A Yankee In The Deep South – Part 2
Tag: Friendship
The Bike
A few years back, I bought a bike at Target. It was one of those “couples” purchases I made as a husband. My wife at the time bought one as well, on the same day. We resolved to go biking on a regular basis. To enjoy the rural Saco life, pedaling slowly by dairy farms and pet cemeteries and sprawling forests. Well, we only really biked together that first day. Real life, and then relationship troubles, got in the way of any sort of regular couples cycling. Eventually, we didn’t even want to stay in the same room as one another, let alone spend quality time together gently cycling through our neighborhood.
Eventually, she and I split up. I took my bike with me, jamming it into my back seat as I filled my car with the final items from my former home and drove away in my car that was falling apart (and would break down as soon as I paid off the car loan, in the same exact week even). When I lost my car, that bike was my savior. Once I was through lamenting my marriage, and having panic attacks – it kept me from walking six miles each way (except for winter) and it also enabled me to explore my new home town of Biddeford. I went on lots of adventures with that bike, once even riding from Biddeford (where I lived at the time) all the way to Kennebunk and Kennebunkport. I made a video montage of myself, riding along, trying to look as if I was leading an exciting life.
When I became officially divorced, more than a year later – the judge was trying to assess our properties and belongings. “What kind of vehicle do you drive?” He asked my wife. She told him what model her car was, and he wrote something down in front of him on a notepad. Then, he looked at me. “And you, Mr. Carro – what kind of vehicle do you drive?”
I looked him in the eye and I said “I drive a Schwinn, your honor.”
The slightest smile curled one corner of his mouth. “A Schwinn? As in, the bicycle?”
“Yes, your honor.”
The judge chuckled to himself, nodding, writing down my response on the notepad in front of him. I wondered what else it said.
Later, when I moved to Portland – the bike came with me. It enabled me to explore the suburbs I was then living in, and I even made a point to ride with my girlfriend and explore the outskirts of Portland with it. The bike had become a companion of sorts, something that stayed with me and survived despite the turmoil I’d been through.
However, as I settled into being a resident of Portland – I was not kind to the bike. It was rusting, off and on, in the backyard lot of my apartment building, through the comings and goings of the seasons. Yet another relationship of mine was breaking apart at the time, and the bike was forgotten. I finally gave it to a friend of mine, who needed it more than I did, and who would take care of it more than I had. And so, I rid myself of one remnant of my past that I’d purchased to invest in my marriage. That marriage is gone, and I’m now married to a different woman and I’m living a much different life than I did back then. My thoughts drift once more to the romantic idea of riding bicycles together under the sun, and I wonder what kind of bike I’ll eventually end up with. I wonder, also, if I’ll treat the bike better than I have bikes in the past.
Simple Man
I’m a pretty simple guy. Definitely not perfect, but real simple.
Over the past couple years I’ve sort of disrupted my life and tossed it all around. So far, it’s largely unaffected me (aside from the fact I am now a married man)…mostly because to keep myself sane – I keep it simple.
Some folks need to have really nice cars. I don’t care what car I have, as long as it drives. And, to be honest – I’d almost never really want to have a nice-looking car because so far mine has been broken into twice and it was a pretty average ride (and I say “was” in the past-tense, because that car has been gone for a year, now). So, I can’t imagine the stress of leaving a nice, shiny new car for any opportunists around to come trying to get into. I don’t want to care about my possessions, and having nicer things makes you care more about them by default.
Some folks need to have really spacious homes where they can have massive gatherings or put up lots of family members. Sure, that’d be nice – but having a place like that really complicates things. As long as I’m warm, dry, and can have alone time, time for thoughts, for writing – a place that “feels” like home – that’s all I need. The spaciousness is something I would take if found, but I don’t go out of my way for. Eventually, if I ever have a family – that’s different. But for now, just the roof will suffice because that’s all I need.
