D&D and Me Part 1

Any who know me will tell you that I am an avid D&D player. D&D is of course, Dungeons and Dragons, a role-playing game originally published by TSR, and currently published by Wizards of the Coast. It is not the only role-playing system I have used, but it is so iconic that almost all of the role-playing games I have been involved in have been referred to as "D&D". The sole exception is the Star Wars RPG which is referred to as the Star Wars Game(s) though they are still noted as happening on "D&D night". This blog series will cover some of my memories of past games and my involvement with my biggest hobby.


First let me begin by saying that my love of Fantasy and my love of D&D are hopelessly intertwined but still very separate things. My love of Fantasy started with such influences as He-Man, Star Wars, and Saturday morning cartoons, not to mention C.S. Lewis, Tolkien, and Lloyd Alexander. My love of D&D started with a Nintendo Entertainment System.


We were living in Amarillo and I was about 8 at the time (give or take a year). My older brother Derrick had come to live with us (this is another story in itself, but the short version is he is my half brother who moved in with us when he turned 18 and his mother no longer had custody). Derrick got a job at a local video store which rented Nintendo Systems and games. We didn't own a Nintendo because my mother thought it was a waste of money (she was wrong) and was worried that my younger brother Daniel and I would vegetate in front of it if we had one instead of playing outside or reading (she was right). Several of my friends had Nintendos, including two families on our street, so I knew what I was missing. Unfortunately I was often cast as the observer because, hey, it wasn't my Nintendo. I used this injustice to lobby for a Millwee Nintendo, but the bill never made it to the floor as it was crushed time and time again by my unsympathetic mother. Derrick, to be kind to his much younger siblings, occasionally brought one of the rental Nintendos home for us to enjoy. He would always bring 2 games with it, and one day he brought home a game titled Simon's Quest.


Simon's Quest was the sequel to a game called Castlevania, and nobody I knew had it. I loved it. The premise is as follows: when defeating Dracula in the first game our hero Simon was cursed. Now he must gather Dracula's remains and resurrect him and defeat him once more to rid himself of his curse. The game remains one of my favorite video games to this day. It had a good story. It had puzzles. There were towns where people lied to you, and shops where you could buy better equipment. The more you played, the more powerful your character Simon became. It was amazing, and it also had most of the elements of a pen and paper RPG though I didn't know it at the time. I didn't beat the game although Derrick brought it home more than once. I can still remember the triumph when, years later and now a Nintendo owner, I finally beat it. At this point I have played the game through about a dozen times, and am over due for another.


We moved to Sugar Land in the fall of 1989 and I did not re-adjust well. My mother noticed a lack of friends and my unhappiness and that Christmas we got a Nintendo from Santa, with a suggestion from my Mom that I try to start a Nintendo Club. Again, my transition to Sugar Land and the effect of the Nintendo Club is for another blog, for my purposes here the important part is that I now owned a Nintendo. Simon's Quest was acquired and beaten as mentioned above, and I quickly began searching for similar games. Zelda, Dragon Warrior I and II, Metroid, Final Fantasy, all were devoured hungrily along with others. Simon's Quest had sparked an ember of interest that blazed into a roaring fire, and I began looking outside the world of Nintendo for my Fantasy game fix.


Sometime during my fifth grade year, I can't remember exactly, I discovered a book. My mother regularly took me and my brother to the library, we would cycle like clock-work through 3 or 4 different branches, and on one of our library trips --in a four sided rotating rack of mouldering paperbacks-- I found a book titled Dragons of Spring Dawning by Margaret Weis and Tracy Hickman. I had read some science fiction at this point, but most of my "fantasy" reading had been confined to the classics and mythology. Dragons of Spring Dawning was a surprise. There was reference to sex, and betrayal. Characters died seemingly meaningless deaths. The bad guys were evil. Not evil because the author told us so, but evil because the author showed us so. Even the victory seemed Pyrrhic. The book was the third in a trilogy and of course made references to events in the first 2 books which I had not read at the time. In a way it was fun for me, trying to figure out what had happened through hints and comments spread throughout the book. It turns out that this trilogy was (loosely) based on the notes from D&D campaign the authors had been in. It was also published under the label of Dragonlance, which was published by TSR, the publisher of D&D.

One day in the fifth grade I was over at my friend Matt's house attending his birthday party and he looked around and said, "Hey guys, want to play a computer game?" Now Matt had an Apple 2, and as far as I knew the only game for the Apple 2 was Oregon Trail. Doubt must have flitted across my face because he look at me and said, "Come on Jacob. It's like Dragonlance." Well, that sold me. A few minutes later the six of us were clustered around Matt's drab grey Apple 2 playing a game called Curse of the Azure Bonds. Azure Bonds was a computer game published by, wait for it, TSR and was basically Dungeons and Dragons rendered into computer code. You could create up to six characters, and everyone at the party created their own. It was meant to be a solo game; instead we gathered around Matt and instructed him what we wanted our personal bundle of pixels to do in a fight. It was an extremely slow and tedious way to play but I loved it. I felt an innate connection with my 30 or so pixels on the Apple 2 screen; both a sense of proud ownership and vague personality displacement. It was great. I was being picked on at school and never seemed to do anything right socially but here I was portraying a character that was killing monsters with a knife.

