Men, Drunks & Buffalo

Two weeks ago, I was sitting around somebody else's backyard with my friends Rex and Grant. We were talking about chicks. Why? Because that's what men talk about when they're not working out, talking about sports, sweatin' for no reason (that's how we spell it too: sweatin'), fixing cars and other macho stuff like that.

And, if you haven't already guessed from that lackluster description above, none of us actually know how to be manly men. Rex plays Taylor Swift while studying, Grant listens to Miley Cyrus to get amped for rock-climbing and I saw the midnight showing of the Sex And The City movie (and was plenty stoked on it). There are better examples, but I just included the first things that came to mind.

Anyway, we were comparing our lives these days to four years ago for whatever reason men do that. MEN DO THAT, OK? THEY TALK ABOUT STUFF LIKE THAT BETWEEN THE SAN FERNANDO ANGELS OF ANAHEIM AND EXTRA CLASSIC CARS AND THE UFC. WE ARE SO FUCKING MANLY THAT WE COULD PROBABLY GET GIRLS PREGNANT BY HIGH-FIVING THEM.

Also, we high-five chicks.

So, with long eyes and his cigarette smoke floating, Rex says, "I feel like we were more charming back then."

"We were definitely in better shape back then," Grant adds.

And, finally, I follow up with, "Jesus, it sounds like we were at least more confident back then."

Four years ago, I was 21. I sure wasn't smarter then (I know that now), but I was a hell of a lot more confident and arrogant, which can be mistaken for intelligence during your youth, I suppose. Well, actually, arrogance kind of mistakes everything from something better. That's all arrogance is. It's looking at a sky blue and convincing yourself it's navy.

I also had a brief conversation with my friends Dave and Kaia at a brewery two weeks (two weeks ago was quite a week, I tell ya) about what we were like at 21. In it, I tried to come up with precise (almost mathematical) reasons why that was such a wild, wild age. Obviously, it's because everyone is drunk for the entire year they are 21. I, for one (with many in my roll-into-bar posse), was at the bars every Thursday, saying how stupid everything was, but it always ended up being one for the books. However, it was more than that, as it seemed like most of everyone I knew was single and mingling up a storm. A SEXY storm.

But this comes back to chicks. Somehow, in your mid-twenties, it seems like a weird grace period where a lot of people are getting married and/or having babies. It's not so much my close friends, but I just sort of hear about it. Now, I love attending weddings and I'm stoked for the couples. But, generally speaking (without real war crimes), as each girl you used to kind of get all romantic with gets married, you start wondering.

Now, I'm not wondering what mid-twentysomething girls ponder in movies: Why not me? NO. FAR FROM IT.

What I wonder is more along the lines of conversation that Rex, Grant and I shared: when all the girls that you have fond/fondle memories of start disappearing, you have to seek out new ones. I mean, fuck, if all the buffalo disappear, you have to find new buffalo, right?

Is that a dated reference? What year is this? What state am I in?

Hmmm.

Anyway, you have to kill all those goddamn fucking buffalo.

Right?

Wait. No, that's wrong. Actually, that's really off-topic here.

Hmmm.

Ah. Ok. I got it.

Back to it.

When you scroll through your phone and notice girls' names that you can't call anymore (because their strong boyfriends have become stronger husbands), you should probably start reconsidering the effort it takes to go out and find new buffalo. And it's for sport, sometimes even relying on an easy kill. It's not out of hunger. I'm not hunting buffalo to eat. I'm hunting buffalo because my friends and I just want to get drunk and shoot our rifles at buffalo for fun.

Ok, this blog post is taking a turn for the worst. Jesus.

Don't tell Jesus though. He'd probably be PISSED about all of this.

I don't know if I even have a point here. I really don't. I started writing this because I didn't want to go to bed and I'm too tired to read. Also, I was going to watch Terry Gilliam's Brazil, but that just seems like too much to take in before bed.

Let me just get back to all this and finish it out.

When I was 21, I was wilder. Most idiots were. But with that came such a lack of consideration for my actions and consequences that I probably would've told cause and effect to go fuck themselves if I could speak to literary devices or scientific explanations.

So, what was it about four years ago that made the buffalo so very there in the field? Why were there so many? Is it because other hunters wanted to eat later on, trading sport for feast? Is it because my friends and I are not as good as hunters as we used to be? Or, maybe, are there always more buffalo when you look back on the past? When you reflect, doesn't everything seem more plentiful?

Maybe it's a combination of things. Maybe there were more buffalo because they were better at dodging bullets while the hunters weren't really trying that hard, wounding them at best, while my friends and I were way better hunters back then when we were drunks and all those hunters were scorin' buffalo titties like crazy.

Ah. Shit. Whoops. Sorry. I totally gave the analogy away and fucked up all the poetic undertones. My bad.