a man

a man came to our door and asked if we wanted a dog for fifteen hundred dollars.

we said that seemed unreasonable.

he mumbled a lot then said, okay, seven hundred.

emily said she didn't even pay seven hundred for our dog. she said she paid like fifty at the shelter.

i knew this was a lie because someone gave us our dog. i stood there grinning.

fine fine fine, the man said. he said this in a rushed and high pitched voice. he said, what i am supposed to do with this dog this dog just out in the backyard and i can't feed it and i got this woman trying to get me to get rid of this dog and nobody helping me how about fifty dollars.

i said he dropped his price a lot.

this is a good dog, the man said.

well, we don't have the money, i said. and we don't want another dog.

why you stringing me along? the man said. he mumbled some more, stamped his foot, then walked off our porch. they don't fucking want it, he yelled up the street.

unimpatient

i want to learn how to not want. i think the only thing getting in the way of myself right now is wanting too much. i ate an enormous red-velvet cupcake and had serious feelings of being a failure. i have been in something like two real car crashes, i have hit one deer but not killed it, and i have known several people who have gone to jail for writing bad checks - i tell each of these stories when drinking with a great amount of pride, which i then try to conceal. the only thing stopping me from quitting what i'm doing right now is probably cowardice. i'm trying to find a way to turn off my brain and let a story happen. this is the opposite of what i did last semester, which was write in third person. i'm not really sure i can write in the third person, but i spent a year working on it. i have almost nothing to show for that, which i say with a great amount of pride while trying to conceal it. i plan on getting very drunk tomorrow and i'm most looking forward to the hangover, when i can walk through the world with enough connections in my brain burned away that i won't be selfconscious, looking at myself looking. if i could burn enough of my brain away, i once believed, i could live sort of like a monk, only i wouldn't have to do as much work to get there. it was such a bad lie. then my body started feeling really bad and i gave all that up pretty quick. if i would've properly rehabed my sprained ankles i wouldn't have had to sit out a month from running and both my achilles wouldn't feel like they're about to snap now. the days are getting longer and the trees are beginning their budding just because, i'm trying to watch without watching.