Some folks need to have the most expensive foods. They go to the restaurants with the “$$$” or the “$$$$” rating. But to me, those places are worth it only once in a blue moon. I’d rather walk into one of those “$$” places and get my fill, get my money’s worth, leave with a smile on my face, barely holding onto consciousness as I battle a food coma. Those other places – you’re eating art, not food. I’ll take an old-fashioned PB&J over a Pâté en croûte with a smear of pistachio ice cream for dessert. That PB&J gives me comfort, and as long as I can supplement a shitty diet like that, I feel generally okay and that I’m eating decently. I can remember a time when I had no food.
And in the case of friendships, relationships – I keep it simple too. You like Star Wars, David Bowie, video games, cooking, etc? Then you have a friend in me (even if you like TLJ ), and I’m someone who, even if at times seems far away or distant, always appreciate those connections. I am a simple man. If you show me love and friendship, you’re going to get that back when I can give it. It’s just that sometimes, I can’t, and what I need from my true friends is their understanding that I cannot always give it back, and that I really don’t expect you to at all times either – just as long as you genuinely care about me. I’ll care about you, too.
And with my last relationship, I couldn’t give back. And that’s why it failed – because I went too long without being able to give back. And I felt bad about it, but couldn’t change it. So I had to let it go before what we had turned into something uglier. And I came to the very brink of that happening. And I made a lot of mistakes. But I’m trying to move myself back to that simple life, that simple state of being, and I think I’m doing well so far.
I hate complicated.
If you’re like me, you should hate it too. Or, you should at least give hating it a try. Stay away from the drama, the discourse, the unpleasantries whenever you can. Streamline. Peg with precision what makes you the most happy and cling to it.
Two Joes Walk Into A Cafe…
I was sitting in the cafe where I work one afternoon when, as my boss was leaving for the day, she caught my attention – waving and saying “Goodbye, Joe” as she walked out the door. I looked up from my work, responding with my own “goodbye” before resuming my work and thinking nothing about the man on my right; The college kid who was impeccably dressed, and who looked absorbed in his own work. I stared instead at the charging symbol on my phone, willing it to download faster than it was. I had a lot of work to do.
I heard a laugh come from his direction, and I reflexively turned to face him. I noticed he wore glasses with black rims.
“My name is Joe, too,” he said, smiling. “When she said your name, I thought she was talking to me and I was confused as to how she knew me.”
I laughed and extended my hand for a shake, which he gripped with his own. “Nice to meet you,” I said. “People always ask me if it’s my real name because I work in a coffee shop.”
He gave me a quizzical look.
“Y’know,” I said, rolling my eyes. “The whole ‘cup of Joe’ thing?”
“Well, I guess it’s a pretty common name.”
“Definitely,” I said. “What, were you born in the 80’s or 90’s?”
He smiled and tilted his head as if wondering how I knew. “It was in ’92. And, you?”
I shrugged. “It was the 80’s, man. I had to deal with G.I. Joe – that type of thing. Got it all the time.”
He laughed. “Well, occasionally I have been referred to as Joe Black.”
“Well,” I shrugged, “At least you’re associated with Brad Pitt.”
He laughed again, this time for longer. “Yes,” he said, pointing out his brown skin. “You can definitely see the resemblance.”
Over the next forty-five minutes, we held a great conversation. He explained to me that he was born in Sudan, and then ended up moving successively to Uganda, Kenya, Egypt, and then a few other places before settling here in America. He was very curious about my writing and editing (which I explained to him was what I was doing), and asked me lots of questions about the creative process, and whether or not I might travel to teach English abroad. I returned by asking him what he likes about mechanical engineering and bio-chemistry – two things I know virtually nothing about, but which he said he was going to school for. There were a few awkward pauses as I scrunched up my face, trying to understand the complexities of the subjects and failing. Finally, I asked him where he wanted to go to grad school. He thought for a long while and then told me he wasn’t sure and was still looking into several. When we were finished talking, we shook hands once more and thanked the other for the conversation.
“It was very nice to meet you,” he said, turning back to his scientific study.
“Likewise,” I replied. “Thanks for the conversation.” My phone was finally done charging.
With the conversation ended, we both sat in comfortable silence and worked on our respective projects.
Sometimes all you need is one thing in common, even if it’s just a really common birth name – and any other differences can become conversation points instead of fundamental differences. We’re all just a bunch of average Joes when you really get down to it, because “Joe” is just a name – and as such, it was a tenuous connection at best which bridged communication between us that otherwise would likely never have happened.
