List of Crap

Everything happens for a reason. Help me figure this one out.

I'm in my room. 2:30AM. The electric fan is whirring, and my earphones are nestled in my ears. Suddenly I hear a loud banging on my bedroom door. Why the urgency? I inch the door ajar, and peek into the darkness to find myself staring at one of my sister's friends. Her face is glazed with fear, and in the background I hear a hushed silence amidst what becomes apparent to be angry knocking at our front door. And then the story unfolds from her trembling lips.

She informs me that a police officer is knocking at our front door. Some kid (it's quite shocking who it turns out to be, but that's best left unsaid) passed out on our neighbors' front lawn. An inebriated kid. My guess is that the neighbors then reported it. My sister's friend doesn't know what to do, my sister was sleeping??, so of course, she goes to fetch me. At this point I'm thinking what the hell am I going to say to that police officer, especially when I really have no clue what's going on....

which brings me to the first big question: was I the irresponsible one for not keeping tabs on the night's shenanigans? ....

.... Well, I really have no choice but to confront the officer at our door, so I make my way down the hallway. Oh so conveniently, my sister's male friends are all sitting on our living room couch. Silent, quivering eyeballs fixated on a muted television screen. I move past them and arrive at the front door. I take in one last heart-throbbing breath... and open the door.

A stern police officer is there to welcome me. In his routine, authoritative voice, he bombards me with the obvious questions of 'Why didn't you open the door?' 'Couldn't you hear me knocking/ringing?' I manage to slip out a "yes," to which he demands a "yes, SIR." After a few more degrading remarks, he instructs me to get my sister.

And this is where confusion set in. He doesn't tell me to get my sister, but rather, to get Krystal. Perplexed but relieved to leave his face, I become a player in the fetching game. This time, I just observe his dialogue with my sister from the hallway, but still in full view of the officer. My sister's friend is next to me, whispering me in on all the details I had missed out on. In front of me, the guys who normally fill the house with raucous laughter are frozen, their faces still eerie reflections of my own apprehension.

"22."

I hear the number of my age echo from the officer's mouth. He re-directs his glance at me and beckons me to the door again. What ensued really pissed me the f**k off. In short, he called me a coward for not opening the door for him. In between his other emasculating words, he concluded by saying I was now on his so-called shit list. Good grief, I'm thinking, now I'm on bad terms with a complete stranger (one with considerable power) in a small town, where odds are, I'm going to encounter this guy again. And it's irreparable damage. A tarnished reputation, for what it's worth. There really was no point in opening my mouth to defend myself, lest I dig myself another hole (or rather, fall into another one that my sister's friends so graciously carved for me). Anyways, silence was probably the best course of inaction against this angry fellow.

But I/we were also lucky. The police officer knew my sister from a previous, unrelated incident, so he left our house with mere warnings. Back in the comfort of my bedroom but unnerved and humiliated, I felt compelled to create this blog.

There are just so many things that I need to re-evaluate. This incident should never have happened, and though I wasn't blind to the smoking and drinking, I'm feeling that I've failed policing my own house. I'm the least confrontational guy you'll ever meet, so it's not exactly easy kicking my sister's friends out of the house. Not to mention the tenuous relationship with my own sister that has the volatility of a manic episode (please forgive the reference). There is one friend of hers in particular, though, who I abhor because of one particular incident on a school bus that still plagues me to this day. It involved offensive and hateful language, which I'll leave for you to decipher.

Also, who are these friends? Should I be concerned that they might be terrible influences on my little sis?

And regarding the officer's remarks, I'm not one to take his words too personally. I would have probably acted the same way in his shoes. Neighbor complaint.. kids not answering the door.. "mature" 22-year-old in my face.. drunk underage kid's safety.. But it is totally unfair that I had to take all the blame and humiliation for my sister and her friends' irresponsibility. Those of you who don't really know me will probably think I still deserved it for turning my cheek all these days. Those of you who do know me will understand that I am the last person in the world to deserve being caught in this situation. And that's how I feel.

And as an extension to my life as a whole, I do feel that I'm doing everything right.... but running into everything that's wrong. Karma is one twisted bi**h.

On a lighter note, Fanny Pak was amazing again! WOWOWOW! <3 Matt Cady