would get chills and they would be married. Everyone would cheer and he would love her and she would love him.

He had always made it a personal goal never to rely on hope.  Sometimes it would get the best of him though, and those nights were always the same. They were nights of listening to “Bright Eyes,” drinking whiskey, and trying to finally write something new. Those nights were always the best to write.  Still, he would try to stop himself at a certain point: the point where his thoughts roamed far past the boundaries of a playful, feel-good longing to the point of a deep and echoing hope rooted in the soul.  But now he knew the truth. After years of telling himself that he didn’t need it, he knew now that his whole life had been based upon hope.  Whenever he fought it back, it came on stronger.

When she left him, his words were gone and he let the novel be a disheveled collection of manuscripts far from anything worthy of defining a generation.  The whiskey and his newfound perspectives began clouding the novel and ruining it.  Writing for Jake was reduced to scribbling and writing fragments of sentences and words that combined to form something meaningful only to those who have felt the intense pang of miserable loss.  Something had changed.  She was gone. Money. Stability. She had let the world get the best of her. She became frightened.  She decided that there were certain things that Jake wasn’t giving her; none of them being love or happiness.  There wasn’t anytime left to be proud of Jake’s gift.  A gift would meaning nothing to the family she wanted to raise.  She became fragile and when that happens the romantic aura of a writer begins to fade when his years near 30 and he has nothing complete. He wouldn’t abandon his dream, and she didn’t want to leave him.

The wedding had to be happening now. Jake had met him. Her new man was devoid of anything real and passionate but he was nice enough.  You couldn’t hate him and he made a decent enough living. He would probably make a good father and give her a little happiness along the way.

He went to the cabinet to find something that could help him pass the time a bit better. He didn’t care what it was this time.  Jake Freeman just wanted to get through today. Tomorrow maybe he would write something. Tomorrow maybe she would come back to him.

July 2006

He awoke well rested to the smell of a hot breakfast. She had obviously been cooking. The room was very clean and it smelled fresh. There were “his and her” towels hanging by the door and paintings hanging on the wall; a Diego Rivera, and a couple Van Gogh’s. She had a section of the room with a bunch of girly magazines and he had a book shelf with his favorite novels. She unarguably had control over decorating the room: the bed and pillow covers were purple and there were matching lamp shades. On the dresser was a photo album that traced the couple’s last 9 months together: the first time they met, the trip to Hawaii, the time they went to tropical Mexico. They were in love and their room was cute. They rented a movie the night before and shared a bottle of wine. He hadn’t drunk anything in a week and he remembered feeling a little tipsy after a couple glasses. They held each other close and it was relaxing. 

“Baby, I love you! Get up for breakfast.” she yelled from the Kitchen. 

Sometimes his mind would wander and he would think about things. He hadn’t seen his boys in a while and he missed them and the times they had. He loved her but sometimes he felt too clustered. Sometimes he wanted more freedom. He knew he was missing out on a lot of good times, wild times, crazy times. I mean should I really be in a serious relationship right now? He thought. I am still young and I shouldn’t be wasting all these potential opportunities to be out having adventures. There was always time for a girlfriend later on. Maybe, he thought, it was time for a change… 

July 2005

He lived in the same place. His room was cluttered with dirty clothes, old newspapers, and random 20th century novels. It was a small room but it kept you interested. There were beer cans scattered on the desk; mostly a cheap local beer called “Josef Hoffbaur.” The bed lay flat on the floor and the sheets looked unclean and unwelcome on the mattress. There was a half-consumed bottle of Jack Daniels on the floor next to what could have been a pile of unfinished writings. All of these things gave the room a personality; a feel, a look, a smell. 

He awoke every morning very much a part of it all. The room became a reflection of his mind and he dwelled within the room like the room dwelled within his mind. He was slightly shaking throughout his body. It could have been the drink or it could have been the loneliness. He was unshaven and unkempt, and he carried some luggage under his eyes. He needed sleep. 

He would have done nearly anything to be alone, but she was sprawled drunkenly next to him. She was clothed only by a few tattoos and he was disgusted by her, but his room embraced her. She was a worthy candidate for that room and he knew it. He fantasized about something real and pure one day; someone who he could connect with and love. He moved quietly and swiftly off the bed and headed to the kitchen; he didn’t want to wake her. Opening the fridge brought him face to face with molded bread, random condiments, and more beer among other things that would never be touched but would always be there when he opened the fridge in the morning. He remembered his mother had always told him that breakfast was very important. He felt the need to honor that declaration so grabbed a bottle of Absolut from the freezer and mixed it generously with a little orange juice. “Breakfast of champions,” he muttered to himself. 

