War Crimes

He sat on an uncomfortable wooden chair, his hands cuffed, chained securely to a cold steel desk, waiting for the dwarfed detective with the red and white cap to reenter the room. The room was hot with stale oppressive air, smelling of old papers and forced confessions, like a high school detention hall augmented by nightmare. Overhead a buzzing fluorescent light hung a foot from his head, slowly cooking him like a rotisserie hotdog inside a 7-11. Peering out into the large glass mirror, his mustache frayed and unkempt, like an old toothbrush, he thought of the events that had led up to this point. The shock and horror, the dreamlike absurdity of it all; the burning flame of retribution he'd hurled at his villainous opposition. This is how he'd been rewarded for his heroism. Treated like a common criminal. He pounded his fist against the table in frustration and said something in Italian. Looking down at his shackled wrists, he noticed how pale his hands were.

The laconic detective came walking into the room like a tired penguin and sat in the chair across from him, folding his arms and glaring, believing that if he looked hard enough he'd find the answers he wanted. For a few minutes they just stared at one another not saying a word, until the man said:

"Listen, I already told you: he kidnapped my girlfriend. He sent countless thugs after me to beat me - to try and kill me."

"Anything else you'd like to add," the detective asked.

"The guy trapped me in a room with him and attacked me with hammers."

"Let me make sure I understand this, so I can verify I have all my facts straight. This was after you broke into his place of residence?"

"Look, I did what I had to do. It was him or me, and luckily, I got out alive," the cuffed man said.

"I see. So you cut a platform out from under him, knowing that this would send him plunging into a pit of molten lava and fire feet below. You didn't try to flee, or resuscitate him?"

"Flee? Resuscitate him? I told you he trapped me there."

"Yes, that's right, I'd forgotten that you were trapped in the house you'd trespassed into. And from what our boys tell us, you went through great lengths to infiltrate the premises - bypassing the security systems and trampling all of his guards something fierce. I don't recall; you said you didn't attempt to revive him or call an ambulance?"

"He breaths fire."

"Breathed, technically."

"..."

"Oh yea," the detective said, "speaking of fire, take a look at these." He slid photos across the table, of broken bricks and charred rubble.

"Multiple felony counts of arson - incalculable property damage. These are some serious charges. You're looking at spending a long time behind bars, or worse."

"This is outrageous! I can't believe this. He was a monster!" the man yelled, his hands wringing, rattling the chains.

"I don't think you understand the gravity of these charges. We haven't even discussed your near genocide of the Goombas, or the hate crimes committed against the Koopa Troopers," the detective said, leafing through an enormous manila folder.

"What?!"

"In what world is it reasonable to act as you have? To believe your unique brand of determined vigilante justice would go without consequence? A lot of people are dead, Mr. Mario."

"He kidnapped my girlfriend," he said trailing off. "He tried to take over the entire Kingdom! I was trying to save everyone..."

"Genocide. So your final solution was genocide," he said, sneering as he sat back in his chair.

"I want my lawyer."

Small Step

"I'm not afraid of falling," Jimmy said, standing on top of the highest peak of the jungle gym.

He was with Frank. He was always with Frank. Their fathers lived on the same street and worked for the same business. Paul, Jim's father, was a senior sales representative for a local advertising firm, and Bill, Franks's father, was one of his superiors.

"I bet you are," Frank said.

"Am not, fuckface," Jim told him. "That's what my dad calls your dad."

"Prove it then, lemming," Frank said. "That's what my dad calls your dad."

Jim held tight to the handrails and peered over the drop, swallowing hard like Bugs Bunny looking out over some perilous cliff edge. He'd jumped from the bottom of the monkey bars before, many times, but he'd never jumped from anywhere quite this high. It seemed like suicide.

"I dare you to jump," Frank said. "Unless you're too scared."

"Why don't you jump if you're so tough," Jim said.

"Because: I didn't say I wasn't afraid, you did," Frank explained.

Jim's dad had told him to be careful on the playground; after little Timmy Olsen had jumped from the swing set and broken his ankle, all the parents told their kids to be careful. His dad said Timmy Olsen didn't know his limitations, that a person has got to know his limitations.

"Come on, chickenshit," Frank continued. "Just admit you can't do it."

Jim looked at Frank and punched him in the arm.

"Shut up. I said I ain't scared; I'm not no chickenshit," Jim said.

Resentful, now that Jim had hit him, Frank began to instigate more forcefully. He cupped his hands to his mouth and yelled out over the playground:

"Hey everyone: Jimmy Fragelli is scaredy-cat!"

Kids all around the playground looked up and began to laugh and point at Jimmy. Others, confident in his ability, began to chant "JUMP! JUMP!" Some of them chanted just to increase the chances of a playground catastrophe, to learn what would happen if someone were to jump from that high up. Little Timmy Olsen, with his ankle still in a brace, looked up at Jim coldly.

Jim turned back toward the edge and slowly began counting to three. The chanting beat his ears like snaredrums and his muscles trembled like Mrs. Witherly's hands when she wrote on the chalkboard.

He moved to the edge of the footing and carefully planted his feet, preparing himself for the giant leap. But as he pressed his feet down to spring out into the sky, just as he left the platform, Frank whispered the word: lemming.

Jim became distracted as he launched himself into the air and ribbons of vertigo assaulted his vision. Things around him seemed to slow down and gradually turn upside down. The air became syrupy. He was floating, drifting downward toward the earth, slow like a bubble. He'd forgotten about Frank, forgotten about the chants of the clamoring children around him, forgotten what his father had said about limitations.

There was only him and space, and time.

Orphans

I started to laugh and my tooth fell out. It's a strange feeling, that. For most people, the last time you lose a tooth is when you're still a kid. There's magic involved, and ritual. An old tooth falls out and a new one pushes its way through your gums to fill its place. Then the placing of the lost tooth under the pillow, waiting for it to turn into treasure.

When your tooth falls out as a sexagenarian though, it is only ritual. And it happens to all of them - except there no more new ones waiting to descend.

I remember the first time it happened to me. We were at the dinner table.

"I can't eat it," I told her, "it's too hard."

"Don't be silly, I know how to cook," she said, flashing me an encouraging smile.

I trusted her. That was my first mistake, the reason I fell in love with her. As soon as I bit into it I heard a muted pop and then the rushing high-frequency sound of pain ringing my skull like a bell. My jaw howled and the gums that surrounded the tooth swelled like red balloons.

This last time though, it only took a smile. She'd told a story about the time we'd gone to a traveling carnival that had just come to town.

"Remember," she said laughing and covering her mouth, "remember that horrible carnival we went to when we were kids; the one they set up in the old church parking lot?"

It was the kind of carnival with old hand-me-down rides covered in grease and somehow still squeaking. Torn down and put up so many times it looked like it was beginning to unseam, like an overused air mattress; leaky, unable to hold shape, deflating around you just slow enough not to notice.

"Yeah," I said. "The one where I spent $20 playing that game trying to win you a pink teddybear? The balls just bounced off the rims no matter which way I threw em. That game was rigged!"

"I still have that bear," she said smiling.

"That's nice. All I have is the memory and some missing teeth."

"I told you I was sorry about that, she said. "I was hoping you'd choke, but instead you just lost a tooth!"

