Tire Swing Press

Where Am I?

2011-11-20T11:42:00.004-05:00

By Brian Wask

In 2050 the Sun will ask the Moon, “Remember the United States?” The Clouds wont weep. It’s a short fall. Guns don’t kill people. People with guns kill people. Get rid of the people and save lives. Government would like people to think they have the extraordinary privilege to vote. People think they decide what and when and how. They make signs and defend the streets. They rally around God-like pundits. They show off guns and bang on drums. What good? The plows are out of ox and the next card is it. Greed has it balls in the mouth of Democracy, and everyone seems to think it’s the little guy’s fault because they grabbed a house they couldn’t afford, after politicians, encouraged by big banks, made it okay for lenders to make promises they knew they couldn’t keep. A lot of people are going to Hell after this mess. The Vikings prevailed.

I don’t blame anyone for this, but I will proceed to call out several types of people whom I believe should take some responsibility. This will get bad, and uncomfortable, for even me. I’m sure I’m in a few of the following types. But it’s something we must all do. First type of people, Clowns. Stop acting like fools, chasing big shoes and makeup. It’s too much by now. There are people who need little shoes. And the size of a clown’s shoe can easily make a dozen little shoes. Stop hiding behind the makeup. There is a reason clowns have to try so hard. Everyone is laughing at them. So they try even harder.

Next. People who get new cell phones every eleven months. Cell Phones are building a mountain in Peru. That’s where they go to die. The life span is a year, tops. Millions end up on the road in a trillion pieces. Plastic everywhere. Even more find themselves in large containers and hoisted on big ships. They travel the Pacific, then dumped like Alaskan crabs onto trucks and taken to the mountain where they settle for good. There is another mountain in the distance. Illuminated by the moon at night it winks a kaleidoscope of colors. It is made of soda bottles.

And people with printers, which I am guilty of. Printers use up too much paper and they don’t seem to care. The paper is made of trees, and the printers don’t even care how much they use. Sometimes a printer will print a whole page with nothing but a number in the bottom right corner. They just keep printing paper with whatever on it. I could do it all day with my printer, as long as it takes. I could buy all the paper, killing all the trees, and print things all day until all the trees are gone. Realistically, I could not do this alone. Perhaps a town, if they dedicated themselves to it, could wipe out all the trees after a few years. I’d watch out for that town. A lot of people these days have nothing better to do.

Religious people don’t have a clue. It’s pretty obvious. I’m confident most of us, including a good chunk of religious people, agree the world would be a better place without religion. But it would not be as interesting, though in spite of it, the world is interesting. And that makes it so. Wolves are a vicious species. They hunt in packs and torment their prey. They jab at each other with taunts preceding the slaughter. They mock humanity. Then they kill. It’s a horrible thing to watch. Terrible, when the prey is a deformed baby left behind by a morally lost band of nomads. There is a purpose for this. I’ve heard.

Three Guys On a Boat

2011-10-11T20:46:00.003-04:00

Guy #1:

So far it seems the most common thread among the Occupy Wall Street is End the Fed or Audit the Fed. Sounds reasonable, though it will be impossible to get either Democrats and Republicans to go along with this. While a good amount of the legislature probably doesn't even know what the Federal Reserve is, I'm sure both benefit from the spoils equally, one way or another. Then there are Party Loyalists, who will do anything for an invite to the party.

Guy #2:

I am not sure what auditing the Fed would hope to accomplish. The Fed operates in a fairly transparent way to begin with and the truth is that the money that the Fed loans is not real money. It is IOUs, so it isn’t like you are going to find payoffs or anything like that. Also, the Fed takes in loans from banks and makes loans to banks so for the most part it is really just other bank’s money that is being loans (of course no actually money is changing hands, just IOUs). Also the rates that the Fed loans at are public and standardized. There is nothing secret about that.

As for ending the Fed, I could not imagine a less responsible way to deal with our currently economic crisis. Maybe eliminating Dodd/Frank, would be AS irresponsible, but not more.

We can pretend that the solutions are simple but frankly, that is what got us into this mess. The idea that decisions don’t have consequences is what led to the current economic crisis. They do have consequences, and it is possible that they are very complicated and hard to see, but that doesn’t change them. We need responsible stewards of our country and they only way we get that (or even deserve it) is if we have a responsible electorate.

To prevent the next depression/recession we need to do one thing (and only one thing): Limit the amount of leverage that can be taken by banks. That is what caused the depression of 1929 (banks were over-leveraged in the stock market) and it is what caused this problem (banks were over-leveraged in real estate).

To correct, the current situation, we need to generate revenue quickly but we also need to look at long term solutions so that we don’t have this ideological brinkmanship every 10 years.

If we need to audit something it is the defense department and millionaires. If someone wants to audit the banks fine, but I can tell you right now that what is going to be found is that they: 1) made a ton of bad loans; 2) with borrowed money; 3) to people who had no business getting them.

The Fed (like the IMF) is a wonderful boogie man, but the truth is that change to the Fed (to anything really) will come from our policy makers. Dodd/Frank limited leveraging and created a fair number of regulations that will (in addition to a lot more) make large banks’ decisions much more transparent. It can absolutely be strengthened. The problem is that it is actually under attack right now from corporate interests and if the majority in the House of Representatives got their way, it would be eliminated completely. If the left gets distracted from the improvements that do NEED to be made, we are likely going to end up in an even worse situation.

Guy #3:

Guy #2 is on the money with this. We continue to allow the banks to dictate how we approach a solution. Even Bloomberg is taking their backs. Over leveraging is responsible for most financial crisis. That is true from household accounts to government budgets. It all has to be managed through regulation. I know that's a dirty word, but since our financial institutions are unwilling to do it voluntarily they have to be regulated.

Guy #1:

Guys, Audit the FED, not end the FED. If you're so confident in it you shouldn’t have such a problem auditing it to make sure it is working to benefit the people, not the government and the corporations. You both know the government is pretty close with big business, so why not make sure the FED isn't?

Guy #2

Auditing it is fine. I have no problem with it. I just have no idea what we would be looking for but maybe there is something there. I hope that it doesn’t feed conspiracy theories about the Fed though.

Ideas aren’t good just by virtue of being supported by John F Kennedy.

Also, I think that it is important to note that it is not just that corporations are close to government officials (FDA is a prime example), but also that corporations are close to politicians. They are the ones that legislate these things and as long as the Oil industry, the drug industry, etc, can spend unlimited money on electing a legislature, then that wont change.

Lastly, I am not sure what constitutes a "Democratic Party loyalist", but in the abstract I would profess to be one. At the same time I am also a former Democratic Party Staffer AND I have no idea what the official democratic party platform or "policy" is. My point is that as Will Rodgers if famous for saying, "I am not affiliated with any organized Party. I am a Democrat." Any attempt by others to assign a position to me based on my affiliation is more than unfair, it is actually in opposition to what I believe (as a democrat).

So, do I (a professed - and proud - party loyalist) think that there are democratic policies that I dont like? Yes. As far as Democratic policy is defined in a static sense (which I dont think that it is). I guess we can imagine that Democratic policy is defined by Congressional Democrats or the White House Staff or the Brookings Institute or Rachel Maddow, but that is not the case. Democratic policy is set by Democratic voters. Just like Republican policy is set by Republican voters. Both policies have changed radically over the last 125 years BECAUSE their voters have changed. As a matter of fact, Republican policy has changed drastically over the last 2 years for this very reason.

If the progressive movement wants to effect change, the way to do it is by winning over a plurality of voters. That is the ONLY way it can be done and that is good because the people need to have the reigns of power. That is why I am a democrat. Because I believe in equality of opportunity and I believe that together people are stronger than separately (which by the way is pretty much the argument FOR a Federal Reserve). If they dont take it or pass the chance to start a fringe movement, then shame on them. They will accomplish nothing. People can choose to vote for individuals that agree with them 100% of the time, and we will have a government of religious leaders (because no free thinking individual can find someone who agrees with them 100% other than in the mirror).

Guy #1:

I do not believe voters shape policy. I believe parties instigate policies. I believe people defy parties. I do not believe people.

Guy #2:

The US has the weakest political parties in the democratic world... really the entire world because non-democratic countries have even stronger parties (think Russia, Syria, etc.). In most democratic countries, the parties actually control policy and the individual elected official has very little influence. In the US, politics is all about the personality. Reagan, Clinton, Bush (2), Obama. They are pure personality. Bush (1), Nixon, Johnson where more party. (I left out Carter because he was kind of a mixture of both.

Party influence in US politics actually took even more of a hit when the Supreme Court removed all restrictions on political spending. The parties are essentially a laughing stock now. If destruction of political parties is the end, then the Citizen's United decision (allowing unfettered money in politics) will do exactly that. Under the current system, I am not sure parties will exist much longer in American politics. Instead, you will have the Chamber of Commerce Caucus, the Koch Brother's Caucus, the Religious Caucus, and the News Corp Caucus. This might sound exaggerated and over the top, but it isnt. Those are the interests that will elect our representatives.

Your belief that people dont influence policies if defeatist as far as I can tell. Honestly, the protests are a waste of time if that is the truth. What can the protests possibly accomplish if they dont influence policy? Obviously there will never be an audit of the Fed if that is the case. People need to support it and believe that it is necessary for it to have a chance at happening. But if people dont effect policy then not even that would work.

Parties are made up of people. There is no mysterious force moving them. Ascribing party insiders as rotten or bad or conspiratorial with big business is just as foolish as ascribing wall street protestors with some sort of virtue (or on the flip side saying wall street protesters are rabble-rousers or thugs or anarchists, etc.). They all have virtues and vices. They are ALL corruptible.

Guy #1:

All I can guarantee is the conversation at Occupy is mainly, Obama has to go. They do not complain about Herman Cain or Rick Perry. They do not talk about Bush. They want Obama gone. I don't have a problem with that, but I'm not sure I understand their alternative. The news would like you to believe this is an anti-Republican protest. A good chunk of these people call themselves Libertarians. This protest wont change anything, except some lucky people. The rest are doomed to repeat themselves.

Guy #2:

The news I have watched has not implied anti-Republican. First they implied (or straight out said) that it was anarchist and anti-business. Now the message seems to be anti-big bank, anti-conservative economic policy, and pro-99%.

I can see how those issues can be mistaken for anti-Republican, but I don't think that is the way it is being described. It certainly appears to be a genuine progressive movement. While I hate to compare it to the Tea Party, their early iteration was definitely not pro-Republican. It was anti-bailout, anti-big business. Then it morphed into anti-Obama and anti-Obamacare. They (the Tea Party) barely even talk about the bailouts anymore.

They are not largely unpopular with the public at large. I only hope the same does not happen with OWS. You are right that they should not closely affiliate with a party. That doesn’t help them. It only helps to alienate them completely to half of the population. Most party line people in the US don’t even like their party and want it to change. The movement needs to stay outside of parties. That said, the energy NEEDS to translate to progressives turning out for elections. That is how we accomplish change.

Guy #1:

Well said. You might be right too.

Guy #2:

I’m pretty sure I am.

Reviews: The Bible- Part 1

2011-09-22T22:30:00.016-04:00

The Bible is one of the best bunch of stories. It’s a great book. And it has a lot of amazing messages. It is also popular. I think everyone should read the Bible. I wish it was more popular. I think people forgot about the Bible. And now they like the koran. All my friends want to read the koran instead of the Bible. I don’t know.

How I read the Bible was in bed. At night with my pillow. My pillow is the oldest thing I have. The Bible is the oldest thing people have. It is even older than fire. The wheel isn’t even older than fire. That shows how old the Bible is. It is very old. Older than Jesus even because it was written about him after he was dead. Wait it was actually written before him. It was written by Jews. I just read that now after I already starting writing this. I’m happy I read that because now I know. Jews are older than the Bible. I don't have to feel bad for them anymore.

The Bible starts out in Eden with a man and then a woman comes over. I think this is a good beginning because when you are born a man and a woman are there. But that is the oldest part of the bible. It doesn’t mention dinosaurs. I read a lot about Abraham. He was always yelling I think and his wife. And his kids. God told him to yell at them when he was 99.

Abraham was always hearing things from God. No matter what you can think about God told Abraham exactly what to do. Even at night when he wasn’t working. God would tell Abraham “Obey me” and “I will shield you from danger and give you a reward” and even “Go back to her an be her slave.” Abraham never understand what God tells him but he likes God because God talks to him when no one else does. That’s why Abraham talks to God.

Slaves were a mistake because in the Bible it says people should only be slaves for 6 years and then they should be released when in Africa slaves were forced to work for all the time. And when the owner lets the slave go he is supposed to give the slave everything he has been blessed with by God. Even though he was the slave. This makes the six years as a slave okay. But if the slave does something wrong the slave owner does not have to tell him. Then when the slave tries to leave the slave owner can say I never told you but I don’t have to give you all my stuff because you talked too loud during sunset on Friday.

If you are thinking of reading the Bible you have to. It will be good for your friends.

In it the book gets long but is never finished. In real life people who read the Bible like everything about it. Even the part when the baby is cut in half and then the whole town is burned up because of all the men dancing together. That was the part that made me think the Bible can’t be totally real because that was badder than anything in the koran. Because the Bible is supposed to be better than the koran.

I don’t know. The cross is pretty awesome.

(This review was posted for 37 minutes before it disappeared. Perhaps there is a God. I understand why this review is wrong but I didn't think Bible-reading folks would. I guess that makes me fascist. That makes me feel bad. Now I have to feel bad. That doesn't sound so bad.)

Dispatches From Hurricane Irene: Bunkered Down in Zone C

2011-08-31T07:48:00.002-04:00

Saturday, August 27 2011

CC >BW 9:47 Get out of the city. You’ll be blown over. Bloomberg cares about you.

CC 10:53 What’s in your GO bag? This is nuts, crazy

BW 10:54 Don’t Panic. Do you have Cheese?

CC 10:57 Oh my God. You and even Milinda are welcome here at my place. You and your squeeze cheese on your wheat thins. GET OUT!

BW 10:59 Never

CC 11:06 Can you say overreact? Well at least the economy is back after all the fear purchasing.

BW 11:08 Maybe food stores and hardware stores, but the rest are all fucked. Do you think this Cheney’s fault?

CC 11:08 What zone are u in? I’m in zon x71A. Sp I can stay. I pooped in my GO bag.

BW 11:08 Laugh my ass off

BW 11:13 Here comes the rain

CC 11:15 I just see a leaf fall out of a tree and I think I see some garbage in the street.

BW 11:16 That tree is fucked

CC 11:19 I’m going to start drinking heavy now.

BW 11:22 I have to pickup my laundry at noon. Then drink. Its very important I hace clean clothes for the apocalyptic aftermath.

CC 11:40 Yes, must look your best for Irene. Touch base with me every couple hrs so I know u- and I guess Milinda- are okay.

BW 12:04 Copy

BW 3:37 I’m in Zone C

BW 4:10 Her it comes

CC 4:14 My mom’s wig just blew off…

CC 4:21 Going to a hurricane party, expecting ‘snow.’

BW4:21 Have fun.

CC 4:24 Stand by me on ch 3, think you get…?

BW4:25 No

BW5:35 I’m cooking striped bass

BW5:57 I can’t believe people are walking around in this shit. They’re crazy.

CC 6:07 What’s ur drink? I just bought a bottle of black label. Irene’s setting me off.

BW 6:09 Had a few beers. Switching to vodka now

CC 6:16 Just stopped by Willie’s for a cocktail. Ahhhh, remember that room/bar?

CC 8:22 R u okay?

BW 8:24 Drunk, Scared. Eating cheese.

BW 10:39 I went outside. It looked like Blade Runner

BW > OAM 10:46 Are you safe? Here it comes.

OAM 10:49 Raining really hard. How are you?

BW 10:51 We’re great. Bunkered down with food and wine. The rain is heavy.

OAM 10:52 Where are you”

BW 10:52 Hell’s Kitchen

OAM 10:53 Your apt?

BW 10:58 Yes. Holding down the fart

OAM 10:59 Hehe.

BW>CC 11:24 You out the door with your Go bag?

BW 12.53 Waiting

CC 1:07 Think I see you in Times Square. Is Milinda still alive?

BW 1:12 I’m about to pass out. Goodnight Irene.

Farmface: From the Dirt

2011-07-31T11:14:00.022-04:00

The first day:

There’s a good piece of land by the green house. The road runs past. The lights are off but for one light on the left side of the house if you’re looking from the road. It’s a dim light, flickers like a fire light. It possibly is. It fades soon after midnight. Then there’s no light. Maybe moonlight. Depends what kind of night. Some nights there're all stars. They are far away but look close to each other. They look small but they’re not small at all. Just far away from the green house.

Come morning:

[Pick it up. Where is it?] [Pic k it up. Where is it?] [Pick i t up. Where is it?] It’s there! [Pick it up. Where is it?] [Pick it up. Where is it?] [P ic k it u p. Wh ere is it?] It’s there! [Pick it up. Where is it?] [Pick it u p. Wher e is it?] [P ick it up. Where is it?] It’s there! [Pic k it u p. Where is it?] [Pi ck it up. Where is it?] [Pick it u p. W he re is i t?] It’s there! [Pi ck it up. Wh ere is it?] [Pi ck it u p. Whe re i s it?] [Pi ck it up. W here is it?] It’s there! [Pi ck it up. W here is it?] [Pick i t up. Wh er e is it?] [Pick it up. Wher e i s it?] It’s there! [Pick it up. Where is it?] [Pick i t up. W he re i s it?] [Pic k it u p. W here is i t?] P ic k i t u p!

(Music by Marc Ribot without permission.)

Another day:

If you find this box I hope you like it. Please dont sell it. This box has never been sold. My grandfather made it and gave it to my dad and my dad gave it to me. You can give it to someone but please don’t sell it. It is meant to be a gift. Though you might be tempted to sell it. Please dont. I put it on the street cause I can’t think of anyone I know that would not sell it. Everybody is selling everything. Please dont sell this box.

Last Day:

A lady with cloudy hair sold me a sack of candy. I emptied it in the dirt for the orphans.

The blue moon chuckles. A red crab collects what little is left behind while the orphans digest and the bells rest. I leave them in the night so I can walk alone. I sleep on an out-of-tune piano. The orphans gather around me in the morning. They’ve returned to my side and make me promise never to leave them again. I climb down from the piano. Toes tap a little tune. Look for my hat but remember Uncle Dust. Not since the accident. The orphans found me a new hat. It fits a little big still just fine. When it’s time to go I go. The orphans follow. Only the dirt can say who follows the orphans.

Words by Brian Wask and videos by Gabriel Comrie Pepin.

Blogging 101: Nothing Much Going On Again

2011-07-31T10:52:00.006-04:00

I’m reading some books I really like. By authors I’ve never heard of.

I’m writing a book I kind of like. It’s by me.

It will be published soon, I guess. By me or someone else.

In the meantime I have a job. I didn’t always have a job.

Ask Milinda.

I should check Facebook. Someone might be “Tired.” Or maybe someone I know is “Swimming.”

Summer is very hot in New York and I don’t really love the park in the summer so I spend most of my time inside. I don’t use an air-conditioner because it’s loud (and the energy is expensive). So it’s always hot inside.

