Silence of Lucky

There are two types of people in the world.  Those who are late, and those that hate those of us who are late.

I, sadly to say, am the former.

People who are time, who are punctual, see our lateness as a moral failing at best and a blatant disrespect of anything and anyone but ourselves at worst.  We see it as a quirky character trait, kind of like the dog who barks too loud but then does something really cute to make up for it at the end.

Not that the punctual among us are without their faults.  Being early fulfills their need to feel superior to those around them.  Most of them pride themselves not only on being on time, but being there ridiculously early.    Have to be at work at 10?  They get there at 8.   They are the people who in high school brought apples to the teacher, and when there was a five page paper, they handed in fifteen.  They are the ones who showed so much interest in the subject that even the teacher was like, "Chill out kid, it's only World War 2.  Wow, your grandfather fought in it.  Big freaking deal."  These people have a singular focus and usually end up in authority positions because they are more likely to be, well, successful.

Those of us who are late don't want to be, it's just that we have varied interests that take up large chunks of our time.  How can we leave an hour early when we can be reading up on the impending collapse of the Honeybee population?  Or writing our spec script for 30 Rock?   Or checking our email for the 20th time?  Or writing their blog for the Charleston City Paper?

And the universe conspires against us.  On those rare times we try to be early, we get stuck in traffic, or the train gets stuck in the station, or we take a wrong turn and get lost.  We realize our being on time is a fruitless endeavor, so we might as well watch the first segment of Pardon the Interruption.

We also tend to be very forgiving people.  We have a giant, glaring fault, obvious to everyone we meet, so we understand the fallibility of the human condition.  Want some sympathy about bouncing your rent check?  Go to the person who is always late.  Need to vent about the terrible relationship you can't seem to pry your way our of.  Go to the person who is five minutes late.

Come to us on these occasions.  But if you need to get something done in a timely manner...don't.

Yesterday was one of the darkest days of the year.  It was a day of uncertainty.  It was a harbinger of harder months ahead.  For yesterday, January 25, was the first Sunday in four and a half months, with no football.

The horror of those words is difficult to comprehend for a non-football fan.  Just imagine your best friend has been in town since the fall, and now he's dead.  Until next September.

No football isn't only going to effect our Sundays.   We had Monday night football as well.  Then Tuesday and Wednesday we spent re-hashing the games.  Then came Thursday and we had to start previewing the upcoming weekend's battles.  Friday we had to make our predictions, Saturday watch College Football, and then Sunday watching the real thing.  It was our entire lives, and now it is gone.  Until next September.

Sure there is the Super Bowl this weekend, but that's not for us, the die hard fan.  The Super Bowl is just the going away party.  And just like real going away parties where the guest of honor has to say goodbye to lots of people while the real friends just hang to the side, so will we be in the back of the room, trying to catch the last glimpses of the game in between the fake friends and the commercials.  One last play action pass.  One last Cover 3.  Until next September.

The bars will be a little quieter, the TV a little softer.  Our women might think they have us back, and they do, in body...but our hearts will be elsewhere.  Painted in the color of what ever team you root for, in a box, put away.  Until next September.

One of the best things about being married is that you're never alone.  One of the worst things about being married, you're never, ever alone.

There are those rare occasions-business trip, jail time- that one of you ends up at the house all by yourself.

When the wife goes away, men look forward to this for weeks.  I know I do.  When we were dating, the thought of her being away for an hour was excruciating.  Now if I find out she's going to be gone for a week-I'm packing her bags myself.

And the first few days of your wife being gone are the most wonderful days you can have.  The house is yours.  You can eat what you want, watch as much ESPN as you want, masturbate wherever you want.  You are finally king of your castle.

By Day 3 the novelty of your new found freedom has started to wear off.  You can't physically eat another slice of pizza, and your house is starting to take on an odd smell.  Day 4 goes by in a blur and by Day 5 you are barely human.  You are just sitting on the couch, same clothes you've had on since Day 3, still watching ESPN, but now even LeBron James is telling you to get your dick out of your hand.

For women, it is a totally different experience.  They start out the week sad and on the couch.  They actually, um, miss you.  They watch Intervention and Grey's Anatomy and hold the phone in their hand waiting for you to call.  But then on Day 3, something changes.  They've started eating salads and grilled fish, and they've noticed their house no longer has that odd smell.  Day 4 they are getting more done then they ever imagined they could.  They are catching Thank You cards, calling old friends.  The house is running like a well oiled machine.  They've even started volunteering at the local animal shelter.  Finally, they look at everything they've created, but it is like a sand castle... beautiful now, but it can't stay.   Because it's Day 5, and like a rising ocean tide, this beautiful life of theirs is going to be washed away by the sea of marriage.

