Liverpool
Last year I massacred this wisteria growing five stories up the back fire escape and while quietly applauded by one or two for the increased chances I added to their ability to escape a fire, the owner of the vine and the person who ask me to trim the vine (oh, you said trim?) were a little upset with me. I did not know that the brief yearly flowering and the godly wafting scent would take precedent over the logical consideration of safety and I bantered back a bit in a futile attempt at healing my slightly wounded pride, because I had initially thought the job was quite well done, and had been quite satisfied with it.
So when yesterday the two offended parties asked me to trim the tree out front I said I would be glad to. If they would come out and point to each and every limb they wanted removed.
Jimson Creed walked up and seeing the two supervisors and the one worker bee commented that we had all the makings of a government road crew. I am not a proponent of micro-managing but I had to mutely disagree with Jimson regarding his assertion that this two to one supervisor to worker ratio looked like trouble. My healing process requires a stricture against disagreement regarding all things in the realm of pruning, and in any case all he said was it looked like trouble and I think I must respect his opinion, based as it would be on years of experience with the two supervisors. And now, picturing myself standing back as he was, taking in the scene, I might even go as far as to wholeheartedly agree that yes it could to the naked eye, unrestrained by a pruned pride or desire not to make the same mistake twice in one year, look like trouble.
But in the end the selective limb removal was an astounding success and other than the small gash on my index finger there was no one wounded.
As I cut up the limbs into pieces small enough to fit in a garbage bag an old woman from the Bronx stopped to talk to me about things that grow and die and rats who eat peppers growing in window boxes. She asked me was I Jewish and I said no. I wanted however to project a little more ethnicity than my WASP upbringing allows so I told her I was half Lebanese. She evidently did not understand that and kept guessing what I may have meant, and possibly I meant Liverpool because she starting singing yeah, yeah, yeah to some tune that to me meant the Beatles and I said, Oh yeah, the Beatles. She nodded happily and we were grooving on the same page until I said, no, I'm American, which is nothing to be ashamed of and really she didn't seem to hold it against me. At some point in our conversation she equated me with the good people of the earth, she had said some people are bad not like me, and wanting to remain for awhile longer puffed up with accomplishment I did not mention my last years slaughtering of the wisteria.
...more recent posts
Big Store
Solomon, Kahlil and Bernadette walk into a Cabellas. Don't forget to look at the fish Kahlil says to Solomon. Solomon says, I'm not forgetting you just told me that 20 minutes ago. Bernadette suggests that no one get lost before hurrying off to find the best deal on camouflage clothing and is soon marveling over a full length moss covered suit. Solomon makes a perfunctory pass through the fish room but is underwhelmed by the differences between the small mouth bass, the sac-au-lait and the northern pike. As if guided by a fuzzy radar he finds the fleece section and chooses a red pullover. Bernadette, unaware that deer season is over, is disappointed by the lack of fluorescent orange winter wear. Kahlil is determined to find parts of the store missed on previous visits and walks hurriedly past the various dioramas, only glancing at the elephant, the cougar, and the crocodile eating the gazelle. He is not moved by the bighorn sheep or the many black beers or the brown bear standing ten feet erect.
Back in the bargain room he is like on every other visit unable to find a truly great bargain to fit his ambiguous needs. He moves on to the footwear section but only lingers there long enough to caress a twenty dollar pair of socks.
Bernadette has moved on to the deer room and is enjoying the irregular antlers from various regions of the United States.
Solomon has headed upstairs to the restaurant. He is gladdened by the sight of so many diners and imagines himself correcting Kahlil about his earlier statement that Cabellas restaurant was unlikely taking many customers from the nearby Cracker Barrel. I think you are wrong about that he will say to Kahlil when they are back in the car driving away.
But Kahlil just a moment earlier passed that way himself and has already realized his gross underestimation of the restaurant's popularity. I must apologize to Solomon for my incorrectness he utters while a clomping tow-headed toddler in too-stiff hiking boots eyes him suspiciously.
A green winter jacket made in Vietnam composed of various polyesters catches Bernadette's eye and she feels a lessening of her earlier disappointment over the dearth of bright orange camo-gear. She selects a medium tall size and sets off to find Solomon and Kahlil. Kahlil sees her from across the store and sets himself on a path that will connect with hers. Bernadette is just passing under a giant elk's head when Kahlil calls out to her. Bernadette is concerned about the missing Solomon but Kahlil is not. She looks along the walls as if expecting to see his head mounted over a gold name plate with black letters that say--a New York Jew. Kahlil tells Bernadette not to worry, that Solomon can take care of himself, and they agree to meet in the front of the store after looking around for him.
Kahlil passes an aisle with various expensive binoculars attached to security cables and tries out each one, focusing them on mounted animal heads up high 200 yards across the store. Bernadette picks up a bag of red licorice and forgets all about Solomon.
Kahlil picks up two on sale t-shirts that promise to fade.
Solomon looks at boots.
