Proud to have Going for the Throat featured on Medium again this week. My urge to stay current is taking me to some dark places, man, and I’d be so glad if you could join us. Going for the Throat on Medium. You either hang yourself or you hang it on the wall.
Ab irato,
Good Reader.
Congratulations. With your help last week’s post on Medium exceeded the average number of views Going For The Throat receives here. Your readership is keeping me alive. I am especially proud of this week’s post, Boil Water Order, and I think you’re going to like it.
See you on Medium motherfucker.
Let’s focus on the steak, not the peas.
-Minchia
Liberals want our country to be more like Canada. Conservatives want it to be more like Mexico.
-Realist
Raising a kid with medical needs is a very, very steep climb in the best of circumstances, and so when we say Medicaid is like the handholds that you’re using to scale up and get your kids to help-without those, there’s nothing below, there’s no safety net once those supports get pulled out, you just fall off the cliff.
-Robert Howell
If they were to collaborate they could strangle data access to parts of the internet, it’s not an understatement to say they could influence history.
-Elliot Brown
One need only look closely at such drag queens as Michelle Visage or Violet Chachi on the RuPaul show to suss out the cruel, cold-blooded lizard that lurks behind the eyes of the Illuminati elite.
-Stephenson Billings
What the hell.
-Jared Yates Sexton
I wish I had let go long ago. Not long after I quit smoking I began to experience a shortness of breath. I’ve had to teach myself to sing again. Psalmships’ “Little Bird“, again and again. Up high in the mountains of Minerva and out here on the blistering plains. What felt like the broken middle finger on my left hand has moved to the thumb on my right. If it’s arthritis, then, what the hell? I should’ve never quit, shoulda kept drinkin’ and womanizin’ and waking up dead in a dead confederate palace, with my pants at Kim’s pool and the aching yellow sun splitting my skull like a shiv, until I could down 400mg and tell her to get…OUT. It’s painfully apparent, these are the end days. I should’ve never left the life but I wish I’d let go a long time ago.
The stupid truth is the life never helped me let go either. I was as hung up then as I am now and drugs never worked. You’re not going to believe me but I could never enjoy myself on drugs because I knew it was only a drug. How terribly unfun and what a fucking drag, eh Brother? The closest I came was on mushrooms down at Stone Harbor, on the shore in the dark, with the Reverend and Butch as a storm rolled in. I lost myself that summer but never before and never again. I’ve kept myself locked tight, fought against it in my 20s but embraced it until now. I perfected my isolation and my Father’s poker face. Like him, the world only hurt my feelings and to be obvious was to be played. What the hell? How did this thing rear and turn into a psychoanalytical journey and examination of why I’m no fun but still wishing for the days?
Oh well, if it brings us to the truth then I can live with that. However we got here, we’re here, and these days I prefer to drink dark coffee with honey, read the news and pretend I’m smoking cigarettes in my mind, like a mid-life Cassavetes and type here in the center of a crumbling palace amidst: piles of poetry collections, poster-pressed covers, a copy of Hunger Makes Me a Modern Girl, CDs and receipts and guitar strings, stacks of typed and handwritten poetry-edited in red ink, the trusty NAS plugged in and humming beside and a cold cup of Italian Roast, in the blasting AC in what I thought at one time was the center of the Rock and Roll universe, in one of the most expensive zip codes in the country-the Pearl of the South and the Velvet Rut, Austin Texas Hippie Town U.S.A.
Incidentally, that moniker and euphemism for the good vibes and pretty white girls that grow on trees down here has become outdated. All the hippies live in Smithville now and I’m outta here, too. Call it The City of Izods&Boots, or, the Town of Technocrats or simply, Bro Country. Call ’em the New Rich or Fancy Dog Walkers, call ’em whatever you want because I am outta here. It’s been a long time that I should be far from here and 5 years since I wrote that elegiac paen to my departure from the barrio. Facebook says I been on there 8 years today, which makes for an interesting capsule of my time down here-beginning with my very first post, a video of Cory Branan singing “Survivor Blues” and ending with, well, “The End” by The Doors.
I’ve learned a lot. I’m a different man. I’m making the seismic changes that come from staying in place. It was real and it was fun but it wasn’t real fun. I’m staying on this side of the river but I am getting the fuck out of dodge. I’ve got 4 gigs booked in the next 2 months and 2 pages of contacts on legal yellow, letter-sized paper. Work in media suits me. I don’t mind the world, from a good safe distance, and writing about it transforms it somehow, makes even the horrid and unconscionable worth going through. I’m a fire walker on here, a hard bitten scoop in the hard lands. And, lovely and overwrought I bring it on home to you, good Reader, my Friend.
