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Ten years ago, I still had growing pains and I was eating my own weight every day, including a lot of protein. But though my muscles hurt and I felt restless, hockey kept me active and distracted. I was competitive without being brutal. I've never understood that, the guys who start a fight to knock a player out of the game. Coaches shouldn't encourage that at all.
I did other sports, too, track and field and basketball, but ten years ago...?
I wanted to become a professional hockey player.
Five years later, I was on my way, acknowledged as 'Most Valuable Player' and awards for leadership and scoring.
Then it all went away in under ten, fatal seconds.
And though I know it was me and that was my life, it sometimes feels like it was another person, as if that Chris Pratt was a cousin I knew once - before he moved away and I never saw him again.
Muse: Chris Pratt
Fandom: 'The Lookout'
Word Count: 227
That's happened to me. I know, because I wrote it down.
There was a woman at a bus stop a few months ago – okay, May 17th is the entry date – and she was crying, not loudly. Just standing there, waiting for the bus, tears running down her cheeks like a light rain. She was about my Mom’s age, I guess, though I’m not very good with that kind of thing. She was wearing nice clothes, but they seemed a little mismatched, you know? A pretty top with flowers on it and a dark skirt and rubber boots…
It just didn’t seem right and she looked so sad. I took a step closer and asked, “Are you okay?” She wasn’t, of course, but I didn’t know how else to put it. She turned and looked at me and said, “He’s gone.”
I looked at her and asked, “Who’s gone?”
“Reggie,” she said, and hiccupped from crying so much. “He was all I had. Such a dear.”
What do you say to that? I managed, “I’m really sorry.”
“He was so young…” Her voice stopped then and I placed a hand on her shoulder, hoping I looked appropriately sympathetic.
“Do you need anything?”
The woman sighed and wiped at her face with one hand.
“Another dog would probably help me get through this,” she said. I thought she’d been talking about a person, but no, ‘Reggie’ had been a little terrier.
“They’ve got lots at the pound,” I said.
She smiled at me then. “Yes. Yes, they do. Thank you, Chris. You’ve always been so sweet.”
I still have no idea who she was.
Muse: Chris Pratt
Fandom: 'The Lookout'
Word Count: 272
I looked up 'redemption' on the Internet, just to be sure I understood the question right.
It said:
- (theology) the act of delivering from sin or saving from evil
- repayment of the principal amount of a debt or security at or before maturity (as when a corporation repurchases its own stock)
- the act of purchasing back something previously sold
It also mentioned that it was the name of an album for an Israeli punk band, a metal band, an American Southern rap duo and some guy named 'Benzino'. It's also a collectible card game about the Bible.
I think I'll leave the music out of this and go with the first definition on the list. It's a good question. I don't know the answer. If there is a God - and I really don't know - would he or she consider it a sin, what I've done in my life? And if it is a sin, can I be 'saved'?
I drove my car without the headlights on. It was stupid, but we could see the fireflies that way and I thought it was... romantic. So did my girlfriend - until our two friends in the back seat told me to put my headlights back on and suddenly, there was a combine in the middle of the road. I swerved, but didn't avoid it. My two friends died. My girlfriend lost one of her legs below the knee. She was going to be a dancer.
Then I had to kill some people, because they killed a policeman and they were and were going to kill Lewis, so what was I supposed to do? They weren't the type of people who were likely to stop there. They robbed banks. People were just faceless things that got in the way.
They're still dead, though. All of them. Whether it was directly my fault or not, I can't change what I've done.
Is redemption possible? I don't know. I hope so, 'cause I'd rather not go to Hell.
It isn't going to get me to go to church, and I'll still sleep tonight.
The pills make sure that I do.
Muse: Chris Pratt
Fandom: 'The Lookout'
Word Count: 361
I’ve never been broke.
My family is pretty well off, so having money was never an issue when I was growing up. My sister and I had an allowance, like lots of other kids we knew, and we got summer jobs when we were old enough. That was just icing, though.
Then there was the accident.
I was in a coma for a while, and when I woke up, I wasn’t as ‘functional’ as I had been before. That was one of the words used to describe my condition. My memory was affected the most; so going to college was out. So was my potential hockey career. I didn’t want to live with my parents for the rest of my life, so I got a job as a janitor, moved out, found a roommate who doesn’t patronize me – much.
I’ve done talks on safe driving at the high school I used to go to, but I didn’t get paid for that. I didn’t want any money. Chris Pratt was an idiot, at least once, and four people’s lives were changed forever. That doesn’t include their families. I’m not going to ask for money for sharing my story.
