2005-04-19
A BULLITTED LIST. A CHRONOLOGY. SUBJECT: THE BEST 24 HOURS OF MY LIFE.It's long, but read the whole thing. IT IS TRULY WORTH IT.
NOTE: I have had several best days of my life. One was when I was 13 and found a fifty dollar bill on the ground at Blockbuster. Two was when I won four speech and debate national championships in one night. This Sunday, April the 18th, wasn't the most rewarding day of my very existence, but it was certainly the most sporadically wonderful. Check the list and dare to disagree.
Now then.
* My 24 hours starts at 11 AM. Woke up after a full night's sleep, slipped on an oxford, my linen pants, and my homemade moccasins, and hopped in the car. It was 74 degrees outside, and I rode with the window down, smoked cigarettes, and listened to Bob Seger, Bruce Springsteen, and my buddy Dayvo's band, the Drones. A flask loaded with Jim Beam sits readily at my right.
* Arrive at Ripple's apartment in the great capitol city of Illinois, Springfield. Ripple's and my destination is two-fold: Tour the newly opened 115 million dollar Abraham Lincoln museum, and third row seats for David Sedaris later that evening. We crack the first beers at precisely a quarter after one.
* Dayvo arrives, more beer, and then we huff it downtown to the CAPITOL BUILDING, where Ripple works. I did not know that he worked in the Capitol until that very day. I followed him through the building with a sort of "I'm with the band" attitude, taking no care of my decorum or behavior because, really, who's allowed to give a damn while I'm with Ripple?
I DID THE FOLLOWING THINGS IN THE ILLINOIS CAPITOL BUILDING JUST BECAUSE I COULD:
- Went into the womens bathroom.- Drank beer and whiskey in the press office.
- Dropped my pants in the House of Representatives. We stood there looking over the hall of desks and speakers podiums and I just thought to myself, "You know what I really need to do right now? I need to drop some serious bare-ass trou'." And the rest, they say, is history.
* We have horseshoes for lunch. A horseshoe, if you don't know, is a dish that was invented in Springfield. Texas toast. MEAT on top of the toast. (I chose buffalo chicken.) Fries on top of the meat. Cheese sauce on top of the fries. One plate. Go. I orgasmed so frequently during that meal that I almost blew a hole through the table. More beer. Got to witness a Cardinals victory in a room full of real diehard Cubs fans that think it's a sign of pride to feel shitty all the time. Much gloating ensues.
* So we're walking down the street half drunk at 2 PM. And there's a TON of Lincoln-related fanfare going on. And amongst all of this old-timey fanfare, Ripple looks at a man walking through the crowd, says "Holy shit, dude," and starts to speed walk after him. I follow. We trail this guy for half a block before we catch him walking into a bank. Ripple says,
"Mr. Sedaris?" And he turned around.
Ripple and I talked with David Sedaris - the most well-read humorist in contemporary American literature - on the streets of Springfield for a good ten minutes. He was very cordial and seemed pleased that somebody was such a fan that they could recognize him off of a photo of his book jackets.
I said, "So Mr. Sedaris, what do you think of all of this Lincoln fanfare?" He smiled and said in his effeminate and exhausted yet charmed cadence, "Oh. So many people in bonnets." He went on to colorfully detail the Lincoln impersonator on his flight from Chicago to Springfield and the disarming grace of the log cabin recreation in the Lincoln museum. ("I came out and... I'm in a forest. Oh, how nice it is to be in a forest!") At the end of our chat, we shook his hand and pointed him in the direction of an ATM. Star-struckedness ensues, and refuses to subside even as I sit here sloshing my wine and regailing my day to you.
* We hit the Lincoln museum. Who's the first person we run into in the museum? Illinois' very own Governor Rob Blagoevich. He's not as accesible as Sedaris. We stop to gawk for only a second and suddenly a goon manifests out of thin air and shoos us along our way. Despite my constantly being kept in perpetual motion thanks to the governor's presence, I can say this about the man: He stopped to talk to every. Single. Handicapped person in the building. It's like he was actively seeking these people out. No foolin', I saw him push his own five (or so) year old daughter aside to get at a beaming woman in a wheelchair. I instantly thought, "Damn, you really are a democrat!"
* More beers before Sedaris.
* At the book signing, Ripple and I present our tatered editions to the man and greet him with "You find that ATM okay?" He says yes and thanks us. He makes out a copy of "Dress Your Family In Courderoy and Denim" to Ripple's fianace, Sarah, wishing her the "best of luck on your first marriage."
BUT. BUT!
I ask Sedaris a very daring question. I ask him to record the voicemail greeting on my cell phone. And even though he had a line streching all the way across the auditorium, he asked, "What should I say?" I suggested "Something like, 'This is David Sedaris. Andy can't come to the phone right now.'" He paused reflectively, like he had a trig problem he couldn't quite solve, and then he said, "Okay, I know what I'm gonna say." And he did it.
My number is 309-264-9643. If you wanna hear the voicemail greeting, just gimme a call. I can't tell you what he said. It's much better heard from the horse's mouth.
* During the Q&A, I ask Sedaris for some advice concerning my interest in writing autobiographical stories. He says to be open and free and not at all concerned with what other people think. Dave Eggers told me the opposite when I asked him the same question in 2001. That should suck, but hey. Now I have an even perspective.
* Karaoke after Sedaris. Four songs, including the world premire of "Dancing In the Dark." At the end of the night, within five minutes of each other, a man buys the whole bar a round of beers and this redneck motherfucker proposes to his redneck ass girlfriend.
REDNECK: "I got something to say. I... I got something to say. Carla, I know we don't get along all the time, but would you do me the honor of being my wife?"
CARLA: "You know I will, baby! You know I will!"
COMMENCE MAKING OUT!
* Stumble home, don't get mugged by a couple of angry looking black guys on kids' bikes, discover an impossibly attractive redhead on OkCupid, pass out on the couch.
* Wake up at 11. Drink a beer. In my underwear, play "Oregon Trail" for the first time in many, many years.
* Hit a McDonald's where the double cheeseburger is on the dollar menu. Order three.
* Thank God. Thank Him, Thank Him, Thank Him. Say to myself, is this Heaven, or is this Springfield? and mean it.
-Andy