Elora had a calculator that could divide by zero. When she pressed equal she held her breath. The answer was always the same.
When she pressed equal she made a wish. Usually the same one every time. But once in a blue moon she wished she existed as an infinite quantity of Eloras in an infinite number of universes. Like a competition, so she could pick a few she liked best and focus on those.
They'd met in Brooklyn, at a bar with a potentially ironic nautical theme and nothing on tap. He'd gone to great lengths to win her over, gesticulating wildly as they leaned against the fake oak bar, with a lifeboat looming overhead and no less than 20 life preservers at the ready.
At the pivotal moment of his argument, making the case to take her home, he'd actually said: "In layman's terms, there are a very large, perhaps infinite, number of universes. Everything that could possibly happen or have happened in our universe, but doesn't or hasn't, actually happens in other universes."
Looking back, the fact that in some universes it must have worked out between them didn't grant comfort so much as spotlight that in this shitty hole of a universe, the real universe, their meeting had marked the beginning of a tremendous downturn in Elora's life.
"If you want to kiss me," she said, cutting him off midway through some further explanation, "sing karaoke."
This had unsettled him and at first he'd refused, stammering, still gesticulating wildly. Finally he'd chosen Roberta Flack and sung it all off key, the tonic vacillating between 3 or 4 incompatible notes.
Aware that that wasn't working he'd added Wyclef Jean ad libs, little one-time one-times, singing that like he was black and sending the patrons of the bar scattering to the lavs or far corners of the bar, scrambling to dodge a tidal wave of cultural insult that could drive a stake through the hot heart of Saturday night, pinning them drenched and screaming to their Monday desks.
Whatever her wish the answer was always the same. But the problem with infinity is that it's useless when what you want is to stand on solid ground, or to be nothing so that none of this has ever happened.
He'd returned to the bar shoulders slumped, a Poseidon who'd lost his trident and with it the respect of all sea creatures. But he'd seemed so vulnerable that she'd kissed him anyway.
With her expectations lowered his apartment and manner in bed weren't nearly as bad as feared. Anyway this city wasn't a buyer's market, you had to find fixer-upper men and hope you could make do with a little paint and spackle.
You could see the clock tower from his bedroom and after an hour or so she even fell asleep, which generally did not happen in these situations. In the morning he made her pancakes, pouring the batter expertly and timing them such that they inflated and never sank, as if puffed constantly by little jets of air.
5.31.2009
5.27.2009
piles of newspapers
A man and a women fall in love, buy a house, and dedicate themselves to filling it with piles of newspapers. "Our love is eternal," says the man. "We need a subscription," agrees the woman.
The secret to not throwing out the paper is that it prevents the day from ending. Whereas before, time might have been a succession of days, one leading to the next, now it should be pictured more as a kind of revolving door. By staying longer in the door, you end up right where you started. Time stops: Nothing can hurt you, nobody dies, and love never ends.
There are marital relations between the man and woman, and they have 2.5 children. When the piles grow too high they carve paths with a hedger. When that becomes unsustainable they pitch a tent in the backyard, sending the half-child into the house on slender missions to find somewhere, anywhere, where a newspaper can be added.
On one such mission the half-child disappears and the marriage of the man and the woman faces its first crisis. It's the man's thought that the game is up; that they must empty the house of newspapers in the desperate hope of finding their beloved half-child. The woman sees his side, but believes that altering the process now would renew the passage of time, thus re-opening their lives to pain, death, and disappointment.
(Or, what's the sense of regaining a half-child, only to see the entire family threatened by the vagaries of chance, desire, and destiny?)
In the backyard camp of the man and the woman a quiet argument rages, while little ones dream Morse code from a brave half-sibling. By dawn a compromise is reached. Cranes remove the roof of the house, and the man and woman find the half-child -- malnourished, scared, and over-read, yes, but very much alive.
The love of the man and woman blossoms and their pile of newspapers grows to tower over the whole neighborhood. A beacon of hope and truth in a decaying, dangerous world.
The secret to not throwing out the paper is that it prevents the day from ending. Whereas before, time might have been a succession of days, one leading to the next, now it should be pictured more as a kind of revolving door. By staying longer in the door, you end up right where you started. Time stops: Nothing can hurt you, nobody dies, and love never ends.
