But it’s Easter Sunday and as you’ve probably figured out by now, I’ll follow Ryan anywhere. If he wants to go to an Easter service, we are going to an Easter worship service. Besides, it will probably make a better meatball chronicle. I’m up at 5:30 AM to drive my parents to the airport. They’ve been visiting for a full week and surprisingly I wouldn’t mind if they stayed just a few hours longer, so that my dad could go to church with Ryan and I could stay home with my mom. My mom says that you don’t need to go to church every Sunday to be a good person. I couldn’t agree more and while the meatball chronicles are quite crude, I can assure you my life outside of them is much more balanced.
Ryan and I had every intention of attending an Easter sunrise service at Curtis Hixon Park overlooking the Hillsborough River
The service started at 10AM and let me tell you, if this place existed in Massachusetts
But the service at Relevant was SO different. I can honestly say I had an amazing time and there was even a complimentary café with coffee, juice, muffins and bagels. While I left believing in nothing greater than the power of the human race, I did find their message embedded in my brain: Be Audacious. Be extremely bold and daring, be recklessly brave. We need to live every day fearless, and take risks, even if that means sacrificing something of your own to help someone in need. For me personally, last year my audacious act was chopping off 13 inches of my hair and giving it to childrens cancer for wigs. While some may think the sacrifice was the actual hair, it wasn't. The sacrifice was a period of lonely months and being mistaken for a lesbian countless times. But I get it; that just isn’t enough. You gotta be more than that...you have to challenge yourself to do more.
I'm positive I didn't walk away with the full message they wanted to convey, but to me being audacious also includes remaining strong to your beliefs, even when others tell you you're wrong. Unfortunately for them, I’m a realist in the purest form. The only supernatural thing I've ever believed in was the curse of the bambino. Oh, I also learned that if you are trying to convey a powerful message, do it with strobe lights, 6 flat screen televisions, two jumbotrons, a violinist, a rock band and a choir of tiny children-- give the people something they can't ignore. While they may not have succeeded in making me one of them, and I still find it extremely humorous to call Easter “Zombie Day, I can truthfully say I’ll be back; I really enjoyed myself.
I'm positive I didn't walk away with the full message they wanted to convey, but to me being audacious also includes remaining strong to your beliefs, even when others tell you you're wrong. Unfortunately for them, I’m a realist in the purest form. The only supernatural thing I've ever believed in was the curse of the bambino. Oh, I also learned that if you are trying to convey a powerful message, do it with strobe lights, 6 flat screen televisions, two jumbotrons, a violinist, a rock band and a choir of tiny children-- give the people something they can't ignore. While they may not have succeeded in making me one of them, and I still find it extremely humorous to call Easter “Zombie Day, I can truthfully say I’ll be back; I really enjoyed myself.
Anyway, while this is all a beautiful revelation on how we need to help others, there's a time and place for that and the present is for meatball chronicles. Don't think for a second that just because I stepped foot in a massive room of believers I’m going to lose my roots. We are now at the Hard Rock Casino dressed to the nines. The smell of pumped oxygen, antibacterial, Brut, a nursing home, and a distant buffet encompass me. The Hard Rock hotel and casino has an establishment called Fresh Harvest, an all you can eat buffet consisting of 7 separate mini-restaurants. It’s is only $20 per person and worth every dollar.
Our waitress is pregnant and although she’s barely showing, her belly button is bothering me. The thought of being pregnant and creating an army of nuggets excites me but I don’t want that weird belly button. Can’t someone invent a flesh colored band-aid with an optical illusion of a normal belly button to just keep that thing under control?
Our waitress is pregnant and although she’s barely showing, her belly button is bothering me. The thought of being pregnant and creating an army of nuggets excites me but I don’t want that weird belly button. Can’t someone invent a flesh colored band-aid with an optical illusion of a normal belly button to just keep that thing under control?
I know this is not your traditional Easter per say but I couldn't wish for anything greater. I love the spontaneity between us and I get a kick out of our non-traditional ways. Ryan is out-eating me. I ravaged the sushi bar and their tiny wonders called “shrimp balls” but as always, Ryan is taking everything to the next level. I watch him get waffles from the breakfast station, and then fried chicken from the “American” station and create a monstrosity of chicken and waffles buried in sausage gravy and syrup. I love him and if he exits this world early by heart attack at least I’ll know we had one hell of a ride. It’s no different than my dermatologist asking me if I want skin cancer. Well no doctor, I don't. But I will tell ya one thing: I’d rather die with a nice bronze complexion than one of a red head.
