how i turned into a robot

the jeep cherokee

I love my Jeep Cherokee. I do. It's red. Four doors. I think it's the perfect vehicle for me and I probably haven't utilized it enough, save for lugging around bikes and groceries and passengers. It's the perfect car for hot-boxing when no one has a van, and no one I know has one. Thanks to Mario, I've finally just got around to stapling the loose-hanging ceiling liner tight against the frame so it doesn't droop down onto your head. I don't keep it clean. I don't regularly maintain its condition, either. I haven't seen the gas needle go higher than a quarter-tank more than once since March. The upholstery has absorbed the weed and cigarette smoke. The dashboard collects dust. I don't even know what that sticky stuff is that gathers in the bottom of the change holder. The floors are filthy with dirt, crumbs, wrappers, receipts, loose change, and whatever else gets lost or left behind. I have a collection of various containers in the back full of water that I've been refilling my coolant tank with for the past month, too stubborn to get the engine fixed and too poor to keep buying anti-freeze. I feed it gas in the way that an ICU patient has an IV pumping into their arm to keep them comfortable as they slowly die. The windows get cleaned once a month, maybe. The red paint has peeled like sunburnt skin on the hood and rooftop. The back door won't stay open on its own and the pole I'd been using to prop it up bent in half about a month ago and I haven't found a replacement. Now it's a pain in the ass to put someone's bike back there. It has a spare tire. The backseat folds down without much effort and that's nice, too, because that allowed for a surprise pow-wow smoking session a few weeks ago when Angelina, Colby, and their friend showed up one night after Michelle and I got off work. It's memories like that which I'll thank my Jeep Cherokee for in the future. The LOW WATER light has been sputtering off and on for the past few months, which is somewhat cruel because the windshield wipers haven't worked since 2006. Having had to find new ways to drive in the rain, I have a few empty bottles of Rain-X in the back. The stuff works. The passenger side door won't open all the way and more than one person has been smacked in the head by the door when it unexpectedly bounced back at them. I don't know what that's all about. I don't remember doing anything to the door that would cause it to get stuck like that. The doors don't lock when you use the electric lock switch. The key that opens the doors is different from the one that turns on the engine. I don't lock the doors because of that. The speakers are worn down and constantly on the verge of being blown out, but I compulsively adjust the bass and treble levels to try and maintain their sound quality, which isn't great to begin with. The steering wheel feels loose in your hands. The gas pedal needs a bit of an extra push before it accelerates the car. Likewise, the brakes and transmission haven't been cooperating very well and sometimes an uncomfortable amount of force is needed on the brake pedal to stop the car, and after that the engine will continue to rev and it feels like the engine is competing with you. And if you let go of the brake,the Jeep will lurch forward by its own will. When idling--in the fast food line, for example--the engine temperature gauge will slowly creep toward the red. It will overheat if given enough time. With a crack in the coolant tank, there's no doubt that the engine is running hot. This prohibits the amount of driving I've been doing. Other than the special occasion when Carissa and I went to the strip club in San Francisco, I don't dare drive it farther than ten minutes, fifteen--maybe. Besides, I can't afford gas these days, anyway. For the record, it's about $4.40 a gallon around here. Speaking of which, the gas tank needs a key to be opened. It takes unleaded fuel. One time, after work, I forgot I had an orange Italian soda on the roof and drove across Santa Rosa to a gas station with Alyssa and when we got out we saw that the drink had fallen over but had luckily gotten stuck in the cargo rack on the roof. It didn't even spill. So I drank it.

All that just to declare that my 1990 Jeep Cherokee died in the parking spot outside of my apartment at 3:35 PM, July 30, 2008.

Upon returning home from Safeway, I heard this odd gurgling, boiling noise like someone had left their pot of water on the stove for too long. So I turned off the music and got out of the car and went around to the hood and yes, surely, the no-good sound was coming from the engine. On top of that, I heard splattering and dripping from underneath the car and bent down to see discomforting amounts of greenish liquid cascading down the rusty underbelly. A puddle of it formed and began to stream away and I just watched for a moment.

Having shoplifted a memory card and some batteries, I went inside and loaded up the camera and came back to try and film the waterfall. It had passed, however. Just the stench of fish-sticks remained, and the puddle. One of my neighbors walked by, this guy I feel like I should get to know better, but still haven't, and this guy went around and looked at the puddle under the car and told me I should pour a jug of water in the coolant tank and I said, "I did, but there's a leak in the tank," and he said, "Oh. That sucks." When he left I filmed a little of the damage.

