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thecollinhartman-blog · 5 years

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Collin’s Coronavirus Thoughts

Corona Diaries

I know what you are thinking. It is Day 4 of the Quarantine and Social Distancing and Collin has gone so crazy without all the busy-ness of life that he is writing a blog post. And you would be absolutely correct. Like every other millennial twenty-something, I have a lot of really great ideas that haven’t quite come to fruition. By now I thought I would be operating a volleyball facility, or traveling the US in a VW van driving for Uber, or pursuing a PhD program in England while playing volleyball, or coaching a small college team in Southern California.

All this to say I’m a big-time dreamer and a mostly incredibly poor “executer”. I often mistake my busy-ness for full-ness. I have seven unread books on my night stand, I haven’t been grocery shopping in weeks, I never got around to painting the trim in the bathroom my dad and I remodeled, my phone hasn’t been at full charge since November, and there has been an overflow of recycling sitting outside my house from the garbage disposal and mattress I got for Christmas… and now it’s March. Welcome to it, friends.

Let’s start here: I stopped by my parents’ house this week to print something – which I often do because I have a lot of printing needs but haven’t ever purchased a printer. It’s nice because I can print some papers I need AND I can always count on cool ranch Doritos and a Mango Orange Crystal Lite…. that I’ll likely take one sip of, leave on the counter, and finish when I’m there 4 days later.

Anyway, here I am printing in my dad’s office and running late for a meeting (all because I napped for too long). I rush out the door of the house, accidentally leaving one document on the printer, pens and paper everywhere, and a cupboard desk drawer open. A few minutes later, my dad sends me a picture of his office, which was without a doubt entirely put together five minutes prior to me being there. The tone of his text is sarcastic but loving but semi-annoyed which I can handle. I spend six seconds feeling bad about my reckless and disorganized self until Hillsong’s Highlands comes on the radio and I turn it up. I don’t spend time reflecting on things that would make me sad, I’m a 7.

In the midst of my frantic printing and meeting prep, my dad told me he was going to call me “F-5”as my new nickname. By the look on my face, he could tell I was confused as to why. He begins to tell me that tornados are classified in F-0 through F-5 categories, with an F-5 tornado being the wildest in nature. My quick google search defines an F-5 tornado as the most “violent damage, homes lifted off foundation and carried considerable distances, autos thrown as far as 100 meters.” I think what my dad was trying to say is that my general way of life is to rampage my way through different spaces, groups, situations… often times in an assertive, proactive, somewhat wild, chaotic way and then just… leave (I think this how I drive too). Stop go stop go stop go. I go from this thing right on to the next without pause. I show up, jump out of my car, race to wherever I’m supposed to go, be (mostly) present there until BOOM, it’s a Monday evening and I’m in the Eagle gym, shutting off all the lights, gathering volleyballs, turning on the alarm, leaving for Young Life – all in an attempt to get there three minutes before it starts so I can prep items for the game I’m leading ALLLLL before being interrupted in the parking lot by a mom of a U11 kid who is reminding me (probably for the 3rd time) about the t-shirt they ordered and are waiting on. Following? Me neither.

In short �� my life actually is like an F-5 tornado. I run run run from one thing to the next, filling my world to the brim with as much as I possibly can all until I arrive back at my house at 10:30 pm, gas light on, eat whatever I can find in the fridge before my head hits the pillow 4 minutes later, only to set my alarm and do it again.

I’ve been living my life like this for a really long time until…. well until Sunday when we got the news that school is cancelled, which means volleyball activities are all cancelled too, and Young Life gatherings paused and suddenly my wild Monday is WIDE OPEN.

This blog post / journal / diary is my attempt to articulate from my squirrel brain some things I’ve learned about myself in the last 48 hours since this craziness called coronavirus officially stopped my (and probably your) collective world right in their F-5 tornado tracks.

First, let me tell you about my day today paint a picture of how my world feels just a bit (LITERALLY ENTIRELY) different…..

1) I didn’t set an alarm and I woke up at 8:30 am.

2) Shortly after, I went on a quick walk to the nearest coffee shop and ordered a Misto: I am on my journey to black coffee and I just graduated from a latte to this half coffee half milk concoction (with caramel) and I feel accomplished.

3) I stopped by my neighbor friend’s house to say hello.

4) I got home, cleaned a couple things around the house, washed a couple plates in my sink, and went on a bike ride to downtown Boise where I enjoyed a takeout lunch from Whole Foods. I would like to tell you that I rode my bike home, but a friend happened to see me and my girlfriend (she is working remotely from Utah and visiting right now) saw us and somehow realized the journey completely uphill from downtown to my house on the bench might not be all that fun so we piled our bikes in her car and she took us home.

5) I took a 20 minute snoozer.

6) I got up and did some yard work outside, gathering pine needles from underneath my big backyard tree and finally broke down those big boxes that have been sitting outside my house for months and was able to fit them all inside my recycling can.

7) It started to drizzle so I came inside, crawled under a big blanket and read the first couple chapters of Prodigal God by Timothy Keller.

8) Kinslie and I then stopped by the store to pick up some things for dinner and I grilled some steaks and shared a giant salad and some grilled asparagus.

9) After a few girl scout cookies (they stopped by yesterday), we watched the last half of Ellen’s Game of Games and picked a movie on Netflix.

10) Now I’m lying in my (perfectly made) bed (because I had the time to make it) writing all my thoughts down in a word document wondering if I’ll actually post this or if there is really anything of worth that I’m typing. I think there is but not sure yet.

