False Logic

“Just because I’m a little older doesn’t make me any slower, I just take some time to think before I speak.” “And don’t let anyone tell you the way things are, are the way they ought to be.” My dad’s name is bonded into the seat of a wood stool at Jim Hobaugh's bar. It’s his last resting place, they might as well have mixed his ashes into the upholstery. People don’t visit the headstone anymore; it’s outdated it lacks his aura. He spent no time there. My father’s greatest achievement being sitting in a chair for enough time to become a fixture. Like a greasy bar cloth or a stack of records, that was my father. I am no such man; he had an easy life.

“If you sleep there all day, I’ll put the couch on the curb.” Martha wasn’t joking, she threw her brother Maurice out of the fire escape for forgetting to take the trash to the door. I was bumming cigarettes in Roscoe Village at the time, this is before I’d met Martha. He broke three ribs and fractured his tailbone. They both testified it was a freak accident, how he’d been watering English ivy, and slipped on melted ice. The building super and Father Hal from St Mary’s down the street collaborated her good character. Maurice lived for three more years before suffering a heart attack induced from the stress of having his gallbladder removed. She was a woman inclined towards unremorseful tendencies. A woman without doubt and that was truly threatening. The power of the dead is that we believe they're always watching, judging us. Even when you're buried you still hold power over someone. I fly too close to the sun more often than I’d like though it's become a comforting expectation that I seem to scare away people in familiar surroundings. That’s why I’m watching the windows fog wrapped in a quilt of pink and yellow rabbits in a 65-year-old folk singers' apartment. Martha was from Birmingham and played the violin well but sang badly at a little den called Suzie’s. It’s why she never progressed past folk tunes. We conflate identity with the experience of being watched, consumed by our peers. What truth is there to existence when isolated. “Esse est percipi” my friend Tobin always said that whenever we met for brunch it was his calling card, without fail. What a committed man he worked in advertising, manufacturing illusions though only the correct illusions for consumption. He ended up working for google after all's said and done. He talked about consumption a lot and the laws of consumption. You’d think he was a doctor, “Berkely would have hated modern advertising, horribly terrific.” I watched two squirrels in descending flight racing to the end from bare elm branches outside Martha’s window seat, my coffee cup, Martha’s cup with ladybugs painted on the side splintered in pieces at my feet, swept under the rug. Have you ever caught yourself in a state of disbelief about your active surroundings. It’s intoxicating to feel paralyzed in the movement of the world and for even just a second to lose the conception of ego. I'm stuck in this low-level state of anxiety. Of course, I couldn’t stand in an open window with corduroy pants around my ankles the whole day. I had to get a baguette before I could remind myself what reality is. The walk to Madeline’s a little faux French bistro surrounded by shuttered department stores was therapeutic and, in a way, cured my hunger. I thought about how the majority of eating is built out of boredom, it’s a routine to consume and very rarely do we experience an intense euphoria built out of food, and that euphoria becomes increasingly dangerous. To become a critic of food I imagine you eat very little so as not to ruin your tongue palate. To be a critic of anything must be a very sad existence, to experience nothing there is no purity in anything. Martha’s apartment is two buildings down from The Luncheonette, a café of similar quality that I walk past every day, Madeline’s is 19 minutes, 0.9 miles, I engage myself in routines for no reason other than not breaking the routine, that’d be sacrilegious. I enjoy the walk though it’s not about the baguette I hate spending money I don’t have. The walk is a pilgrimage, so I don’t resort to drinking coffee because it circulates the brain.

