This fall is my first semester back in school since I dropped out in the spring of 2003, and I kinda wish I had just taken eight years off after high school and started college when I was 26, because I LOVE school right now. I'll be working on my homework and I'll wish I didn't have to go to work and could just sit at home and do work all day, and it'll occur to me that that's what college was supposed to be the first time around.
This holds true for both classes, although it's really easy to get sucked into my History of Electronic Music class, which, as you can see from the syllabus, is possibly the greatest class ever conceived. Part of the class involves creating tracks in the style of the music we're studying, and this past week I finished my Jungle/Drum'n'Bass track. I still have a lot to learn about the programs I'm using, and at times I feel like I'm creating music out of legos, but this is the first track I've been really satisfied with. It's good to have a creative outlet that also earns you college credit. If anyone's interested in hearing it, it's called "Tyger" and can be downloaded here. If you're not familiar with Drum'n'Bass, be prepared to hear a lot of drums. And a lot of bass.
My hard drive has been teetering near full for quite some time now, and so the other day I sat down to try to free up some space. In the process, I discovered a cache of videos that I had downloaded a long time ago and were taking up a good bit of space. So, yeah, as it turns out, I actually have a pretty large collection of 1950's mental hygeine and social guidence films.
Like many hobbies and interests of mine, I had at one point been very very into these films, almost nerdily so, before dropping it for some other interest or hobby. I first picked up the habit in 2003, and at first I found that I favored the "aww gee shucks" wholesomeness of the Coronet Instructional Films, but then found myself drawn to the tragic consequences that await people who make bad decisions in the Crawley films. The uber-patriotism and commercialism of John Sutherland's animations soon hooked my attention, but was soon eclipsed by a brief flirtation with the dry pacing of the Encyclopedia Britannica films. Soon I found myself thinking things like, "Hey! Isn't Jack from "Mind Your Manners" the same kid who plays Woody in "Dating Do's and Don'ts?" (he is, just a couple years older). I was hooked.
But soon my interest was drawn elsewhere, and soon I was pursuing some other interest with the same nerdy gusto. And so my vast collection lay dormant, taking up space on my hard drive.
In an effort to clean up my hard drive while still saving the collection I had painstakingly pieced together, I have started uploading the videos to YouTube. Unfortunately, YouTube has recently put a ten minute cap on all uploaded movies, ostensibly as a crack-down measure to prevent the uploading of copyrighted material, and some of the best nuggets I have are in the 10 to 15 minute range. I'm working on either cutting them into "Part 1s" and "Part 2s" or seeing if there's a way around this ten minute nonsense.
Anyhow, the real point is to broaden exposure to a film genre that hasn't seen the light of day for five decades or so. So please check out what I've got up so far. I plan to slowly add movies for about a month or so, or until I lose interest. Whichever comes first. So here: http://www.youtube.com/shaggylocks/
All of his dead ancestors are on the disabled list Rooting for the home team while riding the pine Arguing 'bout their quarterback, 'bout why his head's not in the game While he's sitting there trying to write couplets that rhyme
Waltzing Matilda (he writes), Waltzing Matilda Won't you come a-waltzing Matilda with me? But he's sitting on the sidelines while the clock is running down Won't you come a-waltzing Matilda with me?
But when she's on the dance floor she saves her waltzes for a ghost He wants to cut in, but he knows he never will 'Cuz he sees her secret smile as she twirls alone through the air And the shoes of that old love will never be filled
Waltzing Matilda (he writes), Waltzing Matilda Someday you could be waltzing with me But she's dancing with a memory while the clock is running down Won't you come a-waltzing Matilda with me?
Then one day on the gridiron our hero pulls a hamstring And joins his ancestors reluctantly And he wears his heart on his sleeve, but it's alright, no one notices Oh won't you come a-waltzing Matilda with me?
Waltzing Matilda, Waltzing Matilda Won't you come a-waltzing Matilda with me? And if you're on the playing field, just know the clock is running down Won't you come a-waltzing Matilda with me?
(Apologies to Australia)
And for those of you who want to play at home:
C G Am F All of his dead ancestors are on the disabled list C G Rooting for the home team while riding the pine C G Am F Arguing 'bout their quarterback, 'bout why his head's not in the game C G C While he's sitting there trying to write couplets that rhyme
C F Waltzing Matilda (he writes), Waltzing Matilda C G Won't you come a-waltzing Matilda with me? C G Am F But he's sitting on the sidelines as the clock is running down C G C Won't you come a-waltzing Matilda with me?
I kinda wish I hadn't started telling people about the hair, because it's already a hard enough decision without everyone telling me not to do it. But c'mon friends, I can't start a new life with my old life's hair. That's coiffure infidelity! Shed the past, start anew. I think that's the way the rastas do it, too.
I've already let three friends cut off a dread each, so I have three less dreadlocks than before. I carry one around in my hat so that randomly during conversations I can reach up into my hat, grab one end of it, and after much strain and exertion I pretend to rip it out by the roots. If you see me doing this, just pretend you didn't read this and act surprised.
It's scary, to be honest, and for some reason quite lonely, which is odd because I'm moving up there with a friend. I think the loneliness comes from knowing that I'm leaving a lot of close friends and deep relationships and striking out onto a new frontier where nobody knows my name. I walk down the street and miss everything I see. I'll miss downtown. I'll miss the way they turn the traffic lights off at midnight. I'll miss walking into any restaurant downtown and having the wait staff know my name. Etc etc etc. I'm sure you can imagine what it's like. If I keep on describing it I'll just make myself sad.
I'll post pictures of my hairless head after it happens. I know a lot people never knew me pre-dreadlocks, which is almost mind boggling for me, since I've not had dreadlocks most of my life, or, that is to say, I've had not dreadlocks mostly. I guess not everyone has known me as long as I've known me. It seems obvious enough, but it's easy for me to forget that.
The whole situation is leaving me a little forlorn, which is unfortunate, since I'd rather not be forlorn if I had my way. It's a tumultuous time for ol' DW, so feel free hang out with me if you want. Bring me going away presents. Let go of old grudges. Bake me cookies. Kiss me full on the lips. Humor me when I do the rip-out-the-dreadlock trick, since I'll have no idea if you've read this or not. That sort of thing.
(quoting someone who survived Nazi Germany): "...To live in this process is absolutely not to be able to notice it - please try to believe me - unless one has a much greater degree of political awareness, acuity, than most of us had ever had occasion to develop. Each step was so small, so inconsequential, so well explained or, on occasion, 'regretted,' that, unless one were detached from the whole process from the beginning, unless one understood what the whole thing was in principle, what all these 'little measures' that no 'patriotic German' could resent must some day lead to, one no more saw it developing from day to day than a farmer in his field sees the corn growing. One day it is over his head."
