Rage On, Eternal Optimist

I just wanted to see how that would feel to type out. Cause I’m Max now, officially. Irreversibly.

I saw my old friends today. [REDACTED], [REDACTED]. [REDACTED], [REDACTED], [REDACTED]. [REDACTED]. [REDACTED]. And I don’t think they saw me. [REDACTED] and [REDACTED], yes to some extent. [REDACTED], maybe. But the other people didn’t feel like they got me at all. I asked them about their lives, their jobs. They didn’t ask me back. [REDACTED] said it’s because they assume I’m just doing good. I can’t tell. Do they not care? Do they feel intimidated? Do they think it’s cringe?

It doesn’t matter.

At [REDACTED]‘s, everyone thought I was the crazy one for asking if [REDACTED] had friends. No one has friends, they said. I’m the one living in fantasy land.

They just go into their jobs, day in and day out. Jobs that they hate. They don’t care about money so they work their entire life away for it. They don’t have friends. They don’t have hobbies.

They, they, they. Who cares? These are not my people anymore. Move on.

How much bigger would my life become if I lost touch with [REDACTED]? With [REDACTED], even? People who are here to support me on my journey but are not pushing me. Not at all. They’re just people to kill time with. I love them, they get me. But I am on the brink of bigger and bigger things. And I waste my time worrying if these people like me. I get sad when I don’t fit in with them. I care when they don’t ask about what I’m doing.

But they know. They know what I’m doing, and what I’m capable of. It’s going to be me. I’m going to do it. For Jevandre, for them. To spite them. To say fuck you, you cowards. You spineless, pathetic, sorry wastes of life. You sell your one shot at this game for $16.25 an hour and get told it’s good money.

What are you thinking about, every minute, if not in pursuit of something more? Jevandre once told me that I have a sense of optimism about the future that he didn’t have. And look at him, he’s dead. And I see my friends dying before me. They just don’t know it. Or maybe they do. Daily, they sap their own life away until they die. I think Jevandre saw this and decided that he’d die a dark quiet death on his own terms rather than waste away and die accidentally.

When Nonna died, I thought to myself, this is just what happens. Old people die. When Jevandre died, I thought to myself, this isn’t what happens. This is wrong.

But no. This is what happened. People fucking died. Nonna died. Jevandre died. And it will keep happening. My friends will keep on dying. And they already are, before my very eyes. My childhood died. My idea that everyone’s life has an ultimate purpose. Dead with Jevandre. The idea that every action leads to something else. Dead.

All my friends are dead. Kent killed them. The world killed them. And I fucking knew it. I knew it since I was a teenager. A kid. A toddler. This life will kill you if you let it. But I also fucking knew that there was something else out there. A great beyond, where childhood stretches eternally and your life is neatly divided into chapters and arcs. And I’m there, right now.

So yes, when I ask if [REDACTED] has friends, and they look at me like I’m crazy, I’m going to reconsider who these people are. And I’m going to reconsider how grateful I tend not to be for my fantasy life in LA. I’ve already fucking made it. Anything else is the cherry on top.

I spend my days worrying about if I’m as popular as my friends. My dead friends back home don’t have any friends at all. It is the pursuit of this life, this dream, that keeps me away from this bottomless fucking pit of suburbia and middle America and waking death and standstill contentment. From ticking clocks and wasted youth and endless timecards.

Maybe Jevandre was right. Maybe he had a point in what he did. “Why do something every day if I’m fucking miserable doing it?” I thought he was talking about his job. Now I think he was talking about living. He’s a man who sought truth, and the truth beneath the truth. And I think what he found is that the truth is plain and simple and staring in our faces all along. This is all it is. This is life. The mundane, dull, in and out, repetition, endless, haze. He had his degree. His prospects. His intelligence. And a fucked up brain. What was there for him? Could a man as intelligent as him stomach the rotten taste of growing older and raising children in this fucked up world, where you get caught in the machine and turn gears for the chance at a few hours a week of redemption?

