Tuesday, November 30, 2004

who's story is this anyway?

had a shockingly long and delightful four-hour dinner with joe tonight. who said americans don't enjoy themselves at a leisurely meal?!

during our four courses including creamy viennese walnut cake, we hit on all the major topics: birth, death, deceits, the mammies and the pappies--not the '60s rock group with michelle phillips, but the phrase i stole from joe, who stole it from his mom. it refers to mammograms and pap-smears. ha-HAAAA! that joe....

at one point joe told me the tale of his family origins--so far as he knows them. the story begins at ellis island, where joe discovered in a flurry of research that his great-greatgrandmother and his greatgrandmother landed in the u.s., having emigrated from poland when his grandmother was three months old.

got all that?

of course the story doesn't actually begin there. but you knew that, didn't you?

it begins someplace earlier in detroit, where his polish greatgrandfather had been working for five years preparing to bring his polish wife and her polish mother to the states.

now keep in mind, i don't tell you that this story is delightful because of the implications its finale has on joe's family but on the assumptions it tears right from the curtain rod--the one we have about how back in the day or in today's day (or insert your prefered era here), people act/-ed differently...better...more civilized...more something... surely. right?

so back to today and joe and his recent flurry of research during his ellis island visit. it seems as he was reading the ship logs from his family's turn-of-the-century travels from old country to new, he discovered--together with his ellis island research assistant bea (who has been dubbed such because she looked like bea arthur from "golden girls")...the inscription scrawled on the records over his then-baby grandmother's name...the word...

"illigitimate"

joe's shockingly long-and-delightfully held family myth dissolved in front of bea's eyes.

because, despite the strange connotations the word conjures--i l l i g i t i m a t e--a little math will show pretty quickly that when a guy who's been gone for five years shows up at home to collect his wife (luuuuuuuuuucy, iiiiiiiii'm hooooooooooooome!) and discovers her five months' pregnant, somethin's not quite ligitimate.

now for me the question is not who's kid is it? but rather why are we still so shocked that this is really the oldest story there is?.

Monday, November 29, 2004

ground zeroes

tonight a friend sent a photo of another "ground zero"--this one in dresden, circa 1945.

in it you see blue-clad gerd standing on a patch of soft soil where, on the day of the bombing, he was in a buggy on the top floor of the house when it tumbled. his mother pulled him from the rubble.

while i've been typing this, one of my coworkers has come in for his late shift. though i'm not eavesdropping, i can hear him tell the big boss that his brother died on this year's anniversary of thanksgiving.

he's not too much older than gerd, i'd say.

here we all are, not knowing one damn thing about each other, and ain't we all just the same anyway... ain't we just...

it's about time

always late for my family's annual thanksgiving weekend party, i do everything backwards and with little thought. today was no different. time drips through my fingers while i'm kneeding, beating, pouring or chopping my way through my recipe. end result: i pack up what's unfinished and head for the door. on the way i pick up buns i didn't order from a bakery that's supposed to be closed. before i know it, rings on woodtops are plentiful and everybody's moving through the night like pregnant women careful of their bellies. it's time to go again--this time back home. i suppose i'm ready to quick-step it to the car in the cold, but i wonder about the time. what time is it?

my nephew louis is on his way to becoming a talented artist; piles of sketchbooks, scads of practice drawings and tube upon tube of paint attest. my niece hannah has a boyfriend--what i mean to say is my niece hannah is old enough to have a boyfriend. my nephew phil has been named to the all-division football team. raymond holds a job, goes to school and courts a beautiful and pleasant girl. naomi is nearly taller than i am. deanna, who isn't taller than i am is nowhere to be seen--busy with school activities, she decides to spend time elsewhere. randy II wants to be a firefirghter; he waits for the callback. kenny jr. now has to stoop to get through doorways. joshua is big enough to move the punching bag when he hits it. emily holds conversations with adults--handily. brendan doesn't cry anymore when he get embarrassed or falls down.

between the party and the front door, i stop for a second in the bedroom to say goodbye to elaina, perched atop the coats watching her latest favorite dvd. she turns primly to me, says: "yes, see you soon, aunt stacy." a regular four-year-old queen elizabeth. oh whatta time.