In this conversation, Mayer's friend suggests that he wasn't making an excuse for not resisting the rise of the fascists, but simply pointing out an undisputable reality. This, he suggests, is how fascism will always take over a nation.
...
"You see," my colleague went on, "one doesn't see exactly where or how to move. Believe me, this is true. Each act, each occasion, is worse than the last, but only a little worse. You wait for the next and the next. You wait for the one great shocking occasion, thinking that others, when such a shock comes, will join with you in resisting somehow. You don't want to act, or even to talk, alone; you don't want to 'go out of your way to make trouble.' Why not? - Well, you are not in the habit of doing it. And it is not just fear, fear of standing alone, that restrains you; it is also genuine uncertainty.
"Uncertainty is a very important factor, and, instead of decreasing as time goes on, it grows. Outside, in the streets, in the general community, everyone is happy. One hears no protest, and certainly sees none. You know, in France or Italy there will be slogans against the government painted on walls and fences; in Germany, outside the great cities, perhaps, there is not even this. In the university community, in your own community, you speak privately to your colleagues, some of whom certainly feel as you do; but what do they say? They say, 'It's not so bad' or 'You're seeing things' or 'You're an alarmist.'"
This is one of my favorite quotes from the book They Thought They Were Free by Milton Mayer. I originally heard about this book from this article, and subsequently bought and read the book.
Frighteningly timely.
When I was a senior in high school, I wrote a independent study paper for my government class entitled "The Dangers of Extreme Patriotism," where I argued that tribal chest pounding and flag waving could be the first step on a slippery slope towards an American incarnation of National Socialism. My teacher, an avid sports fan and tribal chest pounder, didn't like my choice of topic at all. He gave me a C. Granted, I wrote a good bulk of it the two nights before it was due, but I still feel my points were well supported and argued. This same teacher also gave me detention for correcting his pronounciation of "Illinois" in front of the entire class, so I have strong suspicions that his personal political beliefs came into play while grading my paper.
...transcript The man who sees absolutes, where all other men see nuances and shades of meaning, is either a prophet, or a quack.
Donald H. Rumsfeld is not a prophet.
Mr. Rumsfeld’s remarkable speech to the American Legion yesterday demands the deep analysis—and the sober contemplation—of every American.
For it did not merely serve to impugn the morality or intelligence -- indeed, the loyalty -- of the majority of Americans who oppose the transient occupants of the highest offices in the land. Worse, still, it credits those same transient occupants -- our employees -- with a total omniscience; a total omniscience which neither common sense, nor this administration’s track record at home or abroad, suggests they deserve.
Dissent and disagreement with government is the life’s blood of human freedom; and not merely because it is the first roadblock against the kind of tyranny the men Mr. Rumsfeld likes to think of as “his” troops still fight, this very evening, in Iraq.
It is also essential. Because just every once in awhile it is right and the power to which it speaks, is wrong.
In a small irony, however, Mr. Rumsfeld’s speechwriter was adroit in invoking the memory of the appeasement of the Nazis. For in their time, there was another government faced with true peril—with a growing evil—powerful and remorseless.
That government, like Mr. Rumsfeld’s, had a monopoly on all the facts. It, too, had the “secret information.” It alone had the true picture of the threat. It too dismissed and insulted its critics in terms like Mr. Rumsfeld’s -- questioning their intellect and their morality.
That government was England’s, in the 1930’s.
It knew Hitler posed no true threat to Europe, let alone England.
It knew Germany was not re-arming, in violation of all treaties and accords.
It knew that the hard evidence it received, which contradicted its own policies, its own conclusions — its own omniscience -- needed to be dismissed.
The English government of Neville Chamberlain already knew the truth.
Most relevant of all — it “knew” that its staunchest critics needed to be marginalized and isolated. In fact, it portrayed the foremost of them as a blood-thirsty war-monger who was, if not truly senile, at best morally or intellectually confused.
That critic’s name was Winston Churchill.
Sadly, we have no Winston Churchills evident among us this evening. We have only Donald Rumsfelds, demonizing disagreement, the way Neville Chamberlain demonized Winston Churchill.
History — and 163 million pounds of Luftwaffe bombs over England — have taught us that all Mr. Chamberlain had was his certainty — and his own confusion. A confusion that suggested that the office can not only make the man, but that the office can also make the facts.
Thus, did Mr. Rumsfeld make an apt historical analogy.
Excepting the fact, that he has the battery plugged in backwards.
His government, absolute -- and exclusive -- in its knowledge, is not the modern version of the one which stood up to the Nazis.
It is the modern version of the government of Neville Chamberlain.
But back to today’s Omniscient ones.
That, about which Mr. Rumsfeld is confused is simply this: This is a Democracy. Still. Sometimes just barely.
And, as such, all voices count -- not just his.
Had he or his president perhaps proven any of their prior claims of omniscience — about Osama Bin Laden’s plans five years ago, about Saddam Hussein’s weapons four years ago, about Hurricane Katrina’s impact one year ago — we all might be able to swallow hard, and accept their “omniscience” as a bearable, even useful recipe, of fact, plus ego.
But, to date, this government has proved little besides its own arrogance, and its own hubris.
Mr. Rumsfeld is also personally confused, morally or intellectually, about his own standing in this matter. From Iraq to Katrina, to the entire “Fog of Fear” which continues to envelop this nation, he, Mr. Bush, Mr. Cheney, and their cronies have — inadvertently or intentionally — profited and benefited, both personally, and politically.
And yet he can stand up, in public, and question the morality and the intellect of those of us who dare ask just for the receipt for the Emporer’s New Clothes?
In what country was Mr. Rumsfeld raised? As a child, of whose heroism did he read? On what side of the battle for freedom did he dream one day to fight? With what country has he confused the United States of America?
The confusion we -- as its citizens— must now address, is stark and forbidding.
But variations of it have faced our forefathers, when men like Nixon and McCarthy and Curtis LeMay have darkened our skies and obscured our flag. Note -- with hope in your heart — that those earlier Americans always found their way to the light, and we can, too.
The confusion is about whether this Secretary of Defense, and this administration, are in fact now accomplishing what they claim the terrorists seek: The destruction of our freedoms, the very ones for which the same veterans Mr. Rumsfeld addressed yesterday in Salt Lake City, so valiantly fought.
And about Mr. Rumsfeld’s other main assertion, that this country faces a “new type of fascism.”
As he was correct to remind us how a government that knew everything could get everything wrong, so too was he right when he said that -- though probably not in the way he thought he meant it.
This country faces a new type of fascism - indeed.
Although I presumptuously use his sign-off each night, in feeble tribute, I have utterly no claim to the words of the exemplary journalist Edward R. Murrow.
But never in the trial of a thousand years of writing could I come close to matching how he phrased a warning to an earlier generation of us, at a time when other politicians thought they (and they alone) knew everything, and branded those who disagreed: “confused” or “immoral.”
