Pete, 33

Chapter One Full art at The-BProject.com

Pete, 33

It’s Friday afternoon, and if you’re like most people, I’ll bet you’re pretty excited for Monday. Good Old Labor Day, for so many a well-deserved, long-overdue, and glorious day off.  Maybe you’re looking forward to catching up on some sleep, and enjoying a leisurely day of relaxation and recuperation. Or maybe you’re the type who’ll be at a cookout, basking in the perfect summer weather. What isn’t there to love?

Regardless of your path, be it lounging about in your pajamas all day, or having a few drinks while you overindulge in hotdogs and burgers, the day is yours and you’ll leave all the stress and worries of your job behind. You’ll wave goodbye to your White Claws and sunscreen, and even though you’ll be sad to see the sun set on summer, you won’t shed a tear as you ship the kids back to school, and prepare to welcome back flannels, fall frolicking, pumpkin spice everything, and sweater weather with open arms. 

     Want to know how I feel about Labor Day? 

Imagine you’re a kid again, then try to think of an amazing experience from your childhood. Maybe you’re a little boy or girl at Christmas time, and you’ve been good all year so you know Santa Claus is going to bring you everything you asked for in the letter you sent him. You addressed the envelope to the North Pole yourself, spelled all the words correctly in your neatest handwriting, even placed the stamp in the corner and stood on your tippy toes, reached your trembling arm up, and placed that precious letter into that giant blue mailbox outside the post office. With each passing day the excitement balloons until you’re bursting at the seams.

Then Christmas day finally arrives and your eyes shoot open. You gaze out the window to see it snowed overnight. A beautiful, glistening blanket of white stretches across the earth as far as your eyes can see. You sprint down the hallway, banging on doors, waking up your big sisters. You storm down the stairs and see the cookies you left for the jolly man in red are gone, the glass of milk is half empty, and the living room is filled to the ceiling with presents. They’re everywhere, and your name is written on so many of them. It’s more than you’ve ever gotten, more than you can imagine any kid in the world getting.

Even though mom told you to let her sleep, made you promise and you swore you wouldn’t, total delirium consumes you and you just can’t help yourself. You run into her room, jump on her bed and like a madman start screaming, “He came! He came! Come on mom, get up! Santa came!” 

You’re in a different world as you tear through your gifts in a whirlwind of euphoric mania �" but as the pile of presents with your name on them dwindles down to nothing, you find that Old Saint Nick didn’t bring you the one thing you truly wanted more than anything else. You told him about it in your letter, wrote it bigger than all the other words, circled it, underlined it �" even wrote a post script begging him not to forget it. You’re devastated, crushed, broken, and for a moment, all you want to do is cry �" but as that wet, salty sensation tingles in your eye, mom says something about seeing another gift somewhere in the house, and she thinks she saw your name written on the label. 

    “Hmm… it’s got to be around here somewhere… I just can’t remember where I saw it,” mom says. “Let me check my room.” You can’t move, can’t speak as mom disappears in search of the mysteriously missing gift then returns moments later with something in her hands. “Santa left this one for you, too,” she says, smiling ear to ear while your sisters giggle. Mom hands over the present that’s wrapped with a huge, golden, glittery bow and is covered in red paper so shiny it’s like a mirror, and you see yourself smiling in your reflection.

You can hardly breathe. Your hands quake with fiendish excitement as you untie the bow that rains glitter dust onto the carpet, and your throbbing heart feels like it may burst as you shred apart the wrapping paper, and even before you see what’s inside, you’re certain of what it is because the magic of Christmas still flows through your veins, you still believe with all your heart, and you’ve never been surer of anything than you are that Kris Kringle will never let you down. You hold that Holy Grail, that Christmas miracle, in your grasp in ecstasy, knowing you’re living the greatest moment of your life. 

