[This is not going to be articulate, and I don’t care because I’m crying.]

When Henry and I first started dating, my favorite band was Cold. And by favorite, I mean that I would sob through their sets and be an emotional wreck for days after. The first road trip Henry and I ever took together was to Wisconsin, where they were performing a 30  minute set at a radio festival. It took us two days to get there and it was worth every fucking second, even when I cried for an hour on the way home and fought with Henry because he wouldn’t take me to Wisconsin Dells (this is totally one of those stories that will get passed on from generation to generation). We also saw them in Norfolk, Virginia and a million times here in Pittsburgh. And before Henry, there was my best guy-friend Wonka, and together we saw them together in Hershey, Columbus OH, and Buffalo. I still have the orange Starburst that Scooter Ward gave me before the show in Hershey, where we bonded over Robert Smith and I cried in his face. I keep it in the freezer every summer to keep it from melting.

The last time I had the chance to see them was April of 2004, and I was in a very bad place emotionally. I had written Scooter a letter, thanking him for his words and for always being there for his fans. Cold shows were one of the only times I felt I belonged somewhere, and I needed him to know that. But I couldn’t find the nerve to give him the letter. He was standing a few feet away from me before that show and I panicked. Henry, supportive boyfriend that he is, was so angry with me.

“Just give him the fucking letter! He’s right over there! No one’s even bothering him!” Henry doesn’t get it, that it’s not just some petty star-struck syndrome. It’s something more than that, something greater. It’s about being in the presence of someone who I know gets it, someone who I feel a connection with, even if I don’t know them personally. Someone who, in a strange and inexplicable way, was the only one there for me.

I remember wanting to go home. Doors hadn’t even opened yet and I was ready to surrender and just walk away. I knew that I was going to walk inside that venue, the now-defunct Rock Jungle, and lose my shit like I always did when they took the stage. But Henry convinced me to stay, and once inside, he swiped the letter from me and hand-delivered it to Sam, the drummer. Henry wasn’t happy about it, because it made him feel lame, like he was passing notes in high school. But it made me feel like a weight had been lifted.

The next time they went on tour, I was pregnant and knew it would be  a bad idea, so I didn’t go to any of the shows.

Unfortunately, they broke up soon after that, and I had always regretted that I missed what could have been my last chance to see them. I knew that Scooter was going through some shit, and I was worried that he wouldn’t bounce back, that the scene would take away another underrated, amazingly talented and inspirational man.

In October, my friend Jenny texted me, alerting me that they had reunited. I will never forget where I was — in line for Cheeseman’s Haunted Hayride. It was one of the best nights ever.

And that’s how Henry and I ended up in Cleveland last night, watching them live at the House of Blues. For the first time in five years. FIVE YEARS and they still rip my heart right through my fucking ribcage.

I think my favorite part of the night, and the only part where my face wasn’t wet, was when Henry lost his cell phone. We were sitting upstairs, and had switched seats three times because Henry is a fucking retard and kept choosing inappropriate seats. (He was happy to be seeing a band with an older fanbase, where sitting down didn’t call forth the Old Person spotlight.) So in our last seat switch, he reached down and noticed his cell phone was missing. “That’s what you get for clipping it on your belt like an asshole,” I scoffed. Within seconds, people around us noticed that something was amiss, and a small search party had spontaneously formed. I couldn’t call his phone, because I had no service (I found out a few minutes later that it was only in the exact spot I was sitting, and that if I moved my arm to the left, it worked, but owellz0rz Henry), so some dude was all, “Hey bud, I am old too like you so I want to come to your aid. Here, please use my phone to locate your own!” And Henry was all, “OMG thank you, Hot Older Guy!” and then tried in vain to tuck in his Fellow Oldie boner.

Anyway, the man two seats down from me had been sitting on it, so he handed it over and everyone had a good chuckle. I continued sitting there as I had been all along, rolling my eyes. Seriously, there were at least seven to nine people scrambling around, looking under seats, and scratching their temples, but I was not one of them.

Girlfriend of the year!

I know, right – where’s the climax to THAT story?

The opening band  -Drama Club – came on around 8. I was a little ambivalent about them. The singer sounded like he was trying to come across way more glam than he was, but then some of the band members looked like they were on the cusp of being scene yet stuck in a decidedly non-scene band. I didn’t mind them, but I wasn’t riveted. It made me miss the energy of younger crowds at post-hardcore shows and this is no joke, there was a fleeting moment when I imagined I was in the middle of a scene kid group hug. I made the mistake of telling Henry after Drama Club’s set and he of course was annoyed.

[Music geek side note: there were several moments when the singer of Drama Club sounded vaguely familiar to me, and then he mentioned that they’re from Wilkes-Barre, PA. I thought to myself, “Huh. I wonder if that’s the dude from Lifer” because how many bands are actually from Wilkes-Barre, and it totally is; he just dyed his hair black and became fey. The whole way home, I kept bragging to Henry about being a music genius and I think he wanted to dickslap me. Now I’m nostalgic for Lifer.]

The next band was the Killer and the Star, Scooter’s side project which currently features Rocky Gray (ex-Evanescence) and Michael Harris (Idiot Pilot). Scooter sat down at his piano and by the time the second word was sung, my cheeks were salty. I didn’t even try to stop it, I know a thing or two about futility. But sitting there, listening to these beautiful songs, it made me angry that he doesn’t get more respect, that some people think “Just Got Wicked” or “Stupid Girl” is the extent of what he has to offer, when his songwriting weaves the perfect blend of melancholy, angst, and aggression, the resulting product something I can’t even put a label on. Call Cold nu-metal if you want, but there’s depth there in the music and the lyrics. A lot of it. And this new project is the perfect vessel for him to scream “LOOK AT WHAT I CAN DO!” Killer and the Star is still slightly heavy but Scooter’s piano-playing and soulful vocals (he sings differently with this band) bring a bluesy element to the plate, making it impossible to compare it to anything else.

“Hallelujah” was my favorite song, and Michael Harris was amazing to watch on stage. The vocals he provided melted with Scooter’s and I kind of couldn’t handle it. I imagine it’s what church-y people feel like on Sundays – goosebumps, tear-stung eyeballs, and involuntary shudders. The hairs on my arms were erect. (ERECT.)

I really was so unsure that I would ever get to hear this man sing live again, and to have him there, mere feet away, it  made me appreciate him so much more. After that set, I looked at Henry and whispered, “I’m not so sure I can handle this.”

“Yes you can,” he said, and gave me a patronizing back-pat. My man.