He remembered another conversation he had with his family doctor, a while back: 

“Would you say that you drink often?” 

“Not that often.” 

“Like once or twice a week?” 

“Not more than twice a day.” 

“Have any of your friends ever tried to tell you that you drink too excessively or have a problem?” 

“I don’t think they would.” 

“Why is that?” 

“Because they drink like I do.” 

Since then, he had always tried to stay away from any medical opinion. It just didn’t make sense to him because they didn’t understand, he decided. 

He sat down on a tattered couch, grabbed for a pack of smokes lying on the table in front of him and plucked one straight from the pack with his teeth. After a failed match, he successfully lit his cigarette and traded long and full drags with swigs of his cocktail. He wanted to quit smoking but his one attempt with the patch brought on a series of the most vivid and chilling dreams he ever had. He decided he would rather take his chances with smoking, at least for now. Feeling better, he walked back to his room and found her in the same position. 

“Listen, I have to go to work.” 

No response.

He knew she would be gone when he returned; that is how it worked, a simple unwritten understanding. 

They were going out again tonight: all the boys. They went out every night. They were sucked in and there was no use fighting it; they just existed within it. Wearing the uniform of jeans, sandals or Vans, and a t-shirt, they would show up at his house because it was the closest to the bar they liked. They were already slightly liquored up because most of them were bartenders, and free drinks were always attractive. 

It was always beer before they went to the bar; beer and cigarettes which replaced childhood’s milk and cookies. They were all very good drinkers. He wasn’t sure if they all wanted to drink like they did, because he wasn’t sure if he wanted to. But no one ever brought it up and no one ever tried to put an end to it. 

It was never too long before they began the five minute walk down the road to the bar; their favorite bar. The head bouncer had a shaven head and a prominent goatee. He was muscular through his tight shirt and he never smiled. They knew him well and each of them gave him a pat on the back as they dodged the line and walked through the door. It was instinct; they found their favorite table in the outside back corner where they could be secluded but where they could see everything. 

Ordering drinks was a simple routine and one of them would pipe up and spew the order that was repeated every night: 

“3 Jack and Cokes double, 2 Tanqueray and Tonics, a round of Jager Bombs, and each a beer to back it.” 

Then it was time to light up and the cloud of smoke rose as it shielded them from all the others and concealed their insecurities; their loneliness. They observed in silence for some time, searching for a remedy to their inward inadequacy. They looked hard for her every night, though none of them would ever admit it. It was true that loneliness was slowly destroying each of them, but that was part of life and they knew it. The quicker they submitted to the loneliness, the more pathetic they became. It became a long and gruesome battle between pride and loneliness. Everyone was lonely, but their personality was defined simply by how they dealt with it. He liked to think of it as grace under pressure. The trick was in the eyes: they revealed how deep the loneliness went within or how good a person was at hiding it from the world. 

There were women of all types: the young ones who had just turned of age who laughed loudly and were always the first ones dancing when the music came, the slightly older community-college educated ones who flaunted their goodies with short skirts and revealing tops and who stumbled around from table to table asking if they could bum a cigarette, then the unattractive ones who wore unflattering clothing and made fun of everyone else with a loud voice as a defense mechanism for their own physical insecurities, and finally the ones, some attractive, who were interested in drinking and seeing what the night had planned for them. 

The guys stared from their smoky corner in silence and they were not surprised by any of it. They had grown accustomed to the scene; they knew each group of girls better than anyone else in the bar. They knew which women they could take home too: the last described group of girls was the one that always ended back at his place for a card game, beer pong, or a little skinny dipping session in the ocean. But it was too early for that, and they wanted to be past that because they knew it only fed the loneliness. They would only go down that path if they had too. 

Once in a while, a night would come around, every three months or so, where they would catch glimpse of one that was a bit different. She was smiling, and then laughing, actually paying attention to what her friends were saying. She wasn’t lonely because she knew she didn’t have to be. You could see it in her eyes. She was happy and you wanted to be a part of that happiness. She came in all forms. Sometimes she was tall and thin with blonde hair, sometimes she was shorter with curves and brown hair, and sometimes she was wearing a backwards hat or a beanie, but every time she had that look, that smile, and those eyes. She was really something, and the beautiful part of the situation was that it was interpreted individually and subjectively for each of the guys, meaning that the special girl was usually only special for one of the guys at a time. It was something that struck a chord within the individual and not the group. But what was the same was the frequency in which she revealed herself to any of them. 

