My Wooden Snake
There is a wooden, multi-jointed snake on my breakfast table. I got it at a truck stop in Mississippi. One of the cable internet guys was sitting across from me, showing me the bill for 24 dollars. I was writing the check when he said--you a snake lover? I think that is what he actually said but I was writing the check and only caught on that he had mentioned the snake and I just said something like, yeh, hoping that I would get away with it. I don't actually speak a lot, in the course of a day. He went on to say that snakes were the only thing he was really afraid of. I felt bad about this, his fear of snakes, so I blurted out a bald-faced lie about why the snake was there on the table. It felt weird lying to this kid about snakes. He already thought I was a snake lover because I think I had already admitted as much. I wanted to let the kid know that I was also afraid of snakes, but to say so would make me a hypocrite, a snake loving hypocrite. But I don't know, really, what was going on. This was a perfect example of poor communication. Of two people not synching. I think it was partly the kid's fault. His partner was in the other room hooking up the wireless router. That's not what they were paid to do, that's not what the 24 dollars was for but I had told the partner there was an extra cash 40 in it for him if he had me wireless when he left. I'm getting the hang of things. I am a slow learner but I am getting the hang of things. It took the partner about 5 extra minutes to get me wireless. Was it worth 480 dollars an hour to me? Yes it was, is the crazy truth.
...more recent posts
Advice To Slim
I signed up last year and had all the necessary background checks to qualify as a volunteer in a local mentoring program for area youth, but in the year since I have not actually participated in the program. Shortly after the final orientation I had to leave the area for several months. And then upon returning I wasn't sure my future here was stable enough to commit to a program that asks for a minimum of one year involvement. When I did become more comfortable with the idea of being here it was due in large part to a woman in NY, who exists for me in blinking fashion, sometimes here, or I there, and sometimes not. It is a relationship that survives by the acceptance of a five hour separation. And that one of us can visit the other often enough to make it seem real. And so I add this--that I must travel away from here on a semi-regular yet not scheduled basis--to the list of reasons why I cannot commit to a local mentoring program.
But the truth is, before I even get to those reasons, it may be that the real reason I am hesitant to get back into mentoring is because I suck at it. Yeah, I did a little mentoring once, sort of free-lance, outside of an actual program. And in my head I try to blur the number of failures into one. But as the years pass it is hard to imagine any description that would in any way define my efforts as mentor as anything but, well, a tad short of ideal, and the number of failures not just one, but several. On Sundays I used to load up a compact car full of teenage and pre-teenage boys and drive them around a city in southern Louisiana, looking for distractions from the difficult scenarios that played out every day on the street on which we all lived.
What brings all this to mind at this point in time is the news that another of the boys has been locked up for first degree homicide. So that now I can look back to a Sunday almost ten years ago, where of five boys in my car, all five have at least been accused of murder, if not actually committing it. On other Sundays the mix would be different and I can proudly say that one of those mixes included a carful where only two of the five have grown up to be suspected murderers. Of what use is this information? What do you do with it? I'm not sure yet of what use it is but what I'm doing with it is getting rid of it. These bits of information can slip in almost unnoticed, a brief email exchange where you ask--oh really, what was he arrested for? and the answer comes back first degree homicide. And then the information sits there and you think you have processed it but you haven't because it turns out that you could never keep up with it, over the years. Every so often you think you have cleared out the old files, those files with tabs that say--kids who cuss; kids who hit; kids who stab; kids who murder, but apparently you not only suck at mentoring, you are not much of a bookkeeper, either; the information is not gone, just hidden, and not even well hidden at that.
I am not really so egomaniacal, or self-critical, to think that my deficiencies led directly to these kids growing up to be murderers, but as we shared a part of our lives together it is hard for me not to think of our lives as being intertwined. And so to whatever small degree I was actually an influence on these bad boys, I seek in at least that measure the answer to what it is I could have done differently. Which is funny, because my mother, may she rest in peace, once asked the same question regarding her raising of me. I told her at the time that I thought she had done a fine job, I really had no complaints, and that I thought there was a limit to how far a parent should go in taking responsibility for the overall outcome of their child. Hey, that's pretty damn good advice, I should take it.
As for these boys--is it true that they would greatly benefit from a relatively stable two parent family, some love, some discipline, a school system that hasn't given up on itself, and them? I would say for sure it is true and "greatly benefit" might even be understatement. Is it also true that seeing the problem, defining it, studying it and speaking out about it is half the battle? No, I don't think so. I think we should quit seeing it and speaking about it and just jump right in and do something, be something, in some way become something that can be described as actively involved. There will be plenty to look at and talk about after the fact. I'm talking to you, Slim, and this isn't just about mentoring. You need to giddyup boy, giddyup.
I signed up last year and had all the necessary background checks to qualify as a volunteer in a local mentoring program for area youth, but in the year since I have not actually participated in the program. Shortly after the final orientation I had to leave the area for several months. And then upon returning I wasn't sure my future here was stable enough to commit to a program that asks for a minimum of one year involvement. When I did become more comfortable with the idea of being here it was due in large part to a woman in NY, who exists for me in blinking fashion, sometimes here, or I there, and sometimes not. It is a relationship that survives by the acceptance of a five hour separation. And that one of us can visit the other often enough to make it seem real. And so I add this--that I must travel away from here on a semi-regular yet not scheduled basis--to the list of reasons why I cannot commit to a local mentoring program.
But the truth is, before I even get to those reasons, it may be that the real reason I am hesitant to get back into mentoring is because I suck at it. Yeah, I did a little mentoring once, sort of free-lance, outside of an actual program. And in my head I try to blur the number of failures into one. But as the years pass it is hard to imagine any description that would in any way define my efforts as mentor as anything but, well, a tad short of ideal, and the number of failures not just one, but several. On Sundays I used to load up a compact car full of teenage and pre-teenage boys and drive them around a city in southern Louisiana, looking for distractions from the difficult scenarios that played out every day on the street on which we all lived.
What brings all this to mind at this point in time is the news that another of the boys has been locked up for first degree homicide. So that now I can look back to a Sunday almost ten years ago, where of five boys in my car, all five have at least been accused of murder, if not actually committing it. On other Sundays the mix would be different and I can proudly say that one of those mixes included a carful where only two of the five have grown up to be suspected murderers. Of what use is this information? What do you do with it? I'm not sure yet of what use it is but what I'm doing with it is getting rid of it. These bits of information can slip in almost unnoticed, a brief email exchange where you ask--oh really, what was he arrested for? and the answer comes back first degree homicide. And then the information sits there and you think you have processed it but you haven't because it turns out that you could never keep up with it, over the years. Every so often you think you have cleared out the old files, those files with tabs that say--kids who cuss; kids who hit; kids who stab; kids who murder, but apparently you not only suck at mentoring, you are not much of a bookkeeper, either; the information is not gone, just hidden, and not even well hidden at that.
I am not really so egomaniacal, or self-critical, to think that my deficiencies led directly to these kids growing up to be murderers, but as we shared a part of our lives together it is hard for me not to think of our lives as being intertwined. And so to whatever small degree I was actually an influence on these bad boys, I seek in at least that measure the answer to what it is I could have done differently. Which is funny, because my mother, may she rest in peace, once asked the same question regarding her raising of me. I told her at the time that I thought she had done a fine job, I really had no complaints, and that I thought there was a limit to how far a parent should go in taking responsibility for the overall outcome of their child. Hey, that's pretty damn good advice, I should take it.
