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Part 1: The Long Way Home | Part 7: A Conversation with My Father |
To disguise my activities at work, I type my posts into a Word document and then cut-and-paste it into Blogger later. I will usually also have a fake spreadsheet up on my screen so that the combination Word-Excel documents on my screen makes it look like I am hard at work crunching numbers, even though I'd much rather be crunching my abs.
It must be some kind of defect in my tear ducts that the moment the sappy string music is cued in a dramatic movie scene, they start flowing. i carry your heart with me(i carry it in
my heart)i am never without it(anywhere
i go you go,my dear; and whatever is done
by only me is your doing,my darling)
i fear
no fate(for you are my fate,my sweet)i want
no world(for beautiful you are my world,my true)
and it's you are whatever a moon has always meant
and whatever a sun will always sing is you
here is the deepest secret nobody knows
(here is the root of the root and the bud of the bud
and the sky of the sky of a tree called life;which grows
higher than the soul can hope or mind can hide)
and this is the wonder that's keeping the stars apart
i carry your heart(i carry it in my heart)
Part 1: The Long Way Home | Part 7: A Conversation with My Father |
9am. The last day looked liked any other day except that the sun phoned in the sunshine and the heat, a mustered effort. The humidity struggled to rise, while the clouds layed about in the sky trying to catch some rays. I noticed one of them, a paunchy, grayish white cloud wearing a tiny silver lining of a thong bikini. The other younger clouds pointed and giggled, whispering among themselves. 
8pm. I have packed the night before. I picked up the luggage from my old room and loaded them into the trunk of my dad's car. The bags should be lighter, the gifts I brought from Chicago for my nephews and nieces have all been given away. Yet, I feel like I am going home with baggage, heavy and full. My shrink in Chicago will be happy to see me, a late, late Christmas bonus. Part 1: The Long Way Home | Part 7: A Conversation with My Father |
After years of aiming for some level of blog fame, this blog has finally been noticed by the media! Leave it to the folks from Down Under to recognize this blog for its incredible contribution to the community. I think that they realized that without this blog, the world wouldn't know that this amazing level of mediocrity can somehow exist. 
She paused, "Am I to live with you?" 
All About My Mother - Think you can handle it?Part 1: The Long Way Home | Part 7: A Conversation with My Father |
3. Not throwing out the garbage.
It started the day after I arrived at my parents' house, when I went into the bathroom and found a dusty, twenty year-old bottle of shampoo + conditioner in the shower stall. 
Growing up, I shared this bathroom with my twin brother Peter. I looked at all the stuff accumulating dust in the bathroom counter, the artifacts of our juvenilia. 
When I became a teen, I started to become withdrawn, more introspective. I spent most of my time wrestling with my homosexuality; I did this primarily by jerking off. 
In the kitchen, I found that the old refrigerator had decided to quit its job after thirty years. Instead of sending it off to the junkyard, my mother started to use it as a closet to store her tupperware and take-out containers that she re-uses to pack my brother Jon's lunches. I guess if the oven ever breaks down, it might end up in my parents' bedroom to store my dad's shirts. 
Check out the Anchored Nomad's Refrigerator Project, you can find a picture of my fridge there.
My mother sat behind my dad's desk and I, opposite her. We were chatting, laughing at my dad's disorganization when I found a twenty year-old unopened can of sour balls.
On the last day of my trip, as I packed up all my toiletries and my travel kit, I accidentally grabbed that old toothbrush. I realized my mistake and took it out. I was going to throw it into the trash, but I hesitated. I held on to that brittle, worn toothbrush for nearly a minute, debating. It's been here for fifteen years, I should throw it out, all this stuff out, everything here, these relics? Part 1: The Long Way Home | Part 7: A Conversation with My Father |
On the TV in the corner of the office, a local newscaster reported that in the southern part of the Philippines, torrential rains caused a landslide to bury an entire village. In minutes, an elementary school filled with 250 children and their teachers were buried under boulder and rock and twenty feet of thick, heavy mud. 1,500 villagers were reported missing. The scene cuts to a couple of emergency rescue workers holding back a grieving woman from running into the muddy field where the village used to be. 
My father once taught me to Walk Like a ManPart 1: The Long Way Home | Part 7: A Conversation with My Father |
Besides, this rule is pretty murky, like what constitutes friendship? Do they have to be within the core group of a gay man's circle, the friends you go shopping with, have brunch with, the ones who buy you drinks without expecting you to buy the next round? Yeah, I don't have one of those. I tried not buying a round of beers one night and I got bitched up really bad. 
I have not taken a shit for four straight days. Part 1: The Long Way Home | Part 7: A Conversation with My Father |
I kept my head down as missiles flew overhead, it's only my second day here and I am back in the warzone like I never left. I steadily ate my dinner in silence, hoping to get out of the way as soon as possible. One word would engage me in the war, I'd have to choose sides; there is no Switzerland here. That would only bring about the wrath of both parents. Part 1: The Long Way Home | Part 7: A Conversation with My Father |
A single twin-size bed is pushed against the wall. It used to be in the middle of the room. The mattress on the bed looks shrunken, like a dried-out starfish under the thin, worn fitted sheet. I sit on the edge. I can feel its crusty, hard edges--a day-old French bread--under my thighs. Part 1: The Long Way Home | Part 7: A Conversation with My Father |
I had been on the plane for four hours and sixteen minutes before the food cart finally came. 
Part 1: The Long Way Home | Part 7: A Conversation with My Father |
If they were smart like me, they ate a huge lunch an hour before. Mine was a quarter pounder, a six-piece, fries and a Diet Coke. Part 1: The Long Way Home | Part 7: A Conversation with My Father |
I worried about my trip. Part 1: The Long Way Home | Part 7: A Conversation with My Father |
The Long Way Home.
Starvation.
Fake Plastic Food.
My Old Room.
Autopilot.
Jetlag.
A Conversation with My Father.
Archeology.
A Conversation with My Mother.
Redeye.
I Carry Your Heart.
