The Enema Museum
A couple of things ran through my mind on the way to the enema museum. The same things that would run through anyone's mind I guess—one: why is there an enema museum, and two, why was I going out of my way to go to there?
I drove from Mt. Pleasant down to the property in North Carolina to see with my own eyes that which the property manager could not see, or for the measly fee I pay her, did not bother to see, that being the adjustment of my neighbor's border road which previously meandered onto my land but now runs straight and true according to the newly surveyed line. Job well done. Idling down the gravel road waving bye-bye to the toddler on my front porch the heat beating down on my wheeled metal box helped me decide not to drive the four hours back to Virginia during the heat of the day (without AC), but to splurge for a motel. I drove about twenty-five miles and checked into a Danville, VA. Sleep-Inn at three in the afternoon. The room was frigid. I checked the AC unit but inexplicably it was turned all the way off. I got under the covers and signed into the motel's wifi service on my miniature device by touching the glass screen with thumb and forefinger together and then swiping them outward to enlarge the print so I could see a virtual button that said—accept. I sent out a couple of emails and glanced at a news reader long enough to see that celebrities continue to goof up and grab headlines while black goo gushes still from a mile beneath the surface, spreading farther and wider and causing some to speculate in all apparent seriousness that the earth is about to become a fireball and we, all the many billions of us balanced precariously on its surface are surely to perish under a black cloud that blots out the sun.
So that last bit I think effectively answers why the next morning I set my GPS to lead me to the enema museum in Lynchburg, VA. The end will have to come eventually, whether to each of us individually or to all as one I can't see that it makes much difference. Whether it is a result of our hubris and greed and aggressive disregard for the mother planet or just some stray meteor as big as the sun crashing into us will in the end just be a footnote for future civilizations to regard and, probably not learn from. Goodbye Bosch, goodbye Kafka, goodbye Hendrix, I hope someone's got you in their time capsules. But I'm not going down with gloom. No, I have a couple thousand off beat tourist attractions on my GPS that I have yet to see and dammit, if the closest one to my current location is the enema museum then so be it. Lead me oh not completely infallible GPS device. I will follow.
I think the reason Bernadette doesn't love my GPS device is threefold: one it once took us way out of our way to find a Starbucks that apparently did not exist and two I think she resents that I so willingly do whatever the GPS tells me to do while on occasion only begrudgingly do what she tells me to do and three, the third reason is, I don't really know why Bernadette doesn't love my GPS. For my part I think it is a good device and the reason I might prefer it to the interaction of a human co-pilot is because we all make mistakes, GPS, humans too, but when the human tells you to turn left three feet from the intersection and you miss the turn because come on, three feet? That's not enough time to react, I mean it would be if I could hit a 100 mph fastball but I can't so...anyway, it can sometimes get heated, between us humans, whereas if the electronic device messes up I just say, oh that's interesting that I just drove five miles out of my way to an enema museum and end up in warehouse parking lot, across the street from a paint store and a Red Lobster restaurant.
Now the next logical thing that may come to mind, about how men won't ask for directions...I think for many of us every location we are trying to find but can't, is like an enema museum. It's not that we are worried about appearing unmanly for being lost it is just that we are embarrassed to go, say for example into a Red Lobster restaurant and ask, um, excuse me ma'am or sir but this morning without any sort of coercion whatsoever I decided to go out of my way to see the local enema museum and my GPS led me to that parking lot over there and as you may be aware, there is no enema museum over there. Did they move it? Or, are you aware at all of any kind of museum within a block of here because maybe the enema part is a misprint?
Just for a second while we're on the subject of navigation devices, or hell, devices of any kind, I would I think be remiss not to bring up one of the greatest device lovers I know, Mr. BC. Does he have an iPad? Sheeeit, he's got three of them. Hell, he uses one of 'em and a 10 dollar app to navigate narrow channels in his boat. He's a geek BC is. I mean that in the modern (almost) laudatory sense of the word, as in a lover of all things technological or gadget-like. Pretty much all men are geeks in some way, and women too, they can obviously be geeks, I just hope we can be clear that I'm not talking about people who bite the heads off chickens. None of the people I know, nor I, have ever bitten the head off a chicken. I saw a guy in NY, back in the very early eighties, bite heads off little white mice, but that was performance art (which may or may not be in someone's time capsule, because remember, we're all going to die soon, the apocalypse is now, and what do future life forms—let's just hope white mice don't take over the planet—need to know about us?), of course I guess all chicken decapitators are performance artists of one kind or another. I want to move on here, because I feel like I'm belaboring a non point, but please let's be clear, for the record, that, to the best of my knowledge, Mr. BC has never bitten the head off a chicken.
What do you do when you fail? Do you shake your head, bemoan your bad luck and set sail for home waters, tell the Queen, sorry, I couldn't find any gold or other good stuff. No man. You move down the list of off beat tourist attractions and keep moving. You move way off your northern course and head west (which, in general, in Virginia, if you are east of the mountain range, is a good way to see pretty country). You head for Glasgow, the Town that Time Forgot. Plus, as an offbeat tourist attraction, it would be nearly impossible for an entire town not to exist in some fashion. There is no way I could miss it.
