2011 Issue - Santa Fe Community College

Life Before Kant
by Meg Tuite
The nurse checked my vitals and squawked, NORMAL, in a parrot
screech too loud for the barren, white room and me. She scribbled into
her chart. I had barfed up oysters and beer scarfed down at the bar earlier
and proceeded to faint again in the ER waiting room.
I should have locked myself at home that night. Instead, I dragged
myself out to drown in another online genius of a date named Thwartly,
who mumbled, “There was no life before Kant.” Another word similar
to Kant came to mind. This dumb ass, with a name I couldn’t say no to,
hated humans, TV, animals, sleep and when we got down to it, the entire
21st century.
How many online hook-ups had I blitzed my way through in the last
few months Burton was the first. I was a sucker for overwrought quotes
and his profile had a Nietzsche zinger dangling at the top of the page:
“And if you gaze into the abyss, the abyss gazes also into you.” I recall
gazing into his nose hair at the restaurant for a very long time and then
his pubic hair as the night wore on.
Vince loved Bob Marley and had a hot tub. Jefferson was into Einstein,
although when the bill arrived he had an easy time with the relativity
of his lack of cash. I ended up dumping him after I got stuck with
the unending monologue of his eminence and the prodigious bar bill.
Trevor had a fetching quote of Maya Angelou, “All great achievements
require time.” I definitely agreed with her and came up with my own
quote after that date. “Small achievements spurt out prematurely, which
gives no possibility for any great achievements to ever commence.” I
don’t how many dates I’d been on, but I knew that this was better than
staying home.
I doused back three Buds in the time it took Thwartly to detest a
variety of subjects including the naivety of quantum physics and billiards.
I woke up from my stupor and ordered this swain, now eyeing my
breasts, and myself two shots of Jack Daniels along with a plate of sliders.
The least I could do was get a free meal and a good buzz off this screwdriver.
Santa Fe Literary Review 35