If you ever feel bad about thinking about going off Facebook, just try actually going through with it and watch how mean the thing is in response. It picks your 3 or 4 favorite people and shows you their pictures, tells you how much they'll miss you.
If you leave by the most obvious route offered, you aren't even really leaving. If you figure out how to fully exit, it removes all traces that you ever existed, so your friends are left commenting on things you never said.
It isn't that I don't want the connections, I just don't want them confined to a snow globe full of mirrors. I'll let you know if I figure anything out, or whether maximum tundra persists despite this latest half-baked attempt at cleaning house.
11.12.2010
11.04.2010
russian doll
Our new house is an old house and when we moved in you mentioned offhand that you felt the presence of other histories, other owners that had come before. I didn't notice it at first but gradually I did; it started to feel like our lives in that house were the outer surface of a Russian doll, with six or seven vanished generations clamoring from the inside, sealed hermetic, waiting for their chance.
You show me important things in that offhand way, and gradually I could feel the weight of -- but couldn't see -- other lives from the past couple of centuries in that house. I felt strangely accountable to them, and I wondered what they'd think when I snuck a snack at night, or watched too much TV, or said something curt to you.
Gradually those lives felt more real. Sometimes walking into the kitchen I would hear someone was crying in the heat vent, a mournful cry beyond reserve, beyond despair. Late, the house would fill with incongruous smells, like baking bread, or camphor, or wine that had gone sour. I would get this fast alone sense and feel a need to run upstairs,looking behind me the whole way, and I would lie down as quick as possible, without even taking off my shoes. My dreams came from other eras, and I would wake up mid-thought, in a mind I didn't recognize.
Right when we had our first child something shifted. When we got home from the hospital I could feel them all waiting up for us, like proud relatives. I was nervous, and it helped me sense that things would be alright -- that we would figure it out.
I was excited to tell you I could feel the ghosts in this house all around us, like a greeting party, but you told me it was all imagination and asked me to put on some tea. I said you're probably right. It's been years now and I can't tell if the ghosts are gone or if we just stopped noticing their presence.
You show me important things in that offhand way, and gradually I could feel the weight of -- but couldn't see -- other lives from the past couple of centuries in that house. I felt strangely accountable to them, and I wondered what they'd think when I snuck a snack at night, or watched too much TV, or said something curt to you.
Gradually those lives felt more real. Sometimes walking into the kitchen I would hear someone was crying in the heat vent, a mournful cry beyond reserve, beyond despair. Late, the house would fill with incongruous smells, like baking bread, or camphor, or wine that had gone sour. I would get this fast alone sense and feel a need to run upstairs,looking behind me the whole way, and I would lie down as quick as possible, without even taking off my shoes. My dreams came from other eras, and I would wake up mid-thought, in a mind I didn't recognize.
Right when we had our first child something shifted. When we got home from the hospital I could feel them all waiting up for us, like proud relatives. I was nervous, and it helped me sense that things would be alright -- that we would figure it out.
I was excited to tell you I could feel the ghosts in this house all around us, like a greeting party, but you told me it was all imagination and asked me to put on some tea. I said you're probably right. It's been years now and I can't tell if the ghosts are gone or if we just stopped noticing their presence.
10.20.2010
apple
Things had conspired to keep me on a PC. I liked that you could configure it yourself, that you had more free software available for it, with more platform flexibility. The x factor for Macs seemed so boutique, so full of shit that I was never really tempted. Then, one day between an open-source mp3 word processor that wouldn't stop crashing and a mysterious virus that emailed photos of my detumescent junk to my extended family and all my business contacts, something shifted. I found myself paying closer attention to the commercials, to the generally well-adjusted personalities and successful lives of the people I knew who "thought different." I began to wonder if it wasn't time to think different myself.
I went to the Apple Store. It was packed and everybody there seemed, I don't know how to put it, somehow hotter than they actually were. It wasn't that people were necessarily more physically fit, but the dudes who were 50 pounds overweight somehow knew how to wear it, and women (snaggletoothed but proud) seemed generally more interested in talking to them, about the latest accessories, about the iPad, about the ramifications of the new Iphone on communication as we know it. They all went bathed in a bright white light. I was hooked, and I almost broken down right there and bought a laptop on credit in the store. Fortunately, because I was so caught up in the moment I actually might have gone ahead with it then and there, the salespeople were too busy to answer my questions. By the time one had time for me, I had lost my nerve.
I drove home in a cloud of self-hate and lonely misery and cried for a long time. I made popcorn and jerked off and when that didn't calm me down I did it again, this time to the FBI Most Wanted website and when that still didn't do the trick I got drunk and dialed anyone who (a) had ever slept with me or (b) had even thought about it. Those few who still had the same number and were willing to pick up -- as a rule these represented category (b) -- could offer little advice. In the end, my situation was impossible. I wanted an Apple, but couldn't justify the $2500 it would cost for the computer and the cool new clothes to go with it. Finally, Ramona, definitively, sadly, category (b) Ramona, advised me to find one used and save for the clothes at a later date.
I was quite fortunate to find a used Macbook on Craigslist. The guy who sold it to was only willing to meet after midnight and at the Wawa of my choosing. He twitched a little and maybe slobbered once as he counted the money (and for a second I thought he was going to stab me and bolt) but the price was right. It worked great and eventually I would grow to appreciate the "Property of the University of Connecticut" stamped on the thing in bold, black immovable type. I think that hint of danger may have even added cachet or mystery at Starbucks, where for months after I was to parade my new laptop like a highly-convenient newborn child.
I got the clothes, as well: two Banana Republic shirts that I wash in the bathtub to save on detergent; one pair of Banana Republic pants that I wear every day and keep as clean as possible using Handy Wipes; and a pair of Berkenstocks that I wear rain, sleet, or snow.
The results have been outstanding. My world is bathed in a bright, cathode light, bold, heavenly light that emanates from behind doors and windows and through the branches of happy trees. My boss is off my back now, and on my steady diet of cupcakes and Mountain Dew I actually seem to be losing weight. The toothaches and painful diarrhea have stopped and my phone is always ringing. The best part is that I can pick up: It's never bill collectors or my mom or wrong numbers for the funeral home down the street. No, on the other end is Ramona, definitively, happily, category (a) Ramona.
I went to the Apple Store. It was packed and everybody there seemed, I don't know how to put it, somehow hotter than they actually were. It wasn't that people were necessarily more physically fit, but the dudes who were 50 pounds overweight somehow knew how to wear it, and women (snaggletoothed but proud) seemed generally more interested in talking to them, about the latest accessories, about the iPad, about the ramifications of the new Iphone on communication as we know it. They all went bathed in a bright white light. I was hooked, and I almost broken down right there and bought a laptop on credit in the store. Fortunately, because I was so caught up in the moment I actually might have gone ahead with it then and there, the salespeople were too busy to answer my questions. By the time one had time for me, I had lost my nerve.
I drove home in a cloud of self-hate and lonely misery and cried for a long time. I made popcorn and jerked off and when that didn't calm me down I did it again, this time to the FBI Most Wanted website and when that still didn't do the trick I got drunk and dialed anyone who (a) had ever slept with me or (b) had even thought about it. Those few who still had the same number and were willing to pick up -- as a rule these represented category (b) -- could offer little advice. In the end, my situation was impossible. I wanted an Apple, but couldn't justify the $2500 it would cost for the computer and the cool new clothes to go with it. Finally, Ramona, definitively, sadly, category (b) Ramona, advised me to find one used and save for the clothes at a later date.
I was quite fortunate to find a used Macbook on Craigslist. The guy who sold it to was only willing to meet after midnight and at the Wawa of my choosing. He twitched a little and maybe slobbered once as he counted the money (and for a second I thought he was going to stab me and bolt) but the price was right. It worked great and eventually I would grow to appreciate the "Property of the University of Connecticut" stamped on the thing in bold, black immovable type. I think that hint of danger may have even added cachet or mystery at Starbucks, where for months after I was to parade my new laptop like a highly-convenient newborn child.
I got the clothes, as well: two Banana Republic shirts that I wash in the bathtub to save on detergent; one pair of Banana Republic pants that I wear every day and keep as clean as possible using Handy Wipes; and a pair of Berkenstocks that I wear rain, sleet, or snow.
The results have been outstanding. My world is bathed in a bright, cathode light, bold, heavenly light that emanates from behind doors and windows and through the branches of happy trees. My boss is off my back now, and on my steady diet of cupcakes and Mountain Dew I actually seem to be losing weight. The toothaches and painful diarrhea have stopped and my phone is always ringing. The best part is that I can pick up: It's never bill collectors or my mom or wrong numbers for the funeral home down the street. No, on the other end is Ramona, definitively, happily, category (a) Ramona.
10.04.2010
reverse déjà vu
A selfish perk of parenting is getting to watch lessons and strategies that apply specifically to you, absorbed and expressed unfiltered by someone with infinitely less baggage than you bring to things yourself. In effect, from a very early age kids give you advice on how to live, advice that for its innocent implication or expression is somehow more hearable.
The kid's interests are catholic but skew categorically to music and sugar, to screaming for fun and throwing things, to Shrek and eggs and never going to sleep.
Subject also displays avid interest in garage doors.
For a while he would demand that I push the button, and each time he'd give a jump as the door engaged. Now, like everything (piloting a jet, open heart surgery, killing someone bare handed) he wants to do it himself.
Grandma and Peepaw have prime double garage doors, which open onto a tree-lined block filled with quiet autumn light so distilled and savory as to seem flown in from another country as a super-secret upper-middle-class suburban perk. The doors, the aura and smell of the garage are imbued with grandparent magic, characteristics of a fairy-tale world already remembered later in life as experienced now, in a kind of reverse déjà vu.
Saturday we were at it again, me the holder at switch-height, him opening and closing those vaunted doors. This time you could see a new thread: the boy was trying to conquer his fear. Each time he would push the button, each time giving a jump when the door engaged. Each time too, though, the jump would get less pronounced.
The kid's interests are catholic but skew categorically to music and sugar, to screaming for fun and throwing things, to Shrek and eggs and never going to sleep.
Subject also displays avid interest in garage doors.
For a while he would demand that I push the button, and each time he'd give a jump as the door engaged. Now, like everything (piloting a jet, open heart surgery, killing someone bare handed) he wants to do it himself.
Grandma and Peepaw have prime double garage doors, which open onto a tree-lined block filled with quiet autumn light so distilled and savory as to seem flown in from another country as a super-secret upper-middle-class suburban perk. The doors, the aura and smell of the garage are imbued with grandparent magic, characteristics of a fairy-tale world already remembered later in life as experienced now, in a kind of reverse déjà vu.
Saturday we were at it again, me the holder at switch-height, him opening and closing those vaunted doors. This time you could see a new thread: the boy was trying to conquer his fear. Each time he would push the button, each time giving a jump when the door engaged. Each time too, though, the jump would get less pronounced.
10.02.2010
impact
I work for a charity in the South Bronx. Most of my job is stringing together words, and shaping and polishing other people's writing. Sometimes I go to meetings where people ask questions about the words we've written, and I do my best to answer, or punt to someone who can.
The chief impact of my work is financial. I bring in money to help pay the salaries of other staff, who go out into the world and have real impact. On good days that equation is enough to justify my work. On bad days I wonder if it isn't circular, if I'm not changing the world at all, but rather just being a guy who polishes words and thanks people for their contributions and does his best to sleep at night.
My relationship to the South Bronx -- like my relationship to many things -- is one of distant love. I walk around in love with the neighborhood and the people I don't know and the Spanish they speak that I rarely fully grasp. Then I retreat to the top floor of the tallest building on the block and polish words, looking out at the people on the street below.
From that view you can't see much of people's faces but you can see their postures, how they walk, and you can infer what you like about how their lives are going. It's hard to assess direct impact from that height and maybe it's just as well.
Last year someone gave me a coat at random, a nice winter coat with a lot of pockets. It was a generous thing to do and the coat fit me perfectly. I could've afforded it I guess (one of the real impacts of my work to polish words). But it's a nicer coat than I would've purchased. I'm just not a very stylish person.
Tonight I left work late to meet my family in Manhattan for a late dinner. I was wearing the coat for the first time this year. It's one of those rare coats that makes sense in fall and winter, somehow it just adjusts magically to the temperature. It's a comfortable coat.
The walk to the subway is short, but tonight on my way down the hill a woman stumbled from my right to land face-first on the curb. She broke the fall a little with her hands and a lot with her mouth and forehead. It look liked she'd blacked out. She struggled to get up but she crumpled on the sidewalk. Someone walking by said drugs in Spanish and kept going. A couple of us stopped.
The woman was bleeding from the mouth and couldn't really right herself (though she kept trying). One of the people who stopped called 911. We tried to convince the woman that she should stay lying down, because she looked pretty bad. She really would've rather left, but she couldn't. Still, it looked kind of sad to see her lying there on the cold sidewalk, so I took off my coat and put it under her head while the same few of us waited for the ambulance to come.
It wasn't drugs, or if it was it wasn't just drugs. The woman said she was diabetic, trying to get as comfortable as she could, bleeding from the head and mouth with a coat for a pillow on a busy street, barely able to express herself.
Maybe she still has the coat with her at the hospital. Maybe I'll find it on my way in to work on Monday, crumbled in a ball and in real need of a wash, but I doubt it. Sometimes the world passes you objects and sometimes it asks nicely to have them back. Sometimes the way the world asks isn't as nice as you'd want.
The chief impact of my work is financial. I bring in money to help pay the salaries of other staff, who go out into the world and have real impact. On good days that equation is enough to justify my work. On bad days I wonder if it isn't circular, if I'm not changing the world at all, but rather just being a guy who polishes words and thanks people for their contributions and does his best to sleep at night.
My relationship to the South Bronx -- like my relationship to many things -- is one of distant love. I walk around in love with the neighborhood and the people I don't know and the Spanish they speak that I rarely fully grasp. Then I retreat to the top floor of the tallest building on the block and polish words, looking out at the people on the street below.
From that view you can't see much of people's faces but you can see their postures, how they walk, and you can infer what you like about how their lives are going. It's hard to assess direct impact from that height and maybe it's just as well.
Last year someone gave me a coat at random, a nice winter coat with a lot of pockets. It was a generous thing to do and the coat fit me perfectly. I could've afforded it I guess (one of the real impacts of my work to polish words). But it's a nicer coat than I would've purchased. I'm just not a very stylish person.
Tonight I left work late to meet my family in Manhattan for a late dinner. I was wearing the coat for the first time this year. It's one of those rare coats that makes sense in fall and winter, somehow it just adjusts magically to the temperature. It's a comfortable coat.
The walk to the subway is short, but tonight on my way down the hill a woman stumbled from my right to land face-first on the curb. She broke the fall a little with her hands and a lot with her mouth and forehead. It look liked she'd blacked out. She struggled to get up but she crumpled on the sidewalk. Someone walking by said drugs in Spanish and kept going. A couple of us stopped.
The woman was bleeding from the mouth and couldn't really right herself (though she kept trying). One of the people who stopped called 911. We tried to convince the woman that she should stay lying down, because she looked pretty bad. She really would've rather left, but she couldn't. Still, it looked kind of sad to see her lying there on the cold sidewalk, so I took off my coat and put it under her head while the same few of us waited for the ambulance to come.
It wasn't drugs, or if it was it wasn't just drugs. The woman said she was diabetic, trying to get as comfortable as she could, bleeding from the head and mouth with a coat for a pillow on a busy street, barely able to express herself.
Maybe she still has the coat with her at the hospital. Maybe I'll find it on my way in to work on Monday, crumbled in a ball and in real need of a wash, but I doubt it. Sometimes the world passes you objects and sometimes it asks nicely to have them back. Sometimes the way the world asks isn't as nice as you'd want.
10.01.2010
for the branches of trees
Funereal for the branches of trees, for leaves. All night the wind shook the house and when we woke up we were out to sea; the cat, the boy and I left you sleeping for once and rowed us back.
When the wind stops carrying portent take me out to pasture, plant me in the ground to ward off crows. Do leave a television with Netflix Instant, do lobby them to stock it more generously with the rare celluloid written thoughtful and crisp but for chrissakes let me be, don't make the mistake of talking my way. One day someone will get a bright and novel idea to pave over the field to build another thoughtful shopping center for the import of faraway vegetables. I venture they will still need a warder off for hassling crows, or at the very least someone to hoist out from the cellar every autumn to spice up the decor.
Funereal for the branches of trees, rotten where they sheltered years of alright suburban yard. A canopy not so diminished by the loss of one or several planks, a nature's structure hedging its bets in layered lattice until one day the whole thing gives way and falls, or some lawyer-fearing yardsmen call a tree service and extract further any hint of mystery from this old soil.
When the wind stops carrying portent take me out to pasture, plant me in the ground to ward off crows. Do leave a television with Netflix Instant, do lobby them to stock it more generously with the rare celluloid written thoughtful and crisp but for chrissakes let me be, don't make the mistake of talking my way. One day someone will get a bright and novel idea to pave over the field to build another thoughtful shopping center for the import of faraway vegetables. I venture they will still need a warder off for hassling crows, or at the very least someone to hoist out from the cellar every autumn to spice up the decor.
Funereal for the branches of trees, rotten where they sheltered years of alright suburban yard. A canopy not so diminished by the loss of one or several planks, a nature's structure hedging its bets in layered lattice until one day the whole thing gives way and falls, or some lawyer-fearing yardsmen call a tree service and extract further any hint of mystery from this old soil.