Jumping ahead, yeah Glasgow exists, and yeah, it kind of small and old and forgotten looking (there is a Moose Lodge) but I'm sorry, I had to keep on driving because growing up in Texas and having driven over a fair amount of it, well towns like Glasgow would take up your whole device hard drive if you listed every one. It is however near that other nice attraction, which I have once been too, and honestly cannot right now think of its name (I am distracted because my cat is unfairly attacking my left arm), but it is a nice piece of natural beauty and for some reason I was thinking would be a good place to be when the world exploded. I mean I remember thinking that in the past, before I knew the world was about to explode any second now. I could head there right after I hit another nearby attraction—King Kong Crushing Airplane.
Now this was fun because the GPS was taking me down these tiny roads to finally hook up to what is a two lane highway running, not really contiguously, all through Virginia, Lee Highway. I took the right and was about to continue on six miles to see Kong when I saw up ahead an elephant standing on its hind feet. The elephant was artificial. An advertisement for the small zoo, which I'm not kidding, had a sign out front that said—Have your Picture taken with Baby Tiger. I cannot adequately describe how much I wanted to have my picture taken with a baby tiger but whereas going off half cocked to an enema museum is the kind of thing a man can do alone, going into a roadside zoo to have your picture taken with a baby tiger, isn't. As consolation I took a picture of the elephant and kept on moving.
About a mile up the road I saw this decrepit looking junk yard behind a high wall with a gated entrance, only the junk was not cars or household scrap but artificial animals, not unlike the elephant I had seen by the zoo. I pulled into the gates and parked on the grass next to a giraffe with it's head lying separately next it, and a very realistic looking alligator, and between the two a dinosaur lying on its back. Tall grass was growing up around all of it. I asked a Mexican man who appeared to be working around the yard if I could snap some pictures and he nodded. And would you lookey there. It was King Kong, faded, in need of some fresh paint at least, and he was crushing (well, not really crushing) an airplane. Oh sure, after I left I kept going the several miles just to verify that there would not be a King Kong Crushing Airplane at the GPS coordinate and of course, there wasn't.
To verify the Kongless coordinate I had passed the Interstate and just like that all magical sensation had evaporated. The trip was over but I was still a hundred miles from home. I zoomed down the Interstate remembering the recent past with fondness. I could go back I guess, with Bernadette who is due for a visit, maybe they would even let us pet the baby tiger and we could go to the other place, where I've imagined for many years now as one of the places to spend an apocalypse. No, now I remember, it wasn't a place to go during the apocalypse, it was a place where I felt certain there existed an actual vortex to another world, that was it. So, maybe we could do that next week. I was checking my email a minute ago and in the process saw a headline that said the subsurface methane bubble world explosion theory that suggested we were all within minutes of foreseeable extinction has been debunked. I hope that doesn't lessen the urgency I was feeling to see all the rest of my GPS's offbeat tourist attractions.
...more recent posts
Dinosaur, Truck, Foamhenge Sign
Fried Chicken For Bossman
Oh it's hot believe it. Hotter than frog gizzards on a George Foreman Grill. Taking a water break boss. Parking vehicle in the shade boss. Checking pool viscosity here soon boss. Hey boss, took those gates down out front this morning. For shit boss, going to the burn pile. A part of history that is history boss. We lookin ahead now, down that road of gateless entries. Nothing between us and mayhem but that rusty-shotgun wielding crusty ole bean pole of a caretaker. Katy bar the door. My name's not Katy.
Yardman was bragging about his fried chicken yesterday and I said prove it, then cut him up a chicken and he did. Wish he would of bragged about potato salad and some big fat home grown tomatoes too. I would salt those tomatoes down like they were slugs suffering inexplicable cruelty and I would eat them and the juice and the seeds and that slimy snot-like septum stuff would be all over my chin and down my neck and on my shirt front. There is nothing precisely so sad as a man dreaming about fat warm salty tomatoes on a hot summer day while he eats unaccompanied cold chicken with extra salt. And the sadness can be unrelenting as he suffers thereafter the smell of vegetable oil such that it seems to clog his nostrils and block out future possibilities of goodness. The man begins to lose all hope for a world not pervaded by the stale smell of vegetable oil. What kind of world will that be. Not a good one he answers.
I did too eat those kid's potato chips yesterday, like I said I would, guiltlessly. Towards the end of their stay, while their father was cooking chicken, and their mother appeared to be suffering heat stroke, I picked up the second half of the bag and said come gather round children, it's Chip Party USA time. And we feasted on the chips leftover from my earlier ravaging of the bag. The children lined up single file, sort of, and when it was their turn dug their little hands into the bag and stuffed their faces, broken potato beige pieces adhering to their brown sweaty cheeks. They say I throw the best chip parties this side of Old Rag.
The youngest is walking now but not talking. The next one up, the one I used to call hard head, has an imaginary friend and a speech impediment, which is a misnomer, speech impediment is because he talks a blue streak, enthusiastically, doesn't seem impeded one bit, and truly the fact that I don't understand much of what he says makes him no less interesting a conversationalist. That he says hey Jim, hey Jim, to get my attention doesn't hurt either. Even now I'm wondering about his imaginary friend Robbie. I wonder what Robbie is doing right now. The birthday boy was sitting next to me, on the wicker couch on the back porch overlooking the pool, and reached over to get his chips whenever my hand was not in the bag. The oldest boy, the Yardman's stepson, son of a local boxer recovering nicely from last year's stabbing, was shy in his asking, could I have some chips? Hell, they were his chips really, but I didn't remind him of that, I just said, chips for everybody, all day long, I throw the best chip parties in the county. I could tell the Yardman's wife was ready to leave and in her perfect world would not be waiting on her husband to finish cooking me, his bossman, fried chicken.
