The First 12 Memories That Make Me Smile

by G. Sax

One: Listening to my Sony Walkman cassette player while I delivered newspapers, particularly one sunny day on the front stairs of 1054 Norton Street while flipping to Side 2 of the Talking Heads’ Little Creatures.

Two: Crossing University Avenue at Victoria in St. Paul at the age of 6 when I missed my school bus home from Maxfield Elementary but missed it with some other kids who were older than me. Mind you, Maxfield was K–3. Whoever these mystery kids were, they were just babies themselves. But I still remember how exhilarating it was to cross that busy street without an adult present.

Three: Ditching Murray Jr. High on a snowy winter day with Cameron Blackmore. I rarely ditched school, but that day sticks out as a singularly great event of junior high. It was probably one of the only times I did anything alone with Cam. We went to the University of Minnesota’s St. Paul Campus Student Union and ate vending machine food. We walked all the way to Bandana Square, which was still a viable mall at the time. Then we went back to his house near Como Lake. I eventually made it the extra couple of miles home, all on foot. Cam’s dead now and has been since high school. But I have that day as the one memory of me and him when it was just me and him.

Four: Feeling the wind in the air as I digested burritos in Novato, California, on a semi-busy street while realizing that I was in love. I wasn’t supposed to be in love, but I couldn’t help it. The food was so good, and the company was so exactly what I wanted my company to be for the rest of my life. I can only hope that every day is exactly like that day, and, guess what? It usually is. My happiness continues to be a curse to my better writing instincts, but it is the antidote to my being. And I can’t write at all if I can’t be.

Five: Singing “It’s just another one of those boring days…Dragon Snake, Dragon Snake.” This lyric will make sense to only one person in my life. He is Jon Lewis, and I spent the most formative moments of my youth with this cat. And then 30 years later, I took his wife to the Minnesota State Fair and we judged horse-and-carriage shows rather well for a couple of admission fee cheats.

Six: Reviling Mr. Muller, my uncle-bad-touch 6th-grade teacher who took me and Anthony Dent and Cory Cox and Roger Lynch to the Science Museum of Minnesota’s omni theatre to see “Genesis” on a school night. We ate dinner at his house, and the entire proceedings felt semi-formal. The other three boys were black and I was still white, and I got the distinct feeling that this weird man took pity on us as “underclass” although I already knew that I possessed superior intellect, that Anthony and Roger had superior talent, and Cory had superior cuteness. We would all be fine in life. At least until death. I don’t know what Cory and Anthony are up to these days, but Roger is gone as of 2003. I just found this out a few months back, and it really fucking bummed me out. Roger was my yang for a few years in elementary school, and I will always miss him, even if we hadn’t spoken in 20+ years and will never speak again.

Seven: Watching “The Benny Hill Show” with my great-grandfather. Watching “The Love Boat” with my great-grandfather. Watching “Fantasy Island” with my great-grandfather. Listening to an Angels-Twins exhibition game on the radio with my great-grandfather. Playing frisbee on the side of the house on Charles Avenue with my great-grandfather. Putting random bits of metal in the vise in the workshop of the basement of my great-grandfather. Playing Rummy 500 in the kitchen of my great-grandfather. Being mesmerized by the compass bobbling around on the dash of the vehicle of my great-grandfather. Quietly watching the thermostat from the hide-a-bed in the living room that would inevitably be changed in the middle of the night to a different temperature by my great-grandfather.

Eight: Enjoying rainy, dreary days in Milwaukee. Bike rides and car drives with Hunter S. Sax to parks on the East Side, playgrounds on Lake Michigan, cheap food places on North Street and Oakland Avenue, zoos in Racine, and wherever else our adventures would take me and my 3-year-old son.

Nine: Working “The Night Shift” at the snow fort on Mackubin Street, which I romanticized as far more than the snow-plowed pile across from a second-tier frozen lake and third-tier apartment complex. Oh, the way the light hit the shining snow at 9:30 p.m. on those rare, quiet nights as I sat sentry prior to the inevitable vandalism.

Ten: Getting ready before my TRUE night shift at Clean Power, a janitorial service company in Madison, Wisconsin. I generally worked three jobs at a time throughout my college experience (in bare feet, uphill both ways!), and for a time I would pump myself up for the night job with one of two polar opposites: Depeche Mode’s “Enjoy the Silence” or Public Enemy’s “Brothers Gonna Work It Out.” Either way, I’d pump that shit loud and sing it louder, and then I’d vacuum and trash like a fucking demon.

Eleven: Smoking cigarettes on the windowsill of my apartment-with-a-view in Montreal, Quebec. I don’t smoke as a rule, but as an American living in Canada, I smoked my share of Du Mauriers while watching the twinkling lights of my new downtown. Then I’d go read The Trilogy ’til I fell asleep.