Martha doesn’t own a television and it’s possibly my favorite thing about her, I tell her this often, she laughs and snorts and says rather condescendingly, “You're so sweet”. My favorite aspect of someone being their lack of material possessions is somewhat selfish I admit. I don’t think I could control myself if I lived on my own. I’d falter, I’d spend hours on the sidewalk watching the same infomercials on fifty different televisions in the window of Barney’s computer, radio, and entertainment emporium. I’d buy the smallest attena box to compensate only to sit eyes peeled open sprawled on my bare floor close enough to taste the static. Martha believes the television is an invention of satanism to corrupt the youth by instant gratification. She owns a radio that constantly played Duke Ellington or Ella Fitzgerald. It was soft and kept me on a leash. “You need a job, like a real job like something that tears you down, you’ve got all this excessive energy, and it just stirs, you’re a stirrer.” Cidney, my freshman year roommate and former high school chemistry tutor went on as she knitted a pair of yellow ankle warmers. Rocking back and forth in the same chair her grandmother died in, she finds it intimate, I find it disgusting. “The American dream hates stirrers; it’s wasted energy, it’s selfish to hoard your energy you need to make new friends, communal energy isn’t that what life's all about?” I’d hesitate to call Cidney a friend as much as I’d call my couch quilt (Martha’s quilt) or my toaster (Martha’s toaster) a friend. They’re creature comforts that serve a singular purpose. Cidney exists in my life as the equivalent of an alarm clock, she constrains me to reality when I’d rather spend my days dreaming. We don’t talk outside of her flat. It’s a social contract, she’s essentially my physciatrist. “Were increasingly obsessive over what we do rather than who we are, it’s nauseating.” “Were no longer people we’ve become ideals.” “And what’s wrong with being idolized? Isn’t that the sacrifice of happiness.” “Your confusing ideal with idol, that’s exactly the problem, I don’t want to become a standard of perfection I’d like the grace to be adored for being real.” At this point in our conversation is when I pack my coat and head for the door. “Real doesn’t exist, it’s a commodification, it’s a fantasy. We fantasize about what it must be like to be genuine.” She hadn’t made eye contact the length of our talking. “I think I should go-” “Get a job”

“We attach far too much emotion towards the idea that being productive is an indication of maturity.” “Cidney is oblivious to this and were increasingly navigating towards defining people based on their work and not their heart.” Clarence was the dough boy at a basement pizza pub that may or may not be a money laundering front. I seemed to be one of five customers. At least he had a passion, his life wasn’t overridden with guilt for choosing the wrong path. James Dean posters littered the flaky green walls along with a crudely drawn Mussolini ornately framed. I usually ordered a slice of alfredo with mushrooms and macaroni on top, and sat beside a small, barred window where you could only glimpse people’s shoes on the sidewalk and the occasional dog. Clarence usually joined me on his smoke break, they still let you smoke inside. “My only advice is to become a teacher, ease the burden of self-worth onto your disciples like Jesus.” Clarence blew smoke into my mouth. “God it’s hot down here.”

If you wanted a quiet life, you picked the wrong time to be born. My father always said that about people. It was never an insult as much as the grass was green or the sky was blue, occasionally. He never felt seen, so he gave away his personhood and he became an object, something to be displayed. I hadn’t been to Jim Hobaugh’s place since the Halloween following the funeral, there was an apple bobbing competition. The point of the bar is to induce a scene of sleep, seduced into the deepest slumber of their lives. I don’t blame Jim, it’s what my father wanted. Sleep is not death no; the body stays intensely busy my father enjoyed this excuse. “I’ve got your dads cap and coat; it’s been six months I might as well retire it with Elvis.” Jim had a glass framed white jumpsuit along the wall he maintains belonged to the king himself. “The love we give ourselves is never comparable to the love we must earn.” Jim wiped silver mugs engraved with a blue heeler chasing birds, it was still early and two men with gloating eyes whispered over a narrow candle in a stained-glass window corner. It’s great when people you know continually surprise you. “That’s nice, Jim.” I didn’t intend to stay long, “I’ll take the coat now.” Jim smiled knowingly and tucked himself into the back beyond a hanging cloth where a door should’ve been. “You know your father cared; his life was an example that should be clear.” The coat in question was made up of quilt patchwork and black leather. The interior was itchy and sweat stained. “I’m hoping one day you’ll stop telling the truth. People come here to escape real life.” “What is real, you crave an excuse just like your father.” “You were entertained by his excuses; you were entitled to them then you lecture me on all the love he had.” “You could have visited any time why now? You were scared of what you’d find. Is it easier to confront him now.” A knocking against the velvet curtained window stirs a man tumbling out of his stool and sprawling onto the floor hands clasped tightly around his ears. Jim was out from behind the bar knuckles red clinching the splintered end of a mallet. Aside from the catastrophe of glass littered across the tablecloth a bird attempted to escape the entrapments of a bowl of mushroom soup, Jim seemed relieved he picked up the stool, set the mallet beside the forks and spoons, and cracked the poor feathered friends' neck like you’d corkscrew a bottle. “Get up Phil it’s just a pigeon, I'll get youse a new order.” That was that I felt bad for Phil shaking on the floor, he was my mailman and a little slow he thought he was getting shot at. No one bothered to clean the mess and the bird floated around while a small crowd began to form on the sidewalk. I thought about how nice it would be to live life in slow motion, like the movies. I left and the coat hung over the bar by the register. I feel sad for people and the part we play in our own disasters. What was worse, the real condition or the self-created one, nevertheless a well-earned fatigue. Martha stirred a cup of ginger tea and tuned the radio volume while I twisted a can of tomato soup open. A report on striking adjunct faculty at a ballet school in River North aired, apparently there were chains and locks involved, items of bondage. Followed by a notice of warning signs of anarchists to look out for. Which included, tardiness, sunken eyes, a proficiency for spelling and grammar, antagonistic views towards police officers, insurance agents, tourists, lobbyists, four-star generals, and the government. Followed by, an aversion of ambulances, advocation for urban agriculture, an enjoyment of reading, and a frequency for running red lights. “Complaining isn’t a real job” Martha announced though I wasn’t sure if she was talking to me or herself. She turned the volume down and I thought about how we curse ourselves to become what we imagine, the power of suggestion.