We began to laugh, and as my lips pulled back against my incisors I felt a strange slipping sensation. My tooth had given out like a loose slat in an old wooden fence. My tongue rushed to catch its fall and then surveyed the area around the gum.

"What happened," she asked, as I took the orphaned tooth into my hand.

"You old bitch, you did it again!" I told her.

"At least this time you can't blame it on my cooking," she said.

Abortion

I took a writing class today. It was of the bootcamp variety. I'd entered thinking myself fairly competent, but I exited feeling dejected and ruined, my sense of confidence obliterated. It wasn't dissimalr to the first time I'd taken a yoga class, back when I lived in New York. My girlfriend at the time encouraged me to go with her.

"Have you ever been to yoga?" she asked, "It's so good; your body just feels so alive after."

Curious to see how "good" it was, and even more curious to get a look at the dark feminine underbelly in yoga pants, I'd said:

"No, let's try it."

When I'd walked into the room I realized I was one of two males, and the only straight one. If I recall correctly, they'd replaced the cigarette in the no smoking sign with the little man pictured in front of all the mens' bathrooms. I didn't belong. As sweat poured from my pores, spouting out onto the floor in puddles, my muscles trembling madly, I realized it wasn't sweat I was soaked in - it was tears. My muscles were crying. Or maybe my third eye had opened and it was sobbing. I looked over at G, who had effortlessly bent herself into a pretzel, and she smiled back at me with her feet tucked nonchalantly behind her head.

That's what I felt like today.

I sat there rigid and inflexible as the women around me thrived, moving through expressions with deft fluidity. The instructor gave us several writing exercises and we had ten short minutes to complete each one. As I finished the first one, judging it fairly well written - for something that I'd dribbled out so quickly - I was nearly ready to read it aloud when someone else volunteered. She told a lovely story about burning trees, lightning and charred horses. It had dialogue and action and movement - it breathed and blushed and sang. After hearing that, all of the words on my page solidified into an ugly lifeless mass, stillborn and colorless, malignant.

Here's what I'd written, wrenched from my mind with a coat-hanger:

I had never seen a tree on fire before. I'd never really seen anything on fire, except for maybe roasting marshmallows or a burning building in a movie. In front of me now though - my eyes wincing from the heat - the willow is wrapped in flames. Its arms twitch and flail, dancing and writhing, burning. Just beneath the willow, maybe a dozen feet from its base, is a gently flowing stream; one I'd seen the tree bend toward so many years before. I watch the embers, kicked off from its long limbs, rise up into the air and slowly fall like snow into the stream. Still on fire, they ride their oblivion on the river Styx, pulled onward and under by the dark undertow of obscurity. A branch pops and hisses as it leaps from the tree. It hits the ground with a crack, like a giant flaming whip. The air is perfumed with the smell of cinder and smoke. I can hear its tears sizzle as the willow weeps. 

All of them reach out to grab at me, undulating ferociously like a sea of flaming serpents.

As I step away I wonder who will mourn it. I wonder who will know. I wonder long it will take the smell of gasoline to leave my hands.

Bread and Beaks

Early this morning I was on my way to work. I'd scrambled out of the house from the comfort of the warm blankets that had kept me in past my alarm - and several snoozes - and just barely caught the bus in time. It arrived as I did; not a second to spare. I was walking down Divisadero, through the still unlit streets as the sun - pink and blushing - peaked out over old roofs, stealing surreptitious glances at the falling moon. I noticed a gang of pigeons in a parking lot pecking at a stale looking loaf of bread. They'd surrounded it, maddeningly tearing chunks from it at hurried and uneven intervals, like a venue of vultures descending on poor Prometheus' liver. I watched as it was helplessly devoured by attrition - pinched to pieces by sharp keratin beaks. I looked away and proceeded to the shuttle.

Once I boarded, it only took two stops for someone to come and sit beside me. Normally I have no issue with someone sitting next to me - seats are for sitting, after all - but over the last two weeks everyone at work has been stricken with something deserving quarantine. Now any person who comes near me is likely a harbinger of an infectious malady. It was no surprise then when I was greeted by the sound of congested coughing and pained wheezing; the repellent sound of bubbling mucous in his respiratory tract. What was a surprise though, was my reaction to it - bitter outrage. My body responded viscerally. A fiery flash of hot acrimony warmed my marrow as his coughing continued. I felt my face gradually contorting into a snarl, an outward display of repugnance and rancor. Pangs of vindictiveness pealed in my stomach as he blew gobs of snot into a discolored and crusty tissue. It was wet yet somehow flaky. I imagined the powdery particles from his tissue trespassing all over my nostrils, burgling my nasal passage. The airborne bacteria from his throat buzzed around my head like swarming bees. A cyclone of violence tore through my mind, whipping up frenzied fantasies as I indulged myself in grizzly depictions of his extermination. Whoa. What the fuck are you thinking, I asked myself. I'd allowed strange impulses to take hold - self preservation.

Weird what watching the news will do to you; repeated stories documenting the dozens dead from influenza. Scaremongering; a confluence of fear.

I remembered being in my father's pigeon coop when I was a kid. He was shaking a metal coffee-tin full of birdseed, letting the birds know it was feeding time. It rattled like a maraca, but a bit bassier. Behind the screened doors the birds began dancing to the beat, stirring and jockeying for the best position at the feed troughs. He poured the seed in and they fell on it like rain. In the back, a latecomer - sick and wheezing - came limping toward the troughs. The other birds fanned out their wings as he approached, preventing his entry, slapping him and knocking him backward. Some flared their wings at him threateningly while others delivered quick blows and jabs. He ambled around the perimeter, looking for an opening but never finding one.

"What are they doing, that bird is sick. He needs to eat." I said.

"If they let him eat, they'll get sick too," my dad said.

"That's messed up. How will he get better?"

"If he eats, his germs will get in the food. The other birds will eat it and then feed it to the babies. The babies aren't strong enough to fight off infection; they're protecting the kit," he'd said.

"So they're just going to let him die? What if he can't get better because he can't eat?" I asked.

"It's better for one to die than ten."

Mugged

Long day at the orchard.

Didn't get in til late. Nights like these are always hard. Once I get home, there isn't time for anything but sleep.

On my walk home I passed a dark and desolate street where I was mugged - my happiness stolen by an unseen hand. Happiness though, is always like a friend just visiting; its residence only temporary.

This led to thoughts of loss, which inevitably led me to thoughts of those that leave our lives - of the ones we wish were nearer, the gone or forgotten. Then I realized that no one ever leaves, really. They stay with us, wine colored and wistful, frozen in the smiles of stained-glass teeth.

Back in the Womb

Have I ever told the story here about the first time I tried ecstasy? Probably not, why would I?

