My entire life

I was…

• 6 when I had my first memory – it was about food (yoghurt) – and Alison was born.
• 7 when I went to the hospital for a fever – imagine how smart I’d be if I never had it?
• 8 when I had my first, of thousands, of gyros. Battlestar Galatica 1980 just aired.
• 9 when I first saw the building that my father would eventually die in.
• 10 when I killed something for the first time with my grandma, a chicken.
• 11 when I read the book 1984.
• 13 when my best friend left for college (long story). I lost 50 pounds and stopped being fat.
• 14 when I learned how to drive with my dad and got my first job, a busboy.
• 15 when I first noticed a girl that noticed me back. She said I was cute. No one that didn’t give birth to me ever said that to me before her. It was on the same block where I just had AYCE Korean food.
• 16 when I had my first kiss with a girl that had a punk haircut. I was just awful to her.
  • • As an aside, when I was in my mid-20s, I drove by her house and randomly decided to see if she was home. She was. I put on an apron and chopped up a ginormous chocolate bar into chips while she baked cookies. She kissed me on my cheek when I left and told me she forgave me. Never saw or heard from her again. Word is that she’s married in Colorado now and raises horses.
• 17 when I got my first car and Mouse was born.
• 18 when I started writing for serious.
• 19 when the insomnia started for serious.
• 20 when I got my first real job where I had a desk.
• 21 when I started my own business. I still have it even now and it’s (usually) my primary source of income.
• 22 when I started doing club work and met demons that looked human. Beat out PriceWaterhouse and IBM for a Madison Ave project that paid for my rent (and my landlord’s Ducati) for two years in one shot.
• 23 when I went to law school with the scratch from the clubs and biz.
  • (23-25 didn’t exist because: Working and in law school)
• 26 when I started in a law firm and stopped doing club work. Was 26.5 when I left and joined a Fortune 500 company. Passed the bar on the first try.
• 27 when I got my first raise and promotion.
• 28 when I flew around the world and some assholes flew fucking planes into my goddamn city. I also told someone that loved me that I didn’t love her and that I was sorry. She left my side of the country.
• 29 when I left my only salaried job, met a German tourist at a dive bar, traveled around Europe with her, broke up, and started doing what I do now. These were busy years.
• 30 when I met the first person I thought I loved. I was mistaken.
• just 31 when I bought the pad I live in now with Harold and the boy.
• 32 when I saw my grandparents for the last time because I always thought I’d have time.  We always think we’ll have time.
• 33 when the woman I lived with left and I thought it was the lowest point of my life. I was mistaken. Again.
• 34 wrote that a frog in a well knows nothing of the ocean. Been thinking of this a lot lately for reasons I’ll tell you about onea these days.

Between this entry you’re reading now, and the rest of my blog, you essentially have the sum of my life on your screen.

What a meaningless life I’ve lived before 2015.

But I know I’ve changed the course of some people’s lives and that of their families. I think at least two but I hope more –  cause no man’s an island – but I’d be ok if it were just two.

Speaking of two, I look at my little family of two and think to myself that I’m actually happy.

Because I love this kid and I have a purpose again. To make him into something Cellini might recognize. To teach him how to fight monsters. To let him know he’s so loved.

It’s not quite the family I’ve always wanted but he’s still the best thing I’ve got.

Me: What did you see today?
Him: Thunderbirds!
Me: (quizzically) A thunderbolt?
Him: No. (enunciating) A thun…der..bir..d.
Me: Ah, gotcha. “Thunderbird.” Man, Manhattan’s got it all, huh?

Location: earlier today, Riverside Park
Mood: relieved
Music: Give me a paper and a pen so I can write about my life of sin

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