The Seven Deadly Sins (29 page)

“Okay, what do you need?”

“Look up the restaurant menu at the Rainbow, would you please?”

So that is my book! I know you are complaining that there were not enough photographs of Betty White, but I personally do not know Ms. White so pictures of her in my book would not make sense, nor do I know who represents her at this time, although
I would love to work with her! Her role in
Lake Placid
was fucking hilarious! Shit, where was I. . . .

So that is my book! I truly hope you enjoyed it. I know it was heavy in some spots, but life happens, you know? The episodes I described all happened, for whatever reason. I have no regrets for living through them so you should have no regrets for reading about them. I do not know if you noticed, but it apparently did nothing to dampen my enthusiasm or my optimism. I am a silly bent genius with crazy fingers and antsy legs who craves attention and loves an adoring audience. And if there is anyone out there who is incredulous at the fact that this skinny Midwestern fuck up is successful, you are not alone: No one is more surprised and bemused about it than I am. There are days I still cannot believe I get away with some of this shit. There are also days when I truly believe my karma has caught up with me and I can feel the kick in my nut sack. Then again, maybe that is what qualifies me to write this book. You cannot write a book
about birds if you have not studied them in HD for a prolonged period of time. So, consequently, you should not be able to write an entire rambling homage to the Seven Deadly Sins without wearing a few of them on your shirt like Cub Scout badges, right?

Besides, my “sins” are well under control, at least as far as the old seven are concerned. No gluttony, no greed, no rage (well, not much), no vanity, no sloth, no envy, and no lust—well, maybe just a hint of lust. So I am doing okay right now. But that is not to say I will not be awash in these and other human consistencies on another day in the near future. As I have alluded to elsewhere, our idiosyncrasies are what make strangers seem like family. I know one book is not going to make a dent in the theocracy that is planet earth. Hell, I am fairly certain the first thing NASA will do if we colonize the moon is build a fucking church there. I can see the taglines now: “Our congregation is closer to heaven than the rest!” Dear sweet-gravy Jesus, not for nothing, but most times you religious folk are really fucking annoying. I am dangerously close to plunging back into the old seven, and I would hate to lie to you at this point, so I will just keep my cool at least until the last page. But once the book is finished, I make no promises.

I am also nowhere near the New Seven, except for maybe the bad music, but now you are just getting into semantics and that is thankfully a matter of opinion. I am not a hit with certain people, but to each his own. I like it, so fuck it. In all seriousness, I have never killed anyone. I have never raped anyone. I have never nor will ever harm a child. I have not stolen anything in a long time. I have not lied to anyone I really care about since 2006, and I have never tortured anyone who did not deserve it. I am a creative force with a hungry intellectual chasm so I am
prone to distraction and immersion in ideas and unsung music. I can get stuck in my own head sometimes, but I have become very adept at pulling myself back to Life as We Know It when it comes to my children, my wife, and the rest of my family at large. Call me kooky, but it seems like I am doing pretty good for a person who once stuck his dick in an orange for $26. Don't judge me—it was a Halloween meet-and-greet backstage. Besides, they paid me in change, those cheap pricks.

As for Dante's Infernal list, it has been dissected, dismantled, and debunked to the point where there is not much dirt left to kick in its face. I am proud to say my first book may become my favorite; if I am lucky to write more, they may suffer in comparison. Even if my grandmother is the only person who buys a copy, I stand behind every word. Knowing my Gram, she will buy a hundred copies. She did the same thing when I was selling candy bars for my bowling team years ago. Plus she took all the order forms to work with her and bullied all her co-workers into buying a shit ton as well. You have to love a devoted grandmother, people. She is the best person in the world to me. She will object to the raciness and obscenity of this book, but that will not stop her from loving me, being proud, and cleaning out the nearest Barnes & Noble. And as a good heretical grandson, I will bake her a cake on her birthday.

Look at me: assuming my first book will be in Barnes & Noble. Maybe I am a little more vain than I thought. But hey, fuck it. If you are going to have expectations, you might as well have gigantic ones. There is the old adage “expect the worst and hope for the best.” That is a good way to look at life. So I hope my book makes it onto a few shelves. But I expect it will end up burnt in some Lutheran parking lot. It would not be the first time I had a burning sensation in a church driveway. Yep, I said
it. I will spell it: C-L-A-P. I will take “Unexpected Sexual Byproducts” for 400, Alex. I just pray to Allah it is not the fucking Daily Double.

