SubscribeThe girl in the red dress,
she took my breath away:
took my lungs fast,
and with them tore my heart away
Searching through gods, religions, and some dynasty shit
tryna find the one that can answer for this:
burnt flesh, perfect dress
How the fuck'd we come to this?
You could see her teeth melting out her skull
the same teeth that cut the gums just a month before
But...
they say 'walk fearless in the shadow of death'
And...
'those who leave this world can finally rest'
So...
should i hit up that party tonight?
Or...
pray in bed and turn out the lights?
Back when I I I was firing shots
back when I I was connecting dots
back when I survived, against the odds...
I...didn't pay attention in class?
Just forgot so I could make all this suffering last,
and laugh,
when Ma dropped the rolling pin
so she could dance on one foot
in pain again
The Girl in the Red Dress, She Took My Breath Away
(PLEASE CLICK ON THIS LINK: http://www.uruknet.info/?p=12676 BEFORE READING THIS POEM. It's also embedded in the title if you're feelin' lazy)
Screaming Subtleties
Wishing her hair was shorter and wishing, at the same time, that the wind would stop, Jane Salstow stood at the corner of a Great Lake and a Great City feeling somewhat out of place in her yellow dress and shocking orange pumps with the heels lost in sand and only pointy tips protruding from the surface. The shoes were fabulous, subtle instruments that knocked wind from the beige people of the Midwest. Too bad, she thought, that they did not have a similar effect on the lake. Maybe the wind would blow the scent of smoke away, maybe it would blow away the gut-kicking smell of liquor and new clothes, leather and everything else. Maybe it would blow her away, like a giant yellow leaf in the fall, a leaf with fabulous orange shoes.
There were no more stars, because they ran out of energy from burning all night and there was no sun because it ran out of energy trying to keep things happy all day, there was just the moon that would never burn out because it, in fact, wasn't burning at all; just reflecting on the day like some do before sleep. Jane removed the orange weapons from her feet and walked towards the water slowly, but it was hard because she went straight into the wind, face first, hair blowing into her mouth and it was dark because the moon is only known for it's light in bad poetry, and she walked and stopped, moving in bold increments until her toes met the icy water of the Great Lake. Just across the dark body, lights of a Great City burned fossils, feeding the walls of bright blue as they towered far into the sky, all around her. She, at the bottom, by the lake, looking upward, had a long way to climb. A yellow speck against a blue background she stood at the edge of the water between day and night, in ambigous hours of time when the sun cannot dictate whether it is morning or not and the moon is useless. But then she decided to go away, and leave while no one was watching. The dawn always has a way of converting good friends into good strangers. She concluded in thoughtful retrospect: everything looks different under sunlight than it does in barlight. Drasticly. So she decided to float away, in one of her orange shoes. She climbed into the shoe and though it was a tight fit and the smell of leather made her sick, she sat in there and with her arms pushed the sharp orange vessel onto the water and floated, quite effortlessly, all the way to Canada where she was disgrutled to find that everything there was still blue.
I love wildly
Morgan Sharp was an idealist on logistical matters and a realist when it came to matters of emotional consequence. He sat, wrapped in a pungent smoke from the incense, wrapped in a blanket from his reckless travels to Mexico and shivering in the fever that comes with a freshly breaking heart. He felt the tour bus moving, right then, moment for moment, frame by frame, every pebble the wheels ran over jolted the bus in a way that made the edges of the new wound tear slightly. It was harder for him now than it had ever been, because this time he was the one who ended everything; sent pieces of love to the bottom of everything. There was the feeling, at sunrise, the feeling that the world would never stop, no matter what...no matter how many hearts and necks broke in the darkness, it would return each day because it had to. The world would turn, it was only the laws of physics, agonizing in the consistence of their neutrality. Peter's constant tuning of the guitars made his ears hurt. Music hurt his ears. Every sense pained him. He cringed while Kenny killed Hendrix notes on the electric.
"Back before our love got lost you told me, you said, 'my love is constant as the Northern Star'... I said 'constantly in the darkness? Where's that at? If you want me I'll be in the bar'." ~Joni M.
At sunrise he knew she would wake up, he knew exactly how she would look around and laugh at first. Exactly. He looked out of the window and with throbbing eyes beheld the silhouettes of trees as they raced over the glowing sea of sunrise. Eastern light beams blurred into tears and confusion as the awareness of space and time came chopping into his sides. Frame by frame life was converted into memories and memories, conversely, were recoded into life. At some point before sunrise it happened: the very edges, the last strings of his heart, snapped under the constant friction of living and the vital organ separated into two solid pieces sending prickly slivers of pain to every sense he possessed. It was then he started to cry, he cried for hours and days, until the bus was filled with tears, silent and remorseful, they filled the streets over which the bus had passed causing dust to settle and puddles of sadness to spring. The bus moved west, and so did the tears, making a blue trail all the way to California, and there they remained but sparkled this time, in the sun. Then he remembered, somewhat bitterly, the brown girl on the corner four months before, the one whose heart he broke, the only one who could ever lead him to break his own: the one who said it was impossible to drown in one's own tears,that only those of our loved ones had that power. " He rocked back and forth on the dawn, hoping she was safe from his tears, hoping he was not safe from hers.
In Chicago, similar pools formed, but these were louder perhaps and more lamenting. She woke up to the same sun Mr. Sharp had seen from the bus, only the trees weren't racing with her, they stood constant as before. By the same light source they saw into the distance, only he was looking East and she, West. Only trees and space prevented them from seeing one another as they became crippled in the aftermath of a devastating lovestorm.
He left one of the two necklaces, like he said he would, behind the mirror in the living room: he left the cross. The same cross his father had left him the morning he abandoned the infant star at the door of a hospital. She took it, like she said she would, and threw it down from the overpass, watching it land on the railway tracks far below. It was only sanity, then, that held her from following it. She walked up to the edge, were Sanity held her back, firmly, around the waist, and coaxed her off of the ledge. "This is the New Year." It rung in her head.
"So this is the New Year," Morgan Sharp stood singing under the spotlights onstage guitar in hand, people screaming his name...and in the dark crowd he could see no faces but he felt music, note by note, and his mind, altered as it was on stimulants, depressants and narcotics was clear like sheets of water frozen in noonday sun. He felt conscious that someone was watching, one person who's eyes he could never forget, because when they were laid upon him he felt exposed, like a heart wrapped in transparent flesh and cotton. His first live performance broadcasted worldwide with at midnight. Indeed, she was watching, but this time from a secure seat in her new life, and when she saw him onstage she turned to stone, stuck there, a chunk of soft granite, far after they cut him from the screen to show how a domestic woman might use a new age-dustpan. But before that, just before they sold him to the advertising companies, He looked towards the audience as the smoke of the new year swallowed him whole he said, "I love, wildly." Screams almost drowned out his last words: "Because that's the only kind of love there is."
Midnight. So that was the new year, a year that turned him into a memory,one that required intricate recoding. Whether the memory was fond or foul, well, that was irrelevant.
"Everybody get your best suits or dress on.
Let's make believe we are wealthy for just this once.
Lighting firecrackers off on the front lawn
as thirty dialogs bleed into one.
I wish the world was flat like the old days,
and we could travel just by holding a map.
No more airplanes or speed trains or freeways..
there'd be no distance that could hold us back."
~Death Cab for Cutie
"Back before our love got lost you told me, you said, 'my love is constant as the Northern Star'... I said 'constantly in the darkness? Where's that at? If you want me I'll be in the bar'." ~Joni M.
At sunrise he knew she would wake up, he knew exactly how she would look around and laugh at first. Exactly. He looked out of the window and with throbbing eyes beheld the silhouettes of trees as they raced over the glowing sea of sunrise. Eastern light beams blurred into tears and confusion as the awareness of space and time came chopping into his sides. Frame by frame life was converted into memories and memories, conversely, were recoded into life. At some point before sunrise it happened: the very edges, the last strings of his heart, snapped under the constant friction of living and the vital organ separated into two solid pieces sending prickly slivers of pain to every sense he possessed. It was then he started to cry, he cried for hours and days, until the bus was filled with tears, silent and remorseful, they filled the streets over which the bus had passed causing dust to settle and puddles of sadness to spring. The bus moved west, and so did the tears, making a blue trail all the way to California, and there they remained but sparkled this time, in the sun. Then he remembered, somewhat bitterly, the brown girl on the corner four months before, the one whose heart he broke, the only one who could ever lead him to break his own: the one who said it was impossible to drown in one's own tears,that only those of our loved ones had that power. " He rocked back and forth on the dawn, hoping she was safe from his tears, hoping he was not safe from hers.
In Chicago, similar pools formed, but these were louder perhaps and more lamenting. She woke up to the same sun Mr. Sharp had seen from the bus, only the trees weren't racing with her, they stood constant as before. By the same light source they saw into the distance, only he was looking East and she, West. Only trees and space prevented them from seeing one another as they became crippled in the aftermath of a devastating lovestorm.
He left one of the two necklaces, like he said he would, behind the mirror in the living room: he left the cross. The same cross his father had left him the morning he abandoned the infant star at the door of a hospital. She took it, like she said she would, and threw it down from the overpass, watching it land on the railway tracks far below. It was only sanity, then, that held her from following it. She walked up to the edge, were Sanity held her back, firmly, around the waist, and coaxed her off of the ledge. "This is the New Year." It rung in her head.
"So this is the New Year," Morgan Sharp stood singing under the spotlights onstage guitar in hand, people screaming his name...and in the dark crowd he could see no faces but he felt music, note by note, and his mind, altered as it was on stimulants, depressants and narcotics was clear like sheets of water frozen in noonday sun. He felt conscious that someone was watching, one person who's eyes he could never forget, because when they were laid upon him he felt exposed, like a heart wrapped in transparent flesh and cotton. His first live performance broadcasted worldwide with at midnight. Indeed, she was watching, but this time from a secure seat in her new life, and when she saw him onstage she turned to stone, stuck there, a chunk of soft granite, far after they cut him from the screen to show how a domestic woman might use a new age-dustpan. But before that, just before they sold him to the advertising companies, He looked towards the audience as the smoke of the new year swallowed him whole he said, "I love, wildly." Screams almost drowned out his last words: "Because that's the only kind of love there is."
Midnight. So that was the new year, a year that turned him into a memory,one that required intricate recoding. Whether the memory was fond or foul, well, that was irrelevant.
"Everybody get your best suits or dress on.
Let's make believe we are wealthy for just this once.
Lighting firecrackers off on the front lawn
as thirty dialogs bleed into one.
I wish the world was flat like the old days,
and we could travel just by holding a map.
No more airplanes or speed trains or freeways..
there'd be no distance that could hold us back."
~Death Cab for Cutie
ARE YOU FUCKING KIDDING ME?
Many years from now, I will remember my distant love affair with the eccentric art dealer from Hawaii, a time when the intense enchantment of love pumped from my heart into my veins and how we sat together, being hypocritical, under the shelter of a great oak tree. It started raining that day, we spent it under the oak tree playing mankala with pebbles in the dusty ground. It started raining, which at the time was a blessing considering the record breaking heat and the number of days between cloudbursts. It was a lazy thick rain, the kind that seemed to rip the sky and soak the ground without much effort, the kind that was proceeded by a rainbow poised high and magical in the eastern side of the sky. Love, like other drugs, has a way of altering with your judgment and, in most cases, makes you realize after you come down that you just wasted your day under a fucking tree...in the rain.
"If you stare long enough it will disappear." Mr. Grenier took my arm and led me away from the arch of colors in the evening sky. One day it will all come together, he would tell me quickly after walking away from beautiful sights that deserved much longer glances. He was so ridiculously predictable in his spontaneity.
"If you stare to long your eyes will become immune." He said this with a smile as he wiped the rainwater of his face with his sleeve. "Here." He offered a cotton corner of his T-shirt. He one of those who would at any given occasion, walk to the edge of reason without faltering and throw himself into an unfamiliar corner of the world with no inhibitions. From an early age he learned to approach love, among most other things with a senseless abandon and the only things that made him hesitate or doubt were beauty and magic. He felt as if humans had only a small capacity for absorbing beauty and like a bucket under a running faucet it would fill to the brim if one went around staring at beautiful things until eventually they became common. In other words, he was a lousy pretentious fuck, but hear me out:
"I've seen people caught in love like whirlwind,
listening to their squads
and listening to girlfriends
that's exactly the point where
their whole world ends: lies blow in.
That's where the drama begins."
~the roots
There are few places in the world that I would refuse to go and there are no places in the world which Mr. Grenier would refuse a visit. He had journeyed across the Sahara, ventured through the deep jungles on the Amazon and attempted to climb the highest mountains of Nepal all before turning thirty, or at least, that's what he said. He was a dumbass, but that was apparent. If at some point he felt inspired by the promise of an opportunity to learn, he hardly hesitated beyond the almost unavoidable and most inconvenient task of packing. On the evening we realized we were in love, he took a painting and slid it out of the window of the 26 story office building onto the filthy streets of downtown Detroit. "I'll have to reimburse Blake." Rubbing his chin mischievously he shrugged off my stare of astonishment. "What? I just felt like it."
Major dumbasses. Both of us.
Before that evening in Mr. Blake's art studio we never looked each other in the eyes lest one should give in to their feelings and we never spent time with one another outside of the circle of mutual friends. Something broke that afternoon in June, some unspoken rule that exists between friends. Not only did it break but it shattered into a million pieces like a glass frame thrown from the 19th story window of an office building in Detroit, MI.
Reading his tattered copy The Satanic Verses as he lay on his back under the red light cast from the oriental fixtures of his Chicago apartment Mr. Grenier seemed quite at peace with himself, and his surrounds for an hour. He was lost in the bold and beautiful world Rushdie created and I was lost in the bold and ugly world of the internet, sitting against a pile of imported pillows on the other side of the bed. Neither of us was aware of time or space or of anything Beyond the objects that temporarily captured out attention and, or course, each other.
In the beginning, when we woke up together for the first time in the vastness of love and the even greater vastness of Peter Blake's guest bedroom, a strange feeling came over me, as if a six sense had been activated. Ever since then I became enshroud with a strange awareness of Mr. Grenier, as if he presence made the air thinner or his movements made the axis earth title to the slightest degree but tilt nonetheless. On one occasion, when I was so taken up in my writing that I did not hear him come through the door, the light changed and I knew when he and I were in the same room without needing any of my recognizable senses confirm it.
The span of an hour was all the enjoyment Mr. Grenier could ever got out of the satanic verses in one dosage, especially in his third time reading it. The aged book and it fell off of the bed with a dull thud as he let it go. I shut down my computer and placed it on the floor near where the book had fallen. In the following seconds I felt an awareness so clear, so thorough that I knew he had to feel it as well and there grew a tension, a thickness in the air that seemed it would suffocate us and the only thing we found alleviated the intensity was the intimacy of physical contact. I felt his presence so strong by all of my senses that at one point I could not distinguish between my body and his and I was swept into a somehow altered state of consciousness.
exhausted and confused, tangled in a warm sea of Egyptian cotton and still pained by the newness of love, tears flooded forth like they had never had before and probably never would after. He took my hand and moved so that he was again on his back and my head was resting on his chest. Speaking for the first time in hours he ran his hand up and down my back. "I love you." He probably did.
"And they were falling, 30,000 miles,
the pilot was on the air saying,
'I'm sorry, I'm so sorry.'
And then they splashed into the deep blue sea.
It was a wonderful splash.
Into the caverns of the future
with just our flashlights & love
we must plunge, we must plunge
we must plunge
then we'll get there,
way down there at the bottom of everything
and then we'll see it
and we'll see it
and we'll see it!"
~Bright Eyes
"If you stare long enough it will disappear." Mr. Grenier took my arm and led me away from the arch of colors in the evening sky. One day it will all come together, he would tell me quickly after walking away from beautiful sights that deserved much longer glances. He was so ridiculously predictable in his spontaneity.
"If you stare to long your eyes will become immune." He said this with a smile as he wiped the rainwater of his face with his sleeve. "Here." He offered a cotton corner of his T-shirt. He one of those who would at any given occasion, walk to the edge of reason without faltering and throw himself into an unfamiliar corner of the world with no inhibitions. From an early age he learned to approach love, among most other things with a senseless abandon and the only things that made him hesitate or doubt were beauty and magic. He felt as if humans had only a small capacity for absorbing beauty and like a bucket under a running faucet it would fill to the brim if one went around staring at beautiful things until eventually they became common. In other words, he was a lousy pretentious fuck, but hear me out:
"I've seen people caught in love like whirlwind,
listening to their squads
and listening to girlfriends
that's exactly the point where
their whole world ends: lies blow in.
