I recently got some bad news. A friend told me that it might help to keep a journal, to try and "get in touch with me". This is supposed to help me do that. I'm supposed to grow.
The bad news was that I had apparently, apparently, condensed the last four years of my life into a 24-hour bender. As far as I can tell, this has really happened. The date on the newspaper, on the television, on the computer, on my cellular phone, they all say 2011. It appears to be permanent. This is the brunt of my misfortune. At every turn there are, shall we say, tangential misfortunes, collateral tragedies and inconveniences which are presenting themselves in waves. Example- I haven't been to work for four years. This alone would not be that bad, except that, as I'm finding out, the economy collided with a sizable iceberg a few years back. It is said to have sank in cold water off the North Atlantic coast. There were no survivors. Some of my best investments were on that economy. Another example- I no longer have a boat. I used to have a boat. As recently as yesterday, I had a great big boat. When I woke up today, just a flat spot on the ocean. A flat spot with no sails and no saltpork and no row on row of gleaming, glistening, smooth-bore sway.
And it was all so sudden. As I said, I woke up yesterday in 2007 and went to bed somewhere around early 2011. I know the change happened sometime yesterday, because I was watching TV that night. And I saw something which startled me- Just after 11:30, in the middle of Adult Swim, they showed an episode of the Venture Brothers. I was sure (at the time) that I'd seen every episode of both seasons. So I was very confused when I was... very confused. Who were all these characters? Why was 21 jacked? Why was Ray Romano's guy a talking skull, now? Worst of all, it wasn't even billed as a new episode! In thinking about it now, that was my first inkling that something was amiss. Season 4? I've looked it up, and it seems I've missed nearly 30 episodes! I'm quite certain that this, too, will somehow have other as-of-yet unforeseeable consequences. What terrible forms will they inhabit?
I can only wait, and hide, and see.