Sunday, November 28, 2004

dear friends, are your ankles in the air?

vince and i gave $1450 today to a guy who recently drank all night with hunter s. thompson ("he's pissed off [naturally!] about someone shooting a coyote in his yard") and keith caradine. apparently, the ol' chap's hotel room was next door to the former and down the hall from the latter at a recent film festival down south. same guy, back in the day, road managed lynerd skynerd and one other famous vintage rock band. his very good buddy is dilbert mcclinton. recently he hung out back stage with the stones.

"how'd they look?" i asked.

"keith richards looks like a dinasaur," said dean the road manager turned furniture liquidator. "and mick jagger is smaller than you'd think. he's really small."

as for dilbert, he just bought a million dollar house in mexico and is looking to buy one in austin. the place in mexico..."it's really beautiful," said dean with dancing eyebrows.

seems the music bidness ain't too shoddy for some.

***


summerset mall two days after thanksgiving looks and feels like an airport on the same day: the lines stretch out of view and backs bow from package pickup.

you do what you can to amuse yourself while your boyfriend stalks the winter coat that might fit his too-long arms. you suggest that he single-handedly bring back the male poncho. he looks at you with pursed lips. you go sit in the waiting area with overstuffed chairs and doze, the human coat rack.

near the end of my rope, we went into bang & olufsen to goof around with overpriced telephones and stereo receivers. the back room is a giant playroom for the technologically starved moneyed male. sleek black and silver appointments and sexyloud surround sound. bruce, the big&tallest salesman i've ever seen flicks the channel to american football, my cue to leave the boys to themselves.

bruce follows me out.

bruce: are you looking for something special?
me: nah. just seeing what kind of toys the wealthy tech-savvy crowd dig.
bruce: well, you and your husband...(he looks to my face and to vince's and sees the hesitation on both)...or your most easy-going best friend--that's what my friend calls me [great big grin]--might like our...(he begins an inviting diatribe about some system or other) blah blah blah....

vince: well, yeah, it's cool. thanks. (he turns and grabs me so we can reaffirm our commitment to kill a coat and drag it back to the cave or die trying.)

bruce: well, stacy, you and your most easy-going best friend can just give me a call if you have any questions about anything, including the custom furniture we talked about.

i link arms with my most easy-going male best friend and we walk into terminal mall traffic.

***


tonight, after vin set in place the furniture we spent about one month of my salary on, we went to a party at the place of one of his good buddies from his college days. kelly.

within 15 minutes of our arrival kelly and vince were off by themselves in the corner of the dining room, near the hors d'euvres, sniggering about something. the guests immediately flocked and circled.

guest 1: so how do you guys know each other? (smile)
geust 2: (little quiche pointed in their direction) yeah, how?
kelly: we had a class together our freshman year.
guest 2: where?
the word "harvard" is heard above the din from the living room.
kelly: harvard.
guest 2: (snort) yeah right!
kelly: WHAT!? what about me indicates we didn't meet in a class at harvard.
guest 2: hahahaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa!
kelly: tsk.
vince: we had this advanced lit class with...kraft, right kel?
kelly: yeah. weird scene. vince looked about the normalist guy in the class. he had this black t-shirt on that probably said "harpos*" on it. he had these black pants ["which he still probably has!" i yell]. he was super tall and his legs were about the same size around as his arms [and just about as long--see comment above about our trying to find a jacket that fits them].
vince: yeah.
kelly: yeah. we immediately bagan to make fun of everybody in the room.
vince: some things never change.

*in the mid-80s harpos was the detroit hot spot for entertainers in the vein of mitch rider, poison, twisted sister and the like. harpos then closed for years after murder and mayhem ensued. it reopened but the death-wish-inflected thrill seekers hung out. poison and twisted sister still probably play there.

***


after a few hours of eating, drinking and chatting at this party of about a dozen late-30-somethings--some happylooking, some not-so-happylooking, i found myself in the kitchen with phil, kelly's good-natured liberal neighbor. seamus and kelly's husband keith were across the newly renovated kitchen, leaning againt the counter, tall drinks in hand. i recognize them both from keith's 25-year-old? black-and-white little league photos upstairs.

seamus: (to stacy) so, stacy, what's your story? you came with phil? (to phil) you sleeping with her?
me: (looking to phil) well, i came in the room with phil and i'm having a conversation with phil. but no, i'm not sleeping with phil.... would you like to know who i sleep with?
keith: oh, i know who you sleep with.
seamus: don't i know you from somewhere? you look really familiar.
me: aaaaaaaaaah, haven't i heard that one before? kidding. but no, really, seamus, i don't think so. i don't remember meeting you before tonight.
seamus: oh, so, it wasn't you with your ankles up in the air...?