I distracted myself by hating the Southern drawlers behind me, one of which was wearing some nasty patchouli/ash concoction that buffeted me every time she came back from getting a beer. Then I noticed one of the stage guys propping a bust of Michael Myers on top of one of the speakers and I felt giddy. Terry Balsamo used to come out on stage wearing a Michael Myers mask, but he quit doing that sometime after they stopped touring for 13 Ways To Bleed On Stage. And then he left to play for Evanescence, but that’s all I’ll say about that, otherwise I’ll get angry.

Before Scooter came back out with Cold, there was a little tribute video that was played on the big screen in front of the stage, recapping Cold’s journey to get where they are now, starting in the early nineties when they were Grundig. And even that proved to be a test for my tear ducts.

This is the first time the original 5-man lineup has been back together in something like five years. In fact, the last time I saw them live, it was the new lineup and it felt so strange and unfamiliar, like the first holiday after a family member dies.

I would love to go through every song they played, giving you objective thoughts and reviews based on technical merit and sound quality, but the truth is, I’m still an emotional wreck. Today, I was still crying as I recounted the show to a friend on the phone. I still got choked up when I said, “Scooter seems happier now,” because while I don’t know him personally, I care about him very hard.  To see him on stage, in his glory, in his element – it was fantastic. And he is so humble, pausing to thank his fans after every song. A middle-aged woman with spiky red hair and clothes too tight for her age, yelled, “No, thank YOU!” and I thought to myself, “Hey old broad, you might be too old to get away with wearing that studded belt that I know you think you’re rocking, but Amen.” But then I secretly wished she’d fall over the balcony, because fuck, she was annoying.

The show was like being home again.

I didn’t talk.

I didn’t scream.

I didn’t move, apart from a few feeble attempts at applause.

I just sat there, motionless, and, with a few friendly reminders to breathe, I let my heart melt. It is agony at times, running this psychotic gamut of emotions, like swishing hot tea over a toothache – painful but it feels so fucking good.

On the way to the car, I looked at Henry and tried to talk but all that came out was audible sobs (Henry’s instinct was to ignore me and ask aloud, “I wonder which way I should go to get out of here” as he left the parking garage, and I couldn’t help but wonder if there was a greater scope to that question). I felt emotionally exhausted, drained, numb, but 100% willing to do it again, like, right now.

You can make fun of me for crying. You can tell me that Cold is so 2002. You can tell me to get a life. But the one thing I know for sure is that, no matter how much it hurts, I would rather feel this than nothing at all. And if, someday, music stops making me feel that way? Well, why bother.

This is my friend Alisha and me at Henry’s FORTIETH birthday pity party in 2005. I don’t know why my expression screams post-rubber cement sniffing session, but I am wearing a purple bowtie and that’s all that really matters.

Alisha and I hadn’t been in touch for a few years, but we reconnected recently and went out to lunch last Sunday. It was awesome to have a little bit of familiarity after all the changes that have going down lately. I guess I expected some tension, but there was none to be found. On my end, at least. After I forced a high-five upon her, we walked to the Elbow Room where we had super greasy grilled cheeses (the best kind) and reminisced about all the ridiculous memories of 2005, like when I talked her into going roller skating with me.

It’s a wonder that she ever came back for more, to be honest.

In other Twitter news, now that Henry is working this second job I talked him into signing up for Twitter so that my savory tweets can breathe some will to live into his weary soul. Or utterly disgust and annoy him, it’s hard to tell with him sometimes. He left it up to me, which is like giving a thief your PIN, and by Friday afternoon our little Henry became the proud owner of his very own Twitter account: A Woodhick. I even went ahead and added John McCain as his very first friend! I figured it’s the least I could do since it’s been a whole three years since I placed a personal ad for him.

He was not happy with the name I gave him. It’s a funny little story, really. (No, it’s not really.) But one time last year, we were watching some local show called  Dave and Dave’s Excellent Adventures and on that particular episode, they were at some lumber thingie. I don’t really fucking remember, but I know that they were talking to some jackass who worked there and that jackass was all, “Yeah, we’re known as woodhicks.” And I started laughing because before I knew Henry, he was a delivery driver for a lumber yard. So in my most obnoxious manner, I was all, “Haha, Henry was a woodhick.” And of course, Henry had to bring logic to the table and remind me that he never actually cut down trees. But it was too late. The image of him as a woodhick, wearing a trucker cap with “WOODHICK” emblazoned on it in hot pink threading, was already seared into my mind. In some variations of this vision, he’s wearing suspenders.

I decided to change his name in my phone from “Asshole” to “Woodhick” but was not pleased when I realized this would knock him all the way down to the end of the list. So he’s in there as “A Woodhick.” (And to further anger him, I put “Gayblade Juice” as his company instead of Everfresh Juice, and his title is “Head Fag”.) God help me if I die when I’m with someone and they can’t find Henry’s number in my phone. I thnk about that all the time. I should really do that ICE thing.

Speaking of phone book entries, I was going through Henry’s contacts one day (he was sitting next to me, chill! I’m not one of those crazies who sneak peeks at their partners call logs/text messages when they’re sleeping. That’s creepy, even for me) and was a little disappointed to see that there were so many people listed above me. So I changed my name to Adrian to ensure I’d be #1. In fact, I think I should do this for all of my friends’ cell phones.

This concludes an intimate glimpse into my delightful relationship with Henri the Woodhick.

Foreword:

I had a quick flashback of staking out in a mini-snow storm to video tape some pizza delivery guy whom I was stalking for God only knows what reason, and I decided, “Hay ya’ll, that was a fun yarn, let’s all reflect on that right now, ya hear.”

 Originally a LiveJournal post from November, 2005.

The Jimmy Set-Up

One night while taking a leisurely stroll with Henry, I insisted that we walk past the pizza place which employs the latest delivery guy that I’m stalking (I have a thing for pizza guys: Exhibit A / Exhibit B). His name is Jimmy. This I know because last week as Henry and I were ambling past, Jimmy was sitting in his car, waiting to pull out when another employee of Pizzarella came running out, yelling, “Jimmy! Jimmy, wait!” Alas, Jimmy didn’t hear him and pulled out into traffic with a squeal of his tires, the Pizzarella sign adorning the top of his car. “Huh, there goes Jimmy,” I said as we looked on.

Big deal, right? Well, on our way back from our walk that night, we were crossing  the street. All was clear, but suddenly, while we were in the middle of the road, a car came flying up over the hill, forcing me to run the rest of the way. I was clutching my stomach and yelling, “Don’t hit me I’m pregnant!” (LOVE playing that card), when I happened to toss a glance over my shoulder and I saw that it was Jimmy in his dinky white sputtering car with the Pizzarella sign on top. “Aw, it’s Jimmy!” I yelled, as I tugged on Henry’s arm. He didn’t care.