The Midnight Hike
It was fall and I was much younger, then.
I was living with my grandparents in Casco, Maine at the time and my brother Gary was visiting from Lewiston and staying the night. We were both having some troubles in our lives and we kept coming back to them via conversation. We talked about life, about women troubles, about things we liked to do. Brother stuff. Bonding stuff.
Late that night, I had an idea. It was close to midnight but I felt like we both needed some adventure in our troubled, mundane existences. I could tell he was feeling down, and I felt like I couldn’t do much to help. We both were living in different cities and weren’t able to hang out as much as we used to before then.
“Hey, Gary,” I said with a mischievous smile moving across my face. “Are you tired?”
He said he sort of was, but he wasn’t sure.
“Want to go for a walk?”
He looked at me like I was an idiot. “It’s dark out and it’s cold. I don’t want to get pneumonia.”
I laughed. “You won’t get pneumonia, Gary.”
I told him to wait there and I went and found the darkest clothing possible for each of us to wear. I started speaking in hushed tones. “We’re going to go climb Rattlesnake Mountain. Here, take this.”
As Gary threw on the black hooded sweatshirt, I handed him my Chinese dagger (or maybe saber) with the stainless steel blade and engraved scabbard. It had the inscription DONGFANG on the hilt, so that is what I named it. He took it out of the scabbard and the metal gleamed in the light from the kitchen in my grandparent’s trailer. He asked me what it was for.
“We’re going to be like adventurers. It’ll be fun.” I strapped on another blade with a leather sheath, dragons and small jewels decorating the pommel and hilt, attaching it to my belt loop and then throwing on a dark hat and sweater.
We were both becoming excited and we finally strode out into the moonlit night, walking down route 85 as lightning bugs flared and crickets chirped in a massive chorus. The field was on our right, covered in tall grass, and it looked like stars because of all those fireflies lighting the way. There was a light breeze rolling through every once in a while and the trees were rustling in a gentle chorus.
We moved as stealthily as we could, diving into the grass as a car would roll by, creating scenarios in our heads involving secret missions to a far-off land or things like we’d read about or watched in movies or on television.
Finally, we came to the base of Rattlesnake Mountain. The forest at the base was ink-black, and we could see the summit poking out into the clouds.
“You ready?” I whispered.
“Yeah,” he whispered back.
We entered the forest and couldn’t see for the longest time. Gary tried to use a flashlight but I made him put it away. “Our eyes will adjust, give it time. We don’t want anyone to see us in here.”
After a while, our eyes did adjust but we could still only make out spots where the moonlight from the full moon came bursting through the canopy and onto the forest floor. The moonbeams were ethereal and added to the fantasy theme of the night’s events.
We climbed, we said little. We heard noises and kept moving, staying focused on the prize at the top. We didn’t get lost, but we had to stop several times to make sure we were where we thought we were. Then, we emerged at the top where the treeline breaks and the side of the mountain opens up into sky. The stars and the wind greeted us and the moon stood in our faces, so close I felt like we could reach up and touch it.
The two of us stood there, bathed in the light of the moon, fantasy weapons strapped to our waists and a sense of adventure and whimsy swimming through our heads. We didn’t speak for a long time, but when we did, we sat down and we let everything out, letting the moon in on our woes, a distant but very wise and comforting friend.
We laughed, we cried. It was a spiritual experience up there on top of the mountain. When we finally started to get cold, we had to leave, but it was a good couple of hours. To this day, I still look back at that night and I think we both figured things out about ourselves and each other. We didn’t slay any dragons, we didn’t find any gold…but the magic was real and I certainly won’t forget it.
The Rundown
When I was fifteen years old, the world was my enemy. And why shouldn’t it have been? It was 1996. Up until that point, the world had done its best to drag me, sometimes screaming, through metaphorical gutters of the worst kinds of waste. At that young age I had already been half-starved, covered in lice and fleas, abused in the worst kinds of ways. I was a victim, but also a survivor. The constant battling only made me harder, scooped out the soft spots in large chunks so what I was left with was a veritable chitinous exoskeleton, impervious to the outside world.