They could only sit back and sneak glimpses of her. They could do nothing else. If they approached her, they would be just like all the others and she would subconsciously dismiss them. The only thing they could hope for was an opportunity magically presented to them. It happened, but rarely. They would just settle for next time. 

“Where the hell has Sammy been?” he asked directing his attention back to the table. 

“You know that girl he met a few months ago? Yeah, I guess they hit it off.” 

“Christ. They getting serious?” 

“Looks like it.” 

“Jesus. That piece of shit.” 

The others would chime in with their renditions of how Sammy had become “a little whipped bitch.” But they had to say things like that. They didn’t really mean it. They would have taken Sammy’s position any day. 

“The day that happens to me, I give you all permission to beat my ass,” he declared as he raised his glass. 

“Cheers!” said the group. 

The bar was closing soon and the girls next to them were talking about doing something crazy. “I have never been skinny-dipping before,” one of them said. They all knew she was a lying… 

“Let’s all go back to Mike’s place then.”

He had grown up very comfortably in a Southern Californian beach town where summer days were spent lounging around in swimming attire and sandals, and nights around good company and a warm fire. Most of the people would never leave. They would spend their lives in the same place, go to the same schools, and have the same jobs. He went away to college and whenever he returned, the town waited for him as he left it. The same people were there to greet him, the same buddies were there to get drunk with him, and the same girls were there who wanted to sleep with him. It was always a good time, but there was always something amiss; some underlying discrepancy and he was subtly tortured by it. 

He hated his home town. None of it made sense to him. This place is really something, he thought. Everyone who has enough family money to stay here stays and is happy about it. But the ones that don’t have enough money insist on working their ass off to get into a good college to find a good job just so they can get back here. What was it about this place? 

He had a certain way about him; a certain magnetic appeal. He was elusively witty and a he thought quickly; he could be a very good communicator when he wanted to be. People were always around him, trying to absorb anything he was willing to give. But he never really gave it to them, and they always stayed around. He never really thought about that too much. It was one of the few things that never concerned him. What he did think about was something that deeply confused him. The more people that stayed around, the more he was able to observe, the more he was able to become aware of their intentions, and the less he was able to clear his confusion. Lately, he realized that his own confusion was beginning to dominate his mind. 

He didn’t understand why he continued to fuck his ex-girlfriend a few times a week for the last year but tell his friends he hadn’t been laid in months. He didn’t understand how she still wanted to get married after telling her that he was in love with another girl, and had been for the entirety of their relationship. 

But that did not bother him too much. Not more than what he observed around him; what he noticed as a trend in the lives of his acquaintances, like the cultish fetish of going to church every Sunday like a good Christian and then meeting for Brunch and talking about how the “Goddamn Mexicans are ruining this town.” Or abortion being unanimously branded as “absolutely the most atrocious act” except when young Benjamin’s condom breaks and precious Madison finds her future in jeopardy. Or when homosexuality is deemed “inexcusably immoral” until perky Steven shows up to Christmas dinner with Sam, not Samantha. 

He didn’t understand the lucrative business held by “pre-nuptial” lawyers when strapping William and gorgeous Hannah loved each other so much and wanted to spend the rest of their lives honoring that “certainty.” Or the same situation, the second time around. He didn’t understand the expressed impossibility of paying for a private college (unless it was USC), but the practicality of owning the new S 500. 

He didn’t quite understand how all 32% of people that still approved of Bush lived in his gated community. He didn’t understand why he watched a group of “intellectuals” nodding away in pleasure during a televised Rumsfeld speech. “Economics, simple economics,” they would say. They probably won’t be too fond of “economics” when 12 million Mexicans are deported and the cost of maintaining their wives’ Gucci addiction drives them to bankruptcy. He thought about the ridiculoulsy pathetic, lonesome, and bewildered look that would sprinkle across these peoples’ faces when there were no immigrants left: “Wait a minute, I have to clean that?” 

He didn’t understand how all the young ones were so prententious about where they lived; the pride they felt because their town would never be a “ghetto.” All that while they put their faces in a pile of coke. He didn’t understand how no one in this town had read a damn book in their lives, but everyone had read The Davinci Code.