There are marital relations between the man and woman, and they have 2.5 children. When the piles grow too high they carve paths with a hedger. When that becomes unsustainable they pitch a tent in the backyard, sending the half-child into the house on slender missions to find somewhere, anywhere, where a newspaper can be added.
On one such mission the half-child disappears and the marriage of the man and the woman faces its first crisis. It's the man's thought that the game is up; that they must empty the house of newspapers in the desperate hope of finding their beloved half-child. The woman sees his side, but believes that altering the process now would renew the passage of time, thus re-opening their lives to pain, death, and disappointment.
(Or, what's the sense of regaining a half-child, only to see the entire family threatened by the vagaries of chance, desire, and destiny?)
In the backyard camp of the man and the woman a quiet argument rages, while little ones dream Morse code from a brave half-sibling. By dawn a compromise is reached. Cranes remove the roof of the house, and the man and woman find the half-child -- malnourished, scared, and over-read, yes, but very much alive.
The love of the man and woman blossoms and their pile of newspapers grows to tower over the whole neighborhood. A beacon of hope and truth in a decaying, dangerous world.
5.25.2009
blaming the demon drink
More reprehensible shit I did when I was drinking, and making blog amends.
To my parents: I'm sorry I worshiped the devil in your house. That I traded your furniture for a quart of hooch. For the fire, and that I put out that hit.
To my first wife, my heart's desire, my Becky Sue: I'm sorry I didn't wash the dishes unless you begged, that I never said sorry until morning. That I slept with your parents, spurring our pulsating bodies forward on that fateful autumn paddle boat, Baltimore Harbor, 1997. Though I know it can never be enough, I've taken down the streaming video.
To Mindy, my treasure, my second wife: I'm sorry, sincerely sorry I sold our children on E-Bay. What I can say is that each fetched the Buy It Now price, that each faced ground shipping with the heart of a champion. I know that parental pride can only take you so far; after that you want the identities of the purchasers. I can only apologize again, my love, and refer you to E-bay's privacy policy.
To the Gay Men's Chorus of San Diego: I'm sorry I hurt you, sorry I disrespected you. All I have is a heavy heart, a dim memory of awakening center stage under a pile of cops, and this restraining order. Please be assured that I intend to honor it.
To the countries I invaded, the Space Shuttle I blew up, the old ladies I mugged, the orphans I stole candy from, the cats I skinned/dogs I ran over and others too countless to name: I'm sorry. It wasn't me, it was the demon drink. Today is the first day of the rest of my life.
To my parents: I'm sorry I worshiped the devil in your house. That I traded your furniture for a quart of hooch. For the fire, and that I put out that hit.
To my first wife, my heart's desire, my Becky Sue: I'm sorry I didn't wash the dishes unless you begged, that I never said sorry until morning. That I slept with your parents, spurring our pulsating bodies forward on that fateful autumn paddle boat, Baltimore Harbor, 1997. Though I know it can never be enough, I've taken down the streaming video.
To Mindy, my treasure, my second wife: I'm sorry, sincerely sorry I sold our children on E-Bay. What I can say is that each fetched the Buy It Now price, that each faced ground shipping with the heart of a champion. I know that parental pride can only take you so far; after that you want the identities of the purchasers. I can only apologize again, my love, and refer you to E-bay's privacy policy.
To the Gay Men's Chorus of San Diego: I'm sorry I hurt you, sorry I disrespected you. All I have is a heavy heart, a dim memory of awakening center stage under a pile of cops, and this restraining order. Please be assured that I intend to honor it.
To the countries I invaded, the Space Shuttle I blew up, the old ladies I mugged, the orphans I stole candy from, the cats I skinned/dogs I ran over and others too countless to name: I'm sorry. It wasn't me, it was the demon drink. Today is the first day of the rest of my life.
5.23.2009
quack
Nat's first word! Pointing and laughing at rubber ducks in the tub, in the silly voice he cribbed from his mother. Slapping the water with wild flat palms.
5.22.2009
house on fire
I have a snow globe, something I got for Christmas when I was 17 from an aunt overseas who'd never acknowledged that I'd grown past 9.
The layout is basic snow globe. There's a two-story 19th century house, with a lamp post and a horse in a small barn off to the back of the lot, surrounded by a couple of other, smaller houses. A few tiny neighbors walking by. The ground snow-covered, and the sidewalks. The streets are just wet--shiny and black.
