DIY Reads

Andrew Krosch: “WHO YOU WITH?”

Andrew Krosch 

WHO YOU WITH?

Identity. Where do you fall in the ranks of the facility you were dropped in? It’s always felt like they’te asking, or more like saying, “Who the fuck are you?” or better yet; “Who the fuck do you think you are?” So you find ways to show who you are. Prove who you are and how far you’ll take it if you have to or maybe just because you feel like it. You stand on your square and you don’t let nobody knock you off. Ever.

But what the world fails to tell you is that the square you’ll spend your life standing on is like one of those whack ass carnival rides that twists
and spins in place on a platform that tilts and whirls around. And not a good one at a legit amusement park. (Or even a third rate county fair.) No, you  don’t get that kind of ride, you get the fucked up carnival ride hammered  together by a guy named Tweak, the carnmey who works for the outfit that sets up their traveling show in the side lot of a closed down strip mall on the wrong side of town.

That’s the solid ground they give you. The couple of square feet you  get to stand on. And try to hold the lever the world has handed you. The lever with which you are expected to move the world. 

Get on and hold your balance long enough for someone to see you and recognize who you’re with, or better, who the fuck you know you are, an identity beyond a state or federally issued number on & file held by a revolving army of auto-rats who serve their own form of time} their central focus — their own out=dates.

Move past, possibly build on that identity and get to know who you really are, mot who other people think you should be, and that’s when you hit the real fucking wall.

You find you got shit to say. A little, maybe a lot. A lot of shit the other fellas around you have already said, those who came before and will after. 

But what you got to say matters too. Motherfuckers should (better) listen. At least this one time. You know how to speak. Loud. You can be heard through solid steel doors and down long concrete hallways. Through the thin wires of telephone lines and through satellites across the world. And even, once in a while, across the great vacuous divide between captive and captor. But you and me know we’ll never really know if they heard us, not really. The only time we’ve ever known someone has heard usiis when it’s right there in the heat of the moment. On the spot, in the ring, shit flying. The words the rest of the world hears are only the ones that other people put down later. Those words. Their words. Words that are never true to the moment. The words they use to define us, conjured up in the aftermath. BhtakRedso:Aggréssosy va~ Offenders. Perpetrators. The kinds of words they’ve used in every arrest report and discipline record since the dawn of time. Ever since Cain got that first write ify after he settled that beef with his brother in The Garden. Sure, he probably could’ve handled the whole thing better. Checked his pride a little. Cut his brother some slack. But-what do I know. Hindsight’s always  20/20 and
I wasn’t there.

How about you? You ever hear brother Cain’s side of the story? Yeah, me neither. That kind of shit’s been going on pretty much the same way ever since. What goes down on their permanent records only ever tells one side of the story. That’s the only thing the rest of the world will ever hear  The other side of the  story? Your side. Well…   Yours just don’t count.  Never has. Maybe never will…

You ean scream and fight and mostly nobody ever hears you and you lose your voice after a while and when you get it back what do you even say?

What’s there to talk about:

Who do you even say it to:

Who really gives a fuck.

Nobody. That’s who.

So do you even bother? Try it?. Try to actually connect with someone out there in the world that might actually listen? Hear your side of things for once.

Or do you just go looking for another fight.

Start a feud.

Find one to join.

Fight.

Get a couple good swings in before you get swarmed.

When you’ve spent your entire life with people looking you dead in the eye with their ”Yeah, yeah, yeah, I hear you”, and ‘Yeah, yeah, yeah, we really do care’.” You grow a disconnect between what your heart, soul and brain know is right and how fucked up you really are deep down inside. What you want — need — demand to say. The pain, hate, fear and frustration all warring.

And sooner-or later all of it’s 5 going to come out, one way or another. And usually while theTilt-A-Whirl our good ‘buddy Tweak (who ain’t slept a wink in a couple weeks now and’s twitching like he’s got his thumb in a light socket) slapped together is running at top speed, about to fly apart. And all those words inside — Boiling, deep down in your belly, fermenting like warm beer and =¢celd Mini-Donuts — ready to explode. All those years. All the years of pain, hate, fear and frustration ready and waiting for-you to spew all over anybody and everybody who dares to get too close when you finally let loose what’s inside you and show them what — who — you really are.