Solomon, Kahlil and Bernadette walk into a Cabellas. Don't forget to look at the fish Kahlil says to Solomon. Solomon says, I'm not forgetting you just told me that 20 minutes ago. Bernadette suggests that no one get lost before hurrying off to find the best deal on camouflage clothing and is soon marveling over a full length moss covered suit. Solomon makes a perfunctory pass through the fish room but is underwhelmed by the differences between the small mouth bass, the sac-au-lait and the northern pike. As if guided by a fuzzy radar he finds the fleece section and chooses a red pullover. Bernadette, unaware that deer season is over, is disappointed by the lack of fluorescent orange winter wear. Kahlil is determined to find parts of the store missed on previous visits and walks hurriedly past the various dioramas, only glancing at the elephant, the cougar, and the crocodile eating the gazelle. He is not moved by the bighorn sheep or the many black beers or the brown bear standing ten feet erect.
Back in the bargain room he is like on every other visit unable to find a truly great bargain to fit his ambiguous needs. He moves on to the footwear section but only lingers there long enough to caress a twenty dollar pair of socks.
Bernadette has moved on to the deer room and is enjoying the irregular antlers from various regions of the United States.
Solomon has headed upstairs to the restaurant. He is gladdened by the sight of so many diners and imagines himself correcting Kahlil about his earlier statement that Cabellas restaurant was unlikely taking many customers from the nearby Cracker Barrel. I think you are wrong about that he will say to Kahlil when they are back in the car driving away.
But Kahlil just a moment earlier passed that way himself and has already realized his gross underestimation of the restaurant's popularity. I must apologize to Solomon for my incorrectness he utters while a clomping tow-headed toddler in too-stiff hiking boots eyes him suspiciously.
A green winter jacket made in Vietnam composed of various polyesters catches Bernadette's eye and she feels a lessening of her earlier disappointment over the dearth of bright orange camo-gear. She selects a medium tall size and sets off to find Solomon and Kahlil. Kahlil sees her from across the store and sets himself on a path that will connect with hers. Bernadette is just passing under a giant elk's head when Kahlil calls out to her. Bernadette is concerned about the missing Solomon but Kahlil is not. She looks along the walls as if expecting to see his head mounted over a gold name plate with black letters that say--a New York Jew. Kahlil tells Bernadette not to worry, that Solomon can take care of himself, and they agree to meet in the front of the store after looking around for him.
Kahlil passes an aisle with various expensive binoculars attached to security cables and tries out each one, focusing them on mounted animal heads up high 200 yards across the store. Bernadette picks up a bag of red licorice and forgets all about Solomon.
Kahlil picks up two on sale t-shirts that promise to fade.
Solomon looks at boots.
One Boxer Tag
Like a dog I am starting to know the location of every fire hydrant in the neighborhood. It used to be my heart would leap at the spying of an empty space a block ahead but now I just grunt knowingly, to myself, and accelerate before I reach them, not at all tempted anymore by their taunt as an answer to my prayers--a place to park in NYC.
Seeing the street sweeper pass at precisely 9 a.m. I circle the block one more time and pull into a space within site of a door that could be called home. The signs however inform me that I must commit to the residency of my vehicle for another hour and thirty minutes.
And the longer I sit here the more I get to envying the canines on leashes who at least can go to the bathroom, and right on the street no less. I start to worry that my health may suffer, that my evacuation system may become irrevocably plugged if I don't get to a bathroom soon. I see another dog pass, a mutt with a nose cowl on and I call out to him--hey dog, are you counting your blessings?
At 9:43 the sweeper comes rumbling up the street again. I think this second passing is unnecessary. I circle the block and park, three spaces behind where I just was. As the minutes pass the competition will get fierce. If the sweeper comes again it is conceivable that in the time it takes to make another go around the block the professional parkers will drop from the sky into every remaining space. I see a white boxer with mascara running down its eyes. It pauses to piss on a piece of junk in the middle of the sidewalk, a square purple device with a white electrical cord coming out of it. There are black and grey graffiti tags on every side of it and now, at least this one boxer tag.
It is starting to rain a little bit. I call Bill Macy and tell him my problems. He is only interested in making jokes about Sybil Shepard. Seventeen minutes to go.
I wonder if I should take up knitting and if I did would I be any good at it?
I haven't seen a dog in a good while. I expect they are all up on their master's couches, snoozing or watching TV.
How is it possible that only three minutes have passed?
It warms my heart to realize how law abiding we all are, manning our vehicles until exactly 10:30 a.m. I'm going to unplug my devices now and pack up. I am going to exit my vehicle at 10:29. I am a rebel.
Like a dog I am starting to know the location of every fire hydrant in the neighborhood. It used to be my heart would leap at the spying of an empty space a block ahead but now I just grunt knowingly, to myself, and accelerate before I reach them, not at all tempted anymore by their taunt as an answer to my prayers--a place to park in NYC.
Seeing the street sweeper pass at precisely 9 a.m. I circle the block one more time and pull into a space within site of a door that could be called home. The signs however inform me that I must commit to the residency of my vehicle for another hour and thirty minutes.
And the longer I sit here the more I get to envying the canines on leashes who at least can go to the bathroom, and right on the street no less. I start to worry that my health may suffer, that my evacuation system may become irrevocably plugged if I don't get to a bathroom soon. I see another dog pass, a mutt with a nose cowl on and I call out to him--hey dog, are you counting your blessings?