One block over, and it was time to cross the street again. We had just stepped off the curb when another car came barreling at us. I started to yell threats about being pregnant when I stopped and screamed, “Hey, it’s Jimmy again!” His window was down and he clearly heard my zealous exclamations of his name; they were rather orgasmic. Henry was embarrassed. So I decided that it was fate; I mean, obviously. Maybe there’s supposed to be a movie made about us, I suggested to Henry. A romantic comedy!

I began to outline the premise for Henry. Man drives recklessly around town with the intent of running over any and all pregnant women he comes across, because he hates babies and the vessels which bear them. One fateful night in November, he sees me walking with Henry. Henry selfishly dives out of the way, leaving me in the headlights of Jimmy’s car. He hits me, but unfortunately for him, I survive, and so does the baby, which ends up being his, so he spends the rest of his life hunting down me and the kid, trying to kill us with his pizza delivery car.

“How is that a romantic comedy?” Henry asked. Well, maybe it’s more of a thriller. Or it can be a dark comedy and we’ll just have Pee Wee Herman doing something occasionally.

Ever since that night, no matter what Henry and I are involved in, I make time for Jimmy. “Hey, remember Jimmy?” I’ll ask. “No,” he’ll say. Maybe his lack of a Jimmy memory is because he’s trying to trick me into having sex at that particular moment or he’s too engrossed in “Good Eats,” but I know deep down there will always be room for Jimmy’s memory in Henry’s heart. Someday, maybe he’ll be secure enough with his manhood to admit it.

Unfortunately, Jimmy wasn’t at the shop last night. However! As we walked past, a man exited the pizza shop, carrying a precariously-stacked tower of trays. We watched him walk over to his parked Audi and struggle with the opening of the passenger door.

I’ve never seen Henry move so fast in my life. “Here, let me get that for you!” And then an awkward exchange of “No, it’s cool, I got it” and “Are you sure, man?” followed by “Yes, thanks man” and ending with “Oh, OK, bud!” ensued. I was able to hold it in long enough for Henry to rejoin me on the sidewalk, but then it all came tumbling out of the loose cannon.

“Oooooooh! Henry’s new boyfriend!”

He wouldn’t talk to me after that and even tried to walk me into a sign.

Anyway, I’m going to order from Pizzarella this weekend, but only after I make sure Jimmy is working. Then when Henry is paying him, I’ll be hiding by the window, taking his picture. You just wait, Jimmy.

The Jimmy Fake Out

But I don’t even like their food, I thought, after I urged Henry to place an order to Pizzarella that Saturday night. And when Henry brought up that tiny detail, I of course lied and said, “You must be thinking of another place, buddy. I love Pizzarella. It’s like being in Italy. With all that real Italian food. Mmm. Trevi Fountain, holla.” Indigestion brought on by sub-par Brookline Italian fare was a small price to pay in order to lure Jimmy to my doorstep.

Thirty minutes later, Henry began pacing back and forth in front of the window, with his arms crossed tightly across his chest. Wow, I thought, Henry is nervous too!

Turns out he was just really hungry.

When I heard a car pull up to the house, I lurched for the camcorder and yelled, “Is it him!?”

It wasn’t. It was some worthless piece of shit who could never match up to Jimmy’s talent for pizza slinging.

My pasta tasted like poison. I ate bitterly as I reflected on how Henry refused to grant me permission to cut him earlier that day. Just one little slice across his chest with a box cutter, it was all I asked; a small token of our love, I begged. “Shed your blood for me, you son of a bitch,” I hissed with my fingernails at his throat. If he really loved me, he’d have let me. So now I can add this to the list of his other vetoes: me vomiting in his mouth; him dressing as Michael Myers and raping me (I would have loved to one day tell my child that that’s how (s)he was conceived); allowing me to take a Danish lover; and the list goes on, my friends. The list goes on.

And so I start thinking. I don’t have the money nor the appetite to continue ordering shitty food every day in hopes of drawing Jimmy to my front door; I would just have to go straight to the source. I begged Henry to give the night one more chance by walking with me to Brookline Boulevard, where we would have a real life stake out.

“Either do this or let me cut you”: a proposal in which I win either way. I suggested that we pack a small bag full of sustenance, maybe some crackers and peanut butter, because there was no telling how long we’d be gone.

“Oh, we won’t be gone that long,” Henry mumbled as he zipped up his jacket. I tucked the camcorder snugly into my pocket and pulled my hat down low over my eyes.

It was time.

****

There was no sign of any of the Pizzarella delivery cars as we walked past the shop the first time,  me giggling uncontrollably and Henry telling me to shut the fuck up. When I’m giddy, I walk like a drunk, forcing him to grip my arm hard to pull me out of the way of other pedestrians. I hoped it would bruise so I could show the cops, but it didn’t. Damn those cold-weather layers. I plan on battering myself in time for my sonogram next week so all fingers will point to Henry.

We passed this guy Brice who used to stalk me, and his dog took a dump in the middle of the sidewalk. He acts like he doesn’t even know me now, I thought, as my wave and bright smile were met with a vacant stare. I looked at Henry in disdain. It’s all his fault. All of my stalkers retreated with their tails between their legs once Henry came barreling into my life, disrupting the natural order of things. (Gas station grocery shopping, inviting people over from chat rooms, blind dates, roller skating in the house. This list deserves its own entry. Or book.). I walked in silence for a few seconds, shedding invisible tears for stalkers past. Tossing a quick glance over at Henry, I felt a thousand pounds of hatred as I watched the way he scrunched up his shoulders to block the wind; the way he looked like a hoodlum with his hood pulled up tight around his fat face. Look at what he’s done to me, I thought, thinking of all the fun he’s driven out of my life. Maybe he can give me some STDs too, to ice the cake; make sure no one will ever want to stalk me again. No more Brices or Gothic Carls or Johnny Blazes. I’ve been tainted by domesticity. What stalker in their right mind would risk peeping into my window only to catch a glimpse of Henry traipsing around in his underwear? Who wants to stalk a boring quasi-housewife? (If you answered “I do” to that, my address is available upon request. I can also send pics of Henry’s bare legs to requested parties, as well.)

Luckily for Henry and the fate our unborn child, I distracted myself from further thoughts of running away by making zombie noises. The first one I did was the best, but then I couldn’t remember how I did it and I began to try too hard, which resulted in me sounding like I had emphysema. Still, I practiced on and on, relentless, because I’m no quitter. Plus, I wanted to test it out on unsuspecting passers-by.

“Was that it?”

“No.”

“Was that it?”

“No.”

Finally, Henry stopped answering me altogether, but it didn’t matter since we were now across the street from Pizzarella. I dusted off a spot on a retaining wall and made myself comfortable.

Cracked my knuckles a few times, blew on my finger tips, punched Henry in the crotch — you know, all the things people do when they’re preparing to undergo some heavy surveillance.

