I Want the One I Can't Have

“What’s your deal bro?!”

“What do you mean, ‘what’s my deal?’?”

Michael exhaled and let his arms flap to his sides before pinching the bridge of his nose.  “Joe, we’ve been friends since we were little kids and you’ve barely dated at all! What’s that about?”

“Um…I don’t know Mike,” Joe followed suit with the long exhale.  He had often dreaded this question.  He had barely dated.  He did not date anyone at all until he had gone off to college, and even then, it was not until his second year.  Joe knew that this was unusual.  His awareness of his friends’ and acquaintances’ dating experiences all through high school was pretty limited, though what he knew unsettled him.  At one point, he had developed a crush on Samantha from his algebra class, but all he heard about her is that she had a wild side.  He didn’t know what to believe, or if any of it were true, but he did know that she spent a lot of time with tough guys like Tommy, who had a full goatee and a neck tattoo by the seventh grade.  It intimidated the fuck out of him.  Joe was not wild.  He was scared.

“Remember back during the summer before Junior High and we used to talk about all of the girls that we were into?” Michael’s arms raised like a stretching bird about to take flight – a bottle in each hand of vodka and rum.  “It seems like you had quite a list!  What happened?”

“I don’t know.  It just never happened for me,” Joe stuttered and dropped his head.  Blood rushed to his face and he silently asked himself the same question: ‘what happened?!”

“I mean, Joni always says that you’re kind of the shit!” Michael shouted.  Joe thought about how Michael always seems to shout.  Joe supposed that it’s not shouting, if he always talks like this and he did.   Most of Joe’s closest friends were loud.

“Joni has never told me this…” Joe mumbled and stopped and opened the front door of the Victorian home with a creaky closed in porch where Michael and Joni were renting.  Michael’s longtime girlfriend was also Joe’s friend, but she had never told him this bit of info.  Would it have made any difference?  Joe decided it may have only added to the pressure he always put on himself.  No one was more aware of his aloneness and that it was pretty weird. 

Joe held the door open for Michael who set the bottles of booze down just inside the door onto the floor next to a ten gallon rubber garbage can along with a few other bottles.  Joe handed Mike his door keys and flopped down onto the low couch that oddly faced toward the front door. 

“You gotta be confident around the ladies!  Just be yourself!”  Michael shouted, or said as he moved into the kitchen behind the couch. 

“I am ‘me.’  Always.  It’s frightening how ‘myself’ I always am.  I am confident with how ‘me’ I am, because it’s reliable.  I know that I am always ‘me,’” Joe blurted these words with a profound emphasis as if they had already been loaded.  “I’ve always admired how you can blend in with all kinds of different personalities in different situations Mike.  I’m not good at that, and I think I’m incapable of adapting.  I do not want to adapt.  I’ve only had serious feelings for three girls in my life: two of them didn’t want to have anything to do with me and the third didn’t know I existed.  “It seems clear to me that what I am is not something women want.”

“Blah Blah Blah Blah Blah.  You sound like that whiny dude that your dad listened to all the time after your mom left.”  Michael was still in the kitchen.  “I want the one I can’t have / and it’s driving me mad,” a horrific caterwaul floated out to the front room from Michael’s mouth.

 

Joe’s attention was quickly diverted to a jiggle at the front door. 

Joni threw open the front door carrying two grocery bags “Of course you’re here!  Don’t get up.”  Joe had no intention of getting up from the couch.  He wasn’t sure he would be able to without rolling onto the floor first.  “You know the party isn’t for a couple of hours?” Joni projected with no expectation of any kind of response as she clomped her way into the kitchen.

Joe could hear Michael and Joni talking, but he could not hear what they were saying.  He closed his eyes and felt a chill fizzle along his forearms.

