Scenes from Campaign HQ
"She called me an asshole for no reason, then offered to make up for it by baking me a dozen cookies. I said, 'Make it three dozen and deliver them to my house before five p.m. tomorrow, and we'll have a deal.' I told her to ring the bell three times, leave the cookies at the door, and leave, and she fucking did it. She broke the deal, though; she only rang once. So fuck her, dude. Don't call her again.”
This is why I love this house. The chocolate chip cookies come with a story. And they are the only food in the house besides the PBR and Jameson, so once they run out, these boys are going to have to find someone else to fuck with, I guess.
I am watching Nick Hart and Stefan Davis write an email response to a series of questions from the Isthmus about Nick Hart for Mayor. We are all drunk on PBR and whiskey. Nick leaves town with his brother tomorrow afternoon, so this needs to be done now, they believe. Good plan, I think.
Stefan is at his MacBook, recording. Nick is standing and pacing, dictating in the dark living room. Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas is paused on the TV screen. I am in the kitchen cooking rice and beans. The dog Echo is curled on the chair. Adam Hart is on his computer across the room.
“This campaign thing is getting serious,” Stefan says.
“You're right,” Nick replies. “It's getting serious,” and makes a show of grabbing his whiskey drink from the coffee table and taking a drink. Ice rattles. He scans the silent room over the top of his glass.
Stefan recites the first question. “Why are you running?”
“I am running for Mayor--” Nick begins.
“We are running for Mayor.”
“We are running for Mayor,” Nick continues, “Because we want to finger the status quo.”
I am far too drunk to consider the implications of this statement. I dish out four plates of rice and beans and pour some coffee.
Nick takes another drink and says, “This is for a good cause.”
“Which is...?” I ask.
“To be named at a later date.”
Stefan, Nick, and I are working and watching a movie in the living room, and Adam appears in the doorway from his bedroom and says, “I've been trashing pop music on YouTube. People think I hate Asians now. I don't know how I got that rap.”
I'm not always sure how I end up here each night-- can't usually recall the reason or the drive through town. My memory fades back in about the time I walk into the kitchen, hit the bowl, dish up some munchies, and pour a glass of water. But it's never a decision I regret, and each night here makes me want to be around for the next.
It started as a professional relationship, really, but quickly became blurred when Nick Hart said, “Have you ever used a vaporizer? 'Cause we just got one.” Getting fucked up at three a.m. on three bags of weed vapor will inevitably blur labels like “Journalist”, “Comedian”, and “Mayoral Candidate”.
As Stefan Davis dropped me at home that night, he said, “Just so you know, everything is on the record; Nick and I agreed to that.”
“Thanks for the permission,” I replied. “But nothing is ever off the record. I'm here to tell your story.”
“What the hell is she doing hanging around with guys like us?” Stefan asked Nick when he got home.
“Dude, she's an artist.”
It is an Editorial itch that drives me to the Hart Compound, a compelling inner voice that says Oh, it's going to be good here. It's movie Sundays with day beers; it's a drive to Perkins at five a.m.; it's waking up Nick Hart to hand him a bowl while he half-sleeps naked in bed; it's Stefan presenting the candidate with a Mayoral pie at seven a.m. to celebrate a successful start to campaign season; it's the coziest and friendliest little dog who is madly in love with Nick and Adam Hart; it's Nick and Adam wrestling like kids on the couch calling each other faggots to point out the absurdity of the beliefs of the people they grew up around in South Carolina. It's a household where they know what it means to be a Gonzo asshole, and they love it.
I arrived in town after a trying Thanksgiving weekend and texted Nick.
“What are you up to tonight, Nick Hart? I want to find you and take shots of Wild Turkey whiskey. I need a Gonzo shot in the arm after four days of family in Central Wisco.”
And he indulged me. We met at the Argus and ordered the shots from his campaign manager, bartender, fellow comedian, friend, and roommate.
As Stefan set three shots in front of us he said, “This won't end well.”
I raised my glass to meet theirs and said, “It's not supposed to.”
My neuroses fit in well in this household, and I like that.
“She's pretty quiet tonight,” Stefan worries.
“She's just recording,” Nick assures him.
The Hart Compound is filled with those moments that make the writer and the comedians alike exclaim, “Write that down!”, that these moments are shared and remembered.
Nick has been surviving on comedy and unemployment for 18 months now, and the unemployment is about to be cut off. We can't picture him with a job, and it actually makes me kind of angry with the world that such a man will have to work like a sucker to make a living. Such a man ought to be able to survive in life by sharing his art with the world.
“I'm kind of hoping that this mayor thing will work out,” Nick says in response to our concerns about his job search.
The Hart Compound is a place in such juxtaposition to the Real World that anyone who enters can't help but realize that such hope can make things happen in the world. Each moment in the Hart Compound is one moment farther down the rabbit hole, one step closer to the artists' life, further from the reality we are trying desperately to fend off. Nick's seemingly naïve belief that things in life will simply fall into place becomes more and more plausible as I watch life fall into place around everyone who enters the Compound with an open mind.
“I am a firm believer in 'If you act like big shit, they will treat you like big shit',” the candidate explains simply.
