well… i mean really this blog’s about dealing with bad news and how do you move on. here’s a couple things i recommend, first thing is watch the news. when all this stuff first started bumming me out i watched a week’s worth of news on my dvr. i found out about the couple that was murdered in a cinematic safe heist. they had an army of disabled children depending upon them. i found out about bloody afghanistan; sometimes i forget about the war until i receive a letter from someone overseas which is pretty regularly and in between letters if its not in the news i dont think about it. i dont think people can walk around thinking about the real carnage that happens on this earth. we have to block it out to put one foot in front of the other. so yeah the world has it way worse than me.
if you’re sad and you feel alone you’re family is always there kinda waiting for the bat call to spring into action. and my family was awesome in this regard. my brother and i chatted and he advised me to abscond and breathe. he is so wise. and really all this threw me for such a loop that i smoked a cigarette and almost sat down at the bar. i was low. feeling so rejected. but he gave me perspective. and it was good to talk to him. its a great feeling to know that there are people out there that just love you so much, they’d do anything. he was missing his wife and two girls who were on a trip; separation is torture.
i found someone to hang out with and talk to, that would help me gain perspective. her name’s adri and she brought her 6 year old son dakota. their father terrin and i toured together in 2008 before he died of cancer. he was the keyboardist of pinback and basically we were buddies and just constantly riffed and joked and laughed. he was my friend on the tour. two tours really. and the last time i talked to him was on the phone on the side of the stage at the bowery ballroom before making a guest cameo during pinback’s set. i think he complained that his son wouldnt let him play lego batman. i loved terrin and i’ve never lost anyone so close to me. ive never had someone who’s name was on my phone and still is, just leave the earth. i dont think anyone knows how to mourn or how to act like life is the same afterwards. all day long i kept waiting for him to join us.
so adri and dakota needed a laugh as did i and we all went to legoland. this was perfect for me because it wasnt near the con which was just too intense (although a con blog will follow this.) i was also in the middle of a lego craze, having slightly eased out of my peanuts phase. i just finished the motorized walking at-at and was ready for the next project. when i was little my brothers and i didnt get along much save for when we built lego’s together in my brother dan’s room. the radio would be on, playing stairway to heaven and toto, and we’d all be fast at work, mainly making star wars inspired space ships and docking bays. my friends and i all got together last wednesday to watch the new green lantern dvd and the chipmunks animated movie from the 80’s (wow horrible) and we all discussed which lego’s had the greatest value. the rotating pieces, the gun piece, the swivel piece. when i worked at sealab my boss adam would build expensive lego sets to ease his mind and prolly cool his jets. im the age he was when we worked together so maybe there’s just this stage in a man’s life where he needs to sit down and breathe and do something meticulous.
i spent my first two days in california with kids and i think fate can be awesome like that. kids dont know, dont judge, they just want to play and riff and think and laugh. i cant help but feel embarrassed for being perpetually adolescent, i love my nerdy things, my toys and legos, comics and what have u. i dont know if that’s just who i am or if that’s part of me pretending i havent grown up, because being a grown up sucks. i dunno. i just follow my heart. i take luxury in the escape that these things bring me. i feel like it makes the hard ships of life tolerable. i hate that feeling that im an idiot for liking stuff, or for cracking jokes. but i guess its how i cope and kids dig it. im good with kids and i guess that’s important to me. ive worked with them before. i volunteered in philly after college when i felt like no one needed me. i found out that abused people just want to be paid attention to, they want to be heard and they want to interact. it’s just time spent together. ive learned to let kids lead the play, so they can fully explore everything. ive learned to not be condescending to the them or to patronize them. i think i respect kids. maybe im perma-ten or maybe i just think they’re smarter than other people do. i dont mind using a bigger word around them because its good for them to hear a ten cent word. i dont dummy myself down around them. no baby talk. if anything i just be myself. im a goofy guy that loves amusement parks and details and i just love walking around eating up all the details. im an easter egg hunter and lego was full of them.
i have to give legoland a big thumbs up! basically we rushed through the park for like four hours and there was still so much to do. the lego city walk had so much detail that it was impossible to take it all in. there were parts like the pirate world that i didnt even see. the place was huge. when i walked onto the floor at comicon i just went to legos and left. i want to go to the supreme lego store. im making good money as of late and i can just kinda do whatever. i can go anywhere, go on any trip etc. but i dont do much and just try to save. but i will give myself like a cool lego set. to make me happy. i birthday myself like once a month. so i was stoked to go this park’s store and so was dakota. we couldnt really decide what to get. i grabbed a bunch of architecture sets, including the “willis” tower and a frank lloyd right. i really wanted to buy everything for them all day but i didnt want to seem like a jerk. i got to buy him a couple of pitches in the game area. but we were about to leave and i was like pick one, a smaller one. and we just couldnt decide. he was looking at this huge farm set and every part of me wanted to buy that farm for him. and i guess im crying now as i type that. i guess all of this is my dealing with terrin. dealing with losing him. his son acts like him and its so weird, so i just wanted to do something nice. its weird though when u buy gifts. you can make things weird, so i wanted to keep it small. and we picked out a clone tank we thought was 40 bucks. (takes deep breath continues to type) we got to the register and the rang it up and i before i left i had the guy explain why it was 180 bucks. and he was like the clone tank is 100 bucks. you should see a child’s face when he realizes the value of his lego box has gone up 40 bucks. adri was like no way and i was like it’s fine. we wanted to get out of there any way. everybody was super happy on the way out.
hanging out with adri all day was a great help. i went over everything with her and we talked about moving on and how does one do that exactly. she’s wants to date but doesnt feel ready. i dont feel like i can date anymore. i feel like i was shut down. at my show that night in san marcos, i got those eyes from the girls that i get when i rap, and it didnt have any effect on me. its like im not here anymore. i have no desire to flirt. (watch my sales plummet.) adri’s perspective on this was eerily similiar to mine. u have to move on, but can u. i told her that at least she got to experience it. at least she got to be with him and now there’s cody. so terrin’s always here in his son’s face. he’s in the songs cody sings to himself. i got to experience it too. so i’ll leave it at that and try to deal. there were times when i’d smile knowing what love feels like. ur just changed if u ever get to feel it.
we hugged and said i love you’s and split up but our cars were parked in the same area so i ran back to them to take ONE more pic and adri said, he just said he’s the nicest guy ever. and then she told me he said that i would make a good dad. i took their picture and they fell over, drunk on lego’s. i drove home thinking about my family, the one i would start. and how it’s my dream. i wouldnt have a child until i was ready to support it, until the mother was ready to have it, and ive got all these nerds to take care of until the little whipper snapper shows up. but my heart knows that i needed to be with someone that needed a surrogate dad because i needed a surrogate family. i felt like my chances had just been taken away. so i needed to hear dakota say that id be a good dad. (cries)
phew. that was the toughest blog ever to write.
but it’s done. GOOD CRY EVERYBODY! that’s a wrap.
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