As for these boys--is it true that they would greatly benefit from a relatively stable two parent family, some love, some discipline, a school system that hasn't given up on itself, and them? I would say for sure it is true and "greatly benefit" might even be understatement. Is it also true that seeing the problem, defining it, studying it and speaking out about it is half the battle? No, I don't think so. I think we should quit seeing it and speaking about it and just jump right in and do something, be something, in some way become something that can be described as actively involved. There will be plenty to look at and talk about after the fact. I'm talking to you, Slim, and this isn't just about mentoring. You need to giddyup boy, giddyup.
Ticket Envy
Oh he's a big college professor in New Orleans now but when he was just a critter, a speck, an aphid on the family tree if you will, back in Texas, me and my older brother used to mess with his head a little bit, we did. My nephew doesn't seem any the worse for it now, I mean, I don't think he's worse off. You could take things out of context, like the fact that he has been seen more than a few times in public wearing colorful tights and a mask, imitating perhaps the sidekick of a popular superhero (and clearly in possession of an actual hollow leg where he dumps gallons and gallons of beer), and say, well, I think you guys effed up his head permanently, but you don't understand, that was just him being...it is in the context of...it's a seasonal thing...well, never mind, it's hard to explain. To meet him though you would think--what a fine young man, and such a lovely family, oh that wife of his, he doesn't deserve her you might kid him with a poke in the ribs. His three young children not just smart but handsome and pretty as well. Truly, what an outstanding man, what an outstanding family.
All right you bastard, I got you to read this far, I know you're reading this, now where is my damn playoff ticket. I know you have five of them, I know you took a chance and invested in a team that wasn't likely to be that good and got yourself some season nosebleed seats for that whole damn cute family of yours, and it's worked out for you guys pretty well I would say but enough is enough and somebody's got to sit home Saturday Night and I'm tired of it being me.
Here's what you do. G comes home from school today, proudly holds up his math test with a 99 on it. He's looking up the length of your towering bean pole self, waiting for that most predictable response from his proud father. But you tell him, in no uncertain terms, that 99 will just not cut it this time. The bar is being raised. 99, you scoff, crumpling the test paper into a ball and mashing it into the wood floor. You send him off to his room and in response to his predictable crying jag (and the balloon bubble above his head which says--my father is a whack job) you banish him from Saturday's game. Or look, it's already going to cost me a pretty penny to get a last minute flight from DC to NO, I should really start looking for deals right now, maybe you could call up the school and have one of his teachers break it to him.
I'm just kidding G, you know I wouldn't do you that. You too crazy about your sports for me to even think about sneaking your ticket away from you. But nephew, look, what about Izzy? Come on man, that girl is too young to really appreciate the importance of football. Here's what we could do...
Naw really nephew, I'm cool, I'll just hang here, by myself, try to take some consolation in the 50 inches of plasma Hi-Def. Yeah boy, high definition is really, you know, the bomb, makes everything look better. Even the president last night looked...well, like shit actually, but his skin tone was really...a little sallow actually, but...oh!!!--I think he almost correctly pronounced nuclear the second time it came up on the teleprompter. Like any of that world politics crapola matters. Go Saints.
Oh he's a big college professor in New Orleans now but when he was just a critter, a speck, an aphid on the family tree if you will, back in Texas, me and my older brother used to mess with his head a little bit, we did. My nephew doesn't seem any the worse for it now, I mean, I don't think he's worse off. You could take things out of context, like the fact that he has been seen more than a few times in public wearing colorful tights and a mask, imitating perhaps the sidekick of a popular superhero (and clearly in possession of an actual hollow leg where he dumps gallons and gallons of beer), and say, well, I think you guys effed up his head permanently, but you don't understand, that was just him being...it is in the context of...it's a seasonal thing...well, never mind, it's hard to explain. To meet him though you would think--what a fine young man, and such a lovely family, oh that wife of his, he doesn't deserve her you might kid him with a poke in the ribs. His three young children not just smart but handsome and pretty as well. Truly, what an outstanding man, what an outstanding family.
All right you bastard, I got you to read this far, I know you're reading this, now where is my damn playoff ticket. I know you have five of them, I know you took a chance and invested in a team that wasn't likely to be that good and got yourself some season nosebleed seats for that whole damn cute family of yours, and it's worked out for you guys pretty well I would say but enough is enough and somebody's got to sit home Saturday Night and I'm tired of it being me.
Here's what you do. G comes home from school today, proudly holds up his math test with a 99 on it. He's looking up the length of your towering bean pole self, waiting for that most predictable response from his proud father. But you tell him, in no uncertain terms, that 99 will just not cut it this time. The bar is being raised. 99, you scoff, crumpling the test paper into a ball and mashing it into the wood floor. You send him off to his room and in response to his predictable crying jag (and the balloon bubble above his head which says--my father is a whack job) you banish him from Saturday's game. Or look, it's already going to cost me a pretty penny to get a last minute flight from DC to NO, I should really start looking for deals right now, maybe you could call up the school and have one of his teachers break it to him.
I'm just kidding G, you know I wouldn't do you that. You too crazy about your sports for me to even think about sneaking your ticket away from you. But nephew, look, what about Izzy? Come on man, that girl is too young to really appreciate the importance of football. Here's what we could do...
Naw really nephew, I'm cool, I'll just hang here, by myself, try to take some consolation in the 50 inches of plasma Hi-Def. Yeah boy, high definition is really, you know, the bomb, makes everything look better. Even the president last night looked...well, like shit actually, but his skin tone was really...a little sallow actually, but...oh!!!--I think he almost correctly pronounced nuclear the second time it came up on the teleprompter. Like any of that world politics crapola matters. Go Saints.
Admittedly, No Olmi
Man, I look like Howard Hughes at the Bates Motel with these long fingernails perched atop the keyboard next to that worrisome fly. Except Norman would not kill the fly and I will, soon as I finish making this list of things to do, which will include cutting my nails.
I shouldn't have to make a list that includes nail cutting. I should just do it. I should do it after I take a hot shower so the nails are softer. I didn't put nail clippers on the last list and the pair I have, which I will for no particular reason use before killing the fly, have lost their edge. They'll work fine though after I soak myself in 20 gallons of hot water. Or I could burn a few gallons of gasoline driving to get the clippers, and forget the shower. But in my haste will probably also forget numerous other things which should be on the list but aren't, because there is not a list, yet. If the first thing on your list is to make a list and you accept generally that you don't write "make a list" on the top of a list, how do you get started?
Also, if you accept that in making a list you will invariably forget to put things on the list then does it make any sense to make a list at all? Why not just forgo the list and listlessly forget things?
I think people who make lists are superior human beings though. I really do. Make a list and check things off. That is how you go about being successful. But I can't decide what it is I would like to be successful at. Maybe I should start with sentence structure.
I can't even decide if I want to be a successful fly killer. Every time I look over and see it--on the bed cover now--without making the effort to kill it, I feel like Norman Bates, a thing with which I am not all that comfortable. I am not a fly-lover though, nor by not killing the fly do I want to be associated with a male Psycho who dresses up in old women's clothing, or worse, if that is possible, a member of PETA. I just don't know how much of myself I want to invest in the killing of this particular fly. And assuming I do kill the fly, then what?