“People seem to think death is somehow separate from living, but they're really one in the same.” “Dying might be the most important thing we ever accomplish in our lives.” I sat with Tobin on the roof of an antique brick and mortar overlooking the Art Institute’s gated gardens. It used to be a theater for opera and ballet now it housed a dentist office, jewelers, and a paperweight museum. I’ve been sitting a lot lately I feel like every time I talk to someone I’m reclined, is that bad for your health? “The hypocrisy of modern medicine is curing death” Tobin proclaimed amongst the gaggle of pigeons vying for his half eaten hot dog. I desperately needed a vacation. “Are you scared to die?” A long vacation “I get enough of this in confession.” “You go to church?” You could hear all the sirens in the loop from here, see everyone’s guilt. I wasn’t any greater than the cart pusher selling cotton candy and pineapple empanadas. I just had a better view. “God forbid creature comforts.” Tobin huffed at that “Dying for salvation is selfish, you're of this earth. If I get damned for living death should be kinder.” My mother was obsessed with raking leaves, to the point of verging on an exercise in gluttony. That snarled oak tree whose roots fought the sidewalk and branches tore the shingles down seemed so carefree in the fall. Nature taunted my mother, yet it was her order. I’d made peace with the fact that visiting home manifested this incredible lethargy, it was both comforting and uncanny and I was forced to confront my chronophobia. “It’s been a sad time, I thought about calling your father on the phone the other day then I remembered he lost it in the river. I never got the truth of that story.” “He almost fell off a bridge mom he-” “So is that how it happened? How frightening you can’t live without a phone these days.” “I don’t know mom; I just don’t know.” There were three cozy piles of leaves in the front yard one of the neighbors left a garden hose running to catch a stray dog and a stream lined the sidewalk. We played scrabble in the dining room and mom drank earl grey. “Why do you do that to yourself?” “What do you mean?” “You forget yourself; it seems like every time I see you, you feel the need to apologize.” The sun was blinding the living room had at least three mirrors. “I don’t know.” The drive down was always quiet and felt like a dream, mom lived in Cardinal, Texas about an hour east of Austin and the in-between felt like purgatory. I hated seeing roadkill though, the buzzards were pests. The dining room was nicely confined with wood paneling painted velvet and a candle chandelier; one of the neighbors’ lawnmowers launched a rock through a window, and I smelled burning orange. “Did you have a cake in the oven?” “I guess this is a relief for you then, your finally alone.” There was years old birdfeed trickling out of a termite hole in a cottage on stilts by a birdbath with a red fountain. Sparrows chased a mockingbird in circles and my mom’s eyes reminded me of scrambled eggs. “What do you mean?” My teacup was empty, but the pitcher was across the table and the act of reaching for it was far too confrontational, I wanted to be invisible. “You always wanted to be invisible, if your life was a play, you were a stagehand-” “I prefer costume design.” “What’s the difference, what’s the point in arguing I mean you shouldn’t have any guilt, it’s MY guilt.” Mom was always very territorial she instilled the idea that emotions were adjacent to property and not some universal fleeting whisp. Her hands were shaking, “everyone keeps trying to....to co-opt my guilt, can I not have one symptom for myself, what should I do with myself.” “I have my own guilt.” “You're always trying to suppress me, you and your father, twisting the conversation putting words in my mouth, my identity is uplifted in guilt. I mean how much can you change before it stops being a surprise, before you stop getting away with it.” “I don’t have anything to add.” The burning orange smell faded to a sweet charcoal and mom glided from the dining table towards the kitchen. “The neighbors sent over a fruitcake I think there’s pomegranate in it, or grapefruit I always get them confused.” Another rock struck a window, this time there was screaming.

