Andrew's Short Story (Part 1)

If I told you that I thought the funniest shows ever were 30Rock, Community, Arrested Development, Cheers, Three’s Company and The Simpsons, in no particular order, you would probably say that I lived in the first or second decade of the 21^st century. This is because you would know that some of those shows began and ended in that decade, or this decade, depending on when you read this. However, the presence of shows like Cheers and Three’s Company would imply that I was either very old during that or this decade, or that I enjoyed my teenage years during the first decade of the 21^st century and somehow had access to those earlier shows. And if you knew enough about television to place a timeline and use that kind of logic, you either looked up those shows or would assume that if I was younger, I would have watched those shows on the Nickelodeon channel programming Nick at Nite.

In fact, you can rest assured that all those assumptions are very brilliant, so if you were able to deduce my age at all, you deserve the highest of praise. I’m not going to tell you how old I am, because that’s not relevant. In fact, the shows I’ve mentioned I have just selected randomly as popular comedy syndications. None of that is relevant, but you can’t know that. You don’t know what I’m talking about, so you can’t decide if it’s relevant or not. You have absolutely nothing to start with. How is it fair for you? Tell me. How?

Of course you don’t have to tell me. To expect an answer from you would be ridiculous, and even if I did get an answer from you it wouldn’t make sense to me. By the time you answer me, I will probably have no idea what you’re talking about. I’d have forgotten the whole matter altogether.

I mean, it would be ludicrous to receive a call from a stranger, or friend who happens to be reading this, at a random hour saying, “It’s not fair, Andrew. It’s not.” I do not expect it. Well, now that I’ve mentioned it, maybe I will. I don’t know.

It isn’t fair, though. You’re right. You can’t be held accountable for what is relevant and what is not relevant when the subject of this tale hasn’t even been established yet, has it? Don’t answer that.

“A wise man once told me that putting quotations or italicizing words gives a phrase added credibility. This wise man was me, and I told myself.” – from Putting Things in Quotation Marks or Italics Adds Credibility.

Usually this credibility is unquestioned because as long as the quotation or the phrase in question is relevant, people just go with it. The show must go on, after all.”

That’s what he had so far. Sorry, I forgot to add the opening quotation marks to signify that everything you’ve read until the sentence before this one was part of a fictional short story the main character of this short story was writing.

It was what he had so far, and he was ready to send it off into the abyss of the Internet. People don’t really know how the Internet works, really, and if we’re still supposed to capitalize such a common word now. Internet. internet. Either way looked fine to him. It wasn’t a word he was putting into his short story. Even if the word were to come up later, he would decide then. Take life as it goes, he thought.

Oh, I’m such a terrible host. The guy I’m talking about is Marvin. No, never mind. His name is Andrew. I’m going to go back and bold his name now to avoid confusion. There. I’ve done it. I’m sorry I haven’t introduced you two earlier. I’m really usually good with introducing people to each other. I apologize.

Andrew was writing a short story. He’s a very weird thinker, as you’ve probably gathered, and sometimes people don’t follow him. It’s okay, though, because in Andrew’s mind, those who do follow him are lead to treasure troves of knowledge and thought. They are treasures because they are rare. Thoughts in general aren’t rare, but specific thoughts are unique. Any thought could be a thought no one else has thought, and that thought is therefore the rarest thought to exist. If there was a list for “Rarest Things Ever,” it would be tied for first with all the other unique thoughts and other super-unique things. For simplicity’s sake, Andrew called them sunique things. He’s weird. I don’t get it either.

Andrew also didn’t mind his weirdness because he was also very self-aware. In fact, he knew his short story started off terribly because it was too self-referential and went nowhere. As the author of the short story, Andrew knew he was much too involved. It’s best to let a story tell itself, he thought.

I’d like to take this moment to interrupt Andrew’s thoughts. It will only be a moment, I promise. I think he’s wrong. I think an author has every right to get involved with his own story. It is his story after all, and he can do whatever he wants with it. Or should I have italicized the other word. Let me try again. It is his story, after all. Maybe it’s smoother if I contracted the beginning. It’s his story, after all, and he can do whatever he wants with it. Yeah, that sounds better. Did that take long? It was really unfair of me to promise it’d take a moment when reading is such a different experience for all of us. I shouldn’t have presumed. I apologize. Anyways, back to Andrew.

