Very unnassumadly put: Thoughts

I want to crawl into the dark.

It doesn't have to be a specific place; just a place that no one would be able to see me.

Just to go into the dark and cover my face, and maybe weep if I was feeling foolish enough.

Crying is one of the most base things you can do. That and laughing...



It's like they are polar opposites.









Back to the part about the dark though. Maybe in the darkness I would be able to live with myself. I wouldn't be bothered to think about all the things that I do that I hate. I wouldn't be bothered to think about how people around me are full of bullshit. (myself included)

If you look at the way people live and they way we communicate, It's almost like all the signs are telling us to live alone.

Life is pretty miserable by itself right? You don't need other people making it worse.

They get in fights, they spit on each other, they curse each other out, they are dishonest and then lie about lying.


"Really, everybody is a criminal; just not everybody has been given the chance to become one. You change the rules around a little bit and you have a whole new game; people that were law-abiding citizens can turn into the worst of people; Just if you'd give them the chance."


End of Transmission.

Chapstick use begets chapstick use.

Elliot Smith (mix between Spoon, Wilco and Elvis Costello(musically that is))

This is my 100th post. No matter what Trevor says...

I have some posts that I didn't make public so the number of post that you see will be less, but this is officially my 100th post.


I have been listening to Elliot Smith a lot recently. I picked up some of his albums at the library and at first I didn't really like most of his songs.

It's like I really wanted too, because I liked his style. I at least liked the way he phrased his music.



and the more I listened to him, I realized that I really like his music. This one whole album in particular. "Figure 8" it's called.




and I remember reading somewhere before I listened to his music that he killed himself by stabbing himself 2 times in the chest. There are conspiracy theories as there always is with famous people dieing.

Like somehow it doesn't make sense that Kurt Kobain would kill himself using a shotgun and a needle-full of the big "H"?

At least it makes more sense then thinking someone broke into his house, injected him with heroin and then shot him with a shotgun and then didn't leave any evidence behind...


Anyways, I digress...


I think that Elliot Smith's music has taken on a whole new meaning, now that I know he killed himself by stabbing himself in the chest. I look at his music in a whole different way. It's almost like all the songs he made were just catchy individually wrapped suicide notes...


and I can't help but feel sad every time I listen to his music. Maybe like it was all a cry for help?



and then I think about how I feel really alone, and how I'm not friends with any of the people I used to be friends with for various reasons. One of them joined the military, I was in love with another and then found out how terribly pathetic I was at trying to hide it and/or suppress it. Those are the main ones. The "biggies" if you will.

and every time I listen to Elliot smith, I can't help but keeping getting reminded of that girl that I loved and now don't talk to at all (not that I want to...) and the friend who joined the marines.




and so I wonder if my whole life and all the songs I write will just end up being catchy individually wrapped suicide notes.

Maybe people that listen to my music will wonder whether I was asking for help or something.

Like, this song means this, and that song there is talking about how he was afraid and lonely. that kind of thing.

Will I be a victim of suicide?

I honestly have no idea.




I'm not considering it, but it's not like sometimes I don't wish I had the guts to do it.

I feel like I'm flying apart at the speed of light.














God, what is this anxiety and paranoia?




In the words of Elliot Smith.




"Stupidity Tries"

Today; winter without the snow. It's cold and people are tired but there isn't any proof. Your breath makes a cloud when you step outside; your hands get cold.

Hijo de puta

We are a generation without our fathers.

We've got our mothers and sisters,
and sometimes; our brothers.

That is, if they didn't run off to Montana to become addicted to meth or coke, shoot guns and get chased by the nazi skinheads that run rampant in that part of the country.

or if they didn't join the navy, army, air force or marine corps.


I have a friend whose dad is an engineer;


gone all the time.

I have a friend whose dad is a borderline drunk;

gonzo! emotionally, if not physically.


and I have my dad, who is, quite frankly a loser. He doesn't even get a capital "L" as far as I'm concerned, because he isn't a special "Loser", he's just a normal one.



It's like in the book of Genesis, where God says that the consequence of Eve's disobedience is that her pain in childbirth will increase, and the consequence for Adam is that he has to work in the fields all day long and toil, and not really gain anything in the end;

Figures...

Mothers will always be closer to their children then the father because the mother had the baby. She produced his little baby hands through the pain of her labour, while the father stood idly by and cut the umbilical cord.

Fathers will always be distant and unreachable because they have to work in the field all the hours of the day, which is really just an old-age way of saying that they have to put bacon on the table, and provide for the family. They don't just have to work; they have to toil.

and so when they come home they are tired and just want to eat and then go to bed.

and so is the pattern of the natural world.


We are a Generation without our fathers.

and by "Generation", I don't mean like people that were born in the late 80's and maybe early nineties.


It just means Everyone.


since the start of time;



until now.








You know it's the sad depressing truth; and don't you forget that it will be the same thing when we become fathers.

















maybe unless we adopt children into our single-parent Mr. Mom type homes.


then, maybe then, do we have a shot.?

Brad's blog spurred me to share this... It was originally a comment, but It got to be too long, so i thought I'd do it here.

I just recently had a dream where I was at my house and some people pulled up and got out, and for some reason I got in, and there was this beautiful girl sitting there in the back seat, and I sat next to her.

her dad was in the front seat for some reason, and he was driving us somewhere, and his coffee mug that was sitting in the front cup holder all of a sudden had a hole in the bottom and started spilled coffee. He got mad and cussed out the kids that "did it"

and so for some reason, I decided that I would suck it up and use my toe to plug the hole on the bottom of the cup, and the coffee was really hot, and it hurt.

we got to where we were going, and it turned out to be one of those strip malls that actually have a little inside area. So it's like a mall, only smaller, and there are businesses on the outside too.

we went into a music shop, and while we were there, an alarm went off or a siren sounded, and the owner of the store told everyone to get out of the way of the car that would be driving through the middle of the store.

It's like the store was divided in half by this car lane that ran right through it. and then pulled up some people, or some hoodlums, I should say, and they got out and at the same time, a car woooshed past us through the store.




and I woke up in a dark place. only, I was holding glowing things in my hands. They were blue eyes. And somebody's pinky finger, or small toe. I can't remember. But there was this sense of dread. horrible dread, because those were the eyes of that beautiful girl that i had been in the car with. and I was in a totally dark place. and I wasn't myself.

