Jason

Ran into Jason J-dawg T. tonight.

He is living in Oregon somewhere. Starts with an "R". Came back to California because he needed to deal with some sort of legal issue.

He did 2+ years in San Quentin for robbing houses in Castro Valley. He served time in 2001.

He found me walking by him as I casually made my way out of Walnut Creek BART station. I was headed to meet my new girlfriend and he yelled out my name. We chatted for 5-10 minutes and I saved his number in my dying Blackberry.

He was still there when I got back at 11pm. Mel and I had had dinner, three martinis each, and had a solid lovemaking session in the back of her SUV.

He was waiting for a ride. Someone from Oregon was coming to pick him up at the train station. I waited past a missed train. We talked for almost half an hour.

I told him about almost getting married once (Amanda), about making almost $2MM by 23 and losing it all a half year letter, about traveling the world and "doing time" in Britain and Spain. I told him about girls that hurt me and dating blondes. Dating a lot of blondes.

He told me about prison. He told me about living in the same space as lifers, about having his bunk mate try to kill him with a hair pin (is that what it was?), about trying to commit suicide by hanging himself on a phone cable by wrapping it around his neck, standing, and leaning into it until his consciousness started to fade.

It is poignant to recognize that the difference between him and me was a couple of smart decisions and a couple of lucky ones. It is relevant to consider that we were boys back in the day, that we were equals, that 25 cents felt the same to either of us -- one quarter of a slurpee or one game of Street Fighter. Is it because I have a higher IQ? Or because I simply look white? Is it because I got read to at 2? Or just a little extra tenacity when hiring managers at fucking fast food joints told me to take a hike?

He stood there, speaking, talking, lamenting, ranting, and almost crying. He stood there, and I knew him better than anyone had known him in over a decade. And he knew me more, better, realer than my own mother.

It was a religious moment just as it was simultaneously a fleetingly penitent one.

That could've been me. I was one bad decision, one negative review, one firing away from the same fate.

--

As I stood there, taking him in, it was a strange juxtaposition of emotions.

I thought of the hot bourgeoius private school high maintenace chick I had just finished cumming on as she professed her love to me. And I thought of waiting tables, and doing time for disrespecting authority (stupid traffic violations or not).

I thought of my company and how I was frustrated that the 55K salary I am making is less than I made at 22 and how my time investment alone represents a sacrifice of $150K annually. And then, I thought of being mad when, in the summer of 1997, some random Mexican stole my orange and I felt violated, only to be reminded "You're in fucking jail! Just be grateful all you got taken from you was a fucking orange!"

I thought of being in charge, of sitting in meetings and commanding attention, authority, respect, and

(I don't know why, but when I went back to retrieve this and post it, it was truncated. Maybe I got a phone call and never finished?)