That's where the drama begins."
~the roots
There are few places in the world that I would refuse to go and there are no places in the world which Mr. Grenier would refuse a visit. He had journeyed across the Sahara, ventured through the deep jungles on the Amazon and attempted to climb the highest mountains of Nepal all before turning thirty, or at least, that's what he said. He was a dumbass, but that was apparent. If at some point he felt inspired by the promise of an opportunity to learn, he hardly hesitated beyond the almost unavoidable and most inconvenient task of packing. On the evening we realized we were in love, he took a painting and slid it out of the window of the 26 story office building onto the filthy streets of downtown Detroit. "I'll have to reimburse Blake." Rubbing his chin mischievously he shrugged off my stare of astonishment. "What? I just felt like it."
Major dumbasses. Both of us.
Before that evening in Mr. Blake's art studio we never looked each other in the eyes lest one should give in to their feelings and we never spent time with one another outside of the circle of mutual friends. Something broke that afternoon in June, some unspoken rule that exists between friends. Not only did it break but it shattered into a million pieces like a glass frame thrown from the 19th story window of an office building in Detroit, MI.
Reading his tattered copy The Satanic Verses as he lay on his back under the red light cast from the oriental fixtures of his Chicago apartment Mr. Grenier seemed quite at peace with himself, and his surrounds for an hour. He was lost in the bold and beautiful world Rushdie created and I was lost in the bold and ugly world of the internet, sitting against a pile of imported pillows on the other side of the bed. Neither of us was aware of time or space or of anything Beyond the objects that temporarily captured out attention and, or course, each other.
In the beginning, when we woke up together for the first time in the vastness of love and the even greater vastness of Peter Blake's guest bedroom, a strange feeling came over me, as if a six sense had been activated. Ever since then I became enshroud with a strange awareness of Mr. Grenier, as if he presence made the air thinner or his movements made the axis earth title to the slightest degree but tilt nonetheless. On one occasion, when I was so taken up in my writing that I did not hear him come through the door, the light changed and I knew when he and I were in the same room without needing any of my recognizable senses confirm it.
The span of an hour was all the enjoyment Mr. Grenier could ever got out of the satanic verses in one dosage, especially in his third time reading it. The aged book and it fell off of the bed with a dull thud as he let it go. I shut down my computer and placed it on the floor near where the book had fallen. In the following seconds I felt an awareness so clear, so thorough that I knew he had to feel it as well and there grew a tension, a thickness in the air that seemed it would suffocate us and the only thing we found alleviated the intensity was the intimacy of physical contact. I felt his presence so strong by all of my senses that at one point I could not distinguish between my body and his and I was swept into a somehow altered state of consciousness.
exhausted and confused, tangled in a warm sea of Egyptian cotton and still pained by the newness of love, tears flooded forth like they had never had before and probably never would after. He took my hand and moved so that he was again on his back and my head was resting on his chest. Speaking for the first time in hours he ran his hand up and down my back. "I love you." He probably did.
"And they were falling, 30,000 miles,
the pilot was on the air saying,
'I'm sorry, I'm so sorry.'
And then they splashed into the deep blue sea.
It was a wonderful splash.
Into the caverns of the future
with just our flashlights & love
we must plunge, we must plunge
we must plunge
then we'll get there,
way down there at the bottom of everything
and then we'll see it
and we'll see it
and we'll see it!"
~Bright Eyes
Young American Gentlemen
Young American Gentlemen of the 21st Century
It is spring, the season most notorious for inspiring the hopeless romantic, you know, those pathetic people who pick flowers from the meadows and write poems about the changing season as if it was their job. Love in the air apparently, makes me begin to itch…I’m allergic to love at this point, much like I’m allergic to goldenrod, those horrific puffy yellow things that grow in the ditch behind the dorms that some people dare to call flowers. Those are the malicious yellow horrors that grow in the supposed meadow. As for poetry,it makes no sense: the snow is melting because the earth’s axis is now in a position closer to the sun, not because the fuzzy love bunnies came out to play. I know what you’re thinking. You’re thinking “Someone’s a little bitter.” Well you’re right. I am bitter. I do want those golden flower things to be retrieved from the ditch for me by a charming man who will teach me about the fuzzy love bunnies melting the snow. However this breed of man seems to be endangered in these days of late. The young American Gentlemen of today are quite different that those from the yester-year. They have new takes on courtship, dating and life in general. Everything is backwards. First comes sex, then, well, love just sort of happens. Accidental.
What if it all was an unofficial audition?
There's this man. I met him a little over a year ago. We got together, fell in love, had a great time, then fell into a bad spell of poor communication. We broke up for a short spell ( that seemed like ages) and then we got back together. Sounds pretty simple and predictable when I put it like that. But the thing is, it's not boring at all. It's the most exciting love affair I've ever had and every other lover pales in comparison. I've always been a cynic. I've thought that the person one ends up with is the one that annoys them the least. You know how in the intro I sound cynical and I have been for years. What's changing? Am I really in love this time? I don't know, but it's a strange feeling that I like a lot. He's used the word forever and it doesn't scare me. I've used it back and it was sincere. What in the world? I like this. I hope it lasts. For some reason I think it will.
OK. The best relationship I've ever had is in the ICU and it's half my fault. What to do? This is worse than I imagined.
Dear Mr. NOW,
I wrote you a love letter and it sat around for a month before I threw it into the trash along with the notebook it was written in. It's true, I have a commitment problem. I love you today. I may or may not love you tomorrow. I don't want to cheapen love notes with half sincere words and send them to every gentleman I fall in love with. If I do that then by the time I'm 30 there will be multiple love letters circulating in this existence that I'll wish I never sent. I don't believe in "the one." I get more excitement out of "the one for Now". I like open endings, tentative plans (there's a difference between tentative plans and being blown off) and journeys with no destination in mind.
When the excitement of '"Now" drains low, I'm turning the page. It's nothing personal, but of course I can't write that in a love letter. I know love isn't as romantic and cottony as its reputation. Actually I'm glad it's not. That would not only be boring but exhausting. Here's the long and short of it: I love you. I missed you when you were gone all weekend, you make me smile, you challenge my heady opinions and you make me want to be a better person.
But I'll never be 100 percent yours. For instance, today I woke up and spent the day with myself. I had such a great time. I missed you and thought how great the next time we meet will be: passionate, pure and adoring. But because I am who I am I don't think another person will ever make me complete. Why? Because I already am sovereign in my happiness. I'm afraid that some things never change. And if I ever do end up with anyone (it may or may not be you), they will understand my need for solitude, my need for a private life, even from them. And they, too, will have their own life to tend, things they rather enjoy that have nothing to do with me. And when we do meet it will be like it is with you, Now: passionate, pure and adoring. But it's a fine line between freedom, space, and bad communication. While I like my space, I also like to be able to count on a lover's word. I'm not hard to please.
Earning my stripes: The Infatuation:
Dear what's-your-face:
I love how passionate you are about politics. The way your voice raises a little bit when you're upset at what you just heard on NPR. Your eyes are so clear, sometimes I think they're bottomless, I could sink beyond return. So I try not to look. Do you notice that when we're talking I'm looking at anywhere but your eyes? It's not because I'm crazy. Well, maybe I am. But right now you are the man of my dreams, and I can't have you. I can't even try. I know you're not perfect. No one is. I know now that whoever you end up with is the person that annoys you the least. But there's something special about you. I noticed that the day we met, and you were wearing a gray shirt and stained jeans and work boots. I love how plain you dress. You're absolutely unpretentious when you have every reason to be. Not only are you brilliant in your academic discourse, but you have a fundamental understanding of the city you live in. That's saying a lot, but I won't go into detail because the internet is weird and you or someone you know might end up reading this. My secrecy is imperative. But I have to tell someone. These feelings for you are building up like a storm in my body. I feel you all over, I dream about you at night, and when the sun rises I have daydreams.
It's evening now. I feel like there's so much still to know about you. I can't leave before I find it out. If I leave I might never see you again, and that's something I'm not willing to risk. I do admit that not seeing you again may be better in the long run. I understand and respect your commitment and relationship with your lovely lady. She is delightful and you two, of course, deserve each other.
But is it wrong to look? To talk? to enjoy each other's political rants and raves and maybe a smoke here and there? Sometimes I sit at home trying to decide whether there's a loophole in the ten commandments, because I covet you every day.
When news breaks about X or Y, I want to call you. I want to know what you think. I want to meet outside and talk about it. I want to stare at the speck of paint on your face because you've been working all day and you're covered in it. that way I can keep my eyes out of yours.
But I know you look at me. I caught you a couple times. Nothing pleases me more. And when you said I was pretty, I was tickled. You probably have no idea.
I hope we stay friends, after I'm long gone outta this dismal place. I hope we both come back. I hope we both find happiness. I wish you joy as I wish myself: in abundance. You deserve every favor that comes your way. You have saved a community. Don't ever think you're wasting your time. The work you're doing is historic, and brilliant. And I'm not easy with compliments.
Young Secure Gentleman:
His name was Paul Ramond, well, actually that wasn't his name, but names don't matter to you (unless you're paul, or me who's interest it is at this time to keep his identity unknown).
Paul walked around from day to day with his chest up, chin up, looking straight forward and not concerned with people who talked about him, bad or good. He was beatiful and confident enough to sit alone at lunch but humble enough to let all of his admirers sit sit next him. Almost too confident. He let his looks warp his world to the point where he did not know the difference between him, and the center of the universe.
He was a couple years older than me but no more mature. I could see that when he picked up where I left of at phone tag. He called himself "the king." I'm not sure the word Queen was in his vocabulary.
I might as well fess up now, my taste in men is famously bad.
A Modern Gentleman:
He smiled and nodded after hearing my story...well, the big parts of it anyway, from beggining to end. It was New Years Eve and a time for making new friends, I suppose. After I drew my tales to aclose, I expected some of the usual reaction, you know, the immature questions regarding nudity, regarding my accent, regarding my wardrobe, and the awkward "did you use war paint ans spears?" question. But instead he leaned back and took a sip of his champagne and said. "Yeah, I know how it is. When I was in India......" And he matched my story, bit for bit, shocker for shocker and we compared scars. Afterwards, we became friends, as is to be expected of two like minds, and the reason he does not get a number like the rest is that he is, in my mind, an example, one of the reason I have not given up on young american male species entirely. His good looks never corrode his humility, and the looks of others do no deter him. He is a true humatinarian, and for these reasons he is such a good friend of mine. We will only ever be friends because, well, it is all to pretentious. Whoever he marries, I will be at his wedding and if I ever get married (god fucking forbid), would only be honored if he could be there too. He departs from the Midewest, he departs from the USA in the fall and he is one of the few who actually carried out his dreams, regardless of circumstances.
He is vocal, he is intellegent, he is handsome, worldly, well dressed and well spoken: he is a Young American Gentleman.
Andrew, if you ever read this, just know I mean every word.
Gentleman I
He was a brilliant young man; there was no confusion about that. One could merely sense a certain depth about him from the consistency of his eye-contact and his thoughtful conversational impromptu. But behind the atmosphere of intellect that seemed to surround him loomed a great unknown. He had a three dimensional presence, one that gave birth to many questions, yet only conceived answers. After my first encounter with him I left his side feeling an unshakable understanding that he was not common. I drew upon that conclusion quite instantaneously upon engaging in his conversation. However, his motives were intangible and it was difficult to distinguish between dry humor and spontaneity; he spoke with such calculative randomness. I believe he thought himself somehow enlightened and superior in intelligence though his pointed theories were well diluted with ambiguous words. Never once did I loose myself in following his strain of thought and never once did I feel he was advanced in any way beyond my comprehension; only enshrouded by an idiosyncratic freedom. Young James M. was a man of thought without boundaries and master of his own world: a world he was rarely obliged to depart from even to appease his public. There, he would be center of attention in the walls inside his head. Indeed he seemed eager to please no one but himself inevitably, in more ways than one: he spoke what he thought and was motivated by the idea of heightening his own status just to stare down at the faces of others. In his mannerisms however, he seemed quite subtle; this ego seemed not to be written on his face or spoke by his tongue: nothing about him was so direct. That is what set him apart; that and the fact that he was one hundred percent Italian and could no longer eat pizza. He was a living contradiction that could spout line after line of Shakespeare or Whitman, and that he, in his own words, described himself as a “recovering Catholic” despite of his family origins.
Gentleman II
He was grounded to some degree, while still possessing the freedom that comes along with youth. His presence exuded youth in appearance and culture though he somehow he seemed to live beyond his numeral age in years. Unlike his twin brother he did not harbor mystery of any sort, and while there was no doubt regarding his intelligence, he seemed to perform on an academic level. Young Lorenzo had a naïve charm, though I doubt naïve is the best word to describe his academic knowledge. To be a young M. was to be naïve to some degree… and to be young is to be naïve on more levels than one, but he had harnessed that naivety and he was in control, unlike some misguided young gentlemen of the Grosse Point area. No, he was quite calm in his life, and as far as I could tell, quite satisfied. He was not one to complain of trivial mishaps, and his youthful face was frequently graced with a pleasant grin unless he was imitating Dave Chappelle and claiming to be Rick James (bitch) and then smiles and laughter were abundant. In the few hours we made acquaintances he seemed to be more of a realist, unlike his brother James who was constantly basking in ideals such as his stab at the discovery of the potency of pornography. In this real world Lorenzo seemed content however, rarely seeking escape from his own reality by means of drugs or television, though he more often than not engaged in the latter. Sunday night Sopranos, boys, enjoy yourselves. And whether it be clicking on soundboards on the internet or speaking of an old professor of his, he seemed thoroughly entertained, and one could assume easily that he was not void in any need or desire. When served up contradictions he waived his opinions in order to escape argument though he never came off as unassertive. He got what he wanted out of life within his own understanding of things and did not trouble himself questioning controversial matters. He had no problem quoting Tony Soprano while admitting the television character was a bad man and not attempting to draw parallels or make explanations to justify his actions. His adaptive qualities let him enjoy simple pleasures of life without becoming too involved. Part of his charm was his calm, indeed between him and his wily twin he seemed to hold a voice of reason. He remained intelligent on conservative grounds and was not unwilling to learn, thus demonstrating fluidity in thought.
Gentleman III
“Pardon me but I got paper to chase.” He sat at the wheel of a red pickup truck contemplating, or rather, re-evaluating his pre-calculated plan. No, he was not malicious nor did he have any ill favored intentions. If he, his personality, and his actions could be defined by a shape it would, undoubtedly, be a blunt object. There was a raw sense in all he did, nothing was refined. No time was wasted in trying to word things eloquently and no thoughts were concealed in his head, they just had a way of running unchecked at they sprung from his brain and darted to his mouth where they catapulted out with no such thing as resistance. But what Hood lacked in tact he made up for, somehow, in charm though charming is not quite the adjective that best describes some of his spoken prose. Perhaps amusement would be a better word for the energy of his presence. He seemed easily amused in simple and intricate conversation as long as the topic did not wander too far into the jargon of academia. No, our young Curtis decided it not his to go to college. He found his calling in, well, self-employment so to speak. He had a dream and a rather simple one in fact. His eyes were set on a “certain place” in which, as rungs on the latter to getting to that “place” were many legal and illegal methods of approach. He took both: either/or pending the gage of profit.
Ahh yes, he was an entertaining specimen, to this day just the thought of him puts a crooked smile on my face. He struggles with life, as we all do, making plans he could not keep, falling in love only to get his heart broken by his call to make profit. This young gentleman loved money yet his love of the puritan work ethic somehow clashed with his materialistic obsession, therefore, he stepped onto the other side of the law, leaving behind any romantic affiliations, any feelings other than the love of money.
Nothing describes my taste in men better than the word poor. Hood fit the poor category very well, though his “thuggish” style was rare to my past collection of mens. Yet, I remember a point back in the spring & summer of 2004 when I was wildly infatuated with this specimen not even I could tell you why; perhaps it was his calm reactions and his mysterious unavailability. But I do remember that every time I saw his face it was like cool, cool water running down my back. I would play memories of my dates with him over in over like film that never stopped, although I knew how it would end, I couldn’t help but watch. In the spring, I worked through lifeguard training; it would be dishonest to say that my mind was ever really intent upon lifesaving procedures, rather contemplating whether or not Hood would call me like he said he would.
