Fatherhood. Forlorn. Foam.

My father has a difficult time understanding things that have not come to him as a product of television or the narrow tableau of corporate hierarchy that he has been witness to. Thus, when I told him that I plan to eject myself from the world of engineering (a 'good' career as it makes a reasonable amount of money) and into the impoverished world of the humanities he not only generally disapproved of the idea, it barely even registered in his frontal lobe. And yet now, when I tell him that I am at the half-way point of completing this set of hoops towards another degree he is jazzed and motivational. Tells me "that's great" for perhaps the first time in my life. Maybe he's just getting soft with retirement.

All the people I love or might have loved are spread across the earth. Leeching their essence into the ground so that a billion years from now there will be some trace evidence of their existence. I miss them every day. The amazing girl I left in the hood who is now as tough as anyone I know. The mook out there on the edge; born to roam. My Fellow Traveler poised to slap the scientific establishment upside the head. The raven-haired expat, daring the world to not move when she leans into it. . . .A dozen other people I want to share drinks and photos with even when I'm 40 and no longer worth a damn.

I read a thread on ask.metafilter about a guy that reminds me of me. He is reasonably successful in his career, is intelligent (at least he can compose a paragraph) and once a week he likes to get obliterated at the bar and absolutely lose control. Each time he drinks like this he ends up somewhere strange or he gets in some vague legal trouble or he . . . you know the deal. His girlfriend claims that she will break up with him if he doesn't seek help. Everyone on the thread exhorted him to go to AA and get himself cleaned up. Reading the thread, all I could think about what was getting unbelievably drunk. Like a mythical, existential drunkenness in which the hangover is so extreme that waking up on some stranger's floor is akin to being born anew.