As a result, when I moved to the middle-class neighborhood in New Hampshire, filled with anxious folks living in high-end mobile homes and manicured lawns – I found myself hanging for a while with the wrong crowd. Both as a response to their reactions toward me, and also as a defense mechanism. I mean, hey – if they teased me about being poor and dirty, why not throw in some good-for-nothing friends, too? I didn’t want to give in to them, to let them have the satisfaction of pushing me toward what they thought was right and “normal”. I only wanted to make them hate me more. I’m stubborn that way.
And so I became a drug runner. It was sort of an accident, at first, but in the end it was something I chose to do on my own terms. Dana was the only black guy in our neighborhood, and probably the nicest guy I knew. But he found himself in the drug-running trade, and somehow even though I listened to White Zombie and he listened to 2Pac, we connected over music. He heard me singing the lyrics to “Real Solution #9” one afternoon on the train tracks when we were walking through a patch of woods we called “Hobo Jungle” and in his laid-back way he told me that it sounded like rap, or that it could be rapped in the right hands, like Tupak Shakur’s. He made me listen to “California Love” on his walkman. At the time, I hated anything that wasn’t alternative music or heavy metal. So I politely listened, but it didn’t gel with me until years later.
Dana invited me to run with him one day while we were walking to the school. He made jokes about being a black guy in a white neighborhood. He spoke in an exaggerated “white guy” voice as if he were on the other end of a Police CB radio.
“Please be on the lookout for a black man walking with a skinny white male. Fire on sight.”
I laughed, and took swigs from my cold can of Surge.
When he asked me if I wanted to run with him, he didn’t outright ask. He just said “Hey, man. Let’s go.” He started running. I tightened my backpack straps and started running with him. We went to the other end of the trailer park, to one of the run down homes where the undesirables hung out and hurt each other with kitchen implements when they were drunk or high. When we got there, he introduced me as “Joe Cool”. I had never had anyone call me “cool” before in my entire life, so I just sort of stood there while Dana exchanged a bag of drugs for a wad of cash. And then we were on to the next house, and the next. Running drugs, and running…literally.
Finally, when we were finished that day, Dana explained to me that he was going to bring the money to a guy named Beaker. I gawked at the name.
“Beaker?” I asked, laughing. “Like Beaker and Bunsen? The Muppets?”
“I don’t know who that is,” Dana said. “They call him beaker because he’s got a big nose.” He mimed a big nose on his face and laughed.
From that day on, Dana and I went on many other runs. I never fully committed,though, and as time passed, I saw him less and less. I never really knew where he ended up, but running with him (in all senses of the word) helped me shed the side of me that was a victim. Dana provided me a framework in which to explore the idea of camaraderie, and to experience friendship. Of course, it took a few more years of getting into more trouble; riding around and doing drugs, breaking and entering, and other bad things for me to figure out who I really was under that chitinous armor I had made for myself. But I finally did it. I finally broke free.
Dana, I believe, was the catalyst for that transformation. Dana, with his racial jokes and befriending of me without caring about who I was, what I looked like, or what I had ever done allowed me to open up to my eventual friends I made before I graduated. I like to think of my time running with Dana for Beaker not as something negative, but something positive – as weird as that sounds. The people who bought the drugs, they were busy escaping into themselves, and paying money to do it. I looked to do the opposite, and I largely succeeded in most respects. I can only hope that Dana eventually outran his chosen profession in much the same way I did, and in all senses of that word.
Mike Wieringo
Almost a full decade ago, I had the pleasure of meeting one of my favorite comic book writers – Todd Dezago. He made an appearance at the first ever Coast City Comicon here in Portland, Maine. Due to scheduling conflicts, I couldn’t attend the con for more than a day and thus I didn’t meet him that year – but the following year I finally made it when he came back.
I caught him at one point when he was sitting by himself at his booth. I never imagined I would get any one-on-one time with him, but it was important that I talk to him because if I was a fan of Todd Dezago, I was doubly a fan of the amazing Mike Wieringo – who worked with Todd on one of my favorite comic series of all time; Tellos.