9.28.2010
graceless and ashamed
We're here to see an old ritual start again, built from preserved schematics and sewn from a continuous thread of anguish and pain. We've all brought our own pain and we're here to offer it up, some of us more stylishly than others, some of us older and further still from grace, some of us fatter and with more hair, hair in awkward and fearsome places, hair that makes us think of death.
JD expresses concern for the health of the performers; they are technicians, they are precision drivers into radiant discord, and they also look a little like our aging parents. Their actions are to be held close now in memory, because they cannot last forever. If this be some mislaid and freakish tribe, these are (if not elders) then our most senior warriors, scarred and broken, precise from the memory of a thousand futile hunts.
I offer DX a Sour Patch Kid and he refuses. I think to myself that I'm getting old too, that the time comes when a man must put down Sour Patch Kids. When I was young, I thought of childish things. Now that I'm old, I like sour things. I think about buying (but do not buy) a second pack.
The opening act a kind of mis-adventure; leading with the promise of gorgeous accordion that fills the old and lonely hall with sorrow, with pain remembered from across the sea, long ago. Followed by (it sounded) the ramblings of a charmless troubadour, the one you always end up stuck talking to at the party. A nice enough person, I'm sure.
From this you fear that order will never appear but out of the din arises Thor, sturdy and true, down-laying a blanket or better a sea of bells. Now the water is put to fire, now the angels fly from it, their eyes alit too; now they are burning, lighting the night sky with the pain of lost love.
This is a first show, this is a holding together, the eyes of the band locked to the central drummer, he and the bassist with the whole band and the whole audience hanging on each move. We are wishing, we are holding together and praying and by some point we are angels too, transported, on fire, over the ocean.
When Thor takes off his shirt you know you have arrived, but don't let it distract you. The man obviously goes to the gym; a nod to health, to health's need, to the rule of the body. Gira (this really happened) describes his naked body as ice cream on a stick, with "a little thing sticking out." Near the end of the show the thread is nearly lost, the rhythm section must rally. Gira implores, the table nearly skews but for its near loss the fire burns only moreso higher, only moreso killing and scalding and renewing, moreso branding or tattooing us in our shared pain.
At shows I retreat to my head and listen too technically, for mistakes, for chord progressions, for melody in its fluid parameters, a million ways to listen and stay in my head, detached, barely dancing, always self conscious. But at some point in this show I am really transported, non-technical, lost in time in a way that has never happened to me before, set into a pinball collage of old memories of pain.
I remember a boy a long time ago, a young boy just a little older than my son, remember his confused pain and all the pain that followed it a bit predictably, stupidly, unconsciously, the pain I've felt, the myriad and shameful pain I've caused. All I can remember is pain, stupid pain, futile and ridiculous pain, and I feel sorry for that boy at a distance, as if he were another person I remembered.
All around the room you see faces intent, offering, all of us here to offer our pain, here with the hope that it can be channeled in this ritual, poured out of us and into the loud air, blown free and leaving our spirits lighter, more alive, less drowning in time and memory, for God so loved the world he gave his only son.
Why do the angels hide their eyes from the light, graceless and ashamed, aloft in a stellar column, awaiting heaven's fire. What do they remember of their sin, what of it did they cherish, for what is their skin full of memory, their mouths, their fingers alive with the memory of fire.
Why do they mis-hang their heads, their limbs, why are their eyes so without life, what do they share of their last dreams, their pain, the looks of the ones they knew, or loved. Once there were their mouths, their fingers, kissing fire from tongue to tongue, once they lived.
Swans show @ the Trocadero, 9/28/10.
JD expresses concern for the health of the performers; they are technicians, they are precision drivers into radiant discord, and they also look a little like our aging parents. Their actions are to be held close now in memory, because they cannot last forever. If this be some mislaid and freakish tribe, these are (if not elders) then our most senior warriors, scarred and broken, precise from the memory of a thousand futile hunts.
I offer DX a Sour Patch Kid and he refuses. I think to myself that I'm getting old too, that the time comes when a man must put down Sour Patch Kids. When I was young, I thought of childish things. Now that I'm old, I like sour things. I think about buying (but do not buy) a second pack.
The opening act a kind of mis-adventure; leading with the promise of gorgeous accordion that fills the old and lonely hall with sorrow, with pain remembered from across the sea, long ago. Followed by (it sounded) the ramblings of a charmless troubadour, the one you always end up stuck talking to at the party. A nice enough person, I'm sure.
From this you fear that order will never appear but out of the din arises Thor, sturdy and true, down-laying a blanket or better a sea of bells. Now the water is put to fire, now the angels fly from it, their eyes alit too; now they are burning, lighting the night sky with the pain of lost love.
This is a first show, this is a holding together, the eyes of the band locked to the central drummer, he and the bassist with the whole band and the whole audience hanging on each move. We are wishing, we are holding together and praying and by some point we are angels too, transported, on fire, over the ocean.
When Thor takes off his shirt you know you have arrived, but don't let it distract you. The man obviously goes to the gym; a nod to health, to health's need, to the rule of the body. Gira (this really happened) describes his naked body as ice cream on a stick, with "a little thing sticking out." Near the end of the show the thread is nearly lost, the rhythm section must rally. Gira implores, the table nearly skews but for its near loss the fire burns only moreso higher, only moreso killing and scalding and renewing, moreso branding or tattooing us in our shared pain.
At shows I retreat to my head and listen too technically, for mistakes, for chord progressions, for melody in its fluid parameters, a million ways to listen and stay in my head, detached, barely dancing, always self conscious. But at some point in this show I am really transported, non-technical, lost in time in a way that has never happened to me before, set into a pinball collage of old memories of pain.
I remember a boy a long time ago, a young boy just a little older than my son, remember his confused pain and all the pain that followed it a bit predictably, stupidly, unconsciously, the pain I've felt, the myriad and shameful pain I've caused. All I can remember is pain, stupid pain, futile and ridiculous pain, and I feel sorry for that boy at a distance, as if he were another person I remembered.
All around the room you see faces intent, offering, all of us here to offer our pain, here with the hope that it can be channeled in this ritual, poured out of us and into the loud air, blown free and leaving our spirits lighter, more alive, less drowning in time and memory, for God so loved the world he gave his only son.
Why do the angels hide their eyes from the light, graceless and ashamed, aloft in a stellar column, awaiting heaven's fire. What do they remember of their sin, what of it did they cherish, for what is their skin full of memory, their mouths, their fingers alive with the memory of fire.
Why do they mis-hang their heads, their limbs, why are their eyes so without life, what do they share of their last dreams, their pain, the looks of the ones they knew, or loved. Once there were their mouths, their fingers, kissing fire from tongue to tongue, once they lived.
Swans show @ the Trocadero, 9/28/10.
9.24.2010
rhinoceros
This is going to sound a little weird but the other day when I was cleaning the basement I found the skeleton of a rhinoceros. I'm pretty sure it was a young rhinoceros. I'm not going to lie, when a man reaches a certain age and loses control of his basement and the years go by sluggish but inevitable -- like plus-sized models heralding hand-me-down fall fashion on a cheap and freely available kind of ketamine -- when that man one day can stand it no more and he cleans his basement and unearths the skeleton of a rhinoceros, it gives him pause.
When that day comes a man takes stock.
I'm clear on the fact that cleaning the basement was probably overdue. Most reasonable observers or agencies concerned for the welfare of the young or the population at large would tell you it was. When I told my wife I was finally going to clean the basement (my tone hopeful, my eyes full of romantic spark and pointed vaguely in the direction of her face) she grunted and began softly to cry, which I took to mean that she knew for sure that the cleaning was long overdue and in fact by this point totally insufficient. Then my wife buried her face in her hands and cried less softly and it was five or ten minutes before she could watch TV or text or even drink.
I was determined to clean the basement myself. On TV when a man loses control of his house (or even when he just falls a little behind for a few years) all these TV people basically surprise him at his house in the dead of night and like rape him or punch him in the stomach or face until he cries on camera, then his relatives testify to how impossible and selfish he is until he cries some more, then a therapist asks him why he's crying and while he answers a dozen or so people in ninja costumes break down his door and rape or punch him again and wisk everything that isn't nailed down to the town square for a televised sacrificial bonfire.
You can spare me that, friend. When I make a mess or get a little behind on things I want to handle it myself, even if it takes me a while to get to it. And it isn't like having a clean house is some salve or boon. If your house is perfectly clean you still have to live in it with the same people you lived with before, you just have less stuff now to distract you.
If for some reason it *were* me on TV, I wouldn't be the bozo clutching my privates defensively and blubbering to the camera about my lost years or how I never really knew what a clean house was. I'd have fun with it. There'd be outright sabotage ("oh, I see you found the deadly adders... I'd nearly lost hope"). There would be costumes; I'd spend most but not all of the episode dressed as a chicken, and the rest of it in a bathrobe. There would also be a room prepared for weeks in advance wherein (I would try to convince them) I routinely expressed my heartfelt belief that my urine should be preserved in three liter bottles that had once held Wegman's Diet Root Beer, and that feces is the living expression of God's will and should be smeared liberally onto the faces of all who enter my home.
As I said, when I found the rhinoceros it gave me pause. I consulted with my wife, who spat in my face and kicked me in the balls, which I took to mean that she also had no memory of having a rhinoceros of indeterminate age in our house at any point. But then she got a beer and sat watching ESPN, which I took as a positive sign, a flicker of possibility that "the grill was still hot."
Back downstairs I puzzled over the skeleton. I thought about having a yard sale or hawking it on Craigslist but I remembered, probably from TV, that most of the time that's just an excuse someone makes when they aren't ready to part with their loot.
I thought of working the rhinoceros skeleton into the decor of the basement, making it the focal point of some prehistoric man-cave, but I figured more than likely it would just end up piled under thousands of copies of The Sporting News, exactly as it had been before. I thought of the ninjas and the masked gentleman with the taser and my brother-in-law explaining what a douche I was on national TV. I thought of my children and what they'd say, what their friends would say, what their own future children would say. Most of all I thought of the spirit of the rhinoceros, held bound to earth, lost and alone in a suburban landscape that it never could have chosen for itself.
Then I started breaking down the skeleton into the smallest groupings I could get it into and started piling those in trash bags, and I bagged until my hands bled, and then I bagged some more.
When I got back from the dump my wife was on the porch drinking mojitos. I told her I'd made real progress and asked if she might make me a mojito. She told me to fuck myself and called me by another man's name, which I took to mean make your own mojito.
I did and we sat out on the porch, listening to the summer cars out on the freeway, to the swift and loving passage of time, and I knew it would all be fine.
9.22.2010
Mix Like a Master
Albeit abjectly listened squinting into the far corners of non-isolated earbud soundplanes, albeit detuned and fractured into fragments by the loud subway scrape of metal in an interminably ferocious battle to the death with like metal; albeit imperfectly heard perhaps to the point of not being there at all he still could swear he heard a whispered voice in the far back right of this one track, beginning exactly at this point shortly after 2 minutes into the track that he skipped back to for the rest of the ride downtown.
The trouble followed him up the street and into his apartment, through making dinner and eating standing at the kitchen counter and staring meaninglessly at a book with the player cued unconsciously back and back before declaring it pointless, closing the book, turning out all the lights and dipping back into the track again.
He poured himself a drink, lit mood lights and even smoked a joint: There simply wasn't any understanding what was being whispered from 2:04 to 2:19 in this godforsaken track. He tried changing the equalizer settings and plugging the thing into his stereo with an auxiliary wire, he borrowed better headphones from his neighbors (a little too stoned to venture out, but not so much so that he couldn’t pull it off). Nothing did it. It wasn't an exceptional record, it wasn't anything he'd listened to more than a dozen or so times, but this tucked in corner of this one song would be his defeat or his turning point, his entree into a new world of close attention, of deep listening and an acolyte's awareness, of no longer fail.
There has to be a way to remove some parts of a song in real time. This should be a feature of the format by now, he thinks, that mixing down ceases to be a prerequisite for the transfer to home listening. Rather, every song should be delivered whole, to be mixed listeners in real time. He pictures the whisper isolated and looped by itself or accompanied by the barest spectral synth or TR-808 pulse, and the thrill of deciphering the code. He briefly searches online for software with such a deconstructive feature. One link looks promising, but turns out to not be freeware or open source at all. Rather it’s a piece of software that costs about $50, but promises to allow mixing in the moment. Remix any track, the pop-up ad promises. Mix like a master.
He looks around for others, but all roads lead him back to the Master. He smokes some more and pours another drink and sets to looking around for a hacked copy. Some look promising, but none of the torrents work. He looks more closely at the legit website for the program, hoping to find a free trial but seeing no indications of the slightest download option. He scans the FAQ and finds nothing about a trial version of any kind, but the questions and answers (mostly about intellectual property rights, most of the answers suggesting erudite terrains for aural revisionary exploration, a dense catalog for a world he'd only daydreamed of minutes before) only serve to pique his interest further.
He has an odd little feeling purchasing the software, like he's crossed some threshold to bourgeois respectability that he'll struggle fruitlessly and without grace to escape for the rest of his life. The download process takes five minutes, the installer another five. It's after 1 in the morning when he nails down the last of the soundcard settings (slaying an irritating pop, a stuttering beyond the first few seconds of any clip), and it's later still when he figures out how to port the track from his player to his computer and into the program itself.
Are you ready to Mix like a Master? He is. And then it appears; a beautifully-designed, absolutely simple mixing board, with auto-guess labels for each track of the song, each customizable on the off chance that a specific audio track was incorrectly identified by the program’s expert and unprecedented algorithms. The distorted guitars and meandering bass and wander-to-a-click drums go without a fight, as do the lead vocals and the backing vocals and the spectral synths and the well-intended but probably excessive theremin and string section. There's still a little bleed, from an irksome, optimistic egg shaker, but with another hit and some readjusting of the light levels in the room the whispering turns out to be some inscrutable indie shit, words for the sake of sound only, devoid of meaning and never intended to convey a single thing.
He scoops himself a robust bowl of ice cream and loads Dark Side of the Moon, mixing and remixing and isolating and recombining until first light, past the first steps in the hall and the school buses and a guilty Diet Mountain Dew from the fridge, later still when he decides he'd better call out from work.
The trouble followed him up the street and into his apartment, through making dinner and eating standing at the kitchen counter and staring meaninglessly at a book with the player cued unconsciously back and back before declaring it pointless, closing the book, turning out all the lights and dipping back into the track again.
He poured himself a drink, lit mood lights and even smoked a joint: There simply wasn't any understanding what was being whispered from 2:04 to 2:19 in this godforsaken track. He tried changing the equalizer settings and plugging the thing into his stereo with an auxiliary wire, he borrowed better headphones from his neighbors (a little too stoned to venture out, but not so much so that he couldn’t pull it off). Nothing did it. It wasn't an exceptional record, it wasn't anything he'd listened to more than a dozen or so times, but this tucked in corner of this one song would be his defeat or his turning point, his entree into a new world of close attention, of deep listening and an acolyte's awareness, of no longer fail.
There has to be a way to remove some parts of a song in real time. This should be a feature of the format by now, he thinks, that mixing down ceases to be a prerequisite for the transfer to home listening. Rather, every song should be delivered whole, to be mixed listeners in real time. He pictures the whisper isolated and looped by itself or accompanied by the barest spectral synth or TR-808 pulse, and the thrill of deciphering the code. He briefly searches online for software with such a deconstructive feature. One link looks promising, but turns out to not be freeware or open source at all. Rather it’s a piece of software that costs about $50, but promises to allow mixing in the moment. Remix any track, the pop-up ad promises. Mix like a master.
He looks around for others, but all roads lead him back to the Master. He smokes some more and pours another drink and sets to looking around for a hacked copy. Some look promising, but none of the torrents work. He looks more closely at the legit website for the program, hoping to find a free trial but seeing no indications of the slightest download option. He scans the FAQ and finds nothing about a trial version of any kind, but the questions and answers (mostly about intellectual property rights, most of the answers suggesting erudite terrains for aural revisionary exploration, a dense catalog for a world he'd only daydreamed of minutes before) only serve to pique his interest further.
He has an odd little feeling purchasing the software, like he's crossed some threshold to bourgeois respectability that he'll struggle fruitlessly and without grace to escape for the rest of his life. The download process takes five minutes, the installer another five. It's after 1 in the morning when he nails down the last of the soundcard settings (slaying an irritating pop, a stuttering beyond the first few seconds of any clip), and it's later still when he figures out how to port the track from his player to his computer and into the program itself.
Are you ready to Mix like a Master? He is. And then it appears; a beautifully-designed, absolutely simple mixing board, with auto-guess labels for each track of the song, each customizable on the off chance that a specific audio track was incorrectly identified by the program’s expert and unprecedented algorithms. The distorted guitars and meandering bass and wander-to-a-click drums go without a fight, as do the lead vocals and the backing vocals and the spectral synths and the well-intended but probably excessive theremin and string section. There's still a little bleed, from an irksome, optimistic egg shaker, but with another hit and some readjusting of the light levels in the room the whispering turns out to be some inscrutable indie shit, words for the sake of sound only, devoid of meaning and never intended to convey a single thing.
He scoops himself a robust bowl of ice cream and loads Dark Side of the Moon, mixing and remixing and isolating and recombining until first light, past the first steps in the hall and the school buses and a guilty Diet Mountain Dew from the fridge, later still when he decides he'd better call out from work.
9.21.2010
a field of stars
When he decides he'll sleep N. stops settling and exhales sharply and sleeps through to a field of stars in oscillating patterns, in sharpshift constellations of familiar and beloved objects, nightglowoutlines of dump trucks, oversized plastic footballs, omnipotent vacuum cleaners and beach buckets flipped to form brigadier's helmets, ornate, not streamlined but regal, horses and woof woofs and a fuzzy cat and sippy cups of deliciously non-watered down apple juice.