Not your childhood? Yeah, me neither… so let’s ditch the extended metaphor, and just imagine something incredible that’s happened in your life, the happiest you’ve ever been. Close your eyes… picture that exact moment, search deep within yourself in the place of memories long forgotten, and recall all of those sensory details; the sight, the feel, the sounds, tastes and smells. Channel the sensation of how great you felt in that instant, the unquestionable blissfulness and perfection of the experience. Hold that magnificent moment in your mind and transport yourself back to that day. Can you feel it? 

Now imagine the exact opposite of that feeling �" the polar extreme, the inverse, reverse, observe, complete contrast and absolute antithesis. THAT is how I feel about Labor Day �" the darkest, most somber, and undoubtedly one of the worst days on the calendar. Unlike those schmucks who’ve busted their asses all summer through ninety-six degree days, sat in traffic every morning, sweated and slaved away at their nine-to-five jobs only to find themselves sitting in more traffic on their way home, I haven’t done any of that. I’m a teacher - high school English to be precise and I’m at the tail end of a stretch of almost two and a half months of sweet, splendid, spectacular summer serenity, without a doubt the best summer of my life, and I’m not ready for it  to end. 

Among the highlights written in the pages of this twelve week chapter of freedom in which alarm clocks and reasonable bedtimes ceased to exist were a handful of days in which I relived my teenage glory. I packed my gear and headed to the beach where I wasted the day away in the sun. Other days, I forsook all responsibility and notions of adulthood and lounged about in my boxers, eating junk food and playing video games, or binging Netflix all day.

Alright Karen, settle down there. I had some moments of beautiful productivity as well. I read a ridiculous number of books (twenty-five, at least), I exercised almost daily, created some great future lesson plans, maintained a garden, kept the house clean, and spent some time with family and friends.  

The best days were when I was the author of  my own “choose my own adventure” story. I’d go to the beach (not just my regular beach - but a distant beach on a foreign land), take a long hike through woods, or go for a drive without a destination and let the universe guide me. On July 2nd, it led me to the North Kingstown Animal Shelter, where I adopted Polly, a nine month old Australian Shepherd puppy (since renamed Leia, because Polly is an atrocious name). She is the cutest, sweetest and as I tell her about eight hundred times a day, the “goodest” girl in the world. She has a brother, too - a betta fish named Luke that we got the same day.

I’m even down another ten pounds or so since I got Leia, which brings my total weight loss to almost thirty-five pounds in the last eight months. Here’s a before and after!

It was a blissful time, one in which I damn-near fulfilled a lifelong dream. It’s not just, not your run of the mill aspiration - for me, it’s *signal trumpet music* The Dream  �" the one burning desire you have throughout your entire life, one that times may be a bursting supernova, other times just a flickering candle… but its flame is eternal and that fire will never, ever burn out. This dream was a tiki-torch in the wind for years, fighting against a thousand raging storms to stay lit, but something’s changed in me over the last few months. The passion, the love, and the sheer enjoyment are back and they’re fueling an inextinguishable flame that burns hotter and shines brighter than hellfire.

It was Mrs. Cadenazzi, my sixth grade English teacher and the best teacher to ever live, who struck the first match that ignited my curiosity.  She placed it delicately over the kindling and branches she’d intricately set in place, fed it oxygen and fanned the flames until my interest sparked, then after giving it the freedom to burn on its own, she added logs and gallons of gasoline until my passion crackled and roared like a gargantuan bonfire. 

She could have stopped there, but she didn’t, and that’s why she belongs enshrined in the teacher hall of fame. Instead, she fueled the fire by encouraging me, pushing me, giving me positive feedback, genuine criticism, and convincing me that her only mission in life during that year was to teach me to appreciate, find joy in, and love the simple act of putting my thoughts on a piece of paper.

    Writing. That’s The Dream. I want to be a novelist. I’ve always written - poems, short stories, mostly starting in journals. Yeah, I journal, and maybe that makes me a nerd, but I love writing and the idea of preserving memories for eternity. I’d like to think that one day I’ll look back and be able to relive the highs and lows of life through my own words. 

