Prayer

In my head, God used to look like Larry from the Three Stooges when I was a kid. Now he looks like Morrissey.


God,

Forgive my sins, for I know I have sinned. Know my love, etc., etc. Bless my friends and family and the troops in Iraq and Afghanistan and that physically challenged woman who lives on the first floor. Thank You for giving me the capacity to be understanding of her even though she has that ridiculous walk and she talks kinda funny.

Well God, I've got some things I need to talk about with You tonight. Oh yeah, I should get the thank-yous out of the way. I suppose that You can surmise that since we're having this conversation, there's no one in bed with me tonight. While that is a bit of a disappointment for tonight, I must thank You for your gifts received on the evening of the 14th. This guy named Tom who hangs out at the bar heard that I was going to see Morrissey in concert and told me that if I brought a girl, I'd get laid that night. Well God, Your prophet was almost right. I got laid twice! And I know that it has been all my stronggood deeds I've been doing lately that earned me such a fine reward. Thank You for helping to get me there and through it all. Over the last few months I had begun to fear that I wasn't good at sex anymore. As a partial minority with meager prospects, my sexual prowess was all I really felt I could hang my hat on. When I began to lose that, I feared that I would be condemned to a life that consists of relying on my fallback ability--my ability to talk. And don't You know I'm sick of hearing myself talk? My God, I talk so much shit! You're there to hear it. You know.

I've been laid three times this month and it's been great and guilt-free and beautiful and dirty and all. You know?

So anyway, thank you also for bringing Morrissey to Oklahoma City. Please forgive me for my gay feelings I might have had when he came on stage. I swear they were only casually gay and not animal lust gay. I'm not a fag or anything. Like, that's gross. Oh, and thank you for having him sing my favorite song of his, "Suedehead". I can never tell if he's talking about a guy or girl in that song. But I suppose that's par for the course for Morrissey. Besides, if you're not sure it's gay, you can just use your own judgement and decide it's a straight song and then not be a sinner. Right?

Well God, I'm not sure what to make of this girl that's been placed in my life. Are things going really well because we both know she's leaving next month? Or would they be better if she was staying? I mean, I appreciate the idea of a month and a half's worth of no-strings attached, committment-free sex as much as the next man. Give me the strength to let her go and let the chips fall where they may. Wow, don't I sound mature, Big J?

Truth is, I don't want her to go. I want to ride this thing out. And it's not just because of the sex. It's like 40% for good and potentially Christian reasons. If she's the "one", I guess she'll come back into my life. If she's not, give me the strength to find a rebound girl who will make me feel shame in all the good ways possible. Or, help me to find the "one". But I'd really like the "one" to be someone who lives here and isn't planning to leave and isn't at a crossroads and doesn't have a sexual/personality dysfunction and isn't smelly or unemployed or hung up on someone else or cold or mean or miserable or stricken with bad taste in music and movies. You know, something simple. Speaking of one of Your true human creative mistakes, thank You for keeping her away from me at the Morrissey concert. I mean, I don't mind if she saw me happy with another girl, of course. But I appreciate avoiding something awkward. A fistfight would have been a bit of a faus paux, no? And speaking of Lucifer's daughter, that brings up a hypothetical. Now I know that when I was growing up, my mother told me that I couldn't pray for the Dallas Cowboys to win. My mama said that all I could ask of You was to have them "play their best." Well, since I'm not allowed to actually "hate" someone and I'm not allowed to pray that they completely fail, am I allowed to pray real hard that they "do their worst"? I'll await your spiritual guidance on this matter.

Well Jesus, Hijo de Dios, for years I've been praying a pretty standard prayer about how I don't want to get married five times like my dad. Well, let me make a slight change to that. Please don't allow me to get divorced five times. Yep, another one has left Papa. Though I think that You may have been rewarding my father in some way. He had just returned from Honduras where he was doing mission work! Surely, you wouldn't punish him with his wife having left him prior to his arrival home. Because I know you're a good and strong and Chuck Norris and Morrissey-like God, my father's wife leaving must have actually been some sort of blessing to him. In all honesty, he sounded somewhat relieved when he told me about it. I pray Lord that You will allow my dad to fall in love and commit to that feeling of relief.