Maybe it was all those Saturday morning cartoons; maybe it my fascination with all things Star Wars. Maybe it was the books that I gravitated towards. A love of mythology and folklore that persists to this day. Whatever it was, that afternoon clustered around Matt's computer I felt right at home. And I knew that I had found something that I could excel at.

Every time I think I've hit rock bottom, someone throws me a shovel.

I am trying, have been trying to find a teaching job. Recently I found out that Austin High had an available opening in the Theater Dept. It turns out that the Head Theater teacher there was my theater teacher for my freshman year at Dulles High. I emailed him, letting him know what I've been up to and that I was interested. I got other people to put in good words for me too. Called in as many favors as I could, and then promised favors away. Anxiously I waited for a reply from him, or a call from the principal to interview. A week went by. Suddenly, the job posting was removed from the district's website. No phone call. No email. I'm crushed. The worst thing about it is that he didn't contact me. I didn't expect him to remember me, but with the effort I went through, and the "good words" that were supposedly put in on my behalf, you would at least expect a "sorry, he position's been filled email." Would have taken 2 seconds to write.

I have had such a struggle to make it even this far with my quest to have a teaching career that when I saw this posting I felt like the stars had aligned. This will be it I told myself. The reason why it's been so hard, the reason why no one will give me a shot is because I am supposed to have this position.

I am sick of red tape. I am sick of applying online. I am sick of being reduced to an applicant number. I'm sick of state requirements. I'm sick of rules and systems that assume that I am the lowest common denominator. I'm sick of feeling like my BA is worthless because I majored in Drama. I'm sick of watching people that I am smarter and better than get moved ahead of me because they have a piece of paper I don't. I'm sick of hearing why are you doing this? You obviously should be way beyond this. You are too amazing to be here. I'm sick of hearing wow you'd be perfect! Too bad you don't have <insert bullshit requirement>.

I was a long term biology sub at Kempner. The department head loved me. The staff had such respect for me that when the Honors Bio teach was absent, they got a sub for me instead so that I could supervise the Honors fetal pig dissection. An observing teacher, herself an honors bio teacher, was amazed at my grasp of the anatomy and my ability to direct the dissection. Guess what? I only had 1 high school biology course, and I barely passed (because I didn't apply myself). The science department head at Kempner desperately wants to hire me. To teach any science. She even offered me the honors physics classes. But she can't. Why not? Because they won't let me take the subject test to be certified. Why not? Because I don't have enough college hours in science. Well, I don't have any college hours in medieval weaponry, but I dare anyone to challenge my knowledge. My personal mythology library is more extensive than my former University's is, and by far. The example could go on, but I think I've expressed my view.

I am just so frustrated, and disappointed, and...

I'm supporting a family of four. I don't have time to go back to school, much less the money. I know I need to just pick myself up, and keep on going, and wait for that next opportunity. But right now, all I want to do is punch somebody in the face.

Goodbye LA

Originally posted on myspace April 30, 2007


I've been told that one thing people admire about me is my courage to face life changes. People were skeptical when I chose Acting as my major. When I moved to LA. When I asked Val to marry me. When I decided with two friends to make a movie. When we announced Val was pregnant. When Val and I decided to buy a house. These are all scary events. They're scary because these are events and decisions that change your life. Moments you can't go back from. I am admired because I am perceived as taking them all in stride. Being able to gaze into the unknown. Well, not to dispel anyone's image of me, but I am extremely affected by these things. The worst is the moment I'm in right now. The moment right before the consequences hit, before the action. Where you can look at your life and see what you are giving up.

I'm leaving LA on Tuesday morning. I've had a social group that meets about once a week to play games. Mostly role-playing games but also the occasional board game. Tonight was my last one. My last game night in LA. It didn't really hit me until as I was walking out my friends Kate and Gen each gave me a big hug and told me how sad the moment was. All of a sudden it was a sad moment. Then Max shook my hand on the street afterward. My final parting with Max was a series of half-hearted reassurances that we would see each other again soon, but that final handshake was silent. No words were needed.

The drive home on the dark empty highway lit dimly by old streetlights was an emotional one. A drive of loss and sadness. Not the intense sadness you feel at the death of a loved one, but the dull regretful ache you feel when you realize your childhood is gone forever. That nostalgia is just faded memories that have lost their crispness. I've lived in my share of apartments and dorms. On that final day when I move out of each abode I look around at the empty room and the memories just come. I sit there for a moment and savor the bittersweetness of the memories I have of that home. Then I quietly walk out and shut the door behind me- and on that chapter of my life. Now I'm sitting next to the window looking out on Los Angeles at night with Elton John quietly playing in the background (Rocket Man), and right on cue the memories come.

