Friday, June 30, 2017

Postcard #157: "Missing you..."


Sent to Fosforito!  

My friends Patty and Drew came out to visit.  We took a trip up to Snoqualmie to check out some Twin Peaks locations.

Postcard #156: "I farted..."


Sent to my friend JB RN.

Text: I farted.  I am not proud of that fact but, it happened.  I was alone in a room cleaning it up after surgery.  No cases to follow.  Perhaps I felt safe?  In a room adjacent to the OR, a coworker knocked on the door and gave me a friendly middle finger through the glass and smiled.  I walked over dragging the shame cloud of my flatulence with me.  It carried a familiar smell I could not place.  I opened the door and he was checking the shelves for outdated product.  My guilty conscious urged me to speak. "In an effort to meet full disclosure...I just farted. It's pretty bad." He replied, "Is that why it smells like McDonald's in here?" I laughed.  It did.  Like a large order of fries.

Wednesday, May 3, 2017

Postcard #155: "St. Reagan"



Eh.  Sent to someone...

Text:
I don’t know about you but I am so proud that St. Reagan fixed all the gender issues in America during his time in office. Don’t you?

god bless.

T.M.

Monday, May 1, 2017

Postcard #154: "Still Life"




Sent to LV who I felt needed to have a laugh.  

Text:
After retirement my mother worked her way through all the “active senior” art classes my local college had to offer. This was the final project for her landscapes class. My family refers to this as the last of the “normal stuff”. After she took the figure drawing course things started to get surreal. She learned how much she liked veins. All the figures she painted had obvious apparent veins on them. With each iteration the veins got bigger. She no longer drew full figures...tending to focus on particular body parts. Veiny hands. Forearms. Necks. The veins in the temples and forehead. So many varicose vein addled legs...so many. Then something broke. Enormous breasts with dark green bulging veins - broken switchbacks working up to eerily lifelike aureolas. For Christmas, my mother presented my father a painting she worked on all autumn. After peeling back the brown paper to reveal a painfully engorged close up of the shaft of a penis, the room fell silent. Admittedly there was extraordinary detail in the vessels of the prick you’d think the jute rope thick veins were pulsating. My father hung it above the toilet. It’s still there to this day.


Postcard #153: "Game"



Sent via postcrossing to BYCA

Text:
“Game”
It’s midnight, I’m off tomorrow but I am awake fighting to keep my eyes open. The video game I am playing, I beat two days ago. SPOILER ALERT! There are two endings. The planet is slowly changing all those on it…so you can activate a bomb which will destroy the entire planet killing you and everyone else or...you can also let the planet grow to its full potential which I think represents the spanse of all knowledge which instead traps everyone including the ships in orbit...presumably for eternity. Perhaps it’s a metaphor? Being a game completionist I am now playing for the last achievements. To get 100% I have to spend 60 minutes within the in game mazes. I have to be moving to get credit. I have found everything in the mazes and I am literally wandering around aimlessly because I have no aim or goal beyond simply walking around to drive up the clock. In essence I could turn it off thereby “blowing it up” but no, I am trapped… Moving back and forth within tight dizzying mazes I have already mapped out and unraveled to prove to the game I am capable of being lost.

Postcard #152: "Grimm"


Sent to Laura C.

Text:
 This was found and purchased at the “Grimm” estate sale.  I have no clue if it was featured in any episodes.  There was a lot of stuff.  They must have sent people out to buy stuff from goodwill's or flea markets.  Many of the items still had price tags on them.  I bought belts for a furniture piece I have been working on.  I few jackets that may or may not have been worn by Hank or Monroe.  A mug that may or may not have been in Rosalee’s hands in a morning scene.  A few flannels that may or may not have had a dead wesen in them at some point.  I have yet to finish the show...and they stopped filming and the series finale was a few weeks ago.  I do not like the show as I much as I used to earlier on the show.  It feels like the show is on its way to ending poorly.  “Juliette” is putting on her leather jacket and she is revving her motorcycle; getting in position for a sixth season shark jump.  

Sunday, April 30, 2017

Postcard #151: "Creepy"


Sent via postcrossing to DubbleL13

Text:
I don’t know why I said it.  The picture of the dog stuck out among all my political post and news reports. A picture of a small dog.  Its mouth is open in such a way that it sort of looks like it is grinning. “Cuuuuuuute!” “(: OH EM GEE!” I saw my mouse move over the words “Write a comment…” The caption reads “ZOMG! SO CUTE <3 <3”  I type the words “Looks delicious.”  She unfriended me.  Mutual friends asked me “Why did you say that? It was creepy.” I had no answer, it really could not have been THAT delicious honestly.

