Going for a run

May 28, 2022May 28, 2022 ~ John Loraine ~ 9 Comments

It is hard to be angry when you are in a gorgeous place with great company. Everything seems to make sense, and things don’t seem too bad either. Somehow you get a feeling that, shit, this life isn’t too bad at all. They say you can’t run away from your problems, and the new location is not a solution. I could partially disagree with that statement for sure. I ran away from my “normal” day-to-day life, and now I am here, in North West Florida, enjoying the sunshine, the beach, and the perfect climate. My problems did not go away, but the way I think about them changed. They don’t stress me out anymore. They are not as important as I thought they were. They all will get some fucking solution at some point, and I will forget about them as soon as possible. A new setting makes you feel different, and the better your surroundings are, the more appealing it is for you and the better your entire experience becomes. Presently, I am in the best place on Earth, and I love it. It doesn’t mean that nothing else matters, but instead that I have so much pleasure in my life right now that all that stressful bullshit has no place in my heart anymore. Life goes on. Life is beautiful, and we always have to remember that no matter how fucked up it might get.

It is a beautiful sunny morning in Sarasota, Florida. At seven-thirty in the morning, the sun goes up, and you can feel its nice and warm presence. I woke up early even though I was on my brief vacation. I wanted to see and experience more of this place and its beauty. I want to be full of this new life experience that will not last forever, but I want to make sure its impact will. I go into my car around seven in the morning and drive off to the beach. Siesta Key beach is about seventeen minutes away from Palmer Ranch, where I rent. The traffic is very light in the morning, and driving through Midnight Pass Road feels liberating when just a few cars are driving on it. As I drive closer to the beach, I see people walking or running. I see people on bicycles and walking their dogs.

You can easily spot somebody who’s a professional runner. These experienced runners are always very much tanned, and they always wear a running uniform, black sunglasses, and sweat dripping all over them. They run consistently, with a very measured tempo and pace. They have earbuds in their ears and a phone strapped to one of their arms, and they breathe deeply and systematically. You cannot miss the professional runners out here. I am not an experienced runner myself, but I do that for fun and to trigger some new experiences in my life and train my body. It is also a great mental escape from everything. Whatever the situation is, I feel satisfied and happy, and that’s all I need.

There are very few cars in the beach parking lot, and you can easily park in the first raw parking space in the morning. People who park there usually are either early risers who want to enjoy the beach in peace or runners like myself who want to be healthier and fit and satisfy their physical needs by running a few miles in the morning by the ocean. I park my car, get my earbuds in and play some upbeat rock music. It has to be something energetic, something to give me a boost since I am still half asleep in my mind. I stretch my legs right there next to my car. I am always barefoot when I run on the beach. I love to feel the white, powder-like sand under my feet. It is the best feeling ever. It brings me closer to this environment and makes me feel more present. Also, I hate to get sand into my sneakers, which ruins them. And since I don’t like to go out and buy a new pair of sneakers often, in general, I am annoyed by shopping, I run barefoot, and I am happy like that.

Walking to the beach, I can see the light-blue sky on the horizon, with a slight pink reflection from the rising sun. The pale-white, super smooth sand is cold under my bare feet. This type of sand is always cold, but it feels even colder in the mornings. I don’t mind the sand. My mind is set on the sky and the contrast between white sand, light blue sky, and light-blue and green-ish ocean. There are no words to describe this beauty. This picture-perfect scenery takes away my mind and soul. I take some pictures on my phone, I want to always have this memory somewhere in my digital cloud, so I can always go back to it, share it with others, show them how great this place is, and make them a little jealous. I walk the morning-cold sand towards the ocean.

I see some people scattered around the beach this early in the morning. Everyone has a reason to be there. Some are getting ready for another beautiful sunny day, and they decided to set up their beach spot early. Some people are just walking at the shoreline, breathing the fresh ocean air, some are running, and some are on their bicycles. There are fishermen, cigar-smoking men, coffee drinkers, old, young, kids, and others. I don’t start running until I am on the shoreline, next to the water. I deeply inhale the fresh morning ocean air. It looks pretty light and easy on my lungs. I almost don’t feel any pressure inside. I feel easy and relaxed. I want to live. Once I reach the water, I start running.

There is something about running on the beach that is an entirely different kind of running and completely different physical training than, let’s say, running at the gym, or on the street, or running in nasty-cold Pennsylvania neighborhoods. I hardly feel tired from running, and I get to breathe the freshest, smoothest air. The green-blue water comes and goes and comes again, hitting the shore lightly and returning to where it came from. There is a light, easy breeze in the air, and it makes me breathe in fully. My music plays in my earbuds, but I can still hear the ocean, the wind, and the birds. It all adds up to this magical yet so natural scenery. I watch my way, and I run left and right, trying to bypass others on the beach. People constantly walk back and forth. There are always people on the beach, no matter the day and the weather. Some walk in small groups, some walk with strollers, and some are alone but not lonely out here. This is like an early-morning-beach club or something where everyone who decided to come out this time of the day belongs here and is happy to be part of this early-riser community. So am I, and I am not local, but I feel like I am. I feel like I belong here.

My run continues, and I watch people, I try not to look at their faces, but sometimes I do. I want to see who else is out here this morning. I want to see beautiful young girls running on the beach. I usually see very few or none of those. They all seem to be getting their beauty sleep. Elderly and middle-aged folks are the majority of walkers and runners. This whole town is predominantly elderly folks. Those folks made it in this life. Those folks have nothing else to do but enjoy their lives and this beautiful weather that holds most of the year. I don’t mind the elderly. I don’t mind anybody at all. I feel light jealousy towards them since they’ve accomplished something in this life and deserve to enjoy their retirement. I am still very early on this life journey. I still have to go through at least thirty-some more years of working until I can peacefully retire. But I love to get a chance and an early experience of what this life can be like. I want to get an early glimpse of what this life can feel like once there is nothing to worry about but go out for a walk or a run on the beach in the mornings or evenings. This place is the place. This town is the town. I love everything about it. I’ll take it with all the idiots, tourists, lizards, alligators, and turtles over anything in North-Eastern Pennsylvania. Sarasota is the only place where I genuinely feel like I belong here. I should be here. I am happy here at once. Nothing else matters here anymore as long as I have this sun, this warm ocean air, this beach, this white sand under my feet and all. Man needs so little to be truly happy. Somehow, we all take the long road towards our happiness and towards finding what it is that we want to live for.

The music in my ears plays loud, the ocean’s hum is still audible, and I run. I get this immense energy from the ocean. My run feels easy and relaxed. I almost feel no pressure running, and there is no struggle at all. I watched the ocean move back and forth. I ran into the water for a little while to get my bare feet wet, to feel this energy. It works. Getting my bare feet wet refreshes my body and mind, and I want to run faster. I want to run longer. I prefer this run never to end. I continue to move along the shoreline.

Under my feet, on my way, I see the white sand with all those footprints on it. I see all those muscles and the seaweed flushed over onto the shore. I watch the sky and the sun rising on my left as I run towards it, and I feel the wind brushing through my body and soul. To my left are all those buildings along the shoreline, hotels, rentals, private housing, and everything under the sun that keep people coming here and staying there. Some customers are so eager to get there early that they come down as early as seven in the morning. Most of them probably are here for the first time. Many visitors are here on their vacations, spending some time with family and children or even by themselves. I see young mothers carrying their children to the beach in the morning. I see the fathers following them with a little cart with everything they might need at the beach while here. Some people are lightly packed with just one bag and a thermos. There is always a thermos with some mysterious liquid that people would bring with them to the beach. I’m sure there are plenty with alcohol in it. Locals know they can drink freely here, and they don’t even try to hide it. The tourists will be shyer about it and still hide their beer and wine in those thermoses or plastic bottles. It all works. It’s funny how people behave at the beach.

People come here with their reasons and schedules. They sit lazily on those chairs or lay on their towels, watching, doing nothing but relaxing. They are finding their peace and calm here at the beach. Most visitors don’t and will not get up early to run. They love just to lay there and watch others do their thing. It’s very much entertaining that way. I don’t mind them at all. I love to watch them as well while I am running. I love observing other people all the time. I love seeing what they do, how they look like, who they are watching, what they are doing in general, and how they are spending their morning time. A great song came up, and I turned my volume louder on my phone. I have my car key in my back pocket zipped, and I hold my phone in my hand as I run. I control my music, my sound, and my channels. I want to hear only what I want to hear at the moment. I don’t want to suffer through another lazy, dull song. I want all the best tunes playing in my ears this morning. I want to have this music associated with this ocean, beach, palms, sun, tourists watching me running by them, and all those birds making so much noise. I run until the shoreline ends, or almost until it ends, and there is no way to go any further, then I turn around and run back.

My view is slightly different now on my way back, as I can see more of the water on my left and the shore which bends this way. I always want to capture these moments somewhere in my memory to bring them back to life when I’ve been out of here. I might seem like a local to most of these folks on the beach, but I am just like one of them. I am just another tourist here. It doesn’t matter. What matters most is how I feel, at my all-time best. This sunshine does something to me, I am sure of it. I feel like all my anxiety and depression, stress, and all that daily bullshit do not affect me anymore. I don’t even give a shit about my emails or work-related matters or anything. I just live. I just run. I am free as those birds in the sky. I am just enjoying every minute here in the lovely Sarasota. There is sure a reason why I’ve been coming back here year after year for over a decade.

Fifteen minutes into my adventure, I can feel the sweat coming onto my face. I wipe with my hand and continue to run. The light ocean breeze blows through me and makes it all feel alright. I feel fresh. I feel so alive. I can see the yellow beach guard’s booth, my starting point, and my finish line. With every minute, I get closer and closer to it. I don’t have a time or a distance goal for this run. I am doing it for fun. I am doing it from this point to that and back. That’s it. It’s simple. It’s almost too simple to call it an exercise. I enjoy it like I am enjoying my cold white wine with a nice dinner later in the day. I am already planning my next run tomorrow and the next day, and for the remaining of the week. I wish I could spend my entire life like that. I wish I could come to the beach every morning until my last day, run or walk, enjoy this beauty, breathe this air, and feel this sand under my bare feet. I am only here for a month. At least I can count on that. At least it is something. Something worth living for.

I slow down and get closer to the beach as I approach the finish line. My feet are warm and hot from running the fresh, not even cold, and ocean water refreshes me again. I stop, and I walk more into the water to get deeper, down to my knee level. I watch the blue-greenish water moving, the ocean breathing, the birds flying around making noise, and the boats far into the water doing something out there. It’s a perfect view. It’s the view that I want to enjoy all my life. This view takes away my breath and my mind. I stay there knee-deep in the water and watch it all. The horizon is clear, and I can see far, but I can’t see the end of the ocean. This ocean has no end. It doesn’t need to end anywhere. I stay there like that, motionless and thoughtful. I feel like I have to think about something important like the sense of life and the purpose and my goals and my career and family life, but nothing like that comes to my mind. I just want to be present and not distracted from this beauty by nothing else. My mind is blank, already up from my night’s sleep but still wondering, still processing in the quiet mode. I check my watch, It’s about eight-thirty. I look sideways. I look straight ahead into the ocean. There are more people now on the beach with every minute. I know I have to get back to my place. I know my child will wake up about any minute now, and I want to see my son’s beautiful sleepy face, hug him, kiss him, and start his breakfast for him. I turn around, and I walk back across the massive wide valley of sand towards the parking lot, towards my car. I am not looking back. I am just walking away. I know what’s behind me. I don’t need another sad reminder that I am leaving this place and might not ever come back. I know I will come back here at some point in time. I will be here again tomorrow morning, running again, enjoying it all. For now, I need to be with my family. I want to see them, hug them, kiss them, and have my morning coffee with them. They are all I have and all I love in this world. I am so fortunate that we are here together, living and enjoying this fantastic place, and we are happy here, like nowhere else. Life can be beautiful if you let it.

Another Saturday night rant

May 15, 2022May 15, 2022 ~ John Loraine ~ 11 Comments

I sit here at the famous hotel, top floor, overlooking Venice Beach, California. The balcony window is open, and the ocean breeze is coming inside. I can feel it, smell it, and I can breathe again fully I always wanted to be here. I always wanted to be in the City of Angels, create here, live here, and be part of it all. The smell of the beach and the ocean is always refreshing and alive. It makes me want to just be there, just lay there, watch, and breathe. It makes my soul tick. It brings in the Lada Del Ray melancholy with it. I can imagine Lana sitting next to me smoking cigarettes and singing sad songs. There are lights from the street reflected on the walls, and the noise of the boulevard below is heard. Cars are going back and forth at the night, the people roaming around the City that never sleeps. It is a dark and warm night tonight, and I always have my Red Hot Chili Peppers music on. They are California to me in sound. The fake beautiful people and the palms are California to me in actuality. Spiritually, I think it is a place for the lost to be found, find whatever is missing, create something new, grow, and achieve. It is the mecca for so many lost souls, many of whom really found themselves there. The first that comes to mind are all those actors who came over with nothing, and the minute they scored a successful movie, the big payday came around and then some more and they are never the same. This is a life that I believe too many are wishing for, but it is not an easy life to have, live, and maintain. It is a complicated and challenging task. Honestly, with all the time trying to become somebody else for money, one eventually becomes another version of themselves for life. People lose their own entity over time, and they just play the Hollywood game for the rest of their lives. They want to be part of it, be invited to the parties, get roles in the movies, get offers, make money, and spend money while selling their soul. That dirty fake acting soul is worth not more than any other man’s soul even less famous. Almost always thinking of California, I can imagine rich fucking movie stars with tons of money, huge houses, big fancy cars, and busty women with a shit ton of plastic surgeries. When I think about California, I think about John Fante, who came out there when it was fucking dark, and it was nothing around. When the wind would blow a ton of fucking desert sand into your room along with an ocean breeze. I imagine Fante sitting in that dirty, cheap hotel room on Bunker Hill, hungry, poor, with no money or prospects, but typing with a cheap fucking typewriter. Writing meant a different thing to him than it is now to 99.9% of douchebags with a laptop, just like myself, who blog or who are self-made-stupid-ass-fucking-reporters, etc. This used to be a place of nothing but the fucking desert. Many new-coming lunatics come over here to find and build their new life and build their American dream. Fante sat there in that chair hungry and desperate, writing letters to his mother in Colorado, asking for a few dollars so he could pay the rent or send the story out or buy himself something to eat. At the same time, he worked on his American dream. There was so much passion this guy had, and like so many others who came to California for the same reason, to make it out here. In life, it always takes too much of your soul, best years, and best health before you can actually achieve something. Before you can truly say, ok, I am fucking feeling pretty good about myself and my accomplishments today. Today’s idea of getting there and becoming the next best fucking actor or actress is very much a delusional thought process. Fante had to eat shit all his life to at least partially make it work for him, even if it meant writing movie scripts full-time instead of books. John Fante’s books will always be in my home library. I will cherish them always, remembering him as a writer who wrote so simply, so early on, with so much passion and authentic and true feelings that went almost unnoticed until his death. Charles Bukowski is my association with California in a poetic way. Charles Bukowski is the reason I write. Charles Bukowski is the reason I know who John Fante was. Nobody in the whole fucking California is more famous for his raw, authentic, graphic, and very realistic poetry of the time and place than Bukowski. People worldwide learn about California, skid raw, horse racing, drinking, and drunken shenanigans from reading Bukowski’s poetry and prose. His writing throughout his entire life was full of it. The never-ending drinking and drama with the women in question were the two major topics across his career and life that always played a key role everywhere Bukowski went. He wasn’t afraid to stay fucking hungry, drunk, jobless, hopeless. Still, with all that passion for writing and all that passion for becoming a famous writer, he kept writing and creating and eventually did become successful. Success felt like a tremendous reward to Bukowski even in the later years of his life. The man who had been one inch away from skid raw now had a wife, house, a new car, a movie based on his life, a bunch of new books, a great bottle of wine for dinner, and everything else the dirty old man can wish for. It wasn’t a shot or easy way out for him, but he still somehow did it. He made his American dream come true. The dozens of his books on my bookshelves represent my love and admiration for his writing. Drunk Bukowski roaming from bar to bar, from a hotel room to a hotel room, from one shitty job to another, trying to find the right place, trying to find the good life, the peace of mind, the right woman while always getting involved in some weird shit which came up with his poems or part of his prose. There was so much Bukowski in California that I don’t think it is possible to ever take him out of there. I am not even going to bring up the music bands taking their origins from California. It will take the whole fucking night and probably many books, not just a few pages to cover everything. California had it all and had it all great, too good. I am not sure that the good is still there, it could be, but we maybe don’t see or don’t know much about it. The good could’ve left that place a long time ago, as so many people did recently when the poor and the homeless started to run the town. The life changed, the dream was crushed for so many, and so many plans were deemed to never come true or be born in the first place. It is sad to see the beach with primarily lonely or homeless people. It is hard to see people angry at each other and only being pleased when they need to impress somebody to make their next move, get the part, win the role, the contract, you fucking name it. It is said to see the place of so many dreams coming true and so much talent and creativity going to hell faster than hell itself. California, where everything began for America, is now a place of survival for the fake egoistic people. On the other hand, a movement of homeless and poor, an invasion of the overpriced properties with those who didn’t make it or didn’t want to make anything… Everything so glamorous and lavish becomes sad, grey, and doomed. It does feel like I don’t have a partner and my only friend is in the City I live in, the City of Angeles, lonely and as fucked up as I am, and together we cry. Red Hot Chili Peppers got it all right in those lyrics. They are so California. There are a lot of illusions and bullshit in and about California for so many people. But there always is a real side to each story. The real side to the story is that not everything that glitters is gold. Not everything that has been portrayed to be so great and beautiful actually is so. The real side also is that I have never been to California, and there is no hotel, no ocean, and no breeze where I am hailing from. It is actually cold, dark, and gloomy in the suburbs of the East Coast. But that was my dream though for quite a while. I always wanted to come to California. I always wanted to californicate, whatever that means. I am writing about my dream and how I imagine and associate my California life. What would I feel like? What would I do there? I would’ve wanted to come over and be like Fante, a man without a dime behind his soul but so much to say through my writing. Still, there is a small room for rent, and there is a typewriter or a laptop these days. I sit and write like crazy for days and nights, and then I try to sell it somewhere so I can continue to do what I love and live off of my passion, my writing. There is a laptop that never goes to sleep, busy processing words. Like myself, there are cigarette butts all over the table and a half-empty bottle of whiskey. I am typing away, writing my thoughts and words as they all come to me. I create the writing that also creates something else for somebody. It creates a new made-up world that everyone can wander in and be part of. Welcome to my shindig, folks. This is the cycle that never ends. This is the life I wanted to have but no longer can. This would’ve been the story of the next greatest American novelist, poet, and writer, John Loraine, ladies and gentlemen. It feels great. It almost feels real for a moment. I can imagine myself living there, in the City of Angeles, and being part of that mess. The place is hardly changing a person. In most cases, the person changes depending on their surroundings, just like all those successful actors in Hollywood. They will never be the same regular folks they once were before they came over there. Maybe I will never be the same once I am relocated to California? Perhaps I would be stuck there and not be able to write anything? What if that City eats me alive and I am forever lost in its gloom? What if the writing does not require one to move anywhere? Why would you go anywhere else as long as you can get a quiet place to sit down and write? There are so many hours in the day, so many words to write, and so many writers and books to read. I think it is just the right time to sit down and write whatever you feel like and think about and whatever comes through. Bukowski once wrote, “what matters most is how well you walk through the fire.” Amen.

