He makes with his mind, out of ectoplasm or thought-energy or whatever astral plane BS George Noory is on about tonight.
In his room there are universes after school, places where black eyes fade and humiliation is forgotten and she's there, all of her, the only girl who knows his name.
He hears his dad at the door and everything disappears. He can't know, he'll never understand.
Friday, March 14, 2008
Tuesday, March 11, 2008
Gathered Their Books and Burned Them
I don't know how it was possible for this whole generation to have kept the same secret from each other, but there you go.
See, in the old (ha! what am I, 23?) days, we kept it all under wraps. Sometimes you knew or found out, always in rumor, always about somebody from across town, heard across the bar from friends of friends who knew a guy who knew a guy blah blah blah blah blah. It was always the same story and it was always "us" and "them" and even though every single one of us knew that we were on the wrong side of that equation we all pretended just because you felt slightly less alone when people would still look at you.
And then, then one day, "us" became "me" and it wasn't so much a line as a fence and I forget who it was that first looked up and around and realized:
We all feel like this, every day, and it is okay.
We all came out of our apartments and said it to one another, and the years came tumbling off our faces like landslides.
See, in the old (ha! what am I, 23?) days, we kept it all under wraps. Sometimes you knew or found out, always in rumor, always about somebody from across town, heard across the bar from friends of friends who knew a guy who knew a guy blah blah blah blah blah. It was always the same story and it was always "us" and "them" and even though every single one of us knew that we were on the wrong side of that equation we all pretended just because you felt slightly less alone when people would still look at you.
And then, then one day, "us" became "me" and it wasn't so much a line as a fence and I forget who it was that first looked up and around and realized:
We all feel like this, every day, and it is okay.
We all came out of our apartments and said it to one another, and the years came tumbling off our faces like landslides.
Wednesday, March 05, 2008
Setting It In Stone
Inspired by this picture, it would do you good to look at it before you read. Kind of playing the home game here to keep my brain from shriveling up from lack of writing things.
----
There are four hundred and thirteen thousand, nine hundred and eighty-six bricks (visible) in the tower. The tower is one hundred and thirty-seven feet and three inches high. The clock faces east-northeast, aligned along 78th Avenue conforming to the regular city grid.
I usually (no more than five days a week, no less than three, Sundays and holidays omitted) stand fifty-four feet from the tower, next to a bench (Municipal Model 394-D, manufactured by Heich Public Ironworks). I am most often positioned west-southwest facing the clock and 78th Avenue.
78th Avenue carries an average traffic volume of ninety-eight cars per minute. This volume spikes at two hundred and twelve cars per minute at 7:32 AM (weekdays). There are three stops for the 78 bus within view, as well as an additional stop reserved for the 78 Express situated out of view behind the tower. The 78 Express departs from its stop exactly on the hour each hour from six AM to ten PM.
The tower bells sound each hour and half hour. The clock is two minutes fast, but otherwise remains accurate. At noon, the tower bells sound a short melody (thirty-two seconds in length), popularly believed to have been derived from a work of Schubert. It, however, is not: the short series of notes sounded by the tower bells bear no similarity in substance or style to any known Schubert composition.
My father was struck and killed by the eastbound 78 bus (2004 Model D4500CT, manufactured by Motor Coach Industries, operating number 1034) as he crossed the street. The bus was traveling twenty-four miles an hour. His body flew seventeen feet after the impact, taking six seconds to return to earth. Emergency personnel were dispatched from the nearby Presbyterian General Hospital (paramedic unit 8, responding EMTs Allison Marshall, Joshua Smith, and Eric Seydall) and arrived in three minutes and twenty-eight seconds.
Doctor Phillip Miller pronounced him dead on arrival.
He died one hour and fifty-six minutes after we had met for lunch at the Sandersson Deli (corner of 78th and Banks, closed Saturdays). I had the reuben, no dressing, soup (chicken noodle). He had the turkey on wheat. The total was twelve dollars and ninety-three cents, including tip. He wouldn't let me pay.
As he left my company, he pointed to the inscription on the tower.
"Be a good kid," he said. "Make me proud. Fly from evil, you know?"
He laughed, then.
I don't understand laughing.
What exactly is evil? I'm...I'm having trouble quantifying.
----
There are four hundred and thirteen thousand, nine hundred and eighty-six bricks (visible) in the tower. The tower is one hundred and thirty-seven feet and three inches high. The clock faces east-northeast, aligned along 78th Avenue conforming to the regular city grid.
I usually (no more than five days a week, no less than three, Sundays and holidays omitted) stand fifty-four feet from the tower, next to a bench (Municipal Model 394-D, manufactured by Heich Public Ironworks). I am most often positioned west-southwest facing the clock and 78th Avenue.
78th Avenue carries an average traffic volume of ninety-eight cars per minute. This volume spikes at two hundred and twelve cars per minute at 7:32 AM (weekdays). There are three stops for the 78 bus within view, as well as an additional stop reserved for the 78 Express situated out of view behind the tower. The 78 Express departs from its stop exactly on the hour each hour from six AM to ten PM.
The tower bells sound each hour and half hour. The clock is two minutes fast, but otherwise remains accurate. At noon, the tower bells sound a short melody (thirty-two seconds in length), popularly believed to have been derived from a work of Schubert. It, however, is not: the short series of notes sounded by the tower bells bear no similarity in substance or style to any known Schubert composition.
My father was struck and killed by the eastbound 78 bus (2004 Model D4500CT, manufactured by Motor Coach Industries, operating number 1034) as he crossed the street. The bus was traveling twenty-four miles an hour. His body flew seventeen feet after the impact, taking six seconds to return to earth. Emergency personnel were dispatched from the nearby Presbyterian General Hospital (paramedic unit 8, responding EMTs Allison Marshall, Joshua Smith, and Eric Seydall) and arrived in three minutes and twenty-eight seconds.
Doctor Phillip Miller pronounced him dead on arrival.
He died one hour and fifty-six minutes after we had met for lunch at the Sandersson Deli (corner of 78th and Banks, closed Saturdays). I had the reuben, no dressing, soup (chicken noodle). He had the turkey on wheat. The total was twelve dollars and ninety-three cents, including tip. He wouldn't let me pay.
As he left my company, he pointed to the inscription on the tower.
"Be a good kid," he said. "Make me proud. Fly from evil, you know?"
He laughed, then.
I don't understand laughing.
What exactly is evil? I'm...I'm having trouble quantifying.
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