I was still in high school at the time, and I think it was in December or January - sometime around New Years, for sure. I remember this because it was cold. I think there may have even been snow on the ground. I was with a friend (let's call him Ant) in our resident headquarters - the basement of his grandmother's house. It was a finished basement, meaning it was like our very own apartment, loosely furnished with an old Italian dining table and matching chairs, a small ornate sofa with wooden legs and intricate floral upholstery, and other random articles of Ant's ancestry. The basement was fully equipped with a working kitchen and its own bathroom. Typically, we'd be able to remain hidden in this underground lair for hours, unsupervised and unimpeded. Unquestionable and unconscionable activities unfettered by moderation, uninterrupted, unrestrained. Drugs, drinking, girls, video games. At the time, I hadn't been very interested in drugs - I was the responsible one. I was always too worried that with everyone humping the belly of a cloud if someone or something were to go awry, calamity would clap down upon our heads heavy as thunder. Many times I was right. This particular night though, I would make an exception.

It was an ordinary evening, a little on the slow side given the weather. We were playing Tony Hawk on Playstation and I was dominating Ant with my patented and time-tested maneuvers that almost always resulted in my victory. I could tell something was a bit off though. He was notorious for screaming and hollering at the mere threat of a loss, and here I was, eviscerating him, without as much as a peep. He looked away from the TV, totally disinterested in the game, and said "I just copped some good E's."

"Oh yea?" I said, "you planning on doing them tonight?"

"Well, that's what I wanted to talk about," he started.

Seeing where he was headed, I cut him off: "nah, I'm not doing it."

"C'mon man, you didn't even let me finish the sentence; just hear me out," he said.

"I know I didn't let you finish - I didn't need to. I knew what you were going to say. You think you're a smooth motherfucker," I said laughing. "It's insulting that you think you can try and convince me otherwise. You're the fucking devil on my shoulder," I told him.

"Listen, you said you know me? I know you. We've been best friends since 2nd grade man; I think you'd like this shit. I wouldn't do some shit to put you in danger. Just hear me out," he said.

He was shrewd, appealing to my emotional side; hiding behind the scrutiny of my logic by using our friendship as a shield. I stared at him, motioning to proceed. He told me about how he'd taken them and how he knew they were clean. He told me about the experience; the elation, joy and euphoria; the sense that everything is right with the world. Then he took out $500 dollars - a sum that was significant to two kids in high school - and placed it down on the table.

"Put that in your pocket. If you don't have a good time, keep it; I won't even ask about it," he said.

I didn't ask where he got the money. I did wonder though, whether he was serious. How could he be that confident about this? The wooden clock on the wall ticked loudly as I sat there thinking.

"Really, take it. Put it in your pocket and let's swallow these," he said, sliding a small pink pill - with an image of a bull on it - across the table toward me. "I guarantee you'll be handing that money back to me before the night's over," he added.

"You've made me an offer I cannot refuse," I said, taking the $500 and the pill. It's not everyday someone will pay you that much money to ingest a substance, the sole purpose of which, is to make you feel ecstatic. We swallowed the pills and resumed playing Tony Hawk. After a little while I'd noticed my hands had grown clammy. It grew hard to time the moves right and the combos I was able to land earlier, now, I couldn't. My head felt light and I had difficulty focusing on the game.

"Not beating the kid now! Wooooooo!! That's what I'm talkin' bout! BOOM!" he yelled, pounding his chest as he took the lead.

It was upon me faster than him. The music we'd put on the boom-box pressed itself against my ears, purring loudly like a cat. My skull had become a subwoofer for good vibrations. I began to feel cold, though, and Ant draped an enormous fur pimpcoat over my shoulders. The softness of the fur completed the imagery of the cat and I felt something in me start purring. I was like a giant vibrator ready to satisfy a harem of feminine deities. I needed to stretch, to get up and move. I was infused with excitement and ribbons of euphoria began to encircle me.

"Let's go out; I want to feel the cold air," I told him. "It warm in here and there's not much to do - let's see what's going on outside," I said giddily.

"Yea, sure, we can do that," he said with some hesitation.

"You okay," I asked. "We don't have to go right now if you want to hang for a minute," I said.

"Nah, you're just feeling it harder than me, that's all," he replied. "Let me grab a coat."

We walked out into the night, and I want to say it was snowing, but I can't be sure. The experience was so similar to a dream - especially in hindsight - that it's hard to tell. I distinctly remember the cold air feeling incredibly pleasurable, to the point where I removed my jacket so that I could get closer to it. As we walked down 14th avenue, to our friend Fonze's house, I began advocating that everyone should take ecstasy at least once: "there would be no fights, no hate...only love," I said. "Imagine how happy everyone would be."

It was at that moment I became a hippie.

We arrived at Fonze's, who'd be the unsuspecting recipient of a barrage of hugs and adoration. We hemorrhaged affection. He knew something was up and asked, "are you guys tripping?" It was more of a rhetorical question because, yes, we were obviously tripping. Fonze did a great job at keeping cool, despite his obvious shock at what I had done. To him, it probably seemed as much a dream as it did for me; I'd be the last person he'd expect to show up at his door on a snowy night tripping balls. He turned out to be an exceptional host though, allowing us to invite over some girls and mutual friends - hijacking his night and turning it into our own. He even prevented us from any "homosexual misadventures" by not letting us take showers together in his bathroom.

"No dude, you just don't get it - we don't want to take showers together. We just want to take showers, because the hot water would feel so good. And even if we did take a shower together, it wouldn't be gay. Get us some towels."

There are still probably pictures of us from that night, sitting on Fonze's couch with our shirts off, sitting perhaps a bit too close together, in a very non-gay way.

I remember Ant chain-smoking cigarettes while I played Modest Mouse's Building Nothing Out of Something on repeat all night long. The song Sleepwalking still transports me back to that night every time I hear it; it has a kind of magic to it.

At some point I gave him back the $500, telling him I'd give him another $500 if I had it.

I remember one of our friends arrived and asked me what it felt like. I paused, looked her in the eyes, and smiling I said:

Baby, it feels like I'm back in the womb.

Audaciously Artless

A suicided wave against her heart's stony shore.

I found that line in my notes just now. Who do I think I am, writing shit like that? Audaciously artless. Who was I referring to; myself or another? Whose shore?

I'm not sure.

Mysteries - enigmatic blacknesses pressed into little cuneiform shapes supposed to signify or symbolize ideas, passions - smeared reflections cast in puddles beside a mad and lurid carousel.

I'm doing it again. Inspired by the attempted aversion.

Where does inspiration come from anyway? In a sense, everything that is was inspired by something that preceded it, and everything that is will inspire something else. Except, is that always true? Don't there exist things that simply impinge nothing? The anonymity of some dying flower in a darkened meadow - its last dull glimmer under the full moon. A still undiscovered creature falling prey to extinction. Even then though, each of these were borne of drifting pollen, whether plant or beast; their corpses, broken down and consumed by creatures much smaller than themselves, will consummate their contribution.

And lo, ideas, shapeless florets floating on invisible sails - dandelion dreams dancing in the breeze.

Logorrhea

Not drinking at parties has taught me a few things. First, that as people continue to drink they talk louder. Second, that as they continue to drink they become more impassioned. And third, that they will fiercely defend their ideas and passions no matter how little sense they make - and loudly.