See you in Hyde Park motherfucker.
It’s beautiful down here. Great weather. No stress. People come here, they live to be 100.
–Joey Merlino
We are trapped in the belly of this horrible machine, and the machine is bleeding to death.
–GY!BE
As long as we live in this world we are bound to encounter problems. If, at such times, we lose hope and become discouraged, we diminish our ability to face up to what challenges us. If, on the other hand, we remember that it is not just ourselves but everyone who has to undergo hardship, this more realistic perspective will increase our determination and capacity to overcome what troubles us.
-The Dalai Lama
We are living in a news cycle that can be measured in nanoseconds.
-Dan Rather
If this doesn’t take you down,
it doesn’t mean you’re high
-Soundgarden
Yo. Trainer here, at the bougie coffee shop, where the jazz is smooth and the skin is white. I can’t complain but I will. It’s been a long time that I should be far from here, and I’m way past being sick&tired of my own bullshit. Probably wouldn’t be a bad idea to spend some time with others, hang out and fraternize, but-most of them are worse. What an existential stalemate I’ve reached and for shame, too. I’m in the prime of my life with money in the bank but all I can do is bellyache about how easy living is down here in the Pearl of the South, crank out another 400 words and go home and jerk off. Oh well, it could be worse, I could be satisfied with life, like any of these feel goodies here at the coffee shop seem to be, listening to Curtis Mayfield, eating bananas and grinning like imbeciles.
This could be a great opportunity to take to the streets, or hit social media and throw my complaint onto the pile. I can’t even pretend to care anymore and it could be because the whole thing has been at hysterical pitch too long. No wisdom can be discerned. I see outrage and I understand. I see smug complacency and I didn’t think I could ever understand but-look at me, with my fat stomache and apathy, black clothes and apolitical angst. Whichever side you’re on, one thing is certain and that is the genie can’t be put back into the bottle. Racism is the biggest problem in this country, barring imminent ecological disaster, and the American experiment has failed. We ain’t gonna make the nut. It’s all over baby blue, big business has trumped all and the thing that really spurred it on was as dumb as the color of our skin. I can’t pretend I’m not entitled, no matter how much I ignore the national scene. Does my apathy anger you, Good Reader? If so, then use it-impeach the fucker, eat the rich people, start a riot in the street and burn it all down. Let these be the chronicles of a sorry bastard who didn’t care, or whose own emotional load was too close to capacity to affect anything except putting out fires. It’s that bad.
We came up with a soft date for my departure, and it’s after the summer and the over 3,000 miles we’ll be doing up to the Adirondacks and back. I looked at a car today. Lady wanted to sell it to me at almost a grand over the Kelly Blue Book value, and that was after my mechanic found about $500 worth of repairs she claimed unaware of. It goes on. Psychologically I suppose I’m at a crossroads. The worst is done. I’m sober now. I’ve survived and I don’t even entertain the bad drama needed to get laid anymore. Mr. Excitement has retired, the dreamer is fully woke. I suffer bad anger and terrible boredom though, the former flaring in my abdomen and stiffening my neck and upper back, literally getting my haunches up and cursing to myself in the dark. I can’t carry that burden anymore, either, Brother. I feel like there’s an opportunity here, that I could do a lot better than cranking out 600 word complaints to you and generally just getting by. My first time on the therapist couch I’d been up for over 72 hours on whisky&cocaine. Safe to say I’m over that. I’ve survived. Maybe it’s time I give my man a call and see if we can thrive.
See you next week motherfucker.
A dear friend is in the hospital in Berlin. He’s being charged 10 euros a day until his insurance kicks in. We lost the Queen of Austin Comedy last night, all the more shocking because she seemed to be making it, even if having to start a GoFundMe to help with hospital bills after her kidney failed last year. The machinations of the Trump administration twist and grind darkly and the days are adding up since he swore in and I swore to keep up with his every move. I keep telling myself that one of these days I’m gonna hole up and just read the headlines from January 20 until today, but the reality is sinking in that the rulers are the rulers, and short of spitting in Paul Ryan’s face out on the street, I’m neither willing nor able to stem the tide.
Professor Joe Brundidge asked me if the fight is over last night, during our taping of Chillin Tha Most. My gut tells me it’s not but I often wonder. In a strange turn it takes tragedy to shake things up and get a response from me. I’ll pray in the way that I can but the question of God seems like pointless conjecture when right here on earth a Christian shitheel with an Eddie Munster haircut will try to make it even harder for us to do anything but get sick and die. Meanwhile in the other hemisphere, 250 innocent people will die for no reason at all. It’s hard to be zen about it all-when the base and corrupt, the murderers and plunderers can advance any fuckall agenda while progress for the common man is only mired in red tape and rollbacks. I let my gut answer Joe’s question, but, after I thought about it I had to concede, sadly, that the fight is over. We’ve got about eighty years of a sustainable ecosystem left but, like the poem says, somehow, strangely I feel fine.