I remember my apartment with Max. Sitting on the couch taking turns playing Final Fantasy X. Max and I sitting on the porch in wifebeaters drinking 40s on a Sunday morning. I remember playing cards at Chuck and Iris's with Sarah P (Sarah always won because she had Jesus on her side). I can remember standing ontop of the hill in Universal Studios at 2 in the morning with the wind whipping past my Securitas bomber jacket, looking out over the city. I remember Valerie coming to visit for the first time. Laughing at crude jokes from Brian and Jason on D&D night. Carving the wooden ring I proposed with. That first Christmas with Chris and Ben. Rehearsing the first (and only) Third Coast Theatre production at Kaiser Permanente. Endless hours pouring over script and footage with Ryan. Hurrying home from work to watch Alias and Scrubbs with Val. Crossing the border with Ryan, Sarah, and Val, almost passing out at the wheel from the horrible sunburn I picked up in Baja. Telling jokes to Lee while we built furniture for Bombay. Dancing with Jen, Jessie, and Linda Kuhlman at a country dance bar. Driving out into the mountains and lying in my truck bed with Deb and Sarah P, looking at the stars and talking about life. I've been here almost 4 years and I have so many memories. But my life here is over now. I have a new life waiting for me somewhere else. I won't look back, but I'll take a little piece of LA with me where ever I go.

I can't say I left my mark on this town but I hope I left my mark on some of its people. They left their mark on me.

Of Grandparents and Regrets

Originally posted on myspace December 30, 2005

I remember my maternal grandfather fondly. He and my grandmother lived in a large two story house in Magnolia Texas. The house was in the woods, recessed about fifty yards from the road and enclosed by pine trees. There was a porch that spanned the entire front of the house, and was also two story so that there was an upstairs porch over the lower one. My grandparents had it built in the sixties, but by the time I came around it felt ancient. The whole house was built out of dark thick heavy wood. The outside was painted a shade of green that was originally a sea-foam. Time and weather had darken some areas, lightened others so that the house looked like a moss covered hill that had the front carved away into a sheer face. The base of the porch was concrete as the foundation slab extended out. Hanging from the rafters of the porch was a chair. The chair was a black leather piece, with firm armrests. The legs were gone and it hung from chains about two and a half feet from the ground. Lining the wall of the house at its base was a collection of wooden and clay carvings. Mostly masks with pointed teeth and bulls with broken horns, this small audience of immobile watchers observed the forest with a fixed eye. Also hanging from the rafters of the porch were several hanging plants, a birdfeeder or two, and some wooden wind chimes. Wooden wind chimes do not ring, nor do they tingle; instead the give a hollow thunking noise. It was the only noise outside at my grandparents house. The wind didn’t rustle the leaves, but it teased the wooden wind chimes erratically. But for this, the woods were silent; still. In lighter moments the sound conjured a troop of gnomes dancing slowly in wooden shoes; in darker moments I envisioned a blind witch gliding through the forest gently rapping on trees with her cane, searching for the house and a meal of grandchild.

The front door of the house was a large solid wooden affair stained black. In the center was a pewter head of a Mayan priest, his earrings meeting under his chin to form a knocker. The interior of the house was carpeted in a brown shag, only slightly lighter than the wood paneling. The furniture was of wrought iron and dark wood in the style of Spanish missions. The fireplace was on the right as you entered the house. It was large and perpetually black with soot. The fire was kept going in the winter. My grandparents smoked constantly, and the house had a permanent haze that turned reality surreal. They went to Mexico frequently, and my grandmother had knickknacks and curios spread throughout the house of the most odd sort. A sleeping Mexican in a sombrero next to a dried lizard husk. Woody Woodpecker on top of a rattlesnake’s rattle. A stuffed crow. Pictures of matadors were everywhere, as were bulls. For a young boy it was creepy but thrilling. There always seemed to be closets unexplored, things unexamined. Curiosities for the curious. My grandfather sat in the swing/chair on the porch frequently. He was a bald man of medium height, perhaps 5’8” no more than 5’10”. The remaining hair that ringed his pate was still jet black and trimmed close. He was always clean-shaven though if I remember he had a horrible five o’clock shadow. Rotund in the middle, but by no means fat, he maintained an air of energy in spite of his careful movements. I remember his laugh the most. He always seemed to be laughing. He paid quite a bit of attention to me but never in a condescending way. He never spoke down to me, never changed his voice, spoke to me in the same manner he spoke to everyone adult or child. Most of my memories of him are from before the age of seven. He wore slacks and a white short-sleeved dress shirt. He always had a pen and his glasses case in his breast pocket. The swing out front was his chair, and his alone but he let me sit in it. Not once in all my memories did he show himself to be anything other than warm and loving. It wasn’t until later that I first heard the word alcoholic.

