Losing in Gainesville (9781940430331) by Brian Costello Page A

scene in the Nardic Track transforms more and more into something like those cathartic masculine reclamation camps in some desolate part of the Rocky Mountains where men dress in pelts and yell to the heavens until they feel the testosterone again, Ronnie Altamont thinks of himself as a good subject for an emo song, brooding on what happened after the strange incident with Squeaky, when, before going into his room and locking the door, he stopped in the bathroom, giving in to the compulsive need to wash his hands and face several times a day in the brief time he had lived with Alvin and Stevie. He wiped the water off on his navy blue Docker slacks (Ronnie never really tried very hard to incorporate punk fashion into his daily routine, especially in Florida), sized up the Ronnie in the mirror—that faded vermillion dye job (one of the few concessions to looking like the kind of person who listened to the kind of music that obsessed him throughout his late teens and into his mid-twenties . . . and he paid the price for looking so ridiculous, thanks to black hair peeking out where the dye didn’t take, neck and scalp stained vermillion where the dye did take), black-framed glasses rusty and corroded at the hinges with binocular lenses caked with gunk along the edges, the unavoidable Florida tan, the scruffy face of an incompetent shaver, nose average in every way miraculously unbroken in light of all the provocative words he’d ranted back at UCF, flabby chin (despite the depression-fueled weight loss), broad slouched shoulders, a fraying old blue t-shirt ready to give up and dethread with the rest of his shirts, bony arms, small hands pressed against the nasty crusty bathroom counter, slacks stanky from freeballing, unfashionable hiking boots given out of pity and charity by Kelly. He too could be a walking talking emo song . . . Hell, even to get into these shows he’s had to donate plasma, take the money, buy one twenty-five cent Little Lady Snack Cake for lunch and one twenty-five cent bag of Cheese Canoodles for dinner—so yeah, he could write emo album after emo album . . . if only he could take any of this seriously. Always, always, the desire to laugh in the face of futile despair like this—emo bands like Play the Piano Drunk Like a Percussion Instrument Until the Fingers Begin to Bleed a Bit are indicative of the times—these self-loathing 1990s where people have no compunction about walking around in shirts with the word LOSER or ZERO in big letters . . . where all these “alternative” bands tepidly whine about their lives . . . Ronnie, as the “new kid” in the tiny little punk club where the bands play like this and moments are shared that Ronnie can’t understand . . . the only salvation is how they actually laugh with each other between the songs and at the end of the set . . . the way the space between performer and audience is nonexistent . . . the one thing they all agree on is knowing that in the end all of this is nothing more than moments between friends, many of whom could just as easily (and had before, and will again) plug in and play. These were friends—hugging, arms around each other, singing, screaming, sweating, palzee walzee friends, and Ronnie doesn’t know where to begin with anyone, has yet to see any of his old friends who grew up with him in Orlando then went off to college here and started bands. Everyone in the room is a potential friend, but Ronnie doesn’t know how to go about it, and this is also funny to Ronnie. Not only the lyrics, but the music was like nothing The Laraflynnboyles played . . . how all the bands in Gainesville played the octaves of the chords rather than the Ramones chords and/or the Minutemen 9th chord syncopation he loved.
    No, Ronnie doesn’t think he will suffer all that much in Gainesville. He