At 9:43 the sweeper comes rumbling up the street again. I think this second passing is unnecessary. I circle the block and park, three spaces behind where I just was. As the minutes pass the competition will get fierce. If the sweeper comes again it is conceivable that in the time it takes to make another go around the block the professional parkers will drop from the sky into every remaining space. I see a white boxer with mascara running down its eyes. It pauses to piss on a piece of junk in the middle of the sidewalk, a square purple device with a white electrical cord coming out of it. There are black and grey graffiti tags on every side of it and now, at least this one boxer tag.
It is starting to rain a little bit. I call Bill Macy and tell him my problems. He is only interested in making jokes about Sybil Shepard. Seventeen minutes to go.
I wonder if I should take up knitting and if I did would I be any good at it?
I haven't seen a dog in a good while. I expect they are all up on their master's couches, snoozing or watching TV.
How is it possible that only three minutes have passed?
It warms my heart to realize how law abiding we all are, manning our vehicles until exactly 10:30 a.m. I'm going to unplug my devices now and pack up. I am going to exit my vehicle at 10:29. I am a rebel.
Those Were The Days
It came to pass after a number of years that the candidates for the American presidency were so similar in their ability to create divisiveness, not just among voters of the opposite party but also among their own constituents, that voter turnout diminished to a point where the presidency was being decided by a handful of die-hard sentimentalists. The conventions had become irrelevant, for as often as not they were made up of homeless people hired by the candidates in exchange for a one night stay at the Holiday Inn and the included continental breakfast. Script malfunctions were frequent and it was not uncommon to hear a mother of four from Jersey, who lived in a rusty Ford Pinto under the 1-9, blurt out something like--Madame Speaker, the great state of Nebraska wishes to cast all the ballots that may exist in this wonderful place of much corn, to my sister Irene, who was a supposed to be here and would be here if she hadn't got herself thrown out of the Holiday Inn for her mischievous behavior, which includes but is not limited to acts of indecency in the freight elevator. Instead of great cheering there would be booing and instead of falling balloons there would spit-balls flying from one delegate's camp to the other.
As the contagion of violent crime had never been effectively curtailed in America, it became accepted as the common cold of the times, and whereas in the past every home was certain to have all manner of cold and flu remedies, it became increasingly common that every home had a bullet proof vest for each member of the family. Baby vests were traded from family to family and friend to friend as the children who survived grew into larger sizes. A weariness not completely devoid of happiness prevailed.
Presidential assassinations began happening so frequently that it was taken off the list of things that proud parents boasted their children could become, and only the most convincing suicidal fatalists were running and being elected.
In the latter years of the 21st century the last sentimentalist, a man named Hector Bilby, died in his sleep at the age of 135, and while mourned in ceremonial fashion as an icon of an age that had once seemed so full of hope, it was also seen as the official burying of that hope. Avenues across America named in his honor soon became, instead of remindful beacons lighting the way for that return of his positive vision, sad reflections of anything even remotely optimistic, the central arteries of supply for the behind the scenes war that had long existed in the cities.
It was then that American presidents began to be elected almost exclusively as write-in candidates. Only the brightest student could explain how the earlier system worked or what an electoral college had been, which in truth was not that different from when there was such a thing as an electoral college.
Over the years there evolved a system which seemed as good as any of the preceding ones, for considering who would be your write in choice for president. In the cities and towns and backwater boroughs of America, parties were held and though there were a great variety of themes and backdrops to these parties, there was one thing which seemed to unify them and that was the liberal pouring of libation throughout. Only the certifiably drunk had a chance to be heard in this new America. And the loudest, most convincing drunk had the best chance at winning the dubious prize of candidate for leader of the free world. The parties could be dangerous events and there was a mortality rate associated with them that was considerably higher than the norm, as might be represented for example by a family Christmas party.
For the artistically minded these were great times and a notable band of this era was a group called the Wannabe Presidents, who performed on stages with sets meant to resemble an average American living room. Many of their songs were obviously political in nature and so to tie their thematic vision together they would have one of the band members theatrically assassinate another one, after the singing of a song such as--Fuck Your Ideas, or after just about anything from the Blow Me album.
Strangely, the world got along pretty much as it always had. If you wanted to perform a good deed you certainly could and if you wanted to be a hedonist that was ok and if you wanted to combine the two that was also just fine. There was horror in the world and there were flowers in window boxes. People still went to church and sang hymns and prominent men still got out-ed for wearing women's clothing. One man however, a presidential candidate who went to church and sang hymns and wore women's clothing, a drunkard and leader of a new order of the Christian Coalition who ran under the banner of Onward Christian Soldiers and won the office for president convincingly, only lasted six months before he was assassinated by a black-Chinese Muslim bullet-proof vest manufacturer, who just happened to be his vice-president.
Things went on like this for a number of years until four score into the 22nd century there emerged on the scene a man named Bill Macy. Macy was over 300 years old. He lived on the Lower East Side of New York for most of those years and for the last 200 or so had not left his apartment. He had all his food delivered and with the advent of the Holographic Internet and all that it offered, had even stopped entertaining his few so called friends, most of whom were dead anyway. Sometime during his 100th year Macy discovered that his microwave oven wasn't plugged in and yet worked just the same. He was an experimenter, Macy was, so he tried operating it with the door open and when it worked like that as well he tried operating it with the door open and his head inside.
