We mooned a few Woodstockers driving through New York.
We considered asking the police if there was a 'hood close by where we could find some cheap ethnic food.
There was a town in Michigan named Climax. We took a picture.
I have mosquito bites the size of quarters.
We're in Dodgeville, Wisconsin, pumping our own water, sleeping in a one room school house last used in 1962.
I wake up to pee at 4:00am. The bathroom is in a barn around back. I pee off the porch. The corn fields are covered in a layer of fog and a strip of it is illuminated by a full moon. The sky is only somewhat dark and full of different color clouds. They look as if someone sneezed and they all fell apart.
Some kid from Seattle asked us about raves and drag racing in New Jersey because he had heard, "There's a lot of that shit out there."
There is a type of ground squirrel that hibernates for 8 months. It breathes once a minute and its heart beats only five times a minute.
Richard is from England. He loves Credence Clear Water Revival. He smells as bad as I imagined any human could ever smell. He says his ancestors discovered New Jersey and tells us that Cindy Crawford ate at the Mexican restaurant the week before.
In Spokane our campsite is within earshot of a shooting range.
One bookstore sort of doubled as a cat hostel. On top of the bookshelves were railings connecting various parts of the store on which the cats walked.
Apparently my uncle accidently fired a shotgun in the bedroom.
Everything's ok now.
Friday, April 29, 2005
Memory #4 GALAPAGOS (Dos)
Como un arbusto
Roberto is not from the capital. He is from the coast. Because he makes certain to point this out, I figure the significance must be enormous but most of it escapes me at that moment. Later I realize what this means. It means that he came from the ground, the earth, and the mud and now he lives and works in the city, the capital city of bricks and steel.
He reminds me of a shrub, in frame, in color, and in a way that if you attempted to ride a bicycle through and over him he would snap back to attention with only minimal scrapes.
He works the front desk for a hostel in the backpacker section of the city. A local travel agency awarded the hostel a trip to the Galapagos for reciprocal business. The owner had gone a year or two before and this year had given the trip to Roberto.
The boat holds twenty passengers and five crew. Eighteen of the passengers are Israeli. The other two are Roberto and I.
Roberto is enamored with a girl whose name neither he nor I can pronounce. She stayed at his hostel before the Galapagos which gave him ample time to add twigs and sticks to the fire of his crush. He has good reason. His reason is immediately echoed by both the other passengers and the members of the crew.
She is beautiful and has an aloofness that makes her appear as though she speaks a language that no one else does. She is unmoved when one of the naturalist guide plays the guitar. She sits looking at the horizon smoking her cigarettes that she keeps in a leather pouch. She is indifferent when one of the crew pours her a drink.
Remember that sailors fell in love with manatees.
I learn the Hebrew word for shark, which if I remember correctly sounds something like "gadish".
I swim with sea lions.
Como un sueño
"The last Zodiac will return to the boat at 11pm. Anyone who wants to stay later will have to hire a water-taxi."
It was our last night, the only time we would spend on an island inhabited by people not animals.
We are in a bar. The girl has rejected everyone who has asked her to dance. She has decided to share her secret language with her roomate from the boat, not to be heard through the music.
I request a song for Roberto. I insist that for this song he must ask the girl to dance. My Spanish is faltering with the late hour and the emotion of trying to pressure him but also it's bolstered by my drunkeness. He relents, he agrees due to the late hour, the emotion, and his drunkeness.
A few days earlier, as we stood near the edge of cliff watching a brownish-yellow iguana chew relentlessly on a piece of cactus, spikes and all, Roberto laughed. He took out his disposable camera, knelt to take a photo, and said, "Es como un sueño." (It is like a dream.)
The song I request is entitled "Un Monton de Estrellas". I requested it because the chorus sings "Porque yo en el amor soy un idiota." (Because I, in love, am an idiot.)
It was apt for many reasons.
The DJ plays half a dozen songs, and not my request. I press him, this time I take a cigarette out for myself and offer him one, which he takes. Two songs later, it comes on.