While I was getting nestled, two young kids pedaled past on their bikes, so I hit them with my zombie sounds. And then I laughed about it for a few minutes and kept saying, “Hey Henry, remember when those kids rode by and I made zombie noises at them?” He wouldn’t answer; that happens sometimes. I guess it’s because he’s old.

As luck would have it, right when I got the camcorder all set up (you know, extracted from my pocket and turned on), a drunk old black man came from our right, slightly staggering with his head down. So I taped him, with Henry whispering, “Don’t. That’s not nice. Stop.” See what I mean? I am so oppressed. Too bad Henry then started to laugh. Mr. Fucking Humanitarian. This is the same guy who comes home from work and brags about seeing prostitutes fighting and a woman wearing white pants with a menstrual Rorschach pattern on her crotch.

But I’m cruel for videotaping a wino.

While I was fully immersed in this anthropological specimen, Henry jabbed my arm and pointed across the street. A delivery man had returned. I swung the camera in his direction and began squealing, “Oh my god it’s Jimmy! It’s Jimmy!!” The butterflies were ricocheting all over my stomach as my laughter shook the camera, and then Henry said, “Oh wait. That’s not him. Jimmy had a white car.”

What, daddy? There’s no Santa?

I was crushed. Even more so than when I lost the Alternative Press “Number 1 Fan” essay contest last year. (I lost to some cunt in California who wrote something similar to this: “OMG I DON’T HAVE AN OLDER BROTHER BUT THANK GOD I HAVE AP BECAUSE YOU ARE LIKE AN OLDER BROTHER WHO SHOWS ME GOOD MUSIC.” How does that make her their number one fan? I would say that makes AP her number one imaginary friend. Fuck you and your non-brother, you fucking slut. Of course, I didn’t follow the rules and my essay was about three hundred words — give or take a few hundred — too long.

In any case, I know that girl’s name and where she lives. And in one of my lowest and darkest moments, I even tried to find her on LiveJournal so I could flame her. There, I said it.)

You see, we don’t actually know what Jimmy looks like; just his car. Still, I really think I’m in love with him.

I really am, I think.

We waited a little longer, huddled together against the wind. “Sweetie, I don’t think he’s working tonight,” Henry said as he patted my head. You know it’s dire when he calls me sweetie.

But then the clouds parted and another delivery car pulled up.

“That’s not him. That’s the guy that delivered to us earlier,” Henry said with authority because he excels in all things pizza and vehicles. But while Henry was shooting me in the face with his smugness, he totally missed the delivery guy emerging from his car. Suddenly, one of his legs completely gave out, like it was made from putty, and he fell back against the side of his car. I laughed, and I mean laughed, with enough volume and zest for him to hear and look over at me. This made me laugh even harder and I’m going to admit something here because I’m honest: I peed. Yes, I pissed my fucking pants, right there, sitting on the wall. Erin urinated. Granted, it was the tiniest dribble, maybe the size of a gum ball at best. But it was enough to feel warm and uncomfortable.

Look, I’m pregnant, OK? This shit happens. And by shit I mean piss.

This was the final straw for Henry and he urged me to get up and start walking home with him. Also, he was pouting because he missed the stumbling delivery man.

“Wait,” I said. “Not until I know for sure. Give me change, I need to make a call.”

And so I walked a half of a block down to the gas station and called Pizzarella from the pay phone, because I’m proud to be part of the world’s 10% without a cell phone. While I dialed the number, Henry stood beside me but I pushed him away because I didn’t want to laugh. I needed privacy for this one.

A girl answered and, while my mouth was wide open, there was this ill-timed delay in my speech. I almost hung up but didn’t want to waste the fifty cents. (Fifty fucking cents to use the pay phone now? It’s been a long time since I had to use a pay phone. Jimmy, my man, you’re raping my pockets.)

I had it all rehearsed in my head. A simple, “Hello, is Jimmy working tonight?” would have sufficed. But instead, I ended up sounding like a head gear-wearing 12-year-old Bobcat Goldthwait making his first prank call at a slumber party.

“HI!!!! [pause to bite back laughter] IS JIMHAHAHAHAPFFFFFFFFT WORKING TONIGHT!?!?!?”

“Who?” She was clearly annoyed. I hoped it wasn’t his girlfriend.

“Jimmy.” I wasn’t laughing now, but rather trying to hold back more spurts of urine.

You know how hard it is to manually shut yourself off once you’ve started!

And so I was informed that Jimmy was not working that night.

“THANKS” I yelled and slammed down the receiver. And then I laughed all the way to a stomach ache, while the urine burnt my thighs as it dried.

ETA: At exactly 2:20 PM, I was on my way to Pitt to schedule classes and I totally passed Jimmy and his white car on the road. It’s so on for tonight.

Last Saturday, the weather was sunny and 70, so my brother Corey met up at Jefferson Memorial to take some pictures. We saw a wedding ceremony which we desperately wanted to crash, and we also broke up a couple’s romantic interlude near the pond we chose as our location.

The pond is my favorite area of this cemetery, but it also happens to be near the scene of one of my most traumatic childhood memories. I was eight or so, and was with my mother and younger brother Ryan. I don’t know if we were visiting some dead relative or just poking around, but I remember we were all out of the car and it was getting close to dusk. Because my mom enjoyed inflicting psychological trauma on her children even back then, she decided to lock me out of the car. Here is where I will state that my mom to this day insists (through streaming tears of laughter and delight) that this even never occurred and that I dreamt it all up, that I always had an overactive imagination. But that’s only because she doesn’t want me to get to the climax of the story, which is where she would only let me back into the saftey of her Blazer if I read her three names off the mausoleum wall.

This is fact; it happened.

Conversely, my mother likes to make up her own memories, like the one where I pushed my brother Ryan down the attic steps. She still swears that this happened, and I know that I was an evil witch of a child, but I never pushed that kid down the attic steps, I’m sorry. Not even after he drove his twenty-wheeled remote control car in my mid-back lengthed hair which subsequently resulted in my mother doing one hell of a number on my pretty blond locks with shearers. Not even after he caused me to suffer through years of inadequacy issues and brutal, bloody competition. (I was the better tennis player, but  my family never came to any of my matches so they wouldn’t know.)

Fuck, I hate my family. (Not you, Corey. You’re safe from my voodoo doll army.)

Wow, thank you Random Picture Sunday. I feel much better now.

Oh shit. I found a bunch of old junk I wrote in high school, for random writing classes, and they are painful. Because I get off on looking lame, I am going to share this one piece of feces I actually had the audacity to turn in. AND IF YOU LIKE THAT, THERE IS A WHOLE FOLDER WHERE THAT ONE CAME FROM!

