I had been planning for/dreaming of/waiting for the right time to/etc. go on my great journey, the life one. Waiting, learning, hoping, all was the endless accompaniment to my life. It was a bunch of bullshit, and even though that's not the most eloquent way to put it, it's probably the most accurate. I was on probation (shoplifting), isolated in Tennessee with my octogenarian grandparents (the hasty decision of my father almost a year before, to deal with how strung out I was), away from the punks I loved and surrounded by the gentrified youth of the 5th wealthiest county in the US. Things were pretty bleak for a while, until about 3 months before I left. I was beginning to make some friends: both with the relatively small punk community I could find (started with Defiance, ohio! playing at the Little Hamilton Collective, one of the greatest shows I've ever been to) and some of the most beautiful people I have ever had the pleasure of being around. They were psychedelicos of some sort, anti-authoritarians, and once I explained anarchist-communism they were down as hell. We formed a backyard tent commune and dubbed it 'the Loveshack'. It lasted almost a month and a half before Nashville had the largest rain in a hundred years and it was washed away.
Enough of the background. That's how things were, until I got put on house detention for failing a drug test. Because of this, I lost the ability to spend lots of time with the community I loved. I left my grandparents house on the nightly, walking miles upon miles and committing petty crimes and going to see my friends. This was training, I guess. The pull of travelin' was becoming stronger, as it always does when I am trapped in a situation I don't want to be in. I started making signs and banners and other things and put them up around town, in conspicuous and inconspicuous places (they were still there when I hopped town, a week later!). Alright, a month of this, and I was fed up. One day, a normal day, I stole a big bottle of vodka from my grandfather and got pretty toasted. I decided, right then, that the time was now, and if I didn't leave then, I never would. So I quickly threw some shit in a backpack (not even all the shit I needed, and some that I really didn't), and ran out of the house. That was 5 pm on a sunday.
I spent the night drinking and walking around town, calling people on my grandpa's phone, both in TN and back home in Texass. On of the girls involved with the loveshack was pretty distressed, and so we had to talk for a good while about things. She eventually told me that she was simply jealous that I was doing this before her (she's doing a gypsy-oriented across america), and we made up. I drank the rest of the vodka, and then went to see her before I left. As I got there, I stopped to see if this limo that was perpetually parked right behind her house was open, and it was! I looked in all the drawers, and finally, in one of them ,I found more than a dozen tiny liquors! I mixed them all together, but didn't realize that there was also some of that baileys irish cream shit in there, and they made a horrible tasting and smelling alcoholic sludge. Whatever, I'll drink whatever. I went and talked with the girl for a while, giving her a few of the bottles, and finally slept in the limo.
The next morning, I went to the school to say goodbye to a few people and hung out with my friend for about an hour, before heading to the library to get info like maps and directions and stuff. I reeked of liquor, and people were looking at me a little strangely and I was probably acting pretty wacked out. After maybe and hour and a half, I went to go smoke behind my school, where the parking lot is, to wait on a friend who was gonna smoke me out and give me a fone charger. I sat in the drizzle for a few minutes, under a broken umbrella, and smoked my ashtray-cigarettes - when suddenly my principal came outside. He's the classic good ol' boy type, and he's let me off a million times for all sorts of crazy shit... anyway, he was real pissed and asked where I'd been all morning and why I stayed out the whole night before. I gave him some bullshit answer and he told me to go back inside, which I did very quickly. I stood for a few minutes with some friends in the stairwell, talking about what was going on. After a bit, my principal and my spanish teacher came into the stairwell and started interrogating me. My teacher sniffed me all crazy like for a second and gave me an evil eye...
you smell like you've been drinking.
Pt. 2 comin' up!
Enough of the background. That's how things were, until I got put on house detention for failing a drug test. Because of this, I lost the ability to spend lots of time with the community I loved. I left my grandparents house on the nightly, walking miles upon miles and committing petty crimes and going to see my friends. This was training, I guess. The pull of travelin' was becoming stronger, as it always does when I am trapped in a situation I don't want to be in. I started making signs and banners and other things and put them up around town, in conspicuous and inconspicuous places (they were still there when I hopped town, a week later!). Alright, a month of this, and I was fed up. One day, a normal day, I stole a big bottle of vodka from my grandfather and got pretty toasted. I decided, right then, that the time was now, and if I didn't leave then, I never would. So I quickly threw some shit in a backpack (not even all the shit I needed, and some that I really didn't), and ran out of the house. That was 5 pm on a sunday.
I spent the night drinking and walking around town, calling people on my grandpa's phone, both in TN and back home in Texass. On of the girls involved with the loveshack was pretty distressed, and so we had to talk for a good while about things. She eventually told me that she was simply jealous that I was doing this before her (she's doing a gypsy-oriented across america), and we made up. I drank the rest of the vodka, and then went to see her before I left. As I got there, I stopped to see if this limo that was perpetually parked right behind her house was open, and it was! I looked in all the drawers, and finally, in one of them ,I found more than a dozen tiny liquors! I mixed them all together, but didn't realize that there was also some of that baileys irish cream shit in there, and they made a horrible tasting and smelling alcoholic sludge. Whatever, I'll drink whatever. I went and talked with the girl for a while, giving her a few of the bottles, and finally slept in the limo.
The next morning, I went to the school to say goodbye to a few people and hung out with my friend for about an hour, before heading to the library to get info like maps and directions and stuff. I reeked of liquor, and people were looking at me a little strangely and I was probably acting pretty wacked out. After maybe and hour and a half, I went to go smoke behind my school, where the parking lot is, to wait on a friend who was gonna smoke me out and give me a fone charger. I sat in the drizzle for a few minutes, under a broken umbrella, and smoked my ashtray-cigarettes - when suddenly my principal came outside. He's the classic good ol' boy type, and he's let me off a million times for all sorts of crazy shit... anyway, he was real pissed and asked where I'd been all morning and why I stayed out the whole night before. I gave him some bullshit answer and he told me to go back inside, which I did very quickly. I stood for a few minutes with some friends in the stairwell, talking about what was going on. After a bit, my principal and my spanish teacher came into the stairwell and started interrogating me. My teacher sniffed me all crazy like for a second and gave me an evil eye...
you smell like you've been drinking.
Pt. 2 comin' up!