Jack Correu (my grandfather) was born in Laredo Texas, the son of Daniel Correu (my brother’s namesake). Daniel Correu was a doctor who came over from Mexico. My grandfather was extremely upset that he apparently had Mexican blood, and to his dying day thought his lineage was “tainted”. His brother, my great uncle Lawrence who officiated over my wedding, proved this to be false. Two brothers fled Spain for unknown reasons, although the family theory involves the priesthood. One went to South America, supposedly the reluctant priestly candidate, and the other settled in Cuba. He took a Cuban wife, and his son took a Cuban wife as well. This son took his wife to Mexico and had my great grandfather. Daniel Correu hopped the border into Texas and settled in Laredo. Uncle Lawrence went to Spain a few years back and found an old farm house called the Correu Farm. He was overjoyed to have traced his ancestors, and there the story of the Correus ends as far as my family is concerned. My grandfather grew up in Laredo, and went to war in World War 2. It is from his side of the family that I get my hearing loss, and he passed the hearing tests in the air force by bribing the officiators. I don’t know exactly what he did or what rank he held. For some reason I think he worked with or in bombers.

My grandmother was in the army. I don’t know if they met in the War or after. She was named Katherine Funkenhauser (Sp?) but everyone called her Kitty. She was born in Virginia but wound up in Texas after the War, suggesting that she met my grandfather during the War. I think I still have a great aunt or uncle in Virginia somewhere. I don’t know for sure, we had no interaction with my grandmother’s family that I’m aware of. My grandmother was a nurse stationed in Germany. The nurses got to ride in the back of transports, and the G.I.s walked in file behind. They had a small contingent of men that walked in front of the trucks and threw the bodies onto the side of the road, the reasoning being that it was unsanitary for the troops to walk through the muck after the transports had rolled over the bodies. One day while traveling down a dusty farm road in this manner, the distance sounds of gunfire could be heard. My Grandmother was frightened. Women, especially nurses, were not allowed to bear arms which caused her to be anxious at times. After hearing the gunfire she asked the G.I. walking behind the truck if he would get her a gun. He stripped a Ruger pistol off of a German officer lying beside the road and gave it to her. She kept it through the war, and gave it to me about ten years ago. I’ve still got it though my father keeps it for me.

It wasn’t the only memento she brought back. She also brought back a purple cloth covered with silver swastikas that she took from a Hitler Youth podium. And her notes. She was with the first medical group to enter into a concentration camp. I can’t remember which camp, but it was the third largest. She was asked to be a scribe and took notes while the captain of the liberating soldiers interrogated the Nazi Colonel who was in charge of the camp. She keep her notes. It’s chilling to read. Ten thousand dead by gas on Tuesday. Two thousand dead by firing squad on Wednesday. My mother brought the podium cloth and the notes to school when I was in the fifth grade, to give a lecture on World War 2. I had heard about WW2, read about it, and talked about it. But it wasn’t truly real until I heald that podium cloth in my hands. This was history. This was reality. It wasn’t in a book, wasn’t on TV, it wasn’t even in a museum behind a protective glass.

It was in my hands.

However they met, my grandparents had three kids. My mother, the oldest, and my Aunt Susan and my Uncle Jack. And my grandfather was an alcoholic. He would fly into drunken rages. He threw things. He was extremely verbally abusive. I don’t know if he was ever physically abusive, but I do know his kids were punished with the belt.

When my folks got married, my grandmother started bringing my grandfather over to my parents house when he was too drunk for her to control. It climaxed when she brought him and he was roaring drunk in the front yard on a Saturday, raving at the top of his lungs. My father, in a fury, flew out of the house and physically forced him into the car. My mother was terrified that dad was going to physically beat him. She told my grandmother that they weren’t welcome anymore. I don’t think my grandfather ever came back to the house. He certainly didn’t while I was alive. Interestingly enough, my father has never said a harsh word about my grandfather. Whatever his opinion is, he guards it around me and Daniel. The harshest thing I think he’s said was “Like all drunks, your grandfather could be an asshole.” He didn’t say it with vehemence. He just said it. For his part my grandfather loved my father enormously. He was so proud and fond of his son in law.

When I was just going into middle school my grandfather drank himself into such a stupor that he poisoned himself. Alcohol poisoning. When they revived him a good portion of his mind was gone. He took up residence in a nursing home and was bedridden for the remainer of his life. He had dementia. I saw him annually through the years. He reacted to Daniel at first, but we realized he thought my brother was his father. He lost the ability to speak. A year later he lost the ability to make noises, to vocalize. Then one day the last of his brain quietly gave up. He slipped into a coma. They fed him through a tube. From the moment he first went into the nursing home until the end my grandmother visited him every single day.