****

“Put that back. You know your brother doesn’t like Capn’ Crunch,” Val ordered as I loaded up the cart at Giant Eagle with unwanted food. [Ed.Note: I like how I didn’t even bother to call her “mom” when writing things for school.]

“But I like it!” I whined. It wasn’t fair how the world revolved around my brother. [Ed.Note. This tiny line of dialogue makes me realize that I haven’t changed. This could have come from a trip to the grocery store with Henry just last week.]

“So many brands of cereal. But you know what? We’ve discovered that generic brands taste just as good. Plus, you get a whole hell of a lot more.”

Val and I turned around and saw a woman who – if I was pressed to guess-  was in her late forties, leaning on her cart behind us. Her scraggly black hair lounged on top of her head. She looked tired and overly stressed, as if she had spent the last couple of  nights trying to catch up on her soap operas. [Ed.Note: Here is where, if this was written now, I probably would have guessed she had been out all night working the pole and thrusting her pelt in the faces of bearded truckers. Oh, to have that youthful innocence back.]

“You know, I might have some coupons for some of the junk you’re buying.” The woman reached into her bulging purse.

“Oh,  no thank you. Don’t bother. I’ve never been much of an avid coupon user.” Val gave me the ‘hurry-let’s-get-outta-here-before-I-get-stuck-talking-to-this-freak-forever’ look. Once we attempted to walk away, the woman started talking again, as if trying to lasso us back with her unwarranted conversation.

“When I said ‘we’ earlier, I was referring to my husband and myself.” Her face grew dark as she filled with staged sorrow. “Now I’m in a big legal battle with him.” Val knew that she was in for a long chat. “He wants to keep the dog! Can you believe that? My beloved Mitzy! I was the one who brought that dog home; I fed her, I bathed her, I played with her. Not John! No, all he did was neglect her.”

“That’s a shame. Look, I really should be on my way. It’s getting late and I have a baby at home—” Val started nudging me along.

“My lawyer, Mark? He says that he’ll handle the whole mess and that I shouldn’t worry.” I used this woman’s plight as a distraction to toss my box of Capn’ Crunch in the cart.

“I’m sure things will be fine,” Val looked at me, silently pleading for me to help her get away from this strange character, but I’m loving every second of it.

“My husband has gone so far as to lock the shed! How am I supposed to finish my garden with all of my tools locked away in the shed?” A nervous tug on a twisted strand of hair follows.

“Well, I’m sure you’ll get things straightened out. Erin, you about ready to go? My frozen foods are melting.” Val started coaxing me away from the cereals, just as the woman started to open her purse.

The first thing that ran through my mind was GUN GUN OH MY GOD GUN and that this neurotic woman had found her victims. Val, obviously sharing my same sneaking suspicions, backed away in panic.

The woman’s hand started to retreat from the depths of her bag when a voice suddenly boomed from the ceiling.

“Clean up in aisle five.”  The clerk’s voice was like a knife slicing through the tension, and it caused us to momentarily break our gaze from the mad woman. When we turned back around, she held out her hand and showed off a shiny…bottle of pills?

“Check out these pills. These are my anti-depressants. Dr. Hutchinson prescribed them to me so that  my  mood swings can be controlled.” The woman, holding her bottle of happy pills, rambled on and on about her missing son, her kleptomaniac maid, her car that needed new brakes.

It would seem as though Val was offering an unadvertised, pro bono shrink session.

After an eternity had passed, and probably the box of popcicles I hid under the loaf of bread had melted, Val finally spoke up.

“Well…look. I wish you all the best, and I hope that you find your son soon, but I really need to get home.”

“Oh, my. Didn’t you say something about that earlier? I just go off on these tangents sometimes.” She rummaged through her purse and pulled out a piece of scrap paper. “Here’s my number,” she said, clicking a pen. “Why don’t you call me sometime and we can have tea? I’d love to hear your stories someday! I live across from the high school.”

“Yeah, sure. Sure, I’ll do that. Sure.” Val stuffed the number in her pocket and quickly shoved me down the aisle. “Thanks for all the help back there,” she hissed, pinching me under the arm. [Ed.Note: MY MOM ABUSED ME.]

“What? You mean you didn’t think she was lovely?” I dead-panned.

“Listen!” Val stood stock-still. The mad woman’s voice trailed from the neighboring aisle.

“Oh, you shouldn’t buy those diapers! I used Luvs for my baby. Im in a custody battle with  my husband, by the way.  He wants to  take my daughter away from me!”

Turning back toward me, Val said, “Well, I’m ready to go. How about you?”

“Yeah, now that Supermarket Schizo has a new victim.” [Ed.Note: Wow, I sure was witty.]

My mom has always abhorred the idea of being immortalized in a photo. Most of the pictures I have of her from my childhood feature an arm splayed across her cheek, or her face obscured by her drape-like hair. But occasionally, a photo will surface of my mom actually smiling. Maybe the camera-holder caught her after she downed an extra glass of Sangria, who knows.

I could never understand my mom’s camera-shyness, because I always thought she was so pretty. Maybe if I looked even half as good as she did at my age, the act of having my photo taken wouldn’t give me indigestion and cold sweats. I hate having my picture taken so much, that I don’t even have the obligatory mother-holding-slimey-baby shot after I gave birth. If I ever get married, I suppose a stand-in will be in need.

P.S. That’s my step-dad with her. Back then, he wore shirts tighter than my mom’s and shorts shorter than Freddy Mercury’s, and also he was really into his Soloflex.

I wish I could still get away with rockin’ sweater dresses. I’d try it, but I have a sinking suspicion I’d look more like a mountain of scrotum covered by a rumpled sack than a cute 80s throwback with whom you’d want to double dutch. Maybe if I crimped my hair and decked my crown with a neon green floppy bow, it might distract from my stumpy legs.

Finding this photo made me think about all the other dumb fashion trends I bought into (read: my aunt Sharon bought into and projected onto me). Along with side ponytails and Punky Brewster hi-tops, I used to collect these cute and colorful plastic charms.  They either were from Kinney’s or David Weiss, but each charm had a tiny bell and clip that allowed them to be attached to a strand of coordinating multi-colored plastic links. I took pride in my blooming collection of unnecessary trinkets, ranging from a cuckoo clock to a can of hair spray. When I wasn’t using the clunky strand of plastic as a whip or trying to garrot my baby brother with it,  I would belt a jean skirt with i and jingle my way through a day of Kindergarten.

I had forgotten all about that fucking annoying leash of neon plastic until my grandma unearthed it a few months ago. Most of the charms had fallen off years ago, being in the brutal hands of a destructive child, but about eight charms remained intact on a short fragment of the chain.