phil, standing next to me, did not answer, looked a pinch embarrassed then bored. he left the room quietly soon after this exchange.

you know, vince, my most easy-going male best friend, says i hate men. and well, i don't remember asking to be imagined by anybody with my ankles up over my head or anybody else's for that matter... so i guess i do hate what happens when i'm privvy to some things about men.

sometimes it embarrasses me. sometimes it offends me. always it intrigues me. and i'm still working my way through the taking-it-personal.

and so to vince, well... i don't hate all men. and like jesus h. (was it him?) has been quoted as saying: love the sinner, hate the sin. meanwhile, i guess i'm waiting for a few more gents to raise the bar--and not for any body parts.

till then... i'll keep my ankles where they'll give me the most benefit when i'm exercising on a horizontal plane. at heart level.

Friday, November 26, 2004

mm-MM good

why is dieting impossible?
because not even guilt sticks as tightly to the ribs as a mile-high pile of garlic mashed potatoes or buttery crusted pumpkin pie and chocolate chip cookies, that's why.

made it through another thanksgiving dinner. thank god.





Thursday, November 25, 2004

i win, you win, nobody wins

it's a bright thanksgiving morning. 10:40am and already 3 phone calls and myriad emails answered. last night's snow is ice on the pavement. last night's dinner is rumbling in the belly. and last night's play (yes yes the mystery of irma vep--starring john seibert and john lepard) is still in mind. as is the ethical discussion i had with nurse ellen on the way there, and the friend-versus-expectation argument i had with boyfriend vince just before curtain.

here's what all signs point to: people's "ethics" are driven by their expectations and perspective. and sadly everybody (at least folk i usually come across) wants to "be right"--or, perhaps better, to "win."

(for a nearly unbelievable example of a too close examination of this simple truth and how it gets us all into awful trouble: stella awards 2004.)

it's all so base(ic) really. the difference is in how broad or narrow your vision, how articulate your speech, how selfish or slippery you want to be, and how bad you want to stop pounding your round ideas into someone else's square head (or vice versa).

and so. i've decided and will redecide every time it happens--if i remember--patience is a virtue (that's why is so fucking hard, duh), and from now on when i need to halt an escalating argument, i'll simply say: "you win."

maybe maybe i'll hear my own scolding.

Wednesday, November 24, 2004

michael jackson is becoming

last night i hung out with a few friends from work and wanda the german economics student in what happens to be a frigid warehouse/theatre/concert hall/who-knows-what-anymore building downtown. actually, it's pretty much in crackville (about one mile away from the coolest university in the city of detroit, wayne state -- where dj leaureate kasey kasem, pulitzer prize-winning poet philip levine and various others matriculated).

the goliath of a building is in a sort of suspended animation--a real halfway house--the area is...hm...trying to...regentrify, i guess. but it's questionable according to many, and it's happening at a slug's pace. anyway, local drug dealers, vagrants and myriad itinerants have sway. and, well, as these things usually go, the artist-owner and his wife who live in one of the building's many compartments are cool and have cred in the community so there's relative peace in the vicinity.

i'd been to this ghostly place on two separate occasions before. once for a halloween bash. three years ago i think. it looked different, but i suppose it's only the light and my perspective. then, for me, it was strangely becoming.

and the second time, early last year, for an editorial meeting for a new litery arts magazine. during the first visit i didn't notice how cold the place was...too many people and too much dancing. during the second visit, i noticed exactly how cold it was, as i was already deep into a cold. besides, my doctor believes i have renauds disease, and no matter what the mercury indicates, nothing short of a texas summer does much to make my fingers thaw. still, the place was becoming. become what is the question.

this third time, however, a $20 space heater kicked out enough heat to take the visibility out of our breath. and tom, a kid who at last check was supposed to be living in reykjavik, was entertaining the troops with his trusty laptop and adult-style distraction--including x-rated concert footage and the single best piece of pop culture of the 80s: thriller.

michael jackson.

from childstar

to snake oil salesman
(which video was that, anyway?)

to molting snake,

the king of pop has become finally--and seems to remain--the prince of poop.

how easily majesty crumbles. you'd barely even guess at what it hides. and still, still, it is becoming. it must be. why else would we be so fascinated?

