Hey all-
be sure to check out my YouTube site. Lots of new videos there. It's like Netflix times Thomas L. Friedman to the Abbey Road-eth power.
Zac
6.26.2006
6.23.2006
Three.
"Sundays are life on pause." That's what his wife would say to him. Back when life was worth pausing. Now he just wishes it would hurry the hell up.
These days his wife just sighs and wonders within his earshot whether or not he's actually going to mow the lawn. Didn't he mow it every week since they'd fired the help? Wasn't he out there at 10am sharp, every sunday, pushing through that heat and that grass? Why, he wondered, weren't they still paying someone else to do the labor? They were perfectly capable of paying someone else to sweat down the lawn. God knows there were plenty of laborers looking for work. Instead he was wasting the one day a week he had to himself fretting about the stupid useless lawn. So what if he slept in real late last sunday? So what if he went to the bar and had let time sneak away from him. He worked hard and frankly, he didn't know how to stop. So on Sundays, at least occassionally, he'd like to play as hard as he worked. If that meant a few too many beers and a drunken call to his wife for a ride home, if that meant she'd refuse to come pick him up and that he'd have to call a taxi, if that meant that he'd have to stumble inside and through the house, a drunken and slightly sweaty mess, to find some cash to pay for the cab ride home, if that meant his kids would have to see him in a way they'd never had before.... so be it.
And suddenly, for just a moment, he felt as though he were on to something. His wife was monopolizing his day off. He felt resentment and it bubbled to his face in a burning red rage. But then... it wasn't quite that his wife was stealing this time from him. Everyone was stealing time from him. And he knew it. Here was his one chance at existence, his one and only sure chance at consciousness and it was being squandered on maintaining the quality of his front lawn. And for what? So that his property matched everyone else's? Was it that his wife took pleasure in knowing her neighbors would see her husband physically toiling towards perfection? Like somehow what they'd accomplished was the product of having worked harder than anyone else. And that was just it!
He knew deep down that for all his hard work he'd also been occassionally lucky. He knew that some people worked just as hard without nearly the same financial success. He knew that instead of sharing his good fortune he invested it in his own future. And most of all he knew he'd invested it in all the wrong places. Children were starving, but that was half a world a way. He could double his money with a well timed investment property and maybe convince his wife another cruise could fix their marriage.
Screw the lawn. Sure it was long now. And in another week it was going to be a real hassle to clean up. Maybe he'd some home early sometime this week and do it then. Or maybe he'd just pay someone else to do it while his wife is away at work. Right now he's thinking he could use a good walk. Maybe bring the dog with him. It's been way too long since he spent some quality time with that goofy mutt.
He thought about leaving his iPod behind and just enjoying the sounds of his panting dog and the suburban life around him, but thought better of it. Truth be known, the suburbs freak him out. It's fantasy land. The rides are boring and the price of admission becomes more everyday.
With the dog fairly leashed and his music finely arranged he heads out, pretending he can't hear his wife yell after him. He hurries out the door and tries to embrace the music and the walking. His dog is excited to be outside. He tries again to get into the music.
He wants to give the melody a hug.
He wants to kiss that beat you can't deny.
He hopes that someday he may again feel naked for the first time with the music.
That as he walks his dog around the block to nowhere he may again find how to rhyme his footsteps with the rhythm.
For now, the music is stale and wasted on him. The sound of it against his ears reminds him of trying to write on cardboard with an old dull pencil.
He needs a shake up in his bones. He needs a shock to his system. He needs an earthquake on his soul.
And he knows that now is the time to set his plan in motion.
He hurries home in a race against reason for he knows he must act before his sudden confidence crumbles. He calls his work week friend and says to him, "Friend, let's lose our jobs tomorrow." And his friend replies, "Friend, lets risk our lives the day after."