Well, friends of the interwebs, you might be wondering why you just read a detailed list of my day from start to finish. Here’s what I want you to know.

1) Upon arriving at the coffee shop, I had a cheerful silly conversation with the barista about what drink I should order as we laughed about me wanting to eventually enjoy drip coffee. We engaged in authentic dialogue for a few minutes and on the way out I thanked her for the drink recommendation.

2) Before leaving for our bike ride, my tires were flat so we walked them to the gas station and filled up with six quarters before we went on our merry way. I empathized with the Chevron employee as we talked about coronavirus and how it might impact our lives. I wished him well and went on my way.

3) While bikeriding downtown I noticed there are five…. FIVE… different types of massage or spa places between my house and Curtis, which is the next main stop light.

4) At Whole Foods, I asked the clerk their favorite pasta salad as she walked over and told me all about the 2 for $6 deal. I noticed the different textures of the floor and the neatly stacked chairs and how the vegetables were perfectly arranged in their place.

5) While doing yardwork, I stopped and looked at Kinslie as she was raking leaves into a pile. I went over and looked, I mean REALLY LOOKED into her eyes and noticed how the Irish green edges melt into a light sky-ish blue before meeting her pupil. I noticed the way she parted her wavy blonde hair and the way it fell just barely over the sweatshirt she was borrowing of mine. I noticed how thankful I was I had someone to share this day with and even more thankful for her idea to do this yardwork that surely wouldn’t have been started for maybe forever.

6) While reading, I noticed the way the soft sunshine pressed through my semi-open blinds onto my page and made the black ink pop off the page. I contemplated Keller’s words of Pharisees and tax collectors and a story of two sons on their journey of deeper understanding of God’s steadfast love and grace in the midst of their own struggles.

7) While making dinner I couldn’t help but take just a little extra time to delicately cut each cucumber and carrot slice with care as I heard sounds of clattering branches from my cracked window as dusk began to settle in.

8) And while writing this blog post, I can’t help but notice all the things I noticed in my own world for perhaps the first time.

While I can’t be sure what life will look like in a few short days, weeks, or even months, and while I’m not positive what my income will be, and what daily routines or rituals will be impacted, or how our schools and communities will be changed – I can be sure of this: I hope in the midst of my crazy F-5 tornado life that surely will be back in busy routine before I know it – I hope for a couple things.

I hope I can continue notice the little things. To notice the wildly interconnected, perfectly-timed, awe strikingly beautiful, crazy detailed, little details of this world like the way I noticed the lines on the fresh steaks as I pulled them off my garage sale grill.

I hope to breathe deep and see, I mean REALLY see the world around me, to engage in relationship in more authentic and honest ways, to stop for a moment wherever I am to truly connect with the people around me.

I hope to take my time through a home cooked meal, and to not be so filled with anxiousness and fear of the future and unknown that I my eyes are blinded to see the way God is working in and through my (and our) world, possibly even through something like the freaking COVID-19.

While I’m sure there will be more lessons to be learned in the next little while, I challenge you to take a couple moments to really press in and reflect upon the way this Zombie apocalyptic ish tirade is impacting your world. I truly hope in the midst of empty toilet paper shelves and hand sanitizer hoarders there is something beautiful in your world that you’ve noticed, too.

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elfnerdherder · 7 years

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Ill Intentions: Chapter 11

You can read Chapter 11 on Ao3 Here

Check out my Patreon and join the squad! Early updates, character arcs, and whatever else you could desire.

Chapter 11: Character Arcs

The apartment was soon reduced to a chaotic, shambled mess.

A few cups had chipped and shattered as Will decimated the kitchen, and the trash had been overturned in his haste to hunt through the pantry. Towels laid in desolate piles across the hallway, and dresser drawers had been overturned and upended in his haste.

Will sat huddled in the wake of a flipped mattress and abused Wal-Mart sheets, shaking hands grasping a note written in an elegant, beautiful, and furiously familiar hand.

Dear Will,

I am interested to see just how your world turns when you don’t have an electronic device to dictate every aspect of your life. Will it slow to a stop, marked only by a rising and setting sun, or will you retaliate in a blind fury, unable to stop the quickness of your pulse?

I’m eager to see the messages and reminders you have programmed to light up on this screen. The battery life on these, I’m told, are incredible.

-Chesapeake Ripper

He could hear his voice in those words. Will reread it enough times that it began to echo in his mind, frantic and furious with the all-knowing arrogance of it. The bastard had even put it in the sock drawer, where a familiar and not entirely welcome knife once lay.

“No,” he murmured, and he felt himself rocking a bit, side-to-side to try and ground himself rather than start screaming. “No, no, no, no…”

He set the note down on a pile of disheveled shirts, and he let out a croaking gasp. He had the urge to scream, to yell. He had the urge to pace, bellow, to rage, and he contained it all within himself as he started tapping his fingers on the ground, the sound hard and punctuated with the beat of his pulse.

His phone rang, and Will snatched it up from among a spilled glass of water and the remnants of a dead plant that’d fallen from the windowsill. He’d have to sweep it up later, along with the rest of his things he’d reduced to shards in his furious haste.

“Hello?” he asked. It was breathy, needing –God, why did he have to sound so hopeful that it was the Ripper, there to gloat then inevitably return his watch?

“Where the hell are you?” Beverly hissed. “You’d better be in a hospital –you’re not in a hospital, are you?”

Fuck.

“I’m…not feeling well, Beverly,” Will said hollowly. “I don’t think I should come in today.”

“Seriously? Haven’t you seen the news?”

“Is that a joke?”

