House Boat – Sam North

All I Really Need to Know I Learned from a Drunk 14 Year-Old at the Mall | 7-2-2026 | acrylics and pigment ink on canvas | 48 x 30 in

These days, I’m mostly happy, most of the time. But – conceptually – misery, self-loathing, and apathy are still MY FAVORITE. Maybe that’s because I spent so much of my life soaking in despair, that it just feels safe to me. Comfortable.

In conversations about compelling lyrics, I often cite a song by The Murderburgers that opens with: “I’m an ugly piece of shit with a fucked up face and broken teeth and no place to go” and closes with “I’m trying to find a way out that doesn’t involve tying a noose and kicking a chair.”

I was at a show once with a really terrible band – the kind that’s embarrassing enough to want to lead the audience in a call-and-response sorta chant. Their specific chant was particularly embarrassing: “WE DON’T GIVE A FUCK.” My eyes couldn’t have rolled any harder. Because NO ONE loves sentiments like “I don’t give a fuck,” “I don’t care about nothin’,” and “NOTHING MATTERS” more than I do – but only with tongue planted firmly in cheek. Because that shit’s not real. It’s armor against hurt. Your friend can’t let you down if you never really considered him a friend. Rejection doesn’t hurt if you don’t give a shit about the girl rejecting you.

I’d like to think I’ve become pretty good about stepping back and getting myself to a more reasonable place (emotionally), but so often my kneejerk reaction to hurt is:

I don’t need anyone.

I don’t need anything.

I don’t EVEN CARE.

I journaled those exact words once when my girlfriend and I weren’t getting along. It didn’t take me long to realize that I sounded like a fucking child. Like the kind of wounded idiot 14 year-old I’d imagine might get drunk at a mall.

There’s a song by House Boat that closes with the lyric, “If it seems like I don’t care – well, I care a lot. I’ve never, ever cared this much before.”

That admission’s stuck with me. It’s one thing to acknowledge your hurt and pain. It’s another to expressly acknowledge that your hurt and pain only exist because you care so deeply.

Like Bats’ lyrics are so delightfully childish and spiteful that virtually all of them sound like a drunk 14 year-old at the mall – with one notable exception: “caring about nothing is nothing to be proud of.”

If you’d like to hear any of the songs referenced by this painting:
Another Way Out of Here by The Murderburgers
Now We are 31 by House Boat
Lousy by Like Bats

Later this afternoon, I’ll set up for my Chicago show this weekend. In August, I’ve got two shows in Minneapolis and two in Pennsylvania. For more details and more upcoming shows, check the Events page.

It took me a minute to get this painting photographed so I’ve ALREADY GOT ANOTHER just about ready to go. Keep an eye out for it next week. I’m really excited about everything I’ve made this year and how well everything’s going. Follow me on social media if you want more regular, more specific updates.

Use the contact form if you’ve got questions about pricing or availability of originals or prints.

"Because Nihilism." 4/22/13. Watercolor and acrylic paints, charcoal, and ink. 12x16". — “Because Nihilism.” 4/22/13. Watercolor and acrylic paints, charcoal, and ink. 12×16″.

I painted this in April. I like ants. It’s expressive art and the story behind it is enough like a million others that it’s not worth telling. Instead, here’s the story of my life in April 2011.

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When Taylor finally called me back, she sounded weird. “What’s going on?” She wouldn’t say. She was being evasive. I just came out and asked – “are you done with me?” She didn’t answer right away but – when she did – yeah, that was pretty much the gist of it.

Six years… I was in total shock. I had just gotten into my first “treatment” program eight days prior. (Methadone maintenance). I was cured! How could she break up with me now?!? Life was about to become a dream! This is preposterous!

Not to mention, I was in the middle of my final exams. My final final exams. She couldn’t wait two fucking weeks to do this? I was gonna be so busy for the next few weeks that, at most she might have seen me once. By breaking up with me now, it was guaranteeing that I’d fail my exams, not graduate from law school, lose at life, and DIE. What a selfish, miserable human being. (Her, I mean). (I’m really cool and great).

Granted, her timing was a little poor but I’m obviously still alive, and my interpretation of things has changed with time. Taylor didn’t leave me that day – because I had already left her – when I let heroin overtake her on my list of priorities. For the last eight months, I had barely existed in her life. I spent all my time hiding from her, out all day, out all night, shooting up at school or the basement of our building, ignoring her phone calls. Now that I had a couple pleasant days I thought everything was gonna be okay again?

But I couldn’t see that; I couldn’t see anything. I just hurt. More than hurt. I was fucking leveled. I didn’t want to use but… I had to. If I didn’t relapse, that’d mean I wasn’t really hurt. And I was really hurt so… I had to shoot some heroin to prove it. To myself. To Taylor. To the world. (I’m not really sure). And I had to buy a lot (two hundred bucks’ worth) ‘cause that was the best deal. (Money management’s an important skill!) My little bundle lasted me through the day with a few caps left over for the next. And then I put it out of my head and got back to the task at hand.

I hadn’t been to any of my courses all semester (I never even bothered to get textbooks). I logged in to the school’s website, found out which classes I was enrolled in, and settled into a couch in a (usually) empty room at school, where I’d spend the next few weeks, trying to learn as much as I could and just maybe graduate. When I couldn’t stay up any longer, I’d put my computer in my backpack and sleep on that same couch where I was studying. I didn’t get up for anything. Almost. Every six or seven days, I’d walk to the closest store to stock up on bagel bites and apples, which I kept in the fridge of a student organization to which I (of course) didn’t belong. There were three other reasons I’d occasionally leave the couch: to smoke a cigarette, use the bathroom, and (most importantly) – once a day, between the hours of 6AM and noon – go get my daily dose of methadone.

At one point, I saw myself in the bathroom mirror and was pretty impressed with how strung out I looked. (I guess the methadone / Adderall / sleep deprivation combo will do that you). I took a picture for posterity.

April 2011 — Less than a month after this photo was taken, THIS DRUG-ADDLED FUCK UP GOT A LAW DEGREE FROM GEORGETOWN UNIVERSITY!

—–

“Barkmarket Fuckacy” by House Boat is my favorite song on the last record [The Thorns of Life CD/LP] to bear the Traffic Street Records logo.

In the liner notes for the record, there’s a special “thanks to Sam North for basically ruining his life to help get this record made.”

(On our way to the studio for the recording of the album, I caught two felony possession of heroin charges and more misdemeanor charges for needles and other paraphernalia than I can count/remember). And if that wasn’t bad enough, the cops didn’t even give me back my drugs when they let me go! So on top of everything else, I had to spend the next day scrambling around Indiana looking for heroin.