Days Between Stations

“We are all of us living stories that on some deep level give us satisfaction. If we are unhappy with our stories, that is not enough to free us from them.” –Jane’s tutor, “Iron Dragon’s Daughter” by Michael Swanwick

During his freshman October at Duke, an autumn storm fell heavily upon Durham leaving the East Campus full of black ponds and puddles at night. Jack and his friends were rushing from the parking lot to Pegram. The walkway had disappeared underneath the reflections of the orange lamps on the water that had inundated the back lawns of the dorms. None of them had been wise enough to bring an umbrella in the quick trip to Franklin Street and back.

One of Jack’s friend was a North Carolina native, and warned them that they should watch their step. Copperheads were known to come out during the rain, easily rattled and somewhat poisonous. Jack was from the northeast, and the closest he ever got to a snake were small, three-inch long garter snakes, so he made short thrift of the warning as he ran. Then he heard his friend yell, “Stop!”

A few feet ahead of him, something long, thin and sinuous moved slightly above the water. It was perpendicular to him, and soon vanished into the darkness. Jack and his friends moved more carefully after that.

When Jack saw the snake, he felt two incongruent emotions at the same time, both of which had kept him still. He felt awe, amazed that such a creature could exist. He knew theoretically that copperheads did exist, but to see the actuality of such an animal but a few feet ahead stunned him. The other emotion he felt was terror. Had he kept running, he would have been bitten. Had the copperhead sense him, it could have changed course.

Since then, Jack had felt awe and terror on several occasions, though not simultaneously. He hadn’t thought about the copperhead until today.

Jack had been rereading Steve Erickson’s first novel, “Days Between Stations.” It was the type of novel that didn’t have a summary of plot on the back cover, but instead had glowing quotes from various authors, including Thomas Pynchon. Of course, the reason for this was that it was a novel that was so dense with atmosphere, relationship and entanglements that it would do it a disservice to summarize the novel as “a novel about love,” or “a novel of a quiet apocalypse.”

He began rereading “Days Between Stations” when the Santa Ana winds kicked up, making the October days unseasonably hot, while the nights were cold. The descriptions of Los Angeles slowly covered by sands, of Paris burning in bonfires during a frozen winter, or Venice losing its lagoons, all of which were described languidly and matter-of-factly without any explanation, seemed appropriate for the strange days near the close of October.

Jack had not read the novel in a while, and so had forgot the details of the novel even though he remember specific images. The impulse that drove him from scene to scene was not the relationship between Lauren, her unfaithful husband Jason and Michel, but rather the scenes of moonbridges in the backyards of Los Angeles homes, or the innate blue light of Wyndeaux. The connections between those impulses, though, were the descriptions of the emotional lives of the characters, the yearnings and losses.

When Jack reached page 226, he felt that same mixture of awe and terror as when he saw the copperhead.

Jack had first read “Days Between Stations” eleven years earlier. The scene when Lauren went to Venice after her husband, Jason, who had been carelessly unfaithful, knowing that Lauren would always forgive him, begged for once last chance obviously had not registered with Jack after his first couple of readings. Nor did the passages of Michel’s arrival, confident that Lauren would not forgive Jack, Michel's interminable wait for Lauren’s answer, Michel's incomprehension when Lauren chose Jason.

But nine years after first reading “Days between Station,” the first among many incidents occurred with Jack’s own Lauren, a woman named Lynn, on a certain terrible Friday afternoon. And two years after that afternoon, reading the novel again on the hot October day, Jack realized that pages 226 through 238 described with one hundred percent accuracy the actions and emotions of that certain terrible Friday afternoon.

There were superficial differences. Jack’s own interminable waiting took place in his flat in Westwood instead of a hotel room in Venice, Lynn’s discussion occurred in Century City instead of the Accademia Bridge. But otherwise, the passages described almost perfectly Jack’s slow disintegration, Lynn’s decision to stay with Jon, even Jon’s pleading bitter tone toward Lynn.

Jack’s own story and “Days Between Stations” would diverge significantly after that. However, the awe and the terror remained.

To see his own actions and emotions described in a book written twenty years ago, and first read eleven years ago, awed Jack. If he were more metaphysically inclined, he would say he was awed that a novel could foretell events in his own life so clearly. That life suddenly became a piece of metafiction excited and amazed him.

However, the terror came in more than one form. Jack was rational enough to understand that he’s not the first person to be on the losing end of a love triangle, and perhaps the fact that his life so coincided with a novel was that his life, his emotions were simply a cliche. The terror also came from the thought that, if there were some sort of connection between what he read and what happened to him, then he was more than likely doomed “to find himself so near a precipice, and yet to realize so dispassionately what was happening to him[.]”