“Dead serious, if you’re not on your way here, you’d better turn the news on. Work is hell right now, hell, and there are cops, feds…shit, other news vans…”

Will managed to drag himself to his feet where he made his way to the living room. The TV had been shoved to the side so violently that it teetered on the end of the stand. He nudged it to safety and sat down in front of it, skimming through channels until he could find the local news. Teeth gnashed against his bottom lip, breaking skin. His wrist felt bare, far too light.

“…and here now we’re standing just in front of Tattler News where you can see beyond the police line the body of a young man that authorities are now recognizing as Harrison Nolan, an up-and-coming member of the Baltimore Symphony. This is reminiscent of the recent murder of another young musician, Billy Nguyen who was found on the stage of the Baltimore Symphony with the neck of a cello placed down the victim’s throat.”

Will’s heart plummeted to a sickening squelch in his guts.

“Although partitions and canvases are being placed to block the view of onlookers, you can still see the victim has been found much the same way as before. Is this a promise of something more to come? Is there another serial killer in the midst of the DC area, looking to upstage the Ripper? Has the Ripper’s correspondence with Tattler News reduced him to something ‘mainstream’?”

“Shit,” Will murmured. In the distance, just beyond the reporter’s shoulder, he could barely make out a man slumped into a simple-backed chair, head tilted back to give way for the neck of a cello that burst from his mouth.

“Do you think it’s the Ripper?” Beverly asked. It took far too long for him to focus on her voice rather than the image before him. It cut back to the woman, and he blinked rapidly, dispelling it from his retinas.

“No, he…”

He’s playing a different game.

“This isn’t his style,” he said instead, quietly. “I think this is someone else that wants to be in the column.”

“Charlie’s asking where you are. What the hell do you want me to tell him?”

That took Will far too long to answer as well. The image in front of him cut to the crime scene from before, when the first body had been found on stage. He stared at it for several moments, mouth dry, wondering at the still image of the neck of the cello sprouting from a gaping mouth as though it were coming to full bloom.

“Will?”

He gave a start and looked away from the image. As it cut back to the woman’s white noise of fear-mongering, he shut off the TV and rubbed his face, resolute.

“I’ll be there in a bit…I have to get ready. My alarm didn’t go off.”

“Seriously?” Beverly bit out a snort. “Better have a better excuse than that when you get here. He’s pissed.”

Will hung up and sat on the floor of his apartment for several more minutes before he could pull himself to his feet. The skin on his wrist felt odd, and he itched it as he gathered together a suitable outfit and choked down a cup of coffee.

It wasn’t until halfway to work that he realized he’d forgotten to grab his water bottle. He thought about going back, but traffic was such that it’d be an entirely new ordeal altogether that he wasn’t precisely prepared for. He’d have to rely on work coolers, then.

He almost missed his stop on the bus, and he only realized it was there when the old woman beside him shoved and nudged him far enough away for her to walk out. He gave a start at the realization of where he was at, and he followed after her, an uncomfortable prickle down his neck.

“You’re not following me, are you?” the old woman asked.

He looked away from the distant street corner he would turn at and stared at her for an uncomfortably long amount of time.

“Because if you are, I’ve got mace. I’ll mace yeh,” she informed him.

“I’m going to work.”

She eyed him with extreme prejudice –likely his wrinkled shirt. His hair, too, he supposed, seeing as how he was now just realizing that he’d forgotten to brush it. It was quite the contrast to her own perfectly ironed shirt tucked into pants hiked up high at her hips –remnants of the good old days when gas was only twenty-five cents a gallon and a milkshake was a nickel. He likely looked the type to try and pickpocket someone, in her eyes. A mildly desperate expression, right hand twitching towards his left like he could find his watch there if he just fucking tried hard enough.

Oh, god. His watch. His fucking watch.

“Alright, then. Be quick about it.”

“Alright,” he said, and he took a dramatic step around her before he hurried on his way. He pitied the idiot that decided to try and mug someone like her –that pity faded as he figured they’d likely deserve it if they cased someone like that out and thought she’d be an easy target.

He had to fight through the crowd to get to the front, and more than a few elbows nestled into his gut as he skirted around them all. Their breaths and BO clung to him, and when he reached the front he nearly bowled over an officer that stepped just before him to stop him.

“I work here, this is-”

“ID, please,” the man said.

Will fished out his wallet and handed over his license, eyes scanning for Beverly. A cluster of news vehicles cramped up the public parking, and cameras were wildly swinging across the crowd, then towards the partitions that blocked the view of the body.

“No, your badge for the press,” he said impatiently.

“Yeah,” Will snapped impatiently, “it’s-”

Right here, he finished mentally, although the words didn’t come. His hand pressed to the place on his chest where his lanyard would hang, if he had it.

If he’d fucking remembered it from home.

“Behind the line, then,” the officer decided. Will could almost smell his smug superiority as he sauntered away to push back a few people testing the line, and the urge to lunge out at him coiled, ready to spring. It was a sudden wave of emotion, hot and volcanic in its fury, and it surprised him as he stood, puzzled beside a chatty millennial that was glued to her phone.

“Yeah, I can’t get inside to work because of this freak show, and my boss is going to kill me if I…”

Her words faded, though, as he struggled to turn the sudden emotions about in his hands, wrestle them into something manageable. The officer was just doing his job, Will decided. He was just doing his job, and anyone that wanted a closer look at a dead body would say whatever they could if it meant that they could get just close enough to maybe poke it with a stick once or twice. Stephen King had made a novel about something much like that –a group of boys that poked a dead body with a stick.

Serial killers must be Stephen King’s muse, too.