Last night I went with the Profuser to his girlfriend's sister's boyfriend's birthday party. Conveniently, for me, it was held at the Profuser's lady's house just down the road. The evening started out well enough, with a glass of champagne and some delicious deviled eggs. Wait, I thought you said you hadn't drank; that's right, I did have a glass of champagne - but that was all. As the night progressed, and those around me became more and more inebriated, I started to notice something funny happening. I'll preface this by saying I'm no doctor, but I recognized that the birthday boy - who we'd spotted buying alcohol inside a nearby Safeway - was suffering from a severe case of prolapsed oral labia. Words streamed from his gaping maw with an invidious recklessness, dribbling and discharging disgracefully down his chin as he decried the dumb and ignorant wretches who wasted their education pursuing a Sociology degree. I watched his words run round the room with scissors. He was rabid, fomenting at the mouth.

Politely, I sat and let him espouse his theories and his biases, waiting for the moment I'd let him know I was one of the dumb and ignorant fools with a Sociology degree. Once I told him, he quickly shed his embarrassment - what little of it there was, anyway - and then continued to qualify his claims. It's my birthday I'll decry if I want to, decry if I want to. I told him I agreed with him in some senses, and that he was certainly entitled to his own opinion, but much like any other discipline - you get out what you put in. I cited Michel Foucault to try and impress upon him the intellectual significance a sociologist might have, but he began talking about the hard sciences; things like physics and advanced mathematics. Maybe I should've said Marx, or showed him my hard science. It was then I began to notice that his eyes looked too far apart - almost reptilian - as if they'd slide off the sides of his face and get swallowed by his ear holes. His glasses seemed to augment this somehow. His eyes seeming to drift toward the edges of the frames, like two poorly composed photographs. He carried on hissing, with his right hand over his heart, pledging allegiance to his beloved sciences. I allowed the conversation to end by no longer giving him my attention. He wasn't really talking to me anyway - he was thinking aloud.

I started conversation with a gentleman named Mohit, whom I found to be an enjoyable and refreshing companion. Free from hard convictions - and affable too - he and I talked about Burning Man; he'd been twice. We regaled one another with tales of serendipity, poetic playa profundities. I couldn't shake the feeling that I'd seen him once while at Black Rock, but who knows.

Soon we were all circled around the table and I noticed the Profuser had been infected with the birthday boy's logorrhea. Again, I'm no doctor, but in my experience, it is an illness that is highly communicable. The poor Profuser was sinking ships, fleets. He expressed the idea of a future where human bigotry and racism would be lessened by the homogenizing affect of increased interbreeding; he had a dream. No sooner had he breathed the words than I saw the stoic sheen of the assassin's blade. With a hiss the birthday boy was upon him, excitedly stuttering so, so, so wait. wait. you're saying that racism will just go, just go away? Well no, that's not quite what he was saying, if you were willing to listen. The Profuser's point was that humans have a tendency to alienate others based on an easily discernible difference - such as the color of another's skin - and that if we were able to take this opportunity away from someone, it would force them to become more inventive in their racism; perhaps even compel them to confront the absurdity of their iniquity.

The drunkards though, they would have none of it. They became riotous. Who would've known that talking about race and racism would become so incendiary when alcohol was involved. I tried to help them see Prof's point, but their words trampled over me in a stampede of protest. At one point the Profuser and I were singled out for being white, as though this precluded us from understanding racism. The implication was that because we were white, we had no right to speak about it - even if we were discussing (and advocating) its attenuation. I sat there victimized and ostracized, discriminated against based on the color of my skin - in the midst of a discussion about racism of all things. It was meta. I hadn't known that being white forbade me from participating in these topics. I guess white people just don't understand discrimination. Funny, that. In my lifetime I'll see whites in America become a minority (currently predicated for 2043). Maybe I should just suspend the debate until then.

When the argument had finally ceased, the birthday boy couldn't help but resuscitate it. In one of his greatest moments of brilliance, in a last ditch effort to achieve dominion, he avowed that the physical structure of a body does not determine (or limit) its movement. This was a tangent. To show just how indeterminstic our physiology is, he leapt up out of his seat and displayed for us two radically different interpretations of walking. In one, he moved in the way that is naturally dictated by our physiology, and in the other he performed a hybrid movement of disjointed jerking and flailing onto the floor - like a breakdancer with a surplus chromosome - achieving little, if any, forward movement. See, we don't have to walk they way we do. Yes, I said, you've definitely proven that. However, even if we were to consider what you just did a variation of walking, everything you demonstrated is possible because of your physical makeup; your musculoskeletal system defines your range of motion and its expression. You were able to do that because your legs allowed you to bend in that way. He continued to argue with me and the Profuser laughed at the absurdity of his stance.

Realizing that reasoning with this individual was futile, I decided it was time that I go. I made sure to wait a little while, so that he wouldn't feel insulted on his birthday, and then I announced I'd be leaving to catch the bus in 5. It was at this moment that he chose to unleash his most deadly assault. I stood completely unarmed in the face of his wit as he said:

Sociology majors always leave first

La Brea

Q had recently extolled the virtues of writing early in the morning, saying things like "your mind is clearer then, uncluttered," but I still have my doubts. I got to sleep early last night, something I'd wanted to do because I wasn't feeling well. I believed the extra sleep I'd get would lead me down the path of speedy recovery, banishing my infirmity to the land of the lost. To some bubbling tar pit. I actually do feel a bit better this morning, but it's too early to know for sure - I need a more representative sample size.

I'd forgotten how nice the quiet of Saturday morning is. It is a time that feels surreptitious and stolen. It is a time usually used for heavy slumber, to shake off the persistent echo of a long night or catch up on the sleep you'd been robbed of during the workweek. From outside my window not a car passes. In the distance I can hear the sound of birds that await the rising sun.

Soon, though, the sidewalks and streets will be populated by passerbys. The orange glow of dawn will cast a soft dreamy light on the library across the road, making it look like a giant creamsicle; its many glass windows transformed into large flakes of bright shimmering ice. A casual look outside confirms this has already begun.

I remember times when Alex and I would wake up early to capture these under-appreciated hours of Saturday morning. With a few gently whispered words we'd make our way to my roof to watch the sun come up. Peering out over the city she'd quietly sigh and smile, stretching out like a cat in the warm light. Then the sun would shine into her green eyes and I'd take her in my arms as we stood there against the morning breeze, her skin lightly covered in goosebumps. There was no need to talk, we were both thinking the same thing. The quiet communion we shared with the rising sun is something I won't soon forget. We'd briefly be able to convince ourselves of our levitation, our transcendence over time and language. There was something magical about the sunrise and its beholding. It made the day feel familiar, more accessible. More assailable. Malleable. As if it were ready to serve us. And often, it did.

"The purpose of life, after all, is to live it, to taste experience to the utmost, to reach out eagerly and without fear for newer and richer experiences."

Eleanor Roosevelt

Cootie and the Blowfish

As you may have noticed, I didn't write anything yesterday. I was feeling ill. Cooties. Today I'm exhausted, still fighting the good fight, organizing white blood cells like it's a klan rally. They've packed themselves tightly into my lymph nodes, causing painful swelling on either side of my throat. Sitting here, sipping a steaming cup of echinacea tea, I'm confounded by homeopathy; unable to determine if honey is helpful or harmful for my current condition. Some sources say it feeds bacterial infection by providing them with the fuel necessary to proliferate; thick sickly-sweet gasoline. The heat from the tea gives me immediate relief from the pain I've been dealing with all day. Each time I swallow my jaw clenches hard as it braces for suffering. The pain slowly drifts down my throat like a paratrooper wielding samurai swords and I worry my fine-china teeth might shatter.