Anyway, in conclusion, with all due respect to the plaintiffs, defendants, judges, juries, evidence, and impassioned debates established in the literature therein. . . what the bloody fuck do I know? I think I have made it painfully obvious that when I am not talking out of my ass, I am pulling miracles out of it. So why the hell should any of you even give my misguided musings a second fucking once-over? Well for starters, I have firsthand experience. I have no degrees, no diplomas, no doctorates, or any other slip of paper that is mainly used to make other people feel superior to others. I guess I could have printed at least one sketchy credential out and forged some signatures, but that would not be very honest. Plus they would clash with my Miss Piggy collectors' cups that I have given valuable knick-knack space to in my living room. Seriously though, I have seen a lot and I have learned even more. I can make educated guesses with the best of them. So I am nothing more than a professional observer, an armchair journalist, and a cynical fuck. But that does not mean I am wrong. In fact, I know I am not.

I know me. I know how worked up and completely hyper-caffeinated I can get, and I know that may cause poop disguised as theorems to fly from my lips like brown little epiphanies that smell as sweet as they sound. And honestly, what the fuck do I care? On too much coffee and too many cigarettes, I can expound with my fellow Irish poets and laureates till they sound last call and send us staggering drunkenly into the streets of Limerick, still going on and on about the romance but still clinging
to the common sense. I do not let little things like perception or social status keep me from giving it large and telling it like it is. I would rather believe I can learn the truth than cling stubbornly to an antiquated opinion. There are enough of those acerbic hypocrites around without me helping to swell their ranks. You do not believe me? I can prove it. You know those crotchety racist pricks at the shitty bar your mom goes to? I rest my case.

A good guess is just as good as a straight answer, and a straight answer would be “maybe he is not that far off with some of this shit.” It only takes common sense to sort through the recycling bin on the curb of life. And I may not have much, but I would like to think I earned my common sense badge through trial and error. If I were a real author, or at least if I were not constantly dressing as a pirate while this book was being written, I might actually concede that some of these traits are in fact not what I would call “positive behavior.” Believe me, I have the scars to prove it. If that is not selling you at all, let's just put it this way: I have not jumped into any more ceiling fans and I will not be lying down in any bathtubs in Pittsburgh any time soon. So I have at least figured out that these big dogs will hunt the life right out of you if you do not keep them in check. Fair enough? Fair assumption? Fair game? Fair play? No? Aw, go fuck yourself.

I guess I will end this tawdry little tome the same way we came in, by sharing a quaint moment I experienced a while back. It was May 15, 2008. I was in L.A. doing some songwriting with a band called Halestorm. That night I was planning to do a show with an all-star cover band called Camp Freddy. It turned out to be the night I met my future wife and the night I remembered what it was like to be on a stage with no other feeling but sheer enjoyment. It was truly incredible: We jammed, we danced, and
we tore the roof off the Roxy. After the club had cleared out and the energy had died down and someone finally took the J.D. away from me, a bunch of us ended up at the diner in the Standard Hotel. My future wife actually dropped me off there. As she drove away, I vowed that that would not be the last time I saw her and, after checking my phone to make sure I had truly stored her number in it, I stumbled past the seemingly unnecessary velvet ropes in the valet parking area and into the restaurant.

It was dimly lit and eerily quiet for Hollywood at 2 a.m., but that did not stop me from having an Algonquin Table moment once I was inside. Jerry Cantrell and Mike Inez from Alice In Chains were there as well as Lars Ulrich from Metallica. We were sitting at a table, talking shop and shit and anything else we could think of when the half dozen cocktails I had partaken finally caught up with me and I decided it was time to head back to my hotel for some sleep. I stepped outside past the clubbers and scene freaks parading through the lobby. But I suddenly opted against a cab. Tonight was not a night for sitting in the backseat. Tonight was a night for getting a feel for the landscape spinning around me. So I slipped my jacket on to kill the chill and, tapping out a Marlboro into my eager hands, proceeded down the street into the city.

This was Hollywood—unfiltered, unadulterated, and unflinching. I had spent a lot of time there over the last ten years. I recorded my first major album there. I had my first taste of fame and all the excessive trimmings that come with it there. I had dirty sex and whiskey-drenched adventures and violent outbursts all over this fetish wonderland. I had taken every chance and risk, transforming into a vagabond rock star. But I was aimless and crazy. I was blending in more and more with the very elements of Hollywood that I despised. I suddenly had so much
in common with people I had never felt akin to in my life. So my long road back to reality came with high prices and low self-esteem. I had to dismantle an ego that was growing out of control and start from scratch. I had been famous pretty much since I was seventeen, at least on a local level. I was used to infamy. I was not used to spiraling into madness for no other reason than to see what the abyss had in store for me. I wanted more than
Behind the Music
. I wanted the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame.