It is
moment
to
moment
for me
right
now.
The warm blanket of anxiety, which used to comfort me, has been burned in the fire. Many of the logs that I used to fool myself with, thrash myself with, feed, warm, bathe, and surround myself with…have been tossed. Though they are still there, in the garden, I find it harder to use them today.
My thoughts function in an unseemly manner. Please do not let me operate heavy machinery. Please ask the children to go upstairs. Keep pitchforks at arms length. Follow the animals into shelter. Avoid all eye contact. Chew food. Stretch legs. Breath now. Lunge first. Thrust deep. Ask later.
It is a practice to keep from thinking. It is my thinking that starts the judging…the judging then helps build the case… which leads to my destruction of you… and ultimately my destruction of everything… the destruction of me.
So, I am over EVERYTHING in this moment. I have let it all go.
I have detached.
And, it ain’t so bad.
All I really need to focus on right now….is my breath.
I have found… if I can accept… along with forgive….ALL in my skewed perception will turn out better than what my brain wants to have me imagine. If I attach fear, desire or hope to people or possessions, to principals and perceptions, I am totally fucked. And if I am fucked, well then, sound the alarms, all hands on deck…because it appears that you too will be fucked….yes, I am bringing you into this vortex of fury and pain. You are sheep. I am carnage. Please pass the pickles.
Today I have faith in so much more than what my thinking brain can provide. And yeah, you might be thinking, "Isn't that you attaching something to something else?! Aren't you contradicting yourself?! Aren't you a lover of pies and kiwi?!"
Or maybe you're already thinking about something else...some other...something... unrelated to thinking ...or pies ...or truckstops ...or freezer doors...or?
Life is fueled by contradictions.
This is my contradiction. This is what I have found works, right now. In this moment. For me. What do you have? Do you have that? Do you have that in times of question? -In times of frightening reality? It takes real moments to test this out. Try it. Surrender. You don’t know anything. Seriously.
Thursday, April 15, 2010
Wednesday, April 14, 2010
Tantrum
Yogurtland, just below 3rd on the east side of LaBrea Blvd, Thursday, April 7th, 9:45pm-
Totally fucking packed.
-A line of assorted people out the door. The night is hot. We make our way in, I grab a cup, pretend to squirt hand sanitizer from the 3 gallon dispenser into my cup…my daughters do not laugh, they do not smile, they are exactly one month from turning 13, everything I do is unappealing.
We crawl toward the first flavor, plain tart, my favorite. Down the line is coconut, vanilla wafer, dutch chocolate, arctic vanilla, red velvet cake batter, pistachio, taro, butterfinger...it’s all fucking great. There are so many flavors, people can’t help themselves, some are pushing, some walking around getting in the way. Some try to make it to the bathroom. I spy the slummers, who have tiny paper sample cups…like little junkies they hang off the smores machine, taking hits and eyeballing everyone else as if to say, “no, you suck.”
We inch forward.
We get closer to the fruit and dry toppings bar, we’re still 5 feet away, when I notice 3 fat Armenian girls, no they’re Spanish…maybe Russian gypsies. They are inching in ahead of me from my left, kind of elbowing, I give them the benefit of the doubt for a moment, thinking they’re lost or looking. Then the first one takes one step more… and I let loose, “THERE’S A LINE!!”
I say it clear, direct.
I use a tone of impending doom and violence, and a volume that makes the glass in the stores window brace.
It is with authority.
It is with a hammer.
The first one blanches, but she does not heed, does not care, she will be heard, “If all here will pay, so be it…let’s see him try… and bring his fucking sad heat.”
She begins to talk back. Her words make no sense, it’s noise, she’s underwater, she is a cartoon.
I begin,
“WE, ARE IN THE LINE!!
YOU ARE NOT!
THE LINE BEGINS FOR YOU, BACK THERE!!"
Silence.
All those in the store feel sick.
The power of this silence makes me more righteous, more violent, more angry, more, more, MORE, MORE, MORE!!!
This is my time. I am right. This is my tantrum. I will be heard. This is my frightening moment. I will be the tormentor. All will witness.
All will pay.
ALL WILL LIVE WITH THIS IN THEIR DREAMS.
