IT'S NOT THAT EASY GUYS...EHHH, IT'S NOT THAT EASY...

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Well this is pretty friggin' trite if you ask me.

I have just had...and I don't want to overstate this, so I'm not going to...the Week from Hell. And not because it was all bad, just because my brain and my emotions were so all over the board. There were so many rapid swings between "King of LA" and "Disgruntled Mental Basement Dweller" that I feel like a human home run derby. If I'm being honest the last 2-3 months have been like that, but this week was just magnified for some reason. That being said, I'd like to get a few things off my chest.

First, let's take a look at this word...

relationship
Pronunciation: sh&n-"ship
Function: noun
1) the state of being related or interrelated (studied the relationship between the variables)
2) the relation connecting or binding participants in a relationship: a) as KINSHIP: b) a specific instance or type of kinship
3) a state of affairs existing between those having relations or dealings (had a relationship with his family): a) a romantic or passionate attachment

This word came up (and was a major theme of, though in very different ways) in no less than three very serious dealings I've had in the last week - two on the phone and one in an absolutely catastrophically ridiculous email exchange. Now I'm not going to get into the specifics of those dealings, but I do want to focus on one specific part of the definition:

a state of affairs existing between those having relations or dealings

Can we just, as humans, all agree that this leaves the word open to a wide variety of meanings? I don't ask for much...just tell me that we're all on the same page here. Make an old man happy.

Man, I am f*cking tired of dealing with people. I really am. Actually that's not true - most people are fine. I'm tired of dealing with people that try to talk to me and then don't listen to what I say. Moreover, I'm tired of talking to people who listen to what I have to say but hear something else entirely - something they want or need to hear rather than the point I'm trying to convey. I'm tired of dealing with cocky, ignorant motherf*ckers who think they know something about everything and try to speak on said everything. I'm tired of dealing with people who ask me for advice and then complain when I'm honest with them. I'm probably tired of you. It's come to that point.

But you know what's great about this? See, I'm giving you the impression that I'm really upset now. I'm not at all - in fact, I couldn't be further from it. I'm rather content. Why? That's what's great about this. I just entered a previously-visited phase of my life where I get to apply my favorite phrase in the Universe to everything I do.

Fuck it.

Did you notice that I left the little asterisk out? Yeah, I did that on purpose. For effect. Because seriously...fuck it.

I'm sure I've written about this on here before, but a few years back I was in the hospital for a month or so, paralyzed from the chest down after a spinal infection. I never got scared, I never worried, I never stressed myself out because of one thing my father told me. It is, honest to God, the greatest thing I've ever heard in my life and it's something so liberating that I'm going to share it with all of you:

"Attempt to control only the things in life that you can control; if something is out of your control, you can't do anything about it...so why worry?"

It sounds simple, and we've all heard it before, but have you ever really HEARD it? Man, when you hear it...it's loud. I swear it frees you - not to a negligent degree, mind you - to let that which does not matter truly slide. Just one sentence. I hadn't thought about that at all in the past few weeks; it became one of my life's most important lessons that I forgot. I've had sh*t swirling up in my head for three months now that has been bothering me and eating at me and tearing me up and making me think and just generally filling my skull with doubt and worry. I haven't slept more than 4 hours in a night in 75 days...and yes, I've been counting.

But in one pure EUREKA! moment tonight...well, I just remembered that which I had forgotten and the world makes sense again.

There are two ways to stop caring. One is a conscious effort where you tell yourself, "Hey, I'm going to set this crap aside and not dwell on it; it's messing me up." You actually force yourself not to care. I've done that before. This is not the same thing. This is, "Hey...everything that I was just worried about is gone." It's like a switch is flipped and you don't care anymore, not because you think you don't have to but because your mind has washed all its windows. Holy sh*t, I just read back over all of that and man, does it sound like a copout. It's not - I know some of you can back me up on this. It's just that snap feeling you get when you realize everything that was holding you back mentally just isn't relevant anymore.

So perhaps my earlier incantation of "Fuck it" was only partially applicable in this situation. This is not me saying "piss off" to all the things in my life that bother me - that's not a healthy way to deal with your surroundings. I guess it's just more of a way of giving the finger to all of the things you thought you needed to control...but which you were just letting control you. That's my second veiled reference to FIGHT CLUB in this post, and I swear to you, my three readers, I did neither on purpose. I guess it's that period for me to sit down and deconstruct, and let everyone else unfold their own masterplan as they may.

My excess baggage my have kept me up tonight - again - but I bet you tomorrow I sleep like a f*cking rock. It's a fantastic, wonderful, slightly filthy feeling when you know your only emotional investment in the foreseeable future is a weekend of football. It's slightly more soothing, more relaxing than my previous idea: buy a pirated copy of GREEN STREET HOOLIGANS, watch it on a continuous loop for 48 hours, don a track jacket, and walk the streets of LA haphazardly knocking out the teeth of innocent pedestrians.

Should any of you need me, then, you can find me sitting around my living room, perhaps a frosty Country Club Malt Liquor (the Half Quart) in my hand, PSU or the Browns on the tube, and a big goddamn smile on my face.

I'm dreaming dreams,
I'm scheming schemes, I'm building castles high.
They're born anew, their days are few,
Just like a sweet butterfly.
And as the daylight is dawning,
They come again in the morning!

I'm forever blowing bubbles,
Pretty bubbles in the air,
They fly so high,
Nearly reach the sky,
Then like my dreams
They fade and die.
Fortune's always hiding,
I've looked everywhere,
I'm forever blowing bubbles,
Pretty bubbles in the air.

When shadows creep,
When I'm asleep,
To lands of hope I stray...

UPDATE (13 October 2005, 16:45): I was having the best day ever until my accountant decided that he wanted to ruin my life. I can now be found at the corner of Pico and Robertson throwing myself in front of one of those blue LA buses.