There's never gonna be a moment of truth for you while the world is watching, 'cause all you need is the thing you've forgotten and that's to learn to live with what you are...
- Ben Folds
"Why Clark Can't This Time"
1) Mephisto
2) Who the hell's ever heard of a "Smallville Party"?
3) Breaks my new "Blonde or Black" rule
3) Heard she crazy
4) I'm Audi 5000
5) Out of my Justice League of America, even if she may have even heard of them
6) Shared love for a TV show isn't the fertile soil I always assumed
7) My life is a mess
"Why Clark Can't Sleep"
I missed J. Dub when he blew through town.
"Why Clark Can't Share in World Series Sorrow"
I'm sorry, but I love it when bad things happen to St. Louis.
"Why Clark Can't Go Back to School"
Last week, the Brentmeister General was working day and night on a paper for his capstone class -- which roughly translates to him puttering around on the computer for five minutes, then wandering around The Barrio shouting "I'm fucked!" -- and when he eventually finished it, he asked me to look over it, and I did, and I didn't know what to do other than make a few arbitrary changes and suggest one of my patented quasi-academic titles.
That's when I realized that not only do I never want to write another class paper for as long as I live, I sure as hell don't want to have to read, review, and grade one.
"Why Clark Can't Leave Columbia"
1) Will miss Caleb and the FIG kids terribly
2) No ticket
3) No job skills
4) Started playing GTA: San Andreas, and despite my initial disgust that -- as the Brentmeister General so elequently put it -- it's an opportunity for rich white kids to pretend that they live in a poverty-ridden warzone like it's all cap-bustin' joyriding fun, I am so into it now
5) Not sure Granny's got a liquor cabinet
6) DC Comics filled that ass. editor job without even asking me
7) Will miss Brent even more than Caleb and the FIG kids
"Why Clark Can't Play Organized Sports"
I haven't thrown a football since the first day of gym class my freshman year at ol' O'Hara High. Looking back on it now, I realize that the whole point of that particular exercise was so that Demo, our gym teacher/football coach ('natch) could do a little scouting, but that's neither here nor there.
If I remember correctly, I didn't do too bad. My wounded ducks didn't have Demo whispering to me that the Fighting Celtics needed my priceless arm or nothing, but I did well enough that no locker room derision fell my way. (No, most of that fell on the slumped shoulders of this poor pathetic wretch I didn't know too well by the name of Brent Jones, Part One. I wonder whatever became of that kid?)
I'm pretty sure I have my father to thank for this tiny mercy. During my year-long stat in Great Falls, me and the old man would toss the pigskin around once and a while. Of course, I've also got my father to thank for my half-ass loyalty to the Chicago Bears, so let's just call it a wash...
Anyway, the Brentmeister General bought a football a few weeks back, and of course, he needed a playmate, so I got tapped. (A small price to pay to live rent-free.) We hit the FARC mini-quad, Brent taught me how to throw again, and we made like two frat boys flunking math. I think we made a respectable showing for the people passing by. And I noticed we went to greater lengths to do so whenever there were women around -- which used to happen back when I played with Dad, too. My stepmother once remarked that I seemed to really sprint to make a catch if a girl was watching...
So we'd been out there for about twenty minutes when a cluster of girls were coming out of the dorm, and I threw a spectacular pass into Brent's knees. It was shameful... and that's why I suddenly grabbed my shoulder and started screaming "OH MY GOD! I TORE MY ROTATOR CUFF! SWEET SHIT IN HEAVEN, I TORE MY ROTATOR CUFF!!!" By the time I was rolling around on the ground in mock agony, Brent had rushed to my side shouting "OH FUCK! YOU'RE PRICELESS ARM! WHY LORD OH WHY?! YOU WERE THE BEST PLAYER I'VE EVER SEEN! AND YOU'RE REALLY GOOD AT SEX, TOO... OR SO I HEAR FROM ALL THE WOMEN YOU SLEEP WITH!"
I like to think I did Demo and the old man proud.
"Why Clark Can't Take Your Call"
For some reason, whenever I tell someone to just call me at home, because I'll definitely be in the apartment, it takes no more than five minutes for me to shag ass out of there and wander the streets.
I think it's because no good comes from answering that phone. Sure, Kate and Prew-Prew Boo-Boo call every once in a while, but for every call from someone I love, there's ten annoying fucks or VOX editors or Forum managers pleading with me to do something awful.
And we all know what lies at the Heart of Clarkness... We all know what's transformed my simple solitary life into this outrageous mess of mundane maladies --Shit! I'm channelling Stan Lee again! -- that's almost too stupid to live: My inability to say no inability to just say "No... Oh hell no!" even if all logic, common sense, and street-smart survival thinking just scream DON'T DO IT!