I push Roberto off his stool. He crosses the floor as the guitar plays the opening measures of the song. When the congas come in, he is in front of her. The dance floor is small about the size of a living room. It is empty except for the colored lights projecting on the floor. She acts as if she is embarrassed and declines.
He returns to the stool next to mine. He is disappointed but somewhat surprisingly, not broken. I guess trying unsuccessfully to get her attention for the past two weeks has eased this crash landing.
"Roberto, vamos a bailar con las gringas alla."
We dance. I teach people dances that I am no good at. Roberto dances with a girl who is at least 6 inches taller than he is and she is the shorter of the two we asked to dance.
We leave victoriously and somehow we are able to guide our water-taxi driver to our boat in the dark, in a bay full of boats.
We climb the ladder to the main deck of the boat. We walk upright and no longer teeter with the side to side motion of the boat. The alcohol has perfected our balance, it has stopped the ocean and gave us solid, unmoving platform to walk on.
We sit on chairs, fighting sleep.
As we separate and walk towards our rooms I hear Roberto say, "Es como un sueño."
Roberto is not from the capital. He is from the coast. Because he makes certain to point this out, I figure the significance must be enormous but most of it escapes me at that moment. Later I realize what this means. It means that he came from the ground, the earth, and the mud and now he lives and works in the city, the capital city of bricks and steel.
He reminds me of a shrub, in frame, in color, and in a way that if you attempted to ride a bicycle through and over him he would snap back to attention with only minimal scrapes.
He works the front desk for a hostel in the backpacker section of the city. A local travel agency awarded the hostel a trip to the Galapagos for reciprocal business. The owner had gone a year or two before and this year had given the trip to Roberto.
The boat holds twenty passengers and five crew. Eighteen of the passengers are Israeli. The other two are Roberto and I.
Roberto is enamored with a girl whose name neither he nor I can pronounce. She stayed at his hostel before the Galapagos which gave him ample time to add twigs and sticks to the fire of his crush. He has good reason. His reason is immediately echoed by both the other passengers and the members of the crew.
She is beautiful and has an aloofness that makes her appear as though she speaks a language that no one else does. She is unmoved when one of the naturalist guide plays the guitar. She sits looking at the horizon smoking her cigarettes that she keeps in a leather pouch. She is indifferent when one of the crew pours her a drink.
Remember that sailors fell in love with manatees.
I learn the Hebrew word for shark, which if I remember correctly sounds something like "gadish".
I swim with sea lions.
Como un sueño
"The last Zodiac will return to the boat at 11pm. Anyone who wants to stay later will have to hire a water-taxi."
It was our last night, the only time we would spend on an island inhabited by people not animals.
We are in a bar. The girl has rejected everyone who has asked her to dance. She has decided to share her secret language with her roomate from the boat, not to be heard through the music.
I request a song for Roberto. I insist that for this song he must ask the girl to dance. My Spanish is faltering with the late hour and the emotion of trying to pressure him but also it's bolstered by my drunkeness. He relents, he agrees due to the late hour, the emotion, and his drunkeness.
A few days earlier, as we stood near the edge of cliff watching a brownish-yellow iguana chew relentlessly on a piece of cactus, spikes and all, Roberto laughed. He took out his disposable camera, knelt to take a photo, and said, "Es como un sueño." (It is like a dream.)
The song I request is entitled "Un Monton de Estrellas". I requested it because the chorus sings "Porque yo en el amor soy un idiota." (Because I, in love, am an idiot.)
It was apt for many reasons.
The DJ plays half a dozen songs, and not my request. I press him, this time I take a cigarette out for myself and offer him one, which he takes. Two songs later, it comes on.
I push Roberto off his stool. He crosses the floor as the guitar plays the opening measures of the song. When the congas come in, he is in front of her. The dance floor is small about the size of a living room. It is empty except for the colored lights projecting on the floor. She acts as if she is embarrassed and declines.
He returns to the stool next to mine. He is disappointed but somewhat surprisingly, not broken. I guess trying unsuccessfully to get her attention for the past two weeks has eased this crash landing.
"Roberto, vamos a bailar con las gringas alla."