My neighbor above is loud. I know he’s a fool and probably a sociopath. I’ve had words with him about it but he thinks he’s entitled because this is New York and the city is loud. That’s mostly true.

Maybe I need to find a new town. I’d like to stay in New York but I’m afraid it’s not for me anymore. It is loud. And it’s fake. And everyone is so self-aware you can’t walk done the street without someone drilling your eyes, trying to figure out what your wearing and why you’re wearing it. I used to walk down the street oblivious. Now I feel trapped, like I’m being interviewed.

I’m a writer in New York City. That’s cliché. I should be a writer in Bethlehem, Pennsylvania. Even Cleveland would be better. I guess I should’ve figured this out years ago but it’s not so bad I figured it out now.

There are a lot of great minds in New York. I’m confident I’m not one of them.

Confidence is okay.

The books I’m reading are called fiction, and I’m sure they are, though they capture some form of reality. I think that’s important to understand. There is not one reality. There are several realities.

Some people can write things down exactly the way they happened. But they leave out the nonsense. That’s what makes it good.

History is not a certain reality.

Some people say New York City used to be shitty. Other people say it used be the shit.

Here is a picture of me with nothing much going on:

I used the camera on my computer to take that picture. I make funny faces when I write and I often worry someone is watching me through the camera on the computer.

The rivers around Manhattan are starting to feel like the Pacific around Alcatraz. Manhattan would make a great prison. Perhaps it is a prison. If I didn’t know what a prison was like I would say something like, “Sometimes it feels like a prison.”

I feel bad for most of the people in prison. Some of them are killers and rapists and I don’t feel bad for them. But I do feel bad for most of them.

I heard

that

California builds more prisons than schools.

and

Several other states are doing the same.

That sounds like a great idea.

Maybe I should blog about it.

7.27.2010

Noah Cicero Is Here To Save the World

2011-07-12T22:39:00.003-04:00

BY BRIAN WASK

Amazon.com recommended Noah Cicero.

Thank you Amazon.com. While I’m at it thank you internet, the web, Jobs, internet inventors, truck drivers, Gore, teachers.

I don’t know what Noah Cicero is like in real life, but his show is the real thing.

“Don’t try.” - Bukowski

Cicero knows his shit. A little. No one knows a lot.

He can never sell out. He could fool everyone with something commercial. The President and Oprah would never know. Ellen too. He can only pretend to sell out.

Noah Cicero trashes New York for all the right reasons. Too bad he doesn’t see it like I do. He needs better New York friends. I’m sure the ones he has are nice but that doesn’t mean they don’t suck. Maybe they like clubs more than homes. A lot of New Yorkers are like that. They suck. He should visit better people.

New York is cliché and predictable. That’s redundant. New York is not redundant. It is predictable.

The Human War by this Noah Cicero guy is the shit. I should burn it and cook over it. We should eat its flames. That’s not literal. It’s culinary. This book is literal.

It hard to write about Noah Cicero without sounding fake. He sounds so real. I’ve never seen anyone say so little and blow the page up like Cicero. Sometimes I think the world is going to blow up when I finish reading Noah Cicero. It just seems like the perfect time for the world to explode. Just when I’m like “Huh” it can explode but I’ll find a place to land.

A short story in the back of The Human War sounds like a small recorder left behind and found by a sweeper in overalls. The story is called Little Flowers. I don’t believe it happened exactly the way Noah Cicero says, but I trust he thinks it did. And I hope it could.

Noah Cicero tells the truth.

Bastard.

Failure.

Hero.

Writer.

Pervert.

Noah Cicero makes all the other writers punch the sky.

Faulkner’s jaw would drop.

Hemmingway’s drink would spill.

Kerouac’s hiccups would reveal all his insecurities.

Enough praise. Now for some harsh judgment: Noah Cicero, Don’t try harder. You’re fucked. You nailed it and now you have to carry it. Leave it to us hacks to suck on the masses. You need to write for History.

Leave it to they people to suck on the masses:

Dan Aurebach

Chuck Palinknuk

Michale Chabon

Brian Wask

Ryan Gossling

The guy from How I Met Your Mother

Football player

(Notice there are no woman listed. This is because they’re not fucking up like men. We top them is the fucking shit up category so much they have there own category, but it doesn’t even compare to the men’s so it’s not included.)

In closing, thanks Noah Cicero for reminding me about the truth. You are a true piece of shit. I don’t pass that title out often.

Next step: Read his other books. He better not piss me off. I’m optimistic.

Noah Cicero, in the mean time, don’t kill yourself. I’m expecting a resurrection with your name all over it.

7.12.2011

We Should Build a Mountain

2011-07-10T21:44:00.009-04:00

By Brain Wask

They should forget about building a tower at Ground Zero. It’s not going to say much besides we’re good at making buildings. That’s obvious if you look around.

They should make a mountain.

I’d like to see it from Midtown, like we used to see the Towers.

Downtown.

If they made a mountain we could climb it and grow trees on it. Even let animals live on it. Not bears. Maybe condors instead. They might like it here. They don’t have it so good where they live. When they eat they get too heavy to fly and that’s when they’re vulnerable to hunters. But we can hunt them here too. Somewhere around the Bowery. Just so they remember they’re condors.

Ultimately, I think there should be a river passing through the mountain. It doesn’t have to be right away.

Everybody wants to do things right away because they think the Earth was made in six days. I don’t think it was so I’m not in such a hurry.

Another tower is the obvious idea for a replacement. That’s why we’re making a tower. It will be a building. But a boring one with boring jobs and more fancy New York gastro pubs. Boring. We have enough of both in New York. A mountain would not be so boring, and it would be better for the environment. And it would look awesome from Midtown. All the tourists in Times Square could look up from the violent and sexual billboards and see the mountain.

I think a mountain would secure more jobs as well, and a whole new way of doing things in New York, maybe even the Sates.

I feel like most of the United Sates would like to see New York City sink. Some would like to see it bombed. I don’t think any Liberals would like to see it bombed, but I do think there is a small fraction of Conservatives that do (Maybe a big one, you tell me). They believe in the John Birch Society and follow Glenn Beck. And he’s a nut. I don’t think his crying is anything but self-indulgent. He’s also a fool and I’m pretty sure he’s knows it.

Imagine you could see the mountain from Brooklyn and Jersey City. That would make an interesting skyline. There would be no other like it.

If it’s possible we should do it.

The greatest accomplishments remain after the chaos has settled.

Some people believe life is better when stability prevails.

Conflict is good.

Structure is not as good.

Violence applies to both.

The mountain could also be used to collect water, or maybe energy. I’m sure mountains benefit people more than buildings. It would take just as many people to build a mountain than it would a building, so no loss on jobs there. The cost of maintaining the mountain would be covered by tourism revenue. There is really no reason why we shouldn’t make a mountain except we can’t.

Somebody built an archipelago in Dubai.

People could argue there will be more mosquitoes and more rodents because of the mountain. But I don’t have anything to say about that.

Kids growing up in the city would be better off with a mountain around. Because it’s a city doesn’t mean it can’t have a mountain in it. It didn’t always have buildings. The island was mostly beavers at some point.

The idea mountains don’t belong in Manhattan is limited.

Limited is simple.

Maybe New York City is Limited.

I don’t care.

Don’t Drink the Brine

2011-06-10T22:29:00.004-04:00

Antigua, Guatemala, June 3, 2011- I partially apologize for some of the suggestions to follow. The Saratogas, a breakfast club of Conservatives, recently administered a test to potential members, via mass email. Their demands are in red, for the fiery passion they deliver. Not really. Remember, there is no intelligent way to respond to the Saratogas. They speak from the darkest depths of humanity, their minds so closed it’s suffocating to even those exposed to their thoughts. This could be an exaggeration, but I’m a glutton for punishment and will try.

THE FENCE:

You can’t get any more accurate than this! Which side of the fence? If you ever wondered which side of the fence you sit on, this is a great test!

The white picket fence from the show with the perfect family or the fence Conservatives want to build on the Mexican border? Either way, if you wonder what side of the fence you’re on you’ve most likely been fooled into painting it. And it’s pretty scary the Saratogas think this is a test. No wonder education has taken a nosedive. The only thing this test proves is how closely related some of us are to apes.

If a Conservative doesn't like guns, he doesn’t buy one. If a Liberal doesn't like guns, he wants all guns outlawed.

The last thing a Liberal wants to do is outlaw all guns. We’re going to need them. Next time the Saratogas hear Liberals want to ban firepower they should respond with indifference, at least. That said, Liberals do chuckle behind the backs of geared-up hunters posing beside their dead trophies, as though they’re going to feed a village. But, Liberals don’t want to ban all guns. Making them harder to get is simply a good idea. Does that sound crazy or stupid? Liberals would probably own more of them if the fear were as strong, but the dark side of town several miles away does not guarantee an automatic trigger from the gun show. This is a bit of a problem, and it’s not confined to urban minorities, like some music might imply. All sorts of shades are running around with guns, intimidating people and ultimately shooting them dead.

If a Conservative is a vegetarian, he doesn’t eat meat. If a Liberal is a vegetarian, he wants all meat products banned for everyone.

Wow, where did this come from? I can only guess he’s fat and craps black. And Vegetarians? Is this now a party among the conservative delusions? The idea Conservatives don’t see anything wrong with what has happened to farmers in the last 20 years is ironic and ignorant; they’ve been wiped out by government subsidized industrial farms. These farms not only manufacture meat at alarming rates but their meat is full of diseases and steroids and is practically force fed to American school children by corporate food chains. Way to go Saratogas, this must make you proud. Your bleached meat doesn’t come from a farmer in overalls. It comes from a scientist in a hazmat suit.

As well, the Saratogas are going to have to prove there is a Vegetarian Conservative.

If a Conservative is homosexual, he quietly leads his life. If a Liberal is homosexual, he demands legislated respect.

True Saratogas, Conservatives do quietly lead homosexual lives. It’s so quiet their wives rarely find out.

Yes legislation; how most things in this country are accomplished. Now there’s something wrong with that too. Legislated respect abolished slavery, gave women rights, workers rights, minorities rights, old people rights and will someday give gay people rights. Not special rights, the same rights. Get over it, progress prevails in America, always has always will. Conserve all you want.

If a Conservatives is down-and-out, he thinks about how to better his situation. A Liberal wonders who is going to take care of him.

Unless they work for a big bank. Enough said.

By the way, do the Saratogas have a mascot? They should. I think the cassette tape in available.

If a Conservative doesn't like a talk show host, he switches channels. Liberals demand that those they don't like be shut down.

This one comes all the way from LaLa Land. I’ll explain later… but first… Fox News reaches over 100 million people, more than all the other “news” outlets combined. Conservative talk radio has nine times more listeners. Always whining. Roger Ailes, the chairman and founder of Fox News, was a political adviser for Nixon, Reagan and Bush 1. Okay, so today this is called news. Fair and Balanced news. Perfect. You’ve wowed us again. Conservatives own the mainstream media. Sara Palin works for the mainstream media; one of the many reasons Liberals think she’s got a lobster’s brain.

And later… Conservatives have spent many more hours trying to ban all sorts of media, whether it’s music, movies or books. Have you skipped over the last two hundred years? This is going to kill the audience. You can’t make this stuff up. What are the Saratogas eating for breakfast? I think it has lead paint in it. Do they know that’s not good for you? Or is that some kind of Vegetarian Party bullshit?

If a Conservative is a non-believer, he doesn't go to church. A Liberal non-believer wants any mention of God and religion silenced.

Conservatives have spent the last century and half inserting the word God into our culture: in both the Pledge of Allegiance (1954) and on our currency (coins in 1864 and bills in 1956). Not once has it been suggested by a liberal to remove God from the Declaration of Independence and neither is the God mentioned remotely similar to a Christian God. You worship God, that’s fine, but please allow the rest of us to explore other options. Maybe there are a bunch of Jesuses, a few Gods, several Satans, at least ten Easter Bunnies and two Heavens, no Hells. Does it sound so crazy? You might think so. A liberal most likely would, too. Finally, common ground.

If a Conservative decides he needs health care, he goes about shopping for it, or may choose a job that provides it. A Liberal demands that the rest of us pay for his.

This might clear things up. Fortunately, I think I found something we share in common: the passion to be patriots. If Conservatives want to feel Patriotic they cheerfully and hastily cook up a war in Iraq. If Liberals want to feel Patriotic they cheerfully and hastily cook up healthcare reform. Shame on who? I guess we’ll see how Iraq turns out. The least the conservatives can do is wait and see how healthcare reform turns out. Though the intellect of the Saratogos dates them to at least in their 60s, they most likely won’t be around to see either. But their ambitious outlook tells me they have more faith in the Iraqis then they do in the Americans. Maybe they’re not so patriotic after all, besides a few flag-waving barbecues with firecrackers and paper plates. Shame on anyone who considers wealth an answer to health.

If a Conservative reads this, he'll forward it so his friends can have a good laugh. A Liberal will delete it because he's "offended".

Wrong again. But maybe the quotes around “offended” mean something I’m not hip to. Let’s forget this hidden wink and assume the content is the same. I’m encouraged and even more certain. This sounds straight from the diary of a madman. Again Saratogas, lay off the lead paint. While you’re at it, stop using it to paint schools. But I will forward this to as many people as possible because it proves how much insight Conservatives lack. I’m sure Liberals will have a better laugh with this than anyone, even a really evil terrorist. At the end of the day, this mentality scares Liberals. It’s primal and limited. Yet, finally, as one last “offensive” jab from the Saratogas, it reminds us, despite the lack of insight, we’ve come along way. It’s impossible to ignore the possibility this is the Saratogas intention and for that Liberals should thank them.

Finally, thanks again Saratogas, you’ve wowed us with your breakfast club and deep intellect over Eggs Benedict. Or is that too French? Maybe some corn fed beef trimmings would suit you better. Your God willing, you will inspire future generations to bomb the Japs.

P.S. I apologize for the length, but the facts are usually in the details. I know that’s not fair.

All the Dogs Bark at Once

2010-12-15T22:22:00.001-05:00

Santa is a fat white guy and this is a great country for fat white guys. They’re getting fatter, threatening to leave the United States of America if we stop them from eating more. They will take their fat white asses and swallow everything in sight somewhere else. As much as they can no matter what. Their hunger is powerful. They proved it this week when Obama said they could go ahead and run the government. Supposedly, the tax breaks about to expire will instead last for another two years, creating jobs along the way. They didn’t create any jobs since passed during Bush’s first year, but for some reason they will this time. What can the cable addicts say about Obama now? He had to convince the fat white guys to include unemployment benefits in the new bill, just enough to get through Christmas and the New Year. Then what? Then the fat white guys will hire people and they can get all the things they couldn’t get on unemployment: iPods, flatscreens, guns, trucks and books (I wish). And the Tea Party can say I told you so.

My neighbor Feo is fat and he’s white, but he’s not a fat white guy. He despises them more than I ever could. His rage is so fierce I often feel threatened when we're alone together. This does not stop my frequent visits to his cluttered isolation. His weapons take up most of the place– I’m not a fan but I’m comforted knowing the arsenal is there in case– and the rest seems like big frames leaning and a couch covered in books and magazines. All Feo could talk about was Julian Assange and the epic state of Journalism. “It’s a shame they won’t hang him. That’s a true heroes death. He’s a fucking hero.” I opened a beer and dropped it and picked it up before too much spilled on the corner of carpet I squeezed into. Feo waved his favorite machete with one arm, the other arm pushed in his pocket, searching for his capsule of psychedelics. “I’ll kill you. I’ll kill you and your family.” He staggered back into the kitchen, disappeared beyond the doorway. I finished my beer quickly– Feo has a few rules– placed the empty on a stack of books about the fall of Roman Empire and snuck away to my own cave nearby. Locked the door in three places. If I could warn the others I would, but I was safe so I settled for a better chance than those who didn’t know.

There’s a fine line at the finish and the sooner you start the sooner you will get there. The poetry of everything is lost along the way. Automobiles get bigger. Wastes get wider. People get louder because they need to be heard, acknowledged in any kind of way. Some don’t even care when the attention is negative because it’s emotional despite being confrontational. This was clear when Feo started banging on my door an hour after I left him and his machete. I watched him through the peephole. He appeared unarmed but was salivating mad about Amazon.com, Pay Pal and Mastercard. “China will turn them all into piggy banks in the next twenty years. Open up, I need to talk.” I suggested we talk through the door. He walked off and came back with a stool and sat. He started in about John Lennon. “He’s still a villain. He’ll be a hero someday.” I stopped watching because it looked like Feo was crying. I listened to his weak wimpers, the way he cries, I’d heard it before. He managed to express his hatred for fat white guys calmly, as though it would all be over soon anyway. His perspective sounded hindsight. “Then they voted on a war against Iran. Then Russia sided with Iran. Then China watched, quietly. Then Cuba sided with the US. You know that’s never a good thing.” He insisted I respond. Even his delusions were self-conscious. In his dreams people were as bad as animals get and what’s the use if that’s just how it is. He was silent for a few, so I watched him wipe his eyes with the back of his trembling hand. He picked up his stool and left. I heard the door close.

It’s almost Christmas, then the New Year, and this has been a good year for both Right and Wrong. It’s all straight forward, the way we see it. Everyone thinks they’re right. There aren’t many maybes anymore. I’m definitely not a maybe, though I could be wrong. I like to think about it and I’m yet to discover an objection I find reasonable. I’m looking because the way I see it the fat white guys are in control. That means one thing and we’ve seen it before. It’s remains consistent, refuses to change. We can publish all the Mark Twain there is and ever was. We can read it as often as fish swim. We can eat it up and get fat on it. Psychedelic condemnations aside, Feo had point, lost somewhere between his thoughts and his words. He was in Vietnam and sometimes I realize that jungle is still with him. Some people are just better at war with themselves. Those who know this handle it better than those who don’t. Those who don’t find others who don’t and together they pound their feet like stubborn apes. From now on I will leave the apes out of this.

I should finish here. Someone is listening on the other side of my door.

12/10/2302

Flip-Flop Jibber-Jabber

2010-11-05T19:47:00.005-04:00

By Brian Wask

My TV is old and the picture is fuzzy. That’s not the reason I can’t tell the difference between most Democrats and Republicans. Reliably, their drool is repetitive and their hairstyles are socio-pathic, but I shouldn’t expect so much from Executives and Lawyers. It’s absolutely true they eat babies on Thanksgiving and slaughter bunny eggs for Easter. It’s a hard world for cute things and the ugly guys want to keep it that way. Leadbelliy never picked a bale of cotton but who’s to say he couldn’t write a damn good song about it? Only a fool. So, maybe, if we stop paying attention to crying politicians they will stop eating spaghetti with their hands. The drama of World Wresting should stay where it belongs. An R or a D before someone’s name is a Scarlet Letter. Politics are supposed to be a carnival and if that’s agreed we’ve succeeded once again. Now I can finally sleep at night.