All summer this sort of game played out, his was deliciously unattainable and I was blinded by infatuation, and then he sort of faded out just as summer has a way of doing, not to be heard from until NEW YEARS 2005 at around 1:00am:
The ball had dropped an hour before and I was well on my way to obliteration and dialing under the influence when up came Hoods number on my screen, and out of sheer impulse, I pressed the green “send” key… and got his voicemail. I left a message that must have given away my state of mind, for minutes later he called back. I'm almost sure it is the best new years kiss I'm ever gonna have.
Gentleman IV
If there is a type of young man whose description cannot be harnessed into words Thomas R. would be that type. I cannot tell you how broad and open this young man seems at first, and yet, how he closes down so fast. There is nothing I can use to sum him up, for though the word “open” comes quite close, does not cover for the times he is reserved as a clam. I was absolutely wild about this young gentleman, to the point where food seemed a secondary necessity, and everything that was not his was an unimportant afterthought. He seemed spontaneous and impulsive, which I believe he is, undoubtedly, almost to the point of naivety is up for anything, anytime such a spontaneous spirit, I hardly believe he considers half the proposals he creates. It seemed at times that he felt the need to constantly entertain, never sat back and let things go. He claimed he never cared about what people thought but I feel that he cared far more than he let show…just not for me.
Aye, there's the rub.
So I let him go, because I'm not a stalker and it took what seemed like ages for him to become a secondary, and now, an afterthought. I have never been in love, and maybe I never will be. But if love is any stronger than how I felt about Thomas..it might kill me, because the feeling nust be so VERY intense. As for now….I am not sad, I don’t regret anything…when everything is lonely I can be my own best friend. What’s so easy in the evening, by the morning’s such a drag.
Gentleman V
He thought he could sing like bob Marley. He thought he could play guitar like Bob Dylan. He thought sex on the first date was standard. He thought he was a Christian. He was a republican. One other thing regarding his personality is certain: he acted like a ten year old child when he was not humping your leg like a dog. There were some endearing qualities to him, undoubtedly; otherwise I would stand insulted to have ever encouraged his company. He had the naïve, unabashed charm that could put at least a small smile on the most severe faces…and when he spoke he spoke to everyone. He was an entertainer in many respects but unlike Mr. Thomas he was not putting on a show for other people, he was putting it on for himself.
Okay I’ll finish this later I’m getting tired, it can only go downhill from here. As you can tell they're geting more and more recent. What sat is that V stops at 2004...hehehe.
I wasn't kidding when I said famously bad.
THIS IS A RANT
I'm not gonna lie, I'm posting this so I can just rant about everything that is really annoying me right now. SO it's finals week, and I'm pretty stressed out because first and foremost, I'd like to get out the fact that I ABSOLUTELY HATE THE MIDWEST and I feel like I'm in some kind of gray prison where people are either apathetic or just clueless to what is going on. I feel like a little wildflower in a bowl of bread dough....I will never fit in here. THEREFORE I feel even more pressure to get good grades so I can get OUT. With that in mind, I will continue:
I feel that here in the midwest (or maybe it's just Oakland University) people around my age especially, are not driven, they sort of loiter around like zombies and hardly question their surroundings, the past, the present, politics, religion....accepting what is given to them so they can get drunk of the weekends and engage in activies that just make me feel like my brain is dripping out of my ears when I join them. Too many girls I know are so obsessed with chasing boys and basing their self-values on whether or not guys think they're hot and forget how to think critically, forget why they're in college in the first place, forget that it is a privilage to even BE in college so they do just enough to get by.
I'm not even going into politics. It makes me sick to see what's happening in our country right now. The flag should be hanging upsidedown, it's ridiculous.
Religion? WELL I used to be a christian until I realized that they are mostly hypocrites who say on thing and do the opposite. Jesus said to turn the other cheek yet I have yet to see peace in the most conservative christian nations of the world. They have a pope who was once a nazi. And all this greed, this capitalism: christianty, people, is rather a socialistic religion....and the shit that's done in the name of the bible. I cringe at the thought of what is done in the name of christiany and so I can no longer say I am a christian,"hell"....I do NOT BELIEVE IN HEAVEN OR HELL. I am a good person, and do good on my own accord, not to earn myself a ticket to heaven. Additionally, how can people say they follow the bible and then go fuck someone they hardly know, or go steal from someone or cheat on a test? When I die, whether or not there is a god, whether there is a heaven or a hell, I will know I did as I felt was right, in my study of variuos religion I have found common themes: do good to yourself and others, don't kill, steal, etc...and so I find that is fine to live by. I refuse to aspire to what this society frames is "happiness" or "good":the suburbs, marriage, kids......church. I see beyond that, I think, and I find that my critical thought makes me a threat to the status quo....so I feel left out sometimes...well this is one time it feels great to be left out. I will probably never get married, I will never have children, but I will do what I can for my country and the world. See, many people today are confusing patriotism with nationalism, with christianity: I AM A PATRIOT, I LOVE the USA, I love it so much that I dont like to see what's happening to it right now, how foreign countires look at us because we have a dishrag for a president.
ANYWAY, this sums up how I feel:
Something in the way of things, Something that will quit and won't start
Something you know but can't standCan't know get along with
Like deathRiding on top of the car peering through the windshield for his cue
Something entirely fictitious and trueThat creeps across your path hallowing your evil ways
Like they were yourself passing yourself not smiling
The dead guy you saw me talking to is your boss
I tried to put a spell on him but his spirit is illiterate
I know things you know and nothing you don't know
'cept I saw something in the way of things
Something grinning at me and I wanted to know, was it funny?
Was it so funny it followed me down the street
Greeting everybody like the good humor man
But an they got the taste of good humor but no ice cream
It was like dat
Me talking across people into the houses
And not seeing the beings crowding around me with ice picks
You could see them
But they looked like important Negroes on the way to your funeral
Looked like important jiggaboos on the way to your auction
And let them chant the number and use an ivory pointer to count your teeth
Remember Steppen FetchitRemember Steppen Fetchit how we laughed
An all your Sunday school images giving flesh and giggling
With the ice pick high off his headMade ya laugh anywayI can see something in the way of our selvesI can see something in the way of our selves
That's why I say the things I do, you know it
But its something else to you
Like that jobThis morning when you got there and it was quiet
And the machines were yearning soft behind you
Yearning for that nigga to come and give up his life
Standin' there bein' dissed and broke and troubled
My mistake is I kept sayin' "that was proof that God didn't exist"
And you told me, "nah, it was proof that the devil do"
But still, its like I see something I hear things
I saw words in the white boy's lying rag said he was gonna die poor and frustrated
That them dreams walk which you 'cross town
S'gonna die from over work
There's garbage on the street that's tellin' you you ain't shit"
And you almost believe it
Broke and mistaken all the time
You know some of the words but they ain't the right ones
Your cable back on but ain't nothin' you can see
But I see something in the way of things
Something to make us stumble
Something get us drunk from noise and addicted to sadness
I see something and feel something stalking us
Like and ugly thing floating at our back calling us names
You see it and hear it too
But you say it got a right to exist just like you and if God made it
But then we got to argue
And the light gon' come down around us Even though we remember where the bank is
Remember the Negro squinting at us through the cageYou seen what I see too?
The smile that ain't a smile but teeth flying against our necks
You see something too but can't call its name
Ain't it too bad y'all said
Ain't it too bad, such a nice boy always kind to his motha
Always say good morning to everybody on his way to work
But that last time before he got locked up and hurt,
real badI seen him walkin' toward his house and he wasn't smiling
And he didn't even say hello
But I knew he'd seen somethingSomething in the way of things
that it worked on him like it do in will
And he kept marching faster and faster away from us
And never even muttered a word
Then the next day he was gone
You wanna know what
You wanna know what I'm talkin' aboutSayin' "I seen something in the way of things"
And how the boys face looked that day just before they took him away
The is? in that face and remember now,
remember all them other faces
And all the many places you've seen him or the sister with his childWandering up the streetRemember what you seen in your own mirror and didn't for a second recognizeThe face, your own face
Straining to get out from behind the glass
Open your mouth like you was gon' say somethin'
Close your eyes and remember what you saw and what it made you feel likeNow,
don't you see something else
Something cold and ugly
Not invisible but blended with the shadow criss-crossing the old man
Squatting by the drug store at the cornerWith is head resting uneasily on his folded arms
And the boy that smiled and the girl he went withAnd in my eyes too
A waving craziness splitting them into the jet stream of a black birdWit his ass on fire
Or the solomNOTness of where we go to know we gonna be happyI seen something
I've SEEN something
And you've seen it too
You've seen it too,
You just can't call it's name name
name
name
name
name
name
I feel that here in the midwest (or maybe it's just Oakland University) people around my age especially, are not driven, they sort of loiter around like zombies and hardly question their surroundings, the past, the present, politics, religion....accepting what is given to them so they can get drunk of the weekends and engage in activies that just make me feel like my brain is dripping out of my ears when I join them. Too many girls I know are so obsessed with chasing boys and basing their self-values on whether or not guys think they're hot and forget how to think critically, forget why they're in college in the first place, forget that it is a privilage to even BE in college so they do just enough to get by.
I'm not even going into politics. It makes me sick to see what's happening in our country right now. The flag should be hanging upsidedown, it's ridiculous.
Religion? WELL I used to be a christian until I realized that they are mostly hypocrites who say on thing and do the opposite. Jesus said to turn the other cheek yet I have yet to see peace in the most conservative christian nations of the world. They have a pope who was once a nazi. And all this greed, this capitalism: christianty, people, is rather a socialistic religion....and the shit that's done in the name of the bible. I cringe at the thought of what is done in the name of christiany and so I can no longer say I am a christian,"hell"....I do NOT BELIEVE IN HEAVEN OR HELL. I am a good person, and do good on my own accord, not to earn myself a ticket to heaven. Additionally, how can people say they follow the bible and then go fuck someone they hardly know, or go steal from someone or cheat on a test? When I die, whether or not there is a god, whether there is a heaven or a hell, I will know I did as I felt was right, in my study of variuos religion I have found common themes: do good to yourself and others, don't kill, steal, etc...and so I find that is fine to live by. I refuse to aspire to what this society frames is "happiness" or "good":the suburbs, marriage, kids......church. I see beyond that, I think, and I find that my critical thought makes me a threat to the status quo....so I feel left out sometimes...well this is one time it feels great to be left out. I will probably never get married, I will never have children, but I will do what I can for my country and the world. See, many people today are confusing patriotism with nationalism, with christianity: I AM A PATRIOT, I LOVE the USA, I love it so much that I dont like to see what's happening to it right now, how foreign countires look at us because we have a dishrag for a president.
ANYWAY, this sums up how I feel:
Something in the way of things, Something that will quit and won't start
Something you know but can't standCan't know get along with
Like deathRiding on top of the car peering through the windshield for his cue
Something entirely fictitious and trueThat creeps across your path hallowing your evil ways
Like they were yourself passing yourself not smiling
The dead guy you saw me talking to is your boss
I tried to put a spell on him but his spirit is illiterate
I know things you know and nothing you don't know
'cept I saw something in the way of things
Something grinning at me and I wanted to know, was it funny?
Was it so funny it followed me down the street
Greeting everybody like the good humor man
But an they got the taste of good humor but no ice cream
It was like dat
Me talking across people into the houses
And not seeing the beings crowding around me with ice picks
You could see them
But they looked like important Negroes on the way to your funeral
Looked like important jiggaboos on the way to your auction
And let them chant the number and use an ivory pointer to count your teeth
Remember Steppen FetchitRemember Steppen Fetchit how we laughed
An all your Sunday school images giving flesh and giggling
With the ice pick high off his headMade ya laugh anywayI can see something in the way of our selvesI can see something in the way of our selves
That's why I say the things I do, you know it
But its something else to you
Like that jobThis morning when you got there and it was quiet
And the machines were yearning soft behind you
Yearning for that nigga to come and give up his life
Standin' there bein' dissed and broke and troubled
My mistake is I kept sayin' "that was proof that God didn't exist"
And you told me, "nah, it was proof that the devil do"
But still, its like I see something I hear things
I saw words in the white boy's lying rag said he was gonna die poor and frustrated
That them dreams walk which you 'cross town
S'gonna die from over work
There's garbage on the street that's tellin' you you ain't shit"
And you almost believe it
Broke and mistaken all the time
You know some of the words but they ain't the right ones
Your cable back on but ain't nothin' you can see
But I see something in the way of things
Something to make us stumble
Something get us drunk from noise and addicted to sadness
I see something and feel something stalking us
Like and ugly thing floating at our back calling us names
You see it and hear it too
But you say it got a right to exist just like you and if God made it
But then we got to argue
And the light gon' come down around us Even though we remember where the bank is
Remember the Negro squinting at us through the cageYou seen what I see too?
The smile that ain't a smile but teeth flying against our necks
You see something too but can't call its name
Ain't it too bad y'all said
Ain't it too bad, such a nice boy always kind to his motha
Always say good morning to everybody on his way to work
But that last time before he got locked up and hurt,
real badI seen him walkin' toward his house and he wasn't smiling
And he didn't even say hello
But I knew he'd seen somethingSomething in the way of things
that it worked on him like it do in will
And he kept marching faster and faster away from us
And never even muttered a word
Then the next day he was gone
You wanna know what
You wanna know what I'm talkin' aboutSayin' "I seen something in the way of things"
And how the boys face looked that day just before they took him away
The is? in that face and remember now,
remember all them other faces
And all the many places you've seen him or the sister with his childWandering up the streetRemember what you seen in your own mirror and didn't for a second recognizeThe face, your own face
Straining to get out from behind the glass
Open your mouth like you was gon' say somethin'
Close your eyes and remember what you saw and what it made you feel likeNow,
don't you see something else
Something cold and ugly
Not invisible but blended with the shadow criss-crossing the old man
Squatting by the drug store at the cornerWith is head resting uneasily on his folded arms
And the boy that smiled and the girl he went withAnd in my eyes too
A waving craziness splitting them into the jet stream of a black birdWit his ass on fire
Or the solomNOTness of where we go to know we gonna be happyI seen something
I've SEEN something
And you've seen it too
You've seen it too,
You just can't call it's name name
name
name
name
name
name
SHORT WAVE
The year, 1996. The time, universal.
Somewhere, far back-a-bush, “Mmm Bopp” squeaked out of an old short wave radio into the humid night. The radio sat in one corner of a thatch hut, on a knock-an’-stan’-up table, its antenna broken crudely and splinted back together with a thick coating of flimsy scotch tape and an emery board. In the other corner a small pile of coal smoldered, billowing thick white whips of pungent smoke. The coals consisted of bits of coconut husks mixed with chunks of white oleander bark, creating a lightly poisonous smoke that drove off the mosquitoes.
“It is now 24 hours universal time and you are listening to the billboard top-forty on The Voice of America. Coming up, ‘The World Hour’."
Using the tuning knob, he scanned the airways very intently….there must be something on the short wave worth listening to at 24 hours universal time.
“Next on BBC radio news: will Butros Butros Ghali serve a second term?”
“Will Botros Butros Gahli get a second name?” Jan grumbled at the radio as he got up to re-light his pipe in the coals. “Butros Butros Butros—.”
The short wave was an auditory window to the world he had escaped from years ago.
Jan thought his childhood had been confusing…until he grew up and got a look at the world. The summer he turned eighteen he spent most of his time in his friend Peter’s flat watching him build funky sculptures out of wax and barbed wire as they both split a joint. Then his parents threatened to take away his allowance so he applied to college. After college they threatened to take away his allowance…so he cut his hair...which was, in his own words, “the straw that broke the camels back.”
So he packed a bag full of necessities (those which he thought were necessities at the time) and backpacked through Central America…
Days got warmer, his hair got longer…his allowance got shorter, until one day, he found himself in a Guatemalan Prison, and it no longer came at all. Peter was the one who bailed him out.
“You've got to snap out of this you bloody wanker.” Peter scolded jokingly over the phone to a newly released Jan. “I did.” He did, all right. The words, “aspiring artist” might substitute his name in a local newspaper. What was more, Peter still got an allowance.
Years had passed since his traveling days. Now Jan spoke to his short wave on the quiet nights before the rains when frogs went silent, and sometimes it sang him songs. His favorite was BBC, it gave his the most entertainment, and his second favorite was CBC. The VOA seemed to sound a lot like the V.O. the Hanson brothers, and if nothing else, made him smile.
It got fuzzy sometimes when the splinted antenna got temperamental. Jan ignored the static. It seemed that every evening on Radio Sweden, reports of groundbreaking studies linked something new to cancer. Last evening it had been fluoride; tonight it was cell phones. He ignored those too. Funny, he thought, how he had spent half his life away from all of these cancerous things yet still managed to developed skin cancer. I guess wherever you go in the world you can’t escape the sun. Not that it was the sun that Jan had been running from.