When the firmament shifts or blinks to form each new pattern a collage of melodies in modulating sister keys pans stereowide through the room, where the boat rows and the bongo bongs, where the spider bitsies and Ms. Mary Mack dresses like a Beat Poet in a turtleneck, where old Dan Tucker gets narrowly out the way of the wheels on the bus. Said bus is driven by Raffi and it isn't that he's driving recklessly or drunk or high on cocaine or apple juice or distracted by the tender entreaties of his four best groupie moms; the fault is that of Mr. Tucker and I'd appreciate you refraining from questions about Raffi's character; he is at the very least a genius of arrangement and those are his assistants.
Before N. decides to sleep there are random games to be folded into the eachnight ritual (hide under pillows), rote references to Geneva conventions, surprisingly proactive calls for the changing of diapers, appeals to sleep in other rooms, to go downstairs for water, to just be left alone to sleep, please.
And when you honor that particular request and close the door you only have to count to ten before he's out of bed, over to the light, and when you open the door again his eyes are bright with humor, and of course the parenting manual says you aren't supposed to look him in the eye or laugh yourself at that point but christ, it's funny.
When the firmament shifts or blinks to form each new pattern a collage of melodies in modulating sister keys pans stereowide through the room, where the boat rows and the bongo bongs, where the spider bitsies and Ms. Mary Mack dresses like a Beat Poet in a turtleneck, where old Dan Tucker gets narrowly out the way of the wheels on the bus. Said bus is driven by Raffi and it isn't that he's driving recklessly or drunk or high on cocaine or apple juice or distracted by the tender entreaties of his four best groupie moms; the fault is that of Mr. Tucker and I'd appreciate you refraining from questions about Raffi's character; he is at the very least a genius of arrangement and those are his assistants.
Before N. decides to sleep there are random games to be folded into the eachnight ritual (hide under pillows), rote references to Geneva conventions, surprisingly proactive calls for the changing of diapers, appeals to sleep in other rooms, to go downstairs for water, to just be left alone to sleep, please.
And when you honor that particular request and close the door you only have to count to ten before he's out of bed, over to the light, and when you open the door again his eyes are bright with humor, and of course the parenting manual says you aren't supposed to look him in the eye or laugh yourself at that point but christ, it's funny.
9.08.2010
skrimshander/for the safe passage of another night
At night in this room nightflowers grow from the floors and a canopy of leaves shields from the rain and the crickets repeat pedantic their unerring secret in the vastly reverbified robust sonambulatic wind. We dream each three to our own worlds and do we dream the same or rather as polite dreamneighbors in film-lot primordial thatch huts, our latent thoughts alight as fireflies in the wistful forestsearching eyes of those who came before.
At night in this room: simplicity that gave us the dread slip in the toobright toofrenetic middling day, time and breath and togetherlives and forest not around but animistic through, within our hearts (or if this too goes too-stock then within our souls, or criminy, settle for our beings).
You, little one, when you laterlook at our lives then will you know the dreams we hold each in our hearts now, will the transmitted record seek through to your awakened heart intact as something more than the palest least echo of fire.
You, love, when you look at our lives then will you know how this corpulent muckraking daze held said dreams, how they were known like nothing known the selfsame and however fearful blinking held were held true the same.
You, searchers, see this togetherness parceled safe through the grim malaise of Jerseyed forest, a patch of dying trees huddled together in a newmint waste of parking lot, pray see this love intact and moved unerring to its future point, to be checked in your ancestral ghosts' collective list of return on past investment.
At night in this room: simplicity that gave us the dread slip in the toobright toofrenetic middling day, time and breath and togetherlives and forest not around but animistic through, within our hearts (or if this too goes too-stock then within our souls, or criminy, settle for our beings).
You, little one, when you laterlook at our lives then will you know the dreams we hold each in our hearts now, will the transmitted record seek through to your awakened heart intact as something more than the palest least echo of fire.
You, love, when you look at our lives then will you know how this corpulent muckraking daze held said dreams, how they were known like nothing known the selfsame and however fearful blinking held were held true the same.
You, searchers, see this togetherness parceled safe through the grim malaise of Jerseyed forest, a patch of dying trees huddled together in a newmint waste of parking lot, pray see this love intact and moved unerring to its future point, to be checked in your ancestral ghosts' collective list of return on past investment.
9.06.2010
2010 Eagles Horoscope
Roster Detail:
2 Akers, David, Sagittarius
29 Allen, Nate, Sagittarius
81 Avant, Jason, Taurus (Aries cusp)
51 Barnes, Antwan, Libra
84 Baskett, Hank, Virgo
26 Bell, Mike, Taurus
55 Bradley, Stewart, Scorpio
34 Buckley, Eldra, Cancer
97 Bunkley, Brodrick, Sagittarius
38 Calvin, Jorrick, Cancer
87 Celek, Brent, Aquarius
49 Chaney, Jamar, Libra
57 Clayton, Keenan, Gemini
59 Cole, Nick, Leo
58 Cole, Trent, Libra
42 Coleman, Kurt, Cancer
14 Cooper, Riley, Virgo
90 Dixon, Antonio, Cancer
46 Dorenbos, Jon, Cancer
65 Dunlap, King, Virgo
53 Fokou, Moise, Virgo
96 Gaither, Omar, Pisces
54 Graham, Brandon, Aries
21 Hanson, Joselio, Leo
82 Harbor, Clay, Cancer
79 Herremans, Todd, Libra
31 Hobbs, Ellis, Taurus
68 Howard, Austin, Aries
10 Jackson, DeSean, Sagittarius
67 Jackson, Jamaal, Taurus
62 Jean-Gilles, Max, Scorpio
56 Jordan, Akeem, Leo
74 Justice, Winston, Virgo
3 Kafka, Mike, Leo
4 Kolb, Kevin, Virgo
93 Laws, Trevor, Gemini
35 Lindley, Trevard, Aquarius
18 Maclin, Jeremy, Taurus
25 McCoy, LeSean, Cancer
77 McGlynn, Mike, Pisces
27 Mikell, Quintin, Virgo
75 Parker, Juqua, Taurus
23 Patterson, Dimitri, Gemini
98 Patterson, Mike, Virgo
71 Peters, Jason, Aquarius
6 Rocca, Sav, Scorpio
22 Samuel, Asante, Capricorn
50 Sims, Ernie, Capricorn
91 Tapp, Darryl, Virgo
52 Te'o-Nesheim, Daniel, Gemini
7 Vick, Michael, Cancer
43 Weaver, Leonard, Libra (Virgo cusp)
76 Wells, Reggie, Scorpio
Highlights: 10 Virgos, 8 Cancers, 6 Tauruses.
T. Everett Shrubkin's prediction: 11-5; Super Bowl Champions.
2 Akers, David, Sagittarius
29 Allen, Nate, Sagittarius
81 Avant, Jason, Taurus (Aries cusp)
51 Barnes, Antwan, Libra
84 Baskett, Hank, Virgo
26 Bell, Mike, Taurus
55 Bradley, Stewart, Scorpio
34 Buckley, Eldra, Cancer
97 Bunkley, Brodrick, Sagittarius
38 Calvin, Jorrick, Cancer
87 Celek, Brent, Aquarius
49 Chaney, Jamar, Libra
57 Clayton, Keenan, Gemini
59 Cole, Nick, Leo
58 Cole, Trent, Libra
42 Coleman, Kurt, Cancer
14 Cooper, Riley, Virgo
90 Dixon, Antonio, Cancer
46 Dorenbos, Jon, Cancer
65 Dunlap, King, Virgo
53 Fokou, Moise, Virgo
96 Gaither, Omar, Pisces
54 Graham, Brandon, Aries
21 Hanson, Joselio, Leo
82 Harbor, Clay, Cancer
79 Herremans, Todd, Libra
31 Hobbs, Ellis, Taurus
68 Howard, Austin, Aries
10 Jackson, DeSean, Sagittarius
67 Jackson, Jamaal, Taurus
62 Jean-Gilles, Max, Scorpio
56 Jordan, Akeem, Leo
74 Justice, Winston, Virgo
3 Kafka, Mike, Leo
4 Kolb, Kevin, Virgo
93 Laws, Trevor, Gemini
35 Lindley, Trevard, Aquarius
18 Maclin, Jeremy, Taurus
25 McCoy, LeSean, Cancer
77 McGlynn, Mike, Pisces
27 Mikell, Quintin, Virgo
75 Parker, Juqua, Taurus
23 Patterson, Dimitri, Gemini
98 Patterson, Mike, Virgo
71 Peters, Jason, Aquarius
6 Rocca, Sav, Scorpio
22 Samuel, Asante, Capricorn
50 Sims, Ernie, Capricorn
91 Tapp, Darryl, Virgo
52 Te'o-Nesheim, Daniel, Gemini
7 Vick, Michael, Cancer
43 Weaver, Leonard, Libra (Virgo cusp)
76 Wells, Reggie, Scorpio
Highlights: 10 Virgos, 8 Cancers, 6 Tauruses.
T. Everett Shrubkin's prediction: 11-5; Super Bowl Champions.
9.05.2010
the empty page
The empty page is future snow, densely layered cloud. A sun-flash around a curve. Dozing off face down in your own personal mountain of cocaine.
The empty page is the bottom of the pile on fourth down in a jovial but in all respects earnest pickup game at a Klan rally. The bullet's flash, the sudden crash, the light you go to and are pushed to at first sight. A microscope awaiting chance paramecia, a room waiting to catch fire.
Cauterized memory, the names of people forgotten, promises unkept, the list of lies that never came to light, wasted time or future time, that same snowfield as one to be traversed in an ill-advised quest for meaning still probably best to pursue.
Fuck the empty page, the empty page is fear, paralysis, silence chosen to avoid risk. Filler to deceive a reader re> gravity. Dull death, dull, absent death and a delicious absence of pain or confusion that for chrissakes you totally miss out on.
The empty page is an aerial or closeup of the human soul, a flag of no country. Everybody gathers in front of it and sings their own made-up anthem (at least in compatible keys, more Boccaccio or Bacchus than Babel), then everybody gets stoned if they smoke or drunk if they drink or drinks seltzer if neither and promises to never watch the news or read the paper again. And they all live happily ever after.
The empty page is silence between the notes of Art Tatum phrasing, or the first tentative declarations of love. Preamble to sweetness, honey, and light. The moment she leaves in the morning and before she returns, and a white down fall comforter.
The empty page is the bottom of the pile on fourth down in a jovial but in all respects earnest pickup game at a Klan rally. The bullet's flash, the sudden crash, the light you go to and are pushed to at first sight. A microscope awaiting chance paramecia, a room waiting to catch fire.
Cauterized memory, the names of people forgotten, promises unkept, the list of lies that never came to light, wasted time or future time, that same snowfield as one to be traversed in an ill-advised quest for meaning still probably best to pursue.
Fuck the empty page, the empty page is fear, paralysis, silence chosen to avoid risk. Filler to deceive a reader re> gravity. Dull death, dull, absent death and a delicious absence of pain or confusion that for chrissakes you totally miss out on.
The empty page is an aerial or closeup of the human soul, a flag of no country. Everybody gathers in front of it and sings their own made-up anthem (at least in compatible keys, more Boccaccio or Bacchus than Babel), then everybody gets stoned if they smoke or drunk if they drink or drinks seltzer if neither and promises to never watch the news or read the paper again. And they all live happily ever after.
The empty page is silence between the notes of Art Tatum phrasing, or the first tentative declarations of love. Preamble to sweetness, honey, and light. The moment she leaves in the morning and before she returns, and a white down fall comforter.
9.03.2010
cenicero
You can setup drums in the basement should be New Jersey's state motto. Including the ellipsis and delivered by the official mascot.
The official mascot is a cartoon goldfinch with half-baked eyes, a full complement of sticks and brushes and a jean jacket with an illegible band patch. The official mascot's name is Max Finch. He's a fun one, at first, a real presence but after a couple days crashing on your couch he starts pawning every non-percussive item in your house to buy newer and better pieces for his kit. And he never remembers your name.
Tonight where we are there are drums in the basement. When I get to the house N. is eating noodles with cheese but discards that process and insists that we go and play.
The ellipsis in the new state motto is less a grammatical cop out, more a promise. The promise that if you move to New Jersey and setup drums in the basement, no evil will befall you and your spirit will loose from its shackles to become one with time. If New Jersey really is in danger of losing its millionaires, let them be replaced by two-year old drummers.
Q: What are drums like?
A: Drums are like horses and ice cream and TV on and noodles and books and Grandpa and friends and soccer balls and footballs and baseball bats and Grandma when it is dark it is time to notice and when it is light it's time to play and there are Mommy and Daddy and people and friends and there is chocolate ice cream play drums.
Max's tattoos:
a) cracked skull with eye sockets beset by hummingbirds;
b) lightning striking a man head-on; the man is stoked;
c) diagrams of drum-mic positioning (7).
What N. lacks at present in formal prowess he makes up for in fire. And in vision. He sees drums as they are, without a preconceived sense of which pieces to play when or in what combination, without an overriding sense of 4/4 guiding him. He is more of an off-road truck than a reliable train, and friends, I tell you, tonight New Jersey is a beautiful state.
The official mascot is a cartoon goldfinch with half-baked eyes, a full complement of sticks and brushes and a jean jacket with an illegible band patch. The official mascot's name is Max Finch. He's a fun one, at first, a real presence but after a couple days crashing on your couch he starts pawning every non-percussive item in your house to buy newer and better pieces for his kit. And he never remembers your name.
Tonight where we are there are drums in the basement. When I get to the house N. is eating noodles with cheese but discards that process and insists that we go and play.
The ellipsis in the new state motto is less a grammatical cop out, more a promise. The promise that if you move to New Jersey and setup drums in the basement, no evil will befall you and your spirit will loose from its shackles to become one with time. If New Jersey really is in danger of losing its millionaires, let them be replaced by two-year old drummers.
Q: What are drums like?
A: Drums are like horses and ice cream and TV on and noodles and books and Grandpa and friends and soccer balls and footballs and baseball bats and Grandma when it is dark it is time to notice and when it is light it's time to play and there are Mommy and Daddy and people and friends and there is chocolate ice cream play drums.
Max's tattoos:
a) cracked skull with eye sockets beset by hummingbirds;
b) lightning striking a man head-on; the man is stoked;
c) diagrams of drum-mic positioning (7).
What N. lacks at present in formal prowess he makes up for in fire. And in vision. He sees drums as they are, without a preconceived sense of which pieces to play when or in what combination, without an overriding sense of 4/4 guiding him. He is more of an off-road truck than a reliable train, and friends, I tell you, tonight New Jersey is a beautiful state.
we are travelers
Out early to mow the lawn, hedge the sides along the house, prune the indomitable rose bushes where they encroach full on the sidewalk, social as they are, wanting contact. The air is full of moisture, the morning gray and damp and half-lit, still redolent of summer but with the first susurrating pretense of wind, with headstart falling leaves a fine example to their brethren, inspiring the eternal corps of potential yardwork.
In the car (the still-new 1997 Buick, the first plank in a meticulous middle age custom coffin, time still to get it right) the same improv tape that I couldn't get all that into from 1995 the other day now seems golden.
The guitar is discordant and steady, and someone who doesn't know how to play the violin is making that work, steady tritone and minor 2nd marcato bowing and a naive Casiotone keyboard trying to color the proceedings with warm, humorous tones, like a guy handing out candy bars at a burial. This moment from 1995 and my moment now make sense together; this layer of the past and the present align cleanly and in concord. The wish is just for a drummer to fix it but none arrives.
At the bus stop now and wind out on the edge of a storm (thinking of the hurricane offshore, but the air comes from the north) is forcing waves of cool air across the parking lot, changing the tone of the morning and heralding real fall. Storm sentinels bringing a feeling that everybody in this Greyhound line shares, a kind of poetry thrown into the dull everyday. Will we rise? Indeed, we are travelers, we are lords of the road, we are north to the great city.
In the car (the still-new 1997 Buick, the first plank in a meticulous middle age custom coffin, time still to get it right) the same improv tape that I couldn't get all that into from 1995 the other day now seems golden.
The guitar is discordant and steady, and someone who doesn't know how to play the violin is making that work, steady tritone and minor 2nd marcato bowing and a naive Casiotone keyboard trying to color the proceedings with warm, humorous tones, like a guy handing out candy bars at a burial. This moment from 1995 and my moment now make sense together; this layer of the past and the present align cleanly and in concord. The wish is just for a drummer to fix it but none arrives.
At the bus stop now and wind out on the edge of a storm (thinking of the hurricane offshore, but the air comes from the north) is forcing waves of cool air across the parking lot, changing the tone of the morning and heralding real fall. Storm sentinels bringing a feeling that everybody in this Greyhound line shares, a kind of poetry thrown into the dull everyday. Will we rise? Indeed, we are travelers, we are lords of the road, we are north to the great city.
9.01.2010
spirited away
She's still with us, still with us in spirit. Despite the fact that their bus went off a cliff, I know those school kids are still playing hopscotch somewhere. That disease or the mainstream media may have ravaged his mind but they couldn't take away his soul, he's still looking out for us, etc.