There was someone new, though to say “new in his life” was somewhat of an overstatement and perhaps a jinx. Suffice it to say, there was a new character and whether she becomes a major character or briefly mentioned in a passage is still uncertain. However, the closeness of “Days Between Stations” unnerved him. He began thinking of what other novels from which his future might fashion.

He could attempt to tread more carefully with the new character, and hopefully fashion his life to one of the lighter stories. And yet, well, yet has still to be fashioned. In the meantime, Jack will simply have to hope that the new character, in whatever role she plays, will cause a different satisfaction at a deeper level, one to change his story.

Living with the Law

I just had a conversation with a friend and former colleague, we'll call her Special K (not because she's special in a short bus kinda way or special in the other kinda way, but just because it sounds friggin' cool). She and I started at my first BigLaw gig at the same time, and we got along because we both knew from the start that the legal gig should be viewed as a temporary phase to be endured until we saved up enough money to stop being miserable.

What's funny in our conversations is that we always turn to the same topic, even if we hadn't spoken for months, and that topic is this: At our age, aren't we supposed to have figured out what the fuck we want to do with the rest of our lives?

Special K now works only part time for BigLaw--in her calculus, which should be applauded, that additional income of billing 2400 didn't nearly compensate her for the time she would have lost watching her two kids grow up. But the funny aspect is that she's been saying that she'll leave the legal profession entirely for the last three years, and it was kind of a shock to find out she was still at BigLaw today.

Not that I'm fairing any better. There's a part of me almost gagging to get back into the law--mainly because I don't want to use all my reserves up. And unfortunately, the Santa Monica gig is still slow and has decided that's the way it likes it. So I'm stuck in the position of potentially working at Certain Someone's firm, which is apparently hiring though I haven't heard back. This is a shit position, no matter how you look at it. Either I get the gig and get paid a load a cashish while my emotional stability takes a hit, or I don't which means I have to settle for much lesser paying gigs or even worse, no gigs at all.

In any event, back to the what the fuck am I doing with my life issue. Although being a document review drone pays a helluva lot better than being a bag boy at Whole Foods or a book stocker at Borders, the law--with it's inherent adversarial nature, where mostly fucktards rise to the top--is an emotional and intellectual grind. It leaves many of us physically ill thinking about forty years of dealing with asshole opposing counsel, incompetent case management and, well, document review. So obviously, being a lawyer is not what I want to be doing for the rest of my life. I guess I should take comfort in that I am far from the only one out there who feels this way.

On the other hand, what is the alternative? I've begun to realize that, even though I can write damn well, it's the impetus to write damn well about something that is lacking most of the time. And even if I could churn out a short story a day, a novel a month, publishing is still a complete crap shoot. I know, I see the advice about writing everyday, the platitudes that you don't write for money but out of love. And I do love writing. But if it were that easy, then every earnest blogger out there, every plump New Jersey housewife who writes fanfiction for Days of Our Lives, every nebbishly Los Angeles Starbucks barista would be best-selling authors.

What keeps me going is that I don't want to end up twenty years from now and saying, "I gave up on my dreams when I was fifty," which my dad actually said. (If there's a narrative that I'm living, I'd rather it not be Willy Loman's.)

But in the meantime, it looks like I, as well as a multitude of discontent attorneys. will just have to go on doing the whole lives of quiet desperation thing. Shit. Thank God for XBOX 360s, Oban scotch and the furtive glances of green eyes I guess.

And now for something completely different

For some reason, this skit from Kids in the Hall makes me laugh and laugh and laugh . . .

Pyramid Song

"I jumped in the river and what did I see?
Black-eyed angels swam with me
A moon full of stars and astral cars
All the things I used to see
All my lovers were there with me
All my past and futures
And we all went to heaven in a little row boat
There was nothing to fear and nothing to doubt"
--"Pyramid Song", Radiohead

Lately, a recent memory began replaying in his mind. At the beginning of the year, he had been invited to celebrate a friend's birthday at a dinner and flamenco show in Los Feliz. He was still taking several blood pressure pills at the highest dosages, making him faintly and pleasantly dizzy on a regular basis.

Evening came quickly and early, so that by six, it was already pitch black save for the orange lights coming from street lamps. He had not eaten much during the day, nor had he drank much alcohol in the prior months. Yet the stress of driving in an area foreign to him increased his craving for a shot of whiskey and a beer. Also, he was using his doctor's advice that a moderate amount of alcohol was good for his heart as an excuse to start drinking again.

Several of his friends were already at the restaurant, which was almost as dark as the outside, its wood interior dimly illuminated in red and orange. They had all decided to order a pitcher of sangria, and he decided to also order a beer. He made short thrift of the beer and finished a glass of sangria rather quickly.