Tuesday, November 23, 2004

jeff daniels is a weirdo

funny, i intended to buy tickets today for a play at jeff daniel's playhouse in chelsea, michigan. neither vince, nor ellen, nor i have been there yet.

take one guess who, this afternoon, walked right into the station to do an interview about his new cd whose proceeds go to raise money for his chelsea, michigan-based theatre...? yes, dear reader, serendipity is crazy.

while i had him (jeff himself) sort of captive (i was taking pictures of him for wdet's website), i mentioned that i was really looking forward to picking up some tickets for irma vep.

in short - and from the purple rose website:

"
The Mystery of Irma Vep, directed by Anthony Caselli, is a campy tribute to Gothic horror films, stealing liberally from well-known film classics and literary masters alike. Two actors play all of the play's eight characters, racing through a literal quick-change marathon complete with werewolves, vampires, and damsels in distress. Combine all that with crazy plot twists (two characters travel from England to Egypt to inspect a mummy), and The Mystery of Irma Vep guarantees fun for everyone!
"

so i toss my irma-related comment (read 2 paragraphs above) over my shoulder to jeff as i leave him to his interview with celeste. he responds: "See it on one of the nights. I mean, the understudies are great, too, but the two actors //...editor's note: stacy, insert actors' names here when you locate them, b/c you can't remember what jeff said and the guys' names are no place you can find on the purple rose website. tsk...// do such a great job. i saw Irma three time -- I usually see everything once, but it's so hilarious, I've seen it more. You'll love it. Really, be sure to go on one of the nights."

huh.

so real. he's a super tall version of... well, your next door neighbor. (the cool next door neighbor, not the jackass who yells and swears at his kids loud enough for you to hear him through saturday morning sleep-ins...like he has no idea he's the one single-handedly stunting their maturity.)

but what a weirdo eh? (i'm talking about jeff the cool guy neighbor type, not the jackass.)

i hear he even takes his family across nation in an r.v. when he's got to be on location. again, i mean jeff.

and here i was thinking that even semirockstar actors are not allowed to do shit that cool. isn't that what you're thinking, too? it's, like, against rockstar credo or something.

well, looks like ol jeff daniels is giving rockstardom a bad bad name.

yeeeeeeeeeeeeeah!

and so, dear reader, after wednesday night's performance i'll be able to let you know about the actors' names--and i'll even tell you my impression of how rockstardom births and breeds community theatre in a little town in the great lake state....

till then, let's all break a leg.

Sunday, November 21, 2004

dad

so my dad and barb came over for dinner tonight. it's strange...the older i get the more real he becomes. i can swear. i can say. i can be. and he takes it in, and if he doesn't agree, i see his eye twitch. and he laughs too loud sometimes--well, all the time. and he still loves to wear his polakgear--you know, the white sweat socks with dress shoes. and he loses his temper a little too often for my taste these days (sorry, barb, you inherited that too when you married im). but he doesn't squelch my ideas. and he's proud as shit of me. and he give me room to be what i am.

and it reminds me that most people say--and have always said, actually--"your dad's a good guy." and i'd squint at the comment, wondering what the hell it meant. "good guy." what's that? it's not briliant, not ambitious, not...anyting other than "good." and tonight, it hit me. good. "a good man." and i sit at my keyboard and i kind of smile and cry. just a little cry. but a kind of big smile.

it's really fvcking cool. it's not a bad heritage, you know. it's not too hard to look at my future in his face--crooked nose and all. it ain't a trust fund and it don't take my retirement worries away. but sure is money, baby.

dad, whererever you are when you read this, thank you.

Saturday, November 20, 2004

the joke, the poles

first, a joke:

A Polish man married a Canadian girl after he had been in Canada a year or so and, although his English was far from perfect, they got on very well. Until one day he rushed into a lawyer's office and asked him if he could arrange a divorce for him - "very quick." The lawyer said that the speed of getting a divorce would depend on the circumstances and asked him the following questions:

LAWYER: "Have you any grounds?"
POLE: "JA, JA, an acre and half and a nice little home with 3 bedrooms."

LAWYER: "No, I mean what is the foundation of this case?"
POLE: "It is made of concrete, brick and mortar."

LAWYER: "Does either of you have a real grudge?"
POLE: "No. We have a two-car carport and have never really needed one."

LAWYER "I mean, What are your relations like?"
POLE: "All my relations are in Poland."