He didn’t know where he was going with his short story, but he knew that he wanted romance to be involved. Just then, the girl of he had a crush on texted him, breaking his train of thought. It was worth it, he thought after he read and replied to the text and got back to his short story.

“Wait,” he said aloud. Did I come off too strongly with that last text? It was a worry he would never admit to harboring, but felt often. Texts are serious little messages sometimes. Per character, Andrew and I both think that they have the highest efficiency at conveying emotions. You can understand, then, why Andrew was worried about his text. I share his worry, but I’m not important.

Did I? Andrew thought. Maybe I used too many happy emoticons. She hasn’t texted me back yet. Oh, never mind. I can’t wait to read this one.

He had not come off too strongly. She replied as if nothing was out of the ordinary. Andrew breathed a sigh of relief. If there’s anything that would make Andrew uncomfortable, it would be making the girl he likes think he likes her. This makes no sense to me, of course. If you like someone romantically, you should let them know. There is no sane reason to hold back. The only thing you have to fear is rejection, but if you are a good person, then that rejection could mean more romantic possibilities or better yet, establishing a strong friendship with your crush.

I’m joking of course. “More romantic possibilities” is way better than “establishing a strong friendship with your crush.”

Andrew’s crush had not crushed him yet. He got back to his short story and began to develop the romantic storyline he knew he wanted in it.

#2

Every time I enter a relationship, and for me, that necessarily means "long-term," I set my girlfriend on speed dial. She's always #2. #1 is my voicemail, and even if it hasn't always been the default setting, I'd probably still make it dial to myself for convenience and arrogance's sake. I digress.

#2 is always my girl. I like to think that my speed dials are in increasing order of people whom I call the most, but really, it's a combination of those most important in my life and those whose numbers I most dial.
#3 is my brother.
#4 is Helen, who has become my most reliable friend in times of emotional distress.
#5 is my father and #6 is my mother because my dad used to work in a 510 area and my mom's number ends in 666 (of course). It was just convenient to associate their numbers with those numbers respectively.
#7-#9 have changed throughout the years, but it's usually Sean in there somewhere, who, other than Helen, is probably my best friend (it's a tie!).

And when I am single, #2 is open. To be my #2 means that your survival is second only to my own, that if there was any physical way to put you ahead of me, I would. #2 means that I care for you deeply, that my phone, which I have on my body at all times, is ready to connect to you at a moment's notice. #2 means that you are first on the list of people I want to talk to, to see and to be with. All clause-ending prepositions and cliches aside, there has always been something odd in the way we show that we care about people, and speed dial is definitely one of them.

As always, I'm accepting applications for #2 on my speed dial. If anything, it's less than 3. tehehehe.

The End of a Generation's Fantasy

What do you say after almost a dozen years of fandom “officially” closes? How do you say goodbye to the characters with whom you’ve literally grown up? How much emotion are you allowed for characters who, while fictional, show real strength, real courage and real care? These were among the questions that haunted me on my drive back from the Harry Potter 7.2 midnight premiere. Actually, I didn’t think of these things at all. I just thought of them now. I was too busy trying to focus on staying awake for what was supposed to be a 2 hour drive.

My brother Matthew was asleep in the passenger seat beside me, and my friend Andy aka Leroy (long story) was sleeping in the back seat. We were driving back from Woodland, about 15 minutes north of UC Davis, where my brother goes to school. Even though it’s summer, my brother’s Lion Dance Club meets weekly, and in his two weeks back from Vietnam, he asked me to drive him to both meetings.

For convenience’s sake, we decided to watch the midnight showing in Davis, since seating would be nonexistent in San Jose if we decided to drive back after his meeting was over at 10. Naturally, we bought our tickets about 48 hours before the showing, which turned out to be “last-minute” because almost every theater within 100 miles of San Jose was sold out. Luckily, we were able to find tickets at a 5 theater cinema in Woodland, which after some Googling, we decided was convenient enough for us.

The tricky part was that we couldn’t stay in Davis for the night, like Mat and I did the week before, since Mat needed to catch a flight to Spain the following afternoon. Friday flights are always hectic, but as is my filial duty, I knew I had to agree, at least in order to spend time with my brother before he leaves for a 5 week pilgrimage to Europe. It was especially difficult for my mother, having raised two college-aged boys. She rarely saw her children during the school year, and now one was perpetually abroad for summer as well.