That's the essence of marriage: Men, trying to get out, only to realize they can't make it on their own.  And Women, trying to get in, only to realize they'd be so much better off with out us.

Note to self: Never do shows in Sackets Harbor, NY in the middle of January.  Where is Sackets Harbor, NY?  Go to the Canadian border and head north.

That's what I was thinking as my car sat in a ditch at 6:45 Sunday morning.  It was still dark outside, it was 8 degrees, and I was in the middle of nowhere.

How did a nice boy from South Carolina end up alone in a ditch, two miles from Lake Ontario?  By following his dream, that's how.

I was on the way home from a gig and I was eagerly anticipating the ride.  I was going to watch the sun rise over the snow covered hills of northwestern New York.  I was going to listen to all my favorite music.  I was going to eat Egg McMuffins.

I was ten minutes into the drive, The Roots had just started pouring out of the radio, when all of a sudden I see what I believe to be a quail in the middle of the road. I tapped on the breaks, but it was too late.  I hit the quail, and swerved into a ditch with three feet of snow.  This is not how I pictured the beginning of my trip.

I tried to reverse out.  Nothing.  I tried to go forward.  Nothing.  I was stuck.  I turned off The Roots, I stepped out of the car, and I stared.  I remembered that feeling I get whenever I see someone stuck on the side of the road.  It's not, should I help them, or I wonder if every thing's OK- it's more, Thank God that isn't me.  And now-it was me.

A truck that was salting the road passed by, stopped to see if I was OK.

"I hit a quail," I told the driver, explaining the cause of my helpless state.

"No, you hit a pheasant," they informed me, "it's right here.  You want it?"  They pointed to the poor pheasant who was still alive and attempting to, but unable to hop away.

"No,"  I meekly replied.

"Really?  That's good eats!"

They then picked the pheasant up by the neck. Oh Dear God, please don't wrench this thing's neck right in front of me.  That's when they started banging the pheasant's head against the truck.  As I heard it let out its final shrills of life I thought, Dear God, why aren't they just wringing this things neck.

Then something dawned upon me- while I'm going to remember this situation poorly: as the awful morning I almost died in the middle of a frozen tundra- these two truck drivers were going to remember this as their lucky day.  This will forever be the day the scored a free pheasant, and watched some moron almost die in the middle of a frozen tundra.

Maybe your bad luck is some one's good luck.  Maybe one day you are going to be the person stuck on the side of the road.  And maybe pheasants should watch where the hell they're going.

I'm not a closer.  It came to this realization while shooting pool in the West Village last night.

I was beating my friend, who is excellent at pool, like a drum.  I was striking the ball with confidence, knocking down any shot I wanted.  3 Ball, side pocket- Easy.  6 Ball, left corner.  Down.  Combo 1 and the 9-Done and Done. Next thing I knew, all that was left was the 8 Ball, and I had a good, clean look.  Now, if this was the measly 2 Ball and it was 5 minutes ago, I would have made this shot with my eyes closed.  But this was the 8 Ball, and to sink it, meant the game was over.

I called 8 Ball, corner packet, and lined up over the shot.  Didn't feel right.  I broke my stance and looked at it from a different angle.  I put my cue stick against the 8 Ball to make sure I had the right trajectory.

I finally settled on what I wanted, and as I pulled my arm back- I had a flash of me, back in my Junior year of high school. Kristen Thomas, a senior and the hottest girl at Wade Hampton High,  was totally into me.  She liked my curly hair and that I wanted to be an actor.  Her friends told me she was into me, her actions, to any unbiased third party, would have clearly stated she was into me.  But I couldn't accept it. Why would she want me when she could be with someone a year...older.

It was spring and her Prom was forth coming.  She called me one night, telling me that this guy wanted to ask her to prom but she didn't want to go with him.  She was distraught and didn't know what to do.  I  wanted to go with her but was convinced that I shouldn't ask her to her own prom.  The results of that level of rejection would have been hard to handle. And Kristen, this being her senior prom, wanted to be the askee not the asker.

Instead of manning up and asking the girl to her prom, I pussed out.  Two days later, other guy asked her, and she, being a nice person, said yes.

This is what I thought as I struck the 8 ball.  It had no chance.  It careened off the wall into the side pocket and I lost the game.

Not a closer.