I was looking through the eyes of that beautiful girl, and I had been held hostage by those people that ran into the store with the car, and they had cut out my beautiful blue girl eyes, and cut off my pinky finger. Or toe. I can't remember.

and i was just sitting there crying. Because I was alone, in a dark room, and my eyes were in my hands.





and right before I woke up, I remember thinking how weird it was that I could still see even though they had taken out my eyes.

But it was like I was both people, while i was in the dark place, knowing that I had been kidnapped.

I was me, the kid who was admiring the girl, and I was really sad that she was kidnapped, and I was also the girl.

totally terrified at the thought of my eyes being cut out and that they were looking at me, and glowing.





I was telling my mom that I can't recall ever having a nightmare. I've had a high fever one time, and I thought that I was in the T.V. show nash bridges, and that there were people trying to get me.

but I've never had a nightmare.


and so she said that a nightmare is just a bad dream. Or a dream that you didn't like.


and this dream scared me. It really scared me. It filled me with dread and horror. Absolute horror. and I couldn't really even speak of it, and when I did, I just stopped in silence of how terrified it actually made me.


But I wouldn't say it was a nightmare. I didn't wake up in a cold sweat, or a hot sweat, or any kind of perspiration. I just woke up in my regular old way. Slowly opening my eyes, like they had never been shut, and then just being awake.



It's not that I liked it, It's just I felt like I had been in a movie. A movie that I starred in and watched at the same time, and I really like that quality about dreams, no matter if they end up with me holding my own eye balls or if I go sailing off into the distance...

I know you won't be able to read into it, but It might be fun to see...

There is Just, sin, doubt, pride and uncertainty inside me.


I pride myself on being aware of my sin and it's effects, but I'm uncertain sometimes if my doubt is caused by my pride or by my sin. Who knows- it could be both.

I seriously doubt that my uncertainty is caused by my pride. That doesn't make too much sense.

I think that my uncertainty is caused by sin, which makes doubt, and then my doubt doubles into sin, as i know it.


well, knowing all this; atleast knowing that I'm not sure if I'm too prideful, but more then certain that I'm atleast a little bit doubtful in the face of uncertainty, I would be willing to say that the Just would win out over me if I let it.


But then I have to get rid of all the rest...





That's the part I'm no good at; of this I'm certain.

He is a preacher and a carpenter; please!

I choose to follow Jesus of the bible for mostly one reason...

I mean, it's the deciding factor that really cements my suspicions.


Entropy.


It's the reason that the belt to your vacuum cleaner get's stretched out and you have to spend 45 minutes putting on a new one.

It's the reason that when you get food from a fast-food restaurant, your fries are everywhere except in the little carton they were supposed to come in. It's why your burger is horribly messy and doesn't look like the picture on the wall at all.

It's the reason that the strings on your guitar get out of tune.

It's the reason why your car breaks down when you're already late for work and the only thing you can do is get a ride with your grandma.

It's the reason why a glass cup breaks if you accidentally drop it while walking towards the dishwasher.

It's the reason that you get holes in your shoes and in your T-shirts.

It's the reason that the whole front tire of your bike comes loose and falls off while your biking, leaving you to battle with the cement. It's the reason that you don't win.

It's the reason that skin cells and little bug feces and animal dandruff all collect to make dust. It's the reason that you have to wipe up that dust with a cloth when your cleaning your bedroom.

It's the reason that people start out in love and end up hating each other. It's why people start out in a civilized manner and then end up nearly killing each other. It's why the divorce rate is higher than 50% It's the reason that before it was socially acceptable for people to divorce that they probably just died before it was an issue.


Everything is going from order to chaos.

Everything is flying apart; as soon as it's put back together; at thirteen million miles an hour.



and that is precisely why I follow the teachings of Jesus Christ, and why I call myself a Christian.



I can feel myself being pulled apart. All my thoughts are trying to strangle me, and they're gaining strongholds, slowly, but surely.

Naturally some people will say, you take it too seriously. You think too much, your too hard on yourself.

I'm wondering where we go when we die, or where do we come from when we're born. Why am I here? What am I doing in this foreign land?

Can you answer that?



And that is why Entropy is the key.



I'm falling apart and sometimes so rapidly, I can't see it, and everyone is telling me different things. They are all talking about tips and tricks. Everyone is telling me answers to questions I never asked. They're giving me excuses to reasons I never asked about.


when the only one that has ever been able to put me back together is Him;


Slowly but surely.



"I've never met a man,
who holds my heart in his hands,
more securely than,
this man in his 'thirty-threes'.

He is a preacher and a carpenter; please!
He will heal the cripples feet
He'll spit dirt and mud in your eye
but only if you happen to be blind."

"Weak and wounded sinner, lost and left to die. Raise your head because love is passing by."

I'm going to be posting on here alot more often considering that i don't have a facebook... No one will read me here. I can already feel the dust and age...

I'm not an honest man so much as i am just a really bad liar...

I can't imagine why i ever loved you... It seems like a mean thing to say but i fear that it's true. You were a thought. An ideal. Something that wasn't real...

Hiatus

I quit facebook for alot of reasons, the sole one being that I feel like I'm going crazy because of it.

All the fakeness and the stupid words that people say. It's hard to explain.

I feel like I'm in a room with a bunch of people, and we're all talking and it's all fine and dandy, and then I start screaming something, and everybody acts like I'm fine. They act like I'm just quoting music lyrics. They act like I'm sane.


That's the romantic version of it.


The simple truth is, that I don't like facebook, and how people add you just to add you, and they have no real intention of talking to you at all. They have no intention of even pretending to be interested in you. They just add friends and keep adding.

and people see my statuses and they think that they are cute, or thoughtful. But really they are full of confusion and grief and hurt and pain, and disillusion.



On facebook, just like in the world, no body listens to what you are really saying; they just walk around with their heads in other peoples arms. So I've decided to quit facebook, considering that I can't easily quit life and then regain it back again.


I can however, return to facebook with all my friends and things, intact. So that is what I am doing.

It is just a hiatus.

I got 2 new pairs of dickies. One blue and one brown. I haven't worn there sort of pants for likeatleast a year. And it feels good baby!

Song, I haven't finished yet, but I like so far...

subways, We don't have subways, all we have is a metro-light rail.

New york has all the subway trains.

speaking of subways, I put my foot up on a bar, and a cop came and said "you better take it up off of there"

but I didn't and when he came back he said "son, get off the car"


New York and her apple; Me and my foolishness.