When I first met Jan I was working at a corner store on the outskirts of St. Ann’s Bay Jamaica. Once a month he came into town, making a spectacle of himself: a forty year old white man in a bright red Hawaiian shirt and tight flared jeans from the seventies. Jan never hesitated to shake a hand or crack joke. Everyone knew him; no one disliked him.
He came into my store one day looking to buy some tape and two emery boards. I asked him why, so he told me. I suggested a long piece of wire, explaining how it might help. The next time he came into my corner store he wasn’t looking to buy anything.
Years later, Peter and I sat at Jan's bedside in the Hospital listening to Radio Sweden: “a new study linked radio waves to breast cause cancer.” He smiled and weakly turned the little knob all the way to the left: CLICK.
The radio shut off, and minutes later, so did he.
Peter’s cell phone rang as the sun shone through the window, and radio waves danced all around us.
The year, 2004. The time, universal.
Somewhere, far back-a-bush, “Mmm Bopp” squeaked out of an old short wave radio into the humid night. The radio sat in one corner of a thatch hut, on a knock-an’-stan’-up table, its antenna broken crudely and splinted back together with a thick coating of flimsy scotch tape and an emery board. In the other corner a small pile of coal smoldered, billowing thick white whips of pungent smoke. The coals consisted of bits of coconut husks mixed with chunks of white oleander bark, creating a lightly poisonous smoke that drove off the mosquitoes.
“It is now 24 hours universal time and you are listening to the billboard top-forty on The Voice of America. Coming up, ‘The World Hour’."
Using the tuning knob, he scanned the airways very intently….there must be something on the short wave worth listening to at 24 hours universal time.
“Next on BBC radio news: will Butros Butros Ghali serve a second term?”
“Will Botros Butros Gahli get a second name?” Jan grumbled at the radio as he got up to re-light his pipe in the coals. “Butros Butros Butros—.”
The short wave was an auditory window to the world he had escaped from years ago.
Jan thought his childhood had been confusing…until he grew up and got a look at the world. The summer he turned eighteen he spent most of his time in his friend Peter’s flat watching him build funky sculptures out of wax and barbed wire as they both split a joint. Then his parents threatened to take away his allowance so he applied to college. After college they threatened to take away his allowance…so he cut his hair...which was, in his own words, “the straw that broke the camels back.”
So he packed a bag full of necessities (those which he thought were necessities at the time) and backpacked through Central America…
Days got warmer, his hair got longer…his allowance got shorter, until one day, he found himself in a Guatemalan Prison, and it no longer came at all. Peter was the one who bailed him out.
“You've got to snap out of this you bloody wanker.” Peter scolded jokingly over the phone to a newly released Jan. “I did.” He did, all right. The words, “aspiring artist” might substitute his name in a local newspaper. What was more, Peter still got an allowance.
Years had passed since his traveling days. Now Jan spoke to his short wave on the quiet nights before the rains when frogs went silent, and sometimes it sang him songs. His favorite was BBC, it gave his the most entertainment, and his second favorite was CBC. The VOA seemed to sound a lot like the V.O. the Hanson brothers, and if nothing else, made him smile.
It got fuzzy sometimes when the splinted antenna got temperamental. Jan ignored the static. It seemed that every evening on Radio Sweden, reports of groundbreaking studies linked something new to cancer. Last evening it had been fluoride; tonight it was cell phones. He ignored those too. Funny, he thought, how he had spent half his life away from all of these cancerous things yet still managed to developed skin cancer. I guess wherever you go in the world you can’t escape the sun. Not that it was the sun that Jan had been running from.
When I first met Jan I was working at a corner store on the outskirts of St. Ann’s Bay Jamaica. Once a month he came into town, making a spectacle of himself: a forty year old white man in a bright red Hawaiian shirt and tight flared jeans from the seventies. Jan never hesitated to shake a hand or crack joke. Everyone knew him; no one disliked him.
He came into my store one day looking to buy some tape and two emery boards. I asked him why, so he told me. I suggested a long piece of wire, explaining how it might help. The next time he came into my corner store he wasn’t looking to buy anything.
Years later, Peter and I sat at Jan's bedside in the Hospital listening to Radio Sweden: “a new study linked radio waves to breast cause cancer.” He smiled and weakly turned the little knob all the way to the left: CLICK.
The radio shut off, and minutes later, so did he.
Peter’s cell phone rang as the sun shone through the window, and radio waves danced all around us.
The year, 2004. The time, universal.
11 is Company
The sun shone, bright and spring-like from it's apex in the sky. I walked under the blue dome that sealed the edges of the earth around me, whips of white ran across, some followed a course between the earth and the vibrant daystar, casting short lived shadows to the ground. The sound of melting snow dripping off the rooftops sent a rhythm to my ears. I saw icicles sparkle under the sun and slowly disappear...Sparkling droplets diving earthbound from the eves.
Across the sidewalk streams of melted snow made little waterways in the concrete, sliding under my shoes and splashing upon my ankles. Everything seemed to sparkle, and birds chirped, clear and musical, from high atop the nearby pines. I saw Beer Lake in the distance, getting larger as I moved closer to My dorm in Vandenberg. Sheets of translucent ice floated atop the water and the melted portions consisted of a murky brown.
I took the two flights of steps to my new dorm room on the south corner of East Vandenberg Hall. The door was open, and a cool wind blew from the balcony door. My roommate and her friend, upon seeing me they burst out laughing.
"So you recovered from last night?" T. Asked me with a smile.
"No....What?" I was confused. Was she there when I had entered high and drunk the night before? I could not remember, but I assumed she had been from the look on her face.
"Oh, yeah." I laughed. "That was pretty..... interesting."
"You was fucked up." T. Laughed, "You was sayin' you could move things with your thoughts an' some shit."
"Did I....?" I faintly remembered the feeling now, of having to touch them. "Well I guess I recovered. Now I have to get ready. I'm going to Canada."
"In the day?" T. asked. "You know no one be goin' up there for no day trip girl."
"No, it's for a friends birthday." I replied. "we're gonna prolly spend the night---"
"So you gonna get fucked up again?"
"No, I mean...maybe...I think..." I felt like an alchoholic. "I have to get ready."
I tore though my heaps of clothes, all clean, but wrinkled and knotted together. Nothing in my life would ever be straight, neat or organized. I had come to that conclusion some time before. Even my hair seemed to rebel against the idea of being tamed. I looked into the mirror and confirmed my obesity, my ugliness, my frizzy hair...and I reached for my cell phone to call my friend, C. to tell her I no longer felt like going.
The world only likes beautiful people, and I, at the moment was feeling far from accpetable for the public to view. But then I realized that laying in my dorm and feeling ugly was worse than sitting in public and being ugly. So I continued to dig to the center of my moutnain of cloths in an attempt to locate something that, once donned, would make me presentable.
Aftre some debate on whether or not to wear a skirt, I finall decided to throw on some old jeans a black sweater. I would change, I told myself, at the hotel. I never did.
Now I would like to pause for, I see, upon re-reading what I have just written, that I have been writing, for the most part, about myself. While I suppose one always has the most to say about oneself, those whose company I found myself in were quite an entertaining bunch. A company eleven, including a reverand, someone who will be refered to as The Big Tomato, a small canadian, Someone who actually had a date on valentines day, a chaperone who will be refered to as R. , A Grosse Pointer in denial, among a few others who I may or may not introduce later. All of the above mentioned were compacted into one small hotel room with plenty of alcohol..I think. I didn't start drinking until dinner, when I ordered my first legal drink.
But before dinner I found myself engaged in rather a conversation with The Big Tomato, who sat by the hotel window, leaned back in a chair, peering out from beneath his cowboy hat, beer in one hand, gesturing explainatively with the other amidst a conversation with the Reverand.
Aside from the chatter of people boucing off the walls, aside from the little blonde birthday girl, with green underpants over her jeans...(N. was quite a sight, adorable, hilarious...those words come to mind) music played from a small radio that that was perched upon the bed by the winodw.
But after some time, I slowly became aware of a song that played in the background:
"I don't want another pretty face,
I don't want just anyone to hold
I don't want our love to go to waste,
I want you and your beautifl soul."
The lyrics annoyed me, prtially because it was a love song ,and I have become to some dregree I believe, allergic to love songs, and partially because the person singing sounded like he/she was ten...give or take a year or two.
"I want you and your beautiful soul," I retpeated mostly to myself because I didn't think anyone was listiening. I warily eyed at the radio like it was a venemous creature.
"Am I to assume he wants an ugly chick?" The Big Tomato said sarcastically and I looked up, and indeed he was talking to me...or at least I though so, so I replied.
"Am I even to assume it's a boy?"
The Big Tomato chuckled, slightly amused. He lifted his hat about an inch so he could see me.
"Yes." Was his confident, almost serious reply.
"Well then are WE to assume that he has encountered numerous pretty faces and, now he has, quite literally, exausted his liking of a pretty face?" I was neither drunk nor high, but for some reason this mock analysis of a terrible song had me entirerly amused.
"Good question..." TBT rubbed his chin thoughtfully, or at least I imagined he did. The world may never know what exactly happned. I can only give you my count of events, right?
"It leads back to my original question: Is he equating a pretty faces with ugly souls?"
"And a waste of love?" I tacked onto his question.
The radio got fuzzy for a second and R. tuned into the last part of our conversation.
"What?" He said looking confused. "What's a waste of love?"
"That song." TBT nodded towards the radio and took a gulp of his beer. "We are obviously to assume he's wasted his share of (L) on pretty faces."
And at this point R. shrugged and reached for another beer.
At the same point I shurgged and looked out of the glass down to the street below. People scampered down the street, colorful lighted signed directed the bingeing turists to alcohol and if that was not enough, to MORE alcohol. Here was a town developed and upkept solely on the power of alcohol.
The streets seemed alive with people going to bars, and people trying to get you to go to bars...it seemed like it was about an equal amount. By the end of the night at had at least four tags on my wrist telling me to go to this bar, that bar or the other club...all in neon glow in the dark colors...
As we filed out of the hotel room, R. began grabbing our arms and writing on them: 415 Ramada.
"If we split up, and you get too drunk or lost, just show someone this on you wrist." He spoke loudly, to the whole group. "They'll know where it is." His hands shook as he wrote, not because he was nervous. He had always been that way, he said. And as soon as I was out of his direct sight, I licked my wrist and smudged off all markings of the pen feeling like I did some years before when my big sister put a tag on my wrist with my address on it and I tore it off behind her back. I knew exactly where I was and where needed to go back to. Nonetheless, I found R.'s genuine concern for the younger flock to be admirable, genuine.
Just down the street, one of the bar-pushers led us to a restaurant named, conveniently, The Big Tomato. A coincidence?...hmmmmm I'd say.
It is at this restaurant that I ordered my first legal drink in my 20 year old life.
The dinner was nothing special. C. and I shared some pasta, and I looked over to my right and saw the that The Big Tomato himself and his sidekick, who were sitting across from each other, both had ordered the same meal, the only difference was the choice in meat. Need I tell you who ordered fist? I looked down and saw that they were both wearig cowboy boots. Need I imply who got theirs first? hmmmmmm...I'd say.
So then we went to the Casino, Casino Winsor, the magnet for drunk people under 21...and, I suppose in R's case, for chaperones over 21. He took my coat upon entered the Casino, very politely. He reminded me of the big brother character in Hans Brinker who was decsribed by the author as gallant. I can think of no other word.
The sound of chips rattling, coins falling...a whole world came to life around me, tickling chatterish sounds scrabled about the place, under my shoes and between my fingers, and danced on my eardrums. Bets were placed, bets lost, few won. I ordered my second...maybe third... legal drink. At this point, I realized: I has spent $20 (Canadian) on alcohol and was not nearly drunk. I wondered, inwordly, how alcoholics could afford anythihng BUT liquor...things like...rent, clothes...hmmm. I didn't wonder for too long because a sickeningly cheesy cover band began to play. I felt like I was in a Ford commercial.
After the Casino, I was under the impression that we were to follow The Big Tomato to this club called Bentley's. So I just followed the Cowboy Hat. Like I said; I wasn't drunk...I don't think.
And the Bar-pushers slaped more neon paper bracelets on my wrists and some even tryied to drag me into various bars. I wanted to say, "this is a free country, I can go where I please...but I was not quite so sure....And for some reason everyone seemed to clear out of the way of the Big Tomato, perhaps it was because of his hat, his boots....his walk....or perhaps it had something to do with the trench-coated Reverand with staticky hair who lurked in his shadow.
I was speaking to TBT about some thing or the other when I notcied I was no longer being followed by the group of girls...or the chaperone.
"Where did they go?" I asked TBT.
"I dunno. But I'm going to Bently's." He never even slightly hesitated.
"Go find them." The Reverand waved his hand as if he was waving off a pestering fly.
"They went that way." He pointed a sharpened finger in the opposite direction that TBT was leading. "You don't wanna come with us. Go find them."
"But where?"
"I think they went into a club." The Reverand picked up his pace to rejoin his sidekick. "The reactor or soemthing."
"Okkkkk..."I turned to go, and walked towards the flashing yellow sign that read: REACTOR.
Inside, the smeel of spilled beer, mixed with various perfumes and colognes stabbed bluntly ay my nose. Loud music pounded painfully at my ears, sharp lights seared into my eyes. It reminded me of the clubs in Pontiac that I had attened religiously a year before. I was not nearly drunk enough. I stood next to where R. was sitting, engulfed in a pile of girls coats, calmly drinking a beer.
He reached out to take my coat like it was second naute, and after doing so he looked at me funny.
"Why dont you go dance?" he askedgesturing towards the filthy dance floor.
I looked and saw that all the other girls were.
"I don't feel like it." I said, taking a seat. Scareface was playing on a big sceen above the bar. I looked at that for a while. Lights flashed music played, and I drifted off into a daydream.
I imagined that ..........
Across the sidewalk streams of melted snow made little waterways in the concrete, sliding under my shoes and splashing upon my ankles. Everything seemed to sparkle, and birds chirped, clear and musical, from high atop the nearby pines. I saw Beer Lake in the distance, getting larger as I moved closer to My dorm in Vandenberg. Sheets of translucent ice floated atop the water and the melted portions consisted of a murky brown.
I took the two flights of steps to my new dorm room on the south corner of East Vandenberg Hall. The door was open, and a cool wind blew from the balcony door. My roommate and her friend, upon seeing me they burst out laughing.
"So you recovered from last night?" T. Asked me with a smile.
"No....What?" I was confused. Was she there when I had entered high and drunk the night before? I could not remember, but I assumed she had been from the look on her face.
"Oh, yeah." I laughed. "That was pretty..... interesting."
"You was fucked up." T. Laughed, "You was sayin' you could move things with your thoughts an' some shit."
"Did I....?" I faintly remembered the feeling now, of having to touch them. "Well I guess I recovered. Now I have to get ready. I'm going to Canada."
"In the day?" T. asked. "You know no one be goin' up there for no day trip girl."
"No, it's for a friends birthday." I replied. "we're gonna prolly spend the night---"
"So you gonna get fucked up again?"
"No, I mean...maybe...I think..." I felt like an alchoholic. "I have to get ready."
I tore though my heaps of clothes, all clean, but wrinkled and knotted together. Nothing in my life would ever be straight, neat or organized. I had come to that conclusion some time before. Even my hair seemed to rebel against the idea of being tamed. I looked into the mirror and confirmed my obesity, my ugliness, my frizzy hair...and I reached for my cell phone to call my friend, C. to tell her I no longer felt like going.
The world only likes beautiful people, and I, at the moment was feeling far from accpetable for the public to view. But then I realized that laying in my dorm and feeling ugly was worse than sitting in public and being ugly. So I continued to dig to the center of my moutnain of cloths in an attempt to locate something that, once donned, would make me presentable.
Aftre some debate on whether or not to wear a skirt, I finall decided to throw on some old jeans a black sweater. I would change, I told myself, at the hotel. I never did.
Now I would like to pause for, I see, upon re-reading what I have just written, that I have been writing, for the most part, about myself. While I suppose one always has the most to say about oneself, those whose company I found myself in were quite an entertaining bunch. A company eleven, including a reverand, someone who will be refered to as The Big Tomato, a small canadian, Someone who actually had a date on valentines day, a chaperone who will be refered to as R. , A Grosse Pointer in denial, among a few others who I may or may not introduce later. All of the above mentioned were compacted into one small hotel room with plenty of alcohol..I think. I didn't start drinking until dinner, when I ordered my first legal drink.
