The Blissville Morning

I'm awoken by Keyboard Cat. 
I take a moment to gaze at life's only certainty. I feel grounded. 
I search for sustenance. I find scraps. 
I spin some Hall & Oates. 
I'm ready for the day.

Jo Jo Jo! Srta. Clauso is coming to town!

You better watch out - I'm forecasting a Mexican tornado this holiday season!  Better not cry - crying is reserved only for prolonged, arduous phone calls between the hours of  3 and 4 AM on weeknights to discuss varying levels of LDR confusion.  Better not pout - nobody pouts in Fort Greene, unless they miss the B38 bus on a stormy night.  I'm telling you why - you don't know yet?  VIVIANA is coming to town! 

I'm making a list - a list of activities we can do in New York City, some wholesome, some...not so much.  I'm checking it twice - my bank account, that is!  Gonna find out - whether or not egg nog can actually be a suitable substance for various rounds of "babybirding."  Who's naughty or nice - I've been trying to figure that out for about 7 years now.  VIVIANA is coming to town!

Eleven days before we celebrate Christ's birth on this year, two thousand and nine, marks the third (?) or fourth (?) coming of VIVIANA to these United States.  I encourage everyone to take a sleigh ride out to Brooklyn sometime between December 14th and January 10th to see the spectacle that is VIVIANA.  Feliz Navidad Cabrones!             

It's been awhile!

So, here I am.   I've Craigslisted, I've gone out, I've been there, I've done that.  That's life.  But is that all?  I think that's nowhere near all that this life, in this time, has to offer.  As I'm typing there are things going on around me.  People are sleeping, people are laughing, and people aren't reflecting; but I'm reflecting...is that OK?  Being fortunate is OK, but I hope it doesn't get boring.  All I've been trying to do is bring the comforts of home closer to home - bring the luxuries I've come to love from my parents into my own dwelling tucked deeper into Brooklyn than ever before.  Damn do I feel happy; it's more than worth it...or is it?  Right now, I can't tell.  I walk into my apartment and I peer timidly at a couch that's not mine, but became mine through a simple barter, well transaction might be a better word for it.  Yes, a transaction.  But not an official transaction, plastic has no value here - it's all about the paper, the human interaction, the search, the game.  If it wasn't clean I wouldn't bother, but is was clean...it was like brand new, it was something I could take pride in, something with a history that's not my own.  Let's make it my own, better yet, let's make it ours...I wanted it so you could sit on it.  I wanted it so WE can sit on it.  But I'm doubting that's going to happen and I'm doubting that you'd think my motives were pure.  I guess only time will tell.  Fuck Halloween, let's get ready for Christmas...  

Thanks Whole Foods, for the inspiration...

"I USED TO BE A MAN."

Monster Mash

I am hyped up! My energy level is staggering. My heart is pumping 100% pure bull's blood through my PVC pipe veins. (PVC piping is what we use in the pool business - strong stuff, lasts for an eternity.) I have crazy strength. I have the combined fortitude of five middle-aged mothers that have suddenly found their young, feeble offspring lodged under the steel-walled tire of a semi filled with Nautilus gym equipment. I shampoo my hair with additive free adrenaline. I sprinkle testosterone on my Farina. I stand naked in a steam room...I don't sweat, but if I did, I would sweat tears of mercy from those that have wronged me. I recently beat a Cheetah in a potato sack race...I was wearing the potato sack; the cheetah came equipped with a rocket pack. I eat a five to seven dollar meal for lunch. I drink eighteen ounces of Monster Milk brand human fuel mixed in whole milk for dinner. Every day, that's what I do.

Time, why you punish me?

Have you heard those words strung together before? Where have you heard them? Think real hard...it may help if you hold the word 'time' for three to five seconds in singsong and lower your voice as you hit three descending notes. If that doesn't work, look at this: HOOTIE! I was going to write 'Darius,' but I feel that most people may not have shared the same level of fanaticism towards the Blowfish crew. Anyway, I've always liked that song, but that's not the point of this post. I really would like to discuss time and, moreover, the passing of time. Does it really heal all emotional wounds? Are there things out there that can transcend time? Is it possible for one to be hurt so bad that they can never recover from or let go of the past no matter how much time may relentlessly attempt to cushion the blow?

First off, we must decide if time is really what is helping to ease our pain after suffering an emotionally catastrophic event. I sometimes ponder this: if one was to mentally relive some emotionally devastating event everyday for two years, would one ever recover? Would it matter that two years had passed? I think not. I believe that whoever was hurt would feel just as much pain as the day that the walls came crashing down on him/her; maybe even more pain because of the time spent harboring the virus. So time, itself, really doesn't help us to feel better unless we make the conscious decision to let go, to rid ourselves of what's bothering us, and move towards calmer waters. What time does, and this is extremely important, is help us to separate ourselves from the wound, to rise above it and look down on it with a certain degree of self assurance and say, "Look at you...you are an event. You hurt me for some time but now I'm free. I've crawled from your steamy black depths and have rose above. I can see you quite clearly now. I know how you happened, I know for how long, I know who was involved...I know everything because I've been there. But now I'm here. And do you know how I got here? How I separated from you? Time gave me some courage, but more importantly, I made the conscious decision to leave you. It's as simple as that."

Now, I've had some things happen to me before that made me say to myself, "I just need some time; that will make me get over this!" But it's not the time that's healing my wound...I can only heal the wound myself. Time gives us the courage to separate from the pain, but it is impossible for us to rise above and look down upon it unless we consciously decide to do so. I'm not talking about making the decision to bottle it up and hide it within the shadows of bad experiences or the well of self-pity and depression; I'm talking about acknowledging it, understanding that it was an event that took place over a certain fixed amount of time, reflecting on the life lessons you've learned, and most importantly realizing that you are now completely separated from this event and the only thing that may be connected to it is your ego. The ego wants attention, even from you. The ego wants your pity. The ego harbors vengeance. The ego is wrong and you are right. Let time help you generate the courage to rise above your own ego, once you make the decision to do so...you can overcome anything.

The Maiden Post...

Hello friends,

Welcome to my blog, where you'll find all sorts of interesting tidbits about life, love, philosophy, and celebrity gossip...well, maybe not celebrity gossip in the normal sense of the term, but in a much more meaningful way. I'm talking about the local celebrities in our lives - immensely local. So local that they are around you when you kick off your loafers (or in my case quarter-calf length boots) when you arrive home from work, have the keys to your apartment for the purposes of "dropping loads" of laundry, and have the ability to shake up your entire world from an international phone line or a web cam on history's largest laptop computer. These, my friends, are the only celebrities worth gossiping about - and when I say "gossip" you should already know that I don't mean it in the Perez Hilton / WB11 teen drama sense of the word, but in a much more meaningful way. I'm talking about the gossip that doesn't involve rumors, the gossip that happens most Saturday and Sunday mornings when you wake up sprawled across three leather couch cushions on your boxed-up bedroom floor, then proceed to the kitchen to view an empty refrigerator and tell majestic tales from the prior night's happenings; most of which are gratuitously littered with laughter, howls, and hazy reenactments. Simply put, I'm talking about sharing stories about my friends, girlfriend, and loved ones. I don't know why I was so cryptic about it...or maybe it was metaphoric, eh, let's go with metaphoric.

So now that you all know what this blog is, or will be, about, I say we move forward with it and look towards the future with hungry eyes and deep-rooted anticipation, for this is the maiden voyage of Rocco's mind setting sail onto his company supplied laptop. Let's all hope he can "man the jib," whatever that means...