On the bottom of the globe, under the base, I mean, there's a white button. You shake the globe and push the button and after a few minutes, little plumes of smoke start curling out from the top windows of the house. Eventually tiny flames lick all four sides, bottom up, and then the whole thing's up in flames.
At the last second there's an additional flicker of activity in the house, a man and woman trying to run out, but you can see it's too late.
I'm not sure my aunt knew about the button, but it's possible she'd been baiting me for years, and this was her idea of a sick joke or life lesson.
The layout is basic snow globe. There's a two-story 19th century house, with a lamp post and a horse in a small barn off to the back of the lot, surrounded by a couple of other, smaller houses. A few tiny neighbors walking by. The ground snow-covered, and the sidewalks. The streets are just wet--shiny and black.
On the bottom of the globe, under the base, I mean, there's a white button. You shake the globe and push the button and after a few minutes, little plumes of smoke start curling out from the top windows of the house. Eventually tiny flames lick all four sides, bottom up, and then the whole thing's up in flames.
At the last second there's an additional flicker of activity in the house, a man and woman trying to run out, but you can see it's too late.
I'm not sure my aunt knew about the button, but it's possible she'd been baiting me for years, and this was her idea of a sick joke or life lesson.
5.20.2009
bird's eye view
You're on a hike, a day hike where all of human history is a mountain range. Some of the mountains are green, verdant, lush as spring. Some are gray and snow-capped, some are solid lava long-cooled, burning lakes of fire bubbling inside. Some, and these are the shitty ones, trust me, are totally man-made. Styrofoam. But the mountains are so densely packed, one taller than the next, that all you can see is the mountain you're on, maybe a little of the next one or the one behind you. This hike is long as fuck; luckily you've brought some optimal-assed trail mix that's keeping you in tip-top stride. You're the shit, don't sweat it.
On your hike you walk past everyone who's ever lived. It's only polite to wave hello, hiker's credo, and as you do you notice a range of expression and experience. Any emotion, hope, or dream you can name, lit in the eyes and faces of your fellow hikers. All the evil or good there's ever been, etc. But everyone says hello, down to the best and worst of them, and as you pass you can understand how they all got to where they are, to where they were. What's crazy is you're struck point by point by history, seemingly at random. One hiker's from 1709. Another from 1933, and this kid from 702. Another is from this exact age. Then you're in different calendars, the future, etc.
It's a disorienting trip and you're almost out of trail mix. Fuck this metaphor. Only then you get to the highest peak in the whole range. The highest by far. And out there below you is all human history, everyone and everything there's ever been, and for a minute you can sit on a rock and take it in, that whole god-damned crazy dense trip, before you start back.
For just that interlude you're outside it and this is life, this thing you're looking at from the outside, from a bird's eye view. And the weight's almost too much to bear, but who cares what you can bear because in the end your view only matters so much, it's one in a zillion.
Spent more time with Bach's "Aria Varied in an Italian Manner" today. Variation IX breaks it wide open-- switching the time from 4/4 to 12/8, throwing an aerial view at what had previously just been another fat guy in a South Jersey rec room.
On your hike you walk past everyone who's ever lived. It's only polite to wave hello, hiker's credo, and as you do you notice a range of expression and experience. Any emotion, hope, or dream you can name, lit in the eyes and faces of your fellow hikers. All the evil or good there's ever been, etc. But everyone says hello, down to the best and worst of them, and as you pass you can understand how they all got to where they are, to where they were. What's crazy is you're struck point by point by history, seemingly at random. One hiker's from 1709. Another from 1933, and this kid from 702. Another is from this exact age. Then you're in different calendars, the future, etc.
It's a disorienting trip and you're almost out of trail mix. Fuck this metaphor. Only then you get to the highest peak in the whole range. The highest by far. And out there below you is all human history, everyone and everything there's ever been, and for a minute you can sit on a rock and take it in, that whole god-damned crazy dense trip, before you start back.
For just that interlude you're outside it and this is life, this thing you're looking at from the outside, from a bird's eye view. And the weight's almost too much to bear, but who cares what you can bear because in the end your view only matters so much, it's one in a zillion.
Spent more time with Bach's "Aria Varied in an Italian Manner" today. Variation IX breaks it wide open-- switching the time from 4/4 to 12/8, throwing an aerial view at what had previously just been another fat guy in a South Jersey rec room.