These days his wife just sighs and wonders within his earshot whether or not he's actually going to mow the lawn. Didn't he mow it every week since they'd fired the help? Wasn't he out there at 10am sharp, every sunday, pushing through that heat and that grass? Why, he wondered, weren't they still paying someone else to do the labor? They were perfectly capable of paying someone else to sweat down the lawn. God knows there were plenty of laborers looking for work. Instead he was wasting the one day a week he had to himself fretting about the stupid useless lawn. So what if he slept in real late last sunday? So what if he went to the bar and had let time sneak away from him. He worked hard and frankly, he didn't know how to stop. So on Sundays, at least occassionally, he'd like to play as hard as he worked. If that meant a few too many beers and a drunken call to his wife for a ride home, if that meant she'd refuse to come pick him up and that he'd have to call a taxi, if that meant that he'd have to stumble inside and through the house, a drunken and slightly sweaty mess, to find some cash to pay for the cab ride home, if that meant his kids would have to see him in a way they'd never had before.... so be it.
And suddenly, for just a moment, he felt as though he were on to something. His wife was monopolizing his day off. He felt resentment and it bubbled to his face in a burning red rage. But then... it wasn't quite that his wife was stealing this time from him. Everyone was stealing time from him. And he knew it. Here was his one chance at existence, his one and only sure chance at consciousness and it was being squandered on maintaining the quality of his front lawn. And for what? So that his property matched everyone else's? Was it that his wife took pleasure in knowing her neighbors would see her husband physically toiling towards perfection? Like somehow what they'd accomplished was the product of having worked harder than anyone else. And that was just it!
He knew deep down that for all his hard work he'd also been occassionally lucky. He knew that some people worked just as hard without nearly the same financial success. He knew that instead of sharing his good fortune he invested it in his own future. And most of all he knew he'd invested it in all the wrong places. Children were starving, but that was half a world a way. He could double his money with a well timed investment property and maybe convince his wife another cruise could fix their marriage.
Screw the lawn. Sure it was long now. And in another week it was going to be a real hassle to clean up. Maybe he'd some home early sometime this week and do it then. Or maybe he'd just pay someone else to do it while his wife is away at work. Right now he's thinking he could use a good walk. Maybe bring the dog with him. It's been way too long since he spent some quality time with that goofy mutt.
He thought about leaving his iPod behind and just enjoying the sounds of his panting dog and the suburban life around him, but thought better of it. Truth be known, the suburbs freak him out. It's fantasy land. The rides are boring and the price of admission becomes more everyday.
With the dog fairly leashed and his music finely arranged he heads out, pretending he can't hear his wife yell after him. He hurries out the door and tries to embrace the music and the walking. His dog is excited to be outside. He tries again to get into the music.
He wants to give the melody a hug.
He wants to kiss that beat you can't deny.
He hopes that someday he may again feel naked for the first time with the music.
That as he walks his dog around the block to nowhere he may again find how to rhyme his footsteps with the rhythm.
For now, the music is stale and wasted on him. The sound of it against his ears reminds him of trying to write on cardboard with an old dull pencil.
He needs a shake up in his bones. He needs a shock to his system. He needs an earthquake on his soul.
And he knows that now is the time to set his plan in motion.
He hurries home in a race against reason for he knows he must act before his sudden confidence crumbles. He calls his work week friend and says to him, "Friend, let's lose our jobs tomorrow." And his friend replies, "Friend, lets risk our lives the day after."
5.13.2006
Two.
He really likes this time of day in June. The intent of the sun to set was clear, yet the sun was still bright and direct. Call it 4pm. The angle of the light cast distinct shadows of the mighty buildings around him. The shadows landed somewhere around the middle of the sidewalk on which this man was walking. His favorite thing to do as he left work was to straddle the light and the dark so that half his figure was shaded and the other half boldly lit. It made him feel like a ghost, balancing between life and death. It made him feel numb to the harsh reality of his pointless life and with that reality numbed he was deftly able to get in touch with something plain and simple. His most remarkable unconscious longing was for that plainness and that simplicity. But the pressures of his day job, his home life, and the frustrating amount of time he spends traveling between one and the other caused this unconscious longing to remain just that: unconscious. So he walked half in and half out, without really knowing why.