Not to make you dizzy with theme shifts but how often is it that you make a really good list, the list to end all lists, one that includes--if it were lacking it--every item that defines your deficiency, do you then lose that list? Now this is not one of those questions where there is no wrong answer. There is only one answer and the answer is--every time. If you didn't get that answer then you need to re-work the equation. You can use the back of your list for scratch paper.
Scratching now, akin to itching. A fly in my presence makes me itchy. Especially around the eyes, which probably lends credence to the theory of me having some sort of allergic thing going on with my eyes, often crusty, the crust adhering to my lashes like crystals adhere to string dipped in hot water to which you have added sugar. You do this because you are a kid and obviously bored (why else are you making rock candy when you could be watching TV or playing video games?) and you have never done it before and that in itself is its own reward. Or punishment, if the thing you have never done before is putting your hand over a candle in a small jar to see how long it takes to suffocate the flame.
If I choose to be a particular Italian director and am comfortable with my content or comfortable more importantly with that which is missing, I can here finish by saying--FIN.
Man, I look like Howard Hughes at the Bates Motel with these long fingernails perched atop the keyboard next to that worrisome fly. Except Norman would not kill the fly and I will, soon as I finish making this list of things to do, which will include cutting my nails.
I shouldn't have to make a list that includes nail cutting. I should just do it. I should do it after I take a hot shower so the nails are softer. I didn't put nail clippers on the last list and the pair I have, which I will for no particular reason use before killing the fly, have lost their edge. They'll work fine though after I soak myself in 20 gallons of hot water. Or I could burn a few gallons of gasoline driving to get the clippers, and forget the shower. But in my haste will probably also forget numerous other things which should be on the list but aren't, because there is not a list, yet. If the first thing on your list is to make a list and you accept generally that you don't write "make a list" on the top of a list, how do you get started?
Also, if you accept that in making a list you will invariably forget to put things on the list then does it make any sense to make a list at all? Why not just forgo the list and listlessly forget things?
I think people who make lists are superior human beings though. I really do. Make a list and check things off. That is how you go about being successful. But I can't decide what it is I would like to be successful at. Maybe I should start with sentence structure.
I can't even decide if I want to be a successful fly killer. Every time I look over and see it--on the bed cover now--without making the effort to kill it, I feel like Norman Bates, a thing with which I am not all that comfortable. I am not a fly-lover though, nor by not killing the fly do I want to be associated with a male Psycho who dresses up in old women's clothing, or worse, if that is possible, a member of PETA. I just don't know how much of myself I want to invest in the killing of this particular fly. And assuming I do kill the fly, then what?
Not to make you dizzy with theme shifts but how often is it that you make a really good list, the list to end all lists, one that includes--if it were lacking it--every item that defines your deficiency, do you then lose that list? Now this is not one of those questions where there is no wrong answer. There is only one answer and the answer is--every time. If you didn't get that answer then you need to re-work the equation. You can use the back of your list for scratch paper.
Scratching now, akin to itching. A fly in my presence makes me itchy. Especially around the eyes, which probably lends credence to the theory of me having some sort of allergic thing going on with my eyes, often crusty, the crust adhering to my lashes like crystals adhere to string dipped in hot water to which you have added sugar. You do this because you are a kid and obviously bored (why else are you making rock candy when you could be watching TV or playing video games?) and you have never done it before and that in itself is its own reward. Or punishment, if the thing you have never done before is putting your hand over a candle in a small jar to see how long it takes to suffocate the flame.
If I choose to be a particular Italian director and am comfortable with my content or comfortable more importantly with that which is missing, I can here finish by saying--FIN.
NO Murder Inc.
The first couple of times I left New Orleans to consider this life in Virginia I saw no real need to change the name of my email from NOLA page because I didn't see that it made much difference what the page was named and I had never cultivated much of an audience beyond a few loyal readers and I couldn't see how the fact that I was writing from a blog named NOLA about rural Virginia experiences would make that much difference to those few readers. But after Katrina, when New Orleans brought so much attention to itself, I shared on my very small scale, some of that attention and drew a handful of new readers who thought of me, I think, as a New Orleans-centric blogger, which is fitting, since I was living and writing from New Orleans after Katrina, from Oct.05 to June 06., camping in my only moderately damaged dwelling on Rocheblave. But after I left I didn't want to piggyback on any of that New Orleans attention, since I am not currently a New Orleanian, so I started this new page and have tried to keep my themes and stories from having anything to do with New Orleans, as there seemed to be no shortage of NO chroniclers.
But the recent murder spike in that city, 12 dead in 7 days, 6 of those in a less than 24 hour period, makes it hard for me to think about anything else and brings to mind what I have said to almost every person I have ever talked to about New Orleans and Katrina, and that is this--the tragedy of New Orleans existed long before Katrina and central to that tragedy is the killing, and how it never stops, or it only stops long enough for people to fool themselves into thinking that everything is ok now, parrr-teee.
As bad as these weekly numbers are, they only represent a recurring spike that has happened with a thankfully not too frequent regularity over the last 30 years. Except all the previous similarly horrific death counts were framed inside the statistic of a population twice as large. So let's say 24 dead in seven days and 12 of those within a 24 hour period. I know this way of looking at it is probably not allowed in statistics, that there are considerations I am leaving out, but think of it anyway.
I will never be able to rule out a return to New Orleans, if only seasonally. The world is large and we should all see as much of it as is practical to our circumstances, but New Orleans is under my skin for better or worse and I won't be able to go on with my whimsical and absurd blathering until I explore my feelings about the fact that murder seems to be the only fully functioning city enterprise at this date, post-Katrina one year and three months.
I know there will be another march on City Hall this week, in response to the twelfth killing, the artist and mother murdered on Rampart St., and her husband, a family doctor, also shot (but surviving) while shielding their two-year-old son. I do not mean to put too fine on point on this last bit, nor do I mean it as aimless criticism of the civic-minded, but I think that these marches most commonly only happen when the death count includes white people who happen to be productive members of the city. And then the citizenry will more or less rest while the death counts continue, month after month and year after year, but only include the lost boys (who only happen to be black) killing each other over turf and other issues we deem not worthy of our serious consideration.
There is so much about this problem that the individual marching citizens have no real control over and real change will only come with the laying of those essential foundation blocks which seem to forever elude the city, including better schools, more police, better leadership (I do not lay sole blame on the mayor, I still like him, yet I would change my vote if I could travel back in time). And it should not be that pigs have to fly before that money which does occasionally come to the aide of New Orleans is spent solely for its intended use instead of being lost forever into the pockets of those professional, political, and administrative criminals that are forever dooming New Orleans to failure. That they will all be murdered some day is unrealistic and should not be hoped for.
It is right to march and shout and demand change. But to me it all seems like part of the New Orleans pattern which has brought about no change. Marches comprised of not exclusively but mostly white people happen when white people get killed and for the most part only the black ministers of New Orleans hold vigils, and fasts, and prayer sessions to bring attention to that majority of the yearly murders--the black teenager killing the black teenager. The challenge of New Orleans is not one that is all about the division of the two predominant races but I think it is always partly about that. What if the white people of New Orleans marched on City Hall every time the weekly murder count got over some number that all agreed was unacceptable, but only included those hateful, threatening, unproductive gangbangers who always seem to be black and whom we just can't seem to get ourselves to care a good goddamn about (unless fear and hatred of can be construed as caring). In many cases you would only have to erase 13 or 14 years to think of these murderous bastards as babies. And babies are good. Babies are not threatening. That's my idea for the day. It would be different, a break in the pattern. I think different would be good.
