Let's Talk About Sex

SEXUALITY. It's something oft discussed by me, specifically when I get drunk, or when people start talking about orientations both homo and hetero. You see my friends, I don't believe in 'straight' and neither do I believe in 'gay'. Not in the way you don't believe in say, unicorns or the Bible or whatever, but in the way the words are defined. It's always seemed to me that sexuality is a sliding scale from individual to individual, and the reason this isn't widely accepted or talked about comes from people not wanting to admit that they are anything but one hundred percent straight or gay (usually the straight ones). It's easiest to explain if you drag out the ol' 1-10 scale.

We'll go ahead and make 1 the baseline for heterosexuality. You are a 1 if you have never had even the slightest childhood inclination towards a member of the same sex. You are emotionally and sexually turned off by the sight or thought of any sort of intimate interaction with the same sex. You are a shining pinnacle of heterosexuality, always have been, and always will be. Most males you explain this to will inevitably try and immediately establish their position as a 1, and most of them would probably be at least a number or two low. Now we have 10. At a 10 you were gay at birth, born in a shower of glitter and sparkles, coming into this world at the same time you came out, proud as hell. Pretty much take the stipulations laid out for being a 1, reverse them completely, apply, and you have your 10's.

Where most people go wrong is not admitting to the existence of the other 8 numbers, ironic because whether you admit it or not, it's probably where you belong. We are human beings, we are extremely sexual in nature, and for most people that sexuality does not apply solely to one single sex, all the time, every second of every day. Be it a fantasy, a dream, your daily life, or a drunken moment, nearly everyone has had some sort of same sex experience (or opposite sex for those on the other side of the fence). The shitty thing is the stigma that still hangs over such things. I'm not going to use this (right now) as a platform for homosexual rights and acceptance, but I think it's time we all quit being embarrassed about who we are, what we think, and what we do in our own homes and most importantly in our own heads. We need to start by breaking down this wall of it being socially acceptable and even encouraged (usually by men) for women to experiment with each other while no one questions that ultimately they are 'straight'. It's a dirty double standard that we continue to perpetuate. Men constantly talk up and encourage this behavior among women, but would be ever so quick to pull out 'fag' or 'queer' or at the least get visibly uncomfortable if the same situation arose with two men instead. Even women who are professed bisexuals, that is still unfortunately often easier to deal with then being an experimental or bisexual man, because of the still ongoing prejudices, irrational fears, and mixed feelings about gay men. I also don't mean to belittle or disparage any and all homophobic vitriol that gets aimed at lesbians and female bisexuals at all, I mean only that it's often less widely acceptable and understood from a man to man point of view, be that right or wrong. I think that's stupid and ignorant. I'll be the first to admit that I've had a physical encounter with a member of the same sex. I'd also be the first to point out that I'm not gay, I'm not even bisexual. I love women, top to bottom, every inch of them. I don't feel that way about men, but I'm not necessarily turned off by them either. I'm able to appreciate a good looking guy just like I'd appreciate a good looking girl, I'm just 99% of the time not at all attracted to the guy in the same way I would be the girl. That puts me somewhere around a 3 probably, a place where I can appreciate the aesthetic appeal of somebody of the same sex, where if the inhibitions were low, the alcohol was flowing, the situation was perfect and everybody was on the same page, it could go further. It probably won't, but who am I to rule out that possibility. That would just be robbing myself of a potentially good time.