Walking pleasantly now, limbo'd between the light and the dark, the man was feeling strangley fine about just having lost his job to a younger model. He walks on. He passes the bus stop. He passes the train station. He passes his (former) coworker as she waits for the hotdog vendor to refresh his ketchup bottle. It occurs to the man that his coworker is much prettier when she's sitting behind the glass of her car door as they both sit stuck in traffic.
Glidingly confidently now, for confidence is all he feels he has left, he crosses the final street between himself and the parking garage that babysits his car all day. As the man steps onto the final block he sees a shadowed figure turn the corner up at the far end of the same block. The shadowed figure is alone on his end of the block and he keeps himself heavily invested in the dark half of the sidewalk. The shadowed figure, a man in his own right, appears to be equally alone. There's a show down now, at the city block corral. Both parties involved anticipate it as all but inevitable.
Will they each acknowledge the other's existence with a hello or a small short grin? Will they both deny the other's existence by suddenly looking down or away at just the right moment so as to avoid any eye contact? Will the shadowed man stay dark as the sunlit man stays shown? Or will one of them start to make a gesture of their shared humanity as the other tries to deny it, at which point a clumsy interchange will occur and the potential status of one man over another becomes temporarily eased? They might even giggle on the inside a little.
The man in the light continues forward. He does so without externally publishing his internal anxiety to all the people who aren't watching his posture anyway. The shadowed man does the same, but even fewer non-witnesses would be able to tell you so. They get closer to each other. They might connect now, but they don't. Instead they take turns assessing each other. Quickly, without making eye contact. The man in the shadow is a bum, nameless as everyone. The man in the light is dressed finely and carries a briefcase. The lighted man fears he will be bothered for money. The shadowed man fears he will be turned down when he asks. They are with in 20 feet of each other. The two men have somehow subconsciously connected and a course of in-action has been settled upon: they will each not acknowledge the existence, much less the humanity, of the other.
In a few seconds, it will all be over. They both know it. They both long for it. But still... in times like these there is just so little you can be sure of. Ten feet now and the action begins to unfold frame by frame. The bum feels a rush of inspiration and gets closer to the suit by stepping closer to the light. The suit gets nervous but his unemployed ego can't take the hit of moving closer to the road and out of the way of the bum. The bum... walks slower. The suit gets fidgety nervous. The bum stops walking altogether, turns directly toward the man and gives him the biggest, dirtiest, toothiest, silliest, most ironic and revealing smile of the decade.
The bum turns back to the direction he was walking and continues on his shadowy way.
The suit is at his car now, reaching for his keys. He's in his car now. He's paying the toll now. He's stuck in traffic now. He's got alot to think about... how's he going to pay the mortgage? How's he going to explain this to his wife? How will his kids fare in public schools? What will it be like to drive a car that doesn't turn heads, even if it just the occasional head of a teenager?
Instead of all that, he thinks about the bum. He thinks and he thinks and he thinks. He sees that same former co-worker that he saw at the hotdog stand, now stuck in traffic along side him and in a cold stone rush a wide variety of things occur to him. He let his money steal his own innocence. The society in which he exists values women that look more like aliens than humans. He let his pursuit of money steal his children's childhoods from him. He thinks of the complex billboards on the side of highways advertising new housing developments. The developments are named after the bits and pieces of nature that their very contruction detroys and he thinks further of the way that those same housing developments, should her purchase a lot, want to sacrifice the rights he doesn't use as it pursues the perfect little neighborhood. Again, he thinks of the way he let his pursuit of money steal the childhoods of his children from him.
He feels unstable, disconnected from the empty reality he calls his life. He wants to reconnect with something solid, something real. He will get his wish.
Tomorrow, when he should be out searching for a new job, he will be stuck in traffic. The top of his sandaled foot will be bitten by a mosquito and something that feels very solid and very real will connect with him.