My grandmother loved me so much. She lived for the moments when I visited her. She would clip the crossword puzzles and the jokes from the kids section of the Houston Chronicle and save them for me. And I was a little indifferent. My dad’s parents gave me G.I. Joes. This grandma gave me bits of old newspaper. Everyday she clipped stuff she thought I would like. She went on walks in the woods and brought back skulls and teeth. Feathers she had found. She carefully placed them in tins or small cloth bags and saved them for me. Oh I was appreciative, but I just saw some junk. Interesting, but junk none the less. I never stopped to think about the time she put into those gifts. Or how alone she was, by herself in the woods in a moldering old house.
She visited my grandfather everyday. Sometimes twice a day. Before he lost the powers of speech, he interacted with her. For her he became lucid. And when he spoke to her, he knew her. Over the years she became confused. My Uncle Jack moved in with her. She was diagnosed with Alzheimer’s. We would visit her, or mom would bring her out to us. She would sit quietly with a smile. One day in the middle of the conversation she looked at my brother and said, “You’re Daniel.” Then she looked upset. I realize we had all gone silent and she though she had said the wrong thing. Daniel reached out and took her hand and gave her a big warm smile and said, “Yes grandma. I am.” My mother tried to make it to the bathroom before she start crying. She failed.

My grandfather had been in a coma for ten years with no improvement. For that whole time he had been fed through a tube. After conferring with the doctors my mother began to ask her aunts, her uncles, and her siblings if it was time to let him go. They shied from the question, avoided it, and said they’d support mom whatever her decision. In the end, my mother all alone took the responsibly. She signed the papers. The feeding tube was removed. At the moment of action, in the nursing home, she turned to her mother and tried to explain what was about to happen and why. My grandmother cut her off, placed her hand on my mother’s, and said simply, “I understand.” It took my grandfather a month and a half to starve to death. The doctors said they had never seen a man with such vitality.

My mother knows she did the right thing. And in the back of her eyes in quite moments, you can see the price she paid for doing the right thing.

A couple of years ago I went to my mother and asked her about my grandfather. All my memories of him were of this loving warm man. A man with a jolly laugh. And all the stories I had heard painted him as an abusive alcoholic. So I asked my mom, did he have any good qualities? I was desperate to find that jolly laugh in the memories of another. To affirm my memories. To see if I had inherited any traits from him besides a taste for alcohol. My mother took a long pause. And then she began to talk. And the other half of the man, my grandfather, came into view. He was known for his honesty. He never cheated on anything, for any reason. He was never in debt his whole life. He never borrowed money. When he gave his word, he kept it, regardless of the consequences. He refused to participate in anything, including conversations, that he though was unjust. He had a firm personal code of honor that he refused to compromise. But most powerful of all, my mother said he had more capacity for love than any man she’d ever met. And that he loved me very much. My grandmother now moved into a nursing home. Mom put her in one close by her (my mother’s) house. Mom said she always asked about me. Slowly my grandmother’s health failed.

People talk about love. What is it? How do you know when you’re in love? And I am often accused of being unromantic, a cynic when it comes to love. Do you want to know what love really is? Because I’ve seen it. Love is fighting through dementia, love is somehow when you have lost even your identity, being able to look at some one and know I love you. When you know only one thing, not your name, not your past, not even how to speak, you know only one thing: I love this person. Being in love is never having nothing. Don’t talk to me about passion, about love at first sight, of feeling sad when someone’s gone. True love is about always having the ability to feel that love. Always.

My grandmother did not survive my grandfather long. She didn’t make it through the year.

I didn’t visit her once.



And now I never can.

Val's Brush with Nature

Originally posted on myspace September 23, 2005

This past weekend I had the opportunity to go camping in the high sierras, an opportunity I took with enthusiasm. So Saturday morning I set out with Val (my lovely wife), Johanna, and Max. After a five hour drive we arrived at the state park. Having tag teamed with Johanna, I was driving and I pulled us up to the entrance booth. It was a small tan shack occupied by an elderly woman who wore her uniform with pride. We exchanged brief pleasantries and I paid the entrance fee and was rewarded with a small bundle of papers. It was my receipt, a complementary map, and typical "don't litter, don't burn the place down, yes the bears will eat you" literature. As there were a few cars behind us, I only gave the papers a cursory glance and handed them over to Valerie.