 

++++++++++++

 

Joe had drifted off to sleep and had only awoken because of a knock on the door.  It startled him.  It had grown dark outside.  The front room was also dark aside from a few candles.  He could make out the faint scent of sandalwood.  He rolled onto the hardwood floor and pushed himself up from all fours.  His face felt smashed in like he was wearing a tight helmet.  His senses were dulled.  He hated falling asleep during the day.  It always felt catastrophic to him.  He wasn’t fully aware of where he was or what was happening.  He opened the door and there were three people – two guys and a girl – whom he did not recognize.  “Come on in,” he guided as he turned his head and looked longingly at the couch.

The girl smiled at him and introduced herself: “Hi, my name is Sarah, and this is my boyfriend Josh, and this is Josh’s friend Jacob.”  To Joe, Josh and Jacob were identical.  They both had messy hair that he assumed took both of them hours to coif.  They were both wearing vintage drab green military style jackets, black jeans and Docs.  Sarah had a dark brown bob hairstyle that seemed to be balancing a little crooked on her head, and she was wearing a tight fitting pink sweater underneath a black windbreaker.  Sarah smiled and looked at Joe expectantly.

“Um, my name is Joe, nice to meet you,” Joe muttered and then curled into the kitchen from the front room hoping that either Michael or Joni would be there to take charge.

Michael was slicing up various citruses (citrisi?) to dump into the Jungle Juice barrel out by the front door.  Joe could hear Joni’s voice out in the front room.  He took in a deep breath and slowly released it, as he situated himself next to Michael at the kitchen sink.  He began putting the already cut citruses into a bowl that was already in place. 

Michael leaned over and in his quietest voice asked “So what do you think?”

“About what?”

“Sarah,” he said with disgust on his face and a flick of his fingers to splash some juice into Joe’s face.

“She’s very pretty.  What does it matter?  She has a boyfriend.” 

“So what?  Look at that guy.  He’s like a little boy and you’re the man.”  Michael smacked his lips and directed the rest of the cut pieces into the bowl with his knife, wiped his hands with a towel and tossed it over his shoulder.  He grabbed the bowl and wandered off with it into the front room. 

Joe followed and in an effort to explain himself kept talking to the back of Michael’s head, “I’ve got nothing better to bring to the table than those guys, or anyone for that matter!  I’m like the list of horrible side effects from one of those pharmaceutical ads,” he continued “except I don’t come with any positive effect that the medication might have to offer.”

Michael smacked his lips again and shook his head side to side.

 

There were more people out in the front room by that time and Joni was handing out cups full of the red concoction shouting “You know its quality when it comes from the trash!”  Michael upturned the bowl of fruit into the jungle juice and set it down on the floor next to the gray rubber trash can.  A song from the early 00s was playing quietly.  Joe recognized it, but he didn’t know the artist.  The only music he remembered from then were his father’s 80s and 90s punk rock and indie 45s.  He used to look at them obsessively while listening.  The often photocopied paper sleeves and rough recordings transported him to another world.  The music felt dangerous and far more informed than he ever felt.  Most of those 7” singles were stuffed with small bits of paper with organizational information, informative news stories, interesting poetry, and handwritten personal notes from the bands directed to his father.  He pulled his phone out of his pocket and then absentmindedly returned it without looking at it.  He already wanted to leave.

Michael handed Joe a full cup and waved over Sarah to give her one, then shouted out a cheers as he held his cup aloft.  Nearly everyone is the room shouted “cheers” in response and drank in unison.

“Joseph, this is Sarah.  Sarah works with Joni downtown when she’s not too busy taking every college course PSU offers,” Michael smiled and awkwardly winked.  His constant winking was disconcerting at best, which only encouraged him to wink more often.

“Hi Joe.  Is Joe okay?” Sarah looking directly at Joe smiled and asked, “You said your name was Joe earlier, right?”

Joe could feel blood rush to his face.  He looked into her eyes and immediately averted them.  She was too much stimuli for him.  “Yes.  Yes, everyone calls me Joe.”  Joe’s voice was quiet and soft and he could feel himself leaning his head toward Sarah.  Her black eyebrows were set at dramatic angles and they framed her stunning brown eyes, which had a friendliness that resonated with him in a way he did not understand. 