Oh it's hot believe it. Hotter than frog gizzards on a George Foreman Grill. Taking a water break boss. Parking vehicle in the shade boss. Checking pool viscosity here soon boss. Hey boss, took those gates down out front this morning. For shit boss, going to the burn pile. A part of history that is history boss. We lookin ahead now, down that road of gateless entries. Nothing between us and mayhem but that rusty-shotgun wielding crusty ole bean pole of a caretaker. Katy bar the door. My name's not Katy.
Yardman was bragging about his fried chicken yesterday and I said prove it, then cut him up a chicken and he did. Wish he would of bragged about potato salad and some big fat home grown tomatoes too. I would salt those tomatoes down like they were slugs suffering inexplicable cruelty and I would eat them and the juice and the seeds and that slimy snot-like septum stuff would be all over my chin and down my neck and on my shirt front. There is nothing precisely so sad as a man dreaming about fat warm salty tomatoes on a hot summer day while he eats unaccompanied cold chicken with extra salt. And the sadness can be unrelenting as he suffers thereafter the smell of vegetable oil such that it seems to clog his nostrils and block out future possibilities of goodness. The man begins to lose all hope for a world not pervaded by the stale smell of vegetable oil. What kind of world will that be. Not a good one he answers.
I did too eat those kid's potato chips yesterday, like I said I would, guiltlessly. Towards the end of their stay, while their father was cooking chicken, and their mother appeared to be suffering heat stroke, I picked up the second half of the bag and said come gather round children, it's Chip Party USA time. And we feasted on the chips leftover from my earlier ravaging of the bag. The children lined up single file, sort of, and when it was their turn dug their little hands into the bag and stuffed their faces, broken potato beige pieces adhering to their brown sweaty cheeks. They say I throw the best chip parties this side of Old Rag.
The youngest is walking now but not talking. The next one up, the one I used to call hard head, has an imaginary friend and a speech impediment, which is a misnomer, speech impediment is because he talks a blue streak, enthusiastically, doesn't seem impeded one bit, and truly the fact that I don't understand much of what he says makes him no less interesting a conversationalist. That he says hey Jim, hey Jim, to get my attention doesn't hurt either. Even now I'm wondering about his imaginary friend Robbie. I wonder what Robbie is doing right now. The birthday boy was sitting next to me, on the wicker couch on the back porch overlooking the pool, and reached over to get his chips whenever my hand was not in the bag. The oldest boy, the Yardman's stepson, son of a local boxer recovering nicely from last year's stabbing, was shy in his asking, could I have some chips? Hell, they were his chips really, but I didn't remind him of that, I just said, chips for everybody, all day long, I throw the best chip parties in the county. I could tell the Yardman's wife was ready to leave and in her perfect world would not be waiting on her husband to finish cooking me, his bossman, fried chicken.
Small Statue In NY
The Guiltless Chip Eater
Not that I'm name dropping, not yet anyhow, but raindrops as big as cow patties came slapping down against my windshield. I was driving to the dump. I hand deliver my garbage here in Rappahannock. Raindrops as big as cow patties, yes they were, and when they hit the black asphalt they sizzled like bacon in a cast iron skillet. That's how hot it was. Been fearful hot here for a number of days. It's so hot I won't even attempt the short hike from my air conditioned house up that driveway to the swimming pool. Oh you could float a Sunday away when its this hot but I'm staying inside so's my hair don't curl. Not that that's a very good reason but I'd come up with another if you pressed me. I got a fella that cuts my grass and he was going to come over and swim, with his boys, the one of thems been operated on by the foremost children's brain surgeon in this country, over at Johns Hopkins, had a birthday yesterday down in Front Royal that I went to, a kid without a lick of musical sense shouted above all of us during the singing, which was in one way a blessing and in another way just ill-mannered. The birthday boy didn't seem to mind, he just smiled like a boy with a table full of presents to open. Myself I don't care much for an ill-mannered child and I'm old enough now to where it's not considered self-loathing. They was swarming down at the fruit stand, to get to the point, seems Roy got his name in the paper, I didn't read it myself, nor do I intend to just in case it is bad news, of which I do not need no more, but he had his hair combed and one of his good shirts on and seemed in high spirit so I expect it was nothing too awful they wrote about him. Good for him. But I'm not here bragging like I know someone got his name in the paper. I'm just writing to tell you that the frost got his pie cheeries and there ain't gonna be none down here. Forget about it. God bless them ones you enjoying up there, but forget about it down here, they froze up during that late frost. Hell in a handbasket. Oh, there's the driveway alarm, kidding around now you know I ain't got one like Roy, but I can hear gravel under tires easy enough if I'm listening. I can see right off it ain't that one I told not to come back but I'm not so sure it's the birthday boy either. I'm feeling a bit surly, what with the recent news about cheeries, and having to go out in that heat for nothing more that bad news and a trip to the dump that could of waited, not to mention those raindrops as big as cow patties, and the effect they may have had on my electrical system, what with the new hole just showed up in one of my headlights, the one that wasn't already cracked too. Oh yeah no, when it rains like cow poop falling from the sky you know it's raining hard as hell, only it didn't rain that way for but thirty seconds. And that is just enough to make a hopeful man cry in his buttermilk. Oh it was the twin, the one that didn't call to warn me about a visit, coming to warn me about his brother's visit, who did call me to warn me about his visit, and ask did I need something from the civilized world. And oh hell shitfire there he comes now and I sure did want a pizza. I guess I'll go up and get all the beer I can out of the two of them, and hope that somebody brought chips or something for the kids. Their chips I will eat guiltlessly.