When I heard Mike Wieringo died of aortic dissection a few years previous, I was devastated. He was only 44 and he was my artistic hero. I never tried to ape his style, because I never could, but his artwork is unmatched even today, in my eyes.
As I approached Mr. Dezago, I was dressed as Abraham Lincoln – so I was a bit apprehensive. Yet, he was as open to me as he was to anyone else, and we soon fell into an easy conversation.
“I love Tellos, man,” I finally said at one point. “It’s an amazing book. It seriously had an impact on my life.”
“Thank you,” he said, nodding. “I’m really glad. It was a special book to me.”
I then told him that aside from his own wonderful story and writing, that Mike’s artwork was what initially drew me to the book. I explained that I loved their work on Spider-Man, and that to me – ‘Ringo’s version of Spidey was my favorite and most iconic. I loved his cartoony style and I wanted to be able to draw as dynamically has he could.
“Thank you so much for that,” he said. “Mike would really appreciate hearing that.”
There was a point where he told me a bit about what Mike had meant to him and how he had been so very angry and bitter that Mike had suddenly passed away. It was all very surreal and heartbreaking for me to be talking to this actual friend of Mike Weiringo’s who also happened to be the writer of one of my favorite titles. Nobody else came up to the booth, it was just me and Dezago for what seemed like an hour. Eventually, I had to force myself to leave his booth before he grew too uncomfortable with my fanboy presence. I probably could have stayed there all day.
Later, though, I was able to speak with him again during one of his presentations. He went around the room and asked everyone who their favorite artists were and for what books. Naturally, I said Mike Weiringo for Spider-Man and I talked a bit about his cartoony style and fluid lines and how his characters were always striking and dynamic. He thanked me and then talked more about ‘Ringo and then thanked me from the front.
Finally, as he was leaving the convention Todd Dezago actually sought me out while walking by me with what must have been his kids and he shook my hand and thanked me for my kind words about his friend. He told me he appreciated meeting me and getting the chance to talk about Mike.
It was a strange moment with the both of us mourning and reminiscing about a man who had been dead for five years. One, a close friend and colleague and the other someone who he had never met or knew existed but whose life he changed in little ways.
I guess I was thinking about this interaction because I’ve been going through and cataloging all of my comics and I’ve finally reached my collection of Tellos books. I’m definitely going to re-read them before I seal them all up again.
My Friend Mikey
Sometimes, I think back about friends I had who are no longer with me. This doesn’t have to have anything to do with death, mind you. Sometimes, as people, we just outgrow each other. You move, you go to different schools, you get married. Those kinds of things happen and are pretty inevitable in life.
One of these friends I had who fits into this category was named Mike. We all knew him affectionately as Mikey.
We met one summer when my mom moved us to Shawmut Street in Lewiston, Maine. We lived in a crappy apartment, infested with fleas and in a bad part of town at the time. We didn’t notice much of that as children, though, only remembering it when we were older and our tolerance levels for filth and waste have gone drastically down.
What I do remember is that I sort of had a crush on a girl down the street named Sandy (who later became my girlfriend after she slipped a note under our door one morning professing her love for me, which everyone teased me about for days). I had heard of this “Mikey” coming over to our new place and introducing himself to my younger brother and sister but I still hadn’t met him yet. Somehow, I found myself engaged in a water-tossing match late one afternoon with Sandy, using water from one of those kid’s plastic swimming pools. It was me against her and her friend and I was losing…and drenched, pinned down as they hurled water balloons and fired Super Soakers at me.
Out of nowhere came Mikey, screaming in defiance and grabbing a frisbee from the ground, turning it upside down like a bowl, and tossing water at the girls with it. They shrieked, running from the unexpected onslaught of the strange boy.
“RUN!” he shouted to me, as if we were in the middle of Vietnam. Laughing in appreciation, I made my escape. He followed and we met up near an old shed, breathing hard. I could hear Sandy yelling at us, her voice fading as we rounded a corner. We stopped to catch our breath.
“Hey, thanks,” I said to him, grinning. “You saved my life.” I was all bones and pale skin and my tee-shirt clung to my torso like a tattered flag of surrender.