"Why Clark Can't Write"
I'm too freaked out to move.
Brent Jones, Part Two dusted off this ancient laptop he used to drag around school the first time I was a senior, and I remembered that I'd written something on it out of boredom one night at his house, so I fired it up and took a look at the words of a 17-year-old me.
It was a bunch of short bursts of random thoughts sectioned off with odd titles like "Potato Ships and My Dog Skip" and the like -- Seriously, who would read that type of thing? I'm glad I've really grown past that...
There's one paragraph that's just ripoff of my favorite passage from "Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas, a vignette about my Schwartz fixation, another one about my ex-wife, and an odd depiction of a firebomb in a Belfast. The only recurring theme is that members of the British Special Air Service keep popping up to try and kill me and Justin. In fact, there's this scene where the SAS do a drive-by, and Karl takes a bullet from me, despite the fact that he pretty much hates me, and the two of us sit around talking about old Simpson's episodes until he bleeds out.
I look back at something like this, shudder at the all my awkward turns of phrase and wonder why I think I can be a writer... And then I remember how much fun I had writing stuff back then and can't understand why it doesn't seem as fun to write anything now.
I always track the shift back to this Moliere quote I read in my book my first semester in Columbia: Writing is like prostitution. First you do it for love, and then for a few close friends, and then for money.
That, plus I'm using a lot of double negatives these days. Six months out of school and my grammar's gone to shit. Don't tell The Dawson.
In all self-deluded seriousness, I'm working on The Seventh Short-Story by Lenar Clark, which is about a recent college grad who works at a movie theater because Caleb -- in another one of his insightful comments -- told me that I should be able to get a story out of anything I do for more than a month, be it a job, a relationship, or picking at a stubborn scab.
The story's patterned loosely around Dante's Inferno and framed by that old joke, What'd the zen-buddhist say to the hot dog vendor? I'm debating on whether or not to include a section about constantly being asked why black people buy nachos and how annoying that is.
"Why Clark Can't Stand Whitey"
I swear, the next time someone tells me that I'm not really black, I'm going to pop 'em in the face, steal their car and scream "Now am I black enough for ya, bitch?!"
"Why Clark Can't Stay in Columbia"
Actually, never mind. That's too damn obvious to get into.
It's just time. I can't haunt this place no more.
- Ben Folds
"Why Clark Can't This Time"
1) Mephisto
2) Who the hell's ever heard of a "Smallville Party"?
3) Breaks my new "Blonde or Black" rule
3) Heard she crazy
4) I'm Audi 5000
5) Out of my Justice League of America, even if she may have even heard of them
6) Shared love for a TV show isn't the fertile soil I always assumed
7) My life is a mess
"Why Clark Can't Sleep"
I missed J. Dub when he blew through town.
"Why Clark Can't Share in World Series Sorrow"
I'm sorry, but I love it when bad things happen to St. Louis.
"Why Clark Can't Go Back to School"
Last week, the Brentmeister General was working day and night on a paper for his capstone class -- which roughly translates to him puttering around on the computer for five minutes, then wandering around The Barrio shouting "I'm fucked!" -- and when he eventually finished it, he asked me to look over it, and I did, and I didn't know what to do other than make a few arbitrary changes and suggest one of my patented quasi-academic titles.
That's when I realized that not only do I never want to write another class paper for as long as I live, I sure as hell don't want to have to read, review, and grade one.
"Why Clark Can't Leave Columbia"
1) Will miss Caleb and the FIG kids terribly
2) No ticket
3) No job skills
4) Started playing GTA: San Andreas, and despite my initial disgust that -- as the Brentmeister General so elequently put it -- it's an opportunity for rich white kids to pretend that they live in a poverty-ridden warzone like it's all cap-bustin' joyriding fun, I am so into it now
5) Not sure Granny's got a liquor cabinet
6) DC Comics filled that ass. editor job without even asking me
7) Will miss Brent even more than Caleb and the FIG kids
"Why Clark Can't Play Organized Sports"
I haven't thrown a football since the first day of gym class my freshman year at ol' O'Hara High. Looking back on it now, I realize that the whole point of that particular exercise was so that Demo, our gym teacher/football coach ('natch) could do a little scouting, but that's neither here nor there.
If I remember correctly, I didn't do too bad. My wounded ducks didn't have Demo whispering to me that the Fighting Celtics needed my priceless arm or nothing, but I did well enough that no locker room derision fell my way. (No, most of that fell on the slumped shoulders of this poor pathetic wretch I didn't know too well by the name of Brent Jones, Part One. I wonder whatever became of that kid?)
