If it seems this old world has passed me by…you’ll let me know, won’t you? You’ll at least drop a note out the window as you zoom by in your flying car full of laughing Instagram models and wellness influencers on your way to a future an old stick in the mud like me couldn’t even conceive of. Won’t you? 

 

Dear Ted, the note might read. We all love your cranky old man schtick. Your befuddled musings on things the rest of us understood when we were 9 years old were entertaining indeed, but we don’t treasure the past. The past is just that. This country leaves its elders in the dust. Bitch. Peace TF out.

 

People are real quick to tell you when you’ve got a booger hanging out of your nose. People are real helpful like that. With their smug fucking smiles. But it never occurs to them that the booger might be part of your plan. Part of your Method. Young people these days can all rotate Andrew Tate’s cock in their minds but they’ve never heard of Marlon Brando. Yeah, the fucking horror, bitch. 

 

All my rowdy friends are dead. 

 

I don’t ask people to check out my band on YouTube. They seek that shit out. They hear I’m in a band and they think I’m some kind of musician. Then, after they see a clip of us performing “The Cynical Courtship of the Seven Seraphim Sisters” or whatever, live at Cafe Cunt Rot or some such dump, it’s always the same thing. You have a really…uh…punk sounding voice. Smug smile. Motherfucker, I know what I sound like. 

 

I used to be passionate about legalizing things. Then they legalized everything. And monetized it. Now it’s no fun anymore.  

 

You’ll have to give me some grace and some space. A little leeway. It’s natural that the past takes on greater significance as you get older. There’s more past now than there is future. I’m not working toward a better tomorrow. I’m trying not to lose my shit today. You know what they say, never put off until tomorrow acquiring a debilitating mental illness that will get you put on a bunch of designer pills that make you sweat and drain your bank account and leave you with suicidal ideation.  

 

Ulysses S. Grant is the only man I’ve ever been attracted to. Grant is the only four-star general in the history of our country that was better looking in real life than the actor that portrayed him in a Netflix documentary.  

 

I’m not out here fighting inequality. Inequality is a fact of life. Equal parts flour and butter might make a good roux, but the bigger, richer man will always do to you. That’s a line from my debut novel, Napawaupee County Blues, which, incidentally, is due to come out in Italian translation later this year. I’m dead serious. They get me over there. My band’s first album came out on a label from Dusseldorf, Germany. The Europeans don’t make snarky comments about my singing voice. They recognize good art. 

 

I haven’t had occasion to travel to Europe myself. But I did work with a guy who was propositioned by a James Bond impersonator on the London Underground. Anyway, I don’t really consider England part of Europe. They don’t either. 

 

I think if I had the chance to travel internationally I’d want to see India. It’s such a vast, diverse country offering a cornucopia of smells. Indians have been taking it pretty hard on Twitter lately. But I guess that stuff will all work itself out. 

 

I have a brother-in-law who’s making it his life’s work to expose the injustices visited upon the native peoples of the Lake Winnebago region. If he’s expecting much of a reaction from the public at large, I’m afraid he’s in for a big let down. I’m afraid he might be making a grave mistake. Which, ironically, is the name of my favorite dive bar in Oshkosh. The original proprietor actually felt pretty bad about digging up sacred ground, but at least he gave the place a name everyone could chuckle about. You can’t take yourself too seriously these days. 

 

There was a well known pervert active in these parts in the 80s that called himself Grave Danger. He would stalk the cemeteries at night looking for disaffected youths. He’d sneak up on a  maudlin teenage girl or boy in black eye-liner reading Edgar Allan Poe by their grandaddy’s headstone and announce, I’m afraid you’re in danger. At which the startled youth would invariably gasp, GRAVE danger? To which the same would reply, is there any other kind?  You know, and then commence with the diddling. Back in those days you committed to a bit. And not every nascent sexual discovery that occurred somewhat outside the lines of what you might find on say The Many Loves of Dobie Gillis resulted in some hysterical true crime documentary. But there I go waxing nostalgic again. 

 

Not everybody has a noteworthy sexual deviant in their family. My family never had enough money to breed the type. You’ve all seen the headlines: Prominent Patron of Mother St. Mary Catholic College Attempts to Abscond to Aruba With Captain of 9th Grade Wresting Team, Arrested at Airport. Money is the root of all evil. Float me fifty bucks and save your soul. No one cares what poor people do in the privacy of their own hovels. 

 

Life on the plains was no picnic either. And do you really think the day to day for the American Indian before the white man came was all hi-how-are-ya, smoke the peace pipe and cuddle with the squaws? The Historical Documentary Lobby will have you believe all those people we ground up in the Civil War died for a reason. The truth is peace is just the transitional state we’re in before we find an excuse to kill each other. The bi-peds with the big obscenities for brains have been on a bummer trip for longer than Ken Burns would care to consider. 

 

The best part about being an unknown author is you can plagiarize your own work and no one even notices. 

 

So in conclusion: It was the best of times…hang on, I’m getting a text. Is literacy graded on a curve? Unfortunately we had to fire the Quality Department. Budget concerns. Robert Caro is never going to die, he’ll just get integrated into AI. 

 

Life on the plains, the war between the states, aboriginal cannibal tribes…harsh vibes and good riddance. But then what do we stuff in the vacuum of atavistic violence? 

 

I read where some guy in Kansas shot his wife and four children. Then himself. Driven to it, no doubt, by the terrible drone in the back of his brain. They traced his ancestry back to Lincoln’s original USCT. Sad.