Hot Off The Grill

I was the Tin Woodman. Or the Scarecrow. Or whichever one of those Oz fuckers didn’t have a heart. At least that’s what I’ve been told. But that isn’t really the issue here, at least not now. The issue is that if it weren’t for an overwhelming desire to have a yellow tee shirt I would still be breathing, still be narrating from the realm of the living. Instead, I’m in this weird, pseudo past tense disaster of a novel, trying hard to keep my verbs in order. And I still don’t have a yellow tee shirt. Or a heart.


Literally the first paragraph I've produced in two months. The start of something that I can feel slowly working its way to the surface. Something big, something fast, something like a shark or a whale or whatever. Not sure where it is going, and it seems like there or three of four separate ideas swimming around in these sentences, butthat'll all get worked out later. Hopefully.

Patience

Continuing with the theme of archive emptying, here is a storyboard/plotline I wrote up for a story I never even started.

* time is a closed, repeating loop
* the number of human lives on the planet is fixed
* no new lives are ever created
* when a person dies, or reaches the end of one life cycle, they are reincarnated as another person and follow that particular life cycle until its end. And so on
* somehow, the main character is made aware of this situation
* he continues to kill himself until he cycles through every possible life cycle in the hopes that he will eventually be reincarnated as himself and use this 'second chance' to make right some wrong (probably something to do with a girl/lover)
* the time loop always ends with total destruction and then starts over
* by being aware of the loop and altering it (by continually killing himself) he eventually reduces the lifetime of every person on the planet, causing a catastrophic breakdown of time
* he realizes thus and is forced to live out every life in its entirety, essentially on autopilot
* after he explains this to the girl, he is reincarnated as her, and while living her life on auto pilot he realizes she is in love with someone he understands is better for her than he is
* he accepts that she will never love him fully and is doomed to be a self-aware automaton

perspective: after-the-fact narration? Or after-the-fact until he is reincarnated as her? Probably after-the-fact; a memoir of everyone who ever lived.

the train metaphor: time is a train track that is a giant loop. There are many trains on the track. Every time a train reaches the end of the loop a new conductor takes over and drives the train for the duration of the next loop.



Looking back on this, I now find that last part, the train thing, most interesting. To the degree that if I ever summoned the motivation to re-visit this story, it'd probably just be about train conductors on a fixed loop.

Dear Jayne

Sometimes I write fake letters. For fun, or something.

Drunk, and writing this to you instead of my journal, which is probably a mistake but I guess I can always read this in the morning. I don't know, but either way words are qued up at the tip of my pen and it is best to get them going as soon as possible. I was thinking about the sun and how much I'd like to see it close up. If I ever found out I had a terminal illness I'd steal a spaceship and fly into the sun. Cremation and spaceflight all in one package--very appealing, no? I feel the need to write as quickly as possible, while my fingers still tingle, to capture the precise nature of this state of mind. This is all non-sense, but at the same time it's all that I am--words and ink and flesh and bone and hair. Naked, cold, hungry. I'm not sure I have a firm grasp on vocabulary now, but the first sentence of this page should be a reasonable excuse. Strike now, while the iron is hot! When we die we will exist in ink and paper--a history of thought and intention. Everything sounds epic when you're inebriated and I apologize for the grandiose ramblings of this letter. But as I said, I'm ink and paper and intention and can't be held responsible for late-night self-expression, can I? Not sure...if it were raining I'm sure I'd feel even more introspective ----- I think it is important not to censor yourself. I feel like the more I ramble the closer get to some truth, unknown or obscured by my conscious mind. Stoner poetry, for sure, but I'm not stoned I'm just tired and full of echoes or shadows or reverberations of former lives. Strike while the iron is hot! Capture these ghosts and spectres and imprison them on a page within an ink cell. Midnight cats make the night easier, their calm demeanor's are comforting, soothing. But I will not be soothed. I will rage on into the depths of the night content with the absence of others. The more/higher walls I can build the better. Now I'm just being ridiculous. I should go now--sleep--dream about things more exciting than reality, which isn't too hard. Really all I need is a flying car.