It took far too long for him to turn his feelings into something logical. Half of him longed to rush after the man, grab him, and snap his neck. The other half turned the idea about of him just staying home for the day. He could turn around and just go home, lock himself in his bedroom with a fifth of Jack and call it a fucking day.

“I’d say something, but honestly anything revolving around you is hard to be surprised by anymore.”

Jack Crawford’s voice listed across the foggy aspects of his thoughts, turned about as they were with the feeling of what the officer’s pulse would feel like in his palm as he squeezed. Will blinked once, then rapidly; he clung to the sound of professional weariness, and he looked up from his shoe in order make some sort of paltry eye contact with Jack. He swallowed heavily and wished that he’d remembered a water bottle. It’d sat in the back of his cabinets for so long that it’d collected dust, but now that he’d found it…

Something else to blame the Chesapeake Ripper for, then. His water would taste like the sun-abused shit in Charlie’s office by the time he got home.

“I forgot my press badge,” he said.

“…Come on,” Jack grunted, and he lifted the tape for Will.

As they passed by the officer who was busy answering questions to an irate woman, Will ensured that he made eye contact of a sort with the man. A smug, self-satisfied smile crept across his lips, and it twisted to a sneer as the cop realized just who it was he’d held back from entering. He glanced from Will to Jack, then back to Will; that Will Graham, he was fast realizing. That God damn, Will Graham.

“One of yours said that I should haul you in for questioning on this one,” Jack said as they ascended the steps.

“Todd from Marketing?”

“Yeah, I think name was Todd.”

Todd has a cocaine problem, he wanted to say. How about you go and grab the squealer’s stash before you bring me in for this?

It wasn’t the time, though, to throw Todd under the bus. He may need him for more paper analysis or something else mundane and detailed that he didn’t want to do, consumed as he was with his work.

“Todd hates marketing,” he said instead. “And me.”

“I supposed that if you were to start your own killing spree, you wouldn’t put the body on your front doorstep,” Jack assured him. “You seem a little too smart for that.”

There was that. As they skirted the partitions and Will got a full view of the body without the trouble of distance from a news station, he felt something much akin to relief that Jack didn’t find him entirely capable of this.

“…This wouldn’t be my design,” he murmured.

“Thank God for that,” Jack replied.

“This the kind of thing your boss had in mind when he started ‘Will Intentions’?” A guy asked, head popping up from around the body. It wasn’t Jimmy, and that minor change shook him down to his core, made words dry up in his mouth because first the watch, then his water, then his badge, and who in the world was this son-of-a-bitch? Why was everything suddenly changing?

“This isn’t good press,” Jack said.

“Any press is good press,” Will managed hoarsely. “That’s news for you.”

“Well this guy was pressed for time,” the man said, and he stood up. His mouth was obscured by a cloth mask, although unruly, curly dark hair poked up from a headpiece of the same material. A kind attempt at not contaminating the crime scene. “He’s fresher than the last one. The killer probably didn’t want it stinking up anything.”

“The last one?”

“Found in Baltimore just two weeks ago –Billy Nguyen.” The man eyed Will much the same way that the old woman had, as though he could see Will’s worth beneath his plaid button-up and found him wanting.

“You don’t think they’re from the Chesapeake Ripper, do you?” Will asked Jack.

“It’s on your doorstep,” the man interjected. Will ignored him.

“I didn’t at first, but unless you’ve got more crazies climbing out of the woodwork for you, I think it’s highly likely,” Jack said. “Unless you’ve got another idea?”

Will had several ideas, but none of them sounded stable enough to share. He frowned and glanced back to the body.

“Could I…” he looked to Jack, then back to the body. Could he see? Could he look at this the same way he stared at Mary Mai and see?

Jack stared at him, and Will had an uneasy ripple down his spine at the feeling that maybe, just maybe, Jack could see, too.

“Brian,” Jack said, and something on his face made Will’s stomach flop. “If you’ll step out of here with me for a minute.”

“Jack,” Brian needled.

“Come on.”

The apparent Brian didn’t enjoy being shifted from his work, and it showed in his face. The incredulous expression twisted, then cracked somewhat as he gave Will the most accusing and understanding expression of disdain that he’d ever witnessed. He skirted the body and Will, then stalked from the tent with the beginnings of his rant starting with, “Jack, seriously, a civilian…?”

Will ignored it, though. His fingers reached for the watch on his wrist that he knew wouldn’t be there, and he sighed.

The body was older than a few days; it didn’t reek so much of decay as it did chemicals. Will circled it, studying the way that the wooden neck of the cello burst from his mouth, lips curled to reveal the artistry beneath. If he’d been wearing gloves, he’d have taken fingers to it, caressed it as he wondered at its purpose –

-No, no, the purpose was obvious, wasn’t it? The musician wanted to play. This was his magnum opus.

The throat was open, peeled back with efficiency, although there was a bit of classic showmanship in the way that it was pinned in place with pearl-tipped pins. The white, bleached strings at his throat turned out to be vocal chords, though in truth Will only recognized it by the thickness of them –normally they weren’t so white, were they? No, no…no. Blood had dripped onto the suit, speckled bits of red like burst holly on freshly fallen snow. The cold, even within the partitions, was biting. It was going to snow, soon. It was going to snow, and the Chesapeake Ripper had his fucking watch.

“You wanted to play him,” Will murmured, and it made so much sense. His throat was dry, and he swallowed, imagining the sort of music that would burst from someone like this, become from someone like this. He took a musician, and he made his very skin, his very bones into an instrument to play for the masses. A true arrogance, to take one so talented and make him your own toy to play at your leisure. He wondered what sort of thoughts pervaded the mind of someone that wondered the notes they could draw forth from the neck of the dead.