Postcard #150: "Winner"


Sent via postcrossing to Wowyna.

I have had this postcard forever. This is one of MY postcards that sit around and collect dust.  I have had this one since I was at the university of South Florida at least 16 years ago.  I put it in a frame and put it on my desk.  There were many times when people would ask me who was the the kid in the frame to which I would usually warmly and proudly utter "my son".  Those marks in the sender section are rust from the rivets in the picture frame used to angle the backing so it sits upright.

I scanned and sent this postcard on November 11th days after the election.  I don't know why I never posted it.  Sometimes scans get lost in my scan folder...better late than never I suppose.  I think the depressive nature hasn't changed much.  I still think he is a bastard and everyone who voted for him or did not vote for anyone are even bigger bastards.

Text: I went to bed on Tuesday night without knowing the election results. Well.  I had an idea and I think maybe I wanted escape a reality that [I] knew was going to happen. I woke up at 3 am.  Tossing and turning.  It was like reverse Christmas. I wanted to see maybe there was a non-Trump surprise waiting for me if I could just go and look up who had won.  But there was a chance I could look up who won and be able to finally sleep regardless of who won.  After tossing around for >45 minutes I looked and I was not stunned but...disappointed.  I was upset.  I could not get back to sleep I got up at 445am and got ready for work.  God bless America.   - TM

Sunday, February 5, 2017

Postcard #149: "for a bowel movement"



Sent a reply to A./A.
Politics and current events have crippled me in my armchair.  I can not have phone calls with people without devoting time to talking about politics.  Which I find dumb...more and more often.  This sort of shit is why I can not let myself on facebook anymore.  This is the sort of shit I want to type into peoples facebook's.  I can't. I am just tired of everything while being tired.

There is always a little voice inside me that strives to motivate the desire for self improvement.  The voice that sarcastically inserts the idea "Hey Tom! Instead of typing furiously into a comment box perhaps you could debate whether you should or should not be on an SSRI?"  I've always been a fan of the concept of entropy.  But as soon as reality starts to devolve into chaos now I am scrambling for some sense of structure.  Some sort of understanding...a mental algorithm to make things appear to make sense to me.  There is no monochrome.  No way to know if I am right or wrong or just repulsive.  I hope I am at least equally all of the above.

I am reading over the postcard now and I am glad I don't have her address.  I am a phony.  Right, wrong, a phony and repulsive.

Text:
"I wish I had your address, but I don't. You just posted something dumb on social media and it took so much willpower not to call you a fucking idiot.  It saddens me that I am proud of myself for that, like it's some accomplishment for not calling someone out on facebook.  I think it's great people are engaged in "debate" but as a friend of mine recently explained when discussing "the validity of facts one person is just fucking wrong and another is wasting their time on a fucking idiot who will never get it." -(J.S.) It is sort of pointless to call you a fucking idiot.  I can not insult you into engaging reality.  I wish in student government or class council I could have asked you, "Hey, do you think when you are older you are going to elect a racist, lying, sexist, philandering coward and businessman in name only to be president of the free world?  Do you think the president of the free world should take steps to ensure it isn't one?  Maybe I should seek a root cause?   Let's entertain for a single moment the unforgivable...that there is no god to repent to and we must rely on our own actions to be good people? Perhaps ultimately there is noone to ask forgiveness from?  We must own our demons and it's our children who must endure the hell that we leave for them beyond our graves."

Postcard #148: "Tina"


Sent a reply to Tina.  I realized in two sentences that even though this card had magazine style backing to it if I were to keep using the sharpie pen I was using I was not going to complete the entire card.  I had to use my normal pen and just hope the ink will not smudge.  Luckily it worked.  I hope the postal service is not going to challenge just how water proof the ink is...

Text:
I liked the piece so much I bought 2 postcards of it when I was in Salamanca.  I have alot of postcards at this point.  Some better than others.  I have quite a few that are "mine".  I try to send those to people who I think have the remotest chance or appreciating or being enamored the same way I was when I got the card at the giftshop.  I've learned its all subjective...Beauty is in the eye of the beholder and half the time people don't even realize what they like just what they are supposed to like. I try to get people the cards they ask for on postcrossing ...some what collections or certain types of cards... many people just do not want certain cards Ad cards, "multiview" cards, or oversized cards or "Homemade" cards.  I am on the fence about that but I will reserve my opinions to a homemade card.  Even know I as I draw to a close I wonder if I missed the point of what you wanted in a postcard I am not sure if this was personal enough even though I was writing this for you.  As you can see sometimes I underestimate and over estimate the space on my cards all the time.  - Tom
PS.  Loved your card.  Will be in FL in April perhaps we can meet up for dinner?"

