Today’s blog is a math equation. Take the recent holiday weekend. Assign random numerical values to the variables. (Note: Bear with me. I am not a mathematician. I will use what lexicon I have, but the terms may be off) Begin by breaking the past weekend into equal fourths, indicative of the way the time was broken up. Perhaps n could be the first part, while we will randomly allow for y and t and r to denote the second periods of time. From here we will solve for x, which will equal the overall effect of our randomly sampled 4th of July weekend.

Let us assign n to Friday night, wherein a friend, Mike, travels from Washington D.C. up to New York City. We will say that the friend brings Heather, his live-in girlfriend, and that Mike’s sister also travels down from Boston. Perhaps this equation is better suited to some form of algebra or calculus, but it has been years since this writer even put down “2+2=4” so we will keep things as simple as possible from here on out. Perhaps this is better suited to science, in which case we can mix Mike, Heather, Casey, Tony, Eric, Pamela, Miss Diss and Preston in a vat and leave them to simmer at a dinner while I head to a Mexican joint with the SMAK Mom. Let us say the SMAK Mom is remarkable company, a good meal is shared, a short walk and talk back to Bob’s place (who is in Montreal for Jazz Fest with the Magnificent Geebs). So far, the chemicals are stable; everything is going according to our hypothesis. Let us say I mix every metaphor I can in here until I induce myself to throw up in my mouth. I meet up with the crew. There is a bar; there are shots; there are copious amounts of drinking and an oddly aggressive Polish waitress. These variables will account for n.

And here begins y, which begins Saturday morning, around 8:30 or 9 when I open my eyes to a mess of bodies in Tony’s living room. It seems we all spent the night, though I passed out sometime around when Johnny Depp commandeers his first ship. From here, we will get egg sandwiches and Tony will pick up his car. The car will travel with velocity, pointed West on a highway, heading to a house on a beach with two people inside. With the travel, the variable becomes volatile, messy, running in many different directions over the course of its travel, yet heading in the same direction until it arrives. Let us say that these now four separate chemicals come together, and their forming produces a meditative quality. Meals are eaten outside, on a patio. Books are read and beaches are walked on. Words spoken and a pool is there for the swimming. It is peaceful, it is calm, this is variable y.

What to do with t, which is harder to account for. As a variable it involves travel again, for over an hour. Then winding roads and odd locations and a rented house. In this house reside anywhere between 10 to 12 other chemicals. Normally, it is ill-advised for such a combination. One can become bitchy, another full of piss and spit, another, because of the location away from a “home” more open to experimenting. These are all accounted for, all watched carefully. Energy is derived from beef and things grilled and fruit salad, which are all consumed at a large table on a deck on a bay. At one point there is even sitting on this dock by this bay. Libations, cigarettes, laughs and bad Chris Rock imitations. Then a bar. A sleazy, dirty, grimy bar and a girl who, outside, taunts, “I am 16, and dangerous to older men.” There are looks, sideway glances and quick escapes. Shots pass around. Laughter and uncomfortably public displays of desperate affection. These things end in a haze, all going separate ways. This is t.

And here is r. Another difficult variable, with many, varied, seemingly disparate factors. There are egg sandwiches on patios with parents who leave at mid-day. There is travel, there are phone calls, there is meeting up, a group of 4, now bonded boys just from two days of mocking anyone else. Friendship through similar distaste. And then there is the promise of 3 women. And a car drive for cigarettes, and cars double parked on a two lane highway, and a backup and stop. And stop. And stop. And stop. And, just out the driver side window, there are bursts and sparks, 5 feet away, no more than 10, on the beach, beside the highway and the car stops, they all do. New additions. 3 women. Drinks and talks about sex and first orgasms and mild flirtations and many, many, many, many, many questions about jobs. Make that job. And there are swimsuits and there is swimming. The variables stop moving. Exhaustion settles in. The sun is coming up. There is a huge TV and a movie, it could be any movie, it doesn’t matter, because the bodies rest, folded on top of each other. There is, and will be, no touching. Just rested heads on weary shoulders and sleep settles in. And the drive back to a beach house. This is the complication of r.

And how to solve the equation? How to assign variables to such random chemical compositions. Because at 5AM Tuesday you were on the highway, driving back to the City where you returned to work at 9, but as Coldplay hit the stereo you tried to make sense of this weekend, realizing that not once did you ponder what the 4th meant to America, which you are glad you didn’t because the conclusion reached might have been that right now, at this time in your history, perhaps, if you could be so bold, in your countries history, America’s best asset is its belief in America and you’d rather not ponder things such as this on a weekend such as that. So take account. Divide into fourths, and break it down thusly. Assign n, y, and t, and r and solve for x, which will be the overall effect of the four variables when taken together. n+y+t+r=x, and x will be the totality. And x will equal one hell of a fucking weekend.