He stopped aging after that and in fact seemed cured of every ailment that had ever bothered him, both physical and emotional. Which is to say he wasn't bothered, by anything, anymore. For the next hundred years he wasn't even bothered by himself so he stopped going out and instead enjoyed only his own company and began the reading of every book ever printed, which were by then available electronically. When his eyes got tired he had one of his holographic associates read to him. Maria was his favorite.
During the next hundred years he mostly sat very still and considered all that he had learned, until one day, inexplicably, he stood up and walked down the three flights of stairs and out the door onto the street.
How in short time he became a national hero is unclear, but stories abounded. Some say he caught with one outstretched hand a baby who had crawled onto a window ledge before dropping 140 feet just at the moment Macy first entered the street, after 200 years of seclusion. Others would just admit that they had no idea how he became a national hero and that it made little sense to them.
He was elected president that first year and despite his denial of the office he was by all considered the best president to come along in many decades, and was the first in over a hundred years to live out his first term. He was candid about his disdain for the office and the accolades heaped upon him and after each election that he won, would answer the pundits questions about his intentions the same way--I will do nothing, I will just let things be. He became known then as Bill let it be Macy and for all the years of his soft rule (he was elected to six terms) the country prospered.
But Bill Macy died one day, mysteriously (his body was never found), in a hang gliding accident in Kansas, and soon thereafter the country fell back into its old ways. Derivative folk songs were written about him and hardly a day went by when somewhere in America you couldn't hear the mournful yet jaunty lyrics of Oh Bill Macy Won't You Please Come Home.
It came to pass after a number of years that the candidates for the American presidency were so similar in their ability to create divisiveness, not just among voters of the opposite party but also among their own constituents, that voter turnout diminished to a point where the presidency was being decided by a handful of die-hard sentimentalists. The conventions had become irrelevant, for as often as not they were made up of homeless people hired by the candidates in exchange for a one night stay at the Holiday Inn and the included continental breakfast. Script malfunctions were frequent and it was not uncommon to hear a mother of four from Jersey, who lived in a rusty Ford Pinto under the 1-9, blurt out something like--Madame Speaker, the great state of Nebraska wishes to cast all the ballots that may exist in this wonderful place of much corn, to my sister Irene, who was a supposed to be here and would be here if she hadn't got herself thrown out of the Holiday Inn for her mischievous behavior, which includes but is not limited to acts of indecency in the freight elevator. Instead of great cheering there would be booing and instead of falling balloons there would spit-balls flying from one delegate's camp to the other.
As the contagion of violent crime had never been effectively curtailed in America, it became accepted as the common cold of the times, and whereas in the past every home was certain to have all manner of cold and flu remedies, it became increasingly common that every home had a bullet proof vest for each member of the family. Baby vests were traded from family to family and friend to friend as the children who survived grew into larger sizes. A weariness not completely devoid of happiness prevailed.
Presidential assassinations began happening so frequently that it was taken off the list of things that proud parents boasted their children could become, and only the most convincing suicidal fatalists were running and being elected.
In the latter years of the 21st century the last sentimentalist, a man named Hector Bilby, died in his sleep at the age of 135, and while mourned in ceremonial fashion as an icon of an age that had once seemed so full of hope, it was also seen as the official burying of that hope. Avenues across America named in his honor soon became, instead of remindful beacons lighting the way for that return of his positive vision, sad reflections of anything even remotely optimistic, the central arteries of supply for the behind the scenes war that had long existed in the cities.
It was then that American presidents began to be elected almost exclusively as write-in candidates. Only the brightest student could explain how the earlier system worked or what an electoral college had been, which in truth was not that different from when there was such a thing as an electoral college.
Over the years there evolved a system which seemed as good as any of the preceding ones, for considering who would be your write in choice for president. In the cities and towns and backwater boroughs of America, parties were held and though there were a great variety of themes and backdrops to these parties, there was one thing which seemed to unify them and that was the liberal pouring of libation throughout. Only the certifiably drunk had a chance to be heard in this new America. And the loudest, most convincing drunk had the best chance at winning the dubious prize of candidate for leader of the free world. The parties could be dangerous events and there was a mortality rate associated with them that was considerably higher than the norm, as might be represented for example by a family Christmas party.
For the artistically minded these were great times and a notable band of this era was a group called the Wannabe Presidents, who performed on stages with sets meant to resemble an average American living room. Many of their songs were obviously political in nature and so to tie their thematic vision together they would have one of the band members theatrically assassinate another one, after the singing of a song such as--Fuck Your Ideas, or after just about anything from the Blow Me album.
Strangely, the world got along pretty much as it always had. If you wanted to perform a good deed you certainly could and if you wanted to be a hedonist that was ok and if you wanted to combine the two that was also just fine. There was horror in the world and there were flowers in window boxes. People still went to church and sang hymns and prominent men still got out-ed for wearing women's clothing. One man however, a presidential candidate who went to church and sang hymns and wore women's clothing, a drunkard and leader of a new order of the Christian Coalition who ran under the banner of Onward Christian Soldiers and won the office for president convincingly, only lasted six months before he was assassinated by a black-Chinese Muslim bullet-proof vest manufacturer, who just happened to be his vice-president.
