Last night I had a dream that I made a rush decision to leave town and go home, for good. I wouldn't even be saying goodbye to anyone. I got in my car and stopped at some cafe for some coffee for the trip, and I saw Neve Campbell sitting there, and I started to talk to her, because for some reason in my dream, Neve and I were acquaintances. We made small talk, and I remember her telling me that she had an upcoming audition for a regualr role on Walker, Texas Ranger. I said that I thought that show had long ago been cancelled, and she said she had thought so too, but apparently not. I started to feel enormously attracted to her. I thought about asking her out for the following Saturday, but then I remembered that I was leaving forever, and just then her boyfriend walked in. He was very tall. So I excused myself, and walked outside to my car. It occurred to me that I'd better call my parents and tell them to expect me. I pulled out my cellphone and found that for some reason I had locked the keypad, and had no idea how to unlock it. I stood there for a few minutes pressing random buttons, to no avail. I thought about calling someone with a similar phone for advice, but of course that would require unlocking my phone. I was beginning to lose my will concerning leaving. Not totally; I just thought it might be a good idea to hold for a day or two until I could plan things a little better. The whole thing just felt very, very sad.

There once was a September that lasted a thousand days. And then October lasted a thousand more.

I was always one of those kids that kept their bedroom clean, or mostly so, but one day in November my father, who I hadn’t really spoken to much lately, came to my door. My door had been mostly closed as of late, and he’d never really mastered the art of knocking, perhaps feeling that he shouldn’t need to since he paid for the house. Thinking back now, his reaction to the state of my room was quite hilarious, though it probably annoyed me at the time. After informing me or questioning me on whatever issue had brought him into my lair, which I don’t remember the particulars of but in was undoubtedly concerning something that I didn’t do, did too much of, or did completely wrong, he took a cursory look around my very small room and told me in no uncertain terms to clean it. I thought about arguing that in my own little corner of the world, I should get to choose the degree of the filth that I would choose to live in, but I could see pretty quickly there would be no room for debate. And with some amusement in my mind that I didn’t dare show, I could see his point. A quick scan of my room for my own self revealed at least 20 empty Pepsi cans that my father commented on a split second later. My bedroom was about the size of a large closet. If I’d had a cat handy to swing around by the tail, I would have knocked over all 20 or so cans without stretching very much.

It was the middle of November or so. It was November back in the days before I knew how much I loved November. Actually, it was the one that made me feel that way. I like to think now that when I bagged up all those cans and took them out to the garbage cans on the side of the house, I appreciated the cold evening fall air. But I was actually just probably thinking about homework.

The reason I remember this occasion so clearly now is mainly because of one particularly hilarious example of how ignorant I’d become of my surroundings amidst constant social activity with my new group of friends, and rehearsals for my first-ever appearance in a play, and hours-long phone conversations with my first girlfriend, and pointless car trips now that I had my license. During the first week of school back in September, my first assignment in Chemistry class was to create slime, like the kind you buy in toy stores. My chemical recipe was successful, and that green concoction found its way to the top of a copy of the Pittsburgh free newsweekly from the second week of that September. It had REM on the cover because they came through town on their Green tour, a concert which my friends and I camped out to buy tickets for and took the trolley downtown to see. The slime started out covering Mike Mills face, and I had been enjoying watching it seep further and further towards the other members as time went on. After the Pepsi cans, that was naturally the thing my father was most horrified by. For all he knew, it was drugs. “What in the world is that,” he asked, not even trying to be funny. He’d stopped trying to be funny with me a few months earlier, a couple months after I’d stopped pretending I thought he was. I explained the substance was a class project, hoping the scholastic angle would soothe the consternation he was undoubtedly feeling by walking into his son’s room and finding creeping green slime. His reply was “Well throw it away if you’re done with it.”

With a room so small, even the worst state of disarray is cleared up pretty quickly. I threw away some things, including the slimed issue of In Pittsburgh, tossed some things in the closet or under the bed, retaped and rehung the CD longbox fronts that I’d scissored up and used as cheap decoration every time I came back from the music store, and even vacuumed the small bit of carpet that wasn’t covered by my bed or desk. I had to admit the new tidiness was kind of relief. But it still wasn’t the same old room from the summer before. I’d been noticing lately that everything looked a little different; smaller maybe. Like my back yard. The tree I used to climb. The distance to the convenience store at the bottom of the hill was suddenly negligible now that I could drive to it when my mother needed milk. My once beloved bedroom was now a place I preferred to be only if I was forced to be in the house at all. Someone else’s bedroom was always better.

I took a walk on the Promenade and went into a few stores, and for some reason I set off the theft alarms upon entering and exiting each one. It was kind of cool when I entered, as if I was being announced with some kind of fanfare. But having them go off every time I walked out was a little embarrassing.

In every case, I simply let the sound go off around me and kept walking, but as I walked out of Urban Outfitters, the nervous-looking store greeter actually had me come in (setting off the alarm again, of course), and then, not having any idea of what to do once I did return, just kind of stared at me for a little bit. He looked around for...I don't know, a security guard, and not finding one, decided to take things into his own hands by asking me empty my pockets. I went for the left one first, not wishing to start with the right and have to possibly explain why it contains a small plastic toy turtle and a green egg-shaped stone that I've been carrying with me since 1994. Instead I pulled out my car keys and my security badge for work. Relieved, he said "oh, it was probably that." I knew full well it most likely wasn't since I've entered many stores on other days with it in my pocket without setting off alarms, so I waved it in front of the alarm system. It did nothing. I think at that point my jerk gene was kicking in, because then I turned and just looked at him, waiting for him to try something else. Again, he just stared at me uncomfortably. So I said "bye" and walked out, complete with my computerized fanfare.

Seriously though, what's up with the false alarms? Is it my magnetic personality? (HA HA HA HA!) For a moment I actually had to wonder if I'm suffering from some kind of intense kleptomania where I live in such denial that I literally have no idea I'm stealing. But if that's so, WHERE IS ALL MY FREE STUFF?