“I’m Mike,” he said, offering his hand. I took it and he shook hands with me. He was sort of chubby, and at the moment he was only wearing shorts. His legs were horribly scarred. Later, when we had hung out more, I asked him why and he apparently had seen some potatoes on the stove and tried to reach one when he was a lot younger. The boiling water dropped on his little body and disfigured his skin, forcing him into physical therapy for years.
“I’m Joe,” I said. “We just moved in the other day. I heard about you.”
“Yeah, your family is cool. Do you play games?”
My eyes lit up. “Yeah, Nintendo and Sega. We only have a Nintendo, though.”
“Do you like Ninja Turtles? I have that for Nintendo. Want to come over and play it with me at my house?”
There was almost no lapse in time from when he asked that to when I said yes. An instant friendship was formed that sun-dappled summer afternoon that would last for years. There were sleepovers, video game marathons, movie outings, family gatherings. We each moved to a few different places in Lewiston here and there for a few years, but never anywhere inaccessible for adventurous Lewiston kids to walk to. His parents were Indiana natives who moved to Maine so that Mike’s father, Mike (Yup, same name), could work at the Bath Iron Works. Sharon, his mother, was constantly cooking us food (a stark contrast to my own home) and they both had a long southern drawl and big hearts.
As I got a bit older, though, our mentalities started to diverge. I became interested in girls and in trying to be ‘cool’ and Mikey was still interested in action figures and video games. We hung out with each other a lot, though, and I even started to make him come to the school dances with me so that maybe we could meet girls there. He would always come and we’d just sit in the bleachers, looking at superhero or basketball cards we bought with our food money for the dance, having long discussions as pre-teen boys do about things like who would win in a fight, Superman or Thor?
I eventually got a girlfriend and I felt bad that he didn’t have one. He seemed to resent being left behind, and I understood that. Once, I felt so bad that I created an imaginary girlfriend for him, dropping letters in his mailbox from “her” with pictures cut from a magazine of a woman with a bright smile and wavy blonde hair. I told him that she was a friend of my own girlfriend and I had told her all about him and she thought he seemed like a cool guy. He seemed really happy at first so I stuck with the charade for a while. After a time, Mikey seemed disappointed that he never got to meet her in person so I had to come up with a way to get out of it without him knowing it had been me all along and hurting him even worse. I felt horrible, and weird, for leading him along in that way but at that age, I didn’t know any better and I was just trying to help. I was satisfied somewhat when he told me that his long-distance girlfriend had written to him for the last time, saying that she needed to move and that maybe they could write when she got to her new place sometime, but that she needed a break because she really wanted to meet him in person and couldn’t. I acted surprised and gave him a pep talk about how he could get a girlfriend if he needed to because that girl was very pretty and had liked him. To this day I wonder if he ever figured it out.
Fast forward again to when Mikey moved back to Indiana. I was heavily involved in college and work life. I had other friends I hung out with more often than I did him. Co-workers, former college buddies. He still wanted to play video games all day and all night, and I just didn’t have the stamina or interest for that any longer except for a few random times. He eventually started working, though his mental faculties kept him from having a normal job with normal hours. Our time together grew more infrequent.
The last time I ever heard from Mikey, we spoke on the phone. He said he didn’t like Indiana very much and that it was boring. I told him he should hang out with some more people, maybe people he worked with. He gave a noncommittal grunt in response. I told him I was going to be getting married, to the woman of my dreams. I wasn’t sure how he felt about that but he seemed genuinely supportive. He listened to me talk about her for almost an hour.
One thing led to another, and I became involved in my own marriage and my home life and work life. Other friends. Family milestones. My separation and impending divorce. I didn’t think about him a lot during all those times, I must admit. We’d grown too far apart. That connection we’d had as young boys back in that water war with the girls had disappeared with growth spurts and life troubles and years. In some ways, I envied him, thinking that he was just sitting at home probably, eating his TV dinners and drinking Pepsi and playing hours of video games at a time, only pausing to sleep or work. I was concerned with trips to the emergency room for panic attacks in which I thought the end of my life was near, massive nosebleeds from stress, animals and family dying. What I didn’t think of was that I had lost a friend, a friend who’d come to my aid when he saw someone needing help, a friend I’d had for years. For all his childish ways, he was still a good person and in hindsight, I shouldn’t have let that connection go completely. I won’t soon forget our childhood times and friendship and I’m hoping that I can still hear what he’s up to every so often, In any case, he definitely deserved a much better friend than I was to him, at least in the end.