So I guess the general point I'm trying to make here is that people need to be more open and honest about themselves and their sexuality. I'm not saying you have to open yourself up to the same sex/opposite sex depending on your orientation, but only that we start to acknowledge that sexuality, like much else in life, is rarely a black or white issue. There is plenty of room for grey, and whether or not you can admit it to yourself, grey is probably the world you wake up in every day. Everyday I wake up hoping for a world where sexual orientation is not how you are defined, where there isn't anything that you should feel embarrassed or ashamed of. Where we just enjoy being people and humans and sexual beings in any way shape or form we feel is right for us. Obvious exceptions being made for child molestation, bestiality, necrophilia, ect ect. The kind of shit that not just the straights or the gays but evvvvvverybody knows is fucked up. In the meantime, lets just try and be who we are, lets come to terms with the fact that we probably aren't 1's and 10's, but somewhere in between, and that's ok. You don't have to talk about it, or announce it, or write long blog entries about it, but admit at least to yourself that it probably isn't a cut and dried matter, that you are or have the potential to be a much more sexually open being then you know or admit. I promise you it's freeing and liberating to be able to say to people that you have no sexual prejudices or hang-ups, that you are just you, unique and comfortable in your own skin. Straight people, embrace that 2-4 spread, it's ok, you can still be a heterosexual in life and in your actions, gay people I don't have to say this to as much, but some of you are as set in your ways and scared of compromise as much as us. For those of you that aren't already, jump into those 7-9 spots, you can still rock a rainbow tee and raise that fist in pride, but come on, throw back a few drinks and you aren't hitting on your straight friends girl? Just a little bit in good fun? I've seeeeeeeeen it. Being in the grey doesn't mean you can't be a hetero or a homo. You can, it's absolutely true that most people have a distinct predilection towards one sex above the other, but I think you sell yourself short when you completely shut down and ignore a part of you no matter how small, that's just a little bit different.

I have the balls to post this here in an open forum for anybody and everybody to read. All you need to do is find your own number, admit it to yourself, and be okay with it. Good luck.

Tupperware Bank Accounts

Been a while since I posted, my apologies for the slacking. Technically I wasn't, as I've been busy preparing for and subsequently making the move from Colorado back to Oregon and the West Coast. Took us four days to get here, made it a pretty leisurely voyage. Stopped in Arches National Park, which after very little consideration it was decided should be named Giant Rocks That Look Like Dicks National park. I mean once you see one, they just all become dicks. Seriously, go there, google some photos, whatever, it's insane. Some of those motherfuckers look they were carved by Druids or aliens or some shit to look like massive phalluses (phalli?), no stretch of the imagination required. What are you going to do. In our case it was take a bunch of forced perspective pictures of us doing obscene things to some strangely and hilariously shaped rock formations as tourists walked by and looked on. This of course just made us laugh even harder, literally doubling over laughing with these world class sights and miracles of nature all around us.

Sometimes we may be a bunch of guys in our mid twenties acting like we're twelve, but goddamn if my friends and I don't enjoy the hell out of life whenever and however we can. I hope I never lose that, I hope we never lose it, and most of all, I hope I never lose them. Some friends you have and they come and go, just passing through your life for a while, making it better, changing it or shaping it in even the smallest way. Some friends stick around, are forever, are family and not just in a jokey metaphor but real family, the kind of people you know will be there your whole life. I feel like at this stage in my existence I have a few of those people, guys and girls who have run the gauntlet, been there for years, seen me through a lot of hard times, never turned away. We've spent years at a time apart some of us, but when we get back together it just flows, we've all got love for one another and it shows through the bullshit and the drama that comes with simply coexisting alongside your fellow man.

To close it out this post has served mostly as a quick vent, a release, an update cum love letter to my friends. I'd like to put up some more detailed pieces on Colorado and the winter we had once I've had a little more time to reflect upon it. It requires more thought then just banging out something in ten minutes because I haven't posted in a while and I don't want to lose whatever 12 people are actually reading this. I just wanted to get something up so this blog, this thing, can keep going, moving forward, hopefully at some point growing and evolving into something of substance and consistency. We'll see.

It's good to be back in Bend, it's strange and a little surreal, work is hard to find but I'm staying optimistic, looking forward to whatever this summer and the future have to bring. I'm ready!

Sentimental Underthought

So it's been amazing moving out here and living the past six months. It's really made me realize how fortunate I am to be living the lifestlye I live. I answer to no one, I do what I want when I want, I've got a group of friends I'd fight and die for and it's reciprocal. I live each and every single day how I see fit, and I go to sleep at night and don't have an ounce of regret. It amazes me sometimes to think that I've been out of high school now for seven years, almost twice as long as I was in. Yet here I am, living with Stephen Hayes and Erik Benson, kid's I've known for upwards of twenty years, and Dustin Deveaux is sleeping downstairs on the couch, us knowing each other going back 11 plus years.