We dance. I teach people dances that I am no good at. Roberto dances with a girl who is at least 6 inches taller than he is and she is the shorter of the two we asked to dance.
We leave victoriously and somehow we are able to guide our water-taxi driver to our boat in the dark, in a bay full of boats.
We climb the ladder to the main deck of the boat. We walk upright and no longer teeter with the side to side motion of the boat. The alcohol has perfected our balance, it has stopped the ocean and gave us solid, unmoving platform to walk on.
We sit on chairs, fighting sleep.
As we separate and walk towards our rooms I hear Roberto say, "Es como un sueño."
Tuesday, April 26, 2005
Empathy #1 ILLITERATI
The speed limit is 50 miles per hour.
I can't read.
It's a secret.
I can't read.
It seems that other people read or learned to read like a baby learns to walk, for a few days a few falls, then a few stumbles with a guiding hand, and then the next day, full strides, alone.
I can't read.
The first word is THE. Easy, no problem. It's a sight word, one I memorized.
I can't read.
The second word is SPEED. I can sound this one out. I spell it first, S-P-E-E-D. I start with the S, hissing like a snake. I hit the P and exhale like puffing out smoke, the double E sounds like me. Then the D which sounds like Duh. While pushing the letters together, I hear "peed" in the word which almost makes me laugh.
I can't read.
The word sitting in front of me now is, LIMIT. I can spell the letters to you perfectly, L-I-M-I-T. My brain sees the word TIME. That doesn't make sense to you, does it? But look closer, the last three letters of LIMIT are the first three letters in TIME. When I see LIMIT I read TIME.
I can't read.
The word before LIMIT is S-P-E-E-D. I know it immediately. Now I read SPEED TIME. But I know it's SPEED LIMIT.
I can't read.
Let me read it again. Now, when I look at LIMIT and I see SPEED. The words have crossed, they have snuck into each other's closets and are disguised as the other. I know it says SPEED LIMIT.
I can't read.
It probably takes more energy to not read. Think about it. I'm an actor. I fake sick, act like I forget. I go to the bathroom. I forget the instructions, lose them, forget my glasses. I'm a joker. I say I'm stupid, you say that I am not, then you help me because it's embarassing not to read and you wouldn't ask me. I'm a charmer. I'm convincing. Somebody has to read and it can't be me.
I can't read.
And sometimes the letters become ants and move around the page, they square-dance, they tango. And sometimes the W's will flip upside down and act like M's. The Y's will pose as V's. And the B's, the little ones, will run back and forth looking like d's, like sons of bitches.
I can't read.
I stop reading the sentence. I read it. I know it says, "The speed limit is 50 miles per hour." I saw the 50 and guessed the rest. I'm good at guessing.
I can't read.
It's a secret.
I can't read.
It seems that other people read or learned to read like a baby learns to walk, for a few days a few falls, then a few stumbles with a guiding hand, and then the next day, full strides, alone.
I can't read.
The first word is THE. Easy, no problem. It's a sight word, one I memorized.
I can't read.
The second word is SPEED. I can sound this one out. I spell it first, S-P-E-E-D. I start with the S, hissing like a snake. I hit the P and exhale like puffing out smoke, the double E sounds like me. Then the D which sounds like Duh. While pushing the letters together, I hear "peed" in the word which almost makes me laugh.
I can't read.
The word sitting in front of me now is, LIMIT. I can spell the letters to you perfectly, L-I-M-I-T. My brain sees the word TIME. That doesn't make sense to you, does it? But look closer, the last three letters of LIMIT are the first three letters in TIME. When I see LIMIT I read TIME.
I can't read.
The word before LIMIT is S-P-E-E-D. I know it immediately. Now I read SPEED TIME. But I know it's SPEED LIMIT.
I can't read.
Let me read it again. Now, when I look at LIMIT and I see SPEED. The words have crossed, they have snuck into each other's closets and are disguised as the other. I know it says SPEED LIMIT.
I can't read.
