I met my muse. I finally met my muse.

OK, I know what you’re thinking: “Smivey, how could you possibly be inspired by someone you’ve never met?” It’s either that or you’re thinking about cheese. I’m not sure. That’s just the vibe I’m getting. Anyhow, I’m going to tell you about meeting my muse. If you want to learn about cheese, go to this blog and leave me the fuck alone.

Now then, the first thing you have to understand is I’m rather shy. My muse calls it being “a royal pain in the ass,” but that’s neither here nor there nor behind that bush. The fact is, I don’t like to deal with people so much. At work, it’s another story. I’ve learned to adapt and I actually enjoy interacting with my co-workers. But outside of the office, I prefer to be left alone. That’s just the way I am. Deal with it.

Which brings us to the problem: Not many people can deal with it. Sure, they might enjoy my company online, but after a while, they need more. Yeah, that’s right, a face-to-face meeting. For most, this would be easy. You might actually look forward to meeting a person you’ve spent so many evenings with online. But for some of us—mainly me—this kind of thing goes against every grain of our souls.

So why did I finally agree to meet my muse? Rather than get into a four paragraph explanation, I’ll give you the one sentence answer: She gave me an ultimatum. “Smivey,” she said, “if you ever want me to leave Gino, you’re going to have to meet me.”

For those of you who don’t read my blog religiously (shame on you), Gino is the poet who has been shacking up with my muse. Apparently, he’s a better brooder than I am and he’s amazing in the sack. Also, I hear he’s good at sex.

Anyhow, so my muse told me that she couldn’t possibly inspire me unless she could see who I was. So, desperate for an idea, I agreed to a rendezvous at the most natural place for someone to meet his muse: the parking lot of a Target store.

I’ll never forget that day. It was a Saturday morning… or was it Sunday? Hm. Uh, let’s say Sunday. Anyhow, I arrived early and parked my car a good distance away from the store. I figured once my muse actually met me, she’d probably want to jump my bones. So when it came to parking spaces, the more secluded the better. Since I was a few minutes early, I just sat in my car and listened to some music. Those few minutes seemed to go on forever, not so much because of the anticipation, but because my muse was running late. It seems that while my muse is an excellent source for story ideas, she is not very punctual.

To be fair, there was a marathon being held that day and some of the streets were blocked. Unfortunately for my muse, I am not fair. When she finally showed up, I didn’t hesitate to give her a piece of my mind. Surprisingly, she enjoyed the piece I gave her and politely asked for another. Since she was so nice about it, I couldn’t say no. This was followed by another piece. And yet another. And another. Before too long, my muse had collected my entire brain in a Target shopping bag, which she proudly placed on her lap.

“Smivey,” she said. “Just how much do you want your brain back?”

I just sat there in my car and stared out the windscreen.

“C’mon, what are you willing to pay?”

Silence.

“Smivey! Do you even want your brain? How are you going to write?”

A bit of drool ran down my chin.

“Argh! You are so irritating! Just give me a number!”

Of course, anyone with half a brain would want their mind back. But, well, I didn’t even have a quarter of a brain. This one-way barter session went on for about thirty minutes before my muse picked up the Target bag and smacked me in the head with it. Amusingly, it made a rather pleasant tone, kind of like a xylophone. In fact, I bet if you were to line up a bunch of people with their brains removed and arranged them by cranium size, you’d end up with quite an impressive instrument. That being said, I cannot condone such activity, as it is illegal and immoral. Be sure to ask permission first.

Uh, where was I? Oh right, the brain thing. I was left in my car for days with my brain roasting in a shopping bag on the passenger’s seat. Fortunately, a Target employee finally discovered me when he was taking his robotic cart-gatherer out for an afternoon stroll. He carefully replaced my brain and removed from my wallet what he felt was a fair wage for such an operation. In other words, he took everything, even my library card. Funny thing is, I didn’t even know I had a library card until I started receiving warnings that the entire series of Erotic Adventures of Sleeping Beauty books was past due. For the record, I only have The Claiming of Sleeping Beauty and I never even made it through that one. Sorry, A. N. Roquelaure, but you’re no Anne Rice.