I was bunking in the loft here in CO with Garrett Gentry, one of my most recent promotions to best friend. We started the W5 together over a long night of everclear and throwing knives and it was a historic occasion, although we didn't know at the time what we had set into motion. I wouldn't trade my year with that group of five guys for anything. I'd take a blade or a bullet for any one of them and I sincerely believe it goes the opposite way as well. We're family, and in many ways we are five guys who needed some form of alternate family, replacement family, real true blue we bleed and die with you family. Not all of us have two parents, or living parents, or families that are there for us when we need them. Some of us do, but it's never all roses and dancing with glo-sticks, there are skeletons in all the closests. Those are the kinds of friends that I have and I wouldn't trade it for the world. They have my back when I need them, they are there with cash when I'm strapped, drinks when I'm thirsty, beds when I need a place to sleep, and fists when I run my mouth a little too fast.

I love each and every one of my friends, but those that deserve special shout outs are the original W5 besides myself; Stephen Hayes, Austin Marsh, Garrett Gentry, Erik Benson. There's also those homies who are just always there for ya when you need 'em, people like Casey Cathcart, Kaylin Landry, Marta Gurule, Eric Gastelum, Gabe Edwards, Eli Goodall, Amanda Gabourey, Ryan Moss, Natalie K, Amanda Wilson, Colleen Whipple, my sis, and countless others that I'm sorry I didn't have the time or presence of mind to mention. I promise I still love you. Anyways. Tonight was just one of those nights, one where over many many drinks and smokes you just appreciate and love your friends. I hope you are all as well if not better then I am. Much love. Goodnight Colorado! Posting from Oregon in less then a month!

Absolutes and Absolution

I am a writer and these are my words. They come from different places, from uncharted areas of my thoughts, from past experiences, a mishmash of past present and future emotions and expectations. This life that I live, the places I go, the people I am with, the choices I make, all things that I try each and every day to be proud of. Sometimes it's easy, sometimes it takes a little work. As my musing trickle down my ever firing synapses and down into and through my typing fingers it's hard not to reflect. Writing has taken me to so many places, both literal and figurative, peaceful and torrential, I learn more with every word and sentence and it keeps me moving forward.

In response to reading a piece on deconstructionism by my friend Gabe over at the Common Flow Narrative I have some thoughts that are perhaps corresponding albiet in a more nihilistic tone. I very much enjoyed his piece and for better or for worse it's inspired the following.

The world is a nasty place. Everything and everyone have teeth, and you can get bitten no matter where you are, both geographically and metaphorically. We build up our beliefs, our standards, our views and opinions but there is no absolute, nothing is finite. It is truly a meticulously assembled model just waiting to be taken apart piece by piece, spread out, mixed in with new pieces, and rebuilt as something new. Familiar yes, but never the same.

It's been my experience that all this, life itself, isn't happening within some personalized self contained bubble universe where you are free to go about your philosophizing and mental construct building without outside influence, be it good or bad. Some people will come into your life and just step right up and start fuckin with the controls and not word one from you can stop it. Aspects and understandings of and in your existence that you thought were concrete, you thought you knew through and through, dashed against the rocks into a million little pieces. Pieces that fly up into the air like pixels in an early nineties screen saver, swirling and changing right before your very eyes. Where they settle, what formation they take, it's going to be something you hadn't planned, couldn't plan, and thus enters the human factor.

You cannot predict your fellow man. If you are reading this than you are old enough to read and you should know this already. We are absolutely unconventional, fallible, misguided, self-serving, and entirely contradictory to nature and common sense in general. You may have a wonderful thing built up, each tiny cog and screw lovingly put into place over a long period of time, and no matter what kind of fences you build around it, no matter how strong you believe it to be, there always exists the truth that at any time, anybody, anywhere, could come along and tear it down. I'm talking scorched earth, absolute and total destruction, nothing left, no more pieces, time to go back to scratch. It happens. You can't control it, predict it, or God help you stop it.