L AWYER: "Is there any infidelity in your marriage?"
POLE: "Yes, we have hi fidelity stereo set & DVD player with 6.1sound. We don't necessarily like the music, but the answer to your questions is yes."

LAWYER: "No, I mean, Does your wife beat you up?"
POLE: "NO, I'm always up before her."

LAWYER: "Is your wife a nagger?"
POLE: "NO, she white."

LAWYER: "WHY do you want this divorce?"
POLE: "SHE going to kill me."

LAWYER: "What makes you think that?"
POLE: "I got proof."

LAWYER: "What kind of proof?"
POLE: "She going to poison me. She buy a bottle at the drug store and put on shelf in bathroom. I can read - it says, Polish Remover.'"

ain't it just like life? we're all sort of speaking the same language and still, the mix-up, the paranoia, the confusion. like we forget to take the lens cap off - everything is blacked out, so there we go ... alone in the dark (or worse, with a lawyer) prattling on about nothing. we believe our worst fears - that everything around us is ridiculous and strange, and worse, that we are ridiculous and strange (of course, we are) - and this ridiculousness and strangeness is evident to those around us (of course, it is).

we are struck with bubonic-plague... (or, in the case of our joke, divorce-court...) seriousness when it comes to ourselves.

and so we walk around wondering, what language ARE they, those, them over there speaking?

like tonight. i was at the "taste of royal oak" event in, well, royal oak, michigan. talk about poles: there was a doggie fashion show - yes, you heard right - onstage - by a joint called the uppity puppy. i am not making this up. see www.theuppitypuppy.com. this joint is a ... ready? ... "gourmet doggy bakery & boutique." apparently the first of its kind (can we get an "amen!"?) for the ... ready again? ... "pampered furry child or grandchild."

they even bake ... you want me to go on, don't you? ... "birthday cakes are decorated with a clown, balloons and a candle, with the furry child's name and age. extra clowns, balloons & candles available at extra cost."

well, duh.

i can't stop yet. the sick thing is ... here's where i get jealous. they make stuff using purified water, organic vegetable broth, michigan wild flower honey, and a bunch of other yummy crap. what is up with this?!

somebody here has waaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaay too much disposable income and it ain't me.

then the event got really surreal - then again, i am polish, i could simply be reading waaaaaay too much into this... (i'm telling you i only had ONE plastic cupfull of wine). the fashion show really took off with noir leather's barely legal young face-pierced ones trying to wag tale in silly black hair and fetish fashion (although the plastic stretch elbow-length gloves were pretty sweet). they had about the same amount of choreography and fear in their eyes as the hot dogs who preceeded them.

0w-ow-ooooooooooooowwwwwwwch.

then a few more un-embarrassing (and therefore boring) retailers showcased their wares. at that point, the audience was so far into the joke, waiting for it all to kill us, we held our breath for the punch line....

our salvation came on time, at the end, with the dozen-or-so-member second ebenezer baptist choir of detroit. they cleaned up the smut-and-pup-riddled stage with a little "GO TELL IT ON THE MOUNTAIN...JESUS CHRIST IS BORN!" you know, with perfect timing, pitch and tempo. the perfect pauses, the e v e r i n c r e a s i n g c r e s c e n d o... the the "polish-remover."

thank god we live through the joke.

Friday, November 19, 2004

alien ideas

today i got i got inducted into a newish international honor society founded in longbeach, california, in 1986. phi beta delta. i can't help but think that at stanford or harvard, the induction experience would be different than the one i had in the heart of the motor city. i imagine no crying baby in the back. no stuttering introductions. waaaay better lighting in the auditormium.

then again, why kick a gift horse in the teeth?

i found out from our main speaker jack kaye, associate provost (and a slew of other posts) at wayne state university, that only 25-40 percent of american lawmakers (that's everybody in the legislative branch of our government) holds passports. and that fewer than 15 percent of american people have traveled outside the united states.

p e o p l e : you can reach out and touch another country from california and from michigan! what is going on here?! and our president can barely speak english--and he jokes about it. a n d he gets laughs for the jokes.

i feel like fred sanford when esther walks in: devastated by ugliness. elizabeth, i'm comin' to join ya, honey.

and we're the "leaders" of the world economy. bah. yes yes, money talks. but aparently, it doesn't have to walk... far.

and while jack continued, he mentioned that according to some official statistic-taking body, 93 percent of the american public believes that international education is important and approximately 75 percent of these same people believe university-level international education is necessary....

hm. i just wanna know where do we americans get this international idea if in actuality it's alien even to our own civic leaders. (maybe they confuse living on the moon with living overseas.)

of course! that's it! maybe.... shhhhhhhhhh... we got it (the idea of "international") from our resident aliens--you know, the ones who get up and cross those mental and geographic borders.