I was afraid to love you
most of the day I spent alone.
I didn't want anybody to read me
and figure out I was all on my own.


Remember when we walked back, it was pitch black, and we didn't know the block,

of the church, that we were staying at.

do you remember, how we told all of our friends, we got searched and seizured and put up against the wall,

and I didn't have any I.D. on me, at all.

"American Hurt" An Original Essay by Noah Ortiz

If you look deep enough inside of yourself you don't find a little kid or a panorama of space as it looks like from a third-grader's eyes. You find Hurt. Just deep buried Hurt.

and when you look a little further past that, you find that everything you did from then on was your way of trying to mask it, or push it away, or forget it.




And then one night, you're trying to fall asleep in your bed, and your eyes flick open, and you remember all those things that you tried to keep buried in your memory.


And you're wondering how you ever got along with such wounds pent up underneath your aging frame.

Starting from when you were 8 years old and you didn't have the right Pokemon cards, or you didn't have the right game system. Your parents were too strict, your lawn didn't have a hill in it.

and then when you got to middle school, it wasn't about what you didn't have, it was more about who you were.

Someone said that you were too fat, too skinny, too silly, too dumb. too talkative, too quiet. Too-everything.

and then on in high school, it was a horrible mix of the two. It was that you didn't have a cellphone, that you were a prude, that you smelled, that you didn't have any friends.



Then, in your mind, you're cycling through all of these Hurts




and you find




that it hurts even more now, then it did then.

Because you realize that you've been bullying other kids this whole time.

If i didn't love God and all the things he created on the earth, i would litter alot. It's a rush. It's like a cowards way of rebelling against the world...

I don't have bad feelings toward him now. It's just weird. And i had forgotten about it.

It just makes me wonder. What would make an otherwise good kid do something like that. I told the friend whose party we were at and she was shocked.

I didn't really want to fight either. So i walked away. I saw him again a year or two later at a friends birthday party and we were fine. He's pretty cool.

I can't remember exactly why but they were like super mean and james slapped me in the face. I almost threw a punch but there was a janitor and he said "stop"

In tenth grade i was walking through the halls and i think i had my mohawk at that time, and i was approached by james shecter and some of his friends.

You have to check out this guys website. I stumbled upon it while reading The guts by chuck palhniuk or whatever his name is.

http://splinterfiction.wordpress.com/


and then check out the short story that drew me into this guys website.

http://splinterfiction.wordpress.com/2007/06/27/nerve-impulse/


great writing. refreshing.



I'm talking to you trevor, and brad.

I really wish that Kurt Cobain would have not killed himself.

I looked at Francis Bean Cobain and she has her dad's eyes.

I mean, It's overwhelming.




It sucks.

The word verifications on comments I leave are getting harder and harder each day.

arphappo

That's what I had to type in when i just commented on trevor's post.

There's like 3 p's in that!

It's confusing man...

I want to give generosity not because... But just because.

I don't want to see any old friends. I hate old friends. I hate how it's this novelty thing.

"Oh, I used to know you!"

I don't like old friends. Old friends are dead friends. That's what I say.



New friends are untrustable. New friends are mostly out to get you. They are out to get on your nerves and your cash. And they just want to sleep on your couch.

Trevor. You are the only friend that I'm okay with being friends with at this moment.




Past friends are no good. They are dead friends as I like to say. No good. They are no good.

I don't like looking at pictures of old friends. It depresses me. It's depressing, really.

I don't like to think about the friends I don't have. I don't have alot of friends, I only have a few. But I want to forget most of them. Except for trevor.

Trevor, you are the only friend that I'm okay with being friends with.


Trevor is an old friend, and a new friend and a current friend. That's why.

That's why it's okay. It's okay for trevor. Just okay.






But, old and new friends man. yea, I don't know about them.

They are dead as I like to say.

I honestly don't know how to talk honestly without any pretenses. Ya know?

I feel like a Noob.



Trevor has 288 posts

and I have a measley 71 posts.






This one makes it 72 but I still feel bad...

I feel so close to a breakthrough,

and no.

Don't ask "what?"


It's nothing I can explain. It's like the pain you feel after you've been kicked on the stomach.


It's just a little pain.

Just a little poke in the side of your rib that tells you your not dead, but not really breathing yet either.





I am paranoid and jealous and dementiated. I am like a fire hydrant whose water has all been used.




I just want a little peace, but mostly all I want to say is



























































Love me, please?

something trevor would blog about...

The word verification for a comment I just posted was "bradpie" and I thought that it was kind of comical.

I'd rather be your friend for 10 years than be your lover for 1.

True Story.

You scare me. I don't want to remember you in the morning...and I don't want learn who you are in the evening.














I first learned of you when I watched the light come in through the cracks in the closet. I remember thinking that we were floating on a raft and that it was lava streaming through the cracks.














The End.

Operation "forget you"

I am on the verge of a breakthrough. I have been running the spread sheets all day looking for patterns and I found one interesting one.


When ever I say "I love you" you shy away and go into hiding for a couple of days.


Now that wouldn't be so abnormal if not for the fact that you never returned. You never came back and you never said "hello" again.



Now I am on the crest-line of some new thought, or something.



I can't grasp it, yet....oh, there we go.


Let's see, it says "I'm not your lover anymore"



That's strange for me to be thinking. I don't have a lover...

2 hours later...


The Subatronic Utilizing Compart-Mentalizer Energyfield, or the S.U.C. M.E. as I like to call it, has been spitting out data ever since it got ahold of that thought that I was thinking earlier.


It seems to think that I have a rather large crush on an individual of the female genus.


I think not...




2 hours later...


ok, I guess I do have a rather large crush on an individual of the female genus.


but alas, I'm getting new information...


Oh it seems that she does not return the feelings.


well, you can't do anything about that. I'll just forget her forever.



The end.















Atleast I wish that is what I could do...















No, for real, I'm an idiot.
















Like, seriously, get a life...

I like sounds.

I've learned that when i get texts they are rarely from who i'd guess their from. Like they are never from people you actually want to talk to. Serious...

No one is posting anything!

I really don't like this feeling.

It's a feeling of despair and confusion.






I have this theory that the common person doesn't actually care about his fellow man around him. Not more then himself, anyways.


The common man will ask, "how are you?" but he won't want you to break down into tears and go on to explain how you feel "hurt and confused" and that you think your going crazy on account of you not being able to make up your fucking mind!