But before dinner I found myself engaged in rather a conversation with The Big Tomato, who sat by the hotel window, leaned back in a chair, peering out from beneath his cowboy hat, beer in one hand, gesturing explainatively with the other amidst a conversation with the Reverand.
Aside from the chatter of people boucing off the walls, aside from the little blonde birthday girl, with green underpants over her jeans...(N. was quite a sight, adorable, hilarious...those words come to mind) music played from a small radio that that was perched upon the bed by the winodw.
But after some time, I slowly became aware of a song that played in the background:
"I don't want another pretty face,
I don't want just anyone to hold
I don't want our love to go to waste,
I want you and your beautifl soul."
The lyrics annoyed me, prtially because it was a love song ,and I have become to some dregree I believe, allergic to love songs, and partially because the person singing sounded like he/she was ten...give or take a year or two.
"I want you and your beautiful soul," I retpeated mostly to myself because I didn't think anyone was listiening. I warily eyed at the radio like it was a venemous creature.
"Am I to assume he wants an ugly chick?" The Big Tomato said sarcastically and I looked up, and indeed he was talking to me...or at least I though so, so I replied.
"Am I even to assume it's a boy?"
The Big Tomato chuckled, slightly amused. He lifted his hat about an inch so he could see me.
"Yes." Was his confident, almost serious reply.
"Well then are WE to assume that he has encountered numerous pretty faces and, now he has, quite literally, exausted his liking of a pretty face?" I was neither drunk nor high, but for some reason this mock analysis of a terrible song had me entirerly amused.
"Good question..." TBT rubbed his chin thoughtfully, or at least I imagined he did. The world may never know what exactly happned. I can only give you my count of events, right?
"It leads back to my original question: Is he equating a pretty faces with ugly souls?"
"And a waste of love?" I tacked onto his question.
The radio got fuzzy for a second and R. tuned into the last part of our conversation.
"What?" He said looking confused. "What's a waste of love?"
"That song." TBT nodded towards the radio and took a gulp of his beer. "We are obviously to assume he's wasted his share of (L) on pretty faces."
And at this point R. shrugged and reached for another beer.
At the same point I shurgged and looked out of the glass down to the street below. People scampered down the street, colorful lighted signed directed the bingeing turists to alcohol and if that was not enough, to MORE alcohol. Here was a town developed and upkept solely on the power of alcohol.
The streets seemed alive with people going to bars, and people trying to get you to go to bars...it seemed like it was about an equal amount. By the end of the night at had at least four tags on my wrist telling me to go to this bar, that bar or the other club...all in neon glow in the dark colors...
As we filed out of the hotel room, R. began grabbing our arms and writing on them: 415 Ramada.
"If we split up, and you get too drunk or lost, just show someone this on you wrist." He spoke loudly, to the whole group. "They'll know where it is." His hands shook as he wrote, not because he was nervous. He had always been that way, he said. And as soon as I was out of his direct sight, I licked my wrist and smudged off all markings of the pen feeling like I did some years before when my big sister put a tag on my wrist with my address on it and I tore it off behind her back. I knew exactly where I was and where needed to go back to. Nonetheless, I found R.'s genuine concern for the younger flock to be admirable, genuine.
Just down the street, one of the bar-pushers led us to a restaurant named, conveniently, The Big Tomato. A coincidence?...hmmmmm I'd say.
It is at this restaurant that I ordered my first legal drink in my 20 year old life.
The dinner was nothing special. C. and I shared some pasta, and I looked over to my right and saw the that The Big Tomato himself and his sidekick, who were sitting across from each other, both had ordered the same meal, the only difference was the choice in meat. Need I tell you who ordered fist? I looked down and saw that they were both wearig cowboy boots. Need I imply who got theirs first? hmmmmmm...I'd say.
So then we went to the Casino, Casino Winsor, the magnet for drunk people under 21...and, I suppose in R's case, for chaperones over 21. He took my coat upon entered the Casino, very politely. He reminded me of the big brother character in Hans Brinker who was decsribed by the author as gallant. I can think of no other word.
The sound of chips rattling, coins falling...a whole world came to life around me, tickling chatterish sounds scrabled about the place, under my shoes and between my fingers, and danced on my eardrums. Bets were placed, bets lost, few won. I ordered my second...maybe third... legal drink. At this point, I realized: I has spent $20 (Canadian) on alcohol and was not nearly drunk. I wondered, inwordly, how alcoholics could afford anythihng BUT liquor...things like...rent, clothes...hmmm. I didn't wonder for too long because a sickeningly cheesy cover band began to play. I felt like I was in a Ford commercial.
After the Casino, I was under the impression that we were to follow The Big Tomato to this club called Bentley's. So I just followed the Cowboy Hat. Like I said; I wasn't drunk...I don't think.
And the Bar-pushers slaped more neon paper bracelets on my wrists and some even tryied to drag me into various bars. I wanted to say, "this is a free country, I can go where I please...but I was not quite so sure....And for some reason everyone seemed to clear out of the way of the Big Tomato, perhaps it was because of his hat, his boots....his walk....or perhaps it had something to do with the trench-coated Reverand with staticky hair who lurked in his shadow.
I was speaking to TBT about some thing or the other when I notcied I was no longer being followed by the group of girls...or the chaperone.
"Where did they go?" I asked TBT.
"I dunno. But I'm going to Bently's." He never even slightly hesitated.
"Go find them." The Reverand waved his hand as if he was waving off a pestering fly.
"They went that way." He pointed a sharpened finger in the opposite direction that TBT was leading. "You don't wanna come with us. Go find them."
"But where?"
"I think they went into a club." The Reverand picked up his pace to rejoin his sidekick. "The reactor or soemthing."
"Okkkkk..."I turned to go, and walked towards the flashing yellow sign that read: REACTOR.
Inside, the smeel of spilled beer, mixed with various perfumes and colognes stabbed bluntly ay my nose. Loud music pounded painfully at my ears, sharp lights seared into my eyes. It reminded me of the clubs in Pontiac that I had attened religiously a year before. I was not nearly drunk enough. I stood next to where R. was sitting, engulfed in a pile of girls coats, calmly drinking a beer.
He reached out to take my coat like it was second naute, and after doing so he looked at me funny.
"Why dont you go dance?" he askedgesturing towards the filthy dance floor.
I looked and saw that all the other girls were.
"I don't feel like it." I said, taking a seat. Scareface was playing on a big sceen above the bar. I looked at that for a while. Lights flashed music played, and I drifted off into a daydream.
I imagined that ..........
BAMBI and NATURAL SELECTION
Now showing: BAMBI and NATURAL SELECTION
Starring:
JUDE NIXON
as
the voice of BAMBI
JUDE NIXON
as
the voice of THE LION
(all other voices also played by the multi-talented JUDE NIXON)
Director: Jude Nixon
Producer: Jude Nixon
Screenplay inspired by an impromptu performance by:
Jude Nixon
ACT I
Scene I: Daytime. Long shot of sunny green meadow. Grass waving peacefully in wind. Sound of the trickle of a stream nearby. From the edge of a thick green forest, a group of Deers stroll across the meadow: a doe, a buck and one fawn. Zoom to close shot of fawn, BAMBI (aka JUDE NIXON). Bambi has large eyes and eyelashes, alert little ears (awww isn't JUDE cute?).
CUT to THE LION a.k.a. JUDE NIXON (budgeting issues prevented us from using real animals, JUDE did a better job anyway), crouched on his hands and knees in the shady edge of the forest by the stream. His teeth are bared. He is eyeing BAMBI because he knows it is the weakest. Close shot of JUDE, looking ravenous.
CUT to the Fawn, innocently wandering a little too far from her group, smells a flower or something pretty.
FLASH a screen of LION (Mean Jude). Flash Screen of BAMBI (cute Jude). LONG SHOT of the meadow seems peaceful at first. Then LION leaps out of hiding and launches himself towards BAMBI. FOCUS on LION in blurred moving frame. CUT to BAMBI: the Fawn Panics, sprinting for its parents, not fast enough. LION snaps it's neck. The strong adults retreat unharmed. Natural selection plays out once again.
############################################################
"So you see." Jude composed himself in front of the class after a fevered performance of Hunter and Hunted. He straightened his tie and smoothed out the legs of his pants ever-so elegantly. Nothing about Jude was abrupt, accepted for when he channeled LIONS. "Darwin said, 'if there is this higher being, then why so much suffering? Don't you see?" He laughs as he gestured with his hands, "It is natural selection. Randomness, you undastand?"
A student, we'll call him JESUS FREAK spoke up. "There is no proof of Evolution." He said. "But Creation is real. It's in the bible."
"But you first have to undastand the dynamics of science. You cannot go about that in manner with scientific studies. " He paused. "Anyone want to comment?"
The class erupted in a chatter of debates/arguments.
"This is what I like to see." Jude smiled leaning back in his chair. "This is a topic that we cannot overlook if we read book like Vestiges. Now, imagine publishing this book..."
Jude was interrupted by Jesus Freak#2. "But If the lion ate BAMBI than that LION was the DEVIL. God uses his power and so does the devil. Darwin was like the Devil because...."
"Let me explain this better. Perhaps the first example was not the best." Jude leaned forward in his chair. The class feel silent. Time for anther thrilling performance. Jude always kept the class at the edge of their seats...Literally. "I want you on the edge of your seats." He said with an amused JUDE laugh.
"Now imagine what would happen if the LION didn't kill BAMBI. Let us say...Let us say he got a cellular phone call, you know?" Jude raised his hand to his mouth hesitantly as if waiting for a reaction, then broke out into laughter, the class, less amused, chuckled. JUDE crouched back up into the position of the LION.
ACT II
Scene I:
LION: My my. That deer looks good. And I am hungry. I think it will be easiest to get the little one, so...Here goes...
CELL PHONE RINGS
LION: SHIT! I've got to get that. It is God.
LION: Hello?
God: Do not eat that deer. It is little. What are you thinking? Are not allowed to eat the little deer.
LION: Oh, dammit. All right then.
BAMBI: (Jude does high pitched voice) Thank you, God for saving me."
############################################################
Jude composed himself elegantly as the director of an HONORS COLLEGE might, after pretending to be both God, A LION, and BAMBI. "So now the Lion has to go Hungry possibly."
The class arouse back to it's former perturbed point.
"Let us get some order in here first. Chambers loved order." Jude smiled, maybe even smirked. "Now we can see that natural selection has a purpose. It is not evil, it is just nature. It is "Red in tooth and Claw" you know? We all have this maternal view of "mother nature" when really she is a beast. Some of the most beautiful things in----."
"But RAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA
ARRRRRRRRRRRRRRRFAAAAAGGRRREE" The Jesus Freaks spoke, the evolutionists spoke. The class was getting hot, as the sun glared though the glass walls of the Honors College and cooked the already perturbed students alive...Metaphorically.
"Chambers loved metaphors." Jude Says once he had gotten the class back. "So let me give you one more. The class was, once again on the edge of their seats.
INTERMISSION
PREVIEW: In the next ACT, an ELK, who happenes to be handicapped is introduced...and so are Handicapp laws. Jude Nixon is great, if you're not in the honors college @ OU, google him ot stop by his office and experience the greatness of Jude. :)
Starring:
JUDE NIXON
as
the voice of BAMBI
JUDE NIXON
as
the voice of THE LION
(all other voices also played by the multi-talented JUDE NIXON)
Director: Jude Nixon
Producer: Jude Nixon
Screenplay inspired by an impromptu performance by:
Jude Nixon
ACT I
Scene I: Daytime. Long shot of sunny green meadow. Grass waving peacefully in wind. Sound of the trickle of a stream nearby. From the edge of a thick green forest, a group of Deers stroll across the meadow: a doe, a buck and one fawn. Zoom to close shot of fawn, BAMBI (aka JUDE NIXON). Bambi has large eyes and eyelashes, alert little ears (awww isn't JUDE cute?).
CUT to THE LION a.k.a. JUDE NIXON (budgeting issues prevented us from using real animals, JUDE did a better job anyway), crouched on his hands and knees in the shady edge of the forest by the stream. His teeth are bared. He is eyeing BAMBI because he knows it is the weakest. Close shot of JUDE, looking ravenous.
CUT to the Fawn, innocently wandering a little too far from her group, smells a flower or something pretty.
FLASH a screen of LION (Mean Jude). Flash Screen of BAMBI (cute Jude). LONG SHOT of the meadow seems peaceful at first. Then LION leaps out of hiding and launches himself towards BAMBI. FOCUS on LION in blurred moving frame. CUT to BAMBI: the Fawn Panics, sprinting for its parents, not fast enough. LION snaps it's neck. The strong adults retreat unharmed. Natural selection plays out once again.
############################################################
"So you see." Jude composed himself in front of the class after a fevered performance of Hunter and Hunted. He straightened his tie and smoothed out the legs of his pants ever-so elegantly. Nothing about Jude was abrupt, accepted for when he channeled LIONS. "Darwin said, 'if there is this higher being, then why so much suffering? Don't you see?" He laughs as he gestured with his hands, "It is natural selection. Randomness, you undastand?"
A student, we'll call him JESUS FREAK spoke up. "There is no proof of Evolution." He said. "But Creation is real. It's in the bible."
"But you first have to undastand the dynamics of science. You cannot go about that in manner with scientific studies. " He paused. "Anyone want to comment?"
The class erupted in a chatter of debates/arguments.
"This is what I like to see." Jude smiled leaning back in his chair. "This is a topic that we cannot overlook if we read book like Vestiges. Now, imagine publishing this book..."
Jude was interrupted by Jesus Freak#2. "But If the lion ate BAMBI than that LION was the DEVIL. God uses his power and so does the devil. Darwin was like the Devil because...."
"Let me explain this better. Perhaps the first example was not the best." Jude leaned forward in his chair. The class feel silent. Time for anther thrilling performance. Jude always kept the class at the edge of their seats...Literally. "I want you on the edge of your seats." He said with an amused JUDE laugh.
"Now imagine what would happen if the LION didn't kill BAMBI. Let us say...Let us say he got a cellular phone call, you know?" Jude raised his hand to his mouth hesitantly as if waiting for a reaction, then broke out into laughter, the class, less amused, chuckled. JUDE crouched back up into the position of the LION.
ACT II
Scene I:
LION: My my. That deer looks good. And I am hungry. I think it will be easiest to get the little one, so...Here goes...
CELL PHONE RINGS
LION: SHIT! I've got to get that. It is God.
LION: Hello?
God: Do not eat that deer. It is little. What are you thinking? Are not allowed to eat the little deer.
LION: Oh, dammit. All right then.
BAMBI: (Jude does high pitched voice) Thank you, God for saving me."
############################################################
Jude composed himself elegantly as the director of an HONORS COLLEGE might, after pretending to be both God, A LION, and BAMBI. "So now the Lion has to go Hungry possibly."
The class arouse back to it's former perturbed point.
"Let us get some order in here first. Chambers loved order." Jude smiled, maybe even smirked. "Now we can see that natural selection has a purpose. It is not evil, it is just nature. It is "Red in tooth and Claw" you know? We all have this maternal view of "mother nature" when really she is a beast. Some of the most beautiful things in----."
"But RAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA
ARRRRRRRRRRRRRRRFAAAAAGGRRREE" The Jesus Freaks spoke, the evolutionists spoke. The class was getting hot, as the sun glared though the glass walls of the Honors College and cooked the already perturbed students alive...Metaphorically.
"Chambers loved metaphors." Jude Says once he had gotten the class back. "So let me give you one more. The class was, once again on the edge of their seats.
INTERMISSION
PREVIEW: In the next ACT, an ELK, who happenes to be handicapped is introduced...and so are Handicapp laws. Jude Nixon is great, if you're not in the honors college @ OU, google him ot stop by his office and experience the greatness of Jude. :)
It's 4 U, Beave
So, I write these elaborate posts that kinda don't make sense. Today I have no creative energy. I feel like a sponge that's been dipped in dirty dishwater and then wrung out...or something to that effect, I would imagine.
Anyway, as all of you know ( I HOPE, or I'll personally strangle you, jk), my 20th Birthday was Saturday, and I started partying at noon on Friday with whisky (thanks Rainer:) !) And then went to the Auto Show with B. Beaver and M. Cha. Well, Briana and Mary....no they're not strippers or porn stars, for those you who are wondering. Pervert.
