Saturday Night Fever

8:43 pm cellblock 9

The moment my cell door slammed shut I scooped a spoonful of freeze-dried coffee into my workhorse of a coffee cup. I almost never drink coffee after lockdown. But I need to write. Room-temperature coffee is just a part of my ritual.

I was on the phone with the 23 yr. old when the intercom ordered us to lockdown for the night. I could hear Toro, the Nine Fingered Mexican, milling around in the background. Just a few hours earlier he was driving—to attend Stanhope's last show in Chicago.

They had just arrived at the venue when I called.

A year ago none of these people knew the others existed. I met the Nine Finger in prison, I met the 23 yr. old in prison—while she was running a creative writing class for inmates, and I met Stanhope a few years back through my website. It's odd to think that a single incarcerated thread can tie three total strangers together in under a year. It's even more odd to be that thread. There is no place I'd rather be for the anniversary of 9-11 than at a comedy club with these people.

It's not that I'm jealous—well not entirely. I'm mostly excited for them—really I am. But like I said, this whole thing is strange. I'd be lying if I said there wasn't a streak of hurt somewhere. To be fair, there's no way for this night to unfold without making the distance between me and that elusive 7-letter F-word painfully obvious.

I can't help but wonder what they're doing right now in this very moment—Jen and the Nine Finger.

When I was on the phone with her the background noise set me on my heels. I could hear an unmistakable buzz building behind her. The hum of a gathering crowd. Something I haven't heard in years. A group of free people had summoned a Saturday Night that was now on the verge of unfolding, willing it to finally make its move. This was always my favorite part of the night—when everything is just getting started.

The most exciting part of a rollercoaster isn't the plunge or the roll. It's the slow click of the ascension. Leaned back so nothing but the sky is visible. The view is misleading. It suggests you relax. But how could you? In the back of you mind you know a thrilling shift looms somewhere over the horizon. Your heart speeds past the slow clicks of the track. Your hands grow supple with perspiration. Your tinniest hairs raise in anticipation. You take a final breath to steal yourself against the excitement to come, but before you can fully inhale—BAM! The floor drops out from under you. Suddenly you're rocketing though space. It's all designed to stimulate your reptilian brain. It's terrifying but beautiful in its simplicity. There is nowhere to be but here, present in this one fluid ever-evolving moment as it unfolds. 

A day removed from the work week in either direction, the sun has finally clocked out. Anything is possible. There is something special about a Saturday night on the brink of self realization.

Excitement gathers in the space of a reality yet to unfold. The first waves of alcohol—the drink you had in the kitchen just before you left, or in the parking lot outside the venue—dances across the nape of your neck. Music sounds sweeter. Your head nods of its own gravity. The night's potential smells of secondhand smoke and carbonation. Neon lights paint everyone in smooth flawless skin. No one will ever look better that they do under the glow of promotional beer signage—including you. You have to lean into ears to be heard. Up this close you can smell her shampoo—his lotion. Courtship through the tilt of a head, the squint of an eye. In this realm lip-reading becomes a super power. And when you do finally step outside for some privacy the relative silence, held at bay up to this point by a pair of swinging metal doors, lets you imagine what it might feel like to be deaf.

There was a time in this country—maybe just a particular time in my life—when sharing a cigarette outside of a noisy bar while waiting for your hearing to return was the most intimate thing two people could do with their clothes on. Between drags of a lip-sogged Marlboro Light the sound of traffic or the chirp of crickets slowly returns to normal volume. If things are going as planned, you're under coordinated and over confident, regret is just a six-letter word you'd have trouble pronouncing...

God I miss those nights.

I wonder if they're drunk yet.

They never tell you about these things in the brochure—come to think of it, they don't even have a brochure for prison. Maybe one day the right person will find these little musings and finally write one—one that actually tells you something useful, like: of all the Saturday nights you'll miss out on, the ones that will hurt the most are the ones you've managed to stitch together but will never have the chance to forget...though I highly doubt it. Are brochures even still a thing?

11:11pm

The show should be almost over. I try to picture what everyone is doing but come up empty. I know they were hoping to meet Stanhope backstage after his set. I hope they made it. I'll bet they did. Regardless, I'll have to wait until tomorrow to find out for sure.

1:15 am. 

Laying in bed, unable to sleep, the superfluous shit falls away. I realize I'm smiling. My mind is racing with the possibilities of—not the night to come, but the night that is, or WAS. This particular Saturday night has managed to hold onto its potential longer than any other night of my life. The idea that three people I love are all under the same roof laughing, drinking, and being free, doesn't make me envious as much as it makes me feel LUCKY; lucky to be laying in this cramped prison cell, on a bed a hostage would refuse to sleep on, with people in my life worth missing this much, who are doing shit exciting enough to inspire the thinnest filament of jealousy in a thread otherwise made entirely of utter amazement and appreciation for the path my life has taken since coming to prison...

Then again who knows, maybe this sudden burst of positivity has something to do with the amphetamine-like levels of late-night caffeine coursing through my system. It's just as likely I'll wake up tomorrow with a debilitating coffee hangover, and after being forced to hear about the heights of debauched revelry I've missed out on, I'll be overtaken by a murderous jealously before diving headfirst off the third gallery to a gory yet somewhat predictable death. Though probably not. 

Maybe I'm just overstimulated by the events of tonight and my mind has to unwind before I can make any sense of these things, let alone fall asleep.

Maybe I just needed to get a few words out of my head and onto this tablet before I can close my eyes.

Still, I can't help but wonder what those three lucky bustards are doing right this second.