Super Random

Seriously more random than anything yet posted here. Strange things recently found in a notebook:

I remember the days, snow packed, across two streets that separate school and home. Quiet, walk around old brick building, alone, though fresh footprints suggest others are here, inside, waiting. Those same wet footprints navigate hardwood hallways, glisten under lights suspended a bit too high for precise illumination. The classroom is cold. Ancient radiators spit and hiss as they try to counteract the windows above. The lights in here are closer; they provide more modern light. I remember blood blisters in kindergarten, lies and tickets in first grade, burnt hands in second, glasses in third, static water fountain shocks in fourth, snowy halls in fifth...


This page, already tainted by the first--
And on the table I find a single hair. Long, brown. With the proper technology I could make a clone of whomever left his hair here. Would they be the same? How well an automobile runs depends on the quality of gasoline used to power it. Or, you can make the same machinery operate differently by using different circuitry. Or, a brain can be physically identical but I can't imagine it would work the same, have the same thoughts.
How did I get here? This class, a drone, to infinity by way of every rambling backroad imaginable, never changing pace or intonation or randomness. Hidden fidelity. Who is this woman in the rowboat? An image of peaks and valleys; just find me the girl. Minimality is a factor, L.A. riverbed longshot. Perfect apex -- dry lake -- salt flats -- slowly tilt -- water and energy -- an ocean filled with plastic

Random

One from the archives (maybe parts of this found their way into other things):
Forgotten cats outside the window. Wrappers from many teas, assorted on the linoleum. Remembered cats stretched across circular dinner tables, creating curved meridians. Another cat prowled back into the light, from the dark between chairs and couches. The sole desire, the primary mission: cashews. Cashews and Nut-thins, and maybe the delicious background flavors of Goldfish crackers. Sudden cats, spiraled up and down. Lips thick with salt, such a good time to be had fainting for the orange and red keys, fuzzed together, a sort of plastic melted over as a cover

Different Keys for Different Locks

His voice, pinched off at the end of sentences / Revolutions Two through Eight / And walk through the clutter, the dead automation / Circuits bled electricity until nothing was left, no power just silent snowflakes, the buzz and hiss of high tension lines conspicuously absent / Bare walls and hardwood floors and cold rooms. Oppressive empty space / You need to see the timing, like Tetris blocks locked in place / Serpentine vibrations that pass through flesh walls, while in the corner stacked journals tell dusty tales of imagined possibility, dry ink flaked off yellowed pages / Frightened by the speed of his tonal recognition / Wet reflections / wild lights / cloud passed electricity / Lightning is cloud feedback / This storm is a song, thunder chorus and lightning verses, rain fell like liquid percussion on glass ears / All of the songs in the world play at the same time and I try to decipher them, individual melodies like cells in ether / Planets and cells suspended in ether, the sound of a compressed spring / Burnt tongue coffee, like a swollen piece of sandpaper between my jaws / Yellow-tipped power cords and quarter-inch input jacks; again, in the empty cold room. Cracks in the floor, wide / Cracks the floor wide, like veins in the marble or rivers bisecting themselves on graph paper / Everything ends with a g / Golden maple floor, cracks wide in the marble, veins or snakes or / rivers / Little skeleton fingers make a fist around a pen / The floor is basement cool in front porch heat / Perfect cylinders / gears in motion.

Hiatus

So, the blog has been on something of an unofficial hiatus lately, it the complete lack of posts hasn't been obvious enough. It can be really difficult for me to stay motivated, and the first month of summer is usually spent not writing or reading. It's shameful, really, how little I've done sine the end of the semester. However, tomorrow I start phase one of the Program, which is a highly scientific and exacting, um, program, designed to keep me from being totally worthless. Phase one involves writing every day for ten minutes, without stopping, for a week. After that, phase two: two pages in the morning and three pages at night, every day for a week. Then, phase three, which I haven't created yet. Probably be pretty serious though. Punishing, perhaps. The idea is that somewhere in this process a gem will be unearthed, and I can finally stop watching Arrested Development and start writing the next Great American Novel. Then I can retire and return to repeated watching of Arrested Development. That is the goal, the mission, the Program. Or something like that.