Well, that was until I brought it home to Chooch’s lair. He’s since ripped every platsticized piece of 80’s nostalgia from the chain. Occasionally, I step on one and kick it under the couch in frustration because it’s like by having a child, I was duped into signing some secret contract, with a calligraphy pen wetted by afterbirth, stating that I will do nothing but pick up fucking toys all day long and that if I do not have a stooped back by my thirty-second birthday, I am fucking up my duty as a mother and will be relegated henceforth to the nearest Fantastic Sam’s where I will be drugged and supplied with the standard close-cropped Mom Bob.

Last night, we were chilling out on the couch, rubbing our meat fists together with fervor as we anticipated the start of the twenty-fifth VMAs, when Chooch (completely speaking out of turn, that little bastard will be mopping the basement floor tonight) said, “Mommy, look!”

Now, by seven in the PM, I have heard the pairing of the words “mommy” and “look” more times than my sanity is realistically able to comprehend, and I just don’t think any two words should ever commingle that much, unless they go by the names “sex” and “party”.  So, keeping my glazed eyes suctioned to the gyrating images and pornography of color and sonic diabetes that MTV spoon feeds me daily, I mumbled, “That’s great, Chooch.” But he kept chanting it over and over, louder and louder, angrier and angriest, until I began subconsciously flinching because I’ve grown so accustomed to having chunky pieces of toy parts chucked at my cheek bones. Fearing another bruise, I looked to see what he was desperate to show me.

A tiny plastic revolver charm.

I used to wear a cute little replica of a weapon around my waist. To school. To Kindergarten. I probably wore that to church at some point too. And how people probably wouldn’t have batted a lash at it. I mean, it was sold in kids’ clothing stores.

So I laughed about that for awhile, and joked that it could have been the catalyst to my present obsession with death and murder and violence.  Then I laughed while thinking about a kid nowadays, in the year 2008, sporting the likeness of a revolver to school and not having it turn into a Very Big Deal.

Tell me about YOUR childhood fashion style!

Some of my earliest memories center around the stereo room in my grandparent’s house, a.k.a my grandma’s clown room. Listening to a plucky rendition of Dr.

Zhivago’s Theme play from a music box, rifling through my mom’s and her sister’s old record collection (and always pulling out Frank Zappa’s “Valley Girl”), carefully dusting around the clowns with a feather duster for money and thinking I was such a big help.

I’d like to use my (hopefully brief) employment hiatus to do some kind of project in this room, but my damn aunt is fucking possessive about the house now that I’m not sure if I can find a way around her.

It would be fun to have people dressed as clowns, chilling out around the fake ones. Hiding in corners, rolling blunts on the chessboard.

I need to send my aunt to a fucking day spa and get this done.

My aunt seriously hounded me all weekend about coming to visit, but then as soon as she caught me taking pictures in the clown room, she got all flustered and pushed us out of the house. She must have fucking Hoffa hidden under the floor boards or something.

Today, I got to hang out with Lisa. She’s visiting from Colorado and I was lucky to rank high enough on her social ladder to score a visit with her. Over iced Chai tea and strawberry cake, we talked about how I should have one more kid (Lisa’s suggestion, and it made me laugh myself to death), we talked about the varying hues of menstrual blood, about how she couldn’t taste the strawberries in her cake yet mine was bursting with succulence, and we talked about how we’re going to party like heathens when she moves back to Pittsburgh in hopefully less than a year. (OK, that was mainly my suggestion, at which Lisa laughed herself to death.)

I birthed an entire being made of joy and g-spots when I saw an announcement for the upcoming Chiodos show in one our city papers. Lisa, annoyed that I interrupted our grown-up conversation with a fan-girly shriek straight from the pages of Teen Beat, was like, “OK. I don’t know who that is.” I hated her for a little while after that, but then she distracted me with, “Hey, you look good, by the way,” which opened the gates for an ecstatic sermon on the Gospel of Jump Rope. I seriously might die without that fucking rope. Or WITH it, due to my jumping mania and fury.

Lisa and I have drifted apart several times over the years, mostly because we consistently choose different paths. She chose “graduate”; I chose “drop out”. She chose “Christianity”; I chose “none.” She chose “abstinance”; I chose “like rabbits”. Our lifestyles have clashed at times. She left my nineteenth birthday party marathon because it was lewd, debacherous, drug-laden, and overpopulated with underage drinking. I rarely visited her at Bible College because happy people would try to hold my hand and I couldn’t smoke anywhere on campus.

But through the past few years, we’ve come closer to meeting in the middle. I thought she would have freaked at the idea of me having a bastard son, but she never once criticized me, or judged me. She loves my Chooch and is a huge Henry advocate.

Between sips of her latte, she was telling me today about an issue she had with some guy she met, how she emailed him and prefaced it with, “As your sister in Christ…” followed by a dissertation on faith. A few years ago, I might have once laughed at her for being such a God homo. But today, I have a greater respect for her as a person and for all that she’s accomplished, so I just laughed inside my head.

I love Lisa.  I love her so much that I use a song she absolutely abhors as her personalized ring  tone on my Blackberry. And THAT is how you know I love you – through torture.

To commemorate my day with Lisa:

 My favorite Lisa memory is circa 1997, during the spring of my senior year of high school. I was tooling around town with my friends Jon and Justin, killing time before meeting up with the rest of our motley crew later that night.  Justin came to a realization.

“Shit! ICP is playing at Laga tonight. We should go.”

Being a yo-girl at heart, I had no objections to his spontaneous suggestion, until our previous engagements crept into mind.

“But we’re supposed to go over Melissa’s tonight and watch movies with her and Lisa, remember?” A far cry from the havoc we could potentially wreak at a concert, but an obligation nonetheless.

“We’ll just get everyone to meet us at Laga instead.” Jon’s solution seemed so simple, but he was forgetting something very important.

“Lisa’s not going to go for that,” I sighed. The aforementioned Lisa was, and still is, a Christian who just could not get down with the likes of ICP. Becoming a juggalo was not something Jesus would do. (Maybe not her Jesus. My Jesus would have helped pen some of their rhymes.)

 “I have a plan,” Justin said. He dialed Lisa’s number and confidently urged her to put movie night on hold in favor of what could potentially go down in the annals of Very Special High School Moments.

“What is an ICP?” Lisa asked suspiciously.

“They’re a band. It stands for…Intensely Christian…Punks.” Lisa, having a soft spot for non-secular punk bands, called everyone else and informed them of the changed plans.

There were six of us that night, all sardined into Jon’s car. Half of us were giddy to be going to a concert; the other half were giddy because we got away with a lie in order to go to the concert in the first place.

As soon as ICP took the stage, Lisa was chagrinned. “They don’t look like punks…?” she yelled above the crowd of undulating and rioting juggalos. Once they started rapping and she heard their lyrics, she edged back from the stage. Once they started spraying the crowd with Faygo, accompanied by lewd and suggestive gestures, she migrated back some more until a wall prevented her from retreating further. She probably had quite a few dialogues with God that evening.