ALL WILL LIVE IN DARKNESS.
She begins yelling now, faster…her friends chime in like gerbils, I see lips, tongues, teeth and eyes, flashing, flipping, pursing… they are young, insolent, they are fucks. Her brother is on me, but I am faster. I grab him by the back of the hair, a large fistful and yank. -He drops his cup of pomegranate raspberry tart. I thrust his eyes into a machine of New York Cheesecake. He begins to fall down, I balance the weight of him on my knee and hold his limp, right hand up to the lever and gear of the dispenser. I fish his fat finger into the gear and begin to watch as the torque snaps it bringing him and his sister to attention. The cold yellow dairy goo begins to shit in his hair.
Totally fucking packed.
-A line of assorted people out the door. The night is hot. We make our way in, I grab a cup, pretend to squirt hand sanitizer from the 3 gallon dispenser into my cup…my daughters do not laugh, they do not smile, they are exactly one month from turning 13, everything I do is unappealing.
We crawl toward the first flavor, plain tart, my favorite. Down the line is coconut, vanilla wafer, dutch chocolate, arctic vanilla, red velvet cake batter, pistachio, taro, butterfinger...it’s all fucking great. There are so many flavors, people can’t help themselves, some are pushing, some walking around getting in the way. Some try to make it to the bathroom. I spy the slummers, who have tiny paper sample cups…like little junkies they hang off the smores machine, taking hits and eyeballing everyone else as if to say, “no, you suck.”
We inch forward.
We get closer to the fruit and dry toppings bar, we’re still 5 feet away, when I notice 3 fat Armenian girls, no they’re Spanish…maybe Russian gypsies. They are inching in ahead of me from my left, kind of elbowing, I give them the benefit of the doubt for a moment, thinking they’re lost or looking. Then the first one takes one step more… and I let loose, “THERE’S A LINE!!”
I say it clear, direct.
I use a tone of impending doom and violence, and a volume that makes the glass in the stores window brace.
It is with authority.
It is with a hammer.
The first one blanches, but she does not heed, does not care, she will be heard, “If all here will pay, so be it…let’s see him try… and bring his fucking sad heat.”
She begins to talk back. Her words make no sense, it’s noise, she’s underwater, she is a cartoon.
I begin,
“WE, ARE IN THE LINE!!
YOU ARE NOT!
THE LINE BEGINS FOR YOU, BACK THERE!!"
Silence.
All those in the store feel sick.
The power of this silence makes me more righteous, more violent, more angry, more, more, MORE, MORE, MORE!!!
This is my time. I am right. This is my tantrum. I will be heard. This is my frightening moment. I will be the tormentor. All will witness.
All will pay.
ALL WILL LIVE WITH THIS IN THEIR DREAMS.
ALL WILL LIVE IN DARKNESS.
She begins yelling now, faster…her friends chime in like gerbils, I see lips, tongues, teeth and eyes, flashing, flipping, pursing… they are young, insolent, they are fucks. Her brother is on me, but I am faster. I grab him by the back of the hair, a large fistful and yank. -He drops his cup of pomegranate raspberry tart. I thrust his eyes into a machine of New York Cheesecake. He begins to fall down, I balance the weight of him on my knee and hold his limp, right hand up to the lever and gear of the dispenser. I fish his fat finger into the gear and begin to watch as the torque snaps it bringing him and his sister to attention. The cold yellow dairy goo begins to shit in his hair.
Tuesday, April 13, 2010
Releasing on the exhale
One afternoon after 4pm, we sat in his room. He told me two stories...One about the night before.
An oil drum.
A fire in the oil drum.
A gang of men.
Drinking together.
And her mouth…getting in the way.
She pissed all of these guys off. He had to physically remove her. But she kept coming back for more. Eventually he told me that he hit her.
With the back of his hand he said.
And his ring caught her square.
And chipped her tooth.
He was visibly shaken as he sat telling me. I did not want to hear this. But he told
me more…
The next tale was a story of accidental death. Accidental or on purpose, when someone gets hurt by your hand, you should probably stick around. Somehow he had worked these things out in his mind Somehow he found the courage to tell someone, to beg for someone to listen.
I could see him shaking more now.