Crying is free. You can do it all you want and it won’t cost you much, except some right-minded time to think clearly. Sometimes I think too clearly and I need some chaos. I called my friend Harrison, who is still living in the nation’s capital, though his wife’s attorneys took all the furniture and left him with only a few TVs. His diatribe was on loop, having just returned from the local bar where he’d unexpectedly bumped into his doctor, which might’ve been pleasant if the same doctor hadn’t checked his asshole for hernias just a few days before. They shared time over several strong drinks anyway, discussing rumors of the early midterm results. By the time Harrison started the ignition of his minivan, a calm spirit of delight, complimented by grief, settled in his gut. And by the time I got him on the phone he was in a blissful trance, surrounded by not politics, but primetime sitcoms concerning best friends with silly problems. “Careful,” he told me in a deep, comfortable tone. “The devil will come wearing the cross. He will come as your friend wearing a tri-cornered hat. He will open his eyes to you and smile. And because you’re unprepared and misinformed, you’ll smile back. Then you’ll make a sign about the Founding Fathers and smash someone’s head open with it.” Harrison is always good for clarity, but he still has that gun and I worry he’ll find a good reason to use it.

The people are terrified again and nothing good will come from that. Fear is not a reasonable emotion but in this part of the Americas they serve devastation for breakfast; the television, newspapers, the internet and radio. We graze on it, over and over, the same shit over and over. The Conspiracies from the Birch Society are not worth the saliva they spread in, yet for the most popular slobs on television it sells very well. But I don’t blame the TV or the media for this great misunderstanding. That kind of excuse is designated to Fools and Fatheads. I don’t hold conservatives responsible either. They’re wired wrong from birth and, like anyone else deficient of intellect, it’s not quite their fault. Instead I blame the Fools and Fatheads. Their light-headed opinions are easily persuaded by obvious lies. What ridiculous opinion did they have two years ago they don’t have now? Did they think Obama was the Messiah, and when elected he would fix everything himself by simply snapping his fingers while singing a Woody Guthrie proletariat battle cry? I think they did. Why else would they get out of bed in the morning to watch an Alcoholic turned Mormon blubber his way through the Constitution? Tears pull at the heartstrings, don’t they?

But lets get down to brass. Someone who smokes a little pot should not go to jail. Not even someone who smokes a lot of pot. It’s simple. Jail is not a place for people like that. There is no credible argument for it. The debate ends there. I’m sorry if that sounds close-minded, but you have to draw the line somewhere and irrational jibber-jabber is where I draw my line. The House of Representatives’ new majority leader grew up in a bar, and that’s okay. But what’s in the California drinking water? That desert is overpopulated with the results of a secret nuclear mistake. I’m terrified of what they eat for breakfast, lunch and dinner. It’s obviously resulted in strange behavior. That’s the verdict among those who have a clue. The rest I guess are too stoned and don’t give a damn. A pothead will smoke pot, legal or not. It’s time to wrestle the gun out of Charlton Heston’s cold dead hands.

Soon after hanging up with Harrison my neighbor Feo serenaded my door with a monotone ballad about Iowa and her homophobic reaction to the state’s federal circuit court. In his song the voters hung their activist judges from a good old lynching tree in the center of a sparsely populated corn grove. At least that’s what I head through the peephole. I refused to open the door because Feo was also drunk and most likely armed. It was then I realized even progressives are stockpiling weapons and it was about time I did the same. I’m not scared, but I should be. Because suddenly the Fools and Fatheads and the Conservatives and Christianites got a good hand and they won’t fold without a fight. So it’s now time to fight. Fight for equality, freedom, and decency. When the economy is bad and there are no jobs, it’s a good idea to collect taxes from the people who have it. In fact, that’s their contribution to society. They’re boring the shit out of us anyway, so if they want to be awesome then they can act like it. It’s not ideal, but what is?

Brian Wask: Socialist Rant Contest Winner (The Red Collective Quarterly, March/2010)

2010-03-18T10:10:00.006-04:00

Rant– n1: a loud bombastic declamation expressed with strong emotion. n2: pompous or pretentious talk or writing. v: talk in a noisy, excited declamatory manner.

If Socialism is behind the wheel feel free to remove your seat belt, kick off your shoes and prop your feet on the dashboard. Let him know if you need a bathroom break or a quick bite. He will oblige. If Capitalism is driving, buckle up and brace yourself, he will quickly dominate the conversation and the itinerary. Voting on a town to visit and a place to eat is possible, but if Capitalism is paying, Democracy becomes a smoke screen for wealthier interests.

Democracy is a socialist idea, it’s about time everyone understands this. One man, one vote. Its natural counterpart would be egalitarian. The idea Democracy is connected to Capitalism is a fake, a conspiracy, like religion and text books. Are we really so limited, propaganda from the fifties still gets to us? Capitalism is best. It means freedom. It’s the American way. When? What? For who? It failed big time all over the world and just recently here. Now it’s time for all the socialists to stop feeling horrible, stand up and say I told you so. Democracy told you so. Capitalism tried to tell you so but it lied. Continued to lie. And then it showed up at school with no pants on. We’re not Russians. It wont be so bad. Don’t be afraid. This is just the basics.

Traditional communism is not good. That’s what we’re afraid of. The Red Scare. Cuba is not Socialist. It’s a dictatorship, despite what Castro and the Miami opposition insists. If you believe a dictator and the neo-Capitalists in South Florida, then go on believing Cuba is Socialist and turn the page. The USSR was not Socialist. It imperialized at least a dozen nations and held them down for almost a century, while the power players profited during the world’s greatest prosperity. That’s the opposite of socialism. There’s the learning curve. Thank the good earth these misguided places did it first. It makes sense according to the founding fathers. No way would they tolerate men with Boca Raton tans deciding who owns what piece of land. Or Goldman Sachs convincing Congress to allow bankers to control a democratic government of the people, by the people. In the 1970’s one president was brave enough to tell Americans the real threat– the greed, the need, the me first addiction. It’s up to you to figure out which one. Hint, he failed too. Lift the rug and see what’s been swept beneath. Sooner or later people move and the furniture has to go. All the crumbs left behind must be dealt with and digested, otherwise they will attract rats. Rats compete, they don’t share.

Run down the essence of the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution. They sound egalitarian more than profit/power driven. Equality and natural rights. Natural rights are not founded by a specific God either. Arts and Science are expressed more than religion and profit, which easily translates to other than the norm. For anyone to equate the meaning of independence (natural rights) and power (natural selection) they must be over-occupied by their own image in the mirror at the gym. One of the ‘naturals’ is evil. The wrong choice will be forgiven but it must be confronted. Remember Teddy Roosevelt’s big stick. We will spare them of that, for now. We will not even kill their children though we fear the mentality they rapidly breed. Instead, we will educate them. And they will learn to be better than where they came. The reckless opinions previous generations excepted, the death we allowed, harm we imposed, now the good we postponed will reign again and the dreams of the past will wake up. The silly nightmare is over. It was only a pile of drool to begin with. Unlearning as an adult is harder than learning for the first time. There’s the conflict. Lucky for me I never learned to begin with. I know I’m not alone. The reality is, despite your accomplishments, if you believe what your fifth grade teacher told you there’s not much of a chance what you think still makes sense, and progress will remain digressive while TV continues to educate people. Even the Bible people knew this. Only Big Government can face off with Big Corporation. Or else Big Corporation will swallow Little Government.

Airlines are the perfect example of Capitalism gone wrong. (If you request more examples I will provide them.) Going through the airport is normally convenient. They even have machines that spit out your tickets. Thank you. Going through security is pleasant, as long as you know the drill. Pull out your belt, slip off your shoes, fold your coat. Don’t bring your own shampoo cause you know they’ll catch you. I tried. My fault. The hassles feel exaggerated when you get to the gate. Then the real problems start. The airline reps appear bored, defensive and authoritative. The planes are late and flight attendants treat you like you’re on your way to Saint Peter, cash your complaints with him. Some are hospitable, okay, but how often are they enthusiastic about helping passengers. I’m not old and I remember when Capitalism worked. It doesn’t anymore and short flights to Boston prove that. In fact, most terrorist’s scares today are because someone got pissed at a flight attendant, not because of Western policies in the Middle East.

Even I don’t feel comfortable standing up for Socialism, but damn me if I stand for Capitalism. Damn you too. Stand up for Democracy. One man one vote. All votes are equal, not matter your worth, your land, your accomplishments. Don’t sweat Venezuela or the USSR or Cuba. That’s not The United States. We should give healthcare away. We should do our best to help children with parents who can’t. We should support seniors, veterans, the disabled, families temporarily struggling who need it. What good is anything else? What good is the moon or Mars? What difference does oil from the sea mean if a child is hungry? What? If you drive an expensive car you should be ashamed. But shame is good, it means you have a soul and something in your soul doesn’t feel right. Now sell your car and by a tent and a good sleeping bag. Don’t be cheap. You’re going to need it. The stars will look amazing at night. I promise.

This is just the beginning of a very sophisticated argument. If you object I welcome your options. Don’t rely on a Texas text book to help you. Reality is available and an argument against it is a waste of time. Again, like all other righteous fights, this as well will prevail. The details of course are evolving, but the certainties are obvious. Capitalism is dead. The propaganda is exposed. It was a long time ago when it first appeared in black and white, in its earliest forms– imperialism, repression, exploitation, slavery. We’re not in the dark ages, those who choose not to be. The evidence is out there, everywhere. I urge you to care. Find it. Read it. Get with it. Otherwise stay out of it because there is no way you can stop it.

Brian Wask is the founder of Tire Swing Press and remains a regular contributor, despite the unpaid staff's vote to impeach him. Check out his books and music at BrianWask.com.

Danielle Vettraino: reflections of a psychopath in the early stages of development: exhibit a

2010-03-17T10:35:00.003-04:00

so i have this, um, it’s a cell phone. i make, you know, calls on it…and stuff…and it comes off as being this really great thing. you can call people all over the world. there’s also this feature, with the keys. the numbers, they have corresponding letters. and you can actually type messages to people. and it’s crazy. i mean people can be really good at these things. it’s like this whole unspoken universe going on. and it’s amazing to me, the things people can write.

“hey, whats up?”

“Wanna grab a coffee?”

“let’s meet for a drink”

also, you can receive these messages, any time of day. it doesn’t matter.

3am: “come over”

3:03am: “i can’t do that.”

3:04am: “i’ll pay your cab, just come”

and what you think is, no, i can’t come. i haven’t seen you in a while, and you broke my heart, and i haven’t really gotten over it. and i will probably start crying the second you touch me and i get close enough to remember how you never smelled like anything or i hear the same four leonard cohen songs you always play or i see your big round face and your little tiny penis, but that’s not what you write, you see, because the beauty of this message system is you aren’t actually talking to them in real time so you can hide the fact that you’re freaking the fuck out. so no, that’s not what you write. what you write, because your fucking stupid is,

“k, leaving in 5”

and you get there, and everything is fine, he’s being nice, you let him bang you, and then, of course, you start crying. and after a while he just sits there staring because some version of this happens every time we meet up, and i just hope my face will save me. he loved my face. he would always say i looked like a porcelain doll. and when he got in his condescending moods he always seemed to forget how pretty he said i was. and no, i can’t spell condescending and i don’t actually know what it means, i just feel that it applies to you. because we never really fight. it’s more you reminding me that you’re smarter better wiser and i am just some little girl who doesn’t know how to articulate herself so she just cries. and i shut down and hope you will look at my face. the face that you love, the only part of me that you love. hoping it would be beautiful enough for you to stop. and you’ll tell me you’re sorry, and beg me to stay because you couldn’t bear to be away from my face. please just say you love me, you want me to have your babies. but you don’t. my face doesn’t get me out of it. why do you get to make me feel ugly? so unwanted? just today! at the library, i was distracting boys from their studies left and right. i was just sitting, reading, and i could feel their horny eyes climbing all over me. searching, finding my face, my breasts, taking in as much now for use later when it’s just as quiet and twice as lonely. and no matter what position they could fantasize me in the would never dream of making me feel as small as you do. i’ve tried to move on. there are others. some with bigger cocks, some who think i’m smart, most more successful then you. yet, three whiskeys into an empty night, your punishment is what i seek. and i’m sitting on your bed and i’m crying not because it lasted two minutes, i was used to that but, i don’t know, you are everything i hate about myself. and just absolute nonsense is spilling out of my mouth and i can’t stop and there is this ghost of me floating above telling me i am out of control, pleading with me to shut the fuck up and i’m trying to explain why i’m crying, begging for you to love me two years too late and i want to leave and i want my phone so he doesn’t know about the others because fuck, how do you tell someone you just had anal with that you want to take it slow. and i run and i run and i run away from you

Danielle Vettraino is a founding member of LabRats Collective Ensemble, where she is a contributing writer and actor. She plays ukulele and dreams of one day marrying Bob Dylan, despite the age gap.

Chris Conroy: Chef of the Future

2010-03-17T10:29:00.006-04:00

The storm proved the victor. We all had plans. Thank the many gods for the space heater our small profit could afford. The staff was restless and the rain sounded like the beaches of Normandy, 1944. When we lost power I announced a plan to eat Hector first. No one will know. This idea was quickly rejected. Credit to the staff. There was food in the fridge and the rain was supposed to stop soon after midnight. The fear was temporary, we concluded. Bad parties last longer than this. What can we do with what we got? After several suggestions the best idea prevailed. Conroy was the winner and Tire Swing Press’s future chef. His combination of dead plants and ground up animals resulted in a hearty delight. So tasty the entire staff spent all night on the cement floor recalling other meals that maybe came close. In the morning I demanded the recipe, or else Conroy’s resignation. He provided. If you’re ever stuck in Epcot Center or a Whole Foods over night, give this meal your best. You will survive and be a better person because of it. That night it was dark and the rain was heavy on the aluminum awning above the exit, sounded like unwanted guests. Don’t be discouraged. I was and that was wrong. Way wrong. Now, I can say that was good. – BW

Dinner by Chris Conroy

Recipe: Ziti with sautéed Italian sausage, organic red-bell pepper and broccoli in a spicy garlic white wine broth.

The Ingredients:

* 1 Italian Sausage, leftover (I used sweet, I already ate the spicy ones, but you can use either; if they've been chillin' in sauce--or gravy--I recommend first rinsing off the sauce--or gravy--and then slicing into little discs)

* 1/4 red bell pepper (chopped into large squares, picture a scrabble piece and then double it, perfect)

* Broccoli (use leftover or steam some fresh)

* 1 or 2 Garlic cloves (diced or smashed and then slivered)

* Ziti (fill a cereal bowl with dry pasta and you're good for 1, probably end up with leftovers)

* Herb-ox chicken bouillon (little bit, careful here, not too salty, we have 'salted' whipped butter to come)

* Water (depends on how you work the broth & balance the salt)

* Chopped parsley (a handful)

* Cracked black pepper (few twists)

* Parmesan Cheese (lots)

* EVOO (little bit)

* Whipped Salted Butter (little bit)

* Red pepper flakes (optional but come on)

* White wine (optional but come on)

The Game Plan:

While waiting for your ziti water to boil, heat evoo and whipped butter in a cast-iron skillet over medium heat, add chopped garlic and cook for about a minute and then add the red bell pepper squares and sausage. Sautee the garlic, peppers and sausage for a few minutes and then add in the red pepper flakes and some cracked black pepper. Turn the heat up to high—stirring & scraping all ingredients with a fork to prevent burning—and then hit the hot skillet with some white wine, about a ½ cup. In the couple of minutes it takes the alcohol to burn off, add your ziti to the salted boiling water and stir. Now take your leftover broccoli and nuke for about 30 seconds, just to get the chill out, and set to the side. Turn the heat back to medium on your cast-iron skillet, stir ingredients again with fork, toss in parsley, and then ladle into the skillet some of the hot boiling ziti water and then add in some Herb-ox chicken bouillon. Stir again and taste your broth—add more water if too salty and more bouillon if not salty enough—cover and lower heat. By now your ziti should be al dente so drain and return to a cold water-rinsed pot and toss in broccoli. Blast ziti and broccoli with some more evoo, shred lots of parmesan over it and ladle in your spicy garlic white wine broth with sautéed Italian sausage and organic red-bell pepper, mix, and then plate. Add more cracked black pepper, red pepper and parmesan cheese to taste.

Drink: 2006 Bleasdale Langhorne Crossing (52% cab, 27% malbec, 15% shiraz, 6% petit verdot. Cost: $10)

Non-Alcoholic: 3/4 of tall mug with Canada Dry Seltzer with a 1/4 of Boylan's Black Cherry Soda

Dessert: 2 Mini Dark Chocolate Reese’s Peanut Butter Cups

Entertainment: Carver's 'Cathedral' or Spielberg’s JAWS or Van Morrison's 'Enlightenment' or simply the moon, in any form--full, thumbnail, half, cloud scratched--staring back at you and yours.

Conroy's fiction has been published in several online and print publications, including Whetstone, Word Riot, Ward6 Review, Zingmagazine and The Hell Gate Review. Check out an excerpt from a fiction in progress--Quercus Alba--in the inaugural print issue of The Wanderlust Review, Feb 2010. Or drop him a line at conroy18@hotmail.com.

Jamie King Reviews the Arts: All of Them

2010-03-16T08:30:00.003-04:00

If you’re an upper-middle-class American like myself, you’ve probably wrestled with the following question: how do I while away the odd decades before my children are conceived? While other nationalities and social substrata might labor under obligations such as “learning a skill” and “pursuing a useful trade,” this lucky sliver of the American population is able to spend the bulk of its twenties more or less fucking around, or as some have rationalized it, “chasing a dream.”

Due to an alarming overlap of this demographic with the blog-reading community, I dedicate the following column exclusively to these laterally-mobile citizens. Raised with the understanding that any years not directly spent keeping a tiny, helpless person alive may be flushed away in the pursuit of some artistic goal, they have been called “Hobby-Capped,” “Persons Living with Dabble-Abilities,” or, more bluntly, “Art-tarded.” While most of them will never see their goals come to fruition, that doesn’t ease the difficulty of deciding precisely which gust of wind to piss in. As someone who has failed at more things than most people have ever tried, I feel qualified to give a brief overview of the options available in the pursuit of self-expression, self-exploration, and running out your biological clock.

“But Jamie,” you say, “I’m in my twenties. Can’t I express myself and get laid?” If this is your response, then music is the art for you! A hedonist’s dream, success in music is possible and often easier to achieve when under the influence of drugs, alcohol and spectacular overconfidence. Playing music for a live audience is probably the closest you can come to actually fucking someone with your art (unless your creative passion involves the construction of ornamental dildos. See next week’s review!). It’s a lock for those that demand an immediate, visceral reaction from their patrons, one that often ends in unprotected sex. Downsides include loneliness, tattoos and early death. All in all I give music a 7. It’s the greatest artistic thrill imaginable, but if you fly that close to the sun, you must be prepared to conceive a child with it in a urine-soaked bathroom.

Let’s say that you lack the technical skill for music but still crave the adoration of the masses. If you feel comfortable speaking English out loud and happen to be eye-meltingly gorgeous, then acting might be the art for you! Considered to be minor gods in most developing countries, successful actors have combined exhibitionism with knowledge of words and a staggering ability to be looked at to become the most celebrated artists in the world. For those interested in acting but without the benefit of good looks, spin-off pursuits such as performance art and stand-up comedy offer the self-indulgence of acting without the perils of payment or recognition. Try this easy test to find where you fit: snort baby-aspirin and attend a concert by a moderately successful musician. If you wake up in your own bed, the life of a television actor is probably not in your future. However, if you have the face for it, acting is a dream job in every sense, easily scoring a high 8. Some claim that there are large drawbacks to the actor lifestyle, such as a total lack of personal privacy and crippling sex-addiction, but these people are by and large very attractive jerks attempting to corner the market on godhood.

