Balance

Soul Meets Body – Death Cab For Cutie

I can’t believe that I didn’t own a CD player until recently. I had no idea what I was missing. My brother got me this cheap one from Walmart. It’s got, like, no features but the headphones are great. The quality is super high. At least, I think it is. I suppose I have no reference. Regardless, it has changed my life. It helps that I’ve got some fine music to listen to.

Everyone should listen to Apologies To The Queen Mary by Wolf Parade. It came out about a month ago now and I listen to it CONSTANTLY. If you haven’t heard of them, they’re a mix between The Arcade Fire and Modest Mouse. I hate simplifying a band like that. The influence of those two bands is obvious, but they’ve clearly learned their lessons well and they’ve crafted a beautiful, textured, funny, terrifying and mesmerizing album. Yes, all those things. It’s hurt my already hurting social life. One, because I’d rather listen to the CD than listen to another human being. Two, because everytime I actually do talk to another person it’s about the CD. And I get mad when they say, “I don’t get it.” What’s not to get? It’s fucking brilliant. It’s like someone saying that they don’t get Arrested Development. You just sound retarded. I got a chance to see the band again at The Horseshoe Tavern. If anyone has been there before, I think they’ll agree that the sound quality is shit. If I hadn’t heard the CD a million times already, I wouldn’t have been able to recognize any of the songs. It was still insanely awesome.

I’ve yet to listen to Extraordinary Machine by Fiona Apple (can’t wait), Live It Out by Metric (sorry, Annia), Healthy In Paranoid Times by Our Lady Peace (whatever), and Plans by Death Cab For Cutie (I’m stuck on the above song). My current rotation includes Wolf Parade, Spiritual Machines by Our Lady Peace (their best album), Late Registration by Kanye West, XO by Elliott Smith (R.I.P.) and, of course, Ready To Die by The Notorious B.I.G.. By the way, does anyone know an easy way to repair a CD case. I cracked the cover of Spritual Machines and I’ve got the nice black case, which I think might have been limited edition. Fuck.

I had no idea what a thrill it was to walk around with music buried in your skull. Especially at UofT. The campus has the perfect mix of of gorgeous scenery and depressed human beings that makes music not only preferable, but absolutely necessary. At last, I can drown out the endless moaning that permeates the streets. There’s really no way to properly describe the feeling of walking down St. George street, surrounded by miserable students and having A Kiss To Build A Dream On by Louis Armstrong in your ears.

Take away my television, my movies, my video games, my sports, my money, my house, my job, my friends, my family. Just leave me with my music, please.

*****

I’m working in the office at work now. I’m a bean counter. I had my first day alone last Thursday. I lost track of almost five grand. I called in the next day to apologize and apparently I just missed a zero somewhere. Even after that, I was still a bit short, but not five thousand short so…phew. I had my second day today. And guess what? I did it. I fuckin’ did it. I counted it all up and bingo-bango, every penny was accounted for. I was so happy, you have no idea. While I was waiting outside the store for my ride, it was freezing cold and I didn’t give a damn. I was doing a jig. I just needed to do it right once, so I knew how. I’ll never screw up again.

Apparently, I’m still obsessed with Adriana. What, you thought I was going to turn it off like that? Well, so did I. I was reading that post I made about her, the one about how commited I was to the whole thing, and I laughed. However, I’ve been an emotional wreck over the last couple of weeks and I’m definitely still attracted to her so maybe I wasn’t being so crazy after all. I wish I was. I had hoped it wasn’t too late, but I got in too deep. As it stands, I’m still trying to dig myself out. Today, she kept me company in the office while I was frantically counting everything. I want to say something. I’m this close.

*****

Next week I’ll be twenty one years old. That is so pathetic. I believed, I truly believed that there would be so much more than this right now.

I was talking to my friend Alice the other day, this younger girl who lives on my street. We used to ride the school bus together. She’s in first year now at UofT, so we run into each other every now and then. She was telling me how her sleep habits were getting screwed up and how her work ethic was deteriorating. It was a textbook UofT case. I told her that she could not allow that to happen. I told her how the only reason I was even in school was because I wanted to make my parents happy. I can’t stand it. I warned her about living a life of obligation.

The rant extended into my lunch with Natasha on Wednesday. She was happy to see me and she brought her friend Lucy, who was sweet. She wanted to just chill out, but I was in one of my moods and was being a real pain in the ass. I don’t know why, but I was whining about everything. Nothing new, just the usual stuff (work, school, no girl), but I was suffering from a lack of sleep, which gave my complaints an edge. Natasha, God bless her, sat there and took every bit of it and laughed when she should laugh and looked sad when she should have felt sad. When we walked, she put her arm around mine, because she knew it would make me feel better. It did. I swear, I swear, she is the only girl in the world who doesn’t immediately recoil from my touch. She deserves better company.

I was telling her about that guy from work who I argued with. I told her how I wasn’t angry or proud, just sad. I realized that as much as I judged that guy for wasting his time and coming into the store, I’m pretty much the same way. Here is a guy who is unhappy with something in his life and he refuses to change because it is inconvenient for him and he doesn’t know how. I bitch all the time about my job and school but I could just quit and drop out. It would be that easy. Wouldn’t it?

*****

So yeah, things at work finally worked out and I’ve got a great friend and I got to see Wolf Parade live for a second time and I’ve got more music in my life than ever and I get to watch Arrested Development on DVD anytime I want and basketball is coming back and…and…I know things are so good right now. I know that. But I’m bored and I’m miserable and I wish Adriana would fall for me because that would save me a lot of time and effort. I have to wake up in a few hours to go to a class that I’m going to fall asleep in. Then I have to go home almost immediately to go to work. I wish I had real problems, so I could be motivated to find real solutions. As it stands, I remain in vile contentment.

Oh, Jesus, look at me. I’m cryin’. You don’t know. You don’t know what’s happening. On that island they got writers, scientists, artists, and what they’re doing…I mean, I done some bad things. I did bad things to women. I shot kids! In ‘Nam I shot kids…but I never did anything like, like…oh, mother. Oh, forgive me. Forgive me, forgive me, forgive me…I mean, what’s funny? What’s so Goddamned funny? I don’t get it. Somebody explain…somebody explain it to me.

– The Comedian, Watchmen: Chapter 2