The first couple of times I left New Orleans to consider this life in Virginia I saw no real need to change the name of my email from NOLA page because I didn't see that it made much difference what the page was named and I had never cultivated much of an audience beyond a few loyal readers and I couldn't see how the fact that I was writing from a blog named NOLA about rural Virginia experiences would make that much difference to those few readers. But after Katrina, when New Orleans brought so much attention to itself, I shared on my very small scale, some of that attention and drew a handful of new readers who thought of me, I think, as a New Orleans-centric blogger, which is fitting, since I was living and writing from New Orleans after Katrina, from Oct.05 to June 06., camping in my only moderately damaged dwelling on Rocheblave. But after I left I didn't want to piggyback on any of that New Orleans attention, since I am not currently a New Orleanian, so I started this new page and have tried to keep my themes and stories from having anything to do with New Orleans, as there seemed to be no shortage of NO chroniclers.
But the recent murder spike in that city, 12 dead in 7 days, 6 of those in a less than 24 hour period, makes it hard for me to think about anything else and brings to mind what I have said to almost every person I have ever talked to about New Orleans and Katrina, and that is this--the tragedy of New Orleans existed long before Katrina and central to that tragedy is the killing, and how it never stops, or it only stops long enough for people to fool themselves into thinking that everything is ok now, parrr-teee.
As bad as these weekly numbers are, they only represent a recurring spike that has happened with a thankfully not too frequent regularity over the last 30 years. Except all the previous similarly horrific death counts were framed inside the statistic of a population twice as large. So let's say 24 dead in seven days and 12 of those within a 24 hour period. I know this way of looking at it is probably not allowed in statistics, that there are considerations I am leaving out, but think of it anyway.
I will never be able to rule out a return to New Orleans, if only seasonally. The world is large and we should all see as much of it as is practical to our circumstances, but New Orleans is under my skin for better or worse and I won't be able to go on with my whimsical and absurd blathering until I explore my feelings about the fact that murder seems to be the only fully functioning city enterprise at this date, post-Katrina one year and three months.
I know there will be another march on City Hall this week, in response to the twelfth killing, the artist and mother murdered on Rampart St., and her husband, a family doctor, also shot (but surviving) while shielding their two-year-old son. I do not mean to put too fine on point on this last bit, nor do I mean it as aimless criticism of the civic-minded, but I think that these marches most commonly only happen when the death count includes white people who happen to be productive members of the city. And then the citizenry will more or less rest while the death counts continue, month after month and year after year, but only include the lost boys (who only happen to be black) killing each other over turf and other issues we deem not worthy of our serious consideration.
There is so much about this problem that the individual marching citizens have no real control over and real change will only come with the laying of those essential foundation blocks which seem to forever elude the city, including better schools, more police, better leadership (I do not lay sole blame on the mayor, I still like him, yet I would change my vote if I could travel back in time). And it should not be that pigs have to fly before that money which does occasionally come to the aide of New Orleans is spent solely for its intended use instead of being lost forever into the pockets of those professional, political, and administrative criminals that are forever dooming New Orleans to failure. That they will all be murdered some day is unrealistic and should not be hoped for.
It is right to march and shout and demand change. But to me it all seems like part of the New Orleans pattern which has brought about no change. Marches comprised of not exclusively but mostly white people happen when white people get killed and for the most part only the black ministers of New Orleans hold vigils, and fasts, and prayer sessions to bring attention to that majority of the yearly murders--the black teenager killing the black teenager. The challenge of New Orleans is not one that is all about the division of the two predominant races but I think it is always partly about that. What if the white people of New Orleans marched on City Hall every time the weekly murder count got over some number that all agreed was unacceptable, but only included those hateful, threatening, unproductive gangbangers who always seem to be black and whom we just can't seem to get ourselves to care a good goddamn about (unless fear and hatred of can be construed as caring). In many cases you would only have to erase 13 or 14 years to think of these murderous bastards as babies. And babies are good. Babies are not threatening. That's my idea for the day. It would be different, a break in the pattern. I think different would be good.
Bowling, Another Dream
When you find yourself in an area that has limited possibilities for nightlife and for that matter daylife it may come up that someone will ask you to drive sixteen miles to go bowling. The first time you can get out of it by saying that sounds like fun, let's do that sometime. Sometime of course means some other time. The next time you can just be grumpy or in some other way ill of mind and simply say no I'd rather not. It is best not to play this card too often because the bowlers in your life will come to see what a loser you are before you even arrive at that bowling alley to which you know you will eventually have to arrive and of course show to them without a doubt what a bowling deficient, gutterball-throwing loser you really are. They probably won't care because they will figure it as better than bowling alone, if only marginally. When they throw strikes, or, how fantastic, a series of consecutive strikes, it will be dampened somewhat by the fact that their opponent just threw consecutive gutterballs. That you are doing your best is a pitiful excuse.
It may happen once that you will be given the gift of refusal by your bowling desirous partner. You will say, hey let's go bowling tonight (you will say this in the throes of some inexplicable burst of confidence in which you honestly believe that being a shitty bowler is not that big a deal, you have other fine qualities, a verity you cling to even if the enumeration of those qualities does not flow forth easily).
When comes the time that you are driving to the bowling alley for the first time, along a rural state highway in Virginia under a nearly full moon, it may alarm you that the thought of crashing into a suicidal deer is, while not comforting, an almost acceptable alternative to bowling. You really should not underestimate those previous periods of confidence and perhaps it may even behoove you to consider methods of cultivation.
At the bowling alley. While you can watch at night before bed graphic horror movies with nary a bad dream after, the sight of this small town bowling alley, sparsely populated with salt of the earth bowling enthusiasts, puts you in a frame of mind that will later be played out in a dream which has you walking naked in a cold rain down a busy city street.
It's league night and fifteen of the eighteen lanes are quiet, ghostly quiet, waiting for the bowlers to arrive in one hour. Some of them have on their good days bowled perfect games and you can see their names posted on huge banners along one wall, with 2 foot tall 300s emblazoned beside the names. You wonder is it too late to have a tummy-ache? You hold onto hope when the attendant says, it's league night and only three lanes are available to the public and they are all occupied. But wait, one of them will soon be available if we want to wait. Your partner does. You ask, is there beer here?
Bernadette orders a cup of watery beer and I get a Corona, keep your damn lime. We are, combined, almost a hundred years old, but get carded anyway, by a girl that to me looks twelve-years-old. Bernadette doesn't have her ID and the pre-pubescent bartender says Bernadette will have to ask the attendant at the bowling counter if it's okay. Bernadette disappears from view and comes back and says it is okay. We grab a table and wait for her name to be called. People are staring at us because we are new faces on this local bowling scene. They think--I am sure of this--that I am a world class champion bowler come to impress his woman. I am trying to telepathically communicate to these strangers, please don't hold on to your unreal expectations.
The attendant comes to our table and delivers the good news. Our lane is ready, number 17. I hope I don't have to ever find out if this comparison is accurate but walking to the counter to pick up my bowling shoes was like a walk to the gallows. I felt myself shrinking inside myself. This was it then. Had I accomplished anything? Would I be remembered any longer than I myself remembered those dead before me?
