September 16, 2019 | Occasus | Issue 9 | Creative Nonfiction

A Beautiful Mind

As I got on the bus this morning, I still felt the effects of last night. A little lightheaded, weak in the knees, and still burping vodka. I can't even remember how I got on the bus. "Did I walk down Cheapside? Was the light even green when I crossed the street?" The auto-pilot
switch in my body has been turned on. I'm currently glued to my phone searching for restaurants that sell pizza, burgers, crepes, tacos, and succulent fatty cuts of meat. I don't even know where I am, I have yet to look up from my phone since being on the bus.

Suddenly, as I'm looking through greasy pizza joint menus, I can't help but think of my life with an endless supply of money. As a broke university student, this thought often crosses my mind. I don't crave extravagant luxuries in life; just simple things in excess. I would order seventy-five to one-hundred pizzas to my house, all of the different varieties. Being as penniless as I am, ordering one small pizza usually provokes financial insecurity. Veggie, cheese, Neapolitan style, deep-dish, thin crust, meat lovers, I don't judge. My house would be the United Nations of pizza; anybody of any background is welcome. I'm lying on my bed, mostly naked, with a few leaves covering my genitals. On top of the excess amount of pie in my house, numerous Greek Goddesses are walking around dressed in traditional toga uniform. Lying on my back listening to smooth jazz, goddesses are feeding me pizza, similar to how ancient Greek Gods would get women to feed them grapes. They dunk slices of pizza into a lake of ranch-dressing before raising the slice to my mouth. I could stay like this forever. I'm most likely somewhere around three-hundred pounds, but at least there's pizza. At this weight, I am unable to physically raise my arms above my belly let alone get the pizza into my mouth. For a moment, I contemplate if I've died and gone to heaven. 

The next thing I hear is the sound of the bus crashing over a pothole, re-focusing my attention the people on the bus. I close my phone and decide to stare at the civilians on the bus. People-watching is one of my favorite pastimes. I often like to judge someone from afar, taking into account their structure, style choice, and any other attributes that stand out to me. I then use my observation to try and write a version of their life story.

A scrawny kid with a man bun catches my attention. What has to go wrong in your life to decide to shave the sides of your head, and then keep the top long enough to tie into a neatly tied bun? I wonder if men who have man buns were loved as children? Bun boy’s gaze locks with mine. I can feel his eyes scanning my body up and down. Why does this punk keep looking at me? Is he staring at my coat? Is there something wrong with my jacket? I can't help but wish this kid would come over here and tell me what he really thinks of my coat.

"Hey… nice coat… did you get it from your girlfriends closet?"

I'm aware my coat is a little longer than most men's coats. Nonetheless, I make it look good. I understand his reference; women often wear winter coats that are longer, the kind that go down to around knee level.  Mine isn't that long. It goes past my waist, down to the middle of my thigh.

"No. I got this jacket from your mom's closet. Did your girlfriend do your hair this morning?"

There's no possible way this clown will have a comeback. I don't really want to throw this kid through a bus window, but in defense of men who wear longer coats everywhere, I might have to.

"Actually, your girlfriend did my hair this morning."

His last comment was way out of line. Just as I'm preparing to scissor kick this joker in the chest, bun-boy, as well as a surplus of other students, exit the bus. I now know that I must be on campus. My destination is close.

I take a deep breath through my nostrils and attempt to exhale through my mouth. In the process of this I realize my lips are so chapped I can hardly open my mouth. As I reach for some chap stick, my sense of smells becomes activated by the lunch I packed. My lunch is the same every day; all natural peanut butter smothered on two slices of chewy whole-wheat bread. Quickly, I zip up my bag. I have to resist the temptation to eat my lunch already, it's all I have.

If peanut butter sandwiches were the last food on earth, I would be quite content. My life would most likely be in shambles. To me, peanut butter is equivalent to heroin.

There I am, under a bridge, offering to turn a few tricks for a tablespoon of the light brown goo. I'm a full blown junkie. There's a belt mark on my arm from the night before, a needle incision slightly below it. I spent the night in, and out have a euphoric peanut haze. I only shoot all natural peanut butter because it has a more liquid texture. Generic peanut butter has too much viscosity to get into my veins. I worry about the possibility of an overdose, but at the same time, I know I could never quit completely. A few times I had tried to quit cold turkey. No matter how hard I attempted to stop, after a week of being clean, I would wake up beside an empty jar of the good stuff. I couldn't continue on like this. I recognized that it was much safer for me to use more frequently in smaller doses than once every ten days go into full binge mode. If I ever have kids, I hope they never go near this stuff. One day I hope I'll be able to look my children in the eye and tell them their dad is clean and sober.

As I step off the bus and begin to walk to my class, I can't help but try and piece together my bus ride. Why do I imagine getting fed pizza by woman from ancient Greek mythology? How come I ruthlessly confronted a guy who may or may not have said something about my coat? Why do I use peanut butter to drown my problems? I conclude that it must be my desire to be anyone but myself. I can't envision a confident person dreaming of filling the hole inside them with pizza. Anyone who has self-respect would not pick a fight with a stranger because they're too insecure in their own jacket. A sane person doesn't contemplate going home, grabbing a jar of peanut butter and ending it all. Only a person who is so uncomfortable in their own skin would fantasize this much about being anywhere but the present moment. It's an attempt to escape my reality. I wonder if there are any other beautiful minds out there like mine. Maybe, hopefully, one day, we will meet. Until that day, I will keep imagining the world.

AIDAN GUGULA is a third years student enrolled in the Film Studies Major module and the Creative Writing minor at the University of Western Ontario. He was inspired to write this piece when he was given a prompt that challenged him to incorporate his stream of consciousness into every day life.