But maybe you’re not a people person. Maybe you’d prefer that the adoration of the masses doesn’t begin until years after your death. If this is the case, then visual art is probably your best choice. Visual artists can spend years in isolation, crafting masterpieces with their own blood, sweat and tears (often all too literally). While lacking the popularity and visceral response elicited by music and acting, visual art compensates with a total lack of any quantifiable criteria for success. Most people are able to identify bad music or bad acting, but bad visual art can almost always be hidden behind a compelling explanation. Almost anything, from an unpainted canvas to a small amount of human feces can be passed off as visual art, as long as the artist exhibits expansive sociopathic tendencies that can be interpreted as an “aesthetic.” Whether you’re a little eccentric, a future serial killer, or just plain like to draw, visual art is a safe, relaxing choice that earns a solid 9.

Of course if you’re blind and tone-deaf with a face that frightens even the bravest children, you can always try writing. Writing is widely regarded as the lowest art form, and it’s a little known fact that up until the late 16th century the terms “writer” and “leper” were interchangeable. Beside the fact that it requires almost no preparation or materials and can be performed under any circumstances (for example, while sitting in my underwear, picking cheez-it dust off my hairless upper thighs), writing has very little to recommend itself as an artistic goal. It elicits no visceral response from the audience, garners little praise or recognition, and works within a network of grammatical conventions through which bad writing very apparent quickly becomes. Considering that, if current trends continue, within 10 years all written work will most likely be limited to 140 characters, this artistic pursuit is lucky to walk away with a score of 2.

I hope this condemnation will not go unnoticed, especially by those sunk deep into the dabble-ability of writing, such as New York Times columnists, and the producers of “Mad Men.” To these people I say, it’s never too late for you to switch gears and try something else. Join a band, get some headshots, poop on a pedestal. And if you need someone to wallow through your pathetic writing jobs once you’ve abandoned them, I can begrudgingly offer my services. After all, I’ve tried everything else. And I’ve still got a little more time to kill.

Jamie King is a writer and comedian from Washington State, based in Brooklyn. Recently, his work has appeared online in McSweeney's Internet Tendency and onstage at The Upright Citizen's Brigade Theatre, New York. More essays, videos, and propaganda can be found at www.kingjamie.net.

Brian Wask: CPAC Sounds Like a Douche

2010-03-04T09:44:00.015-05:00

Hell's Kitchen, NYC– The plan was to visit a friend in DC last weekend, but the snow and growing wolf population gave me second thoughts. Since Spring of 2009 record number cottontail rabbits have burrowed homes into Washington’s vast lawns, but with so much snow they’ve been unable to find their holes after returning with food for their young. I was eager to see what would come of the rabbits since the Mall was devastated by snowfall two weeks previous. According to Republicans, hot after a few lame victories in usually blue friendly places, Obama should’ve been out with his shovel first thing in the morning. But what does an elitist immigrant born with a silver spoon in his mouth know about shoveling snow. That’s hard work. Obama went to Harvard. The white rabbits had the snow in their favor, but a hungry wolf can smell a horny bunny three miles away. That’s nature and the nation’s Capital is the still heart of a bloody corpse because of it. The rabbits are timid anyway and that kind of stink is lethal in Washington.

During the brief moments between snowfalls my phone rang. I reluctantly answered but all I heard on my end was the TV real loud and a lunatic reading the inscription from the Statue of Liberty: Give me your tired, your poor, your huddled masses yearning to breath free. The wretched refuse, tempest-tossed to me. I lift my lamp beside the golden door… I recognized the weeping on the other side. It was Harrison, whom I was to visit, and my source of all good things political. He’s recently divorced, wife took the kids to Puerto Rico, so the first image popped into my head was an empty bottle of Jack between his thighs and a Ruger Single Action revolver to his temple. (I was with him when he picked it out, his nervous hand could barely hold the plow-handle grip.) “Put on Fox News Channel,” he said. I told him I couldn’t. He agreed it was painful but there was something I needed to see. I explained I lack the luxury of cable and instead endure the long-hand version of politics on C-Span. “God bless you,” he said. “Most people don’t even know what that is.” I asked if he was okay and turn the TV down so I can hear you. “It’s Glenn Beck. He’s puking all over the place, making a mockery of the Revolution. He’s cried several times. I can’t turn it off.”

A week before CPAC wrapped up its annual three-day convention in DC, but the stench lingered like a toxic gas from a George Romero film. The remaining Crazies gathered at coffeehouses in nearby Alexandria, where Harrison holed up in the new suburban spread he’d recently purchased for his growing family. Not no more. I felt bad Mother Nature discouraged me from visiting, but I also started the weekend early, and forget the weather I wasn’t going anywhere for at least three days. Plus I had work to do. A friend of a friend found an agent willing to read my latest, but I’d lied about being finished in the first place, so the next few days I’d have at it. It was unlikely I’d get anything done with all that was on my mind– wolves and the slaughter of innocent rabbits– but I’d give it an old-fashioned coffee and Benzedrine try anyway, despite the cold-weather in my head. “Is anyone else there?” I asked Harrison. He said he was alone and the only company he was expecting would come by small plane trailing a banner denouncing taxes. “The fuckers defended the bastard,” Harrison said. “Like they did McVeigh and Nichols. The Right is armed to the teeth, taking a page from Al Queda. It’s bad. Cheney needs to be muzzled. He’s telling everyone America is unprepared. When will that prick’s machine heart finally fail?” We agreed probably never.

Harrison answered a call from his lawyer on the other line and forgot I was waiting so I hung up soon after. Hopefully things work out for the guy. The value of his house is down a good chunk of change and since the Mexican gangs supposedly took over Northern Virginia’s school system no one was looking for property in the Fast Food district of suburban Alexandria. But progress will prevail, always has, which got me thinking about what’s wrong and what’s right, and who is this CPAC guy and why does he spell his name like a robot? I went to C-Span’s website and activated a marathon of CPAC footage. It was quite a chill to see Liz Cheney, the grateful offspring of a savage Aryan, soak the microphone with rumors of incompetence over the Christmas Day Attack. Keep America Safe is the name of the group Miss Cheney represents, which seems to me a twisted joke when it’s her own gene pool that would better serve NASA’s waste management program in space far far away. Friday night turned into Saturday morning, despite the terrible reality of CPAC and the digressive culture it dignifies. Halfway through the second day’s events I again confirmed why I often side with lame Democrats over their textbook counterparts in the GOP. Thanks to CPAC it gets easier and easier.

The ferocious banging at my door will have to wait. Dedicated Aryans (see Teddy Roosevelt’s Following the Sun Philosophy) have hijacked our nation’s cornerstones and rewritten them to suit a “Christian” foundation, contradicting the founders' preference of Science and the Arts (see Amendment 1) and to justify imperialism with the Monroe Doctrine (again, see Teddy Roosevelt, John McCain’s favorite president). Forget all the other dangerous opinions breeding among Tea Party carnies. They maintain a distant second place to this vile, primitive agenda. Global Warming can wait. Right now there are powerful people whose happiness depends on other’s misery (see the gloating of Pat Roberson after the earthquake in Haiti, the hurricane in New Orleans and the destruction of the Twin Towers). CPAC called their invited guest Ryan Sorba’s homophobic rant connecting civil rights to natural rights via reproduction “freedom of opinion.” Sorba, a combative misanthrope who justifies his delusions with philosophical roundhouses, thinks humans are programmed like wild beasts and all feelings between us are pure instinct, no passion, love or intellect– in his case this is true. If that’s all that Limelight Conservatives can say about this kind of hateful ignorance, I fear what will happen if CPAC’s bag of nuts ever serves as a jury of my peers.

Brian Wask writes books, makes music and has spent several trips to an isolated cabin sweating out his unhealthy addiction to American Politics. Go to BrianWask.com to see more.

Joe the Plumber's Aquacracy: A Photo Exhibition, Reviewed by Duncan Sweever

2010-03-03T08:26:00.022-05:00

Joe the Plumber– one of his many aliases– presented his most recent work at the Whitney Museum last week. It was the follow up to his book, the thought provoking and distinguishingly logical Fighting for the American Dream. In the book he casually rationalizes the beneficial ways a country should run government, as well the wholesome luxuries that go along with being hardworking, old fashioned and Christian, when convenient. Though the same ideas have failed over and over throughout history, they worked at the Whitney last week. Aquacracy demonstrates restraint and fear. Multitasking is not easy. Ideas don’t have to “work” in order to be preserved and repeated.

Those in attendance were a fair balance between the left-handed and the right-handed, and at times their ambiguous debates concerning the artist’s intentions contributed a surprising aesthetic to the gallery’s setting– the floor was soft. The dexterity of angle was an obvious sign the artist is right-handed. At the same time the materials photographed pursued a space found left of center. Perhaps contrived, perhaps provoked, Aquacracy presents a vulnerable tension while recognizing its own uncertainties. Peripherally, in Australia, it could be compared to surfing, without motion, or an emptiness harangued by the professor himself, like a half-eaten balloon.

Aquacracy symbolizes a downstream mentality. It’s a blunder of theories, tangled by nature, isolated by choice. The brilliance of civilization recognizes differences, but awareness is brief and differences endure. People used to live in caves, now they live in houses. That’s a big difference, and standing out among the variations is plumbing, and, on a grander scale, Water Works. Still, for six thousand years, since God created the Earth and its varicose water tables, similarities linger. Gravity, a divine invention, remains the determining factor, despite technology and/or science.

Photography toys with reality and perception. Images appear and disappear. Everybody knows that. The deceptive impact is frustrating and frightening, creating both euphoric anxiety and violent reactions. Joe the Plumber discreetly inspires confusion, but the possibilities of interpretation pass the baton, until finally the finish line appears, though distant, within sight. Yet when finished one looks back and wonders why they ran around in circles to begin with. But circles don’t end. Neither does gravity. But Space does and Aquacracy proves this. Thanks to Joe the Plumber that debate is over. Next up for the man of many names: The Left’s addiction to Lying and the benefits of saying you own a business when you really don’t.

Duncan Sweever writes for a number of print publications, including Afterthought and PlayDate. He remains elusive, despite a very long nose.

Jamie King Reviews Turns of Phrase: Inspirational Sayings

2010-03-02T07:11:00.002-05:00

This week I’m bringing a critical eye to so-called “inspirational sayings:” turns of phrase designed to convey hope in times of despair, grant strength to the downtrodden, and shine a light where once there was only darkness.

As exemplified by that nauseating topic sentence, even the most cynical of writers can find themselves drawn to flowery analogies when inspiration is involved. This is due to the baffling truth that optimism increases exponentially when combined with half-hearted wordplay and flimsy metaphors. As proof, one needs only peruse the multitude of “inspirational quote of the day” websites scattered about the Internet like the abandoned children of an overly fertile, deadbeat Care Bear. Online, these phrases are as prevalent as pornography, evoke about 40% as much masturbation, and are far more harmful to our society than a thousand hours of German pooping videos. For even the vilest sex act ever filmed is guiltless of the sins committed by inspirational phrases: the sin of false hope with a thin sugar coating.

The most insidious of these phrases seem upbeat at first glance, yet after rudimentary examination reveal themselves to be as depressing as a stillborn smurf. My first example, “You never know,” is so delusional a phrase that the New York State Lottery employs it as their slogan. It presents itself as a rebuttal to the pessimists:

“I’ll never win a million dollars. That’s crazy.”

“Hey, you never know!”

Unfortunately, the marketing geniuses behind legalized gambling overlooked the fact that this phrase can just as easily be cripplingly depressing if used in response to a more positive statement:

“We’ll have beautiful children together.”

“Hey, you never know!”

“...well, as long as they’re healthy.”

“Yeah, but you never know...do you?”

“I guess not. But you love me. And that’s all that matters, right?”

“Sure. I mean that’s what I keep telling you.”

“But I’ll never really know...will I?”

“Definitely not.”

The fact that nothing can ever be truly known is one of life’s great tragic ironies. And yet, its inspirational usage elicits warm smiles and wasted change from thousands of people every day. For this reason I give “You never know” a solid 2 out of 10 stars.

Next up for review is the insidious backhanded compliment, “You’re one in a million.” The sins of this phrase are fairly obvious: while clearly intended to boost confidence, its literal translation smacks of isolation and insignificance on a massive scale. What types of things stand out as one among millions? Grains of sand on the beach? Stars in the sky? Trees in the forest? Bloggers? Being “one in a million” says nothing about your value in comparison to your 999,999 competitors. A far more specific and accurate compliment might be “You are a successful sapling in a field of failures” or “your accomplishments make me feel bad about my own. “While these phrases may keep it “too real” for the inspirational quote establishment, they easily trump the unspecified praise of “You’re one in a million,” which earns a merciful 4 out of 10 stars.

Most inspirational phrases are in the public domain, originating in that long ago time when very little had been said and almost anybody could end up with their ramblings sewn on a pillow. The coining of a modern inspirational phrase is a rare thing, and attempts are frequently clumsy and misinterpreted. Still, every now and then a group of young men will sell their souls to the devil in exchange for wild success, eternal life and the authorship of a memorable inspirational quote. I am referring, of course, to “You Can’t Always Get What You Want,” by the Rolling Stones.

At first glance, I find this quote much more satisfying than the previous two. Its abrasive honesty is refreshing, and it seems to be the first truly post-modern inspirational phrase. Unfortunately, it sells itself out in the 2nd act: “But if you try sometimes, you just might find, you get what you need.” Close inspection reveals that lyricist Mick Jagger’s efforts to fit the phrase gracefully into the chorus of a song have resulted in the addition of a depressing number of modifiers. Consider the amount of variables in this sentence:

“But if you try, sometimes, you just might find, you get what you need.”

When you consider the likelihood of trying in the first place, the dubious timing, and the fact that even a successful attempt “just might” be successful, the chances of actually getting what you need seem very, very slim indeed. That’s why this phrase, which in the last few decades has become a kind of fatalist-rallying cry, earns only 6 out of 10 stars. While it seems to affirm through multiple choruses that everything happens for a reason, in reality it sounds more like a poorly thought-out exchange with the Almighty:

“God, why are we here?”

“Because…um...if you…maybe, um…try and believe in me...I, uh…could…sometimes…possibly…have a divine plan.”

“So do you have a plan or not?”

“I just might!”

“But we’ll never know, will we?”

“Oh hell no.”

Chris Conroy: Possible Side Effects

2010-03-01T10:32:00.006-05:00

Josh Marino bitch-slapped his boss. He didn't win the lottery or have another job in waiting and it wasn't when Gary Ponderson, Josh's boss, told him he wasn't on the level, that he needed to produce the Franell Reports quicker and with more attention to detail, that Josh slapped him open-handed across the face.

No, here’s how it went down:

"How're the Franell Reports coming?" Mr. Gary Ponderson asked standing over Josh, clicking a pen-point in and out, click, click, click.

"Oh, slowly but surely," Josh said looking up from his desk.

"Looks like”—click, click, click—“you're out of practice.”

"It's been awhile."

"We'll need you to pick up the pace. We're on deadline you know. And details, you must pay attention to the details."

"I can do that," Josh said, turning his head, realizing Gary had already walked off. Josh stood up, stretched and went to the kitchen to make a cup of coffee. He bumped into Gary in the doorway.

"By the way, Josh, we're out of half-n-half...pick some up on your lunch break, okay?" Josh just stood staring up at Gary for a few seconds. Gary pointed his pen at him and click, click, clicked it—“Oaky?”

And then wham, the bitch-slap to the boss's face. It was a simple order disguised as a request—pick some up on your lunch break, okay?—that set Marino over the edge. Or maybe it was that fucking pen, the incessant clicking, like a tiny drill-bit piercing the proverbial ‘thin ice’ of patience and common respect that set him off.

Josh called his girlfriend Cindy on the way home and told her what happened. He forgot his head-piece on his desk and was driving with his phone to his ear.

“Shit,” she said. “Guess you’re fired?”

Josh said he didn’t know for sure but expected he was and that he wanted to see her later tonight.

“Why don’t you come now?”

“They’re waiting for me.”

“Jesus, Josh.”

Red lights flashed in his rearview. He hung up on her and stashed the phone under his seat, working a scenario in his head while trying to properly conceal it, forgetting to set it to ‘ALL SOUNDS OFF’ mode.

His brother Mark bailed him out of jail.

“Dude,” Mark said on the way back from the station. “You turned what would’ve been a silly ticket into a possible criminal record. Resisting arrest—what the fuck?”

“How’s Mom?”

“She’s a wreck. She thinks they’re putting you away.” Mark slammed the brakes and pulled into a 7-11.

“That reminds me, she needs cigarettes.”

Josh waited in the car biting his fingernails and squinting out the car window. There were black cats, hundreds of them, slinking around the parking lot, huddled on the hoods and rooftops of the other parked cars. Then on top of Mark’s car, clawing and scratching at the paint, their sharp tiny teeth exposed in quick hisses, bloody tendrils of prey hanging from their mouths.

Mark got back in and slammed the door. He looked over at Josh. “You okay?”

“Do you see them?”

“See what?” Mark brought his window down and stuck his head out. “The skateboarders? What?”

Cindy was looking through the blinds when Josh pulled up in his 87’ Pontiac. He flashed his lights at her a few times and she waved him in. Everything 80’s Radio was playing Kenny Loggins’ Danger Zone, and he wasn’t about to turn off his favorite song—‘Out along the edges…Always where I burn to be…The further on the edge…The hotter the intensity. He turned it up louder and started singing, “Highway to the Danger Zone…Gonna take you Right into the Danger Zone.”

There was a tapping at his window. It was Cindy. She lipped ‘what the hell’ with her hands in the air. He turned off the car and grabbed his 12-pack of Bud-Light Golden Wheat from the passenger seat and got out. He kissed her. The moon was full above them.

“It’s been a rough day,” he told her inside, sitting on her couch, cracking a beer. She was in the kitchen pulling cold mugs from the freezer. “What’d you say?” She said walking back to him and setting the mugs down in front of him on the coffee table.

“It was a rough day,” he repeated and filled the mugs with measured pours—a little in this one, a little in that one, back and forth—until the foam rose to the top and puffed over the frosted rims. She held up her glass.

“To tomorrow,” she said. He held his up and clinked it to hers. “Tomorrow.” They chugged their beers, she finishing and wiping her mouth before he.

A half-hour into Weekend at Bernie’s and eight beers later, they were all over each other. They only had sex a few times and things were still new and exciting; the unfamiliarity of bodies its own aphrodisiac. But something was wrong. Josh wanted sex, wanted to release the stresses from the day, to satisfy Cindy, to bring them closer in mind and body, to make love or to simply get laid, it didn’t matter, Josh wanted it and so did Cindy, but it was not to be, it was mush, Josh’s dick was mush and neither one was making love or getting laid. Not tonight anyway.

Josh Marino called his doctor the next morning. They put him on hold. He used an anti-bacterial wash on his hands while he waited. His cell phone was being kept as evidence and he was using the house phone with the long black coiled cord. God only knew what type of germs and filth grazed upon this ancient unit.

“Hello Josh,” Dr. Zubowski’s voice sounded on the other end. “How’s the new medication working?”