Beer-infused rant on Saturday night

April 27, 2022April 27, 2022 ~ John Loraine ~ 2 Comments

Times New Roman is a perfect font. I don’t know who determined that, but it is what they say, mostly a widely used font for writing. I write like that. Why the fuck not? I am walking through the clouds and writing my prose and poems like nobody’s business in this crazy fucking world of ours. Sometimes it feels like it is the end of the next closest thing to it as we can get, but then the next day, it’s alright. We’ll power through. We’ll live. We’ll write more books, songs, and poetry and create even more disparity in the universe because we are the people, and that’s what we do. That’s why we are here on this planet to fuck things up and then think about how to solve this. Cigarettes taste good even if they kill. Even if they fucking stink, we still smoke them passionately and on impulse because our bodies crave that chemical shit and our bodies need more of it. The hangovers are harder than ever as you age as you get older, and who am I to tell you? You should know that. It is a fact. My hangovers were so much more severe right after passing thirty. Is it the age that is not keeping up with the young spirit, or is it our desperate bodies that cannot handle that shit anymore? I am not a doctor, don’t ask me. I am just a writer, an addict, a drinker, a family man, a working man, and a writer nobody knows. I just write and spit and shit and try to help myself and hopefully others somehow. It is late March, and it is still fucking cold, and that fact alone is depressing as anything else is depressing in this life. I am sick of depression and being depressed. Fuck depression, I want love, I want crazy passionate sex, I want a beer with a cigarette and have no regret tomorrow or ever. I want to live my life how I want it, not how society, the church, or the establishment wants me to live my life. Why don’t they worry about their own shit? Why don’t they worry about saving this world from other things and problems? I am not a pessimist but rather an optimistic realist. The reality these days is not what anyone wants to live through. It seems like there isn’t much to do to save this fucking and completely insane world of ours. We are on the verge of world war three, nuclear war, a major fucking world pandemic, chemical war, and the war on genders and equality and race and veganism, you name it. I don’t know what to do with all of it, and neither do you. Trust me, you can have your opinions, as can I, but who really gives a fuck and who really is helping to solve anything? All we do is deepened that hole in the normality of our existence. I wish I could save the world. I wish I could write like Hemingway. I wish I could have the largest balls of them all. I wish I never spotted playing guitar. But I don’t, and more than likely, neither do you. So we just live our lives day in and day out, and we keep questioning the same questions with no answers and no solutions, and this has become normal. More often than not, we don’t even ask any questions anymore. We don’t even give a shit about any kind of critical thinking or whatever. All that music in the world, any fucking music one can imagine, is available to anyone’s taste at any point in time. I find it impossible to pick what I want to listen to most of the time. There are so many streaming channels on TV and apps and shit, and it takes forever to pick a show or a movie to watch. And then I do pick something; it is often some stupid shit that doesn’t make sense and is obviously a wrong choice and a waste of time. Halfway through, I don’t even pay any attention to it. Are we spoiled too much? Fuck yeh! The deficit and the scarcity or limitation of supplies create more demand for something. The law of economy. Works like a fucking charm all the time, every time. I wish we never run out of beer. Beer is important. Cigarettes are important. Music is important. Books are important. Lunch is way too fucking important. We cannot not have it. We can’t say no to these things. We live for them to have them, own them, and consume all of them. As Pink Floyd sings, “Welcome, my son, welcome to the machine.” Everything is being controlled by the system, everything is a machine of some sort or kind, and you and I and everyone else are part of it. We are the main ingredients for it. We make that shit work. We make that wheel spin and evolve and progress. We don’t even know why. Why is this the most annoying type of question? Nobody has any fucking clue or patience for it. It just hangs over us like a fucking brick occasionally hits us in the head when the time is right. Fucking time is always on the money. There is just, in general, so little time for anything. I have so many wishes, desires, needs, and hobbies I want to maintain, but I don’t have any time. We have the sun, but we don’t have the time, honey. Owning ten watches is not helping you to keep the fucking time still. It doesn’t help to keep the accurate time either. All these watches help us understand how fucking miserable and incompetent and powerless we are against it. Time will make us old and ugly and sick and eventually dead. Time is running fast as a motherfucker, with no mercy, no soul, and not even a thought about slowing down. You can throw away all your watches, but this fucker will never stop counting down. Then you will look into a mirror, and you will see another person there. That face looks familiar but is not what I feel like. It is not what I imagined I look like. It always looks much worst in the mirror than we think it is. Am I too optimistic about myself and how I look? Or maybe that fucking mirror has no soul and has no problem showing me the truth? I know I do a lot of stupid shit intentionally, not in my favor, but I always have an excuse. I always have something to defend myself with. I always have something to stand by. There is a reason why I drink something every day. There is a reason why I cannot ever quit smoking cigarettes. There is a reason I am a nervous fucking wrack many times. The reason is in that fucking mirror staring at me with a tired, confused, and disappointed face wondering. This is life, I’d say. Life has been getting to me. Life is happening. Life is what it is and time is what it is, and we are who we are. We can change, I’m sure. We should be changing and constantly evolving. I am more than convinced. But what is the point of it all? What is the reason we are all here alive and wondering, making mistakes, and trying to ruin every fucking thing we touch? Why the world is set to self-destruct? Can we all live in peace and harmony and mind our own fucking business without any major consequences and conflicts? Even beer makes more sense right now than the time or even the whole wide world. For fuck’s sakes! People don’t really need much of anything. We all just need to be more human. Even fucking Jimy Hendrix on my Spotify playlist makes more sense after some fucking sixty years later. I hate that these beautiful long Saturday nights with music, beer, and books and writing are never lasting long enough. They end. They end soon. Too soon. I can smell tomorrow in about a few hours when I wake up with a swollen face from cigarette smoking and beer drinking the night before. My whole experience of freedom and I do whatever fuck I want to do will be over. It all will become past. And tomorrow will be the future and the present and eventually the past. Even the small great experience in your life is worth more than having nothing. All these little moments are all worth it. They are worth living for, waiting for, creating even more of them in the future. I live my life for an experience. I spend my money, I don’t save as much as I probably should, but I know why I do all that. I am separating myself from the materialistic things to have more space for the spiritual experiences, to have a better life experience, to enjoy this short and dull fucking life as much as possible. I am not a baller. I am far from it. I am just a regular dude, trying to raise a family, become somebody, find myself, be a great father and a husband, trying to make all the right moves. I want to be a writer and write. I write as much as I can. I write as much as I have an opportunity to do so or as much as I make myself sit down and write. But I do. I try. I write. I want to make it happen for me, and I think that with time and perseverance, I will fucking make it one day, some fucking day, I surely will make it all happen for me just like I wanted, just like I planned. There will be a nice house in Florida near the beach, maybe with a pool, always nice weather, family near me, money in the bank, nothing to worry about, a few cars in the driveway for any occasion, and books all over the house. Why the fuck not?! For now, it is just a dream, just my imagination. Just a thought, food for thought, and fucking wish of mine, ok? Can a man have a dream? Can we all dream about something great for ourselves? I’d say, fuck yeh! Knock yourself up. Fuck yourself up. Whatever. Yet another bottle of beer is empty, and it is past midnight, and I know tomorrow I will be sad and tired and hungover, but I feel so alive tonight. I feel so inspired. I wrote all this shit in about half an hour. There is just so much of this shit in me tonight. I don’t want this moment to end. I don’t want this stream to end. I want to go on. I want this night to last forever, like a high school ball, a wedding night, a birthday night, or something else you don’t want ever to end. Fuck there is always so little time for everything. There is too much time for work, daily chores, misery, depression, problems, and payments, but so little time and opportunity to actually enjoy your fucking life. I want to live. I want to enjoy my life as I want it to, as I chose to enjoy it. Even if it means waking up with a hangover tomorrow. Even if it means fucking open another bottle of beer. I am going to, and I will stretch this night as long as I can. Fuck everything. How many times I will be free and thirty-three or four or five or fifty? We make our choices, and we should stand behind them. We should own our shit, good or bad. This is our life, and we should live it to our best potential. What is potential anyways? You figure it out. I am just writing. I think I have potential. We all do. Life will show how full of shit we are as time goes by. If six turns out to be nine, I don’t mind, nor does Jimy Hendrix. Jimi Hendrix is really fucking on fire this night in my earbuds. I realize how much I’ve missed some great classic, fucking blues, rock music. I can’t have enough of it. The fucker was twenty-seven when he died, and all that music he created, played, and recorded is purely amazing. It all still sounds too fucking great if you listen today. None of it got old. None of it got irrelevant. It only gets better with time. Something tells me people don’t get better with time. Something tells me otherwise. Before people had this freedom to express their opinions worldwide on social media and elsewhere, there was just so little bullshit in the world in general. Life was so much better. Now everyone is walking around with their fucking phones checking shit out, posting this up, commenting, hating, shitting, crying, fucking around on the web, polluting everything with garbage and nonsense. And that’s what we’ve become. Walking zombies, living in our own little virtual universe shitting on each other. Even the great benefits of social media are so much suppressed now that they are almost inexistent. Life was better when all that bullshit took place in a small circle of friends or family behind a kitchen table. But the Ginnie is out now, so go fucking wonder where we go from here. I guess I know why I love sitting here in my basement until the deep of the night, listening to my vinyl collection, reading books, and drinking beer. It feels so much more organic and natural and so much real and meaningful. This is what I love, the music, the books, the writing, the boose, and the smokes. Men don’t need much to be happy, honestly. You would not be happy if you got it all. You will not be happy if you have nothing to your name. But you still have some chance if you get at least part of it. I think I’ve figured it out. I think I’ve got it. Another beer, another hour into the night. Another night of complete indulgence and what I like to call have fucking fun and joy. Tomorrow is never guaranteed. This is the saddest fucking reality ever. I wish I knew the day, the last day, I’d prepare myself better. I’ll be or maybe not be anything I am not today. I think I like being myself, or I think it’s cool for the most part. I am feeling pretty cool right now. It could be the beer, but I am feeling pretty fucking great right now. I’m a voodoo child, according to Jimi Hendrix. Damn, I’ve missed this great fucking music for such a long time! There is a shit ton of great fucking music to listen to. I’ve lost my focus, but I am finding my way out of that hole. Life is not all that bad. All in all, at least I get my chance at it. At least I am doing something, something good, something bad, something too much, and something too little, but it is my life. This is my scenario, my play, my fucking game, and I own it. And the wind whispers, Mary and I wrapping this mother fucker up. See ya later fuckers. Cheers to the good times and good and meaningful life. Let’s make this world a better place, even if it means drinking more beer, listening to more great music, and reading more of the Hemingway books. Jimi Hendrix lives forever.

For whom the bell tolls today

March 22, 2022March 22, 2022 ~ John Loraine ~ 10 Comments

War. The most disgusting and terrifying three letters in the English language. The war is here. One of the largest and most terrible wars since WW II is happening today in Ukraine. It is so strange to acknowledge it. I still cannot believe this is real. It seems like 1941 is repeating itself. What the fuck went wrong? How did we get here? The war is not only for Ukraine. This war will determine the destiny of the entire world. The whole civilized world is nervously watching this battle of good and evil and hoping it will end soon. The world is supporting and helping by sending their weapons, aid, money, but they don’t want to physically interfere by sending their troops in. It’s ok, world; Ukrainians got it. They’ll do the job themselves. They are strong. They will win. I believe in Ukrainian people. These are my people.

The talk about the possible russian-Ukrainian war used to be a science fiction kitchen table talk some ten years ago or so. The idea of putin invading Ukraine was floating around for some time. Ukrainians always knew that these neighbors that call themselves brothers are just a bunch of fucking bullies and assholes who cannot wait to dick-punch them in the most unexpected moment. It was always a possibility because of that freak in the Kremlin and his ambitions and dislike of Ukrainians as a nation and culture. Somehow, another nation’s identity is not a consideration for him, but the delusional dreams about reuniting the Soviet territories have been hunting that motherfucker for a while now. Since its independence, Ukraine has never lost its ties with Russia. That fucking older brother was always near and dear, and fucking pressing and bullying and aggravating. And as usual, constantly undermining and disrespecting Ukraine and its people and culture. Hence, their anti-Ukrainian propaganda that worked so damn well made the Ukrainian look incompetent and unable to make any decisions or break free from Russia. They believed that Ukraine couldn’t live without that fucking bullying older brother. Ukrainian always felt different about that. Ukrainians were always to blame for their blunt love for Ukraine. So many racist jokes were created about Russians and Ukrainians laughing at the nature of each culture and the nature of their people.

Today the world changed, and it changed forever. There will be no more jokes about Ukraine. There will be no older bully-brother soon. Nobody will ever confuse the two countries and two nations with one another. Now the whole world can see the difference. Day five of the war ended, and Ukraine has shown great strength. Even these fucking bullies are shocked to see how much more substantial and organized and with a fucking style Ukrainians are killing them on the invaded Ukrainian soil. This so much smaller country with almost un-existing military just some eight years ago is standing strong and tall and is defending its territory so fucking brave that even kids want to join the army to fuck some Russians up. I remember days of not so long past when guys would pay up or make any lame excuse to avoid the military. Joining the army was for those who had nothing better going on. Most kids were too cool to go to the military. It was the thing of the past. The army was something their dad or grandfather did when they were young. Today, we see these huge lines to the military recruiting centers, just like some fucking Black Friday sales lines at the mall. Everyone is there, ready to defend their country because nobody else in their place would. The patriotism is in their minds, it’s in the air, it’s in Ukrainian blood running fast in the tense vanes, pulsing to live, to survive. And they know that they can willingly die defending their country and for the safety of their land and people. It is an outstanding attitude. It is what the world has been lacking for some time now. It is something one must do to prove to be a decent son of their country who will be glorified and respected forever. These people are willing to take the bullet for their country, defending their nation against the enemy. This is the most honorable death one can die. It is still a terrible death but nonetheless. One will become a hero. A hero for their people.

Who would ever think that we, as the world, will ever get here? I did not. I was hoping for a rosy future. I guess I should not be hoping for fucking anything anymore because one never knows what’s gonna happen the next minute. We were almost fucking done with that fucking pandemic. That little fucking omicron was almost going away, and now, who gives a shit anymore? We should know better that there always will be something else to replace the existing problem. The world will never run out of problems. It will run out of peace, fresh air, food, supply chains, russian products, maybe even idiots, but not the fucking problems. Somehow, somewhere, we need to learn to live our lives as best as possible and deal with all that bullshit as best as possible because there is no other life; there is no happy ever after. This is the end after one ride. One-way ticket. No more sequels in this motherfucking life. How we spend our lives will determine who we are as individuals. And what did we do? What did we do to get where we are now, all fucking wondering if there will be another day? This war in Ukraine is not the war in just the Ukraine. It is the big russian Fuck You to the entire civilized world. All of us motherfuckers were dared to step in and help Ukraine to defend itself. And rightfully so. Ukrainians proved everyone’s worries wrong. However, there are consequences. People are dying, neighborhoods and infrastructure are being destroyed, pollution is through the fucking roof, tanks and military equipment are burning on the streets, dead russian soldiers’ bodies scattered on the streets of Ukraine everywhere, whole or in pieces. I haven’t seen too many dead people, but they always gave me chills. This time, looking at the dead enemies, I feel nothing. My love for my country is so big that the anger I feel as a result of invasion is on some fucking highest level. It made me heartless, and all I do is just watch the Ukrainian news. I can only imagine what people feel like out there whose homes were destroyed, whose relatives died, whose cities were fucking destructed, who’s watching it all and living it all and sleeping in the fucking bunkers with their kids and all that trauma! No wonder the lines at the army recruiting centers are so fucking huge.

