Friday, August 22, 2003

Wanna Hear Me Sing? Day!

Drunk? Bitchin'.

Sitting next to somebody who's known you for more than eleven weeks but less than three hundred and eight? Cool.

Upset about not feelin' nothin' no more (couple years running now)? Sorry to hear it, but let's get started.

Say to your neighbor now, "Wanna hear me sing?" When he says Motherfuck Yeah! get up from your chair, pick up the ketchup bottle and hold it up to your mouth like it's a microphone, open your mouth as if you were about to belt out Moon River, then let all the muscles in your face go limp and bug open your eyes in terror.

Everyone at the table will understand. Even though they were really hoping to hear you sing, you saw yourself in the 3'X6' promotional Harp mirror spread across the back wall of the bar. You saw yourself looking 30 years older than you are, dressed in clothing you find unappealing, your nose different than you remember it, your hands someone else's, clearly, anyone would say so.

Your chest hair, showing. The air surrounding you, gray-green. The retarded blind dwarf a few feet to your right, talking shit about you. Your shoes, stupid and boring. The way you would look holding a first place trophy, incorrect. What you ordered, not what you craved. Everything you settled for, causing more pain than trying to get what you longed for probably ever would have. Everything you've ever kissed in love, amounting to a total of three. Everything that smells, including you. Everything that fails, claiming you. Everything that swells with pride over the achievements of a relative on the road to greatness, avoiding your eye contact. All that you don't want, staring back at you baby.

They'll understand if you just wanna sit back down. Don't. It'll ruin the next five minutes and the next five minutes are as important as those five minutes that started five minutes ago were. Blink your eyes and wipe away the gray that's clouding up your vision and sing the first thirty nine words of that Billy and the Beaters song. Everyone will love you for it and you'll be allowed to clench your eyes shut tight while you sing.

Happy Wanna Hear Me Sing? Day!