Thus, forgive me, for reading Murrow, in full:
“We must not confuse dissent with disloyalty,” he said, in 1954. “We must remember always that accusation is not proof, and that conviction depends upon evidence and due process of law.
“We will not walk in fear, one of another. We will not be driven by fear into an age of unreason, if we dig deep in our history and our doctrine, and remember that we are not descended from fearful men, not from men who feared to write, to speak, to associate, and to defend causes that were for the moment unpopular.”
My body may be in the car, instinctively shifting and searching for a comfortable position, feigning the motions of someone who wants to sleep, but my mind is on fire. My mind is in the tent with Myra. In that tent Myra and I are forging a new future together, laughing and crying and moaning and forgiving each other of every wrong turn and stupid mistake and promising to start fresh with the sunrise, knowing we’re just going to make the same stupid mistakes and hurt each other in the same stupid ways, but laughing and crying and moaning some more anyway. If we’re going to love and laugh and get hurt no matter where we are or who we’re with, we might as well do it together, tonight, while we’re still young, while we still have our looks.
Fuck. This so stupid. A light rain starts to fall, and the drops on the roof bring my mind back into the car with my aching body, and I curse the Japanese design team that designed the Nissan Sentra. People sleep in cars all the time. You’d think they’d take that into account.
I’m approaching this situation like it’s a test, and I think that’s probably my problem here. Okay, Myra confesses that she’s sick of sex because she’s been using it as a tool to mask her insecurities. She’s afraid to be alone and friendless. Okay. Fine. I’ve pretty much known this about her since we met, but today was the first time we’ve ever talked about it, and I pretty much bungled my end of the discussion. I’m not really sure how you respond to something like that, but I’m pretty sure that if you’re trying to be understanding and supportive, the response isn’t supposed to come in the form of sex. I would think that after all that, the right thing to do would be to NOT have sex with her a couple hours later. If this was a test, I think I passed.
I think I think I think. Fuck fuck fuck. I’m too fucking analytical. I’m so conflicted it’s driving me to pieces. I feel guilty, too, because I know that I probably wouldn’t have come on this trip if I didn’t see the sexy little carrot dangling in front of my eyes. I’ve been trying to let my desire to be good be the driving force in my life. I’ve been trying to heal scars and leave a trail of light in my wake. I’ve been trying to be angelic. Sounds really pretentious, I know, but I’m just aiming high. Some people are primarily driven by the pursuit of knowledge, the pursuit of power, the pursuit of lust, gratification, profit, glory, the pursuit of immortality, and I’ve been trying to subordinate these other desires to a higher ideal. And I know that if Myra’s enticement wasn’t preceded by that conversation, I’d be in that tent right now, grunting away. And knowing what I know now, I feel guilty about that.
But what good am I doing Myra by hiding in the car? How can I expect her to know that my motivations are honorable without talking to her? I just got scared by my own internal conflict, and for all I know I’m doing more damage than good. Myra knows me pretty well, after all. I can’t just assume that this was some sort of test. Today was full of intimate conversation, and it doesn’t seem like too far of a stretch to extend that intimacy into a physical encounter. God only knows what’s going through her head right now. God and Myra, that is.
If I were writing a story about Myra, my character would get out of the car, climb into the tent, and Myra and I would start forging a new future together, laughing and crying and moaning and forgiving each other of every wrong turn and stupid mistake and promising to start fresh with the sunrise. But in real life, when I finally got up the nerve to go to the tent, Myra was passed out asleep. I lay out my sleeping bag, kissed her on the forehead, and fell asleep myself. And honestly, I think that’s fine. It would have made a good story the other way, though. It could have been a story about rebirth, or maybe a story about the disappearing nature of the people we were. It could have been a story about making the same mistake over and over again. Maybe someday I’ll sit down and write a story about Myra, and I can make it all those things. But this isn’t a story, this is real life. In real life, when the sun rose on us, we woke to found that we had been holding hands in our sleep.
I just spoke to a guy at Plan 9 who bought a couple of my DVDs, including almost all of my Chaplin DVDs, from a guy today. They have his name, address, and phone number. They might even have a security camera. I forgot to ask.
Last night (Friday) my apartment was broken into and burgled. Here is a list of what I have discovered missing thus far:
Almost all of my DVD’s My banjo and banjo case About $100 in quarters, dimes, and nickels from my change jar A pair of Toca congas (14” and 15”) All of my beer and wine Almost all of my liquor My orange backpack
This is just what has been discovered so far. I went out to dinner and a movie with some friends around 6:30 last night, and came home again at 10 with my friend Krissie to watch another movie. The first thing I noticed missing was my congas, but even those I didn’t notice right away. They’re very big, so their absence from my living room was what first clued me in that something was wrong. Then I saw that most of the bottles of liquor on my refrigerator were gone. They left half a bottle of Wild Turkey and a bottle of Kahlua, however. I guess they’re not into mixed drinks or bourbon. Fortunately, I am into bourbon. I made sure to drink some. The beer: I’ll get back to that in a second. This certainly bummed me out, so I decided I wanted to watch something light and happy to raise my spirits a bit. I decided on The Pawnshop, a short Chaplin made with Mutual in 1916. (Note, if you’ve never seen anything by Charlie Chaplin, I highly highly recommend it. The man is a brilliant performer who can still seem fresh and relevant 90 years later. Start with the Mutual shorts. Any decent public library will have them) It left me feeling better, and in the mood for a good movie. That, dear reader, is when the DVD’s were discovered missing. I’ve always prided myself for having a great movie collection. I have something like 300 movies, and I only buy movies that are good. There. That’s the secret to having a good movie collection. Pretty simple, eh? I acquired a DVD player long after all the other middle class white kids had one, so I only started buying DVD’s about 2 or 3 years ago. They left all my VHS movies and a couple of random DVD’s.
Let’s talk about the DVD’s a second. They didn’t take any of the DVD’s that were sitting by my TV, which is why my boxed set of Chaplin’s Mutuals and Essanay comedies were still here. Also sitting by my TV were Mr. Show seasons three and four, Malcolm X, Heartlands, and The Maltese Falcon. They left any DVD that was in a box bigger than a standard DVD box, such as my Buster Keaton box set, West Side Story, season one of Fraggle Rock, and Chapelle’s Show, seasons one and two. There was a notable exception to this stealing policy, however. The only three normal size DVD’s they left were all Buster Keaton DVD’s, while the only box set they took was my Charlie Chaplin feature length movie box set. I know there’s a debate about which silent comedian was better, and I guess the thieves had an opinion as well. And to be perfectly honest, I’m a Keaton man at heart. If I had to pick any DVD for a desert island, it would be a Keaton DVD. I’m glad they left them for me, because they’re hard to find. As to the DVD’s they DID take, they wound up with a pretty eclectic collection. I had about 50 DVD’s stolen, all told. This included some pretty random stuff, such as three volumes of Harold Lloyd comedies, a documentary about Paul Simon’s album Graceland, two Marx Brothers movies, Arlo Gurthrie’s movie Alice’s Restaurant, and a couple of rare and random documentaries. On the plus side, these movies will certainly shoot up red flags if they wind up at a pawn shop.