I'm pretty sure I have my father to thank for this tiny mercy. During my year-long stat in Great Falls, me and the old man would toss the pigskin around once and a while. Of course, I've also got my father to thank for my half-ass loyalty to the Chicago Bears, so let's just call it a wash...
Anyway, the Brentmeister General bought a football a few weeks back, and of course, he needed a playmate, so I got tapped. (A small price to pay to live rent-free.) We hit the FARC mini-quad, Brent taught me how to throw again, and we made like two frat boys flunking math. I think we made a respectable showing for the people passing by. And I noticed we went to greater lengths to do so whenever there were women around -- which used to happen back when I played with Dad, too. My stepmother once remarked that I seemed to really sprint to make a catch if a girl was watching...
So we'd been out there for about twenty minutes when a cluster of girls were coming out of the dorm, and I threw a spectacular pass into Brent's knees. It was shameful... and that's why I suddenly grabbed my shoulder and started screaming "OH MY GOD! I TORE MY ROTATOR CUFF! SWEET SHIT IN HEAVEN, I TORE MY ROTATOR CUFF!!!" By the time I was rolling around on the ground in mock agony, Brent had rushed to my side shouting "OH FUCK! YOU'RE PRICELESS ARM! WHY LORD OH WHY?! YOU WERE THE BEST PLAYER I'VE EVER SEEN! AND YOU'RE REALLY GOOD AT SEX, TOO... OR SO I HEAR FROM ALL THE WOMEN YOU SLEEP WITH!"
I like to think I did Demo and the old man proud.
"Why Clark Can't Take Your Call"
For some reason, whenever I tell someone to just call me at home, because I'll definitely be in the apartment, it takes no more than five minutes for me to shag ass out of there and wander the streets.
I think it's because no good comes from answering that phone. Sure, Kate and Prew-Prew Boo-Boo call every once in a while, but for every call from someone I love, there's ten annoying fucks or VOX editors or Forum managers pleading with me to do something awful.
And we all know what lies at the Heart of Clarkness... We all know what's transformed my simple solitary life into this outrageous mess of mundane maladies --Shit! I'm channelling Stan Lee again! -- that's almost too stupid to live: My inability to say no inability to just say "No... Oh hell no!" even if all logic, common sense, and street-smart survival thinking just scream DON'T DO IT!
"Why Clark Can't Write"
I'm too freaked out to move.
Brent Jones, Part Two dusted off this ancient laptop he used to drag around school the first time I was a senior, and I remembered that I'd written something on it out of boredom one night at his house, so I fired it up and took a look at the words of a 17-year-old me.
It was a bunch of short bursts of random thoughts sectioned off with odd titles like "Potato Ships and My Dog Skip" and the like -- Seriously, who would read that type of thing? I'm glad I've really grown past that...
There's one paragraph that's just ripoff of my favorite passage from "Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas, a vignette about my Schwartz fixation, another one about my ex-wife, and an odd depiction of a firebomb in a Belfast. The only recurring theme is that members of the British Special Air Service keep popping up to try and kill me and Justin. In fact, there's this scene where the SAS do a drive-by, and Karl takes a bullet from me, despite the fact that he pretty much hates me, and the two of us sit around talking about old Simpson's episodes until he bleeds out.
I look back at something like this, shudder at the all my awkward turns of phrase and wonder why I think I can be a writer... And then I remember how much fun I had writing stuff back then and can't understand why it doesn't seem as fun to write anything now.
I always track the shift back to this Moliere quote I read in my book my first semester in Columbia: Writing is like prostitution. First you do it for love, and then for a few close friends, and then for money.
That, plus I'm using a lot of double negatives these days. Six months out of school and my grammar's gone to shit. Don't tell The Dawson.
In all self-deluded seriousness, I'm working on The Seventh Short-Story by Lenar Clark, which is about a recent college grad who works at a movie theater because Caleb -- in another one of his insightful comments -- told me that I should be able to get a story out of anything I do for more than a month, be it a job, a relationship, or picking at a stubborn scab.
The story's patterned loosely around Dante's Inferno and framed by that old joke, What'd the zen-buddhist say to the hot dog vendor? I'm debating on whether or not to include a section about constantly being asked why black people buy nachos and how annoying that is.
"Why Clark Can't Stand Whitey"
I swear, the next time someone tells me that I'm not really black, I'm going to pop 'em in the face, steal their car and scream "Now am I black enough for ya, bitch?!"
"Why Clark Can't Stay in Columbia"
Actually, never mind. That's too damn obvious to get into.
It's just time. I can't haunt this place no more.
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