Umm…mma?
Cool Hand Yazdo
Today I was trying to decide where I was going to settle for my lunch today. There is a lot of mediocreness around the office in SF, and currently I have to play like I have a half-hour lunch. You must be saying to yourself, “Pouria, you’re way too picky about food.” To this I would say yes I am. BUT I can eat at places that are very meager and have delicious foods…I am getting way off track, this is not my yelp account.
So I chose this place called Pita’s Cafe, or Pita Place, or whatever…it had Pita in the name. I’d eaten here before. There was even a yelp sign on the door, plus they have specials sometimes. I knew this because of the boards out front with the chalk. None of the specials were enticing, they focused on meat. I do not focus on meat…anymore.
They pretend to be Greek, I think, but I couldn’t help thinking that this was an Armenian or some sort of Turk. We Middle Easterners like to pretend we’re other things, it helps with business. There is a really popular Italian place run be Persians who pretend to be Italian. White people love eating at places that aren’t authentic, they like to pretend without even knowing it.
So I order a falafel wrap, cuz the wrap came with humus whereas the sandwich came with tahini. I hate tahini. So they told me to grab a seat and they’d bring me my meal. It took a really long time for a wrap of lavash with lettuce that makes souls weep. But this is not a yelp review, as I’ve noted before.
I sat 2 tables behind this chick with a laptop. She was a blond white chick, I didn’t really get a good look at her but she may have been attractive, who knows. So when I sat behind her I noticed she had a red-crescent moon tattooed just below her right shoulder. It was slightly covered by her shirt. She was typing away, when the owner brought her a menu and said to her, “Wow you’re still writing.” She said, “Yea I love this place.”
So I figure she is some sort of reviewer maybe? Who cares though I shouldn’t be paying attention to her life. Then her phone rings. I am still sitting without my food by the way. She says something that sounds like “merhaba.” My ears ring at this. It’s Turkish for “hello.” Then she confirms her poor Turkish with some other greeting related things.
So it is just me and her, in this small place, her talking to some Turkish asshole, and me sitting there listening to this chick. She tells this Turkish guy (Turks really like to bang white blonde’s) how this Greek place is sooo good (it’s not) and how authentic everything is (it wasn’t). He pretends to listen. I can feel this through the phone.
She talks about how she just got off her job (it’s 11 AM), I still don’t know what she does but I can tell you it’s useless. Most of us do useless things though. She goes on to tell this Turk about blah blah blah, I’m not that kind of girl anymore, all the while fueling his gigantic Turkish ego. Turks like it when white women tell them no, let’s take it slow.
Anyways, through all this I’m thinking, I should casually walk by and say something in Turkish. Then she’ll know that I know some Turkish too. That will make me really cool, and I’ll just walk away without turning back. This thought process went through my head. Why? Because I like to boost my Persian ego by giving hints to others about how cool I am.
I’m not who I thought I was
Don’t worry, this blog isn’t going to be about crises all the time. But it more about reflection. Afterall, I am in the winter of my life and it is time to take tally.
I was walking around Oakland, well…I’ve been walking around Oakland and I’ve been looking at restaurants to go to. I’ve been discounting a lot of restaurants based on criteria that was never important to me…vegetables. In fact if it’s a place that sells BBQ, gumbo, soul food, prime rib, chicken halves, sausages, steak…I tend to stay away.
This is not that new a thing for me in terms of recency, I’ve been avoiding meat since December. But it is new in relation to the length of my life and the love of meats on the grill. Maybe this is another piece of evidence that I am becoming…well…a pussy. That or more aware of my impending death and how the choices I make now affect my heart disease later.
What happens as we age?
Just sitting here listening to some music, to be more specific I am listening to Dave Matthews. To be even more specific it is acoustic with Tim Reynolds. I make slight fun of myself for still listening to it.
I was struck with the realization that this entity sitting here used to really want someone who found as much poignancy in the song as I did. That somehow there were emotions that I could never express in this song, but yet the function of emoting would be as real for my imagined lover as it was tangible for me.
I never found someone like that. I got my heart broken a few times. I was never great with the ladies. Years passed. I became bitter. I stopped listening to music like Dave Matthews. Whatever was being impressed onto me became my flag. I championed many different musics.
Otis and Stevie sought to set me back on a course. To find a woman who also shared the gut-wrenching, the regret, and the drunken sorrows. Never found that woman either.
This is not to say that I have not met fine, young ladies who enjoyed this music. I did. Bought never with one where I could hope to have a connection. Blame me.
Now sitting here, Dave Matthews comes up, I wonder where the guy that used to be is now. I mean, I really am the same guy, right? Maybe as we grow older we just become xerox’s of xerox’s you know? Things become blurred, less defined, more angry.
Where am I going with this? Hopefully to something fresh.
Dream residues
Just had a dream that featured the first girl I ever asked out. Feature is a strong word, how about had a cameo of the first girl I ever asked out. In the dream she was Michelle Pfeiffer, but my dream residues let me know she was that first one, Tara Flint.
I had a hard time remembering her name. This girl was from Yazdo pre-history, and I kept thinking her name was Tara Reed, with two e’s instead of an ei. Flint was the first girl to break my heart.
It was in 4th or 5th grade and a girl from California had just moved to Virginia, lucky her. She was blonde and real skinny. She was a runner, you know, in 4th grade. Which is weird right? Who teaches their young child to run and be a runner in the 4th grade?
Anyways, she was also really smart…like me. In fact they put us in our own little math class together because other people in our grade were far behind us in intelligence. This is why I fell in love. I had to sit with her in a room learning maths and she was a force to be reckoned with.
I was convinced I was in love her. I talked to my 4th grade besties about her. I listened to 90’s soft rock and pictured her as the muse for all the songs. After months of agonizing, mainly because I was chubby and she wasn’t, I asked her out after school one day.
She looked at me with this incredulous and shocked face and said, “No.” I was shattered. I could never look at her again, and had to avoid her with all my might. I turned to the soft rock songs of heart break and remorse. I was a sad little creature.
The next time Yazdo asked a girl out it was in the 10th grade.
Playboy isn’t for masturbation
I was over at Neil and Clayton’s house today when the urge struck me to pee. So I went to the bathroom, lifted up the toilet seat with the tip of my shoe, and began to relieve myself into the mold ridden toilet bowel. On top of the toilet was a copy of a Playboy and I thought to myself, “I really appreciate that whenever I come to this house there is a Playboy/s hanging around.”
I then got into this internal dialogue with myself, still whilst peeing, about how I don’t think I’ve ever masturbated to a Playboy and that I most likely couldn’t respect or trust someone who gets Playboy for the purpose of masturbation.
I mean, yes the chicks are hot. Sometimes there is bush which can be hot. But never is it masturbation material. I don’t know how they do it, but they remove all the urge of masturbation from the pages. I don’t even think it can even be considered porn. It’s like they use some special camera that tricks your penis into not being aroused.
I imagine the type of guy who pulls out a Playboy for the purpose of pleasing himself is the type of guy who also believes that there’s never been an instance of a holocaust, that people who curse go to hell, may have the tendencies of a serial murderer, or probably grew up as a teenager in the 60’s.
I mean, sure I talk about masturbation a lot. It’s something that was forbidden for me as a youth growing up in a restrictive household. But even when I broke my seal, so to speak, I never turned to Playboy. Maybe it’s because it’s too wholesome…or too much a part of the public sphere so it’s not really deviant, so it’s not really porn.
What do y’all think?