After Krissie and I discovered my DVD’s were missing, we also discovered some of HER DVD’s were missing, too. She had lent me a half dozen of her favorite movies for safe keeping while she was moving, and they had been sitting in a bag in my hallway. Had been. The situation was becoming dire, so we did what any rational beings would do when things are going bad: we went out for ice cream sundaes. When we got back, I noticed my banjo was also gone and my change jar was empty. Time to call the po-po.
It’s weird to know that someone had been in your apartment, but it’s even weirder having a police officer in your apartment. Officer Wheelbarger was very nice, and told me the criminal investigations unit contacts all the local pawn shops weekly with a list of stolen items. The fact that my banjo was a left-handed banjo would also be a help send up red flags for the pawn shops. He said that I should personally contact the pawn shops and second hand stores as well. Beyond that there wasn’t much more that he could do.
So let’s talk about the beer. I said I’d get back to that. The beer was actually stolen on Monday. We had had a three year anniversary party at the Little Grill Sunday night, and when I got home from a meeting Monday evening I was still hurting a bit from the night before. I went for a beer to ease the pain, and to my surprise the five or six bottles in my refrigerator were gone. I assumed one of my friends had come in and taken them. Campbell Court, the apartment complex I live in, is a great little community of people who for the most part all know each other. We have a community garden. A lot of people leave their doors unlocked. Since my liquor was still on top of the refrigerator, I didn’t suspect foul play; merely a neighbor entertaining guests who didn’t want to run out for beer. I was mad that they didn’t at least leave one or two for me, and I had a short list of suspects, who, over the course of the week, all cleared their names. I was perplexed, and looking back I realize the first burglary attempt may have been thwarted when I came home from the meeting.
This evening I noticed my orange backpack was gone, and with it my 2006 Jazz Fest T-shirt. I assume it was used to help transport DVD’s or loose change. I’m sure I’ll continue to notice things missing over the coming days. I still have to talk to some of my neighbors to see if anyone spotted a suspicious looking person moving giant conga drums. In my mind, the culprit was wearing a bandit mask, prison stripes, and was dragging a large iron ball by his leg. Officer Wheelbarger disagreed, although he agrees that it was probably done by a single male working alone. The cats, who witnessed the entire thing, are declining to comment.
I should also note valuable items which were not stolen. My laptop was in my car. I still have my stereo, TV, VCR, DVD player, bike, golf clubs, guitar, ukuleles, vintage camera collection, and an assortment of suits and cowboy shirts. Hallelujah!
So there it is, my friends. This is what is new in the life of Douglas Woodhouse. I’ve started a wish list with Amazon.com (http://www.amazon.com/gp/registry/11YC5C53OK4PS) to replace my missing movies, although those are just the ones I can remember at the moment. The list will grow as I keep remembering more. My birthday is August 23rd. Hint hint, nudge nudge.
If I really wanted to be honest with myself, I’d admit that the main reason I agreed to come on this trip is because I thought there might be an outside chance that Myra and I might have sex.
There. That’s why I agreed to it. Surprise, surprise. Now it’s out in the open and we can quit dancing around the subject. I thought that maybe, under the right circumstances, we might wind up in the sack.
But I’m not going to have sex with Myra. Not tonight, at least. She’s in the tent, waiting for me, and I’m in the backseat of the Sentra, trying to get comfortable. I’m wrapped in coats and it’s cramped and awkward, but I intend to stay here.
I don’t really remember how the conversation started. It became clear early on in our travels that this was going to be an introspective trip for both of us. The miles slipped away beneath us and we sat in silence, strapped to our seats, side by side. There was occasional chit-chit and logistical discussions about where to eat, where to sleep, and when to switch drivers, but for the most part the real journey was an internal one.
Until this afternoon. I think we were talking about what CD to listen to next, and before I knew it the conversation evolved into the heaviest discussion Myra and I have had since we broke up. Soon she was talking about her insecurities and hang ups, about her childhood and her adult life. It was intense. She didn’t think she was an interesting person. She didn’t think she was worthy of other people’s friendship. She felt that all the men in her life were only around her because they wanted to have sex with her, and so she was constantly engaged in a series of one night stands and casual hookups because she couldn’t stand to be alone and friendless. She didn’t want to be proved right. She enjoyed sex, but she was sick of it. She hated using it as currency.
It was intense. It was sad, too, because I knew that in a way she was right. Although Myra is quite possibly one of the most amazing, interesting, and funny people I know, she had developed a reputation as “easy”, and so she’s constantly surrounded by guys only looking to get into her pants. My end of the conversation consisted of stammered ineloquent speeches telling her she was wrong, that she was an extraordinary human being, just as deserving of love and appreciation as any other person on this planet. I tried to expound upon her numerous positive qualities, but I don’t think I was ready for a conversation like this. I’ve never had one like this before, and I wasn’t sure what to say or how to respond.
The conversation was winding down, and so was the daylight. We passed a sign along the interstate for a campground, and decided to stop off there for the night. I stayed to pitch the tent and get a fire going while Myra drove off to pick up groceries for dinner. She came back with the all the makings for a pasta dinner, complete with a loaf of French bread and a bottle of red wine.
Oh, the red wine! After the bottle was empty, Myra magically produced another. Soon we were sitting shoulder to shoulder, the cold night behind us and the roaring fire in front of us, telling stupid jokes and laughing about nothing. When the last drops of the second bottle were gone, Myra turns and very slowly kisses my neck. My heartbeat pounds in my ears and I try to navigate the wine-drunk fog to figure out what to do next. You can put the fire out, she whispers, and then she slinks into the tent, shooting me a seductive glance before zipping the door shut.
You can put the fire out, I think, as I pull the coats around my body and try to stay warm in the backseat. Was that an attempt at double entendre? I could be having sex with Myra right now. Am I being stupid? Is this just making things worse? Am I just making her feel even more unwanted? Maybe she knows I’m one of the people who really do appreciate her for more than just what’s up her skirt. We did, after all, have a long and serious relationship. Maybe, for her, this trip is about reestablishing our relationship in some way, and tonight is just a physical manifestation of that desire, tempered by wine. Or maybe these rationales are just my hormones talking, egged on by our old ally alcohol.