My parents didn’t want me to move out. They thought I couldn’t do it and they didn’t like Lewis – my roommate – very much. That was too bad. I guess it was tough at first, but I didn’t have to resort to anything illegal in order to pay the bills. I did without, if it came to that.
In a way, I guess I’m always broke, because I’m permanently ‘broken’. I read this out to Lewis and he thought that was ‘quite clever’. I don’t know about that.
It is what it is.
Muse: Chris Pratt
Fandom: 'The Lookout'
Word Count: 289
I can barely think forward to next week, never mind to when I die.
Of course, I've nearly died a few times, that I know of. There might be other times that I don't remember - memory is a funny thing. I'm not laughing, though. The only reason I know about anything that happened last week - other than the really big stuff - is because I write it all down.
Anyway...
Cremation sounds more practical. I mean, why put my body in a fancy box that's just going to rot in the ground? Not very... ecological. That's the word, isn't it? It's a waste of money and materials and... Ashes you can spread on the flowers, can't you? Fertilizer or something. that sounds good to me. Help things grow. Not like I'm going to care, one way or the other, so might as well put me to good use.
I've read that some religions don't want to cremate the dead. Their bodies have to remain whole for when Judgment Day comes and God has you rise from the dead and join him in Heaven or something. I thought you went to Heaven when you died, so it's confusing.
Lewis doesn't help with this question at all. He said, "God is on vacation. That's why the world is going to Hell. Who cares what happens when you die?" Then he laughed and went to the kitchen. He's cooking something as I type this.
I don't know what my family would want and I don't really care. I'll put 'cremation' in my will and help flowers grow.
Muse: Chris Pratt
Fandom: 'The Lookout'
Word Count: 267
I wake up, have a shower, with soap, shave, and manage not to get too angry as the blade moves across my skin. I pull on jeans, because I usually wear jeans. It’s fast and easy and I don’t have to think about it, which is just as well. I have enough that I can’t remember to also bother with ‘What am I going to wear tomorrow?’ I’ve eliminated that step completely.
Except when I go to my parents for dinner.
Then I try to wear something that isn’t a pair of jeans. I have two sets of dress pants in the far left side of the closet, where I don’t go. A pair of black, leather shoes live there, too, in a cloth bag, so they don’t get dusty.
I don’t wear fancy clothes when I’m at the restaurant. It’s still jeans and a T-shirt or maybe a button-down shirt, depending. I’m clean and the clothes are clean. Oh, and sneakers. Never without them. I’m practical and it’s all easy to wash at the Laundromat and no one looks at me like I’m trying too hard.
What am I wearing right now?
Jeans. A T-shirt with the Bat-Logo on it. Bare feet. That’s all.
Muse: Chris Pratt
Fandom: 'The Lookout'
Word Count: 205
— Chuck Palahniuk (Stranger Than Fiction: True Stories)
I have over two dozen little notebooks now, each two hundred pages long. They were intended for school kids, not to take notes in class, but to pass notes in class. These are the kind you fit in your pocket, not the kind you use to copy a lesson from the blackboard. These books contain my life, such as it is.
Yeah, not having a good day.
It's raining outside, but if I wrote in my current book that the sun was shining and the sky was blue, when I looked at it a week from now, I'd believe myself. I'd think that it didn't rain today and wasn't that nice? I could control my perception of my own life by lying to myself, if I wanted to.
I don't.
My life is confusing enough without that angle, tempting though it might be sometimes.
Do I want to remember that the kid at the gas station looked at me like I was some kind of retard when I stopped there for a paper? Or that I still haven't talked about the accident with certain people, who I really should talk to? Do I want to know how many days it rained in Nowhereville, Kansas this spring, and how it just never seems like enough?
The kid at the station was a few grades younger than me, so I guess he knows the story. I can't talk about the accident right now, or even write about it. I haven't revised what happened that night, though. I never will. And my notebook says this is day five of rain. I hope the crops are going to be okay this year. Too much rain, and the roots rot.
Not that I'm a farmer.
I can't control some parts of my life, but I could control my version.
I don't think I'd like it, though.
Muse: Chris Pratt
Fandom: 'The Lookout'
Word Count: 310
It's my social worker, Janet, asking me the same question she always asks. Even after I blurted out what I thought about her in the coffee shop that one time, she still wanted me on her case load. Even after everything that happened with Gary and the bank heist and stuff, she still said she'd be my social worker. She wants to guide me, help me to find someone - which means 'get a girlfriend' - as part of me acknowledging that this is my life now and I can be in control of some of it.