5.18.2009
a fall is a flight
The piano fell out of tune in February, which the tuner said would happen when he first came in December. It was May before I called him back. He said it should be good now until the end of the summer, when the shifting weather will drag the pitch in a million different directions.
This morning in its best new intonation the piano couldn't have expected the torture I'd put it through, mucking up some Bach. Variations on an aria in an Italian manner, in the manner of five sonnambulatic Italians in a potato sack race, with their ankles tied together on a pot-holed 70-degree incline.
But every variation repeats, giving me a chance that second or fifth time through to approximate triplets and grace notes, notes that by a generous reckoning might even register as 16ths, were the tempo slowed 200 percent and the listeners dosed with ketamine.
The problem is trying find the right note. Only one note is; the rest are garbage at best or at worst, fusion. The detective should say something clever and piercing; he shouldn't speak with the air of a spurned lover in a harlequin romance or don a Cincinatti Bengals uniform, unless that move comes in the service of solving the case. The sprinter doesn't squat to shit mid-way through the hundred yard dash, nor does the tight-rope walker at the midpoint of the wavering rope. Unless for either it is a shitting to absolve oneself of a tremendous weight, to sail onward to victory with unprecedented lightness.
By their own survival instinct the notes form lines, a sheet on a summer clothesline with storm wind under it, lifting it into concave sine patterns. For a second my Italians become airborne and a fall is a flight. Then I hit a clinker, and can't get the flow back. I have to go, it's time for work, and that's all I can think for the last few bars.
This morning in its best new intonation the piano couldn't have expected the torture I'd put it through, mucking up some Bach. Variations on an aria in an Italian manner, in the manner of five sonnambulatic Italians in a potato sack race, with their ankles tied together on a pot-holed 70-degree incline.
But every variation repeats, giving me a chance that second or fifth time through to approximate triplets and grace notes, notes that by a generous reckoning might even register as 16ths, were the tempo slowed 200 percent and the listeners dosed with ketamine.
The problem is trying find the right note. Only one note is; the rest are garbage at best or at worst, fusion. The detective should say something clever and piercing; he shouldn't speak with the air of a spurned lover in a harlequin romance or don a Cincinatti Bengals uniform, unless that move comes in the service of solving the case. The sprinter doesn't squat to shit mid-way through the hundred yard dash, nor does the tight-rope walker at the midpoint of the wavering rope. Unless for either it is a shitting to absolve oneself of a tremendous weight, to sail onward to victory with unprecedented lightness.
By their own survival instinct the notes form lines, a sheet on a summer clothesline with storm wind under it, lifting it into concave sine patterns. For a second my Italians become airborne and a fall is a flight. Then I hit a clinker, and can't get the flow back. I have to go, it's time for work, and that's all I can think for the last few bars.
5.17.2009
two months
Two months since I had a drink. I'm clearer, more level. Most of my old t-shirts and all of my pants fit again. I feel more aware of how I'm feeling and better able to check that needs be. I'm also a thousand times less depressed.
I just read my first Zola, L'Assommoir, which shows the arc of a couple destroyed by drink. The husband gets delirium tremens; the wife dies under a staircase. While both situations struck me as extreme to be directly applicable to my life, they also rang true.
In about 15 years drinking I did some reprehensible shit. I drove drunk twice, once getting pulled over and only escaping a breathalyzer out of luck and over-politeness. I kicked in a door in a maudlin rage, dated the wrong people, dated the right people and systematically fucked their friends. I flunked out of college, saw and instantly forgot lover's eyes or movies. Came close to punching someone I love in the face.
I cried my eyes out because a girl wouldn't kiss me, then drank so much I puked before she could. I lost friends, drank until I couldn't get drunker, then snorted heroin or popped capsules of unknown chemical liquid. Blacked out and woke up in somebody's mouth (okay I'm not saying it was all bad).
Early one morning I got into an accident, maybe one I would have avoided had I been more alert, less groggy and hungover. Another time I almost pulled out in front of an 18-wheeler. Not drunk then, just hung over. Sluggish. Another time I crashed a TNT-laden chopper into a childrens' hospital.
I owe it to my family not to hasten death on purpose. To take care of myself and them. To pay more attention. There are things I wanted to understand more in the Zola, so I'm reading it again.