“Well, the attacks aren’t as bad, but I think I’m experiencing side effects.”

“What are they?”

“They vary.”

“Well, let’s make an appointment. We’ll have to adjust the dosage or get you on something new.”

Letters to the Editor: February 2010

2010-02-25T07:06:00.010-05:00

We are happy to receive your letters at Tire Swing Press. They are thoughtful, helpful and often delusional. Some demand a response. The following are such letters.

grammarpolice1 said:

Just browsing your blog. Has it occurred to you that you are posting pieces with many grammatical and editorial blunders? If you want to take writing and your blog seriously, which it looks like you do based on your presentation, then I urge you to consider taking a more professional stance if you are to call yourself a "press." It is an insult to the professional writing community at large to pretend to be a press and not take the care and expertise to post clean and polished writing. Call it "Tired Swing," if you choose to be this lazy. There is no excuse for misspelling anything in this technological age.

Something to consider. Editing is not optional in the pro writing world, it's mandatory. That's of course if you want to make a legitimate name and reputation for your press.

Sincerely yours,

General George Grammar

TSP said:

We would like to know a little bit more about you?

grammarpolice1 said:

I am your basic locution sleuth. A morphologist if you will. I cruise and orbit regions of words and simply point out issues with language and grammar. Not specifically in the case of Tire Swing, though. It turns out that the bedraggled prose I stumbled upon was merely a link to another blog--my bad--I offer an apology. With my sincerest expression of regret--I will also state my case: With the growing decimation of magazines, journals, newspapers and hand held publications, a new generation of writers has emerged on the cyber scene.

Once upon a time, rigorous editing processes were conducted before works went to publication. I have found that with the advent of blogging, this is no longer the case. And so my mission is to uphold the integrity of language and artistic composition.

I hope this helps.

Very Truly Yours,

General George Grammar

TSP said:

We forgive you?

___________________________

Drgkovacsfl said:

Writers Wanted- Improper dash! Tire Swing Press Date: Reply to: see below 1. "See"! 2. Dangling preposition! "Below" what/where/whom? "Tire Swing Press is looking..." The inanimate entity that is a "press" cannot be "looking"! for submissions and possible staff. Visit our blog, see if you're a fit. 3, 4, 5. "Visit our blog; see whether you fit." Provide an advance, and you might have a chance!

TSP said:

What a tool.

Drgkovacsfl said:

!It is nice of you indeed to assess yourself so humbly and correctly! Do not respond; you could not do so literately anyway!

TSP said:

"Cut out all those exclamation points. An exclamation point is like laughing at your own joke." F. Scott Fitzgerald

Drgkovacsfl said:

There is no such thing as an "exclamation point" because, of course, there is no such thing as a "question point"! Do you get the "point" [sic]?! "Exclamation mark"!!! You sustain your mark of illiteracy!!! DO NOT RESPOND!!!!!

TSP said:

This is an automated reply. As a computer I was able to calculate your location and profession. The result is positive. We at Tire Swing Press ask you to re-consider writing for us. Your behavior demonstrates an insane perspective. That's what we want at TSP. Please think about it. Your contribution could only be beneficial. This could work for you and the entire world will embrace it.

___________________________

churchisstate said:

To the minds which behold such elitist opinions and those readers who appreciate your dribble, I say death to progress, for it has not lead us but dragged us. This country was founded on the principles of Jesus, but after reading Tire Swing Press, especially Wask, I have not but one true hope your brains function as do other living, breathing, caring, loving souls. Instead this experience, shorter than most mornings, has left me in a state of sincere, wholehearted sorrow for children being born today and children being born tomorrow. I hope you are forgiven. I hope you are saved. I hope you never so much as come near my town or my family. And further more, please do not publish this email.

TSP said:

We agree wholeheartedly– thought you might like that word– Wask is no good. We're working on that. In the meantime, please let us know what else you think about anything from anywhere.

__________________________

ShaliBhat said:

Visited your blog. Liked it very much. I also see you are looking for submissions. The biggest illusion in the world is the concept "FREE." Nothing in this world comes free. So what is the benefit I derive out of writing for your website? Please do reply.

TSP said:

You will benefit nothing at all. In fact, writing for Tire Swing Press could lead to terrible nightmares, itchy skin and gray hairs. If I had the choice I would never ever write for Tire Swing Press. But I don't have the choice, so I do, as do the others locked in this windowless basement wearing away the skin on their fingertips.

Joshua Marc Levy: Return to Ink Drawing

2010-02-19T00:05:00.009-05:00

Josh works at Sony full time as an Art Director and Illustrator. His current clients include AC/DC, Ozzy Osbourne, Modest Mouse, Joe Satriani and Buddy Guy. He also creates large ink drawings and randomly shoots photography. Levy lives in New York City and can be reached at JLevy423@gmail.com. You can view his work at JoshuaMarcLevy.com.

Brian Wask: Meet the Author: New York

2010-02-18T11:57:00.022-05:00

I want to reveal a secret I've kept until now. It was a Tuesday. Makes no difference. I got a call from my cousin early in the morning, before the sun. He explained he was driving home from a bar and had taken pictures of a car and tree twisted up like a pretzel. Looks like nobody lived. That’s not my bag I told him. Have fun. I was awake so I slipped out of bed, made some coffee, sat at the computer and listened to the radiator boil. Checked some emails. Read a couple rejections. They were generic, which is standard these days. Thanks for considering So-n-So Agency, good luck in the future. A day earlier I returned from an independent book fair with at least fifty of my own books, none of which I was able to sell or give away. But not for the lack of trying. Turns out there was a large fee just to participate and a small fee to register, which sounded like the same thing though I could handle neither. I had to buy the books and pay for gas, counting on the profits to get home. Sometimes you have to take things you can’t pay for. That’s a different story. A judge will hear my side of it soon.

After coffee I dressed and packed my books in a canvas messenger bag. I removed a mahogany stained board from the bookshelf. Stacked Cain, Hammett and Chandler on the floor by the piano. Juggled what to call my cardboard sign– Barnes and Mobile or Random Cart. The sun was just coming up when I left the building. My super was bundled up under a scarf, hosing at puke on the front door. The hookers were tired, looking for that last Benjamin. I went to the hardware store on the avenue but it was closed, opened at seven in forty-five minutes. Had my pick of seats at the diner next door, ate bacon and eggs, drank more coffee. Someone left behind a New York Post. Still hungry. A little nervous. Swallowed a grilled cheese with mash potatoes and gravy. More coffee. A columnist in the Post argued with himself about the correlation between illegal drugs and welfare. There was a similar correlation between golf and extramarital sex. That’s also a different story. When the hardware store opened I used a credit card to buy a small shopping cart. The urban kind an old lady might use for groceries.

I set up on the corner of 4^th street and Washington Square Park, counting on foot traffic, including students and academics, as well an eclectic mix of junkies, hobos and tourists. I removed all my items from the cart and placed them on the sidewalk, trying to avoid gum and urine and a colony of aunts devouring an apple core. A man with an enthusiast’s camera stopped and waited to see what would result from the pieces I was assembling. The cart served as a platform for the mahogany shelf, which served as a table or display for my books. I unfolded the sign, revealing the title of my exhibit. “Barnes and Mobile, how clever,” the man with the camera said. “I bet you’ll get a lot of attention like that. Much success.” I hoped this stranger’s prediction was accurate. He disappeared into the park soon after taking a photo of me, brick wall as backdrop.

In the next hour only one man in a long coat stopped to look over my books. He had a spider tattooed on the web of his thumb and the many piercings in his ears had long closed up, leaving a deformity of pinched skin. He barely acknowledged me before opening a book. “I found a mistake,” he said. I acted surprised. I had also served as the editor. “Right here.” He pointed to a sentence, one I recognized, where I spelled ‘form’ instead of ‘from’. He closed the book and said, “You wrote this? You can’t have mistakes man. I’m a book seller down the street. I sell Hemingway and Burroughs and shit like that. No mistakes there. You can’t make mistakes. Why would someone read your books when they got mistakes instead of Hemingway books that got no mistakes?” I had no clear answer, besides, he was interfering with any chance I might have to make a buck. He shrugged off a request for his departure and kicked over my display, warning this turf was taken and he’s the only one gonna sell books around here.

Defeated, I collected my goods like a magician exposed and found a different spot on the opposite edge of the park. This corner was designated for chess players and others hoping to catch a nap on a chess table. I erected my display, repeating the same motions. Made sure it was sturdy– no one was kicking nothing this time. Within minutes familiar eyes behind Windsor glasses passed, stopped, then returned in rewind. “Brian,” he suggested. I recognized him of course. He was the most advanced member of a writer’s workshop I belonged to almost ten years previous, until he’d been accepted into Iowa’s creative writing graduate program. Everyone expected great things from him, though beneath their admiration there was terrible envy. I was indifferent. It seemed graduate schools treated writing as a craft while I hoped to be more of an entertainer. And here we are. “What are you doing?” he asked. I explained I was selling my own books and things were going well and why not after all New York is great and blah blah blah aint life swell. He said something about Holden Caulfield and Henry James, told me he was teaching short story writing at NYU, editing anthologies, and I should stop in sometime, meet his students, explain to them the Ups and Downs. I acknowledged I was unfamiliar with the Ups but the Downs I had covered. He congratulated me on my ambition and went his way, a wise old shoulder bag bouncing against his corduroy hip.

Afternoon clouds bullied the sun into a dark corner forcing the temperature to drop. A saxophone player joined me at one point and jazzed his version of Bird’s Autumn, eventually attracting his own revelers who soon noticed my books nearby. It was at this point, despite the sax’s sad croon and the day’s cold gray, several passersby began to show an interest in Barnes and Mobile. I explained my situation to curious nods. About the same time the sax began muffling the bops of Bird’s Solar, two uniformed police appeared, one finishing a hotdog the other a slice of pizza. “Can’t be here,” the one with the hotdog told me. “Not allowed.” I asked why not but the saxophone new the deal, packed up his gig, gone. “Against the law,” the pizza cop said. “Sorry. Gotta pick it up and go now.” I let out a sigh of discontent. “Hey,” the hotdog cop said, “Don’t catch a tude with us, get ya-self a permit.” I asked how I could go about that and he went on about Borough Hall and applications and waiting for the mail. They watched me dissemble the display and gather my things, ignoring a fight on the corner between two taxis, agreed that was Traffic’s problem. “You write these books?” The pizza cop asked. I admitted I was responsible for anything written within the 400 pages. The mistakes too. “How much you selling them for?” I told him ten bucks. He thought that was a lot. I forced the books into my messenger bag. People passing seemed more interested now that police were present. That gave me an idea I’d use in the future. But that’s a different story. I gave the cops a book each, thanked them, pushed my cart to the subway and went home.

Brian Wask is the founder of Tire Swing Press. You can find more about his books and music at BrianWask.com. Join the fan page on Facebook.

Jamie King Reviews Personality Traits: Self-Consciousness

2010-02-16T07:54:00.005-05:00

Self-consciousness made its debut fairly early in the trait game, right around 3 or 4 years of age. Its early work was visceral, usually consisting of a simple awareness that there was poop in one’s pants, and that this was not okay. Self-consciousness could have remained this way, as a survival instinct, if not for the complications presented by 12 years of formal schooling. When anonymity is the goal, self-consciousness quickly becomes undesirable. In the conformist boot camp of high school, any awareness of the poop in one’s pants is excruciating not so much for its inherent health hazards as for the fact that it sets one apart from the surrounding poopless masses. Also it’s gross. I mean dude, seriously, come on.

In adulthood, self-consciousness becomes a two way street; a street that will occasionally host long, noisy parades dedicated to one’s shame and humiliation running in both directions. Like all traits, self-consciousness has its fans and its detractors. Proponents of self-consciousness often pride themselves on having total control over the way others perceive them. These people never allow themselves to “play the fool,” but would rather calculate every move by carefully predicting its outcome. In social situations, you may find them passing off lines from obscure books or movies as their own, putting off certain interactions until they feel comfortable with the ambient music, and strictly choreographing the way in which they pensively check (or pretend to check) their text messages.

Those who reject self-consciousness may enjoy a more carefree existence in exchange for the constant possibility of massive embarrassment and/or severe injury. Abandoning any sense of how one is perceived is a great way to free up mental time and energy for other things, such as generating actual accomplishments rather than cultivating the appearance of success. This devil-may-care attitude, however, puts one on a fine line between maverick and asshole, and those who eschew self-consciousness completely must be prepared to live their lives as some variety of mav-hole.

As with all traits, self-consciousness is best enjoyed in moderation. Some situations, such as a first date or job interview, lend themselves to high levels of self-consciousness, while others, such as Burning Man or a meth-fueled orgy, do not. The trick is finding what level of self-consciousness is right for you. If you are considering a career as a poet, robot, or department-store manikin, you might wish to give your self-consciousness a long leash. However, if your goals fall more along the lines of a reality TV show participant, sports fan, or the inventor of Twitter, self-consciousness will only stand in the way of your dreams.

On the trait-grading scale of one to ten, I give self-consciousness a solid seven. While it’s probably not going to land on anyone’s top ten traits list, its overriding influence on many other aspects of a personality cannot be disputed. Some people, who on occasion may find that a grating awareness of their own tousled nose hairs prevents them from mustering up the confidence necessary to order a sandwich, may wish that they could give up self-consciousness altogether, and return to the impetuous, free-spirited days of their early childhood. It’s hard to deny the appeal of living life without any backward glances, or peripheral vision for that matter, to slow you down. However, before succumbing to the regrets of a life observed versus a life truly lived, consider this: can anyone who stumbles blindly through the day, oblivious to their poo-choked Dockers ever be truly alive? Or are they rather, in the end, just kind of nasty?

Chris Conroy: Small Fires

2010-02-15T08:06:00.014-05:00

Can I tell you about the guy who was standing in front of me at the register?

I was in my car in the parking lot listening to the weather report—another blizzard pushing up from the south—when I saw him walk in the deli. He was the type most would keep their distance from; a camouflage jacket with the hood up hid some of the green tattoos painted on his yellow skinned face, his jeans were baggy and looked wet, he was without a car in a place where everyone owned one and—on a metaphysical level—the air around him was tense from things he had done or what things had done to him. Most would wait in their car for him to come out and leave before they went in, nothing positive could come from the possibility of interaction with him they would think, or simply would not even give him a thought, perhaps a meaningless phone call to a friend ("oh, nothing just thought I'd say hello...can you believe this weather...."), until the unconscious threat was gone.

I kept the engine running and went in for my lotto tickets, my hand catching the closing door my man had just opened. He was standing at the register like I said. It was just him me and the guy behind the counter. He ordered cigarettes and then turned around and our eyes met. I smiled at him. Tears were in his eyes. "My dad died yesterday," he said, "I thought last year was a bad year, and...and now this." The guy behind the counter was nervous, his large brown eyes not blinking. I said I was sorry to hear that. "Sorry to hear that." But he just stood there in front of me. He looked back at the clerk. "And now this," he said still standing there. The tattoos were bad—bad like the artwork sucked—snakes and letters and numbers and I wondered if there was any regret in them. There's always regret. Less is more with bad fucking tattoos and regret.

"Can you do me a favor?" He asked.

I looked at the clerk and then back at the question. "What?"

"Can you do me a favor?"

The clerk said here, here, I have a book of matches for you.

"What's the favor?" I almost called him boss.

"Punch me," he said. A tear rolled down his cheek slow like syrup.

I looked back at the clerk. "One mega and one pick six—quick pick." I put two bucks down and took the tickets and book of matches. "Follow me," I said to the guy and went outside.

I leaned up against the front of my idling car. The windows were fogged from the running heat; the vibration of news radio ran through me like a sermon heard from a hallway. I tossed him the book of matches. They landed at his feet.

"You smoke?"

"No." I watched him light the butt with a lighter he had inside his jacket. It took him awhile to get a flame going—click, click, click. And then a tiny light inside a hooded cave. Puff, puff, puff.

"What did he die of?" I asked him. "Your father."

"He just died. They called me up and said he's dead, your father passed they said. They told me where I had to go and when. That was all.”

I say nothing and then, "Where do you want me to hit you?"

"His name was Earl...he was an asshole," he says. "Can I have a few dollars to get something to eat?"

"Eat your cigarettes," I tell him. "Happy meal."

"What?" The wind kicks up and almost blows his hood down. He holds his hands over his head trapping the hood tight. "Fuck you," he says like a question, then: "FUCK YOU."

A snow flake melts on my knuckle. The sky is gray and the storm is here like dog shit in my nostrils, unmistakable, distinct, but not yet under my feet. There is so much more to the sense of smell than humans know. "Good," I tell him. "Fuck me."

"Your fucking tattoos," I tell him, "are terrible." I hold my hands out and the flakes melt into me, microscopic sculptures of art here and then gone in seconds, half seconds. "When was the last time you looked in the mirror? Do you know what you look like?" For a second I almost reconsider what I'm doing, but only for a second, this is not about me, or is it? I bring my arms back to my sides, the wetness dripping from them.

He starts walking away.

"Hey," I yell. "Where you going?"

He keeps walking.

I breathe in and then shout, "Your father killed himself because of you. Because of worthless you."

He stops.

"You're a fucking waste," I yell, "And Earl knew it. Couldn't live knowing it."

He turns and starts back to me.

I close my eyes and hold my hands out again. The snow, now fat and flaky, smacks my hands, my arms, my face…and then the knuckle, his hard cold knuckle to the side of my face, above the left eye, cracking me crooked like a sharp stone skimmed on calm waters. I keep my eyes closed for awhile waiting for another shot but nothing comes. All I see when I open them is a book of flaming matches glowing in a new storm.

Brian Wask: The Changey We Hopey For

2010-02-11T07:40:00.010-05:00

The following is a query I submitted to the magazine Christianity Today. I never heard back.

Dear Christianity Today,

I know you don’t publish books but your magazine was the first thing that came up when I Googled Christian Publications, and I got a good idea you might want to get behind. In the year 2010 Uganda will contemplate, and most likely consummate, a law sentencing homosexuals to death. According to blogger David Rattigan, “The bill is effectively a mandate for the genocide/mass slaughter/mass murder/wholesale execution – call it what you will – of gays.” I predict this is going to be big. The streets of the capital Kampala are already celebrating with signs like HOMOSEXUALITY IS UGLY AS THE DEVIL WICKED. Now gay Ugandans are going undercover while advocates scramble to toss water on the homophobes controlling legislation. But this is where my book will end. Unless of course it sells well and in that case we should publish a sequel. I’m sharing this idea with you because it’s Christian related and the submissions rules on your website suggests Christian related topics.

And listen to this. Christian kids will love it. Stephenie Meyer can’t write like this. I got a great piece of monolog from one of the main characters already in my head. He says this during a passionate plea to someone, not sure who yet. But he says, “My gay heart feels like it crawled out of my mouth, slithered along the dirty sidewalk and sunk into the gutter, rolled around in trash among body waste and used condoms from gay women, climbed out, filthy and broken and all slimy, pumped back up my muscular chest, into my mouth and nestled between my even gayer lungs.” If that line doesn’t sell you I don’t know what will. You put those words in Hugh Jackman’s mouth you got yourself an Avatar. I promise. Funny side note: This morning my neighbor Feo woke me to tell me he’s leaving to kidnap the preacher Pat Robertson, hoping to hold up production of the 700 Club. Before he left I suggested he might get better leverage with Jerry Springer. He disagreed. Last time we talked he was in Virginia. I called him a fool and a liar but he assured me a shovel was in the trunk. I’m starting to think he’s just a fool. It’s not so funny anymore. But a dead Pat Roberson is.

