Have we met?

One night in July, I slept in a tent on Prince Edward Island. The wind blew hard that night, shaking the tent so violently that I woke repeatedly. In fact, the wind was so harsh my friend’s tent broke, and he woke up wrapped in canvas; he spent the rest of the night in the car. Because of the difficult night, all three of us got up around 6:30 in the morning, sunrise, although it was overcast.
Prince Edward Island is the smallest of Canada’s provinces, boasting a mere 100,000 people. It is a small island nestled on the East Coast, surrounded by the waters of the Atlantic Ocean. As we were all awake so early, we decided to take advantage, and go see the coast. It was nearby, of course (everything is nearby on the island), and we reached the coast within minutes. I don’t know why, but the rocks, and consequently the sand and soil, are the color of rust in P.E.I. We parked, and my friends immediately went down to the water, their cameras in tow. I hung back, intentionally, and doubled back to the car. I opened the trunk, and rooted through my duffel bag, which at that point was half filled with clothes and half filled with dirty laundry. I was looking for a bottle of whiskey.
About three weeks earlier, back in Winnipeg, I had purchased the bottle; I only drank about a quarter of it before I decided to quit drinking entirely, the culmination of a lengthy, messy bender. The morning that I was leaving for the coast, I had the impulse to pack the bottle, I didn’t know why at the time.
I was having a hard time finding the whiskey in my bag; although you’d think finding a glass bottle in a bag of clothes would be short work. I was getting frustrated, and accidentally knocked over a plastic bag with a bottle of BBQ sauce in it. Finally, I found the bottle of whiskey, and I stuffed it in my bag. I picked up the plastic bag with the BBQ sauce from the ground, to set it back in the trunk, and noticed that a) the bottle had broken, b) BBQ sauce was spilling all over my friend’s luggage, and c) I had cut my hand on the broken glass. I mopped up the spilled sauce as best I could with damp paper towels, and cleaned the blood off my hand and BBQ sauce out of my wound as best I could. I had cut my hand on the soft skin between my thumb and forefinger.
I set off along the coastline, in the opposite direction from my friends. Red cliffs lined the coast, and I walked along them, through knee high grass, until I found a sufficiently remote spot where the cliff jutted out over the water. Satisfied that I was alone, I took the bottle out of my bag. It was Wiser’s, my favorite brand of whiskey, and, as I said, the bottle was three-quarters full. I held the bottle with my bloody hand and said, aloud: "Liquor bottle, you carry all my fear, and you carry all my weakness. I send you out, now, into the world, to trouble me no more." And I flung the bottle over the cliff where it shattered against the red rocks, and mingled with the waters of the Atlantic Ocean.
Then I put a band-aid on my hand.
* * *
I haven’t posted in any serious way for along time. The fact is, since I quit drinking I have had no urge to write about myself, or my life. I stare at the blank Blogger posting rectangle and I have no desire to write anything. It’s taken me a week to write this. I don’t know what has brought this change about me, but I think I don’t like Dash Bradley, any more. It’s not my real name, of course, as I’ve mentioned, but a name I invented to describe both a kind of person I don’t much care for, and a two-dimensional character who becomes three dimensional. I think both descriptions are appropriate. It’s time to cast off this alter-ego, shed him like a skin I’ve outgrown.
I feel like… remember when you were a kid? Remember that moment when you realized you know longer wanted to play with toys? Remember how it was kind of sad, to be leaving your childhood behind you, but also kind of exciting? That’s how I feel. I’m sober, and I feel good about it. I’m going to AA. I’m probably going to go into therapy (but I’m not taking the pills). I’m looking for a new job. I’m even starting to write again.
Maybe these are placebos and pipe dreams, and in six months I’ll be back where I started, drunk and hopeless. I don’t know. All I know is that, right now, I don’t feel hopeless at all.
As hope is alien to Dash Bradley, I must send him away, off into the wastes of Siberia with his bitterness and his alcohol. Who knows? I may check in on him from time to time.
As for me, I’ve found this an interesting experience, and may return to blogging in the future. I have met some terrific people I wouldn’t have met otherwise and I’ll be keeping my eye on you, don’t worry.
My name is Nicholas Andrew Beley, and I’m not dancing so madly anymore.