Things went on like this for a number of years until four score into the 22nd century there emerged on the scene a man named Bill Macy. Macy was over 300 years old. He lived on the Lower East Side of New York for most of those years and for the last 200 or so had not left his apartment. He had all his food delivered and with the advent of the Holographic Internet and all that it offered, had even stopped entertaining his few so called friends, most of whom were dead anyway. Sometime during his 100th year Macy discovered that his microwave oven wasn't plugged in and yet worked just the same. He was an experimenter, Macy was, so he tried operating it with the door open and when it worked like that as well he tried operating it with the door open and his head inside.
He stopped aging after that and in fact seemed cured of every ailment that had ever bothered him, both physical and emotional. Which is to say he wasn't bothered, by anything, anymore. For the next hundred years he wasn't even bothered by himself so he stopped going out and instead enjoyed only his own company and began the reading of every book ever printed, which were by then available electronically. When his eyes got tired he had one of his holographic associates read to him. Maria was his favorite.
During the next hundred years he mostly sat very still and considered all that he had learned, until one day, inexplicably, he stood up and walked down the three flights of stairs and out the door onto the street.
How in short time he became a national hero is unclear, but stories abounded. Some say he caught with one outstretched hand a baby who had crawled onto a window ledge before dropping 140 feet just at the moment Macy first entered the street, after 200 years of seclusion. Others would just admit that they had no idea how he became a national hero and that it made little sense to them.
He was elected president that first year and despite his denial of the office he was by all considered the best president to come along in many decades, and was the first in over a hundred years to live out his first term. He was candid about his disdain for the office and the accolades heaped upon him and after each election that he won, would answer the pundits questions about his intentions the same way--I will do nothing, I will just let things be. He became known then as Bill let it be Macy and for all the years of his soft rule (he was elected to six terms) the country prospered.
But Bill Macy died one day, mysteriously (his body was never found), in a hang gliding accident in Kansas, and soon thereafter the country fell back into its old ways. Derivative folk songs were written about him and hardly a day went by when somewhere in America you couldn't hear the mournful yet jaunty lyrics of Oh Bill Macy Won't You Please Come Home.
Greg
I heard the honk of geese over a silence under a hum. And then their fleeting shadow casted across the pages of the book before me. And on the other side of cold window glass their wings appeared against blue sky. I heard a sound that may not exist as they touched down, breaking the thin sheet of ice on a shallow pond outside my view, a pond that for all I actually know, may not be frozen at all.
Prior to that, while the narrator carried out his research of a dead man, whom only the narrator and the dead man knew to be not dead at all, I was thinking, between the written lines, about a black man in Texas named Greg.
Greg was raised in parts east Mippisipi on a plantation run by white folks. The white folks treated Greg as their own and in fact better than they treated their daughter by birth, who according to Greg was so white she mostly disappeared every time she walked in front of the white columns of the portico. While he was allowed to swim in the pool, she was forbidden. He was home schooled and cherished and loved and allowed to recreate most of the day while she took the bus to the public school in town and was forced to scrub the floors on her return.
This upbringing did not exactly fit the man we knew as Greg, a man who blurted out snippets of Hendrix or Rod Stewart, and to amuse us or distract us would eat snuff sandwiches or clamp down with his teeth on smashed aluminum cans and tear away jagged chunks. Greg at one point starting taking a machete home from work, ostensibly to wait along the railroad tracks behind his house so he could catch the man coming to see his wife.
It was in a Texas town famous for its ice cream that I met Greg. We were doodlebuggers, searching across farmland and woods for oil 12 hours a day, 10 days running with four days off. Greg was barrel-chested, I was a wisp. My co-workers joked that I would have to run around in the rain to get wet. We lugged cables and planted geophones and swung machetes. We slung pipe for drilling holes and dropped into these holes 20 pound charges that came in five pound yellow plastic sticks which could be threaded together and then tied to a blasting cap with a 100 feet of wire attached. We were warned to pull on the wire before detonation because sometimes the charges floated to the top. There were stories about people who didn't pull on the wire.
All the jobs were separate and you did the one job everyday until told to do something else. If you swung a machete you were on the survey crew. If you planted geophones you were on the jug crew. Pipe slinging made you a drill helper. Working with the cables was the layout crew. If you got to drive the big equipment tractors you were a buggy driver. If you detonated the charges you were the shooter. The vibration of the explosions were read by the geophones attached to the cables that ran over a straight surveyed line of maybe a mile or less to a recording truck, inside of which the vibrations came out as jiggly lines on paper that were then studied to determine the feasibility of there being oil or gas pockets below.
Nine or ten of us drove to work together in a Chevy Suburban. In the mornings on the way to work we smoked commercial Mexican dope, lot's of it, and the seeds would fall into crevices caked with mud and little marijuana plants would grow and we cherished the little babies until the bosses told us enough was enough. For lunch we would drive to the nearest convenience store in the nearest town and eat microwave burritos with a bag of chips, and cellophane wrapped carrot cake for dessert. In the summer we would wash this down with one of those 48 ounce fountain drinks. If we were too far from a town we would only stop in the morning on the way to work and, in the winter, buy canned chili or soup or dinty moore stew which we would heat up on the manifold of the buggy driver's engine. With a church key we would punch triangular holes in the top until it could be folded back enough to slurp down over the jagged tin edge whatever was inside.