While we had waited, sipping our beers, Bernadette jabbed rusty nails into the remaining wafer of my self-confidence ( a level of confidence that had me pretty damn close to uncontrollable weeping) by admitting that she had twice in her life been a league bowler. I wanted to tell her that twice in my life I had broken a hundred, the last time perhaps as recently as 15 years ago, but I just nodded my head while feeling my lips press together in what I hoped would not be construed as a grimace.
Three of my first four balls thrown traveled happily through the gutter. They were these balls very possibly grateful for this holiday from pain, this easy and smooth path that I provided for them. I don't think anyone laughed at me. I kept my eyes averted just in case.
To our right on lane 18 played an affable father and son, of similar portliness, and complexions just slightly pitted. The young man very politely informed us at the beginning which of the balls in the return rack could be removed, as they belonged to the former bowlers. I was touched, perhaps out of proportion to the effort involved, by this simple kindness. I'm sure I was just happy to experience a bit of kindness before the probably approaching ridicule.
When Bernadette began picking up spares the father would say, nice pickup, and give her some skin, on the level, neither high nor low. If fives from the father were added together over the 20 frames we each bowled, Bernadette collected possibly 50 to my 10, which pretty fairly represents the disparity between our final scores. I did break a hundred in the second game. Unfortunately, Bernadette broke 169.
I shook hands with the kid and said goodbye and told him to go easy on his dad, who was gently beating his son each game. They both laughed. At one point during my less than illustrious play the father had offered to buy me a beer if I could pick up an almost (okay, for me, entirely) impossible spare. I didn't pick it up. We had not reached that level of friendship where he bought me a beer anyway.
Later, in the dream, walking naked through wide populated alleyways on a cold rainy night in a city I did not recognize but was probably NYC, a man came urgently running up from behind me and gave to me my old, stained, brown leather work jacket and said I had left it somewhere, but I don't remember even existing before being naked on a city street. The man exuded kindness. I put the jacket on as a jacket is worn, feeling half relieved but if possible, twice as ridiculous. It is only now, typing, that it comes to me I could have tied the sleeves of the jacket around my middle and covered that part of me that should in public be covered.
When you find yourself in an area that has limited possibilities for nightlife and for that matter daylife it may come up that someone will ask you to drive sixteen miles to go bowling. The first time you can get out of it by saying that sounds like fun, let's do that sometime. Sometime of course means some other time. The next time you can just be grumpy or in some other way ill of mind and simply say no I'd rather not. It is best not to play this card too often because the bowlers in your life will come to see what a loser you are before you even arrive at that bowling alley to which you know you will eventually have to arrive and of course show to them without a doubt what a bowling deficient, gutterball-throwing loser you really are. They probably won't care because they will figure it as better than bowling alone, if only marginally. When they throw strikes, or, how fantastic, a series of consecutive strikes, it will be dampened somewhat by the fact that their opponent just threw consecutive gutterballs. That you are doing your best is a pitiful excuse.
It may happen once that you will be given the gift of refusal by your bowling desirous partner. You will say, hey let's go bowling tonight (you will say this in the throes of some inexplicable burst of confidence in which you honestly believe that being a shitty bowler is not that big a deal, you have other fine qualities, a verity you cling to even if the enumeration of those qualities does not flow forth easily).
When comes the time that you are driving to the bowling alley for the first time, along a rural state highway in Virginia under a nearly full moon, it may alarm you that the thought of crashing into a suicidal deer is, while not comforting, an almost acceptable alternative to bowling. You really should not underestimate those previous periods of confidence and perhaps it may even behoove you to consider methods of cultivation.
At the bowling alley. While you can watch at night before bed graphic horror movies with nary a bad dream after, the sight of this small town bowling alley, sparsely populated with salt of the earth bowling enthusiasts, puts you in a frame of mind that will later be played out in a dream which has you walking naked in a cold rain down a busy city street.
It's league night and fifteen of the eighteen lanes are quiet, ghostly quiet, waiting for the bowlers to arrive in one hour. Some of them have on their good days bowled perfect games and you can see their names posted on huge banners along one wall, with 2 foot tall 300s emblazoned beside the names. You wonder is it too late to have a tummy-ache? You hold onto hope when the attendant says, it's league night and only three lanes are available to the public and they are all occupied. But wait, one of them will soon be available if we want to wait. Your partner does. You ask, is there beer here?
Bernadette orders a cup of watery beer and I get a Corona, keep your damn lime. We are, combined, almost a hundred years old, but get carded anyway, by a girl that to me looks twelve-years-old. Bernadette doesn't have her ID and the pre-pubescent bartender says Bernadette will have to ask the attendant at the bowling counter if it's okay. Bernadette disappears from view and comes back and says it is okay. We grab a table and wait for her name to be called. People are staring at us because we are new faces on this local bowling scene. They think--I am sure of this--that I am a world class champion bowler come to impress his woman. I am trying to telepathically communicate to these strangers, please don't hold on to your unreal expectations.
The attendant comes to our table and delivers the good news. Our lane is ready, number 17. I hope I don't have to ever find out if this comparison is accurate but walking to the counter to pick up my bowling shoes was like a walk to the gallows. I felt myself shrinking inside myself. This was it then. Had I accomplished anything? Would I be remembered any longer than I myself remembered those dead before me?
While we had waited, sipping our beers, Bernadette jabbed rusty nails into the remaining wafer of my self-confidence ( a level of confidence that had me pretty damn close to uncontrollable weeping) by admitting that she had twice in her life been a league bowler. I wanted to tell her that twice in my life I had broken a hundred, the last time perhaps as recently as 15 years ago, but I just nodded my head while feeling my lips press together in what I hoped would not be construed as a grimace.
Three of my first four balls thrown traveled happily through the gutter. They were these balls very possibly grateful for this holiday from pain, this easy and smooth path that I provided for them. I don't think anyone laughed at me. I kept my eyes averted just in case.
To our right on lane 18 played an affable father and son, of similar portliness, and complexions just slightly pitted. The young man very politely informed us at the beginning which of the balls in the return rack could be removed, as they belonged to the former bowlers. I was touched, perhaps out of proportion to the effort involved, by this simple kindness. I'm sure I was just happy to experience a bit of kindness before the probably approaching ridicule.
When Bernadette began picking up spares the father would say, nice pickup, and give her some skin, on the level, neither high nor low. If fives from the father were added together over the 20 frames we each bowled, Bernadette collected possibly 50 to my 10, which pretty fairly represents the disparity between our final scores. I did break a hundred in the second game. Unfortunately, Bernadette broke 169.
I shook hands with the kid and said goodbye and told him to go easy on his dad, who was gently beating his son each game. They both laughed. At one point during my less than illustrious play the father had offered to buy me a beer if I could pick up an almost (okay, for me, entirely) impossible spare. I didn't pick it up. We had not reached that level of friendship where he bought me a beer anyway.
Later, in the dream, walking naked through wide populated alleyways on a cold rainy night in a city I did not recognize but was probably NYC, a man came urgently running up from behind me and gave to me my old, stained, brown leather work jacket and said I had left it somewhere, but I don't remember even existing before being naked on a city street. The man exuded kindness. I put the jacket on as a jacket is worn, feeling half relieved but if possible, twice as ridiculous. It is only now, typing, that it comes to me I could have tied the sleeves of the jacket around my middle and covered that part of me that should in public be covered.
Hear What?