"If you're fond of sand dunes, and salty air/ quaint little villages, here and there"

Well, I’m off for pastures greener. Sorry I haven’t spoken for a few days but I’ve been away from work, getting involved in all sorts of monkey business. I am still sober, in case you were wondering, and it seems to be going okay. I actually feel pretty good about it, to tell you the truth. I have been concerned that in giving up drinking my life would be less exciting or fun, which may well be true, but in return I seem to be feeling a twinge in the back of my neck that may be this thing you hu-mans call ‘self-respect.’ Shh, don’t tell anybody.
But yes, I am heading out for the East Coast on a long-overdue vacation. What adventure will I find out in the wild maritime provinces? Who can say; perhaps what I will really find is… myself?

Tell me why/ I hate Mondays...

Embarrassing admission: in my wayward, brooding youth, I used to shoplift. I know, I know, it is terrible horrible and bad, bad, bad, but I was a weird lonely adolescent and this was my way of acting out. Arguably it was a cry for help, but seeing as how I was never caught it was a cry for help that no one heard, which I guess was a waste of time. Anyway, things took an upturn; I became less brooding and a relatively happier person, who felt no need to commit antisocial acts. Many, many years later, I feel I have become the victim of karma, in as much as I seem to set off those fucking, fucking anti-shoplifting alarms every fucking time I pass through them, despite the fact I have not stolen anything. I must have an alien chip in my head. It only happens in big box stores (Best Buy, Wal-Mart etc), where the doors are some distance from the checkout. Now, in a perfect world when the alarm went off an employee would be discreetly alerted and rush over, we’d discuss the issue and I’d verify that I had not, in fact, stolen anything and we’d laugh about it and I’d be on my way. In a perfect world. What actually happens is… nothing. Well, not nothing. First, a hideously loud screech sounds throughout the area. Then, all the other customers nearby look at me with contemptuous accusing eyes; "You shoplifting piece of shit!" they say, silently. Now, at this point, you’d think an employee would come over to investigate the piercingly shrill alarm, but no. No employees bat an eye. This leaves me with the choice of a) ignoring the alarm and continuing on my way, or b) going and finding an employee, to advise them that I am not a shoplifter. Now a) results in even more contemptuous looks, as it looks like I’m just trying to escape. Option b) results in charming little exchanges like this:

Me: Excuse me, I appear to have set off the alarm.
Brain-dead retail zombie moron: Huh?
Me: The shoplifting alarm? At the front doors? I set it off.
BDRZ: Melvin?
Me: No, I’m not Melvin. Could you just check my bag or something, so I could leave?
BDRZ: What section was that?
Me: No, I’m talking about the front doors. I would just like to leave. I promise I didn’t steal anything.
BDRZ: I think that’s in cookwares.
Me: Uh… so can I leave?
BDRZ: Melvin?

And so on. As these stirring discussions seldom yield results, this generally leaves me with the only option of just leaving, thus setting off the alarms again, and so on and so on. My question is: what is the fucking point of these fucking alarms if no one gives a fucking shit if they fucking go off? Huh? What’s the fucking point except to heap embarrassment on poor fucking wage slaves who are just on their way to their own brain dead fucking jobs and they are just passing through your fucking store and it’s not their fucking fault that they have alien fucking chips in their head and set off your fucking stupid alarms you fucking fucking morons? Huh? HUH? HUH?
Not that it bothers me or anything.

You want the truth!?