I remember a quote from my childhood, a true friend will always help you when you are in need. I grew up with many other kids and young adults and people of different nationalities, skin colors, religions, etc. They all, on some level at some point, were called friends. We are still happy to see each other and share a few updates when running into each other somewhere. But that is not true friendship. The true friendship is the thing that happens when you are alone, in pain, in your trouble, in deep shit, and there is a person, a friend with you regardless of their own issues, that person is there for you, even if it’s just to be with you, shoot the shit, drink beer or smoke a cigarette together. A true friend will wake up in the middle of the night to help you out with whatever it is. A true friend is somebody who will always, and no matter what, sacrifice their own livelihood, even sacrifice their own lives to help you out. This true friendship we see amongst Ukrainians right now. Today, people who were traditionally so accustomed to shit on each other or just plain ignoring each other are fighting together against a common enemy. They trust their lives to one another. Many of them might not even know each other at all. But it doesn’t matter. Sometimes the evil had to come down so the people could realize that they need to stay together and help each other and appreciate each other because their lives and the destiny of the entire country will depend on that relationship. In today’s case, the fate of the whole fucking world might be determined in this war. We see who has been supporting Ukraine right away, those who hesitated, and those who turned their backs because of their own insecurities. These are not true friends. We also see the Ukrainian president who used to be telling jokes on the TV just a few years ago who is now together with his people and his country helping and trying to protect his nation and his people. There are no more jokes but the power of soul and mind and the love for your country. That is the bravery that most world leaders could fucking die and never show. The new world history is being written now by Ukrainians at last.

I haven’t visited home in about four years. I haven’t lived at home for the last eighteen years. I call home another country today, but my soul, mind, and brain cells are so fucking Ukrainian. Sitting here and watching TV, a 24/7 live news stream from Ukraine, I am going fucking crazy over this disaster. Feeling like there is something I could or should do, and I am not doing shit. It tears my heart and soul and gets into my poor dumb head. I am thinking more and more about Hemingway, who joined the US army in Italy in 1918, and it wasn’t even his fucking country to help out, and he wasn’t even fighting. He was just an ambulance driver, helping around for Red Cross. But he had that presence of mind and courage that many lacks today. We see many people running away from war, trying to save themselves, and escape. And here is this guy who wants to join the military just for a fucking experience or because he is just ballsie as hell. And he proved some little bravery there as it seems, and he was severely wounded at the battle. That fucking situation gave him an idea and the theme for his upcoming, one of the most famous and the most successful books he ever wrote, “A farewell to arms.” Sometime later in his life, he returned to a battlefield to cover a Spanish Civil war and showed even more balls there. The fucking famous writer who commanded a militia to fight the nazis! What a fucking man all around! I wish I had ten percent of his balls and could do shit like that. As weird as it seems to relieve Hemingway’s youth, this is perfect timing, living through yet another war, not much different from what he went through. There was just recently a young guy who blew himself up at the bridge to prevent Russians from coming through. This is true heroism. There is for you a real-life of “For whom the bell tolls” happening as we speak. History does indeed repeat itself, and those who don’t know it is deemed to repeat it. Aren’t we all? Isn’t that some sort of fucking weird-ass deja vu? It sure seems like it is. And we are living through it, watching the history being made in front of our eyes by some small, unknown, always undermined tiny nation.

I haven’t been that much depressed since ever. It’s day nine as of this writing, and the war is still on, even more, destructive and nastier than ever. Today, March 3rd, the fucking Russian orks fired at one of the largest nuclear plants in Europe, located in Zaporizhaj, Ukraine. What is the fuck is wrong with people? Are they even humans? Who are those dumbfucks, and what brings them here? Is it the paycheck? The army rank? Respect of the ork nation? Stupidity? Fuck if I know? Fuck if they know for sure. These russian fucks might now launch the nuclear missiles, but they might as well blow that fucking nuclear plant up, which could be ten times larger impact than Chornobyl.

Where is God right now? Where are all the saints? Where is anybody who can fuck these fuckers up?!!! I am not superstitious, but certain things are freaking me out more and more. I did notice how time always flew by so fast. They say it’s the world coming to an end. Today, with all that fucking bullshit in the world and Ukraine, it sounds true as never. Fuck. I want to live. I want my son to live. I want my family, friends, and everyone to live, except the orks. They can fucking all die the worst death possible. They deserved it. There should be no mercy for them. Is the end of the world near? Is it coming? If it is, how will I know? What can I do? Can I save the world? Can you? Is there anything anybody can do? Who the fuck knows?

If the world ended today, it would be a shame. It would’ve been a very premature death to all of us, and it would be just like leaving everything up hanging for nobody else? I have been enjoying my life more every day for at least a few years. They have been incredible few years. I have learned a lot, achieved a lot, and improved a lot. Not waking up tomorrow or just disappearing from the face of the Earth would be just fucking sad. It is not the war in Ukraine. It is not just another fucking stupid war. We don’t know the consequences, but we can see that everything is batshit fucked up. If the world ends today or in any very recent future, it will just make everything, my life, your life so fucking dull and meaningless. Why have we even lived, to begin with? What are the purpose and the goal here? And is life only about suffering, stress, depression, and anxiety? Why can’t we all just live together well and be happy? This is a billion-dollar question right now.

I have seen so many war videos in real-time that I think I am there. I am part of this war somehow. Burning tanks, dead people all over on the ground, dead soldiers’ body parts scattered around the neighborhoods, and destroyed infrastructure, houses, hospitals, and everything. Everything looks like a fucking apocalypse there. I think about it too much. I cannot stop watching or listening to the news; I am so depressed I cannot even enjoy anything anymore. Fuck. Fucking russian FUCK! Who gave you permission to fuck with people’s lives like that? What is your fucking end game anyway? Do you really think anybody would fucking respect you afterward? All major businesses worldwide cut russians out of their relationships and their wealthiest people. There is no future. There will be no light. There will be no tomorrow. You will not bring the soviet union back again anymore. It is not possible. Nobody gives a shit about this anymore. The world has moved on, and so should you, you dickless sick in your head FUCK!

I wish the war to end. I wish for a victory for Ukraine. I wish for the death of the enemies of the modern world. I hope we will spend some more time here on this planet. I wish we could but not the orks. Orks must fucking get extinct The Mordor must die. I wish the world would be more intelligent. I wish the world have learned something from past mistakes. We all should give the peace a change right after destroying the evil. To quote the soldier from the Snake island – “russian warship, go fuck yourself!” who responded to an approaching russian ship telling them to surrender. This clip is hilarious but it shows the attitude and the great spirit of the Ukrainian people right now. Ukraine will win. Ukraine will be forever. Slava Ukraini! Gerojam slava!

End game

February 5, 2022February 5, 2022 ~ John Loraine ~ 5 Comments

“Where is this fucking world going?” He sat by his kitchen nook with his coffee, thinking. “I can’t even remember when it all began to go South. For fuck’s sake, what kind of life this is anyway?” Jack’s face was looking tired. It was tired of too many things. His sleep was poor, drinking too much, too often, writing at weird times and hours or not writing for too long, abandoned by his family, having no or very minimal human interaction, all those things. He’s been getting older by the minute, and he felt like it. It was that face in the mirror every fucking morning that he had to cringe at every time. His soul might have felt younger, but the face showed it all. There were too many messages written on it, too many scars. He could read them all too well. He did it to himself in a way. It was too late to judge now, and who was there to judge him anyway? We all make mistakes in life. For many, life was a mistake. For many, there was no life, just a miserable existence. For some, it was a fucking paradise with the sun shining all the time. He’s had it all and then some.

What does money mean now? What does fame mean now? What do these books on the shelves and beer in the fridge mean now anyhow? He looked around with a depressed look on his aging face. The grey was now showing more in his hair and three-month beard. His eyes were sat deep and looked small and tired. It was impossible to go back in time and fix things. Fuck, if only he could do that! Everything felt great at the time, and nothing was to be changed. Years later, more and more of these revisioning thoughts were coming to him, stressing his hangover brains. Maybe, it was his drinking. There was plenty of that. There is always plenty of drinking and hanging out when things are swell. Things were going well for a long time. He was basking in his fame, and his books were topping all the charts back in the day. He still had his fans, but he didn’t have his passionate soul and youth anymore. That’s life, he thought. That is my motherfucking life.

Sipping his coffee, he stood up and walked up to the window. The picture outside the window was pretty much reflected what he felt like on the inside. It was late January, and it was freezing cold. There was so much snow, and he never bothered to shovel it. His backyard looked like the place where nature goes to die. All these naked, empty, dark trees were standing there motionless. Everything was stripped from its green wealth and beauty. That fucking snow covered everything, hiding the fucked up ugly surface underneath. This was a rough winter. This was a rough life.

He drifted in his memories back to when his family was living there with him. What a cheerful great old days they were! Where did they all go? He saw his wife planting flowers and decorating the backyard. He saw his young son running around, playing with their dog. There were smiles on their faces. There was laughter and joy, and there was his family. There was a feeling of being alive. He was busy working on his next novel all the time, but once he stopped writing, and just like right now, he looked through the window, and he couldn’t take his eyes away. These were his favorite people in the world. They were the people he was supposed to keep around, support, and love till the bitter end. That was the best part of his life passing by him while he took everything for granted and got busy with everything else. Somehow you feel like other responsibilities need more attention, and you keep distancing yourself from the ones who truly love you and need close to you. There are usually more and more responsibilities and other shit that pile up over time, and eventually, you end up old and broken and alone. Sadness took over his mind and soul. The tears rolled up in his old eyes. He felt the heart trembling and the pain inside. Fuck, he said, what a fucking asshole am I? How could I miss out on them so much? Where are they now? I guess you can’t go back in time to change anything. I think this suffering is permanent.

Jack’s wife divorced him some five years ago. There were a lot of problems between the two. Jack’s writing career picked up. He was always in the center of everyone’s attention, and it took the best of him. He was never around, and he was always busy with meetings, writings, appearances, new book projects, movie projects, all that kind of shit. On the one hand, it was great to see him succeed; on the other, he appeared to be more and more away from his wife and family, and eventually, when he was around, he wasn’t sober. The constant glorifying of his works and celebrating his successes led him to drink his ass blind. That was never a plan. That was never supposed to happen.

Jack remembered meeting his wife when he was a young and starving writer. They went to the same school, they had known each other for a long time. It has been one of those moments when you realize, damn, how come I never saw this in you? You are so beautiful and caring, and I cannot stop thinking about you. He offered to marry her right there in the dorm room, and she said yes. Jack smiled again, and his stone face moved awkwardly. These were the good days of his life. These were the best days of his life. He was young and ambitious. He wanted to become a writer, and school was just a distraction. It was just another social norm to follow while establishing his writing career. The college was supposed to cover up for his writing time while working on his debut masterpiece. He finally got it. He wrote that first best-selling novel. Everything started to change around him right the next day after. He barely graduated as he became famous. It felt great. It felt rewarding. They were both happy about his success then. They’ve shared their joy and excitement. Around the same time, his wife got pregnant with their son, and there was another great reason to be happy. Jack was writing on the next book.

If I only knew what that early success would cost me. Jack was desperate. Now, on the edge of his life, he was lonely. He was going to be a successful writer and provide for his family. He’s lived his dream life. But now his family is gone, his success in the past and his writing stalled for an undefined period. Life is a bitch. Life always keeps fucking you over. You have to pick your fucking battles more carefully, pal, he said to himself. Who gives a fuck about you, old man, anymore? His coffee was now cold, but he still felt like drinking it to the end.

It was sunny outside, and it seemed like it was warm. The snow was still on the ground, which would tell you otherwise. These short and cold days were flying away from one after another like the wild birds in the sky. There was no way of stopping the time. There was no way to get back in time and fix past problems. All you have to do is to suffer well, old man. He would call somebody, but he had nobody to talk to. Nobody called him either. It’s been a while since that phone was ringing. This is life. This is a revanche. I am losing this fight, Jack thought. It was not supposed to be this way.

He strolled to the bar and picked a bottle of whiskey. He went up to his writing room. His laptop was sitting on the table next to a pile of papers and glasses scattered all over. He poured himself a drink in one of the glasses and drank it all. It felt calming. He opened his laptop and started to type:

“There he was, on the edge of life, lonely and broken with all those books dusting on the library shelves around the world. Life gave him too many chances. Most of them he wasted. It’s not over until it is over, he thought and drank another one. Living his dream cost him a lot. He paid his price in full. There was nothing left for him in his City of Brotherly Love, not love nor any future promises. Everything came and went, and not all of the memories remained in his hangover mind. Fighting the good fight and drinking the good whiskey was everything left for him to do in his empty house of broken dreams with windows shut dark from the outside world. The writing was a lonely game. Life was a lonely game too. It wasn’t too bad as long as the words kept coming and the lines were written. Not at all.”

Another year, another try

December 25, 2021December 25, 2021 ~ John Loraine ~ 5 Comments

As another year comes to its natural conclusion, I sit and think about it for a while. Many things were going on this year that I wanted to analyze and reflect on. This year was not the best or most remarkable, even though many great things did happen, and overall it has been an improvement to the year prior. I think nothing will and could ever compare to 2020. That’s how fucked up that year has been for me and for all of us. 2021 has been a little bit better. In many ways, similar to 2020, not much improvement, although one could feel a bit of a relief. Something that was so mysteriously dangerous and everyone was holding on to just got out of the way. We all took a long deep breath and moved on in our lives. I think this is how 2021 will go down in history. It was time to move on. I am so fucking happy I moved on.

I am always fascinated by how fast a year flew by, and usually, that would make me a bit nostalgic and sad. This doesn’t happen anymore because these were some crazy two fucking years, and I cannot wish more to have them behind my back and fucking forgotten, thrown out of my life and mind. Fuck these crazy times. I am very hopeful for the future days to come. I do hope for a much better and prosperous future. I am the fucking future. I will make it all work starting right fucking now and onward. This is how it should be. Each of us has to own it, take our lives into our hands, and make shit happen. Nobody else would do that for you or me. It is all in our fucking hands.

I remember how desperately I’ve been waiting for the end of 2020. That one was a motherfucker of the year and such a turning point in, I believe, everyone’s lives. How many of us will never be the same after all that crazy shit? I think all of us have changed our life’s dimensions and priorities since 2020. I don’t know how much longer we all will be in this pandemic and how much longer we will be getting forced into vaccinations, masks, limited capacities, shortages, and all that other shit. One thing I know for sure, we all have to move the fuck on. We all have to own our lives. We all had to improve our lives, relationships with one another, and our health because otherwise, there is no movement forward. I made my choices, I made up my mind, I know what the fuck is what the fuck. I also see that many people are still living in this never-ending wait, for the directions, waiting to be told, waiting not to die from the virus, waiting for another fucking shot. The shot we all should be taking is our own shot at this life, not some fucking half-backed chemicals that might as well fuck up your health even more. And of course, even the fucking science doesn’t know the long-term effects and consequences or what else will the new variant bring on.

Reflecting on this year of God 2021, I think it’s been a rough one, but overall not too bad. I did spend too much time waiting on something to happen, and everything seemed to be a drag. I’ve been trying to take ownership and make things move around but with little success. Some fucking things just take their time. I have finally left the big Corporate America world, which was a very long-time coming and fucking finally came to fruition. Around February, I realized that I could not make things work and that there was no return from that fucking hellhole. The only option was to run as far away as I could. And I did. It took almost six months to run away and find a new job. There was so much fucking effort invested into this fucking job search that I almost gave up. I thought the month of searching would be enough at first. Then one month went by, second, third, fourth, fifth, sixth. How wrong was I? And then, all of a sudden, somebody reached out to me from the deep past and offered me a job. I considered the opportunity, and I finally got the new gig. I got all that I’ve been ever asking for, and I finally was able to say good buy to all that corporate bullshit. Searching for the job took away all the time I wanted to spend on writing, fitness, family, sleep, and the rest of life-important things. It only made everything more complicated and more painful.

We wanted to move to Florida this passing year as well, unsuccessfully. We started house hunting early in the year, and we were very close at times of getting one. It didn’t happen until late September, and I think for all the right reasons. Fortunately, we’ve got our new place right here in the Philadelphia suburbs. We did spend an entire month of May in Florida renting, and it was the highlight of the year. That really felt very much like healing, very rewarding, relaxing, and just fucking awesome. I am considering going there next year as well. There are some things to consider prior but fuck the things. My life, my family’s life, and our well-being are top priorities against everything else. Everything else can go to fucking hell as far as I am concerned. There is always something in our way preventing us from going after our goals. Some fucking last-minute, out-of-the-blue fucking emergency that will fuck up the big plan. Here is where we need to be laser-focused and cut that bullshit right out. If you know what you want, go and get what you want. There is no need for waiting, crying, trying, or asking somebody for something. Just fucking do it, as Nike said.