When this sort of jazz gets said (always at funerals, always everyone at their most open and sorrowful and needing) it sounds to my heart like a well meaning but ultimately ineffective or inaccurate salve, a kind of polite quack remedy. Deep down (particularly if those saying it aren't terribly religious, or ascribe little in a concept of afterlife) you can tell that very often the people saying it don't mean it themselves. The caring piece, of people looking out for each other in low moments, in moments when the shared script of trying and reward is most questioned, comes across, and helps. But that shared lie also strikes a hollow and deflating chord, just when that certainty that nothing is ever really created ex nihilis and therefore nothing ever really returns to it would help the most.
I'm not sure why I'm so rooted in skepticism at those moments, though. Because there are times that the people we love who've passed away are as close as ever. Times I can feel the spirits of our ancestors keeping careful watch, including people I'm sure we've never met, and including too the people that we miss the most. It's something felt and intuited; something I know to be as real as anything else I know. Something known in the way a melody comes to mind on a sad day, to let me know everything will be okay; in the way that for the most part things hold together in our shared lives, that more times than not it seems like someone has sprinkled good luck to hold the stray, errant, or potentially fatal pieces in place, to stave off full disaster for another day.
The world has more magic than we'll ever know, but certainly less than we need it to, on a given day. This skeptic/dualist balance-- knowing deep down and full well that one of two things that I know for sure absolutely can't be true, and still believing both on an as needed basis-- feels rather grown up and rather primitive all at once.
When this sort of jazz gets said (always at funerals, always everyone at their most open and sorrowful and needing) it sounds to my heart like a well meaning but ultimately ineffective or inaccurate salve, a kind of polite quack remedy. Deep down (particularly if those saying it aren't terribly religious, or ascribe little in a concept of afterlife) you can tell that very often the people saying it don't mean it themselves. The caring piece, of people looking out for each other in low moments, in moments when the shared script of trying and reward is most questioned, comes across, and helps. But that shared lie also strikes a hollow and deflating chord, just when that certainty that nothing is ever really created ex nihilis and therefore nothing ever really returns to it would help the most.
I'm not sure why I'm so rooted in skepticism at those moments, though. Because there are times that the people we love who've passed away are as close as ever. Times I can feel the spirits of our ancestors keeping careful watch, including people I'm sure we've never met, and including too the people that we miss the most. It's something felt and intuited; something I know to be as real as anything else I know. Something known in the way a melody comes to mind on a sad day, to let me know everything will be okay; in the way that for the most part things hold together in our shared lives, that more times than not it seems like someone has sprinkled good luck to hold the stray, errant, or potentially fatal pieces in place, to stave off full disaster for another day.
The world has more magic than we'll ever know, but certainly less than we need it to, on a given day. This skeptic/dualist balance-- knowing deep down and full well that one of two things that I know for sure absolutely can't be true, and still believing both on an as needed basis-- feels rather grown up and rather primitive all at once.
8.31.2010
silent summer
All the ocean waves stilled mid-arc, at dawn in fading into light from dark. A light glint telescoped skyward and down that beam slid a solitary frozen gull, also stalled mid-flight, mid-screech, mid-shit on a frozen early walker with a metal detector mid-wave too, mid-beep. The sound stopped too, not a fade or echo, a hard stop. Some other guy on a pier (old salt type) froze mid-cast, leaning back from now to past in a cacophony of clam chowder breath and musty tobacco. Now the oldies station falls quiet too, now the lifeguard towers and ice cream stands and umbrellas and pickets all topple, now the sun is hollowing inside out.
Now the sun is hollowing inside out, that new light the last the world could see as early in the sky it drifts away to dark. And in the silent summer left behind the people rise for morning one by one, rise for morning one by one and burn their houses, long farewell to seasons past.
Now the sun is hollowing inside out, that new light the last the world could see as early in the sky it drifts away to dark. And in the silent summer left behind the people rise for morning one by one, rise for morning one by one and burn their houses, long farewell to seasons past.
8.30.2010
Jon Runyan
Dear Congressman Adler:
Despite your negligent and doubtless poorly calculated failure to vote yes for the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (ACA) this past spring, and the questions it raises about your vision and your fortitude, I wish you the best for the upcoming election. As such, I am writing to suggest a line of argument for use in sharpening your campaign.
It would be relatively easy (and delicious for your electorate) if you were to pull a Swift Boat turn and use Mr. Runyan's years of service against him. Specifically, I suggest that you make his time on the Eagles a liability. It is my sense that this could be achieved even without resorting to a renumeration of the team's NFC Championship history.
My specific suggestion is that you focus your campaign on the decision by the Eagles organization not to bring Mr. Runyan back to the team last year, despite his interest in returning. I would suggest running a picture of yourself hugging a kitten, as if to defend her from an onrushing pass rush, also standing in front of a woman or women aged 80 or greater, on one side of the flyer. On the other side, I would suggest messaging in block letters to the effect of:
In fall 2009, the Philadelphia Eagles considered Jon Runyan for an open offensive line position, after 9 years with the team. They ultimately decided no.
Who would know better if not the Eagles? You might ask the Houston Oilers, where he began his career in 1996, but they no longer exist. This fall, vote with the Eagles: vote no for Jon Runyan, and yes for me, Congressman John Adler.
Congressman John Adler: Even though I incomprehensibly didn't vote for ACA, I'm still your guy.
One love,
Congressman John Adler
The Campaign to Reelect Congressman John Adler
Congressman Adler, I trust that you may wish to make slight typographic or font modifications to this letter. That would be fine. I am free most days to review any changes you might make; but given the urgency of your campaign, please do not hold up the final draft on my account.
I wish you the best with the campaign, and whatever your future career plans may be.
Respectfully,
T. Everett Shrubkin
Moorestown, NJ
Despite your negligent and doubtless poorly calculated failure to vote yes for the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (ACA) this past spring, and the questions it raises about your vision and your fortitude, I wish you the best for the upcoming election. As such, I am writing to suggest a line of argument for use in sharpening your campaign.
It would be relatively easy (and delicious for your electorate) if you were to pull a Swift Boat turn and use Mr. Runyan's years of service against him. Specifically, I suggest that you make his time on the Eagles a liability. It is my sense that this could be achieved even without resorting to a renumeration of the team's NFC Championship history.
My specific suggestion is that you focus your campaign on the decision by the Eagles organization not to bring Mr. Runyan back to the team last year, despite his interest in returning. I would suggest running a picture of yourself hugging a kitten, as if to defend her from an onrushing pass rush, also standing in front of a woman or women aged 80 or greater, on one side of the flyer. On the other side, I would suggest messaging in block letters to the effect of:
In fall 2009, the Philadelphia Eagles considered Jon Runyan for an open offensive line position, after 9 years with the team. They ultimately decided no.
Who would know better if not the Eagles? You might ask the Houston Oilers, where he began his career in 1996, but they no longer exist. This fall, vote with the Eagles: vote no for Jon Runyan, and yes for me, Congressman John Adler.
Congressman John Adler: Even though I incomprehensibly didn't vote for ACA, I'm still your guy.
One love,
Congressman John Adler
The Campaign to Reelect Congressman John Adler
Congressman Adler, I trust that you may wish to make slight typographic or font modifications to this letter. That would be fine. I am free most days to review any changes you might make; but given the urgency of your campaign, please do not hold up the final draft on my account.
I wish you the best with the campaign, and whatever your future career plans may be.
Respectfully,
T. Everett Shrubkin
Moorestown, NJ
8.29.2010
something kind of Lebanese
This weekend I came into possession of an excellent used car from 1997, an American-made automatic with a sexagenarian aura, squeaky brakes, and a functioning cassette-deck. Since taking possession of the car I have driven with slow authority and the smell of old memories wafting from inside the cushions. I have avoided spilling coffee or iced tea or donut crumbs. I have refrained from crumpling burger wrappers to accrue below decks, and have not sworn.
I have not taken the car with me to play Bingo, nor have I taken it bowling, nor have I driven it into a tree or a crowd of pedestrians. I have parked with difficulty and have driven to one diner, where I did not purchase the early bird special but did wonder about teenagers these days.
Having a cassette player at hand again reminded me of the Tupperware container in the basement with the old cassettes, a smattering of four-track recordings (still unplayable), microcassette recordings of an experimental improv band I played a bit part in more than a decade ago, and mix tapes from back in the day. Opening this container offered a living lifeline to a time of great hopes and short attention, and the perfect audio backdrop for a nice afternoon drive at exactly the speed limit (or 5 to 10 miles per hour slower).
I tried the improv cassettes first but couldn't find the thread. A lot of it I found unlistenable. Others moments would verge on coming together. There was a moment where it sounded like we were right on the verge of playing something kind of Lebanese, but we never really found the right scale or mood and instead it became vaguely tribal, following a safer and less descript route, treading melodic water for a few safe minutes. A linear course or sort of commute to work that echoes my current reality now more than anything else. At the time I must have surely thought it was some Pharaoh Sanders-esque journey to interstellar regions. At the time I was under the illusion that the people I knew were destiny and everything we'd make would turn to gold without the slightest effort.
I switched to one of the mixes and started thinking of the friend who'd made it for me 20 years ago, how I couldn't wait to call her to tell her what I'd dug up. I nodded my head to the songs -- which maybe I hadn't understood at the time (or I'd thought they were fine, or whatever) but which suddenly seemed so apt, so perfectly on point, like a time capsule that would know and aptly suit the mood of the person opening it a hundred years later. I really couldn't wait to call her.
The tape flipped sides and a new song started and I realized with cruel certainty that I'd dubbed over at least half of the mix with rehearsal from the same improv group.
It felt a little like getting all drunk and stoned with your best friend to go see the Wu Tung Clan on the last night of summer, only they've cancelled due to a family emergency and have asked Tony Conrad to play in their place, and you're too drunk too leave, too stoned to stay.
I have not taken the car with me to play Bingo, nor have I taken it bowling, nor have I driven it into a tree or a crowd of pedestrians. I have parked with difficulty and have driven to one diner, where I did not purchase the early bird special but did wonder about teenagers these days.
Having a cassette player at hand again reminded me of the Tupperware container in the basement with the old cassettes, a smattering of four-track recordings (still unplayable), microcassette recordings of an experimental improv band I played a bit part in more than a decade ago, and mix tapes from back in the day. Opening this container offered a living lifeline to a time of great hopes and short attention, and the perfect audio backdrop for a nice afternoon drive at exactly the speed limit (or 5 to 10 miles per hour slower).
I tried the improv cassettes first but couldn't find the thread. A lot of it I found unlistenable. Others moments would verge on coming together. There was a moment where it sounded like we were right on the verge of playing something kind of Lebanese, but we never really found the right scale or mood and instead it became vaguely tribal, following a safer and less descript route, treading melodic water for a few safe minutes. A linear course or sort of commute to work that echoes my current reality now more than anything else. At the time I must have surely thought it was some Pharaoh Sanders-esque journey to interstellar regions. At the time I was under the illusion that the people I knew were destiny and everything we'd make would turn to gold without the slightest effort.
I switched to one of the mixes and started thinking of the friend who'd made it for me 20 years ago, how I couldn't wait to call her to tell her what I'd dug up. I nodded my head to the songs -- which maybe I hadn't understood at the time (or I'd thought they were fine, or whatever) but which suddenly seemed so apt, so perfectly on point, like a time capsule that would know and aptly suit the mood of the person opening it a hundred years later. I really couldn't wait to call her.
The tape flipped sides and a new song started and I realized with cruel certainty that I'd dubbed over at least half of the mix with rehearsal from the same improv group.
It felt a little like getting all drunk and stoned with your best friend to go see the Wu Tung Clan on the last night of summer, only they've cancelled due to a family emergency and have asked Tony Conrad to play in their place, and you're too drunk too leave, too stoned to stay.
8.26.2010
real middle-aged dudes of new jersey
And you're probably wondering what life was like after Jim's lap band surgery and how Todd's divorce proceedings finished up specifically who got the kids who got the basement full of two decades worth of shit no one not even the kids had the heart to throw away and who oh who took custody of the ghosts that haunted that filthy house.
And you're probably wondering if Steve still picks his nose with savage compulsion until it bleeds raw, if he and in fact they all still scratch themselves sagely on yonder couch the same, if it still burns and itches simultaneously when John pees.
If their God smiles upon them, their women still somehow gamely by their sides, filtering, absorbing, cajoling, wheedling into line, making presentable, tolerating, heaven help them screwing, holding, occasionally joking, sitting across at dinner, playing one two three shoot to see who changes the baby helps with homework cleans up after the puppy.
What is their sandwich of choice?
Todd: Subway Meatball 12" Sub
Steve: Pastrami and Swiss on Rye
John: Wawa Tuna and Cheese Classic Hoagie
Jim: Subway Sweet Onion Chicken Teriyaki Sub
What is their current emotional state?
Todd: perplexed
Steve: preoccupied
John: reflective
Jim: new lease on life
What is the color of their mood?
Todd: The mood is blue.
Steve: The mood is invisible or opaque, unknown, secret even to self.
John: The mood is brown red, the color of foreboding curry.
Jim: The mood is green, like first sprouts.
What is the new lease on life?
It is a lighter load, a quicker walk, the shrinking of distance and the opening of possibility, it is the reignition of sex life (flower once thought dead reassumes form and once again battles gravity), the occasional guilty snack. It is the consideration of cholesterols good and bad with anything less than an insurance analyst's cold calculation of expectancy. It is the woman perhaps a year or so younger who smiled at him when he was getting gas and for a second his heart lifted hundreds of feet in the air to float smiling above Route 38, right where it meets Church Road, to float free.
And you're probably wondering if Steve still picks his nose with savage compulsion until it bleeds raw, if he and in fact they all still scratch themselves sagely on yonder couch the same, if it still burns and itches simultaneously when John pees.
If their God smiles upon them, their women still somehow gamely by their sides, filtering, absorbing, cajoling, wheedling into line, making presentable, tolerating, heaven help them screwing, holding, occasionally joking, sitting across at dinner, playing one two three shoot to see who changes the baby helps with homework cleans up after the puppy.
What is their sandwich of choice?
Todd: Subway Meatball 12" Sub
Steve: Pastrami and Swiss on Rye
John: Wawa Tuna and Cheese Classic Hoagie
Jim: Subway Sweet Onion Chicken Teriyaki Sub
What is their current emotional state?
Todd: perplexed
Steve: preoccupied
John: reflective
Jim: new lease on life
What is the color of their mood?
Todd: The mood is blue.
Steve: The mood is invisible or opaque, unknown, secret even to self.
John: The mood is brown red, the color of foreboding curry.
Jim: The mood is green, like first sprouts.
What is the new lease on life?
It is a lighter load, a quicker walk, the shrinking of distance and the opening of possibility, it is the reignition of sex life (flower once thought dead reassumes form and once again battles gravity), the occasional guilty snack. It is the consideration of cholesterols good and bad with anything less than an insurance analyst's cold calculation of expectancy. It is the woman perhaps a year or so younger who smiled at him when he was getting gas and for a second his heart lifted hundreds of feet in the air to float smiling above Route 38, right where it meets Church Road, to float free.
8.18.2010
my question is what happened to you
everyone else in the wild puzzle i more or less understand; my question of late is what happened to you to make it turn out so this way for you, to make you act as catalyst to so many emotional catastrophes without the slightest mental map of the emotional world yourself. yet all of that was ten or twenty years ago, now when i see you it's like you're a teenager trying on emotions for yourself for the first time.
it isn't that living in the suburbs has been for the best. i have real doubts that that's true. i think it's made us all crazier if anything. it has made me more aware though (particularly with these newly fierce new jersey seasons) that things grow as much as they can and die, that's all they do, it isn't that there's some overarching destiny or logic or transcendence to it, more a dumb blind imperative. the weeds find purchase whereever they can, the grass, the wild flowers all push into every place that allows the faintest glimmer of root. like how on the backdrop of those decades your soul has found a place to quiet down now, to begin some long-delayed reckoning, and in a quasi-patronizing way i'm happy for you.
now i find myself somewhere between you and a completely different person. emotions for me are a bizarre confusion but sometimes i know the names, sometimes i even know that this-is-an-emotion-i'm-feeling. it doesn't prevent that from be a disorienting grid on which i'm more likely to hurt others than not. it just tells me i should know better. maybe my dumb growth will to be more quiet in my failings than you were, to keep them better hidden from the surface of the earth. maybe my achievement will to be a better and more subtle weed in the lives of the people i know.
in death though. maybe that's where we find transcendence, moving from the dull provincial limits of blind individual growth and back into soil and carbon, into the wild dumb flowing pulse of nature. i think stereolab could have convinced me of the joy in that in a song in the 1990s, i don't really know where they sit on the subject today.
it isn't that living in the suburbs has been for the best. i have real doubts that that's true. i think it's made us all crazier if anything. it has made me more aware though (particularly with these newly fierce new jersey seasons) that things grow as much as they can and die, that's all they do, it isn't that there's some overarching destiny or logic or transcendence to it, more a dumb blind imperative. the weeds find purchase whereever they can, the grass, the wild flowers all push into every place that allows the faintest glimmer of root. like how on the backdrop of those decades your soul has found a place to quiet down now, to begin some long-delayed reckoning, and in a quasi-patronizing way i'm happy for you.
now i find myself somewhere between you and a completely different person. emotions for me are a bizarre confusion but sometimes i know the names, sometimes i even know that this-is-an-emotion-i'm-feeling. it doesn't prevent that from be a disorienting grid on which i'm more likely to hurt others than not. it just tells me i should know better. maybe my dumb growth will to be more quiet in my failings than you were, to keep them better hidden from the surface of the earth. maybe my achievement will to be a better and more subtle weed in the lives of the people i know.
in death though. maybe that's where we find transcendence, moving from the dull provincial limits of blind individual growth and back into soil and carbon, into the wild dumb flowing pulse of nature. i think stereolab could have convinced me of the joy in that in a song in the 1990s, i don't really know where they sit on the subject today.