Nothing tasty, surely.

Will closed his eyes, and there was a flash of light that turned his lids pink –likely a reporter in the distance trying to get a good photo. He inhaled, and the taste was on his tongue, the scent of whatever had bleached his vocal chords stung his nose, and just in the distance, Will swore that he could hear the sort of music that would make tears come to even the hardiest of men’s eyes.

It would be mellow –something along the D-string, fingers fretting over the vibrato. Will swayed to the sound of it, the crooning lilt that made his bones vibrate, and he imagined the care it must have taken to lay him out so kindly, to share such art with the world –

-Art? Surely, in this man’s eyes, it was art. But for Will, too?

“Will?”

It wasn’t his name that pulled him from the sound, the sensation that sent goosebumps along his arms. It was more the tone, he supposed, and how it didn’t mesh in the least with F-Harmonic notes that settled deep like the ache of overworked muscles. He looked to the entrance of the tent where Jack was busy observing him, and he supposed that out of any time to be caught not quite ‘all there’ this wasn’t a good one.

“This isn’t an act of anger,” he said, and he cleared his throat to relieve the hoarseness from it. “Not at all.”

“He isn’t punishing the musician?” Jack snorted. “Seems like jealousy to me.”

“No, no, it’s –” Will scowled and rubbed at his mouth, swallowing down a foul word “–elevation, Jack, he’s…elevating them. They’re probably good musicians, aren’t they? First chairs, second chairs…he’s taking them, and he’s making them more. He’s making their music something that comes from within, something…”

He clenched at the air, grasping for the words that didn’t want to come easily. Jack stood by the entryway, patiently impatient as he waited.

“He’s… making them more than what they are,” Will finished lamely. “Taking the core of what brings their happiness, and taking that art and passion and ingraining it into their skin. That’s what he’s doing.”

Jack nodded and looked to the man, mulling a few thoughts around his head as he thought. It left Will feeling anxious. His watch didn’t buzz to tell him that he’d better take a walk through the office –is that what he’d be doing right now? He made a move to check the time, then hissed out a curse when he realized once more that it wasn’t fucking there.

“His intestines are missing,” Jack revealed. “Are you sure this isn’t the Chesapeake Ripper, Will?”

“Yeah, Jack, this…this is different. The Chesapeake Ripper isn’t so much a man succumbing to intrusive thoughts –this feels intrusive. Thoughts that pervade the mind until…” He gestured lamely to the corpse. The cello. The art. “And I’d say it’s here because he probably wants his name in the column, too.”

“Are you going to give him that satisfaction?”

“…No. One too many psychos, I think.”

“One too many psychos,” Jack echoed.

He was let go after he sighed a few things, and he headed into the office with an odd, lingering sound just at the edge of his hearing, like the haunting vibrato of a cello’s wavering song.

He tried to banish it, shove it to the far back of his mind where it could lay to rot and wither like his other tasteless thoughts, but there seemed to be a genuine lack of control. His thoughts leapt with short, electric burst, rapid sensations like the quick blinks of his eyelids, watering at the gust of AC that hit him as he walked by the lobby desk: the cop, the watch, the music, the throat, the cello, the need, the violence, the fury, the feel of the Ripper’s blade against his stomach, the putrid muck that fed through his veins like a poison because it’s no wonder you can relate to someone like this, considering your own tasteless, horrendous penchant for violence.

“Will, there you are –come on; are you coming?”

It wasn’t Beverly that yanked him unceremoniously from his thoughts, but Freddie. Just inside the elevator, she swung a checkered arm out to hold the door for him.

“Charlie is having a field day, you know,” she said as he stepped into the elevator. It chimed shut and shuddered before lifting. “Where the hell were you?”

“…I lost my watch,” he said. It sounded far more blank than morose, an odd feeling attached to it –confusion and disbelief rather than anger.

“Your watch?”

“It wakes me up in the morning,” he explained. “I don’t know where I left it.”

Freddie eyed him with extreme prejudice. It was reminiscent of the woman on the bus and Bryan poised beside the corpse, and it made a trickle of anger slither up his throat and lodge itself just at the back of his mouth. He had to resist the urge to spit it out at her.

“That out there him?” she asked.

“No. Someone else, someone…”

Someone that really shouldn’t be my problem right now.

Freddie laughed, sparing him the elongated, pregnant pause. “Wow, Graham, you’re really shook up. Did your grandma buy you that watch or something?”

The elevator dinged onto their floor.

“I never knew my grandma.”

“Okay.” She gave him another sidelong stare. “Just letting you know, Charlie’s-”

“Pissed, I’m late, there’s a dead guy on the steps outside, my watch is gone, and-”

“-waiting for you in the conference room,” Freddie finished. “Someone else is there to see you.”

That stopped him. Will turned towards the conference room rather than Charlie’s office, and he spared Freddie a confused, uncomfortable look.

“Yeah, someone’s in there to see you,” she said, and her mouth of secrets twisted into something akin to a smile. “See, not all bad.”

Not all bad, she said. Could still be somewhat bad, somewhat…

Just who in the hell would want to see him?

“I’ll go see to that, then,” he said distractedly, and he headed towards the conference room.

“Thank you,” Freddie prompted.

“You’re welcome,” Will replied.