Within the half hour, he began to feel rather warm. His heart was making a hummingbird beat. It felt like he was breathing through smoke. He started seeing flashes of color and stars in the corner of his vision. He excused himself to go outside to grab some fresh air. Every so often, he had felt this claustorphobic response which dissipated after a few minutes in the cool air. He had no reason to expect any differently.

One the friends followed him outside to make sure he was OK. He reassured the friend that he was perfectly fine, and that he just needed to sit down. Then he was on his back, opening his eyes, his friend saying, "It's OK, man. Just rest. You passed out." He actually felt better than he had in months. His mind was clear. He felt refreshed. Eventually, he went inside, watched the flamenco show and had dinner. "Don't pass out" became the running inside joke among his friends.

There was a significance to this memory that he would later tell only to his high school friend a coast away. There was no subjective transition between setting himself down to sit, reassuring his friend he was quite alright and then opening his eyes, his back on the concrete walkway. Apparently, a minute or so had passed. And yet he felt no passage of time while his brain decided to shut down briefly. That minute period was a nothingness--no consciousness, no thoughts, no dreams or hallucinations. There was not even an awareness of a nothingness. This is when he realized that he did not fear his own mortality. If there was no awareness, this nothingness, even with a brief deprivation of oxygen to the brain, then what was there to fear?

He would come back to this memory in the couple of months after that friend's birthday dinner, when he was barely able to cope with a broken relationship that had ended several months previously. It was the closest to the edge that he had ever been. It is the fear of whatever lay in that undiscovered country that kept most in his position alive, that fear outweighing whatever pain was being felt. But without that fear, the emotional calculus changed--to know that the alternative to that paralyzing sadness was a nothingness so complete that you were unaware of it. But for better or for worse, he valued the feelings of this friends and his family more than his own. It would be selfish for him to take that step. He even thought about his cat that had grown attached to him and only him, plaintively yowling for a scritch behind the ear, the rub on the tummy that would never come. This pulled him back.

He got help. Eventually, he learned how to deal. He went through the motions. He had met people who exited as quickly out of his life as quickly as they came, and because this did not bother him (in fact, he had a palpable sense of relief whenever this happened), he was convinced that he had lost the ability to feel that spark of potential, to feel smitten. This, he believed, was not a bad thing. It made life simpler. Soon, other factors in the emotional calculus became greater. The warmth of friends, a late lunch at a Santa Monica pub with the cool ocean air drifting through, good thoughts that kept him tethered.

And then, about a month ago, another friend invited him to happy hour at a cozy Hollywood bar to meet some friends of friends. This was not unusual. He expected to go out, go through the motions of chatting with new people, then go home and watch whatever he had Tivo'd quickly forgetting the names and the faces of those he met. But a small thing happened. Maybe it was a smile, or a sustained glance, or having his jokes being laughed at. Maybe it was none of those. But there was a small feeling which he thought was dead, and suddenly it mattered if he saw her again.

This scared the shit out of him. With the spark comes a good chance that it will become extinguished. Simplicity becomes chaotic. He knew himself very well, and knew that he, in all likelihood, would fuck this up.

And when he didn't fuck up the next few times he saw her again, it gave him a feeling of hope. Maybe he could escape the past. Maybe he could let go and move on.

But unfortunately, this coincided with a very bad anniversary. Maybe it was self-sabatoge given certain admonishments about the age difference, or given that he was not wholly over the other relationship. Maybe it was just pure stupidity. But as he predicted, he fucked it up and fucked it up royally, mentioning that other relationship on the one time they hung out without others. He acted too intense instead of just being.

Like the other women in the past few months, she exited his life as quickly as she came in. Unlike the other women, he regretted this.

His emotional calculus began to change again. That feeling of spark, that feeling of being smitten was now inextricably tied with that feeling of frustration, helplessness and sadness. He didn't know which was worse--that most of his friends thought "Shit, how is he gonna fuck this up?" whenever he met someone, or that he never disabused them of this notion.

He began craving whiskey at 11 in the morning, a pack of Malboro Reds. He had to hide himself from certain get togethers so as not to make her feel awkward. He tried to be proactive, to keep the calculus stable by taking selective serotonin inhibitors. He tried to remind himself of other short-lived situations like this, the memories of which he barely remembered.

This doesn't change the fact that he's not out on the weekends, that he had to stay home yesterday night.

The signifance isn't just this most recent incident, but the likelihood that this incident will be one of a long, inevitable sequence of friendly correspondence filled with potential turning into silence. The significance is the return of that memory of the incident from earlier this year, that nothingness so complete you aren't even aware of it. The significance is that each further sequence will lead to a tipping point in his emotional calculus.

