2001-09-17 - 8:35 a.m.

Of course, life has changed irrevocably and it will not change back. Yesterday's news has become utterly irrelevant. But I will still say these things I planned on saying, just as the stock market reopens and the baseball season continues, the adventures of oldgreedy must go on, to provide the world with its necessary distractions, and for a few weeks, until my ongoing narration has caught up with september 11 and we enter 'season 4: oldgreedy joins the army,' we can pretend that all this hasn't happened...

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He wears me out. Sometimes he makes me want to never leave my house again. But I�m back the next day because his videos are in my car. He has this very convenient habit of leaving things in my car, then calling me to bring them back the next day.

So here I am again to drop off the videos. I�m determined not to go out tonight, but then he tells me about his friend with the boat. This guy wants him to bring some girls out to the boat and go for a cruise in the lake. Sounds to me like some rich party animal with a yacht. I can�t pass this up.

We hit the town to sell some videos and look for some girls. We run in here and there, weave through crowded bars, chat with random world-travelers and have a beer. While I sit at the bar and watch the Cubs game, Marius works the tables, sitting down with a group to say, �Hey ladies, anybody want to go for a ride on a boat?� They�re all too busy, or have to work tomorrow, otherwise they would love to.

We run out and hit another place or two but it�s just not happening. Neither are the videos. Marius just doesn�t feel like selling. So I leave him to drink his beer with Micky, who has just wandered in after a long day assessing houses.

But I want to go out on that yacht. It could make all this waste of time worthwhile. I need that experience, that sublime moment when all this makes sense. I could forget all this on a yacht, sailing away from all our troubles, leaning out over the railing with Marius and having that perfect moment, or maybe talking to a lovely girl, leaving Chicago and everything else behind. So when he calls me up the next day and tells me the guy has invited us out on the boat, girls or no girls, I say sure.

First we go through the whole rigamarole � he has to pop in this bar, see that guy, borrow some change to make a phone call � but eventually we meet up with this guy Chris, who�s middle-aged with graying hair, out at the docks.

Turns out he doesn�t have a yacht. It�s just a regular motor boat with a crawl space underneath and a couple seats in the back. Doesn�t look like he was really looking for girls, either. He�s got a wife and four kids. This week, they�re away, so�s made this little floating room his vacation home.

�So we gonna go for a spin, or what?� Marius says. �I�ve been telling my driver I�d take him out, that we�d have a good time.�

Chris isn�t in the mood. �Come on, man. I�m tired,� he says.

I suddenly have no desire to go out on the lake. The ideal has disappeared again, replaced with mundane reality. That idea of floating out over the waters in a sea of perfect understanding drifts off and I see once again that it was all smoke and mirrors. Marius has sold me that ideal like he sells people on his videos, sold me on the whole idea of a better time right around the corner, on my own belief in a perfect moment in the perfect boat under the perfect sky. It keeps receding, beyond the shores of Lake Michigan, but we keep buying it because to lose that dream would be to lose everything.

The dream drifts away and we�re left with one another, three misplaced guys on a boat headed nowhere. But suddenly it�s okay. We can have our own moments here on the boat, imperfect but fine.

We�ll just enjoy the quiet night, sipping a beer, munching on the hunk of cheese and crackers that Chris has brought up from below, and talk about my brother�s wedding, August�s lost loves, life on the water, whatever.

Chris loves being out on the boat. It�s his refuge from the family life, a refuge that only he can appreciate. The kids, they don�t understand these things, they just say what the heck, it�s just a boat. They didn�t grow up wondering what it would be like to have their own boat to ride in, imagining the freedom of the open waters and the power of a strong vessel to forge your path.

But Chris, he loves it. He�ll take it out on the water for hours at a time, just take off his shirt, fire up a burger on the grill he�s got clamped to the back, and float lazily by. One day this summer, the boat broke down in Milwaukee and he had to get it towed back to Chicago, they charged a thousand bucks for it, but he didn�t mind, because it meant a whole day of relaxing on the boat, nothing really to aim for or do, just sit back yourself as you drift home from Milwaukee�

Milwaukee. Haven�t been up there in a while, Marius says. Had a girl once who left me in Milwaukee, the kind that will do anything for you. He takes a sip of beer. Yeah, that girl, she really loved me, moved into my house when I was just 16 and she was 18, she loved me, man. She came with me all the way down to Georgia when I had to leave Chicago, and we made a go of it. But it just wasn�t our cup of tea and we moved back to Chicago, I was getting started selling videos and she was dancing, she was the most beautiful wonderful dancer and she loved me. But one day she wound up in Milwaukee, someone told her she could make more money dancing up there and she went, and when I called her she wouldn�t go back. I just couldn�t take care of her like she needed so she left, but I know knew she loved me. So many women since then, maybe a hundred, but none like her�

Damn. It�s getting late. We�ve still got to get out and film a band, and before that we�ve got to pick up Melvin from the vet, who�s had some kind of skin rash, only Marius doesn�t have the money to pay the vet. Money�s coming too slow, he�s not selling enough videos, losing too much gambling.

He borrows Chris� phone. Melvin must be so unhappy in there, he�s got to get him out of there tonight. What do you tell a vet you can�t pay? That I�ll pay you guys as soon as I sell a few more videos, as soon as I�ve paid off the other three guys I owe money too? That I�ll give you some great exposure on my cable access show if you�ll just cut me a break? You gotta be smooth with these guys, they mean business, they�re not some metalheads you can hit up for money at a bar.

�Ask them if they have an installment plan,� I say.

An installment plan. That�s good. He calls them up and tells them the situation, plays it real smooth. I want to come by and pick up Melvin tonight, he says, I do have the money only I don�t have it right now, I just have to wait to get paid in a few days. I was wondering if I could get an installment plan. I need him with me, I do concert video promotions and I like to take my dog around with me, I�m kind of freaking out here and I need you to help me out.

�You are one smooth talker,� Chris says after he�s hung up. Yeah, well thanks, that�s what I do for a living, he says. Anyway, we have to go. We�ve stayed too long as it is. You stop to enjoy, you take a load off and appreciate what you have, and you find you�re getting behind again, you�ve got to pick up the pace, strike out again. So thanks for the boat ride. And we hit the road again, trying to keep pace with the dream.

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