Of

The expected glow of a computer screen conspicuously absent. In its place the shallow hues of old Christmas lights stapled to the walls, so he sits, a basement stoner, on the corpse of a couch, at least as old as he is, in the dull orange light, smoke tendriling up through the hot summer air trapped in the room, deprived of the freedom of midnight breezes, the smoke now pollinating the air, tickling the gentle hairs in the nostrils of those with noses for such things, like the addition of cheese to a burger, that little extra ingredient that makes the whole meal better, or so he tells me, or tries to tell me, but his speech is too slow, too stunted to decipher properly so all I hear is a string of ums and likes and totallys , the true language of those types, sadly content with inferior communicative abilities, unable even to deliver the most basic indication of coherent thought, whereas I have vastly superior skills and a functioning knowledge of human emotion, like the perfect cyborg assassin, programmed with just information to complete the mission, whatever that may be.

Chapter Two

My first contribution to the project. It will be interesting to see how the different writing styles mesh together, if they do at all. I think I can see the plot developing, or at least there are some elements available for plot development now. Or something like that...regardless, I'm eagerly awaiting Chris D.'s chapter.

II

Moments earlier, on the other side of town, in a similar diner (it does, in fact, belong to the same chain of diners as the one in which Derek’s bloody fork will be thrown shortly) similarly occupied, Henry Herman was sitting on a toilet. Specifically, he was sitting on the toilet in the women’s restroom. Henry always used the women’s restroom at this particular diner, not out of some strange fetished programming, but rather because he felt it was cleaner than the masculine equivalent.
So Henry sat, on the toilet, avoiding the return to his booth as best he could. He figured he had about three and a half minutes more before his booth-mates grew too suspicious of his absence. At his booth: Holly (sister), Roland (her husband), and Peter (relationship unknown). Henry despised Roland, largely due to his being in Henry’s class every year of elementary school. Also due to the time in sixth grade when Roland knocked Henry’s fresh-off-the-grill hamburger out if his hand and onto the dirt at Henry’s Backyard Birthday Bash. Mostly due to that time in sixth grade.
When the fork hits Lenny’s chest at the other diner, Henry emerges from the restroom. He walks to his booth, his mind made up: he was leaving.
Hey guys, I’m sorry but I gotta go. Work called. They need me downtown.
You took a phone call while on the shitter? Roland asks.
I never said I had to shit.
Well, you were in there so long. I just assumed.
Thanks, Roland.
You still answered your phone in the bathroom. That’s so gross. Holly frowns, disapprovingly.
Thanks, Holly. Look, I’ve got to go. He tosses a crumpled up ten dollar bill onto the table and walks towards the door.
Don’t forget your sidewalk chalk, Picasso! Roland shouts after him. Henry pretends not to hear and exits the diner. He flips the hood of his sweatshirt over his head and steps out into the rain. A few steps later and he’s fumbling for the keys to his ’96 Honda Civic. A few more steps and he’s at the driver’s side door. He slides the key into the lock and with his knee presses on the door while turning the key and engaging the handle, a ritual necessary to open the antiquated door.
On his way home Henry gets a non-fake business call.
Henry. We need you. 14th and Exeter. Double homicide. Pretty messy.
I’ll be there in five. Henry flips closed his phone, turns the red Civic around and points at the desired intersection.
Four and a half minutes later Henry arrives on the scene. He parks a block away, grabs his pack out of the trunk and heads toward the mass of police officers and medical personnel gathered in the street. His arrival is unnoticed.
Sir. Excuse me, sir. Is detective Lantz here? Henry pulls at the shoulder of a uniformed officer.
Huh? Oh, it’s you. Hey, Lantz, you’re boy’s here. The officer motions at a small group of policemen. Detective Lantz looks back at them.
Hey, Henry, over here.
Henry walks over to the curb where the officers are standing and sets his pack down. The policemen return to their duties, oblivious to Henry’s presence. He opens his pack and extracts the necessary equipment for the task at hand.
What do you think, cyan or cerulean for the pants? he says out loud to no one. He decides to go with the cyan and takes the corresponding stick of chalk out of the large box of multi-colored chalks.
Yes, cyan was the right choice, he says when he finishes tracing around the victim’s tee shirt. Now, is this blood maroon or wine? Or perhaps a combination? When he’s done, Detective Lantz ambles over to check his work.
Christ, Henry, we just need an outline, not a fucking mural.
Yes, sir, but I thought mustard was a good match for victim number two’s shirt.
Keep that shit in art school, son.
Yes, sir.
Alright, then. Thanks for coming out.
Henry replaces his things in his pack and walks back to the Civic.