This year I’ve lost my dear lifelong friend. It is hard to write about your best friend who is no longer here. There has been so much between us that we went through together that it will take a novel-sized book to capture everything. I don’t know if the words I am choosing are the right words, and indeed, they are not enough to capture the loss and the sadness. I have a ton of memories of him that I will always treasure, as well as all the things we did together. He’s been in poor health the last three years of his life since the diagnosis, and he’s been a true fucking fighter, fighting this thing to the end, until his last minute. Unfortunately, his illness was stronger than him. Unfortunately, all these other things got in a way, impacted him and his health one way or another, and in the end, he was gone. There was so much of him in my life, and now there is just emptiness. It is very unusual to realize that and confirm this new reality. How will this life go without a person who’s been so close to me all these years? We went through so much shit together. We have been together since the day we’ve met. Life did not prepare me for this, but this is something that, when it happens, leaves you with no choice. It leaves you broken up there, hanging confused and shocked, wondering what the fuck just happened. Rest in peace, my dear friend. I love you, I miss you, I will never forget you. As Warren Zevon sang, “I’ll keep you in my heart for a while,” and forever. Take care now. I hope you’ve found your peace up there in heaven. May your soul be comfortable for once and until we see each other again.

Job is something I seem to always struggle with. It is either the job search is challenging and complex, takes too much time, and there are no opportunities, or, when I finally lent a job, I feel like I am not in the right mindset to deal with it and I am thinking about the escape. And on the other hand, getting along with a bunch of strangers at work and pretending that you like them all and enjoy their company even if you don’t care, and even if they treat you like shit, is a full-time job on its own. Sometimes it feels like there are no great jobs for me or at all. It seems like everywhere I go, I own somebody something. That owning is what fucking drives me crazy. The minute I start feeling all those eyes on me watching, waiting, wanting me to jump out of my skin, wanting me to break, and all these fucking never-ending expectations and constant not enough’s are killers for anyone’s soul, not just mine. My soul is small and humble, and it doesn’t need much comfort or requires anything unusual. It is in a much better place when all the necessities are covered and paid for, but there the problems begin. I am a free spirit, and I like to think I am independent, and I like to think I have a don’t-give-a-fuck attitude, but that only goes for so long. At the end of the day, I love to have my bills paid on time and have certain comfort in my life, certain financial freedom, certain life qualities that I think a normal human being who works hard deserves to have and should be enjoyed effortlessly. I don’t like to count every single fucking penny. I don’t like to shop for savings and discounts, and I don’t give a fuck about savings and overthinking my retirement budget. I want what I want and when I do want that, and I am getting it right there and then. Not because I am a spoiled lunatic, but because this approach, in my opinion, takes away the pain of letting go of the hard-earned money and the stress that comes along with not having enough or spending your last dollar. I also don’t like to spend too much time worrying about stupid shit. I’d rather pay more and have nothing to worry about. Life is short. I wonder, when we die, what will be the biggest regret, our retirement budget, or all the missed opportunities in this life?

This year will mark the fifth year since I’ve seriously decided to write. Back in 2016, after reading Charles Bukowski’s poetry for the first time, I felt something that I had never felt before. There was this crazy urge to write, create, be a poet, and a writer. Everything I observed around me, every thought that entered my mind, I was trying to somehow put on the paper in the poem form. I remember that fire burning inside of me. I have never felt anything like that before or after. Bukowski’s poetry initially seemed too simple. I felt like even I could do that. I can write my thoughts as Bukowski did. This is why he was a genius. This is why he has inspired so many and keeps inspiring new writers today.

It wasn’t all that simple when I tried to write something myself, but at least I tried, and I’ve got something. It was the beginning of everything for me. My poetry wasn’t good, and there was no prose early on at all. Somehow, I wrote over two hundred poems in some three-plus years and self-publish that in 2020. Since that time, I haven’t published anything else. Last year, I finished writing a novel which I started writing back in 2018. This year I was planning to final edit it and start looking for representation as I was planning to have it all done professionally and officially.

The editing process stalled early in the first half of the year, and I could never finish it. There was always something in a way. Mostly my job or my new job search, which took away too much of my fucking time. I do feel like shit to yet again put my writing career on the back burner for the sake of comfortable and worry-less living. Looking back at it now, I don’t think it was all that comfortable and worry-less as I thought. Life is full of fucking surprises and challenges, and it keeps to fuck me up at every corner with every bit of opportunity it has to cut me off. I know this and expect this to happen, but this will take my focus away from my writing and my true passion. Am I disappointed? Yes, I am a little. I feel that this unfinished business is hanging over me. I feel like I didn’t hold the promise I’ve made to myself to finish that novel this year. But, with some challenges, I was able to make many improvements in my life and career, and hopefully, that will help me move forward and spend more time on my writing. I do hope to finish that fucking novel this upcoming new year and hopefully find somebody to push this to big guys in publishing to have a traditional publishing release. It would be great. At least it seems like it. There is a lot of shit I will have to go through as well, but I’ll deal with it when I get there. For now, I have a lot of work to do, and I need to have my priorities straight and set my mind on them.

It is not so cold and snowless on this Christmas Eve of 2021. It is dark and quiet outside, and nothing is happening in the suburbs besides Santa, who has a lot of work to do tonight. All kids are asleep, waiting for tomorrow’s morning to come faster so they can finally see their gifts. My wife and son are upstairs sleeping, and I am here downstairs, drinking great Irish whiskey, listening to a great Irish guitar player Rory Gallagher on vinyl, eating pistachios ice cream, and typing this final blog post for the year. Life is not all that bad. It can be bitchy at times, though. Everything that I have now, today, is not luck. I know that. I can recall too many sleepless nights and never-ending workdays and never-ending struggles and sufferings. I survived all that, and somehow I am still here. I am in a much better place and space and keep moving forward. Just like Rocky, I keep punching and moving forward. I don’t know what will happen tomorrow or after tomorrow or the next month, next year. It doesn’t bother me anymore. I have learned the hard way to survive, and I will survive no matter what happens. I will break the fuck free and breakthrough all that bullshit. I wish we all did just that in the new year. Let’s make this new year the best one yet for all of us. Life is too short to spend on stupid shit hopeless dreams. There is so much more to live for and to accomplish. I want to raise my glass tonight to all the new great beginnings and a better life for everyone. Cheers, y’all, Merry Christmas, Happy Holidays, whatever you celebrate, and a Happy New Year! We all fucking deserve it.

Thanksgiving Day thoughts and reflections

November 28, 2021November 28, 2021 ~ John Loraine ~ 9 Comments

It is another day, another Thursday, another Thanksgiving. I woke up early today, even when I didn’t have to. I just like to be up early in the morning to have it all to myself. This is my time to recharge and think and write and just be all alone in peace and quiet. I love early mornings. I love to see a new day breaking in. Everything in life just happens too fast. One minute it is dark outside, and the next, it is bright daylight, and the morning sun is shining in your face brightly, making it impossible to look straight. I love the sun even when it is thirty degrees outside and cold as shit. Something about the sun makes me want to love, watch, see, be in it, and experience it more and more. I do love warmer weather, though, but it is what it is. We live here in suburban Pennsylvania, and here it is cold, and we live through this fucking cold now to see the nice warm sunny days later.

There are a lot of things and people I need to be thankful for, just in general. Of course, all these things combined made me the man I am today, living the life that I do today, and that’s the fact. After such a fucked up and never-ending craziness in the last almost two years, it feels liberating and peaceful at last. I never knew that this time would come where I could fucking just be myself, get my life back, and just relax. There are no more crazy work demands and routines, and lack of proper live-work balance is in the past. After all of this, I now realize how damaged I’ve been that this normal life still feels strange to me. Fuckness! Life can be rewarding, and great, and balanced, and my fucking dividends are finally being paid back indeed. Who knew this time would ever come? I didn’t. I was always hoping for it, but I never knew this would come to any fucking fruition.

Nothing ever was easy for me, whatever it is. Everything has always been a fucking pain in the ass, a drag, a struggle. Everything required a significant work investment and effort. Early in my life, I’ve learned that I always have to put a lot of work into everything if I want to get anything in return. I knew that this is how my luck works, and it doesn’t give a fuck how nice of a guy I am; it will beat me to the ground on any occasion possible. At least, the good thing for me is that early in my life, I never felt entitled to anything. I knew that I needed to bust my ass to get anywhere. And that is what I’ve been doing with my life, busting my fucking ass all the time, especially in the last five-six years. I got more fortunate than most on a few occasions, but the hard work still preceded anything.

Even just a year ago, I was so lost and damaged and confused and really locked in my own bullshit and madness, literally locked up within the four walls, trying to see and wait, what the fuck is it going to be next. How will it all turn around for me? It was dark and depressing, and it has been my lowest of the low mentally and emotionally. I have never experienced depression so deep and profoundly and constantly. For a brief moment there, it felt normal. Thank God it is behind me now. Thank God I can see the clear sky above my head. Things did get around a lot, especially in the last few months. I am living in a new house, my family and I are all healthy, I am working a new job with much better pay and conditions, and pretty much everything I ever wanted. I’ve got it all now. I finally got everything I ever fucking wanted! And I’ve just realized it as I am writing this. This is still kind of unbelievable to me.

Not so long ago, I’ve been hustling at this fucking insane corporate job, trying to get shit done, trying to make shit happen, trying to fulfill the agenda, and playing a role in all that corporate bureaucracy world. I always had hopes that it would end soon; crazy shit like that cannot last forever; I will see a better life soon. That was the problem. I should’ve run away the minute I’ve seen the shit going sideways. I should’ve never justified any of that bullshit for myself. I should’ve known better. I didn’t, unfortunately. Maybe I was too naive. Perhaps I really thought that I could change something. I guess there are places in the world where you shouldn’t try to change anything. Now I’ve learned my lesson. You are there for as long as you can be there, and then, you should be gone and forget about all that horseshit and move on. That is what I eventually did, but it took me almost a year to get done and over with.

If I had to be thankful, I would be selfishly grateful to myself for sticking through all that bullshit and never giving up. Mentally on a certain level, I was trying to give that shit up, but in reality, I didn’t. I was always trying to make things work to the best abilities. I was trying to navigate through that nonsense with peace of mind and calm and just being patient. It took a lot out of me. I am never the same person again. I don’t know if that crippled me or made me stronger, but I am a much different person today. I am glad I’ve become a different person. This is how life works essentially. It takes you on a trip through all the picks and valleys and makes you understand that you mean shit to it. It shapes you and your inner world, pushing you to get to that new perspective that is more accurate, more true, and eventually helps you see a better side of your life. It comes with no instructions, though. You have to figure it all out on your own.

Happy Thanksgiving to you all! I hope you’ve made this a great one, as you should.

New Chapter

November 11, 2021November 11, 2021 ~ John Loraine ~ 13 Comments

Yesterday I quit the job that I worked at for the last three and half years. This has been the longest time I worked for any company in my life this far. Every time I left a job in the past, I was reminiscing; I felt sad and nostalgic. Not now, though. Strangely enough, leaving this hellhole was not triggering any sensitivity in my heart and soul. It ate so much out of my life that I cannot even fathom it.

The last two years have been shit for most people. Too much nonsense went on, too much stress, anxiety, bullshit, and the discovery that there could be a new normal, even more, fucked up than the old one. The last two years have been both exciting in my personal life and fucking traumatic workwise. My son was born two years ago; I got a promotion at work; I was finally able to pay off all my debt, save some money, buy a house, we moved to a better place, we’ve traveled, I’ve self-published my first book, a collection of poems, we’ve discovered new things for us as a family. It all began as a mystery in the workplace, turning into something productive for a short period, and then the shit hit the fan, and all the fucking craziness broke loose.

We were all in the lockdown stage of life, and the pandemic was in full swing. All of a sudden, everyone, and I mean everyone, freaked the fuck out. All companies, organizations, grocery stores, factories, banks, you fucking name it, they all went fucking insane. A lot of people learned that their jobs were not essential, and they were fired or furloughed. The government was kind enough to send them “Covid-checks,” which kept most of the people officially out of the workplace for almost two fucking years now. It was scary to go to the grocery store, the fucking shortages began, people were afraid to walk by one another, people were even more strangers than ever.

My workdays became gradually longer and longer, and since we were all locked up in our houses, it was easy to reach us and give us some more work. There were priorities on top of fucking priorities never fucking ended. They always wanted more and more and fucking more! Greedy corporate fucks! Fuck them! Eventually, there was so much work to do that I would still be behind on everything even if I skipped my sleep and meals. Everything just got utterly unmanageable.

I don’t know how and why I took all this shit on myself but apparently, so did everyone who decided to stay employed. On the one hand, this persistence gave me a great opportunity down the line to save more money, remain independent, buy a house, and keep out of debt. On the other hand, I’ve got a fucking significant brain damage from work overload, burnout, fatigue, and quite a few nervous breakdowns. I literally, mentally, and spiritually lost my shit. Regardless of how much work I’ve done, there was always something else, something more, and then more on top of that. Somehow I made it all work.

I tried to keep my sanity intact, I was keeping well with my writing, I was trying to stay fit and exercised a lot, I meditated a lot. More stories and poems reflective of what the fuck was going on in the world and my life than. My mind went into some strange places for a while but luckily came back. I was finally able to finish editing and re-writing some of the poems for my self-published book. The whole process took me almost six months to complete, but I did it. I found a designer who created a cool fucking book cover; I wrote all the bios and intros and re-organized all that shit, and it was an excellent experience for me altogether.

We went to Florida for a week once in late September of 2020 with friends. It was a great time. I was able to relax, forget about the stupid job, relax and stop the fucking time from running. It is fascinating how fast the time was going here in PA, and then out there in FL, everything slowed down. It was just chill. There was no rush, no urgency, nothing particular to do, and no fucking due dates, no deliverables. I just relaxed and got my life back for a week. After we returned, the crazy shitshow continued as usual.

In early 2021 I started to think seriously about a new job. I started to apply online a lot but with no success. I knew my resume was shit, and I needed a better, professionally written resume to breakthrough. The whole resume process went on forever. I started the process with the agency in late February, and it was only ready by early May. Two fucking months of a drag. As I said, everyone was fucked up. In March, I got a severe nervous breakdown while working on a “critical update,” and my fucking phone wasn’t connecting right, and then my computer took a shit, and I threw both of them against the fucking wall. Needed to get new equipment within the same day to get online and finish all that work shit.

Then was an announcement that we would start returning to the office beginning in mid-May. First, it was just voluntary; if you want to come, please come and check it out, see what’s new, see what’s changed. Then it was a mandatory visit or a few visits before early July when the hybrid schedule officially would kick off. I knew that the “freedom” of working from home would end very soon, and I needed to take advantage of that. I needed a vacation, and since last year’s break was very brief, we decided to take a more extended vacation time. Since I started looking for a new job, I decided to use most of my vacation days and mix them with remote work to cover the whole month.

We thought about a two-week straight vacation. But then why in the fuck would we want to cut ourselves short? We found a rent for a whole month of May, at the nice place, in the lovely neighborhood, and it all worked out just fucking great. We went to the beautiful Palmer Ranch in Sarasota, Florida. It was a fucking blast. That sunshine, the ocean, the sand, the palms, fucking alligators, all of it completely changed my life, how I felt, how I thought about life, all the anxiety and bullshit and depression went the fuck away. I felt like a normal human being at last for such a long time. Finally! Finally, I knew that there could be a decent life, a great life is possible, living in Florida is fucking awesome, and the climate is fantastic. I also proved to myself that moving to FL is definitely doable, and we as a family will at some point move out here. Things have changed in our lives as the year went by, and our priorities and responsibilities changed. So we decided to stay in PA and bought a house here in the suburbs. But my heart is other there in Florida. I couldn’t get enough of sitting on the sand, drinking beer, smoking a cigarette, watching the best fucking sunsets ever, and really enjoying my life.

I’ve been very reminiscent about FL recently. Somehow, something just triggered good memories, and I was all consumed by it. The weather on the East Coast is getting colder, too, and that also doesn’t help not thinking about the good warm days. If one had the perfect living place, Sarasota would be mine and the only ideal place to live. I remember evenings spent on the beach with my family, watching the most amazing sunsets while drinking my beer and genuinely enjoying every moment.

There is nothing more simple and more beautiful in the world than a beach. The blue ocean water was calming my worried mind and soul. The sand was so white and pure and soft; you wanted to be there to experience it all and never leave. The days were perfectly hot, with 88 average temperatures, and the sun gently burned out all the anxiety, stress, and bullshit that occupied my brain. The whole experience was very much therapeutic.

The future is unknown, and many things can and will happen down the road. I know that I cannot control most of it, but I can set my mind on something and achieve it. And I will. I fucking will, sooner or later. For now, though, we’ve just got a great house, our first house as a family, it needs us, and it needs our attention, so we’ll be here. We’ll take care of it. We’ll do our best to have a great time here. We’ll be ready to move to Florida in no time. Sarasota, we miss you, and we will be back soon. The new chapter of our life is about to begin.

Coming to fruition

October 29, 2021October 29, 2021 ~ John Loraine ~ 18 Comments

It’s been a while, my friend, since I lay my fingers on you and wrote something. It used to be great to wake up early in the morning, brew some strong, fresh coffee, and type my sleeping brains away. It used to be that I’d write almost every morning, and there was always something to write about. There is still something to write about. It is just that so many other things happen in our lives that require attention and then require some sort of shift in priorities. It’s been over one month since I wrote anything new, and my blog feels like a foster child with nobody to look after it. I am back at it again. Back to my writing game, back to the rhythm of the words and lines and pages.