I think he would care very little indeed!

Joke.

This post is an obligation. I'll just say it right out.


It doesn't mean it can't be good, but it probably won't be any good.




Well...so...



I am not in love anymore, so that's good.


Well, she actually died... so, I don't know if that constitutes me having stopped loving her, I just know there is no possibility that we'll ever go out on a date!

Once your dead, you don't come back for the living.

Like she would want to come back and have dinner and a movie with me after what she's been through...





It's just not going to happen.


































Is it?

I like the movie "Fight Club" but I don't like how people like live by it.


My friend, Ryan, has like quotes on his Facebook page and he thinks they are just the most profound quotes ever.


It's like....



What the F?!



It's not real. It's just a movie that some guy made. He probably doesn't even live by those quotes and he wrote it!

I heard about this cat that would know 2 weeks ahead of time when his owner would have a seizure.

Like it would be all over it's owner for 2 weeks before a seizure came.



and I've heard of other instances where a pet knows stuff like that. but it's just like "what the F?"



Why don't we humans have any kind of intuition like that?

We're just left in the dark with our reason.

I like the feeling of sleeping naked. I've even got used to the feeling of vulnerability that comes with it and that is part of the thrill. You should try it!

I was just at a wedding.

and it was awesome because I knew the people who were getting married.

And She was there, and She hugged me so tightly... I just want to be with her.



And now I feel dejected and all I want to do is go to bed.




Night.

I am a desperate man

I sometimes don't like looking at old pictures.


from left to right: Isaiah (my brother), Ryan Haeg, Donald "D.A." Knapp, and me.


This was in a time before D.A.'s family was separated by divorce and alcoholism.

Before he and his Mom and Sister moved down to Texas.

Before me and my brother had no connection to him anymore when we had known him our whole lives.


And to talk about change!

let's talk a bit about Ryan Haeg. Or... "Conan O'Ryan" as I used to call him.

He lives in Chicago now, going to school to become a mechanic, which he told me himself he doesn't want to do.

He's drinking and smoking pot and partying a lot, just like his older brother who he hates because he's a nasty drunk, and calls him in the middle of the night sometimes to curse him out.




And for me and my brother... well we're basically the same as we were.






NOT!





It's like all of our lives are swirling down the toilet into an oblivion of nothingness and trade school and debt and early marriages that end in early divorce.


Yea, So pardon me if I sometimes don't like looking at old pictures...

In the words of Daniel "The DJ" Johnston,

Despair came knocking

At my door
And I let her in
For a while

She sat on the couch
In the end, smoking

She said nothing

Suddenly I felt tired
I began to feel tired
And all of the sudden,
the room seemed dizzy and dirty

Despair came knocking
And I let her in
For a while

This is for you Trevor. 1 week straight.




I had a dream last night and it was so pathetic and sad that I don't want to share it.

And I'm not going to.

Beautiful, yes very, but something's wrong. Yes, Yes, something is wrong. Very wrong. Yes Beautiful, but very wrong. Very Very Very Very

I don't like it when people say that everything will turn out alright. It's just a comfort phrase probably, like when your 4 year old's dog dies, and you tell him everything will be alright.

That's understandable.

But in some situation where you know things maybe aren't going to be alright, all it is, is just one more lie. isn't it?


Life sometimes doesn't end up okay, but I like not being able to control it.

I just don't like it when people say things they don't mean, and I'm certainly guilty of it.



But it's like our culture encourages people to say bullshit. They encourage people to comfort others with words of shit.


That's messed up.

I'm in cali right now visiting my family and i'm realizing how fucked up my family really is. It really scares me.

Like they could if they tried...

And finally there are the people. They are just people though. They wander around in the salvation of the rain. Sometimes they even try to dodge it.

You know the oil that comes up from the ground when it rains? That is just blood. Alone and freestanding life that comes up through the cracks.

Standing here and watching the rain fall. It's like watching the world fall and crumble in tiny little increments.

I just want to touch some skin.

Just reach out and touch smooth skin;

and I would back away right when i touched it, don't worry.


I just want the touch.

"To each his own" means we're all alone.

I had a dream that i was running around getting chased by the cops and while i was running, I ran into a cop, which seemed like he was from the future, and I beat him up and took his gun and uniform.

the uniform was just two pieces of square plastic that went on the front and back of my body. It was like a cheap Halloween costume. and the gun was a long rubbery musket type gun. When i would bring it up to aim, the tip would bounce around like a fishing pole.

I ran into this house where my friend was and he was in there with another cop, and so i hit the cop in the face, and he fell down to the floor. Then i pointed a pistol that magically appeared on me, towards the cops face and fired.

and then I ran away down towards town. We were in excelsior right across the street from my house.

when all of a sudden Tyler Dow was running after me. I shot him once, but the bullet didn't seem to do anything, and so i kept firing, but no bullets would come out after that. Then i ran up to a guy that looked like Ed McMahon and he told me i had to reload by pressing X. haha.

and then by that time Tyler Dow was in a car driving away towards the town. I took aim and with my musket, shot one good shot into the back window of the car. then after a few seconds the car veered off the road.


end of dream.


It's kind of messed up that I killed 2 people and one of them was a cop. =(

There are alot of kinds of christians out there, but for what I'm thinking of right now, I will just say that there are 2 kinds.


There are the kinds of christians who just do. they serve at shelters and help the homeless and when they share the gospel they whip out John 3:16, like the most overused verse in the whole bible.

and then there are the intellectual christians, who will talk to you for hours about how jesus came to fulfill all the prophecies that were set in the old testement, or they might just try to convince you with reason of why God exists and why you should believe in him.


I'm just a self-rightous nothing, because I'm not either of these.

the boy with the thorn in his soul...(side)...

You look like a supermodel and you've got legs for miles.

That's what supermodels are aren't they?

They are all legs
all butt
all back
and then nothing.


their body is cut off at the shoulders?

-----------------------------------------------------------


I was driving back from the movie theater last night with Trevor listening to the smiths

and the windows were open and I didn't want to say a word.


I'm sure Trevor noticed something. I usually talk his ear off after a movie, or any other time.

but not last night...



Last night was an awakening.



It's not that profound even. really that word has lost it's meaning.

I mean, back in middle school,

if someone would start talking about the universe and about how
everything happened for a reason,

without even saying what the reason was,

everyone would be like "wow, dude. that's profound"


That's not really a profound thing.