Melatonin

So I have embarked on yet another pharmacological journey with yet another serotonin reuptake inhibitor--this time it's paxil. I was getting sick of thoughts that repeatedly circled around my mind like particles around an accretion disk, that would not leave me alone until they finally flared as intense behavior, mental paralysis, or blog entries. It should come as no surprise that my mother is on paxil, and that there is no doubt a genetic component to my behavior. It's actually changed her personality for the better--she's calmer, less intense. So I figured what's good for the goose is good for the gander.

Now, much of what I'm feeling is no doubt a placebo effect--I've only been taking it for a week, and most SRI's take at least a month to have any noticeable effect. But I do feel a change. And I wouldn't be me if I didn't say I feel rather ambivalent about this.

On the one hand, sure I still have certain thoughts that I hold onto more often than not, but the urgency and the sense of helplessness that I have no control over these events are gone. There is a lack of intensity to my feelings--sure I may be sad that I really dropped the ball recently, but it's a distant, clinical sadness instead of a keening, depressive sadness.

On the other hand, this lack of intensity has hampered my urge to create and my enjoyment of anything creative. Listening to my Ipod on shuffle leads at best to a harmless nostalgia. I'm reading novels out of a sense of inertia instead of a sense of wonder. I can barely be bothered to write the second short story.

I'll give this thing a full month on the chance that this is simply my mind going through changes, and that I'll be in a new equilibrium soon. Maybe grey is how life is supposed to be.

Back Where We Started . . .

And so yet another full year has passed in my life, and I am officially in my "mid-thirties." In any event, I figured now that the first day of my mid-thirties has passed, I'd do a survey made up by yours truly since I'm still wired.

What was the first song you heard on your birthday?
Well, at midnight, my Ipod played "Wave of Mutilation." Not sure I want that to have any portentious meaning there. The first official song of the morning was "Green Eyes" by Coldplay, and I really frakking hope that does mean something.

What was the first thing you watched on television on your birthday?
MSNBC. I can't remember what the tagline was.

What was the first thing you ate/drank on your birthday?
Some limeade with a bunch o' pills.

What was the first think you read on your birthday?
Page 46 of lost boy lost girl by Peter Straub--"On the grounds that the overall roominess more than made up for the added cost, whenever possible Tim Underhill rented Lincoln Town Cars."

What gifts did you receive?
The warm company of good friends--plus I'm sure the 'rents are sending some cashish.

What gifts did you buy yourself?
A whole bunchamunchacruncha books.

What did you do for your birthday?
Met my wonderful friends at the Well in Hollywood, then headed for another Hollywood party as a second act.

What did you wish for?
Yeah, I'm not telling that one, but I'm hoping against hope it will come true.

Best part of your birthday?
Obviously hanging out with friends, especially a buddy who drove all the way from the OC. And there is a small thing that made me giddy for a while.

Worst part?
Awww, why'd you have to go negative. OK, realizing that I may have f'd up on something that I hope my birthday wish will rectify.

Last song you heard on your birthday?
Not sure. Midnight passed by without me knowing. Though the last song I heard when I got out of the car was Fatboy Slim's Song for Shelter.

You sure you won't tell us your birthday wish?
Won't come true if I tell it. Though it does have something to do with the small thing that made me giddy and that something I may have f'd up.

Plans for the year?
I would like a place I could call my own, have a conversation on the telephone, wake up everyday that would be a start, I would not complain about my wounded heart. Oh, plans that aren't a New Order lyric--OK, get something published, maybe, just maybe have a non-dramatic healthy relationship (yeah, yeah, and all the kids in the world want chocolate).

But Still You Call That Number

"i'm alive, it kinda took me by surprise
but everytime i look away, there's no light
there's no sentry at the gate" -- Twilight Singers, "There's Been An Accident"

There's a controversial theory that posits labile personalities, where moods are affected wildly by the environment--a penny found on the floor inducing mania, a unkind word causing a catatonic depression, a car cutting you off causing rage--are in part due to an overactive sympathetic nervous system. The sympathetic nervous system is responsible for the flight or fight instinct--it raises the energy level so that an individual can adjust and react to the environment. With an overactive sympathetic nervous system, the flight or fight instinct has a hair trigger.

I write this because I'm trying to be cold and rational about myself. If I can rationalize this, then I can deal with this recent re-emergence of old pattern. Unfortunately, identifying the problem doesn't really help me much. I'm sure a paraplegic knows which spinal discs are severed, but that doesn't help him much to stand.

