mychai's Diaryland Diary

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About the time JP tried to take up cigarettes.

I'm slowly starting to adjust to Spanish-Speaking Neighbor's soon departure.

A quick reason why I don't tell many people when I get upset about something. This is usually how it goes, adjusting for the situation.

Me: I'm sad and just really upset.
Other Person: Oh? Why's that?
Me: Because my best friend is moving, and I am going to really miss her.
OP: Good for your friend! Where are they going?
Me: California, but--
OP: California! That is where you will be in tech school! See? Problem solved!
--OR--OP: Well, you were going to be moving soon, so it doesn't matter now, does it?
Me: That's really not the point.
OP: You'll get over it.
Me: Thanks, Freud.

Not everyone does that. Some people are real supportive. All I ask for is someone to say, "Damn, JP. That sucks. I bet you are upset." Or even, "I know what that is like. Been there, done that. It sucks." Amazingly enough, that cheers me up.

But I get more of the former than the latter.

I told SSN yesterday that, even though I was very happy for her and am glad she is going on to bigger and better places in her life, I don't want her to go and I miss her very much. I hugged her, kissed her cheek, and told her I loved her.

She just looked at me blankly and said, "No puedo hablar ingl�s. �Usted desea ir tener sexo?"

Man, I'm going to miss her.

I found some really great pictures while I was home. I really had to dig, but I eventually found them. They are of me and my best friend Marcus from my high school days.

He used to own a bunch of horses, and I am an Eagle Scout. What does an Eagle Scout think about when he sees a bunch of horses?

...

NOT THAT! That's just nasty. Shame on you.

No, every 6 months -- in April and October -- we used to saddle up the horses, pack a hell of a lot of equipment, and cast off for a weekend of horseback camping. It was usually just one night, but once we did it for two nights.

Looking back, those were perhaps the best days of my teenage years. I don't have a brother, but Marcus is pretty damn close enough.

We would do things on our camping trips that made us feel like rebels for the weekend. One time, we decided that we would be smokers for a weekend. We would smoke cigarettes like it was nobody's business. And damn, boy, we would look cool in the process.

But nobody could know about it. His dad would have killed him, and everyone thought I was a goody-goody. I would have hated to ruin that image.

We debated for a long while about how many packs of cigarettes we should take on our weekend camping trip. I was a realist and thought two or three packs between the two of us would keep enough fresh air away plenty.

Marcus was an idealist and wanted to get a carton.

Each.

I think we agreed to get 5 or 6 packs to share. "Next time, if we go through these, we'll get more." By that night, we were green. We each got our own pack at the beginning of the day, and by the end of the trip, we didn't finish our one pack.

Where we camped was on this big bluff overlooking a turn in a creek. It was a great place to stand because you felt on top of the world.

I was standing there, reluctantly having a smoke, when we heard a little motorbike in the distance. There was a dirt road that went by our campsite, and forresters and other science types sometimes would come by to check out some trees. I didn't think much of it.

But I was standing there with my cig, enjoying the view, and I heard Marcus scream with bitter intensity:

"SHIT!ItsmyDAD!"

I didn't even think. I just spit out my cigarette butt over the cliff, ran back, and started hiding all of the evidence we had left of our rebellious experiment.

Brave, we were not.

His dad was on a little scooter that -- thankfully -- made a lot of noise. He came by to check on us and wish he was young again. Looking back, the cigarette butts probably weren't all that noticeable, but we kept pointing them out like we were aggrivated by their presence.

"Damn rednecks musta had one helluva party here, because when we got here there was all kinds of beer bottles and CIGARETTE BUTTS on the ground. Look. See all of the CIGARETTE BUTTS?"

I went back to my cliff to pretend like I was aggrivated about all of the rednecks leaving cigarette butts laying around. I looked down and saw...

My cigarette butt I spat out minutes before. And it was still smoking!

Luckily his dad only stayed a few minutes. And when he left, we pretty much burned all of our evidence.

We thought we were toast at the time. Surely his dad knew it was us. Hell... he is an ex highway patrolman.

But we supposedly got away with it. Maybe his dad just chose to let us lie that one time.

We still can't talk now without bringing up, "SHIT! It's My DAD!" Good times, good times.

Remind me to tell you the story about the camping trip where we got drunk and I pooped my pants.

Now THAT is a story.

Well, I am off. I need to take a (cold) shower. I am also making loads of bread today. I've made three loaves so far.

I'm just loafin' it up.

Spanish-Speaking Neighbor is making spaghetti AGAIN tonight. Gawd. I should buy stock in spaghetti just on how often she makes it. She wanted some fresh garlic bread for her dinner, so I was kind enough to make it for her.

She's gonna miss my cookin', uh-huh.