Friend Helmet
By Blake Butler.
1. grover was my best friend when i was little | i talked to grover all the time | one time my family and i were going to dinner | i was like 2 | and grover started telling me where we should turn | to go to dinner | and we ended up at some expensive italian restaurant like 15 miles from my house | and we ate there
2. i like to think of myself as being part of an oil machine | more often i feel fecal | but maybe one day we can run our cars off shit | i imagine someone somewhere has invented the adapter
3. i don’t know what to think about anything any more | i want to make you happier | that’s all
4. last night | did not warrant you yelling at me for as long as you did
5. i’ve been exhausted all week | today’s the first day i feel back to normal
6. i open a new package of napkins | and in the middle | are 3 napkins with what looks like splotches of blood | someone in a napkin factory somewhere may be in trouble
7. i just wish i felt like that guy putting his balls in that girl’s ass | 24-7 | all day all night 4ever | just really accomplished and excited about life
8. i am going to kiss you tonight | on the neck | and the face
9. you seem to have no conception of yourself sometimes
10. i don’t like drinking with people because of how i act when i get drunk and i worry about how i affect people a lot | i mean | i’ll still drink a lot | but i may become very quiet | etc
11. i’m not trying to be a jerk | nothing is going right | there is a dumpster on the other side of the pool from us
12. i need to get milk and bananas from the store | if u want you could get them | kisses
13. you make me shudder more consistently than anyone i know
14. last night i dreamt that my hair was coming out in chunks | and i asked my friends if they’d still like me if my hair was short | and they said no
15. rain affects me too much | remind me to take laxative tonight
16. i don’t know what i feel like doing
17. starting today with no internet and then walking outside and having an asian woman blow dust in my face with a leafblower | then talking on speaker phone to comcast covered in soap
18. i made coffee. i had a dream that my mom was a prostitute. i climbed up to the upper windows and fixed the miniblinds | i had another dream that i found out that i was an asian… and adopted by white people | the sun coming in unattenuated ruins my morning dreams. i wish you coulda seen me in my dream when i found out i was asian
19. i want to be haunted by a 12 year old version of myself | giving me the early version of a look i’ve since perfected
20. These messages were sent while you were offline: ok | I am here
21. i woulda come already but i thought that u’d be sleeping
22. my head is so full of snot | and i’ve blown my nose so much | my ears are stuffed | i can’t hear anything
23. too much coffee today | too much
24. 2 days ago i was on treadmill | and i thought, i am going to write a salable mystery novel that starts with hidden cameras
25. its raining a little | men keep walking back and forth in front of the apartment | i exfoliated the hell out of my face
26. it’s important to look like you were just born polished
27. i’m convinced that the place is making me ill. the smoke, the heat… i feel like i’m rotting from the inside
28. i don’t think this would make sense to anyone | but i know something is following me around | that’s not paranoia or ‘overgeneralizing’ | something is systematically fucking everything i try to do
29. i’ve been pissing out my ass 3 mornings in a row now
30. i think i’d like to see you.
31. i got shower curtain and liner | we should clean up tonight and rent some movies, you can pick them | no beer
32. i just got my cat tattooed on my forearm
33. i just want to kiss your dang head | and sit and smile
34. everything is just so depressing lately | no english, 3.45 an hour | i got coffee this morning and a woman was yelling at the worker “i want an early gray tea!” | she just kept saying EARLY GRAY TEA
35. every year at challenger elem we had a memorial service for them where 7 special kids got to hold up giant portraits of the astronauts | i can remember their faces | went there for 7 years
36. ok | i’m goinginvisible
37. i feel big tired and unable to focus and unable to think of what to do | big, tired
38. i was having an awesome dream. i was just taking flight and going back in time and you fucking kicked me | i wanted to hit you | ruiner even in sleep
39. you have been a little scary for the past two days. i plan to just continue staying out of your way
40. i’m making beef stew and peach crisp. it will be here when you get home so think about being hungry.
41. one time a midget came to my house and i saw him making out with his full-sized gf | i thought, “this is tender”
42. i can’t take much more of this life | wee | i’m gonna get a hell of a tax return | i’m going to keep working here hard
43. we need to start dressing in the traditional garb of our forefathers
44. i’m painting the fucking bathroom green | again. yes. again. yes.
45. what is a good equation to signify infinite replication?
46. what if google is an arm of god? | today stock in god’s arm went up 1.64%
47. no one wants to be calm
48. things always come together. | we are not retarded. the terms of this life are retarded | probably
49. tonight is a blanket | i am excited for when all is in place
50. you used to hate a lot of things before i turned you into the light
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Blake Butler is the author of EVER (Calamari Press 09) and Scorch Atlas (forthcoming from Featherproof Books). His work has been published in Ninth Letter, Fence, Unsaid, New York Tyrant. He edits HTML Giant and blogs here. This list was almost entirely composed from words stolen from instant message conversations between the author and those he loves.
First published in 3:AM Magazine: Sunday, July 19th, 2009.