Just a little spark of interest on my part, an ability I had long thought died, and I'm falling back into the same pattern. That beginning euphoria, potentials filling me hope, and then the nervousness, being too analytical, coming to conclusions, over-interpreting every small thing in hope of some meaning. I'm already thinking of every possible negative outcome (because I have been hit with almost every possible negative outcome--fuck, if you've read this blog, you've seen it all--from the simply just not interested to the intervenor who happens to catch her interest shortly after I've met her to, well, a Certain Someone). I think the random intervenor option is happening here, with a smidge of just not interested.

I wish that with this identification of this very real problem, I could just avert this behavior. I'm trying my damndest. But instead I find myself disgusted that I'm back in this pattern, and only after a couple of weeks from that unilateral little spark. Of course, this feeds into another round of negative realizations. If I'm feeling like this so quickly, obviously that doesn't make me that attractive--honestly, I'm one of the last people who should be in a relationship of any sort.

And of course, it just reinforces my belief that everything is just noise.

My friends keep telling me that I need to look at what has happened as a positive--a part of me that I thought was gone forever is back. There is hope. There is potential. That I am healing. I'm trying. I honestly am trying. But I can't help thinking that every single time I've felt this, I ended up feeling redfaced and disappointed. That everytime I see a secret smile directed my way, there's a part of me that says it's nothing, it's noise and dross. Even if there's some potential, I'll fuck it up because I complicate things.

After a Certain Someone, I wouldn't care that "Yeah, I'll give you a call" is just an empty Angeleno farewell platitude because I really had no other expectation, nor did I care. And now, well, you can probably guess.

My therapist told me the one way to avoid all this is just to become a recluse, like J.D. Salinger--with no risk comes no disappointment. Given my recent reactions (which I concede is fucked up and over the top, duh, that's why I'm making this attempt to exorcise these demons), maybe that's what I should become. Because that ability to feel the spark is back, as well as all the attendent issues.

This no longer makes me feel a righteous anger against myself. I'm just sad. Sad, and very, very tired.

"far away, where you run, when it all became undone
you'll be dust, realize, you were taken for a ride
but still you call that number, til you're crawling under
them stones, assorted jones, and all alone." --Twilight Singers, "There's Been An Accident"

Let Down

Sometimes, I wish I weren't right.

Transport, motorways and tramlines,
starting and then stopping,
taking off and landing,
the emptiest of feelings,
disappointed people, clinging on to bottles,
and when it comes it's so, so, disappointing.

Let down and hanging around,
crushed like a bug in the ground.
Let down and hanging around.

Shell smashed, juices flowing
wings twitch, legs are going,
don't get sentimental,
it always ends up drivel.
One day, I am gonna grow wings,
a chemical reaction,
hysterical and useless
hysterical and

let down and hanging around,
crushed like a bug in the ground.
Let down and hanging around.

Let down,
Let down,
Let down.

You know, you know where you are with,
you know where you are with,
floor collapsing, falling, bouncing back
and one day, I am gonna grow wings,
a chemical reaction, [You know where you are,]
hysterical and useless [you know where you are,]
hysterical and [you know where you are,]

let down and hanging around,
crushed like a bug in the ground.
Let down and hanging around.

--Radiohead, "Let Down"

Just Like A Bug On The Ground . . .

Astronomers detect new planets by carefully measuring the miniscule wobbles of a star over a period of time. If the planets are massive enough, their gravitation creates wobbles detectable only by the most careful, high powered telescopes. The planets themselves are not directly detected, at least not with the current technology.

Yup, I'm about to segue into another tortious metaphor. If you're a casual observer, watching me as I go about my life, interacting with people, you're not going to see anything unusual. I'll chat, smile at the right times, be polite, and act pretty regular. But those who know me well realize that I do have a slight wobble, one that's been there for the last year. A couple of friends ask me, "So how's the ladies front?" and I shrug nonchalantly--a sincere apathy as opposed to a superficial reaction to disguise frustration. When I've been out on dates, I'm aware enough to know that I'm just going through the motions of being charming and engaging--my therapist says "You're there but you're not there." Needless to say, those dates haven't led to anything. Three years ago, that would've gotten me down. Now, there's almost a palpable sense of relief.

Obviously, that massive planet orbiting around me unseen except for the influence it exerts upon my life is a Certain Someone, who left me almost a year ago (and a week after my birthday--I guess you can say I'm ambivalent about my birthday). I've already dwelled enough upon how that catastrophically impacted my life, catastrophic enough that I am in therapy. Don't worry, I'm better now. But the one positive--if you can call it that--thing that occurred is that it made my life a helluva lot simpler.

Call it what you will--labile personality, poor impulse control, ridiculously romantic, bipolar--but I used to ride my emotions instead of controlling them. And despite efforts to be positive, I was the type of guy who at the first smile of an attractive woman at the beginning of the night was already thinking about the slap on the face and slammed doors at the end of the night. Not exactly a healthy combination. That first wave of giddiness would always be followed by a depressive low. Soon, I was associating that giddiness with the inevitable lows so even when I was happy, I was sad. Anytime I began feeling interest, I also felt incredibly foolish.

