Squeezed, Spanked, and Screaming

Today, being Easter, and given last weeks topic, I will talk about Easter a little, and something we all have experienced but not one of us remembers... Birth. Sorta bookend the whole "life" thingy. Last week was "Point B", today is "Point A".

This will not be a long blog. I am not a fan of birth. This planet is a tad crowded as is. I have heard that at our current rate of consumption, we would need 57 more Earths to sustain the population. Since we do not have more Earths, we can only control one part of that equation. I might get more into that next weekend as Saturday is the last Earth Day... Pretty sure it will be outlawed by the current administration.

I know that there are emotions I missed out on because I did not spread my seed. I have heard more than one parent croon about how once their child looked up at them, how "Everything changed."

Yeah. Everything like: Finances - Do you know how much they cost? Holy Shitballs!

Freedom - "No, we don't have a sitter, so go enjoy that once in a lifetime concert/event/something awesome."

Sleep schedules - Show me new parents and I will show you people who would murder for sleep.

Watching/Listening to anything at a decent volume - Once the monster is asleep, you DO NOT WAKE THE MONSTER.

Sex with your significant other - There IS the recovery period. Then, apparently, kids are blessed with a natural cock-blocking type radar. "We are go for penetration in t-minus 4. 3. 2..." "WAAAAAAAAAHHHHH!!!!"

Your relationship with your significant other - Some people tend to focus on their kids rather than their spouse, whom they hopefully have known a bit longer period of time. I call people who do that "Future Single Parents".

And what do you get? For the first two years or so, your only job is making sure the creation does not get broken. No return policy and all that. The warranty on those things sucks as well. 

After that, a contest of wills for, oh, say, the next sixteen years. I was at a severe disadvantage in that department. My parents are (NOTE: NOT PAST TENSE!) a united front. One on one was an almost impossible proposition and an exploitable opportunity rarely presented.

Also, during those formative years, there will be a period where YOU, THE PARENT, THE PROVIDER OF ALL THEY POSSESS, THE SHELTER-ER, THE VERY HAND THAT FEEDS, will be viewed as an enemy, as you "ruin their life!".

I am not the type to let shit go, like being told, nay, having "I HATE YOU!" screamed at me. If that were to happen a couple times a year, I can totally see me buying a varying array of different sized boxes in December. I would wrap each and every one of those boxes - and do so beautifully.

I would start filming as my offspring tore into each gift... only to find each box has a single piece of paper with "I hate you", and the calendar date it was verbally spewed at me, written on it. As the sobbing commenced, I would keep filming, and make them open each and every one.

Yes, I would put differing amounts of rocks or weight in the last couple of boxes... Ya know... Give em hope.

If I were to have a child, I am pretty sure that they would inherit all my worst characteristics... They would be an obnoxious, manipulative, little shit. It would have my own parents aligned against my by the time it was out of diapers.

So, it is probably a good thing I never had a kid... Sorry, Mom.

In the end, that is what is Easter is about... Birth/Rebirth. Bunnies are known for a couple of things... Voracious desire to propagate their species among them. Eggs as a symbol? Little heavy handed on the symbolism, wouldn't you say?

As many religions are quick to remind, "Go forth and get pro-creatin'!!!" I won't bore you with the details of how Easter is yet ANOTHER pagan holiday, from the way back, co-opted by the Carpenter Cult in order to be the "cool religion". That and sell chocolate. (But will provide the link!)

I do have good memories of Easter... Mom and Dad would hide plastic eggs with little clues in them that led to the next egg until the end, where a token/gift was waiting. This went on until I got older... I can now understand the hypocrisy of receiving Metallica's "Creeping Death" EP as a present on Easter... 

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Another reason I am just not that interested in Easter as a holiday... You get ZERO days off from work. It is always on a Sunday, so - BUPKISS! When Xmas is on a Sunday, I usually get the Friday before AND the Monday after off of work. Easter... NADA!

Lastly, something to trip on... I am a big believer in reincarnation, having met the same asshole twice. Now... people have said that when they feel they are dying, they see a tunnel of light... and all their relatives...