I figure the only way to deal with this is to just go with it, accept it, know that it's out there and could happen and come to terms with that. You will rebuild, you will make something new and different and no matter what, better. It's better because it's progress. It's forward motion, and if you don't commit to it you will die, there is no place in this world for the stagnation and decay that accompanies motionlessness. You will be stomped on and beaten back and down until you know nothing but the intimate details and cracks on the floor.

If you accept that it's all fleeting, that everything is meaningless and nothing lasts, you open a door to freedom of a nature you've never known. Learning to just say 'fuck it' to those myriad obstacles you can't control or change is eye opening. There is so much worry and thought and time wasted on things that worry and thought and time have no effect on. It's all pointless. None of it makes any sense and it's just pissing in the wind to bother wasting brain cells on a meaning or a purpose. Just concentrate on the truths. Every day the sun will come up. You may or may not be around to see it, so live fast, enjoy all you can, and never put too much stock in things that fade. Take a deep breath and exhale everything that you don't have a direct influence or impact upon, because these unchangeable forces will suck the life right out of you in a sinkhole of stress and worry and panic. Embrace the void, and fall face first into the cleansing nothingness. The ultimate deconstruction will come when there's nothing left to pull apart. Just white noise.

Already Forgotten

Here it is. People are assholes. Also they are vultures, and have with them screaming babies and shitty attitudes and inflated senses of entitlement. What the fuck? I'm working at a massive corporate bookstore that is going under and as I work on this sinking ship in it's last few week(s) of life, you really see the underbelly of retail and consumerism. "I'm so sorry you are closing and losing your job along with 20 other people also hey do you know when things will be 45% off instead of 40% because I could get these cheaper online."

Me: "So go fucking get them online. We don't give a shit lady, we are headed for the unemployment line."

Customer: *Looks at my manager standing directly behind me*

Manager: *Shrugs, walks off*

Me: *GIANT SMILE* "HAVE A GOOD DAY!"

That's one of the least volatile encounters I have had, including flipping off a customer in front of two managers. People are just fuckin assholes. Some people are cool, they just come in, buy something, acknowledge you, and leave. Some people come in dragging their yelling crying asshole infants with them, all full of attitude, demanding and laying down ultimatums. Where they go wrong is assuming we actually give a shit about anything anymore. We've all been layed off. Everybody. It just hasn't kicked in yet (give it a week and a half). Nobody gives more then a minimal fuck about anything in the store. If you treat us poorly, we won't be kicked around, we won't take it like dumb corporate drone sheep clerks. We are just putting in time now. If you are a dick to us, we will absolutely be a dick to you. I will not tolerate your idiocy or your hamfisted douchebag approach to what should just be a simple transaction.

Thanks to all the people out there who have been cool during the insanity and unpredictability of this bankruptcy situation, and a big middle finger to everybody who apparently wasn't raised with any manners. You insensitive bastards.

Other news I'm stoked to be done working soon. I'm glad my birthday is coming up (I didn't die this year!). I'm glad I have some true and loyal friends to get my back. I'm irrationally excited that I was retweeted by Lisa Lampanelli (LOVE HER). I'm excited to get back to Bend, and I'm excited to go through the next month and a half here in the Rocky Fuckin Mountains. I'm glad I'm me.

Post's done.

So sorry to everyone that I haven't put anything new up. And by everyone I mean my sister. Hi Erin. SO. Not an entirely impressive report to make I'm afraid. Work at the ol' corporate bookstore is winding down and life as an employed contributing member of society will soon be a thing of the past. In the meantime, more time to ski. Or whatever. The skiing has been great, I'd like to write up a whole post just talking about it, but I'm just kind of maybe possibly getting to the point where I'm like fuck this snow, give me some sunshine! Anyways there will be plenty of time still for sunshine, we leave here end of April for Bend, and oh how it will be good to be back. It's been an amazing goddamn winter that I'll never forget (except the nights I never remembered), but it'll just be nice to see 'home' again. Go to our bars, tip our bartenders, pick up on our girls (or your girls), talk to our friends.

