![\"Masochist\"](\"http:\/\/jeremyvarner.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/10\/Masochist.jpg\")
<\/a><\/p>\nSo where the fuck have I been?<\/p>\n
Well, for that, I\u2019d like to explain to you the reason for the season and tell you about some trees, son (sorry, needed a rhyme there). So for the followers I have, all one of you, I\u2019m now going to tell you a story about\u2026<\/span><\/p>\n Writers have a lot of \u201cmuses\u201d. This is our way of saying that we like to excuse becoming chemically altered to \u201cinspire\u201d us. Hemmingway was a total drunk and adrenaline junkie. Mary Shelley came up with Frankenstein during a drug fueled livid dream that left an impression on her. Jules Verne reportedly wrote a book when he went for almost a week without solid sleep after discovering his love for cocaine wine. Long story short, the differences between your typical writers\u2019 conference and an AA meeting are carpal tunnel and Pulitzers.<\/p>\n But then there\u2019s me, I only drink on one condition \u2013 the Canadians make me. You\u2019d think that\u2019s a joke but the truth is I\u2019ve only had alcohol put in my hands throughout my life by two classes of people: Canadians and my mother. It\u2019s just really hard to turn down people so polite all the time or to refuse a sip of mommy\u2019s magic grape juice when you\u2019re 12. However, seeing as my mother only did that once to teach me a lesson and the Canadians live across a border, you\u2019d expect me to otherwise be stone cold sober 365 days out of the year. After all, I don\u2019t touch anything.<\/p>\n So everything decides to touch me instead.<\/p>\n Once a year, I become accosted by a cloud of dust and pesticides the likes of which can blot out the very sky itself. You\u2019d think I\u2019d be kidding about that but I\u2019m completely literal as I say this shit has made mountain ranges disappear like a Criss Angel trick without an army of cameramen and paid \u201conlookers\u201d. I am a shill for no man\u2026 other than myself. (buy my books<\/a>)<\/p>\n Now, I\u2019m not saying that the air quality around here is any better year round, there\u2019s a lot of times when those mountains play hide and seek behind nothing but air. But once a year there\u2019s a little extra something in the air, it\u2019s not a sweet aroma and it sure as hell isn\u2019t love, it\u2019s the vile cloud of shit thrown up from harvesting these little fuckers.<\/p>\n The walnut, nature\u2019s answer to a question nobody asked. I ask you this now, how often do YOU eat walnuts if you have any alternatives? That\u2019s right, you don\u2019t. It might be in a brownie, it might be on a salad, but they\u2019re no one\u2019s favorite nut. And you know why? Because they have the texture and flavor of a rice-cake drizzled in nut oil.<\/p>\n Being nature\u2019s filler, shaped like a defective packing peanut inside a wood shell, you\u2019d think we\u2019d have a load of industrial uses to excuse our keeping of the nuts. Maybe we could even feed it to our livestock, as they\u2019re willing to eat just about anything if you grind it up enough. But no, none of this is true; we consider it a food staple as though there was someone willing to eat the thing. In the end, the only real uses for walnuts are oil, wood, and defense against the zombie apocalypse.<\/p>\n But every year the walnuts must be harvested and every year that\u2019s accomplished by approaching a tree with a giant machine and then shaking that thing with the ferocity of babysitter with someone else\u2019s kid. What you get from this interaction is a rain of edible wood and a cloud that I\u2019m sure for a moment has the face of Satan laughing as it rises into the sky. When you take a tree that hasn\u2019t been touched in 364 days, the things that have collected on them are things that should not be disturbed. But does that stop people? Hell no. They jerk that wood with the tenacity of a teenage boy when his parents are gone until their nuts drop.<\/p>\n So what\u2019s my point? At this time of year I have one of three natural states brought about by unnatural circumstances:<\/p>\n Remember when I said that the walnuts could be used to stop Zombies? It doesn\u2019t just apply to the whimsical world of plant based zombie warfare, it also applies to me. There is a state of being in this time of year that is basically like every cold and flu you\u2019ve ever had combined with asthma attacks and a constant tingling sensation that mirrors the descriptions of minor nerve damage. The result is a stumbling, jumbling mess of limbs and a constant groaning sound that some say you can hear in the dead of night if you listen closely enough.<\/p>\n However, unlike my undead brethren, I fear not headshots \u2013 because if anything is going to decompress the sinus congestion I experience in that time it would be a shotgun shell. I\u2019m sure other stuff would ooze out as well, and that would be unfortunate, but for a few brief seconds I would probably inhale deep and then thank my assailant for being so well prepared in his bunker.<\/p>\n Now if this sounds hyperbolic \u2013 only slightly. This state of being doesn\u2019t last nearly long enough for me to truly wish for the sweet embrace of death, but I am not against simply passing out and I would only be slightly inconvenienced by not waking up again until November. Upon awakening I would be greeted with the news that the walnuts had been purged from our land and that we were going to celebrate by stuffing bread up a bird\u2019s ass and then eating it.<\/p>\n When not in a state of near or post death, I find myself in a state which involves a lack of cognitive function or an ability to remember things. I\u2019m sure you forget times, dates, and minor details all the time, so you likely assume that it can\u2019t be much worse than that. But what I forget is a little bit of everything as I slowly descend into a waking dream and find myself in a place where the world makes no sense. For that period of time, I have become some freaky combination of the absent minded professor and the dude from Flowers for Algernon when he could feel himself getting stupid again.<\/p>\n Some would suspect, once again, that this is hyperbole. To those people I say to you this: my father, in the same state, accidentally purchased $50 worth of artificial pumpkins and forgot about it because he momentarily forgot how the internet works. This is the sort of story that you expect of an elderly man in his 70s, but my dad is in his 50s and he\u2019s normally quite tech savvy. No, he bought those pumpkins without realizing he\u2019d gone through with the transaction and then forgot about it until the next week. As vengeance, we will now cut those bitches with a Glasgow smile.<\/p>\n But what happens to me, as a writer, is a bit more sinister. I forget words. The words that I forget aren\u2019t complicated or even rare, they\u2019re the words that get used almost every day and are used to describe common ideas. I forget names and places as well. Over the course of the walnut season my language skills slowly devolve until I spend many of my waking moments cursing and grunting incoherently about what people call that thing where they do the\u2026the\u2026.THING. The, you know, that thing, where they do stuff\u2026<\/p>\n Which leads to the point where we just have to give in and take the medications. At that time, we enter the third state.<\/p>\nThose God Damn Walnuts!<\/h1>\n
<\/a><\/a><\/a><\/p>\n<\/a><\/p>\n<\/a><\/p>\n1)\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 The Living Dead<\/h3>\n
<\/a><\/p>\n<\/a><\/a>2) The Absent<\/h3>\n
<\/a><\/p>\n<\/a><\/p>\n<\/a><\/p>\n3) The Medicated<\/h3>\n