Teamwork / Chapter One

After much talk between myself and two fellow fictors, a multi-author novel project is now underway. Tentatively titled Check, Please, we're alternating chapters and smashing them together, hopefully with stupendous results. Eric W. stepped up to the plate in the leadoff position, and his contribution, the first chapter, is included below. We'll see how this works out...

I

You heard the man, give him your wallet.
That's not what he said at all.
Two grimaces. The man's skin is pinched at the neck and jawline.
Of course it is, you nit, now give him your wallet.
That's not what I heard you say, is that what you said?
No. I said wallet. Just wallet. A short man, galoshes. An umbrella. The rain, always the rain.
I can't believe this shit. Indignation is hard on most faces, no exception here.
The first man is Derek Unger. He was born in a hospital in Brussels, but only because his father was stationed there in the war. He's bored and his face is pockmarked. He spent years in front of the mirror perfecting a smile that has worked its way into any number of women's pants.
The second is Lush. That's what he tells people when he meets them. He has a pipe that his grandfather gave him from after the same war that Derek's father fought in. The two men have no idea they have this connection. Right now, their concern is with Derek's wallet.
Wallet. The short man repeats himself. His hand is like a badgers paw, maybe a raccoon. Perhaps a badger when it's dry. A raccoon's timidity, in this downpour, it's understandable.
Why would I give you my wallet, will you answer that? Lush's lips smack as he says this. His breath is hot, and there's a hint of chili that makes him feel like the bile is rising in the back of his throat. This doesn't really happen until there's a gun in his mouth. Later.
He doesn't need to explain anything to you, man. Give him your wallet.
Just shut the fuck up, man! I'm asking this guy questions and you keep answering. What do you have to do with this anyway?
Wallet, Derek.
Derek had no idea the short man knew his name. He's visibly surprised. Shaken more than he would have been if the man hadn't know. That's obvious, perhaps, but it works. He hands over his wallet. The shorter man keeps his hands under the protective circle of his umbrella's shade.
Lush has a piece of pipe, of the metal variety, tucked in his jacket, which he brings to bear against Derek’s skull at the completion of the request.
Yeah?
Yeah it's here. The shorter man re-folds a piece of paper he's just finished examining from Derek’s wallet. He drops it into the pocket of his rain jacket.
---
What'll it be gentlemen?
Two eggs, over easy. Grits, hold the hash browns.
How do you want your toast?
Held as well.
No toast?
No toast. Thank you.
And you?
Lush sets his menu back between the ketchup and the mustard. The shorter man orders a coffee and a side of cottage cheese. Lush hates cottage cheese, shakes his head.
And your friend? He doesn't look too hungry. Aspirin?
Yeah, four aspirin. A second glass of water would be nice too. Oh, actually, cranberry juice. Lush loves cranberry juice.
Alright, back in a moment, gentlemen.
Derek’s head droops. He's got a spot of drool at the corner of his mouth. His hood has been forcefully held up to cover the purplish egg rising on his shaved head.
So. Lenny.
The short man is Lenny. Shit-Eating Grin Lenny is what his cousin's called him when they used to play rough at the farm his grandparents owned.
So. Lenny.
Lenny is clearly not paying attention to Derek. He's staring at the spot of drool on Derek’s face.
Clean that off, Lush.
What?
Clean that off. That spot of drool.
Lush checks his lips. Lenny isn't pointed at Derek, and Lush is self-conscious. This is fairly typical. Lenny points at Derek, who's mouth is starting to gape open a bit.
What? Oh. No thanks, man.
Do it.
Fuck you.
Lenny slams his fork into Lush’s hand. Lush yells.
This is a good opportunity to take a gander at the rest of the diner. There are four other patrons, none at the same table. The waitress, Miranda, has her hair in a bun. She loves eating the frosting off of cinnamon rolls and her husband of three years left her for a job in another state. Chasing the dream is how he referenced it when he left her. She's staring at the men’s ticket. Hard.
The three men are now all wide awake (though Lenny remains stone-faced). Derek rips the fork out of his hand and throws it, in a slightly offhand manner, at Lenny who dodges it. Hard to do in a small space. The fork thuds into his chest, and then falls softly onto the padding of Lenny's side of the booth.
It has blood on tips of the prongs.

