Just Call Me Dr. Party Pants

Amanda,

I won’t tell you not to worry over your mother, nor to break your vigil, though these past few weeks have been an unjust burden. Like the rest of your friends and family, I can hope for the best, and pray that is enough. Neither can I speak for her, though while I remained incoherent and delirious after my heart surgery, I was glad for the company. You’re doing everything right kid, just don’t go overboard.

This is a strange holiday season.

All I have to do is look down at the blue tint on my fingernails to remind myself of life, death, and all the minutia inbetween. Sometimes I wish I’d approached living while always remembering each day was borrowed and precious. Not everyone has their mortality branded upon them, but in the grand scheme of the universe, we’re all equally fragile. But still the daily drudge beckons: work needs to be done, retirement plans require upkeep, and we clamor greedily for a single mote of recognition while assuming tomorrow holds our salvation.

Tomorrow may never arrive. Planning entirely for the future is a foolhardy gambit at best, yet the American Dream presents a desirable conquest: college, career, marriage, house, 2.4 kids, retirement, travel. Save some freak accident or unexpectedly volatile organ failure, most will eventually reach that elusive brass ring. People like me don’t have that luxury, Jack. Sure, we could pursue all those things in blind ignorance, frittering away our cache of time while desperately clinging to some modicum of expected returns. But maybe it’s better to wear the gleeful grin of a drunk with the keys to his boss’s shiny new Porsche. And isn’t it a shame he just fired you?

There’s a lot of uncertainty in merely existing. Oh isn’t it just a beautiful sight? Roll it out man, Death and Taxes. Too bad that isn’t me, regardless the wry merriment I can squeeze from even impending and irreversible calamity. Backed into a corner, plenty of previously unopened doors swing wide, blasted to splinters because there’s no longer anything left to lose. But I’m still not that guy, much to my shame. It’s impossible to give a tinker’s damn, when the boundless mystery of the universe comes down to a practical joke. Hey, you’re Schrodinger’s Cat, enjoy it sucker!

Yeah, kiss my ass.

I’d say that’s life in a nutshell, but I don’t buy cliches. I’ve stolen a metaphorical Lamborghini, but I’m puttering along like Granny Betsy zeroing in on a farmer’s market to buy some fucking maple syrup, and maybe I can fit in some bingo before I finally expire of boredom. I was given a chance to kick life squarely in the jewels, but wasted it dauntlessly venturing toward mediocrity and the bounty I was indoctrinated to expect for behaving myself. I think of Amanda’s poor mother in the hospital, and magically it dawns on me that I’ll be lucky to live that long, no matter how forthright and healthy a lifestyle I maintain. That’s almost enough to depress me. So an impasse it is, then; I’m not the adventurous type, though I feel my potential burning like a stack of cash I have no intention of spending. Anyone have some kerosene?

Until Tomorrow