Don't you think that if something is truly profound, that it would escape our human words and understanding?

would we be able to describe something that gigantic and big and explosive and awesome?

Like God.

How can I sit here and describe the feeling I got as I stuck my head out the window and
smelled the dirt in the air,
and listened to the gentle British coos of The Smiths?

If it was really God that was in the air last night, would I be able to describe it to you? and better yet, would you even understand?





I don't think i could and I don't think you would.


So I won't explore the subject further.


--------------------------------------------------------


I know this one girl named Val and she is more beautiful then I ever remember her being.

She's really quiet and shy, but she is very beautiful.

She looks like a supermodel, actually.

but she's smart and sensitive and caring.




Let me tell you something; That is hard to find in a girl.

Not the beauty part. that's hard to find, but not really. Besides most of that fades away after like 50 plus years of marriage.

It's hard to find a girl that is smart and sensitive and caring.


She is legs
and butt
and back

and then she is heart
and mouth
and brain
and then



just



soul;



For miles and miles it seems.













I am the number 1 (me)
and you are the number 99. (I am)

Get the camera!

In the loch

there stood, tall and swinging

scales and things.

But believe, even though for lack of seeing,



that packs and packs of animated discs;

had made and sewn a roughed up green;

had formed a figure out of the dark; out of the lake; out of the still.


And that figure moved slowly,

without bending,

back down into the waters.

I feel sick on the inside.

Really fucking sick.

My dog and her blindness.

My dog is blind.

She has been for quite some time now, and
by now
she's taught herself how to get
around
the
house

quite well.

It was late last night and crawled up next to her

fat beagle body,

and with my one arm around her torso and my
other arm under my head,


I layed with her.







I did that for a while and when I realized that I had to go to bed already and
it was early,

I slowly lifted my arm off of her torso.



and when she awoke and noticed my absence,
I felt bad.


She stood up and jaunted over three feet, and sat down,

probably unsure of where she was,

after all, she is blind.


I said, "go to bed, Lucy. Go to bed now"

and she kind of just looked at me in a tired way and
followed the walls of my kitchen,
into the walls of my dining room,
all the way back to her bed.

and as i sat sitting in the kitchen,
looking at her from 10 feet away,

I just remember thinking,


"I wish she could see me"

I mean, if she could see me,
at that moment, I
would have blown her a goodnight kiss,
or given her a smile.

after all, she's my Lucy.

My fat, blind, beagle dog.


And i suddenly was overwhelmed with sadness;

because that's how God must feel.


No one has ever seen the face of God before.


I mean, even Moses was only allowed to look at the back side of God,
and in some translations that just means
that Moses was only allowed to see


where God had just been.

and if you get down to it,
reason why we can't see God now, is because He is too perfect and we are not.

You can blame it on Adam and Eve

or you can even say that


we shouldn't have to pay for what 2 naked people did millions of years ago.

but the fact is, we all have sinned.



WE did.
not our fathers or families or mothers.
but our souls have been tarnished by sin.


and well, if you want more of a definition then that,
I'd be hard pressed to find one.



God looks at Bradley Service and Trevor Oestenstad and myself,

and just thinks,


"I wish they could see me."

Wendy's again...

I was working the front counter at my work and this girl came in.


"does the number one come with cheese"

"no," i said, "but you can add it"

"ok, I'll do that."



And that's all we said, but the whole time, she was looking me straight in the eye with a slight grin. she was pretty attractive and I felt myself getting nervous.

It wasn't because she was attractive that I was getting nervous but it was mostly because she was looking me straight in the eye and smiling.

She made me feel like I was a person; like she was happy that I was taking her order.

and right then, I was attracted to her.

I was really attracted to her just because she looked me straight in the eye and was smiling.


It's weird how that happened.



























Little side note...


It was Abby Sparks.


You'll love this Trevor...

I had a dream that i was swimming in water.

I fell down below the water line and i tried to take a breath...


and i could?


I could frigging breathing underwater and it was the best feeling in the world.








If i could breathe underwater in real life, I'd think about living in the ocean.



I seriously would.

Today is a day that i want to last forever. I want to be able to enjoy the cool breeze and overcastness of it all.

But i have to go to work.

and i won't be back until 4 or 5.





What a waste of a great day.







In all honesty,

honestly,

I'd like a face.

to hold onto and
kiss.

delicately and

hold that thought.


Ok, now we're back,

and was i talking about my lover again?



oh sorry, that was just the real me coming through.


Won't happen again. I promise.












Like I said;


What a waste of a great day.

The birds are out and singing and i'm still up. Tomorrow is going to be tired.

I am
going
to
go
and
sit on
the back of a hill,
overlooking
the
lake,
and
first write
then read,
my poetry

to God.


Now that,

I've got this thing
under my skin,
and I've got you,
under my wing.

I feel you
taking me up,

and eating me up,

and swallowing

all
of
my sins.

Some people look exponentially more beautiful when they eat. Right now i'm at wendy's and i see i girl. Her cheeks push her lips in a pursed position.

I'm really scared because for the first time in my life, I'm siding with the world instead of with the church because I can't find any good friends inside of the church.

And when i say church, i mean people that believe what i believe.

I've only loved one girl and she is the girl that i talked about before on here.

She was a lot like me, but honestly, she didn't like me back.

Now, I can't seem to find any good friends who listen to good music and read good books that also believe the way i do.

I can't find a girl who i want to date. Who i actually want to spend time with.

I want a girl that doesn't want a ring to get married. It would be sweet to get a tattoo instead of a ring.

stuff like that.

I'm mad at myself for giving into sin so easily. The kind of sin that goes unnoticed until it's too late, and I'm mad that if i told the people around me what kind of sin it was, they wouldn't care.

I don't know what else to say.

If you're going to ask me about my life story, ask me about it in person.

It's simple

If you would just ask about my whole life story
i would tell it to you.


Just as long as you wanted to hear it.


I ain't no bitch, ya know?

boom.

I need someone to tell me that what I'm doing is wrong and
hurtful to others around me.

and then I need that same person to hand me the nails while I
keep rebuilding myself.

Or maybe i can explode this sin out of myself?

I've seen it done with the sides of rock-walls.

anyway it happens, I need more help then someone saying,

"you need help".

My name is...

Noah, and i like the smell of skunk-butt juice.

I like to make people feel uncomfortable.

Or atleast, I like to ask questions about personal things with no tact at all.