ANYWAY, we went and looked at the cars and took pictures.... It was fun. Cha wanted 2 DUB keychains but only got 1....WAAAAAAA!!! ok, jk. That was a minor detail. There was a really shiney car there...that was the only one I really remember. But it was fun to see all the shiney cars and DUBS and rich people who actually were considering buying these cars.....some cost more that a large house. wow.
"Hey Beaver, did you say you'd marry for money? Looks?"
"Yeah....I mean no.....There's something to be said for personality." She said.
It's true. There's something to be said for personality but I forgot what it was. Oh well.
So then we left. It was not as cold as it was when we got there which was funny, because it was dark out. Usually temperature drops when the sun leaves the sky. But no. This is Michigan we're talking about people. So yeah, we got into the car and discussed where we were going to eat: La Shish? Macaroni Grill?
........PANERA....? hahahahhahhaha, jk. I just had to throw that one in there for Beave.
But we were driving...actually Mary was driving the good ol' Honda at a nice clip...pace....speed...whatever, fuck being literary right now. And as we flew past HockyTown CAFE Briana Beaver made a comment about getting some kind of Detroit "experience" and we agreed that if we were gonna do it up we better do it BIG in the D....with our DUB keychains and all... SO fabulous.....so we turned around and headed for Hockeytown....but THEN...dum....dum...dum....we changed our minds.
Mexican food! Mexican town was...in Detroit, right? YES! "But where?" One might ask....or 3 honors college girls might ask. And we kept on driving...and driving....and driving....and driving
Wait....do we even KNOW where we're going? no. Not really. But Cha started chewing, packing away gum like they were marshmallows and she was in a competative tourament of "chubby bunny."
And there were some phone calls made...to people who might have been able to reel us in from obscurity...a.k.a give us directions. No fancy way of saying it. We're lost.
So Beave decides to give the old EX a ring...always a good idea right? Maybe, maybe not....ask Beave next time you see her...or don't. ANYWAY, we don't know where we are therefore none of these people who know where it is can help us....so we keep driving....and driving...and driving.....
"FUCKIN' A!!!!!! MORE GUM!!!!!"
Please pay no attention to that outburst, it was just Cha....it's the turrets. She's okay. Really.
.......And I made baby-footfrints with my hand in the frosted car window. Cha and Beaver were on the phone and I was about to utilize the old celli myself when I realized: few of my friends had ever even BEEN to Detroit let alone Mexican Town...and the ones that did were probably drunk and of little use....plus it was the eve of my birthday and in my universe the world was revolving around me. I imagined I saw little green gnomes in the snow, hitchhiking....green thumbs...I started laughing.
"CANADIAN BRIDGE? WHAT THE FUCK! I KNOW I'M ON CANDID CAMERA RIGHT NOW!!!!!"
It's okay Cha. Eat more gum.
Then we drove in loops and ended back on the highway several times. We even spent some quality time at the Marathon Gas station. Golden Memories!!
But we made it there. That is key. We got there alive, (despite M. Cha's frantic predictions of death). But we were hungry, indeed.
"I WANNA SEE MEXICAN PEOPLE!!! WHERE ARE THE SOMBREROS?"
Chaaaaaaaaaaaaa.....love that girl....she thought the Lions played at the Joe...LOL. Only dull people are brilliant on Friday nights right? RIGHT. :)
Where's ESPERANZA? OK, that was for the WAD peeeps, what! What! Represent!!!!! Ok.... No? No. Ok.
So we found a restaurant and another one...and another one and one that looked like it might be a personal residence..no wait....It WAS a residence. We were that hungry.
Anyway we ended up eating at Xochimillcos, I believe that was the name, and the food as heavenly...either that or I was incredibly hungary. The world may never know.
The Beave and the Cha had a plan. They wanted to do up the whole birthday thing....you know the drill, embarassing song and dessert....but the restaurant was too busy (thank god) and there was no song. But there was cold cake. Very cold, but good. I even got a little candle. :). Fun times. No forks but that was ok. A knife works when the cake is cold enough.
OK, so then we sat and gossiped for like an hour....always a blast! You know of whom we spoke!!!! LLLAAUUUREN...JUUUDDDE....MARG...., fun, fun. WAD old memories. I think I talked to some kid names Trevor who was stranded on eight mile. Yeah, it was that kinda night.
As we were leaveing the restaurant, this guy in a faded plaid vest approached us...and asked for like, 50 sents, something small. Beave and I said no, politely and when we turned to keep on walking to the car, we found that our dear friend Mary Cha had made a dash...apparently she didn't like beggars or was scared of them....for we saw her tunneling through the darkness,...made me laugh anyway.
So After we left (BTW thanks for DINNER GIRLS!!!) and did not get lost on the way back might I add. We worked out (telepathically of course) with Kanye West....it was...special.
I think Christina called me a bunch of times and i talked to Consetta on the phone, there was a party, I believe, at Joes...the "FRAT" jjja.
But Mary felt "crusty" and Briana had to work early so I ended up hitting up the par-tay by my lonesome...not really but you girls shoulldda come!!!! jk. There's a lot more weekends to come!
There I found more whisky, beer, talking, girls and boys, socialists and republicans....Santa....Yeah, it was that kinda night. There was a boy names TEEN SPIRIT there...a 40 yr old trapped in a 13 yr old's body...but really he was 18. Didn't look it...but he was the only sober one there, so he drove me, B. Koss, and Christine back to the dorms. I had to work nightwatch.
We watched bootlegged CARNIVALE (HBO series) for like an hour before I had to go to NW. I LOVE that show! Samson's a Handsome Devil.
Anyway, I am getting bored with this crappy writing. Need to get back to my tropes and metaphors.
But this one's for you Beave, because you are prolly the only one who actually reads my wordy posts to the last sentance...or maybe you don't. But since you got to the end...
And CHA, see, you prolly only read like the first 2 sentances and then asked Beaver what it was about.....or better yet, scrolled down...hehehehehe)
If I married Cha's Bro my name would be Minehaha CHA....hahahhahaaha.
Ok.... no? No. Ok.
I *HEART* my friends!
Anyway, as all of you know ( I HOPE, or I'll personally strangle you, jk), my 20th Birthday was Saturday, and I started partying at noon on Friday with whisky (thanks Rainer:) !) And then went to the Auto Show with B. Beaver and M. Cha. Well, Briana and Mary....no they're not strippers or porn stars, for those you who are wondering. Pervert.
ANYWAY, we went and looked at the cars and took pictures.... It was fun. Cha wanted 2 DUB keychains but only got 1....WAAAAAAA!!! ok, jk. That was a minor detail. There was a really shiney car there...that was the only one I really remember. But it was fun to see all the shiney cars and DUBS and rich people who actually were considering buying these cars.....some cost more that a large house. wow.
"Hey Beaver, did you say you'd marry for money? Looks?"
"Yeah....I mean no.....There's something to be said for personality." She said.
It's true. There's something to be said for personality but I forgot what it was. Oh well.
So then we left. It was not as cold as it was when we got there which was funny, because it was dark out. Usually temperature drops when the sun leaves the sky. But no. This is Michigan we're talking about people. So yeah, we got into the car and discussed where we were going to eat: La Shish? Macaroni Grill?
........PANERA....? hahahahhahhaha, jk. I just had to throw that one in there for Beave.
But we were driving...actually Mary was driving the good ol' Honda at a nice clip...pace....speed...whatever, fuck being literary right now. And as we flew past HockyTown CAFE Briana Beaver made a comment about getting some kind of Detroit "experience" and we agreed that if we were gonna do it up we better do it BIG in the D....with our DUB keychains and all... SO fabulous.....so we turned around and headed for Hockeytown....but THEN...dum....dum...dum....we changed our minds.
Mexican food! Mexican town was...in Detroit, right? YES! "But where?" One might ask....or 3 honors college girls might ask. And we kept on driving...and driving....and driving....and driving
Wait....do we even KNOW where we're going? no. Not really. But Cha started chewing, packing away gum like they were marshmallows and she was in a competative tourament of "chubby bunny."
And there were some phone calls made...to people who might have been able to reel us in from obscurity...a.k.a give us directions. No fancy way of saying it. We're lost.
So Beave decides to give the old EX a ring...always a good idea right? Maybe, maybe not....ask Beave next time you see her...or don't. ANYWAY, we don't know where we are therefore none of these people who know where it is can help us....so we keep driving....and driving...and driving.....
"FUCKIN' A!!!!!! MORE GUM!!!!!"
Please pay no attention to that outburst, it was just Cha....it's the turrets. She's okay. Really.
.......And I made baby-footfrints with my hand in the frosted car window. Cha and Beaver were on the phone and I was about to utilize the old celli myself when I realized: few of my friends had ever even BEEN to Detroit let alone Mexican Town...and the ones that did were probably drunk and of little use....plus it was the eve of my birthday and in my universe the world was revolving around me. I imagined I saw little green gnomes in the snow, hitchhiking....green thumbs...I started laughing.
"CANADIAN BRIDGE? WHAT THE FUCK! I KNOW I'M ON CANDID CAMERA RIGHT NOW!!!!!"
It's okay Cha. Eat more gum.
Then we drove in loops and ended back on the highway several times. We even spent some quality time at the Marathon Gas station. Golden Memories!!
But we made it there. That is key. We got there alive, (despite M. Cha's frantic predictions of death). But we were hungry, indeed.
"I WANNA SEE MEXICAN PEOPLE!!! WHERE ARE THE SOMBREROS?"
Chaaaaaaaaaaaaa.....love that girl....she thought the Lions played at the Joe...LOL. Only dull people are brilliant on Friday nights right? RIGHT. :)
Where's ESPERANZA? OK, that was for the WAD peeeps, what! What! Represent!!!!! Ok.... No? No. Ok.
So we found a restaurant and another one...and another one and one that looked like it might be a personal residence..no wait....It WAS a residence. We were that hungry.
Anyway we ended up eating at Xochimillcos, I believe that was the name, and the food as heavenly...either that or I was incredibly hungary. The world may never know.
The Beave and the Cha had a plan. They wanted to do up the whole birthday thing....you know the drill, embarassing song and dessert....but the restaurant was too busy (thank god) and there was no song. But there was cold cake. Very cold, but good. I even got a little candle. :). Fun times. No forks but that was ok. A knife works when the cake is cold enough.
OK, so then we sat and gossiped for like an hour....always a blast! You know of whom we spoke!!!! LLLAAUUUREN...JUUUDDDE....MARG...., fun, fun. WAD old memories. I think I talked to some kid names Trevor who was stranded on eight mile. Yeah, it was that kinda night.
As we were leaveing the restaurant, this guy in a faded plaid vest approached us...and asked for like, 50 sents, something small. Beave and I said no, politely and when we turned to keep on walking to the car, we found that our dear friend Mary Cha had made a dash...apparently she didn't like beggars or was scared of them....for we saw her tunneling through the darkness,...made me laugh anyway.
So After we left (BTW thanks for DINNER GIRLS!!!) and did not get lost on the way back might I add. We worked out (telepathically of course) with Kanye West....it was...special.
I think Christina called me a bunch of times and i talked to Consetta on the phone, there was a party, I believe, at Joes...the "FRAT" jjja.
But Mary felt "crusty" and Briana had to work early so I ended up hitting up the par-tay by my lonesome...not really but you girls shoulldda come!!!! jk. There's a lot more weekends to come!
There I found more whisky, beer, talking, girls and boys, socialists and republicans....Santa....Yeah, it was that kinda night. There was a boy names TEEN SPIRIT there...a 40 yr old trapped in a 13 yr old's body...but really he was 18. Didn't look it...but he was the only sober one there, so he drove me, B. Koss, and Christine back to the dorms. I had to work nightwatch.
We watched bootlegged CARNIVALE (HBO series) for like an hour before I had to go to NW. I LOVE that show! Samson's a Handsome Devil.
Anyway, I am getting bored with this crappy writing. Need to get back to my tropes and metaphors.
But this one's for you Beave, because you are prolly the only one who actually reads my wordy posts to the last sentance...or maybe you don't. But since you got to the end...
And CHA, see, you prolly only read like the first 2 sentances and then asked Beaver what it was about.....or better yet, scrolled down...hehehehehe)
If I married Cha's Bro my name would be Minehaha CHA....hahahhahaaha.
Ok.... no? No. Ok.
I *HEART* my friends!
~Word to your Mother~
Her Universe House: A reflection
I climbed into the window of her universe house:
Thanksgiving came, like it does every year, and I ate too much, like I do every year. And even though it was three days, it seemed like a week, I hadn’t been home to Birmingham in at least four months, I felt like a visitor in my own house, I slept in my old room in the attic, and it seemed almost as if I was in the room of a stranger. A person I never knew, a person whose bed was on the floor, the room of a high school student. This person wore platform shoes and had an ugly red down coat with stains on it. She also seemed to like to like boy bands and her phone book contained only three phone numbers that were not those of her relatives. I never knew her, and if I had, I’m sure that I wouldn’t like her. I saw a picture of her and she was fat, with curly hair and was wearing poorly applied makeup: she probably did it herself. And I read her journals because I was bored, and a little intrigued: something about this stranger seemed aggravatingly, almost painfully familiar. In her journal she did write about herself, but there were other people. People that did not exist save for the space in her head. In her journal she was in Italy, bringing back a rise of a modern roman empire and engaged to the son of the man, Romaine Chestari, who sponsored the invention of nuclear fusion. And her best friend’s name was Janice. It dawned on me that it was all her imagination when i found out she did not,in fact, know anyone named Janice; I looked in her yearbook and her phone book. Nothing. The only thing that was real in that journal was her name…And I felt sorry for her but at the same time, almost envied her: she had really known these people. And then I felt like I could cry. I had lost them. That girl was me…, only time had come between us. The only thing that remained intact was the name…the only thing that was real. The rest was saftly shuttled back to the land of imagination.
It was two in the morning by the time I put down my old journal and turned out the light. I had a strange feeling, like I had stepped into a foggy fourth dimension though I was neither high nor drunk…and I went over to my laptop, Jack, and opened Windows media player. I clicked on the postal service “the district sleeps alone tonight”….and fell asleep on my bed on the floor. I put my arms around an old stuffed animal of mine, a life-size lioness. It was dry and dusty…it was Lemonseed, my old friend.
Thanksgiving came, like it does every year, and I ate too much, like I do every year. And even though it was three days, it seemed like a week, I hadn’t been home to Birmingham in at least four months, I felt like a visitor in my own house, I slept in my old room in the attic, and it seemed almost as if I was in the room of a stranger. A person I never knew, a person whose bed was on the floor, the room of a high school student. This person wore platform shoes and had an ugly red down coat with stains on it. She also seemed to like to like boy bands and her phone book contained only three phone numbers that were not those of her relatives. I never knew her, and if I had, I’m sure that I wouldn’t like her. I saw a picture of her and she was fat, with curly hair and was wearing poorly applied makeup: she probably did it herself. And I read her journals because I was bored, and a little intrigued: something about this stranger seemed aggravatingly, almost painfully familiar. In her journal she did write about herself, but there were other people. People that did not exist save for the space in her head. In her journal she was in Italy, bringing back a rise of a modern roman empire and engaged to the son of the man, Romaine Chestari, who sponsored the invention of nuclear fusion. And her best friend’s name was Janice. It dawned on me that it was all her imagination when i found out she did not,in fact, know anyone named Janice; I looked in her yearbook and her phone book. Nothing. The only thing that was real in that journal was her name…And I felt sorry for her but at the same time, almost envied her: she had really known these people. And then I felt like I could cry. I had lost them. That girl was me…, only time had come between us. The only thing that remained intact was the name…the only thing that was real. The rest was saftly shuttled back to the land of imagination.
It was two in the morning by the time I put down my old journal and turned out the light. I had a strange feeling, like I had stepped into a foggy fourth dimension though I was neither high nor drunk…and I went over to my laptop, Jack, and opened Windows media player. I clicked on the postal service “the district sleeps alone tonight”….and fell asleep on my bed on the floor. I put my arms around an old stuffed animal of mine, a life-size lioness. It was dry and dusty…it was Lemonseed, my old friend.
Where's the Candid Camera?
“Where’s the Candid Camera?”
Something happened this year, and I cannot point it out as a constellation in stars or a definite point of a graph. But something (lets call it a luckybug for all adorable purposes) crept into my life, and stayed there. If this year could have been made into a slideshow, the slides would start out slow, black and white, with maybe as much as an hour between slide changes, and end in and in a motion picture, complete with color and sound.
Slide 1: Me in a miniskirt wearing something pink and something green, looking
like maybe I stepped out of the Delias/Alloy catalog
Thirty minutes….
