Pass the...whatevah

I'm drinking again.

That's right, I had a drink after months of serious sobriety. I mean a serious drink. I'm not talking about a six-pack-before-I-get-high beer, I'm talking about straight to the head Jack Daniels. I started doing shots before the night was over.

My brother and I met at Nightin- gales bar for the Saturn Reading Series where we met the old gang. I got there early, to scope out the joint, and to get our favorite seats, that would be fought over assiduously before the night was over. I saddled up at the bar and ordered a gin and tonic, because I felt like drinking, but did not want to get drunk. That was then.

When the crowd started pouring in and all of the old faces came back to me. I laughed and talked and hugged until I was growing tired. I just had so many people to talk to, to catch up on old times with. It was as if my brother and I came home after the war. During all of this merry making, I found myself returning to the bar and scooping another and another rock glass of Jack on ice. I lost my favorite seat because I was walking around jaw jamming, so I took one just vacated next to it. Yeah, there was this kind of musical chairs among the six or seven chairs in our corner. I guess it wasn't our corner any longer.

Soon, my name was called upon to read and there was an explosion of applause. It even took me by surprise as I walked up on the stage and quickly read two poems. One from Bukowski and the other from myself. Again, thunderous applause, or so it felt like to me. My brain was already addled. I went back to our area, only to find my seat taken, so I went back to the bar, this time for a shot.

Then came the inter- mission, where the crew piled out and headed to the side of the building and blew up a joint. We shared it gabbing amongst ourselves in a circle and I'll be damned if my man hasn't found a better supplier. In no time that joint had sent me into orbit, with the fucking munchies. I felt like a packman stuck in mud. When the reading began again, I was squirming in my chair, hating to get up but dying for something to eat. It was like the urge to fuck. Fuck this. My brother and I snuck out of the bar and down the street where we dive bombed the junk food section, coming back with handfuls of junk and filling up a plastic bag full of goodies.

Returning back to the 'gale, we passed around the bag to our fellow poets and I fucked up some junk food. We stayed for the entire reading, which ended at around eleven O'clock in the evening and the three of us staggered out into the night. We broke up from D2theL at the Union Square Station and rode uptown. I was banged up pretty good, getting home, and stopping short in the middle of my room to feel the world rock.

I crawled into bed and closed my eyes. That's when I realized that the Jesus Freaks were no longer blasting their radio. Either that or my brain had shut down prematurely.

Hobobob