Why do I always have to say "please" and "thank you"

Now those words are shit.

they don't mean anything, and no body cares when you say them.

I literally hate it when I comment on someones blog and they don't comment back. I don't care when it's a statement.

"this blog is coolio"

But when i ask a question, like "what does this mean?" or some other question that begs an answer and they just don't friggin respond...

I hate it.

and then i begin to hate that person.

It's especially bad if you know they read the comment because they published another post...
and you just feel like a shit for even giving them your words in the first place.

I hate you.

I hope you choke, because I'm calling your name.

Budlub(this was a comment on someones page, but it's great and so I am claiming it in this place.)

see I, myself, used to love a girl who called herself 'artist' and 'lover of God'.

she had beautiful hands. I remember that now; she had beautiful hands. She was nothing like anything.
everything like anything.

she was pretty, brains, brawn, and brunette (blonde when she dyed her hair.)
She was so beautiful. and my oh my, she could write too!

I remember one night,
she came into
the church,
and i told
her
how beautiful
she looked
in her
sweatpants and T-shirt
get-up.
No makeup needed,
instant beauty is here,
just
add
ME.

But of course you know, she
didn't catch on,
she didn't play ball,
or bat flies,
or really anything.


And so now we are just friends,
although sometimes i can hear the
distance herding us farther apart
then when i was chasing her,
down the street with a
paper hat and
my love.

We are not really friends though,
we are awkward embracers
of hugs and smiles
and cell phone text messages.


But i say to you here. She has never once called on the phone to talk.

Well... she did call once...











to ask for directions.

sinafee aqua

Writing is like bike riding.

no, not because once you do it, you always know how.

Mostly it is for the simple reason that you will always find more adventure by yourself,
in the middle of a trail that you didn't know existed.

And if you were biking with someone else they would either be too afraid to go on, or they would be leading. It would not be your bones, it would be something else.

----------------------------------------------------------------

Separate thought.


We just painted our dining room in a really cool bright aqua blue and a yellowish creme. It's pretty far out and it looks good, but my whole house is set apart.

It reminds me of when i saw a literal wrecking-ball going through the side of my old house. We demolished that old rusty red house to make way for the new one.

I was sitting in the backseat of my moms car with a cookie and a hot chocolate that we got from the Holiday gas station. I just remember that feeling of being totally dismembered but being totally okay with it, and being more than happy with my cup of boiling hot lava hot chocolate and chocolate chip cookie.

And that's how i feel now.
I feel like a child, with some new sense of adventure.

And I don't want to lose it by choosing to live in the same way I have been.

End Of Transmission.

Mark the spot.

I don't want to bury you.
In the ground,
dirt is red and
worms crawl
around.

I had a dream in which
you died.

I took your wife and we married,
but she wasn't happy.

We never made love
in the light.
Only in the dark,
and so i killed myself.

So don't worry, friend.

one thing led to another

I am such a fuck-up and when i die, only the people that I hated will have anything to say about me.

So the moral of the story is this: Hate everyone, so they will at least show up to your funeral drunk and angry and have something to say about you.

Or,

Hate no one, so that when you die, you can go in peace. Just like going to the bathroom or eating dinner. (although, they are both on different sides of the time continuum)



Separate subject.

Saying the phrase "one thing led to another" when your talking about how you got married to some girl named 'Yolanda' or joined the army or had a kid, is a horrible way to express the way in which something happened.

It's basically like saying, "I lack so much ambition that i let things literally just happen to me and then I hit the 'accept' button"

"Hey bill, do you want to join the army with me?"

"eh, yea, just leave me alone, I'm trying to watch Seinfeld"


"Hey bill, do you want to go on a blind date with this girl named Yolanda?"

"eh, yea, just leave me alone, I'm winning at this online poker tournament."


"Hey bill, do you want to have a kid with me"

"eh, yea, just leave me alo- wait, what?!"


It's all exactly the same as saying the phrase "one thing led to another"

"Ah Shit"...

Those were his last words before the gunman busted in through the window and shot him in the head. He didn't just shoot him in the head though, he really shot him. "He shot the fuck out of that motherfucker!" people would say.
He fired and fired and fired into your chest and head and neck.


If i could have told the future and was standing in the room, i would have told you to put on a different shirt because the one you were wearing was about to get dirty.

"don't wear a white shirt" i would say, "your going to get brains on your shirt"

And you wouldn't listen, because you're a degenerate and a fool.

But the gunman, he would listen.
He would wait until the last word came out of my lip-sticked mouth.
-"shirt"
and then the gun would fire and fire and fire into your chest and head and neck.

And me and the gunman would leave to go have dinner. And the gunman would tell me how pretty i looked, and how poetic my writing was, and we would fuck in front of the fire.

The End.

But really, all that happened was a friend turned on a friend and fucking shot him in the foot and then riddled his body with red lead, and I was there to catch it on home video.

"Say cheese," i would say, "Your on candid camer-" and the gunshots would cut off my sentence.

The End. (really)


List of characters by un-alphebetical order:

"I" am Cece-(L)
"You" is me.
And "the gunman" is 'the reader'

Webster has dyslexia.

In my modest career of 6 months at Wendy's where i work, I've touched more hands than i would have liked too. It happens when someone gives you $10 and you give them $4.76 in four dollars, three quarters and one penny. It's the change that get's you. If you want to touch someones hand, give them your spare change.

You should know that touching someones hand when your giving them their change or their food is a lot different then touching someones hand in a high five or even a handshake.

It's almost like you don't exist. You're just a robot that they get their food from. Just an orifice, if you will. you're not their friend, or even a stranger. you are an employee. You say "welcome to Wendy's what can i make fresh for you today?"

Like this one kid i know, he came in and was standing in front of the counter looking at the menu for at least 10 seconds before he recognized i was the cashier. 10 seconds doesn't seem like a lot of time, but it is when your standing there waiting for someone to think of what they want to order. It wasn't that he waited though. I've had some people take like 5 minutes to figure it out, blocking the line in back of them and slowing everything down.

No, it was the fact that he didn't even look at me until that time. He didn't even recognize me as a figure, otherwise he would have seen it was someone he knew.

I mean, realistically, he could have been just looking at the menu intently, not even noticing. maybe it had nothing to do with me.

But it's not the first time.

Maybe they are getting back at me for feeding them their deathfood.