“Not Joey though.  He hates that,” Michael interjected as he turned and walked away. 

“Uh, I don’t really mind,” Joe smiled and tried to regain eye contact with Sarah.  He noticed that he had clasped his hands together with fingers intertwined.  He had become a cartoon.  He had always suspected that he was a cartoon, but the most uninteresting and least entertaining ever.

Joe felt a calm rise up through his body, and despite the loud chatter of people talking over the music, his voice became soft, “How long have you known Joni?” he leaned in and asked Sarah.  Her eyes captivated him.  Sarah held eye contact like no one he had ever encountered.  She smiled and he couldn’t help, but try to smile too.  She was contagious.  He was fully aware that his smiles look more like a pained grimace like he’s trying to keep in a fart. 

“We’ve been working together for a few months down at the coffee shop.”  She leaned in so her face was near his.  “Joni says that you’re a writer!”

“No, not really,” Joe stammered, “but I do enjoy writing, but it’s all terrible”

“I’d love to read some.  Do you have a website?”

“No.”  Joe blurted out.  “Nice answer,” he thought to himself, “What the fuck was that?” he asked himself as she backed away.

“I should probably go find Josh,” she said turning away.

Joe watched her move across the room.  He was trying to read her mind as she navigated her way through the small groups of people clustered in the room.  He sensed that she had an interesting running inner dialogue that he wanted to know.  She exuded a confident intelligence that was making his stomach toss and turn with excitement.  He didn’t know what was happening to him.  Everything about her was amazing!  He had never felt so drawn to anyone like this before and had never felt such a peace overcome him.  His prior attractions have always shot through him like electricity giving him a nervous and generally disastrous energy.  He kept her in his sights and followed her over toward Josh and Jacob.

He stopped about five feet short and watched. 

“You should’ve seen Josh shouting at the city council as the gestapo dragged him out of the room,” Jacob yelled to Sarah.

“It was awesome!  They had to shut down the meeting because we fucked their shit up!” Josh confirmed.

Sarah shook her head back and forth and crossed her arms.  “Weren’t they supposed to vote on appropriations for low income housing today?” she asked as she took in a short breath and held it.

“Yah dude, but we fucking made sure those bastards know that they need to shut down the ICE shit!  Quick look up and see if my mugshot is online yet so I can post it on IG,” Josh commanded to Jacob.

“Isn’t that up to the Feds?” Sarah followed up, “Is that something the council can do?”  Sarah didn’t wait for an answer as she turned away from the conversation and turned to grab her jacket by the door.

“Are you leaving?” Joe asked her with a crack in his voice.  He felt a sudden desperate surge push up into his chest.

“Yeah, I’m not feeling so great, sorry.”  She looked down as she cinched her jacket around her waist. 

“You don’t need to apologize,” he trailed off, “I’m sorry you’re not feeling well.  Can I see you to your car or walk you home?” he blurted with renewed vigor and a major sense of panic.  He wanted to know everything about her at that moment and knew it wasn’t going to happen.

“Aw, thanks Joe, I’ll be fine, Josh and I live in that shitty building just across the street.”  Sarah zipped up her coat and looked over to Josh as he and Jacob slapped hands in celebration as they told someone about their disruption tale.  “It was very nice to meet you, Joe, I hope to see you soon.”

 

+++++++++++++

 

“Hey man,” Joe croaked into his phone.  It was Michael.  He’s always been a caller.  Joe is a texter.

“Joni says that Sarah really likes you!  I was feeling a vibe between you two the other night,” Michael stated, as if this were a question.  Joe felt a rush of energy flash through his arms.

“She liked me?  We barely spoke,” he stuttered in response.

“Hell yeah!  We gotta set you two up.  Bro, I’ve never seen you like that before!” Michael’s voice causing Joe to pull the phone away from his ear. 

“What about her boyfrie-‘

“Fuck that idiot!” Michael emphasized.  “Your dad would’ve rolled over in his grave seeing Sarah with those two wanna be punks,” Michael added knowing full well Joe’s dad was still alive.  “Shall I have Joni give her your number?”