No, I think I’m doing the right thing. It’s so complicated, though. I feel like I’m sitting in the middle of a million dominos, and any small move I make will send dominos tumbling all over the room. I guess that’s true with everyone, with everything we do. All of our thoughts and actions affect the people around us, no matter how small or how slight. I’ve bumbled enough relationships in the past, made a lot of mistakes and took a lot of wrong turns and hurt a lot of wonderful people, and right now I’m just trying to do things right. I want to get it right, god damn it. I’m just trying to be a good person. In a situation as complex as this, I’m just trying to err on the side of being honorable.
It’d be so easy, though. Myra’s in the tent. We’re drunk. How could anyone blame me? Would it really be wrong? The wine and hormone double-team keeps reminding me that it’s been quite a while since I’ve last had sex. The pro-Myra cells in my hands are fondly remembering the curves of her body. But the internal morale compass is pointing the way through the fog, and I’m already in the car. I’m just trying to be good, damn it.
I’ve noticed before that being good and honorable isn’t a quality that always gets you laid. This is a very obvious case in point. I pull my knees up to my chest and try to fall asleep, but I know it’s going to be a very long and restless night.
I’m stretched out in the back seat of the car idly playing with a Rubik’s Cube while Myra drives around looking for a non-chain restaurant where we can have lunch. So far we’ve passed over twenty different fast food joints and chain restaurants with nary a mom’n’pop in sight. I think it would be interesting to sit at the bar at Ruby Tuesdays or Applebees and meet the people who spend their lunch hours there, but Myra is sticking to her guns. It’s not that I don’t share her idealism, but I’m also getting unbearably hungry. I’m starting to think we’d have better luck looking for a giant panda or white Bengal tiger than for a local food source.
As we drive through the town, I can’t help but notice that it’s full of interesting, complex, beautiful people: people with fantastic stories and adventures, people who’ve loved and lost and loved again, people who’ve looked up at the stars and wondered what it’s all about. And here I am with Myra Madison, just driving around and killing time before the apocalypse comes.
I try to shake it off. I don’t want to start thinking that maybe I made a mistake when I agreed to go on this road trip with Myra. Just shake it off, man. Solve the red face of the Rubik’s Cube and try to ignore the empty rumble in your stomach. Shake it off. Stop staring at those stars and get back to your cubicle. Drink beer and watch TV and get fat and stupid. Just ignore that feeling that there’s something more, something bigger that we’re missing out on. Be a zombie. Start sleepwalking. Stop dreaming. Shake it off.
Maybe right now, back home, the girl of my dreams is sitting in my favorite coffee shop, at the table next to my favorite table, looking for someone to talk to. Or maybe she’s sitting at the bar at that last Ruby Tuesdays. Maybe if I were back home I’d meet her on the street, looking for her lost dog, and I would help her find him. But here I am with Myra Madison, the great breaker of hearts, driving around and looking for a good place to eat before the apocalypse comes.
Okay, maybe it was a mistake, but then again I’m not sure I even believe in mistakes. If I really made a mistake and went to the wrong college, does that mean all of the relationships I forged at that college were mistakes, too? If I went to the “right” college, I would never have even met Myra. I would never have rescued my two beautiful pet cats from the dumpster by the park. I would never have been exposed to the people and ideas and opportunities I was exposed to there. I would be a completely different person right now, and I happen to be a fan of the person I’ve become. Maybe the girl of my dreams is waiting for me at the end of this trip. Actually, I’m sure she is. I mean, just look at all these interesting, complex, beautiful people in this one little town alone.
Myra finally finds a tired looking greasy spoon diner and pulls in. My stomach jumps and shouts Hallelujah, and the rest of my body follows suit. As we walk towards the door, I notice a picture of a polar bear on the wall inside. Fitting, I think. You endangered species should stick together.
When I was a little kid I got a gyroscope for Christmas. The packaging said it was a “magic levitating” gyroscope, and once you got the gyroscope spinning between the two magnets you could carefully remove the base and for a couple of seconds it would magically levitate. For an eleven year old boy at Christmas, this was only fascinating enough to hold my attention for about a minute, and soon the gyroscope was forgotten, overshadowed by the bigger and better presents.
I haven’t thought about that gyroscope since I was a kid, but I’m thinking about it today. I wait until Myra disappears into the gas station to pay before putting my forehead against the steering wheel and screaming as loud as I can. I fill my lungs again, once, twice, three times, and I slowly raise my eyes and watch the color come back to my knuckles as my grip loosens on the wheel. After hovering in the air for a couple seconds, the gyroscope always succumbs to the pull of gravity at some point and comes crashing back down on the table.
A couple months after we broke up Myra and I got drunk at a party and hooked up in the back of her car. She was beautiful that night, vivacious, and when I woke up the next morning I could still feel the electricity on my skin. We never talked about it after that, but that night the alcohol had upset the delicate balance that was both holding me together and pulling me apart.
Fifty percent of the cells in my body are huge Myra fans. They love being around her, they love her smell, they love her laugh, her taste, her energy. They love how her body is one long serpentine curve. They love how she gets jokes that other people don’t. They love how smart she is. They love how dangerous she is. When Myra walks into the room, these are the cells that make me want to discreetly check myself in the nearest reflective surface, and they’re the cells that try to make my body jump up and run, slow motion, arms wide open, across the room to her.
My body doesn’t jump up and run, however, because the other fifty percent of the cells in my body are firmly anti-Myra. They hate her passionately. These are the cells that remember crying with the shower running, they remember waking up and feeling the cold spot in the bed where Myra should have been, they remember laying in the dirt under the fallen tree. These cells are holding a grudge, and when Myra walks into the room these cells try to get my body to run for the door on the opposite side of the room.
When Myra walks into the room, civil war erupts. It’s neighbor against neighbor, brother against brother, a colossal tug of war and I am the rope. But Myra never sees the tug of war. I don’t know if you’ve ever seen someone simultaneously running towards something while also running away from it, but to the outside observer the result looks strangely cool and collected. Looking back on it now, I really don’t know why I agreed to come on this trip with Myra. All I want out of this life is a little love and a little adventure, and at the time I guess I thought this might be an adventure. Fifty percent of my cells were probably also rooting for a little love, perhaps aided by our old ally, Mr. Booze.
I glance up to see Myra coming out of the gas station. I quickly get the gyroscope spinning again, with half of me pulling down while the other half pulls up. She smiles at me as she slides into the passenger seat, and it is then that I see that she is also carrying a case of beer. The gyroscope falters slightly as the pro-Myra cells let out a little war whoop, but all Myra sees is a body looking over it’s shoulder, reversing out of the parking space, and then turning to smile back.
Myra is probably one of the smartest people I know. She has a fantastic range of knowledge spanning everything from classical music to quantum physics, and she can hold her own in any conversation she might find herself involved in. I remember a long time ago, well before we were dating, getting into a discussion with her about the nature of intelligence. Whereas I thought the single most important quality of an intelligent person was retention, she felt it was organization. I would later find out how revealing these answers were about each of us as a person.