In an even stranger turn things are only looking brighter for me, your writer, the littlest bit these days but that’s enough. I’ve gotten by on nothing for so long, it’s not hard for me to thrive with just a little of the gods’ favor. I feel like they may be smiling down on me, and it could very well have to do with the years I paid them respect and attrition. I bowed down to the god of luck even while bargaining broke against the black night, gambling with the shards of a glass ceiling, floating a broom and gnashing my teeth ever since I dropped out of college in the twentieth century. What can it mean? I don’t know. I’d like to tell you I’ll always give back, that no one besides me and New Ghost know better that it’s got to mean something to the folks back home. The truth is I’ve always been giving. Am I privileged? Should I be out there, on the street, fighting the good fight? Well. If I lead, who will follow? You think it’ll be these hordes? The Americans? There comes a time when you’ve got to ask yourself: am I being lazy or is it just too damn late? You know what my answer is. I’m after what I’ve always been going for. This and every post since that bizarro shit show of an election last November have been my long and protracted extraction. I’ll be keeping my people close and closer, and conquering my own world over here.
Don’t believe the hype. There is hope but not much. If you’re busy shaming me for what I’m not doing then you’re not suited for politics. Try religion. There’s plenty a flock to be fleeced in making people feel ashamed. But it ain’t me babe. I’m invested in the arts and up to my tits in bearing witness. I’m not much of a mover or a shaker. Although, with your help, good reader, in the coming months I’ll be doing both. Stay tuned for a whole lot of good news coming from the Office of Jim Trainer. I’ll be putting my protest on to the page.
Rest well, Lashonda. See you next week motherfucker.
…living systems need shocks to stir up stagnant equilibria and stimulate development.
–Jonathan Zap
The idea is not to confront bad ideas but to come up with good ideas. Otherwise, your enemies define the game and you are the loyal opposition.
-Terence McKenna
Turns out it was just a giant, toddler arm-sized turd. A Moby Dick of a thing that I felt like I was having a stroke while pushing out. I tried last night but I thought maybe I was just tired. And this morning I thought I was just blue. Then I went out, into the America, and caught every red light in Austin’s antiquated downtown district. Got to the CVS, parked. Waited in line and wondered, is this it for me, just when things were starting to get good? Would I only succumb to failing health-shortness of breath, enlarged prostate, constipation and failing eyesight? I’m 41 and the thought of it horrifies me.
In allot of ways I’m just getting started. Certainly past and over allot of stupid shit that was weighing me down. When you’re done putting out fires you can get some real work done. If you take away the cycles of vulnerability and isolation I’d been riding for the last twenty-six years, I’ll be wide open.
I know I’ll have to face the America because it’s everywhere. I’m starting to grasp what my heart always knew. The path to sobriety is only the beginning. Next are the emotional intoxicants. Anger (my favorite) and apathy, anger’s comedown. There is a world that needs me, and, truth be told, that I need. I need to make it mine, really bleed and put my heart into it. Not caring just isn’t cool anymore.
Back on the can and feeling even closer to death, I thought about the dramatic and self-serving people in my life. I saw that I should start thinking about serving the world but that I would need to start with me. The pendulum swung right back but I wasn’t just being a prick. Whatever pearls of mine the swine were holding onto would have to be the price. I wasn’t wrong to try with them, but I’d be wrong to keep trying. I would have to clean house. I was needed elsewhere. Then I flushed it down.
Today, after the 2016 elections in the U.S., we are living out the example of what happens when what goes unacknowledged surfaces and it feels like a new reality but you know in your heart it is not. To suffer based on expectations is to live haunted and hunted. But we are fortunate. There could be no other answer to our meditation and prayers in dissolving hatred than to be placed front and center with it and be exposed. When a shift in a system has occurred, especially one that causes fear and discomfort, it allows for something strikingly different to appear, furthering our evolution as people. We can only know where we are going when we get there. Many of us have been practicing Buddha’s teachings or walking a spiritual journey forever and preparing for every moment of our existence. We are ready and have been waiting for this time. Our rage, pain, and anger are to be exposed if only for us to transform and mature with it. In Buddhist practice we say congratulations because now is the time we have been practicing for. No more just practicing the dance. We must now dance. And this is not a dress rehearsal.
-Zenju Earthlyn Manuel
Going for the Throat 