Here’s my new journal - a leather bound book, which I’m pretty sure makes me a big deal…

Nothing in this world would make me happier than to have my words be read by the masses. I want to write bone-chilling horror like Stephen King, Shirley Jackson or Richard Matheson. I dream of creating fantastical worlds like J.K. Rowling, George R.R. Martin, or Tolkien. I want my work to make social statements like Harper Lee, Chinua Achebe, or Tony Morisson… and that’s the problem. I don’t actually know what I want to write exactly. I’m still trying to figure that out - searching for my voice and niche. 

I started working on several different novel ideas at the end of the last year, right before my breakup with my ex-girlfriend. I had some decent starts... The Seven Songs of the Awakening, a wild fantasy fiction, Beyond the Black Doors, a terrifying horror story, and Pieces of Leah, an ambitious and harrowing dive into the impact of adolescent trauma told from the perspective of a seventeen year old girl… great titles, decent premises, s****y writing - but I’ve gotten a lot better as I’ve rediscovered my stride. 

I didn’t finish any of those seedlings, and my writing is nowhere near the caliber of any of the aforementioned geniuses -yet - but this summer (DRUM ROLL PLEASE)...  from the crop of ideas, one sprung forth, and after countless hours this summer, I almost finished it, my first novel. The key and somewhat disheartening word being almost. 

I’m getting there, but I’ve been stuck on the last few chapters for about a week or so, which is the true source of my misery towards going back to school, because I’d sacrifice a thousand lambs before all the gods and deities of every faith if they’d grant me the blessing of two more weeks without school so I can finish it. But with damn Labor Day looming, I know that even such a bountiful offering wouldn’t curry their favor now. Still, I’m proud of myself for what I’ve accomplished - and I’m sure I’ll finish it… eventually.

But enough about that. Just as writing has been a process of ups and downs, highs and lows, triumphs and tribulations, so too has been this somewhat recent development in my life. After eight months of living the single life, and finally feeling like I was ready, I took the plunge back into the dating scene.

I didn’t know what to expect after I took the dive, but it’s been a wonderfully wild whirlwind of a ride. I’ve gone out with more women than I ever could have imagined, more than I can even remember.

I won’t keep you in suspense. I’m still single - and let’s just say that while the dates have been plentiful, they haven’t all been magical evenings filled with romance. I haven’t stood outside any balconies…

… nor have I felt the first flutters of love. Some have been embarrassing, others outright train wrecks, but I’m getting out more, meeting new and interesting people (though not always the type of interesting I’d been hoping for), and I’m doing things I never could have imagined I’d be experiencing at this age… and even though I haven’t met the right person yet, I’m having fun through it all. 

It was a summer of ecstacy and elation, jubilance and joy, a glorious run of freedom - but that all changes after dreaded Labor Day. Three days, fourteen hours, thirty-two minutes from now (not that I’m counting) I’ll reluctantly turn myself in to the prison of Roger Williams Academy where I’ll relinquish my name, hand over my liberty, and be relegated to the confines of that dark decrepit dungeon of a classroom. I’ll once again submit myself to the shackles and bonds of another nine and a half month sentence of being Mister Thomas.

    Tuesday morning, I’ll be rejoining my rank among the schmucks. I’ll be back to my alarm clock blaring at the asscrack of dawn. I’ll put on my collared shirt and khakis, my jumpsuit. I’ll have to iron again. Ugh. The horror. I’ll rush out the door every morning, where I’ll be back to the grind of bumper to bumper log jams, lesson planning and grading, parent-teacher conferences and endless staff meetings - being a babysitter, crime scene investigator, adolescent psychologist and a peace-keeping diplomat all in the span of an hour. Back to having to answer to Principal Perriman, the warden. 

I’ll be back to answering the same damn question eight thousand times a day...

Back to having to repeat basic directions umpteen times a day, only to have to repeat them again to that one kid who goes to the bathroom for about nine minutes at the beginning of every class �" then again to that one kid who’s either high as a kite, or whose mind can longer function properly outside of social media world, and back to having half of them not follow the directions no matter how many times I repeat them, how loud I say them, and regardless of how clearly they’re written on the board…

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    I won’t let it get me down though. There’s still three days of freedom before I’m (contractually) due back at the slammer and I don’t even want to think about that hell right now, because tonight I have a date with a cute blonde named Lauren. 