I’d borrowed Cidney’s mom’s second car, belonging to her sister before it ran into a logging truck. It was a yellow beattle with spongy coffee-colored seats. The glove compartment was overflowing with peppermint sticks and gas station receipts, this car had lived a far more interesting life than me. “Whatever happened to that girl?” Mrs. Newman was my therapist and aunt once removed who I habitually saw when I attended home. She also saw mom though she was related to my father. I’d mentioned once we should see other people though I was assured my mother only ever talked about the declining bee population and her supposed affair with John Wayne, she didn’t ask about me. “She’s still around.” “Is that all then?” “We have opposing views on living.” “Arguments build the strongest relationships; people don’t like to argue they're scared but they're missing the key to eternal life. If you can’t be direct, you’ll be forgotten. You want to be remembered don’t you Karl?” Mrs. Newman was an odd therapist; she didn’t comfort me if anything, she antagonized me. Her office smelt like canned tuna and engine oil. She shared a two-story building with a brake and air conditioning mechanic. The ‘bide your time’ magazines and newspapers were all dated pre-1995 and the pink wallpaper gave me a headache. “Sure, I’d like to find someone who agrees with me for once.” “Wouldn’t we all, that takes time, you must put in the time. Arguing presents an ultimatum of agreement or death, wouldn’t you like a little challenge?” “Death of what?” “Death of the mind, everyone’s so eager to agree nowadays there’s no punchline, people shouldn’t marry their waiter.” “Sure.” The rate was 150$. Though given I was family I cleaned the office in exchange, though we couldn’t talk as I cleaned as that would’ve extended the session, in her words. Cardinal had a flour mill with an affinity for catching fire, the river that runs adjacent has caught fire before which unfortunately lingers onto the mill grounds. There's oil in the river. There was a red brick hotel across the street which was reportedly haunted by Davey Crocket and once hosted my uncle Jerry’s wedding where aside from me throwing up during the slow dance, a piano fell from the ballroom to the basement due to a termite infestation. There was a free bar. The town was quiet enough, the drugstore was charming in its own way. People sat on porches and there was still an ice-cream truck. I hated running into people from high school. I was homeschooled till 8th grade. Even then mom arranged for me to come home for lunch every day. Dad was in the garbage business and used to let me honk the horn on the route before school. The cab smelled strongly of olive oil. “Coffee causes cancer” he drank two mugs of virgin olive oil with honey every morning. It clogged my throat though I’d never met a man with clearer skin than my father. Mom drank eight cups a day, coffee. I mix the two occasionally, an olive oil cappuccino sounds worse than it tastes. I admit there’s a natural superiority in the act, the aesthetic of coming home out of state. With your faded accent, big coats and lack of haircut it made me feel like I had some secret. It’s nice to gloat on who never left. The quarterback who did two years of state college and works at a used car dealership. “I don’t want to reinforce this habit, Karl; you’ll keep coming home and forget to live. This is easy, isn’t it? It’s an excuse for self-importance.” I was always enamored seeing out of state family during Christmas, cousins in Arizona, uncles and aunts in Vancouver and Los Angeles. Their independence was respected, they had stories to tell, and people listened. “Leaving home is an accomplishment in of itself, if I keep traveling it slows the spiral.” “What happens when you run out of money, hun?” “I’ll hitchhike, I’ll go to Alaska and become an ice fisherman or rob a gas station and die in a climatic shootout somewhere between Dodge City and Las Vegas.” “Oh, what an imagination, I think this session is over.”