And then it hit him. He remembered a somewhat intelligent realization he had reached just before falling asleep during a seemingly ironic extraction of four teeth that represented “wisdom.” He remembered thinking what fools Hollywood actors were. “Goddamn idiots,” he thought. “All they do is entertain people. What a ridiculous way to live life; by trying to convince people of a complete false identity.” But as he continued on the thought, he began to consider the odds that these actors were the elite of the elite; that they had somehow mastered the one code to live by; they had reached a certain clarity long before anyone else. But then he guessed that most of them were probably too inept to be capable of that thought process, but his own realization carried over. He began to see with more clarity: 

All the world’s a stage, 
And all the men and women merely players.

He thought: we are all acting, There is really no substance to anyone. We all have no damn idea who the hell we really are. Who we are, is just a reflection of how we act with others around, is it not? How can we be “anyone” or “anything” without others? We just play the right part in front of the right audience. We are all a product of our stage. This town was our stage. We say the things we say because we are supposed to say them, and we change the rules when we must. If I came from a new town, I would have a new stage, and maybe I would be required to act differently. No one knows anything true. We are made to entertain, to be entertained. We are all playing roles. We are all actors. 

He was ready to give in and let it take hold. He was ready to embrace this town. He thought it was time to love it. He was ready to begin his career, as an actor.

The power of speech may be the most dynamic and influential realization ever manifested within the human race. Nations have been built upon it; wars have spawned from it; politics swears by it; religions amass by it. The power of speech can disillusion (Google Hitler), it can inspire (read Hemingway), and it can uncover stupidity (listen to anything Bush says). The words of today have been spoken yesterday and they will be heard tomorrow; mostly to achieve the same goals. Words have become, or have always been, the most powerful form of expression. 

And that, my friends, is where the tragedy unfolds. It is the Shakespearian ACT III of our current lives. 

Are we nothing without words? Quite possibly, but to deprive yourself of the ability to communicate through words is to awaken a hibernating passion that you never thought could exist within. There is something so pure and innately beautiful about being completely stripped of the ability to speak. In the routine of life, such beauty is so discrete that it is barely recognizable; it quietly lingers within all of us, waiting to be noticed, waiting for recognition. 

Sicily, Italy 
I had been seeing her in passing every day for nearly two weeks. I was even standing close enough to her at one time to hear her speak. I did not understand what she was saying because she spoke Italian; a strong and old Sicilian dialect. I knew she didn’t understand an iota of English and she knew the same about me. It is just something that is naturally understood; our facial expressions can tell all. Our eyes would meet with such resilience that an observer could trace with his finger the invisible line connecting her eyes to mine. I felt alive again. I had almost forgotten the feeling. I knew then why I had to leave home. 

This particular day was different. I was feeling slightly more confident than usual and it appeared that she shared a similar confidence; perhaps something that built with time. She was alone and so was I. As I walked toward her, our eyes remained loyal to each other, like an elderly couple who still walk together after a lifetime of marriage. I was just in front of her now. I grabbed her hand. That feeling was so god damn strong. I touched for the first time. We both knew what was going to happen… We stepped back, floated back down to reality, smiled softly and walked away. I left Sicily the next day.

Every writer should know when the subject matter he dwells upon exceeds his talent to describe it. I do. So, I will allow the poet Saul Williams to do it for me: It was a “kiss that confirms that the universe is aligned, that the world’s greatest resource is love, and maybe even that God is a woman.” It was “pure psychedelic inebriation.” 

When there is an inability to produce words that convey any understood meaning, the previously neglected senses of the human body are significantly enhanced. The sense of touch, hearing, taste, smell, and sight awaken full of vibrancy; a vibrancy unique because for so long it has been caged and repressed. It is a feeling that we may slightly stumble upon every so often in our normal lives, just enough to know that it exists but clueless when it comes to making sense of it. Only when you can eliminate the possibility of communicating through words do you begin to truly communicate. The lack of words gives rise to the beauty in simple acts: a movement, a touch, a smile. It is a feeling lost in translation but slightly still pulsating within certain experiences. The last real experience humans have had is virtually impossible to remember: a mother and her newborn sharing that sensual connection, communicating clearly and passionately without any words. 

Perhaps there is a reason we can not remember that feeling. Perhaps the very memory of such experience is enough for some to remain content, but we must learn to search for it, and we must embrace it. I have just now learned how to speak. I will never leave here, and only when I begin to understand the native language will I move to a new place.