As Ryan attacks several more stations, I’m left eavesdropping on the couple beside us. The girl has a huge Belgian waffle in front of her and her boyfriend says “So what makes those waffle’s Belgian? Do they speak a different language!?!” That was hilarious guy, really. Frigan hysterical. To my disbelief, she dies laughing. You two asstards are meant for one another.
As Ryan attacks several more stations, I’m left eavesdropping on the couple beside us. The girl has a huge Belgian waffle in front of her and her boyfriend says “So what makes those waffle’s Belgian? Do they speak a different language!?!” That was hilarious guy, really. Frigan hysterical. To my disbelief, she dies laughing. You two asstards are meant for one another.
In just two stomachs, we fit sushi, waffles, stuffed French toast, bacon, bbq ribs, eggrolls, lo main, fried chicken, peel n eat shrimp, raw oysters, smoked salmon, shrimp dumplings, potato wrapped shrimp, shrimp balls, lump crab meat, oscar egg benedict, sausage, chicken marsala, salami, smoked gouda, pistachio cannolis, mini reeses pieces, carrot cake, a chocolate easter egg stuffed with white chocolate mousse and last but not least a macadamia nut chocolate tart. OH and a mimosa and a bloody mary to take the edge off.
Instead of leaving and immediately falling into a food coma, we decided to hit up the slots. It’s a good thing we did because we won $100. Our winnings paid for our gambling fun, our drinks, our food and that nice donation Ryan made to Relevant Church
4 comments:
Mass production, as the term implies, was a creation of the Catholic Church. Mastering the masses through massive guilt redeemable by a weekly Mass have inspired proto-fascists, pro-fascists and post-fascists from The Lord to Henry Ford and beyonder. Stamping out and stomping on deviance, whether appealing to inferiority, superior morality or fear of mortality, creates the malaise (boredom) and dualistically (faux-secretly) provides the cure. That way, when The Order establishes the parameters of Rebellion, the rebel can safely raise hell without moving heaven and earth.
The dualistic ‘opposition’ between romanticism and realism follows the same bandwagon. Romantics celebrate the beauty that the realists claim is illusory or ‘based’ on ugliness. Pontificate and potty-mouth agree to disagree. Nobody gets hurt when dualism remains a strategy of understanding apparent chaos, until some futtbuck starts mouthing off that “it’s all in your head”. At which point very real heads begin to roll.
But reveling in irony and stuffing oneself, one’s partner in crime, and one’s unpleasant feelings of outrage, indignation, and all those underserved boo-boo’s, is great grist for the comedy mill, and I must say you grind it out with a rare talent. Just in case you do eventually bottom out in some twelve-step program where they preach, “Take what you like, and leave the rest”, you might want to just “Take what you like, and leave”. Because when they also preach, “Keep coming”, they ain’t kidding: it’s a damn orgy in there and dissipation is all they’re offering. Realistic as hell, you might say.
The Husband of The Mother of The Man Formerly Known As Ryan: I was not aware that Ryan had changed his name, but I must compliment you on being quite the lyrical gangster. I had to read this, drink my coffee, and then go back and read a second time to fully understand. I think the important message to take away from all of this is that there is a reason we live in this country>>>Because you can be who you want to be and believe in what you want to believe. It’s a beautiful thing. Regardless of church, religion or even political affiliations, every individual is responsible for being a good human…and there is a level of personal sacrifice and helping others associated with that. As for the crude humor, people can take it with a grain of salt.
I can see how it looked like I missed your real message, because I zeroed in on the ‘supernaturalist versus realist’ line in your narrative. I agree that there are ‘redemptive’ qualities in certain strains of Christianity, beyond the body and blood of the God-man curing us of humanness, and cutting us in on the Great Real Estate In The Sky. But my trip the last few years has been noticing how dualism itself seems to be at the root of so much destructive/counter-productive human behavior. Since the very way we think seems oriented toward polar-opposites, “the dialectic”, alienation, whatever, this might seem inevitable. Recently, though, the light bulb came on and I clearly saw that it was a cognitive strategy for INTERPRETING reality that was then being superimposed BACK upon that reality. Life is a multiplicity, not a pyramid of successively absorbed pairs of ‘opponents’.
Despite all the other great stuff you wrote, I guess I couldn’t help preaching my own ‘gospel’. Thanks as always for all you do.
I thoroughly enjoyed this interaction (despite my entirely sarcastic tone at all times, I really mean that).... You're a tough read Sir. As for zeroing in on any one thing, I CLEARLY DO IT ALL THE TIME!! :-D
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