Postcard #147: "Dead To Me"



Sent to Bill S.
Front text: 16745 Looking East From Vista House - Columbia River Highway, Ore.

Back Text:
www.minormumbles.com
Bill, 
This is where I had my revelation that New Jersey was dead to me.  The expanse and power of the wind being pulled from the Gorge.  The are only a few things in my memories that leave me speechless...all of which require a considerable drive to observe. There is nearly nothing in New Jersey that is as humbling as this...with the stark exception of one thing. Hurricane Sandy.  That was so utterly incredible and devastating simultaneously.  To witness first hand the power of a world I could no longer say I shared.  I just happen to live in it.  So it certainly begs to ask if Oregon possesses so much beauty that exists as a sort of present "potential" energy to be observed.  What is Oregon capable of when it wants to show me it's "Sandy" level of humility or active "kinetic" energy?

-Tom

Saturday, January 28, 2017

Postcard #146: "Townie"


Sent via postcrossing to magenta0810.  I felt like writing a bar story.  I felt like writing something NOT depressing.  So, this one came to mind.  True story.
Text: 
I don't know why the bartender was taking so long to cash us out.  My cousin was standing next to his barstool patting down his pockets looking for his keys.  The woman townie which had been talking to me all night tapped on my shoulder again. "So if you aren't going to come home with me can I at least get a hug?" She asks. I could not see the harm in letting this enormous (not fat, just large) mostly toothed woman hug me.  Until she started to lick my neck.  

Wednesday, January 25, 2017

Postcard #145: "Happy Holidays (Part 1)"


Sent via postcrossing to niek1963.  Who did not really care what sort of postcard they received.

True Fucking Story.  I wish it weren't.
Text:
It was cold and damp when I left work at 6pm.  AS I approached my car I thought I had left my windows down.  How could I?  Windows down, in rainy downtown portland for 11 hours?!? So stupid! My doors were unlocked everything of value was gone. I realized I did not leave them unlocked or my windows down... someone broke in...well not broke...forced themselves in by forcing my windows down to unlock my doors.  They took credit cards, money, old ipods, a butterfly knife that I had bought in Spain.  I was in disbelief as I filed the police report and report with hospital security. I felt an array of emotions. Angry at the person who did it.  Upset that what I thought was safe...was not. Happy they did not break my windows or get into my locked glove box...or steal the car. Confused how it happened.  I was I was not so weak that it made me hate desperate people. 
- TM

Wednesday, January 4, 2017

Postcard #144: "New Years Resolutions"



Sent via postcrossing to KaT-85 who likes dolls apparently and wanted ticket stubs. So I've had this card for a few years since my last trip to Spain.  When I got it I had every intention of writing a story about creepy dolls.  But since getting it I have noticed I have a few creepy doll postcards and it's not like I could not find a creepier card.  I needed to write down my post to make my resolutions a reality.  I have to leave to go to the gym (2nd time this week).  

I have also deleted the Facebook app and messenger.  I have to admit my stress level has been dropping since doing so.  I don't go on nearly as much.  Though I have noticed that I have been going on quite a bit today since it's my day off.  Sure enough, there are so many fucking idiots on Facebook that just infuriate me.  [insert long rant that I just typed up about a couple of the brands of fucking idiots that I deleted when I realized it only tangentially related to this postcard.]  

If you truly want to witness how neurotic I have become right now, the act of me reading that last paragraph had made me hate myself a little more.  Part of me wants to change "so many fucking idiots" to "a bunch of phonies" just to aid in my evolution to someone I hate.  

Perhaps that lends to a 7th resolution.  "Tom, just keep your fucking mouth shut."  Perhaps even an 8th resolution...get Sam to change my password so I can not log into it anymore.  

Text:
Like many people I routinely fail in making/completing new Years Resolutions. Two Year ago I practically made a manifesto...and failed. "Lose Weight." "Write a novel." "Get healthy." This year I have switched to fairly attainable goals that are so simple to complete but will create a decent foundation for anything else.  
1) Go to the Gym 2-3 times a week for a half hour. 2) write a postcard once a week.  3) Delete Facebook app/messenger.  No more FB at work or on breaks. 4) Read a half hour each day. 5) Cut the work fuck, fucking, fucked, from my spoken words. 6) Visit Mom, dad, grandma. -T.M.