Until I figure out what to do next, I guess this is it, old friend.

UPDATE: AUGUST 27:: The vehicle mentioned above was, for all you knew, out of commission when it overheated that afternoon. However, since that day, you have continued to drive it and pay for AAA insurance. You drive to work, mostly, and sometimes take people home after work. It's an around-town Jeep, for sure, and it still overheats. There is a leak in the coolant tank and you can't fix it -- or you're too lazy to. But don't let anyone tell you otherwise: you did not give up on the Jeep after this video was recorded, as serious as the event seemed, because you're sort of a lazy bastard.

this is how it works

I've happened across a low-level camcorder with expectedly grainy video quality, but it still records movies in short spurts that can capture parts of my life that words can't explain. And with this kind of hobby forming, I might be inspired to use it more. For example, here is an excerpt from an evening with my friend Carissa.

the purpose of the present

The purpose of the present is to not be forgotten in the future. Otherwise what is the point? I'm not one of those people who think "life isn't worth living without a camera around" because the only cameras I see are for security purposes and traffic violations. But I am one of those people who thinks life isn't worth living if you're just gonna forget it all in the end. Smoking as much weed as I have been recently, I've become aware that my lifestyle has both allowed for an increased amount of note-worthy experiences and plagued me with Swiss-cheese memory.

Get it? There are holes.

And part of the reason I keep wanting to start a blog like this and not feel like a tool giving in to an already overly-saturated trend, was because there's a lot of random stuff that happens in life that really gives it color, and that's the stuff I want to remember.

I want to remember yesterday, as mundane as it was, because I flirted with that girl who wanted a cup of water. Because I had one of those off-putting moments when no one can understand what I'm saying even though it sounds like I'm speaking loud enough. And this is an annoying occurrence when you're behind the register asking someone "their name?" and they say "to go." Michelle was in a "tired" mood and I just let that one go. Sara had gone home early, which could have almost been predicted, and so I didn't get to ask her how the rest of her night went after we left the Toad in the Hole on Sunday. My Monday shift is split between the break coverage 3:00 to 5:30 PM and the closing 8:00 to 12:00 shift the same night. Sometimes I hang out with Michelle during that break and we smoke a bowl and download music and whatever. Not yesterday though. No big deal. I had time to write.

And I want to mostly remember leaving work with Rosa and Alyssa. Rosa's this short little adorable Mexican woman with three kids who is going through an awkward separation from her drug-abusing husband. I dropped her off at her apartment because I guess her car is AWOL. Alyssa's a newly-18 year old living on her own--with friends and her boyfriend--who needed a ride out to Rincon Valley to stay at her friend Alex's. I went inside for a while and smoked with Alyssa, Alex, and their friend V and V's boyfriend. Conversation fades first, I think, in the memory of a pot smoker. But I remember V was absent-mindedly playing with a Barbie and we all talked about Barbies and other childhood toys. We talked about Disneyland. We reminisced about Pop-Up Video. We got yelled at for being too loud by Alex's dad, who stumbled up at some point and told us he could hear us from outside.

A small gathering of people in some random bedroom at 12:30 in the morning. It doesn't matter what we talked about. I didn't know anyone but Alyssa, but I felt pretty comfortable joining in conversation and I recall making a couple good jokes. V was this gorgeous Asian girl with very sharp sarcasm. Alex was the bubbly, too-loud, best friend figure that I would catch looking at me in a "I'm on acid and love everyone" way, though that's strictly metaphorical. If you've been on acid, you'd know the look, but I don't think she was really... Anyway, I felt like since Alyssa invited me in without letting anyone know I was coming, I had to up my game and be a little more witty just to make my presence worth their while. You know what I mean? And after I felt like it was a good time to go, I went, and when I was home I stayed up even later with Bryce to play Gears of War and eat frozen pizza. I took a big hit of salvia and went on a temporary drug trip into a place of incredible peace and unity with the universe (not even kidding) and so that was the last of my salvia. Probably a good thing, actually, because I kind of like altering my perception of reality. I kind of like it a lot.

So that was last night. And "last night" happens a lot. But like I said, it's the small things I forget first. Even if it was nothing--even if all I did was smoke and talk and laugh--it was still a "last night" when I got to hang out with three new people and share a spontaneous experience with them; a "last night" when I smoked salvia; a "last night" when Bryce's candle went hay-wire and nearly set of the smoke alarms. Little memories I'd probably have forgotten. So small. Yet so important to me.