Sidetracked. Always happens. Happened to congress last week when Admiral Mike Mullen, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff and a graduate of the Naval Academy in Annapolis, unexpectedly announced to the Senate Armed Service Committee, “Allowing homosexuals to serve openly would be the right thing to do.” But, it’s speculated, a lot of the Admiral’s parents’ showbiz friends were gay so that makes him bias. He went on to say, “I cannot escape being troubled by the fact that we have in place a policy which forces young men and women to lie about who they are in order to defend their fellow citizens.” Who they are. I’ve come to rely on the military for a few things but never for championing Gay Rights, and with such clarity and logic. Who they are. Those three words stand out for me. I think the Admiral is bias. It seems his parents and their Hollywood hegemonies had a positive influence on his prejudice. That’s possible, so what’s wrong with other people’s parents? To see John McCain’s reaction to Mullen’s statement you’d think the United States was in no position to move forward on any issues while at war with a culture that pushes walls over on suspected homosexuals. McCain thinks we should wait until everyone is ready. I don’t think you wait to do the right thing. Imagine if he became President, with Palin the Punchline as his sidekick. Instead of progress we’d be suffixing our words like a corny couple– changey hopey, smoochie poochie– and talking about converting homosexuals back to the way God made them. That idea scares me more than any Underpants Bomber. You can expect a debate on the issue soon. They had the same kind of debate in 1948, when Harry Truman decided to racially integrate the American military. Conservatives thought that was a bad idea and predicted it would lower morale and ultimately destroy the nation. You following me?

Anyway, back to the book, it should start with a small group of American Missionaries who go to Uganda to spread the word about homosexuality’s dark agenda, its followers hell bent on sodomizing cattle and drinking the blood of straight babies. One of these missionaries is a pastor, who, like a lot of pastors, teaches people who hate themselves to hate others instead. The pastor admits he was gay once but he’s not gay anymore. He’s back with his wife and they even plan to make another baby, so they tell the large crowd gathered in Kampala, a few kind eyes buried beneath the anger. And the crowd roars because one thing gays can’t do is make babies. Or can they? This is where the story takes a huge turn for the better. I swear I guarantee a Pulitzer or an Oscar or a wedding ring for this one. Because the pastor is pregnant… and he’s a man. Go ahead, catch your breath. If you’re anything like me you can see the mechanic from Wings wearing a prosthetic belly and delivering one of the best monologues in cinematic history. He was in Sideways too. I forget his name, but the Oscar goes too… that guy. Good luck Crazy Heart 2.

You get the idea. I can’t explain the book any better. Or the movie, whatever you think will turn a better profit. No doubt both will. Only a retard like that guy on that cable news network would argue otherwise. Imagine, I can see the hardcover edition cradled in the arms of America’s greatest patriots, between Sara Palin’s Going Rogue and Joe the Plumber’s Fighting For the American Dream. Why not, let’s name it Going Rogue While Fighting For the American Dream. I’m going to cry. I hope you’re as happy as I am. This event will feel like a rusty screw-jack turning into the bottom of a liberal’s left foot. Hello champagne. Getting stinking rich feels good, especially when no one else is. Oh, a little something else to think about, maybe another book. George Washington, the first president, gay as Mr. Brady. Swear.

2/10/2010

Beautiful: A Christmas Short

2009-12-30T19:38:00.016-05:00

By Brian Wask

Jeff Holland kicked the snow looking for the newspaper. It usually landed by the lamppost but who knows sometimes. The newspaper-boy was getting older and his arm probably stronger, so maybe some day it would reach the front door and Jeff won’t have to walk through the snow or rain to get it. It used to land at the end of the driveway. That’s before he bothered to read it, but after the kids were born he cared about the schools, the property taxes, the roads and the new zoning laws that ruined his idea for a pool. (Still trying to figure something out cause the kid that can talk wants a pool.)

The boldest headline said, Attack on Christmas, and the smaller print beneath promised the residents of Brookdaleville Township there would be no such thing. A photo showed the Happy Holidays sign at the entrance to Branchville, the next town over. The article quoted a promise from Mayor Howard Skip that though the threat was closer than last year no way would it be an issue for Brookdaleville, “The last bastion of traditional Christmas”. Jeff didn’t care what signs went up where. The last two weeks Rudolph, Frosty and Santa were all over the TV, the storefront windows and colored lights the shape of the same characters hung over Main Street along with Christmas Trees and candle lamps in household windows. There was a small menorah in the tailor’s window but no one seemed to mind. He’d been the town Jew for decades and people liked their town was open to that sort-of thing.

Jeff put the damp paper under his arm, crumpled the plastic wrap into a ball and pushed it into his old robe’s good pocket, the wet soaking through and chilling his hip. The other pocket was torn by a neighbor’s dog years earlier during an argument over where Jeff parked his car. The neighbor thought Jeff parked it too close to his driveway and claimed backing his hotdog truck in and out was difficult.

Inside it was warm and the TV was quiet, the tree a blinking silhouette in the corner. Someone, most likely his oldest, was brushing their teeth in the bathroom and he could hear the boy’s aggressive strokes against his gums. “You’re going to make your mouth bleed,” he called, unconcerned if he was heard but satisfied he made an effort. He smelled the coffee finished and decided to bring Kathy a cup in bed. The stairs made more noise in the winter. The basement opened up beneath them and it was cold down there. In the bedroom, the windows frozen over with moist air, Kathy rolled over and moaned regret. Her hair, honey colored and wild, covered the side of her face. The other side sunk into the pillow.

Jeff put the coffee on the nightstand and sat on the edge of the bed. He pulled her hair away from her face and loved her cheeks and that thin nose. She opened one eye as if to say, you still there and if so why, can’t you see I’m trying to sleep, what time is it anyway. He was familiar with those expressions. “It’s seven,” he told her.

She moaned again and slightly moved so her hair stopped itching her nose.

“You got to get up baby,” he whispered, smoothing her hair back from her face, hoping it would help but quickly remembering she didn’t like it as much as he did. She accused his dirty fingers of giving her face the pimples she worked so hard to hide with makeup. He couldn’t help it. He loved to touch her face.

She turned away from him. Still didn’t want to get up.

“What time you go to sleep?” he asked. Outside through the window a small avalanche of snow fell from the roof. “It’s warming up a little.” He pulled a corner of the blanket around her exposed shoulder. Hated to think she was cold. The heat upstairs sucked but right now the money wasn’t there to fix it. “Maybe you should lay off for a while,” he said. She purred like she didn’t want to hear it. He opened the draw on the nightstand and there was the small mirror and the snipped straw and a little left smeared like salt on the road. “Denise is coming today.”

She pulled the blanket away from her face. “Why?”

He drank her coffee. “Terry called last night. They had a big fight and she left. Got on a bus and said she was coming to stay with me.”

It took effort for Kathy to sit up. Her face left an imprint in the pillow. “Oh my god. She got on a bus?”

“Yeah, last night. She called me from Ohio.”

“Oh God. I hope she’s okay.”

“She’s okay. She called again around five this morning from Pennsylvania, said she was a couple hours away. Gonna pick her up in Riverwood a little bit. She’ll be okay. We’ll have a talk with her. Lay off the shit while she’s here.”

“Okay, I’m done anyway. I feel horrible.”

Jeff was about to say something because she said that before. Instead he said, “I love ya baby.” Maybe that would help.

She leaned into his face but covered her breath with a hand. “I love you too.” She waited the little time in between that means more than the words. “Do you have work?”

“The ground’s solid, covered in snow. No machine can dig up a cold ground. Better off. They got us digging over gas lines. Shit came up last week. Someone lights a cigarette you can kiss my ass goodbye.”

“I’m worried about you.” She put her hand on his clawing into the sheets.

Jeff thought about worrying too but stopped himself.

“You gonna pick her up?” Kathy asked.

“Of course.”

“It’s been a while.”

“I miss her.”

“Me too.” Jeff closed the draw to the nightstand and wished he never opened it.

Kathy smiled apologetically. “I’ll stop.”

“Please.”

She put her hand against his prickly cheek. “Hey.”

He worried. “What?”

“She’ll be okay.”

He nodded. “I’m sorry. This shouldn’t be your problem.”

“I got the whole package when I married you. If a daughter with another woman years before is part of it then so be it. It’s okay. She just needs her dad. Is she gonna stay with us for Christmas.”

“Tonight’s Christmas Eve so I’m guessing she is.”

Jeff drove his pickup to the bus stop in nearby Riverwood. There too was an attack on Christmas. Beside the giant tree in town there was a manger and a sign that read, PLEASE RETURN OUR BABY JESUS. The infant was missing from the straw cradle at the center of the Wise Men’s attention. At the buss stop small Latinos waited in big coats, their arms gone in their pockets. A wind picked up and they turned away, the hard cold against their dark hair.

Jeff waited. His cell phone rang. Just a normal ring, no songs or jingles. He couldn’t stand hearing songs from another man’s pocket. Forget the death of Christmas, he thought, what about the death of humility. MOM CELL on the phone’s screen.

“Hey Mom,” he said.

“Is she with you yet?”

“Not yet, I’m waiting.”

“I’m worried.”

“Well, don’t.”

“What if she got off the wrong stop?”

“Then she’ll call and I’ll go get her wherever she is.”

“What if she doesn’t know where she is?”

“She’s a smart kid.”

“Why did she have to take a bus? Why couldn’t she take a train? If she was so smart she would’ve taken a train.”

“I don’t know.” He knew, but if Mom didn’t what’s the point of explaining. Kids don’t take a train when they run away from home. They take a bus, most likely, but who knows now days.

“Are you waiting in the car?” his mother asked.

“Yeah.”

“Can you see the bus stop?”

“It’s across the street. I can see it fine. How’s dad?”

“He’s fine. He’s worried too but he doesn’t want me to know cause he knows I’ll worry more.”

“Well, don’t worry. Go back to bed.”

“Oh right, like I can sleep now. I’m up early anyway. The doctor changed my pills now I’m not so tired. How’s Kathy?”

“Good. She’s busy with school.”

“I have a jacket she might want. I don’t wear it anymore.”

“She’s got plenty.”

“Well, I’ll bring it when we come by. If she likes it she can keep it. If not I’ll ask your sister. But it probably won’t fit her.”

“When are you coming?”

“We want to come by tonight and see Denise.”

“I thought you were coming tomorrow.”

“We are but your father misses her. We thought we’d have a quick Christmas Eve dinner out with Lynne and John and then stop by to see you guys for a drink afterwards. Just us though not them. They’re gonna see their grandkids. You want to talk to your father?”

“What’s he doing?”

“I think he’s in the bathroom.”

“Then no. Let me go. I’ll call you when she gets here.”

“When is she supposed to get in?”

“Soon.”

“Call me as soon as she does.”

“I will.”

They hung up, didn’t always say goodbye and I love you anymore. It’s not necessary after thirty-nine years. He remembered when Denise stopped saying it. At first he’d remind her but she sounded so discouraged, no longer comfortable using those words, like they carried no weight.

A light went on in the deli across the street from the bus stop. A short latino came out with a shovel and pushed the snow away from the entrance. He waved to some friends waiting at the bus stop. They yelled something in Spanish back and both sides laughed.

The truck was low on gas so Jeff killed the power. The heavy engine bounced to a halt and hissed while the rotary belt continued to spin. He opened the door and dropped his work boots into the snow, stood. He closed the door and zipped up his flannel coat. Should’ve worn a hat. The morning wind made his eyes tear. He jogged across the street, careful not to slip on the road’s packed snow. Before entering the deli– its warmth among the shelves of chips– he watched a bus appear down the road. It stopped at a light. A knot formed in his stomach. It had been awhile. Last time they spoke was a few months back, but she was brief and unfamiliar. He always knew that age would come. He hadn’t seen her in over a year, with money tight on both ends, traveling and taking off from work made it difficult. But now he realized there was no good excuse. They were close once and a little distance between them shouldn’t have brought it to this. Maybe, if he’d stayed involved, been the father figure she needed, they wouldn’t be meeting at a bus stop in the freezing cold on Christmas Eve. Life got busy when the kids came. Life gets busy.

The light changed and the bus’s exhaust clouded up the pale sky. The brakes squealed when it stopped, its breath steamy on the snow beneath. The doors opened and a couple of Latinos leaped out eager to get to their indoor jobs. Her small frame was the last to exit, revealing she was uneager. She was hooded but not clothed for the current weather. A gym bag, patched with skulls and crossbones, hung by her side.

Jeff waited rather than call her name. She spotted him and pulled down her hood, a small smile, more like an apology. Her nose was pierced and so was her lip. Her head was shaved around the side so the curls on top stuck out like a mad clown, part flamingo part raven. She was beautiful, still, never mind all those things on top. Jeff took off his jacket while crossing the street. He wrapped it around her small shoulders, hugged her and together they reached the car. Once in the car Jeff noticed some of her hair was blue, too. “You look different,” he said.

“I know.”

“Cool.” He started the trcuk and messed with the heat dial.

She was surprised. “My mom doesn’t like the way I look.”

“Well, parents don’t like when their kids try so hard.”

“I’m not trying hard. This is just me.”

“Okay,” he said. “I got no problem with that.”

“Are you mad at me?”

“I should be.”

“But you’re not?”

“You’re mom is.”

“She’s always mad at me.”

“You hungry?”

“Very.”

“What do you feel like?”

“Pizza.”

“It’s a little early. Don’t think pizza’s ready yet. How bout a diner? Eggs, bacon.”

“Okay. I don’t like bacon though.”

“You don’t like bacon? Who doesn’t like bacon?”

“I don’t.”

“Okay, but… your loss.”

“It comes from a pig though.”

“So do hotdogs. You love hotdogs.”

“Not anymore.”

On the way he watched her look out the window, her slender neck a pedestal to her wild head. He handed her his cell phone. “Call your mom.”

“Now?”

“Yeah, you better. She’s worried.”

“Are you going to make me go home?”

“Not today.”

She smiled. He missed that smile. She was beautiful, despite the metal piercing her flesh, the short buzz circling her head and the candy colored springs of hair sticking out of her scalp.

Jeff pulled up the phone by the power chord attached to the cigarette lighter. “Call your mom.” He let it fall on her lap. “Tell her you’re okay.”

“Why does she care?”

“Be quiet. That sounds stupid. Even you know that.”

“Whatever.”

“Whatever,” Jeff echoed, his voice a mocking squeal. “Call her,” he reverted to a baritone.

Denise pulled off her tight, knitted gloves and watched the growling snowplow clear a path ahead. “She’s gonna be mad.”

“I would think so. Why shouldn’t she be?”

“Cause.”

“Well, then I guess you’re right. Cause.” Jeff turned down Garden Place, a corner mailbox on his left.

She dialed, put the phone to her ear. “It’s me. I’m with him now.” She listened, pretended like she had something better to do, playing with the hoop circling her bottom lip, turning it like a ring on a finger. “I know.” Something her mother said stopped her. “I’m sorry. I love you, too. Okay. Bye.” She closed the phone and put it on her lap.

“Everything good?” Jeff asked.

“For now.”

“How long you want to stay?”

“Where?”

“With us.”

“I got to go back to school January third.”

“You don’t want to be with your mom on New Year’s? You’re already not gonna see her for Christmas. That’s a first, no?”

“I don’t care.”

“You should. She’s all by herself.”

“That’s her fault.” Denise blamed her mother for not having a Dad, that she knew at least.

Jeff navigated the truck into a spot in the diner’s parking lot. They high stepped through the snow. Once inside they followed the host to an empty booth by the window. The floor was covered in wet footprints. They ate quietly. Jeff watched Denise mostly. Her movements were angelic. There was a peace in her presence he couldn’t get any where else. For that moment he knew his daughter was okay because she was with him. Most nights he lay awake thinking about her. This Christmas Eve he planned to sleep well for the first time in a long time. They left quickly after finishing their food. He pulled into his driveway not long after. He’d shovel later, probably work up a sweat, take off his jacket and come down with a cold just in time for holidays.

They exited the truck. Rather than follow the path Jeff carved through the snow earlier Denise stepped into the soft bed of snow and up to her knees. She lifted her knees leaving small but deep footprints behind. Jeff shuffled down the slightly shoveled walk.

“Is Kathy home?”

“Yeah.”

“Is she mad at me?”

“Nah. She could never be mad at you. That’s why you’re not aloud to be alone together cause she’d let you do whatever you wanted.”

Denise found that idea appealing and that smile lit up her face.

“Yeah, she’s cool.”

They dusted off inside, a pile of wet shoes and gloves in a puddle next to the door. Kathy appeared in the kitchen, finished wiping her hands with a towel before she came over and gave Denise a hug. “School was cancelled,” she told her husband. “Went all the way over there before I found out.”

He looked around the doorway and into the den where his children watched TV, mesmerized by the colorful puppets singing the alphabet. “Great.”

“What’s going on?” Kathy asked on her way back to the kitchen. “Want some hot chocolate?”

“Nah,” Denise said.

“Have some,” Jeff told her. “She’ll make it for you.”

“I don’t want any.”

“Take off your coat, or whatever you call it. Sweatshirt. Why don’t you have a coat?”

“I do but I don’t like it.”

“Why not?”

“Cause.”

“Cause why?”

“I don’t know. I just don’t like it.”

“What’s not to like about it? It keeps you warm…” He stopped when Kathy looked through the doorway and gave him a look telling him to stop. He watched his daughter peel off her sweatshirt and hang it on a hook next to children’s little winter coats. “Go sit down in the kitchen.” She went and Jeff entered the den, leaned over and kissed the baby in the cradle. He tried to kiss his son but he squirmed in his little comfy chair. He didn’t like being bothered when watching shows. It was a video he’d seen a thousand times. Maybe a million. Jeff watched for a second.

The kitchen was quiet and warm, except the surface of the table was for some reason cold so Denise kept her arms at her side.

Jeff came in and flipped through the paper he left on the counter earlier. “Say’s it’s going to snow again tonight.”

“I hate snow,” Denise said.

Jeff laughed. “You hate snow. On Christmas Eve. Why? How could you hate snow? You’re a kid.”

“I don’t know. It gets all wet and dirty.”

“You used to love the snow.”

“So.”

“Yeah, I guess. So.”

She was turning the ring in her lip again.

“Doesn’t that hurt?” he asked.

“No.” Denise left the room. Jeff and Kathy wondered why. She returned wearing her sweater, zipping it up and pulling the sleeves over her hands. “I’m cold.”

“Put on a wet sweat shirt. That’ll keep you warm.”

Kathy’s look told him to stop. She still felt like shit but laying in bed was not an option like she thought it would’ve been that day. She had presents to wrap later but that’s it. “What’s new? How’s school?”

“Stupid.”

Jeff looked up from the paper. Didn’t like hearing that.

Kathy said, “Yeah school’s pretty stupid but if you don’t do it now you’ll be doing it when you’re my age. And that’s really stupid.