I should just say "welcome to wendy's, how can i make fat for you?"

upsilluo

Something happened today at work that i feel kind of weird writing about. I was working the front counter at Wendy's and this girl came in. she was wearing a blue shirt i think, and she was kind of tall and looked to be around my age. She was pretty in some athletic sort of way but in no means was she the prettiest girl I've seen.

I took her order, and she handed me the money. We may have touched hands when she gave me the various bills that make up a burger, fries and a soda, but if we did, it was a regular, unimportant touch.

and then i gave her back her change. (It was a few bills probably and some coins) but when i gave her back the change, our hands actually touched and i felt the inside of her palm. It was warm and moist but not sweaty. It felt like the hands of a child, actually.

The way all the children you know have weird warm hands. (It's like they have some sort of moist hand disease up until they hit puberty and grow testicles and breasts.)

I looked at those gentle child hands and i glanced 4 inches up to see her wrist. On her wrist she wore a flat blue ribbon that was tied on the underside. It was all so sensual and immediately i was attracted to those hands whose wrist was wearing a sort of ribbon lingerie.

All of a sudden i felt exposed and hot.

Usually i can comfortably hide behind the veil of my Wendy's counter and not feel any intimidation from girls much more pretty then I would deserve to talk to.

But now, i felt exposed, like i was touching this girls hand in the middle of my 3rd grade english class.

Anyways the moment soon faded. it did only last however long it takes to give someone some bills and the change.

when i finally gave her the food she'd ordered she just laughed and said "thank you".

And I stood there and squeeked out some sort of "have a good day"

Adam and Isreal had a fight, but none won.

Do you feel fucked up?
Because i do.
I am drafty windows and some stupid lame surprise.
What are you?

"Hey, who turned out the lights"

That's what i said
when the moon stopped
working.

When the bulb burnt out,
when the old man gave his last words,
and when the tides turned around.

Oh, you should have seen the peoples
eyes pop out.



Now i just ride my bike in the darkness of the winter night
instead of in the glow of the still dark moon.

You are grownups. You go to jobs and don't blow out birthday candles. You smoke cigs and talk about
"fine ales." you give to your favorite charity. I hate you.

I feel it all i feel it all.

Guys have a thing called B.O. Girls have it too: it's called PERFUME!

This is an alert! I am a cheap imitation. It's like eating "chocolate gelatin" when you could be eating "jello pudding"

I am in my bed thinking about beauty and life. And i think that they aren't related. (unless you're willing to stretch a little...)

I am Gravel. She is Pretty. He is your Boyfriend. I am Gravel

I saw a girl
sitting on a bench.

She was so beautiful that it made my heart hurt. I wanted to touch her face with my hands.

to feel every crevice, to feel all the ridges of her face.

I looked down to where i was standing and i looked at the gravel.

and i felt ashamed.

Not for wanting to touch her face. No, that was normal. Anyone would want to caress such a beautiful face.

No, I felt the red hot cheek-burning sensation of shame
because i was ugly.

I am a fall kid.

Autumn, I mean.

My friend Lynn, shes a fall kid too,
and we talk about how
winter is coming
and how
the seasons are about to change.

and we talk about past lovers too,
(past summer lovers)
bordello green and
periwinkle purple.
Fireworks in the night
are to us and our lovers
as color is to sound;
unrelated nouns.

we talk about the future
(and) in little increments, inching our
way to the top of the world.

"when you are famous" I say, "I'll have known a
great artist just before the discovery" and she
laughs and giggles and forgets about it.

I guess i should note that my friend Lynn,
she is a great artist.

she is the kind of artist that paints, draws,
and sketches her visions onto any medium around.

She is a typical starving artist.

she wears red and black bracelets around her wrist
and she has a nose-ring. the cute little pin-tip kind, not the
horny bull one.

she has just enough to eat, but not enough people to love her.

she does not wear her heart on her sleeve,
rather,
she wears it
in tattoo form,
on her back
and,

It
arches
when she stretches.

defiled, defeated, denounced she is.
but worthless, she is not.

Just like her dreams
and fears
and anxieties,

all of them have their own weight on her shoulders,
they all have their own place, their own gravity and oppression.

One night together in a field, she said
"I'm tired of being sorry"

"You don't have to be sorry here," i said, "under the stars
we're weightless.

I realized then,
when
she started crying
and i awkwardly
embraced her,
that we were totally different.

For her, the stars are just a reminder of how fragile
the world is,
and
how at any moment,
the stars and
comets
could
come
crashing down on her fragile 'artist' frame.







That's when I stopped loving her,

and became her friend.

F(R)iction

we were walking along the avenue parkway
when you said "I think I'm pregnant."
"I'm a good pretender," i said, "and an actor too."
And you're baby bump fell out of you
and we cried as it fell along the curbside.

Our parents and friends held a wake for the dead
the one in your stomach, in your uterine wall.
we wore long socks and black dress clothes
we stood in silence and watched our toes grow,
and everyone else, they all grieved for us.

I remember how you said you "cant do this"
and how your silences were taking up the room of your words.
If your little baby boy had fallen out a little bit earlier,
you would be fine with this absence of life,
but when he fell out of you, he hit the curb and died.

But you didn't even cry.

This is me. Brad thought it was a reflection of society but it's strictly about how much i suck.

note to self: You are weak. You are annoying to others around you. You are inappropriate, unsubstantiated, Unable, Infertile. You lack drive and motivation and you bring others around you down. You are wicked, hurtful, domineering in the worst way. You are undecided, uninformed, unintended. You are careless and selfish. You seek to serve yourself over others. You are hypocritical, judgmental, facetious, extravagantly foolish. You lack planning ability, concentrating ability and the ability to learn new abilities easily. You smell like death, and you look like it too. You are not the smartest crayon in the box, nor the lightest bulb in the pack. You are uncorroborated, unwilling, unhappy, and misgiving. You start things and you stop them. You don't finish what you have started. You look at people and judge. You think you are smarter then the rest, more emotional than the rest, more generous then the rest. You are misguided, misaligned, malicious, militant-when-need-be. You are less then modest, less then half a man, you are the embodiment of failure, the epitome of loneliness. You are not the cream of the crop, rather you are the dirty lily pads on the top of the lake. You are a small fish, small game, and big trouble. You can't make up your mind. You are fickle, unforgiving, indian giving. You speak with too much words. You are too complicated, too slow, too hyper, too rebellious. You cannot be saved, but you can be sweet-talked. You don't stand enough ground. You stand too much of the wrong ground. Your shirt is inside out, it's all wrinkled, it's faded, it's ripped. Your shoes are worn, your thighs are warm, your neck is fat. You can't be abandoned, left alone for a second. You can't tie your own shoes. You can't play the right games. You are too right wing. Too liberal. Too mad, too mediocre, too fat, too cranky. You don't have enough compassion, community, high school spirit.

wonderings of a stupid idiot face

Imagine 2 scenarios:

Scenario One: a stupid person; an idiot for all intensive purposes, says to himself "I'm just an idiot!", in a certain self loathing way.

one of his friends come up to him and says "oh Joe, you're not an idiot" and he sits there while the idiot is crying, and he just says "you're not an idiot, Joe"

Scenario Two: an intelligent person that just feels like an idiot at the time, says to himself "I'm just an idiot" in the same kind of self loathing way.

