I was thinking it’d be bad suit to speak about this before the show, but the more I think about it… well- the more I think about it. An afternoon hasn’t passed in the past month that it hasn’t struck me at random. As if something were urging me to confront the damn thing, or simply find a way with it. I don’t think I’ve ever found a means of rationalizing it, seeing it’s in the deep past and such things can sit without guilt or moral application. As Matt Damon says in The Departed, “I’m Irish, I can live with somethin’ being wrong my whole life”. I say the same, but perhaps only half the time. I’ve done my fair share of setting fire and aborting ethics, however rarely do we evade our moral jumpships without paying for them. Even if we escape, we still pay.
I’m a firm believer that we all have a moral compass. Whether it be cops, the law, gravity, confines of the universe, or karma that catch up with you, there is an innate sense of morality in each of us that can feel when we’re in the wrong. Now, this is an extremely ideal belief, but I factor in the stipulations of mental illness (i.e. schizophrenia), drugs, and absence of consciousness. However, there is a definite “gut feeling” we all have when watching someone else go through struggle or success. We can empathize along side, as if we’re able to say “Hey, I feel your pain” or “Congratulations, I’m so happy for you”.
To understand the situation, you have to understand the environment. Welcome to 2004- wait or was it 2005… shite, it could’ve been 2003- was it that long ago?- Either way, welcome to 2004-ish. I lived with good friend Tesch, couldn’t not like the guy; Shane, all-around cool kid; and Devon, badass kid, made a habit of walking around the house… naked. Twas a swell group of guys rounding the final lap of their undergrad tenures, meanwhile I was just beginning to mentally check out of college.
Things were looking up. Student loan checks rolled in, The Blend was finally making money, and it felt like I was getting somewhere with theatre. Fresh from writing my first play, receiving local acclaim as a playwright, I felt a sense of infallibility. I’ll admit it’s a dangerous thing to write and direct the same project. You walk a line bordering the heights of masturbatory exhibition and artistic self-preservation. Problem was I didn’t know the difference. I was coming off my 2nd year on the MN National Slam Team... and had just discovered I didn’t need a live band, DJ, or stage to do what I wanted. Artistically, you could say I was blooming, but mentally, I don’t think I’ve ever been more naïve.
We didn’t think, back then. We’d drink first and ask questions later, blackout and not care to figure it out, wake up and do it again if the consequences from last night weren’t immediate. Absolutely short-sighted to the fact that we’d have to “do” something when we graduated… or at least when all the bad decisions finally caught up with us. I could be disserving Tesch, Devon, and Shane by lumping them in the same category as myself… or not. Devon and Shane had put the master plan into action to grow marijuana in the basement for the past year and hadn’t been caught… ever. If you’re not privey to the psychology of it all, the more we get away with something, the more we do it. It’s simple: no consequence, no problem. Yet again, we still pay. .. one way or another.
I didn’t care much for the basement garden, however I did contemplate the connotations of being a young black male and getting caught with drugs in your household. Naively, I figured because I didn’t smoke... anything, that I wasn’t in the wrong. This goes to show, again, how young-minded I was. If we were to be caught, at that moment, with the amount of “stuff” that was in the basement, we all would’ve been thrown behind bars, permanent record-stained, and destined for a career working with temp agencies… perhaps I’m already there;) Na, I kid. Maybe just the latter…
So here we are, money-woes non-existent, doing what we love without care, and house-party ridden ‘til the nearest Sunday morning. Once more, the infallibility set in like the plague. I’d smile through class, writing lyrics and poems, pseudo-acing the test later, and promoting shows between it all. I must’ve thought I was the coolest thing on the fucking earth… Na, I’ve always been the self-conscious type. My ego and I are like distant brothers separated at birth. I can fake the bravado as long as I can act it… but really (drum roll please)… I’m shy. However, during this particular time, I strived to aim for confident, outgoing, and brave beyond means.
Shite, it’s 5pm. Still gotta take this dog for a run, meet with Joel and the gang for rehearsal at 7, and run to Cause for a show with Kristoff Krane… We’ll have to slap a TO BE CONTINUED on this one.
But what should we call it… Almost Infamous? Pseudo-Cool? Minneapolis Go F--- Yourself?... Na, too dramatic. This diary/blog crap gets so emo and personal that the exact action of it (for me at least) is to de-personalize the story and put it out into the universe with hopes that others can maybe learn something from it, while perhaps I learn just as much from typing it.
Ahh… yes, that’ll work. K, we’ll make this one of three- and before I drop the “to be continued”, watch this -à http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GkvdljRAnPc
Alright, TO BE CONTINUED…
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