Greg's stories of his upbringing on the white people's plantation grew in complexity and detail over time, even if occasionally the details were contradictory. Some of our co-workers were unaffiliated bikers with that appearance than can instill fear in people who don't know them well as individuals and Greg was cautious around some of these guys, who in the first place had little tolerance for his blackness and secondarily, his bullshit. This all took place coinciding with the 444 day Iranian hostage crisis and Greg seemed at times relieved that his imagined inferiority was supplanted by the hatred many of these guys expressed for Arabs.
A couple of months into Greg's tenure the bosses hired another black man from the town and this man knew Greg, and had known him all his life. He said Greg had never lived anywhere but in this Texas town and that in fact these 20 and 30 mile drives to work in the surrounding areas was likely as far as Greg had ever been from his birthplace, and that he was certain Greg had never been to or lived in parts east Mipissipi (Mississippi).
Whether because of his hoax having been exposed or because of the sneaking ways of his wife (the new man said Greg was not married), Greg grew very erratic over the last days of his time on the crew and his lyrical rantings which had included song and fantasy became more tortured in nature. It was a few weeks after he first took a machete home that he stopped coming to work. And where my memory of Greg ends is hearing that he had been locked up, in that jail in the town he had never left, except for the journeys he took with us for a handful of long days one summer.
I heard the honk of geese over a silence under a hum. And then their fleeting shadow casted across the pages of the book before me. And on the other side of cold window glass their wings appeared against blue sky. I heard a sound that may not exist as they touched down, breaking the thin sheet of ice on a shallow pond outside my view, a pond that for all I actually know, may not be frozen at all.
Prior to that, while the narrator carried out his research of a dead man, whom only the narrator and the dead man knew to be not dead at all, I was thinking, between the written lines, about a black man in Texas named Greg.
Greg was raised in parts east Mippisipi on a plantation run by white folks. The white folks treated Greg as their own and in fact better than they treated their daughter by birth, who according to Greg was so white she mostly disappeared every time she walked in front of the white columns of the portico. While he was allowed to swim in the pool, she was forbidden. He was home schooled and cherished and loved and allowed to recreate most of the day while she took the bus to the public school in town and was forced to scrub the floors on her return.
This upbringing did not exactly fit the man we knew as Greg, a man who blurted out snippets of Hendrix or Rod Stewart, and to amuse us or distract us would eat snuff sandwiches or clamp down with his teeth on smashed aluminum cans and tear away jagged chunks. Greg at one point starting taking a machete home from work, ostensibly to wait along the railroad tracks behind his house so he could catch the man coming to see his wife.
It was in a Texas town famous for its ice cream that I met Greg. We were doodlebuggers, searching across farmland and woods for oil 12 hours a day, 10 days running with four days off. Greg was barrel-chested, I was a wisp. My co-workers joked that I would have to run around in the rain to get wet. We lugged cables and planted geophones and swung machetes. We slung pipe for drilling holes and dropped into these holes 20 pound charges that came in five pound yellow plastic sticks which could be threaded together and then tied to a blasting cap with a 100 feet of wire attached. We were warned to pull on the wire before detonation because sometimes the charges floated to the top. There were stories about people who didn't pull on the wire.
All the jobs were separate and you did the one job everyday until told to do something else. If you swung a machete you were on the survey crew. If you planted geophones you were on the jug crew. Pipe slinging made you a drill helper. Working with the cables was the layout crew. If you got to drive the big equipment tractors you were a buggy driver. If you detonated the charges you were the shooter. The vibration of the explosions were read by the geophones attached to the cables that ran over a straight surveyed line of maybe a mile or less to a recording truck, inside of which the vibrations came out as jiggly lines on paper that were then studied to determine the feasibility of there being oil or gas pockets below.
Nine or ten of us drove to work together in a Chevy Suburban. In the mornings on the way to work we smoked commercial Mexican dope, lot's of it, and the seeds would fall into crevices caked with mud and little marijuana plants would grow and we cherished the little babies until the bosses told us enough was enough. For lunch we would drive to the nearest convenience store in the nearest town and eat microwave burritos with a bag of chips, and cellophane wrapped carrot cake for dessert. In the summer we would wash this down with one of those 48 ounce fountain drinks. If we were too far from a town we would only stop in the morning on the way to work and, in the winter, buy canned chili or soup or dinty moore stew which we would heat up on the manifold of the buggy driver's engine. With a church key we would punch triangular holes in the top until it could be folded back enough to slurp down over the jagged tin edge whatever was inside.
Greg's stories of his upbringing on the white people's plantation grew in complexity and detail over time, even if occasionally the details were contradictory. Some of our co-workers were unaffiliated bikers with that appearance than can instill fear in people who don't know them well as individuals and Greg was cautious around some of these guys, who in the first place had little tolerance for his blackness and secondarily, his bullshit. This all took place coinciding with the 444 day Iranian hostage crisis and Greg seemed at times relieved that his imagined inferiority was supplanted by the hatred many of these guys expressed for Arabs.