Scene: Sahara Desert, Africa 

A herd of gazelle timidly approaches a swamp crossing. They do not want to cross but they must; they are migrating and survival depends on continuing their journey. There is simply no other choice. The gazelles shoot shifty-eyed glances across the swamp, looking for something, scared of something. They catch several scattered glimpses of large shadows gracefully and elusively gliding beneath the surface. The boldest of them all makes the first move and darts quickly into the murk. Dog-paddling, or perhaps gazelle-paddling, with a frantic urgency as the others look on, the gazelle gets lucky and successfully crosses over. The others are newly motivated by a quick jolt of optimism. More and more of the herd enter the swamp. And then it happens. The fear becomes the reality. A young male gazelle, who has the potential to be a great gazelle leader with many gazelle children one day, senses something is wrong. He glances right, then to the left, and there they are: the eyes of a scaly monster. Before the gazelle can react, the jaws of death are tightly and jaggedly locked upon him. It’s over.

I stay up late. I have friends. I smoke cigarettes. I like to drink beer. I smoke a little weed. I have run a few stop signs. I am an Orange County delinquent. 

Orange County used to be the neglected little goodie two shoes brother of Los Angeles County. It used to sit back and watch LA bask in the limelight with a more curious eye than a jealous one. Then one day it happened: LA’s skin started to age, it slowly began going bald, and then out of nowhere its little brother began looking like the new hot thing. Orange County took on a stage name to better equip itself for the new-found fame. It became “The OC.” 

The overnight fame undoubtedly came with a price tag, and in all likelihood, “The OC” may not be fit to handle the fame as LA did. LA is tougher and it has the street credibility along with the glamour. “The OC” lacks the edginess because it has unofficially separated itself from most inland cities and now consists of the beach cities Dana Point, Laguna Beach, Corona Del Mar, Newport Beach, and Huntington Beach, in that order from South to North. These cities are mostly inhabited by wealthy families who now aggressively invite the chance of telling someone, “I’m from The OC,” as opposed to, “I live just South of LA.” 

Wrap all of these recent developments in a couple flower tortillas and you may take a bite out of one fucked up burrito. You have tourists around for reasons other than Disneyland, paparazzi, more cocky rich kids, more coke, and more illusionary projections of ridiculous stereotypes. However, there still remains one recent development; one that is perhaps less acknowledged but indeed more ridiculous. The single most outrageous development in “The OC” since its new-found fame is the birth of a monstrosity known as the Orange County Police Department. 

“The OC” has relatively low crime rates and hardly ever are there any serious crimes committed. But guess who else grew a chip on his shoulder since he realized that he now works in a famous county? Yes, that would be Officer Asshole. But now, instead of doing nothing, he feels like he should do something, and by “do something” I mean create criminals out of normal young kids. 

Since my return to “The OC,” it has apparently become a theme that I should get harassed incessantly by these fine officers. And why? Because I have friends, I drink beer, and I go to bars. 

Last weekend, my fellow delinquents and I were thrown out of the car and onto the curb. Officer Asshole was on a mission. 

There he was: A 5 foot 10 inch tight legged uniformed prick with tightly combed hair, a moustache, and a tight-lipped cocky face that translates to “your ass is mine.” You may have also had the pleasure of dealing with this specimen of a human being. 

“Put your hands out the window where I can see them. Everyone do it now,” Officer Asshole. “Now, after I open the door, put your hands behind your head and walk to the curb and take a seat.” 

Are you kidding me?

“Officer, we are all good kids,” one delinquent. 

“Shut the fuck up. No one talks. I am alone here and I have no problem beating all your asses.” 

Wow. Real cool asshole. Isn’t that illegal you piece of shit. Even more amazing is how you are calling for backup now. Why? Perhaps you just realized that it would be the biggest upset in history for you to take on 5 guys. I pull out a cigarette and light it as I stare right into his beautiful blue eyes.

“You there: stand up and put your arms behind your back. Do it slowly.” 

Have you mistaken me for a stripper because I believe that is stripper talk.

“No Problem Sir.” 

“Do you have anything on you that I should know about?” 

Yes I have a condom in my back pocket. You should probably know that it was created for the act of sexual intercourse. See, one day when you get laid from some coke head willing to do anything to not go to jail, you should probably KNOW how to put one on.

“No Sir. Only a pack of smokes and my money clip” 

He then proceeded to conduct the most intense body search I have ever known. 

“Protect and Serve” huh? Because the only thing you are protecting is your attraction to the same sex and the only thing you serving are my nuts. What are you looking for? Weed? We already smoked it bitch!