When the show was over, we all tiptoed over the puddles of Faygo left to coagulate into sugary stains. Lisa, the bottom of her Vans slick with the liquid, slipped and fell down the steps.

Best night ever.

My parents were in the process of having a back porch built onto our house. This was a big deal for my brother Ryan and me, because stalking one of the workers became the sole reason we got out of bed each day. I mean really, who wants to swim and lay out in the sun when you can be violating someone’s privacy?

There was no real reason why we felt so intrinsically drawn to the sweaty laborer. He wasn’t good-looking, he didn’t sport a peg-leg, he wasn’t albino. He was just your average forty-something year old porch-builder with tinted eyeglasses, a farmer’s tan and a bushy moustache. I don’t even think he ever spoke to us. I mean, would you?

We would run from window to window, snapping pictures of him. Pictures from the kitchen, pictures from our parent’s bedroom, pictures bent around tree trunks. One day, Ryan even chased his truck up the street as he departed for home after a long grueling day of hammering nails and chugging Schlitz under the shade of a maple. I often wondered if our porch-builder had a good broad with a nice plump behind to nail, maybe cook him up a nice thick stew.

I’ll never forget the day we discovered his name was Gary. We ran into the house, erupting into shrieks and giggles. Our mom’s reaction was something akin to “Yeah, so?” accompanied by an eye brow raise. She always raised the eyebrow that bore a scar from when she was a baby and rolled off her bed, banging her face off the corner of the nightstand. I still can’t believe she never made up a better story, like how she was nicked by a gypsy’s butterfly knife the time she tried to steal cantaloupes off their wagon. When I was fourteen and viciously mauled by our psycho rabbit, you better believe I went back to school with a yarn about getting stabbed during gang initiation.

After a week of wasting film on this fine craftsman, we decided these clandestine snaps weren’t providing enough of a sociopathic rush. We needed more thrill, something that provided more of an instant gratification. When you’re young, you want souvenirs for everything you do: pocketed sugar packets from a truck stop diner, pebbles from the parking lot of the first sex shack your dad made you wait outside of, bloodied gauze from your first tooth extraction.

So the next obvious step clearly was to collect Gary’s cigarette butts and beer cans.

We waited until he’d go to his truck, then sprint out in the backyard like scavengers, picking through the grass in search of a butt or two. Once we accumulated enough to satiate our pursuant appetite, we brought our treasures in the house and stowed it underneath the couch in the family room. Like chipmunks storing acorns, crack heads hording rocks.

Stalking Gary consumed so much of our summer. So much that it infiltrated the summer of my friends, as well. My best friend Christy was out of town for some sort of academic camp. I wrote her a letter and enclosed one of Gary’s cigarettes butts for her to cherish as well. I just wanted her summer to be as rich as ours had become, thanks to Gary. I wrote letters to every one of my pen pals, detailing Gary’s every action and movement. Everyone clung to the Summer of Gary with bated breath.

Unfortunately, the fun and games ended when my dad unearthed our stash of purloined memorabilia under the couch. Now, any other dad would have rightfully accused us of smoking and drinking. Luckily for us, my dad recognized the extent of our weirdness long before this incident, so he believed our tale and we escaped punishment. The downside was that he forbade us to continue our game and pitched our pirated keepsake, muttering something about how we were embarrassing him or something.

I often wonder what Gary is doing these days, and if he knew he was being stalked. Was he flattered? I asked my mom: she said probably not.

I went through a short (five year) spell where I compulsively answered and posted personal ads for the sheer thrill of probable disaster. In the winter of 1999, a delightful man named Pete responded to one of my ads. After exchanging several cordial emails, I decided there was a fair chance he wasn’t keen on brandishing machetes, so I offered up my phone number.

He called me one night when my boyfriend Jeff was over. Jeff — yes, my boyfriend — was no stranger to my need to spread my wings of infidelity, so he busied himself with an episode of "Felicity" (the one where Brian Crackhouse raped the pink Power Ranger) while I carried on a merry conversation with Pete about all the various cereals we liked and how it was so hard to choose just one variety each morning.

Pete and I made plans to meet up one fine evening, and to be safe, I invited Janna over too. Because if he were to arrive wielding a chainsaw, at least I’d have a decoy. Minutes before Pete’s arrival, Janna called. "My mom won’t let me have the car because of the snow. I’m so sorry!" she whined, probably inwardly relieved that now she could stay home and watch PBS.

I tried to call Pete to cancel, but he had already left. I wondered about the possibility of him leaving the piano wire at home, on the kitchen counter, miles away from my vulnerable neck.

But he likes cereal so much, I pep-talked myself. It’s hard to imagine a serial killer enjoying a bowl of Apple Jacks, I assured myself, because that’s clearly grade A logic to apply.

When I opened the door for Pete, I was taken aback by his unexpected redneck visage. But once we got the handshaking out of the way, he settled down in a chair and conversation flowed freely. I was slightly irritated by his constant abbreviation for cigarette. "Let me light another ciggie," he’d announce, feeling the need to include me in his smoking schedule.

Then he pulled out a joint. I knew not to smoke it with him, because even when I’m with someone I’m supremely close to, my paranoia gets way out of control and of course every person in the tri-state area is vying to rape me. I want to sear my skin with a hot iron, leap from speeding vehicles, watch Olsen Twins videos.

So I did the rational thing in Erin’s World and joined him.

On TV, the news reports gave constant updates on the severe weather condition unraveling outside. I kept urging him to leave, and he would respond with obvious insinuations that he wanted to spend the night, which my marijuana-clouded mind translated as, "Imma treat ya like a pig, stuff an apple in yer mouth, and fuck ya silly from the bee-hind, you slutty broad. Who’s the cereal king now, ho?"

Oblivious to the pandemonium tap-dancing through my nervous system, he’d jiggle a cigarette between his fingers and say, "Just one more ciggie!" I sat on the couch, hunkered down among the pillows, arms protectively covering my boobs, legs bouncing with the verve and RPM of a bridge-dwelling paranoiac. I had cotton mouth and I wanted to go to bed. Maybe eat a PB&J.

He finally left after I completely closed off and started answering his questions with irate outbursts. I never heard from him again, which is a shame because we could have maybe made beautiful cereal together.

Sharing Harlan Coben books.

Weekend Players & The Flir.

Choking on chlorine.

Firecracker trips to Ohio.

Horror movies on humid nights.

Amaretto sours & A/C at McCoys.

Loving the Decemberists, hating bronchitis.

Pink Disney Princess phone.

Blue floppy beach hat to stay incognito.

Death by riding mower.

