Did ya ever see one of these?

I hated the circle game but everyone played it freshman year.   I maintained a steadfast policy of feigned maturity but really I just hated getting punched in the arm.  Nick loved the game and loved punching people in the arm most of all.  I always insisted I was not playing but he would not yield.   He was relentless, catching me on the way to the shower and even in the academic halls of my major.  What was he even doing in the fine arts building?  Reluctantly, I had been drafted into this stupid game.  I suffered for so many days that it  seemed endless.  

The way it works, if you’re not familiar, is this:  The protagonist cups his forefinger and thumb in a circle below his belt, anywhere but it has to be below the belt.  He then conspires to get you to look.  If you look, you lost and you get punched in the arm.  The only other option is to quickly stick your finger in the hole and retrieve before he can catch it.  If he catches your finger in the circle, you again have lost.  Like most things in life, this game favored the bold and the aggressor usually won most matches.  The game becomes more absurd as your opponent goes to greater and greater lengths to draw you attention to the circle.

One day, I was talking to Audra, a sweet girl from my english class, on the stairs.  Nick was walking by, stopped and asked me if I got the note from my room-mate?  What note, I said.  Nick smiled and went  “Ya know what, I got it right here” but there was no note.   Nick, I said I wasn't playing.  "You owe me" was his response.  Audra looked confused.  Nick nodded towards Audra as if to say, don't make this difficult.  I used my middle finger to respond.  Angrily, he chased me thru the halls of the dorm.  I laughed gleefully as I could run pretty fast.  However, I soon grew scared as he was relentless in his pursuit.  The final lap of the building, on the ground floor, I threw a full recycling can in front of him.  He stumbled and fell in a puddle of stale piss and beer.  I stopped just long enough to see him get up.  The RA for that floor opened his door and told him he would have to clean up the mess.  I howled with laughter and saw a look of devout anger on his face.

Later that evening, we had a small party.  One of those lame dorm room parties that seemed a lot cooler than they were.  A bunch of us stood crowded into one room sitting or standing and drinking beer while listening to music.  At this time, the college had a policy of enforcing the drinking age in the hallways of the dorm only.  Once you were in a room, you were safe, provided the music was low enough.  I left the room to get some music from Zach, who happened to be the roommate of Nick, my circle nemesis.  Zack had a huge collection of compact discs which was only strange when you realized that he did not actually own a CD player of any kind.  “I wanna have a good collection when I buy one” he said.  Well, there I am, in Zach’s room and there’s a party raging in the across the hall.  You can hear the faint percussion in the distance.  I’m looking through this pristine music collection for the perfect CD but it’s mostly Columbia House monthly selections, which were always terrible.  The music in the room suddenly grows louder.  

I turn around and there is my opponent but he’s way more intoxicated than I am.  I can see this by the way he glares at me and struggles to stand.  He’s got both of his hands behind him and he’s fiddling with the door.  All of the dorm rooms had a locking mechanism on the inside edge of the door.  You had to open the door to push the lock button.  I realized that he was locking the door at the exact moment I recalled my earlier victory in evading the circle game.  “What...what are ya doin Nick?”  Nick shook his head disappointedly, standing in front of the now locked door.  “Why, why did you lock the door Nick?” I asked but Nick just continued to shake his head wearily.  He slurred, Why did you do it?  “What?”  I asked.  "You know what you did.  Why did you do it?  Why, did you do what you did?  You said you weren't playin tha game but you looked...you looked"  He shook his head and stumbled toward me.  

At this point, there was a knock at the door.  Zack wanted to get into his room.  That bastard did not trust me to pick the right music even though he did not actually own a CD player.  How did he decide what was good, by the cover?  I shook off this thought as Nick drunkenly sighed, “You know what you did” and shuffled toward me.  At this point, I was reminded of an old after school special called, “When Daddy Drinks”.  Nick had cast himself as daddy in this melodrama and I was obviously to play the part of the wayward child.  True fear entered my mind as a small drop of sweat rolled down my back.  This guy was angry and there was no apparent escape.  I was going to have to fight him but he was far bigger than me.  I looked around for a weapon of some sort.  Thankfully, at that moment the door opened, Zack had found his key.  I still had to escape, I faked right, then left and using Zach to block, left the room.  Once again, Nick glared at me as if to say this is not over as I closed the door.