7.06.2010
East Coast put to fire
Bad image in my head tonight in this dry weather of the East Coast put to fire, natural or somehow more apocalyptic because man made. The traffic jams for the escape path and whether ditching your car and jogging on the Turnpike (or 195 or 80 if escaping west/east etc) would be the safest choice. The shrugging told-you-this-place-sucked attitude with which the typical New Jersey resident would respond as the road filled with parked cars. I picture a fat guy who looks a little like me huffing it down the side of the road, family in tow. Maybe he's wearing flippers and an inner tube, you know, just to be ready for whatever comes next.
7.05.2010
wall of silence
Since there was Phil Spector there must surely have been his opposite, a man who did not layer a wall of sound but instead its opposite, the progenitor of a towering and insurmountable wall of silence, non-layer upon non-layer of the densest quiet imaginable. His production work didn't make him famous but neither did he maniacally shoot a woman in the face on a paranoid bender. Indeed,this hypothetical person probably would have actually made a decent partner or spouse, had he ever gotten to know anyone closely.
Objectors would point out that a wall of silence by definition requires solitude, and I would accept this argument with the mild objection that somewhere in the world there surely is a mime whose destiny it is to love the anti-Spector with all her or his heart, to understand him fully and within that silence to establish an implied overlap of frequency ranges far beyond the scope of human hearing, far beyond the scope of sound itself, a resonant wave field or subnet on which thought and spirit mix freely, a communion of understanding and implication ahead of and around normal speech.
What is the anti-Spector's modus operandi? Simply the removal of noisemaking devices from the grasping range of passersby, beyond the reach of toddlers, drunks, sports fans, hunters, referees, construction workers, experimental guitarists, oboeists, vice principals, cheerleaders, prognosticators and agitators, harpies, candidates for town council, religious proselytizers, stepfathers, argumentative potential divorcees, etc.
It was never your right to scream at her that way, it was never your god-damned right.
Objectors would point out that a wall of silence by definition requires solitude, and I would accept this argument with the mild objection that somewhere in the world there surely is a mime whose destiny it is to love the anti-Spector with all her or his heart, to understand him fully and within that silence to establish an implied overlap of frequency ranges far beyond the scope of human hearing, far beyond the scope of sound itself, a resonant wave field or subnet on which thought and spirit mix freely, a communion of understanding and implication ahead of and around normal speech.
What is the anti-Spector's modus operandi? Simply the removal of noisemaking devices from the grasping range of passersby, beyond the reach of toddlers, drunks, sports fans, hunters, referees, construction workers, experimental guitarists, oboeists, vice principals, cheerleaders, prognosticators and agitators, harpies, candidates for town council, religious proselytizers, stepfathers, argumentative potential divorcees, etc.
It was never your right to scream at her that way, it was never your god-damned right.
6.18.2010
music brain
In Recoleta in Buenos Aires they do a flea market on Sunday. A guy brings RCA Victrolas that you can wind with a crank to play records. On an old 78 at the bottom of a dusty box that's survived innumerable crises quasi-intact is a record without any words on the label. There's a picture though, a doodle of a worried looking cartoon fat man with bug eyes. The A-side is ungrooved and would sound like nails scratching on the flaming chalkboards of full hell in the open-air market.
If you wind the crank and put on the B-side, though, you'll hear preserved the contents of my music brain, which I've transcoded there for safe-keeping as I build competency in realms far more bureaucratic and parental.
Under the music is a gringo trying to sing in Spanish because he thinks the language will make his lyrics more poetic. The engineer on duty the day of the recording had the good sense to fade the lyrics in the mix to the point of mumble, so all you hear is the occasional mispronounced accent or stray letter n with a tilde, or o. Porque no tengo la sensibilidad a cantar con palabras que yo entiendo, porque la luna es libre y cabelleros son su estudiantes idiotas.
If you wind the crank and put on the B-side, though, you'll hear preserved the contents of my music brain, which I've transcoded there for safe-keeping as I build competency in realms far more bureaucratic and parental.
Under the music is a gringo trying to sing in Spanish because he thinks the language will make his lyrics more poetic. The engineer on duty the day of the recording had the good sense to fade the lyrics in the mix to the point of mumble, so all you hear is the occasional mispronounced accent or stray letter n with a tilde, or o. Porque no tengo la sensibilidad a cantar con palabras que yo entiendo, porque la luna es libre y cabelleros son su estudiantes idiotas.
6.06.2010
dream as metaphor for the full parenting process
In the dream we were in front of the house and he was running from near where you were, along the sidewalk toward me. I tried to catch him and called to him but he didn't listen and he was moving faster than I could catch him, much faster than I expected. That part of the dream ended as he ran into traffic and across the road. The same dreamspeed logic through which he evaded my grasp allowed him to dodge cars as he crossed the street to safety, or out of our care and into the world.
6.05.2010
salt air
So we walked out to the edge of the land, far out from the full coast, held by the temperate late Atlantic. Boats in the bay, every house losing its slow fight with salt air. The same with people's faces, or how you tell the difference between a townie and the folks in for the weekend, the week, or at most the summer. A glamorous way to demarcate your allocated time, out on the edge of the world, where the end seems both close at hand and never further away, what comes after east.
6.04.2010
water underground
The antique roses in the front yard bloomed last week. They're in full flower now, some dragging the stems to the sidewalk with their weight. There are so many this spring, how still the depth of this winter makes its presence known. And in my work, one way or another every day I catch myself still digging out from those huge storms.
Home and barely functional or honestly half dead, when I see your faces leaning together, hear your voices speaking together I feel you both a part of me the same, a breaking through to light from water underground.
Home and barely functional or honestly half dead, when I see your faces leaning together, hear your voices speaking together I feel you both a part of me the same, a breaking through to light from water underground.
5.30.2010
so much of water
I think as I age that my memory is improving. It can't be that, no, it must that the power of some memories has increased over time. We are so much of water that it must define a huge part of our personalities. Our composite memories are like water in at least two ways. First, that everything that has happened to and through us is interconnected, like every drop of water in a puddle or a sea the same. Second, that in the way light plays tricks when it refracts through water, some elements are clearer in memory to us than others; or it's that in that heavily chlorinated pool we swim instinctively in the same safe laps until something in the present moment jars us from our normal rhythm, bringing new glimpses of submerged old life into clear view with frightful intensity, or at rarer times like vaguely glinting treasure.
5.22.2010
the heaviest cloud
concept for children's book. The heaviest cloud is always ostracized by his peers for being far too slow, last to arrive at any storm, etc. But, through a sequence of devastating displays of raw natural power, the heaviest cloud is able to win the respect and love of his peers, and even gets the chance to murder his nemesis, the sun. A compelling proof of the adage that might makes right -- Kirkus.
the first dumb-assed flower of spring
early flowers in the yard, precise coffee and singing with our kid. a bevy of hungover angels perched on the roof, unpainted toenails hanging over the gutters.
the cat's gone nuts, maybe for spring or for ordinary cat dementia, his meow insistent and ill-timed like Lassie trying to tell Timmy to go for help, but if Lassie were more of an unreliable narrator who always bit a little too hard at 4 a.m., just when Timmy was starting in on that last cycle of REM sleep, a Lassie who tragically gave Timmy rabies that one morning only to deny everything later in perfect human Shaggy English, "it wasn't me." Here the movie reaches stride, Act II Lassie's Regret, Act III Lassie's Race for the Cure, Act IV Lassie as Fundraiser, Act V Meeting with the Donors, Act VI Lassie's Recurrence of Regret, etc.
early flowers in the yard, a second cup of coffee and our kid playing with a bus, a musical tractor, a soccer ball. i believe he's imagining the toy tractor as the world's greatest pizza delivery truck, with a flat-bed trailer and a sheet of pizza that brought to its full scale would be about 7' by 10'. in that same scaling up the soccer ball is now the size of our kitchen, and the little bus takes up a whole block. the roses look set to bloom, too, to overshadow the whole neighborhood.
Lassie, I thought I was good for it, you said stop by any time.
early flowers in the yard, waiting for old friends to visit and everything feels this out of scale. they're going to want to catch up, they're going to want to know how we are. i'll have to ask L. the answer, i'm not sure i could come up with one of my own after what feels like months away from myself. this is why when you ask people how they are they say they can't complain. it isn't that they don't have complaints, it's that they wouldn't have the first idea how to articulate them.
middle aged man as mentally-challenged flower, blooming in brief on a saturday morning. an interpretive dance that i entitle the first dumb-assed flower of spring.
the cat's gone nuts, maybe for spring or for ordinary cat dementia, his meow insistent and ill-timed like Lassie trying to tell Timmy to go for help, but if Lassie were more of an unreliable narrator who always bit a little too hard at 4 a.m., just when Timmy was starting in on that last cycle of REM sleep, a Lassie who tragically gave Timmy rabies that one morning only to deny everything later in perfect human Shaggy English, "it wasn't me." Here the movie reaches stride, Act II Lassie's Regret, Act III Lassie's Race for the Cure, Act IV Lassie as Fundraiser, Act V Meeting with the Donors, Act VI Lassie's Recurrence of Regret, etc.
early flowers in the yard, a second cup of coffee and our kid playing with a bus, a musical tractor, a soccer ball. i believe he's imagining the toy tractor as the world's greatest pizza delivery truck, with a flat-bed trailer and a sheet of pizza that brought to its full scale would be about 7' by 10'. in that same scaling up the soccer ball is now the size of our kitchen, and the little bus takes up a whole block. the roses look set to bloom, too, to overshadow the whole neighborhood.
Lassie, I thought I was good for it, you said stop by any time.
early flowers in the yard, waiting for old friends to visit and everything feels this out of scale. they're going to want to catch up, they're going to want to know how we are. i'll have to ask L. the answer, i'm not sure i could come up with one of my own after what feels like months away from myself. this is why when you ask people how they are they say they can't complain. it isn't that they don't have complaints, it's that they wouldn't have the first idea how to articulate them.
middle aged man as mentally-challenged flower, blooming in brief on a saturday morning. an interpretive dance that i entitle the first dumb-assed flower of spring.
4.13.2010
mental blocks
Everyone who does this sort of thing must go through these mental blocks. For me it starts with the fact that I'm 50 pounds overweight and I've only jogged once in the last decade. Right now it's midnight and it's raining and chilly out and the economy sucks and I'm on my last shred of energy, but preparations must go on if I am going to run this marathon.
I can't find my sneakers. Also tonight I smoked a cigar with my father-in-law and I just ate a half a bag of cheese curls and yesterday I stubbed my toe pretty hard on the wall trying to turn a corner too fast to get to the fridge. Training for a marathon requires you to hone your reflexes. Razor sharp reflexes, or sharper if possible. Note to self to Google sharper reflexes.
Blogosphere, I'm getting nervous about this marathon. I know it because my reflexes are a little off. The other day I was washing a wine glass and I accidentally put my hand through the glass -- breaking it into about 5 pieces with just the joint of my left thumb. I don't want the bleeding to be a distraction, so I've got to keep a good supply of Band Aids at the ready if I'm going to run this marathon. Thumb removal might be a faster way to heal. Or sports medicine? I also know I'm nervous because when I'm nervous I eat and surf the web a lot. Mostly looking at boring shit that I hate. The more boring the more nervous I am.
But when you're running you aren't nervous (unless you're nervous you're going to keel over), you're an eagle, a gazelle, leopard, etc. You are everything Apple has ever named an operating system after. When you're running you become one with the landscape, with the wind, and in the rhythm of the wind (of the you) you can beat your demons.
My demons are pretty boisterous. One of them is wearing an Atlanta Falcons jersey. Another is dressed in a speedo and drinking Boone's Farm and I think he's the asshole who hid my running shoes. I could run in my dress shoes and that speedo and the old Falcons jersey. Determination. Fuck you, demons.
I'm not going to go running tonight, I'm going to go to sleep. As everyone who's ever run a marathon knows, you have to get a good night's sleep the night before. And eat a boatload of carbs first. Head start on that.
I can't find my sneakers. Also tonight I smoked a cigar with my father-in-law and I just ate a half a bag of cheese curls and yesterday I stubbed my toe pretty hard on the wall trying to turn a corner too fast to get to the fridge. Training for a marathon requires you to hone your reflexes. Razor sharp reflexes, or sharper if possible. Note to self to Google sharper reflexes.
Blogosphere, I'm getting nervous about this marathon. I know it because my reflexes are a little off. The other day I was washing a wine glass and I accidentally put my hand through the glass -- breaking it into about 5 pieces with just the joint of my left thumb. I don't want the bleeding to be a distraction, so I've got to keep a good supply of Band Aids at the ready if I'm going to run this marathon. Thumb removal might be a faster way to heal. Or sports medicine? I also know I'm nervous because when I'm nervous I eat and surf the web a lot. Mostly looking at boring shit that I hate. The more boring the more nervous I am.
But when you're running you aren't nervous (unless you're nervous you're going to keel over), you're an eagle, a gazelle, leopard, etc. You are everything Apple has ever named an operating system after. When you're running you become one with the landscape, with the wind, and in the rhythm of the wind (of the you) you can beat your demons.
My demons are pretty boisterous. One of them is wearing an Atlanta Falcons jersey. Another is dressed in a speedo and drinking Boone's Farm and I think he's the asshole who hid my running shoes. I could run in my dress shoes and that speedo and the old Falcons jersey. Determination. Fuck you, demons.
I'm not going to go running tonight, I'm going to go to sleep. As everyone who's ever run a marathon knows, you have to get a good night's sleep the night before. And eat a boatload of carbs first. Head start on that.
bright new atmosphere
perhaps i'm going to have to do this nyc marathon 2031 thing last minute. sinking feeling that the night before I’ll be lacing bobo running shoes for the huffing first mile of practice, "wracking" my brain to figure some adrenaline-laced recipe for success only to end up the next morning sprawled on my 300-pound ass in a pile of crushed gatorade cups on fourth avenue in the gray November light looking up at the clock tower thinking it's the empire state building, drooling into the cracks in the concrete.
i keep getting signs from the world that i need to keep it simpler. that i need to find comfort in my own skin and not spend every waking minute trying to escape.
when i was a wee plus-sized i learned to "dodge" reality through books, a strategy that made good sense then. even if books can't tune out your childhood's screaming violence, they can help one you make it through the aftershocks. stick a book in front of your face and a) it acts as a simple visual shield b) it fills your brain with other elements, other compounds, a bright new atmosphere. ignoring for the moment that what i loved to read then was horror.
"the" problem being that decades later i don't know how to turn off that winning escape instinct. dodging reality has served me well enough to this point, so why suddenly believe in the here and now. deep down i do, i do, i really do, though its been hard to get a brain quorum on that.
Doogie Howser diary entries aside the late-or-non-bloom curmudgeon will lace up shoes this morning, not for a jog but for the subway steps, up to the summer street and on to numbing work.
{P.S.: mountain goats sunset tree on the train in this morning, and how that guy has really learned to reckon with his memory, to find his pain and use guitars to anesthetize it, if not beat it}.
i keep getting signs from the world that i need to keep it simpler. that i need to find comfort in my own skin and not spend every waking minute trying to escape.
when i was a wee plus-sized i learned to "dodge" reality through books, a strategy that made good sense then. even if books can't tune out your childhood's screaming violence, they can help one you make it through the aftershocks. stick a book in front of your face and a) it acts as a simple visual shield b) it fills your brain with other elements, other compounds, a bright new atmosphere. ignoring for the moment that what i loved to read then was horror.
"the" problem being that decades later i don't know how to turn off that winning escape instinct. dodging reality has served me well enough to this point, so why suddenly believe in the here and now. deep down i do, i do, i really do, though its been hard to get a brain quorum on that.
Doogie Howser diary entries aside the late-or-non-bloom curmudgeon will lace up shoes this morning, not for a jog but for the subway steps, up to the summer street and on to numbing work.
{P.S.: mountain goats sunset tree on the train in this morning, and how that guy has really learned to reckon with his memory, to find his pain and use guitars to anesthetize it, if not beat it}.
4.11.2010
scattershot pattern
When I was a kid and I ended up alone outside at night I could feel an evil force rushing behind me as I approached the house. I always broke into a late sprint, as if it were possible to outrun a shadowy evil force, outwit it by switching from a walking pace, I always turned around as if by looking it in the face you could ward one off.
At times I've felt the opposite, that my dead are watching over me and those that I love behind the scenes. At moments of loving weakness I even explicitly pray to them, appealing to them to pull strings behind the scenes to make sure things fall right. If love is such a transcendent force can it disappear when those we love die? Or could it transform into pure energy, become immanent in the world for us to access when we need it most.
At other times I've felt that both views are too simplistic. That either things go well or not in a kind of scattershot pattern separate of all love or human logic and the best we can pray for is to be alert, to react with our true hearts and good reflexes to what the world throws at us, to what we throw at ourselves.
O mucky universe, what's your true nature, why so project as beautiful murderous creature never to be fully understood, like some philandering middle-aged English prof's platonic daydream grad student turned soul-sucking vampire (and of course the fact that she's a vampire was the kinkiest part of the daydream). And lo as his metaphoric soul is consumed he tries to figure out the prime angle for some final discerning piece of academic critique, luckily she hips to his game and nulls his mind at that instant.
