My mom tried to take credit for building this “monument to failure” that is my life
She thought that the beach house ruined me
But I was ruined before that
I had dropped out of college
Was delivering pizzas and living on campus
Not attending classes
Attending classes was the route to work
all work and no play
i was balancing my play very well in college

I was sitting in a 2nd grade classroom every day
Grading papers
Every day at seven we would meet at the cafeteria and grab our lunches and ride over to the little school
No matter how late I was up the previous night
No matter how few we had on the keg we snuck in
No matter what
Seven o clock

The idea was to separate the functional alcoholics from the raging ones
To teach a system of coping
Four aspirins and a quart of water at bed time
Makes you get up in two hours to pee and drink more water

seperates the contenders from the pretenders
well
a classroom full of young tiny people was very scary to me at that point
so i faked a car accident after i overslept in a drunken funk
borrowed some crutches and wrapped my knee
said sorry i didnt call, but i was in the hospital
kept up the crutches for three more days
i would get dropped off after work at rugby practice
unwrap the ace bandage from my knee
and go on out and joyfully kick some ass
joyously kicking ass, thats what i did in my life
this monument to failure
as my mom called it
she said
of course your dad doesnt want you hanging around the farm with him, hes 73 years old, getting ready to die, and you are this constant reminder of failure, just loafing around, freeloading, a monument to failure

a lot of people stop talking to my mom after she rips their asses apart like that
the monument is to successful loafing
to an efficiency of effort
i take it light, i live efficiently, i dont get tied down
i see what happens when you get tied down
to a mortgage, to an unborn fetus, to a woman
you get tied down then you have to eat shit
id rather not be told what to do at gunpoint
id like to willingly enter longterm arrangements
not be forced into them

i am enjoying this window of freeedom
even as i am blasted
and its nice to feel parented again
even if the parenting is borderline abusive
of course a trip to the liquor store was mandatory last night
words have power when weilded by a ninja
and my moms a master word ninja
i got really good at deflecting
really got a good defense
really got good at hiding from the passing thunder
some battles you just cant win

but for her to take credit for fucking up my life?
please
that was all me
and it aint over yet
my dad hid his bukowski books from me
and when a bar customer at the gay bar i worked at
un aware that a place named "feathers" could be nothing else
the oblivious country hick waiter
a guest told me about bukowski as i stumbled around the dining room
between chugging beers with the cooks
and free champagne at brunch
i was always loaded there
i asked my dad
did you ever hear of a dude named...
and he said oh shit

i made this mess
im almost done wallowing in failure
like the pigs of legend

its fun to be a broken man
oh
such tragedy
im almost done
even the king of the fuckups can tell when his reign is nearing the end
ill step down before the coup
im just making sure the power transfer works out well
before i SHINE AGAIN
SO SHINY
SO SO SHINY