"Cocktails at 6 Sonny." my father called after me as I walked up the stairs to the small room that I grew up in, with model trains, planes and various reminders of my youth spent in quiet introspection. "ok dad, I'll be ready."
My father and I were playing in a member/guest golf tournament at his club, and tonight was the "Mens Grill". Starting off with cocktails from 6-8, then a steak dinner with plenty of beer and wine, and ending the night with gin rummy and backgammon tournaments to the wee hours. I had played in this tournament for the past 8 years and day one of play was always tough. "I'll be ready in 20 minutes." I called down the stairs

Fruit

Matt ### was a very good friend of mine. I don't exactly know when it was that we met or specifically how long we had been friends, but I've known him for as long as I can remember. He was a very tall and lanky sort of fellow, and quite goofy in his own way. But despite being goofy, we was an accomplished tennis player, and as a young man he was being groomed for a professional career. He was affectionately known to his friends as "fruit" because he was a bit of a fruit cake. As the years progressed, we saw less and less of each other, but we would still have a good time when we got together. I didn't notice the changes in him right away, and really just thought of the changes as fruit just being funny. I had several friends that thought wierd was funny, and just thought that he was one of them. In our teenage years we had experimented with drugs and alcohol, but for most of us it had ended with that; experimentation. Years later I would come to realize that perhaps for fruit, it was more than just childish experimentation. He would make little comments about certain things that upon thought leads me to think that his mind was going. One of the last times I saw him he was telling me that people he saw driving on the road thought that he smelled and that he suspected they thought that I smelled too. At that point, I decided that I missed my friend. Last I heard he had been involved in a hit and run and had fleed the state and was staying with his sister down south somewhere.

In the still heat of a mid summer night, the sound of crickets blend magically with the gentle rolling of waves on the beach. sitting on the deck, closed in by the scrub brush of Wauwinet, several bottles of wine and enough cigarettes to keep us going until dawn. Sitting with my best friends in the world, discussing things that really matter. Prep school scandal, fishing, who's doing who, who's a douche bag, friends that have fallen out of favor. The deck lit only by a string of large bulb Christmas lights. There was a faint sea breeze coming off the atlantic that made the mid august night bearable. Among all of the topics of conversation was the criticizing of friends old and new. It was great fun telling stories fun and famous. Embarassing and assinine. These are the times that really matter. The times where you can truly be yourself around an army of people that would do anything for you. These men; bankers, brokers and lawyers. Neer do wells, fools and deviants. All living completely different lives in their own ways can come together at any given moment and be children once more. Forget the stresses and responsibilities of life and drink irresponsibly. Most of them had quit smoking years ago, yet whenever they get together and are deep in the cups, smoking comes quit naturally.

She walked into the cafe cold and wet. Her hair was drenched despite her efforts to keep it dry with the most recent edition of FADER magazine... She was fucking cool... I always loved the fact that we were able to talk about music, and all music too. She wasn't limited to any one type of music. To look at her, you would have thought that without question, all she listened to was techno/house crap. She had chestnut colored hair and dark eyes. She was short, 5' at best, but she carried herself like an amazon. She was scrappy and gregarious but with a tender side that was unrivaled. I sat alone at the table in the cafe with my elbows on my knees, and my face 3 or 4" from the travel section of the new york times. I knew that she had entered, but I didn't lift my eyes from my reading. she saw me from across the room and made her way over and sat down. I looked up and said hi. "hi" she said smiling sweetly. I sat back in the chair and looked her up and down. "raining?" I asked. "yes baby, it's raining." was all she said. I pulled a box of cigarettes from my pocket and slid on out. I hesitated a second before I put it between my lips and lit it. "When did you start smoking again?" she asked? "when I decided that it wasn't worth it to deprive myself of things that I like."

I thought that one day I would be this incredibly well respected creative mind that was good at everything that I did. I thought that I would be a triple threat and then some. Film, Literature and art. I thought that at this point in my life I would have published works of fiction, my name on a few well respected independant films and an burgining art collection filled with mostly young upcoming artists. I have always thought of myself in a greater light than my current state. Short of all this, I also wanted to be involved in building and gardening and landscape design. I think of myself in terms of art and design. Intellectual persuits. I wanted to be able to persue all of the things that interested me without fear or worry about how to make it all work financially. I never thought in terms of making money, because I thought that if you did what you loved the money would come. but now I find myself working my ass off trying to make ends meet and being too tired at the end of the day to write, or create a wonderful meal, or work in the garden. I'm lucky if I have the time and energy to shower. I want the opportunity to be financially secure enough to persue these things, but for now i'm just tired.