Walking pleasantly now, limbo'd between the light and the dark, the man was feeling strangley fine about just having lost his job to a younger model. He walks on. He passes the bus stop. He passes the train station. He passes his (former) coworker as she waits for the hotdog vendor to refresh his ketchup bottle. It occurs to the man that his coworker is much prettier when she's sitting behind the glass of her car door as they both sit stuck in traffic.
Glidingly confidently now, for confidence is all he feels he has left, he crosses the final street between himself and the parking garage that babysits his car all day. As the man steps onto the final block he sees a shadowed figure turn the corner up at the far end of the same block. The shadowed figure is alone on his end of the block and he keeps himself heavily invested in the dark half of the sidewalk. The shadowed figure, a man in his own right, appears to be equally alone. There's a show down now, at the city block corral. Both parties involved anticipate it as all but inevitable.
Will they each acknowledge the other's existence with a hello or a small short grin? Will they both deny the other's existence by suddenly looking down or away at just the right moment so as to avoid any eye contact? Will the shadowed man stay dark as the sunlit man stays shown? Or will one of them start to make a gesture of their shared humanity as the other tries to deny it, at which point a clumsy interchange will occur and the potential status of one man over another becomes temporarily eased? They might even giggle on the inside a little.
The man in the light continues forward. He does so without externally publishing his internal anxiety to all the people who aren't watching his posture anyway. The shadowed man does the same, but even fewer non-witnesses would be able to tell you so. They get closer to each other. They might connect now, but they don't. Instead they take turns assessing each other. Quickly, without making eye contact. The man in the shadow is a bum, nameless as everyone. The man in the light is dressed finely and carries a briefcase. The lighted man fears he will be bothered for money. The shadowed man fears he will be turned down when he asks. They are with in 20 feet of each other. The two men have somehow subconsciously connected and a course of in-action has been settled upon: they will each not acknowledge the existence, much less the humanity, of the other.
In a few seconds, it will all be over. They both know it. They both long for it. But still... in times like these there is just so little you can be sure of. Ten feet now and the action begins to unfold frame by frame. The bum feels a rush of inspiration and gets closer to the suit by stepping closer to the light. The suit gets nervous but his unemployed ego can't take the hit of moving closer to the road and out of the way of the bum. The bum... walks slower. The suit gets fidgety nervous. The bum stops walking altogether, turns directly toward the man and gives him the biggest, dirtiest, toothiest, silliest, most ironic and revealing smile of the decade.
The bum turns back to the direction he was walking and continues on his shadowy way.
The suit is at his car now, reaching for his keys. He's in his car now. He's paying the toll now. He's stuck in traffic now. He's got alot to think about... how's he going to pay the mortgage? How's he going to explain this to his wife? How will his kids fare in public schools? What will it be like to drive a car that doesn't turn heads, even if it just the occasional head of a teenager?
Instead of all that, he thinks about the bum. He thinks and he thinks and he thinks. He sees that same former co-worker that he saw at the hotdog stand, now stuck in traffic along side him and in a cold stone rush a wide variety of things occur to him. He let his money steal his own innocence. The society in which he exists values women that look more like aliens than humans. He let his pursuit of money steal his children's childhoods from him. He thinks of the complex billboards on the side of highways advertising new housing developments. The developments are named after the bits and pieces of nature that their very contruction detroys and he thinks further of the way that those same housing developments, should her purchase a lot, want to sacrifice the rights he doesn't use as it pursues the perfect little neighborhood. Again, he thinks of the way he let his pursuit of money steal the childhoods of his children from him.
He feels unstable, disconnected from the empty reality he calls his life. He wants to reconnect with something solid, something real. He will get his wish.
Tomorrow, when he should be out searching for a new job, he will be stuck in traffic. The top of his sandaled foot will be bitten by a mosquito and something that feels very solid and very real will connect with him.
5.04.2006
4.05.2006
One.