New life is here. Many new beginnings were happening and building out this year. Good new beginnings, considering the circumstances. At some point last year, it felt like I was losing my shit. And I did, on the mental level, but I was in shape and productive like a motherfucker. This year is just like last year but with more fucking weird surprises that nobody could account for. I cannot remember my life being that fucking odd and chaotic and without any reasonable sense. Everything happened this year like a new president, new virus, new social guidelines, new vaccines, tornados in Philly, bitcoin’s rise, and you fucking name the rest of the crazy shit that we’ve lived through.

There were also some good things happening there as well. I never consider myself a lucky person. Lucky is not in my fucking dictionary, and more than that, it is foreign subject material to me. I always had to and needed to work very hard on everything to achieve anything. This has always been my truth. The thing is that this hard work made me appreciate my life and my achievements much more. This is where I struggle yet to learn how to make this life a better place to be. And I’ve come a long way.

This year also had some milestones that I’ve been planning to achieve for a while now. Today it all makes my head spin about how much shit I’ve put up with to make it all happen and how many personal sacrifices I was able to make it all work in the end. Since about a year ago, I started to think and strategically plan to leave my current workplace. The fucking corporation has gotten too close to my balls, disturbing my personal life too much and too often. I fucking hated it. I am a responsible adult, a father, and I try not to act on impulse but rather be thinking first before reacting. I’ve sucked all that shit up for the greater good of my family and me. I am the man, and I make shit happen, and I ensure everything plays out well in the end.

So I’ve suffered for a very long time while thinking about and prioritizing my exit from that corporate world, planning for my future, building my moves while setting shit up for the best. And you know what? Fucking finally, it all worked to my best advantage. It fucking did work as I planned it. I am finally getting my life back. Now I have a new place of work, a much better place, much better pay, and a much better life overall. I purchased my first home, which is a great fucking home for my family, and we are happy here. It almost feels like I’m dreaming after all the shit I went through. Waiting for all that shit to happen, waiting for a pandemic to end, waiting for a recruiter to call, waiting for a response, waiting for a decision, waiting for the sun to shine, waiting for an escape… I’ve been fucking waiting for so goddamn long that now I have a hard time believing this reality. And the truth is that if you have your fucking mind on the money and think strategically, always work towards your plan, you will achieve your desired results. You will make it all happen sooner or later.

“Good things are fucking happening.” This was a quote from Instagram, which came through at some point randomly in my feed. I’ve been thinking about it and saying it myself too often lately, knowing that no matter how hard it is now, it will be ok. Good things will fucking happen eventually! This quote makes me both smile and it inspires me, gives me some good energy, and promotes positive thinking and hope. It is hard to be positive and have any great stamina when you are literally and figuratively locked up in the fucking box with all your usual liberties taken away or suppressed. You don’t know what the fuck is going to happen in the next minute, and nobody will tell you the truth anyhow. And slowly, we become animals. This is what happened to America recently. In my case, I am happy with how things have turned out to be. The future is there, it is near, and it holds its mystery. And I am looking forward to being part of it and part of that fucking mystery.

My waiting finally came to fruition in such a short period after such a long waiting feels surreal. I remember how long and hard things were for me in the beginning and pretty much until recently. I was on the edge of losing my shit multiple times. I was feeling down, broken, and hopeless. However, I held up, took my blame, my responsibilities, and moved forward, not knowing what was out there, not knowing how it all would play out for me in the end. It’s been a year since I planned my move out of this job; it’s been about six months since I started actively looking for new positions; it’s been hundreds of job applications sent with half of them never receiving any feedback; it’s been dozens of interviews with various success and progress, and all of them going into nowhere, except one, the one that made it for me. The one I’ve been waiting on for so fucking long, and it finally came to me. All this fucking misery finally paid off. It all fucking came to fruition.

I’ve been driving home one evening from work, listening to a podcast about something, and zoning out into my world of thoughts and nonsense. I took the exit from the highway and into the suburbs, driving by the darkened streets of single homes with nicely mowed lawns, trash cans all lined up as if in the army, all color red. It’s quiet, dark, almost no people seen around, a few cars driving by here and there. And then suddenly I woke up from my thoughts, looked around, and thought, where am I? What is this place? In two seconds, it all sank in. Ok, now relax, you’re am home. I am home. It is my new neighborhood now. It is nice, quiet, and beautiful, and it only costs a jacked average home price plus a few more thousand dollars of property taxes compared to where I lived before. It’s ok; we will make it work. This is a new life and a new beginning. Life wasn’t all that fucked up after all. Good things are fucking happening.

I woke up in my bed, on the second floor. It’s dark, about the break of dawn, and I can hear the birds chirping. The sun is yet to wake up, but I beat it by at least thirty minutes. I put the meditation on and woke up with my mind at ease. I never thought the early morning meditation could be so much helpful to such damaged goods as I am. I was wrong. This meditation set me at ease and made me wake up properly and feel great. I take a shower and brush my teeth, after which I brew my coffee. I open all the blinds on ten or more windows around the house to have the early morning sunshine break-in.

I open the sunroom’s large windows up to get a perfect, wide-open view of my newly acquired backyard, which reminds me of some sort of national park with all the trees and bushes, and squirrels, and the wild nature in it. It is very chaotic; there is no sense and logic as to why these trees were planted where they were. I have this perfect chaos now for myself and my family to enjoy. This backyard is all in one, my nature and my freedom, and my privacy.

Soon after, my two-year-old will wake up, and I will hear him playing with his toys. He’ll come down to this sunroom and continue playing until his nap time. He’ll go outside with his mother at some point in the day. He loves his mother a lot. Those two are the perfect company while the dad is working. I usually join them mid-day for a bit and then later in the evening. I love them both dearly. I love them both more than life. I am a fortunate son of the bitch, after all.

Here I go again

October 26, 2021October 26, 2021 ~ John Loraine ~ 14 Comments

Here I go again. This is another birthday. Another year went by, another lesson learned and too many not learned. It was thirty-four years ago when I was brought to this world, and I cannot believe how fast the fucking time passed. In a heartbeat, I become a grown man. Not so long ago, I was just a small boy, playing carelessly in my parent’s house, enjoying my cared-for and straightforward living. Everything was great, as I can recall it, back then. Our lives were happier, more eventful, more organized, more engaged. Everything had a purpose and a meaning, or it didn’t have to have any. But we all lived the life, smiled, played, had fun, met friends, celebrated, and reminisced.

The time was prolonged then. I remember always waiting for something to happen, whether I wanted to be old enough to go somewhere or wait for the holidays, birthdays, new gifts, new visits by our family friends and relatives. I recall friends of the family and relatives were coming over almost every weekend. My mother would cook something, then serve the table full of her delicacies. We all would dress up in our nicest, newer clothes and be waiting for our guests to come over. They always did, and it was the happiest time. They always brought something for my brother and me like some new treats, toys, clothes, chocolates, anything. We felt so excited and happy and appreciative. Back then, this was true happiness to me.

As time went by and I was growing older, I remember that point in time when our guests would stop visiting. Their visits were rare and not even on all major holidays or birthdays. Every time my parents told me somebody would not come, it made me upset. It felt like the holidays were ruined. I always wanted these good old days to go on all the time, never stop no matter what. Everything good and bad eventually comes to its end sooner or later. My childhood did come to an end, and all these neverending visits by our relatives and family friends. My family is now thin-spread across the globe. We don’t have those happy childhood days at the house anymore. We don’t even own that house anymore. We become adults and parents ourselves, and now we are in charge of our lives, children, friends, and relatives. Live came full circle.

Many things have happened in my life over the last thirty-four years. I’ve been around a corner a few times. Somehow I remember all that shit, and it is still affecting me to a certain extend. Things started to go sideways somewhere along the line, and more often than not, nothing was great anymore. However, I keep looking for my purpose, for my new motivation, for another thing to do or accomplish all the time with little or no success. At this time in my life, I realize that this is not the game anymore and that there are some serious responsibilities I need to assume. Having a wife and child and elderly parents should make you take that responsibility, want it or not.

I know that I am on the right path; however, I feel like this path is too fucking annoying for me. I am too tired to follow it. I need something new, something fresh, something more purposeful and more enjoyable. I love to have certain comforts in my life, and strangely enough, my shitty office job is helping me to have them. On the other hand, this fucking job and this corporation with all their bullshit are driving me fucking insane, killing my soul, and shitting on my brains. I now spent over three months looking for a new job with 0 success. There haven’t been too many interviews, to begin with, but this economy, this fucking pandemic, these new job requirements, and constant chaos all around is just making it all weird and challenging to navigate as fuck.

I no longer know what I want to do and how to get there. I don’t know where I should go to find any fucking purpose in this chaotic and ridiculous life. I don’t know how to feel happy again because nothing or nobody except for my child makes me happy. I am lost as I ever been, with no directions, no purpose, no satisfaction, no goals, lost goals, no motivation, no desire to do any fucking thing. How did I get here? How to get the fuck out of here? Where is the recipe for this nonsense? How long is this misery going to last? Should I be getting used to it, is what life has become nowadays?

I don’t know, like so many other things. I just don’t fucking know. I just live my life like a fucking soldier on the mission, waiting for the next day to come while trying to survive today. What kind of life is that? Why has all the joy left me? Is this depression talking to me again? How many fucking times can a person be so depressed? It seems like this fucking darkness came last year and never left me. I felt for a very long time that my job was the reason for all my misery. And for the most part, it has been. That fucking soul-crushing-god-damned-fucking-shitty-office-slavery job has been down my throat for quite a while now. I mean, it all began all well and good, and somehow all the satisfaction and motivation went to shit. Somehow I am on the lowest of the low again. Oh, Fuckness!

Now, I am trying to find a new job, and there is just so much shit happening on my way that I don’t even want that new job. All these new jobs sound like a fucking disaster. There are no great jobs anymore. Everything has its limits, its course, and its fucking time. And it’s all about how much of somebody else’s shit are you willing to put up with.

I am talking to recruiters and managers trying to sound happy and knowledgeable, but I cannot even pretend to be interested in anything. I don’t give a fuck. I just don’t give a fuck! Meanwhile, I don’t even have an alternative. Stupid shit pops up in my mind like taking a physical job, get away from that fucking office and corporations. But that is not a solution. That is just another fucking trap. And I even know today that doing that for a bit will drive me fucking bunkers very soon. Somehow I need to find this golden middle. Somehow I need to figure it all out.

I am always a happy person as I know it. I am trying to be always on a positive note. I know that I have had something happy and positive and exciting waiting for me shortly. Everything takes too much time, and the time seems to be flying over our heads like a fucking tornado. I don’t know how long I can or will be waiting for anything to happen. I need to take action, but I don’t know what these fucking actions should be. I am stuck in this fucking misery with no way out, and the fact that I am kind of paralyzed in this situation, I am not able to make any moves or progress in my life, drives me fucking crazy! I don’t know where I am going, and I don’t know what the fuck to look out for.

I will continue to take care of myself, my family, do all the right things, and spend time with them. That will always be me and my mindset. They need me, and I need them even more. They are my love and joy, and they are everything I need in this life. I want all the best for them. Right now, I cannot afford all the best for them, except my best intentions, but I will be able to one day.

I go to the gym as often as I can. I will work on my body, my character, my overall well-being, and my fucking mental state. I will continue to look out for these fucking new and better jobs until I will finally get one. I will spend more time with my family and my friends, as I always should’ve. I am going to write more regularly and write more, and write fucking good. Writing does make me feel better, more fulfilled, and productive. There is a shit-load of writing to be done; there are books to release and publish, self-publish whatever. All I need is to actually sit down and do it. Do it for my own satisfaction, for my own sanity.

Happy birthday, mothafucka; you’ve made it this far and to so many more! Make sure you don’t fucking waste your time. Make sure you stay in your right mind and stay strong. These motherfuckers out there are not worth going crazy for. You have many people who are worth living for and trying for, which should be your reason and motivation. Fuck the rest! Cheers, you fucker!

Uber story: Down to earth good people

September 18, 2021September 18, 2021 ~ John Loraine ~ 11 Comments

“Where I am coming from, man, Alabama, they are all just down-to-earth good people. My family lived there the entire life. We have nine people in the family: grandfather, grandmother, my parents, and five kids. Three sons and two daughters. I am the youngest son. My grandmother was the first great school teacher in my little town. My father worked at the factory his entire life, providing for the family. My grandparents took care of my parents, and my parents took good care of my siblings. They all are becoming somebody, you know? We are all well-educated and well-behaved, and everybody has become somebody in their lives. Here in Philadelphia, everybody is different. People are coming here from around the States. And he, he is doing things like that, you know? Do you see what he’s doing? But, you know what, I don’t care what kind of rich mothafucka are you, but if you ain’t shit – I ain’t fucking with you, you know?”
“That’s right, man. I totally agree.” Said another black man from the back seat.

James was a black man, well-dressed, soft-spoken, and well mannered. He wore a suit with a vest, black-framed eyeglasses, and a hat. Nobody dresses like that on a Saturday night in Philadelphia. He and his friend got into my car, having a little chat about life and family and who is who. Seeing two black men from the country’s deep south on the East Coast was exciting and somewhat unusual. However, they both were well-mannered and spoke softly, and were very interested and involved in their conversation. I wasn’t involved as I tried not to be involved in anything, but I’ve always overheard other’s conversations intentionally or not. Most things didn’t matter to me or anybody, but it helped to pass the time, and it was always excellent material for the stories I wrote.

There were tons of these weird and exciting and just random stories I’ve heard, but only so few of them survived in my sleep-deprived and always over-tired head. I always try to pay attention to different and interesting people, especially if they came here from “God-knows-where.” I lived in Philly for the last fifteen years at the time, but I think I’ve spent my entire young adult life here, from my teens to my early thirties. I feel like a local even though I am an immigrant. However, for those newcomers and one-time visitors to Philadelphia, I am a local expert. I should know anything and everything. I am their fucking Google Maps, restaurant and bar guide, Yelp, city guide, mother and father for some, as well as somebody willing to listen to anything with no objections. My passengers asked me all kinds of questions, and they honestly believed anything I said, even if I was talking out of my ass. I do try, though, to give people my best response to my best knowledge. At the end of the day, I am a regular human being. I am trying to make it in this world of fuckery and inequality where you have to be a tough mothafucka if you want to survive. And I always wanted to survive.

The good thing about this job was that I got to meet all kinds of people from all walks of life and be part of their lives, even if it was just for a few minutes, while I was driving them around the block. Interestingly enough, the people you have in the car now you will never see in your life ever again. I have never picked up the same person twice, and even if I did, nobody would remember or recall that. For the most part, I just sit quietly in my front seat behind the wheel after I greet a passenger, and then I just drive listening to my music and the sounds of the City. On multiple occasions, passengers begin a conversation or start asking me questions. Usually, they all ask about the same shit over and over. Once they hear my accent, they ask the same annoying fucking questions again over and over: “Where are you from originally?” “How long have you been here?” “Do you like it here?” “How do you like Uber?” “Do you know any good places to eat in the city?” “What would you recommend to do in the city?” Little do they know that I have no other business or any inside knowledge besides driving in the City. I never go to any restaurants, or bars, any other entertainment establishments for that matter. All I really do is driving around, picking and dropping people off, and watching people walking on the streets, watching the City living its life, and by the end of the day, I go back to where I belong, the North East Philly and my wife.

I don’t mind people ranting and asking dumb questions. I do indeed appreciate the curiosity and an attempt to keep up the conversation going. I don’t like to talk to strangers, but sometimes I have no choice. Randomly, I find myself talking to the weirdest, or I should say “unlikely-to-talk-to” people, and the conversations are really great. Often, I feel like, damn, this ride was too short; I really wanted to talk to this person more. But in most cases, I would just greet people, ask them about how they are doing, and drive on shutting myself the fuck up. The Uber app guides me around, the radio plays some music, and I just follow the navigation, regardless of how shitty it is. The mission is to get a person to the destination safe and happy. And that’s what I do. I safely transport people from point A to point B and smile, thanking them for their ride and business.

This wasn’t what I wanted to do, but I didn’t have too many choices. All my job interviews were very sporadic and with no success. Even when it felt like I would get to another round, I’ve never heard back from a recruiter or HR person. This might sound like nothing, but it really dawns on you mentally and spiritually and makes you feel like the world doesn’t need you anymore; you are a worthless piece of shit, and you can just go fuck yourself. After a handful of these unsuccessful interviews, I felt like, fuck it all. I’ll just drive. I can still pay for my shit and move in my life day by day. The future will show what else is there for me, but and in the meantime, nothing but Uber is available.

There was another request a block away. I’ve changed my music and started another trip. Carolyn needed a ride to the Old City’s bar with her girlfriend, and I was there for them. I gave them a ride, and they thanked me. I’ve heard so many “Thank you’s” during the day that I don’t even pay any attention to those overused mechanical words. Certain people out there would just exit the car shutting the door without saying anything. Then in my head, I go, “Where is my fucking Thank you, asshole?!” Did I do something wrong? Did I ruin your day? I never saw you before, and more than likely, I will never see you ever again in my life, and that is that no exchange of words or pleasantries, just the transaction. What did I really care about as long as I made my required daily trips and made my quota?