“It’s just, like, they teach us stuff I don’t care about.”

“I know. I used to think that, too. Who cares what the square root of five is, right?”

“I know. Like, why do they waste my time?”

Jeff tried to refrain but couldn’t. “They’re not wasting your time. You’re wasting their time.”

“No I’m not.”

“Yes you are.”

Kathy dropped a spoon on purpose. “Anything you’d rather be doing?”

“Not really.”

“We’ll…” she continued with her back to them, mixing cups of hot chocolate. “Find something you’d rather be doing this way you don’t have to go back to school when you’re my age. You got hobbies?”

“I don’t know. Hanging out.”

“Where?”

“Wherever.”

“You like movies?”

“Not really.”

“You like books?’

“Yeah, I guess.”

“What books?” Jeff asked.

Denise looked past him. “Is it too late to change my mind for a hot chocolate?”

“No way, sweetie,” Kathy said. “I knew you would so I made you one.” She turned and carried two mugs to the table. A third on the counter was hers. Denise went to take a sip. “Wait,” Kathy said, opening the cupboard. “Got marshmallows.”

“Got whip cream?” Jeff asked.

“No,” Kathy said disappointed. “Sorry.”

“That’s okay,” Denise assured her.

Kathy sat with her mug and the bag of marshmallows. Dropped a few in each. Together they smelled before their first sips and all umm-ed at the same time. Snow fell from the roof and past the window looking out at the backyard, the tree limbs heavy white and the houses past the old wooden fence a real winter wonderland.

The house was quiet the rest of the day until dinner, which came late because they’d forgotten to remove the steaks from the freezer until last minute, had to defrost them under a hot faucet. After dinner Denise said she wanted to walk around the house in the snow and look at the stars. They assumed that meant sneak a cigarette. What could they say? They wanted to do the same but quit years earlier when the kids were born. Some habits are easier to kick. Others lingered. Kathy approached the draw beside her bed, its little knob electric by touch. Maybe. Shouldn’t. I’m tired. Just a little. Got presents to wrap. While Jeff sat with his feet up in the living the room– the soft fabric a cozy swallow and the kids occupied by the TV– in the dark Denise smoked weed from her little pipe under a window in the deep snow beside the house and his wife inhaled cocaine above in a chilly bedroom, the space heater starting to smell like burnt paper. What’s so funny about Sponge Bob? He would’ve read something about the Civil War but the print was so small it gave him headaches. So did the overhead lights. Sometimes the kids did too, when they cried in disguise of demands.

The front door opened, inviting the cold, and light toes tapped down from upstairs. Denise leaned over to untie her wet boots. Kathy appeared, her nose a little runny.

“What you guys doing?” Jeff asked.

“Nothing,” they replied almost simultaneously.

“Gonna start desert,” Kathy continued. “Ya hungry?” she asked anyone listening.

“No,” said the boy on the floor, never looking away from the TV.

Jeff adjusted his feet. “What do you mean no?”

“I don’t wanna eat.”

“You gotta eat desert of Christmas Eve.”

Denise remained at the door, afraid her smell would give her way.

Jeff dropped his feet and sat up. “You don’t want to eat desert on Christmas Eve?”

The boy pushed a toy with wheels away from him. “No.”

“How come?”

“I don’t know.”

“That’s not a good enough reason.”

The boy looked at his dad, unable to respond logically, but surprised that logic was necessary. I don’t know had always been a good enough reason. And at that moment the boy was a day older, no longer allowed to ignore rationality but expected to reply with reason. “Why do I have to?”

Jeff thought. “Because you do.”

The front door opened again inviting the solstice sounds that accompany a winter's night. Denise, still nearby, was immediately embraced by Mimi. Poppy not far behind, his knees not what they used to be. “Hey,” he called into the house. “Why’s the walkway all icy?”

Jeff pushed himself up, certain his knees would go just the same. “I shoveled earlier. Been busy all day. Grab a shovel.”

Poppy smirked. “You’re mother almost fell.” It was really him who slipped.

Mimi was still holding her first grandchild. The one that changed everything forever. “You made us worry,” she whispered.

“Sorry,” Denise said. “I didn’t mean to.”

Mimi held her away so she could get a better look. The metal in her face and the blue hair was distracting. “Why you make every body worry?”

Poppy stomped the snow from his feet. “Where you going?” he asked Denise, still in her boots.

“Hi Poppy.” She wrapped her arms around his thick waist. “I was just playing in the snow.”

“You take your brother out in the snow? Maybe you can see Santa in the sky.”

“Nah.”

“You should. He’d like that. His big sister taken him out in the snow.”

The boy was on the carpet in front of the TV, an eager look on his face. He would’ve liked like that.

Kathy came from the kitchen, her eyes wide and smile broad. “Hey.” They exchanged hello pecks and loose hugs. “You guy’s want a drink?”

“I’m okay,” Poppy said, unzipping his coat and mysteriously hurting his elbow in the process. “We had a few at dinner.”

“You got rum?” Mimi asked and laughed like she shouldn’t but why not.

Kathy winked, decided she’d have one too.

“Make me a vodka,” Poppy decided.

A little later they sat at the kitchen table. Denise attacked her ice cream but ignored her cake. The boy picked through his plate but found nothing he liked. Mimi fed the baby a little melted ice cream. Kathy didn’t touch anything but her drink. Poppy watched the dark windows reflection of his family, sometimes smiling when he’d hear the children. But there was that look he’d give Jeff. Why is she here and what’s all that stuff in her face? Jeff finished desert first and sipped from a beer bottle. He watched the clock. Eventually his parents left said see you in the morning. Jeff put the kids to sleep and laid down in bed. He listened to Kathy and Denise talk, TV sounds between their laughs.

In a dream Jeff watched himself operate a backhoe. Someone on the ground, bundled up like an Eskimo, called out so he opened the little window on the door. The man was inaudible over the wind so Jeff chose to pretend he heard and closed the window. Another man, not as bundled, waved for him to dig. He pushed the stiff lever forward and pulled another back. The bucket stabbed the Earth and the machine shook. He tried again, this time lifting the machine’s front end off the ground. He’d tried several times to brake the surface with the bucket while the others shivering nearby waited against their shovels. The one in charge waved his hands but Jeff already had the bucket coming down and felt like this time it would break through. When it did something exploded and sent the backhoe and the men on the ground tens of yards in the air, landing hard on the dirt. The backhoe fell on its side, Jeff still belted into the seat, the fan hot against his neck. The world looked sideways. The way things had always looked for Jeff Holland. A geyser of gas exploded from where he tried to dig. Some of the others ran to his aide, climbing up the yellow machine, the door’s rusty hinges cranked when they opened it. He couldn’t hear much but droned out voices carrying over one another. The men handed him down to the ground. The smell of gas was overwhelming. He couldn’t move and them his eyes were opened and the ceiling above was his bedroom. He realized it was a dream. Kathy was sleeping beside him. She did what he asked and stayed off the shit.

Jeff slipped out of bed and felt around with his feet for his slippers. He tried to be quiet on the stairs but the old wood yawned. He found the living room in the dark and in the little moonlight coming through the window he could see Denise on the couch, a giant comforter swallowing her hole, but for her head. That beautiful head. She moved a little but didn’t wake. He watched. She was safe. He sat in his chair nearby and closed his eyes so in the morning he’d be there beside her.

Maxter Metropolis Knows How To Dance

2009-12-27T22:01:00.008-05:00

By Brian Wask

Maxter Metropolis is a singer/songwriter from the low-side of town. His hair is missing in some spots and his thumb serves as a guitar pick. His shirt hangs open revealing more than his audience prefers. Performances have been described as odd, invigorating and bare. A rooster plays the drums.

I'm Getting Down

by Maxter Metropolis

Gone to the beach show my chest

Packing heat I got the best

Kicking sand in punks face

Got a dollar watch strippers dance

Pull your pants push your car

Toke the dope cash the bar

Doobie’s bored of bad plans

That face’s name is Dead Man

I’m getting down.

Getting down.

Forget all the greats.

Don’t throw(smash) the plates.

I’m getting down.

Getting down.

Dance real slow but real fast

Throw away the little bastard

Plant the bush between chapped lips

Toss the ship into the mist.

Hold her hand and don’t let go

Pray my man who makes the snow

Hide the fake ‘hind monster leaves

Let the dogs prove real peace

I’m getting down.

Getting down.

Forget all the greats

Don’t throw(smash) the plates.

I’m getting down.

Getting down.

Check into Machine Motel

Shake your hips like a soul from Hell

Swim the boat kick your shoe’s good heal

Catch a moon it’s the Earth’s last sound

Sky falls along with the birds

Dirt’s plan call it quits old world

That worm aint sorry

Rain comes in a hurry

I’m getting down.

Getting down.

Forget all the greats.

Don’t throw(smash) the plates.

I’m getting down.

Getting down.

Don’t leave the floor open when the couch is empty cause that’s how the cats go boom.

Dear Santa

2009-12-21T14:52:00.007-05:00

From Cody Ovitch.

Hey Santa. You never brought me nothing and I feel I’m about due for something. One Christmas Eve I slept in Grampa’s car while he drank everything in a bar across the street. I watched the snow land on the windshield and after an hour I could no longer see the night sky. I didn’t ask for nothing but I remember thinking maybe you’d find me. I understand why you never brought me anything because we moved around so much how were you supposed to figure out where I was. Now I can tell you exactly where I am and I want you to do something for me. I’m in the MDC in Brooklyn, Floor 3 cell 6. My bunky is a black kid from a shitty town and he got mixed up hanging out on the street. He robbed some drug dealer and someone got shot in the foot in the process. Rashid was sentenced to five years in a plea because he was facing fifteen for armed robbery. He’s taking classes in math but he sucks at it. I don’t know what he’s good at. He writes in a notebook but he isn’t ready to share it. When he does everything will change. He’ll find he has better things to do than stand on the corner and sell coke. But I want you to bring him some good pens. The COs only let him have one per month so he’s real careful with it. He even got some bad time because another inmate tried to shake him down for his only pen but Rashid wasn’t having any of it. So bring him some pens damn it. I’ll even hoard some of the stale cookies they give us with dinner and the warm milk they give us with breakfast. And carrots. Never mind, that’s the Easter Bunny. See you soon. Also, if you could do something for the other guys too cause there’s way too many people locked up for no good reason and I heard they’re building another prison nearby. Thanks.

From Feo, my neighbor.

Fuck you old man. You saint of a bitch. I’m running for Santa Claus next year and I’ll do a hell lot better than you no doubt. When no one older than ten believes in you it’s time to call it quits. I’m growing the fucking beard. No ifs. DONE. The other day or maybe yesterday I gave ten dollars to the hunchback that lives in the basement of my building. What are you going to give her? Nothing I’m willing to bet. You’re not half the man I am. I turn sixty-two in March and the rules state Santa has to be sixty-two or more. Expect my campaign to begin soon after. Beware the Ides of March old friend, we have a score to settle. Remember the claw-hammer I asked for? Yeah, I never got it. You’ll get it. I take that back. But watch your ass. My sister called the other day said she got mixed up with a limo driver and he wails on her. I offered to come down to Florida and kill him myself. At first she thought it was a good idea. Then she started thinking about all the good things he does for her. He drives her back and forth to the bar. He grills steaks on Sundays. His eyes are blue. You can guess where I’m going with this one. You’re a smart guy. Lazy yet still quick. But you disappoint me Santa. You disappoint a lot of people. I’m giving you one more chance but if you fail I’m coming after you with everything I got. It wont be a cookie eating contest. It’s going to get bloody and I will win. I’m growing a beard but I wont hide behind it like you. One more chance Santa. Lets see what you got.

Coming Soon: "Beautiful: A Christmas Short"

Winter Recollections From Aunt Bea

2009-12-09T16:11:00.009-05:00

Barbara Eleanor Anderson is no longer with us but she left countless recollections of holidays past and loves lost. She was nostalgic and sentimental and rarely remembered why her stories began. I recently visited London where I was allowed by the executor of her archives to leaf through millions of pages, some no longer legible. Some made me cry, others made me laugh. I don’t know what to make of the woman. I’d like to think she was a knockout in her day but those days are not commonly documented by photographs. Either way, not a letter I read made a bit of sense.

Winter Tales and Christmas Eve Eve

By Aunt Bea

I can remember the years of old, in the days of flowers and rock candy, at night when snowflakes sparkled and lamp posts shined under the light of the moon. I’d dance for a dime to see a movie or buy soda pop for a boy whom I loved, and played the songs of doves and dreamed of planets far away. I looked into an endless space illuminated by stars, not the kind in movies or television, but the kind at night in space and beyond. And Mother. It was always a boy Mother warned me of, with their short hair and Adam’s apples, she’d say, “Sneeze them away with all God has given you.” I’d come crying like a child, as I was as I remember, placing a hand above my head she’d then pat me like a doggy and I’d cry more, until she began to yell and curse at me and call me worthless and fruitless and throw things around the room injuring the real dog and braking glasses because they were made of glass. I ran and ran and ran away finally and moved in with a family who only yelled at me when I overflowed the toilet and they let me stay in a bedroom with a window and a bed and access to the bathroom in the middle of the night. “Find your inner self,” my new mother would whisper in my ear, pushing my hair away from my face and kissing me as though she loved me. “Before you are happy, you must look within yourself and find what it is about yourself that is truly and entirely from you.” Then I’d say, “Please continue mother, with me guiding me to salvation and beyond this world.” New mother didn’t like when I spoke with such fruitful and delicious detail and sophisticated tone. “For instance,” she said with her lips and her mouth moving with the sounds of letters and syllables. “When you find your true self, you will be happy with what you are. But as long as you think you want to be something else or look like somebody else, you won’t find happiness because, you will never be anybody but yourself.” New mother found a new family years or so in the future relating to that story which I have recalled from my youth many long years ago. Now with the leaves turning a solstice rust and the nights becoming cooler in temperature as though nothing can stop the time that goes by in our lives and in other’s lives. Until next time when I recall and remember something from a long time ago, be well, take care, and live healthy. Peace. God. Love.

Barbara Eleanor Anderson

Bloomsbury, London

December 9^th, 1978

When Punch is Served...

2009-11-18T17:21:00.022-05:00

By Brian Wask

“Goodbye boys. I die a true American!” – Bill “The Butcher” Poole

Pawel Pulaski came to the U.S. from Poland by ship in 1861. During the voyage a woman eight months pregnant was raped. The monster left her and her unborn child to die in the cramped bowels of a damp hull. A deckhand discovered the woman face down suffocating in her own placenta. Though the woman departed while giving birth to a healthy girl, she was able to identify the attacker. The baby was named America by a collection of midwives. Pulaski was elected judge and jury and set out to find the fiend among the ship’s mechanicals and inventory. What happened next has been dramatized over centuries. Each legend agrees he returned to the cabin covered in another’s blood. Some said he had guts between his teeth. In an illustration, presently kept at the Lower East Side Tenement Museum in Manhattan, drawn by Brunon Machowski, the ship’s resident artist, Pulaski’s face is painted like a clown, the mote of red around his mouth represents blood, the hand behind his back holding a partially devoured human leg.

After traveling the Yankee states for a year, learning English from the oral histories of freed slaves, and Americanizing his first name to Paul, in 1862, Pulaski, inspired by Lincoln’s Emancipation Proclamation, enthusiastically joined the North in the war between the states. He personally promised Jefferson Davis’s faux-presidential head on a stick. He tagged along with Colonel Ambrose Burnside's infantry in Rhode Island. Pulaski had such admiration for the Colonel's patriotism (Burnside would soon be a general) he mimicked his appearance– Ambrose's unique style of facial hair would later be called sideburns. In December of the same year General Burnside’s army was hammered by General Lee in the Battle of Fredericksburg, where the nineteen year old Paul Pulaski lost his left leg. He recovered in a makeshift Confederate hospital beside the Rappahannock River. There he continued to work on his English by listening to the wounded southerners surrounding him and transcribing what he heard. Some of them killed northerners with bayonets. A powder bomb took a Confederate soldier’s sight. He promised God he’d never fight nobody or nothing ever again in return for his sight. An amputee Yankee soldier finally departed after weeks of decomposing from infection. The hospital mourned together. Never mind what flag they fought for. After learning to walk with a wooden prosthetic Paul Pulaski gathered the few things he still had, registered an ID with a new last name– he took the name from a dead Irishman– and left with one leg in the night.

In July of 1863, Pulaski, now known as Paul Cody, finished his long haul to New York, settling in a Lower East Side tenement. The final draft of the Conscription Act passed congress; the government could now draft men eighteen to forty-five to fight in the War. It was hell hot and the street sewage ankle deep. The public was dispirited, insisting the draft infringed on their individual freedoms. Paul Cody sat and listened from the doorway to his ground floor tenement. Sad dogs slept nearby. Souls sunk like fractured ships. Orphans begged and coppers beat them with clubs. The Dead Rabbits and Plug Uglies gathered at the Five Points, cracked skulls and severed hands. Sometimes at night Paul Cody left the tenements and limped west to the Hudson River, along the way passing rumbles outside Bowery brew houses. At the river, strolling the planks, he’d listen to wharf rats pillage anchored ships, often followed by loud gun fights that lit up the dark like the stages of Broadway. During a flash of light he could see the brown ridges of New Jersey. One night a hussy called Mazie drunk stumbled into a turf war between local thugs in Paradise Square and was bludgeoned to death with a cast iron claw-hammer. The police force came in numbers but retreated just as often. The gangs ruled the slums and there wasn’t much anyone could do about it. Then John Wilkes Booth shot Abraham Lincoln and, in Paul Cody’s words, “The country died, leaving a population to debate between the innate delusions of right and wrong.” His English was still okay.

For ten years Paul Cody auctioned live stock on the polluted river. Ships came and went and the brew clubs of the 4th Ward spilled into the streets until the Westside of the Bowery sank into the harbor, feeding the river death and disease. He gathered the few items he managed to keep from thieves and slept against a wall just above the Bowery in Cooper Square for several weeks during the Fall. Before the first snow Old John McSorley, the owner of the Old House at Home on 7th street, offered him a job watching his horse during the day, while Old John, between pouring ale, fed the baker’s oven wood so his saloon remained toasty. The city was predicting a cold winter, a confidence plan the government conspired to collect charitable donations from its wealthier citizens. Without heat Old John was certain customers would find another alehouse to drown in. The winter sales were better than ever so Old John hired Paul to watch the horse full-time and gave him a room for nothing above the saloon. Because the horse slept peacefully most of the day the horse-watcher enjoyed considerable time drinking ale in lieu of pay. One day a German bricklayer, fixed to a window next to the entrance on most nights, called out to Paul but instead called him Punch. From then on everyone called him Punch. Over the years Punch Cody continued to document the stories he heard at McSorley's but most of these journals remain illegible.

Nov 17, 2009

Buck “Buck Tooth” Jones, Prolific Writer and Inventor, Dead at 109

2009-11-11T07:53:00.010-05:00

By Brian Wask

Big City, Collectico– Buck “Buck Tooth” Jones, most known for his groundbreaking part-novel/part-recipe, Misery is Luxury (1956), and the inventor of the word ‘knockerbombed’– to be hassled by secret societies and/or covert operatives– was found dead Sunday at his home in Pandora, Collectico. He was 109. The cause of death is so far unknown but speculated to be old age. He is survived by his great, great grandson, the genetic scientist Charlie “Charlie Horse” Jones, his great granddaughter, the archaeologist Sally “Sally Boy” Johnson, and his wife Betty “Betty Days” Jones, also 109. His loved ones will not bury Tooth’s body but instead have him stuffed and erected beside his father, grandfather and great grandfather at the family compound in Pandora. First, they plan to take him on his favorite underwater roller coaster ride one last time.