To give him a name would give him too much color. To call him a man would give him too much definition. To look him in the eye would give him too much credit. Yet here is a story about a man with eyes and a name. He walks, he talks, he drives and rides. He abuses his senses and he takes them for granted. He stubs his toe on his way out the door and on the same day he flirts with a woman that is way out of his league. He grabs his keys, he scratches his balls, he hits his head on the roof of his vehicle as he plops into the fresh leather seat of his brand new ride. He sits in traffic and stares at the suburban wasteland around him, exemplified by the Wal-Mart on his right. He sits in traffic and stares at the red light in front of him as his blood pressure rises. In traffic, he sits and he sits and he sits.
Lost in a synthetic world and longing desperately for something organic to sip from there flies a rather lost mosquito. Thoughtless, nameless, and completely driven by instinct, this mosqito is becoming weak from a lack of nutrients. From cloth, to metal, to plastic, it flies hopelessly and wearily. In the conditioned air there wafts the unmistakable scent of a synthesized man, all chemically musty, chemically leathery, and chemically smokey. It is the scent of this man's cologne trapped and circulating within his vehicles inside air. Too weak to maintain its search, the mosqito drifts downward towards the man's sandaled feet. Each passing inch downward is an inch toward the mosqitos tomb. Fantastically, this nameless mosqito lands on the smooth exposed skin at the top of the foot of this equally nameless man.
Frame by frame, as the future unfolds into the present, a tiny dot of blood slides out of the man and into the mosqito. In the same series of frames, a vehicle driven by another man careens out of control. This man is so god damn sick of the god damn traffic that, "Goddammit," he just can't take it any more. He tumbles across the median. Through his violently shaky vision he sees that he's barreling toward the spitting image of his own vehicle. He understands that terrible things happen when one cinderblock on wheels collides with another cinderblock on wheels. The mosqito is full. The matching vehicles feel nothing, see nothing. The eyes of the men inside the vehicles widen. The mosqito disengages. Adrenaline bursts from the well-fed bellies of the two men. A tremendous jolt, felt silently, collides with the sudden realization of how loud it is when cinderblocks tear into each other. Frame by frame, all the comotion comes to a stop.
The mosqito, feeling fine now, flutters happily into the rapidly refreshing air.
Lost in a synthetic world and longing desperately for something organic to sip from there flies a rather lost mosquito. Thoughtless, nameless, and completely driven by instinct, this mosqito is becoming weak from a lack of nutrients. From cloth, to metal, to plastic, it flies hopelessly and wearily. In the conditioned air there wafts the unmistakable scent of a synthesized man, all chemically musty, chemically leathery, and chemically smokey. It is the scent of this man's cologne trapped and circulating within his vehicles inside air. Too weak to maintain its search, the mosqito drifts downward towards the man's sandaled feet. Each passing inch downward is an inch toward the mosqitos tomb. Fantastically, this nameless mosqito lands on the smooth exposed skin at the top of the foot of this equally nameless man.
Frame by frame, as the future unfolds into the present, a tiny dot of blood slides out of the man and into the mosqito. In the same series of frames, a vehicle driven by another man careens out of control. This man is so god damn sick of the god damn traffic that, "Goddammit," he just can't take it any more. He tumbles across the median. Through his violently shaky vision he sees that he's barreling toward the spitting image of his own vehicle. He understands that terrible things happen when one cinderblock on wheels collides with another cinderblock on wheels. The mosqito is full. The matching vehicles feel nothing, see nothing. The eyes of the men inside the vehicles widen. The mosqito disengages. Adrenaline bursts from the well-fed bellies of the two men. A tremendous jolt, felt silently, collides with the sudden realization of how loud it is when cinderblocks tear into each other. Frame by frame, all the comotion comes to a stop.
The mosqito, feeling fine now, flutters happily into the rapidly refreshing air.
An Experiment and a Story.
I think its about time to try turning this blog into something new. At least 4 days a week I will wake up, go running, eat breakfast, and post a few paragraphs of a story I will make up as I go along. I'll start it soon.
4.04.2006
2.25.2006
Subscribe to:
Comments (Atom)