Wednesday, November 17, 2004

escape

i sent a package to a friend in italy recently.

this friend, frankie (aka francesco pollonara), came to the states to study for his italian masters degree and to see the world as we say. he was here (in detroit - a very far cry from northeast italy for sure) for six months. during one of the 182 nights he spent on our continent, we snuck out of my house b/c two friends were arguing, sweaty and boring facts flying around the room. we made snow angels in my backyard in the virgin white while marco's voice rose and fell "the roman empire extinguished itself due to..." "this country is built on a principle unlike any other principle on the planet...", and our boots made waffled tracks down my street to the swings where second graders sit and scream from in the weekday afternoons.

and when i last saw frankie, in italy, in the mountains, we were hours from anything. he visited me in my summer exile and we walked in the dusk while fireflies hovered fat and bright on the periphery of our road. the next day we walked in the sun while blue-green and green-blue pines swayed in the valleys below us. we sat breathing. and he said lies are essential. he said truths are essential. and i diagreed and agreed. regarding lovers; regarding bosses; regarding friends and parenti (family).

when i said what i said, on that bench in abruzzo, i meant every word. and now, four months later, i don't know if i agree at all with my-then-self. what the hell happens when you lift the veil? maybe you just pull another one out of your sleeve and tack it up.

and frankie, he's been back in northeast italy - a very far cry from southeast michigan for sure) for way more than a year now.

so the package. a pewabic tile with the skyline of detroit. bluish. "if italy cannot come to detroit then detroit should come to italy," said my message. he put it on his desk.

"you are correct," his reply said. "and you are correct, stacy.... whatever our souls are made of, they are the same."

he wants to come back the u.s. to find work, to find a different life.

and i want to go back to italy.

everyone's looking for something beautiful, i guess.

Tuesday, November 16, 2004

all songs written by bob schneider

before anybody says another word, bob schneider is from michigan. ok then.

i asked vince, just a few minutes ago on the phone, right after he inquired and i substantiated the fact that, yes, i had in fact not bedded down with bob, what's the difference between ricardo "de brazil" (see "chicago is..." entry on monday, 15 november 2004) whom i met on the platform of the red line yesterday, whose perfect directions got my ass to midway on time, and bob schneider.

vince said it was in fact that bob has something to give, tell, show to as many people as want to take, listen, see what he offers.

so it is not in the quality of life, but rather the sharing of that quality.

so what about bob. bob schneider jr. is hijinks. he is sappy ballads. he is raunch and fuck jokes. he is kind of dirty looking. and he is quiet and he has nice hands. and he can sing his mutherfucking ass off and play the guitar like...like he knows what he's doing.

see&hear for yourself. more later on this mutherfucker. i need some sleep.

just remember, everybody, despit the fact austin is his adoptive home, HE WAS BORN IN MIIIIIIIICHIGAAAAAAAAAAN!

Monday, November 15, 2004

chicago is...

well, i spent the last 24 hours in chicago. one thing i can say is: why the hell isn't detroit living up to its potential like that place? i could spend an eternity talking about it, but i'll spare you.

let's just say i had fun. between the el (or "L") and etheopian food, the polish liquor store/bar, too many brownstones and cabbies, and a tall brazilian who's ethnically ukranian (father's side) and who lives next to midway airport and whose english-speaking roommate works at o'hare, and getting back to my car to find my ignition and house keys lying on the floor on the passerger side glistening in the light on the otherside of the locked door, i'm exhausted and need to sleeeeeeep.

