Goddamn, Thors and Thorettes: It's My Masonic Apron's 900th BLOGDAY!

Well, here we are, kids.

When I started this ass-crap, on Friday, March 13th, 2009, I was not just a 20something Blogger but, as that moniker would imply, a twenty-something.

Now, I'm a thirty-something. And not a 30something Blogger, because that website is all about Cialis and shit. And I can still get it up.

(Obvs.)

Speaking of which, as you know, in mid-to-late December, I'll become a father to two assuredly charming and awkward children. The way I figure it, my impending fatherhood will coincide nicely with the termination of this blog, or at least the obsessive, habitual, ritualized nature of the postings on this blog. I somehow don't think I'm going to manage keeping my marriage together, changing scads of freshly-sharted diapers, doing feedings, tummy-time, G&S lullaby-singing, working, and maintaining my sanity whilst blogging daily.

Will I still write on this site? Sure. Probably. We'll see. When my mother used to say, "We'll see" to me, it always, universally meant "No" but, when I say it, I really mean it.

We'll see.

At the rate I'm going, and have been going for some time, I'll reach a thousand posts before the children are born, and that'll be good, because reaching a thousand posts will satisfy that itch I have for roundness-- must be why I've always been a breast man. Lots of zeroes in a thousand. Lots of big, round... things.

900 is a good number, too, though-- don't get me wrong. But it's not the kind of number to crap out on, necessarily. Not at all.

Mrs. Apron suggested that, on this 900th post, I reflect on what I've been doing on here lo these many months, but I'm a little resistant to that idea. See, there's a fine little line between healthy self-analysis and a kind of neurotic self-absorption that threatens to envelop bloggers throughout Blogsylvania. And I don't want to be enveloped.

Unless it's during sex.

I go back and forth on whether or not I like blogging. If you're doing something for the 900th time, you'd think, "Well, fuck-- I'd better like this." But, even after all this time, I'm still not sure. I've always expressed myself better through the written word than I have through speaking. I get tongue-tied, emotional, my voice starts to break. I get confused, stymied, lost, unhinged, distracted. Caught up. Caught off guard.

Unguarded.

I don't like being caught off guard, and I don't like being unguarded. It's kind of a big reason why I don't do drugs, or drink. Or talk.

Writing is a way to bring it in, real thin. It's a way to make yourself vulnerable, and yet, at the same time, to keep everything firmly in check. Edited. Restrained. Controlled. Guarded. Even my work that appears to be the most wild, the most revealing, the most off-the-cuff, well, isn't. It's the illusion of familiarity and manufactured freedom. It's the performance aspect. It's me letting go, but not.

I think people who meet me after reading me (I make sure that there aren't many of those people) must be phenomenally let down, in a way. And bored. And confused. There's so much... quiet in me. So much furrowed brow and rumpled shirt and half-finished phrases and thoughts-- so much vacant glancing at my own shoes and socks. It's a good thing I usually wear interesting socks.

Or maybe not. I don't know.

I'm kind of surprised, in many ways, that we're here together, you and me. 900 posts. I sort of didn't think I had it in me-- the scourge of the sea, just little old me. Mrs. Hook's little baby boy.

(Sorry-- "Peter Pan" moment. It happens to me sometimes.)

In another way, though, I knew we'd get here. Because I couldn't let us not. I'm not ready to let go of... whatever this is.

Not just yet.

See you tomorrow, Pan.

You Can Party Now: It's My 700TH BLOGDAY!

I met an old college friend (this phrase implies that I have a bunch of those, just, you know, sort of hanging around. I don't. I have, um, two.) for coffee in Providence on Christmas weekend. A blizzard was beginning, but he still took time out of his day to drive to Starbucks on Thayer Street and meet me. And, after we parted, I still took time to purchase a wool blazer from the 1940s at a second-hand boutique. Because I'm nucking futs.

Anyway, while we made each other laugh like no time at all had passed, assuredly to the annoyance of the other Starbucks patrons, he asked me about my blog, and, because I am an insufferable megalomaniac, I told him about it. He suggested that, one day, I should invite all of my readers (this phrase implies that I have a bunch of those, you know, sort of hanging around) to some random place for a party.

"But, I don't throw parties," I said.

"That would make it even funnier," he expertly countered. Well, he had a point there.

I was uncommonly silent.

"Can you imagine the bizarre mix of people a My Masonic Apron party would attract? People tossing back and forth your gay catchphrases and there would inevitably be this awkward moment where they'd all look at you with the realization that this... awesome schmuck is the reason they're all together? Oh my God, it would be so beautiful."

"Right," I said, "like the Last Supper, only with pork and more clothes. I would insist on fancy dress, and bacon-wrapped scallops."

This happy little reunion got me thinking about what exactly a My Masonic Apron party might look like. As I've said, I'm not so much into the whole party thing. It's distinctly possible that my stodgy side would come out at such an event, causing it to look something like this:

You might think that nobody could possibly have fun at a party like this, but you can tell that they've just come off a totally raucous game of Pin-the-Tail-on-the-Negro-Manservant, and that the tea was damn good.

It should come, I would hope, as no surprise to you that I am incapable of executing anything as self-indulgent as a party for my blog. Believe me when I say that I am perfectly happy celebrating events like my 700th Blogday as I celebrate a lot of small victories and notables: by myself. My wife, in fact, is out tutoring as I bang out this little post, recognizing my little accomplishment, and the fact that there are no random faces around me is really okay. It's kind of how I want it. It's kind of how I run my life. I'm even okay with the fact that there is no food in front of me that is wrapped in bacon.

700 posts. Since March 13th, 2009. Seven. Hundred.

Some sloppy ol' assbubble should be opening up a bottle of champagne somewhere, don't you think?

The plain fact of the matter is: I don't like parties. And I like people about as much. That's not to say I wouldn't like you if I met you-- don't get me wrong-- I just love being at a distance. It's so... safe. That's, after all, what we love about our little internet, isn't it? The safety. The avatarness of it all. The fact that we don't have to answer to anybody except our own demons and, if life gets too hot, there's always that little "x" in the upper righthand corner of the monitor.

x

That's not to say I wouldn't wholeheartedly support your hosting a My Masonic Apron Appreciation Party in my honor. Do it. I encourage this. I endorse it. Have your guests dress up as their favorite G&S character. You be the Duke of Plaza Toro. My reader in Waterbury, CT can be Patience. Tampa can be The Fairy Queen from Iolanthe. Take pictures. Put them up on The Book of Face.

You bring the bacon.

Tell me all about it.

And I'll send content, sincere, half-frown smiles from home.