Avocado

And I kind of hate her now, probably due to the innumerable cold shoulders thrust into my advances, but then she stifles a quiet laugh and instantly I’ve forgotten and forgiven any trespasses and when she bites her lower lip and scrunches her nose I melt a little, content with the scene I’m seeing in my head of the two of us hand in hand exploring a long, bright grocery aisle, a small black basket in my free hand and an avocado in hers as she meticulous inspects the green orb, but by the time she’s done the real her, the one I hated moments ago, is already out the door, down the hallway and off into a world unknown and untouched by even my imagination, and I guess that's fine, for I am much more enamored by the infinite possibilities of the her that is still holding a ripe avocado than the her that just left.

Gangsta Bucket List

According to a professor of mine, the three main goals of a 'gangsta' (hearing a white college professor in his fifties use the term 'gangsta' is always amusing) in the late 80's were:

1) get a girl pregnant

2) take a life

3) survive in prison

So far I'm 0/3, which probably isn't a bad thing.

Butchered

Yes, this is the worst haircut I have ever received. Yes, I paid for it, too. $16.97. Three of those dollars were a tip, which I normally wouldn’t have given, out of principle, but my girlfriend has made such a big deal about tipping in the past that it’s almost become habit. And it’s not just that the haircut sucks; the whole experience was a total disaster. The woman with the scissors (not a barber, that’s for sure) talked. A lot. About things that I could not have cared less about. No, I don’t care about your teenage sun. No, I’m not interested in your uncle the famous historical writer (it helps if you remember his name, too). No, I really don’t want to hear about the lineage of your family or all the terrible stories your grandfather told about the war. And if you say pitcher instead of picture one more time, I might take this ridiculous smock off and use it to hang you. That might have been a bit harsh, but this haircut is terrible. You should see it. And, just like at the dentist’s, I don’t want you bombarding me with questions about my degree and my career plans and my social life while you are wielding sharp instruments around my face. Please focus on the task at hand and cut my goddamn hair straight. Seriously, what kind of question is what do you want to do with your life? I want to work some shit job every Monday through Friday until I’m too old to do anything fun and watch my relationships with close friends disintegrate as we all grow older and closer to death. Or maybe I just want to have my hair cut decently and in peace.
The reaction to the cut isn’t good:
You look like either a pedophile or a victim of a pedophile.
Oh, great. I’m shaving it immediately.
No, keep it. You look like a little funky monkey, it’s cute.
What? A funky monkey pedophile. That’s just what I had in mind. In fact, the next time I go in to get my hair cut I will tell them. I’d like to look like a pedophiliac monkey, please. Oh, and could you add a little funk too?


True story, unfortunately.

