“Don’t fuck with me, you puffy blob of yeast.” Troy gets masculine with a poundcake.

Waiting at night in front of Kinsolving, in the yellowed lamplight glow is one of my fondest, most bittersweet memories.

One wonders how many men share these memories, intersected in space but diverging in time?

A gulf exists between creation and production. The urge to create has no link to the urge to produce, and the urge to produce, need not rely on one’s urges to create.

Publishers are driven to produce the creations of others with no regard for themselves.

I first learned to dance when I was drunk. It involved a girl named Cecily.

I’d never really been one to dance.

Cecily and I were the best of times and the worst of times. When I first saw her, she’d attended a meeting for a group on campus set up explicitly for meeting girls. Our public manifesto clinged to some concept of art, but any artist who claims to not aim to get laid is a fraud.

So, there she was. Young, possessed of some mutant cuteness barely rivalled by my own. My best friend and I made a bet over who would win her, and I won.

It’s no surprise. She and I possess a preternatural comfort with one another. Yet, at the same time, both scared, hurt, and xxx we formed an odd commitment-phobic alliance: default Friday night dating companions. If one had no one better to spend time with on Friday nights, then it was agreed we would hang out by default.

Of course this didn’t stop us from the myriad gropings, drunken cuddlings, and making out that form the hallmark of American youth.

If you cannot speak what you believe, you can never question yourself. If you cannot question yourself, you will never know your truths, and if you do not know your truths, your world will be made of lies. If you cannot question yourself, you can never raise yourself up, and if you cannot raise yourself, you will never touch the stars.