I personally have a terrific power of retention. If I care to remember something, I usually do. If the teacher says it will be on the test, I’ll remember it. That doesn’t mean I was a good student. Far from it. Homework, an educational tool designed to reinforce the day’s lesson, served me no purpose and I refused to trouble myself with it. I also had little respect for teachers who taught for the test and little patience for busy work meant to fill time. Life’s too short for busy work, I’d say. And although I was fascinated by subjects that interested me, I often found myself in inferior classes with a teacher teaching down to the slowest students in the class. This was a result of my middle-of-the-road grades, which in turn was a result of my contempt for homework and the like. Public school was by no means the ideal environment for me, yet I still to this day remember much of what I learned, and I still managed to graduate with honors, mainly to appease my parents.
Due to various quirks in my nature, however, I’ve used this knack for remembering things to develop a terrific mental database of entirely useless information about my friends. Middle names, for example. I love middle names. Everyone has a secret second name, and you can be very close to someone and know their deepest darkest innermost secret hopes and dreams, and still not know their middle name. Myra is a perfect example. Myra Edith. I can’t think of another person besides her dad who knows her middle name.
Most people who know Myra socially are usually surprised to see her in her home. Myra may dress like a rock star and party until dawn, but when she comes home the rock star outfit gets folded in the hamper and washed the next day. Her sock drawer is organized by color and her book shelf follows the Dewey Decimal System. She irons everything, and her desk is so maddeningly ordered that I sometimes think she suffers from a mild case of OCD. Even in her “drugs and guns” phase, her mini-arsenal was carefully polished and cleaned daily while her pills were kept in neatly ordered rows in a cigar box under her bed.
But while Myra’s mind manifests itself in her neat and ordered surroundings, my mind reveals itself to the world in the chaotic, disordered mess that seems to surround me everywhere I go. If you invited me to your house for a game of poker, by the time I’ve left the poker table would be in general disarray and their would be crumbs on your couch, even though I never sat on it or ate anything while I was there. I like to joke that I want all of my worldly possessions out in the open where I can see them, but the joke is never really funny to the visitor trying to clear a place off on the couch or trying not to step on anything too important while navigating my bathroom. But ask me for a book and I know exactly which pile to get it from. If I want to wear a certain shirt, I remember exactly where I took it off and exactly which door I draped it over. The phone bill? It’s in the back pocket of my gray corduroys. I still have a week and a half before I need to pay it. I doubt a person without my awesome recollection could live the way I do and maintain their sanity, but in my opinion slovenly living sure beats wasting time cleaning. Life’s too short for cleaning, I say.
I still don’t quite understand how Myra and I came to be living together. I promised to keep my bedlam under control, and she promised not to get too uptight about it, and for two kids in love that seemed like enough for us to get by. For the most part I thought I was pretty good at keeping tables and counters relatively neat, and for a while she seemed content and happy with slightly cluttered surroundings.
After we broke up, I kicked myself for ever agreeing to live with her. That, in my mind, could have been what pushed her over the edge. She might have still been dissatisfied in the relationship, but at least she could have retreated into her own organized sanctuary and wouldn’t have had to come home to a new mess of papers all over the bed. If we didn’t live together, I might have still have had a fighting chance to convince her to stay. When we signed the lease, I thought, well, for better or worse, we’ve got to make this work for at least a year. But for Myra, life was too short to try to save a sinking relationship. She abandoned ship and cut her losses. I moved out.
Myra bounces back to the car and hops into the driver’s seat. Even though I assume she checked her hair in the bathroom, she checks it again in the rearview mirror before pulling out of the rest area and back onto the highway. She glances back with disgust at the backseat, which is cluttered and messy as a result of my time back there. She runs the engine hard in third and jumps straight to fifth to gun it into the passing lane. She once told me that cleanliness is next to godliness, but I think everything is next to godliness, if you care enough to pay attention.
One day when I was six years old I got on a school bus and attended my first day of kindergarten. When I was eight, I put on a blue uniform and attended my first day of cub scouts. When I was fifteen, I kissed a girl for the first time.
I now know how to do long division. I can also read a novel and then write a report on it. I can tie a bowline with one hand, I can sew buttons back on my shirts and operate a sewing machine, I can identify both poisonous and edible plants, I can calculate both the area and circumference of a circle knowing only the radius, I can point out a dozen constellations, I can identify birds just by hearing them, I can read music and I can read Latin. If you don’t believe me, my parents have turned the wall space of my old bedroom into a record of my achievements, yet among all of my framed diplomas and awards and accomplishments, there is no record that I have ever learned how to function within a relationship. Not even a certificate of merit. No honorable mention.
There’s no training course available for kids in love. You can watch your parents, you can watch other kids, but for the most part it’s all trial and error. After college I spent a year substitute teaching, and I was always shocked to see children holding hands and kissing. Children! Middle schoolers, barely even teenagers, barely aware of the power of creation coursing through their veins, yet their bodies are developing fast while their minds are still catching up. One day they’re spending recess playing tag and the next they’re making out in herds under the monkey bars.
Myra was an early bloomer, and became sexually active when she was thirteen. When I think of this, I get a mental image of a Myra who looks pretty much like the Myra I know, only a little shorter. Maybe some braces. I imagine her the way I remember other kids my age when I was thirteen. But when I see an actual thirteen year old, live and in the flesh, all I see is a child. Thirteen year old kids seem to have gotten younger since I was that age, and I’m amazed that some of their parents let them out of the house dressed the way they are. Do you hear me? Do you hear this stuff I’m saying? I’m turning into an old man. Pretty soon I’ll be complaining about their music, and before long they’ll be playing Smashing Pumpkins in elevators and grocery stores.
I’ve taken to stretching out in the backseat when it’s Myra’s turn to drive. My head is on the passenger side, and from this angle I have a good view of Myra’s breasts. Well, actually just her right breast, but it’s been holding my attention for the last 50 miles. It’s frustrating, I want to look at something else, but there’s really nothing else to draw my attention away. Her tank top is tight and from the bra strap I recognize the bra. Most girls seem to have a built in radar that tells them when someone is checking them out, and Myra’s is either blasting full tilt or is offline. Maybe her guard is down, maybe she doesn’t care, or maybe she just doesn’t know what to say. Or maybe she enjoys it. I try to go back to my Sudoku book, but the highway is too bumpy for a book and just the right amount of bumpy for a boob.