Indeed, the two weeks in between my brother’s Vietnam trip and his Europe trip seemed more like the vacation than the homestay. But this isn’t about that. It’s about our midnight showing trip with our childhood friend, Andy.

The reason why the Harry Potter characters are so indelibly ingrained into our emotional psyche is that they are the loyalest friends we have. From ten years ago, I can probably only count one hand’s worth of close friends who maintained their closeness throughout the time. But Hogwarts housed all our friends, some of whom left, but most of whom stayed with us. Even when the books ended, we still had the movies to watch, to meet again our old friends, who have never, ever let us down, unlike many of our “real-life” friends.

That’s why we’re so obsessed, see? We call ourselves the “Harry Potter” generation. We put each other in different Houses (even though no one really wants to be in Hufflepuff, which I never understood). We dress up and we daydream about the wizarding world, bask in both its perils and luxuries. We do it because of the people, who are at once so intrinsically different yet so instantly and believably similar to how we are and most importantly, how we want to be. They are our friends, and have been for far longer than most of our “real” friends.

So when I drove home, with Mat and Andy sleeping in the car, I felt a certain love I reserve for very few people in the world. Andy and Mat are two of only a few people whom I can call lifelong friends, though in Mat’s defense, it wasn’t by choice. Regardless, though, it’s these kind of relationships that are the most important. They are not the bright flashes of brilliance you see in a firework, bursting into blinding colors, but fading quickly, making the night seem darker somehow than it was before. No, these relationships are the sun and the moon, steady and unyielding and reliable, no matter the time of day and the distance. They will always appear.

And in a way, Harry and his friends were the same. They were always reliable, and we love them for that.

So when I dropped Andy home, what he said and how we responded was both poignant and hilarious.

“Mat,” he said with his door ajar, facing the walkway into his home. It was 4:35, and certainly his parents were asleep.

“Mat, I won’t see you for 5 weeks, so be safe in Europe, okay?”

“Yeah…” Mat muttered, still half-asleep. They hugged despite the passenger seat’s backrest obstructing them. The hug lacked awkwardness only because of how long they had known each other, a feat you can’t do with an acquaintance.

“Take it easy,” I told Andy, and offered my hand for a shake.

“Yeah, I’ll see you around.” He took a step outside and paused.

“Oh, yeah,” he paused. “Mischief managed.”

“Mischief managed,” we both replied in unison without skipping a beat. He closed the door, and walked toward his house.

Mischief managed.

Thanks, Harry. Thanks, friends.

Mischief managed.

Goodnight.

Andrew came from a short line of rejections. He knew relative success his whole life, but in his mind, he peaked in high school. The saddest realization Andrew had was after his first year of college, after countless of parties and maintaining a GPA that would disappoint his high school self (but still was not that terrible considering the lack of effort, he justified). He realized that his most intelligent and creative days were past him. He chose the path, the path he was still on, and for the first time in his life, Andrew could not do something, and that is why Andrew comes from a short, not a long, line of rejections.

I have other skills, right?

That's it. I'm over it.

Trains of Thought

It must have been easier to write a long time ago, when the only prerequisites for literature were a cohesive idea and the motivation to focus on a piece of paper and physically pen your words. Now, it’s ironically more difficult. I can type, and I’m doing it now, with my eyes off the keyboard, off the screen even. And now I’ve lost my train of thought. See?

Trains.

I’m on a train right now. Bay Area Rapid Transit. It’s a monorail-type thing. The clouds are threatening to pee on us soon, but I have moving shelter. The clouds aren’t the only threat-thing. What’s a word that means “someone who makes a threat?” We need a more common word for that. Threatener/threatenor/threater? Those don’t look right. It looks too much like “theater,” although I suppose an argument could be made that theater is a bluff for reality. It could also be a buffer-reality, a reality that links our imagination to the physical world. Or it could be a bluff, only threaten at being reality, but never being it.

I like facing backwards on a train. I am always seeing exactly where I just was a moment before. If we claim that we live in a dimension, then it must have coordinates. So when I look at the guy right in front of me while I’m sitting on a train facing backwards, I can say that he is literally where I just was a moment ago. He is now occupying the space I just occupied, and is continuing to occupy all the spaces I just occupy. It’s true with a lot of moving things, but it’s definitely interesting to see it explicitly.

Here's an awesome video.