Not that I'm name dropping, not yet anyhow, but raindrops as big as cow patties came slapping down against my windshield. I was driving to the dump. I hand deliver my garbage here in Rappahannock. Raindrops as big as cow patties, yes they were, and when they hit the black asphalt they sizzled like bacon in a cast iron skillet. That's how hot it was. Been fearful hot here for a number of days. It's so hot I won't even attempt the short hike from my air conditioned house up that driveway to the swimming pool. Oh you could float a Sunday away when its this hot but I'm staying inside so's my hair don't curl. Not that that's a very good reason but I'd come up with another if you pressed me. I got a fella that cuts my grass and he was going to come over and swim, with his boys, the one of thems been operated on by the foremost children's brain surgeon in this country, over at Johns Hopkins, had a birthday yesterday down in Front Royal that I went to, a kid without a lick of musical sense shouted above all of us during the singing, which was in one way a blessing and in another way just ill-mannered. The birthday boy didn't seem to mind, he just smiled like a boy with a table full of presents to open. Myself I don't care much for an ill-mannered child and I'm old enough now to where it's not considered self-loathing. They was swarming down at the fruit stand, to get to the point, seems Roy got his name in the paper, I didn't read it myself, nor do I intend to just in case it is bad news, of which I do not need no more, but he had his hair combed and one of his good shirts on and seemed in high spirit so I expect it was nothing too awful they wrote about him. Good for him. But I'm not here bragging like I know someone got his name in the paper. I'm just writing to tell you that the frost got his pie cheeries and there ain't gonna be none down here. Forget about it. God bless them ones you enjoying up there, but forget about it down here, they froze up during that late frost. Hell in a handbasket. Oh, there's the driveway alarm, kidding around now you know I ain't got one like Roy, but I can hear gravel under tires easy enough if I'm listening. I can see right off it ain't that one I told not to come back but I'm not so sure it's the birthday boy either. I'm feeling a bit surly, what with the recent news about cheeries, and having to go out in that heat for nothing more that bad news and a trip to the dump that could of waited, not to mention those raindrops as big as cow patties, and the effect they may have had on my electrical system, what with the new hole just showed up in one of my headlights, the one that wasn't already cracked too. Oh yeah no, when it rains like cow poop falling from the sky you know it's raining hard as hell, only it didn't rain that way for but thirty seconds. And that is just enough to make a hopeful man cry in his buttermilk. Oh it was the twin, the one that didn't call to warn me about a visit, coming to warn me about his brother's visit, who did call me to warn me about his visit, and ask did I need something from the civilized world. And oh hell shitfire there he comes now and I sure did want a pizza. I guess I'll go up and get all the beer I can out of the two of them, and hope that somebody brought chips or something for the kids. Their chips I will eat guiltlessly.
Flyover
Flyover
A plane flew overhead yesterday while outside on the lounger I read the first installment of the Swede's trilogy so that a month from now I can go see the movie, or by then I may have to download it, or just wait for the official DVD release. The plane overhead always makes me think of Mr. BC and his flying lessons. I am always pretty sure the planes overhead are flown by Mr. BC. The plane banked left and I went inside to get my camera. If possible I try to take pictures of Mr. BC when he flies overhead. Way to fly in a straight line I yell up to him. Way to keep that thing up in the air. You flying sonofabitch I yell affecting the salty familiarity of a seasoned war veteran reliving the past, remembering it all but making stuff up when necessary.
A plane flew overhead yesterday while outside on the lounger I read the first installment of the Swede's trilogy so that a month from now I can go see the movie, or by then I may have to download it, or just wait for the official DVD release. The plane overhead always makes me think of Mr. BC and his flying lessons. I am always pretty sure the planes overhead are flown by Mr. BC. The plane banked left and I went inside to get my camera. If possible I try to take pictures of Mr. BC when he flies overhead. Way to fly in a straight line I yell up to him. Way to keep that thing up in the air. You flying sonofabitch I yell affecting the salty familiarity of a seasoned war veteran reliving the past, remembering it all but making stuff up when necessary.
Upstate
Have You Seen Zoe?
I was unwilling to risk another sleepless night so I took a pill.
After a fairly strenuous previous day I had anticipated a night of deep dreamless sleep but found it elusive. That day by 2pm. I had ingested two Bloody Marys, three frozen Margaritas and one lavender infused gin lemonade drink and here let me pause and say oh God bless that wonderful Margarita machine, you were a marvelous and I would go so far as to say essential part of my survival and happiness while roughing it for four days with as many as 33 other rummies in a decrepit and sometimes spooky three story former ballerinas compound deep in the Adirondacks. After the heavy early morning drinking I and five others attempted a 5.5 mile hike of a somewhat strenuous nature (up and back down Slide Mountain. Three had to turn back once it became obvious that completing the hike would make catching their bus back to NYC unlikely). Midday hiking on a hot muggy day is hard to beat I say facetiously and as the sweat poured down my face and soaked my body I counted off one Bloody Mary, two, and so on. I did though after the hike feel an energy akin to elation, which was however short-lived, as once back at the compound I again began pouring down frozen Margaritas and then, inexplicably, lifting heavy objects, cinder blocks and such, and also wondering, why is there such a stigma about drinking Bloody Marys late in the day, I hate that, because, they are, properly made, perhaps the most delicious drink in the history of tomato-based drinks.