He was visibly upset and unaware of what to do.
He asked me what I thought.
I was too stoned, too young, too stupid to give anyone advice.
But I may have said, “This is now in the past.”
An oil drum.
A fire in the oil drum.
A gang of men.
Drinking together.
And her mouth…getting in the way.
She pissed all of these guys off. He had to physically remove her. But she kept coming back for more. Eventually he told me that he hit her.
With the back of his hand he said.
And his ring caught her square.
And chipped her tooth.
He was visibly shaken as he sat telling me. I did not want to hear this. But he told
me more…
The next tale was a story of accidental death. Accidental or on purpose, when someone gets hurt by your hand, you should probably stick around. Somehow he had worked these things out in his mind Somehow he found the courage to tell someone, to beg for someone to listen.
I could see him shaking more now.
He was visibly upset and unaware of what to do.
He asked me what I thought.
I was too stoned, too young, too stupid to give anyone advice.
But I may have said, “This is now in the past.”
That is so me!
In my morning meditation this morning that I have yet to do, I was right there...right at that place. I was able to quiet my mind once and for all. I had another awakening.
The meditation topped other epic meditations because it hit me like a golden arrow, it pierced my conscious mind so hard I tipped over backwards and lay on my back for nearly 3 days…in pure peace, awake, with the universe fully realized in my smile.
I finally got up and dialed my girlfriend in France. She was on her way to work, at the Perrache stop in Lyon. She was not ready for what I wanted to tell her. She was late and had just bitten the inside of her cheek. I asked her if she was still going to the south for holiday, she said yes. I tried not to worry but could feel it rising in me. I reminded her that I didn’t have a new suit, but was planning on buying one upon arrival. She hung up on me.
I got up, opened a drawer and looked over the array of weapons and grabbed the Bilier, a small axe. “This should do it,” I said to myself catching a glimpse of my forehead and the fresh scar in the mirror.
As a relentless seeker of beauty and death, I made my gratitude list and jumped into my Humvee, sped down rural route 28 counting the gobs of money in the sack. “Fuck! I do not have a good feeling about this exercise!!” I screamed as I put in my iPod. I selected a new podcast of John Kenneth Galbraith reading Philip Roth’s, When She Was Good. Galbraith read a ton of shit, it’s how he really made his money. My favorite is JKG reading The Rosie Greer Story. It is wrong in every aspect and yet electrifying slow, perfect.
She called my cell.
I listened.
She was unhappy about everything.
Focusing on the road, I remembered that I was a liar, living the perfect life; 2 young children, a wife, a motorcycle that will go 160 miles an hour, I no longer have a tattoo that spreads across my stomach saying V Thirteen, a 1964 Eldorado convertible, and a will that is my own…it now belongs to the universe.
The meditation topped other epic meditations because it hit me like a golden arrow, it pierced my conscious mind so hard I tipped over backwards and lay on my back for nearly 3 days…in pure peace, awake, with the universe fully realized in my smile.
I finally got up and dialed my girlfriend in France. She was on her way to work, at the Perrache stop in Lyon. She was not ready for what I wanted to tell her. She was late and had just bitten the inside of her cheek. I asked her if she was still going to the south for holiday, she said yes. I tried not to worry but could feel it rising in me. I reminded her that I didn’t have a new suit, but was planning on buying one upon arrival. She hung up on me.
I got up, opened a drawer and looked over the array of weapons and grabbed the Bilier, a small axe. “This should do it,” I said to myself catching a glimpse of my forehead and the fresh scar in the mirror.
As a relentless seeker of beauty and death, I made my gratitude list and jumped into my Humvee, sped down rural route 28 counting the gobs of money in the sack. “Fuck! I do not have a good feeling about this exercise!!” I screamed as I put in my iPod. I selected a new podcast of John Kenneth Galbraith reading Philip Roth’s, When She Was Good. Galbraith read a ton of shit, it’s how he really made his money. My favorite is JKG reading The Rosie Greer Story. It is wrong in every aspect and yet electrifying slow, perfect.
She called my cell.
I listened.
She was unhappy about everything.