Saturday, November 13, 2004

in the quiet before sleep

i gotta go to sleep immediately.
but before i do, a poem i heard yesterday morning as i woke up:

nothing happens
almost nothing
a feather falls

Friday, November 12, 2004

ambiguity

tonight i smoked alone and then proceeded to try to paint my soon-to-be romper/tv room, clean up my office (very very very very very difficult at best), pull the hunks of lentil soup out of the pot i forgat to take off the stove before i started to paint, wash the dishes, begin and ...(i need a word here/can't remember...sounds and acts like "repudiate" i think. you know, it means drop because your attention drifted elsewhere...)...anyway, i started and eventually stopped organizing the mail, ... you still with me? ... it goes on, and it includes walking into a wall of destressing gospel music. bammmmmmm whooooooaaaa. ollabelle. you gotta check 'em out. self-titled album, track number 4 is what did it. "Jesus On The Mainline."


jesus on the mainline



l him what you want . . .
e l
t


anyway, becaue i was realizing at that very moment how like david sedaris i really am (my man vince corroborated this fact ........... ;C .......... with me mometarily ago. so i walk right almost-blammo into this room of sound. and i felt it hit me, then weirdly, it settled over me, settled kind of inside me -- and surrounded me at the sametime.


and i just let it all go.





i flopped on the couch like a fish with tuby-tunnel hollowy arms. i felt and yet did not feel my hands. i had an idea what they must look like if i were looking from the outside of me, looking from say the upper corner across the room. it's a good 15 feet, i guess. and there's i be hovering over there just observing me. and there i was on the couch starting to feel silly for exploding with weepingness, yet still weeping and telepathing, i guess, to my othersame self across the room.

but wait, i think from the couch -- and from across the room -- how and more importanty why should i be watching myself. why should anybody be watching, or investigating rather, this... me.

and so, i reintegrated and felt just awfully wonderful crying out loud on the couch listening now to track 5 (b/c some time has past and track 4, though an instigator, has left the scene). i welcomed myself back to myself, gave up and got god. and my tears stoppedish and i laughed from my guts as 3 or 4 seconds before i gave it everything i got to ... love myself? peace myself? give myself permission open the cage door of my frustration.

and now, even though i'm sitting at my desk, and i continue to see one more thing -- the plastic-parisiany coasters at the upper corner of my desktop (given to me by my own philosopher waitress jenny. i would like to see her again, it's been 17 years.


holy shit.


17.



years.




i was 15 and she was 2 husbands down and a new nose later b/c one of them had busted it for her. she put down alcoholism and loved lipgloss (she looked very cute in it). we (in jest but as a testament to her seriousnous) drew up a contract so she would quit smoking--i later tried that trick on my then-boyfriend. it was a noble effort but eventually he caved and i found out from one of the young smart-ass boys he worked with. at the christmas dinner table with all his work buddies i had never met. i guess he'd been smoking for a few months, maybe less, at that point. i felt rather bad about the whole thing. i mean, he felt pressured into lying. probably because he figured he wasn't measuring up (to some ~divine "potential" in my eyes. somehow, however, we tend to ignore the implications for ourselves, which is probably why i'm having a bit of a hard time articulating exactly what...exactly...i felt.

i felt like there was a breach. and because, well, everything runs toward entropy and the course is set until something , or someONE, changes it. and so, it happened for a reason, but what fvcking reason. ? .

and so it continued... for some time... and i still love him. but the two of us, we stopped.

necessarily, we stopped.

but that's that. where WAS i before i started this tangent.

vince, you might be right. maybe i DO need drugs. but,really, do yu really think so... A-D-D. ? . really?

> s i g h <

Thursday, November 11, 2004

zina, the dude on the radio and paul

let me tell you about zina, a kid who really seems to know where it's at.

three nights ago in dallas, we're all at dinner--russ&sudi, ric&sheila (with zina) and vince&me. and russ is making small talk with zina between bites of cake.

he goes: "so, zina, what do you want to be when you grow up?" keep in mind she's five.

and she tilts her head to one side and goes, "what?" like "what are you even talking about?"

so he repeats the question: "so, zina. what do you want to be when you grow up?"

and she kinda laughs because his question is, of course, silly.

"a human being what else?" she says.

***


outside of raleigh, north carolina, thirty-four years ago, a 10-year-old boy stopped bouncing his basketball to listen to his neighbor tell him about a murder that just occured up the road. the story is one we've heard before. it goes something like this: young black man, older white man, one dead, the other unpunished even after a trial by his peers.

only, the story doesn't stop there. in this story, the boy lives the following 34 years as evidence to the murder. his book, Blood Done Sign My Name is now available. one moment in a life, 34 years in gestation.

and even today, at the headstone of the murdered man's grave, tim tyson, who traded in his basketball for a phD in african-american studies, stutter-steps through his thoughts. "i came out here," he says, "because the murder of henry marrow marked my life and it marked my hometown. and coming to grips with that has been kind of a life work for me because...it's not just henry marrow you know...it's kind of a symbolic thing about our history and the difference between us, and how we reconcile that and how we come to be one country."

another kid who knew about being a human being. another kid who realizes the vast interiority of the self.