“Oh, I can imagine, people are rude up there.” “Well...you’d be surprised” “I don’t know I’ve never been” My only high school friend Ivan Reardon retched himself out of the front passenger seat of a 1969 orange ford bronco. “What’s the point of a seatbelt.” He phrased it as a question though I knew better. I rolled his wheelchair out from the trunk. “You know pain is a reminder, our bodies attempt at rescuing autonomy from the mind.” Ivan had been in a car accident two years ago. “You never cease to amaze me my friend.” Ivan’s smile turned inward, and he said no more. Tobin called he’d met Ivan once and said he was a case against eugenics, disability was a constant lurking, not anymore, a surprising punishment than spilling hot coffee on your crotch. “Is it hot?” “It’s mild, the sun was much more friendly as a kid. Like a low simmer, now someone’s left the oven on and we’re burning up.” “isn’t it strange how our perception changes? Grass used to be fluffier, and coffee tasted like burnt tires. I’m looking at a photograph of me standing in my grandmother's garden and the colors are so much more distinct, now everything's so muddled together. Of course, it’s only a photograph.” “Only a photograph” I repeated unintentionally. “Photos are much more interesting to me now, no more coloring books, the worlds far too literal now.” “Yeah” We stood in silence now, me staringly blankly at the spines of a bookshelf of Dostoevsky first editions, Ivan only collected them he wasn’t much of a reader. Tobin probably in his mother's living room eyeing the china cabinet that housed his grandmother's urn of ashes. “Well, I’ve got to go now.” “Yeah, me too” we hung up. “Who was that?” Ivan yelled from the kitchen rolling into the living room with jelly and toast and a stack of vinyl on his lap. “Tobin, he just called” “What’d you talk about?” “How sad our lives are.” “He needs to get out more, meet some real people.” He had little issue laying a record on the player. “Am I not a real person?” “I’m not accomplished enough to answer that, Karl.”

“You know death is a big business, death is a business of growth.” Ivan talked about dying a lot though it wasn’t depressing despite its repetitiveness it was reassuring to hear even if it did make me a little envious. “Everything starts with death I guess.” “It does yeah, think about obituaries there’s so much ego, you suddenly become a fixture of inspiration after your buried.” Discussing the funeral industry in Ivan’s living room while sorting through John Callahan cartoon memorabilia was better than therapy. “There’s so much pride in dying, though we don’t figure it out till after the fact. Funeral homes and debt collectors.” “I hate that feeling after just waking up from a day nap in sweat, that feels like death.” “Tell me about it Karl.” “I used to have this idea as a kid where I thought if I stayed up late enough at night, I could see spirits, I used to visit my grandparents in this shotgun cabin that was rebuilt after a hurricane, so the floor was half slanted. My grandparents had it passed down from their parents and their grandparents before and half my family probably died there.” “You used to swear you saw things?” “I’d forget to eat or brush my teeth and my breath would smell horrible and that’s how madness starts, subtle childhood delusions.”

The phone range, “Hey” “Hi” It seemed like we talked easier on the phone, there was more patience, a welcome silence that didn’t feel condescending. “You went back home.” “Yeah, I run back when I get bored, I guess.” “Is that drive-in still open, the one you used to talk about.” “It burned down” I never actually went I just always talked about it, it’s funny. “You know your mom doesn’t hate you right, I don’t think she knows how to talk about feelings.” “She’s always waiting for the other shoe; you know my therapist says the same thing.” “Your aunt doesn’t count honey.” “It’s a family tradition to keep problems in the family.” “Maybe that’s the bigger problem.” Ivan had the living room television on in the background someone from north carolina crashed into a wall and a NASCAR announcer faded into the lime green wallpaper. Mustard squirted across the counter onto the sink wall, balancing the landline on my shoulder I attempted to build a blt. ”What are you doing?” “Taking my time, feeling unaccomplished in my hometown doesn’t feel as bad.” I could hear Cidney’s boots slapping a tile floor, she used to tap dance and still carried the enthusiasm. “My mom's making baked rigatoni, no one ever cooks here anymore.” “I always preferred ziti.” Ivan was out of lettuce, but the tomato was more important anyways. “How is she, your mom I mean.” “Carol’s fine, she’s seeing that chiropractor, Arnold something or another.” “Seeing or seeing?” The neighbors' sprinklers whacked the side of the house, I watched water droplets slide off the kitchen window. “I mean since dad died; he’s alright you know.” “You know chiropractors are like witch doctors Cid, the founder thought he was a saint” “Yeah, he’s alright you know.” “You said that already.” There was a silence, I was scared to eat the crunch and pop might disrupt something intentional. Sound isn’t always a good thing. “Yeah, I should probably go Karl, uncle Michael’s stopping by.” “That’s the guy who knew Vivian Maier right?” The line was dead. Some advertisement about a traveling circus played and Ivan got quiet.