Trilogy

On the back of my spacewhale I feel a slight tinge of panic as the inerstellar cetacean takes flight and slips through massive clouds of gas and dust particles and cosmic debris. The panic subsides and I remember the pleasure of space flight.
There are other people on the back of my spacewhale. They aren’t much fun. In fact, the two girls sitting directly behind me are candidates for the most-annoying-sub-twenty-one-year-old-duo award. Probably will win. They talk constantly during preflight preparation, about the most mundane bullshit: boys (not men), television programs, sex with boys (and definitely not men), and clothing. Their voices are like serpentine razor wires, slinking and wrapping around my head, piercing my ears. Midway through the flight their batteries are depleted and they fall into restless sleep, shifting in their makeshift beds and kicking the back of my seat.
The girl across the aisle, funny story about her. Right after the stewardess goes over the safety features of the spacewhale and just before it takes off, the pilot comes on the intercom and asks for someone named Kayla Keyes.
Kayla Keyes, will you please ring your call button? Kayla Keyes.
No call buttons are depressed, and soon the captain is back on the intercom.
One more time. Kayla Keyes. Please ring your call button.
Still no call buttons are depressed and the captain comes on again, frustrated.
Kayla Keyes. Ring your call button now. Kayla. Kayla Keyes.
One more time: Kayla. Kaaaaaaaayla. Ring your call button.
I happen to glance off across the aisle and catch this girl sitting in the aisle seat raise her arm and press the call button overhead. A small light comes on and dings and soon the stewardess is coming down the aisle.
Kayla? she asks.
The girl just looks up and shrugs her shoulders
We called you four times? Why didn’t you answer?
The girl shrugs again.
Well, you could have saved us a lot of time here. Anyway, we have an important message from your dad. He says to text him as soon as you land.
The girl shrugs once more and the stewardess leaves.
I watch the girl stare down her phone, hovering over her lap, protected by furious thumbs. Texting a storm. All this well after the pilot commanded all passengers to power down all transmitting cellular devices.
Some time later the spacewhale touches down at Sky Harbor Intergalactic Spaceport in Phoenix. Not long after I’m standing at the passenger pickup bay, waiting to be picked up by unknown family members. I say unknown because I don’t know which members of my family will be picking me up, and some of those members I haven’t seen in six years or haven’t even met yet. That would be my step-cousin, the one that, though she’s been my step-cousin for ten years now, I haven’t met. Her name is Jesse, I think. The others, the ones that I haven’t seen in six years, include my aunt Melissa (we call her Missy) and cousins Lindsay and Dan, my step-uncle Dennis and his daughters (my step-cousins) Jesse and Megan. That’s Jesse I haven’t met. Megan I never will meet, because four months before I got on my spacewhale and travelled to Phoenix she packed a bag and ran away. Also there: my mom and dad and grandma.
The longer I’m waiting in the pickup bay the more nervous I get. I wasn’t sure I’d recognize Missy (more concerned that she wouldn’t recognize me) and dreaded an awkward ride home with Dennis. After half an hour I give up all hope of having a decent trip. Then, out of the darkness at the far end of the pickup bay, a sleek silver craft roars towards me. Music blaring out the open windows (“Ocean Man” by Ween) and I see my cousin Dan behind the control panel, eyes hidden by silver aviators and head obscured by a very old locomotive conductor’s cap. His fiance, Janice (I left her out of the list of family members because I’m not sure what to call a future cousin-in-law), sitting next to him. Dan notices me, violently jerks the silver craft at me and guns the sub-lightspeed thrusters. At the last possible instant he hits the brakes and slides the craft right up next to me.
Well, get in, he shouts over the music.
I open the rear hatch and toss my bag in before crawling into the tiny passenger compartment.
Hours later I’m poolside, staring off into the Phoenix sun while my dad throws coins into the water. For Jesse. She recently turned sixteen and, not having a job or allowance, will do nearly anything for money. So my dad throws coins in the pool, and when she gets home from school she puts her backpack down and jumps in after them. Four dollars and seventy-three cents, enough for lunch at McDonald’s, she says.
The next day Dan and Jan take me with them to the airport to pick up Lindsay. We leave early and stop in the desert. It’s hot and barren and full of bizarre vegetation and everything I expected the desert to be. We walk along a trail, mostly in silence, watching the dry air move through the spines of cactus. The colors here are soft, muted. Nothing is vibrant.
Lindsay is standing nearly in the same spot I was twenty-nine hours ago.
The ride back is quiet. Dan and Lindsay talk, but only to each other and only in their secret sibling language. We see a homeless man on the side of the highway with a sign. It says anything helps. I say sorry, we thew all of our change in the pool. They laugh. Dan tells me he once tried to send me a telepathogram, but couldn’t remember my area code so he tried a random combination of digits he thought might be right and sent it to someone he’d later discover to be a fourteen-year-old girl (the telepathogram: did you know more than half Earth’s population lives in yurts?). I laugh.
That night Dan and I stay up late by the pool. He sips from a glass of Wild Turkey and smokes. I just sit and don’t smoke. We talk for hours about music and passion and art and integrity, but we just say the same things we sad the last time we stayed up late and talked. The same recycled conversation. Still, it’s a connection, which is more than I can say for my time with Lindsay.
No one wakes me up in the morning and I sleep through breakfast. I stumble through the kitchen and out onto the back porch where breakfast debris litters mostly empty plates and the whole family is sitting around a table. I sit and drink coffee and listen to Grandma talk about Grandpa. He died six years ago--his funeral was the last time I saw Missy or Lindsay or Dennis. She talks about Poppy (how it came to be that we all call him Poppy, I’ll never know), and how empty the house is without him. I can see the hurt in her voice hang in the air like cold ocean fog.
The day goes by quickly: hot, dry, still. We go off into the desert again, Dan, Jan, Lindsay and myself. We walk a long dirt trail, winding around mesquite and under the upreached arms of ancient saguaros. I hang back and talk to Lindsay. Or try to talk to Lindsay. I ask her about bands and movies but she;s less than enthusiastic in her replies. Finally I get her to talk about the family.
It’s weird how we’re supposed to be related but we have nothing to relate to. We might as well be strangers.
Yeah.
I mean, I don’t know anything about you. What have you been up to all these years.
Not much.
Oh come on, you gotta give me more than that.
Why?
Because we’re cousins. Family. We should know each other.
Why? We see each other once a decade. You don’t have to be friends with everyone, you know. She walks away, catches up with Dan and Jan. I stop and pick a spine off a young saguaro and roll the slender dagger between my fingertips.
Dennis transports me to the spaceport. Dan, Lindsay and my dad are off searching for used record stores and old book shops. Jan, my mom and Missy are taking Grandma shoe shopping. So I’m sitting next to Dennis (who looks like some strange breed of Jay Leno and Wayne Knight’s character in Jurassic Park), in his cream colored luxury cruiser, doing my best to sound interested in his awkward computer babble. He stops and buys us ice cream, and for a minute we sit, not talking , just eating ice cream. Dennis finishes his ice cream first.
This is some family we’ve got.
Tell me about it, I say, my throat thick with the frozen treat.
He starts his cruiser and sets off for the spaceport.
I hope you’ll come back soon, he says when we arrive at the departure gate.
Yeah. I close the passenger hatch and enter the spaceport. I think about what Lindsay told me yesterday in the desert and board the spacewhale, leaving my family in the dusty sun as the great creature swims off into the upper atmosphere.