A couple of months into Greg's tenure the bosses hired another black man from the town and this man knew Greg, and had known him all his life. He said Greg had never lived anywhere but in this Texas town and that in fact these 20 and 30 mile drives to work in the surrounding areas was likely as far as Greg had ever been from his birthplace, and that he was certain Greg had never been to or lived in parts east Mipissipi (Mississippi).
Whether because of his hoax having been exposed or because of the sneaking ways of his wife (the new man said Greg was not married), Greg grew very erratic over the last days of his time on the crew and his lyrical rantings which had included song and fantasy became more tortured in nature. It was a few weeks after he first took a machete home that he stopped coming to work. And where my memory of Greg ends is hearing that he had been locked up, in that jail in the town he had never left, except for the journeys he took with us for a handful of long days one summer.
Acts Of Sabotage
If faith allows for suspicion I have the greatest faith in my mechanic. Do I really suspect that with one hand he is fixing a part of my Jeep while with the other he is hammering away at a part that will need fixing next week? Certainly not. It is preposterous to blame the failings of a piece of aging machinery on the capable hands of a mechanic. And yet for about a month now, on three separate occasions, something breaks on the Jeep the day after I get it back from the mechanic. This mechanic is a good guy and well respected in the community but once planted the seeds of doubt and suspicion what can grow but weedy thoughts? For example, am I a good guy and well respected in the community? I am not at all sure what is fully included in being a good guy but considering my hermetic lifestyle I would say the well respected part is in question. Outside of a baby's handful of exceptions, I am not that well known here, and so what could a general respect be based on? Perhaps I am seen by the few people with enough idle time to give a damn about me as a person to be trifled with. Or Easy Money or Mr. Moneybags or a nimrod, as in a dolt, (rather than a hunter or first ruler of the earth after the flood.)? Do I seriously entertain these doubts? Well I guess that would depend on what you mean by seriously. How do you weigh one thought against another? If I'm writing it am I serious? I suppose not necessarily but it certainly must be given more weight than the passing thought of seeing someone who resembles a mutant freak from a horror movie, and then wondering if that person could possibly be mutant offspring. I mean I think there is more a chance that I am not respected than there is that a certain person resembling a B. Kliban cartoon character is actually the offspring of at least one mutant parent. I think I'm just going to go with that. I am not a good person and I am not well respected. In which case, isn't it entirely possible that I wake from deep sleep each night and in a semi-conscious state sleep-walk out to my Jeep in the freezing cold and then perform acts of sabotage? That certainly is the type of thing an ill-respected bad person would do. I think I should keep an eye on me, see what other deviant acts might be going on. It is entirely possible that with a due diligence I could find myself back on the track of wholesome goodness, which is where I foolishly thought I was all along. I think if we nip this thing in the bud I should have no more problems with that Jeep.
If faith allows for suspicion I have the greatest faith in my mechanic. Do I really suspect that with one hand he is fixing a part of my Jeep while with the other he is hammering away at a part that will need fixing next week? Certainly not. It is preposterous to blame the failings of a piece of aging machinery on the capable hands of a mechanic. And yet for about a month now, on three separate occasions, something breaks on the Jeep the day after I get it back from the mechanic. This mechanic is a good guy and well respected in the community but once planted the seeds of doubt and suspicion what can grow but weedy thoughts? For example, am I a good guy and well respected in the community? I am not at all sure what is fully included in being a good guy but considering my hermetic lifestyle I would say the well respected part is in question. Outside of a baby's handful of exceptions, I am not that well known here, and so what could a general respect be based on? Perhaps I am seen by the few people with enough idle time to give a damn about me as a person to be trifled with. Or Easy Money or Mr. Moneybags or a nimrod, as in a dolt, (rather than a hunter or first ruler of the earth after the flood.)? Do I seriously entertain these doubts? Well I guess that would depend on what you mean by seriously. How do you weigh one thought against another? If I'm writing it am I serious? I suppose not necessarily but it certainly must be given more weight than the passing thought of seeing someone who resembles a mutant freak from a horror movie, and then wondering if that person could possibly be mutant offspring. I mean I think there is more a chance that I am not respected than there is that a certain person resembling a B. Kliban cartoon character is actually the offspring of at least one mutant parent. I think I'm just going to go with that. I am not a good person and I am not well respected. In which case, isn't it entirely possible that I wake from deep sleep each night and in a semi-conscious state sleep-walk out to my Jeep in the freezing cold and then perform acts of sabotage? That certainly is the type of thing an ill-respected bad person would do. I think I should keep an eye on me, see what other deviant acts might be going on. It is entirely possible that with a due diligence I could find myself back on the track of wholesome goodness, which is where I foolishly thought I was all along. I think if we nip this thing in the bud I should have no more problems with that Jeep.