I don’t blame him for what he did. I forgive him for it. I understand it. He saw the truth dead in the face. Maybe when he [REDACTED]. Maybe when he [REDACTED]. Maybe when he didn’t eat for 5 days. He saw something. He knew something, more than I did, always. But he died and I think I see it now. His final revelation. This is fucking it. This. Is. Fucking. it.

The eternal pessimist sees the almost ludicrously small scope of life and decides what’s the point of continuing? The eternal optimist sees it and decides to squeeze out every last drop.

Jevandre, you fucked up. Dude, C’mon. You gave up that easily? I know your face you’d be making right now. It was right around the corner for you, I think. You could have figured it out. I know you would’ve. You might’ve taken a few more years even. Or thought of it one more way. I’m sure you see it now. But you were tired. I understand. And I hope you’re not haunting me so that you can get some rest. Your Mind’s Guy likes to be asleep in his cave.

Your friends told me how much you loved me. He said you talked about me all the time and that he’s sad this is the first time we’re meeting. She said that you showed her my music. She said that you told her about our pact. Your dad said he knew we were brothers. And we fucking were. We had a bond, man, a bond that transcended that tiny little bubble of existence in third grade, where we were absolutely certain about the infinite possibilities of life and the destinies that awaited us. That’s who you are to me, man, and will always be. I don’t know what you became, but that’s not you. Not to me. I’ll spend the entire rest of my life tossing you around in my head trying to make sense of you. I’ll find the words to best describe the way you laughed.

You told me that in third grade you think you liked me. I like to think you weren’t in your right mind when you said that. Or maybe you were fucking with me, as one last thing to get over on me before you went. You loved fucking with people. You didn’t fuck with me that much. Remember when you called me and said you were sorry for calling me Choji? It’s okay, man. It hurt me real good back then, I think you could tell. You were always kind of mean. But that’s fine. I’m sure you were hurting, too, all the way up to the end.

But now, I take your flame, and carry it on. I will do it. I told you. I will fucking do it.

I am going to be the first famous, ridiculously rich person from Kent, WA. I don’t care if it’s delusional anymore. It’s going to happen. And I’m going to pursue it. I’m going to have 2 places, a mansion in LA and an apartment in Manhattan. I [sic] my mansion will be in the hills with a view of the skyline. It’ll have a pool and a hot tub. It’ll have speakers throughout the house. It’ll have a grand piano. It’ll have white marble floors and a kitchen island. It’ll have a library. It’ll have giant bay windows. It’ll have a backyard and a trampoline. It’ll have a tatami room for guests. My apartment in Manhattan will be minimalist and sparse. It will have art and sculptures and fine furniture. It’ll have down comforters and a TV in the wall.

And with my first check I will pay off my student loans. Then my parents’ house. Then I’ll buy my mom a Red Jeep. And I’ll produce my dad’s movie. And I’ll buy my sister a trip to anywhere in the world she’d want to go. And I’ll buy a house for myself but not live in it, just rent it out.

And I’ll buy a car. I’ll buy a Black 911. I’ll upgrade my studio. I’ll have synthesizers and furry red carpet and big windows and vintage microphones and golden guitars.

My friends will be the most famous and interesting people in the world and would have great parties. I would even throw some at my house. I will travel the world and see all there is to see.

Because I am from Kent and my friends are dead and my best friend killed himself and I promised him I would do it. And I fucking will. And I will do it because it is me and it is my destiny. I am the only one living this life. I will make it possible. And by the next time anyone sees me I will be famous and my song will have a million streams. And I will be the person I have always known I was but no one has seen yet of me. And I won’t need to talk about myself on [REDACTED]‘s porch because my eminence will be tangible. And I will know who the fuck I am.

I am shook up by your death, Jevandre, and perhaps you did me a favor. When the silt settles I will not be Marcello. Marcello is dead. I am now Max Bennett Kelly. Perhaps I always was. But today, my sister’s 22nd birthday, I have confirmed it. Who am I for myself? A mentor. A friend. A collaborator. I am Max Bennett Kelly.

And I will be so far from Kent, WA that I forget I was ever from here in the first place. And so far from Tucson that I forget I was there. My life starts now. Marcello died. Max Bennett Kelly is born.