Digital Demolition

Cory has been a good friend of mine for more than 20 years. I wouldn’t say that we’re close now – life does have a way of rending friends from one another without careful care – but each time I see him, it is a joyous and all-too-short encounter. I thought that one day I’d make an entire site dedicated to his stories, but now they’re just going to live here.

In his 20s to 30s, Cory was a bit irresponsible and a lot experimental. He walked an adventurous path with a great attitude and more courage than I could ever muster. No matter what the outcome, he was always up for more.

In Our College Days
Cory used to save his farts in jars. Yes, plural, making it all the more unusual gross. He inherited the most vile toxic emissions from his father. Words are incapable of describing how foul his farts could be and he took great pride in this. So he saved them, to share with unwitting friends, in jars in his bedroom. As if the practice itself wasn’t strange (weird, crazy?) enough, the results were hilarious (as long as you weren’t the victim, of course). He once unscrewed a cap for a friend to elicit the extreme inhalation disgust, then rapidly resealed the jar so he could spring it on someone else another day.

Encounter at Coit Tower
Not long after Cory moved to San Francisco, he was visiting Coit Tower at night (possibly Halloween or another fall holiday) with some friends. He was on acid, and probably some additional illicit drugs, as he’s always been an experimenter. (I’ve mentioned his tendency toward bad judgment, right?) Well, on this particular evening, Cory was walking around the Tower, admiring the views of the city from this lovely spot. All was going great until a strange girl came charging up with her boyfriend in tow and pointed at Cory and said something to the effect of “He’s the guy who tried to rape me!” Well, in addition to the statement itself being false, Cory had never before seen the girl or her boyfriend, and was incapable of such an act. He’s a really nice guy, with good intentions, and possibly one of the most compassionate people I’ve ever met. He’s also a raging homosexual. Not that he didn’t try a few girls back in the day, but by this time, he knew his love was for the boys.

His protestations of innocence, along with his slight frame, led to him getting a solid pounding at the hands of the boyfriend and the boyfriend’s friends. His only crime? Wrong place at the wrong time. (A crime that is probably the single most common in San Francisco.) His friends came along shortly and took him to the emergency room to get patched up. No serious harm done, except to his sense of security and a few bruises he didn’t earn.

I think that’s enough for today. I’ll post some more later.

Sometimes when I’m doing the Dance of Shiva in the mirror, I feel like a fucked-up cheerleader. It’s hard to resist the temptation to snap into every position (three years of marching band in high school will do that to you). Most of the time when I start feeling really cheeky and flow-y, I throw myself off balance within moments.

I was a contrary child. Best way to get me to do something? Tell me not to do it. Before I left for college, mom told me to be careful and please please please not to try this one drug. Of course, that’s the first thing I looked for. If she said not to do it, it must be good, right? (It was definitely interesting, but I’ve gotta wonder if she was just recommending against it because that was the “right” thing to tell your kid or if she had actual experience. I suspect the former.)

That’s probably the reason I’m enjoying the Dance thingy. The right way to do it doesn’t really exist and even people who’ve been practicing for years can still throw themselves off balance. Being off balance has been my modus operandi forever. After I had the stroke, the doctor asked me if my balance was uneven. “More than before?” I asked. (Yeah, even under the worst situations, my odd sense of humor remains. I suppose it’ll die when I do.)

But when you start exploring all these get-yourself-back-after-a-tragedy methods, they talk about being grounded and being centered. After a little research on how our bodies work, I found that it’s a literal thing – our inner ear dictates our ability to judge where we are in relation to the planet and gravity and everything. Understanding your place in all of this madness and owning your own space is related to the reality of actual balancing in this world. And I’m off. Maybe you are, too.

Quite a few things I read have lately talked about being normal and how there is no normal. Every person has issues (stuff, stuck, triggers, whatever you want to call them) and no one feels normal. Ever. We’re struggling to fit into a nebulous place that doesn’t exist, except in our heads. (And probably our hearts, too, if you want to get all hippie about it.)

The more I consider this current thread of “there is no normal” and my observations about my off-balance-ness, the more I think that I’m heading the right way. Dave has this theory that when serendipitous things start happening, it’s the universe’s way of letting you know you’re on the right heading. I like to believe him.