The pill I took last night—which combined with just a splash of Johnnie Walker Black puts you in a pretty much guaranteed state of temporary death for about eight hours—begins and ends with the third to last letter of the alphabet. My lame attempt at subterfuge is because I don't want to glorify brand name drug use, or make it too easy for others to replicate my decision making, which can occasionally be listed under the title ill-conceived, or stupid, if you find that easier to spell, nor do I want to condemn it too harshly, this decision to ingest drugs, lest those revelers (I have your names written in my “notebook”) who regaled relentlessly through the night my wakeful aching body as they “sang” and danced and engaged in ponderous discussion under the influence of um, whatever that stuff is that makes you alert and uncommonly vivacious until 7 in the morning after a previous day and night of heavy drinking and exercise, think that I am holding a grudge (the fact that your names are scrawled with delirious hand in my notebook is not intended to make you jump in the night every time you hear some strange noise, and wonder, was jimlouis serious about that “notebook” or is he just spoofing, he's a real kidder, but also, he's kind of got that edge that scares me sometimes? Do you thinks he's one of those whack jobs that snaps one day and then they find these notebooks scrawled with all sorts of weird shit?) I would love to help you answer those questions, set your mind at ease but...did you hear that? Did someone just turn our doorknob? Hey does your drink taste funny? Mine tastes a little like it has 1200 mics of LSD in it, naw it's probably ok.
So the pill worked, perhaps too well (I got my desired dead dreamless sleep), and when Bernadette nudged me this morning, back in NYC, to ask do you need to move the car, I said or croaked, possibly squeaked, a yes and when she said it was 8 I thought, that's a nice number and I could probably use about 8 more hours of sleep. When she asked did I want her to move it I gave an adamant no, it's not woman's work afterall, I mean, there's just things she wouldn't understand about growing up on the streets...I won't go on in this vein...it was the beginning of an attempt to obliquely reference something that we did last night, which she made me promise, or maybe promise is too strong a word, that I wouldn't mention, while we baby-sat for a kid named Atticus. But despite the aforementioned lack of or at least occasional lack of good judgement I think now it will be best if I just admit that we watched Dirty Dancing on the TV . It was the best I could do with the system I had to work with, of which the DVD part along with the multiple remotes had so flummoxed me that I just gave up on it. The movie we had intended to watch, which was much the artier film, with accomplished actors, and buttloads of nuance, was the type of film you would be proud to discuss, drunkenly or sober, with just about anyone. I can't remember its name and as far as I know it is still stuck in that machine with the word “cannot” flashing on the display.
I exited the building and when you do that you are like immediately smack in the C part of NYC, which luckily accepts the walking dead as normal parts of its makeup, but in preparation I had put on my billed cap and positioned it low to hide behind instead of the bleary eyed drunk pill popping hiding sunglasses that other Nykers might prefer. There was however no accessory to hide the fact that I could not walk all that well and I just did the best I could. That pill had really kicked my ass. It felt as if not just my shoes but perhaps my pants and underwear were on backwards. And to get to the Jeep, which uncharacteristically was parked all the way over on Houston near the FDR, with literally only thirty seconds to spare before a meter maid dropped from the sky and zapped me for sixty, I had to run or rapidly limp (I should have mention earlier about the Adirondack block of cement that viciously attacked my left baby toe) the last two blocks while holding up my beltless pants in the most subtle fashion I could manage.
Usually when I start out writing I have some kernel of an idea inspired by one simple, ordinary sighting from a day, but what I say or how obviously it is connected to the original kernel can be hard to discern. Today I thought it was going to be that boy child I saw on Norfolk, the last of a group of seven kids leashed together single file. A previous group of leashed children had been led by a few moments earlier and it usually makes me smile, these leash or wagon train led groups of children in NYC, but this morning it made me laugh out loud, not at the boy per se but after he had passed and I had processed all of it: the cuteness of the group, and certain of its members individually, the way they walked or what they wore or when they waved at construction workers, and the fact that the doll the boy was carrying was Elmo's best girl friend, the tutu-wearing Zoe, who is a figure very close to me for reasons...save your breath...I'm not telling you, well, all of it seemed connected and part of that spiral of life that makes writing about it seem worthwhile. But I don't see how I really got Zoe into this one. I'll check for Zoe on the next edit.
I was unwilling to risk another sleepless night so I took a pill.
After a fairly strenuous previous day I had anticipated a night of deep dreamless sleep but found it elusive. That day by 2pm. I had ingested two Bloody Marys, three frozen Margaritas and one lavender infused gin lemonade drink and here let me pause and say oh God bless that wonderful Margarita machine, you were a marvelous and I would go so far as to say essential part of my survival and happiness while roughing it for four days with as many as 33 other rummies in a decrepit and sometimes spooky three story former ballerinas compound deep in the Adirondacks. After the heavy early morning drinking I and five others attempted a 5.5 mile hike of a somewhat strenuous nature (up and back down Slide Mountain. Three had to turn back once it became obvious that completing the hike would make catching their bus back to NYC unlikely). Midday hiking on a hot muggy day is hard to beat I say facetiously and as the sweat poured down my face and soaked my body I counted off one Bloody Mary, two, and so on. I did though after the hike feel an energy akin to elation, which was however short-lived, as once back at the compound I again began pouring down frozen Margaritas and then, inexplicably, lifting heavy objects, cinder blocks and such, and also wondering, why is there such a stigma about drinking Bloody Marys late in the day, I hate that, because, they are, properly made, perhaps the most delicious drink in the history of tomato-based drinks.