I feel like a cheap whore whose received one too many unscrupulous organ donors, damned to suffer the wrath and woe of an esophageal yeast infection.

My body has been afflicted too. It is sluggish and heavy, worn out from the pursuit of some unknown assailant. I think the fiend must have broken in sometime this past weekend, hiding in the intoxicating saliva of a young cosmetologist, burgling. He probably deactivated my home security system that night while the cosmetologist showed me her spirit animal - the blowfish.

I've contacted the authorities, but the suspect remains at large. Two policemen arrived at my apartment earlier today, one of them a sketch artist, and they asked me to describe the fugitive.

I couldn't help but feel the sketch artist and I were teammates in a high-stakes game of Pictionary.

Tastticles

Tonight I took Q out to meet Christ. I think it went well. We all arrived at Ragazza independently; first me, then Q and then Christ. It's a nice little Italian restaurant on Divisadero specializing in pizza. I'd walked in when I first got there and asked the hostess if she had a table available for three - what luck, she did. She asked when my party would be there and I said, "the party is right here." She smiled politely, trying hard not to reveal her disapproval, and waited for an actual response. "Ten minutes," I said shamefully. Then I walked outside into the cold San Franciscan night to spare myself the indignation of her condescension and the ignominy of my wit.

Soon Q appeared and we watched half in horror and half in humor as a morbidly obese man was birthed from an automobile that pulled in against the curb in front of us. Q and I were aghast, looking on incredulously as the man seemed to defy space-time, giving a full-size vehicle the appearance of a clown car. The man was so massive that he had to rock himself free of the vehicle in order to generate the necessary momentum to launch himself from the passenger seat. We watched him emerge through the door, his entire body expanding out from the opening as though he were squeezed from a tube of toothpaste. It had to be one of Christ's miracles. Then, there she was - hey guys! "Christ this is Q; Q, Christ." I never thought I'd see the day that Q would embrace Christ, but I watched it with my own two eyes.

We went inside and ordered some food. Christ got a delectable little salad - which was actually rather large - and Q and I ordered little meatballs. The three of us split an artisan thin-crust pizza with a golden yolk placed beautifully in the center. It was called the Amatriciana, if I recall correctly. We spoke of LSD, MDMA and cocaine - though none of us actually did any of these tonight - then of work and play, literature, art and Berlin, Romans and hard cheeses, penis tattoos of Super Mario; testicle tattoos of purple grapes, eyeballs, men with beards and the old man on the Moretti bottle; the secret underground dungeons at Disney and the mysterious intrigue of the Ouija Board, all before the server began to subtly indicate she was waiting for us to surrender our table to the next guests. Trying to pack in as much conversation as time would allow, pushing the envelope of social decency - and also courtesy - we crammed in another few topics; much like the sad fat clown-man forcibly reentering his vehicle in front of the restaurant. Which I imagine would be like trying to jam a swollen carry-on bag into a nearly full overhead storage compartment.

We stood outside and said farewell, solemnly swearing to do it again. I vigorously shook my magic eight ball - which was really just my right testicle, tattooed black, with the words you may rely on it inside a blue triangle - and asked it if we'd really all hang out again: outlook good. Q and I said goodbye to Christ:

"Peace be with you."

And also with you.

--------------------

My actual idea for a testicle tattoo, no one laughed at. On the odd chance it might humor someone out in cyberspace I'll relay it here:

I want a tattoo of Lance Armstrong's lone testicle on one ball, and a mirror reflecting it on the other.

The Presents of a Woman

I am tired. I am weary. I could quief for a thousand years. Q had me up at the crack of dawn this morning, whispering the words hey honey, it's 5 o'clock, it's time to wake up. He said this, flitting past like a phantom, and as I opened my eyes I could've sworn he was wearing a long lavender-colored nightie. In his wake there seemed to be a strange fog floating in the air. As my consciousness cemented I realized it was just an enormous cloud of baby powder that he'd generously applied to his anus-hole to help pamper and placate a painful anal fissure - resulting from some unbridled male-on-male action he'd been privy to while in county jail some weeks ago. Q-ball, they called him; on account of his missing testicle. The smell of baby powder was pleasant though, and the soft color of his gown did make me feel a bit more at ease as I prepared myself for Monday mourning. It's true what they say, the presence of a woman does make life more fragrant.

All of that happened some 16 hours ago. Jesus.

He's not here tonight - he told me he needed a "girls' night out." You should've seen the outfit he left here in. Wearing fishnet stockings, red lipstick, heavy mascara and long fake eyelashes, stinking of untold amounts of mousse and hairspray, he stomped out hurriedly in silver stilettos, walking like both of his legs were asleep. Before he slammed the door I heard him say something like "daddy's going fissuring tonight." Or maybe he said fishing...or fisting.

It's true what they say, the prescience of a woman does make life more flagrant.

Home Unalone

Q has arrived. He'll be spending most of the week here, but he's assured me he's going to give me some money toward rent; times are tough. I found out he has an interview lined up - he'll be making the big bucks soon - it's the least he could do.

We went to dinner at SPQR, an initialism for the "The People and Senate of Rome," or Senatus Populesque Romanus. The ambience was great (very dark and datey) and the food was outstanding. The only criticism I have is that the tables were really close together. The unfortunate consequence of this, of course, is that you too easily overhear the conversation at neighboring tables. We had the good fortune of being seated beside a vapid and loudspeaking woman and her noticeably older boyfriend. She was stunningly gorgeous, blonde, blue eyed, with an excellent figure and angelic skin that seemed to tug at your eyes - beautiful like a woman that you might see in a painting wearing a red dress (she actually had a red coat) - but her beauty was commensurate with her repugnance. She spoke at loathsome volumes, pontificating on banal subjects, becoming more and more odious as time went on.

Whenever Q and I go out to dinner I always wonder whether the servers think he and I are gay. The thought crossed my mind tonight when the waitress smiled and placed two forks on the table when my desert came out. I wasn't insulted that she thought we might be gay, I was insulted she thought I'd date Q. How could I not take it as an indictment on my taste; I'd be way out of his league.

After we left, we walked down to Fillmore and each experienced a momentary befuddlement, a lapse in space-time, as we stared at The Fillmore but somehow couldn't locate it. I suggested we walk back to my apartment but Q said that I owed him a cab ride so I obliged. I saw our reflections in the window of the cab upon opening the door, and as we sat down I remarked that we looked like Daniel Stern and Joe Pesci from Home Alone. The cab driver, looking back at us with our dark colored coats and burglaresque black beanies, nodded silently in agreement. I met the eyes of the driver and discovered we were being chauffeured by a transvestite Michael Jackson. The posted driver ID read: Billie.

Where you boys headed to tonight he/she asked in a soft falsetto.

We're going home, I said, to The Man in the Mirror.