I don’t know much about her aside from what I learned from her profile. She’s thirty-eight, pretty, runs her own small business, loves dogs and books �" an impressive list no doubt, and I don’t really need to know much more to be sure that she won’t be nearly as much of a dud as the last girl I took out. 

Anne-Marie, 39 whose profile picture, if it was really her at all, was her at least fifteen years and forty pounds ago. Don’t misunderstand �" I’m not body shaming Anne-Marie, nor am I one of those guys who thinks appearance is everything. Anne-Marie wasn’t bad looking. She wasn’t a beauty queen by any stretch, but she was certainly attractive enough that I would have gone out with her if I’d known what she truly looked like, but we were doomed from the start. She looked NOTHING like the person I’d seen in her profile pictures. I don’t know if that qualifies as being catfished, but either way, I felt as though I’d been the victim of fraud from the moment I saw her. 

That wasn’t the worst of it. Maybe I could have gotten past the deceit if Anne-Marie had a car, or if she didn’t get plastered drunk and babble for two hours about how wretched her ex-husband is. Perhaps I could have seen the beauty that surely existed inside her if she didn’t brag about being late to work almost every day, or if when I asked about her life dreams she didn’t simply shrug and say, “I dunno” before guzzling down another drink. There’s even a chance I could have seen past her perjury if she didn’t have the personality of a potato �" but that’s not what I’m looking for. I could yammer endlessly about exactly what that is, but there are still parts of it I’m trying to figure out myself. 

    Well, the past is in the past. It’s already after five and I have to meet Lauren at six. Who knows, maybe she’s exactly the person I’m looking for. 

“Who’s a good girl?” Leia, the dog of my dreams, rests at my feet and wags her little tail. I set down Ousame Sembene’s God’s Bits of Wood, take a quick shower and get dressed for the first time all day in a hurry. I take Leia out, say goodbye to her fish-brother Luke, and I’m out the door by five-forty.

Author's Note

Full version including art can be found at:

The-BProject.com

Reviews

[Neville]

I dont often stay the course when it comes to stories or chapters.. there are however a small number of writers here who I invariably enjoy, but in this case.. I found myself engrossed from the off... I think the combination of humour, me being a bloke (although change the names and everything could become reversed and seen from another perspective quite easily methinks) and the authors style all played their part... I certainly enjoyed my read sir and feel sure there will be others... Cheers, Neville

[Brian Aguiar]

Thanks Neville! Glad you enjoyed it!

[Linda]

Thank you for sharing this, Brian, and for your honesty. I'm always fascinated by what men like about women + I can't wait to see how you get on with Lauren !

[Brian Aguiar]

Thank you so much! The entire project has been posted on The-BProject.com if you want to check it out.

[Linda]

Sounds good. :)

[Samuel Dickens]

I find this interesting, informative, and funny in places. You may have burst my balloon, you know. (Or caused it to develop a slow leak, at least) I've always admired and respected teachers. As part of my young life, they were the only real role models I had. Now you've gone and revealed the fact that they're just like the rest of us. End of summer and back to work... oh, no! And here I thought teaching us kids was the highlight of their lives. Alas, I already knew that frustrated artists end up teaching art, and now this. Woe is me.
Okay, okay, I'm just messing around with you. (Mostly) Your mention of living alone and having to dress spiffy reminded me of when I was in the Navy and single. If it was me, I'd put Tolkien first in that list of fantasy writers.

[Brian Aguiar]

Thank you for that feedback! I appreciate it very much! And duly noted on Tolkien, who I agree, belongs at the top of any list of fantasy writers!

[Samuel Dickens]

Oops, I forgot to mention this: I know you're the English teacher, but shouldn't "mom" be capitalized when used in place of her name?

[Brian Aguiar]

Yes, and thanks again! Glad to have an additional set of eyes on some of this!