Effluvia

Links? Are you kidding? Boss Kenny hadn't even invented the internet in 1991.

Videos MTV actually played during the summer of 1991:

• Guns 'n Roses, Don't Cry
• Nirvana, Smells Like Teen Spirit
• Motley Crue, Anarchy in the UK
• Tori Amos, Silent All These Years
• Siouxsie and the Banshees, Kiss Them For Me
• EMF, Unbelievable
• Jane's Addiction, Been Caught Stealing

Journal Roulette

Vixen - Tracy is old-school. No shit, hers was the first online journal I ever read. I said to myself, "well, if she can do it, so can I!" And the rest is history.

Siobhanorama!

Jim Fassel, head coach of the New York Giants, has recruited Siobhan to play linebacker. Apparently, Siobhan can picture the faces of guys with whom she has had less-than-satisfactory relationships and then make violent, bone-crushing tackles in the opposing team's offensive backfield. Kind of like this.

The Old Guys
At The Gym
Ain't Cool Dep't.

No, I don't want to talk about baseball. Especially not with your wang hanging out. Do you even own a towel?

Three Years Ago
I buy a G3.

Two Years Ago
Freaks at Kroger.

One Year Ago
Oh, crap - it's my class reunion! Don't miss the pictures.

Looking back on that summer, now, it's almost unbelievable that we lived that way. But all our friends lived that way, too. What would be unredeemably white trash now - and quite skanky as we approached graduation - was underclassman chic at the time.

First, let me tell you about the apartment. Living room, dining room, kitchen, one bedroom and a bathroom. A little box, really. Gas heat and oven. Avocado green appliances. Beautiful green-gold shag carpet with several huge, concrete-exposing holes and ominous red stains in the bedroom.

All this was on the second floor, motel-style, and it looked out on a courtyard containing a green, scum-filled pool and a tiny, ramshackle laundry room. We didn't have a phone; at least not 'til the end of the summer. When we needed to call someone we used the payphone in the laundry room.

It was the only apartment we'd been able to find in February, though, so it was good enough. That summer the whole complex (the University Apartments, they're called, and I'm sure they're still right there, just a couple of blocks down Donaghey Avenue from the University of Central Arkansas) changed ownership. Apparently, many of the other residents had been on week-to-week agreements. The people were scruffy, it's true. Many of them moved out at the end of the semester in May. Through the course of the summer more and more moved out or were evicted until only a few - maybe five or so - of the forty units were occupied. Sometimes we'd sit outside, drinking a beer, maybe, or just looking at the green pool, and not see a soul stir for hours.

I was working at Arby's, Sonya was working in the library at school. Two minimum-wage jobs. We had a couple of meager safety nets, true: Sonya had a checkbook from back home, and so did I - though I was wary of using mine. I'd failed three classes the semester before, you see, and I didn't talk to my family much (except to confirm that my mom would indeed pay for summer school) until the end of the summer when we returned home, flush with successfully completed summer classes, grant money and guaranteed work-study jobs. Sonya also had a gas card from her parents. I can't tell you how many times we had fountain Cokes, chips and candy bars for dinner. Sometimes family would send a letter with a ten- or twenty-dollar bill in it. Otherwise, we were on our own.

But we didn't have many debts, either. Rent was two-eighty, utilities and cable were another hundred. Our parents still paid the insurance on the cars (because they still owned them) and we had no phone. We had no credit cards. No credit cards.

Food was a constant worry. Usually a meal consisted of spaghetti (with a thin coating of Hunt's spaghetti sauce) and french bread. Every time one of us got paid we'd immediately buy thirty dollars worth of groceries. That, friends, would carry us for a couple of weeks before supplies started to get thin. Thirty bucks! I can't go to Winn-Dixie for beer and chips for less than forty these days! A huge treat was ordering pizza from Litte Ceasar's.

It was so hot that summer. My normal outfit for class was some rock-n-roll t-shirt (Motley Crue, The Creatures, Great White, REM), cut-off sweats and a Marine fatigue cap. No shoes. I didn't need shoes. My feet were filthy.

Arby's. Arby's was a good first-real-job. Greasy and hot, but the coworkers were cool, grim in the way of all restaurant workers, and I made friends there that I kept all the way through college, anyway. I also worked there the next summer when I unexpectedly found myself unqualified for a work study job. And I ate at work. Fries and beef and bacon and all manner of cheese and - when I could - the grilled chicken. God, that food was delicious. Many was the time when I'd let Sonya eat the rest of whatever it was we had, knowing that I could scavenge in the workplace.

Arby's closed at eleven, I think. We could do some closing stuff (mopping, scrubbing, counting down a register) before we actually closed, but most of it had to wait until we had actually locked the doors. If we were working fast and got lots done before closing we could leave by ten-fifteen or so; if we were busy or bullshitting I wouldn't get home until one.

Ling lived with us that summer. Ling was an aloof shih tzu, my childhood pet. He loved Sonya more than anyone before or after. Shih tzus are not lap dogs, as a rule, but Ling would happily jump into Sonya's lap to be brushed or just to sit.

I'd come in late and, if it were a school night, Sonya would already be in bed. I'd go in the bedroom to change clothes and Ling would be sitting on the end of the bed, guarding the sleeping Sonya, softly growling until he realized it was me. Then he'd hop down and go in the living room to await his nightly walk. He pissed all over the closet doors, rusting them horribly, but he was damned fine watchdog.

Alvin and Chris, friends of mine from my time in the dorms, lived with us for a month or so waiting for their own apartment to get ready. Michelle, Marcie and Katy - our hippy friends - lived in a house not far from our place. Jon and Angie came up on their weekends off; it seemed like one or the other was always there. They'd bring wine, too, or beer. The other Michelle lived in some apartments across from ours. She had a big, clean swimming pool we visited sometimes. We would go out to Toad Suck and watch boats go through the locks. We'd take late-night rides on the interstate in Alvin's huge old truck. Chinese food, trips to the movies, loitering at the mall - these were luxuries.

I can't imagine living like that now. It seems as far away as Africa is from Iowa. But we were, for the most part, happy. At the end of the summer, with the new school year starting, Sonya and I collected our grant money and paid off the school. We still had hundreds of dollars left over. While money would definitely be tight from time to time after that we were never in such a bad spot as we were that summer. We immediately made a liquor run and I think I giggled for weeks, after trading in my greasy job at Arby's for a cushy desk in the University's Public Affairs department.