There are moments or rather specific patterns during the workdays where you can see clearly that the requests are down to almost nothing, some sort of a die-down. It almost feels like the City has paused for a moment to take another breath, to recharge before the busy night’s adventures. I do feel these no-requests-moments happening at a specific time during certain days. It was a Saturday, the busiest day to drive for Uber. Everybody needs a lift on Saturday, whether you are going home from work, visiting a friend, seeing your boyfriend or girlfriend, going out with your buddies for a drink, or taking your fucking dirty laundry to and from the laundromat. And then, you don’t hear any new requests coming in for one minute, two, three, five, twenty minutes, sometimes an hour. What should I be doing?
On the one hand, I am not making any money. On the other hand, I like these down moments to just be with myself. I drive around, play the music super loud and open the windows to get some fresh air and freedom inside. I pull over to the curb and smoke a cigarette to relax, think and recharge. These are also moments to visit Wawa, go to the bathroom, maybe grab a sandwich and a coffee.

Then I turn my Uber app on again, click “Go Online,” and shortly after, I hear the painfully familiar sound of a new request coming in, and I hit the “Accept,” and there I go again for yet another adventure somewhere in the City. The City of Brotherly Love, my adapted second hometown. The City for the survival of the fittest, for the rich and the poor, for the strong and the weak, along with all those “down to Earth, good people.”

Dead town

August 8, 2021August 8, 2021 ~ John Loraine ~ 11 Comments

I am never looking forward to going there. But I worked in that fucking town. I guess I had to. It always gave me the crips. There were some weird vibes in this town, and I always felt the strangest feeling telling me that I don’t belong there. I always felt like a stranger in this town, even after three years of working there. This town and this job! They both had me, and I am very much sick with both of them. Now, after the pandemic, things looked really rough out here. I was back in town for business, and it all looked way too desperate and much more depressing. This was a dead town now.

It was never a very populated or crowded town per se, but now it looked almost empty. Cars are driving on the road, but no people are seen walking on the sidewalks. There are very few people around, period. And those people you do randomly meet, they don’t look too happy or too normal either. This is a city full of big corporate offices, parking lots, hotels, and poor, disadvantaged, primarily black locals. These locals certainly did not work in any of these fancy offices. They probably never worked since there was no place for them to do so. They just survived on the government support money. God bless America!

Since the commuters stopped coming in, many of the local businesses shut down. Everyone has been working from home in the last year and a half. This is the death of big corporate mentality or rather the death of the traditional nine-to-five lifestyle. All major corporations were now following the work mentality of those unconventional tech start-ups who allowed their people to work from anywhere in the world. It didn’t matter, as long as the job was getting done. Corporations were firmly against that flexibility since they never trusted people and always wanted to be in complete control monitoring their employees closely. Those fucks!

There was a shit load of work to do for everyone, even more than pre-pandemic in many cases, but the fact that you could do it all at home, no commuting, no in-person meetings, no bullshit, was kind of liberating for the average folks. Corporations worried how in the fuck is this all going to work out. But it did and to their best advantage. I’ve got used to this new work-no-life-no-balance style, but at least I didn’t have to come to this God-forsaken place for so long. It always reminded me of the town which will eat you alive once you are in, and you will never return to where you came from. One will never be the same again. The darkness, the depression, the desperation on the background of tall corporate highrises gave it all a sharp socio-economic contrast.

Walking these streets, I felt like this is what being or living in the simulation must look like. Everything just felt foreign and surreal. The strangest thing was that even in a poor town like this, you never felt in danger. It still felt reasonably safe because of how poor and disadvantaged those people were. Looking at them, one felt compassion and sorrow rather than angst and fear. Occasionally, I’ll see some folks walking down the street, carrying some bags, not sure if those were shopping bags or they just taking some garbage with them around. Poor people always brought some sort of bags with them all the fucking time. They walked somewhere they seemed to know well. They’ve been here a while. Now there is no escape; there is nowhere to go. Maybe they got used to it? Perhaps this is what home feels like to them? Maybe I am the only one who feels estranged being here? No judging the poor folks, but rather feeling sad for them. I am always very sorry for the poor and disadvantaged once. There’s got to be the way out of this somewhere, somehow.

I worked for one of the major companies in town, the major bank institution. There were two significant tall buildings right by the downtown area, which looked very impressive considering its surrounding. They looked like the two tall office buildings packed with people of different ranks, and they must’ve been swamped and very much occupied in those buildings working towards something, working for the system. I knew the truth. These buildings were there for the show-off reason, just an illusion. Even in pre-pandemic times, these buildings were semi-occupied. My floor was half-full back then, now it was one-third of what it has been. There were ghost floors as well, with no people there at all. There were floors where just a handful of people were located. What was the need for it all? Why keep all these buildings if not able to fill them with employees? The answer is that they needed to have the image of “the big guy in town.” The more space they occupied physically, the more powerful the corporation should’ve seemed to be or wanted to look like they were. I knew this all was bullshit a long time ago. I was constantly spinning those ideas in my head when looking at these dead, tall, empty, useless buildings with no soul and not even enough people’s souls to occupy them.

A tax-free state sounds excellent if you are a corporation. They created all those laws to satisfy their hungry needs. These corporate fucks!. When you are just a regular person living here, you probably wish they charged those corporations more taxes so that this town wouldn’t look so depressed. Nobody cared. Even if there were no people left here at all, this city would thrive. They had plenty of offices and companies registered there, that it didn’t matter. They made it all work, just for them. They always do. Overall, these large corporations still employed a boatload of people to their advantage, and no government could tell them anything. The government works with those corporations hand-in-hand. They need each other. Somehow I was employed here. For some weird, strange reason, I was part of the evil of the evilest organization on the planet, the bank.

How did I get here? I wish I knew. I always think about it as a random coincidence. I never thought about working here or in any similar organization at all. But I guess they had a job opening, and I needed a job at some point in time. So we found one another like the two lost souls in the lonely, desperate poor-man’s world. It wasn’t the best match for me, but it was something. Compared to anything I made before, the pay seemed great, and the short-term commitment certainly worked for me. It started as a short-term contract, and I never hoped it to last any longer. I was wrong. Three months of the initial contract got “extended” now into three years and counting. Fuck, I’ve got myself deep into this hellhole. I also have a family to support, and oddly enough, I am the only supporting member of my family. I have no choice but to grind. I am the primary provider, and that is what you do. I am fucking grinding at this, struggling and suffering for my sake and my family’s sake. Looking at the not-even-two-year-old, I couldn’t take too much risk. It was easier to stay, to be part of the system. The man is as good as the choices he makes. The man always has to grind to live.

I never knew what the soul-crushing job actually was or felt like until recently. Until I got involved with this organization, which probably still seems like a prestigious job to many, I never knew how miserable I could be. This one got me and got me real bad. The depression, the stress, the anxiety, the bullshit were endless. The workload or the sense of the work I have to do is less and less, and the mindfuck is overwhelmingly accumulating with the speed of light. There is so much a man can take. There is only so much tolerance, and patience left. It felt like this is the depression talking; this is not me. Shortly, this has become me, the new me, the fucked-up one with no desire to do anything, with no satisfaction received from life, with no personal life at all. All I had was misery. The fucking anguish of mind and soul and sadness that my life gets wasted like that, for that goddamn paycheck, for that goddamn job, for that goddamn security. Was that all worth it?

I’ve tried to find a new job with very little to no success. It seems like there is no place for the wicked. It looks like the gods were not done with my punishment just yet, and I was due for some more. I’ve accepted the challenge. Fuck me up, folks, here I am. I’ve had so much of it already that nothing scares me anymore. Bring it on! At some point earlier this year, when I decided I had to move, I had to escape. I hoped that I would be out even before this time around. I never felt like coming back to the offices again, hybrid schedules or not. I didn’t give a fuck. This is not my shit, not my town, not my passion, not even my life. I have been stuck in this fucking simulation here, struggling to move forward and break through all that corporate bullshit.

I have a free, company-paid-for garage at the hotel garage nearby, and I have about a two-block walk. It is the weirdest and most useless walk ever. These two blocks, right by the courthouse and the police headquarters, are very much uneventful and dull. I occasionally saw some strange people entering and walking out of that court building. There are always some peculiar poor folks hanging around it. I walk this block like I own it, but I don’t want to own it. There is nothing there to own. There is nothing there to look at. As you drive up to the city, taking the exit, there is a sign on the sidewalk “Wilmington. The city where everyone can be somebody.” That is a very indistinct slogan. It looks like you can become as wretched as most of the folks living there. What a fucking bullshit.

There is a cigarette in my hand, the earbuds in my ears, and the black shades on my face as I walk through this little dead town. My senses are getting high, and my heart gets tight as I walk past, and I see the life around me that is tough to swallow. Even after three years, I am still a stranger in this town. Walking to and from the office, I still feel these same strange and weird vibes. I just can’t get used to this misery and social tragedy of this town. I’m hoping the cigarette and the music will make this short walk more enjoyable. I hope to get distracted temporarily while I am walking by. But they only help as much as they do.

The sun is still high up in the sky and burns through every living soul in this dead town as it does burn through me. The air is dense and hot, and the sun in the late afternoon looks like poison. I cross the street with the cloud of smoke high un in the sky. There are some locals across the street walking into nowhere, looking sad and hopeless. I glance at them and then look straight ahead; I walk toward the garage, towards my escape. Some five-six minutes later, and I will be there, sitting in my car, driving off of the garage and out of this city into my life. I will be leaving this fucking god-forsaken place one more time. I hope every time it will be the last one.

Searching for purpose

July 15, 2021July 16, 2021 ~ John Loraine ~ 16 Comments

Things don’t always go the way we wanted, and sometimes it seems like they go against us. My shit keeps going off the rails quite often. The minute I start enjoying what I have accomplished, the ground begins shaking under my feet, and I have to run for covers. I always have to run somewhere, anywhere, run away. Everything seems to be coming and going in cycles, and these cycles and circles just keep spinning and turning and flipping my life upside down. Sometimes it just feels like the gods are fucking with me by not giving me a clear mind; they keep me confused and searching without even a hint of where to go or what the hell to look out for.

With all the right intentions I keep and always try to make things happened, I am striving for success and trying to make things better for my family and me. But there are moments like this where I have just stuck. I don’t even know what’s stopping me, what’s against me, and why in the fuck I get lost so often. It just happens so. I look around; the wife is here, the babe, the apartment, the neighborhood, I am here too. What’s wrong, then? There is the same face in the mirror every day, which keeps getting older and sadder. The same fresh and cold water in the sink has no taste or smell. The clouds are always there up in the sky. They are, too, all the same, dull and meaningless. They come and go and then come and go again. This is the movement of life.

I’ve always been told the right way of doing things and the proper way of going about my life. And I’ve followed. Now I am here in my life where just some ten years ago, I was dreaming about and striving to be. I got here, and it is not much fun. It is the same rough life that always has been. There is always endless bullshit to deal with. Then I realized that everything only seems great and exciting in the distance. Once you’ve reached your destination, you know that the satisfaction isn’t there, and you continue to move on, going for more, looking out for new excitement, new goals, new purpose.

Then I find myself sitting in the dark room alone, staring into the darkness, thinking about why shit doesn’t feel right. The past comes back up in my mind, and I wonder how I dealt with similar challenges. How I got to where I am now, how I beat the status quo, how I made my own way here. And now, where do I go from here? It is easy to stick in the past and dwell on it and reminisce for nostalgic reasons. I do that from time to time. But I know that I cannot remain there for too long. Life is moving fast. Life waits for no one. I need to catch up; I need to keep moving along with it or advance in my own direction, but I have to keep moving.

It is amazing how time flew by and how fast I grew up older and how many different things in my life changed with it. I am not too old, and I am still young and young at heart, but I am not that careless youngster who used to have nothing but big dreams about the future and couldn’t wait until growing up to be somewhere else to what grown-ups do. Now I have arrived. I am a grown-up with a corporate job, family, child, bills to pay, and freedom of choice, and some sort of financial freedom. There are aspirations to become a writer and to write I love. I love to get up early in the morning before my head is filled with the daily garbage and put my morning thoughts and ideas on the page. It is mainly a hobby, though; nothing serious. But it could be. I need to focus on it more and work on it more. It all depends on me. I have to do it.

Meanwhile, I am more worried about finding a new job because this one is just fucking eating me alive piece by piece every day. The minute I get comfortable with one job I have, shit starts to go sideways, and I am looking for something else, again and again, and again. This trend is always the same. This part of my life and this fucking trend has to change. On the one hand, this keeps the bills paid on the other, drives me fucking crazy way too much.
I don’t know if there is a job that I would love to do for a while. Probably not. Every job gets dull with time, and with more bullshit being added to the mix, the more frustrating, annoyed, and disinterested everything becomes. But it all depends on me and how I am reacting to it and the choices I make afterward. I know I have good inspirations and good intentions for everything, but a lot of time, the shit is not rolling my way, and then I struggle, and I lose my focus, and I am back to the ground zero, thinking about why am I here?

The forever question, my fucking purpose in life, keeps coming back to me quite often. One moment I feel like everything is going my way and the right way, and the next, I have no idea or no control over anything. What should I do? Keep adjusting to the current flow? Get the fuck out of that flow? Mind my own business? Or suffer in the name of a secure, humble living? Somebody once said, if something feels wrong, it probably is wrong. There is another saying that goes something like this, where you are now is the result of who you were back then and what did or didn’t do that brought you here. Butchering this great saying in my own way, but the just of it is there. There are a lot of great things that I did in my life that I am proud of. There are many that I wish I did more of or started sooner, and there are plenty that I wish I’d never done. Everything always has been in perspective, and there are always quite a few things on the scales for me to evaluate the importance of and decide to go after, prioritize or leave the fuck out.

Somehow I ended prioritizing shit that now eats me alive. Shit, that is disturbing me from doing the very few things that really bring joy and purpose into my life. Eventually, I am more involved in shit that is not letting me live the life that I want. That shit keeps me away from my dreams and inspirations and prevents me from making critical steps in life. This is a trap. Fucking corporate trap. Life’s trap. This fucking economy, the job market, the corporations, banks, small business, technology, and everything else is out of their fucking mind and out of control. The people factor is not essential anymore to anybody; it is just the checkboxes on the list that had to be checked and the spreadsheets on the screen which have to balance out. I get that. I understand that, but somehow I am finding myself in this situation again and fucking again, sacrificing my life for the shit that makes me so much more miserable. Why? Because I am a moron. This is an honest answer. Because I cannot yet or have not yet made that right decision towards my personal best interests. I am choosing the safest route all the time.

Maybe this is the time, right here and right now, to figure out and make the tough choice? Make the choice that is mine and works for me? Works for my purpose? Maybe the safe way of living is not really leading me to nowhere? Maybe there is no safer way in anything, and everything has a fucking trap and has second meanings? I think about this situation where I am so lost and have no idea of any directions moving forward that something led me here, and somebody wants me to take the lead and make a change.

The change is always constant, and the change is what has to happen all the time, and I have to change with it. I need to figure out what that change will be and embrace it. I need to have a clear mind about my values and my priorities and how I can be the best me I can be today. I think I am on the right way. I know my heart is in the right place. It is just a matter of time to get these depressing black and hazy clouds out of my fucking mind to clearly see what is out there for me what I should go after. It is still dark, too dark to see at this time…

To us

June 19, 2021June 19, 2021 ~ John Loraine ~ 11 Comments

It was night and dark outside. She and I were on the beach in Miami. I had a glass of red wine in my hand, and she had a cup of hot black tea. We were not married then, but we both knew our love was real and deep, and it will last for as long as it could.

The beach was almost empty, and the ocean was dark with just some sparks here and there, reflecting the city lights on the water and the moon and the stars in the deep, dark, faraway sky. We were silent, sitting close to each other as one. We did not need to talk at all; we understood everything at that moment. It was love. It was us. It was our future together, which we didn’t know yet. But we hoped it would be good for both of us. It will have us together.

I was inspired at the moment, and I knew it is one of a kind. I never had any moments like that before. I knew gods gave me a chance to think and to dream and to see what I wanted in this life. I never had time to focus on thinking about life and the future, and I wanted to do with my life. She was there near me, and that was enough. I was there for her, and I was enough.

I sipped on my glass, looking at the dark ocean. There was a star in the sky, and I saw one falling down for the first time. I knew this is a proper time to make a wish, and I did. I wished to be successful and rich and famous. It was a bullshit wish, but I felt like it was a necessary thing to do. I didn’t care about being rich or famous or successful because I never was one, and I didn’t even know what it all meant. It was just an opportunity to do whatever I wanted and never worry about money, prosperity, impressing anybody, and career, jobs, or anything at all. Life was young and simple then. Worry less.

I wanted to live my life the best I could. How I liked it to be. My understanding of life and its purpose was limited. A young man’s heart is always on fire, and his soul is full of adventure. It wasn’t about being correct or intelligent all the time or only making the right decisions. Wise decision-making usually takes much more time and comes with some life experience. I didn’t have that back then. I had my heart and soul full of adventures and my love next to me, and her dreams and passions. We were in love, and we were in our moment, creating our moment together. We were us.

It is interesting how life plays games with you and what one has to go through until we find ourselves, all the struggles and broken hearts, arguments, fights, and misunderstandings. Everything else that goes along and eats a person alive. Being with the wrong person for some time and then understanding that you’ll never get your time back and never getting your youth back feels sad. But, the sadness filled with understanding and life experiences that make adults out of young people teach them lessons that nobody else can teach. I’ve just had a bad relationship experience behind me, and now I was with my future and the love of my life, sitting on the dark beach at night, drinking my red wine, feeling in love, and enjoying every second of that moment, every breath of that fresh ocean air.

