roadtrips not taken

Watching motorcycle diaries makes me think of all the things me and my best friend never did.

We never went on that post-high school road trip to nowhere. We never even graduated high school together.

 

I got kicked out of school around February of senior year and ended up finishing at another school and graduating before everyone else. (with a 3.5 GPA)

 

...but that meant that i didn't get to share in graduations festivities with all my friends. I did attend, but I was watching from the stands and as of now i remember more about my sister’s graduation than I do of my classmate’s graduation. If it weren’t for the pictures I have I’m sure that would be gone from my mind as well.

I left for boot camp immediately after graduation.

I didn’t get a final summer.

That means that I didn’t get to go screw around with all my friends before we decided what colleges we were going to go to, or if we were even going to go.

By the time my friends were starting their first year of college, I was across the world learning different things.

 

I learned that long distance relationships don’t last when you’re 18.

I learned that only when you’re helpless do those things you worry about not having control over actually happen.

I learned to depend on myself and no one else. (I still do this)

I learned that I was smart enough to get by, but not smart enough to avoid life.

I learned that when you push your hand through a wooden locker one time with success, maybe you shouldn’t try again.

I learned to live on my own, even though I always had room mates.

 

I spent two years away. I spent two years away because I had broken up with my high school sweetheart, and I didn’t feel the need to come home any time soon anymore. So I decided to extend my overseas service for another year.

That decision led me to my final meeting with my cousin in life.

 

I learned to appreciate the time we have with people and that sometimes a cab ride and giving away of “things” can be a substitute for “goodbye”.

 

I learned that if you believe in yourself, others will too. (I flew home to California with a set of fake orders that someone had printed up for me at the administration office and a little bit of guilt trip applied to the airport personnel.)I wasn’t supposed to land in California for another few weeks, but I was done with Okinawa and no one could stop me. Not even my healing broken hand.

 

I joined the military when I was 17 and lost all of my friends.

 

We still exist in this world where proximity is not an excuse to see each other and every few years someone dies or gets married and we all get together again to explain why we haven’t called. Sometimes I’ll catch a movie like “The Motorcycle Diaries” and I’ll get all sentimental and write something like this.

I had a friend one time that was as scared as I was. And when we were together we were the adolescent angst that all those punk songs we loved only screamed about. Now he lives right down the road and I haven’t seen him in forever. Sometimes I find him, but he never wants to stay in the light anymore. So I’m left holding a torch with nothing to burn for.

 

 

 

 

Sam and I right before senior prom.

i should be studying.. again.

     i was driving home just now, drinking a soda and listening music fairly loud.

i was thinking about alfredo.

i have been thinking about him for a while now. i think i'm going to make him the next subject in my 30 seconds project. so, i have to find a fitting song.

i found a song yesterday, i think. and it made me think of alfredo.


we were twenty-ish. i was home for my birthday.
alfredo still had a car, and we all still could hang out in the same place at the same time.

i remember being in uniform.
it was some time after september 11th.

wait... that means i wasn't home for my birthday.

i'm no longer sure what i was home for. ohhh... maybe it was the funeral. i was wearing my dress blues.

anyway.

we were young men. invincible. on our way to the airport. in alfredo's car.

it was me, sam and alfredo was driving.

we packed my stuff into my big green seabags and threw them into the jetta. sam got into the back seat and i got into the front passenger side. alfredo had a six pack of Corona bottles for the road.

i didn't drink like that.

so we drove to LAX, and alfredo drank the beers, one at a time, until they were almost gone.
then he had to pee. we had to pull off the freeway and drive into some random los angeles neighborhood so he could get out and piss against a pole on some dark street while we waited in the car. but that's what it is to be cool. you can't tell him he shouldn't do that.

he gets back in the car and we drive the rest of the way to the airport. along the way i collect bottles at my feet until i have the complete six empties under me. my shiny black shoes reflect the passing streetlights almost as well as the rims of the now empty glass bottles do.

we get to the airport and there's a big line.

The Inspection Point.

shit.


alfredo was six beers in, the car reeks, there's empties all over the floor and we have zero excuses and i need to be on that plane back to okinawa.

i was starting to freak out and so was sam. alredo was always unnaturally cool.

we get up to the point where to cops are standing guard. one on each side.
by this time we have shuffled the bottles under whatever we can find and made ourselves to look as normal as possible.

we pull up to the stop point and the cops look at alfredo, then at me.
then, they just wave us through. they see that i am a Marine and just wave us through without even rolling down the window or anything.

we calmly roll through and when we are far enough away we let out a loud roar of laughter that says... did you fucking see that?! how lucky are we!!... tinged with a little bit of nervousness and covered in young bravado. we had won.

i don't remember anything after that part, but i will always remember the night alfredo drank a six pack of bottles while he drove me back to the airport. the music was loud and the air was warm. i had nowhere left to run.

we were young, and we thought we were men,
life was as real as it was going to get that year...

that's alfredo on the right in the yellow shirt. ha.

30 seconds (part 4)

still love me...

 i have nothing to do with this song, but i do enjoy it. so here it is.

30 Seconds (part 3)

Part 3 of the 30 second project. watching old tape is ...

The Speech

Something i have had in my mind for over a year, here it is now.

.alive

     I watch these things, and I feel something inside. I feel it coarse through me. I feel alive.



     I always think I could save you. could have saved you.
I feel my heart beat through my chest and I can't stop my mind again.


     in the end I always fail.

I always fail.



    but I feel alive. I feel the last gift you left me.