Nick was fine the next day, he acted like he was just joking at first and then pretended not to remember anything when I mentioned this story to him.  Once sober he was one of the nicest people you could meet but after a few beers he was literally the worst drunk I’ve ever known.  A few weeks later, there was a party near the end of the semester.  We had all fallen into comfortable groups of friends, some of us even had girlfriends.  There was one girl who seemed particularly sheltered.  At once, I noticed Ann was gone and asked where did she go.  To pick a CD from my room, Zack said.  Where’s Nick, I inquired next?   I thought of the drunken altercation from a few weeks past.  Every date rape scenario presented by the freshman seminar on sexual assault crept into my mind and I grew quite paranoid.  Ann was a nice girl and rarely drank.  How many beers did she have already?  I tried to figure her consumption but I had already lost my own count.  I sipped my warm beer and contemplated a course of action.  

I jumped up, sprinted into the hall before I realized I had made a decision.  I tried the door to Zack and Nick’s room which was surprisingly, not locked.  I walked in and they were both sitting on Nicks bed, just talking.  I had obviously interrupted something but I did not care because I had a plan.  Nick glared at me and asked "What's up", in a manner that clearly said, get the fuck out of here.  "Oh hey, " I said "Zach jus wanted me to ask you, if you had one of these?"  I smiled at Nick as he realized he had been caught in the game.  Angrily, Nick shook his head “Not now, man.”   Oh yes, I said smiling back.  “Is it a game, I wanna play” Ann innocently asked.  In response, Nick gave her the same terse introduction to the game that everyone got.  He immediately followed with “Did ya ever see one of these?” and when she looked, he punched her in the arm, full force and without any regret.  Ann jumped up, at the pain in her arm and walked out of the room horrified.  Suddenly, I remembered something my mother told me about good deeds.  Nick smiled gleefully, remembering our previous encounter from weeks past “I still owe you”.  He chased me down the hall and into the quad while I yelled back, “You looked, you looked.”

The Circle Game

Rainy Day Dream # 6 & 7

I'm in a concrete culvert filled with light blue jello and I'm drowning.  The jello looks pleasant enough, like tropical sea water.  I could touch the bottom as I'm almost tall enough but there are metal mechanical rats that keep trying to eat my feet.  So I keep struggling to find the edge of the pool but I keep sinking into the jello & snapping metal rats.  It's almost funny but every time I laugh I get a mouth full of jello at the same time but it has no taste.  All I can think is I probably have metal boots somewhere at home that would really help in this situation.  The truth is, I don't own any metal boots but I always wanted a suit of armor.  I wonder if chainmail would help in this situation?  I've seen it used effectively against sharks.  Still, I wonder why the blue jello has no flavor.

Now, I'm walking down the street and I see a house that used to sell honey and I'm a lil nervous because I know they have bees.  I'm allergic to bees.  If I get stung by one, I blow up like the Michelin man.  I can't imagine what a whole nest of them would do to me.  I'm nervous as I get closer, I see a Ford Econoline van like my father used to have and its backed up into the driveway the way he would when on a service call.

The back, bomb bay doors are swung open wide with a water main key propping up the one side from closing.  I get a lil closer and I see its a dark green van, not blue like his was, but there is his company logo.   The sign on a giant magnet, looks like a vaguely ethnic version of the fallout guy cartoon, running with a wrench in his hand.  Now, I have to go inside.  In highschool, I would always dread this situation.  He would put me to work with my catholic school uniform still on and tomorrow, I would not be able to find a clean outfit to wear.  Another detention in my future.

I quietly walk into the split level home and see my father sitting down, eating a meal that my mother and sister have prepared, in a brightly lit room.  The whole scene reminds me of the Presence album cover.  I hear my father say "Where's the moose?" My sister has bright red hair and its chopped short like Prince valiant.  This is the awkward syle she adopted in high school but she's older now.  They all smile at me.  Why are they so happy?  I don't remember family dinners being all that happy.  My father turns to me, he has dark brown hair like when I was in high school and says "There's the moose."  and then I woke up.

The Scale of Pollution

A while ago we discussed certain levels of intoxication and you mentioned that your sister had developed a scale for your behavior.  I too, have developed my own scale for your behavior, which is detailed below.  The scale is graduated from five to negative two with zero representing a condition devoid of chemical influence.  

The TJD Scale of Pollution:  

5:  Passed Out:  Otherwise completely incapacitated with alternating shallow and congested breathing. (Stranger Danger: Check for signs of life!) 

4:  Incoherent State:  Rambling xanax fueled gibberish, often pauses for catnaps only to continue conversation minutes or hours later.  (Will often start a conversation with "Hey, remember the time we flew that plane into the ocean of jello and you got mad?")