Joe’s mind began to race.  He didn’t know what any of this meant.  Did Sarah like him like him, or was she going to be his friend, while staying with Josh?  He felt his phone buzzing in his hand and saw an incoming call with a familiar prefix.  “I gotta take this call, hold on.”  He pressed the green button.  “Hello?”

“Hi Joe?”

“Yes.”

“This is Doctor Rosen.  I’m not sure if you’ve seen the abdominal MRI results in your MyChart yet, but I wanted to get in touch with you as soon as possible.”

Joe was picturing Dr. Rosen, who had been his urologist since he had been a little kid.  His calm voice and shocking white hair.  “What’s going on?”

“Well, I have bad news.  Those lesions we’ve been monitoring in your kidneys need to be addressed.  It looks like we will likely have to remove both of kidneys before the tumors can metastasize.”

Joe sat on the arm of his loveseat and took in a deep breath.  “Um, okay?”  He did not know what to say or ask.

Dr. Rosen continued, “Can you come in tomorrow afternoon.  We will go over your scans and come up with a game plan.  This will involve dialysis, so we will get you set up with a nephrologist and a vascular surgeon for a fistula.” 

“A what?” Joe mumbled, barely able to move his lips.

“How about my office at 2 PM tomorrow?” 

Joe let out the air he had taken in and agreed to the appointment.  He began smashing his face with his left palm, and switched the call back to Michael.  “Hey.”

“What was that all about?   Are you down?  Maybe she’ll give you a call and you can go out?” Michael urged.

“I – I don’t think that’s a good idea.  I gotta go, sorry.”

 

Lullaby

My friend Jeff and I used to escape the campus of Pacific University in Forest Grove, Oregon by walking to the bus stop for Tri-Met line 57.  It was the final stop about 25 miles west of Portland.  We’d grab as much change as we could and try to get to Portland to visit cool record stores and such, despite the hour and a half trip each way.  If we had less time, or patience, we’d ride the 16 or so miles into Beaverton and go to Tower Records.  We needed to feel civilization.  Being on a small college campus in an isolated town that didn’t want to have anything to do with the college students back in 1989/90 was a little claustrophobic.  There was little to do, so we invented our own fun, and minor escapes.  During our treks to the bus stop near the mini mart and the Vac & Sew storefront, we generally sang exaggerated versions of songs that would pop into our heads. 

 

One of those songs was The Cure’s “Lullaby.”  It was never a huge favorite of mine from their catalogue, but our overly breathy version was, well, it was a thing.  The combination of the exaggerated gasping whispers and the attempts to stifle our laughter while performing this song for our own entertainment would lead to near hyperventilation.  If it wasn’t “Lullaby,” it might’ve been “Fire in Cairo,” or “Party of the First Part,” or “Debaser,” or “Cuts You Up,” for which I was convinced I had perfected the Peter Murphy croon, but I’m sure in reality I sounded more like a dying harbor seal barking out my misery.  Then there was the Jesus and Mary Chain’s “Sidewalking,” which included our repeating howls of “chilled to the bone” and an impossible contorted stroll that can only be described as a silly walk – Monty Python-style.  I would say, “You had to be there,” but it still likely would not have made any sense.  None of it ever made sense, but I will never forget those mini adventures and the laughs.

I woke up from a short fit of sleep recently having dreamt of spider webs.  They were everywhere.  Thick and sticky.  In my eyes and mouth.  Surrounding me enough to make me believe that a giant spider or a gang of ambitious regular sized spiders were hunting me.  I could feel the webs in my mouth and sticking to every part of my body as I tried to force my way through them.  There were layers and layers.

 

Legend has it that one of Robert Smith’s uncles would tell him nightmarish bed time stories about a spiderman that would eat sleeping children.  Was the “Spiderman” from “Lullaby” coming for me after all these years for making fun of the song? 