It probably takes more energy to not read. Think about it. I'm an actor. I fake sick, act like I forget. I go to the bathroom. I forget the instructions, lose them, forget my glasses. I'm a joker. I say I'm stupid, you say that I am not, then you help me because it's embarassing not to read and you wouldn't ask me. I'm a charmer. I'm convincing. Somebody has to read and it can't be me.
I can't read.
And sometimes the letters become ants and move around the page, they square-dance, they tango. And sometimes the W's will flip upside down and act like M's. The Y's will pose as V's. And the B's, the little ones, will run back and forth looking like d's, like sons of bitches.
I can't read.
I stop reading the sentence. I read it. I know it says, "The speed limit is 50 miles per hour." I saw the 50 and guessed the rest. I'm good at guessing.
Monday, April 25, 2005
Memory #2 HAMMER
We were on the beach. He was immediately to my right on a beach chair, an old one made of a woven nylon that broke apart over time and would prick you while you sat in it. He was a handsome man which I know from both memory and from pictures even though I didn't consider it at the time.
I cannot help but stare. It's not in disgust or shock but more a curious look at something not ordinary.
He had lost his arm.
This sounds almost comic, as if he could, after some searching have found it, maybe lying under the bushes along a sidewalk.
Hit and run.
I cannot help but stare. It's not in disgust or shock but more a curious look at something not ordinary.
He had lost his arm.
This sounds almost comic, as if he could, after some searching have found it, maybe lying under the bushes along a sidewalk.
Hit and run.
Friday, April 22, 2005
Forthcomings
A soap opera which takes place entirely on my desk in which the actors are inanimate objects.
A story involving a pair of copulating Neanderthals frozen in the act by a sudden avalanche in the Alps, and what happens when their still-connected, intact bodies are discovered.
An explanation for peanut allergies. There is something here that someone doesn't want us to know.
A story involving a pair of copulating Neanderthals frozen in the act by a sudden avalanche in the Alps, and what happens when their still-connected, intact bodies are discovered.
An explanation for peanut allergies. There is something here that someone doesn't want us to know.
Wednesday, April 20, 2005
Short #1 DISCOVERY
Usually once a week our housecat, Tomboy, would bring us corpses. Mice, moles, a few birds, an occasional squirrel, and even once a cicada that buzzed its wings in its final moments of life on our kitchen floor. The cat had two drop off locations for the catches. The preferred spot was behind the row of garbage and recycling cans in the garage. But if the garage door happened to be closed, the second choice was outside the sliding door leading from the kitchen to the deck.
Each location was equally disturbing.
A body in the garage would not be found immediately, giving ample time for a decomposing squirrel to add its odor to the stale, dusty garage air. We would argue fiercely over whose turn it was to bring out the garbage because no one wanted to be the discoverer.
A body on the deck was always in the open, never hidden behind a chair or in the shadows. It was always quickly disposed of but there was always the shock of seeing a mouse with X's in its eyes warming in the sun. And sometimes if you were not paying attention to where you were walking, you might, just like my mother did one day, step and slip on the squishy body of that mouse with the X's.
For a week she refused to feed the cat.
She argued every free moment," We should let it out in the woods to live with the rest of the wild animals."
My father countered in a low voice, one that sounded like a hostage negotiator speaking in a library, quiet, calming yet practical. He reserved this voice only for my mother when she was angry.
"It's instinct you can't blame it."
Talking my mother out of abandoning our cat in the woods turned out to be more significant than any of us could imagine. It indirectly provided for my father, who normally was an unexcitable man content with the sphere of his home and family, a brief period of minor fame and excited obsession.
As the dishwasher hummed, my mother sat in the kitchen talking to my aunt on the telephone, having her nightly glass of wine. My father was upstairs tuning his guitar. She moved her eyes toward the sound, smirked, and shook her head slightly. He'd had the guitar for more years than I could remember but never really learned to play beyond a few chords. He could easily play a few recognizable measures of a Angie or Bad Moon Rising but couldn't continue for the entire tune. He understood music well, he could explain chords and theory and the circle of fifths and a few other things that were always lost on us whenever we expressed interest in a lesson. But somehow he lacked the glue to piece it all together.
I could hear the plucking of strings and the bending of tones.