He didn’t hesitate by the door because that would be cliché –Will Graham wasn’t much a person for such things as that. Instead, he walked right in with his shoulders hunched, his messenger bag digging into his collarbone, and his tie bunched up, half-hanging out of his coat –this he only realized when he saw a faint, faded reflection of himself in the windowpane across from him. He stared at that image of himself: glasses crooked, clothing rumpled, hands bunched to fists in his pockets. His reflection was more of the person that he generally tried to present at Tattler news; something innocent to be trusted and left well enough alone. He wondered how his colleagues would have described him, hunched over their keyboards with the pressure of deadlines on their back.

Something much like that reflection, he supposed. Nothing at all like the reality of himself. Nothing at all like what the Chesapeake Ripper was trying so desperately to reveal to the world.

“Will,” Charlie grunted. He stood from his chair at the head of the table, and the look he gave Will could have melted steel beams. “Glad you could make it.”

“…Rough morning,” Will managed after a beat. “Sorry,” he tacked on hastily.

“Well, you’re here. So is your guest.” Charlie gestured off to the side, although the look on his face barely softened. “I’ll leave you to it.”

Whatever lecture Will had been expecting wasn’t to happen, it seemed. Charlie excused himself from the room, nudging and shoving past Will who hadn’t managed to leave the doorway. Fight or flight instinct, he supposed. He needed an exit close.

It took too long for him to see her there, hunched back towards the small AV station where the TV and work videos rested, collecting dust. She was a thin, slight girl with classically straight brunette hair and pale skin found in most rural, mid-American homes. She turned to look at him only after Charlie had left, and although her clothes were plain, they seemed to be a sturdy, expensive make.

“Hello, Mr. Graham,” she said, and despite the watery, uncertain stance, her voice came out strong and sound. “It’s nice to finally meet you.”

“Who are you?”

She smiled. “I didn’t expect you to recognize me, although I recognized you immediately. My name is Abigail Hobbs.”

A special, lovely thanks to my Patrons: Emily Elm, Matilda, Starlit-Catastrophe, Sylarana, Heather Feather, Frosty Lee, Duhaunt6, and Superlurk! You’re the best!

#LiaS scribbles #ill intentions #hannibal #hannibal au #hannibal fanfic #hannigram #slowburn hannigram #journalist!will #someone help will graham #find his god damn watch

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willandandy · 7 years

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Father John Misty - Pure Comedy by Will

Father John Misty – Pure Comedy

Hello my name is Will Stubbs and I love music. I feel that music is the best medium for creativity, and the best standard of communication on earth. People can explore new ideas and emotions with the help of music. I am here to talk about music that interests me and maybe start a great conversation. Thanks for reading and remember to love music forever.

“Without music, life would be a mistake.” -- Friedrich Nietzsche

Before I start the review I want to apologize for the lack of content. I am trying to figure out how I want this blog to work. As of now I want to post a review every two weeks. I have a lot of things planned for this, but the motivation and time are sort of lacking. I don’t want to make excuses for myself. Another thing I want to mention is that for this review, I want to put my top songs, but I don’t want to put them in order of how much I like them. I don’t know if I will keep that format, but I think I want to change that. Let’s get into this review.

Josh Tillman is an indie rock singer/songwriter. I have been a fan of his other projects, one including Fleet Foxes (one of my favorite bands ever). He has been involved in many projects in the northwest. He has had many high profile credits as of late, with some including Lady Gaga and Kid Cudi. While hesitant, I was a huge fan of Fear Fun and I Love You, Honeybear.

Now I did really enjoy this record, I am having a hard time fully fleshing out the music. This record is a lot of what we expect with Father John Misty. A lot of folksy guitar, or slow piano ballads. Josh’s vocals give a lot of personality as usual. This album seems to be focused on lyrics. This album is social commentary at its finest. I truly enjoy the quiet poeticism of this record. Josh is completely criticizing modern pop culture while being completely self aware. While I think he may come off as pretentious, I think that he used this album as a tool to distract himself of all the stupid and disgusting things that humanity is capable of. The best way to distract yourself is to laugh. That’s where pure comedy comes from.

Now right off the bat the lyrics I am going to share are a bit longer than I normally would but the whole thing is required for the context of the conversation. In the title track to this record, Josh Tillman starts off the song by saying

“The comedy of man starts like this

Our brains are way too big for our mothers' hips

And so Nature, she divines this alternative

We emerged half-formed and hope that whoever greets us on the other end

Is kind enough to fill us in

And, babies, that's pretty much how it's been ever since”

This sets up a depressing narrative. I think it speaks a lot to the problems of our species. We are kind of brought into this world and have to win the lottery of emotionally stable, and intelligent parent(s). The rest of the song follows this cynical approach. We have to laugh at all the cruel and depressing details about our species such as religion, health, languages, and other putrid horrible topics. As far as the sound goes, this song is great. Its grandiose fits the human nature concept. It’s grandstanding and exaggerated just like the lyrics indicate. It almost feels like the setup for a movie about the beginning of man.

The next song “Total Entertainment Forever” seems to take the same cynical approach, but is directed towards pop culture. I take the lyrics to be a criticism at our need for constant simulation. We don’t have any real experiences because we are always looking for the next inevitable thing. He has a great way of contrasting deep and cynical lyrics but with such a happy sound. Maybe that’s where the comedy is extenuated.

As the record continues, I realized that the songs all seem to be thematic. While Josh is always criticizing the ideas within society and humanity, he is very specific. In the following song "Things It Would Have Been Helpful to Know before the Revolution" he takes jabs at government and financial structure of our society. He points out the way we are allowed to use this planet like a resource as opposed to a home. In this song I also realizes that many of the songs sound the same. Now I know that is silly to say so let me explain. The way he sets up the band is perfect in each song. The songs feel like chapters in a book. While they shift the mood, the set each other up so well. The songs all have the same elements of the acoustic guitar and the piano. The subtle drums, and often string instruments are foreshadowed and subtle.