“On candy stripe legs the spiderman comes

Softly through the shadow of the evening sun

Stealing past the windows of the blissfully dead

Looking for the victim shivering in bed

Searching out fear in the gathering gloom and

Suddenly a movement in the corner of the room

And there is nothing I can do

When I realize with fright

That the spiderman is having me for dinner tonight”

I look back at those days with bewilderment.  I was fairly healthy and one of my biggest fears at that time was sleeping through my 8:30 am classes at college.  Sure, life wasn’t always fun and games, but a lot of my needs were met, I had new friends, my small insular world was expanding, and there wasn’t a lot of outside pressure.

Generally, I’m not one to read a lot into dreams.  If I’m dreaming about looking for a bathroom then, yes, I likely need to pee in real life and should wake up.  In this case though, the imagery is not lost on me.  I’m pretty sure that those webs represent my own inhibitions and shields that I’ve continued to build and maintain throughout my life. 

I’ve always been slow to trust and very wary of trying new things, especially if there’s potential danger.  And by danger, I mean everything from falling from a tree fort, or flying off jumps on my first dirt bike, to opening myself up for emotional damage from failed relationships.  For the most part, I’ve kept to myself, which has always felt safer and frankly, comfortable.  It can get lonely sometimes, but I’m not so bad at keeping myself company most of the time.  As a kid, I never fully embraced being away from home.  Never felt comfortable sleeping over anywhere.  I preferred spending time with friends and then going home.  I’m still that way.

After years of medical issues that have caused a lot of damage, I am feeling like I’ve isolated myself into a deep, dark hole full of those sticky webs that will not allow me to escape.  It’s frustrating, because I’ve been this way for so long, that I am not sure how to remedy this self-entrapment.  The older and unhealthier I get, the more I realize that I cannot do this alone anymore.  I need help, but I don’t know specifically what help I need or how to ask.  I feel like I’ve alienated a lot of friends who have offered help, by declining, but I do not know how to relinquish control of every aspect of my being, or what to ask for, and I don’t know how accept the idea that I’m anything but a nuisance or burden, if I reach out for help.  Pride is a bitch.

 

Self-hatred would likely have happened anyway, but it took a dark turn after having a few serious abdominal surgeries before I turned 20.  I do not feel proud of my scars like well-adjusted people do for having toughed things out.  I feel mutilated like some sort of Frankenstein’s Monster.  Back then though, I suppose I had enough belief that eventually I’d pull myself free of my self-imposed shackles and not be ashamed of my physical being.  It has never happened.  Shame and embarrassment has only expanded with age and numerous hardcore medications.  Steroids, chemo drugs, immune suppressants, and numerous cholesterol and blood pressure medications have helped me morph into some kind of pale doughy crippled Sasquatch.  I feel humiliated.  Ashamed.  I could go on and on.

 

Shit.  This got dark real quick. 

What I’m trying to say is that I think this dream led me to some self-reflection and a full honest realization of how I’ve sabotaged myself over the years as part of my unfortunate lifelong unhealthy journey.  Emotionally, I do not know how to handle it anymore.  My poor social skills have caught up with me leading to isolation and difficulty navigating some of the few friendships I have remaining.  I spend so much time with medical professionals that they have essentially become my social circle, which is incredibly unhealthy.  When I move on from a physical therapist or a specialist having completed some kind of arbitrarily sanctioned insurance coverage.  I get incredibly sad, because these people are no longer part of my life.  

As I mentioned above, I seem to reject offers of help.  I do not know what to ask for, and by the time I do have a specific need, I struggle to send out a request, nor do I want to give up control and my privacy.  The nature of my health issues stems from a genetic disorder that never seems to end, as long as I keep surviving.  So, the same things that were making my life hell in 1991, are still affecting me – only it’s expanded and become more all-encompassing.  I feel embarrassed and reluctant to keep complaining to those I love about the same old shit.  Nothing has changed.  The disorder is unrelenting.  I often get “what now?” reactions when I attempt to communicate my problems to others.  How do I make it clear that I live with this stuff every day and have most of my life?  It doesn’t go away.  It is a part of who I am. 