Valerie didn't take them. I put the car in gear and gave the hand holding the papers a shake to get Val's attention. "Jake. Jake" Val said quietly. Frowning, trying to watch behind and in from as I began to pull away from the booth with one hand, I leaned over with the intention of putting the papers in her lap. Valerie screamed. Not a typical scream but a blood curdling I'm-getting-murdered-by-bigfoot-in-a-haunted-castle scream. Slamming on the breaks I looked over at my wife. Val looked as if she was trying to exit the car ass first through the keyhole. She had stood up, no mean feat in a car, and her eyes were as big as dinner plates while tears of terror streamed unchecked down her face. Perched on top of the papers in my hand was an immense black spider. I didn't actually see the spider, when the car screeched to a halt it bailed andwas lost in the depths of the vehicle. Val immediately jumped out of the car and hopped around in a circle crying hysterically. After a minute she composed herself, and got back in the car. To her credit the fact that it was still in the car somewhere did not phase her and we arrived at the campsite without further incident. She enjoyed the trip and was able to joke about her experience.

I love my girl.

Where were you?

Originally posted on myspace August 30, 2005

It was a relatively sunny September morning, and I was sleeping in as usual. Suddenly I was rudely awakened by my roommate. This was an odd occurance as Andrew (the roommate in question) and I rarely spoke. The two of us lived in a campus apartment just across the street from the dorms. While we got along well, we really had nothing in common and seldom took notice of the other beyond simple courtesies. He gently but urgently shook me awake. I threw a glance at the clock, normally I would not be rolling out of bed to stumble slovenly into class for another hour or two.

"You've got to see this Jake."

Sensing his mood, I arose without response, threw on token clothing, and followed him into the livingroom. The TV was on and a newscaster was screaming his report, but I didn't notice. My world was silent as I was captured by the image on the screen: an airplane hanging out the side of an office building. The World Trade Center to be exact. For a moment we two college boys with nothing in common felt a bond as we stared in shock. Not a word was spoken. Not a breath stirred.

I quietly left the room and got dressed. The ride was a short one and five minutes later my beat up old station wagon came to a rest on Jack street. I walked up to Misha's apartment and saw that the gang was already there. There were no smiles, no cheerful greetings for a friend, instead there was a silent acknowledgement as they met my gaze with wizened eyes. There were many there but I only remember the presence of a few: Chris, Morgan, Adam Bires. I don't remember if Justin was there, I'm sure he must have been. Chris and I sat in silence on the porch for a time, and when we talked it wasn't with anger or hate or worry, but with regret. The two of us mourned an era.

I remember Morgan because she empathized with our attackers, a stance many of us considered inappropriate at the time. But she wasn't being radical, or anti-establishment; she was merely reminding us that the opposition had a story, and that the majority of those who would recieve blame were blameless, that an entire culture would take the fall for a group. She had odd ideas about things, did Morgan, and her perspective was often viewed as bizarre. Maybe she intuitively saw what was to come. Maybe not.

I can remember being angry with her. She had spent the majority of her life in Africa and I was certain that she was so far removed from contiental American thinking that she could hardly be considered a citizen. She didn't understand what I felt, what I could feel in those around me. And in hindsight I truely don't know if she understood our grief, our terror. But I do know that she cared, that she was moved.

The day wore on and we all began to go our seperate ways. As Adam Bires walked out he stopped and clasp my hand. Adam has always had an air of tradgety about him. Few of his stories flatter himself, rather the contrary, and failure haunts him in his own mind to this day. And this man, this tragic man, clasped my hand on his way out and paused to meet my gaze. And a sad smile crept on his face. It was gone in an instant, but that instant was all I needed. It could only have come from a man like Adam Bires, a man who saw himself as tragic; a man who lived under a self-imposed cloud of guilt and failure. My world had been sent rocking, and Adam reached out and steadied it. With that one sad smile he said: tomorrow is another day.

In idle conversation today, September 11th was brought up. The original topic was the current catastrophe, hurricane Katrina, and conversation had wandered about the calamities of the past decade until arriving at 9-11. A common question for my parents generation is "Where were you when you heard JFK had been shot?" So in eery tradition the same question has been oft posed to my generation concerning 9-11. And so it was today. When asked where I was on 9-11, I am proud to quietly repy:

In the company of friends.

Home Again Home Again Jiggity Jog

Originally posted on myspace August 23, 2005

So, I'm married now. To those of you who were at the wedding, thank you so much for attending. To those of you who were not: It broke my heart not to be able to invite everybody. Unfortunately the fire marshall had some crazy ideas about how many people could be in that one building, and Val has more family than Father Abraham. The whole experience was lovely, and thank god it's over.

Ladies if you want to cure cold feet just involve the groom in some wedding decisions. I promise by week two the only thought in his head will be "elope". I offered to Val's dad. He and I were in the back seat of his car and Val and her mother were riding up front. I turned to him and said, "By my count, you're going to spend about $##### dollars on this wedding." "That's about right" he said. "Tell you what," I rejoined, "if you pay me half now, in cash or check, we'll elope tommorrow." Mr. Father-In-Law's face split into a smile as he reached for his check book, and then he and I both noticed that the temperature had dropped about 60 degrees. I snuck a glance up front and met Val's eyes. Her look could have curdled cream. It was horrifying, but it spared me from seeing her mom who was radiating murderous intent. I don't know what that woman looked like in that instance, but Lord knows I'm a better man for having missed it. Needless to say, the wedding went as planned.