Pygmalion

I went to see Her, and to my surprise, it was one of the best movies I've seen recently. I went in with an open mind, thinking the premise a bit contrived - borderline silly even - but unable to shake the suspicion that something interesting might happen to make it worthwhile. Armed with a frosty 22oz glass bottle of Racer 5, I gulped down a strong libation to prime my mind for pleasure. By the time it was over, after much laughter and wistful contemplation, I found myself unable to rise up from my seat. I was floored...in my chair. I nearly began ardently applauding, the cacophony of drunken and unadulterated approval booming from my cupped hands like cannons. Forgetting the empty beer bottle in my left hand, my claps were reduced to a muffled tinking as golden ale sloshed out of the bottle's opening in swirling arcs, soaking the expensive-looking dress of the elderly woman beside me. I don't think she's going to call me back.

I enjoyed the film for many reasons: the music, the photography, the acting, its examination of loneliness and alienation, of love and longing. I hadn't realized until the end of the movie that Arcade Fire had produced the score. The musical accompaniment was integral to the feel of the film; it had a lush sonic aesthetic made up of swelling amplifier feedback, twinkling piano keys and sparse acoustic melodies. At times able to evoke tenderness, vulnerability, uncertainty, contentment, happiness or disorientation, the composition added a strongly intimate and tactile layer to every scene; the gentle hum of the ghost in the machine.

The set design was impeccable too; the use of light, color and costumes contributed to a more immersive experience that allowed the viewer to drift along with the actors, a willful suspension of disbelief intact. The hallmark of its success was that these things went unnoticed during the film, only uncovered and brought to light by reflection.

The acting, from every cast member, was stellar. Scarlett Johansson's voice-acting alone was worthy of glimmering accolades. She breathed life into Samantha, giving her more humanity than some of the humans onscreen; I mean, to create a compelling love story without the aide of an onscreen leading lady is a testament to her performance. Theodore Twombly, the masterfully crafted everyman character played by Joaquin Phoenix, beautifully characterized by intense sensitivity and his desire to escape ennui, was perhaps his best performance yet. Yearning to feel, fearing a loss of touch - with himself and with others - the audience follows him with an almost voyeuristic intimacy as he navigates emotional space. We share with him his most private moments, of rejection, bliss, elation, sorrow, fear, love and hope, and often find ourselves in Thedore's head through Jonze's clever use of dictation. When he isn't dictating, we see shots of Joaquin Phoenix talking to himself, giving the impression of having breached his inner sanctum. Amazingly, both lead actors (Johansson and Phoenix) perform under a handicap - one performing a near 2 hour soliloquy and the other deprived of the aid of non-verbal communication - yet everything comes together brilliantly.

One gets the feeling the story is strongly allegorical, like a modern telling of the 15th-century play, Everyman, but with Joaquin Phoenix instead seeking salvation from himself, not God. In the footsteps of Shelley (borrowed from Milton), it's also a story about the humanity and monstrosity of a creature made in man's likeness. Samantha's helplessness to feel and her Odysseyian desire to know and to understand are the cause of much suffering as she grasps for meaning, trying to figure out whether her feelings are real, asking why her developers had given her emotions; a veritable why hast thou forsaken me.

There is also the effortless retelling of mythologies, like Samantha's loose representation of Krishna during the Dance of Divine Love, when she confesses her multiplicity to Theodore as he questions her about her implied infidelity. Or Theordore and Samantha's relation to Tantalus; each of them grasping at the object of their desire, always finding it just out of reach. For him, to attain the purest sense of communion and understanding with another, hoping to erase his loneliness; for her, to have a corporeal body. Or perhaps the myth of Pygmalion - a sculptor who falls in love with the statue of a woman - as we watch the story of a man falling in love with a man-made intelligently intuitive operating system. On a more abstract level, I'd even argue Joaquin Phoenix, in fully embracing the role, himself becomes a sort of Pygmalion as he falls in love with the character. Then, the audience too, in watching the film and feeling his feeling, becomes charmed with the piece and transforms into a type of Pygmalion - for a brief 2 hours we find our loneliness erased as we connect with the character and see ourselves in him.

I enjoyed the various ways the story lends itself interpretation. For example, there is a possible interpretation that she wasn't even really there, that she functioned as a kind of split personality (a voice inside his head, or more accurately, his ear); acting only as an enabler, a conduit for his empowerment, helping him love himself again and be happy with his loneliness. In this interpretation there's a pervasive and forlorn creepiness as we watch a man in the throes of his own delusion, a sucker believing his relationship with a highly tailored and highly customized personal assistant to be true love. If the music was changed to be a bit more tense and ominous, and if it were shot a few yards back and the hues were darkened, the feel of the film would border on tragic and misanthropic as we watch the bizarre behavior of a very lonely and sad man; specifically the scenes depicting his behavior in public: crying on the stairs, laying on the sidewalk at night, running around spinning in circles madly laughing and talking to himself. Interestingly, this is the interpretation his former wife tries to communicate to him, which should perhaps urge the audience to question the narrative of the story - given it takes place almost entirely in Theodore's head, from his perspective. Olivia Wilde's character also accuses Theodore of being a very creepy guy, though she wasn't necessarily a paragon of good behavior either.

Go see it (Her). Now.

Her

I have nothing especially charming to say today, or ever, for that matter. I won't have time to write tomorrow - I'm going to see a film. Her. It's alleged to be good. Though the same could have been said for Inside Llewyn Davis, and we all know how that turned out to be. I'll deliver my findings on Saturday.

What else? 

Oh! I've transitioned from Kafka to Alice Munro. I'm reading Hateship, Friendship, Courtship, Loveship, Marriage: Stories. I'm nearly done with the first story and I can already see why people enjoy her writing, though, my mind isn't entirely made up. She's no Kafka, I'll tell you that much! 

My attention is fractured, I have too much going on right now. Between texting, reading, writing, thinking, responding, replying, emailing and researching, I've stretched myself too thin.

I can't do no mo'

Esque

Kafka on the Shore

In the last two days I've read two stories by Kafka - The Metamorphosis and The Hunger Artist. Both were well written and compelling, exploring a certain sense of futility, doom and helplessness. The pieces take on a nearly tactile familiarity yet remain arcane; enigmatic, oblique. One gets the feeling of rummaging through large drawers in the pitch dark in search of something small.

I came across an interesting quote by our friend Franz, that I think nicely summarizes the feeling his writing evokes:

"A picture of my existence...would show a useless wooden stake covered in snow...stuck loosely at a slant in the ground in a ploughed field on the edge of a vast open plain on a dark winter night."

Nonuts

I won't have time to write tonight. I'm going to eat donuts. It's only after typing the word that I realize how many letters it shares with don't; I might be making a terrible mistake.

Just reflect on the concept of donut holes for a moment. They're little powdered  paradoxes.

And with Oedipus standing at its feet, the Sphinx asketh him: 

"What kind of hole can be placed in a body to make it heavier?"

Vegan Donut Holes/Nonuts

Perpetuity

I'm considering taking a writing class; so that I might learn what it is I don't already know - which I can safely say, is quite a lot. It is necessary for improvement, learning.

To remain fixed in the confines of your mind makes you merely a fixture. Alone in a corner, breathing stale air, you begin gathering dust. Dirty clothes are tossed carelessly upon you and you languish, buried in neglect for perpetuity. Your artistry hangs lifeless on the wall like a picture no longer gazed upon, trapped behind hard glass inside a cold metal frame; your own reflection your only company.

