I was so high the other night- so high. I swear my vision turned inward and I could see the big picture. You know, the entire landscape that everyone seems to miss out on when they look at the world. I could swear that it all made sense when you just squinted your eyes a little. It was like the world was this big clustered joke, and we were all just swimming around in circles, lost in all our own silly little pursuits. Whether you're baking bread or writing foreign policy, you're just a dressed up ape working in a collective machine.
Of course, revelations come very easily when you're 20 years old and working in a coffee shop. Without an education or a career as a distraction, the world comes through clear on all channels, amplified by a combination of your own ignorance and an herbal mixture that some people call inspiration, others an anchor.
That was me, another ape dressed up in grungy clothing that wouldn't pass outside of High School, sitting an a dinner table with my family. My family had been kind enough to let me stay in the basement while I tried to sort out whatever it is I was trying to find; not that I really cared. I was angry about it for some reason, in fact. I displayed this by laboriously spooning a glob of mashed potatoes onto my plate.
"You still dating that whore that works at the video store?" my father asked directly.
"She's not a whore..." I mumbled in reply.
"... well, are you?" he growled.
"...yeah."
"She isn't good for you." my mother chimed in.
"I don't care." I slumped in my seat, further than I already was.
"When are you going to get a real job?" my dad interrupted.
I dropped my fork and stomped out the door. I didn't really care, or at least that's what I told myself. If I'd been impartial, I would have sat with a dumb expression on my face and took it. I slammed the door behind me and turned to one of the driving forces of my life- in fact, it was the force that drove me everywhere I went: my van. It was a sort of aged Starcraft deal that looked sort of like the A-Team's van. It basically completed my burn-out package, but I thought it was awesome.
There's a sort of strange retro-novelty you lock on to when you have no direction. Relics of the past like my two-fisted van became icons of conquest, things that I can look of as passed as the only thing I'd really accomplished most of the time was passing time. I quickly pulled out of driveway and made a b-line to see that whore that works at the video store. Camile.
"Camile."
"Jeremy," she smiled. She turned to lock the gates of the old video store she worked at. It was one of those little private owned video stores that somehow existed despite Blockbuster's icy grip. Actually, it's no mystery- the place is an unabashed porn grotto. My girlfriend, Camile, spent the majority of her day sorting through semen-stained DVD's and VHS tapes of wannabe actresses taking shots in the face and wannabe actors... taking shots in the face.
"Come on, let's go," I said, "the night is ours!"
"What should we do?" Camile had this sort of goofy English accent that made it sound like 'do' had an 'r' hidden it in somewhere. I didn't blame her for it, though; she was English, after all.
"I don't know. It's been a crappy night. Let's just stay in."