I just read my first Zola, L'Assommoir, which shows the arc of a couple destroyed by drink. The husband gets delirium tremens; the wife dies under a staircase. While both situations struck me as extreme to be directly applicable to my life, they also rang true.
In about 15 years drinking I did some reprehensible shit. I drove drunk twice, once getting pulled over and only escaping a breathalyzer out of luck and over-politeness. I kicked in a door in a maudlin rage, dated the wrong people, dated the right people and systematically fucked their friends. I flunked out of college, saw and instantly forgot lover's eyes or movies. Came close to punching someone I love in the face.
I cried my eyes out because a girl wouldn't kiss me, then drank so much I puked before she could. I lost friends, drank until I couldn't get drunker, then snorted heroin or popped capsules of unknown chemical liquid. Blacked out and woke up in somebody's mouth (okay I'm not saying it was all bad).
Early one morning I got into an accident, maybe one I would have avoided had I been more alert, less groggy and hungover. Another time I almost pulled out in front of an 18-wheeler. Not drunk then, just hung over. Sluggish. Another time I crashed a TNT-laden chopper into a childrens' hospital.
I owe it to my family not to hasten death on purpose. To take care of myself and them. To pay more attention. There are things I wanted to understand more in the Zola, so I'm reading it again.
5.13.2009
fundraiser
I've hit a wall in my work raising money for charity: I've come to see the statement of problem as more compelling and believable than the solution I'm trying to sell. The problem can be defined to the nth detail. The solution often seems implied at best and when there are measurable outcomes it's unclear how solving the problem is one of them.
In the end I focus on the quality of how the proposal is written, which I can control. And when it gets funded and it looks like the project will have any positive impact on the world at all, I get all inordinately happy. I guess it should be enough to know that sometimes the work pays people's salaries.
In the end I focus on the quality of how the proposal is written, which I can control. And when it gets funded and it looks like the project will have any positive impact on the world at all, I get all inordinately happy. I guess it should be enough to know that sometimes the work pays people's salaries.
5.11.2009
everyone there was white
Tonight I went to a book party with L., at the Four Seasons in shitty Midtown. The hors d'oevres were delicious but everyone there was white. The book was about the wacky adventures of an investment bank that recently nearly destroyed the U.S. economy.
There were crab cakes and tuna with caviar dressing on potato chips and caviar by itself in little open pouches of dough. There were white bean crackers and spring rolls and shrimp curled into a defensive crouch. Strips of chicken on wooden sticks. All of the servers were white, too.
There were cheese poppers and roast beef crackers and youngish professionals eyeing each other in mating clothes, a group you could picture dashing from the Mayflower with the maddening scent of American money on their noses, pausing only to populate New England.
The guy who turned on the water for you in the bathroom seemed like he might be olive-skinned, maybe from a country near the Mediterranean. But it was dim in there and he turned out to be white too. A guy from a catty website made sincere pleasant smalltalk. Someone complained: "They've declared war on the rich."
We took the V down to 34th and walked over to Penn. There was an altercation at the Sbarro on the corner of 32nd and 7th. Actually, people had set it on fire. Everybody in the crowd outside the burning restaurant was white, too. Eventually the fire was really raging and the crowd had to back away. Their shadows extended far into the sky, arms waving, hands searching out dim stars.
There were crab cakes and tuna with caviar dressing on potato chips and caviar by itself in little open pouches of dough. There were white bean crackers and spring rolls and shrimp curled into a defensive crouch. Strips of chicken on wooden sticks. All of the servers were white, too.
There were cheese poppers and roast beef crackers and youngish professionals eyeing each other in mating clothes, a group you could picture dashing from the Mayflower with the maddening scent of American money on their noses, pausing only to populate New England.
The guy who turned on the water for you in the bathroom seemed like he might be olive-skinned, maybe from a country near the Mediterranean. But it was dim in there and he turned out to be white too. A guy from a catty website made sincere pleasant smalltalk. Someone complained: "They've declared war on the rich."
We took the V down to 34th and walked over to Penn. There was an altercation at the Sbarro on the corner of 32nd and 7th. Actually, people had set it on fire. Everybody in the crowd outside the burning restaurant was white, too. Eventually the fire was really raging and the crowd had to back away. Their shadows extended far into the sky, arms waving, hands searching out dim stars.