Now, as I’m married (again) to the actual woman of my dreams – I wonder what he’s up to and if he ever found someone to hang out with in boring ol’ Indiana. I hope he has, and I hope his mom Sharon still makes that killer breakfast scramble.
Defeating the Darkness
Whenever I get too down on myself, it’s mostly because I’ve become too caught up in my everyday life. Work, bills, laundry, taxes, dishes, etc. No matter what I do to try to remedy the “everyday blues” – it can be hard to pull myself from the oppressive black hole of the mundane.
At that point, I try to take stock of my surroundings. I remember that ultimately it’s the things I choose to do, the things I’ve been courageous enough to try, the things I partake in to set off the constant edge I feel. Those things are all more important to me in the long run than the momentary stresses and anxiety of the day-to-day.
I’m no musician, but I’ve spent a lot of time being in a band. We were known only as Tyler. Matt. Joe – and the only thing that mattered was that we had fun and made music. It didn’t matter that ultimately the band never went anywhere, and it doesn’t matter that I’m still not a real musician to this day. What matters is that I felt comfortable enough with myself, and my friends felt comfortable enough with my abilities to let me just try it out. It was something I gave myself fully to at the time. It was an experience, and it was positive in a time of real darkness in my life.
I’m no actor, but I’ve been in my fair share of productions. I’ve been in commercials, in a music video, and in some short films (one of them even won an award). Though I rarely ever use it any more, I also have my own YouTube channel – complete with videos I created to be silly and also of me lip-syncing. For me, looking at even this small body of work – I am amazed at how far I’ve come, especially growing up with severe anxiety. What drove me into this particular arena was a combination of wanting to fully defeat my own anxiety, to challenge myself, and most of all – to have fun. It worked.
I’m no dancer, but I dance whenever I can. I’ve never been formally trained, and I can still be very self-conscious at times. But I have fun. I had to force myself out of my shell, and a lot of my friends think of me (wrongly) as a great dancer. But really, I just have fun, and that’s sometimes the most important part of dancing – to have fun and not care what others think. It’s hard to do, and I still struggle with it because the darkness is always present within my thoughts – but I feel the beat. I’ve danced on stage at multiple concerts now, and on my aforementioned videos for all to see, and that has led to people looking for me to liven things up at parties and get-togethers, which is really weird to me considering how introverted I once was.
I’m no cook, but I cook a lot. I taught myself, aside from what little I learned back in home economics in grade school. I grew up on Ramen cooked in coffee makers, on pan-fried bologna, on government cheese and powdered eggs. I work hard for my money, and I use that money (most of the time) to buy what I consider healthy food. I prepare many of my own meals, and I experiment. I am a king of leftovers. I work on dishes until I get them right. This is a challenge for me, and yet I have been moderately successful. Ask me to make my scrambled eggs for you sometime, or my Chicken Gruyere, or my succotash, or my Lemon Chicken. Baking is another story, but try a steak I’ve prepared and tell me it’s bad.
I dress up like characters from pop culture and I entertain people, mostly children – and it’s the funnest and most rewarding thing in the world. I worked on a comic book that a childhood hero of mine worked on as well. I hunt ghosts. I walk old battlefields looking for inspiration. I try to create art. I review films and books. I explore. These are all small ways in which I combat the darkness in my own world.
But what I do most is I write. Writing enables me to frame some of the more mundane events in my life in a new context. And when I see that some of you read these things regularly, these work stories and little anecdotes – and you actually appreciate them – it makes those mundane times seem less mundane and more part of the journey. It turns the darkness into an illuminated space that feels like home. Thank you all for being a part of that, and especially for reading what I write here.