Focusing on the road, I remembered that I was a liar, living the perfect life; 2 young children, a wife, a motorcycle that will go 160 miles an hour, I no longer have a tattoo that spreads across my stomach saying V Thirteen, a 1964 Eldorado convertible, and a will that is my own…it now belongs to the universe.
Monday, April 12, 2010
food
A piping hot plate of Pad Siew from Triple Tum Tender calls to me today; the steam rising off the wide noodles, the thick gravy, the beef, ginger, the broccoli, the sweet smell, my mouth awaits the taste reminding me of summer rains in Bangkok, the hints of chili, garlic, oyster sauce, a bay leave, a coconut, chopped nuts, a touch of cilantro, all of it chewable, melting, authentic.
There was something about the search for food that gave us little comfort…Us being myself and a few of my white, entitled, supremely middle class, 19 year old droogs. We had no idea how to fend or cook for ourselves. We had lunch passes to the cafeteria, no cookware, no resources to get off campus and explore. Well, we did have our feet…we could’ve walked someplace, but the places walkable were shit. Places like, Doug’s, where they served potato bread smeared with wood. Or, McKorkle’s, where they just served gravy… you had to bring in your meat, potatoes or rice, they did not supply it. The Kettle was where they melted things, The Blue Crab served beer nuts and beer, The Shack had their famous French imported tables and dripless candles from Hungary before dripless candles had been invented, fine silk table cloths, cutlery from Portugal, a smartly mustachioed man of 67 years old who never spoke but was the best Maitre’D in town. He waited silently, patiently for customers each afternoon beginning at 5pm sharp. No one bothered to tell him that the bar stopped serving food in 1974.
Salvation arrived when we found Runza Hut…a staple of our childhood. Someone had a car or stole a car and by accident we found Runza Hut blocks from the capitol. A Runza starts with daily homemade dough, stuffed full with ground beef, onions, cabbage and secret spices, baked and then served hot. Add a side of onion rings and a Coke... Man, that’s good eatin’.
Ma grandma Tilly used to spend the night. She would come out to our suburban home from her brick house in South Omaha, the old place on 36th street, across the street from Richmond Gordman’s, down the street from the packing house that still worked off the stockyards. She was Lithuanian, still…even though she had moved to the states in the late 20’s.
My grandmother made blintzes for us in the mornings she would spend the night. She would wake up at 4 in the morning and start the batter. These were the best, and were never recreated quite the same by her daughter. They were eaten with butter and jelly on the inside, sometimes powdered sugar sprinkled over. They were as thin as paper and melted in one’s mouth. At one sitting in my childhood, I ate over 23.
Last week I felt fat. So I took a tennis lesson. Saturday I rode my motorcycle out of town and ate continuously; Mexican food in Lake Arrowhead, a half rack of pork ribs at Pappy & Harriet’s, more Mexican food in Banning, a bunch of grilled chicken, salad, mac n cheese last night for dinner. Today I will fast a little bit. Probably bake some cookies. I spoke out loud this morning about how I need to start eating right, doing some sit ups…it’s fun to finally imagine beginning a physical, healthy practice too.
There was something about the search for food that gave us little comfort…Us being myself and a few of my white, entitled, supremely middle class, 19 year old droogs. We had no idea how to fend or cook for ourselves. We had lunch passes to the cafeteria, no cookware, no resources to get off campus and explore. Well, we did have our feet…we could’ve walked someplace, but the places walkable were shit. Places like, Doug’s, where they served potato bread smeared with wood. Or, McKorkle’s, where they just served gravy… you had to bring in your meat, potatoes or rice, they did not supply it. The Kettle was where they melted things, The Blue Crab served beer nuts and beer, The Shack had their famous French imported tables and dripless candles from Hungary before dripless candles had been invented, fine silk table cloths, cutlery from Portugal, a smartly mustachioed man of 67 years old who never spoke but was the best Maitre’D in town. He waited silently, patiently for customers each afternoon beginning at 5pm sharp. No one bothered to tell him that the bar stopped serving food in 1974.
Salvation arrived when we found Runza Hut…a staple of our childhood. Someone had a car or stole a car and by accident we found Runza Hut blocks from the capitol. A Runza starts with daily homemade dough, stuffed full with ground beef, onions, cabbage and secret spices, baked and then served hot. Add a side of onion rings and a Coke... Man, that’s good eatin’.