At times I've felt the opposite, that my dead are watching over me and those that I love behind the scenes. At moments of loving weakness I even explicitly pray to them, appealing to them to pull strings behind the scenes to make sure things fall right. If love is such a transcendent force can it disappear when those we love die? Or could it transform into pure energy, become immanent in the world for us to access when we need it most.
At other times I've felt that both views are too simplistic. That either things go well or not in a kind of scattershot pattern separate of all love or human logic and the best we can pray for is to be alert, to react with our true hearts and good reflexes to what the world throws at us, to what we throw at ourselves.
O mucky universe, what's your true nature, why so project as beautiful murderous creature never to be fully understood, like some philandering middle-aged English prof's platonic daydream grad student turned soul-sucking vampire (and of course the fact that she's a vampire was the kinkiest part of the daydream). And lo as his metaphoric soul is consumed he tries to figure out the prime angle for some final discerning piece of academic critique, luckily she hips to his game and nulls his mind at that instant.
4.05.2010
employment history
Four years as dishwasher at a local pizzeria taught me that I will never succeed as a short-order cook, delivery person, or server. I learned how to wash a large number of dishes effectively in a brief time. I also learned to have unrequited crushes on women totally out of my league (e.g. every waitress/counter girl in the restaurant), and how my best strategy for getting close to them was to present myself as totally pathetic. Over time I was able to perfect this particular skill and am now married to a woman totally out of my league.
Ten years as an IT guy taught me that writing email(and writing in general) is a wonderful way to escape reality into a kind of mental pseudo-reality free of all inconvenient physics and biology. Over time I was able to hone that skill and am now a successful nonprofit fundraiser.
In five years as a nonprofit fundraiser I've learned that dishwashers have an amazing impact on the world. Every night they are presented with a target number of dishes to wash and every night they meet that target before they can leave. No one writes a bullshit report about how the dishes would have been washed but the policy landscape shifted and here are some lessons learned. There are no pressures to invent a new washing technique, and no middle managers who exist solely to watch the dishes get washed or coach the dishwashers.
I have identified my path to self actualization. Or, as the poet wrote: The search is over...you were with me all the while.
Ten years as an IT guy taught me that writing email(and writing in general) is a wonderful way to escape reality into a kind of mental pseudo-reality free of all inconvenient physics and biology. Over time I was able to hone that skill and am now a successful nonprofit fundraiser.
In five years as a nonprofit fundraiser I've learned that dishwashers have an amazing impact on the world. Every night they are presented with a target number of dishes to wash and every night they meet that target before they can leave. No one writes a bullshit report about how the dishes would have been washed but the policy landscape shifted and here are some lessons learned. There are no pressures to invent a new washing technique, and no middle managers who exist solely to watch the dishes get washed or coach the dishwashers.
I have identified my path to self actualization. Or, as the poet wrote: The search is over...you were with me all the while.
4.02.2010
rare perk of sobriety
A year plus in I'm starting to notice an actual mental payoff to not drinking. Yes -- even above and beyond the lack of daily hangovers.
A, um, new kind of internal strength. Sharper focus. Remembering more day to day, being more aware of the subtexts to a conversation. More aware of what I want from the world long-term/how the world should/could be. What needs to be done to avoid getting killed on the road or run over by my professional life. More aware of how individual and family dynamics evolve and relate. Of the need for closeness and clarity. Of how beautiful Spanish is on the page.
Even hanging out in drinking situations has gotten easier. A fun project to match the trajectory people take when they drink and loosen up on your own. In a way I actually over-compensate and loosen up further than people. So I'm the asshole who says the wrong thing with no relevant cultural pretext to back it up. Crackpot role to relish.
A, um, new kind of internal strength. Sharper focus. Remembering more day to day, being more aware of the subtexts to a conversation. More aware of what I want from the world long-term/how the world should/could be. What needs to be done to avoid getting killed on the road or run over by my professional life. More aware of how individual and family dynamics evolve and relate. Of the need for closeness and clarity. Of how beautiful Spanish is on the page.
Even hanging out in drinking situations has gotten easier. A fun project to match the trajectory people take when they drink and loosen up on your own. In a way I actually over-compensate and loosen up further than people. So I'm the asshole who says the wrong thing with no relevant cultural pretext to back it up. Crackpot role to relish.
3.21.2010
birth signs of a new world
Today I jogged outside for the first time in ten years or more. Although the goal I set was modest I didn’t make it. Early on I thought I was going to have a heart attack. You know when you're driving in your car and you see somebody trying to convince themselves they're running but really they're walking in a stupid way. Today that was me. For about an hour after I kept thinking I was going to pass out. All day since I've felt more grounded than I have in 5 months.
This afternoon N. and I went grocery shopping together. We just needed parsley, strawberries, and milk. You know when you're shopping and some idiot keeps getting in your way trying to have fun with his kid? Today that was me.
Right around mall closing time I went to get my hair cut. The woman who cut my hair had a lot on her mind. She said Jesus conquered death and defeated Satan and no other God had done that. She said his name was on every tongue. She said recent events told her that the end times were close. She said earthquakes and storms and even the President in power now read like signs and wonders straight from Revelations. She got in my face and peered into my eyes to see whether I saw her point. She said these were signs but more were yet to come, that they were birth signs of a new world.
You know sometimes it does feel like the end of the world and you could almost agree with a person who spoke to you in such a manner? Today that person wasn't me. This world doesn't get to end on my kid. I gently made my case against her vision and we left it as friends who disagreed but in respect. The haircut's pretty good.
This afternoon N. and I went grocery shopping together. We just needed parsley, strawberries, and milk. You know when you're shopping and some idiot keeps getting in your way trying to have fun with his kid? Today that was me.
Right around mall closing time I went to get my hair cut. The woman who cut my hair had a lot on her mind. She said Jesus conquered death and defeated Satan and no other God had done that. She said his name was on every tongue. She said recent events told her that the end times were close. She said earthquakes and storms and even the President in power now read like signs and wonders straight from Revelations. She got in my face and peered into my eyes to see whether I saw her point. She said these were signs but more were yet to come, that they were birth signs of a new world.
You know sometimes it does feel like the end of the world and you could almost agree with a person who spoke to you in such a manner? Today that person wasn't me. This world doesn't get to end on my kid. I gently made my case against her vision and we left it as friends who disagreed but in respect. The haircut's pretty good.
3.20.2010
floor plan
The storm that blew winter away was so fierce, it seemed like the trees had grown tired of being surrounded by suburban blight and one by one would take their shouting splintering revenge. Five feet of rain in a weekend. We added a couple hundred pounds of salt and made our basement into a giant aquarium. Now we have an octopus and a Portuguese man-of-war and some Atlantic blues. We have jellyfish and a skate and a depressive tuna. We have diving suits in his and hers and toddler sizes. We have a coral reef and even sunken treasure, a piggy bank split open along the floor bed, nickles pennies and quarters awaiting the intrepid diver. I hope we've properly sealed the drainage. In the morning the baby whale surfaces near the top of the basement stairs and gives us a good morning spout.
We've knocked out the walls of the ground level of our house and turned it into an indoor soccer field. Our young son is Ronaldinho or Diego Maradona or better yet Zidane, running up and down the field with the ball in his hands. He's impossible to catch. He runs laughing from one goal to another. He does not yet know how to throw with any accuracy so to score he runs and touches the ball to the back of the net. At halftime he sits for supper. He scores constantly, recording shut-outs by margins of 150 or more. He is much coveted by Boca and River Plate. There is the potential he could play for both. The ball is an expanding world that he runs with, laughing, held tight, almost off balance. Goal! Goal! Goal! (goal, goal, goal, goal).
Upstairs we brush our teeth and go to sleep in single file. And dream, he of a bowl of butter three feet wide and five feet deep, eaten fastidiously with a large plastic spoon. We of multiple disasters that we dream, so as to avoid living them.
We've knocked out the walls of the ground level of our house and turned it into an indoor soccer field. Our young son is Ronaldinho or Diego Maradona or better yet Zidane, running up and down the field with the ball in his hands. He's impossible to catch. He runs laughing from one goal to another. He does not yet know how to throw with any accuracy so to score he runs and touches the ball to the back of the net. At halftime he sits for supper. He scores constantly, recording shut-outs by margins of 150 or more. He is much coveted by Boca and River Plate. There is the potential he could play for both. The ball is an expanding world that he runs with, laughing, held tight, almost off balance. Goal! Goal! Goal! (goal, goal, goal, goal).
Upstairs we brush our teeth and go to sleep in single file. And dream, he of a bowl of butter three feet wide and five feet deep, eaten fastidiously with a large plastic spoon. We of multiple disasters that we dream, so as to avoid living them.
3.16.2010
crystal crucifix
A crystal crucifix with diamonds for rosary beads that play in the light finger by meditative finger. She tried to go to church this morning but it was like God didn't want people around today the trees had been ripped out of the ground taking the sidewalk with them to form a natural barrier blocking both doors the priest didn't know what to do at all. Like God had decided her house wasn't fit for company today, the sidewalk ripped of its moorings and transmogrified into a crooked staircase of roots and straggler worms and unknowable divine intention.
A crystal crucifix with diamonds for beads that play in the light prayer by prayer and could you hold this world together on the strength of your wish that it be so with your wish that nothing fade or fall away.
She tries to get to church best she can but doesn't make it and seeks no alternative (thus a sin) by alternative she thinks they could have gone in I guess through the windows but the priest was sitting on the ground paunchy in his inconsolable cassock, soiled and sorry with his nose kind of red in a tacit and spontaneous confession of how he'd held his own life together draught by draught up to this point. Those veteran trees still standing shudder together and in the smell of rain she senses or feels predetermined a collective flash or vision of the end of the world on those renewed drops the rippling back echo of the explosion thus ending all and no on and no forth.
Which is why help me Jesus/Mary she holds in her hands a crystal crucifix to bind the world together prayer by prayer. People killed in stupid fashion each day on their way to church by earthquakes or in head-on collisions or by random bullets hearts give out etc, when that happens do you note that they died fulfilling their chosen purpose or in the cheap and non-helpful irony that that supposed protector never had their backs in any fashion.
A crystal crucifix, prayer by the glinting of the light as a form maybe even of time travel to protect the ones she's lost. Maybe it's just the prayers of people that help other people she thought, maybe it's the prayers of people that bind our intentions and hearts to wish each other well and in collective wishing could there be some binding glue to hold the world together such that nothing fade or fall away.
She doesn't recall how it came into her possession only that when she prays in a rhythm when she is in the rhythm of her prayer she can feel those around her safe in a kind of holy halo. It is the days where distracted or otherwise preoccupied she neglects to pray or God forbid to give these prayers her true intentions that unforeseen misfortune befalls her friends or family or at least those sad people in today's paper now missing one or more of their number through unforeseeable calamity.
Out at the edge of town she's driving crystal crucifix in her fingers gone to wrinkle the beadstrings strung partial curved like a wilted infinity across the driving wheel. The light no longer feels to show her or save her the light is a dim threat of extinction dim fear of last moments and wasted lives a revealing of last days kind of brought too soon. Lately she doesn't believe in God or care much for her if she does exist she thinks and goes on These prayers of mine are prayers to link only with those of other people, prayers to make a net for each other's prayers and for those who don't pray too to be caught in on the way down. And the cross is where our bodies touched in love or compassion and the beads are justice lost and held together point by point and though we pray to no one or no one who cares we pray together.
She isn't sure even who she prays for today or who for her out at the edge of town driving with the crystal crucifix dangling down almost to her knee beneath the wheel. Is it going to rain or is the light to break through out at the edge of the dark clouds. Let this darkness take my sight, she thinks, let this full stop come and find me where I huddle under whatever debris praying bead by bead with everyone I've loved held together in my memory. If you mean for this to end then honey you do your worst.
She wonders what will be on TV this afternoon, light just starting to break through clouds being pulled apart tuft by tuft by the brutal wind, what she'll put on for dinner.
A crystal crucifix with diamonds for beads that play in the light prayer by prayer and could you hold this world together on the strength of your wish that it be so with your wish that nothing fade or fall away.
She tries to get to church best she can but doesn't make it and seeks no alternative (thus a sin) by alternative she thinks they could have gone in I guess through the windows but the priest was sitting on the ground paunchy in his inconsolable cassock, soiled and sorry with his nose kind of red in a tacit and spontaneous confession of how he'd held his own life together draught by draught up to this point. Those veteran trees still standing shudder together and in the smell of rain she senses or feels predetermined a collective flash or vision of the end of the world on those renewed drops the rippling back echo of the explosion thus ending all and no on and no forth.
Which is why help me Jesus/Mary she holds in her hands a crystal crucifix to bind the world together prayer by prayer. People killed in stupid fashion each day on their way to church by earthquakes or in head-on collisions or by random bullets hearts give out etc, when that happens do you note that they died fulfilling their chosen purpose or in the cheap and non-helpful irony that that supposed protector never had their backs in any fashion.
A crystal crucifix, prayer by the glinting of the light as a form maybe even of time travel to protect the ones she's lost. Maybe it's just the prayers of people that help other people she thought, maybe it's the prayers of people that bind our intentions and hearts to wish each other well and in collective wishing could there be some binding glue to hold the world together such that nothing fade or fall away.
She doesn't recall how it came into her possession only that when she prays in a rhythm when she is in the rhythm of her prayer she can feel those around her safe in a kind of holy halo. It is the days where distracted or otherwise preoccupied she neglects to pray or God forbid to give these prayers her true intentions that unforeseen misfortune befalls her friends or family or at least those sad people in today's paper now missing one or more of their number through unforeseeable calamity.
Out at the edge of town she's driving crystal crucifix in her fingers gone to wrinkle the beadstrings strung partial curved like a wilted infinity across the driving wheel. The light no longer feels to show her or save her the light is a dim threat of extinction dim fear of last moments and wasted lives a revealing of last days kind of brought too soon. Lately she doesn't believe in God or care much for her if she does exist she thinks and goes on These prayers of mine are prayers to link only with those of other people, prayers to make a net for each other's prayers and for those who don't pray too to be caught in on the way down. And the cross is where our bodies touched in love or compassion and the beads are justice lost and held together point by point and though we pray to no one or no one who cares we pray together.
She isn't sure even who she prays for today or who for her out at the edge of town driving with the crystal crucifix dangling down almost to her knee beneath the wheel. Is it going to rain or is the light to break through out at the edge of the dark clouds. Let this darkness take my sight, she thinks, let this full stop come and find me where I huddle under whatever debris praying bead by bead with everyone I've loved held together in my memory. If you mean for this to end then honey you do your worst.
She wonders what will be on TV this afternoon, light just starting to break through clouds being pulled apart tuft by tuft by the brutal wind, what she'll put on for dinner.
3.15.2010
spirit vs. mechanics
I've been trying to teach myself to read Spanish. I'm doing about 5 pages a week. The best help has been from my friend Meddie, who speaks Spanish from birth and who taught herself English when she moved here by reading the paper. I think she feels sorry for me because I'm trying to learn her native language by reading its obscure literature.
The last couple days when I've gotten stuck on the odd sentence, phrase, or full page she's helped me to unpack it. In that, she's showing me how to read for figurative meaning, how to find the the author's spirit and humor behind the narrator's voice.
These human elements and the psychological analysis underlying them are why I'm reading this particular book. But I get so caught up in the mechanics of grammar that if I am to glean deeper meaning it can only be by getting familiar enough with the mechanics to have them become a subconscious process, to free up brain space for interpretation. Or by getting a friend to help.
Sketch of world view: difference is static, commonality the signal. That what we can't understand about each other shouldn't matter in the least.
The last couple days when I've gotten stuck on the odd sentence, phrase, or full page she's helped me to unpack it. In that, she's showing me how to read for figurative meaning, how to find the the author's spirit and humor behind the narrator's voice.
These human elements and the psychological analysis underlying them are why I'm reading this particular book. But I get so caught up in the mechanics of grammar that if I am to glean deeper meaning it can only be by getting familiar enough with the mechanics to have them become a subconscious process, to free up brain space for interpretation. Or by getting a friend to help.
Sketch of world view: difference is static, commonality the signal. That what we can't understand about each other shouldn't matter in the least.
3.14.2010
year and a day
Drunk, blogging while driving. Also reading a book (The Elements of Style) and trying to program my car stereo to spring forward. What I drank was a cocktail sequence I like to call Noah's Ark. What I've discovered is that I can drive with my dick using only scotch tape and a jelly bracelet. Follow my updates on Twitter.
Pee break. Question posed to Burger King rest stop cashier do you love me answer unclear/possible no. Question posed to Starbucks rest stop cashier answer also unclear/possible no. To Exit 7A toll collector answer unclear/possible no, shocked look at steering column.
Question posed to self answer definite no. Twitter grows tiresome. Burning sensation from steering. Revert to by hand. Persistence of burning sensation. Question of three or nine southbound lanes. Re-engagement with Twitter. The important thing about blogging is that you have to keep doing it, you just have to write whether you want to or not. Press on. Re-imagine childhood as lovable kangaroo raised by human family. As baby bear raised by human family. As cuddly alien etc. Re-imagine childhood orphaned at 3 months, 6 months, 9 months, etc. Re-imagine childhood as slightly overlong setup to the greatest porno ever made as selected by a panel of 4 feminists and 4 male lizards. Re-imagine childhood as king cobra raised by human family, as swarm of bees etc.
Perfection of steering design (improved knot, sustainable misuse of ED meds). Travel thermos full of 100 Pipers whiskey. Driving for Deepwater, for Carney's Point. For thine is the kingdom, the power and the glory etc. A twip is a tweet one word in length. A twero is a tweet with no words. Partial loss of vision. Review of past Connect Four losses. No one strategy to win them all. Chirping. Vomiting. Pull car to side of road for purposes of mixing.