Cosplay Confessions: Mike Lavoie Cosplay
Cosplay Confessions is (what used to be a) monthly feature I added to my blog, though I’ve sort of been away from posting for a few months (almost a year, really) due to my job and getting married and other developments. Every month (and maybe twice a month), I tried featuring a different cosplayer and my interview with them, along with photos featuring their cosplays. This will not only be beneficial to the cosplayers themselves – because any publicity is good publicity when it comes to updating your fans on which conventions you’ll be at, and what you’re working on – but it will also be beneficial to those who are interested in cosplay as a hobby. If I can reconnect with enough cosplayers, I hope to make this segment a regular feature of my blog once more. Until then, I will be posting them as I get them.
It’s my great pleasure to introduce a local Maine cosplayer, Mike Lavoie, whom I originally met at Coast City Comicon (which is sadly now defunct). Mike is adept at finding characters he thinks will suit him, and then inhabiting the cosplay with not only looks, but with attitude and a knowledge of the characters. He has cosplayed Batman’s foe The Penguin, as well as Cartman from South Park and even the infamous WWF (WWE nowadays) character, Paul Bearer.
On to the interview!
QUESTION: Hello! Many people reading this may not know much about you. Please tell us a little bit about yourself. How long have you been cosplaying?
Hey. I’ve lived in Lewiston most of my life but I have also lived in Brunswick, Bangor, and now Auburn. I’ve been cosplaying seriously as a hobby since 2011. (Technically, I dabbled in cosplay in 2010 but I don’t think anyone recognized what I was going as and I didnt do a terribly good job on it). I also like to draw anime and take photos of other cosplayers.
My main cosplays I’ve done more than once have been Jake Blues of the Blues Brothers, Super Mario, The Penguin, Jason Voorhees, Leatherface, and Peter Griffin. Sometimes I’m inspired to do something at the last minute. I’ve cosplayed the Nostalgia Critic, Anonymous (V mask version), Paul Bearer (WWE), a Hunter zombie (Left 4 Dead), Milton Waddams (Office Space), Matt Foley Motivational Speaker (Chris Farley SNL), and Fat Bastard (Austin Powers 2).
I even have my own Ghostbusters character and my own hobo clown character I named Sadsack the Tramp. So I have a lot of costumes under my belt as you can tell.
QUESTION: Do you attend many conventions? Which ones are your favorite to attend?
I usually try to attend as many as possible going on in Maine, but I hope to check some out-of-state ones someday. Portcon has been an annual tradition for me to attend every year since I started going back in 2008. I have also attended AniMaine, Coast City Comicon (please come back!), Bangor Comic and Toy Con, and the Portland Comic Expo.
QUESTION: Do you have any pet peeves when it comes to cosplaying?
Wearing makeup can get kind of itchy. Masks can get pretty sweaty. Things that need to stick to your face can fall off when it gets hot or windy out. Walking around a lot can really do a number on your feet, but getting recognition makes it all worth it.
QUESTION: What’s one cosplay project you’d like to do in the future?
I’m planning on doing Dr. Mario, Eric Cartman, Dr. Robotnik, and maybe the Ventriloquist (a Batman villain) if everything works out all right.
QUESTION: Are there any cosplayers (professional or otherwise) who inspire you? If so, why?
Most of my cosplayer friends inspire me. They often have such a work ethic and passion I admire and sometimes envy. I’m not quite at the skill level to make my own clothes and props from scratch yet.
QUESTION: What do you think sets you apart from other cosplayers?
I tend to do mostly bad guys like Wario, for example, since I can pull off the unusual body figures due to my own not-so-heroic figure. But sometimes I challenge myself to do unusual choices that not everyone else would think of to do like Zorro. It still puts a smile on someone’s face when they didn’t expect a particular character to show up.
QUESTION: Any advice for someone wishing to begin cosplaying?
Try to buy quality stuff but don’t go over budget, try to find that balance when looking for a particular item. Make wise decisions on purchases, especially online when you can’t see the item for yourself in person. Dedicate yourself and have fun. Really embody your character! Network with friends you meet through cosplaying, it really helps when you are in a bind.
QUESTION: Last but not least – do you have a website or Facebook page where people can check out your cosplay endeavors?
My Facebook cosplay page is a link you can click right HERE. You can check out my latest cosplay photos and other stuff at my deviantart website HERE.
Away With Words 