I saw the film Last Tango In Paris last night (and it was excellent), and I had a thought. Yes, just one. In the movie, Marlon Brando plays a man whose wife has just committed suicide, and he enters into a self-effacing affair with a young woman. Now, there’s a scene where Marlon visits the body of his wife, and starts to berate her, just a torrent of obscenities, that gives way to a weeping, pathetic appeal. This scene reminded me very strongly of a scene in Magnolia (possibly my favorite film), where Tom Cruise’s character confronts his dying father, and also unleashes a vitriolic attack that degenerates into childish weeping. The similarity of both scenes struck me with this thought: Tom Cruise is the new Marlon Brando! Think about it; Brando was a famous, critically lauded, popular actor whose talent became overshadowed by his increasingly eccentric personal life. Sounds like Tom to me! You can’t go to a supermarket without seeing fifty magazines talking about how crazy he is, nor turn on the TV without hearing about one of his crazy interviews. I think he’s just getting started. I think weirder on-set behavior, many marriages, massive weight gain and private islands are all in his future. Scientology is a fabulous start.

My name is Dash*

Well, internet, I hate to say this but I think it’s time for me to quit drinking, again. I guess I should say try and quit drinking, actually, but we’ll give it a go. Man, this has just been a brutal week for me, entirely self-inflicted. Let’s break it down, shall we? Wednesday, after dinner with my family, I got drunk and watched, appropriately enough, a film called Drunks, about alcoholics. There was one character, played by comedian Richard Lewis, that I especially identified with; he plays a two-year sober dude who goes on a bender. Man, watching him swear at a bottle of bourbon, so filled with desire and self-loathing, I really saw myself. I still got drunk, though. Thursday I went and saw a matinee of Batman, stopping off at a liquor mart first to buy a bottle of whiskey. I bought myself once of those giant-ass cups of coke, and proceeded to maintain my drunk as I watched the film. I drank my way back home, and then met some friends at a bar. I had to leave early, around midnight, as I’d been drinking for about thirteen hours. I went and sat down on the front steps of some random apartment building, where I promptly fell asleep. Yes, that’s right, I slept on the street; a new one for me. I woke up a little while later, staggered home and proceeded to throw up all over my bathroom. I couldn’t even get it together enough to prop my head onto the toilet. Friday morning, I washed my vomit-stained bathmats, and then started drinking around 10am. I think I walked around town after that, but who remembers? I know I hooked up with some friends in the afternoon, to attend a street festival. At some point, I wandered off and got into an altercation with a brick wall, leaving me with a hand that is still bruised and swollen as I type this. I don’t know how or when I left, or how I got home, I just woke up on the couch Saturday morning. I had to drag my sorry ass to work, and after my shift I went to meet some friends for -guess what! - more drinking. Except I couldn’t. You’re talking to a guy who’s been drinking pretty much daily for a long fucking time, but I couldn’t even choke down a beer. It’s like my system wouldn’t take it; the taste was disgusting to me. I attempted to drink a few beers of different brands, but there was nothing for it. Again, I ended up leaving early, but I didn’t sleep in any stairwells, nor punch any walls. I woke up today and went for a very long walk, and I’ve decided to quit again. I know, I know, I have been down this road before, and failed. But, maybe I’m going into it a little wiser this time, with fewer expectations. I don’t know if it will last or what will happen to me, but I think I’ve finally lost my taste for self-destruction.



*actually, it's not.

yay for me

Well, internet, the rumors are true; yesterday was my birthday. I am now 25 years old. Twenty five. That's a quarter of a century. Shit. It was a pretty good day, I (guess what!) got very drunk. The neighborhood where I live shut down and had a festival, which was very cool. Many beer gardens. I think I broke some knuckles on my right hand, and a few on my left; they are all swollen. What the hell was I punching? Not people, I hope. Anyway, I hung out with all kinds of interesting people, had some laughs. I wore a suit, because I'm awesome, but I didn't count on the heat. My God, the heat! Fortunately there was much to drink, so I could stay cool.
Happy birthday, Jennifer!