Dear Mother and Father,Greetings to both of you
from the farthest northwestern indoor
point at 10815 Charles Drive in
beautiful downtown Fairfax City,
Virginia! Yes, I know, that's a lot of
unneeded verbiage on my part, but it
does sound a bit better than saying I'm
sitting in my den. Just trying to slap
down a rollicking-good intro for you
guys. Then again, since I am your Last
Hope For A Decent Son, I would like to
think that you'd be happy with any kind
of correspondence from me--even if I
were to write in crayon and leave out
all of the vowels. Of course, that's my
ego doing the writing right there, but a
smidgen of truth can be found.
But actually and truly, I
don't believe I need to fake a good
start because "things" in Glennland have
been very hectic and quite interesting
lately. Hmm (he mused), I think
"interesting" is indeed too bland of a
word to describe "things". Thrilling?
Exciting? Breathtaking? Well, such a
description would be taking my life to
an extreme that hasn't been seen since
my first masturbation experience, so
let's just settle on the nice
pre-packaged word that we all know and
rarely use: "Stimulating." Yes,
"things" have been "stimulating." And
stimulation, as you may have suddenly
pondered, does cause the overuse of
quotation marks. Thank you for the
English major genes, Father!
Anyhow, first and foremost, my existence as a
slightly-deranged solitary man has taken an unexpected downward turn. No,
I'm still slightly deranged, but I've taken my act on the road; it seems
that the rumors that I'm shacking up with a Latino crackhead
hooker twice my age are true. No
Mother, I'm only kidding. And yes
Father, I heard that little "That's my
boy!" But seriously, I have met someone
and quite surprisingly she's still
hanging around despite my best verbal
taunting and general rudeness. As it
turns out, Beth is not only up to the
task of taking my abuse, but she serves
it right back to me with just as much
relish. Ah, what a girl! Actually, I
think you'd both really like her because
Beth has certain qualities that I see in
each of you: Like you, Father, she's
wickedly sarcastic (but with brand new
comeback lines) and she cherishes family
and friendship bonds. And just like
you, Mother, she's a bit on the quiet
and introspective side and she's very
thoughtful. But of course, I'd never
tell her any of this because not only
would that be an actual compliment from
me (gasp!), but also I don't want her to
get the queer notion in her head that
I'm looking to date my parents.
As far as other aspects of
my "stimulating" life go, well, the only
exercise I'm getting these days is from
running down long fly balls and taking
the extra base on an opposite-field
single. True, I'm playing a game which
conjures up images of a grizzled
45-year-old man with a half-warm Bud
Light nestled behind the bag at 1st
base, but I take the victories--both
personal and team-- wherever they can be
found. No, it's not the most glorious
of accomplishments to stretch a double
into a triple against Norm Peterson in
right field, but it does make me feel
that my 32-year-old body is still
capable of running with the pack. And
since I am playing somewhere in the
neighborhood of 7 to 8 games a
week, I think I'm staving off that
Burger-King-and-cigarette-induced heart
attack for at least another 6
pain-filled months. Plus, softball
forces me out of house and into the
hands of the general populous, grunting
and sweaty as they may be. Just two
weekends ago, one of my men's teams
played in an all-day tournament and we
were all treated to a heavy dosage of
team bonding. Although the wins were
few and far between, the joy of poking
fun at Barney's on-field backwards
tuck-and-roll after missing a line drive
was an invaluable and everlasting source
of player unity and camaraderie.
Besides such extracurricular
pursuits, my time is mainly spent with
such activities as house cleaning, The X-Files, random writing,
dancing nude in the basement, pizza
delivery, and the occasional day at
work. Speaking of which, CVS/Pharmacy
is still experiencing a shortage of
qualified management, so my job is
secure for the time being. My pretense
of leaving early every day to do "paperwork" was
starting to wear thin, but thanks to my
milking of two measly employee reviews,
I've been able to maintain a strict
30-hour work week for the past month or
so, as I have my employees believing that I've
suddenly been burdened with all 45 of
their reviews at once. I've even got
them all thinking that I'm forgoing my
usual 9 am wake-up time to valiantly
fight with my boss over fifty cent
increases for everyone.
And finally, since you
always seem to ask about these two, both
my pesky cat and my little hut
of a house are both alive and still
standing, respectively. The cat's
rather annoying habit of relieving
herself in various corners of the house
has subsided recently, but that's mainly
due to the fact that I'm locking her in
the bathroom for 12- to 14-hour periods.
Needless to say, bathing in that
bathroom has become quite nauseating,
but I've remedied that by simply doing
the ol' 30-second-in-and-out-no-soap
shower. I like to call it the Max
Special. As for the house, now that the
Fairfax Homeowner's Association is off
my back about the height of the grass
(thanks to me bribing Eric with cold
beers and Chalupas), all is well in my
little space in the world. Well,
mostly. I'm still struggling with the
Merlot stains in the carpet from last
month's wine party, but since I
am encouraging the cat to lick away to
her heart's content, I'm hoping to kill
the proverbial two birds with one
stone.
So that should just about get you both up to
speed on The Trials And Tribulations Of The Man-Child Glenn in the last
month or so. I hope this letter finds you in good health, in good spirits,
and with good senior-citizen sex. Or at least I hope it just finds you. I'm
going to make a conscious effort to write to you at least once a week, but
with my newfound Life I can't make any promises. Give my unending love to
my brother Kevin and, of course, the greatest love to you both.
