Deep down what it is that I am feeling all comes down to stories. My story, your story, the person five years from now that I meet and their story. I love stories, all the way from the most elegant and extravagant to the most basic and fundamental ones. Stories are why I love to write, they are why I love movies, hell they are why I love people so much. Because everyone of us big or small young or old, black, white or purple have their own unique story, and that story of theirs is what makes them the person that they are.
Now I have lived just a shade over a quarter of a century and in that time I have learned that while everyone has a story some of those stories just are worth the time of reading. Much like a Us Weekly or an In Touch magazine they might have some glitz to their story, but there just isn't too much substance. These are the people that fall by the waste side. I feel like at this very moment I should a bit like a dick, but seriously I am being completely for real I have as much use for people with these empty and hollow stories the rag tag magazines i just mentioned as I do an asshole on my forehead.
I say all of this to talk about some very unique stories I heard just a few weeks ago when I was at a buddies birthday party. One of a person I have known somewhat and the other of someone that I had never met and I know I will probably never meet again. But both stories touched me in a profound way. The first was of a girl that shall remain nameless, but she happened to be the wife of a friend of mine, and we started talking about movies and tv shows and all the stuff that pretty much gives me a boner and for the record the longer we talked about all these great tv shows like Arrested Development, The West Wing, Parks and Rec, The Office and so many more I have to say I did get a little aroused. What a sicko. Well I am a pervert and Leslie Knope does in fact give me a boner. But that's not the point I'm getting at, am already getting off track.
So we are talking about TV shows and all that jazz when I find out that like me Aaron Sorkin is one of her favorite writers, and we just go down the list of tv shows he's created and movies that he's written and god it was so much fun finding a kindred spirit in that department. And after a bit she tells me that when she was in law school in DC she actually wrote a pilot. And I was just blown away. Not because I didn't think she was smart enough or anything like that, but just because I thought it was just the coolest thing ever. And I was just listening to her tell me this story that I found to be so unique and fascinating and I just felt so very close to her. And it's not like we are the best of friends or that we ever will be. She is my friends wife, and she is a good person, and she wrote a pilot once which I think is pretty fucking cool.
The next story is probably the reason it took me so long to finally write this, because really it disturbed me so much and made me feel so bad that I needed a little bit of time to process it all. If you're reading this and you've read any of my other entries you might know that I am a crier and this story just makes me want to cry.
So in the middle of this birthday bowling celebration, somewhere in between me getting my TV show Boners I met a guy. A guy named Bruce. This guy looked to be a guy that was down on his luck. he looked to be in his early 20's and the closes he wore were a bit dirty, as if he might of worn them for a day or so. He wasn't smelly or anything but he carried a backpack with him, and you just got the feeling that everything that he owned in life, which wasn't much was in that backpack.
He came up to me and a buddy of mine to shoot the shit with us. He was a black kid as are me and my buddy so I think he just felt more comfortable with us. He asked us both what we did for a living and then told us (and me in particular because my buddy was back and forth bowling) about himself. He was a hell of a nice guy and he told me he was happy to see a couple of black guys that were positive people and that were doing so well, and that he was trying his hardest to really make something of himself, and you know what I think he will, because even though he seemed to be in a bit of a hard circumstance the guy had a smile on his face the whole time.
But the part of the story that disturbed me, the part of the story that almost made me loose it was when we went to introduce ourselves. He sat down next to me and told me his name was Bruce, then he held out his hand to shake mine and asked me what mine was. I shook his hand and told him mine was Brandon. And the next things that came out of his mouth have to be in the top five worst things another human has said to me, and that includes when my parents sat me down and said they were getting a divorce. He said to me, "Oh, my league name is Brandon too. But when I was little I was in a home, and there was already a Brandon there, so they named me Bruce." I didn't really know what to say after he said that.
It is moments like this when I think that I want to resign myself from this world, because there are so many people out there that just aren't worth liking. It's so awful to think that there is this kid and because he is living with these fucking awful people that are too lazy to have two kids in the house with the same name they called this kid Bruce. Just gave him a new name, so much to the fact that when he introduces himself to people today he calls himself Bruce. I've been thinking of this guys story and it just crushes my spirit, it really does. But then I think about this guy just always smiling and he had such an optimistic look on life and I thank god that I got to hear this guys story. Because if by some chance something happens to him and he his gone from this earth tomorrow, he will in some part live one because I know him, and I will tell his story, or at least the story of him that I know.
When I was in college, one of my favorite professors asked us all what "our stories were"? He was going around the room asking us, but nobody really got it. He had to tell us his story before it really clicked. I remember this day very well because it was one of the first times I was truly honest with someone about how I was really feeling in that period of my life. I remember it all very well. After nobody really got it he stopped and told us "his story", He said, "My story is I was in love with two women and I had to make a choice and go on living the rest of my life." When he said that I remember thinking that I don't ever remember a time where someone of authority or being an adult had ever been so honest with a group of kids. And when he came back around to me and said, "Brandon, what's your story?" I told him straight up that my story was, "The thing I wanted and loved most in life I failed at, and now I'm trying to figure out what that next thing I'm going to love is." And I remember leaving that class feeling so free having said exactly what I felt, which I really hadn't done before.
And now many years have passed and my story has changed quite a bit, and even though I am still the same person as I was back them I am completely different if that makes any since. And right now I would say that my story is.... "Me trying to get up the guts to be the person that I've always wanted to be, so that the people I love can be proud of me." WHAT'S YOUR STORY?
Just my version of an early Christmas Present
No comments:
Post a Comment