Settling in Misery

I've been a transient most of my life, bouncing from town to town with whatever belongings would fit in the backseat of my car. It's nothing short of a Hobo's life, which isn't for most folk, not even the crazies. Jumping from train to train, always feeling drawn to leave, yet only shortly satisfied once you do. It's a curse of some sort, that monkey on your back that never stops chattering. The only way to quiet the bastard is to jump back on, heading to places never charted. It's a painful jump, leaving friends and places alike. Some of us never have a choice, it's just part of who we are, what we're compelled to do. Our move to Misery was certainly one of those jumps.

We left much behind, as do all hobos who jump the train. This time it was more than big screen TVs and worn furniture. This time we left a friend in the hospital on life support; she died six weeks later. That makes life in Misery just a bit more miserable. It makes you question why you keep jumping from city to city, why you keep testing the elasticity of life, that string of seemingly endless yarn. These jumps only get tougher, the pain burrows beneath the tissue and bone and aches the soul. To survive you need a team of psychiatrists and chiropractors on call 24/7, but there's no capital in our simple budget for those kind of luxuries, nor time. We settle in quickly and adjust, or die. It's that simple. But this is our crux that we so choose to bare; if not by choice, then some magical prankster in the sky.

And if you think that's tough, then multiply that grim thought by a thousand, square it twice, throw it in a hat and wave a magic wand over it – you'll be lucky to pull out something that vaguely resembles a newspaper in one month. More than likely, you'll pull out a bunny with a broken calculator hanging from its ass. That's setting in with two publications in hand!

Perhaps I'm stretching this yarn a bit too tight, this tale of life. It's not the tale that I'm stretching, though, it's life itself. Perhaps that's why I've always stretched it, testing the very fabric of my mortality, my simple existence in this complicated realm. In the end, it may not matter to anyone more than myself and a handful of family and friends. For now, though, it does. I feel compelled to once again jump this train, to stretch this string of life and sanity and start another Sinner in a faraway land. I choose this burden. Perhaps the world would be a better place if we all bared some, contributing to our community out of concern, not pressure. Maybe the world would just end up with a bunch of rambling nuts like myself making ridiculous suggestions to each other till we all dropped dead.

Questions & Complications

Tonight as I type away not much of that is relevant. We've settled into Misery, about six feet of it. On such jumps you quickly find the expected is the unexpected. Nothing will go as thought or wished. Some people call this curse Murphy's meddling; some call it God's. I have yet to find the time to curse either, much less contemplate on the matter. Settling in for an independent publication means a lot more than figuring out where to put your TV and couch. It means finding a printer, local shit and giggles to cover and, most importantly, finding some people to believe in what you do without ever having seen the first issue. For a good salesperson, it's like burning ants with a magnifying glass; for myself, it's like launching my ass to the moon on a Bald Eagle. It's never easy, not even when you're established.

So what do you do? That's the big questions to answer when you make the potentially fatal jump from that express train. Where do you find a printer? In Seattle, there are several; in St. Louis, not so. Search the web or phone book and you'll find nothing but a bunch of god-damned copier shops. Not what you want. Grabbing another publication is seldom any help. There seems to be something taboo about putting your printing company inside your publication, a Pandora's box of some sort. Potentially there is. You could walk in the press door one day and find a couple of new papers ready for delivery – competition, that's bad, right? Most greedy pricks think so.

Now, how do you do it? First you have to learn how to negotiate with a printer. If you're a virgin independent, and I mean just you and a couple of buddies, not some fucking corporate backed staff, you've got a pissed-off Cocker Spaniel starring you at the knee! And unless you're living on some trust fund, Mama ain't going to be there to shew it away. Your stuck in that spot until that dog has to shit or decides to hunch your leg. That means pissing your pants or kicking this fucking dog out of the way and getting to business! You're gonna have to get several quotes and bargain these printers down. If not, you're fucked from day one!

So while you negotiating with printers throughout the week, you also have to figure out layout specifications while you're trying to sell ads to print this work of art. Don't forget to figure in expense money for booze, food, bands, art shows, clothes, cell phone bills, business cards, websites, and this list goes on. Something certainly has to be wrong in the head for anyone to jump from this train twice. But sometimes you land without breaking a limb or your neck. Sometimes when you do, you just have to grit your teeth, smile and shake it off until the whiskey kicks in. And there will be pain, even misery at times.

Why do it? "Why" has been the most asked question since man stood upright and obtained enough sense to hide from the weather and cover his little wiener. Why? It's different for all of us. Why do we even get out of bed in the morning, why do we even care if we have one in the first place? Why would anyone want to publish an independent paper, on any level? For this simple-minded sinner, it's became a bit more complicated than challenging my mortality or mentality, or financial stability. It's become something larger, about making that little difference here and there on a community level. This jump has always been about you, my neighbor that I too often never know. It's never easy nor simple. Sometimes I find myself wishing I was one of the fortunate bastards, to dine and dash from this good gig before the Big Bouncer in the sky throws me out on my ass some eighty years later with a bill in hand. Either way, we all end up in the same shit hole, six feet under. And that's just a tale of fear and publishing in two cities...

In Loving Memory of Kat Carr, my favorite Republican. 1958-2009