One of his friends come up to him and says "Bob, you're not an idiot!"
and bob thinks to himself. "he's just saying that"

and then his friend goes on. "bob you're seriously not an idiot. remember that time we did..."

really you can fill in anything about how bob was the smart one in the situation and his skills helped them. or his friend was in a jam and bob helped him out of it.

His friend keeps on going, "bob, listen, if you're an idiot, then that makes me a de-evolved caveman." and his friend just keeps on going until bob realizes he is not an idiot, he is just a regular guy that feels like an idiot at the time.

the difference between these 2 scenarios is first of all, Joe is an idiot, while bob is not. they both feel like they are, but only one of them is.
the second difference is that because bob is not an idiot, he has a friend there to say so. there is evidence supporting the friends findings and all is well.


I just have one question, if I say, "oh I'm just an idiot" and nobody says anything,

Doesn't that make me really an idiot.

I would say it probably does... But how would i know. I'm just an idiot.

In the midst of all this...

In the midst of all this world,
there is a red blood mist.
serving no purpose but to distract and ignore the problem at hand.

In the midst of all this fighting,
i see a child.
hes got a uniform on and a gun in his hand, but hes still crying.

his tears fall and they hit the ground.
they are swept up, thrown in a trash compacter and used several more times until they become so brittle and so small that eventually they don't trickle from his harshly shaven face.

As i stand in line at the grocery store i see a family.
the youngest participants have cake and other various foods on their faces.
while the oldest seems to only sport a frown.

It is in this family that i see the division.
the lines that are drawn up between good and bad.
young and old. strongest and weakest.

they stare so long and so firm into the small bones of my spine.
these lines. whether they be battle lines, strike lines, food lines, shelter lines, or any other kind of "divide and conquer" type system. they do divide and they do conquer.

I see the child with his uniform and the mom with her kids
at the store. I see the rich man with no heart,
and i see the poor man with no money.

I can't see everything, but i can see enough to know there is a division going on. a separation of souls. a line being drawn in the sand.





Watch me step right over it.

Form Asymmetry

It was the fall of man.

or maybe just the fall of me?

well anyways, i know it was autumn. (or wait, was it winter?)

i know that i loved her.
so truant so tied (so true and so tried)

we sat on the lake with the Lilly pads dancing green and happy.
we watched that big gold curve go down in the sky like a thousand bees missing their burns.

we were both poets.

thinkers if you may...

(at least i think?)

i remember squeezing her so fast and secure.
but we were not joined at the belt.

rather... we were joined at the swinging sensations of our sides.
like old new york jazz.
swinging our way into the cool night, we were.






and then i awoke to see the towering pines so gently whispering to me.
whispering cold winter and hot tea.

A
man
alone
in a cabin.
Essentially,
Form Asymmetry.

Memories: #795-837

yesterday, me and my mom were driving______795
and we saw a cool rug
that someone had thrown out.

"Its pretty dirty" she said, as we
loaded it into the car,
and drove away.

When we got home, we
unraveled the rug,
and looked inside.

We figured out that the reason
they had thrown it out,
was because someone had thrown up on it.

at that moment,
somebody's trash was also
our trash too.

"we'll bring it back" she said,
"in the middle of the night"
and i stared at her.

"we're returning trash" i said,
and she said, "yea, but it's okay"
and i stared even longer at her.

"go and do it now" my mom said,
as she looked at me and my sister,
and we took the car into the night.

we drove to the wrong spot
because I remembered it was a Y in the road,
and we drove to 3 Y's before we got there.

she drove past it at first,
and we had to reverse,
and the light turned on.

naturally, she couldn't see behind her
as well as she could if the light didn't blind her,
and so we backed into some garbage cans.

I hopped out of the car and
with the rug in my hand,
i dropped it on the boulevard.

I didn't see, but there was a heap
of metal and things,
and it crashed down. loudly.

"Get in! Get in!" my sister yelled,
and as i got in, i yelled,
"Go! Go!" and we sped away.______837

I want to just walk off into the night and never come back.

the pier would swallow me up
in a southern california oceanside
or new york or
some other port city.

i want to write poetry
in the night
when Nothing is dead
and Everything is alive.

The figurines on my shelf
they come to life and
oscillate
around each other

like some silent silhouettes
they bound across the room
small and invisible

like the breathe of the walls
my chest rises and falls and their laughter makes them
tumble and topple against each other

they form triangles and shapes
and the shadow puppets on their bodies
come to life.

And when the earth sleeps,
the Nothings come to life.

He was dazed when he came, and dazed when he left.

I said hi,
and he stared back.
I thought he wanted to
beat
me
up.

but instead
he had just gotten the beating,
not twenty minutes ago.

at first
i just wanted to
convince him
not to
pop
a
cap

but i soon found out
that it was more then his
jaw
that was
jacked
up.

well anyways, It looked like he was going to cry, and i couldn't help but feeling like it was the most sincere face I've ever seen anyone make.
he said over and over again that he didn't know why they did it.

he opened up his cheek and showed me the place where his teeth hit his gums.

I told him not to kill anyone and i walked away and so did he.


when we had reached the car, i asked if we could turn around and go back to talk to him,
and so we made our way down the street, past the stop sign and into the path of him.

I yelled, "hey nick, can i talk to you for a second?"

and i proceeded to ask if i could, and then pray for him.

and it was an awkward, lacking, unmotivating prayer.

and he said it was the nicest thing anyone's ever done for him yet.

and he just stumbled away into the night, as soon as he'd come.

and neither of us were the better for it.

I felt like i hadn't made a dent, and I'm sure he felt dented beyond repair.