And it was wonderful. Everything we had hoped for. As was the honeymoon.

Now we're back in L.A., re-settling after a two-week absence. There's something odd about coming home. My parent's house always felt like home, no matter where I was living at the time. After the honeymoon, Val and I stayed at my parents for two nights before driving back to L.A.. And suddenly, it wasn't home any more. Our parents (both mine and Val's) treated us different. It was very subtle, I don't think they knew they were doing it, but there was a detachment there. Somehow our status changed in the eyes of our parents; maybe it was a new found respect of privacy, or a final nail in the coffin of our childhood. Whatever it was there was an unspoken cutting of ties, an air of "my work here is done". And in that realization, that turbulent groping for realignment of relationship between parents and children, I could not help but feel orphaned. Not in a negative way by any means, but suddenly my home, my place of security and being for that majority of my life wasn't mine anymore. It has become my parent's home, and I just a visitor, a stranger on familiar shores-- welcomed, accepted, but no longer belonging. Val tells me she feels the same way about her parent's home, and in that first night in Houston after the honeymoon we held each other and she cried softly in my arms as feelings of sadness tinted our new found joy.

The drive back was exhausting as we drove straight through the night, taking turns driving. It was with the relief of the weary that we stumbled into our Van Nuys apartment. As one we collapsed on the bed and Val said, "We're home." And laying there, dog tired, I realized she was right. This dingy apartment felt like home. And once more, it was ours; we had built it together, arranged the furniture, fixed the leaks, tiled the porch. Somehow, as we cast aside the strings of the old, the new, which had been there all along, was able to burst forth in it's own glory un-shadowed, un-challenged by wistful memory. I reached out my hand, finding hers amid the rumpled comforter, and clasp it tightly. "Yes", I said, "we're home."

Security Blanket

Originally posted on myspace August 22, 2005:

Everybody had an object of affection in their childhood. The most common is a stuffed animal of some kind, the teddy bear being the most recognizable from a traditional stand point although it has fallen into disuse with the passing of time and the influx of variety. My brother went the conservative route and was deeply attached to his stuffed bear. For my part I had a child's blanket, what is commonly referred to as a "security blanket" or a "silkie". Both he and I devoted considerable amount of affection to these objects. I don't know why some are more attached to these toys than others; we were raised in a very loving environment and never wanted for attention.

My blanket was made by my grandmother, a small frail woman with a wry sense of humor. I remember her most sitting in her rocking chair softly singing to herself, tiny wax paper hands tapping in rhythm. As a child she was something of a tomboy. The family lived on a farm in Louisianna, and her older brothers used to win money betting that their kid sister could out-shoot any challengers. No one would have guessed that those tiny wax paper hands were once a crack-shot with a 22. She died a few years back, quietly passing on in the night, my grandfather holding her hand. Her funeral was the second and last time I ever saw my father cry, his big bear body hunched over in the oak pew of the little white funeral home. Face in his hands, tears running down the back of his hand. My great uncle Ed, my grandmother's brother, sat next to my father with red eyes and the occasional suppressed sob wracking his body. Two towering boulders of men, reduced to mud by the quiet passing of a dried leaf. Meanwhile my grandfather stood over the proceedings with a calmness that I took comfort in. He had a firm handshake and warmth in his sad smile as he moved amoung the mourners. He was a twisted root of magnolia wood, browned and hunched by years of labor in the hot Louisianna sun. Where the boulders were reduced to mud, he floated. Only once did I see him falter, as he turned and walked away from the little white funeral home. A path he had walked many times before in good company, now he walked in solitude.

The blanket itself was patchwork and backed by that smooth soft material that such blankets are commonly made of. The material folded over the edges of the outermost patches, making a smooth edge for the blanket. While my brother Daniel was able to use his Teddy as a confidant, a companion, my blanket did not lend itself to personification instead being more of a force than a personality. My earliest memories are of lying down and running my hands along the edges of my blanket. By placing the edge in my palm, I was able to use my thub to feed the material through my hand; an action I find soothing even to this day. While it didn't have a personality, I drew strength from my blanket, taking courage in it's presence. It didn't speak to me and I didn't speak to it, but there was a sense of primal communication. Slowly as I grew older the blanket became an object of purity and demanded of me a certain morality of action. Once I was old enough to talk I found that I could not bring my self to lie in it's presence, not even by omission. Nor could I mistreat my brother as I was often wont to do. In sight of the blanket no wrongs went unnoticed, and suddenly all things fell into right and wrong, true and false.

