The Weekend and The Warriors

We’re going to the house on the lake

For the weekend

We’ll be bringing two friends

Who we’ll argue in front of

And drink with

And smoke a little

And try some shit

And belittle a little

And pass out next to

And maybe jerk off

If we think we can stand

The next-day guilt

This is the weekend

We are the warriors

Battleground: Relaxation

Credit extended

Bathing suits that look like fabric swatches

Purchased and photographed

In mauve dressing rooms

All over the city

Pool chairs, photographed

Calm, blue, chlorine waters—

Photographed

Drinks in hand

Drinks never out of hand

Out of hand hijinks by the one

We knew would be good

For a few laughs

A party at the house next door

A party down the road

A party with a cover that would cover

Half our rent

Tan lines and bar lines

And fun straws

And music that grinds on us

When nobody else will

Food?  Who needs food?

We’re not hungry

The heat takes care of that

Whatever room you’ve got left in you

After the alcohol and pills

Gets filled up with resentment

For the Younger Ones

The Younger Ones

Are getting younger

--Have you noticed that?

They look at us

And they

Are not

Impressed

But they don’t have lake houses

And they don’t have pools

They show up on a Thursday

And fuck their way into a weekend rental

But not our weekend rental

At least, not since two weekends ago

When one of the Younger Ones

Wound up on our couch

Dribbling vomit out slowly

Something we didn’t even know was biologically possible

Someone brought one of the Younger Ones home

And we
Said

Nothing

We don’t argue about the things we’re actually upset about
We argue about the pool chairs not being wiped off

And the beds not being made

And the rising cost of the party covers

But we do not

Argue

About

Actual

Things

And by things we mean—

The lack of attention we pay to our significant others

The desire for attention from people other than those aforementioned others

The wrinkles we found yesterday

The extra two pounds that won’t go away

The inability to find a filter that would convincingly place us back in our 20’s

The cruel irony of being able to live better than you’ve ever lived but not at the time when you wish you could have been living it

The guilt we feel when we hop online to announce that ‘We don’t want to be anywhere else’ when we secretly suspect there are other places

Better, brighter, bigger places

That we could be

Spots on the lake aren’t as enviable as they were

When we were the Younger Ones

Before we were the Warriors

And our conquest was the Weekend

After all, once those of us at the lake

Stopped being the Younger Ones

There were other places to be

Over a long weekend

Islands in the Pacific

Coastal towns in Europe

Even hidden metropoli in the Middle East

A spot on the lake?

How quaint

Good for you

Probably all you can handle these days, right?
I mean, you’re not as young as you used to—

Fuck it

We’re getting the plane tickets now

A trip to Spain over a long weekend seems silly

By the time we get there it’ll be Saturday—

Unless we take off work on Friday

Which we can

We can

We can do that

We can leave Thursday

Be in Europe by Friday afternoon

Be drunk by…

Well, we’ll be drunk the whole time

Otherwise what’s the point

We’ll get drunk on the plane

In the airport

In the uber on the way over

We’ll come home Sunday

And be a wreck on Monday

Maybe we’ll call out sick

How are we on vacation time?
Oh right, one of us doesn’t get as much vacation time as the other

Jesus Chris

And when it comes up

It’s always—

You wanted me to get a job

Yes, but I wanted you to get a good job

One with eight weeks vacation time

Like a normal human being

Who isn’t a fucking disaster

Why don’t you go find that kid on the couch

With the puke spilling out onto the carpet

We had to have cleaned

See if he can make you feel relevant again

Fuck you

Fuck you

Plane tickets booked

We’ll be fine by the time we leave

We’ll sit silently back on the way home

Whichever way we’re going home

Sunglasses adjusted

Attitudes deescalated

Depression medicated

Anxiety elevated

Weekend abbreviated

Rage placated

Sexual urges satiated

Spouse berated

Life alleviated

For the time being at least

Next weekend we’ll bring the dogs

The week after that, it’ll be the in-laws

After that, we’ll have that couple with us

That we met in L.A.

Then our rich friends

Then our broke friends
Then our exes

Then our dentists

Then our bosses

Then our girlfriends

Then two guys we meet online

Two hours before catching the train

Live a little, we think

Or live a lot

And survive a little

We have a sinking suspicion

We’re going to die soon

Of course, ‘soon’ may be

Sixty years from now

But it’ll still be too soon

And not soon enough

We sit by the pool

By the lake

And wonder we come to a lake

To swim in a pool

Beyond the lake is an ocean

And beyond the ocean

Is a world

We’re never going to see

Because out in that world

There are unfamiliar parties

And unfamiliar people

We might not want to meet

There are limits to what we can expect

Of ourselves

There are people we have become

Who look nothing like

What we thought of

When we were the Younger Ones

There are weekends we coming up on us

That feel like waves, like tides

When really we’re in an emptying pool

The water going down the drain

Circling slowly, then quickly

Like a drink down the hatch

Like the first thing we needed
And the last thing we needed

And who knows what the fuck

We need anymore

We grin and think we won

We won the race

We won the prize

We won it all

The house, the pool, the lake

The dogs, the dentists, the filtered photos

The sunglasses we’re not sure we could afford

That block out the light and whatever else

Our eyes can’t handle

We feel like we conquered it

The Friday and the fear

The Saturday and the sun

The Sunday and the slim chance

That this can keep going on

We are the Warriors

We are the winners

We are the ones who figured it out

And when the pool is finally empty

We’ll pack up

We’ll head out

We’ll go home

Home

Wherever

That’s supposed

To be