The next song “Ballad of a Dying Man” is a jab and modern culture stereotypes such as hipsters, homophobes, etc. With the dying man, I would say it’s a thought experiment. If I were to die tomorrow, would I think that life was all for nothing. Are we superficial and jaded towards the world? We only care about followers and tweets.

The song “Birdie” seems to be a criticism of politics. And the false assumptions and stereotypes built around the parties. I wonder if the birdie analogy is maybe a backlash of the special snowflake criticism. I may be reaching, but I thought it was an interesting thought. It’s even funny thinking about how soft and sweet the song is to go along with this idea.

While the song “Leaving La” felt nauseatingly long, it had the most to say. I know that is an obvious observation, but I wanted to point my frustration. I love the detail he goes into with criticizing the la mentality. Josh seems frustrated with the idea of how vapid and self-centered La can be. He explains his dissatisfaction with the town. I know I may be reading the title too literally, but I think that it sets up the narrative well. It has so many stupid and shallow ideas that exits in our society. Like followers, gods, celebrities, social justice, and so many others. I think that this song, he seems the most self-aware. The lines “Mara taunts me 'neath the tree

She's like, "Oh great, that's just what we all need

Another white guy in 2017

Who takes himself so goddamn seriously."

She's not far off, the strange thing is” seems to point out the silly hypocrisy within himself.

The next song ”A Bigger Paper Bag” seems to talk about the idea of capitalism and greed. We always want a bigger paper bag. It’s simple and slow, but unique and great in the way it presents the material.

I think the next song "When the God of Love Returns There'll Be Hell to Pay" brings up an interesting thought experiment. The thought that if the Judeo-Christian God returned, what would he think about the state of the world. I enjoy that Josh brings up the hypocrisy that God would ultimately be partially responsible for his failings. The music in this is hilarious given the lyrical context. It’s very spacious, somber, and godly like gospel. It ironic in the best way possible.

The song “Smoochie” feels like a chapter on mental illness. It’s not particularly funny unless you have an alternative sense of humor. It seems to maybe be a turning point in this story. In the context of the full album, this song fits the least. The music is fine, but the content is confusing and misplaced.

The next song "Two Wildly Different Perspectives" on the surface seems to focus on politics. Josh criticizes both sides of the political spectrum as being mostly destructive and hypocritical. I think that he takes these jabs because we are in the internet age, but just as uninformed as ever. Maybe not misinformed necessarily, but equally as stubborn and illogical.

“The Memo” is hilariously absurd. I think it’s another criticism of social media. He seems to hate how vapid and narcissistic we all are. The first line sets up a horrible thought experiment of taking a blanket from an amputee just to use it to make some pretentious modern art. I think this whole song may subtly take jabs at millennials, or more specifically his fans. He even throws in the computer voice that says stupid vapid things like this guy just gets me, and music is my life. I had to look at myself and laugh at this one.

Yet again, the next song "So I'm Growing Old on Magic Mountain" is absurdly long. The pace is long and slow. But this song seems to be the wind down of this journey. He refers to this magic mountain as if it’s a place. I think it’s a metaphor for either altering your consciousness (drugs, liquor, etc.). He seems to be relishing on his younger years when he could just have fun and party, but now that he is done he realizes how miserable that life is. That’s why he has to laugh. He wants to have fun and be young, but now he is old and miserable. The ending is beautiful and easy to get lost. Maybe it signifies the idea of the magic mountain.

The last song "In Twenty Years or So" Josh says that in twenty years or so the floating rock that we live on will die. The human experiment will die and nothing will matter. So maybe now that he is done with Magic Mountain, he can look at the world and think that nothing matters. We will all die in a violent end anyway so why not enjoy ourselves. Let’s all have a laugh at this funny world we live in. this song is the most complex with the way it’s composed. It almost reminds me of a far more depressing version of Space Oddity by David Bowie. It’s looking at the world as if though you are not there. It’s ethereal and surreal at one point, but then very poignant and precise at another. I love this song completely.

I think that you guys can tell by the length and detail that I enjoy this album. It took me a few listens and reading the lyrics to understand why I liked it. I think I went in biased because I am so fond of Father John Misty’s other projects so at first I didn’t like it. It definitely grew on me and resonated with me in a very tangible way. If you are a fan of introspective music, or indie/folk music, give this a few listens.

Rating: 8/10

Top Songs:

In Twenty Years or So

The Memo

Ballad of a Dying Man

Pure Comedy

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hollywoodjuliorivas · 8 years