In any case, I have my brain back now and it’s slowly getting back into shape. You’re just going to have to bare with me. I mean, you can’t expect a man who didn’t have a brain for three days to be able to write flawless prose immediately. Come to think of it (because I can do that now), you wouldn’t expect him to be living at all. I’m a fucking walking miracle. So stop complaining about me not updating my blog and start calling your friends and telling them about the medical marvel that is I. . . that I am? In which I am? Hm.

Sorry. Like I said, it’s going to take a while to get this brain back into working condition. But I’m determined. I have a psychologist, a hypnotherapist and a life coach working with me every day. Thanks to them, I can now type over 30 words a minute and I’m capable of carrying on a relatively intelligent conversation with just about anyone. I should be grateful. But my success is somewhat bittersweet.

You see, I found out yesterday that my muse had no intention of leaving Gino for me. In fact, Gino was across the street the entire time recording everything on his Sony HD camcorder. She plans to show the video at her next muse meeting and let all the muses have a good laugh at my expense. Not only that, I hear she’s working on a book about her experience titled Beauty and Brains: Memoirs of a Muse. Oh well. Such is life. Farewell, muse. I wish you much happiness with Gino. Just keep in mind, he may be smarter, cooler, sexier and more talented than I am, but he’ll never be as. . .

I am so fucked.

I won’t even tell you how long I’ve been trying to make this blog entry work. Suffice it to say, more than a week. Anyhow, let’s get this over with.

I’ve spent most of my adult life living in fear: fear of the unknown, fear of rejection, fear of being attacked by an albino clown. You know, nothing unusual. Why am I bringing this up? Well, a friend of mine was recently given an assignment to write an essay about what life would be like if she had no fear — which got me to thinking: What would my life be like without any fear?

Hmmm well, I suppose I would travel more. Not only would I not be afraid of flying, I wouldn’t have any fear of foreign diseases. Oh, and I’d certainly be more successful, since I would be better at public speaking. I suppose I’d go out more often, too. Heck, I might even start dating again. But before I’d do that, I’d have to ask a woman out.

I hear the safest way to ask a woman for a date is for you to refer to it as “hanging out.” It makes it seem less creepy. Like this: “Hey, I think you’re pretty cool. Maybe we could hang out sometime and have sex?” Personally, I think that’s a little too blunt. I’d probably go with something more like this: “Hey, we seem to get along pretty well. Would you be interested in exchanging bodily fluids?” Yeah, I might try that one—if I had no fear.

So after I picked up my date and we went back to my place, I’d tell her that I’d just like to get straight to the sex. But before we had sex, I would do an eight-ball of cocaine and chug down an entire bottle of whiskey. Then I would take out a chef’s knife, lay my hand on the table and proceed to rapidly stab between my fingers. I would then throw the knife up in the air and just let it land where it may. In this case, that would be my right arm—right into the bone. Ouch. A life without fear does not mean a life without pain.

Anyhow, after the sex (no protection, of course), I’d go out and get some sushi—the raw kind, not that pussy California-roll crap. But rather than pay for my sushi, I’d go in the alley behind the restaurant and dig out the stuff they threw out last night. I mean, I know it would make me sick, but I really wouldn’t care, since I had no fear.

After getting very sick on the sushi, I’d eat some more of it, then take off all my clothes and run onto the freeway. Of course, it wouldn’t take long for me to get hit by a car. And if the first one didn’t totally take me out of existence, I’d lie down across the road and watch as cars came rushing at me, never flinching or blinking my eyes.

Yeah, a life without fear might seem like a good idea at first. But when you really think about it, you’re much better off being a wimpy, snivelling coward like me.

See, if I had more fear, I wouldn’t have posted this crappy blog entry. I apologise. It seemed like such a great premise. 

Well, it’s been a very long time since I last posted anything, but it’s not like I haven’t been writing. It’s just that I haven’t written anything that I felt was worthy of appearing on Everything Sucks. Hm. That’s rather ironic, isn’t it? Anyhow, that’s why I’ve created a new category for my less-than-stellar posts. It’s simply called “REJECTED.” It appears in all-caps because I want it to evoke the authority of a big, red rubber stamp: BOOM! REJECTED. OK, that being said, prepare for an onslaught of lousy writing. I can almost hear the people frantically clicking their mice to unsubscribe to my RSS feed. Oh well. It was fun while it lasted.