Addendum. Things I'm really into right now, Charlie Sheen and everything he says or does, being a bigger asshole to asshole customers in front of my manager with total freedom, Donettes, going to bed.

Tattoo Rants

As someone who is heavily tattooed I apparently fit into some sort of sub genre of human according to a certain set of people. To me getting tattooed is a way of life. It's something I've been fascinated by since I was a little kid and saw my first set of sleeves. My tiny brain couldn't quite comprehend exactly what I was looking at, or how it was possible, but I knew I wanted some of those. I started getting tattooed when I was 18, and in a couple weeks I'll be 25. I've come a long way since that first tattoo, my one color piece, a sacred heart on my back with a banner reading 'Veritas', Latin for 'truth'. Over the years I've built my tattoo collection in different states with different artists on all different parts of my body. Currently I have two nearly finished sleeves, an LA on one ankle as a memento to living there, and a full chest piece I plan on expanding into a full torso piece. I want to get to a position in life where I'm financially and jobwise set to where I can tattoo my neck and my hands. Each and every single tattoo I have I remember the needle hitting my skin, I remember where I was and who I was with and where I was in life. They are milestones and markers that for me, I display on my body, permanently and proudly.

I get that it's not for everyone. For some people they will never get a tattoo and never be missing out on anything in their lives, completely fulfilled in the skin they came into this world in. Some people just get one, or two, or several small pieces throughout their lives. Some people take it an entirely different level and tattoo their heads and faces, their eyelids. All of these are perfectly acceptable for the people who's choices they are. That's what they are, individuals making choices, choices that nobody else can judge or be party to, because what's displayed on my body or anybody else's is mine and their own damn business, respectively. I've had very visible tattoos for a few years now, and I'm used to the looks, the comments, the questions. When they come from somebody who is actually interested in tattoos, or wants to discuss where mine where done, by whom, or just to compliment my art, then all is good in jolly old. It's the people who look down their noses at you and ask snotty questions about how much money you must have wasted on that and why would you put yourself through that pain and my personal favorite 'You know those are going to be there forever right?' No you stupid asshole I've spent thousands of dollars and probably a hundred plus hours of discomfort and they DON'T WASH OFF??!?! Oh my God I've been had! I'm used to that kind of ignorant BS, like the guy who asked me if I had 'all them things' (my sleeves) so that if ya ever get decapitated you can be identified', but it more then makes up for it when somebody just comes up to you out of the blue and says 'Hey I like your tattoos.' It makes me feel good. It makes me proud to be displaying such quality work, and I have no problem spending twenty minutes pointing out who did what and how they are done in such differing styles from artist to artist. How my left sleeve is done in a ridiculously detailed black and grey shading, how you can tell the artist (Tom Clark, Fullerton CA) has been around a long time and has honed his craft and has worked to become very good. How my right sleeve is done in sweeping bold art (Nick Pulzone, Salem OR), an in your face style by probably the most natural artist I've ever met, that asserts itself and is not only incredibly well executed but aesthetically pleasing in every way. How my chest was done in one single sitting at the Portland Tattoo Expo (Nick) in front of hundreds of people, six hours straight made possible by large doses of percocet and intermittent cigarette breaks.

The interesting thing is, I HATE getting tattooed. It fuckin hurts. Some people will tell you it's just a warm tingling feeling, or that they like it. I can absolutely believe liking the rush of a new tattoo, but the actual process of applying said tattoo is never going to be something I like. I love my tattoos though, I love my friends tattoos, I love looking at and talking about tattoos. Thats something I'll never apologize for and I'll never change. Getting tattooed until I die or run out of space, and to the people who can't except that or who think they can judge what I do, well you know where you can go.



It was hell. In case you were wondering. See me for directions, I've vacationed there from time to time.