Now, after Certain Someone, I didn't feel any of those highs upon meeting someone. I believed that ability got burned out of me. Sure, I went on dates, but then I'd go home, catch some Tivo and sleep well instead of having a sleepless but excited night thinking about potentials. Life was much simpler this way. I didn't have to think about meeting someone, having a relationship, that possibility of having to support more than myself, being a fulltime lawyer, a white picket fence, two kids, a dog and a cat. I could be content, living life aimlessly, trying to write and maybe get some side gigs as a contract lawyer. And, I certainly didn't feel foolish, redfaced and disappointed about my social life. Foolishness requires unmet and unrealistic expectations, of which I had none.

And now, well, let's say I'm preparing myself to feel foolish, redfaced and disappointed again.

Even though this might sound like the blogger protesteth a bit too much, nothing earth-shattering has happened. I didn't "meet someone," because that connotates a mutual interest. But for the first time in over eleven months, something is flickering. Think of it as a confluence of small things eliciting something larger, the way a cool wind off the beach hits you as you're listening to Jeff Buckley's "Grace" while eating fish and chips in Santa Monica can lead to a moment of perfection. So it's not so much that I "met someone." I didn't. It's the confluence of small things, perhaps a smile, perhaps random conversation, and now I'm feeling that flicker.

And although a part of me is trying to enjoy that flicker for what it is--a hope that what I thought was gone inside me is actually still there, there's also an equal part of me that's telling me to run for the hills, it can only lead to being let down again.

"One day, I am gonna grow wings,
a chemical reaction,
hysterical and useless"
- Radiohead, "Let Down"

Wake Up Everyday That Would Be A Start

Ah YouTube, a boon to lazy bloggers everywhere. So in the spirit of cautious optimism I seem to be having in my life these days:



This is one of my favorite New Order songs--it has surprisingly sweet and direct lyrics, like Bernard is almost tentatively admitting that things are going well. And of course, there's that little bit of doubt near the end. Very on the nose for my state of mind.

I've Been Thinking About You Baby . . .

OK, so I know that maybe four people in the United States will understand how much this just absolutely rocks--The Twilights Singers have done a cover of Massive Attack's most recent single, "Live With Me." C'mon, how often does one of your top two favorite bands cover the other top favorite band?

OK, so here's the original Massive Attack version (though you will have to wait through 30 seconds of random prologue):

Orchestral, lush, and dark--it's red wine, dark chocalate and desire.

And here's the Twilight Singer version:

Just as dark, but slower, smokier--cigarettes, roses and passion.

These are the small things that make me feel whole on quiet nights.

Mushaboom

OK, so I haven't been on some self-pitying binge full of melancholy and darkness. Instead, I had a realization that, instead of working on a novel during this hiatus, I should instead be writing short stories--little creative outbursts that keep me writing, and instead of slogging through four months of hitting the square peg through the round hole, I get that accomplishment euphoria in a couple of weeks. I've finished one short story that I've sent to some friends for peer review--I realized it was a ghost story without a ghost, oh, and some quantum physics, halfway through writing it. I think I'll try something upbeat next. After I get a couple more stories out of the way, I'll start sending them to various lit magazines and see what happens. If I do get them published, then I'll have some lit cred to get some leverage for a novel.

In any event, I figure I owe whoever is still reading this blog something insanely cheerful for putting up with my absences. Here's the second (and better) version of the video for Feist's "Mushaboom." It's just so friggin' happy.

Incantations

Ah yes, here's the product of another self-imposed writing exercise, this time to see if I can write some Lovecraftian horror. The lesson learned? I'm not sure, other than trying not to info-dump is hard when your narrative depends heavily on dialogue. Bleah. Oh well.

Video from security camera #2, interrogation room #5A in Counterintelligence Field Activity station located in ______; 19:07 hours, April 11, 20__, ten days before discovery of the Ceres Object, three days before the Cincinnati Incursion, one day after the Lexington Hysteria:

The video is in color, but the walls are dark grey and the floor is concrete so that the video might as well be in black and white. As requisitions for higher quality recording devices have still yet to be approved, the video is of low quality such that the facial features of the subject and the two guards remain indistinct. (For photographs of the subject, please refer to CIFA File #1013AA Babel or the notes of Dr. G. Gustavson.)