Twelve: Driving on I-95 in Baltimore while listening to a lyric in Q-Tip’s “Vivrant Thing” that mentions I-95. Feeling like I had it all. Feeling like I was starting a brand new day. Hearing Sting’s “Brand New Day” while driving the same stretch of I-95 and thinking Sting and I could be pals in optimism. Thinking I could write an award-winning screenplay at the Royal Farms on Key Hwy long before some chick did it in a Target in Crystal, MN.

I got memories, yo. They’re all up in here (pointing at left temple). And if I did my job, you love the way I wrote about them, even if you don’t know them. But maybe they pinch something similar in you and you stop and think and remember a piece of your life the way it should be remembered—not in crisis but in private, otherworldly elation.

Reunion 20

by G. Sax

I went to my 20-year high school reunion, but at first I didn’t want to.

I dig my past and all, and I’m happy with what got me to where I’m going. I admit to a few loose ends that have perplexed me when I awoke after a particularly robust dream state, but I’m good, dude.

Plus, I’m kinda old now, and I would hope I’ve learned to keep most imagined dramas to a minimum (not always easy, but I’m always great at it in retrospect). I ended up having a real sweet time celebrating with a bunch of people who are exactly my age and a few younger ones.

Do You Remember When?

by G. Sax

I don’t bring you flowers anymore. I know. I used to write like every day, and then I just started to get weird and insular, amusing only myself—and infrequently at that.

So much has changed since those early days of this column, and I’ve touched on one big one in recent times: I’m happier. It always seems that the best artistic endeavors occur through a Gaussian blur of depression. Stand-up comics are funnier, actors and directors are sharper, and painters are downright brilliant.

Writing when you’re happy makes for some serious Disneyfied production, and I’ve never been a fan of Mickey Mouse. Some of the bitches that come out of his club, on the other hand…

See, I used to write sentences like that last one all the time, but now they sometimes feel forced, and I sometimes wonder how they will be received. I’ll try to stop worrying about that. I saw a comedian last week named Rich Vos. Funny effer, for certain. And totally brutal in the best kind of way. He asked one guy up front if his shorts came with a cock in his mouth. Of another gal, he said her young pussy was probably like a little clam shell and when you put your ear up to it, you could hear her mother’s voice telling her to clean her room.

That’s pretty fucked up. And. I. Loved. It.

Just total nonchalance in delivering language. Fuck ‘em all, y’know? Some Geto Boys shit, right there. Cypress Hill. Dice Clay. Ying Yang Twins. Sam Kinnison. Quentin Tarantino. Pauline Réage. Vincent Gallo. Jenna Jameson. Howard Stern.

Okay, I’m not them and I don’t want to be them, but I do admire their WTF attitude. Within reason. I try not to put other people down just for the sake of it. I won’t fly off on a bawdy tirade without some sort of artistic merit behind it. Usually.

Anywho. I’m just saying. Thanks, Rich Vos. For buzzing my ears with level 5 spice. Thanks for trusting that I can handle it, like a good server at a Thai Restaurant who overlooks my abundant whiteness and gives me the fire I crave.

Jimmy’s in Minnetonka

by G. Sax

It was all white people at Jimmy’s in Minnetonka. They were wearing various uncool shades of gray and had this year’s jacket style slung over their chairs. John Mayer played overhead. She ordered water with no ice. The other, a salad with a light pasta. They cared not for cheese. I felt the walls closing in around me.

I need to relearn how to play the game. I used to not mind mingling with white people in pseudo-fancy restaurants. Now, I burn disdainfully within, which is not healthy.

“Don’t ever settle,” goes the deep, internal mantra, but have I already? Why am I even here? Need to stay positive. Need to keep the attitude up. But I am feeling a need to check the bread crumbs I’ve scattered behind me before the squirrels eat them.

Embracing My Minnesotaness

by G. Sax

“There’s more to life than a little money, ya know. Don’tcha know that? And here ya are. And it’s a beautiful day.” – Marge Gunderson, Fargo

I’ve arrived. I’m at one of those places in life where it feels exactly like it’s supposed to be. I’m flooded with tingling sensations. When I talk to people I haven’t talked to in a long time, they tell me it’s great to see that things are going so well for me, and for a moment I drop my cynicism and believe them because they seem genuine, and I do feel at perfect ease.

I want to soak this in, y’know? It’s such a great thing. It’s maybe the closest I’ve been to understanding what winning a championship or an election or bingo feels like. It’s better than the ‘87 Twins and on par with the ‘91 Twins.

But this beaming, overtheatrical joy…it makes for super dull writing. My comical suffering is far more engaging, even to me. I’ll try to make the happy shit worth reading.

