Brian Cummings

You left town about sixteen years ago. One Tuesday in March you were sitting in front of me in a science class. Then you weren't. But I heard you were doing pretty good for yourself.  A new pair of boots showed up in time for the first snow. And your second son is saying his first words. The car starts every morning and no one mentions that night at Ray's anymore. I wonder what you think about every night in that second just before you fall asleep and dream of the old boulevard and that house on the corner you told your mother you would buy for her when she retired. Does the sting of no one clapping when your name was called during graduation from eighth grade return? Does the smell of Kristen after your first kiss at my birthday party bring back the chill of November desert nights? Or do you hope this is the last night away from home?

a post intended to create more post-funeral threesome opportunities

OK, not really. Well, maybe. I don't know.

Tomorrow will be two weeks unemployed. That is no problem. I have things that might lead to work, or they might not. I'm thinking food stamps maybe. That would be good.

I'm cooking a lot lately. Doing things I've never done before. Sauteeing mushrooms, pizza from almost scratch with potatoes on it, and some interesting takes on burritos.

I've also been writing.

And riding my bike.

And rediscovering the joys found in other people.

And listening to great records.

And listening through the wall to see if my roommate is breaking up with his girlfriend and she is crying or if they are just watching basketball.

And shaving off my beard for a funny moustache.

And trying to live like I've always wanted to.

California has been very good to me. Thank you.

Tomorrow, a how to post, via either video, slide show or powerpoint.

I do have one regret.

I'm not having or going to an Ides of March party.

Next year I promise.

a partial list of things set on fire in my backyard on 3/10/2008

• chair
• cd's
• a 7inch record
• speaker wire
• bottles
• cans (clap your hands)
• underwear
• booze
• traffic sign
• random wood
  

the trinty of blog posts. -mix, update, video day

Three things in one day. Pretty exciting.

When I was moving out here to Chicago a friend from high school said all road trips should have The Weight by The Band as part of the soundtrack. So as I embark on another path in life, I figure I'll start it out with that. My time in Chicago has come to an end. Come sunday around 11 am I will be a California resident. I am moving back into my old room. I don't have a job. I don't have a car. I don't have a bike. These things will work themselves out when I get there.

I could probably explain why I am going back, but I also can't. It is pretty much everything. I'll get in to specifics, but till then I have this mix. It might help explain. I fly on sunday, keep your fingers crossed for turbulence.

some things in my head - mix - http://www.megaupload.com/?d=4N4007AZ
Last Songs - The Gunshy
Attention All Pickpockets - the Mountain Goats
3am Qvc Shopping Spree Hangover - The Lawrence Arms
Francie Nolan - Lifetime
Tire Swing - Kimya Dawson
Get Big - Okkervil River
The Black And The Red - One Reason
Keep The Car Running - Arcade Fire
One More Time - Joe Jackson
People II: The Reckoning - Andrew Jackson Jihad
Bring on the Dancing Horses - Echo & the Bunnymen
Wherefore Art Thou, Elvis? - The Gaslight Anthem
P.S. New York Is Burning - Jawbreaker

...

I am existential crisis. I sit in a leather chair at a bookstore and talk with my mother. I want to make sure she is sober. I want to make sure she is ok. I just talk about myself instead. I tell her what I'm thinking, almost. SO i say goodbye and I walk down the street. The sun is down. It is cold. Cars drive past and their headlights bloom. It might be tears. It might be my eyes quiting on me. Strangers and their children look at me. They know. They can see it. I got rid of most of my stuff. I left some of it in the care of others. I took plains and buses to get 2,011 miles away, the long way. And what do I do? I still ask if you would like a PRESIDENTE margarita. I don't play guitar. I play it less, which I didn't think was possible. I don't write. I barely even think. Except for tonight. This light won't change. I don't change either. I have to cross the street. I have to make money. I have to pay rent. I have to be an adult. I am existential crisis. I can't change my mind. I can't give up. I cant retreat. I can't deem the whole experiment a failure. I can't try a different trajectory. I can't try a different location. I can second guess. And I do. And I will, no matter what happens. I'm standing on a corner waiting for a light to change, but I'm also riding in a car in the dark of the desert with a song playing, and I'm sitting in the back of a van on a nameless highway, and I'm looking out the window of an suv at some homes I'll never own and wondering why people kill and thinking I could never feel that way. Till I do. I am existential crisis. It shows on my face. My tables and coworkers think I'm tired. They ask if I'm sad. They ask if I'm drunk. They ask if I'm hungover. And I am. But not the way they get hung over. I forget to ask people how they want there meat cooked. Instead I standing on a balcony in the hills or lying naked in a car or screaming with all my heart or being screamed at. 365 days ago. I am a year older, a year of difference. But it feels like I just read a book about it. I get an extra day this year. I'll fuck it up like the rest. Not the rest of the world, but the rest of my days. I am existential crisis.

lancaster sends me off, without even trying

It finally happened. I have been going to these parties for years. There had been cross words thrown around, idle threats in passing cars leaving the scene, to maybe, or maybe not, mingle at another place or time, but tonight, it happened. I stood in a living room drinking a beer. I used to live at the house, and now it seems a lot longer than the two years it was. And a guy almost got beat up. He had pulled a knife before, or twice. And why not tonight? Who knows, but I'm glad he didn't. A friend was involved in the scene. It was a fucking shame. A cycle that doesn't seem to come close to ending. Not on nights like these, in these homes, in a town so dead, or dying.

And the Antelope Valley put on it's best clothes. It has been doing it all week. The people I served ribs to at Peppers. The girls I talked to at bars. The christmas lights that didn't burn as bright as before. All the kids who showed up at this house on a friday night. To drink free beer. To smoke others drugs. To start fights that shouldn't have happened. No one here walks away.

But I do.

all it takes is technology

I had a friend send me a message over my cellular phone last night. She asked me if it had rained here.

I told her no, and called this place a shithole.

Then it started raining.

Thank you for sharing.