The subject is seated in a plastic chair, hands cuffed behind his back and feet manacled to the floor. He is naked, and although the room is set to forty-degrees Fahrenheit, he does not appear to be suffering any discomfort. There are electrodes on various parts of his body that lead toward a machine at another end of the room. The subject is looking at the one-way mirror (framed at the right of the screen). On the top left of the screen is one of the guards in full body armor with his semi-automatic drawn and aimed at the subject’s head. The muzzle tip from the other guard’s sidearm located at the bottom left of the screen is the only sign of the other guard’s presence.

A voice off screen is heard. The quality of the recording is also poor. There is an underlying hiss of white noise.

“I apologize once again for these precautions. You understand that you make, well, quite a few people nervous. I’m sure that once you begin answering our questions, you will go a long way of dispelling our concerns.”

The subject speaks. “Dr. Gustavson, I’m not here to dispel any concerns. And even if I were, I’ve already answered your questions. You just aren’t listening.” Although the image is poor, there is a distinct feeling by several observers of the video that the subject is grinning.

“Well, maybe we aren’t. Please, explain it to us again. It doesn’t do us any good to have you in there like this, and it can’t be too enjoyable for you.”

“This? This is all irrelevant. Dr. Gustavson, did you know the Mayans invented the concept of zero seven hundred years before the Battle of Hastings, and almost a full millennia before the concept spread to Europe from India? This from a civilization that didn’t fucking use the wheel.”

“This is all very interesting, but . . .”

“But you’re not paying attention. Our geography, our culture, our environment drives us. The Mayans invented one of the most accurate calendars in the world at the time our ancestors were painting their asses blue. But they didn’t use the wheel because there were no fucking draft animals in the Americas. The Japanese have a highly stratified society, so is it any wonder that you have to add five syllables to create a negative sentence and three different syntaxes exist depending on whether you’re speaking to a superior, your equal or an inferior? You want me to tell you how I did it, but you’re all so obtuse. What you should be asking is how are they different from us? From where did they originate? Even if you knew the language, that knowledge will not make a bit of difference if you can’t think like them.”

“Well, how do they think?”

“Dr. Gustavson, you know that they say. ‘If you have to ask . . .’”

“Please, none of us have expended the amount of time or energy in the area of . . .”

Subject sighs. “I think I have been patient enough. You’ve found the mounds in southern Illinois, in Lesotho and in Tikrit. You have linguists and semiotic theorists working on this. If you can’t figure it out for yourself, then you don’t deserve the knowledge.”

“I don’t think my superiors will be too happy about your answer or your attitude.”

“Do you want an answer? Really? Hmmmm, fine. I’m just spinning my wheels here anyway. Are the recording devices in working order?”

Dr. Gustavson begins to stutter.

“Don’t worry. I’m sure they are. OK, ready for the answer?”

Subject opens his mouth. The audio plays something like a growl or guttural whisper, then becomes inaudible. The video recording warps and then goes to static. After 2.4 seconds, the video reestablishes and, implausibly, is sharper and clearer. There are thin lines on the bottom of the screen (which are determined to be the blood of PFC Walter Hillard–his body has still not been found). Off camera is a hysterical giggling. (Dr. Gustavson will be found playing in his own urine. As of this date, Dr. Gustavson remains in a manic, hysterical state.) The guard in the corner is naked and repeatedly smashing his head against the wall.

The subject is no longer in the chair. He appears walking from the bottom of the screen, back turned to the camera, buttoning up clothing taken from one of the guards. He then turns to the camera and directly addresses it.

“I want you to know this. I want you to know that I came here voluntarily. Do you understand? I wanted you to know the significance of my findings. I gave you every chance, but you just wouldn’t listen. They had so much power, but they didn’t have intelligence as we think of it. They had no need of a binding internal narrative. They had willpower and a binding purpose as an adaptation from a chaotic environment where decoherence did not exist. They had no need for an internal self-referential model of themselves where every possibility existed, but every need to manipulate those possibilities. And they are coming back, and don’t like what we have done in binding the world to one, uniform reality in our image. I will be ready, but I’m afraid you won’t. I would say good luck, but seeing what happened to Dr. Gustavson, well, I feel very very sorry for you all. I’m leaving now.”

2+2=5

So President Bush has just admitted that the CIA did have a secret program to interrogate terrorist suspects overseas, and is now making a big deal about sending these terrorists to Gitmo for trial where they are presumed innocent and the rule of law shall prevail. I'll leave aside the Chris Rock quote I have in my head ("You supposed to you low-expectation-having mutherfucker! What do you want, a cookie?")

Instead, I ask this question: Whatever happened to "Terrorism is not a law enforcement matter"?* Kinda sad that the MSM probably won't point out the fact that ol' Shrub, by now stating that he is for putting terrorists on trial instead of indefinitely detaining them overseas, is in essence stating that Kerry was right.