WHAT IF... 

That tunnel with a light at the end is the opening of your new Mom's birthing canal as you are being born... As oxygen hits your newly "infantized" brain, it causes a memory dump... Like a hard disc in your computer being overwritten and formatted. Wiped clean... As it does this, it causes memories to flash by... Like your whole life, flashing before your eyes...

OOH... It could be your SAME Mom's vag... Like we are just on a repetitive cycle... A Life Cycle version of "Groundhog's Day"... Doing the same life over until we get it right. Woah... Deja Vu explained... Trippy... 

Now we run,

d

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So A Priest Walks Into A Bar...

On this day of zombie worship, I thought it only fitting that I regale you, faithful reader, with my top three most blasphemous tales.

I am not saying I am proud of these... But... Truth be told, gun to the head... They do make me smile.

Coming in at number Three. Knock Knock.

I do not know if this counts as "blasphemous", but it is in the same ballpark... So, it was Easter weekend when I was in the USAF, and I was divorced from X1, so this puts it in 1997.

Being that I was drunk on most, if not all, of my awake hours when I was not in uniform, this is one of those rare stories that I can NOT start with the phrase, "So... we were drinking and..."

There was a lady in my shop, we will give her the made up name of Karla Melly. She was... "spirited" and believed in "free-love"... And like Simon & Garfunkel croon in "The Boxer", "There were times when I was so lonesome, I took some comfort there." (As did a lot of other guys in the shop...)

She had a very skewed moral compass at that time... It aligned with mine quite nicely, and we were good friends. So, when early April was nearing, she decided that I was the needed element in her mission...

"Hey, Dougie."

"Yo, Karla."

"You need to come with me to church on Easter Sunday."

See had a ritual that all the drinking, cavorting, and shenanigans would be eradicated from her "record" if she went to church on Easter and Christmas. Sort of a Bi-Annual cleansing... I weighed her dilemma... I took into account the fate of her immortal soul which hung in the balance and two milliseconds later...

"Um... No?"

"We will sin directly after. In the parking lot if ya want..."

"Kinky.. Okay."

So, in our Sunday best, and just a little hungover (NOT DRUNK!), we made our way to the base chapel.

Walking up, we could see through the little side windows that we were maybe two minutes late... I gave her the nod back to the car, indicating my willingness to bail. She was resolute and gave a shake of her head. She was set on her mission of atonement.

Not minutes before getting out of the car, I had remarked on how calm and serene the day was...

As we opened the doors, a gust of wind, Category 4 Hurricane force, out of FUCKING NOWHERE appears, as if we summoned it, and proceeds to extinguish EVERY. SINGLE. lit candle in the joint. There were many.

Was there a follow up gale? Was there a front on the horizon? Did the severe weather alert system go off?

Nope... Just the one.

The smoke in the air hanged for an eternity. The congregation looked at us. We looked back at them... I was kind of waiting for someone... ANYONE... to point and say "I cast thee out!!!" They never got the chance.

The bruises on my arm from where Karla death gripped and pull me out of the chapel and back to the parking lot were the only reminder of the incident... And I proudly displayed them to my fellow troops on Monday.

At the time, I was not the militant Atheist I am today. I was still in the "Identify As Christian but I have some serious doubts" camp. So, sadly, neither of us were much in the sinning mood after that little meteorological anomaly.

Unholy Shit aka Number Two... The Taste Test!

I would like to stress upfront that it was not me in this chapter who did the blaspheming... I just love the story. Oh, word of warning... Shit gets real graphic.

In the yule season of 2004, it was the first Xmas being divorced from X2. I was living in Waxahachie, Texas. Smoking like a chimney. Drinking like a fish.

Through the miracle of technology, a girlfriend of a friend introduced me to a nice young lady... Via myspace (The Facebook before Facebook). She was 20 years old. I was 32. Don't judge me... We all get ourselves something nice for Christmas... Mine just happened to be bendy and had a tongue ring.