5.10.2009
delaware
Nat and I are up early this morning. The air smells like Canada; it's crisp and perfect, like a fresh apple left out over night in an oak bucket. We walk to Wawa and I get you a Times and me a coffee. Nat wants to drink the coffee so we have breakfast, Greek yogurt with Gerber banana mixed in, a small bottle of formula.
We're listening to Monk's Misterioso , its joyful major sixths like a friendly arachnid who lost 2 legs in the war but whose heart melted for love and now he wanders the land, regaling the children with stories of all he's seen. To live and breathe, my children, to eat flies, the colors and sounds and the sweet noble spinning of the Earth. Nat and I like this, he's nodding his head and dancing along to the ribbons of saxophone.
When the Monk finishes and breakfast's done I look through the CDs and find a Death Cab one, the one with the drawn out "I will possess your heart" and not much else I've bonded with (still a listen in progress). I can't figure out what would put me in the mood for that until I remember a day last summer before Nat was out in the air when we drove to Delaware for A's sister's wedding. We had some time so we stopped at Rehoboth. On the way we'd heard the song on the radio and we couldn't stop singing the chorus, which was all we'd retained.
You were so strong carrying our son. That day it was like 100 but you wanted to be on the beach so we were and it hit me how everything was going to change and now it has, only better than I let myself hope. It's incredible to me what you did and what you've done, it's incredible to me that we're here and he's here, over our heads in love.
5.09.2009
late Picasso
At opposite ends of a hall with high wood beamed ceilings are doors. A door of light and a door of dark. Inside the dark room you can't see anything, not even the light from the hall. When your eyes adjust you see blurred shapes on a blurred platform.
In the light room are 20 or so men in 17th-century costume trying out for a TV commercial. The coveted role is Rembrandt, the narrator; the commercial is for a device that's one part bong and one part phallus, called The Dildabong.
The role of Rembrandt calls for the actor to dress as a musketeer, who should wield The Dildabong as a vanquishing sword. For beginners the suggested order is bong, dildo. Mixed mode is recommended only for advanced users craving a more membranous high. The order of the name suggests a yet more challenging application, the possible result of a perilous quest for enlightenment.
In the dark room when your eyes adjust you see lovers on a soft brown bed. Their bodies exhibit abnormal plasticity, as if their genes have scrambled and an arm can have eyes and legs grow sensibly from necks. The constraints of matter became matters of trivia when the lines foreshortened and blurred in the fading light.
Picasso's final performance was in Indianapolis at the Market Square Arena on June 26, 1977. According to many from his entourage, it was the "best show he had given in a long time," with "some strong singing."
In the light room are 20 or so men in 17th-century costume trying out for a TV commercial. The coveted role is Rembrandt, the narrator; the commercial is for a device that's one part bong and one part phallus, called The Dildabong.
The role of Rembrandt calls for the actor to dress as a musketeer, who should wield The Dildabong as a vanquishing sword. For beginners the suggested order is bong, dildo. Mixed mode is recommended only for advanced users craving a more membranous high. The order of the name suggests a yet more challenging application, the possible result of a perilous quest for enlightenment.
In the dark room when your eyes adjust you see lovers on a soft brown bed. Their bodies exhibit abnormal plasticity, as if their genes have scrambled and an arm can have eyes and legs grow sensibly from necks. The constraints of matter became matters of trivia when the lines foreshortened and blurred in the fading light.
Picasso's final performance was in Indianapolis at the Market Square Arena on June 26, 1977. According to many from his entourage, it was the "best show he had given in a long time," with "some strong singing."
5.08.2009
funnel cloud/caesura
the noise from the thunder woke him up. it scared and confused him. he was standing in his crib so freaked his cries were confused and stutter stop. he was still half asleep.
i sat with him on the rocking chair, holding him. sang to him. it wasn't a song with words. it was from a deeper or non-lingual place, a song about safety, intentions, strong hopes for bright futures. a song about Dartmouth. my strong hope that he gets in. it was actually the Dartmouth fight song.
i sat with him until the storm passed, holding him in my arms after he'd long gone back to sleep. by some point it was more for me than for him. caesura to emphasize: concrete example of being able to protect him.
i go to sleep and my dream is of a change of pressure in the room and looking out to see a funnel cloud on the closing horizon. we all have to get to the basement but i'm not sure there's time.
