The Cereal Journey (aka Lost in the Suburbs)

So, I had this strange dream last night (what's new?) and it involved an incident that happened to me some several years back. It was in the time of the creamy corn moon, the time of being in school, SSU, and living in a weird house with pink carpets in Cotati, CA. I lived there with some guys from my dormitory days back on SSU's campus - a small campus it was in those days, still personable, like a glorified community college. The time was ripe with questions, which were answered by exploring the unknown in and for myself. I was young, but not that young, and the late bloomer in me had yet to rear its limp-haired self and force me to become more 'adult'. It was a time of placid navigation, a time that is remembered in strange, watery images, and drunken recollections of nights spent wondering if I'll ever have a girlfriend. Hmmm, yeah and in my dreams, of course. Late night ephemera passing through my head. Bits and pieces of my history coming together in a stream of consciousness flow, but sometimes making itself very clear and understandable. This is a true story and it happened sometime in late spring of 1995.

There was party on the Northside of town. A guy named Charles hosted the party while running around his house in his weird little short, black, mod suit. Charles was an eccentric kind of guy and he would often sneak up to me on campus and at parties and whisper something like, "You see all those girls over there? I want to fuck all of them tonight." Yeah, he was overtly weird, a bit of a misogynist, but mostly a liar. I remember once he directed a play on campus that involved Greek theories, history, philosophy, or something. I went to see the play, didn't understand it, but thought it was kind of funny. As for Charles, I think the only reason he was involved in the play was so that he could cast about a dozen half naked SSU girls and have them parade around and say absurd things throughout the proceedings. Damn, I wish I could remember the name of that stupid play, but I guess it does not matter. Charles probably wanted to be seen as being more strange than he really was, so maybe that is why he went to such great lengths to direct obscure plays, wear tight little suits, and host "art kids" parties.
SSU had its fair-shair of resident eccentric types, i.e. Adam Hervey, Monkey Boy Matt Snope, The beat poet dude, the pre-EMO girls, the shoeless hippie, Primus Dan, Kretek Ken, the Greaser, the Running Man, and so on and so on...for some reason, I seemed to be friends with most of these people, some becoming and remaining very good friends to this day.
So during this time, but before the summer solstice, many off-campus parties were held, and me and my soft-spoken friend Schuyler, would attend them. Like Schuyler, I didn't say much back then. I was very shy and extremely timid, but for some reason always wanting to be at parties, or be on the peripheral of social gatherings. I liked drinking, as I soon discovered around this time, and I liked the way it made me feel. The drink surely is the "social lubricant", as it is often called. I felt loose, happy, un-inhibited, and downright sociable when I drank. And it usually did not take much to get me drunk; a couple cocktails and maybe a beer or two. I was a light-weight and a light-body, maybe weighing a whopping 150 pounds in those days. Yeah, that was me alright - skinny, reddish hair (not balding yet), baggy clothing, and sometimes clad in prescription glasses. But I didn't care because I never considered myself something to be looked at, I always liked to be the one doing the looking, like at this party, for instance.
So here we were, no Schuyler this night, but my friend Adam H. and his girlfriend Tara were with me. We were at Charles' house with all of the avant gardists from school. I remember standing in the kitchen, drinking, when all of a sudden Charles jumped up onto a table and started shouting something. Nobody really cared what he was saying, I think he was just trying to feed his ego a little bit. Adam and Tara and I made our way outside, to the front of the house, and sat on the curb. I remember being pretty drunk at this point. I was laying down and resting my head on the sidewalk when I suddenly realized I didn't want to be at the party anymore. It was boring, Charles was annoying, the art kids were being snotty, and I was becoming self-conscious. So I heaved myself off of the warm sidewalk and kind of wobbled a bit as I began to walk away. Adam asked where I was going and I said that I had to go pee. He was saying some other stuff as I walked on. I did not stop to pee, but rather continued on my own drunken trajectory away from the noise and action of the party. Adam's voice slowly faded as I rounded a corner and continued walking down another four blocks. For a minute I suspected Adam would come walking up behind me and ask where I was going. I looked back and he wasn't there. Nobody was there. The quiet and domesticated streets of Rohnert Park were still and eerily lit by the orange street lights flickering on and off at random intervals.
It was getting late, not sure how late, but pretty damn late to be wandering around in a drunken haze. Bits of fog were rolling in and the smell of the stale Sonoma County air was becoming too strong. I had to stop walking, so I rested under a willow tree near one of RP's "strategically located" parks. I sat there and almost vomited. I held it in, but I should have just let that shit flow. I needed water badly. I didn't know where I was, or where I was going. Albeit, this is Rohnert Park, and getting lost here would be a blessing, not a curse. I think that's what it was, I kind of wanted to get lost in this town, I wanted to spend the night outside somewhere and just wake up the next day and make my way back to my pink carpeted home with the mullet headed Ryan Bevers, and the stern Darryl - both black belts in karate, and Ultimate Fighting enthusiasts.
I passed out under the willow tree. I had no idea what time it was when I woke. The fog had completely saturated the area, and visibility reached a maximum of about 50 yards. I stumbled upon a drinking fountain in the park. I sipped mightily from the weak spigot shooting up little splashes of water. I must've stood there for about ten minutes just lapping up water like some depraved and dehydrated dog. I finally got going again. It was still dark out, and I estimated the time to be around 4:00 am. I figured it would be best to head back home at this point. I made my way down the unremarkable RP streets, with every turn thinking that I'd already been there. It was a massive, mind-boggling exercise in repetition and good luck. I was becoming extremely hungry, and the thought of making it back home to eat something kept me going. I was near no stores, otherwise I would've ducked into one for a donut and some coffee. Alas, nothing but house after house, and park after park.
As I walked along I started to notice that the Sunday paper was out in front of some of the homes. I didn't really care about RP's Sunday paper. But I did start to notice these strange, boxy lumps in the paper, under the plastic wrap. After passing by about half a dozen papers I finally knelt down to see what this lump was all about. I opened the plastic on one and a box of Frosted Flakes fell to the ground. I looked around to see if anyone was watching and I quietly opened the small cereal box and began munching on the sugary, golden flakes. I'll tell you, cereal never tasted better, dry or with milk, than the night I stood there and ate a whole box of somebody's promotional cereal. Along the way I found more papers and more cereal. I think I ate about ten little boxes of cereal as I walked along that early Sunday morning. I had a loopy grin on my face. I could feel the sugar slowly making its way through my body, providing me with the necessary energy that I needed to get out of these hellish suburbs and back to my own little hellish suburb to sleep in my bed.
I stumbled, made wrong turns, stopped for metallic park water, ate Frosted Flakes, yelled at myself, and eventually found the right street, which would lead me to greater Cotati, and to Hahn Avenue, where my quiet house lay nestled comfortably between two identical tract homes. I was home, not the home I necessarily wanted to be at, but home nonetheless. Damn you Bevers for finding this place - you could have tried harder. I couldn't complain though, as I wearily unlocked the front door, shuffled into the entryway, and moved myself up the pink carpeted steps. I found my room, then my little, concaved bed. I threw myself upon it. Before I closed my eyes I thought of all the people who were going to be missing something from their Sunday paper. I played out a scenario in my head, between two neighbors.
"Hey Frank, you get your cereal this morning?"
"Ahhh, nothing here Bill, looks like somebody ripped it out?! Damn kids."
And this brought a smile to my face as I slowly drifted off into a blue, easy sleep.