For the next two or three weeks, we Netflixed and Chilled a lot... And since there was no Netflix, we did the later. Fun times.

I knew in my heart of hearts, there was no real future relationship, and I made sure she was informed of this, as well. I don't think a diagram or even four years of classes could have made her "understand" it. The fact that the "relationship" was on it's last legs came sharply into focus as we were cruising back to her place, and she remarked, "Those spinning rims on that truck are the COOLEST!"

Yeah... Start the countdown...

I think it was two days later, she informed me that she, "Could not continue our wicked ways."

So... My first thought was, "You mean our 'wicked AWESOME' ways!"... but went with, "Why is that?" instead.

"Because our Lord and Savior...." and that shit went on for a while. I tuned it out. She had left a few items at my apartment and came down that weekend to get them.

And you guessed it... We were wicked again.

I did not hear from her after a while. I checked a couple of her posts online and it looked like the Jeezy Creezy took hold this time.

Sooooooooo... Thursday. My friend, whose girlfriend did the introducing, and I are cruising up the Chili's for lunch. I was behind the wheel... and our conversation went like this...

"You seeing <Her name redacted> this weekend?"

"Nope... We are done."

"What happened???"

"She found Jesus."

"You mentioned that last week... Didn't she spend the night last Friday?"

"Yeah... she found him last week, but came down to get her shit... and... well..."

And then Elroy dropped the bomb...

"So... How does Jesus' cum taste?"

I fully expected the pit to Hell to open right in front of us and swallow us whole... And there was much swerving as I was laughing til my balls ached.

That's my boy, ELROY!

Number One With a Blessing

In the summer of 97, which puts back in Tacoma and in the USAF, we went out on a Friday night.

When I say "we", I mean there was anywhere from 10 to 20 of us from our shop heading to the same place to hang. "Espirit de Corps" they call it... We ran thick as thieves. Someone always had your back and there was always someone there to make sure EVERYONE made it home.

Some Sergeant heard of this town that had a "community hall" type thing. It was about 30 minutes out of Tacoma. I could not even begin to tell you where... We get there... and I know that I will be bored fuckless in about two minutes.

HEY LOOK!!! It's a diagram... I do apologize for it not being to scale...

Click to Embiggen!

The "X" marks the spot where we ended up. Someone was on the main stage "Blah Blah Blah"ing about something. In front of me, there were some napkins. White, paper napkins. I was admiring the fact they were not just some cheap ass paper napkins. One step below cloth napkins, I tells ya. Classy!

So, I am folding this napkin. And I realize that my black shirt had an interesting collar.

The red arrow is to indicate that the button for the "collar" was offset of the main button line...

So... I took my napkin... and folded it right over the "collar"...

My friend looked up and started tearing up with laughter.... "Holy shit. If it did not look so SPOT ON, it would not be as funny..." The rest of our group took notice... There was applause.

I stood up and said, "Who needs something from the bar?" Bets were made if I would wear it all the way up the bar and back...

I received our order, headed up to the bar. The bartender asked, "What'cha nee...." and then she looked up... gulped, "Father, what can I get for you?"

"Good evening, I need three Bud Lights, two Sam Adams, a Jack n Coke, and a pack of Marlboro Lights - shorts. We are at table 4... Can't miss us..."

"Ah... Ah...  All right..."

As I was headed back, feeling completely sacrilegious, I noticed that in one of the booths, there was a nice group of young ladies... I also noticed the booths all had pitchers of water...

So... I stopped... Turned, and dipped my fingers in the pitcher, flicked a little H20 at each, did the Catholic Sign of the Cross, and ended it with a wink and a smile that would charm Satan himself...

As I finished going back the table, my crew gave me a standing ovation.

I haz moments.

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I did not share these to show you that there is no deity... But if there was one, I would probably be struck dead nine times over by now... Just sayin'.

These are just some funny moments that will ALWAYS make me happy to have been a part of. I will take a couple of minutes of that life, over a lifetime of "servitude" any day... And twice on Sundays.

Salty, bitter, and runny,

d

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