i sat with him on the rocking chair, holding him. sang to him. it wasn't a song with words. it was from a deeper or non-lingual place, a song about safety, intentions, strong hopes for bright futures. a song about Dartmouth. my strong hope that he gets in. it was actually the Dartmouth fight song.
i sat with him until the storm passed, holding him in my arms after he'd long gone back to sleep. by some point it was more for me than for him. caesura to emphasize: concrete example of being able to protect him.
i go to sleep and my dream is of a change of pressure in the room and looking out to see a funnel cloud on the closing horizon. we all have to get to the basement but i'm not sure there's time.
5.02.2009
stress test/wishing you well
I had a stress test this week. Because when I went on vacation this winter when I went out into the water for the first time it felt like my chest had cold fingers stretched inside it, for a long minute. The water was beautiful, crisp and the sunlight had worked out a mutually beneficial arrangement with it. The fingers eventually retracted and maybe it was all my imagination.
I had a stress test because I had a checkup and told a doctor. They shaved my chest in a few places and stuck EKG wires on the cleared skin, then I got on a treadmill. Printer paper spat out the results like a seismograph.
At the end of the test the computer froze. The Windows hourglass for suspense. The tech and the nurse said that happens sometimes. Then the printer changed its pace and a single dense sheet like a photograph started to print. It looked like a Cornell box. An aged wooden box painted navy blue, held together by rusty nails. The box was open so you could see the objects inside. A long lock of a woman's hair. A diecast replica of the Space Shuttle Challenger. A birthday card from my mom's mom that I thought I hadn't saved. And all the mean things I'd ever said to you. They said that happens sometimes, and they'd send the results on to my GP.
We were good friends and that made it seem perfect for us to work together. I know how we pictured it was different than how it turned out. It ended up with both of us stuck pushing forever in opposite directions. It's painful to me because we did good work together. None of it changed the world (which was different from how I pictured it.) But maybe some of it prevented the world from getting worse in small areas that two other people wouldn't have noticed. Maybe it stalled some inevitable decline.
Man, I'm proud of you for seeing we were stuck and making a change. I think I would have been willing to keep pushing until it broke. Maybe it did break and I didn't notice. I'm sorry it got to this. But I wish you well.
The other day in the office you had all your papers in trash bags. A decade worth of records of your good fight. I'm glad I got to help you with some of that. I'm sorry so much energy got wasted trying to make you see my perfect vision of the world.
My hope is that when this shakes out and I'm over here and you're over there we can think of each other and know the other one is trying to make things better. That neither of us is alone in that. Maybe one day we'll be able to talk about it.
I had a stress test because I had a checkup and told a doctor. They shaved my chest in a few places and stuck EKG wires on the cleared skin, then I got on a treadmill. Printer paper spat out the results like a seismograph.
At the end of the test the computer froze. The Windows hourglass for suspense. The tech and the nurse said that happens sometimes. Then the printer changed its pace and a single dense sheet like a photograph started to print. It looked like a Cornell box. An aged wooden box painted navy blue, held together by rusty nails. The box was open so you could see the objects inside. A long lock of a woman's hair. A diecast replica of the Space Shuttle Challenger. A birthday card from my mom's mom that I thought I hadn't saved. And all the mean things I'd ever said to you. They said that happens sometimes, and they'd send the results on to my GP.
We were good friends and that made it seem perfect for us to work together. I know how we pictured it was different than how it turned out. It ended up with both of us stuck pushing forever in opposite directions. It's painful to me because we did good work together. None of it changed the world (which was different from how I pictured it.) But maybe some of it prevented the world from getting worse in small areas that two other people wouldn't have noticed. Maybe it stalled some inevitable decline.
Man, I'm proud of you for seeing we were stuck and making a change. I think I would have been willing to keep pushing until it broke. Maybe it did break and I didn't notice. I'm sorry it got to this. But I wish you well.
The other day in the office you had all your papers in trash bags. A decade worth of records of your good fight. I'm glad I got to help you with some of that. I'm sorry so much energy got wasted trying to make you see my perfect vision of the world.
My hope is that when this shakes out and I'm over here and you're over there we can think of each other and know the other one is trying to make things better. That neither of us is alone in that. Maybe one day we'll be able to talk about it.
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