I'm Also Gonna Drop Mad Scrilla On PBR

So I'm heading to China on Tuesday. Kinda mind blowing when I stop and think about it. Not so much that China is in and of itself mind-blowing. I mean its just a country after all.

Its just wonderful that this is my life right now. I'm just about as free as a body can be and I'm doing something to realize that freedom. This is the upside to being without a real home. This is the upside to having all that money I whored myself out to get. At least until Oct. 17th I can go where I please and do as I please and have the resources to do so.

All too often I get caught up in missing a stable life. I miss having a home and a group of people around me that I love. But I also forget the responsibilities and mundane-ness that go hand in hand with the comfort and security.

And so for the near future I'm going to do the best I can to enjoy my transient life. I'm going to live out of the bag on my back, drink whatever's presented, sleep on whatever couch is offered, kiss which ever pretty girl will have me, bathe whenever possible, hop any train, plane or boat at hand and not stress about anything.

Home Front Update:

Got visa for China trip. (CHECK)
Drunk moonbounce.
Bought clothes. (CHECK)
Gave self head injury. (FAIL)
Day drank with JPo

Fucking A I love NoVA

Sometimes Love Don't Feel Like It Should

Once when I was younger than 10 Ralph, Liz and I were driving in R-Unit's car. We were heading down 123 toward home, near Westwood listen to an Oldie's station and a Mellencamp song came on. It was "Jack and Diane". Almost out of nowhere he asks Liz if she thinks its a happy song. She listens for a second and he asks me. I ask him what he means by 'happy song' and right then Liz answers in the affermative.
She says she thinks its a happy song because Jack and Diane are doing the best they can and love each other and some other retarded shit.
I damn near hopped over the seat and hit my dear sister. It became so horribily clear to me after 30 seconds that J&D was one of the most depressing songs ever written. It says in plain black and white that life goes on even after the thrill of living has gone. Then says to hold on to 16 as long as you can. Its a lament to lost youth and the irony of being young. We all want to grown up and move on, yet once we get there we kinda want to go back.
Of course I know Mellencamp is not of the same caliber of the Boss or many other bards who say the same shit in different ways. But he has his own charm. Kind of a Dollar Store feeling that is so blatent (sp? I'm drunk) in its meaning you can't help but love it.

To Answer Your Second Question: 'Love' Is A Bit Strong Of A Word

My youngest brother just started Kindergarden at Westbriar. He was born when I was 17 and a Jr. at Madison. I love him to death, but its a bit of a trip to have potentially had a kid of my own years before he was born. I guess that's my way of saying that Paddy make me feel a bit old.
I started at Westbriar when I was in the 1st Grade. I can remember parts of it so clearly it scares me. Here I am at 22 and I still have the same two friends as I did 16 years ago.
And maybe 16 years isn't such a long time. Maybe after a while, after you get married and you have kids of your own 16 years goes by really fast. But I feel like the 16 years from 1st grade through turning 22 might just be the most eventful 16 years of a person's life. Maybe eventful is the wrong word; perhaps formative might be better.
In any case it just blows my mind to look down at Paddy and see something of myself. He's a real, growing person and if he's as lucky as I've been he'll meet some great friends that will always be there.

Who Can Say No To A Personal Letter?

Dear World,

I would really like it if you would please stop being such a bastard. Don't get me wrong, sometimes you're really great. I mean you provide us all with beer and sunshine and boobies and Teen Mom on MTV. But the whole giving-me-something-while-taking-away-another is really pissing me off. I get that we can't have it all, but maybe you could work on giving me things that go well together as opposed to not.
Its like a game of Scrabble. You keep giving me vowels, which are needed, but most of the time they're pretty useless without a consonant or two. Ease up on the E's and toss me a few S's or T's.
Honestly World, am I so bad to you? I try not to litter. I don't drive a car or dump toxic waste in the ocean. I attempt to apreciate your roundness and infinite mystery. I'm against another World War. I liked Pluto, but if you think that little asshole with an elipitcal orbit just isn't in the same category as you then I'm with you, World. Fuck Pluto!
So please with all due respect, back the fuck off and stop fucking hassling me.

Yours,
M. Nappi

It Looks Like A Background From Micosoft Power Point

Say what you want about El Paso; its hot, dusty, dry, boring, isolated, hostile, dangerous, ect. but damned if right around sunset it doesn't get a thousand times better.
The sun fades behind the Franklin mountains to the west while the clouds and the wind roll in from the south. The breeze is dry, but cools things off while the clouds give off lots of lightning but no thunder. The western sky always turns all kinds of pink and red and orange, silhouetting every peak of the whole range.
Come around sunset its always perfect weather to sit outside and have a beer, smoke the day's last cigarrette and relax in the breezy air.

I often miss the warm, wet summer nights at home. The air is like blankets, smothering sounds and giving everything a steamy feel that makes you want to have sex outdoors.
I often miss the freezing winter nights of Shippensburg where the air cuts your lungs and stings your face and smells so clean. Its so quiet you can hear nothing moving, no one awake for miles.
I often miss the sunrise out in the empty, flat desert where the sun breaks over the horizion in a split second all at once. Grey pre-dawn gives way to glaring sunlight in the space of a single breathe and shoots rays of light right into your eyes.
And I suppose when I've left this god damned place I'll find myself missing the wonderful sunset that always seems to be a fitting end to whatever kind of day I've had.