One day several weeks ago I explored head on the potentially harrowing risk of human interaction and left the property in search of ice cream. As I drove down the hill I saw a vehicle parked off road by the pond and its occupant standing by the fence a hundred yards away. The vehicle was a late model foreign-made family hauling vehicle, dark blue, and the woman an American, of healthy appearance, not showing distress of any kind, and at home in her trespassing. As caretaker it would be necessary to scold this bold trespasser but as I saw no reason to be abusive or threatening--even though to be so would be well within my job description--I stayed in my Jeep and waited patiently for the woman to finish whatever the hell it was she was doing over there along the north fence. I stared straight ahead and therefore missed the woman waving to me in a fashion which if seen would have implied friendliness, perhaps even familiarity.
If for long periods you refrain from exposing yourself to other people even friends and family can appear, upon new viewings, to seem intimidatingly unfamiliar. How dare this woman park on the grass. Is she challenging me? And what, in holy hell, is she doing over by the fence? She began to walk towards me.
As it turned out it was one of my bosses, Mrs. BC, come out to meet a contractor or deliver some new piece of furniture, but when she first arrived she had heard a ringing over in the direction of that fence and had gone over to investigate. Thinking that the ringing was someone's alarm and that she might perhaps save them and subsequently have a parade thrown in her honor--the townspeople lining the street weeping for joy, so happy to have in their midsts one so courageous--she had me follow her back over to the fence so that I could hear the alarm. I couldn't hear it. Are you sure? Yes, quite.
I'm not always so literally minded nor am I above playing along with people who hear things or for that matter people who see things but in this case I thought it best to admit only to hearing things that I could in fact hear. Mrs. BC is the mother of three and it would do no one any good if I were to coddle her in these early stages of whatever mental disorder can be implied from the onset of auditory hallucinations.
Mrs. BC though was not ready to give up so easily on a parade thrown in her honor and attended by all 150 full time residents of the town, which would break the record for the number who attended the annual Christmas parade. She was not at all impressed by the fact that I don't hear things. It could be that the sun was slanted just so that day and that she could see the fulsome crop of hair clogging my ears which thus rendered any acoustical opinions I might have to be utterly without merit.
She suggested we drive over a few blocks to a road that runs parallel to the north fence because now she believed she was smelling smoke. I could see how badly she wanted that parade so I didn't bring up the fact that most everybody has a burn pile going this time of year. I might later be telling a concerned Mr. BC--at least we can discount the olfactory hallucination. We drove as far down the road as we could before becoming trespassers, and got out to listen. She could still hear it. You can hear that now, right? No, I swear to God I cannot. When she suggested that maybe she was crazy I, out of respect, said nothing. We drove over to the next parallel block and found the burn pile which blew smoke towards the north fence and Mrs. BC was now ready to admit defeat as the image of adoring, cheering, happily weeping townspeople faded to black. Let's go back she said, and we did. A tree man came out shortly after that and she got his opinion and diagnosis regarding trees.
The thing is, now, on a pretty regular basis, I can hear that ringing, all the way up at the cottage, which is more or less in line with the spot where Mrs. BC first stood by the fence, pretending to be an interloper. I don't know what it is but it can be mildly annoying. If it is a fire alarm I wish the building would burn down already. I did eventually get ice cream that day. It wasn't very good. I still have some of it in the freezer. Butter pecan should have pecans in it but this brand didn't have a single pecan.
One day several weeks ago I explored head on the potentially harrowing risk of human interaction and left the property in search of ice cream. As I drove down the hill I saw a vehicle parked off road by the pond and its occupant standing by the fence a hundred yards away. The vehicle was a late model foreign-made family hauling vehicle, dark blue, and the woman an American, of healthy appearance, not showing distress of any kind, and at home in her trespassing. As caretaker it would be necessary to scold this bold trespasser but as I saw no reason to be abusive or threatening--even though to be so would be well within my job description--I stayed in my Jeep and waited patiently for the woman to finish whatever the hell it was she was doing over there along the north fence. I stared straight ahead and therefore missed the woman waving to me in a fashion which if seen would have implied friendliness, perhaps even familiarity.
If for long periods you refrain from exposing yourself to other people even friends and family can appear, upon new viewings, to seem intimidatingly unfamiliar. How dare this woman park on the grass. Is she challenging me? And what, in holy hell, is she doing over by the fence? She began to walk towards me.
As it turned out it was one of my bosses, Mrs. BC, come out to meet a contractor or deliver some new piece of furniture, but when she first arrived she had heard a ringing over in the direction of that fence and had gone over to investigate. Thinking that the ringing was someone's alarm and that she might perhaps save them and subsequently have a parade thrown in her honor--the townspeople lining the street weeping for joy, so happy to have in their midsts one so courageous--she had me follow her back over to the fence so that I could hear the alarm. I couldn't hear it. Are you sure? Yes, quite.
I'm not always so literally minded nor am I above playing along with people who hear things or for that matter people who see things but in this case I thought it best to admit only to hearing things that I could in fact hear. Mrs. BC is the mother of three and it would do no one any good if I were to coddle her in these early stages of whatever mental disorder can be implied from the onset of auditory hallucinations.
Mrs. BC though was not ready to give up so easily on a parade thrown in her honor and attended by all 150 full time residents of the town, which would break the record for the number who attended the annual Christmas parade. She was not at all impressed by the fact that I don't hear things. It could be that the sun was slanted just so that day and that she could see the fulsome crop of hair clogging my ears which thus rendered any acoustical opinions I might have to be utterly without merit.
She suggested we drive over a few blocks to a road that runs parallel to the north fence because now she believed she was smelling smoke. I could see how badly she wanted that parade so I didn't bring up the fact that most everybody has a burn pile going this time of year. I might later be telling a concerned Mr. BC--at least we can discount the olfactory hallucination. We drove as far down the road as we could before becoming trespassers, and got out to listen. She could still hear it. You can hear that now, right? No, I swear to God I cannot. When she suggested that maybe she was crazy I, out of respect, said nothing. We drove over to the next parallel block and found the burn pile which blew smoke towards the north fence and Mrs. BC was now ready to admit defeat as the image of adoring, cheering, happily weeping townspeople faded to black. Let's go back she said, and we did. A tree man came out shortly after that and she got his opinion and diagnosis regarding trees.
The thing is, now, on a pretty regular basis, I can hear that ringing, all the way up at the cottage, which is more or less in line with the spot where Mrs. BC first stood by the fence, pretending to be an interloper. I don't know what it is but it can be mildly annoying. If it is a fire alarm I wish the building would burn down already. I did eventually get ice cream that day. It wasn't very good. I still have some of it in the freezer. Butter pecan should have pecans in it but this brand didn't have a single pecan.
