LJ IDol, Week 15: Cracking Up

Melynda and I have a running argument that is a few years old now. Usually it starts when someone does something that causes one of us to raise our eyebrows and delicately say, "He's your friend." Over thousands of games of cards, cups of coffee, cigarettes, books, laptops, we could always count on at least one of us to say something terrible. It never ceases to amuse us.

It would be unreasonable to expect things to never change. I should have seen it coming. But I was so focused on getting out and getting away from high school, so numb from medication and hospitalization that I didn't pay so much attention to how it happened then. I stopped talking to most everyone from that part of my life. Later we lived so much in moments measured by semesters and summers that when it ended it caught us by surprise. Life goes on and on, and the nights feel endless at twenty two in a way far different from twenty eight or thirty eight. There was always a table in our favorite coffee spot, Metro, which let us smoke upstairs and stayed open all the time. I think I was the only one who loved the uncomfortable, German industrial decor chairs from the mid 1990s. Sometimes the air would shimmer with the smokey haze as Social Distortion screamed out of the speakers.

I'm still here. It feels strange sometimes, like I'm left behind even though I made choices to keep me here. Sometimes I wish I would crack and drift somewhere far away. Sometimes all I want is for everyone to be here, to have that friendship now that I deserve it more. When I first met Melynda I hardly spoke at all - now I talk too much. Melynda and I met in college, unfortunately through someone who turned out not to be the friend we imagined. Despite significant differences, we bonded in adversity and the madness of our final semesters at the University of Texas. Melynda seemed to collect boys with blue eyes the way I collected stupid crazy stories. Tyler had the biggest blue eyes and was in one of Melynda's classes. He made her crazy by asking question after question during a class presentation when all she wanted to do was sit down and be done. Sam studied in jungles in South America, smoked a pipe at times and dug things out of the dirt. He rented a house and the end of semester parties in his yard were legend. Nick studied theater design and never could hold all his cards despite having such broad hands. He had terrible luck with girls and broke his wrist stone cold sober on a skateboard at two in the morning.

Gene and I became friends in Prague after a year in classes together, on the university's program at Charles University. He passed out on my kitchen floor while a group of us played cards and argued about the rules. Later we would make a habit of getting drunk and doing things like grilling steak or watching screwy European movies. Jim taught us how to play mah-johngg and cooked incredible food. Elisa was the prettiest, friendliest girl who laughed without restraint. Together Jim and Elisa threw incredible parties with delicious food. Little Matt wore punk rock shirts and provided socialist commentary. James usually had something educated to say in response and they both put my current events knowledge to shame. There was Rachel, whose older sister I knew through the Slavic Department and her boyfriend Greg for ages was one of the guys behind at the counter at Metro. There was a counter girl I fell half in love with, stupidly and uselessly. It was all a tangled web. I met Sarah through Livejournal and her vicious sense of humor went along perfectly with the rest of us. Sometimes I forget she wasn't always there. Micah was like my brother; we got tattoos together after the world didn't end on a New Year's night in Houston. He picked me up in Dallas when I came home from the Czech Republic, running across the terminal and spinning me around like something out of a romantic comedy. His older brother Matt became a firefighter and dated our friend Tara. She could be crueler than any of us when she felt like it, and laughed the loudest.

The problem with living in a university town is that eventually most people graduate and then they move away. Our circle of friends has cracked and drifted like a glacier in warming seas. Gene went to UMass, Micah went all over the place, Sam moved to Colorado, Melynda went back to Houston, I went to the Czech Republic, Jim and Elisa went to California where they got married and had a baby boy, Rachel stopped talking to us unless she wanted a ride, Sarah went to North Carolina, Melynda and Tyler both moved up to Seattle last year. Matt still lives here but our paths never cross now. I have no idea where Tara is now and sometimes I see women who look almost like her when I am in restaurants. The taste of cold coffee and cigarettes is familiar, like the pebbled glass tabletops and the slick playing cards. Jim was the person who finally taught me to shuffle, unable to stand watching me cut cards haphazardly during our games anymore.

We cracked up, came apart, moved on, moved away. Looking back I can see our friends were so disparate, so unlikely. If classes, a coffee shop, Harry Potter, cigarettes, Shanghai Rummy and youth hadn't thrown us together we might never have seen each other at all.

questions part the first

coyotegoth -- What's Lucius's favorite Muggle music?
Rasputina, for all those strange and otherworldly cellos.

brightflashes -- What would you guess to be most woman's greatest hangup? What about a man's?
I would guess that for women, it is their weight/body/physical appearance. For men, I would guess penis size/performance.

schmidtybooger -- If you could make a ticky cupcake, what would it be like?
A ticky cupcake! It would be a fluffy almond and chocolate marbled cake, frosted with a mocha ganache and decorated with a marzipan ticky box and a chocolate covered espresso bean to represent the ticky.

swswswsw -- what is your favorite "easy to make" pie? and...is it really entirely necessary to make your own pie crust versus store bought? (I have been dreaming of making pie, can you tell?)
An excellent question! My favorite "easy to make" pie is the chocolate cherry one. It is essentially cherry preserves, heavy cream and semi-sweet chocolate in a crust. Nom! As far as crusts - I will be heretical and state it is not entirely always necessary to make your own crust. Pillsbury makes a refrigerated crust that comes rolled up that is excellent. It provides a nice flakiness and flavor. However, you should get the Pillsbury and not the store brand - it is superior. (Full disclosure - I participated in the product testing for Pillsbury's refrigerated crust in 2002!)

eroticcakejob -- This is almost taboo to ask because I don't want to be seen as size-ist, but given your list of 1001 goals: Will you be my internet gym/diet/weightloss buddy?
Surely - I will try to post encouraging comments and the healthier recipes I know.

miep -- Who is the better poet- Akhmatova or Tsvetaeva? why?
I've stared at this the longest - it is so hard to make a decision. Both Akhmatova and Tsvetaeva wrote beautifully. In the end, I go with Akhmatova. Her work is less bound up within herself. Tsvetaeva wrote intensely personal poetry. While lovely, I think it is harder for someone outside of her self to approach. Akhmatova's work was directed outwards, addressing the world outside of her mind and the world in which we lived. Personally, I also love Akhmatova's Requiem best.

abbismom -- You now have the power to freeze time...just once...for 24 hours. What happens?
I would rescue lots of kitties from dire places, and perhaps rob a bank to provide funds for rescue groups and people here. I would probably also help myself to a lot of bakeware - I dream of a shopping spree somewhere to buy pans and plates and things.

sianlee -- If you had to give GW a BJ, what flavor salad dressing would you choose? (credit goes to my friend Stewart)
Oh, why GW? Couldn't it be Obama? Eugh. I cry acidic tears at the very thought. My favorite salad dressing is strawberry balsamic.

(no subject)

Today's lunch was tuna and shrimp marinated in pineapple and papaya. Yum. Take a half pound of tuna, and a half pound of small cooked shrimp and cover with cubes of pineapple, papaya and pineapple juice. Marinate for about 30 minutes, then briskly slap it in a hot skillet for a couple minutes per side of tuna. (Cooking time depends on how rare you like your tuna.) Do toss some of the fruit bits in the pan as well. (If you are not up to slicing fresh fruit, canned fruit is perfectly acceptable.) Garnish with a sprinkle of salt and a spoonful of pineapple juice. Voila! Protein and fruit.