A Disconnected Trilogy of Self-Discovery in Three Parts

Probably I’m too contented to be a good writer. So I tried to be an alcoholic, like Kerouac or Bukowski or Hemmingway. Didn’t work. I never liked the taste of alcohol and mixed drinks just made me sick. So I tried my hand at drug addiction, like Burroughs or Dick or Hunter Thompson. Also didn’t work. Turns out it’s supremely difficult to score hard drugs in Crawford, Nebraska (population: 1,107). Really, this town is Mayberry. No rough side of the tracks, no ghetto, no dark underbelly. And besides addiction is a skill I do not possess.
But back to the contented writer thing. After failing to get on the addiction wagon I turned my attention towards sabotaging my close relationships, like Kerouac or Bukowski or Hemmingway or Burroughs or Dick or Thompson. My family is scattered around the midwest and I don’t really talk to them much anyway, which ruled them out. So I turned my attention to my girlfriend. If I could just get her to throw a lamp at me or smash some dishes maybe it would be the spark necessary to write the next Great American Novel.
I’d come home late and not tell her where I was. She didn’t care. Said I needed my space and that’s okay with her. I’d be emotionally distant as I knew how. She said it’s just a phase and I’d get over it. I even tried leaving fake love notes to non-existent lovers on my desk. She never read them--she’s not the snooping type, I guess. So I told her I was having an affair. She laughed, asked me with who and said there are only seven girls in town within ten years of my age and if I was sleeping with anyone older or younger I had more problems than infidelity. I accused her of having an affair. She laughed.
Goddammit, I’m serious, I said.
Okay, honey.
Nothing but smiles, so I went into the kitchen and took a coffee mug out of the cupboard and hurled it into the wall. Being one of those plastic, refillable jobs it just bounced helplessly off the wall. Laughs.
What’s his name!
A new cup projected into the wall with a successful explosion of glass.
Honey, wasn’t that the cup you made for your mom in the fourth grade?
I slinked over to the debris, knelt down, tears welled up in the corners of m eyes.
Look what you made me do! I was sobbing now, streams of tears and snot sliding down my face.
It’s okay, honey. It’s not broken too bad. Let’s try to glue it back together.
Okay.
* * *
So now I’m on our front porch, lemonade in my hand. The late summer sun is broadcasting its final warm rays of the evening and the sound of cicadas pulses rhythmically through the cottonwoods and a slight breeze trickles through my hair and across my face.
To hell with Hemmingway. All he did was undo everything Faulkner established. Kerouac and Bukowski, too. Just shiftless drunks who embellished their mundane lives. Burroughs and Thompson were too twisted to keep their shit together and managed to coast downhill into greatness on a single piece of work each. And Phillip Dick, he was just a paranoid amphetamine fiend, so caught up in his own delusions to make anything of his life.
She appears through the screen door and refills my lemonade, the engagement ring on her left hand clicking against the cool glass pitcher. They can have their names emblazoned on the pantheon of great literature. I’ll take my porch.