The pill I took last night—which combined with just a splash of Johnnie Walker Black puts you in a pretty much guaranteed state of temporary death for about eight hours—begins and ends with the third to last letter of the alphabet. My lame attempt at subterfuge is because I don't want to glorify brand name drug use, or make it too easy for others to replicate my decision making, which can occasionally be listed under the title ill-conceived, or stupid, if you find that easier to spell, nor do I want to condemn it too harshly, this decision to ingest drugs, lest those revelers (I have your names written in my “notebook”) who regaled relentlessly through the night my wakeful aching body as they “sang” and danced and engaged in ponderous discussion under the influence of um, whatever that stuff is that makes you alert and uncommonly vivacious until 7 in the morning after a previous day and night of heavy drinking and exercise, think that I am holding a grudge (the fact that your names are scrawled with delirious hand in my notebook is not intended to make you jump in the night every time you hear some strange noise, and wonder, was jimlouis serious about that “notebook” or is he just spoofing, he's a real kidder, but also, he's kind of got that edge that scares me sometimes? Do you thinks he's one of those whack jobs that snaps one day and then they find these notebooks scrawled with all sorts of weird shit?) I would love to help you answer those questions, set your mind at ease but...did you hear that? Did someone just turn our doorknob? Hey does your drink taste funny? Mine tastes a little like it has 1200 mics of LSD in it, naw it's probably ok.
So the pill worked, perhaps too well (I got my desired dead dreamless sleep), and when Bernadette nudged me this morning, back in NYC, to ask do you need to move the car, I said or croaked, possibly squeaked, a yes and when she said it was 8 I thought, that's a nice number and I could probably use about 8 more hours of sleep. When she asked did I want her to move it I gave an adamant no, it's not woman's work afterall, I mean, there's just things she wouldn't understand about growing up on the streets...I won't go on in this vein...it was the beginning of an attempt to obliquely reference something that we did last night, which she made me promise, or maybe promise is too strong a word, that I wouldn't mention, while we baby-sat for a kid named Atticus. But despite the aforementioned lack of or at least occasional lack of good judgement I think now it will be best if I just admit that we watched Dirty Dancing on the TV . It was the best I could do with the system I had to work with, of which the DVD part along with the multiple remotes had so flummoxed me that I just gave up on it. The movie we had intended to watch, which was much the artier film, with accomplished actors, and buttloads of nuance, was the type of film you would be proud to discuss, drunkenly or sober, with just about anyone. I can't remember its name and as far as I know it is still stuck in that machine with the word “cannot” flashing on the display.
I exited the building and when you do that you are like immediately smack in the C part of NYC, which luckily accepts the walking dead as normal parts of its makeup, but in preparation I had put on my billed cap and positioned it low to hide behind instead of the bleary eyed drunk pill popping hiding sunglasses that other Nykers might prefer. There was however no accessory to hide the fact that I could not walk all that well and I just did the best I could. That pill had really kicked my ass. It felt as if not just my shoes but perhaps my pants and underwear were on backwards. And to get to the Jeep, which uncharacteristically was parked all the way over on Houston near the FDR, with literally only thirty seconds to spare before a meter maid dropped from the sky and zapped me for sixty, I had to run or rapidly limp (I should have mention earlier about the Adirondack block of cement that viciously attacked my left baby toe) the last two blocks while holding up my beltless pants in the most subtle fashion I could manage.
Usually when I start out writing I have some kernel of an idea inspired by one simple, ordinary sighting from a day, but what I say or how obviously it is connected to the original kernel can be hard to discern. Today I thought it was going to be that boy child I saw on Norfolk, the last of a group of seven kids leashed together single file. A previous group of leashed children had been led by a few moments earlier and it usually makes me smile, these leash or wagon train led groups of children in NYC, but this morning it made me laugh out loud, not at the boy per se but after he had passed and I had processed all of it: the cuteness of the group, and certain of its members individually, the way they walked or what they wore or when they waved at construction workers, and the fact that the doll the boy was carrying was Elmo's best girl friend, the tutu-wearing Zoe, who is a figure very close to me for reasons...save your breath...I'm not telling you, well, all of it seemed connected and part of that spiral of life that makes writing about it seem worthwhile. But I don't see how I really got Zoe into this one. I'll check for Zoe on the next edit.
An Unhinged Screw
A couple of screws were loose, or three in fact (the third had come so loose as to fall down into the hot water supply line, and was at least partly responsible for the vibrating pipes that the Restauranteur was complaining about) and the hot side washer, without the screw, was just lying free against the stem, and/or the seat, working in a fashion but not that well. The other two screws were not themselves actually loose but the handles they were supposedly securing definitely were not as you would want them, functioning yes, but shaky. What appears to have fixed this wonkiness of the handles is longer screws, although they would certainly also work better if the female housings, into which go the hot and cold side splines, were deeper. So in fact, there were no loose screws, although the one that had fallen down into the supply line had I guess you could say gone through the process of being loose. Completely free of its mooring though a thing is not really loose anymore, but free. Turning the hot water valve to off and unscrewing the stem and then cupping my hand around the exposed valve seat and turning the water back on caused the missing screw to shoot up through my hand and into the sink (and I had thought ahead and closed the drain stopper.)