Slide 2: A picture of me dressed in the OU Housing Staff black polo, unkempt hair, sporting a fake smile.
An hour…
Slide 3: Me wearing a lifeguard uniform, kept hair, and makeup done.
An hour….
Slide 4: Me looking tired.
An Hour…
Slide 5: Me sleeping
Slow transitions, silent. No genuine life. I got up in the morning to go to work. I slept in my dorm so I wouldn’t fall asleep in class. I ate because I needed energy to work. Hunger was a distraction. Never in my life had my schedule been so chaotic. That semester I learned how to nap.
Slide 6: Me Voting
Fifteen minutes:
Slide 7: Me walking to work in the rain looking disgruntled to say the least
Then the slides began to change more rapidly, colors filled in the dark spaces and sounds flashed by. I met Kerrie in Theatre class. The Man Who Came to Dinner project, we were partners. She was a colorful person, animated, which rocked the foundations of my slideshow. And she had curly hair, like mine. And then we got high. One night, work and leisure met face to face, shook hands…and then, as if in some agreement had been reached, for one brief moment, work stepped aside.
The ground felt spongy that night, and I was fully entertained by depth perception. The signs of the city seemed to overlap and fly past each other, yellow, red, yellow and sometimes green. The windows were foggy, and Fall bowed out...the leaves were gone, the warmth was gone. So was work, class, and all my worries at the time, just for that night if not at all. And when I got back to Vandenberg there was music. Matt Kelly held his choir practice at Nightwatch that night. Either this choir was phenomenally talented, or I was phenomenally high, I’m not sure which, but either way it was good to me, so I sat on the bench in front of the Beer Lake Nightwatch station listened, stuffing my face with vanilla cookies. I ate so fast I could hardly taste them but I am sure they were good. I was not eating for energy; I was eating because I felt like if I didn’t, I would swallow myself. When I went to sleep that night it was not so I would not because I had to be awake in class the next day, and when I got up in the morning it was not because I had to work.
The slideshow projector was rattling at the speed at which my life wanted to process and display the slides, it stared smoking and, eventually, it exploded. I was asleep for the explosion; sound asleep when the luckybug came into my life. I suppose the benevolent, imaginary insect either repaired the slide projector or replaced it with a candid videotape recorder. Perhaps the one Mary Cha referred to last night….but that’s for later on in the slideshow. Right now I have to clean up my Nightwatch Station and go to sleep…and no, I don’t have class tomorrow.
~to be continued
Something happened this year, and I cannot point it out as a constellation in stars or a definite point of a graph. But something (lets call it a luckybug for all adorable purposes) crept into my life, and stayed there. If this year could have been made into a slideshow, the slides would start out slow, black and white, with maybe as much as an hour between slide changes, and end in and in a motion picture, complete with color and sound.
Slide 1: Me in a miniskirt wearing something pink and something green, looking
like maybe I stepped out of the Delias/Alloy catalog
Thirty minutes….
Slide 2: A picture of me dressed in the OU Housing Staff black polo, unkempt hair, sporting a fake smile.
An hour…
Slide 3: Me wearing a lifeguard uniform, kept hair, and makeup done.
An hour….
Slide 4: Me looking tired.
An Hour…
Slide 5: Me sleeping
Slow transitions, silent. No genuine life. I got up in the morning to go to work. I slept in my dorm so I wouldn’t fall asleep in class. I ate because I needed energy to work. Hunger was a distraction. Never in my life had my schedule been so chaotic. That semester I learned how to nap.
Slide 6: Me Voting
Fifteen minutes:
Slide 7: Me walking to work in the rain looking disgruntled to say the least
Then the slides began to change more rapidly, colors filled in the dark spaces and sounds flashed by. I met Kerrie in Theatre class. The Man Who Came to Dinner project, we were partners. She was a colorful person, animated, which rocked the foundations of my slideshow. And she had curly hair, like mine. And then we got high. One night, work and leisure met face to face, shook hands…and then, as if in some agreement had been reached, for one brief moment, work stepped aside.
The ground felt spongy that night, and I was fully entertained by depth perception. The signs of the city seemed to overlap and fly past each other, yellow, red, yellow and sometimes green. The windows were foggy, and Fall bowed out...the leaves were gone, the warmth was gone. So was work, class, and all my worries at the time, just for that night if not at all. And when I got back to Vandenberg there was music. Matt Kelly held his choir practice at Nightwatch that night. Either this choir was phenomenally talented, or I was phenomenally high, I’m not sure which, but either way it was good to me, so I sat on the bench in front of the Beer Lake Nightwatch station listened, stuffing my face with vanilla cookies. I ate so fast I could hardly taste them but I am sure they were good. I was not eating for energy; I was eating because I felt like if I didn’t, I would swallow myself. When I went to sleep that night it was not so I would not because I had to be awake in class the next day, and when I got up in the morning it was not because I had to work.
The slideshow projector was rattling at the speed at which my life wanted to process and display the slides, it stared smoking and, eventually, it exploded. I was asleep for the explosion; sound asleep when the luckybug came into my life. I suppose the benevolent, imaginary insect either repaired the slide projector or replaced it with a candid videotape recorder. Perhaps the one Mary Cha referred to last night….but that’s for later on in the slideshow. Right now I have to clean up my Nightwatch Station and go to sleep…and no, I don’t have class tomorrow.
~to be continued
The Secret Life of Sunflowers
My favorite type of flower is the sunflower. It is born in spring and dies at the end of summer when leaves begin to ripen and the warm of vernal months subside to the changing season. The sunflower is one life, one plant, one flower: the head of a body made to nurture the one. And through the hot months if perseveres, taking in energy from the sun and converting it into a spectacular showcase of warm yellow. The face of the flower is resilient, never sun burnt but rather welcoming the balmy rays cast from the nearest star. And so it is modeled: in the likeness of that star.
The young flowers, before they become brittle and set in their ways, will follow the sun on its daily path trailed in the sky, east to west. Illuminated by the dawn breaking beams, they lift their faces to the glory of morning and bow to the power of the sun at the later hours as the blazing orb falls off the brink of the western horizon. In the hours between the rise and set, at midday, the flexible young awe-struck flowers will beam upward, straight up, like noon hands on a clock. But when too many of these cycles come to pass the flower chooses a stance it likes best. Some stay tilted to morning, others, more submissive, nod in poise of evening. Still, the star soldiers of the crop choose to stand tall at all hours frozen to the stance of noon, and unrelenting, even under the face of the sweltering summer sun.
Now I will describe the beginning of sunflowers. Indeed, their derivation from the earth is in a whole, almost (if not more) of a magnificent adventure than their bowing out.
First they sprout at a disadvantage: how crows love to peck off their succulent cotyledons! Then, off course there are those just not meant for this world, they poke their fragile stems just above the soil fighting for survival, but it just is not in them to live past their first day and they are soon beaten by the hard world they find themselves in, shriveling back into the crack in the earth from whence they came, gracefully admitting defeat and welcoming what death has to offer: they have nothing to regret in so very short a life.
But there are others quite on the contrary that start out so strong and promising from the seed: troopers from the very beginning. But funny thing about those overconfident ones, they almost always seem to meet misfortunate ends. Such show offs they are, tempting the hungry crows and squirrels in their vainglorious entrance to the humble community of the garden. Boastful in their beauty to yet so dangerous an audience; naivety and conceit become a deadly potion when mixed correctly.
And so the arrogant sproutlings and the weak seed sprouts meet their early ends. Those rarely get to spend a week on this planet, as it is not theirs. Gone, going, gone.
But don’t be discouraged, there are still some citizens of the sunflower bed that I have yet to mention! No, I have not forgotten about those late seeds that hide away until the first battle is silenced. They shoot out of the earth when all is thought to be over and they are neither very weak nor overly strong or proud. They are mediocre, genuine in life, not posing a threat to anything and joyful, joyful, joyful: shameless in the autonomy of their own spirit. They reach for the sun before they even grow arms to reach with, ever hopeful and growing, so passionate for life! Some of them do meet early ends, as we all know how greedy slugs and pregnant butterflies patrol unpolluted gardens in the warm months of the year. But this is an occurrence of nature and no fault is reflected on the innocent sun-sprouts and when those ones meet misfortunate ends a certain amount of regret is to be felt for them; overcoming so much just to be extinguished at the brink of their prime.
Yet still, there are the chosen ones. The ones that survive to maturity: the very ones I mentioned at the beginning. Yes, these are what we know as sunflowers, but as outside spectators we know very little of their previous adventures, their accomplishments and what they have overcome. But they are the chosen ones; humble, yet invincible in life. Sunflowers are true survivors, masters of the game of life, worshippers of the noonday sun, and when they do come to their inevitable ends (for we all do on this temporary earth), when the sun sets on their fortunate lives, they all hang their heads regardless of the stance they took earlier in life. They hang their pretty heads, (not in sorrow, for they have nothing to remorse, nor in defeat for they have been victors from the very beginning) but they hang their heads in respect for the earth; in respect for generations to come. It would be ignorant to pay homage to the sun alone, when indeed it is to the earth that they owe their initial existence. So they bow out in grace, subsiding to the oncoming season for it is not theirs, and they lend their seeds back to the welcoming soil, to the promise of a spring to come. The little seeds are set to sleep until spring commences when the pivot of Earth’s axis leans in their favor. The seeds will then awaken to the melted snow softens the waking. They will come alive in to a world that may or may not be for them; yet for some amount of time (whether it be long or short) they all will find themselves in same the garden which hosted their triumphant ancestors.
One day I should like very much to learn more of the life of sunflowers, but then again perhaps it is not mine to know. Perhaps it is not my place as a gardener to interfere with their system, polluting the garden with insecticides, or chasing the crows and squirrels, because it is all a part (in some way I believe) of their secret life, a life that is not mine to change. Indeed I too am an outside spectator, an onlooker of their lovely show, and in the end I can say I am annually entertained. No, their show never bored me, it doesn’t bore me now, and it will never bore me, year after year. I am quite content as I am when I water the flowerbed, knowing that I myself play a part in the secret life of sunflowers as they play a part in mine.
My favorite type of flower is the sunflower. It is born in spring and dies at the end of summer when leaves begin to ripen and the warm of vernal months subside to the changing season. The sunflower is one life, one plant, one flower: the head of a body made to nurture the one. And through the hot months if perseveres, taking in energy from the sun and converting it into a spectacular showcase of warm yellow. The face of the flower is resilient, never sun burnt but rather welcoming the balmy rays cast from the nearest star. And so it is modeled: in the likeness of that star.
The young flowers, before they become brittle and set in their ways, will follow the sun on its daily path trailed in the sky, east to west. Illuminated by the dawn breaking beams, they lift their faces to the glory of morning and bow to the power of the sun at the later hours as the blazing orb falls off the brink of the western horizon. In the hours between the rise and set, at midday, the flexible young awe-struck flowers will beam upward, straight up, like noon hands on a clock. But when too many of these cycles come to pass the flower chooses a stance it likes best. Some stay tilted to morning, others, more submissive, nod in poise of evening. Still, the star soldiers of the crop choose to stand tall at all hours frozen to the stance of noon, and unrelenting, even under the face of the sweltering summer sun.
Now I will describe the beginning of sunflowers. Indeed, their derivation from the earth is in a whole, almost (if not more) of a magnificent adventure than their bowing out.
First they sprout at a disadvantage: how crows love to peck off their succulent cotyledons! Then, off course there are those just not meant for this world, they poke their fragile stems just above the soil fighting for survival, but it just is not in them to live past their first day and they are soon beaten by the hard world they find themselves in, shriveling back into the crack in the earth from whence they came, gracefully admitting defeat and welcoming what death has to offer: they have nothing to regret in so very short a life.
But there are others quite on the contrary that start out so strong and promising from the seed: troopers from the very beginning. But funny thing about those overconfident ones, they almost always seem to meet misfortunate ends. Such show offs they are, tempting the hungry crows and squirrels in their vainglorious entrance to the humble community of the garden. Boastful in their beauty to yet so dangerous an audience; naivety and conceit become a deadly potion when mixed correctly.
And so the arrogant sproutlings and the weak seed sprouts meet their early ends. Those rarely get to spend a week on this planet, as it is not theirs. Gone, going, gone.
But don’t be discouraged, there are still some citizens of the sunflower bed that I have yet to mention! No, I have not forgotten about those late seeds that hide away until the first battle is silenced. They shoot out of the earth when all is thought to be over and they are neither very weak nor overly strong or proud. They are mediocre, genuine in life, not posing a threat to anything and joyful, joyful, joyful: shameless in the autonomy of their own spirit. They reach for the sun before they even grow arms to reach with, ever hopeful and growing, so passionate for life! Some of them do meet early ends, as we all know how greedy slugs and pregnant butterflies patrol unpolluted gardens in the warm months of the year. But this is an occurrence of nature and no fault is reflected on the innocent sun-sprouts and when those ones meet misfortunate ends a certain amount of regret is to be felt for them; overcoming so much just to be extinguished at the brink of their prime.
Yet still, there are the chosen ones. The ones that survive to maturity: the very ones I mentioned at the beginning. Yes, these are what we know as sunflowers, but as outside spectators we know very little of their previous adventures, their accomplishments and what they have overcome. But they are the chosen ones; humble, yet invincible in life. Sunflowers are true survivors, masters of the game of life, worshippers of the noonday sun, and when they do come to their inevitable ends (for we all do on this temporary earth), when the sun sets on their fortunate lives, they all hang their heads regardless of the stance they took earlier in life. They hang their pretty heads, (not in sorrow, for they have nothing to remorse, nor in defeat for they have been victors from the very beginning) but they hang their heads in respect for the earth; in respect for generations to come. It would be ignorant to pay homage to the sun alone, when indeed it is to the earth that they owe their initial existence. So they bow out in grace, subsiding to the oncoming season for it is not theirs, and they lend their seeds back to the welcoming soil, to the promise of a spring to come. The little seeds are set to sleep until spring commences when the pivot of Earth’s axis leans in their favor. The seeds will then awaken to the melted snow softens the waking. They will come alive in to a world that may or may not be for them; yet for some amount of time (whether it be long or short) they all will find themselves in same the garden which hosted their triumphant ancestors.
One day I should like very much to learn more of the life of sunflowers, but then again perhaps it is not mine to know. Perhaps it is not my place as a gardener to interfere with their system, polluting the garden with insecticides, or chasing the crows and squirrels, because it is all a part (in some way I believe) of their secret life, a life that is not mine to change. Indeed I too am an outside spectator, an onlooker of their lovely show, and in the end I can say I am annually entertained. No, their show never bored me, it doesn’t bore me now, and it will never bore me, year after year. I am quite content as I am when I water the flowerbed, knowing that I myself play a part in the secret life of sunflowers as they play a part in mine.
Training Ground
Training Ground ~Minni Forman
A thick layer of fog hovered just above the salty waters of the origin. There, the roar of the almighty water was deafening to the living ear, while shaking the cores of the non-living elements that surrounded the one. One by one, walls of blue-white life and salt fell forward towards land: they fell hard, and their energy was absorbed. Energy was never ending then, it seemed, for it neither emptied nor tired. The force that generated towers of foam and spray was none other than the one that powered life. Life in turn, finished the cycle, eventually giving back to the one origin. So when the liquid walls fell fast against the solid land, that energy was swallowed by the grains of earth; it was soaked back up by strings of life creating the reciprocating symphony of the one power. The power of the ocean was immeasurable; to lie at the bottom of it or float astride its living current was to feel the presence of the endless being, the living origin. Even the fog hung low to the water lingered there to embrace the almighty presence of the sea. Such a large unified body was so wonderful, yet terrible at the same time, creating the powerful union of life and death.
That mass of saline fluid had brought forth such ugly creatures in times past; yet they grew more gruesome with each era. And before long they took it upon themselves to divide, those ugly ones, and then multiply, forgetting their very origins in the sea. Cast off onto the island, they all emerged at one point long ago, from the one. And just as those walls of water fall here on the white mouth of grainy pumice under this shell of fog, they all fell back to the one, and it sucked them back only to spit them out once more, each regurgitation becoming more hideous. And then came the homosapiens out of it all, the most fatal rejects. Those creatures with the holes on their faces and brains that is were relatively too large for their bodies. These ones that crept about the planet, burdened by the weight of their torturous heads: what was a living creature to do with such intelligence, if intelligence it could have been called? So much promise was awakened at the birth of this species but that promise was never kept, nor did it bloom past skyscrapers and malevolent cures for self-generated diseases. The promise that this species once held fell short directly after their awakening and no conclusive result could be contrived from their selfish existence. It came to a downfall, in the end, but that was inevitable.