What’s funny is that intellectually I recognize that I self-shame myself into oblivion.  I am proud of my survival on a certain level.  Not a level that’s high enough for me to prevent me from feeling like a waste and a failure.  I can recognize this kind of defeatist attitude in others when they manifest it and I can come up with compelling arguments as to why they shouldn’t punish themselves that way.  Apparently, these arguments do not apply to me.  Is it possible to turn things around?  Is it possible to undo a lifetime of mental sabotage?  Is it possible to fend off the spiderman?  Do I want to fend off the spiderman, or do I want to give up?

 

Promised You A Miracle

 

He flopped back over onto his left side and let out a loud frustrated groan.  He thought he had gotten past getting pissed off when trying and failing to sleep.  After not being able to sleep for most of his life, he had finally let it go and accepted it.  He had learned to get out of bed, instead of fighting sleep, and try to be productive, or just zone out to the overnight news broadcasts to try to relax.  It was the spiraling thought.  It was his biggest sleep enemy.  Some sort of dreadful anxious notion that would repeat in his mind endlessly, keeping him from sleep and making him agitated.  Generally, when he was younger, these were about trying to solve some problem at school – not wanting to fall behind, or having to deal with a classmate for some reason.  Then it became work shit and sleep became that much more difficult – especially having a job that was never resolved – just a constant continuing cycle of chaos where no sense of accomplishment could ever be felt.  Yet, he had begun to feel better, once he realized that if he just accepted sleeplessness as a part of his life. 

The futility of it all is what made him so upset.  It all reminded him of his past experience with the Pain Management Clinic and the resulting overnight sleep study.  The bizarre study that took place on a Friday night one summer, where he was expected to go to sleep at about 7 in the evening.  They hooked about 500 wires to him and left him in a lightless room, with nothing to do.  According to the unbelievably handsome doctor who he consulted with the following morning, he did actually sleep some, but stayed in the first phase of sleep the entire time.  This is a phase, where the sleeper’s mind is still semi-conscious and they have incredibly vivid visions or dreams.  This phase normally lasts for less than ten minutes, but he laughed as he told Charles that he stayed there much of the night and never delved into the next phase.  He said, that it’s actually more tiring than not sleeping, again with a chuckle, as he looked to be practicing his golf grip on the pointer in his tan hands.  That was it!  Charles didn’t ask any questions either!  It was like six am on a sunny summer Saturday morning, he probably had a tee time too.  The good looking sleep doctor wrote him a prescription for Ambien, which Chuck had tried in the past and for which it had long lost any effectiveness.

Charles laughed to himself as he thought about the old Pain Management Clinic.  It had all started when his normal headaches were becoming so intense that he was struggling to function.  It was a few months after his kidney transplant, and his transplant doctor thought the PMC might be able to help him.  The clinic was designed to address chronic pain from different angles.  A patient was set up with a medical doctor to direct each case, a physical therapist, and a psychiatrist.  I met my team and they immediately referred me to a headache specialist who looked way too much like the early Law & Order detective Lennie Briscoe.  It’s amazing how little we as people know about the brain.  Treating sleep and headaches at that time was to prescribe a series of formerly antidepressant medications, of which none of them helped my headache nor my sleep, so, after a while Dr. Jerry Orbach sent me back to the PMC.  The four people I interacted with there was the receptionist, who was clearly in charge of the entire clinic and who was a voluptuous blonde named Jenna Jameson, who seemed oblivious that she shared the same name as the most well-known porn star at the time.  Charles would save the phone messages from her regarding upcoming appointments – hoping his roommates would listen to them.  His doctor was Dr. Miracle, who was eerily similar to the Orbit Gum spokeswoman with her sharp British accent and early 60s fashion sense, the psychiatrist was a creepy guy who reeked of cigarettes, had a tiny cramped office, greasy hair, and tons of cassette tapes which he had recorded of him saying things quietly over the sounds of a babbling brook or some such.  Chuck’s first and last session with him took place in a tiny windowless office crowded with stacks of file boxes, after it seemed the shrink had inhaled a tuna sandwich.  They were in facing desk chairs only a few feet apart.  Charles was incredibly uncomfortable, while the psychiatrist diagnosed him as needing sleep, so gave him a few of his homemade relaxation tapes.  Lastly, Charles would see a physical therapist each visit, who would generally employ Craniosacral Therapy on him, which would make him incredibly woozy for the rest of the day, and unsurprisingly, she was the one who diagnosed and solved his headache issues. 