*10/10/04 Quote from "Face the Nation" by Ed Gillespie, Republican National Committee 2003-2005 Chairman, criticizing Sen. John Kerry

Come From Way Above . . .

Yup, that's right. Even more prose!

To become an angel, you must forsake your past. Family and friends are no different than old clothing and forgotten toys, to be left behind as unnecessary remnants of a life from which you are supposed to move on.

The path to become an angel, to leave onself behind, to open oneself to the Divine, is as individual and distinct for each person, though these paths can be overgeneralized into three categories. Some are led by the tried and true methods of sleep deprivation, of mob mentality, of physical and mental abuse alternating with praise and sympathy. Some are taught breathing exercises and meditation, to focus on everything and nothing and realize there is no difference. As there is a War ongoing, more and more are being led into the barracks, their heads placed in electromagnetic resonance helmets that directly induce rapture via manipulation of the parietal lobes. Except for the second grouping in which every so often a Principality and even one Power arose, those who arrive at the Waystation invariably only transcend to the rank of angel. If you need assistance in transcendence, you probably don’t have it in you to fly very far.

My path to the Divine was rather mundane. After a particularly bad break up, listening to Radiohead’s “Pyramid Song” over and over again, and finding myself tiptoed on the ledge of a Century City office building rooftop (and more importantly, being found by the security guard who had propped open the roof access to smoke a big fat joint of Mauwie Wauwie), I was given a choice of voluntary commitment and ongoing therapy or Transcendence. I loved my family and friends, all of whom wanted me to take the first option, but I realized I loved them in a way that I loved “Simpsons” reruns at 6:00 p.m. I know that might sound harsh, but that particularly bad break up was with a woman who with a love that felt like the fluttering of wings in my chest. After that, at least at that moment, every single thing in my life lost the sheen of importance. So I could either sit on a couch about shit that meant jack to me, or I could learn how to jump off a roof and soar into the air and not land as a 150 pound sack of meat, crumpling some jagoff’s penis substitute of a sports car.

The Los Angeles Waystation was located at the old Greyhound Station on 7th Street. Most of the homeless that had littered the streets were gone, having been among the first to enter into the Waystation to be transformed. Most of them were no doubt flying over Damascus, taking arms against Gadriel and the Sovereigns, or hunting down the Fallen or Non-Aligned (who, depending on the politician and faction, might as well be Fallen) in alleyways from Caracas to Wellington. When I entered the Waystation those months ago, I heard whispers that the Angels who floated above the entry, one black, square-jawed, and handsome, the other white, rugged and sandy-haired, both in bright platinum plating with Kevlar webbing, fiery swords and Glocks holstered, had been crackheads from the area who panhandled at the local McDonalds. Every so often, their fire in their eyes would alight, and they would perform some minor miracle on the few homeless who decided to stay mundane. Perhaps turning Chicken McNuggets into fresh strawberries, or providing moments of clarity, fifty dollars and a resume to a crack dealer.

Like all Waystations, the inside the larger than the outside, a strange phenomena that is necessary given the thousands of initiates who enter everyday, the tens of thousands who are housed and cared for until Transcendence. One the outside was a bus station that took up a square block of sun-addled concrete and weeds. But the inside was an elegant station of white marble doric columns, three story stained glass windows filtering a constant sunlight buttery in its texture, and a floor that seemed to extend hundreds of yards. I remember watch a show on Discovery Times with one of the Virtues, working with a quantum physicist at the University of Chicago, attempting to explain how this was possible. However, I got lost within the phrases like “static Planck measurement fallacy” and “dark energy substrates like rebar through concrete.” That small agnostic part of me smiled that there were those in the Hierarchy who sought answers after the first fall at the Battle of Antietam. Even when Raphael appeared on “Oprah” to proclaim once and for all that the world was not 6000 years old, and that the Bible was allegory (although Jesus did transcend), and none of the angels had any thoughts on abortion, there were still small-minded literalists who firebombed womens’ clinics and proclaimed only they knew God’s message.

The first step of a path was a questionnaire with 5000 questions. There were the standard personality type questions (At a party, which do you prefer? (a) To lead in the fun; (b) To sit back and people watch; (c) To hang out with your friends; (d) You’re just there for the free food). But there were some very odd questions (What does electricity taste like? True or false: The thought of warm oven mitts, wire mesh and orthopedic shoes excites me). The Powers who oversee the questionnaires take the time it takes to answer each question as well as the totality of the questionnaire into consideration.

Next was a physical battery. There were stress tests, laps around a track and in the pool. There was lifting of weights and throwings of balls. I was prodded and poked. Electrodes were attached. Blood was drawn. Probes were, well, inserted in areas where things are normally ejected.