I felt some sort of comfort, and I think she did as well, the comfort of having the right person next to you and the comfort of being in love with one another. I wanted to keep her with me forever. I wanted her to be the love of my life. I knew early that she was the one, and I needed to hold her close to me. When you get those kinds of feelings, you are often right, and you have the right person next to you. I didn’t know when that it will take us six more years before we will get married and three more years before she will give birth to our son. We stuck together through thick and thin, and we are still together, and I hope we always will.

“To a better future together, babe. I love you more than I ever loved anyone else, and I always want to be with you!” I raised my glass to a toast.
“I love you too, honey,” she said, “to us!”

The greatest writer of our time: Mark McGuire. Part II

May 29, 2021May 29, 2021 ~ John Loraine ~ 1 Comment

With his fame, there also came the consequences. He was always busy with appearances and readings and presentations and speeches and meetings and phone calls. He never, since his last book, had much time for anything, not even writing. His family suffered because of it as well. They became the most celebrated and well-known families in Philadelphia, but his family took a big hit on the inside. He was never around the home too much or too often. He was always on the move and busy with something else. He had affairs that his wife was aware of, and this was the reason for their divorce. They divorced two years ago. Now each lived their own lives. The wife kept the place on the Rittenhouse square and the house in the suburbs, and Mark kept the Old City’s condo and the beach house. Their son was now in college and lived on campus by himself. He visited both mom and dad whenever he needed something, mostly when he needed the money. He was a celebrity on his campus and was busy managing the school, friends, and multiple girlfriends. Mark had numerous girlfriends himself. There was always a fan who would like to meet him and ask about the writing and a piece of advice and eventually have sex with a successful writer himself. The phone rang again.

“Hi, is this Mark McGuire?” the voice asked.
“Speaking, how may I help you?” Said, Mark.
“I would like to have you on our show in New York sometime next week. We are doing a round of interviews with successful people in today’s culture, and we would very much like to have you on.”
“Ok, I think I could make it. When is that interview going to take place?”
“Next Tuesday night, we will be live.
“Ok, sounds good.”
“Thank you, sir. Have a great day.”
“Likewise. Good-bye.”

It has been just another afternoon, and Mark knew that the writing wasn’t happening for him today. He felt helpless and hungry. Mark needed some good food, steak, maybe? He called downtown Del Frisco for a reservation. They always had the best table for him. Every time he called or just showed up, a friendly waiter and valet parking person smiled and greeted him. Mark drove his Porsche up to the restaurant’s entrance, leaving the car with the valet before entering the building.

“Good afternoon, Mr. McGuire!” Said the waiter greeting Mark at the entrance, smiling like a hundred-dollar tip.
“Good afternoon,” said Mark.
“How are you today, sir?”
“I am well, thank you. Just a little bit hungry.” Mark said, smiling back at the waiter.
“We will take care of that for you, sir. Please, follow me,” said the waiter and guided Mark to his table. Today he was seated in the far-right corner. It felt more personal and private, just like he liked it.
“May I have a double shot of Johnny Walker Blue label and Bone-in prime strip with brussels sprouts, please.”
“How would you like your steak done?”
“Medium well, please.”
“Will do. Ok, thank you, sir. Your drink will be out in a minute, and you will have your steak ready for you as you like it.” Said the waiter leaving his table smiling.

There were not too many people at the restaurant at this time around. There were a few other visitors here and there, some business lunches, and few affluent locals who loved to eat a steak for the late lunch. Mark’s drink arrived, and he sipped on it. It felt great. The expensive whiskey always tasted like a victory, like success like the fresh air. Mark loved his whiskey. The steak arrived sometime later, and Mark ate it with passion. He ordered a couple more whiskeys, drained his glass, paid, and went outside. The valet brought his car. “Here you go sir, have a great day.” “Thank you, you as well.” Said Mark and rolled down the fifteenth street to Locust and the Philadelphia orchestra parking lot. They were performing Brahms at 3 pm. Mark loved Brahms. He parked and went to the hall.

After the performance ended, there were standing ovations, as usual. There was something about watching the symphony music played live. One could witness how these most fabulous sounds in the world were made right there in front of their eyes. All the musicians played their instruments perfectly, manufacturing their perfect sound with their gentle gestures against the instruments. Mark was fascinated. He was a regular visitor at the Philadelphia orchestra for quite some time. After the orchestra, he decided to drive around the City. He drove his car on Broad Street, the Avenue of Arts, the most luxurious and beautiful and artistic streets in Philadelphia. He watched people walking on the sidewalk; life moved around him.

Every person had their own story. Mark saw some homeless people sitting on the pavement begging for money; there were plenty of them in Philly all around. He drove down to JFK boulevard and Market street, observing everything. Driving around the City without any directions was like therapy for Mark. It was a great time to think about his life, city life, and others people’s lives. He played some classical music in his car, which always helped to clear his mind. Mark remembered how he was driving around the City in his old car when he was a young lad. After a stressful day at school, he would get in his car, get some coffee and cigarettes, drive around and just observe everything. Often, he would find himself going through the neighborhoods he has never been to before. The diversity of Philadelphia was fascinating. The neighborhoods built by the poor emigrants; everyone lived in their tiny communities, preserving the culture and the tradition of their homeland while trying to make it in America. This feeling was very familiar to Mark; his parents raised him like that.

His parents came here with nothing but a dream and high hopes for a better future for him. Even though they were not around anymore, Mark still remembered to visit them at the cemetery and leave some flowers for them. “You would be proud of me now, mother, dad. I did make it; I am a famous writer now. You said back in the day that I should better focus on the business career and try to find a job in my field of Economics, but I just loved writing so much more. Look at me now, and the writing made me a great man, the most celebrated writer in Philadelphia. I hope you are doing ok up there. Please pray for my family and me. Please ask God to help me write. I will be back to revisit you, I promise, I’ll visit soon. Take care of you both now.”

His first book, “Immigrant Song,” was about the life of an immigrant family in Philadelphia who struggled to live up to their American dream. This book was his first outbreak and his first success. The book was a story of underdogs, about endless struggle, misery, hope, and continuous perseverance. The first book was based on Mark’s personal experience. All these struggles shaped him to be the man and the writer he became. He forgot about it all a long time ago. The City was different back then. It wasn’t like it is now. Everything had a sad, depressing tone, and everything was colorless, gray, and muddy. The City seemed dangerous and nothing like it is now. There wasn’t much of “the brotherly love” left in this place back then, and even now, sometimes it seems to be the case. Everyone was fighting for their place under the sun, for their success, trying to survive. For Mark McGuire, love had a different meaning. Everyone loved him, even if he hasn’t written anything lately. It didn’t matter to the people. Once someone breaks through the regular bullshit and poverty into the world of recognition and fame and luxury, one becomes a different kind of human. You feel untouchable, indestructible, and you think above everybody and everything. Maybe that was the path of his self-destruction and creative misery?

On his way home, his son called. “Dad, I need a few hundred bucks. Can I stop by your place sometime today?”
“Hey son, how’s life? Sure, stop by. I’ll be home in about 35 minutes.” Said, Mark.
“Ok, thanks, dad. I am alright, taking this girl out tonight. I need some cash.”
“I got you, son. Stop by later then. Ok?”
“Ok. See you soon, dad. Thanks.”

Mark returned home, open the fridge, and got himself a bottle of beer. He sat on his couch watching through the window overlooking the City. He wanted to relax a bit and wait for his son to come over. His phone rang again. It wasn’t his son; it was his ex-wife.

“Hey Mark, my lawyer sent you some papers to sign. Did you get them?”
“I’ve been doing great sweetheart, how about you?”
“Mark, I’ve been same old great, thanks for asking. Can you please sign and return the documents?”
“Maybe I can. Do I want to do that? Absolutely not. Why? Because I don’t care.”
“Mark, can you stop it already, please? Just sign the damn papers, and let’s part ways once and for all. Shall we?”
“Sure, we shall. I just cannot wait. How’s your new boyfriend doing? He still lives under my roof on Rittenhouse square?”
“Mark, stop it! This is not your business. This is my life now, my private life, and I shall not respond to you and your stupid questions.”
“Of course, You don’t owe me anything. Somehow it is me who is in debt with everyone else. Have a great day, babe, ok?” Mark said and dropped the phone. He loved to drive his ex-wife crazy, especially now during the final stages of their official split and going through this long and tedious separation process.
“Asshole!” Said Jane angrily. “What an asshole!”

Mark chuckled, sitting on the couch thinking about this conversation. He thought about that folder which he received in the mail last week. Mark never bothered to open it after he saw the law office name and address on it. “Fuck, that, he thought, you, assholes can wait. And you too, honey.”
An hour passed. Mark was still on the couch sucking on his beer listening to some good old rock-n-roll tunes. Then the doorbell rang.

“Yes?”
“Dad, it’s me.”
“Ok, coming,” said Mark opening the door and greeting his son.
“What’s up, kid? I haven’t seen you in a while. How’s life?”
“I’ve been busy with school, dad. You know, it takes a lot of time.”
“Yeah, and chasing girls does as well, right?” Mark chuckled.
“Yes, it does,” Jason responded with a shy smile on his face.
“So, can you lend me some money? I am swamped and need to do a few things before tonight?”
“What a rush son, are you hungry? Do you want to grab something?”
“No, thanks, I’m good.”
“Ok, here you go,” Mark reached for his home safe and pulled a six hundred dollars and gave it to his son.
“Thanks, Dad. I really appreciate it.”
“No problem. Does your mother give you any money?”
“Yes, she does. I’ve already asked her for some earlier this week.”
“Oh, ok. Thanks for stopping by, son. I hope we can grab lunch or dinner sometime soon?”
“Yes, that we should. I’ll let you know when I’ll sort the school stuff out.”
“Sounds good. Take care, son, and it was good to see you as always.”
“You too, Dad,” Jason said, hugging his father, the greatest writer in the world. He walked out of Mark’s place, closing the doors behind him.

“Kid, you grew up so fast,” said Mark to himself, wondering, locking the doors and returning to his beer bottle. “I remember when you were so young, and your mother and I changed your diapers and carried you around the house singing songs and playing stupid childing tunes and cartoons, anything to keep you entertained and happy. Especially tough was to keep you from crying. And you did cry a lot. I couldn’t write at home for some time because of it. I had to relocate to this place from our beautiful suburb’s house to write. Eventually, this place became my writing mecca. Every time I came down here, I was able to write. Every time I brought my ex-wife here, we had the best sex ever. Every time I brought any other girl after my Ex, I had a great time. This place is full of good memories for sure. Now that the writing is gone, not too many things could make me happy again. We all were happy back in the day. Now we all grew up, changed, and each is full of their own bullshit. How did we get here? Who knows?”

Nothing happened at the typewriter an hour later either. Mark stared at the blank page, sipped on his whiskey, and still, nothing came. His phone rang again. “Fuck! – thought Mark, the damned phone always rings at the wrong time all the time.”

“Mark’s here. Hello.”
“Hi babe, are you lonely tonight?” It was one of his mistresses on the line who was indeed lonely that night.
“Hi, Anna. I am lonely, but I am kind of busy tonight.”
“Busy writing?”
“Busy not writing. Just trying to get me there, you know. I think I’ve lost it. I don’t know what the fuck is going on with me lately anymore.” Mark sounded desperate yet very serious. Just enough to kill all the companionship requests without explaining too much.
“I feel sorry for you, babe. I just wanted to be with you tonight. I thought maybe there is something I can help you with. You know, take the edge off, relax a little bit?”
“Yeah, that’s what I need, except that I don’t even have the edge anymore. When I used to have it, I wrote days in and out. Shit. Never mind me. Sorry.”
“No, it’s ok, no worries. If you want to be alone, it’s your wish. Call me later if you change your mind. I’m staying home tonight, alone and horny so that you know.”
“Thanks for a boner, sweaty. I really appreciate it. I’ll be in touch. I just got to go back to work here. Have a good night, babe, alright?, Don’t get too bored out there.”
“Good night, Mark McGuire, to you as well. I hope to see you soon. Love you.”
“Ok, bye, Anna.”
“Bye, Mark.”

The phone went dead, and Mark was alone again. It felt strange that this girl, Anna, his mistress, is the only one who truly wants his attention. Mark poured himself another drink, grabbed a cigar from his cigar case, chopped the end off, and went on the balcony. It was getting dark outside already, the air felt fresh, and the City was getting into the evening blues. He puffed on his cigar, looking at the view of the City, sipping on his whiskey, and thinking about her. “Anna is friendly to me all the time. Was there a single time that she was a bitch? No, I cannot remember. Even when I ignored her on multiple occasions, she still came back to me with love, passion, and affection. Oh, Mark McGuire, what are you doing to these women? Why everybody has to suffer around you? Am I this bad, or is it whiskey talking? There was no return to my wife, and I don’t even want to. It just feels like getting back home, back to my family. But what is my family anymore? My parents have died, they had a decent and challenging life, but they lived it proudly. My wife has a boyfriend and hates my guts. My son has his life to live and his priorities. And what about me? I am a middle-aged man, lonely as hell, trying to put my life in order. It is just a cigar and a glass of whiskey with me here. Why did I push Anna away yet another time? She is always so nice to me. She always has been. Maybe this is it? Perhaps I need to be less of a macho and more like a grown man? I guess I should. I think I do. I need to get my shit together quickly. I am Mark McGuire, the hottest writer in town and the country!

I wonder when I will start writing again? Maybe this cigar will help. He looked at his Rolex, and it was showing him 9:45 pm. The night was still young, and there is a possibility that the writing will come. Looking at the City at night was a fantastic view. It has always inspired Mark. And he just loved it. That’s why he spent most of his time in this place. He remembered the days when he arrived in Philadelphia for the first time. It was a magnificent experience. This place was so much different and more prominent, and brighter and broader when his tiny hometown in the middle of nowhere. He remembered his struggles and how his parents worked hard to make things work, pay the bills, and put the food on the table. He remembered when his mother told him, “One day you’ll get your education and will help your old parents. You are a smart kid, Mark. I have faith in you.” These words felt like a hot coffee with whiskey down his through warming down his chest and burning him on the inside. Something clicked. The cigar went into the ashtray. He put the coffee on brewing, poured himself some in the cup, and went back to the typewriter. He sipped his coffee, looking straight at the page, his eyes red and tired but focused. He put his hands up and started to type. One word followed another, one line followed another, and so on. He wrote through the night without even thinking of stopping or taking a break. Mark was alive again. He felt it in the air. Mark felt it in his soul. He was indeed the greatest writer in the world, Mark McGuire.

The greatest writer of our time: Mark McGuire. Part I

May 23, 2021May 23, 2021 ~ John Loraine ~ 9 Comments

Mark McGuire – the greatest living writer of the present day. What a talent, what a man, what a writer! The man who wrote so good that he humbled the entire literature world, and all the Philadelphia residents cherished him more than anything else. Some would say he was more popular around here than Rocky. That’s how vital Mark McGuire has been to his native Philadelphia, the City of Brotherly Love, the City that gave birth to this great man, this great writer, the genius of the written word, the writer with a capital “W.” This writer wrote better than anybody else in the entire world. Hundreds and thousands of tourists were coming to Philadelphia, first and foremost, to see the City where the great writer lives, to walk the streets where the great writer walks, to get a drink in the bars where the great writer drinks occasionally, and just breathe the air of the City infused with such a quality talent. A ton of inspiring writers would get inspired coming to Philly. Here it is, this is the place, the City that can encourage anybody. Philadelphia, the City that can make you a great somebody. Mark’s name has been part of the local news almost every day. There were reports on the late night’s news coverage covering the day in the life of the most famous writer in the United States of America and the most known and recognized writers and residents of Philadelphia, Mark McGuire. Even though it was hard to spot him wondering the City during the daylight, he was still here; he was around, he was home.

Mark was born in late August of 1973 to his emigrant parents, who came here from Eastern Europe in search of a better life. Mark grew up like a regular American kid in an immigrant family. He was a bright child growing up, a good-looking young man, and everything was alright with him. There was something about him that would make one stop and take a closer look and listen to what he has to say, or just to be around this great man. Mark graduated from a public high school and enrolled in one of the best business schools in Philadelphia City to pursue a degree in Economics. His parents were broke, and he didn’t have enough money to get himself better clothes, a better car, or a better anything. With his outstanding grades and some government help, he enrolled into Drexel, one of the top business schools in Philadelphia. He needed a great school and a great work experience to make sure he’ll get a good-paying job in the future and can help his parents to get old and retire in comfort. His study was tough on him in the beginning. The wealth of knowledge was overwhelming, the pace was too fast, and he often thought that getting into this school was a big mistake. He still had to make his parents proud and pushed himself harder. Eventually, he graduated after four years of torture and was happy to graduate finally.

He has learned some Economics and general business studies, but the most crucial class was English. He took the English class dedicated to the work and life of John Steinbeck. Mark was fascinated with John Steinbeck. While learning about Steinbeck’s life, it seemed to him that a writer’s life was always full of unpredictable, exciting, and exotic events and unusual people who eventually will help shape you as a writer and inspire you to write. Ultimately, life will inspire one to write. In his English class, Mark’s assigned reading was “The Log from the Sea of Cortez,” the novel about Steinbeck’s expedition to the Gulf of California in 1940 to collect and learn about various marine species while writing about his observations and experiences. Mark felt that this is something that he would like to do as well. The life of a writer, Steinbeck’s indeed, must’ve always involved some drama in personal life, drinking, smoking, travels, discoveries, struggles, misery, and desperate writing itself. All these things he will live through eventually. All these things will ultimately influence his writing and will make him as great as Steinbeck has been.