Mutant Review
The Hills Have Eyes 2 is a movie about mutants. If you have ever seen a mutant this would be a good movie to see, for comparison's sake. I personally found the mutants to be legitimately frightening and grotesque, hell bent as they were on chopping up people and storing their parts haphazardly, from hooks or on tables, around an underground storage room. In this episode the people were soldiers on a training mission who found their automatic weapons to be only moderately useful in combating mutants. And answered in this sequel is a question which has long nagged mutant aficionados--do they have a sense of humor? Apparently yes, for in one scene a soldier is rescued from a difficult cliff climb by a fellow soldier, who from above grabs his wrist just as he is about to fall and pulls him up effortlessly. Unfortunately, the helping soldier above is just a mutant in soldiers clothing. Letting the soldier-in-training dangle in mid air the mutant soldier chops off the arm he is holding and lets the man fall, some 80 feet or so and we are witness to the sound and vision of his head hitting a rock. Before he falls though the soldier is holding on the best he can with one hand but you know that's no good and when he begins to fall the mutant waves goodbye, with the soldiers cut off hand. And while at the time this was more horrifying than funny to me, in retrospect I have to judge it as proof of mutant humor. I could go on and on about this movie but for the few of you--and I'm guessing the number is very few--who enjoy, for whatever sick reason, the portrayal of mutants on film, I will spare you more details that in the end would only ruin the movie for you, and make you angry at me. I think it should be obvious that your anger is best saved for that day when you find yourself battling mutants. And good luck to you on that.
The Hills Have Eyes 2 is a movie about mutants. If you have ever seen a mutant this would be a good movie to see, for comparison's sake. I personally found the mutants to be legitimately frightening and grotesque, hell bent as they were on chopping up people and storing their parts haphazardly, from hooks or on tables, around an underground storage room. In this episode the people were soldiers on a training mission who found their automatic weapons to be only moderately useful in combating mutants. And answered in this sequel is a question which has long nagged mutant aficionados--do they have a sense of humor? Apparently yes, for in one scene a soldier is rescued from a difficult cliff climb by a fellow soldier, who from above grabs his wrist just as he is about to fall and pulls him up effortlessly. Unfortunately, the helping soldier above is just a mutant in soldiers clothing. Letting the soldier-in-training dangle in mid air the mutant soldier chops off the arm he is holding and lets the man fall, some 80 feet or so and we are witness to the sound and vision of his head hitting a rock. Before he falls though the soldier is holding on the best he can with one hand but you know that's no good and when he begins to fall the mutant waves goodbye, with the soldiers cut off hand. And while at the time this was more horrifying than funny to me, in retrospect I have to judge it as proof of mutant humor. I could go on and on about this movie but for the few of you--and I'm guessing the number is very few--who enjoy, for whatever sick reason, the portrayal of mutants on film, I will spare you more details that in the end would only ruin the movie for you, and make you angry at me. I think it should be obvious that your anger is best saved for that day when you find yourself battling mutants. And good luck to you on that.
Happy Holiday
I was up to the convenience store on the highway before sun up buying milk. So impatient was I for milk that I could not wait for the windshield to thaw and I squinted at the road on the other side of the frosted windshield, hoping not to find conflict with some small or large animal more impatient or careless than I.
The parking lot was full of the trucks of working men who were inside buying coffee and cigarettes and ding dongs for breakfast. There were three available spaces closest to the store and they were marked--Handicapped, No-Parking, and Reserved. I chose a spot that does not exist
A man about my height but twice as wide was blocking the open door with his comedy routine directed at a co-worker. The co-worker was a black man working on Martin Luther King Day. The big man said, Hold on now, what are you doing, don't you know what today is? If the circumstances allowed, the big man played this same joke every year. It was not mean spirited, the big man loved his black friend, and while comfortable with the word, nigger, was just as comfortable telling people he knew a black man who was all right. The big man took pride in this inside knowledge--the ability to discern between good and bad.
As a working class man of mostly the southern states, I have witnessed this exchange many times, in various forms, and one year, as my crews resident lover of black people, took off the day myself, although for me it was not out of reverence or protest that I took off, but rather that in regard to taking off from work, I feel one day is as good as another.
I had it in my mind to relate to you horrendous racial injustice on this day honoring the man who fought against it, but instead choose to leave you with the image of the two men at the store, who were gleamy-eyed and seemed happy to be in each other's company. As for what is in their hearts, I more and more wish to accept that I do not know.
I was up to the convenience store on the highway before sun up buying milk. So impatient was I for milk that I could not wait for the windshield to thaw and I squinted at the road on the other side of the frosted windshield, hoping not to find conflict with some small or large animal more impatient or careless than I.
The parking lot was full of the trucks of working men who were inside buying coffee and cigarettes and ding dongs for breakfast. There were three available spaces closest to the store and they were marked--Handicapped, No-Parking, and Reserved. I chose a spot that does not exist
A man about my height but twice as wide was blocking the open door with his comedy routine directed at a co-worker. The co-worker was a black man working on Martin Luther King Day. The big man said, Hold on now, what are you doing, don't you know what today is? If the circumstances allowed, the big man played this same joke every year. It was not mean spirited, the big man loved his black friend, and while comfortable with the word, nigger, was just as comfortable telling people he knew a black man who was all right. The big man took pride in this inside knowledge--the ability to discern between good and bad.
As a working class man of mostly the southern states, I have witnessed this exchange many times, in various forms, and one year, as my crews resident lover of black people, took off the day myself, although for me it was not out of reverence or protest that I took off, but rather that in regard to taking off from work, I feel one day is as good as another.
I had it in my mind to relate to you horrendous racial injustice on this day honoring the man who fought against it, but instead choose to leave you with the image of the two men at the store, who were gleamy-eyed and seemed happy to be in each other's company. As for what is in their hearts, I more and more wish to accept that I do not know.