times like these, when i'm drunk at 9:30 pm (friday only, mind you,) and i end up cruising social websites (facebook, myspace,) that i realize how much i ACTUALLY REALLY HATE some people. its awful. im a terrible person.

<3 parents.

Carol Krywalski and James Latchford were married in Paul’s backyard pre-swimming pool, before the click and whir of the large pool filter in the garage, before the pool’s cement would rub the bottoms of my toes raw and painful, just to the point of bleeding, or snag the shiny spandex of my suit bottoms when I sat down to just put my feet in, when I would swipe my fingers across the deck to smear those tiny speck bugs we called Bloodsuckers; before the shellacked but slivery pool deck was the site of card games and boxes of wine. It was 1980; I know so from the Gold Circle Photo stamp on the back of the small photo. This sepia world faded the green of the plastic porch furniture strewn about the yard; it shaded everyone’s limbs a crisp brown that seems impossible for an Irish guy and a Polish girl in July. Sepia has since absorbed like iodine into their bodies and bloodstreams, a poison that surfaced as wrinkles for Mom, and skin cancer for Dad. But here, they are languid and lazy, wispy-haired and as soft as linen, their mouths formed mid-sentence O’s; this whole place is a whisper from their ring-mouths, the smoke from their July cigarettes.

sometimes, people from my past have sifted through time so quickly that it seems as if i never even knew them; not even for a second. the time was never spent and i have no recollection of them other than a trip to the flea market or a high school locker combination: i am indifferent about these folks but this does not cause me sadness. i will not mention their names; most of which i have forgotten anyway.

others pop up repeatedly and happily; a slight wave, "hello! you'll never see me again!" and it warms my heart as much as it makes it weep: evelyn, the old volunteer at the hospital gift shop; larry, my tenth grade buddy with the blonde skater haircut; mr. olly, the neighbor across the street from my grandmother that worked for general mills.

some people's limbs turn creamy caramel;
mine stays sallow and spotted, like the cement sidewalks i observe walking down Ashland.
the copper/bronze company implants in the sidewalk make me wonder why they ever changed the formula for cement.
why?

Who's afraid of Virginia Woolf, Virginia Woolf, Virginia Woolf...

I am...george. I am.

today i attended an estate sale at the mystery house on the corner of my street. often josh and i would question the fact that nobody was ever there, but an eerie blue light, much like a computer screen, would remain on in the upstairs window. for eight months, nobody occupied the house, an adorable red brick thing on the corner. it was one of those flat front brick houses; probably there before my house was built, with tall, rounded windows that had swirling black iron over the bottom half of them. historical.

the tenants, we concluded, were in their winter home on the sunny shores of Florida. vacationing from never finding a parking spot near their house in the snow.

the mystery house's interior is an absolute wreck: the walls were yellowed, even brown (at the intersection of wall and ceiling) and the majority of the ceiling was shredding off in strips. one could contend that she was a smoker, this Sarah Jo Barth (i peeked at a single piece of mail sitting in her mailbox from the City of Buffalo. was this her death certificate?), as everything inside was cast with unfathomable dinge. the once wallpapered hallway exposed layer after stained layer of the history of the house: i wanted to see what the very first layer was, what year it was put there. the corners of the house smelled strongly like skunk. i like to imagine feral cats claiming chairs and creating villages out of this woman's withered books. the furniture was remarkably high quality AND out of my price range, although i would trade my shitty Target Wobbly Desk for a mahogany end-table with brass knobs and a velvet-lined drawer and just make due.

there is no continuity of objects in my bedroom; there is a halo of cloth and denim surrounding my bed.