I can’t stay off the internet. I want things to happen. I want to progress. I know it’s possible.

My niece is a in a bad spot. Most of the family got together this morning and had an intervention. It’s funny, because she’s going through the same problems both of us are, she just got sucked in to the worst possible outcome. I understand where she’s at. Lots of people have been there or are going there. I believe she will turn things around. But then again, I believe everyone will do the right thing all of the time instead of the convenient thing or the easy thing. What’s better, a life lived with meaning or a life lived in search of meaning (or completely without it, even)?

I just read The Snakepit Book. I don’t get a lot of time to read because I’m too busy pouting in my room and typing blogs on the internet, but I was up at the lake and I wanted to be a good person, so I read. I read the whole thing. Snakepit is a comic zine that describes life in three panels. The captions are always seemingly mundane or occasionally magnificent. “I woke up late. I went to work. I hooked up with the cute girl from two pages ago.” Each daily comic captures the three (or less) moments the author found compelling to share.

The years covered in this book were 2001-2003. I didn’t know it at the time, but Ben Snakepit had joined J Church and was in the band the only time I got to see them. The pane for that show was something like “The show was lackluster anyways.” Every May 18th, he counted the number of years ago he had gotten married. Each day described a search for identity much like the ones that all the people I care most about are going through. I read to the end of the three years described in the hopes that I could find the future of those around me (and myself, of course. Will I keep remembering anniversaries?). But Ben kept wandering between women and drugs and drinking and music and houses and never really found out who he was. Or rather, already knew who he was and what I saw as a search was really just everyday life. Yet, every few weeks, he would question what he was doing. I just ordered years 2004-2008. I need to know.

In my own questioning, brought about by the apocalypse, I have found out a lot about myself. At the same time, I have forgotten a lot of my worth to the world. It seems like my knack for remaining invisible is not as far gone as I’d hoped. I want all these things to happen that simply are not happening and, let’s face it, may not ever happen. I’m strong enough now that I won’t become self-destructive, but there was a time that I was not that strong. I worry about the strength of others dealing with this kind of crisis. I believe in them, but I’ve been known to be wrong too many times.

I went to mixtape club tonight. I made a mix called "Dude Party 1988". I wanted magic to happen tonight. I even made my bed. I left disappointed and needing escape from a story about a trip to the ape caves which reminded me of a similar story, if not the exact same one. The mix I got looks pretty good. It has Hot Water Music on it, so it definitely can’t be all bad.

On Tuesday, I’ll be leaving. I have impossibly high expectations for that trip as well. I mean, I have a hotel room already… I feel like there are a million things I should be doing and no time to do them all. Instead, I set my Rhodes back up and put together some ideas for a song I was working on up at the lake. Threw some lyrics over the top and I think the potential is here for something. My favorite saying is “When I get back from Europe…” I’ve followed that phrase with a myriad of different actions: I’ll get therapy. I’ll put my house on the market. I’ll be more active. I’ll be healed. I’ll play more music. Of all these, that last one is what I need to do. I need to get a set of songs worked out and start playing every single day for hours. Less internet stalking, more rock music. It looks doubtful that I’ll be playing drums in a band, but they’re in my room still anyhow. I have this idea about Rhodes and drums at the same time. The bass drum fits right under the Rhodes, in fact. That would get me ladies for sure. Either that or going to one million more shows. That will be the plan, I guess. It worked for Ben Snakepit.

Here’s the song I made. Here’s the blank spot where I would normally talk trash about it. ______________________ Recording style: Piano: Verse is practiced, middle part is improv but basically stolen from my other song, Second Person Singular. Vocals: first section is first take overdubbed over piano and second section is second take because I strongly disliked the first one.

Welcome back. God damn, I miss you. Rhodes.

The three nail holes
in the bathroom
remind me each day…

you move farther away,
how nothing
is as permanent as it seems.

Like prints
or holes
or heartbreak.