No one ever taught me how to break up with a girl you don’t want to date anymore. No one ever taught me how to tell if a girl wants to kiss you, or wants you to kiss her. I was never taught how to initiate sex or how to identify a fake orgasm. I’ve never read a book on how to live with your girlfriend, and even though one probably exists I probably never will. It’s all been trial and error, and I’m still pretty shaky at almost all of it. To some extent girls still give me those queasy butterflies, and no matter how cool and collected I am with friends, once I take an interest in a girl I become a stammering idiot. It amazes me that I ever manage to get myself into relationships to begin with. But the sun goes up, the sun goes down, and the miles are disappearing beneath us. Seven years ago I may have graduated with honors from high school, but today my teacher is Myra, and today I’m learning how to conduct myself properly in a car with my ex-girlfriend. We hit another bumpy patch. Let’s just say I’m still learning.
Myra’s slumped up against the steering wheel crying, and I don’t know what to do. I put my hand on her shoulder to rub her back, and she unbuckles her seat belt and leans over to hug me. I quickly try to unbuckle myself as well, but I fumble with the release and it takes me a second to hug her back. It’s an awkward hug, but when you’re both sitting in a car any hug will be awkward. After about a minute, I get out of the car to see if the dog is still alive.
It had been getting pretty tense before we hit the dog. We had pulled off the highway to find someplace to eat, and Myra had gotten us lost in a suburban section of town. That was enough for me to start getting snappy with her, and seconds before we hit the dog I had called her a bitch. She turned her head, glaring, but before the car could become a full blown war zone a puppy dashed out in front of us and Myra swerved too late.
The dog was dead. It looked to be only about three or four months old, and it wasn’t wearing a collar. I’ve never killed someone’s pet before, and I didn’t really know where to go or what to do from here. I don’t even remember walking away from the car, but suddenly I’m knocking on a door, asking if they know anyone in the neighborhood with a little golden-haired puppy. Why yes, the Johnson’s have a puppy. The house with the blue door.
The Johnson’s had a puppy, I think. I get Myra out of the car and put my arm around her as we walk over to the Johnson’s house. She stopped crying, but she looks like she could start again at any minute.
I don’t know what to say to the woman who answers the door. I start stammering an apology about the little golden dog, and Myra chokes back a sob. The woman suddenly turns her attention to Myra, and the next thing I know we’re sitting in their kitchen with Myra crying on Angela Johnson’s shoulder. I’m instructed to go out into the backyard and get her husband Chael.
Chael goes to the garage and get an old blanket to wrap Buster in. After I move the Nissan out of the road and park it in their driveway, I follow Chael into the backyard to help him dig the hole. There’s only one shovel, though, so Chael tells me to sit under the willow tree and try to take it easy. You’ve been through a lot today, he says. He tells me about his first car, and how the very first time he backed it out of the driveway he backed over his neighbor’s cat. He’s trying to make me feel comfortable, and I can’t help but marvel at how beautiful and wonderful these people are. We killed their dog because we were in a fight, but both Angela and Chael seem more concerned about putting us at ease than their little Buster. I’m not sure what I expected, but I didn’t expect this.
I look up at the house, and through the sliding glass door I can see Myra, wrapped in a blanket, sipping steaming liquid out of a mug. Angela says something to her, and she smiles and responds. It strikes me how beautiful Myra is when she smiles. I can’t believe that twenty minutes ago I was trying to bait her into a fight. It all seems so petty and hypocritical now. I’m no saint. I wasn’t always the best boyfriend to her, and I’ve left a trail of broken hearts in my past, too. We’ve both been broken, we’ve both been defeated and jaded and we’ve both cried uncontrollably, but we’ve always managed to get back on our feet. I had some pretty powerful weapons I was going to use against her, but before we could spew our poison we found ourselves on Angela and Chael’s doorstep, which is probably right where we needed to be at that moment.
Chael finishes up and we go inside. Angela has put some pasta on, and she asks me if I prefer marinara or alfredo sauce. I guess that means we’re staying for dinner. I give Myra a feeble smile, and she gives one back. She looks like she’s had a really rough time of it, but it’s obvious that Angela has been taking good care of her. I opt for the marinara and take the seat next to Myra. Chael starts telling funny stories, and as I watch Myra laugh, I realize that this was not an accident.
We’ve been riding in silence for an hour and a half now, and I’ve been mentally cataloging all the various ways Myra has fucked me up. I know this is a dangerous game, strapped to our seats inches apart and hurling down the road at 70 mph, but I can’t help fiddling with the fuse.
When we broke up, Myra told me that she didn’t like feeling guilty if she was out having fun without me. The discussion stemmed from an incident that happened about a week before, when she called me from a bar because she was drunk and needed a ride home. Some of our friends from out of town had dropped in unexpectedly on their way to a conference in New York, and they had all gone out to one of our favorite spots to hang out and catch up. I couldn’t believe Myra hadn’t called me, and I told her so on the way home. It probably wasn’t the best time to get mad at her since she was tired and drunk, and I ended up locking myself in the bathroom and running the shower so she wouldn’t hear me cry. They picked her up at her office, she said, she thought I was busy with my work, she said, she didn’t want to disturb me, she said, but I still felt like she was having more fun without me and didn’t want me to be there. I was hurt, but Myra was so insistent that I was being irrational that I couldn’t help think that maybe she was right.
Myra cracks her window and I crack mine. She lights her cigarette and passes me the lighter. Although I’m close enough to touch her, it feels like we’re on two separate islands, miles and miles apart. I can’t see her, I can only see her smoke signals. She blows the smoke out her nose and stares straight ahead. I wonder what she’s thinking, but I know better than to ask.
A year after we broke up I was invited to a birthday party for a girl I had a crush on, and the entire night I found myself constantly leaving the room when she entered it. I was making myself miserable, and I wasn't entirely sure why I was doing it. I thought it might be because I didn't like competing for her attention (which it partly was), but when I got home I realized I was displaying a trait that I had now subconsciously labeled as "positive". I was told that wanting to be with Myra when she was out doing fun things had had a repellant effect upon her, that I had suffocated her and it had made her want to get out of the relationship, so there I was, like a peacock strutting my plumage, leaving the room to show her "Look! I can let you have fun with other people! Aren't I desirable?" Stupid, stupid, stupid, stupid, stupid.
Myra flicks her cigarette out the window and puts her seat back to take another nap. What poor, disheveled beasts we are! Every human out there is a fucked up and complicated creature, living out dramas that we're barely even aware of, bumping up against others in the night, running mental mazes and trying to find the other soul that will fit like a puzzle piece against our own ragged coast line, not knowing what their coast line looks like, and sometimes not even knowing our own, just crashing the two together and rubbing them back and forth, hoping to find a point where they snap together in place, but often times only succeeding in eroding the coast even more, giving it a new broken shape. Is Myra a different person now because of me, or is she just making the same mistakes over and over and over again? Am I? Why did I agree to this trip? Maybe I died years ago and this is what hell looks like: a white Nissan Sentra with Myra sleeping in the passenger seat. My own Sisyphean hell. I pull off at the next rest area and get out of the car, just to prove to myself that I can.
welcome to my writing project, aka Myra's raison d'etre
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Okay, so you've noticed that every day these past four days I've written a short little story about a girl named Myra. I don't know exactly how it started, but I wanted to start a project where I sat down and wrote a little bit every day. I used to write constantly, but lately I've felt that I haven't had the time. The purpose for this is to get me to sit down every day and write something. Right now it's about Myra, but in a week I might put Myra on the shelf for a while and start a new narrative, and come back to revisit Myra later.
