Fiction: It may or may not be any good.

Well, I've graduated. College. This milestone is a pretty belated one, but I wouldn't have it any other way. I had a lot with which to come to terms in the years immediately following high school. Anyway:

I thought it might be beneficial for me if I began to post some fiction. I'm not sure if y'all are interested in that, but I suppose there might be the odd individual who'd be willing to dispense some criticism.

Here's the beginning of a story. I've always been interested in Christian fanaticism and the sexual repression that often manifests in its practitioners. Also, I've always been interested in evangelical disdain for Catholicism. Anyway, tell me if you think this stuff is any good and where you think it's going. If you want.


I drink a good deal of tea. I keep a metal travel mug in my hands nearly all the time, because it keeps my throat loose and wet. I yell the word of God on the street, and you’d be surprised how well the tea soothes the ache and the soreness of my abused larynx.

It warms me in the rain and the snow of the New English winter, it quenches my thirst, and it soothes the tool with which I praise God and spread his word. I do not own a microphone, as amplification would only dampen the intensity of my message. The rough, prickling breaks in my tired voice add gravity to it. Mint, black, sweet tea, bitter tea, it’s all the same to me.

Main Street is bereft of the Godliness that once characterized this great nation. The bar signs burn with a gaudy neon lust, and the antique stores -- filled with Catholic idols -- creak in sin and fanaticism. Only the lowest and most ragged people venture out at night to drink, and the worst among that lot loiter in the street with their beer bottles to their lips like they were nursing at their mother’s tit. That is why I am here. I was once like them: empty and Catholic, knowing only the mother and never the son. I knew him only as a babe at Christmas, a creature of monumental prominence and consequence, but the beer bottles on which I suckled kept me clinging to that virgin’s skirt. Emptiness persisted in my gut no matter how often I sought to fill it with drink. But then, his image found me at night, curled in bed as if in the womb, and told me to leave his mother behind, for she was not the intermediary those idol worshippers would have us believe. No, in fact, it was he who would lead me to God, and he alone. I unhooked my fingers from her hemline and I followed him to where love and sacrifice usurp lust and greed. I was born again from the womb of his atonement.

The drunks laugh at me. Sometimes they even throw their empty bottles in my direction, jeering. What makes this worth my time are the few who come to me with tear stains on their cheeks and God in their heart. They are curious and attentive, asking questions and seeking clarification, and they promise to consider getting saved. Some get saved, some do not, but I plant a seed in their heart. If they care for it and tend to it, they will see it flourish. Love will burst forth from their chests. Their lives will begin anew in Christ’s love.

Some of these bar folk are not drunk, and yet they still laugh along with the rest. I see one walking languidly by me with a smirk. His heart is hardened. When I see him, he does not look like a member of this small town. He’s wearing tight blue jeans and a black t-shirt covered by a blazer. He is clean and does not look as though he had been sitting on a tractor or working with his hands. An Ivy League boy, home from the halls of academe? A Wall Street boy, home from the affluence and sin of the city? Is he visiting friends? Why is his chest so broad, his shoulders so wide?

I Have Multiple Sclerosis

It's true. I do. A lot of people hear this disease mentioned and imagine tragically infirm people in wheelchairs, watching wistfully as walkers raise money for their benefit. I suppose some people with MS embody just that image, but I don't (yet) fit that description.

I have had problems -- I was legally blind for a year, and I've had bouts of numbness and such -- but I've been lucky. Really, the worst part is the anxiety associated with getting my medication, a thing frequently threatened by incompetence and greed. My hope is that when I get to Finland, it won't be such a headache. Ass-ache.

What's it like having a chronic condition, the future symptoms and severity of which are entirely uncertain? There's a lot of worry and hypochondria involved. "Why did my leg just twitch? Should I tell my doctor? What's up with that debilitating pain in my back? Should I tell my doctor?" And when your doctor inevitably leaves some true, tell-tale symptom unrecognized and untreated, you might find yourself asking, "Why is my doctor such a dumb shit?" You might have two spinal taps, the first just for shits and giggles; these lab results will determine that you're spinal meningitis free!
But, bad news. They don't have enough spinal fluid to correct their mistake. You'll need another one.

For me, it also involves a lot of denial. Healthy denial, I think. First of all, I'm relatively symptom-free. Why should I ruminate on the possibilites more than is necessary? What I should really do is enjoy my mental faculties and motor functions a whole hell of a lot in the event that they one day diminish. Secondly, I tend to like to avoid doctors at all costs. They do nothing but order painful tests that yield no results, and they ignore you if they can't devise some way to torture you. Experience has taught me that keeping them at arm's length is actually pretty beneficial. [To be fair, my current doctor has been good to me. I'm thankful for both him and his office. Still, I'm not ready to trust. I'm just not.]

There are certainly things I think of during rare moments of reflection like this one. Should I avoid having children? MS's genetic heritability is uncertain (I think? I'm woefully ignorant about such things. It's part of that healthy denial I mentioned), but it's certainly possible that I could pass it on to some potential kid. Fortunately, I don't really want children anyway. Will I become some sort of invalid? Well, probably not, given how the disease has progressed in me so far, but if I do, I guess I'll deal with it then.

Sometimes people force me to think about it. Like in biology the other day. My professor was under the impression that all MS is progressive -- that is to say, it progressively destroys your myelin sheath until you're immobile and stupid. Well, from the little I know of MS, it most commonly manifests as a series of relapses and remissions, hence the term "relapsing-remitting." Sure, there's a pretty sizable element of progression in those relapses, but, hey, quit telling me I'm doomed if you're not entirely certain.

I think, actually, the most painful thing about it is to think a lot about it. So far, its hold over me isn't disability but rather fear and anxiety. In that sense, I'm quite lucky. Nevertheless, it is a little like having someone threaten to punch you in the face and not disclose when it will happen. "When you least expect it," it says.

Still, I am lucky, and I know it. But I think I'll retreat back into denial now.

Lazy + Tired

Well, I was going to write an entry, but I decided to instead redesign the look of my blog. Then, it was almost 11:00, and I thought better of my plan, as I have to be up at 5.

As one might expect, being that it's spring and all, school is busy as hell. So, I think I'll do the responsible thing and go to bed so that I might read some Joan Didion at work in the early morning hours. I'll leave you with a beautiful song, should you find the lack of content in this entry too egregious.




Good night.

Edit: P.S. I simply had to mention that this song reminds me of strolling the hot streets of Rome in late July, and of eating calamari with plenty of red wine.

Edit 2: What a pretentious douche I am.