If I'd been doing this earlier, I'd have captured the memories of river trips, playing pool, going bowling, the Guitar Hero phase, the power-outage, the roller derby, setting off fireworks on the beach, smoking and seeing movies with Kim on Fridays, building Sunday afternoon traditions, hanging out on Danny's porch, finally having a chance to hang out with Alisa outside of work at the Toad where we went with Sara, Adam, and Carissa to celebrate the Toad's first birthday, and whatever else has happened over the past while. I think I would have really wanted to start writing after I broke up with Amy in early June, because that's really when this new chapter started. I'm just about to start my last (fingers crossed) year at Sonoma State and then I don't know what's going to happen after that.

But I don't know what's going to happen tomorrow, do I?

I like that.

all just a thought

So we have it. I've broken down-- pause while I blow the incense smoke away from the smoke detector (I've been paranoid about that recently) --and here I feel like I don't have anyone to really tell everything to. So why not the internet? That makes more sense. But there's always that anonymous aspect to it that I find more appealing than sitting someone down and really pouring my heart out to them. I get a little off my chest here and there when I'm good and stoned and sitting around in the Cherokee philosophizing about our role as coffeeshop employees.

I've only just started writing and I'm already losing interest. That's the problem, I think. I don't know what I want to do right now, anyway. I could work on the novel, on the poster, on some other creative endeavor I've set out to never accomplish. Fingers crossed that I finish the novel. I've never felt as sure about something as that--but I think that's what I said about a few of my recent projects. Who am I kidding anyway? Yesterday I was talking to Bryce about how I've always had this weird idea that life was going to work itself out on its own-- that one day I would suddenly be that successful author (or successful something, at least) and have that American dream lifestyle that's been subconsciously promised to me throughout my media-driven upbringing. I've never really doubted that notion until recently. Until I started to grow up.

I am that slacker college student. I really am. I smoke all the time. I panic when I'm low. I am surprised when I hang out sober with my friends. I work at a privately owned coffee shop in a small Northern California town outside of San Francisco. My town is called Santa Rosa and you could say that it's technically a city, but to me the only City is San Francisco. My grades in college reflect my opinion of college. But at least I'm going. If I want that American Dream, I know that I have to finish college to stay in the game. Too many of my coworkers skipped that step and I feel like [metaphor warning] some of their motivational mouses have stopped running their wheels, while I still get that nagging bite of the one inside my brain that keeps me going to classes and passing tests and giving speeches, even though I'm barely learning anything.


That's a picture of my favorite sweater, which I made for myself, which might give an example of my sense of humor. Maybe. I laugh at anything. No kidding. I think it's like having some girl walk by with really nice perfume and how that smell makes you feel-- that's what it's like to be able to observe life and laugh at it. Laugh at anything. In the middle of a hectic rush of customers, when I've got like ten drinks on the line and the fucking Mocha Frio won't blend-- I like to reverse any sort of incoming stress and cope with the ridiculousness of the situation and embrace it. Life is a trip. Don't fight it.

If you're not good at laughing at nothing, then look at the things you overlook. Take a look at what you're doing with your hands, with your thoughts, or what you do every day, your habits and hobbies, or look at the people you hang out with and think about who they are, or think of something crazy you'd rather be doing. Why is anything happening at all? What keeps the stoplights changing? What keeps the earth spinning? Why-oh-why does everything exist in the first place? Laugh about how bizarre everything is when you try and make sense of it. Who you are. Where you're going. What the rest of your life has in store.

How small you are in this universe shows you how little of an impact you will make in the big picture. I take comfort in that. That means there's no expectations. I can do whatever I want, whenever I want. This is my one life and no one really gives a fuck about my life because they're too busy thinking about their lives-- so as long as we coexist harmoniously, I think we're all gonna be fine. What I really want to do is not a whole lot. I just want to be happy and comfortable.

Will I get the American Dream? Each passing day gives me less hope. I'm only 21 and I know that I'll be holding onto the careless days of my youth because this is the only time in my life when I think it'll be okay to be who I am. I sense an approaching wall, of course. I've known that all along. I'll get started with a career soon enough. I'll climb the corporate ladder of some company. That's the worker bee route toward the American Dream. It's basically the "if you can't beat them, join them" mentality, but applied alongside my knowing that having money is a hundred percent better than not having money. And I've only seen the tip of the iceberg when it comes to low-income living and debt. I've got it good compared to others. And I know that. And I appreciate that. I don't try and be anything I'm not. I know my role as the 21 year old college senior. I know what I'm doing.

And now I've grown bored. But I'll save this anyway. For the record books.