One of my problems is that I'm my own hardest critic. I'm never satisfied with what I've done. With this the purpose isn't to create little masterpieces, but just to write something that I'm satisfied with every day. I may be a busy person, but I always seem to find an hour or two each day to bum around on the Internet. I want to put that time to good use.
Interestingly enough, none of my livejournal friends are people I interact with on a day to day basis. Morry and HQ, for example. I think it's hilarious that we all know each other. The digital age is so funny.
SO for the three or four of you who are actually reading this: thanks. Your encouragement and kind words are very much appreciated. So enough of this, let's get back to the main event, eh?
Myra looks like a Myra. I won’t even bother describing her, because you can imagine yourself what a Myra looks like. The name evokes purple swirls, dark and strangely exotic. So does Myra.
Her full name is Myra Edith Madison. Her father wanted to name her after his mother, but they both really liked Myra and decided to make Edith her middle name. Her grandmother was pleased and honored, which is funny to me because Myra never ever tells anyone her middle name.
I’m glad they picked Myra. She looks like a Myra. I glance over at her sleeping in the passenger seat and try to picture her as an Edith, and I just can’t see it. Edith evokes crochet and mothballs, and Myra is definitely purple swirls.
Back when we were living together I had gotten her a pop-up Kama Sutra book for her birthday. That night we stayed up until sunrise with it. By the time my birthday rolled around a month later we had worn out the binding and inadvertently crushed the popup on pages 48 and 49, which was our favorite. For my birthday she had found me a book of 1970’s porn scripts, which were as hilarious as they were short. Apparently you can make a full feature length movie with ten pages of dialogue. We would act out the various scenarios, complete with costumes from her costume trunk, and we broke her old coffee table more than once during our visits to the doctor or explorations of the jungle.
But is Myra purple swirls because everyone has treated her like purple swirls? If she was an Edith, would she have been treated like crochet and mothballs? Would I still have dangerously flipped Edith over into a wheelbarrow in the shower? If Edith came to my office after class begging for an extra credit assignment, would I still have assigned her pages 48 and 49 from the text book?
The original Edith Madison was a devout Christian. I forget what denomination she was, but she was an elbows off the table chew with your mouth closed dear yes ma’am no thank you ma’am crochet and mothballs Edith. A text book Edith. She had two children, and Myra thinks she only had sex twice in her life. Joyless mechanical sex, for the purpose of procreation. I like to think the young Edith hid a fiery passion behind her prim and proper exterior, and that when young Grandpa Joe came home from work Edith was waiting with the beds pushed together, wearing only her frilly strawberry apron. But Myra is probably closer to the truth. I’m sure Edith and Joe probably had sex more than twice, but only in bed, at night, with Grandpa Joe on top. A whole generation of sexual repressed adults, having sex in bed, at night, in the missionary position. A mere fifty years later, Edith’s namesake was getting nailed on the balcony of her apartment in the middle of the afternoon with a crude popup sex book propped open next to her. If Grandma Edith were still alive, she’d probably hail a story like that as sign of the downfall of Christian civilization, and I’m not sure I’d be able to disagree. Is this how it always is? Each successive generation seen by their parents as the destroyers of the moral fabric of society? The kids who grew up on Duke Ellington’s pot laden devil music hated Elvis’s gyrating hips, and I’m sure all the Marilyn Manson kids today will hate whoever pops up in the music scene ten years from now. I’d like to think this cycle has been repeating since the dawn of human history, but my bones tell me we’re perched on the cusp of something big, a massive shift of consciousness and we’re accelerating towards the edge of the cliff. Maybe our whole generation is going to hell, but I’m not getting any younger or better looking. Life’s too short for the missionary position.
Myra wakes up, stretches, and stares vacantly out the window. Something stirs in my chest and I suddenly realize how angry I am at her. The last month of our relationship she spent with another man. There were late night calls, afternoons when she wouldn’t come home from work, and of course the excuses and alibis. I believed every single one. An honest man is easy to lie to. I was completely oblivious to it all. The only indication I had that there was anything wrong was our sex life. The last month of our relationship we only had sex twice. It was joyless, mechanical, and missionary.
When I go up to the register to pay for our gas, I notice the attendant is staring out the window at Myra, checking her out. There’s really no reason for this to annoy me, but it does anyway. She’s leaning over the hood washing the bugs off the windshield, smiling to herself. Part of me thinks she knows the attendant is watching her and that just irritates me even more. But what annoys me the most is the fact that it even bothers me to begin with.
I pay for the gas and buy a pack of Camel Lights for Myra. I still have half a pack of American Spirits left, and I’m trying to conserve them until we find another gas station that carries them. I ask the attendant if he knows where I can get some, and he just shrugs and goes back to stocking the cartons of cigarettes behind the counter. It amazes me that they don’t have my brand. It’s a small gas station in the middle of nowhere, but they have more cigarettes than I’ve ever seen in any little outpost station like this. I watch him for a minute and do some quick math in my head. Twenty cigarettes in a pack. Ten packs in a carton. Three cartons in a row stacked fifteen rows high. That’s nine thousand cigarettes. There are maybe twenty five columns of cartons stretching across the entire back wall of the gas station, making two hundred twenty five thousand cigarettes total. Almost a quarter of a million cigarettes! Just in this one little gas station! He and I are the only two in the building, which means the ratio of cigarettes to people in the building is one hundred twelve thousand five hundred to one!
I wonder if he’s ever marveled at the sheer volume of cigarettes he handles daily. In a month he may personally sell over a million of those little sticks of rolled tobacco. I want to ask, to somehow strike up that conversation, but I know from the experience of too many odd sideways glances that people are seldom interested in my brand of observation. Why are we so narrow? What is it that makes us shy away from experiencing the boggling vastness of the universe around us? Is it too much to ask to want to revel in the grandeur of being with a fellow voyager?
Hmm.
Maybe it is. Maybe just because I happen to enjoy the experience of amazement and wonder doesn’t mean there’s anything wrong if other people don’t. I walk back out into the sun and toss Myra’s twenty cigarettes onto her seat. She doesn’t thank me, but opens the pack and lights one up. As the car pulls away, I turn back, squinting, and take one last glance at the attendant mindlessly stacking carton after carton of Marlboros. I can’t help but think that maybe I’m right.
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shaggylocks's journal
