Sain’t Louis

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st louis. i went home in january. i could wax poetic stl history for days but it still feels like a compromised place. there’s gun toters, there’s abortion clinic bombings, there’s “legitimate rape”, there’s seedy strip clubs, there’s abandoned strip malls, but there’s jesus. in the black neighborhoods where the whites dare not go and want them to stay, there’s a lot of crime but jesus is also there. it’s a melting pot of midwestern simplicity with licks of northern and southern culture. the people and their varying groups, no matter how extreme, are separated by a single colloquialism: ain’t. some use it their Others don’t but they’re all St. Louis.

i hung out with family, i hung out with friends. we hung out with strippers. one stripper is a juggalette with a public sex tape on worldstarhiphop. another has a confederate flag tattoo on her back. her best friend works at the same club; she’s dating a tug boat captain. the bartender at one strip club slide me her number and told me to call her. when i did she texted that she’d have to call me later cause she was at the mall with her kids. she never did. she has four kids and a husband: he keeps things open so she does too

my relationship with this city’s toxic. a lot of bad memories of that whole people being “St. Louis” thing i mentioned before. it’s a bit like an over-confidence of nothing with a kill lust towards everything not same. have you seen winter’s bone? it’s that only urban and a couple hours north. despite my grievances it’s still a relationship. with every visit there’s a moment where i flirt, “maybe it’s time to move back.” but those are just moments. moments don’t last and aint’s not a word.

My Not Talking to you Chil’d

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trying to figure out how to write day-to-day activity has been a bit of a boulder in continuing this site. i’m not on the road doing exciting stuff everyday. i’ve been in berlin nine months: a whole pregnancy. there’s a lot of adjustments in whole-pregnancy relocating after vehicular isolation. it felt as though i’d lost the ability to have normal conversations with others. did i go crazy? i didn’t know how to talk. maybe i never knew and i suddenly became aware of this inability. i could get deep and i could charm strangers- talking anything else was a chore.

i’d spend conversations thinking how i was doing in the conversation and/or daydreaming endlessly. “am i making enough eye contact?”, ”what did they just say?”, “how can they talk so easily?”, “what should i say?”, “am i doing bad at talking? who doesn’t know how to talk? nell. they’re on to you!”, “are you the boy nell?”, “what does ‘on to you’ even mean? on to me. i wish she wasn’t wearing bootcut jeans. she’s not a mom and she’s probably wearing them cause they still fit. this will never work, good thing i dont know what to say”. all while trying to hide this self-analyzation and/or daydreaming from whomever i was with so they wouldn’t think me rude or bad at talking. later on i’d analyze myself and these conversations until they grew to waves of depression to ride out. radical.

sometimes my daydreams were about moving to a small town to start writing a book, “The Boy Who Couldn’t Talk with Others”. but if my last nine months with this blog shows anything, i’d get a few pages in then start my second book, “The Boy Who Kicked the Book Idea”. ha ha. making light of a difficult reflection. it’s always easier to make a joke. whatever- enough about the boulder. *insert recent photograph of self

about the author- joee is originally from st. louis, missouri. he just shat an admittance of a neuroses child to excuse his not-postings on his cute little blog in past tense to allude that things might be different. joee is wearing a wig in recent photo of self: he wore it for attention. everyone look at joee.

End of the Line

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i sold my car and moved to berlin. it’s been seven months since my last post. The Journey was 2012 and the world’s predicted to end in december. upon my arrival i knew that this blog couldn’t be continued as it was while making myself at home in a place i’d never been because there’s that time in a new place after the honeymoon fades where one might question the decision. i didn’t want to write about that or endless rambles of longing wheat thins and other groceries not available in germany. when the end-of-the-world-day comes and goes my blog will be a year old and in the new year i’ll continue this project as the next chapter.

last weekend i rode the trains. that’s it. as far as my day-passes would take me i rode the trains. ipod in pocket, camera at my side, and changing leaves all around. it was vaguely reminiscent of The Journey, quite fitting for an epilogue and the pass cost less than a shrimp cocktail

Cupcakes Turtles and Kinks

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dolly parton had her own variety show on abc in the late 80′s. we watched it as a family. she said a lot about growing up in the smokey mountains. they meant a lot to her.

in the early 00′s a girl i was with told me she’d never pilgrimed graceland and wanted to, badly. hours after the start of spring break we were diving south to the mississippi delta in the rain. we wore all black. the sad-face photos of us at the eternal flame were outstanding and appeared meaningful.