To this day more specimen of various build and intelligence still spring from the sea and run the red waters of their originator through their networks of arteries and veins. Those waters run in my veins now as I type, they run to the tips of my fingers and it is only minor layers of cells that hold them back from flowing forth, onto this keyboard.
Salt and mineral derived directly from the sea, the warmth, the depth, and living units that dwell within us are all part of the one; part of the being that will reclaim us in the end. This is a borrowed lot of time, ours is, and for our stay we pay a heavy price. That price is not monetary, nor is it tacit in any manner. It is chemical, mental, and spiritual. This blue-green spherical station on which we cluster is a training ground. And yes, the endless red-blue current of the sea runs us all, it strings us together on an invisible chain that marks us as living, it marks us as one. One life, one energy, one spirit: divided, multiplying, and lost. Lost and renting time on this training ground to learn its way back to the one. Learning, however, we are finding to be difficult, (regardless of the size of our heads) for it is near impossible to find answers by groping in a questionless darkness wielding numb fingers at that. But we are all here, in training for purity. And as it is a relatively timely process to convert swamp water into pure liquid, it takes an even longer more tedious one to make the selfish fragments of a pure being selfless once again.
A thick layer of fog hovered just above the salty waters of the origin. There, the roar of the almighty water was deafening to the living ear, while shaking the cores of the non-living elements that surrounded the one. One by one, walls of blue-white life and salt fell forward towards land: they fell hard, and their energy was absorbed. Energy was never ending then, it seemed, for it neither emptied nor tired. The force that generated towers of foam and spray was none other than the one that powered life. Life in turn, finished the cycle, eventually giving back to the one origin. So when the liquid walls fell fast against the solid land, that energy was swallowed by the grains of earth; it was soaked back up by strings of life creating the reciprocating symphony of the one power. The power of the ocean was immeasurable; to lie at the bottom of it or float astride its living current was to feel the presence of the endless being, the living origin. Even the fog hung low to the water lingered there to embrace the almighty presence of the sea. Such a large unified body was so wonderful, yet terrible at the same time, creating the powerful union of life and death.
That mass of saline fluid had brought forth such ugly creatures in times past; yet they grew more gruesome with each era. And before long they took it upon themselves to divide, those ugly ones, and then multiply, forgetting their very origins in the sea. Cast off onto the island, they all emerged at one point long ago, from the one. And just as those walls of water fall here on the white mouth of grainy pumice under this shell of fog, they all fell back to the one, and it sucked them back only to spit them out once more, each regurgitation becoming more hideous. And then came the homosapiens out of it all, the most fatal rejects. Those creatures with the holes on their faces and brains that is were relatively too large for their bodies. These ones that crept about the planet, burdened by the weight of their torturous heads: what was a living creature to do with such intelligence, if intelligence it could have been called? So much promise was awakened at the birth of this species but that promise was never kept, nor did it bloom past skyscrapers and malevolent cures for self-generated diseases. The promise that this species once held fell short directly after their awakening and no conclusive result could be contrived from their selfish existence. It came to a downfall, in the end, but that was inevitable.
To this day more specimen of various build and intelligence still spring from the sea and run the red waters of their originator through their networks of arteries and veins. Those waters run in my veins now as I type, they run to the tips of my fingers and it is only minor layers of cells that hold them back from flowing forth, onto this keyboard.
Salt and mineral derived directly from the sea, the warmth, the depth, and living units that dwell within us are all part of the one; part of the being that will reclaim us in the end. This is a borrowed lot of time, ours is, and for our stay we pay a heavy price. That price is not monetary, nor is it tacit in any manner. It is chemical, mental, and spiritual. This blue-green spherical station on which we cluster is a training ground. And yes, the endless red-blue current of the sea runs us all, it strings us together on an invisible chain that marks us as living, it marks us as one. One life, one energy, one spirit: divided, multiplying, and lost. Lost and renting time on this training ground to learn its way back to the one. Learning, however, we are finding to be difficult, (regardless of the size of our heads) for it is near impossible to find answers by groping in a questionless darkness wielding numb fingers at that. But we are all here, in training for purity. And as it is a relatively timely process to convert swamp water into pure liquid, it takes an even longer more tedious one to make the selfish fragments of a pure being selfless once again.
Unexpected as Nature
It became evident to me, scrolling through ancient mythology that floods have recurrently signified a beginning. To initiate new creation, all that is old must be washed away and thus, purged of old reminiscence, a new leaf of life is overturned. So it came to be, during the rain season of the year nineteen hundred and eighty-seven in Belize, Central America, as a ruthless rainstorm rampaged through the flora upsetting the very foundation of leaves…
I
The Flood
A break in the storm was not yet forecasted on the ominous eastern horizon where, looming low to the earth, were clouds swollen with a bluish black. The once silent waters of Cocoa Creek were now tormented with relentless rains, thrashed by wild winds. The creek was roaring and boiling over the shallow banks. Footpaths had transformed to flood veins and were surging, pulsing across the gigantic stone ledge which stood hitherto above water. Clouds filled dark with moisture clotted the sky with a hopeless gray, smashing all that separates day from dawn into oblivion. The voice of the rampant water seemed as if it would never silent, ripping through the canna grass that held fast to the banks and the stone ledge. Only those too indolent to plant thier roots deep were torn from their rock beds into the live river. A ghostly wail was dispersed from the banks, and thunder shook the heavens: as the day tore onward the fury of nature came down upon the untamed jungle, haunting the very foundations of the earth. The groaning grass blades blended eerily with the screams of the wild wind unleashed, and ripping through the behemothic fig tree towering proudly over the river. Together they created a symphony of horror heralding lost lives in the wild darkness.
Rain continued streaming down in buckets. For five days the storm held out without a sign of weakening. The only force holding an old chicken coop from plummeting into the deadly swirl was the most fragile plank of rotted rosewood. One more tug from the lethal liquid tentacles would drag the chickens to a watery grave. Two hens in the coop that had remained living thus far clucked nervously and clung for balance as they perched tediously on the highest roost, the flimsy structure swaying to and fro in the voracious current. Then, within the blink of a keen eye, it was gone: sucked into a murky stampede...there was nothing more final.
When the day finally gave way to evening, the storm only gained more power and now the night roared onward, driven by an uncontrollable force. A pot-licker dog with a pink nose stood atop a heap of flotsam, howling at the top of its lungs into the night, though the hungry seemed to swallow its cries. Death seemed to draw ever nearer now, all around, it was enclosing fast in tightening rings of peril. The dog stared up at a decaying house tucked into the branches of the fig tree: it stared on in half hopes of a salvation which now seemed light years away. It longed for rescue from the deadly liquid circles that tore clockwise around the little island on which it perched. The dog wailed even louder at the sight of a human figure carefully making its way down the deteriorating wooden stairs out of the tree house which was covered in lichens and moss. The figure, somewhat shielded by a torn yellow raincoat, struggled though the rushing waters towards the stranded dog. The figure helped the dog off of the island of debris and guided it back towards the tree through the current.
Together they were fighting the force of the run off water, every footstep a perilous venture. Man and animal fought the force of the water’s will with all their might. They were different beings by far though they shared that common desire...the desire to survive. Both were in the seemingly endless struggle for life. There was a strong gust of wind and the figures raincoat blew off, exposing the figure and revealing a man. A man the dog knew well, for it was the same muscular frame that never hesitated to bring the staff down upon its back when lard was missing form the frying pan. Together, they arrived on the slimy steps that led up to the tree house. The dog bolted up the stairs first, followed by the man, and both saturated in remnants of the outside flood, though the droplets that fell from their bodies hardly reflected the intensity of the outer night. Vigorously, the dog shook itself sending a spray of muddy floodwater throughout the bantam structure.
“Pinto!” A girl cried. “You saved him Da!”
“He lucky you ‘round,” the man grumbled. “He ass be dead long time.”
The little girl viewed the emaciated dog fondly. “He’s shaking. Can I put a towel on him Na?” Sarah looked at her mother who was sitting in the corner next to a rusty kerosene lamp. She held a two year old baby tightly as the house rocked back and forth in the wind. Another little girl stood at her side her eyes darting here and there, fear written upon her face. The moaning water seemed to getting louder every minute.
“Everything’s wet honey,” Na answered quietly. “Pinto will be fine.”
“Are the chickens going to be okay do you think?” She asked, running to the window.
“Sarah, stay ‘way from the window, yah hear?” Da exclaimed irritably.
“Is the chicken coop still there?” Sarah asked. It had been days since anyone had ventured outside and news was more than welcome.
Da grumbled. “I don’ know! Me cah do everything a’de si’ame time!” He took off his wet shirt and threw it onto the creaking wood floor. “Me los’ da raincoat Mary K.”
“How?” Na asked sincerely confused, no sarcasm sharpened her tone.
“How you tink?” I’ de blow outside! Ya no know what I go trough all a’ dat fo’ wa good-fe-nuttin maga dog!”
“Calm down Charles,” her voice lowered almost to a whisper, “There’s nothing you can do.”
“Carm down? Ya tell me fe carm down? How me goin carm down when da house de blow out de tree, eh?”
“There's nothing you can do.” She shook her head slowly, almost regretfully from side to side.
The house jolted and there was a bright flash of lightening. A large opossum darted across the floor. Da ran to get his machete. Pinto didn’t move. He stood shivering in the corner, his tail between his legs. By the time Da had the machete ready, the frightened marsupial had disappeared into one of the large cracks in the wall.
“Fuckin dog!” Da shouted. “Dat de wa good fo’ nuttin’ pot licka’!”
“He’s too cold.” Sarah defended the pathetic, shivering animal in the corner.
Da sucked his teeth. “Cho! Shouldda let i’ ras drown.”
“Look, there’s another!” Sarah squealed as a corpulent gray opossum scuttled disjointedly across the soaked pine floorboards. Da raised his machete this time bringing it down upon the opossum’s spine with all his might. A horrendous shriek seared through the humid air and within seconds the opossum writhed upon the floor in those final seconds preceding death as the last drops of life escaped its putrid corps, waiting for rigor mortise to set in. Its eyes remained open while the corners of its saliva and blood encrusted mouth curled upward as if grinning up condescendingly at its slayer. Da took it by its succulent pink tail, pushed open the heavy zinc window, and flung the lifeless carcass down into the profound spiral of the fluid that simultaneously creates the powerful union of life and death. The wailing water grew louder when the window opened and then a bit fainter again as it closed. Everyone was silent in the minutes that followed. Sarah’s eyes dashed tensely about the decaying tree house, tensely scanning for more opossums. There were none.
I
The Flood
A break in the storm was not yet forecasted on the ominous eastern horizon where, looming low to the earth, were clouds swollen with a bluish black. The once silent waters of Cocoa Creek were now tormented with relentless rains, thrashed by wild winds. The creek was roaring and boiling over the shallow banks. Footpaths had transformed to flood veins and were surging, pulsing across the gigantic stone ledge which stood hitherto above water. Clouds filled dark with moisture clotted the sky with a hopeless gray, smashing all that separates day from dawn into oblivion. The voice of the rampant water seemed as if it would never silent, ripping through the canna grass that held fast to the banks and the stone ledge. Only those too indolent to plant thier roots deep were torn from their rock beds into the live river. A ghostly wail was dispersed from the banks, and thunder shook the heavens: as the day tore onward the fury of nature came down upon the untamed jungle, haunting the very foundations of the earth. The groaning grass blades blended eerily with the screams of the wild wind unleashed, and ripping through the behemothic fig tree towering proudly over the river. Together they created a symphony of horror heralding lost lives in the wild darkness.
Rain continued streaming down in buckets. For five days the storm held out without a sign of weakening. The only force holding an old chicken coop from plummeting into the deadly swirl was the most fragile plank of rotted rosewood. One more tug from the lethal liquid tentacles would drag the chickens to a watery grave. Two hens in the coop that had remained living thus far clucked nervously and clung for balance as they perched tediously on the highest roost, the flimsy structure swaying to and fro in the voracious current. Then, within the blink of a keen eye, it was gone: sucked into a murky stampede...there was nothing more final.
When the day finally gave way to evening, the storm only gained more power and now the night roared onward, driven by an uncontrollable force. A pot-licker dog with a pink nose stood atop a heap of flotsam, howling at the top of its lungs into the night, though the hungry seemed to swallow its cries. Death seemed to draw ever nearer now, all around, it was enclosing fast in tightening rings of peril. The dog stared up at a decaying house tucked into the branches of the fig tree: it stared on in half hopes of a salvation which now seemed light years away. It longed for rescue from the deadly liquid circles that tore clockwise around the little island on which it perched. The dog wailed even louder at the sight of a human figure carefully making its way down the deteriorating wooden stairs out of the tree house which was covered in lichens and moss. The figure, somewhat shielded by a torn yellow raincoat, struggled though the rushing waters towards the stranded dog. The figure helped the dog off of the island of debris and guided it back towards the tree through the current.
Together they were fighting the force of the run off water, every footstep a perilous venture. Man and animal fought the force of the water’s will with all their might. They were different beings by far though they shared that common desire...the desire to survive. Both were in the seemingly endless struggle for life. There was a strong gust of wind and the figures raincoat blew off, exposing the figure and revealing a man. A man the dog knew well, for it was the same muscular frame that never hesitated to bring the staff down upon its back when lard was missing form the frying pan. Together, they arrived on the slimy steps that led up to the tree house. The dog bolted up the stairs first, followed by the man, and both saturated in remnants of the outside flood, though the droplets that fell from their bodies hardly reflected the intensity of the outer night. Vigorously, the dog shook itself sending a spray of muddy floodwater throughout the bantam structure.
“Pinto!” A girl cried. “You saved him Da!”
“He lucky you ‘round,” the man grumbled. “He ass be dead long time.”
The little girl viewed the emaciated dog fondly. “He’s shaking. Can I put a towel on him Na?” Sarah looked at her mother who was sitting in the corner next to a rusty kerosene lamp. She held a two year old baby tightly as the house rocked back and forth in the wind. Another little girl stood at her side her eyes darting here and there, fear written upon her face. The moaning water seemed to getting louder every minute.
“Everything’s wet honey,” Na answered quietly. “Pinto will be fine.”
“Are the chickens going to be okay do you think?” She asked, running to the window.
“Sarah, stay ‘way from the window, yah hear?” Da exclaimed irritably.
“Is the chicken coop still there?” Sarah asked. It had been days since anyone had ventured outside and news was more than welcome.
Da grumbled. “I don’ know! Me cah do everything a’de si’ame time!” He took off his wet shirt and threw it onto the creaking wood floor. “Me los’ da raincoat Mary K.”
“How?” Na asked sincerely confused, no sarcasm sharpened her tone.
“How you tink?” I’ de blow outside! Ya no know what I go trough all a’ dat fo’ wa good-fe-nuttin maga dog!”
“Calm down Charles,” her voice lowered almost to a whisper, “There’s nothing you can do.”
“Carm down? Ya tell me fe carm down? How me goin carm down when da house de blow out de tree, eh?”
“There's nothing you can do.” She shook her head slowly, almost regretfully from side to side.
The house jolted and there was a bright flash of lightening. A large opossum darted across the floor. Da ran to get his machete. Pinto didn’t move. He stood shivering in the corner, his tail between his legs. By the time Da had the machete ready, the frightened marsupial had disappeared into one of the large cracks in the wall.
“Fuckin dog!” Da shouted. “Dat de wa good fo’ nuttin’ pot licka’!”
“He’s too cold.” Sarah defended the pathetic, shivering animal in the corner.
Da sucked his teeth. “Cho! Shouldda let i’ ras drown.”
“Look, there’s another!” Sarah squealed as a corpulent gray opossum scuttled disjointedly across the soaked pine floorboards. Da raised his machete this time bringing it down upon the opossum’s spine with all his might. A horrendous shriek seared through the humid air and within seconds the opossum writhed upon the floor in those final seconds preceding death as the last drops of life escaped its putrid corps, waiting for rigor mortise to set in. Its eyes remained open while the corners of its saliva and blood encrusted mouth curled upward as if grinning up condescendingly at its slayer. Da took it by its succulent pink tail, pushed open the heavy zinc window, and flung the lifeless carcass down into the profound spiral of the fluid that simultaneously creates the powerful union of life and death. The wailing water grew louder when the window opened and then a bit fainter again as it closed. Everyone was silent in the minutes that followed. Sarah’s eyes dashed tensely about the decaying tree house, tensely scanning for more opossums. There were none.
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