Posture

by G. Sax

Hump…Back…Get It?
I may be getting a hump. At least Carly says there’s a humpy angle at the base of my back neck. I’ve always been angled odd. If you look at me close enough or at straight-on photos of me, I lean left.

Let’s call it a permanent pimp lean rather than what it really is—an underdeveloped newspaper boy carrying too many Sunday papers over one shoulder for too damn long.

I’ve been waking with neck and back pain of late. I don’t sit right, which isn’t good because I sit at a computer all day. If you ever come to this spot for a G. update or a laugh and you have seen very little on either front of late, it’s because I’m pretty sick of sitting at a computer by the time I get around to playing with whaletime.net.

My current job doesn’t call for as much getting up out of the chair. At least one of my shit tasks at the last job involved pretty constant trips to the printer and all the things associated with printer operation. I was miserable doing it, but at least I was moving.

I’m also an excuse maker from way back, so take this entire entry with a shaker of salt. I have a sack full of excuses to explain my lack of writerliness…

I work too much. This would be a great excuse if I really needed to put in the hours that I do. With a few tweaks of some time-eating tasks, I could open up more time for the tipple-taps that make for a worthwhile “Key of G.” column.

I have a life. This one’s true, thank goodness. But being a writer-dude is kind of a big part of my life, so this excuse gets a big WTF.

My computer is slow. True again, but it’s not that slow. Another hole in this argument is the fact that I own a wireless-ready laptop. I can write from anywhere! I don’t even need to be sitting and increasing the size of my hump. I could stand like a cool guy at the Chipotle window bar or at a Panera Bread or a Starbucks or a Caribou Coffee or wherever dudes who wear ties and real leather shoes and have real leather daily planners stand with their earphones and Blackberry jams. But…

I’m fat and lazy. I almost started my old “Weight Journal” again to try to shame the pounds off like I did back in 2002. But then I remembered that it didn’t work before. I actually gained 5 more pounds on the Shame Diet.

So this brings me to what I know is the truth of all truths, damn the excuses…

I’m into procrastination. Oh, if only it weren’t true. I procrastinate so much that it’s crazy, really. I don’t want to brag or anything, but I’m a pretty smart and capable guy when I put my mindgrapes to it. I can take charge when I need to, but the problem is I don’t seem to go for it until I’m in a time crunch or the problem has reached a level that requires a fire extinguisher (quite literally, in one famous case).

I have a lot of interests, which is part of the problem. I fancy myself a Renaissance Man, but please. A man shouldn’t have so many interests that he is unable to have a true impact on the world because of his lack of action beyond the dabble of “interest.” I stretch myself thin rather than focusing on one or two career endeavors, hobbies, or life tasks.

At work, it’s not enough to be a good writer/editor type. No, I’m not satisfied until I also learn page layout, photo editing, mapmaking, font design, color processing, database management, website development, public presentation, and so forth.

At home, I partake in far too many stupid TV programs; I like to get out of the house and explore; I follow most of the major professional sports and attend several sporting events during the year; I play sports; I join social clubs; I read as much as possible; and I recently went through a serious jigsaw puzzling addiction. Closer to the bone, it’s not enough that I “blog” like millions of others with some degree of webbish know-how, but I have to write a “column” and I have to build an online pseudo-magazine where writerly friends can express themselves, too.

That’s just the surface of my spaz. Throw in the chores (including an obsession with clean dishes), the fantasy football (which has become an all-year “lifestyle choice”), the driving to and fro (so many freeways in the Twin Cities), and I’m too thin for the number of friends I like to keep, the kind of father I want to be, and the sort of loving partner I hope earns me a lifetime of joy.

But, see, I’m not thin. Just thin on time, and there’s only one logical reason for that, given that I’m not any busier than you are. I suck at time management. I think I was good at it once, but that’s a delusion. I delivered newspapers late when I was a paperboy. I was late for high school and college classes all the time. I rarely see the first pitch at a baseball game. I consistently find jobs that allow me to show up later in the day. I’m late on website updates. I’m late for dinner.

I’ll point to my last column entry about strengths and weaknesses—the one that was up for far too long because I was procrastinating on this new entry—as my first serious realization that I have to approach my weaknesses differently. It’s not so much that I need to fix what makes me weak, it’s that I need to focus on my strengths.

Everything that is negative in my above statements can be manipulated to read more positively. I have a full and enriching life with many interests and wonderful people in it. I have smarts, my health, and a few less luxury items than the others but luxury items all the same. I have learned to make time for a variety of endeavors, now maybe I could stand to learn how to harness time with better quantitative and qualitative results. Whoa; that’s deep, yo.

And with that, I point to this column as my first step toward better time management. So if you’ll excuse me, it’s nearly 11:00 a.m. and I have to get to my 9-to-5 job. Okay, I clearly have a ways to go, but I promise to sit up straight today.