"POISON"

For the last three weeks, while getting ready to move into my new place, I've been staying with my parents in the KC 'burbs, and this is, hands down, the most consecutive time I've spent with them since I moved out ten years ago. 

For the most part, they're normal folks, but I'm starting to notice some of their quirks.

For example, my mom's morning routine includes drinking coffee and watching the weather while brushing the cat, and at least once a week my dad brings home leftovers from his neighborhood hangout, announcing to an indifferent audience, "I've got livers and gizzards. Who wants some?" He has also been known to enjoy the occasional episode of Buffy the Vampire Slayer (though he'll tell you it's my mom).

Last night after brushing my teeth in their bathroom, I found them stretched out in their respective recliners watching Dancing with Desperate Former Celebrities, or something like that. I had discovered something peculiar that demanded an explanation.

Me: "Do I even want to know why there's a giant Tylenol bottle by the sink labeled 'POISON?'"

My mom, who throws away everything on the exact date it expires, pointed to my dad, whose advice for eating past-prime foods is "just cut the mold off and it will be fine."

Dad: "That's mine."

Me: "Why do you have poison in the bathroom?"

Mom: *shakes her head* "Your father..."

Dad: "It expired, and your mother was going to throw it away. I told her I'd keep it."

Me: "So it's not really poison?"

Dad: "Your mother thinks it is." 


splitting molecules

Yes, I know I will be fine. Yes, I know it gets better with time. Yes, I know I can be strong blah blah; I don't need someone else to be happy blah; it was probably for the best blah vomit blah; and I'm gradually moving on with my life blah blah facedesk, but the truth remains: Getting dumped by someone you love fucking sucks, and I'm not going to pretend like it doesn't.

Three years later,
you fit in a box.
I taped you shut
while I wait
for a blanket to become
just a blanket again,
or a necklace
just a necklace.

For now these
once-comforting
once-loved
cold metal
paper postcard
hard plastic
relics
whisper
remember,
combing through my hair
with the rigid fingers
of ghosts.

I’ve been trimmed away like fat,
but you’re still in the
water I drink.

mud rock

Note: Know how I know this shit you're about to read is insane? It is pretty much the exact plot of a sleep adventure I had last night after taking melatonin, which boasts a side effect of "vivid dreams or nightmares." Seriously -- you gotta try it.
_______________________________
Beneath the town of Easton runs a long, underground tunnel called Mud Rock Run. The name comes from a local legend: The tunnel runs flat and dirty for several miles with a thin, sludge-filled stream cutting through the silt-covered floor, ominously calm, as though stalking invisible prey.

Then the pathway gets narrower – we told Billy that might be a problem for him, being such a fat-ass – and the water starts spewing from above with the strength of ten trains. If you can find your footing on the sharp, slippery rocks and forge upward through the waterfall, you’ll reach a plateau at the top, and there’s the Mud Rock: shimmering, ten feet tall, made of solid gold and balanced on its edge like a ballerina en pointe.   

We would call it a natural wonder, if it weren’t so obviously a mistake.

strange days

I'm naturally a depressive person, but even though these are dark days in the life of Lutz, I'm working on it.

These things help (and seriously, if you have no room in your heart for cute cat pictures, I have no room in my heart for you):

Little Lady Phoenix lends a hand.

Bubbie is real serious about cleaning his belly fluff.

Like a lazy junkie, Fifi spends the whole damn day in bed.

"Runaway train, never comin' back..."
Yeah, I was a teenager in the 90s.

deep comedy

One Saturday morning
post-whiskey binge
we snapped awake as
my cell phone alarm
shrieked the arrival of sun-up.

We were entwined,
hungover as usual,
cursing the cacophony that was
like God chewing glass in our brains.

You said
the alarm tone
must've been
composed by a
Swedish
minimalist
torture
artist
whose other
greatest
hits
include
“Neighbor's Vacuum in A-minor”
and
“Car Alarm Quartet in B-flat.”

You were always so hilarious
in the morning.

This one, I'd remember it later,
shopping for heirloom tomatoes
at Whole Foods,
giggling while running my fingers across
the improbably colorful fruit:
red, yellow, purple, orange,
some striped,
some still caked with dirt.

But for a moment I lost myself,
I squeezed a green one too tightly
my thumb piercing the delicate skin
the juice oozing out
settling into the creases of my knuckle
stinging in a fresh cut there, still red.

You called this deep comedy.

i wish they would just let me lick it

Photo of the day: Pastry case at Cupini's Italian Restaurant

valentine's day from A to Z

In honor of Valentine's Day, I figured it was only appropriate to compile a whiny, self-loathing list about why I'll probably die alone in a silver bullet trailer surrounded by my 35 cats, who will then proceed to eat me.

Altercations with authority figures: Sometimes I have them.
Blankets: I hog them.
Cats: They are my best friends. (Pictured below: Bubba Lee Kinsey licks Phoenix's face.)

Desire to travel: The only reason I want money.
Energy level: It is generally low.
Food: I suck at cooking it.
Generalized social anxiety: I have it.
Hairbrush: I'm not sure where it is.
Intuition: I base important decisions on it.
Jewelry: The weirder, the better.
Kansas City Royals: I'm going to keep taking their shit.
Lies: I suck at telling them.
Modesty: I have none.
Nudity: Sometimes it accidentally happens in front of the window.
Openness about thoughts and feelings: It's only achieved when drunk.
PMS: When I have it, you will know.
Quiet: I am, excessively.
Random and socially inappropriate things: Sometimes I do them.
Shyness about farting: I do not have it.
Twenty-three-year-old, creepy, balding sociopath: He proposed to me when I was 16.
Underwater creatures: They're neat, and one day I will live near them.
Very tall coffee sleeve tower: It is my pride and joy. (Pictured below: Containing coffee cup sleeves from Starbucks, The Roasterie, Muddy's, Einstein Bros. and 7-Eleven, my three-foot-tall coffee tower is nearing the ceiling of my office.)

Whiskey and wine: I like them.
Xavier: He's my godson, and he's more important than you.
Yoga: Without it, I'm a bitch.
Zack Grienke: He's on my shit list for marrying a supermodel and moving to Milwaukee.