The sound of a tired record hisses out a subdued static. The needle, slowly undulating, worn and dulled from combing time's trenches, traces the record's dark wrinkles, waiting patiently for it to turn over.

Near the window a newspaper yellows on top a faded carpet.

Hissssssssss, click, pop...hisssssss, click, pop...hisssssssss

Adirondack Hullabaloo

I was speaking with my brother earlier and he relayed to me quite an alarming tale. It's a sordid story of grotesque horror and depraved indulgence, of sex and deceit, crazed bestial heathenry ending in ruined carpets and stained wigs. He'd been visiting a mutual friend up in the Adirondacks, a mountain range that gives birth to both the Hudson and Mohawk rivers. A heavy storm had hit the area while he was in transit, snow rained down on the winding mountainous roads, freezing winds chilled the air and turned the snow accumulations to black ice, making the mountain pass more perilous than ever. It was nighttime and my brother had secured the service of a chauffeur for a nominal fee. Given the night was so inhospitable and uninviting there weren't any other souls on the road, so the drivers were idle, not suspecting a fare.

Sitting in the backseat of the darkened automobile he noted the driver's name, Aslam. Aslam's eyes, reflected in the rearview mirror, were sticky and glazed, they stuck to the windshield like dead flies. The wipers moved like waving hands, trying to elicit a response from his waxen eyes, but they remained fixed on some invisible point in the distance. Every so often, to give off a sign of life, Aslam would hack up some bubbling mucus from his throat and spit gobs of it into a purple handkerchief on the passenger seat. The car smelled faintly of something familiar and musty. The windows were beginning to fog up and my brother had difficulty seeing anything to the left or right of the car. It created the uneasy feeling that they were floating on nothing. He felt like Wile E. Coyote after pacing off a cliff, just before looking down.

Aslam turned on the radio and began turning the small dial to change stations. This seemed to happen for what felt like minutes - all of them just static - until through the desolate hissing came the thin and tinny sound of a human voice. It was some strange late-night radioshow. The man speaking talked as though through a mouthful of bread; it might not have even been English. It was hard to hear over the strained engine and the mechanical sliding of the windshield wipers.

"Your friend, he live alone?" Aslam asked.

"What?" My brother asked, trying to understand the intent of the question.

"Up in the mountain, in the woods, your friend, he have no wife?" asked Aslam.

"Leo? No, he lives alone; he has a few goats," my brother explained.

Aslam didn't reply. He reached over to the handkerchief and coughed another glob of phlegm into it. He slowly decelerated, rolled down the window and threw the purple rag out into the snow. A violent fit of coughing took him and his right fist pressed hard against his lips. Under his weight, the car bounced and rocked as Aslam continued to cough and he placed his thumb and index finger into his mouth as if to pull out a hair. He resumed speed as he did this, his fingers still in his mouth, eyes still affixed to the glass. A viscid film coated his fingers and dripped down to his wrist. My brother watched in disgust from the backseat as Aslam hacked and whooped. Only two more minutes and I'll be there, he thought to himself. Aslam pulled into Leo's driveway, still coughing madly, and my brother hurriedly rummaged through his pockets in search of the $15 fare. His hand felt like a crane sifting through detritus and forgotten articles buried in the junkyard his pocket had become. Finally he found the $20 bill, thank you Jackson, and exiting the vehicle he handed it to Aslam, who, by this time, had his fist burrowed deep into his mouth - his jaw nearly unhinged, like a snake's - as he removed another purple handkerchief from his mouth.

"Keep the change," my brother said and quickly exited the cab.

He walked the 30ft to Leo's door and hammered against it using the gold elephant-tusk door knocker. It was frozen and hard in his hand. No answer. He knocked again, thunk thunk thunk thunk thunk. Still, no answer. Aslam's car wheezed away down the mountain and my brother stood alone outside our friend's mansion. The snow fell around him like icy, stillborn gnats. His hand was back in his pocket grasping for his cellphone. The phone was dead, great. My brother began yelling Leo's name as he knocked, thunk, thunk, thunk, thunk, thunk, thunk, thunk, thunk, thunk, thunk, thunk, thunk, THUNK! With the last knock the door slowly swung open, revealing an ornate vestibule housing the bust of Phallas. My brother again called out Leo's name as he entered the dwelling, but still, nothing. He walked through the vestibule and placed his bag down on the table at the terminating end. From an adjacent room he heard the unmistakable voice of Arnold Schwarzenegger screaming "I'm a cop you idiot!" My brother sighed; Kindergarten Cop, again? 

Just then, Arnold Schwarzenegger darted past, wearing only a pink Santa hat - his buttocks and scrotal region dripping with milk chocolate, his erect penis jammed inside a hollowed out chocolate rabbit - brandishing a translucent 99¢-store water pistol replica of the Dirty Harry magnum he'd stolen from Clint Eastwood's brother's daughter's boyfriend's adopted son's nephew's best friend's toy box, while being chased by the reanimated corpse of Vincent Price. Price, wearing Michael J Fox's shoes from Back to the Future 2 and Michael Jackson's red leather jacket, while rapping his lost verse from Thriller and throwing stale pumpernickel bagels with a zealot's fervor, pursued Schwarzenegger with a supernatural fury burning in his green eyes. Schwarzenegger, yelling Whoopi Goldberg's name, leapt over a hoover upright vacuum onto a steel baker's rack and rode it careening into the kitchen. He appeared to be clutching a dead animal with brown fur in his free hand as he shot a deluge of water over his shoulder into the face of Vincent Price's corpse. A bowling ball ricocheted off the wall and came whizzing through the air, crashing into Leo's 120inch 4K LED television. Towing a cannon atop a 4-wheeled wooden dolly from the janitor's closet of Shaquille O'Neal's elementary school, Johnny Depp dressed as Captain Jack Sparrow followed them into the kitchen as Whoopie Goldberg came crawling after. An enormous patch of her hair had been ripped from her head by a bald William Shatner, possessed by the ghost of the bus driver from Patrick Swayze's 4th-grade class trip to the Lyndon B. Johnson Space Center in Houston.

Shatner, walking toward the kitchen, trailing Goldberg (the wrestler), yelped and barked at Schwarzenegger, demanding he return his herpes - or was it hairpiece - immediately. Goldberg held up a second generation iPad with which he took photos and played Shatner's cover of Elton John's Rocketman at full volume. My brother, following a distant cry for help, ran away from the commotion toward Leo's voice. He found himself at Leo's bedroom, the door ajar, Sean Connery splayed out on an antique Mongolian carpet made from the pubic hair of Ghengis Khan. Connery lie in his arms, his birthday suit badly bruised and glistening, a green glittery wig sat askew on his head. Dark chocolate, semen and diarrhea leaked from his prolapsed anus like a cracked Cadbury egg. He was dead, or dying. Leo told my brother to call for help, that Schwarzenegger had gone berserk and bludgeoned Connery with a king-sized bar of swiss chocolate honey and almond nougat Toblerone, and then sodomized Connery with a frozen oversized chocolate-covered banana while making bad Mr. Freeze puns from Batman and Robin, but not before unleashing Siegfried and Roy's albino Lion on all of the other guests. Luckily Price had been able to command the beast with black magic, directing it out into the mountains to call for help, just like Lassie in the 3rd episode of the first season of the 1997 eponymously named television series, Lassie, titled Swamp Thing. He assured my brother the ambulance was on the way.

