Eric Lived

I can’t sleep.

The blow-up mattress halfway deflated, the window open with the winter air kissing my face, the blinking of midnight on the VCR, and my open eyes occupying this room surrounded by walls. I can’t sleep. The kind of insomnia that you believe will go away if you just follow your nighttime habits. Take a steaming shower, brush the teeth, drink a glass of milk, strip to boxers, and crawl into warm covers, which are all – I’m convinced – habits of the slowly dying.

From the freezer I grab the vodka. Half gone and cold, I pour a shot into my red coffee mug and I take it and I pour another and I take it and the sun says, “Good morning.”

In my kitchen, the walls white and bare, I say to myself, “I have a plan and it begins today. I’m going to spend the rest of my money on a last minute plane ticket to Thailand. I’m going to go there and order two prostitutes. An older one and a young one. Variation. When I’m satisfied with that I’m going to get a hut on the beach and a bottle of Thai liquor. Something authentic. I’m going to drink it. All. Then get another. And do it over and over. Then on the beach, after I’ve wandered out, and wherever I’ve fallen, I’ll wake in just a swimsuit. Hung over, I’ll be depressed remembering how selfish I am and that all this was just running away from everything. Now, enter the Internet. I’ll find some volunteer group and I’ll join. Build houses and outhouses and help people. But then I’ll get anxious and bored. I’ll look for other alcoholics to get drunk with but I’ll just end up by myself. Then one night I’ll get mugged. I’ll say, ‘Take whatever you want.’ And they’ll take much more than that. I’ll almost die. And maybe that’s the whole point of everything anyway. To almost die and therefore understand what living is all about. It’ll be a year later, and I’ll fly home to New York. And I’ll be right back where I am now wondering if everything was worth it. Day by day I get older and I’m not figuring anything out and all I know is I’m completely unsatisfied.”

Floating from the other room, through the closed door dressed in party pictures, is my roommate’s alarm. It’s 6:00AM. And from that room I hear:

New York, my home, my last stop on this set of tracks, and out the window, with the city silhouetted, the sun wakes with a somber purple. In front of me sits a half eaten bowl of cereal. The little O’s life rafts in the water. And into the surface of the wooden kitchen table, which is cluttered and wobbly, I etch “Eric Lived” with my butter knife.

I think of the plane, over the ocean, flying as one of the angels over the world, and that maybe I will sleep. And dream. Soft and gently. With the world small below, arching toward home. And as I ask the stewardess to bring me a vodka tonic to bring on the dreams, I’ll consider that this is my life, and it’s coming to me syllable by syllable.

With the note to my roommate etched on the table, I grab my backpack, and go.

 

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