***


tonight i met a friend up at the bar. trouble is i didn't spend much time with her because i ran into another--i can't say friend exactly, but i can say my closest girlfriend's ex from, oh, more than 10 years ago.

anyway, paul. he's a lawyer now. says he's surrounded by republicans at work. he's married now. he said very nice things about my friend. of course, it took me about 30 seconds once outside the bar to call her. she was stunned.

"paul!? said that!?

"yep."

"huh. he said he was a real asshole? he said he was immature? he said to say hello to me? he said he hopes i'm happy? how does he look? is he fat? how does he look-- wiat!--did you think he was good looking back then?"

it went on like that for some time. she'd barrage me with questions, then settle into a little cloud of thought.

"it's almost..." she sounded like she was going to cry..."sad."

"it's not sad, it's great!" i said.

"yeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeaah," she sighed. "that is...really...nice."

sometimes i guess it takes a little time for kid logic to kick in.

Wednesday, November 10, 2004

today and yesterday

i met doug lansky today. the bastard. he's got this great job and he spent years doing cool shit so that he could have this great job. the bastard. doug lansky, in case you've never heard of him, is this 34-year-old guy who decided at some point to stand tall and wing it through the world. and then, on top of that, he decided to write about it. the bastard. here: check it out.

naturally, he's a very cool guy. so after i missed the free eurail pass giveaway (a $900 value) and most of his lecture and about how cool it is to travel all over the world living on a little ego and daredevilishness and not a whole hell of a lot else but the sense that fate gave him (see herman hesse's takeoff on nietzche in an 1919 essay that i now lift, like eddie haskell would, from the introduction of penguin books' 1999 publication of hesse's Siddhartha: "To whomsoever Fate comes from the outside, it kills him as the arrow kills the deer. To whomsoever Fate comes to from within, it empowers him and makes him into a god."), i HAD to show doug lansky something of MY town. something really fucking amazing. something really unbelievable. something that creates humility where humility may never have existed--or maybe where it is born. something that not only symbolizes beauty, betrayal and bloodless death, but does so in vibrant graffiti and dozens of floors of jawless elevators and jagged-tooth windows: detroit's michigan central railway station.

to see it is to see the the pain of the smallest slum of equador, india, africa, poland, elsewhere, everywhere. to see it is to see your father cry. the utter loss of hope, loss of sense. it is old grandeur's faint heartbeat. it is a patient in very bad coma. it is the epicenter of detroit--totally ransacked.

anyway, we drove there tearing open a discussion about the unbelievably crappy turnout of the 2004 presidential election and how doug lansky had gotten dave barry to sign a letter of reference that said, and i quote, "hire doug lansky or i'll kill you." see what i mean! unreal.

we pull up to the usual ghostland and--people!--workin men under hard hats and inside bright fleece sweatshirts were milling about. one was eating a peanut-butter and jelly sammy. another was talking on his cell phone. these were dudes on the job. and before i could park the car, doug lansky had already loped on over to the crew, did some fast talking, donned a hard hat and was walking into the long-gone majesty. i ran after, trying to act like i owned the place, too.

it's not the same inside with midday light pouring through its gaping wounds--or with hollywood additions (turns out they're shooting a movie in my beaten up building: michael bey's The Island, with ewan mcgregor, scarlett johansson, djimon hounsou and steve buscemi. all taken from The Island, written by alex kurtzman, roberto orci and caspian tredwell-owen.)

aply enough, dreamworks is the distribution company. i guess anything is possible. it remains to be seen, however, if "dreamworks" implies what we're dreaming about the building or what the building is dreaming about us inhabitants.

at any rate, i had my camera (blind dumb luck! i think doug lansky really must have some sort of midas touch) and snapped off a couple shots. "it's easy," i think doug lansky says, but i'm not sure because i might just be thinking out loud.

"yeah," i say. "easy." and i wonder how long, how many it will take before this place is strong enough to breathe without the machine. or maybe it will just implode, unable to bear the weight of a fantasy future.

"just focus," says dough lansky. the secret revealed. i try to take one more photo for good measure, but it's hard because my hands are getting stiff from cold. it's november and i can see my breath inside this building.

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