“Where were you all day, you come home once a year and all we do is have tea?” The door slammed behind me unintentionally and echoed through the house. “I went to see Ivan; you know he doesn’t get out much I would’ve felt bad if I didn’t stop by.” Slipping my shoes off mom emerged from the guest bathroom down the hall from the kitchen wearing an apron with painted bumblebees and a skinny plunger in hand. “You didn’t invite him over huh, that woman you live with called, asking about how you use an espresso machine, that’s your new mother?” “She’s an old friend, I got an espresso machine at a garage sale a few weeks ago it’s uh temperamental.” “Where’d you get the money for that?” I’m exhausted, though this is the end of the line. “Just don’t worry about it. What's in the oven something’s burning.” I fell back onto a yellow loveseat by the fireplace with feather stuffed pillows and a coffee stain shaped like Idaho. “Baked rigatoni I didn’t have any ziti, you know I went by a new spot downtown by where the methodist church used to be, they’ve got pizza with cheddar and ranch, you ever heard of that?” “I’ve got a headache.” “The times are changing on me honey.” “Everyone always says that mom, then you forget by new year's.” Somehow as a twist of fate a green and yellow Gameboy emerged between the couch cushions. A fossil with a cracked screen and sticky buttons. “You want any of dads' sweaters? Before he ran off, there’s a whole pile in the closet I’m going to start using them as dish rags if I find anymore.” “Why not just sell them mom?” She didn’t like that; my mom was always a frugal woman. “How could you say that garage sale people wouldn’t appreciate sentimental value they're just looking for a quick fix.” “You are a garage sale person ma.”

Going through someone’s clothes feels like a cardinal sin, regardless I had no sentimentality over maintaining a time capsule. You always hear about someone’s son who went to Vietnam or Afghanistan and never came home, and the family keeps the dirty laundry on the bed and locks the door without a key and suddenly your home doesn’t belong to you anymore, at least not fully. You resign to allowing memory to control your physical presence, that’s what Ivan meant and really, it’s only people who've suffered catastrophe who understand the body and mind are in a state of isolation if not constant conflict with each other. Seven or eight fishing rods in one state of disrepair or another tumbled out of the closet as I rummaged between my father’s sweaters and loafers. It still smelled like cologne even though he hasn’t lived here in five years. “You think it's coming back in style, like vinyl I mean?” “What?” “Cologne, men don’t wear it anymore it was possibly your fathers greatest prize, what was the watershed moment I missed.” I shrugged my shoulders. “There’s no one left to impress anymore I guess.” Mom cackled at that, “Only the dead and forgotten.” I associate places with people and not the other way around which I'm told is odd. I always loved reading books or movies where the setting was the most interesting character, you weren’t limited by what the author called attention to, the act of being distracted was essential to understanding and enjoying the story as it unfolded. 

Dad took off a little while after crashing the truck through the Martins master bathroom while Mrs. Martin was blow-drying her hair. She wasn’t injured, though among the spillage that leaked from wounded trash bag mixed into shattered tile and chunks of drywall were rotten oranges, pears, and strawberries, a seemingly endless flow of packing peanuts, and someone’s pet goldfish. Mom sent them flowers on the anniversary of the day for five years. I used to take long pointless drives up and down the highway from here to Houston with him and his former coworker Arnold. There was no radio and dad’s punishment for me talking too much was threatening to run his red Pontiac Phoenix into the nearest semi. What reason Arnold was forced to accompany I never did figure out, maybe he sensed some manifestation long before dad jumped off a bridge. He was a hunched man with big googley eyes, one glass, and stringy brown hair with the texture of raw noodles. I used to spend nights at Arnold’s house occasionally where he’d supply unlimited bottles of root beer and force me to read books, sometimes I like to imagine Arnold finally spoke up from the confine of the backseat and I became his adopted son.

I’d like to be selfish in a natural way, unbound and unbothered in my ability to grasp and let go of moments. “I think my most personal relationship growing up was with the living room television, we experienced media in real time as a child. Me and Cid always talk about the side characters and spinoffs or the sequels and prequels of our lives, never considering how odd it is we’ve grown so accustomed to relating our lives through media tropes. It's lonely.” “You used to think Halloween was real, but that was okay.” “We experienced media with such disregard until silently this silhouette creeped away and actors became people.” On the rare occasion where the scenery complimented our attention, we’d drift through nostalgia and occasionally guess each other’s sentences. The scenery being walking on sunday afternoons smelling food trucks without actually buying anything. “I wish Texas would tell you a story” “No kidding, I can’t keep lying to myself.” We passed an intimate little orange truck with a flat tire and Selena bumper sticker.