But earlier, in the morning, not knowing ahead of time that I was destined for failure, if not a permanent one, and as it seems this faucet has been nothing but trouble, I went out in search of a new one. Not wanting to go back to where I had gotten the one that has caused all the trouble I used my new found interest in subway travel to justify a trip on the F train to 23rd Street, where there is a Home Depot. But I'm looking for a faucet with big lever-type handles to accommodate disability plumbing code requirements for restaurant bathrooms and I'm not seeing these at Home Depot. While the employees there are helpful enough they cannot really answer my question regarding the finer aspects of NY plumbing code, so I collared a couple of guys dressed in coveralls speaking to each other in what sounded like maybe Croatian, and interrupted them to ask were they plumbers. I'm not sure they were but the one of them seemed to like the idea of it and said, in perfectly unaccented English, uh yes, we are. But I'm probably asking the wrong questions based on what is clearly an imperfect understanding of plumbing. As I walked away from the Croatians a Home Depot employee trotted up to me and suggested I go to one of two area plumbing supply stores.
So from 23rd Street between 5th and 6th I'm heading to 18th Street between 7th and 8th. And I'm daydreaming right out of the gate and end up on 8th Ave and know by the time I get to 18th Street I'm going to forget my orientation (seems implausible from here but at the time I was just thoroughly disconnected from a visualization of the grid) and not know whether I should turn left or right.
The last time I was in this neighborhood was months ago to meet a group of friends for a buffet of intestines and such. After the meal Bernadette and I had walked for awhile with a couple from the group, two artists, and once remembering that I felt pretty sure I would run into the man, and I did, just one block later. We chatted briefly, not really awkwardly but with a mutual inclination towards wrapping things up so as to avoid the awkward silence. He was clearly not as prepared to see me as I was him, and for a moment afterwards, walking away up 8th Ave., I wondered if perhaps I had conjured him to appear from some thin air, and now that my back was turned, he was transporting back through that thin air to wherever he had been before the rude interruption, and once back there was shaking his head in befuddlement, wondering, and not for the first time, too much acid in the eighties?
I can tell right off that this is not a place that particularly welcomes with open arms retail customers, it is a plumbing supply for contractors mostly, and I wait patiently while two employees doing absolutely nothing avoid having to deal with me. I have written all over me man with stupid questions who will waste your time. And I do not disappoint. I am, as advertised. And I leave empty handed, accepting slowly the failure that is defining my morning.
And so, over eager to get back on familiar ground I descend again into the bowels of the subway, but into the wrong entrance and realize only after I've swiped my card that none of the options in front of me are ones I want. Instead of heading back downtown I travel a few stops uptown on one of the numbered lines, and exit at 42 and Broadway, Times Square. It is a bit of a GollyGee, New York City moment, the entire sides of buildings are flashing advertisements at me, so I stay put, lean against a building and pull out the little device which continues to prove its hesitance to pick up a wifi signal when I most need it to. The signal is necessary to make any of my various mapping programs work (there is one that tells me which subway to take), and when they do work, they really work quite well. When working they allow me to achieve the best of both worlds. Not when I'm on an important mission to fix a faucet but on one of my many days off, it is for me a great thrill to venture out from a starting point and find myself through circuitous routing, completely disoriented. And then later, if my electronic maps are working I can in responsible fashion come back to earth, get myself oriented, and back to home base. It is kind of like a hobby for me.
But you can't engage in your hobbies every day. Once in awhile you need to fix a faucet and is too much to ask that in pursuit of this goal that everything works just the way you want it to? Which is a dumb question. No, there actually are dumb questions.
Now though, still leaning against the building, I realize I am in the early stages of paralysis, I have given up on the pretense of searching for a signal but am still staring downward, using the little device only as a prop, scoping out the hundreds and hundreds of passing shoes, my favorites this year and by favorite I mean least favorite is the open toed high heeled sandal espadrille hybrid. They seem to have too much and too little going on at the same time. The only thing that would make me like those shoes is if they came with built in wireless routers, so that every time I saw a pair I could also be using a mapping program to help me get the hell out of Times Square. I mean, I'll come back another day when I have more time.
I have by now stared long enough at a static version of the miniature subway map on my device to feel less daunted by the task of moving forward, and so find myself imbued with a surging confidence which has me walking back down steps leading below the sidewalks of NYC. I'm not sure what I got on, maybe an X or an R line, but it took me close enough, I got off on or near Prince St. and walked back easterly. And as with the many times before when suffering from disorientation in the west, realizing I had arrived at the Bowery made me feel calm, and home again.
In the restaurant which is closed for Monday's I performed the up above aforementioned and had that faucet working, well, let's just say better than it has in awhile. Right smack dab into the dubious expression on the face of the just arrived Restauranteur I said, no really, works great, try it out. She did, said hot damn. Neither one of us believes it will stay fixed forever. There will come a day in the foreseeable future when I will have to go back out there searching for a new faucet.