Being A Real Person List Ver. 1

• Drink less
• Sleep more
• Smoke less
• Run more
• Get a car?
• File tax returns
• Apply to college
• Pay cable bill from last year
• Less head trauma/fall down less
• Spend money wiser
• Buy clothes
• Do laundry
• Plan things more than 48 hours in advance
• Figure out what to do with my life

Seems like a pretty good start.

I'm On Fire

You ever read a book or watched a movie or listened to a song that you wish would just keep going? Not keep going forever, but just last a little longer. Two more chapters, one more scene, thirty more seconds. Anything to keep it from being over right then.

For me it happens most often in music and it takes one of two forms. Either the song is slow and understated and you never understand how so much was conveyed in so short a time frame. You expect some epic ballad of Led Zepplin/Journey length that is five minutes minimum, but instead you have a Tom Petty & the Heartbreakers sort of thing. Short and sweet and leaving you wanting another verse or two.
On the other hand, and more common, is an explosion of big sound that goes for the throat from the first beat and ends just as quick. Often with guitars being smashed and someone bleeding. Think the Ramones or Fight Like Apes; masters of delivering a severe musical beatdown in two and a half minutes that leaves you jonesing worse than a meth-head the day after rehab.

Maybe that's what makes those sort of things so great; they leave you wanting more. They never drag on or overstay their welcome. They show up, say what needs to be said and head for the door.
But maybe not. Maybe in a perfect world we get to keep the things we love and they never grow old. We never have to move away or break up or lose touch. We never come back to find that everything we knew is different and while we weren't looking the world went and spun around a few times on us.

Either way though the best thing about books and films and music is you can always rewind your favorite part, re-read your favorite book and set your iTunes to repeat.

Hell Of A Time To Cut Back On My Drinking...

Booze is really great at getting me to not think about things. Pretty much anything can be kept a bay with a bottle of gin, at least for a while. So this whole new sober-weekdays idea is getting a trial by fire. Damn it damn it fucking damn it.
Now I want to break something.

It Doesn't Matter Where You Been, As Long As It Was Deep

I honestly think Sid is wrong about things this time. Granted I thought Sid was wrong about it last time, when he was actually pretty much spot on. But (and no disrespect to my dearest Sidney) I feel safe in knowing Sid being correct about this type of shit is an abberation. Simply stated; there is no way he's right twice in a row.
I suppose however this is my fault in the end anyway. Linds seems to think so. How the hell am I supposed to know? Or is that just a bullshitting lie. Do I really know but just ignore the signposts? I also prefir Lind's alternate take; the gods hate me.
But here I am again, thrusting blame away from myself with both hands. At least I'm sober today...
Anyway what am I whinning about? I had a great weekend and I go home for a whole month on Friday. That's more time off than I have had since ever. Suck it up and move on, self.

Always Go To The Party. Always

I love un-spiced rum. It tends to make me reflective in a good way. Sometimes I envy people whose lives seem to have been filled with adventure and such. I feel they have really sucked the marrow from their time here and it shows. They have medals and memoirs and wrinkles and scars. They have stories and pictures of places and people most of us will never see.
But sometimes I realize that we all live amazing lives. Even trivial instances echo forever in our souls and make us who we are.
I never understood people who claim to live life like there was no tommrow. Its just not possible and that's ok, so why lie about it? I have made mistakes, some HUGE some (thankfully) less so. If I could go it again I'd change shit. But I really only have one full-on regret. The rest of my mistakes I look at this way:
I did the best I could. I made the choices I made with information I had and the feeling in my gut. I didn't know then what I know now, so why beat myself up about it? Just finding your way through life one day at a time is an acheivement worth note. Getting up and going out into the world is an adventure, because no matter what you're not quite sure how its going to end. That's why I always carry my passport and knife with me; you never know.
Life itself is an adventure.

Must Be Da Money

WE ARE ALL GOING TO BE ALRIGHT.

They Also Really Like Andre

I really like Richmond. Every single time I've gone down there, from my first visit through my most recent it has been nothing but kind to me. Great people, great parties, great chilling, great food, great shit to do, great porches, great music, and for the most part great conversations. Its a wonderful place and if it were a girl I'd finger it.

That being said...

Sometimes I find myself in the most insane conversations. And not really the good kind. The kind where someone tells me they "don't like water". They were being truthful. I swear to shit they said they did not like water.
Another time when I surveyed a pick-up truck full of girls what was worse; being an alcoholic or being a heroin addict, they all agreed that being addicted to smack was better than being an alky. Heroin. They would all rather shoot an opiate into their arm then get sucked into a bottle. They all came to this conclusion, I later found out, without ever trying heroin, nor ever meeting a scag addict. But they still thought it better than drinking. The stunner here for me was we were all riding in the back of the pick-up truck on our way to a lake to drink all day.

Now I don't really blame the RVA for this. I've had some stupid conversations all over this world, but I can honestly say no one is ever more earnest than in the River City. Which I suppose is a good thing. They don't equivocate or fuck around. They think something and stick to it. So good for them. I just hope they stay hydrated.