while dolly aired, the family took a spring break road-trip to florida. we left in the middle of the night. i woke up in the backseat when my mom announced, “this is where dolly’s from!” the rising sun shined through the fog that rested on the range: smokey mountains! the name made sense

the day after graceland, girl and i were entertaining the staff of a bbq place on beale street. we asked if they had ideas on where to continue our trip but they weren’t much help: two of the cooks hadn’t ever traveled outside of memphis. we numbered six places we knew on a napkin and rolled a die. one was drive east to the smokey mountains; two was south to new orleans; six was west to texas; i don’t remember four or five. we rolled a two, easy!

despite my car breaking down so close to new orleans, i didn’t make it back on this trip or back to the smokies on that trip. if i stay on the road long enough i’ll be able to connect all the nouns of my life. e.g. if i take the smokey mountains on this journey, i’ll be experience mapping at a highly skilled level. like the circled white icing on a hostess cupcake

great smokey mountains-

i stayed the night with family friends in louisville. from there it’s a straight four-hour-drive to st louis. i wasn’t ready for that: i had this feeling that the trip was incomplete: it wasn’t a i-don’t-want-this-to-be-over feeling, rather a this-isn’t-done one. i turned the gps off. exited the highway and cruised with no direction

for days i wove roads and states without a map. i often didn’t know where i was. i slept in the car. i barely spoke. i drove really fast. this is experience dessert.

weaving until it feels right-

in southern missouri, i was on a farm-to-market road. the speed limit is marked 50 but everyone keeps 70+. at the top of a hill, off the corner of my eye, i noticed a turtle crossing the street. i hit the brakes and ran out. i snapped the photo and picked him up as a caravan of trucks sped past the spot he was at

i set Allegory Turtle down safely in the field he was walking to

now i’m ready.

i kept a rough course in the direction of st louis and as the cupcake’s circle would have it, came upon the subject of the journey’s first photo via a road i’d never traveled-
how predictable – life is pathetically poetic

A Palmetto State of Mind

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from savannah, i took two-lane state roads through the cradle of reconstruction. this is where lincoln experimented with giving land to the Freedmen. everyone i met was wonderful though my conversations were more “yes” and “thank you” than talking. im over talking. it’s forced. self-oppressive. i don’t want to talk anymore. i want drive through the south quietly, forever.

the sun isn’t far from setting. i got the biggest coffee the gas station had. then got another biggest coffee another gas station had. it’s not a big deal: i pull over and pee wherever i want cause i can do it standing up cause im a man. i pulled into spartanburg, sc cause it’s on the edge of the smokey mountains. a perfect place to stop before appalachia.

i fill up my tank and drive towards downtown. a police car is to the right of me at a four-way-stop. the police car turns and i pull behind them. then they pull over to the shoulder. i pass them then they get behind me. i can almost hear the benny hill theme playing really slow. then they turn their lights on and i start my voice recorder. it is no longer forever.

the marriott was nice. the restaurant was a joke
remember when i was over talking?

Hostess City of the South

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i left miami and began the conclusion of my journey. i slept at a rest stop near daytona beach. woke up at sunrise and went to the beach: we went there as a family when i was seven. my folks drove the station wagon through the smokey mountains down to florida: it was my first road trip. i’m backtracking their route for the finale. kind of.

savannah photographs were lost because my computer ate the sd-card

Savannah, GA
the savannah college of art and design is a private design university for the artistically inspired children of those wealthy enough to afford it. you can see the money in their bone structures. i liked savannah, it’s cute. my ex-fiancé and her husband have been living there since last summer while he works on a secret project that will be a very popular toy among the parents of scad students.

they’re awesome. we ate shrimp cocktails on the ocean and saw real gators and ferrel cats and (i) drank so many piña coladas at this place that was like merlotte’s- they were two of maybe six people dancing to new order at ultra because the stage was empty… they’re awesome. she knows everything about eighties and nineties pop music there is to know. she coulda done 120 Minutes on the fly-

two weeks before our wedding her and i had a bickerment that lead to calling things off. we’d have been divorced within the first year. in my opinion we couldn’t find a balance between our dreams so for one of us to be happy, the other would be miserable. i feel much of the time since then has been a frenzy of proving it not in vain and perhaps this journey was my way of coming to terms with what i see/saw as a major sacrifice *mind you my hindsight is messianically romantic.

her and i spent the morning walking through forsyth park talking about everything that’s happened since we last saw each other and what we thought of what we had. she sees our end a little differently, “you live your life like a game. constantly finding different scenarios to put yourself in. you figure things out faster than your patience and when you find yourself in the throws of total intimacy the game suffers and eventually… eventually you get bored.” ffffffffffffff

there’s no fountain at st augustine’s fountain of youth. no basement either