A couple of screws were loose, or three in fact (the third had come so loose as to fall down into the hot water supply line, and was at least partly responsible for the vibrating pipes that the Restauranteur was complaining about) and the hot side washer, without the screw, was just lying free against the stem, and/or the seat, working in a fashion but not that well. The other two screws were not themselves actually loose but the handles they were supposedly securing definitely were not as you would want them, functioning yes, but shaky. What appears to have fixed this wonkiness of the handles is longer screws, although they would certainly also work better if the female housings, into which go the hot and cold side splines, were deeper. So in fact, there were no loose screws, although the one that had fallen down into the supply line had I guess you could say gone through the process of being loose. Completely free of its mooring though a thing is not really loose anymore, but free. Turning the hot water valve to off and unscrewing the stem and then cupping my hand around the exposed valve seat and turning the water back on caused the missing screw to shoot up through my hand and into the sink (and I had thought ahead and closed the drain stopper.)
But earlier, in the morning, not knowing ahead of time that I was destined for failure, if not a permanent one, and as it seems this faucet has been nothing but trouble, I went out in search of a new one. Not wanting to go back to where I had gotten the one that has caused all the trouble I used my new found interest in subway travel to justify a trip on the F train to 23rd Street, where there is a Home Depot. But I'm looking for a faucet with big lever-type handles to accommodate disability plumbing code requirements for restaurant bathrooms and I'm not seeing these at Home Depot. While the employees there are helpful enough they cannot really answer my question regarding the finer aspects of NY plumbing code, so I collared a couple of guys dressed in coveralls speaking to each other in what sounded like maybe Croatian, and interrupted them to ask were they plumbers. I'm not sure they were but the one of them seemed to like the idea of it and said, in perfectly unaccented English, uh yes, we are. But I'm probably asking the wrong questions based on what is clearly an imperfect understanding of plumbing. As I walked away from the Croatians a Home Depot employee trotted up to me and suggested I go to one of two area plumbing supply stores.
So from 23rd Street between 5th and 6th I'm heading to 18th Street between 7th and 8th. And I'm daydreaming right out of the gate and end up on 8th Ave and know by the time I get to 18th Street I'm going to forget my orientation (seems implausible from here but at the time I was just thoroughly disconnected from a visualization of the grid) and not know whether I should turn left or right.
The last time I was in this neighborhood was months ago to meet a group of friends for a buffet of intestines and such. After the meal Bernadette and I had walked for awhile with a couple from the group, two artists, and once remembering that I felt pretty sure I would run into the man, and I did, just one block later. We chatted briefly, not really awkwardly but with a mutual inclination towards wrapping things up so as to avoid the awkward silence. He was clearly not as prepared to see me as I was him, and for a moment afterwards, walking away up 8th Ave., I wondered if perhaps I had conjured him to appear from some thin air, and now that my back was turned, he was transporting back through that thin air to wherever he had been before the rude interruption, and once back there was shaking his head in befuddlement, wondering, and not for the first time, too much acid in the eighties?
I can tell right off that this is not a place that particularly welcomes with open arms retail customers, it is a plumbing supply for contractors mostly, and I wait patiently while two employees doing absolutely nothing avoid having to deal with me. I have written all over me man with stupid questions who will waste your time. And I do not disappoint. I am, as advertised. And I leave empty handed, accepting slowly the failure that is defining my morning.
And so, over eager to get back on familiar ground I descend again into the bowels of the subway, but into the wrong entrance and realize only after I've swiped my card that none of the options in front of me are ones I want. Instead of heading back downtown I travel a few stops uptown on one of the numbered lines, and exit at 42 and Broadway, Times Square. It is a bit of a GollyGee, New York City moment, the entire sides of buildings are flashing advertisements at me, so I stay put, lean against a building and pull out the little device which continues to prove its hesitance to pick up a wifi signal when I most need it to. The signal is necessary to make any of my various mapping programs work (there is one that tells me which subway to take), and when they do work, they really work quite well. When working they allow me to achieve the best of both worlds. Not when I'm on an important mission to fix a faucet but on one of my many days off, it is for me a great thrill to venture out from a starting point and find myself through circuitous routing, completely disoriented. And then later, if my electronic maps are working I can in responsible fashion come back to earth, get myself oriented, and back to home base. It is kind of like a hobby for me.
But you can't engage in your hobbies every day. Once in awhile you need to fix a faucet and is too much to ask that in pursuit of this goal that everything works just the way you want it to? Which is a dumb question. No, there actually are dumb questions.
Now though, still leaning against the building, I realize I am in the early stages of paralysis, I have given up on the pretense of searching for a signal but am still staring downward, using the little device only as a prop, scoping out the hundreds and hundreds of passing shoes, my favorites this year and by favorite I mean least favorite is the open toed high heeled sandal espadrille hybrid. They seem to have too much and too little going on at the same time. The only thing that would make me like those shoes is if they came with built in wireless routers, so that every time I saw a pair I could also be using a mapping program to help me get the hell out of Times Square. I mean, I'll come back another day when I have more time.
I have by now stared long enough at a static version of the miniature subway map on my device to feel less daunted by the task of moving forward, and so find myself imbued with a surging confidence which has me walking back down steps leading below the sidewalks of NYC. I'm not sure what I got on, maybe an X or an R line, but it took me close enough, I got off on or near Prince St. and walked back easterly. And as with the many times before when suffering from disorientation in the west, realizing I had arrived at the Bowery made me feel calm, and home again.
In the restaurant which is closed for Monday's I performed the up above aforementioned and had that faucet working, well, let's just say better than it has in awhile. Right smack dab into the dubious expression on the face of the just arrived Restauranteur I said, no really, works great, try it out. She did, said hot damn. Neither one of us believes it will stay fixed forever. There will come a day in the foreseeable future when I will have to go back out there searching for a new faucet.