Pee break. Question posed to Burger King rest stop cashier do you love me answer unclear/possible no. Question posed to Starbucks rest stop cashier answer also unclear/possible no. To Exit 7A toll collector answer unclear/possible no, shocked look at steering column.
Question posed to self answer definite no. Twitter grows tiresome. Burning sensation from steering. Revert to by hand. Persistence of burning sensation. Question of three or nine southbound lanes. Re-engagement with Twitter. The important thing about blogging is that you have to keep doing it, you just have to write whether you want to or not. Press on. Re-imagine childhood as lovable kangaroo raised by human family. As baby bear raised by human family. As cuddly alien etc. Re-imagine childhood orphaned at 3 months, 6 months, 9 months, etc. Re-imagine childhood as slightly overlong setup to the greatest porno ever made as selected by a panel of 4 feminists and 4 male lizards. Re-imagine childhood as king cobra raised by human family, as swarm of bees etc.
Perfection of steering design (improved knot, sustainable misuse of ED meds). Travel thermos full of 100 Pipers whiskey. Driving for Deepwater, for Carney's Point. For thine is the kingdom, the power and the glory etc. A twip is a tweet one word in length. A twero is a tweet with no words. Partial loss of vision. Review of past Connect Four losses. No one strategy to win them all. Chirping. Vomiting. Pull car to side of road for purposes of mixing.
3.13.2010
year
It's been one year since I had a drink. My plan was to reach this goal and see how I felt. In that time I've realized that I was over-reliant on alcohol, that it was keeping me in a narrow place, and that to go back now would be a mistake.
A lot of people I know can pull off drinking fine, I would just say that if you have a nagging voice in the back of your head on the subject, it might help to listen to it.
The physical act of not drinking has gotten almost easy. What's remained challenging most days is that I was using drink to medicate pain that I didn't understand or know the name or extent of. This next year I want to make progress in making that pain stop.
Lest I seem to have grown overly sincere sans sauce, the fucked thing about Captain Morgan is that he's an android whose whole program is to robofuck your significant other into submission. Next thing you know he's living on your couch and having his mechanized share of your sweetheart the second you leave for work and every day you have to all make small talk and shit, try to be his friend, let him borrow your clothes, etc. Stay in school, champ.
A lot of people I know can pull off drinking fine, I would just say that if you have a nagging voice in the back of your head on the subject, it might help to listen to it.
The physical act of not drinking has gotten almost easy. What's remained challenging most days is that I was using drink to medicate pain that I didn't understand or know the name or extent of. This next year I want to make progress in making that pain stop.
Lest I seem to have grown overly sincere sans sauce, the fucked thing about Captain Morgan is that he's an android whose whole program is to robofuck your significant other into submission. Next thing you know he's living on your couch and having his mechanized share of your sweetheart the second you leave for work and every day you have to all make small talk and shit, try to be his friend, let him borrow your clothes, etc. Stay in school, champ.
3.09.2010
Gain as Much as You Fucking Can
Foil to"The Biggest Loser." Sponsorship opportunities for Cinnabon, Playstation, whiskey, the music of Cheer Accident. Each time somebody busts out of a pair of pants they get 20 bucks, a subway token and a week's supply of Cinnabon. Each week the one who gained least gets kicked off and is made to chug a ceremonial Slim-Fast while the other Gainers sing "The End" and gently pelt her or him with mushed-up Cinnabon.
Viewer interest segments where Gainers name the emotions/back stories/failures that are actively being buried deep inside and how good it feels not to have to deal with that terrifying shit directly. Working at one's normal job is allowed as long as it's mindless and at a desk. Masturbation is allowed without limit. Cinnabon: allowed.
What's your secret?
"I got so much ice cream on my shirt I couldn't tell what color it really was"
"Wish I could stop shitting, that the design of the human body might be improved"
"Chocolate bars dipped in tubs of mayonnaise then chugged the mayonnaise"
"Cinnabon in sandwich of deep-fried cookie batter"
"Yoga to teach my body to stop shitting"
"Feel Mars want feel Jupiter"
"Tiny arms, tiny arms"
"Liquified Nutella IV drip"
"Munch, munch"
Days before setting both gain-per-week and total-gain record Gainer #25 dies. Per custom the other gainers descend to eat the remains.
Culinary Eulogies
"Redolent of Cinnabon"
"Redolent of partially-digested Nutella drip"
"Redolent of non-shitting"
"Redolent of... Diet Dr. Pepper?"
Each their rituals, each their mysteries. Love story of Gainer #3 and Gainer #57, their shared love of self-love in a Cinnabon haze. How Jesus and in particular the Last Supper inspires Gainer #18 (who sees each meal as her last supper), how the presidency of Taft inspires Gainer #50 (who sees each year as his lame duck year). Whimsical accordion fanfare. Sprinting 18-member jug band enters and exits. Now amid a circus of color and light and cheese doodles a whisper-thin man with a washtub bass strides on to belt out:
The Gain as Much as You Fucking Can Theme Song
This land is your land, this land is my land
To gain as much as, you fucking ca-an
Oh Cinnabon is, your only friend
Gain as much as you fucking can
When I went walking, through the food court
I almost died on the cold mall floor
Thanks be to Cinnabon, my heart kept beating
Gain as much as you fucking can
This land is your land, this land is my land
From Ponderosa, to that amazing crab place on Shelter Island
Oh Cinnabon is, your only friend
Gain as much as you fucking can
(etc)
Season II Finale
Enterprising Gainers #15 and #17 create a compound of Nutella and Cinnabon in liquid form that they vow to guzzle and receive via IV drip. If they survive one will win it all. Work shots: getting it done. Rapid meal preparation and unwrapping of ready-to-eats, munching. Vigorous self love of Gainers #11, #17, #22, #24, #28. Back story of Gainer #11: Parental abuse, inanity of spouse, children, job, one remaining friend. Tug of war between Gainers #15 and #17 over last carton of Cinnabon. Inspiring dark horse victory by Gainer #11 who clubs both Gainer #15 and #17 and spends the last quarter of the episode feasting on their remains. "Redolent of victory."
Viewer interest segments where Gainers name the emotions/back stories/failures that are actively being buried deep inside and how good it feels not to have to deal with that terrifying shit directly. Working at one's normal job is allowed as long as it's mindless and at a desk. Masturbation is allowed without limit. Cinnabon: allowed.
What's your secret?
"I got so much ice cream on my shirt I couldn't tell what color it really was"
"Wish I could stop shitting, that the design of the human body might be improved"
"Chocolate bars dipped in tubs of mayonnaise then chugged the mayonnaise"
"Cinnabon in sandwich of deep-fried cookie batter"
"Yoga to teach my body to stop shitting"
"Feel Mars want feel Jupiter"
"Tiny arms, tiny arms"
"Liquified Nutella IV drip"
"Munch, munch"
Days before setting both gain-per-week and total-gain record Gainer #25 dies. Per custom the other gainers descend to eat the remains.
Culinary Eulogies
"Redolent of Cinnabon"
"Redolent of partially-digested Nutella drip"
"Redolent of non-shitting"
"Redolent of... Diet Dr. Pepper?"
Each their rituals, each their mysteries. Love story of Gainer #3 and Gainer #57, their shared love of self-love in a Cinnabon haze. How Jesus and in particular the Last Supper inspires Gainer #18 (who sees each meal as her last supper), how the presidency of Taft inspires Gainer #50 (who sees each year as his lame duck year). Whimsical accordion fanfare. Sprinting 18-member jug band enters and exits. Now amid a circus of color and light and cheese doodles a whisper-thin man with a washtub bass strides on to belt out:
The Gain as Much as You Fucking Can Theme Song
This land is your land, this land is my land
To gain as much as, you fucking ca-an
Oh Cinnabon is, your only friend
Gain as much as you fucking can
When I went walking, through the food court
I almost died on the cold mall floor
Thanks be to Cinnabon, my heart kept beating
Gain as much as you fucking can
This land is your land, this land is my land
From Ponderosa, to that amazing crab place on Shelter Island
Oh Cinnabon is, your only friend
Gain as much as you fucking can
(etc)
Season II Finale
Enterprising Gainers #15 and #17 create a compound of Nutella and Cinnabon in liquid form that they vow to guzzle and receive via IV drip. If they survive one will win it all. Work shots: getting it done. Rapid meal preparation and unwrapping of ready-to-eats, munching. Vigorous self love of Gainers #11, #17, #22, #24, #28. Back story of Gainer #11: Parental abuse, inanity of spouse, children, job, one remaining friend. Tug of war between Gainers #15 and #17 over last carton of Cinnabon. Inspiring dark horse victory by Gainer #11 who clubs both Gainer #15 and #17 and spends the last quarter of the episode feasting on their remains. "Redolent of victory."
3.08.2010
The Snowy Day (rated R)
Adapted from the Caldecott Medal-winning classic, "The Snowy Day" recounts the adventures of Peter (Jamie Foxx), an African-American child living in the city on a very snowy day. Through his eyes, we see just how grand a day it is, and also, the dangers that can lurk beneath the snow.
There are mountains of snow, and lots of things to do in it (once he is properly bundled, of course.) Peter makes a snowman, snow angels, and myriad footprints; he finds the perfect stick. And he climbs a mysterious mountain of snow. Appropriate for small children through second grade, the first 15 minutes of the film present an environment transformed and cloaked in joyous and innocent mystery. Up until this point, "The Snowy Day" remains a relatively straightforward adaption of its source.
Atop Snow Mountain, Peter encounters The Snow Magician (Danny Devito, acting for his life). A slinking chord sequence brings our idyll into fraughter territory, drawing the viewer into an intricate and ceaseless dance of tension and suspense.
To prevent him from disclosing a shocking incident witnessed in the fog of Snow Mountain-- an incident best left undescribed here -- the Snow Magician grants Peter a magic talking snowball (Javier Bardem) that will kill any child that it strikes, and which confidently forecasts doom to its victims in elegant Spanish. When later that day Peter is caught in the crossfire of a fierce snowball fight, he senses that his own life may be in danger, and he is forced to use the magic snowball.
When Peter takes the snowball home to his apartment, a tense standoff ensues with his mother (a moribund Sarah Jessica Parker), and Peter is forced to use the ball again.
Peter puts the snowball in his pocket and goes to sleep. While he sleeps, the snowball sneaks out of the apartment and bludgeons his downstairs neighbor to death. After dreaming of a YMCA pool filled with skulls, Peter awakens, guilt-stricken, and is relieved to find the snowball no longer in his pocket.
Unfortunately, he finds the magic snowball sitting at the breakfast table, eating a bowl of Shredded Wheat with almond milk. Thinking to shatter the ball with the stick he'd found the previous day, he reaches for it and shudders to discover that it has transformed into a snake. The stick-snake barks at him, hissing that "the ssssnow never endssss" and to "join ussss Peter." Shaking with anger, the ball shouts insults and promises swift dispatch in less-refined Spanish.
Peter runs out of the apartment without getting dressed, realizing to his further horror that it's snowing again. The voices of his victims whisper accusations in the drifting snow. Staggering down the alley, dragging his bare feet through an un-plowed and un-shoveled urban tundra, he has become overnight a desperate fugitive. He looks constantly behind him, awaiting the last snowball he'll ever see, and seems a boy aged overnight into a frail, dying man.
There are mountains of snow, and lots of things to do in it (once he is properly bundled, of course.) Peter makes a snowman, snow angels, and myriad footprints; he finds the perfect stick. And he climbs a mysterious mountain of snow. Appropriate for small children through second grade, the first 15 minutes of the film present an environment transformed and cloaked in joyous and innocent mystery. Up until this point, "The Snowy Day" remains a relatively straightforward adaption of its source.
Atop Snow Mountain, Peter encounters The Snow Magician (Danny Devito, acting for his life). A slinking chord sequence brings our idyll into fraughter territory, drawing the viewer into an intricate and ceaseless dance of tension and suspense.
To prevent him from disclosing a shocking incident witnessed in the fog of Snow Mountain-- an incident best left undescribed here -- the Snow Magician grants Peter a magic talking snowball (Javier Bardem) that will kill any child that it strikes, and which confidently forecasts doom to its victims in elegant Spanish. When later that day Peter is caught in the crossfire of a fierce snowball fight, he senses that his own life may be in danger, and he is forced to use the magic snowball.
When Peter takes the snowball home to his apartment, a tense standoff ensues with his mother (a moribund Sarah Jessica Parker), and Peter is forced to use the ball again.
Peter puts the snowball in his pocket and goes to sleep. While he sleeps, the snowball sneaks out of the apartment and bludgeons his downstairs neighbor to death. After dreaming of a YMCA pool filled with skulls, Peter awakens, guilt-stricken, and is relieved to find the snowball no longer in his pocket.
Unfortunately, he finds the magic snowball sitting at the breakfast table, eating a bowl of Shredded Wheat with almond milk. Thinking to shatter the ball with the stick he'd found the previous day, he reaches for it and shudders to discover that it has transformed into a snake. The stick-snake barks at him, hissing that "the ssssnow never endssss" and to "join ussss Peter." Shaking with anger, the ball shouts insults and promises swift dispatch in less-refined Spanish.
Peter runs out of the apartment without getting dressed, realizing to his further horror that it's snowing again. The voices of his victims whisper accusations in the drifting snow. Staggering down the alley, dragging his bare feet through an un-plowed and un-shoveled urban tundra, he has become overnight a desperate fugitive. He looks constantly behind him, awaiting the last snowball he'll ever see, and seems a boy aged overnight into a frail, dying man.
lighthouse acknowledges the astronaut
In my dream you were packing up to leave this world, so we threw you a block party. It got out of hand from the start. People kept showing up from all over the world to see you off. It was like some rich folks' wedding where the father of the bride gives a count of the number of countries represented during his toast. There were Inuits and Japanese, Germans and Newfies, Swedes and Chinese, even a guy from South Jersey below exit 2. A couple none of us had ever met was going at it on the coffee table, egged on by a guy in a rhinestone jumpsuit come to think of it none of us had ever met either. About a hundred people were breakdancing in teams of a dozen or more.
A group of kids were doing keg stands behind the Robinson's shed. You joined them briefly in your own, then chugged another beer for good measure. I know you passed on weed, which seemed like the right idea for your last night on earth, one never knows how that's going to go.
People were shooting bottle rockets at each other, like Dutch new year. The music grew in volume until the cops came. We explained the situation and they did keg stands as well. Then they left and soon came again. They issued us a warning that time, but it was clear they were just making sure they were back before the keg got kicked. People kept kissing you on the cheek.
The air was part bitter, part sweet. It wasn't totally clear which side of that you came down on, but I suspect sweet. You were tapping your feet to the music, which was something big band and which everybody seemed to understand the vibe of that night.
When you and I talk an issue straight on one of us always presses too hard, leaving the other to sit on regret for months after. Recognizing that we didn't have that kind of time we talked instead about spring training, about the Eagles off-season moves. You asked me how my wife and son were and I said they were fine, everything was fine. That was really you asking me if everything would be okay and me replying that I thought it would be, that I hoped to God it would be.
When you left we were kind of worried about your driving, but there wasn't much point. Everybody kept coming back to give you another hug. Ruby had packed a care package of road beer, potato chips, and a toasted pastrami sandwich. As you left we flicked the light on the front porch per Freeman custom, the lighthouse acknowledging the astronaut. Cops followed you home, playing Earl Hines loud out of bullhorns mounted on top of their cars.
A group of kids were doing keg stands behind the Robinson's shed. You joined them briefly in your own, then chugged another beer for good measure. I know you passed on weed, which seemed like the right idea for your last night on earth, one never knows how that's going to go.
People were shooting bottle rockets at each other, like Dutch new year. The music grew in volume until the cops came. We explained the situation and they did keg stands as well. Then they left and soon came again. They issued us a warning that time, but it was clear they were just making sure they were back before the keg got kicked. People kept kissing you on the cheek.
The air was part bitter, part sweet. It wasn't totally clear which side of that you came down on, but I suspect sweet. You were tapping your feet to the music, which was something big band and which everybody seemed to understand the vibe of that night.
When you and I talk an issue straight on one of us always presses too hard, leaving the other to sit on regret for months after. Recognizing that we didn't have that kind of time we talked instead about spring training, about the Eagles off-season moves. You asked me how my wife and son were and I said they were fine, everything was fine. That was really you asking me if everything would be okay and me replying that I thought it would be, that I hoped to God it would be.
When you left we were kind of worried about your driving, but there wasn't much point. Everybody kept coming back to give you another hug. Ruby had packed a care package of road beer, potato chips, and a toasted pastrami sandwich. As you left we flicked the light on the front porch per Freeman custom, the lighthouse acknowledging the astronaut. Cops followed you home, playing Earl Hines loud out of bullhorns mounted on top of their cars.