And I need to move on.
"Sort of," I say, playing with one of the sugar packets. I don't take sugar. We're in the usual coffee shop again - they let me come back, hero and all that crap - and I knew the question was coming, because it always did.
I hate it.
Janet smiles and I look down at my mug, embarrassed. "Really? Chris, that's great. Who is she? Do I know her?"
She sounds so damn happy. What do I say? If a girl I was seeing did live here, Janet would probably know her because everybody knows everybody. Small towns are like that. Rural ones, doubly so.
"No. I mean, I don't think so. I met her on the Internet."
I glance up at her face and catch her reaction. She isn't sure if that's good news or bad news. "Really? What's her name?"
I can think of several that I've 'met' and say, "Um... Well, I've met lots of people, but... Dawn said she'd be my Valentine."
Sometimes, I can't stop myself from saying things I probably shouldn't. Janet's disappointment is palpable, but she tries to be encouraging. Ever the cheerleader for her hopeless assignments.
"Where does she live, Chris?"
I don't know, but I say, "I have it in my other notebook." That sounds logical. "She's in the States, though, and she's going to college." I remember that much. I've had to train myself to reread certain things, so I can remember important people. Like Dawn, who said she'd be my Valentine.
I wonder how she's doing.
"Well," Janet says, and sips her coffee. "How is Lewis?" And the topic is done - for now. I sigh and wonder if she'll ever stop asking.
Maybe on my wedding day. Ha.
Muse: Chris Pratt
Fandom: 'The Lookout'
Word Count: 402
- Location:A coffee shop...
- Music:Some pop song or other...
Lewis is in the living room, listening to the TV. He can't look at it, of course, but I don't mind if it's on.
"Are you asking me?" he says. "Or is this something you've found on the Internet?"
I turn in my chair and say, "It's on one on the blogs."
My roommate sighs. "It's something a Roman poet said, about who makes sure those in power don't get out of line." He sips his beer and continues to not watch the TV.
I can feel the frown forming on my face.
"So... it's a political thing?"
"That or it's a commercial for that movie."
He's got me there. "What movie?"
Lewis turns his head toward me, even though he can't see me. I think about the meth lab he's told me about and how being blind makes him like Daredevil - or so he says. "You know, The Watchmen? It's from the graphic novel." He pauses, as if he's waiting for me to say something. "Chris, tell me you've read the book?"
"I've read the book," I say, to appease him. Or to piss him off. Sometimes, I'm not sure which it is, but I do it, anyway.
He sighs. "You need to read it."
"Why?"
"Because it's good."
"Oh." I look back at the blog and think about it for a moment. "I'll think about it," I finally say, and reach for my little notebook.
Muse: Chris Pratt
Fandom: 'The Lookout'
Word Count: 249
- Location:My Apartment
- Music:Something is on the TV...
About the movie - the Long Form...
Credit to: MARCUS (http://www.themoviespoiler.com/Spoilers/l
( Details behind this cut... )
do you need to reach me?
you can leave a message here.
thank you.
- Location:coffee shop
- Music:i think it's elvis...
I'm scribbling again.
Last night, I dreamed that I talked to Kelly. We sat in the diner and had a coffee, and she said she forgave me for the accident. In the dream I tried to believe her, but it was difficult. I kept thinking how she wouldn't have been hurt and our friends wouldn't be dead - and I was getting distracted by a fly in the window as it battered itself against the glass, trying to get outside. I thought about killing it, just so I could have some peace, so I could listen to Kelly, so she'd know that I was paying attention to her and not some stupid fly.
She killed it with her newspaper, before I could do anything, and when she smiled, a trickle of blood started to come from her nose. I tried to tell her, reached for a napkin, but her face started to bruise and then -
I woke up. I had a shower, with soap. I wrote the dream down, so I wouldn't forget it.
I'm scribbling. Re-reading the dream and wondering if maybe there's a meaning to it. I've tried to write it out, like it was someone else's story. Except it isn't. It's part of my story. Part of my past. I forget how long Kelly was in hospital for, but what happened to us on Route 24 is like yesterday to me. My past is my present. It's the strongest memory I have.
Somedays, there is no me. Just a car and a combine and screaming.
Muse: Chris Pratt
Fandom: 'The Lookout' (movie)
Word Count: 259
- Location:My Apartment
- Music:I think it's the Stones...