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Oh, those smooth-talking, self-congratulating white liberals. Listen to them moon over Barack Obama. Look at how widely they open their arms to a black visitor. Don’t be duped. They’re wolves in L. L. Bean clothing. There’s danger under the fleece. That’s a principal theme in the most surprising movie hit of the year so far, “Get Out,” whose box office haul in America crossed the $100 million mark last weekend. Heck, that’s the premise. The black protagonist heads with his white girlfriend from an apartment in the city to a house in the woods, where he’s gushingly welcomed by her parents. But their retreat is no colorblind Walden, not if you peek into the basement. I won’t say what’s down there. I don’t want to spoil the fun or sully the chill. Besides, I’m less fascinated by the movie’s horrors than by its reception. The most ardent fans of “Get Out,” many of them millennials, don’t just recommend it. They urge it, framing it as a “woke” tribe’s message to the slumbering masses, a parable of the hypocrisy that white America harbors and the fear with which black Americans move through it. Photo Daniel Kaluuya as Chris in “Get Out.” Credit Justin Lubin/Universal Pictures The enthusiasm for the movie says a whole lot about how one group of Americans views the other, and it underscores the distance between them. I’m tempted to call “Get Out” a movie for the age of Trump, perhaps the movie for the age of Trump. For his opponents, it has the right timbre of foreboding. For his supporters, it brims with what they surely see as lefty paranoia. If anything ever cried out for a Frank Luntz focus group, it’s “Get Out.” I’ll bring popcorn along with my tape recorder. Continue reading the main story Advertisement Continue reading the main story But the movie’s African-American writer and director, Jordan Peele, conceived and began developing it well before the possibility of a Donald Trump presidency came into focus. He wasn’t responding to stark examples of racism like that infamous tweet last week in which Representative Steve King, the Iowa Republican, warned against trying to “restore our civilization with somebody else’s babies.” He wasn’t reflecting the fresh currency of the phrases “white nationalism” and “white supremacy.” He was moved by the myth that, with Obama’s election, we were entering some postracial era. No small number of liberals bought into that, and “Get Out” is an all-out assault on their complacency, a bloody mockery of it. Photo Jordan Peele, the writer and director of “Get Out,” on set during filming. Credit Justin Lubin/Universal Pictures “Obama was elected and all of a sudden we weren’t addressing race or there was this feeling like, if we stop talking about it, it will go away,” Peele told National Public Radio’s Terry Gross during an appearance on her program, “Fresh Air,” last week. He added that he was concerned about “a denial of the reality of the African-American experience and the horrors” attached to it. “Get Out” is being categorized as a horror movie, though Peele prefers the neologism “social thriller,” and it’s more eerie than violent, with superb pacing that critics are rightly praising. It’s also a reminder that the best horror movies are intensely topical, putting a fantastical, grotesque spin on the tensions of their times. I could subject you to my whole long riff on Vatican II and “The Exorcist.” (Don’t worry: I won’t.) I could link abortion to “Rosemary’s Baby,” women’s liberation to “The Stepford Wives” and Black Lives Matter to “Get Out,” in which black lives matter to the main white characters in only a ghoulish fashion. The ingeniously plotted details of “Get Out” — not just what’s in the movie, but what’s left out — gather and distill complaints that black activists, writers and intellectuals have brought to the fore over recent years: the objectification and violation of black bodies; white people’s appropriation of black culture; the trope of the white savior. Photo Daniel Kaluuya as Chris and Allison Williams as Rose in the film. Credit Justin Lubin/Universal Pictures “Get Out” has proved to be unusually rich fodder for commentary, a Rorschach test in which shadows and strands of the past and present are visible. It “perfectly captures the terrifying truth about white women,” according to the title of an essay in Cosmopolitan by Kendra James, who wrote, “American history is littered with the bodies of black men jailed, beaten and killed due to the simple words of white women.” ADVERTISEMENT Continue reading the main story An article in The Atlantic theorized that the crucial role of photography in the movie may evoke “how important camera phones and video recordings have been for many African-Americans experiencing police violence.” An article in Vox pondered the “benevolent racism” of “Get Out,” while one in The Muse observed: “The real horror, exemplified many times over, is the weapon of white privilege and pretense.” A BuzzFeed list of “22 secrets” hidden in the movie even noted that Froot Loops cereal in one scene could be symbolic of miscegenation. But to understand fully the feelings that “Get Out” stirs up and the chord it strikes, you have to turn to social media. A typical Twitter post: “What if the blind man in #getout represents white people who claim ‘not to see color’ but still end up contributing to oppression and racism.” It was retweeted more than 1,000 times and liked more than 1,700. Photo Bradley Whitford as Dean and Catherine Keener as Missy in “Get Out.” Credit Justin Lubin/Universal Pictures Kellik Dawson, an 18-year-old freshman at Ithaca College, wrote on Facebook that the “catharsis of watching that black man” fight back against white oppressors “saved my life.” I swapped emails with Dawson, who is black, on Friday, when he told me that he’d seen the movie twice and would probably buy it as soon as it’s available on DVD. He said that “Get Out” meant so much to him because it “shows the dangers of racism from white liberals” and because white audiences were embracing it even though “it rejected the oldest horror movie formula of the black person dying first.” That white audience is a notably young one: Exit polls revealed that nearly half of all the people who saw “Get Out” when it opened on the last weekend in February were under the age of 25. Data from the survey organization CinemaScore suggested that this group of moviegoers was especially taken with “Get Out” — they gave it an average rating of A+. Moviegoers of all ages awarded it an A-, which is still well above the norm for the horror genre. 491 COMMENTS Peele, who is half the TV comedy sketch duo “Key & Peele,” has set a precedent with “Get Out,” becoming the first black writer-director whose debut movie hit that $100 million mark. ADVERTISEMENT Continue reading the main story He’s in fact biracial — his mother is white — and he’s married to a white woman. His biography bridges the racial divide, a territory that apparently seethes with more misunderstandings and greater malice than most Americans care to admit. Just check out the basement. I invite you to follow me on Twitter (@FrankBruni) and join me on Facebook. Follow The New York Times Opinion section on Facebook and Twitter (@NYTopinion), and sign up for the Opinion Today newsletter. A version of this op-ed appears in print on March 19, 2017, on Page SR3 of the New York edition with the headline: The Horror of Smug Liberals. Today's Paper|Subscribe Continue reading the main story

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