3.07.2010
binary absolution
the job that kills us/the job that makes us stronger. your actual thinking/your best deadpan of a confused and deeply bitter monologue just prior to giving up. jokes/ inarticulate cries for help. an aging person's fear of progress/a developing intellect's appreciation of historical context. cultivating an interior life/fearing that grown-up social situations will bore you to death and becoming a shut-in.
death as feared/ death as release into eternal.the people you know as a mutually supporting network of being and becoming/the people you know as dead weight. pets as emblems and encouragers of love/pets as organic and ultimately disappointing toys.
art as vanity/art as essential nourishment. sex as desire/sex as fruition. books as enrichment/books as enablers of lonely imagining. computer love/computer anomie. loud music as spiritual cleanser/loud music as that shit you wasted your time on that's made you half deaf at a young age. life as human progress/ life as circular refeeding of broader kinetic or environmental process.
america as sinking ship/america as complex flawed progress. the religions of the world as vampires/the religions of the world as rescue ropes out of clinical isolation and feeble, inappropriate ritual.
let's go mets/let's go off ourselves. kids as enablers of love/kids as transforming incredible enablers of love/kids as destroyers of whatever attention span you might have had left. this case of more than a binary crashes the loop, feeble construct disappears in cloud of smoke.
death as feared/ death as release into eternal.the people you know as a mutually supporting network of being and becoming/the people you know as dead weight. pets as emblems and encouragers of love/pets as organic and ultimately disappointing toys.
art as vanity/art as essential nourishment. sex as desire/sex as fruition. books as enrichment/books as enablers of lonely imagining. computer love/computer anomie. loud music as spiritual cleanser/loud music as that shit you wasted your time on that's made you half deaf at a young age. life as human progress/ life as circular refeeding of broader kinetic or environmental process.
america as sinking ship/america as complex flawed progress. the religions of the world as vampires/the religions of the world as rescue ropes out of clinical isolation and feeble, inappropriate ritual.
let's go mets/let's go off ourselves. kids as enablers of love/kids as transforming incredible enablers of love/kids as destroyers of whatever attention span you might have had left. this case of more than a binary crashes the loop, feeble construct disappears in cloud of smoke.
3.05.2010
ask a creepy curmudgeon
In today's column, CC offers marriage advice.
Dear Creepy Curmudgeon--
My husband and I are both "Church people", and don't use drugs or alcohol. I'm a stay at home mom and my kids love my husband very much. How would the judge determine who is the better parent for the children to live with?
--Betty Sheets
Dear Betty--
What gender are your children? A boy should be raised by the father, a girl by her mother. If the children are boys or a mix you therefore have three choices: a) allow custody to be granted to the father; b) change genders, win custody, and require the children to call you daddy and treat you as they did their father; or c) end the biological father's life and enlist a taxidermist to preserve the body. This will both maintain your maternal role and give your children the consistency that only a paternal presence can bring.
If the dinner table is rectangular, mount the father atop the head of it. For all other shapes of table, you shall mount the father in the center. The length shall be three hundred cubits, the breadth fifty cubits, the height thirty cubits. The father shall be presented daily with burnt offerings. During meals, dinner in particular, the conversation shall be kept light and airy -- he has had a difficult day and this is his time to unwind. Keep the father in a warm, dry place; dust regularly.
Sometimes when it’s late and my mind feels occupied by a kind of a shadow mind, a cat mind that I know I should avoid but instead always to (the kind of mind that tells me I should get to bed with haste but instead I pour a drink) I think of my second wife, of the way I always thought we would excel at parenting together when we had the opportunity. But time is cruel and we were crueler still and one night the moon set flaming below the treetops and when I awoke she was gone. She left a note that I couldn’t bring myself to read, which I instead folded carefully on itself and shredded in the garbage disposal. At night when I think of her now, I torture myself with the thought that I might not have understood the meaning of that note. That perhaps it might have left hope for us and the children we never had, that perhaps it begged me to follow her, that perhaps it even told me where to go.
Hold on to your love! And look me up sometime if you're ever in Monmouth County, kiddo.
--CC
Dear Creepy Curmudgeon--
My ex and I share custody of our 9 year old son. My son has told me that his Dad has drinking 2 bottles of Crown Royal a day. My ex was ordered not to drink when we first divorced, and I'm going to try and get full custody of my son because of the alcoholism that's going on now. I'm worried that if my son testifies about his Dad's drinking, that his Dad will blame him and get mad. What can I do?
--Daisy Curfews
Dear Daisy--
How much do you drink yourself? I ask because a key aspect of joint custody is balance. It's important to respect ground rules established by the other parent, and that they respect yours as well. If you drink 3 bottles of Jim Beam each day, it's important to ask your partner to model the same behavior, no more, no less.
My first wife and I were always at each other's throats. Things got out of hand before we realized the importance of the balance I described. For us, balance ultimately involved the witness protection program, a fake catering business, and the Thirty Years' War. It also (and perhaps most importantly) involved keeping tanks of nitrous oxide on each side of our bed. But in the end those were all just accessories. In love we were like reactive elements, like molecules of heat and cold that had to be nearer, had to bring the other toward some fleeting stasis. To say that we hurt each other those nights was to ignore the clean stinging feeling of air on an open wound, the redemptive nervous joking of the early-morning emergency room, the extra little ziplock bag of nitrous we shared to take the edge off before heading in for our respective days in the classroom.
By the way, do you know anyone looking for five or more lightly-used pine coffins at a reasonable rate? PayPal and MasterCard accepted. Stop in if you're ever in my neck of the woods, hon.
--CC
Dear Creepy Curmudgeon--
Can I sue the woman who my husband had an affair with that led to our divorce?
-Susan Maiman
Dear Sue--
Typically, you can't, at least not as it relates to your divorce. Speaking as a common law lawyer and five-time husband, however, you could sue her if she broke into your house and left a boa constrictor in your john, or poisoned your medication, or blew up your car with you in it, or defrauded your grandmother of her public assistance, or ran over your parents with a cement mixer, or left you for dead with a bullet in your spine in the Gobi Desert. I should stress that these are just examples from my own personal history, this list isn’t meant to be prescriptive. The only limits are those we place upon ourselves, on our imaginations.
In some states (Hawaii, Illinois, Mississippi, New Mexico, North Carolina, South Dakota, Utah) you can sue the third party for alienation of affection. You need to realize though that this is an expensive endeavor that requires a lot of time. A better option is to kill your husband and have his body stuffed by a taxidermist, then set his body at the head of the table, etc.
Sometimes at night I walk the fringes of this town alone. On a moonless night I can pretend that I am a walker in another age or species, in a forest pathway only vaguely known. I realize in the darkness that we are never alone, that each age of humankind is lived parallel with the others, that generations are a stacked sequence of parallel segments, packed densely line by line to wrap around a cylinder or sphere. I feel the decaying dreams and won hopes of other ages channeling in real time through me, a man aging and lost on the periphery of his own consciousness. An owl shifts in a tree, a man stands alone at a far off fence in the dark. I shiver and realize that she and I were born to love each other, even if only for 25 minutes in the bathroom of a Greyhound coach in a pornographic tangle of cheap lipstick and septic metal and screams muted fast against shoulder blades, to have and to hold, promises that she and I could only ever be relied upon to keep on E in an honest-to-god uncomfortable Greyhound coach bathroom in the Nebraska night. That our lives were only for that, that it's well possible our lives were just for that.
Look me up sometime if you're ever in Monmouth County, sweetie, I know this great dim sum place.
--CC
Dear Creepy Curmudgeon--
My husband and I are both "Church people", and don't use drugs or alcohol. I'm a stay at home mom and my kids love my husband very much. How would the judge determine who is the better parent for the children to live with?
--Betty Sheets
Dear Betty--
What gender are your children? A boy should be raised by the father, a girl by her mother. If the children are boys or a mix you therefore have three choices: a) allow custody to be granted to the father; b) change genders, win custody, and require the children to call you daddy and treat you as they did their father; or c) end the biological father's life and enlist a taxidermist to preserve the body. This will both maintain your maternal role and give your children the consistency that only a paternal presence can bring.
If the dinner table is rectangular, mount the father atop the head of it. For all other shapes of table, you shall mount the father in the center. The length shall be three hundred cubits, the breadth fifty cubits, the height thirty cubits. The father shall be presented daily with burnt offerings. During meals, dinner in particular, the conversation shall be kept light and airy -- he has had a difficult day and this is his time to unwind. Keep the father in a warm, dry place; dust regularly.
Sometimes when it’s late and my mind feels occupied by a kind of a shadow mind, a cat mind that I know I should avoid but instead always to (the kind of mind that tells me I should get to bed with haste but instead I pour a drink) I think of my second wife, of the way I always thought we would excel at parenting together when we had the opportunity. But time is cruel and we were crueler still and one night the moon set flaming below the treetops and when I awoke she was gone. She left a note that I couldn’t bring myself to read, which I instead folded carefully on itself and shredded in the garbage disposal. At night when I think of her now, I torture myself with the thought that I might not have understood the meaning of that note. That perhaps it might have left hope for us and the children we never had, that perhaps it begged me to follow her, that perhaps it even told me where to go.
Hold on to your love! And look me up sometime if you're ever in Monmouth County, kiddo.
--CC
Dear Creepy Curmudgeon--
My ex and I share custody of our 9 year old son. My son has told me that his Dad has drinking 2 bottles of Crown Royal a day. My ex was ordered not to drink when we first divorced, and I'm going to try and get full custody of my son because of the alcoholism that's going on now. I'm worried that if my son testifies about his Dad's drinking, that his Dad will blame him and get mad. What can I do?
--Daisy Curfews
Dear Daisy--
How much do you drink yourself? I ask because a key aspect of joint custody is balance. It's important to respect ground rules established by the other parent, and that they respect yours as well. If you drink 3 bottles of Jim Beam each day, it's important to ask your partner to model the same behavior, no more, no less.
My first wife and I were always at each other's throats. Things got out of hand before we realized the importance of the balance I described. For us, balance ultimately involved the witness protection program, a fake catering business, and the Thirty Years' War. It also (and perhaps most importantly) involved keeping tanks of nitrous oxide on each side of our bed. But in the end those were all just accessories. In love we were like reactive elements, like molecules of heat and cold that had to be nearer, had to bring the other toward some fleeting stasis. To say that we hurt each other those nights was to ignore the clean stinging feeling of air on an open wound, the redemptive nervous joking of the early-morning emergency room, the extra little ziplock bag of nitrous we shared to take the edge off before heading in for our respective days in the classroom.
By the way, do you know anyone looking for five or more lightly-used pine coffins at a reasonable rate? PayPal and MasterCard accepted. Stop in if you're ever in my neck of the woods, hon.
--CC
Dear Creepy Curmudgeon--
Can I sue the woman who my husband had an affair with that led to our divorce?
-Susan Maiman
Dear Sue--
Typically, you can't, at least not as it relates to your divorce. Speaking as a common law lawyer and five-time husband, however, you could sue her if she broke into your house and left a boa constrictor in your john, or poisoned your medication, or blew up your car with you in it, or defrauded your grandmother of her public assistance, or ran over your parents with a cement mixer, or left you for dead with a bullet in your spine in the Gobi Desert. I should stress that these are just examples from my own personal history, this list isn’t meant to be prescriptive. The only limits are those we place upon ourselves, on our imaginations.
In some states (Hawaii, Illinois, Mississippi, New Mexico, North Carolina, South Dakota, Utah) you can sue the third party for alienation of affection. You need to realize though that this is an expensive endeavor that requires a lot of time. A better option is to kill your husband and have his body stuffed by a taxidermist, then set his body at the head of the table, etc.
Sometimes at night I walk the fringes of this town alone. On a moonless night I can pretend that I am a walker in another age or species, in a forest pathway only vaguely known. I realize in the darkness that we are never alone, that each age of humankind is lived parallel with the others, that generations are a stacked sequence of parallel segments, packed densely line by line to wrap around a cylinder or sphere. I feel the decaying dreams and won hopes of other ages channeling in real time through me, a man aging and lost on the periphery of his own consciousness. An owl shifts in a tree, a man stands alone at a far off fence in the dark. I shiver and realize that she and I were born to love each other, even if only for 25 minutes in the bathroom of a Greyhound coach in a pornographic tangle of cheap lipstick and septic metal and screams muted fast against shoulder blades, to have and to hold, promises that she and I could only ever be relied upon to keep on E in an honest-to-god uncomfortable Greyhound coach bathroom in the Nebraska night. That our lives were only for that, that it's well possible our lives were just for that.
Look me up sometime if you're ever in Monmouth County, sweetie, I know this great dim sum place.
--CC
3.04.2010
dub as foreign substance/the whitest advice column in the world
headphones dub music and as i try to nod along a thicket of knots in my shoulders prevents the slightest rhythmic movement. it's like as if a layer of muting cotton balls has stuffed itself between muscle and joint.
i'm awfully white. i say this more as simple fact than as an emblem of self hate or ridiculous and racist pride. there are things that come naturally to me it's true (e.g. abstraction, retreating into a cloud, the subjugation of women or those less fortunate) but i don't completely hate myself, or at least not because i'm white. damn it though, i want this music to get through.
turn the lava lamp back on. groovy, sad fuck of a man. when i get this caustic and useless i should write the advice column that hastens me to hell, the kind where i ruin people's lives. pure poison.
Dear Creepy Curmudgeon --
My mother and I are really close. I am 13. There is only one problem. She doesn’t know I go out with boys. She is always telling her friends that I am different and not interested in that sort of thing. I want to know if I should tell her. The one other time I lied to her she cried because I kept a secret from her. I need help.
--Confused
Dear Confused Waste--
It is likely that you will soon die of an obscure VD, you lying waste. Tell that crow mother of yours that I stole her shit. Take care.
--Creepy
Dear Creepy Curmudgeon--
I am planning to marry the man of my dreams this coming September. Although his parents are wonderful, I'm a bit concerned about the role that they still play in his life...particularly his mother. She still does my fiancé's laundry, cooks his lunches daily, and cleans his house. What do you think?
--Hesitant
Dear Horny Freak--
We all get cold feet, but to insinuate that your fiance's mother is interested in moving in on your marital bed is to project your own perverse unconscious desires onto the motivations of a thoughtful family. Incest is a near-universal taboo and you should be ashamed of yourself for even picturing your mother-in-law to be in such a compromised position, care gone to the wind, love in her eyes and the sound of her breathing, her pulse erratic, her hair adrift on the pillow. It's time to cut this man loose, admit you have a problem and either hurl yourself off a gorge or take up a relaxing hobby, such as building model cars. Take care of yourself, kiddo.
--Creepy
Dear Creepy Curmudgeon--
I am a 41-year-old recovering addict with eight years of sobriety. I have not been in a loving relationship for over 10 years. Truthfully, I am scared to death of actually finding a mate.
Everyday I rush home after work, hide away until the next morning, and repeat. Initially in my sobriety, the solitude was fine. Now I am so lonely I could puke myself to death. I know I could meet women, but I don't know where to start. I am intelligent, attractive, and so confused. I just want to feel again. I want a new life, this one went off track somewhere in the 1980s.
--Down and Alone
Dear Downer --
Let's face it, love is elusive. When you're down and out, running from north to south, what more can you do? When I'm horny and lonely (which is often) I like to go to a bar and get a little loose. One thing leads to another until at some point in the night something "clicks" and I usually wake up the next morning in a different room than where I began the day. Sometimes another person is next to me and typically they are alive. Jesus loves you, kiddo. Get screwed up out of your head and the sex will follow.
--Creepy
i'm awfully white. i say this more as simple fact than as an emblem of self hate or ridiculous and racist pride. there are things that come naturally to me it's true (e.g. abstraction, retreating into a cloud, the subjugation of women or those less fortunate) but i don't completely hate myself, or at least not because i'm white. damn it though, i want this music to get through.
turn the lava lamp back on. groovy, sad fuck of a man. when i get this caustic and useless i should write the advice column that hastens me to hell, the kind where i ruin people's lives. pure poison.
Dear Creepy Curmudgeon --
My mother and I are really close. I am 13. There is only one problem. She doesn’t know I go out with boys. She is always telling her friends that I am different and not interested in that sort of thing. I want to know if I should tell her. The one other time I lied to her she cried because I kept a secret from her. I need help.
--Confused
Dear Confused Waste--
It is likely that you will soon die of an obscure VD, you lying waste. Tell that crow mother of yours that I stole her shit. Take care.
--Creepy
Dear Creepy Curmudgeon--
I am planning to marry the man of my dreams this coming September. Although his parents are wonderful, I'm a bit concerned about the role that they still play in his life...particularly his mother. She still does my fiancé's laundry, cooks his lunches daily, and cleans his house. What do you think?
--Hesitant
Dear Horny Freak--
We all get cold feet, but to insinuate that your fiance's mother is interested in moving in on your marital bed is to project your own perverse unconscious desires onto the motivations of a thoughtful family. Incest is a near-universal taboo and you should be ashamed of yourself for even picturing your mother-in-law to be in such a compromised position, care gone to the wind, love in her eyes and the sound of her breathing, her pulse erratic, her hair adrift on the pillow. It's time to cut this man loose, admit you have a problem and either hurl yourself off a gorge or take up a relaxing hobby, such as building model cars. Take care of yourself, kiddo.
--Creepy
Dear Creepy Curmudgeon--
I am a 41-year-old recovering addict with eight years of sobriety. I have not been in a loving relationship for over 10 years. Truthfully, I am scared to death of actually finding a mate.
Everyday I rush home after work, hide away until the next morning, and repeat. Initially in my sobriety, the solitude was fine. Now I am so lonely I could puke myself to death. I know I could meet women, but I don't know where to start. I am intelligent, attractive, and so confused. I just want to feel again. I want a new life, this one went off track somewhere in the 1980s.
--Down and Alone
Dear Downer --
Let's face it, love is elusive. When you're down and out, running from north to south, what more can you do? When I'm horny and lonely (which is often) I like to go to a bar and get a little loose. One thing leads to another until at some point in the night something "clicks" and I usually wake up the next morning in a different room than where I began the day. Sometimes another person is next to me and typically they are alive. Jesus loves you, kiddo. Get screwed up out of your head and the sex will follow.
--Creepy
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