Mark read this book with excitement regardless of plenty of biological terminologies. Mark loved this expedition’s whole idea and thrill, especially Steinbeck’s remarks and thoughts he wrote about in that book. Mark reading “The log from the sea of Cortez,” thought about how fascinating it must’ve been to be John Steinbeck, the most significant American author of his time, living his life full of adventures and excitement while being almost broke financially and while his personal life was falling apart. Nonetheless, he was writing, and he was doing what he wanted to do, creating his art of a written word. He was John Steinbeck. Mark wanted to be like him. For the first time, the idea came to him to become a writer, and it was larger than life.

Mark McGuire has published three successful books and multiple short stories across various publications and journals. His first book, “Immigrant Song,” has put him right up there with all the promising writers. He met his agent around the same time and got a deal for his second book. The second book, “The Houses of the Holy,” has won the Pulitzer prize and put Mark McGuire on the national level. As the sales in the United States went through the roof, the book received international printing and has been translated into more than thirty languages earning him international success as well. “Gods and Monsters,” the third book by mister Mark McGuire received a Nobel prize in literature in 2014. Mark was a proud son of his parents, a happy family man, at that point, and the most respected resident of Philadelphia and the State of Pennsylvania, and the entire country and the entire world. Hollywood bought the rights to all of his books and produced three top-grossing movies. The White House at one time invited Mark to have dinner with a President and his family. Mark has befriended multiple celebrities around the globe who wanted to meet the most incredible author of the present day. His life couldn’t be more exciting and successful. He was the greatest living writer in the world!

Mark owned multiple properties in Pennsylvania, New York, Los Angeles, and the beach house in Jersey but spent most of his time in Philly. Philadelphia, his hometown, had everything his little heart desired. Mark loved the architecture of Philadelphia, the parks, busy during the day streets, and peaceful calming nights of the City of Brotherly Love. The City inspired him and made him want to be an artist and to create his craft. He loved to walk around the City a lot before he became famous, and it was still possible to walk outside and not be bothered by the people. He loved to take long walks down Broad street and onto the Spruce and down to Columbus Boulevard, then take Walnut back to the Market and his bellowed Old City. Mark’s favorite residence was right there in the heart of the Old City, 3rd and Market. He owned the top floor with a nice view of the City, which always inspired him and made him feel at home. This residence was his creative shelter. This place gave birth to his latest third book, five years ago, and since he hasn’t published or wrote anything new.

He was a writer that didn’t write. He had it all and at some point, but everything has left him alone, high and dry. His situation was dire. He thought a lot about his life and death and all the reasons and meaning of everything, but nothing helped. He still wasn’t writing anything new. He drank more too. Mark would wake up early in the morning and look through the window over the dark and still sleepy City. He found this view very comforting and inspiring in the way. Mark loved to get up early in the morning and watch the sun rising and observe how the color of the sky changed, often with a glass of whiskey in his hand. He had his typewriter ready to go, but still, nothing came to him. Mark would stare at the blank sheet of paper for a long time. His face would freeze in the sad and thoughtful grimace, thinking about what he should be writing next.

“I am Mark McGuire, the greatest writer in the world! Isn’t it? I used to write well. I used to write days and nights, tired and starved, with a shitty laptop and a word processor, and there were so many great stories and ideas to write about! Where are they now? Why did they all leave me here all alone and desperate? I need to get back to business; I need to write something. It’s been five damned years since my last book. I need to show people some new work, and it got to be good. It better be good! Not good, but great! Yes, it better be great, another great book by Philly’s famous one and only, Mark McGuire! And I feel like I also need some coffee.” He went to the kitchen to brew some fresh, strong black coffee. Pure black was his favorite. Sipping at his coffee from the large white ceramic mug, Mark was staring at another sunrise, looking into the infinite skies thinking. “Maybe I should go for a run while the City is waking up and there aren’t too many people outside? I think I need to get back in shape, both physically and in writing. I need to be strong and active.”

He dressed in his running clothes and running Nike sneakers and went outside. It was September out, and the air was still warm but somehow very clean and fresh this early morning. Mark stretched his legs and started jogging down the street. He ran for about 40 minutes one way and then returned home. Running in the morning in the City was great. As he ran, he listened to a classical station on his phone. The classical music in the morning did the trick. He felt so elevated and fulfilled while listening to it. The running seemed to come easy, and he felt like he could run even more than his usual distance. There were not too many people and cars out yet, and he found a bit of personal comfort and privacy in that. Mark loved his fame and his fans, but more than anything else, he loved his privacy. He could be the nicest guy out there socializing with other people; however, people tired him fast. He felt exhausted and frustrated and had to meditate to find his peace of mind and get back into a stable mental condition. After about an hour and a half of his morning jogging, Mark returned home. He returned yet again to an empty page.

“I need some breakfast,” he thought and went to the fridge for some eggs and veggies. That was his “breakfast of the champion” – two fried eggs and fresh vegetables with a cup of coffee. He ate and drank his coffee. He felt a little better. After Mark finished his breakfast, he looked at an abandoned typewriter and still felt nothing but sadness. It was time for his morning meditation. Mark loved to sit in his favorite rocking chair and drink or listen to music or meditate. Mark meditated for at least thirty minutes every day. Meditation was his remedy for going insane. Writing could’ve been the most liberating and fulfilling thing, or it could turn out to be the most depressing, uneventful, and devastating experience for a writer. Mark has had it all. He’s been around for long enough; he knew things, he knew what it meant to be a writer, especially a good writer.

“I need to write something now. I know I can. Maybe not today, maybe tomorrow? Who knows, I just hope it will come back to me. I wish this meditation helped more, or whiskey, or even running. Fuck, anything would be helpful to get me started at the typer. Once I am there, I am truly there. I can kill, I can destroy, I can write like no one around! Maybe, I just need to relax a little bit more and watch some TV or something?”

TV bored him fast; there was nothing on it that would fascinate him. “I’d rather read a book.” Mark grabbed “Ask the Dust” by John Fante and started reading. Oh, John Fante! The lost and long-forgotten one of the Great American writers! What a man! What a writer! Reading Fante was like breathing the fresh air. His writing always seemed so easy and smooth and funny and nicely composed. Mark admired John Fante a lot. He was another significant influence on Mark’s writing. Reading anything Fante did would make any idiot start writing himself. He read for about two hours and stopped, then went to his home bar and grabbed himself a glass of whiskey. Whiskey felt good. He sat back in his chair and read some more. After a while, he thought he could go back to his writing again. He was standing before his typewriter, looking at this machine with slight curiosity. “Ok, my dear friend. I want you back. I want to be friends with you again. Help me put a few pages, and I will never forget your generosity, and I shall always cherish our friendship.” He came closer and started to type:

“It has been a cold and dark morning, and the City was still asleep. John woke up after he heard the harsh noise which came from the street. He wondered what the hell that was. He woke up and took a shower. The shower felt sobering and refreshing, and John felt better and calm. Even yesterday’s hangover was gone within minutes. His wife called him a day before, and he refused to talk to her. They were divorced for the last two years but still had to talk to each other from time to time, especially to discuss the alimony payments and when the child can stay over. John had enough of that. He wanted to move on. He wanted to leave town, but he couldn’t. He missed his son and loved him dearly. Why was he ever involved with this woman in the first place? Why was he so stupid?”

Mark stopped for a moment, re-filled his whiskey, and tried to continue but didn’t know how to. He stared some more at the half-full page. He needed some more time to focus. He stepped back, turned to the window with the city view, and watched people move on the streets and cars drive back and forth. The City was alive and busy again. There is so much life in there. Mark felt nostalgic for a moment. He reminisced about the days when he was a poor student, with no car, no money, no books published. How simple was life back then? How great and terrifying it felt not to know what the next day will bring and not to be sure if the very few dollars in your pocket will last long enough. He was young and starved, and there was something about that state of mind. When your back is against the wall, and you have nowhere to run and nowhere to hide, you act fast, you think quickly, have no time to discuss anything, no time for bullshit, only actions, clear, precise, concrete steps. Those actions made him write in the first place. He wrote his first book in about three months. He remembered the feeling of finishing his last page and then just stare at the pile of paper. “This is my book! My very first book!” He said, smiling proudly. That moment was worth reliving a hundred times.

Moments like that usually don’t happen too often. Unfortunately, things were not so easy as they seemed. He was not starving; he wasn’t hungry; he wasn’t in the state of his back-against-the-wall. Once the most celebrated people in Philadelphia, he was wealthy, well-respected, and an established writer. He did not wish for anything anymore and for many-many more years to come. His wife divorced him two years ago, and now he had a lot more time to spend on his writing. And he did, but he didn’t write. It just didn’t come to him. Whatever came out of him went straight into a trash bin. The writing was never easy. The writing was never easy for anybody, not even for Fante.
The phone rang.

“Hello, this is David Fitzwater, from The Philadelphia Inquirer. I would like to speak to Mark McGuire if possible?”
“Mark McGuire’s listening.”
“Hello, Mr. McGuire, I am the main editor of Philadelphia Inquirer, and we would like to do an interview with you and let our people, Philadelphia residents to know what you have been working on and how your life is going these days. Would you be willing to sit down with me for an interview?”
“Um, sure, let’s do this.”
“How about tomorrow, if possible? Afternoon works?”
“Yeh, tomorrow afternoon works; around 1 pm is good for me.”
“Sounds good, Mark. Thank you very much. I am looking forward to talking to you tomorrow. You have a great day yourself.”
“Thank you, David, you as well. I’ll talk to you tomorrow.”

He hung up. One more interview to talk about nothing. Because nothing mostly was happening in his life. People asked him to do an interview almost every day, either for journals, newspapers or TV shows. He had his “great life story” ready to go. However, not everything was so great and smooth in his life anymore. After the third book, when the big success hit him, everything changed. One might think that he had finally achieved what all writers in the world would like to achieve, the Nobel prize in literature, worldwide success, and endless fame, limitless possibilities, and opportunities in movies, books, and TV. Everything changed entirely for Mark to the worst.

Depression

May 6, 2021May 23, 2021 ~ John Loraine ~ 5 Comments

I found myself in these same traps again, in this darkness, where the sun doesn’t shine, and I am lost as lost can be and there is no escape, and there is nothing else to do but suffer. Was this depression talking? It could be. It has been a good part of my life. It is present like never and relevant, and it fucks with me constantly. All these hours of meditation and calming this shit down work only temporarily. It’s like a sunrise in the morning obscured by shitty dark grey clouds that wouldn’t show the beauty of it all. You’ll look to see the wonder of nature, and all you see is sadness all around. You know you want to escape, you know this is not right, you know this is not you, but you can’t. You’ve been part of it, a significant portion of it.

Charles Bukowski wrote, “We don’t even ask happiness, just a little less pain.” Everything will pass someday, somehow, someway. I hope it will. I never liked to be part of this, and this is not the way I am. It just fucking drags you into this mud and smears the fuck out of it on your face and soul. You try to wipe it off, wipe it out, but with time it doesn’t matter. It won’t help you. And you are infected with it. It’s on your breath and face and skin and soul and in your ears and your blood. It is fucking everywhere. You feel it in your chest and spine and arms and legs and brain. How should I deal with it? How to be free and happy again? How to stay away from it? I don’t know.

I am never a sad person in life as I am trying to be as optimistic as possible, but I cannot sometimes maintain that frame of mind for too long. Something else takes over. Even though there are plenty of reasons to be happy and enjoy life when this fucking darkness comes over, I am down on my knees, struggling to get up and look forward. I guess I did allow this to happened to me somehow. Unintentionally. I was trying to make the broken and useless shit work, and it just wouldn’t, and as time went by, it hit me back hard. It won’t comply. There are many sacrifices to be made, and I think I’ve made too many. Too many to count for, but just enough to make me feel all that now and suffer.

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My old man

April 18, 2021May 23, 2021 ~ John Loraine ~ 15 Comments

I haven’t seen my old man in so many years. Looking back, it comes to me that we didn’t see each other more than we did. He was gone for work when I was thirteen, and since that time, we only occasionally talked on the phone. He would visit us about once a year, but he felt like a guest at our house. He was a stranger now since being out for so long does change a person. Back then, I was just a teenager, and not many things mattered to me. I didn’t care. I didn’t have anything to say; whatever parents decided to do was the law, and I could not question or not follow it. We separated for good for seventeen years with no visits, no photos, and just some rare phone calls. It became a new norm, a new life for all of us. Questions about where your father was, were not asked by others because everybody got used to my father being somewhere far away and he’ll never be here with us, so it doesn’t matter anymore.

My old man wasn’t always this old. I remember him as a younger man, full of energy, power, and life lessons. He wasn’t well-educated, but he was street smart. There was so much wisdom in his words that I would learn as time went by. He was right on so many levels, but the lessons he taught me were a bit pre-mature for my foolish, childish brain, and they didn’t register right away. He kept on preaching and teaching me things, and I continued to ignore them. Time has caught up with me, though. As a young man, my old man was always angry, and he never liked other people. Other people were always dangerous, mean, harmful, bad-spirited, and for some reason, they always wanted to take advantage of us. The only safe place in the world was our old house which was our home, which was the only place we could feel safe and relaxed.

I remember when I was fifteen, and he taught me how to drive a car. His lesson didn’t last too long. After the first day, I left the car crying, drowning in tears, because the old man had no patience with me, and I didn’t know when to focus on the road or his screams. The next day my mother signed me up for driving school, and some other man was teaching me the driving skills.

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Lost in New York City: Part II

March 26, 2021May 23, 2021 ~ John Loraine ~ 1 Comment

I woke up in the morning to the sound of my alarm. I could see the world outside was waking up and getting brighter with every minute. The first thing I felt was the wine smell on my morning breath and in my mouth, and it felt disgusting. The second thing I felt was the major headache. I always hated the mornings after drinking and the headaches, and the breath smells, and the puffed-up face, and paranoia and everything else that came with it. I rolled in bed for a couple of minutes and then decided I need to get my shit together and get ready for work. I went to the bathroom, pissed. I was disgusted with my breath, so I decided to brush my teeth to get the wine smell out of my mouth. As I brushed my teeth, I looked in the mirror at my face, which was all swollen and puffy. I wondered if it will go away in the next two hours to look fresh for work.

I took a shower and started to dress up. I got my white shirt and my dress pants from my bag and put them on the bed. I found an ironing board in the small pantry along with an iron. I started to iron my shirt and pants, making sure that all looked nice and well pressed. I was hoping I could hide my hangover and headache with the sharp outfit. I needed to be at work by 9 am. It was almost seven now. I felt hungry and thought about where I should get my breakfast. I saw the restaurant downstairs, maybe I’ll go down there. I’ve searched for an Uber car to see the approximate time to the office. It was about 30 minutes in the morning traffic. I thought I had just enough time to get my breakfast. The headache became worse, and I took out a Motrin pill and swallowed it with some spring water. I’ve got my laptop bag with my stuff in there and was ready to leave. Spraying myself with some fancy perfumes, I looked at myself in the mirror and left the room. I took an elevator downstairs and walked towards the restaurant.

The restaurant was pretty busy this early morning. As I came closer to the front desk, the waiter greeted me and asked me to hold on a minute. Then a minute after, another waiter showed up and guided me to my table.

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Lost in New York City: Part I

March 16, 2021May 23, 2021 ~ John Loraine ~ 11 Comments

I arrived in New York City on early Monday morning. I’ve recently got a new job. It was the best thing that happened to me in a long time, getting a new job. After eight months of nothingness, misery, and unemployment, I was a decent human being again. I was back to normal. I could even write again. There was no need to hustle and no need to live on my last dollar anymore. I began to work for a major and well-known financial institution. I was a contract employee, and even though contractors are never even remotely close to employees in terms of general compensation and benefits and all that good shit that we all are thriving for, I was happy at last. I felt like I’ve made it. I, who came from nothing, who came to this country with nothing more than two bags of bullshit and high hopes for a brighter future, have finally made it. I was able to graduate from one of the top business schools in Philly. I worked for various companies, from real estate to medical devices to fucking financing. And here I was, the major player has offered me a new gig. This Company’s name I could proudly put on my resume as one that will open so many opportunities and doors for me in this country where both idiots and dreamers have an equal chance.

I have booked a hotel right by Times Square, on 47th Avenue, in the “tourist’s heart” of New York, the Big Apple, the City of all the Cities, the power, the money, the big shot, the big shit. I never knew before that my Company had three different buildings in the Manhattan area. Two were across the street from each other in midtown, which reminded me of the Twin Towers. The third one was 15 miles away, downtown. Of course, I booked my hotel closer to the two across the street from one another since I thought that was where I was going to. I was wrong. The lady at the front desk has told me that the building I was looking for is on the other side of Manhattan, downtown. Fuck. I took another cap for another $20 to go to the other side of Town. I paid and walked out with my laptop bag and the mid-size travel luggage bag, and the fucking umbrella which I had to purchase first coming out of the train station. It has been raining in New York since the early morning, and the forecast wasn’t any better for the next few days.

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