Born during the newspaper wars between William Randolph Hearst and Joseph Pulitzer, Buck Tooth published his first novel at the age of three (Goodbye Diapers) and went on to release 607 more books on subjects ranging from the eclectic scent of owl urine (That Smell in the Night, 1917), self-induced nightmares (The Computer Took My Eyes Away and Wont Give Them Back, 2002; Get That Creamed Corn Away From Me, 1952) and scavenger dogs in the slums of South Africa (Skeleton Crew, 1960). He worked as a pseudo-journalist for Hearst during WWI and, though only nine, helped Pulitzer’s defense during the libel suit filed against him by Theodore Roosevelt in 1909. A few years later Buck Tooth was investigated for his ties to Italian Anarchists on the Lower East Side of New York City. He went on to chronicle the investigation and the authority’s amoral tactics in 1926’s half-novel/half-needle quilting instruction manual Blow Me!– he’s been credited with coining the phrase.

He met his first and only wife Betty during a trip to North Dakota’s Badlands in 1933, and soon after gave her the nickname Betty Days, as in, “Hopefully, Betty Days lie ahead.” He alluded her existence was only a figment of his imagination during a lecture on sliced bread and Richard Nixon at Columbia in 1973, and latter admitted he was only kidding in an article titled “Why Would Anyone Believe Me?”, published the next year in the December issue of Harper’s. It was Betty Days who convinced him to try creamed corn on his sixty-third birthday at a fall-out shelter forty miles north of Interstate 80 on the sunless plains of Kansas. Nineteen sixty-four’s To Hell with Americans and Their Lawnmowers was supposed to be a commentary on The United States’ fear of communism compared to his own fear of creamed corn, but was instead regarded by the Christian Right as unpatriotic and pornographic, with hints of pedophilia. He vowed never to publish again but sure enough Betty Days convinced him otherwise and ten years later he was the winner of the MANN-GODD Prize for the memoir/wordlist collection, I'm Not Getting Any Younger. He was quoted by many as saying, “If it wasn’t for Betty Days I’d be nailing all kinds of women.” And though there’s been several accusations of infidelity against him, there was no proof he was anything but absolutely faithful to his wife of seventy-five years.

In 1977, after a three year period of publishing twenty six fiction and non-fiction books concerning everything from Korean manicurists (She Got The Homemade Special) to the avant-garde theater director Robert Wilson (The Big Ship is Sinking) and different kinds of fish (Wet and Ugly), Buck Tooth Jones catapulted to world-wide recognition when he set out to prove Jesus Christ was actually a woman. With his great granddaughter Sally Boy he left for the middle East and eventually southern France, where he claimed to have recovered the corpse and announced its anticipated arrival in Washington, DC. The media was alerted and prepared a monstrosity of equipment to capture the occasion on the runways of Dulles Airport, shutting down all incoming and outgoing flights for three days. Upon his arrival, in front of an estimated six hundred-thousand, the power went out and the pine box holding the body of the Lord was abducted by a secret organization of Vatican Operatives. The event was labeled a hoax and Buck Tooth’s career was considered done. The irony was he predicted the event and the same outcome in a previous book, This Is What Will Happen In DC (1970).

For the next ten years Buck Tooth confined himself to the family compound in Pandora, writing books and dancing to Cole Porter songs with Betty Days on the veranda, overlooking Dry Harbor and the rest of the blue world beyond that. He built the Earth’s longest and tallest roller coaster with his own two hands and could be heard calling out to the night white moon by sailors anchored in the harbor. He dismantled the ride before the public could see it, but according to those lucky enough to experience the Highway to Heaven, it reached the clouds and at night during the highest peak you could touch the stars if you really wanted to. When, in 1987 Buck Tooth finally left the compound he delivered 254 manuscripts to his publisher in New York. Within the next year they were released, some in several volumes, ultimately resulting in 306 books total. Each sold in the tens of thousands, but God’s a Jackhammer (The World is His Sidewalk), Photos of Nothing and Hello Again Diapers did much better, selling a million between the three.

Buck Tooth spent the last twenty years publishing a number of books, some two hundred ultimately, and helping his great, great grandson Charlie Horse Jones in his endeavor to develop an intravenous anecdote to greed. It was Charlie Horse’s life project mainly but when it became known Buck Tooth was involved donations from all over the world flooded the institute where the experiments were taking place. It was probably the greatest blow to Buck Tooth’s will when most of the money donated disappeared and was never recovered. In an interview with Esquire magazine three years ago, when asked about the vanishing donations, Buck Tooth said, “I figured that would happen.” His last book, Don’t Need Pants Where I’m Going (2008), sold just under three thousand copies. It was assumed by his most loyal fans this failure would closely precede the end of the world in 2012. If so, Buck Tooth’s estate doesn’t have long to release the estimated five hundred un-published manuscripts the legend left behind. It would be a travesty if the world ended before that.

10/10/2009

Interview With An Umpire

2009-10-21T08:27:00.004-04:00

By Brian Wask

"I really believe that the pagans, and the abortionists, and the feminists, and the gays and the lesbians who are actively trying to make that an alternative lifestyle, the ACLU, People For the American Way, all of them who have tried to secularize America. I point the finger in their face and say 'you helped this happen.” –Jerry Falwell on The 700 Club, after the September 11 attacks.

Hell’s Kitchen, Night Time– The walls in Feo’s apartment tend to slouch after a certain hour. It’s happened during the day so I can’t be specific. But when they do slouch I prepare myself. The kettle was whistling by the time Paul arrived with a Bible under his arm. He placed it on the end table beside the window facing the fire escape. When Feo returned from removing the kettle his eyes flamed and I knew right away it was on. The following text transcribes the audio records capturing what happened next.

Feo: What are you doing with that Bible?

Paul: Reading it.

Feo: Why?

Paul: Why not?

Feo: It’s dangerous. What’s wrong with you?

Paul: Nothing. How?

Feo pushed a pile of newspapers and magazines from his couch and forced himself to sit as much as he wanted to stand. But at his age sometimes he has to sit. I went to the kitchen and pulled the light on. Cockroaches scurried for cover between cabinet creases and under stove-top burners. I grabbed three beers from the fridge and tossed one to both. Paul missed my toss and when he opened his it spewed like a geyser and coved his chin and spilled down his polo shirt.

Paul: Great. Now look at me. I have to drive home like this.

Feo: Look at you. It’s the same book that inspired bin Laden to attack New York and it’s the same book Bush referred to when he needed to justify his attack on Iraq. I don’t expect you to understand this. You’re an idiot. But that’s irony.

Paul: Take it easy Feo. I think I understand but I don’t agree. You sound like too many conspiracies. The Bible speaks the truth whether you like it or not. Whether I like it or not. That’s a good word right there. You got something better?

Feo: True or not, Abraham was a beast. A bigot. He destroyed Sodom for the same reasons Jerry Falwell insisted New York was attacked on 9/11. Tell me you’re okay with that. Tell me you’re okay with that and I’ll throw you and your good book out the window.

Paul: It wasn’t for the same reason. Those men in Sodom were raping other men. Tell me you agree with that. Besides, God destroyed Sodom, not Abraham. And he let the good people escape before he did so.

Feo: I don’t think so. I can’t talk to you. You sound like a fool. Are you? Look at the way you drink your beer. You think it’s poison. Why are you here? Your Bible killed more people than the Atomic Bomb. Both of them.

The Yankee game was the reason we three had gathered to begin with and it was now 4-4, bottom of the sixth, after an Angels homerun tied it up. I brought this to their attention.

Feo: God damn you look what you did. All that bullshit now see. Surprised you’re not rooting for the Angels.

Paul: You’re a douche. I read that book you gave me. NOTES FROM UNDERGROUND. Is that you’re theology? God, you must be happy. They should find a place for you to hide. I don’t think anybody would care.

Feo: I wouldn’t.

Feo used the arm of the couch to help him stand. He pulled his shirt down from where it rested on his herniated gut. His feet were bare and pale, his toenails sharp. His old man wiener spied from his boxers. He shook his head into the kitchen.

Paul: What’s his problem? We came to watch the game. He wants to talk about God instead. Can’t he help himself? Does he own a gun? Here he comes. I hope not.

Feo balanced three tea cups on a sliver platter. In his second hand he carried a revolver. He put the gun down next to the bible on the end table beside the window facing the fire escape. He served the tea to each of us.

Paul: Is it poison?

Feo: It could be. Drink it Osama bin Laden.

Paul: What is it?

Feo: Fungi. God made it.

The recorder lost power after this point. Part of me thinks that’s best.

10/20/2009

Then and Now

2009-10-14T17:38:00.026-04:00

By Brian Wask

Even stupid people know how to make signs.

Then… they were wrong. They felt like they were right. They lost that battle too. And the guy holding the microphone looks like he’s going to lick it. He might be dead today but I'm sure he had a few kids with his daughter. Hopefully those kids didn't grow up to be anything like their pappy.

Now... I don’t know this guy but by the looks he’s not the brightest light in the chandelier. In fact it looks like this one’s burned out. His t-shirt says it all. That flag don't fly so well anymore pal. But you keep it alive cause something you ate made you stupid. Abort Obama? What the...? You lost the Civil War, you lost race mixing, and you’ll lose healthcare reform. What values? I challenge him to name one thing the South can be proud of. Sweet Home Alabama? What an idiot. Wait 'til we legalize gay marriage. You're gonna love this place. Freedom. That’s about it.

Yeah, right old man, time for you to die. You're not doing much good here anyway. Thanks for coming out. Try not to fall on the way home and break your hip. Don't want your insurance to drop you like the load of crap it's safe to assume comes out of your mouth whenever you open it. YOBAMA? He's got more class than you've ever had. I promise I'll only take away your guns so I can shoot you with them. "For War! Against Healthcare! For War! Against Healthcare!"

They must be twins. Both idiots too. That must be her daddy licking the microphone above. I could think of a few things I’d like to do to her with a hammer and sickle. That’s right, I get mad sometimes. The "commies" in Washington want to take over healthcare so they can give it to people who need it. But you can't understand that cause your head aint on straight. I got your death sentence right here. It includes a week old port-a-potty and ten thousand angry hornets. We'll put you inside and listen to your screams. Oh, that's mean. Lucky for you the government will pick up your hospital tab. Doesn't that sound nice?

The End

10/14/2009

Letters From Far Away

2009-10-06T16:46:00.009-04:00

101st Airborne Division Richard A. Luttrell writes, Vietnam War:

Dear Sir,

For [twenty two] years I have carried your picture in my wallet. I was only eighteen years old that day we faced one another on that trail in Vietnam. Why you did not take my life I'll never know. You stared at me for so long armed with your AK-47 and yet you did not fire. Forgive me for taking your life, I was reacting just the way I was trained, to kill V. C. or gooks, hell you weren't even considered human. Over the years I have stared at your picture and your daughter, I expect. Each time my heart and guts would burn with the pain of guilt. I have two daughters myself now.

Today I visit the Vietnam Veterans Memorial in D.C. I have wanted to come here for several years now to say goodbye to many of my former comrades. I truly loved many of them as I am sure you loved many of your former comrades. As of today we are no longer enemies. I perceive you as a brave soldier defending his homeland.

As I leave here today I leave your picture and this letter. Forgive me Sir, I shall try to live my life to the fullest, an opportunity that you and many others were denied.

So until we chance to meet again in another time and place, rest in peace.

Respectfully,

Richard A. Luttrell

101st Airborne Division

(Luttrell, in 1981, left this letter along with the photograph at the Vietnam War Memorial in Washington DC.)

Rupert Trimmingham, WWII:

April, 1944

Dear YANK Magazine:

Myself and eight other Negro soldiers were on our way from Camp Claiborne, LA., to Fort Huachuca, Arizona. We had to lay over until the next day for our train. We could not purchase a cup of coffee at any of the lunchrooms around there. The only place where we could be served was at the railroad station but, of course, we had to go into the kitchen. As you know, Old Man Jim Crow rules.

But that's not all; 11:30 a.m. about two dozen German prisoners of war, with two American guards, came into the station. They sat at the tables, had their meals served, talked, smoked, in fact had quite a swell time.

I stood on the outside looking on, and I could not help but ask myself these questions: are we not American soldiers, sworn to fight for and die if need be for this our country? Then why are they treated better than we are? Why does the Government allow such things to go on? Some of the boys are saying that you will not print this letter. I'm saying that you will.

Cpl. Rupert Trimmingham,

(The letter was printed in Yank, The Army Weekly, a magazine published by the U.S. Military during WWII.)

19-year-old Artillery Gunner, Leon responds to his fiancée, Korean War:

Dear Babe,

I just received your letter in this morning's mail. I held it in my hand for a minute while a little voice in the back of my head whispered, "This is it. This is the one."

You tried to "let me down easy."

I never said I was the greatest guy on earth; you did. Anyway, he's there. I'm here.

"Be careful," you tell me. "Take care." I almost laughed out loud. We wouldn't want to see me hurt, would we? There's no need to worry about me. I'll be all right.... Do I say something brilliant like "may all your troubles be little ones"?

How about "If you ever need a friend"? That presumes a future.

There are 500,000 N. Koreans and Chinese on the other side of that hill bound and determined to make sure I don't have a future. Over here where your past is your last breath, your present is this breath, and your future is your next breath, you don't make too many promises. Which leaves me what?

Goodbye,

Leon

(Two days later, Leon charged an enemy machine gun nest and was killed.)

P. Burns writes to Ann Maceubbin, Civil War:

Nashville, June 10, 1861

Ann,

It makes my heart sick to think of the state of our once happy and yet beloved country . . . to see two brave armies armed with all the deadly instruments that art and wealth could procure and to think that when they meet in the bloody battlefields what destruction and misery they can produce.

What is most horrid of all in this contest is that brother will meet brother and father will meet son in the strife. No matter what side I might take, might bring me in contact with a cousin or uncle, & god forbid that I should ever be found in arms against either.

Ann, I will be in your town by the 27th, but should I not be prompt do not despair for these are squirrelly times.

Your friend, P. Burns

Old Days, New Days, No Days Are Good Days

2009-09-30T18:35:00.011-04:00

By Brian Wask

Hell’s Kitchen, NYC– The rain started before the sun came up. I woke around ten am, but I’d been listening to the tree drops tap the air-conditioner for a few hours. Dreaming about it and sometimes singing along. I could see the day was dark between the heavy curtain and the wall it falls short of reaching. I should’ve quit at beer number six the night before. Instead I carried on with my neighbor Feo (short for Fyodor), listening to Charles Mingus’ Tijuana Moods, playing Gin Rummy, talking about Honduras and its military coup and sudden beef with Brazil. (Of course Chavez, South America’s Simon Cowell, got involved before the end of the weekend.) Ousted Honduran President Zaleya somehow made it to the Brazilian Embassy. From there he encouraged his followers to protest against the interim president Roberto Micheletti, who has close ties with big business and rightwing politicians and is supported by the military. I’m not old enough to remember what went on in Central America under Reagan’s foreign policy in the eighties, but I’d have to live under a rock– or pretend to– if I was not up to speed about the democratically elected leaders of places like Honduras, Guatemala and Nicaragua once removed by military coups. (And I read a lot of books about it because I wanted to.) Following, dictators were installed with US support, financially and militarily. I would NOT conspire the same theory this time around– simply because Obama is President– but because the military is backing the new government, and responsible for the coup, neighboring countries who plan to intervene would certainly face an Honduran army. However threatening that doesn’t sound.

I’m bothered by the idea Fascists are running things in Central America. But some things bother me more. Over the weekend, four blocks from where I live, three gay men were passing a pub on 9th avenue a little after midnight. A Fascist beast was outside the pub having a cigarette, most likely bitching about how the “fascist” mayor Bloomberg (I’m not a huge fan but by no way is he a true fascist), who once banned smoking in bars, was also considering a ban on smoking in most public places. Note here, Feo disagrees Bloomberg is NOT a fascist. But, to be fair, anyone in a tie with a savings account is a fascist to my neighbor. He once called the landlord a fascist simply because our rooftop was no longer stable or safe for people living directly below it, therefore prohibiting access to tenants. Anyway, the beast having a smoke outside the pub attacked the three gay men, using fists and nasty slurs describing their sexual behavior. The cops were called but felt the situation didn’t require an arrest or even a record of the parties involved. The next day, when the three men followed up on pressing charges, there wasn’t anything anyone could do, the beast got away because cops never took his name. I wonder why this situation went down like this. You ask me, if somebody thinks it’s okay to call a man out on the street cause he’s gay, things aren’t getting better. The day before, ten blocks away from where I live, an Iraq War vet stabbed another man in front of New York City’s main Post Office before the sun had a chance to go down. The night before that an off-duty cop drank too much– though he would later refuse a breathalyzer– and killed a nice lady with a five thousand pound machine. I’ll say it again. Things are NOT getting better.

Feo warned me I was behaving like it was my first trip to New York when in fact I’ve lived here for ten years. “Shit happens all the time,” he reminded me. “Relax yourself and get us another beer.” I agreed, though the reality was discouraging. “What’ the point then?” I said, looking for the light in the kitchen. “I’m a little confused about Obama’s mission in Afghanistan,” I continued. “And Iraq for that matter.” Naturally this was Feo’s big chance to explain the two wars, which he’d done during dozens of late night/early morning escapades. He insisted both were started by two Idiots, Bush and bin Laden, and no way could anybody ever figure out how to get out of either because Idiots always prevail. “Forget Cheney, forget Saddam Hussein,” he demanded, accompanied by a good spray of beer. “This is the way of the world, and perhaps the Universe, if it really exists anyway. I’m starting to believe it does. And all matter of existence anywhere and everywhere is inspired by genuine stupidity. Absolute narcissism!” For Feo this was not a debate. So I maintained my regular naivete for the sake of peace is my small world. Otherwise, with the slightest opposition, my good neighbor would’ve shown me the door six different ways. He did eventually over of a disagreement regarding the pros and cons of baked bananas.

In the morning, listening to the rain– no thunder– I started to think Feo was right. Neither Osama bin Laden or George W. Bush make sense any time they open their mouths. It’s amazing how some people can NOT make sense so often. Sometimes I think most of the people I communicate with daily don’t make sense. And it’s easier to tell how little sense someone makes when they speak the same language, which is maybe why I get along better with people who speak a different language first, and English as a second or third or fourth. But do Idiots really control the Universe? Is that possible? Barak Obama is NOT and Idiot. Does this mean he will NOT have an affect on the universe? Maybe. Things are NOT going to get better. Yet everyday, no matter if it’s raining or the sunshine is peaking around the curtain, for some reason I think things will get better. And one day, hopefully when I’m one hundred and twenty-three, my breathing will pleasantly cease. Next, I’ll appear before God. His presence alone will mean I’m in Heaven. Then he’ll open his mouth and say something stupid.

9/30/09