My father finished tuning and was sorting through his sheet music when a fly began circling his head. He swatted at it and continued looking through his folder. The fly made another pass. After it had swooped past his eyes another half dozen or so times my father stopped sorting his pages and stopped swatting. He stared ahead. He hummed. The fly hummed back. He hummed more. The fly hummed back, then flew away.
My father quickly grabbed a pencil, flipped over the music for The Thrill is Gone and began scribbling. Then he put down his pencil, abruptly got to his feet, and declared, with a confident honor, "A housefly buzzes in the key of F!"
My brother and sister didn't turn from their videogame. My mother used it as an excuse to get off the phone.
Disappointed by our response to his discovery, he repeated it louder. "Listen, I was just sitting here tuning my guitar, you guys heard me and I figured out that a fly buzzes in the key of F."
"Sweetheart, how can you know that?"
"Yeah, ok Dad."
"You'll see, I'm right, just wait."
He gave up on us and the awe he expected. Then he sat down at the computer and began typing furiously. My mother noticing two or three flies exploring the kitchen table in front of her, called up to him, "Chris go check the garage, I think Tomboy may have left us a present." He groaned and walked slowly towards the garage. He entered, the door slamming behind him. No one had paid any attention to how long he had been gone until my mother asked,
"Did your father go to bed?"
"I think he's still in the garage."
The four of us went to the door and with a little pushing, we all saw my father standing above the body of a dead blue jay, flies darting around his body. His eyes were closed and he was humming.
It took months of sending letters and making phone calls to different professional organizations and college departments and "bug people" until someone decided to look into his claim. It turned out to be true. An experiment was conducted. Who knows where the funding came from, but one summer day a scientific journal arrived in the mail. It was glossy, had a picture of a dragonfly on the front cover framed on all sides by an inch of white. My father's discovery was outlined in a three sentence blurb in a section entitled Short List. His name was printed as well as the scientific method used to conduct the experiment which I did not understand then nor can I recall now.
My father called the publisher and ordered 10 copies. One for each of us and a few extras for himself.
Within a day, an old fly swatter that had hung on the frame of the garage door disappeared. And even now when most people would swat and complain as a housefly circles their head, my father closes his eyes and hums, a smile reaching across his face.
Each location was equally disturbing.
A body in the garage would not be found immediately, giving ample time for a decomposing squirrel to add its odor to the stale, dusty garage air. We would argue fiercely over whose turn it was to bring out the garbage because no one wanted to be the discoverer.
A body on the deck was always in the open, never hidden behind a chair or in the shadows. It was always quickly disposed of but there was always the shock of seeing a mouse with X's in its eyes warming in the sun. And sometimes if you were not paying attention to where you were walking, you might, just like my mother did one day, step and slip on the squishy body of that mouse with the X's.
For a week she refused to feed the cat.
She argued every free moment," We should let it out in the woods to live with the rest of the wild animals."
My father countered in a low voice, one that sounded like a hostage negotiator speaking in a library, quiet, calming yet practical. He reserved this voice only for my mother when she was angry.
"It's instinct you can't blame it."
Talking my mother out of abandoning our cat in the woods turned out to be more significant than any of us could imagine. It indirectly provided for my father, who normally was an unexcitable man content with the sphere of his home and family, a brief period of minor fame and excited obsession.
As the dishwasher hummed, my mother sat in the kitchen talking to my aunt on the telephone, having her nightly glass of wine. My father was upstairs tuning his guitar. She moved her eyes toward the sound, smirked, and shook her head slightly. He'd had the guitar for more years than I could remember but never really learned to play beyond a few chords. He could easily play a few recognizable measures of a Angie or Bad Moon Rising but couldn't continue for the entire tune. He understood music well, he could explain chords and theory and the circle of fifths and a few other things that were always lost on us whenever we expressed interest in a lesson. But somehow he lacked the glue to piece it all together.
I could hear the plucking of strings and the bending of tones.
My father finished tuning and was sorting through his sheet music when a fly began circling his head. He swatted at it and continued looking through his folder. The fly made another pass. After it had swooped past his eyes another half dozen or so times my father stopped sorting his pages and stopped swatting. He stared ahead. He hummed. The fly hummed back. He hummed more. The fly hummed back, then flew away.