3:  Medium Junked:  Visibly trashed on oxy, eyes pinned, extreme time spatial disorientation.  (Will often start off a conversation fairly coherent and then make widely inaccurate statements like "I have not gotten high in like... a month, dude")

2:  Lightly Junked:  Lively high on oxy and quite pleasant to be around for 10 or 15 minutes. (Will often start conversations about ambitious plans for the next day "Tomorrow, we get up real early and ride our bikes to Atlantic Highlands for breakfast and then we hit the gym.")

1:  Regular High:  Lit up on weed with minor time delay and spatial disorientation (Will often start conversations with "Yo, let's get Wendy's")

0:  Stasis: The absence of any chemical effect, seen once or twice a year. (Will often start a conversation with "Did you see the news today, the market dropped like 100 points, I wonder how much of that was Tech stocks…")

-1:  Irritably Sober:  Slightly disorientated from oxy withdrawal and poor co-ordination. (Will often start a conversation with "These people are all robbing me, I can't find my shit.  Have you seen it?")

-2:  Malevolently Sober:  Bad mood swings, combative attitude coupled with flu like symptoms from oxy withdrawal  (Will often start a conversation off with "WTF, I never said that, yer jus making shit up man!")

You Are Even Here

The phone rings and its Pat, he says he might stop by.  I go “Alright then, let me start holding my breath now”.  He’s one of my two best friends but they’re both fairly unreliable in any situation.  However, it is strange timing, my two best friends call me on the phone to hang out, only minutes apart.  I’m excited because I haven’t seen either of them in a while.  I haven’t seen either of them because they’re both dead.  Unreliable when living, I can’t imagine either one has gotten better with their schedules.  I hardly complete this thought, when Pat pulls up in his green jetta still talking to me on the phone it seems.  I wonder what I said?  Sometimes, my mind wanders, it’s a wonder i’m still here at all.  

Pat is surprisingly upbeat & calm, he jus wants to hang out and go for a few beers.  He tells me about his kids, he has three of them now.  They’re still alive but they don’t remember him it seems and he finds this kinda annoying.  Also, Kelly, his loving wife of ten years is a whore.  I don’t know why but he keeps repeating this over and over to me.  “Kelly’s a whore...”  None of this makes sense to me.  I barely know her but she seems the picture of innocence.  More importantly, she put up with him all those years.

I don't think she deserves this designation but ever the diplomat, I try to gloss over this assertion and change the subject.  Tom is supposed to be here any minute I say.  We hang out and watch Nobody’s Fool with Paul Newman.  He says he’s never seen this part, the scene where Sully gets hit in his bad knee by his long lost grandson, Wacker.  Pat laughs out loud.  Other than that, everything is going surprisingly well.  I’m a lil nervous, trying to avoid saying the obvious, asking the obvious but I’m jus really happy to see him.  I always had a good time with Pat, Tom on the other hand...

While reflecting on these thoughts,  Tom & his alchy friend Tommy burst into the room.  I did not even hear them come in.  Last time I checked, Tommy was in rehab but apparently not anymore.  Tom & Tommy or TnT as they were known,  have found each other in what I like to call the Great After Party.  They yell “YOOO” in unison while  they barrel into the room.  Tommy or T to his friends, sits on my reclined exercise bike that doubles as a coat rack while Tom sits behind me, at my desk.  

I already know what he’s doing, I don't have to look.  He’s doing what he always does but Pat looks annoyed.  I know by the quiet tones Tom is crushing up pills and laying out lines.  I turn in my chair and look over his shoulder, shaking my head.  He’s already snorting a mound of  oxy & some white powder that I assume to be xanax, his favorite combo.  Strange because xanax or zany is usually yellow.  Maybe this is something new?  Listen, I begin mildly; you know you can’t do that here.  Ignoring me, Tom racks off another line.  Lower this time, I half whisper “You know that’s how Pat died, and it upsets him.  Besides man, you get way too fucked up and...”.  Tom replies “Jus wanna have a good time with ya, it’s been a while.”   “Listen” I say, there’s no more pretending Tom, I don’t even understand the point of this.  “Yer already dead”.

I turned around to look at Pat for some kind of moral support and he goes “Yeah, stupid.”  I hear his voice but I don’t see him.  Confused, I turn around again and Tom looks depressed & annoyed like I just ruined  the party, which I did.  I turn to Tommy and I go I thought you only drink vodka?  He shrugs his shoulders and laughs.  When I looked back to the desk chair, Tom is gone and then the whole room is empty.  Why did I  ruin the party by saying the obvious, I know that’s always a mistake.  Maybe they’ll both come back again, next week?