Ma grandma Tilly used to spend the night. She would come out to our suburban home from her brick house in South Omaha, the old place on 36th street, across the street from Richmond Gordman’s, down the street from the packing house that still worked off the stockyards. She was Lithuanian, still…even though she had moved to the states in the late 20’s.
My grandmother made blintzes for us in the mornings she would spend the night. She would wake up at 4 in the morning and start the batter. These were the best, and were never recreated quite the same by her daughter. They were eaten with butter and jelly on the inside, sometimes powdered sugar sprinkled over. They were as thin as paper and melted in one’s mouth. At one sitting in my childhood, I ate over 23.
Last week I felt fat. So I took a tennis lesson. Saturday I rode my motorcycle out of town and ate continuously; Mexican food in Lake Arrowhead, a half rack of pork ribs at Pappy & Harriet’s, more Mexican food in Banning, a bunch of grilled chicken, salad, mac n cheese last night for dinner. Today I will fast a little bit. Probably bake some cookies. I spoke out loud this morning about how I need to start eating right, doing some sit ups…it’s fun to finally imagine beginning a physical, healthy practice too.
I would never...
Twelve things I would never in a million years do-
1- I would never do this list.
2- I would never have sex with your dog.
3- I would never shake hands with your father.
4- I would never wear a fur skirt to the opera.
5- I would never vacation in Minot, North Dakota
6- I would never boil a pigs head in chocolate.
7- I would never touch the tit of an 80 year old woman.
8- I would never eat your heart.
9- I would never kick a fire hydrant.
10-I would never swim to Catalina Island for the fuck of it.
11-I would never perform oral surgery on myself.
12-I would never hit a young girl in a wheelchair with a hammer.
I often try to give people the benefit of the doubt.
I try to allow the idea of another perspective. It is important that there may be conditions, unseen circumstances, or extra information that I was not privy to. Once when I was driving to the flower market downtown, it was about 4 am and a black transvestite was lying, bleeding about the face, in the middle of the street screaming, “Help me, I need help!! HELP ME GODDAMMIT!!!"
-I immediately thought that maybe she had deserved this. Or, she was perhaps yelling to someone in a car parked along the street and maybe they were napping or were deaf. Maybe she was shooting a student film. Maybe she was part of a TV prank show. Maybe she was not hurt but was doing some downtown performance art piece that was experimental and a protest, commenting on the societal ills that have befallen the befallen. Maybe she did get beat up by her John or her pimp and had been sexually assaulted beyond comprehension, left for dead. How was I to know?
One time I saw a 5 year old little boy in a mall all alone, crying. Maybe he didn’t get the toy he wanted?
1- I would never do this list.
2- I would never have sex with your dog.
3- I would never shake hands with your father.
4- I would never wear a fur skirt to the opera.
5- I would never vacation in Minot, North Dakota
6- I would never boil a pigs head in chocolate.
7- I would never touch the tit of an 80 year old woman.
8- I would never eat your heart.
9- I would never kick a fire hydrant.
10-I would never swim to Catalina Island for the fuck of it.
11-I would never perform oral surgery on myself.
12-I would never hit a young girl in a wheelchair with a hammer.
I often try to give people the benefit of the doubt.
I try to allow the idea of another perspective. It is important that there may be conditions, unseen circumstances, or extra information that I was not privy to. Once when I was driving to the flower market downtown, it was about 4 am and a black transvestite was lying, bleeding about the face, in the middle of the street screaming, “Help me, I need help!! HELP ME GODDAMMIT!!!"
-I immediately thought that maybe she had deserved this. Or, she was perhaps yelling to someone in a car parked along the street and maybe they were napping or were deaf. Maybe she was shooting a student film. Maybe she was part of a TV prank show. Maybe she was not hurt but was doing some downtown performance art piece that was experimental and a protest, commenting on the societal ills that have befallen the befallen. Maybe she did get beat up by her John or her pimp and had been sexually assaulted beyond comprehension, left for dead. How was I to know?
One time I saw a 5 year old little boy in a mall all alone, crying. Maybe he didn’t get the toy he wanted?
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