My father quickly grabbed a pencil, flipped over the music for The Thrill is Gone and began scribbling. Then he put down his pencil, abruptly got to his feet, and declared, with a confident honor, "A housefly buzzes in the key of F!"
My brother and sister didn't turn from their videogame. My mother used it as an excuse to get off the phone.
Disappointed by our response to his discovery, he repeated it louder. "Listen, I was just sitting here tuning my guitar, you guys heard me and I figured out that a fly buzzes in the key of F."
"Sweetheart, how can you know that?"
"Yeah, ok Dad."
"You'll see, I'm right, just wait."
He gave up on us and the awe he expected. Then he sat down at the computer and began typing furiously. My mother noticing two or three flies exploring the kitchen table in front of her, called up to him, "Chris go check the garage, I think Tomboy may have left us a present." He groaned and walked slowly towards the garage. He entered, the door slamming behind him. No one had paid any attention to how long he had been gone until my mother asked,
"Did your father go to bed?"
"I think he's still in the garage."
The four of us went to the door and with a little pushing, we all saw my father standing above the body of a dead blue jay, flies darting around his body. His eyes were closed and he was humming.
It took months of sending letters and making phone calls to different professional organizations and college departments and "bug people" until someone decided to look into his claim. It turned out to be true. An experiment was conducted. Who knows where the funding came from, but one summer day a scientific journal arrived in the mail. It was glossy, had a picture of a dragonfly on the front cover framed on all sides by an inch of white. My father's discovery was outlined in a three sentence blurb in a section entitled Short List. His name was printed as well as the scientific method used to conduct the experiment which I did not understand then nor can I recall now.
My father called the publisher and ordered 10 copies. One for each of us and a few extras for himself.
Within a day, an old fly swatter that had hung on the frame of the garage door disappeared. And even now when most people would swat and complain as a housefly circles their head, my father closes his eyes and hums, a smile reaching across his face.
Tuesday, April 12, 2005
Sketch #13 ESSE (NON)
I am not invincible.
I am not melting candy in your hot pocket.
I am not a rancher on horseback looking for coyotes.
I am not tired.
I am not going to stop repeatedly playing track nine on this CD even if my neighbors come to the door a third time.
I am not joking.
I am not feathers caught between interlaced twigs of a nest.
I am not rain that sits in the cups of flowers.
I am not the buffalo grazing.
I am not a skyscraper moving slightly, unnoticeably with trembling earth.
I am not styrofoam sitting in a landfill, waiting.
I am not melting candy in your hot pocket.
I am not a rancher on horseback looking for coyotes.
I am not tired.
I am not going to stop repeatedly playing track nine on this CD even if my neighbors come to the door a third time.
I am not joking.
I am not feathers caught between interlaced twigs of a nest.
I am not rain that sits in the cups of flowers.
I am not the buffalo grazing.
I am not a skyscraper moving slightly, unnoticeably with trembling earth.
I am not styrofoam sitting in a landfill, waiting.
Monday, April 11, 2005
Observation #2 THERE
There is the fact that the man who was just sitting at the table beside me drinking an afternoon coffee brought a hooker to his room in plain view of 6 people.
There is, of course, the woman hitting her child harder than I have ever seen one human hit another.
There is the owner of the Internet Cafe who is kicking the woman while she bends over her child who is now slumped down on the floor of a pick-up truck between the seat and the glove compartment.
There are those who, beyond language, are attempting to coordinate a date, attempting to explain their desires and then the constraints of time and geography.
There are things said like: "With the eyes can speak many words."
There is, of course, the woman hitting her child harder than I have ever seen one human hit another.
There is the owner of the Internet Cafe who is kicking the woman while she bends over her child who is now slumped down on the floor of a pick-up truck between the seat and the glove compartment.
There are those who, beyond language, are attempting to coordinate a date, attempting to explain their desires and then the constraints of time and geography.
There are things said like: "With the eyes can speak many words."
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