They Called Him Fuzzy
You've seen along congested roadways those ubiquitous billboards for apartment complexes that says “If you lived here you'd be home by now? There may be soon springing up new ones that says “If you lived here you're not dead. The billboard's background would consist of a mushroom cloud and I think you know what that means. Around here some rural towns are being touted as new hots spots by reason of being cold spots, that is radioactively speaking. These towns are close enough to DC that you can justify commuting to work there (if you don't mind every day spending countless hours in your vehicle and being dependent on foreign oil and probably going to hell for it regardless of your proximity to the ground zero of a nuclear blast.) Don't let the fact that the FBI and other government agencies are setting up fairly fleshy skeleton crews inside satellite offices outside the "blast zone" set you on edge. These movements are described as precautionary and should be seen as such and should in no way lead DC area residents to cower in abject fear of the impending doom and destruction wrought by nuclear warheads from extremist nations raining down and wiping out the city and everyone you love the way we know it can because of our impressive testing in the field, especially the two in Japan. Talk to people inside a potential blast zone and you will get the full range of response. There are those that don't want to survive a nuclear blast and act as though even having one go off within a hundred miles of them is reason enough to just throw in the towel for all humanity. And there are those who fully expect it to happen and are preparing accordingly with safe rooms, bunkers, and stored away provisions. Of course another large group, and the one to which I belong, can see it happening but are in no real way preparing for it and might just be hoping for the best, that is, that it happens on the day after I get my bottled water delivery but before I drink all the full and partial bottles of hard liquor leftover from the Christmas party that I just carted away from Mr. BC's city house, for safe keeping out here at the farm. Liquor left in my charge for safe keeping is my one sincere attempt at humor for this day. Hah, I laugh into the face of nuclear annihilation ( I live outside the blast zone AND I haven't even broken the seal on the 16 year old single malt.) . Let me bring it down a notch and with great sadness report that the grey-striped carcass seen last week lying stiff along the side of Main St. may in fact be the cat known to its owner as Fuzzy, but to me these last few weeks, before the local paper's missing Fuzzy story and then the week after the possibly dead Fuzzy story, during which I contemplated cat ownership by kidnapping, was known as LaDainian, even though I never actually got to say “here LaDainian, come on kitty, kitty, kitty. LaDainian, get off that table, is too, something I never got to say. In my brief association with the cat once thought missing but now thought dead I had him up in both houses, the bighouse and the cottage, and he proved both curious and friendly and to my knowledge not a furniture-shredder. LaDainian, known to some as Fuzzy, is survived by the many of us who considered stealing him and also his actual owner, a local businesswoman. The businesswoman's ex-husband, a nationally syndicated Pulitzer Prize winning cartoonist, was not available for comment, nor is it known or even suspected by those of us who possess barely a scrap of knowledge regarding his life and work, whether or not he had any predilection towards cats.
You've seen along congested roadways those ubiquitous billboards for apartment complexes that says “If you lived here you'd be home by now? There may be soon springing up new ones that says “If you lived here you're not dead. The billboard's background would consist of a mushroom cloud and I think you know what that means. Around here some rural towns are being touted as new hots spots by reason of being cold spots, that is radioactively speaking. These towns are close enough to DC that you can justify commuting to work there (if you don't mind every day spending countless hours in your vehicle and being dependent on foreign oil and probably going to hell for it regardless of your proximity to the ground zero of a nuclear blast.) Don't let the fact that the FBI and other government agencies are setting up fairly fleshy skeleton crews inside satellite offices outside the "blast zone" set you on edge. These movements are described as precautionary and should be seen as such and should in no way lead DC area residents to cower in abject fear of the impending doom and destruction wrought by nuclear warheads from extremist nations raining down and wiping out the city and everyone you love the way we know it can because of our impressive testing in the field, especially the two in Japan. Talk to people inside a potential blast zone and you will get the full range of response. There are those that don't want to survive a nuclear blast and act as though even having one go off within a hundred miles of them is reason enough to just throw in the towel for all humanity. And there are those who fully expect it to happen and are preparing accordingly with safe rooms, bunkers, and stored away provisions. Of course another large group, and the one to which I belong, can see it happening but are in no real way preparing for it and might just be hoping for the best, that is, that it happens on the day after I get my bottled water delivery but before I drink all the full and partial bottles of hard liquor leftover from the Christmas party that I just carted away from Mr. BC's city house, for safe keeping out here at the farm. Liquor left in my charge for safe keeping is my one sincere attempt at humor for this day. Hah, I laugh into the face of nuclear annihilation ( I live outside the blast zone AND I haven't even broken the seal on the 16 year old single malt.) . Let me bring it down a notch and with great sadness report that the grey-striped carcass seen last week lying stiff along the side of Main St. may in fact be the cat known to its owner as Fuzzy, but to me these last few weeks, before the local paper's missing Fuzzy story and then the week after the possibly dead Fuzzy story, during which I contemplated cat ownership by kidnapping, was known as LaDainian, even though I never actually got to say “here LaDainian, come on kitty, kitty, kitty. LaDainian, get off that table, is too, something I never got to say. In my brief association with the cat once thought missing but now thought dead I had him up in both houses, the bighouse and the cottage, and he proved both curious and friendly and to my knowledge not a furniture-shredder. LaDainian, known to some as Fuzzy, is survived by the many of us who considered stealing him and also his actual owner, a local businesswoman. The businesswoman's ex-husband, a nationally syndicated Pulitzer Prize winning cartoonist, was not available for comment, nor is it known or even suspected by those of us who possess barely a scrap of knowledge regarding his life and work, whether or not he had any predilection towards cats.
No Help For The Homeless
Bernadette said ask no questions when on the way to Katz's we passed a downtrodden man unlocking "his" bicycle cable with a pair of bolt-cutters.
The next day, like the most recent Miss USA "caught up in the whirlwind of New York," I found myself discussing needles with a Midtown Manhattan man in a spartan cubicle ten stories up. He was very professional about it, asking me if I'd ever used the needles before and I confessed that I had never. He assured me that they were the finest sterile and disposable one time use needles and that if I would initial here and sign there we could begin with a procedure that would have me lying prone on a table while the man hammered gently, needles into my flesh. I don't know why I had to drag Miss USA into my ill-conceived analogy but there it is.
Walking back Downtown I got behind the clopping cadence of a high-booted woman and trailed her for blocks until it suddenly hit me that I was tapped into her high-heeling drumbeat and therefore a bit of a stalker, and at that moment was sure she thought the same, so I passed her and stayed in front long enough to show her a thing or two about what it feels like to be a stalker, before turning left on St. Marks to Ave A and then right, continuing Downtown.
Two nights ago killing time before meeting Alice and Cassady for dinner Bernadette showed me around the part of town above the one where we would eat and I saw diamonds and fur coats and the giant Christmas tree and the giant toy store next to the glass cube across from Bergdorf's. On the way back down to eat we passed through Grand Central Station and looked around and up, it's hard not to look up, and discussed acoustics. Bernadette showed me the four corners of a hallway/foyer that one person can whisper into and then a person 50 feet away in the opposite diagonal corner can hear the whispered words. The sound evidently travels up the corner and then up the curving vault of the ceiling and back down the other side. She said it was a goofy touristy thing to do but has enough self-confidence to pull it off whereas I could not talk into a corner, as much because I know they have really cracked down on the babbling homeless freaks of Grand Central as because I lack the self-confidence. Not to mention standing with my face towards the corner reminded me of the minor but obviously lasting shame of grade school punishments. I do believe though that I heard her say can you hear me? And when I asked her in person did you say can you hear me she said yes. So there's that, which leads to this.
