mychai's Diaryland Diary ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Reflections of my home town In one week from riiiiight now (riiiiight then if you are in the Eastern time zone), I will be in beautiful Picayune, Mississippi. Of course, I say that with a good dose of sarcasm. I love my home town, don't get me wrong. It is where I grew up, gained loads of experiences and It seems like every time I go home, I feel more and more like a visitor. Not so much that people treat me coldly but in that it doesn't feel like the same town where I grew up. In experiencing a real, productive, bustling city, I have come to view Picayune as a city wannabe. It is as if the whole town gets together and says, "Oh. Wow. Look at what that city does! They have street fairs every year. We should have street fairs! Then, we will be a city!" So, they go through all of this trouble to have a street fair. The wannabe newspaper covers it. The wannabe radio station (where I began my DJ career) broadcasts live from there. And they pull it off. They have a street fair. But after it is over, people sit around and scratch their heads wondering why their street fair didn't feel at all festive and why Picayune is still not a real city. But we've fulfilled the "street fair" requirement, the organizers say. Maybe if we plant flowers in all of the medians like the big cities do, we will then be a city! So, they go about planting flowers in all of the medians. Yet it all looks like a superficial attempt at making the town feel like it is all together as a collective community. Ugh. I dunno. It is hard to describe exactly what I mean. It's like trying to fall in love by doing all of the things people do when they are in love. Write her a love poem... check. But in the end, you aren't really in love with her. You just want to be. And doing the actions to be in love doesn't mean you are in love. Does that make sense? Or do I just have diarrhea of the mouth? Now that I have totally shammed my home town... I have been talking to my best friend from there. His name is Marcus, and he is definitely one of the coolest guys I have ever had the privilege of knowing. I have more positive memories with him than I have with anybody else in my life. One time, when we drove out to his farm to take care of his horses, we both exited the truck at the same time and walked towards the back to get things out. There are certain things guys do when they get out of a big truck at a farm, intent on doing manly farm work. One of them is to adjust Uncle Wiggly, as he gets all misconfigured on the truck ride. Another is to hock up a big loogie, tilt your head back, and do an arching loogie spit a good distance in front of you. Well, Marcus did this loogie spit a good distance beyond the back bumper of the hooded truck. But, like a bad hunter, he couldn't see beyond the truck and couldn't see his target clearly. Just as the loogie left his puckered lips, I stepped from behind the back of the truck. Marcus said later that he "instantly did all of these intricate, detailed mathematical projections and models, and I knew exactly what was about to happen." Switch to my point of view: I walked from behind the truck, adjusting my pajama python, already having spit on the dirt floor of the barn. I was looking at one of the horse stalls, thinking that I would have to shovel it. Suddenly, my head jolted to one side violently, a la JFK. At first, I didn't know what had happened. Then, I felt a warm ooz somewhere on the right side of my head. I reached up, and I felt the slimey mess perfectly centered in my ear. It was such a perfect shot that not a speck of moisture could be found anywhere else on my head. I looked over at Marcus. I would have thought that he would have been concerned? Scared that I was going to kick his ass? Amazed at the odds of what had just happened? Any of those. But nope. He was doubled over, laughing so hard that he couldn't even make a noise. His face was beet red. His knees buckled, and he collapsed to the floor trying to catch his breath. Do you know how hard it is to get a loogie out of your ear canal? Do you have any idea how long it takes to hear clearly again? I sure do. I tell you this story because Marcus and I will be collaborating on a special two-person entry over Christmas break. It will be a long one, and it will surely be a lot of fun to write. I hope it will be equally as fun to read. We are already talking about what all we should put in it. He wants me to start hyping it now so all of yoose kids will be excited to read it. I will see him for the first time in probably five years over Christmas Break. Lisa (Just the Polymer Scientist), Marcus, and I will be heading over to the casinos while down. Lisa will be our designated driver. Marcus and I will become what is known in the medical and technical world as "Shit Faced." Well, that's all I will write about tonight. I was going to write about the Sopranos season finale, but I will hold that off for tomorrow night. It was a great episode, and I don't want to ruin my review of it by trying to rush through it. So, here I am again at the end of the entry. Not knowing how to end it. So, I guess I will end it with a great misquote from one of my favorite children's books. Email me or post to the guestbook if you get the reference. There's a monster at the end of this diary entry! 10:45 p.m. - Wed., Dec. 11, 2002 ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- |
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