By the time I had reached middle school I had set aside my toys as well as anything that I decided was childish as I was eager to advance to the psuedo-adultism that was teenager. My blanket however remained in my bed. I did not devote near as much attention to it, and I certainly did not drag it behind me everywhere I went as I had pre-elementary, but it remained at hand if only in my sleep. As I made my way into high school it was ignored but was still present in my room. I remember on one occasion my mother expressed concern, wondering if there was some sort of developmental deliquincy in my personality due to the fact that I still had my blanket. By now my brother's Teddy had been boxed away as friends replaced the stuffed toy's role as confidant and companion. I angrily rebuffed my mother, upset and offended. When she brought it up again though, some six months later, I uncerimoniously folded my blanket up, now a tattered rag due to years of loving abuse, and put it away in my closet. And there it stayed, ignored and avoided as I went about the business of becoming an adult.

The first time I saw my father cry was just after high school. In childhood I regarded my parents as parahuman. Slowly as I matured I recognized that my mother had flaws as well as strengths and my thinking gradually adjusted as my mother became more and more human in my perception. My father however remained a towering boulder. He had flaws, but his flaws seemed somehow titanic as if he were a Greek God. I could recognize his faults but somehow they failed to humanitize him, and he remained an Icon, as much of a symbol of manhood and fatherhood as a person. Until one lazy sunday morning at my parents house when my view of my father was shattered. I was home for the summer from my first year of college and was awoken suddenly by my mother. Her eyes full of concern she told me that she was worried about dad. I went downstairs and met him in the backyard where he was pacing about, clutching his chest. He told me he was having a pain in his chest, said it felt like an iron spike had been driven into him. My mother joined us and then insisted that dad call the nurse hotline that was on his insurance card. He agreed, which tells anyone who knows him that he was really hurting. Normally my father refuses to see or talk to doctors if he can avoid it. Now up until this point my father had only four emotions that I could discern: happy, angry, dissappointed, and proud. He walked away from my mother and I and had a muffled coversation with the nurse hotline. He came back to us with a steady expression on his face. "What did they say?" my mother asked. My father replied, "Well they said that I..." and my father cracked. His face contorted and tears ran un-checked down his cheeks. In between sobs he choked out that the nurse had told him that he needed to go to the hospital because he may be having a heart attack. I was shocked to the very core of my being as I realize that my dad was terrified. I had never even allowed for the possibility that my dad could be scared and all of a sudden here he was. Not a boulder, not a Greek God, not an Icon, but a man; a frail flawed, terrified man. My mother was afraid for him, but she went to him and did her best to comfort him. A voice unbidden sprang from my lips and I heard myself say, "Come on. We'll take dad's car." My parents got in the back seat together and I drove them to the hospital. I can remember thinking that I was taking care of my father. Where my whole life he had taken care of me-- in one instant our roles were reversed. He had good cause to be scared, heart disease runs in his family and only a few years before one of his favorite uncles was killed by a heat attack. But for me I had no foundation, and looked at the world from the eyes of one who is responsible, instead of one who is a responsibility. It was determined at the hospital that my father had a bad case of indigestion.

Several times over the years I would go into my closet, often looking for something or storing away, and I would chance upon my blanket. And every time as my eyes fell on it I would feel a twinge of guilt. Guilt for abandoning it, for leaving it to collect dust in a dark corner of my closet. But I had moved on, I had grown up, and the blanket stayed where it was.

I left the family homestead, the world of my friends, my past, my family behind and moved to L.A. Shortly after Val (now my wife) followed, and she and I began carving out a life together. Most things that I left behind had been shoved in my closet, and as my parents slowly absorbed what used to be my old room this became a problem. So an unspoken agreement was struck, and now everytime I return to Houston I throw some things away and bring some things back with me. On one such trip I rediscovered my blanket, neatly folded on the top-most shelf. I brought it back with me and now it resides in mine and Val's bed, or next to it. I'm no longer concerned with the trappings of adulthood and take no embarrassment from it's presence. But it no longer is a security blanket, and every time I touch it I have a bittersweet feeling of loss. Loss for my childhood, my innocence perhaps; for a period of my life where a simple piece of cloth could banish my fears and make me feel safe in all ways. On refection I have found that I have lost many security blankets as I go through life. And I've picked up new ones. I call my friends in Texas on a regular basis and we talk about our doings maintaining an illusion that we are still part of each others lives. And we are, just not to the extent that we were, and both sides struggle to pretend that I'm not out here, and they're not back there. I take comfort in the presence of my wife Val, in our conversations and the moments we share together. But it is a two-edged sword for she takes comfort from me as well, and a balance has to be maintained. I continue my escapism habits of reading, video games, and role-playing; they have served me well through most of my life. But this is a hollow safety, for reality constantly makes itself known no matter how far I retreat into fantasy. With each of these blankets comes apprehension, because I never lose sight of the fact that once gone, it can never be reclaimed.