I looked to my buddies for comfort only to be greeted with stone-cold helpless pale faces. Shit, I felt like that woman from Crash who was getting groped by Matt Dillon. There were five guys in the group and each received the same preferential treatment. However, one of the delinquents, who happens to be a bit better looking than the rest of us, essentially received a hand job. I looked up to see Officer Asshole’s hand in between the delinquents legs from behind literally feeling his package. So that’s what a “reach-around” is!What’s up Officer Asshole, haven’t you read the consesus on hand jobs? The delinquent’s face had lost any of its remaining color and he stared coldly and blankly into the night. He looked like he had been broken, like he’d lost at the game of life. I was going to stand up and say something but resorted to just shaking my head at the ground. Now I felt like that dude who watched on as his wife was getting groped by Matt Dillon. 

Oh yippee. Here come the others. Three more cop cars carrying 4 more officers who deliberate for another 35 minutes while all the delinquents sit hopelessly captive in a line on the curb. 

“You guys are free to go. Get out of here.” 

You bastards. You better be taking me to San Quentin after an episode like that. We are free to go? Fuck that. Cuff me. Throw me in the back of the car. Were you just fucking with us the whole time? You know Officers, I am sorry. That’s right. I am sorry that you are so goddam socially awkward that you must enforce your power upon a bunch of young guys you wish you were like. I feel like drop-kicking you in the patella.

“Thank you Officer. Sorry about the inconvenience.” 


Scene: Hennessey’s Tavern, Laguna Beach. 

The bar is now closed and a herd of young people are heading in the direction of the cars. They do not want to drive but they must; they have work tomorrow and they need to get home. There is simply no other choice. As they get closer to their cars, they begin shooting shifty-eyed glances down Pacific Coast Highway, looking for something, scared of something. One bold driver makes the first move…

An original idea: such a loaded conception nearly extinct to this world. The only form of its existence seems to resonate in the works of those who choose not to partake in a search for “it” but who formulate a systematic and desperate criticism of its absence. Are we blinded by the thick cloud of a world plagued by commercialization and standardization? Have we become what was predicted of us? Are we living in a “Brave New World”? Surely it is not the year “1984” anymore but the significance of the date can be overshadowed by the truth of a prediction. Huxley and Orwell envisioned it. Has the prophecy been fulfilled? 

The last main surge of originality seemed to have its roots in the early 20th century when the writers and thinkers of that time were dubbed what Gertrude Stein called the “Lost Generation.” It is interesting that those who were “lost” seemed to express more purity, originality, innovation, and individuality that we can even imagine possible in the world today. The “Lost Generation” was plagued by what Malcolm Cowley called “deracination” and was forced to turn to ex-patriotism to find some sort of meaning or value, but even still, they found it. 

Fitzgerald, Crane, Hemingway, Wilder, Dos Passos, Cowley, and others rebelled against the traditionalism and conformity that represented the literature of the time and created an artistic version of their own. Some of the best pieces ever written were born from this version, and we are lucky enough today to be able to read and re-read the genius it exposes. Because we are living in a time where typography must take a step down and yield to the powers of the all-mighty television, a mental journey through the pages of some great original art is all the more revitalizing. And to do this, we must rely on past generations. 

You might hear people today proclaim joyously that “Dan Brown is our savior. ‘The Da Vince Code’ was the re-birth of a passion for literature. The Kids are reading again!” But what has Brown done for literature? His books will eventually be movies one day and make millions of dollars. The crowds that flock to see “The Mona Lisa” might even be a little thicker, but what does that accomplish besides ultimately just further feeding the massive monster of commercialization that thrives in capitalism? 

The difference with Ernest Hemingway’s “The Sun Also Rises” is that it inspired a way of life. College students around the nation started talking like Hemingway’s characters and the beauty of simple conversation was born. Hemingway instilled a passion and love for dialogue, and he made people appreciate the simple art of being around other people. Hemingway established that the most significant meaning in life arises from those simple moments of conversation, and people were better off for reading him. He shone the path of hope with exuberant lights, and dialogue became a vehicle for the establishment of a second chance. And, most importantly, he recognized the single most important theme in all of literature: the answer to survival does not lie in challenging the meaninglessness of life or attempting to disprove it, but rather, in accepting and trying to co-exist amongst it. 

But it is far too early to throw in the towel yet. We must have faith; hope still bears its presence in glimpses that come every so often and stay long enough to have an effect, but fade too quickly for any permanence. There is still a chance and it takes human form in Jim Jarmusch, the writer and director of Coffee and Cigarettes. He sees it, he feels it, he is desperate for its return, and most importantly, he feels like we still have a chance.