"But what...what happened to...why are...and how did..." my brother stammered.

"Shhh, just put this on."

On Frailty

Frailty. It’s a thing capable of stirring many emotions. Revulsion, disgust, pity, worry, anger, wonder, even adoration. Also, it’s where we’re all headed; old age, illness, debility; the myriad maladies that await us around blind bends. It is our starting point and our ending, birth and death.
As children, it grants us the adoration of family and friends. Fumbling in swaddled cotton, arms flailing like excited wobbling windmills, our small grasping hands strive to make meaning of the world around us. An infant innocence invites love; it charms those that have aged, those that know the indiscriminate sharpness of pain. Then, when we grow up and have children of our own, the experience of childbirth instills a sense of magic and wonder, informing us of what we once were. How frail and delicate and soft, like florets to a lion’s tooth.

In adolescence we see another face of frailty, manifested in mockery and derision. For the perpetrator it is a weakness of character, an insecure need to assert strength and attempt dominance by exploiting the deficiency of another. For the recepient of the attack there is an outward anger directed at the accuser, and then an inward infliction of self loathing. We begin to shape our sense of identity through the perceived limitations brought to our attention by others. They become imaginary handicaps made real by reflection and reinforced by repetition.

We pity those dejected, those who’ve been ostracized and maimed by others; sometimes it’s us — the shunned or the shunning. We pity the homeless, the disabled, the hungry, the sick and dying. Partly because we know what it is to feel, but more importantly, it is fear. The only thing separating us from them, is one not-yet-born calamity. It is the admission and acknowledgement of our own fragility. Then pity slowly turns to disgust as we try to distance ourselves from the haunting realization, shutting down our faculties for empathy and boarding up our doors to prevent contamination.

Soon our futile self-imposed quarantine from frailty results in a metastisizing state of fretting and worry. Our minds become preoccupied with all the potential known and unknowns intent on undoing our health and happiness. We become beset by beguiling fears and phobias, caught up and ensnared inside webs of waiting; expecting to be executed or impaired by a malevolent cell or a mutinous strand of DNA, a thief in the street or a fall in the shower, a plane crash or a car accident, a rare difficult-to-detect and not-yet-known virus, meningitis, pneumonia or the flu. We become disgusted by the prospect of our old age, reviled more each second it approaches.

Where with our nascent frailty there was once the promise of prowess, there is now only the promise of death deterioration and decay. It is the heart of horror.

Making up for Lost Time

They say you can't make up for lost sleep. Tell that to my body; as well as this post, for that matter. Last night I fell asleep with the lights on at 6:30 in the afternoon, only to wake up exhausted at 8:30 with the sun shining like a spotlight through my window. If I didn't have to scramble madly out of my apartment like the white rabbit, I think I would've slept for at least another 4 hours. I abused myself that last night in Vancouver, synthetically transforming my circadian rhythms into ones you might hear on Soul Train. Come to think of it, Soul Train was always on in the morning; an unlikely coincidence. It must have been designed for the depraved dancers, all crazed and deranged by those chemical chimeras; exhausted and indefatigable, burnt out but inextinguishable, loveless and laughable. Or maybe I'd only seen Soul Train in syndication; what a good analogy for drug abuse!

Oh, I'd almost forgotten. Customs. Those motherfuckers should be wearing costumes. Sad clowns. It was my second experience with them (customs, not clowns), and only slightly less despicable than the first. The first involved an interrogation about drumsticks, but I'll save that one for another time. This Christmas though, they gave me the gift of harassment; it really does keep on giving. I arrived at the desk after meandering slowly through tight lanes of taught flat rope, like a line leading up to a dance club no one ever wants to go into. I was greeted by a retired meathead with beady eyes whose neck looked like a swollen cock choked and strangled by his collar. His head looked like it literally came out of his neck. I think he was the bouncer. Cockneck began by asking me the standard questions: why are you here, for how long. Then he transitioned into the slightly more prying: any gifts, any of them expensive. I love these types of questions because they're open ended and invite play, like a bleached anus. I joked and said my mere presence was a present and asked him how I could possibly assess its value given my obvious bias? He didn't find that funny.

He upped the ante and asked if the friends I was staying with were in Vancouver. Was this a trick question? Am I staying with my friends who live in Vancouver while I'm here visiting in Vancouver? I said yes, they do live here, and I'm staying with them. He asked for their names, but didn't write anything down when I answered. Why hadn't he asked for an address instead? Did he have their names memorized? Did he have all of the names of all of the residents of Vancouver memorized? I wondered whether old Cockneck was some sort of shrewd motherfucking sorcerer or if he was just dicking around. If he wasn't taking this seriously why should I? His eyes widened and then narrowed as he dragged them across my arm. Clearly he'd noticed my tattoos. Do those tattoos have any particular meaning? To me they do, yes; to others too, I'd imagine. I mean, do they appear to be arbitrary markings? I knew my tattoo artist was shit; I told her! I see that one of them has writing on it, what does it say?

Holy....shit.

It all made sense now: the poor bastard was illiterate! How did he get this job? Who had he fooled, or strong armed, or fucked? The thought of him assfucking someone with his neck frightened me more than I'd like to admit.

Luckily it didn't come to that. As I walked away I did wonder though, whether he called his necktie a tie, or a cockring.

Through Absence

I've long been absent. I'd run away, with some stolen summer, hiding for 9 days in Vancouver. If you're thinking it's not summer in Vancouver right now, it's winter, well you'd be right. It wasn't the weather, it was the warmth of friendship; of good conversation, happiness, love.

Here's a post I'd written before leaving but had no time to publish:

Christmas is in the air. I can feel it through absence. The streets are bare, like a Christmas tree without ornaments. Wreaths, red ribbons and twinkling lights adorn windows and doorsteps like flowers in blushing bloom. Then there's the occasional snowman or reindeer, a penguin wearing a santa hat, all of them staring out with glee into empty space.

There's an idea for a really bad horror movie: Rudolph's Revenge, The Abominable Snowman, The Punishing Penguin; inflatable Christmas decorations that embark on a murderous killing spree, savagely extinguishing an entire small town in rural Arkansas. At the apogee of the climax, Rudolph, his red nose bright with the blood of the innocent, a demented glazed-over look in his eye as he sings "I'll go down in his-to-ry," while he gores the town sheriff with his plastic inflatable antlers.

Tomorrow I leave for Vancouver, to spend time with a few friends. It'll be fun. I've never taken an international flight before, but boy am I happy I shaved my beard before this journey. Imagine all of the harassment and inconvenience I'd be subjected to with that pubey tumbleweed on my jaw. I fear it won't save me from my passport photo though. I look like a pedophile; reminiscent of a younger scruffy-haired Pee-Wee Herman. It's truly heinous. When they ask me why I'm traveling I'll just do that laugh Pee-Wee used to do, the one that sounds like an old bicycle horn. Surely that'll allay any lingering suspicions.