Instead of working, I’m flipping through an old notebook I kept when I was sixteen; a scrapbook of decoupaged pages of magazine clippings and ads for haunted houses, stream-of-consciousness scribblings, and my signature brand of really stupid poems. Also apparently I was running a CD rental program and kept a log of who had what and when it was returned.

It seems on one really special occasion, I felt compelled to list my idols at the top of one the pages.

1. Michael Myers
2. Jason Voorhees
3. Ellen DeGeneres
4. Bizzie Bone, of Bone Thugs n Harmony fame
5. Jennifer Aniston
6. DaBrat
7. El DeBarge

No wonder my parents are so proud of me.

Hopefully, I still have time to become a lesbian psychopathic (just a few breakdowns away!) killer with awesome flow, a penchant for chainsaws, and perfect hair before falling into obscurity (seriously, El, where did you go?). Luckily, I already have the ‘brat’ part mastered.

I don’t have any idols anymore.

If there was one moment in my life I’d love to be able to re-watch with a bowl of popcorn, it would be that day in fifth grade when Mike Harrison called Mrs. Glumac — the  obligatory meanest, nastiest, wartiest, tan-quilted-parka-in-the-winter wearingest lunch lady at our school — a bitch in the middle of a high stakes game of kickball, after she called him out unfairly.  Before she even had a chance to threaten him with a paddle, he took that rubber ball and hurled it at her face with the might of a thousand scorned bipolar women, smashing and breaking her glasses against her face.

He smashed them for every kid holding their piss on that playground, every kid that Mrs.

Glumac brought to tears in the cafeteria and every kid whose peaceful sleep was ever jarred into a fitful nightmare of hair nets and deadened eyes and Glumacian orders to line against the wall.

I remember how everyone just got really quiet, and Mrs. Glumac and Mike just stood there at a standstill, both in shock, we were all in shock. Mike was legendary in our eyes after that, having done what every kid thinks of doing, dreams of doing, wishes someone else would do to the cruel lunch lady who makes penises worldwide cower when she walks into a room. It was fucking awesome. I had a crush on him for real after that.

He totally got in so much trouble.

I used to keep a little log of daily happenings back then, just a little miniature spiral-topped notebook that I would write things like, “Spring is wearing a ponytail today — she’s going to be mean!” and “Oops, I have to sharpen my pencil!” It wasn’t a private diary, it was pine green, and everyone knew about it; so when we came back in from recess, everyone was all, “Erin, did you write about it yet, let us read what you wrote about it!” I believe all it said was a very succint “Mike H. called Mrs. Glumac a bitch then broke her glasses!” and everyone cheered when they saw the word “bitch” in actual penciled handwriting.

When I was growing up, my mom would tell me stories about Green Man’s Tunnel. According to her, the Green Man lived in an abandoned train tunnel in a suburban town south of Pittsburgh called South Park. He was green because he had the horrible misfortune of getting struck by lightning. Electrocuted by a toaster while bathing.  Stuck his dick in Gumby’s light socket. He was green, OK?

I would argue with people for years, spitting in their faces that it wasn’t an urban legend, that the Green Man was real, that my mom went to school with the Green Man, that her best friend went to the prom with the Green Man, that I SAW HIM WITH MY OWN EYES.

(I never really saw him.)

Then there were the people who believed in the legend (hello, it’s TRUTH, not legend) but insisted that the tunnel was located in other wooded areas, next to a creek in another town, on a pot-holed rural lane in a different county. My friend Keri insisted it was in a town called Dravosburg. "Remember when me, you, and Dan went to Green Man’s Tunnel to set off firecrackers?" she’d start. I would shrug. "Yeah you do. Dan got hit in the face with one of them, remember? He had that big welt on his cheek?" I would stubbornly say, "Well Keri, I remember the time we went to a tunnel in Dravosburg, but not Green Man’s Tunnel. THAT tunnel is in South Park." For years, I wouldn’t acknowedge the memory of that day until she quit calling it Green Man’s Tunnel.

My mom would drive us out there, my brother Ryan and me, repeating the story in case we forgot how tragic and green the Green Man really was. "He was so nice, really good looking too, until he got turned green." Before we’d reach the part of the road where his rusted, graffiti’d, abandoned train tunnel could be seen, we’d have to first drive through a long underpass; a creek flowed along one side. Some people’s version of the story claim that when you’re in this tunnel at night, your headlights go out. Your car just shuts off, completely dies. The Green Man comes and steals your electricity and then I don’t know what. Fucks you with it? Shoots down planes with it?

Sometimes, in the tunnel, my mom would slow to a halt, the headlights would go out. My brother Ryan would cry, but I knew that the lights were out because my mom turned them off to scare us. My chest would tighten, palms would moisten, even though I knew that part of the story wasn’t real, that the Green Man was sad and just wanted some friends. Just wanted some friends to bring him some Hustler and maybe a forty of Miller Lite.

I couldn’t provide him those things, the booze and the porn, but I was determined to give him companionship, friendship, a membership to the Erin Rulz 4 Lyfe club. So one night I prepared a small sandwich bag of assorted candies. Tootsie rolls and Lifesavers and some mini Snickers, and in that bag, among all the candy, I tucked in a note that I wrote on a piece of blue paper. My mom drove me out to his tunnel. I had intended on taking the bag right up to his tunnel, right up to entrance, where I would then knock on the steel door and he would take me in and we’d sit down and drink some cans of Coke and talk about how tough it is, not fitting in, and then I’d give him half of a best friend pendant and we’d keep in touch and twenty years later he’d be my son’s Godfather.

Instead, I completely flipped my shit when I got close to the ominous tunnel, saw the "condemned" sign on the gate, heard fluttering noises in the patch of woods above the unused tracks, and I chugged my ass back down to the road where my mom idled in the car. Tossed the baggie of treats into the small gravel lot across the street and ended up back in the passenger seat, eyes closed and fighting to catch my breath.

"I thought you weren’t scared of him," my mom said as the tunnel became smaller and smaller in the rearview mirror. And then she did what she did best when I was in distress: laugh at me.

I always wondered if he got the care package, my carefully prepared snack pack of love and frienship. I wondered if he ate the candy before a woodland creature scampered over from the other side of the creek and devoured it. I wondered if the Tootsie Rolls got stuck in his teeth and if he used his tongue to pry it from his molars and I wondered, was his tongue green too?

Today, while I was getting my hair done, my stylist Lucia was talking about her boyfriend’s sister.

"She lives out by Green Man’s Tunnel." She paused, waiting for a sign of recognition. I didn’t say anything, but my body stiffened, hoping she’d give the right answer.

When she added, "Out in South Park," I lit up.

"OK, I know exactly where that is," I smiled.

Just another reason I love Lucia — she knows the right story.