Still walking, on Ave A a couple of blocks before Houston and a bearded, aged bum is bent at the waist, with his face towards the sidewalk. He is the letter L fallen forward. He's groaning out the first notes of an unknown yet to be heralded opera and also it seems that he may be near ready to vomit. Or is he choking? It's rush hour and he is missing his chance for handouts from the passersby. I have walked 25 blocks by now and passed thousands of people and this man is the single most compelling example of humanity I have yet seen. He tells so much of the story with the least effort. But I don't really want to interact with him or God forbid get close enough for him to breathe on me or touch me. I'm glad he didn't see me looking at him, or at least I think he didn't. It does feel as if he may have eyes in the top of his head, looking at me glancing at him. When I am just past him, and perhaps in line with a certain pattern of cracks in the sidewalk, I am able or think I am able to hear a whispered message which in addition to being unintelligible has the unique quality of blotting out all other sound. As if the man is talking only to me, his sour breath hot and close and curling the hairs grown too long in my ears, except I am 30 feet away from him by now. He wanted some kind of help but before I knew it I was at Houston watching a kid push his bike across the wide intersection against that particular red light which is as good as the green one.
Bernadette said ask no questions when on the way to Katz's we passed a downtrodden man unlocking "his" bicycle cable with a pair of bolt-cutters.
The next day, like the most recent Miss USA "caught up in the whirlwind of New York," I found myself discussing needles with a Midtown Manhattan man in a spartan cubicle ten stories up. He was very professional about it, asking me if I'd ever used the needles before and I confessed that I had never. He assured me that they were the finest sterile and disposable one time use needles and that if I would initial here and sign there we could begin with a procedure that would have me lying prone on a table while the man hammered gently, needles into my flesh. I don't know why I had to drag Miss USA into my ill-conceived analogy but there it is.
Walking back Downtown I got behind the clopping cadence of a high-booted woman and trailed her for blocks until it suddenly hit me that I was tapped into her high-heeling drumbeat and therefore a bit of a stalker, and at that moment was sure she thought the same, so I passed her and stayed in front long enough to show her a thing or two about what it feels like to be a stalker, before turning left on St. Marks to Ave A and then right, continuing Downtown.
Two nights ago killing time before meeting Alice and Cassady for dinner Bernadette showed me around the part of town above the one where we would eat and I saw diamonds and fur coats and the giant Christmas tree and the giant toy store next to the glass cube across from Bergdorf's. On the way back down to eat we passed through Grand Central Station and looked around and up, it's hard not to look up, and discussed acoustics. Bernadette showed me the four corners of a hallway/foyer that one person can whisper into and then a person 50 feet away in the opposite diagonal corner can hear the whispered words. The sound evidently travels up the corner and then up the curving vault of the ceiling and back down the other side. She said it was a goofy touristy thing to do but has enough self-confidence to pull it off whereas I could not talk into a corner, as much because I know they have really cracked down on the babbling homeless freaks of Grand Central as because I lack the self-confidence. Not to mention standing with my face towards the corner reminded me of the minor but obviously lasting shame of grade school punishments. I do believe though that I heard her say can you hear me? And when I asked her in person did you say can you hear me she said yes. So there's that, which leads to this.
Still walking, on Ave A a couple of blocks before Houston and a bearded, aged bum is bent at the waist, with his face towards the sidewalk. He is the letter L fallen forward. He's groaning out the first notes of an unknown yet to be heralded opera and also it seems that he may be near ready to vomit. Or is he choking? It's rush hour and he is missing his chance for handouts from the passersby. I have walked 25 blocks by now and passed thousands of people and this man is the single most compelling example of humanity I have yet seen. He tells so much of the story with the least effort. But I don't really want to interact with him or God forbid get close enough for him to breathe on me or touch me. I'm glad he didn't see me looking at him, or at least I think he didn't. It does feel as if he may have eyes in the top of his head, looking at me glancing at him. When I am just past him, and perhaps in line with a certain pattern of cracks in the sidewalk, I am able or think I am able to hear a whispered message which in addition to being unintelligible has the unique quality of blotting out all other sound. As if the man is talking only to me, his sour breath hot and close and curling the hairs grown too long in my ears, except I am 30 feet away from him by now. He wanted some kind of help but before I knew it I was at Houston watching a kid push his bike across the wide intersection against that particular red light which is as good as the green one.
Not Only Cupcake Dreams
I was always fairly certain that the particular brand of mild emotional dysfunction from which I only moderately suffer was at least partly being played out in disturbing dreams. That I have for many years been unable to access my dreams I took as proof that the images being played out on the big screen of my sleep were simply not something I wanted to consider while awake. Lately, in NYC, I have been remembering dreams and I am at least comforted by the knowledge that I was right about the nature of them. They are not back dropped by daisies and sunshine.
Coming out of a small darkly lit back room of a small unfinished, unfurnished slum dwelling I see approaching from a shadowy entrance 30 feet away a very large gray rat that upon closer inspection is actually a diseased and partially hairless cat. When it crosses a ray of projected moon or street light the cat shows itself to be rubbed raw along its spine and while the short scene of this dream mostly consists only of the gray tones between black and white the raw spots are definitely red. Enter from the same ill-defined exit/entrance three pit bulls who then proceed to act as if I am not there while surveying the room for the object of their obvious interest. That object has slinked back to the room from which I began. Two of the dogs move directly back to that room while the third dog is acting a bit absurd and rambunctious. This third dog has something in its mouth, a piece of fabric maybe or a flap of something. The dog shakes its head violently and from its mouth or breaking free from the flap comes the euphonious sound of a small pebble, or in the dream I am thinking tooth, hitting the wood floor with a note all the more startling for being, start to finish, the only sound in the dream.
It is very clear to me that I am unclear about what I want to do, run, or go for help, but as they both require that I exit the scene, that is what I do. I did not however in any of the subsequent disturbing dreams of last night find my way back to the gray room, or the cat. Honestly though, despite the subject matter of many of this week's dreams I am quite grateful for the subconscious feedback. Even though I say I assumed I was dreaming, even without the recall, occasionally I have considered that maybe the projector was broken. But no, seems to be working fine.
I was always fairly certain that the particular brand of mild emotional dysfunction from which I only moderately suffer was at least partly being played out in disturbing dreams. That I have for many years been unable to access my dreams I took as proof that the images being played out on the big screen of my sleep were simply not something I wanted to consider while awake. Lately, in NYC, I have been remembering dreams and I am at least comforted by the knowledge that I was right about the nature of them. They are not back dropped by daisies and sunshine.
Coming out of a small darkly lit back room of a small unfinished, unfurnished slum dwelling I see approaching from a shadowy entrance 30 feet away a very large gray rat that upon closer inspection is actually a diseased and partially hairless cat. When it crosses a ray of projected moon or street light the cat shows itself to be rubbed raw along its spine and while the short scene of this dream mostly consists only of the gray tones between black and white the raw spots are definitely red. Enter from the same ill-defined exit/entrance three pit bulls who then proceed to act as if I am not there while surveying the room for the object of their obvious interest. That object has slinked back to the room from which I began. Two of the dogs move directly back to that room while the third dog is acting a bit absurd and rambunctious. This third dog has something in its mouth, a piece of fabric maybe or a flap of something. The dog shakes its head violently and from its mouth or breaking free from the flap comes the euphonious sound of a small pebble, or in the dream I am thinking tooth, hitting the wood floor with a note all the more startling for being, start to finish, the only sound in the dream.
It is very clear to me that I am unclear about what I want to do, run, or go for help, but as they both require that I exit the scene, that is what I do. I did not however in any of the subsequent disturbing dreams of last night find my way back to the gray room, or the cat. Honestly though, despite the subject matter of many of this week's dreams I am quite grateful for the subconscious feedback. Even though I say I assumed I was dreaming, even without the recall, occasionally I have considered that maybe the projector was broken. But no, seems to be working fine.