 

He was now dreaming.  He could tell, because he was about four or five years old and there was his mom walking behind him.  She was wearing dark sunglasses.  Beside him was his childhood friend, Jon, whose family lived across the street in their old neighborhood.  They seemed to be at a carnival of some sort.  Dried and pressed grass beneath their feet, twirling rides all about, the smell of burned grease and oil.  He was wearing sandals with white socks and blue shorts.  He had a t-shirt on underneath the green cardigan sweater his grandmother had knitted him.  He was also wearing a blue bucket hat, which he had loved.  He spotted another kid nearby with an ice cream cone shoved up underneath his nose.  He immediately thought about asking his mom for one, but decided against it, when he realized that he was carrying something.  He had a scrapbook in his hands.  Within the context of the dream, he knew that it was his.  His soon to be Kindergarten teacher and his mom had started this book for him.  Inside were projects for him to work on.  It contained reading assignments, art to draw and color, things to read and places to write about various things.

His mom had not been around the family for a short while, and had taken this book with her, but now she was back and the book had some new pages.  The carnival seemed to be near the Hollywood District in Portland.  They had likely walked down the hill from their neighborhood to get there.  It seemed to be themed around movie and TV characters who were based in Portland.  There was a ride/exhibit that featured odd random characters from the old primetime cartoon the Flintstones, who were apparently Portland born.  Strange, but very Portland.  Our inferiority complex runs deep.  Our local news will report about an earthquake in Istanbul or somewhere and relate it to our quake readiness for “when the big one comes.”  They always find some reason to find a NW connection – no matter how loose – to any news positive or not

This was different from any dream he had ever had with his mom.  The only dreams she ever showed up in were the occasional dreams where she would re-appear in his life, such as it is now.  She hadn’t died.  Instead she had gone into hiding for all of these years.  In other words, she had chosen to leave.  These were disturbing, hurtful and very realistic dreams that he hated.  Over the years, he had worked to try to control his dreams, but in this light state of sleep, his influence generally just woke him.  In the case of disturbing dreams like these, he was okay with that.

His mom used to discuss various controversial subjects with him.  The first one he remembered was when Oregon passed a mandatory seatbelt law, but he remembered long discussions regarding hunting, clear cutting forests versus preserving them, the death penalty, abortion, and even daylight savings time.  She would let him come to his own conclusions, would never raise her voice or try to sway his decision, but would play devil’s advocate to test his newly found stances no matter the side he had chosen.  He learned a lot and always appreciated her approach.  It made him feel important.

He sat next to her on a park bench.  Jon, and his older sister Michelle, were waiting in line to ride a Merry-Go-Round made up of Portland based cartoon dinosaurs.  He was looking at his scrapbook.  His mom had added some pages about accepting death.  He turned to her and asked her what these were for, and she said that it was time to get back home.  All of us kids were due at our elderly neighbor’s house, the Kimberly’s.  The childless elderly couple often took care of the young kids in the neighborhood and they spoiled all of us.  We were always welcome to come in for cookies or candy, or play basketball in their driveway, or watch their television.  They were super nice.  He tried to ask his mom again regarding the death pages in the scrapbook.  His semi-conscious self wondered if these were a warning years too late?  This was before his grandmother had passed and all of the dying began.  Were they preparing him for an upcoming loss of someone close in his life now?  Were they for his own life?    His attempt to control the dream stirred him to wake up and feel more exhausted than before he laid down.