God Jesus God, please watch over my family. My brother hit some bad luck with a college in Your forsaken city of Houston. I pray that You would grant him peace and the ability to move onward and upward. I also pray that You would rain down hellfire, disease, and destruction on the sewer toilet dumpsite known as Houston. Let them feel Your love real, real hard.

I pray that You would watch over my friends and I pray that You would hear a few special requests:

Even though Kara is an atheist and a heathen, I love her so much. Please guard her against shitty men, stupid people, and anyone who would make her cry. She is the bestestest.

I pray for Dara who is the only pretty, blonde white girl within a five mile radius of where she works and it sorta scares her but she secretly loves being lusted after by all the Mexicans who come to her store. I pray that you will keep her going through all that her job throws at her and remind her that she'll always have good friends who love her when she needs them. And she'll also have me.

I pray for Rhiannon who is carrying the baby of a guy I sorta hate because part of me feels like he cut in line five years ahead of me and stole my potential life. She is truly beautiful and lovely and she must remember "that there is a light that never goes out".

I pray for Swanny who is figuring it all out when it comes to her life. Her future is so bright. Like Brite Lite. I also pray that she figures out that somehow along the way she forgot to sleep with me five times and is on the way to Oklahoma City to make good on her promises because that's what good girls do.

I pray for Janna who is also about to be ruined and redeemed all at once by motherhood.

I pray that the couple whose wedding I presided over figures out how to keep their shit together because their shit is actually quite beautiful and shit-free and it would make me crazy to know that even my fake-ministering is cursed by the plague of divorce.

I pray for Jessica who even though she's a Jew needs Your help in her future that is coming so fast where she'll teach poor kids in Las Vegas and will help them to be literate and proper English speaking gamblers on the Strip who will piss away their small paychecks on one last game of blackjack and a dancer named Sierra and hates me lately because she has no use for me. She has no idea of how much I miss talking to her and having her tell me how ridiculous I am.

Be with Karen who deserves better and owes herself HER life.

Be with my co-workers and keep their homicidal tendencies in check--at least while I'm in the office.

Be with Christi, even though we only talk once or twice a year. She still has super killer seniority and I love love her. Not like love. But love love.

Be with my special little gift from Enid. I don't always know how to be her friend. I need help to be a better one because she's been my best ex in the history of ever. Foreva, eva? Eva, eva? Eternalever, I'd bet.

Be with Brian. He is my deja vu. Help me to help him or leave him alone or whatever it is I'm supposed to do and help him to know that he shouldn't feel too irrationally about things. Let him know that it is true--most girls are this evil. Except when they're not.

Be with Shannon. The first friend of friends. He is the greatest. Keep him that way, Sir.

Finally, be with Candy Girl. Let her do what she must, what she will, and what she ought to. I'm putting my faith in You, DJ Jazzy JC!

Be with all my friends and family, God. While I am obviously one of Your chosen ones, I certainly can't be a light to everyone at once. Grant me continued humility in my great journey so that I may see all that there is to see and so that I'm right more often than as many people as You see fit. Oh, and please let me find "the one" before all my hair is gone and I've completely let myself go and my jokes aren't that funny anymore and no one reads my piece of shit blog anymore. Love you God Christ Jesusman.

All these things I pray in Your kickassholy name,

Amen.




Album of the Week: "You Are the Quarry"

Artist: Morrissey

Song Highlights: "Irish Blood, English Heart", "I Have Forgiven Jesus", "The World Is Full of Crashing Bores", "First of the Gang to Die", "Let Me Kiss You"





Song of the Day: "Hell Yeah"

Artist: The Bloodhound Gang

Album: "Hooray For Boobies"

Lyric of Possible Relevance:

"But would I be a good Messiah with my low self-esteem?
If I don't believe in myself would that be blasphemy?
Just sport some crummy "holier than thou" facade
Yeah that's what I would do if I were God."