A Shade of My Former Room.

I can't say that being tired is something that is fairly enjoyable or even satisfying. But something about this quiet, carpet spread corner gives off a simple, yet, strange pinch of comfort. Like my old friend, him and I, sitting, silent, knowing what each other wants to say but has no strength to do so. I can't help but give praises to its support, its selfless partnership, its quiet understanding.

A lampshade glows atop my nightstand. A mahogany desk sits to my left, scarred on its silky layers with years of miswritten shedding. From the top of my head and above sits my dormant four pronged fan, jittery at its worst, cool to the naked self at its best. On my walls are remnants of old history, stained with my age and tinted with my notes and regurgitated nonsense. My closet sits with its mouth wide apart, gleaming its various gaps and gum scars of forgotten sweaters and worn in coats. There, nearly unrecognizable to the unwary eye, is my hat rack, wrapped in skeletons of old baseball caps and skinny belts. And my bed is neither its youthful appearance nor its adolescent stiffness. It is now just beat down, worn out, and soft as the wrinkled skin of a forgotten, folded, back closet, once favorite blanket.

And I'm still here, way past late, too tired to look at everything past its chipped paint and sapping armor. It's less of nostalgic than more of a secret old song that you picked up from some distant radio channel, one night while driving a lonely drive home. It's that beautiful and ugly at the same time. It only makes sense, to me at least, that nostalgia is so goddamn difficult at times, because it reminds you of so much that you'll never have back, only to hold it behind a quivering smile. Because you've grown up together, but you've forgotten how. But at the same time--the whole goddamn time--you realize that it'll be alright. Only then, at that very simple moment, you can finally fall asleep.

My Holiday List.

I sent a letter to Santa just once as a child, only to find out that my hours committed to wishing and meticulously picking out items to slap on that perfect gift list was to be returned in such an orderly and heartbreaking fashion. In shorter sentence explanations, the letter was postmarked and returned to the sender. I wasn't ever the biggest Santa geek, but I did hope--which led to thinking, which led to brainstorming, which led to jotting, which led to writing, which led to the above. So, I have taken the time to write my own list, something that came to mind as I was driving home this rainy, un-xmaslike night.


Henry is a sucker for the following:

1. Women.
2. Fine Cheese.
3. A late night fiasco.
4. Yao Ming.
5. Gibberish.
6. Pretty girls.
7. Mexican Food.
7 1/2. Pretty damn cute girls.
8. Rain.
9. Worn in novels.
9 3/4. Really expensive shoes that I will never buy. Ever.
10. Pretentious bastard literature.
11. Finding different opportunities to use the word 'pretentious' in the correct context and manner.
12. Pretentious.
13. Non-pretentious girls.
14. Pretentious girls.
15. Those shows on the history channel or TLC about America's prison systems and their internal gang warfare.
16. Vince Young and all his glory.
17. Beatdowns in racquetball when allotted the availability.
18. Women. Jesus, you ladies really don't know what you do to us fellas.

Have a merry xmas and some happy kind of holiday, chummy.

My Most Meticulous, Pretentious, Adventitious Subtitle Yet!

I guess you could call me psychotic. But I'd rather just get it over with.

Picture this: hair strewn across layers of cotton with a mouth ajar.

Or this: creases on creases pressed between sheets of ghostly apparel.

But maybe: lips pressed together, pinched tight, with eyes of an orphan smiling back at something she never had.

I'm giving up on finding imperfect chapters that can't help but find their ways into my little dark side. Maybe it's that I just need some sort of routine. Finding yourself with everyday habits doesn't seem too mundane. Check this. Check that. Sign this. Drink that. Run point five this way. Jog point two this day--only because it's an odd day. Or what about posting a bit of my mystery on the television screen. Blaring out in anguish and letting verbs fall where they may. Okay, okay. I'll bite my tongue now, knowing that everyone finally appreciates me for what I am.

Yeah, right. I'll take those first four sentences instead.

Liberacion De La Boca.

I have this bad taste in my mouth.

On the other hand it's rather wonderful. An array of sparks and flashes, invisible light bulb pieces sticking out the sides of my tongue, sharpening themselves on the edges of my gums. If we could snap Polaroids from the dark depths of our throats, would we? Would new words emit new techniques? Would streetwise slang become some new fad of bourgeois portrait snapping? Who knows, maybe I've developed some new science--or even better (and tax free), a religion.

Who's to say? Except from the mouth of some fibster, I can see no one else.

Or--maybe it could be this monstrous Pad Thai that happened to be stuck in the corner of my fridge. Oh, the fury that hath stricken across my guts. But the worst is the mouth. Worse than sharp glass, oh, is this crustaceous paste that used to be savory, burning goodness. But that was ages ago--more respectively, less than five days ago. Curse this thing called time.

But am I boring you? Have I made you age as well? Because I've realized that however eloquent one believes they age, things will always be the same. No matter how I grow--laterally, vertically, or flatulently--things will always be the same.

Change is scary. It always has been. Decisions are difficult. They always have been. It's an awful feeling that I've wrapped myself in this entire semester because I'm such a stalwart when it comes to these things. I sit like a rock and glue my edges to the carpet, immovable by the forces, whether it be the fire ant, the erratic roommate, or the churning pain of hunger. Well, maybe scratch those last two.

Well, if I knew it would end like this. I knew from the beginning. I'll never quite have an answer until I get there, whenever that will be. But for now, if you'll excuse me, there is an awfully sensational taste in my mouth, a disgustingly sharp pain in my side, and a lot of old Pad Thai ready to be liberated.