Where The Time Went II

Four flame outs later and several lives ago.

Driving Stick (Fairlady 280Z)

I think my pops saw a spark in me and didn't know how to feed it.

I think, faced with something completely different from his first two children, he hit a language wall.  This one has the design eye, this second one does too.  "This third one has an eye, but why is it obsessed with physics and manipulating form and space instead of creating on a canvas?"

Learning to drive stick was a massive challenge.  Enter the F-250 1996 V8 5.8 Liters of displacement in a breath.  Stupid torque and no horsepower.

The thing was, you never knew if he was taking you for a ride to explain to you why you had a beating coming or not.  Sometimes it was Billy Graham, sometimes it was the guy who always had that quotable audio clip at the beginning of his radio show "lay up treasure in heaven" (it always made me laugh inside thinking about how does suffering now get you a v.i.p. pass to heaven and how dumb it felt watching years spin by and thinking 'the forsaken are now!')

There was this one day, he may have been driving me to work at Six Flags Great America or some shit, but we were in his 280 ZX that myself, my younger sister, and I don't remember if my older brother was there or not, but we washed and detailed that car.  Cleaned from the floor mats to the spots where you put your fingers on the sill to push the passenger door open to the stock rims and the corners of the chrome trim around the rear window to the toe kicks along the foot of the door sills.

I can't remember what day it was specifically; Monday Tuesday Wednesday Thursday.  We drove.

I may have missed the bus for the umpteenth time and he happened to be off work that day and heard me come back into the house absentee.

At any rate, what I do remember was this:

Before I took on driving school and getting licensed proper, he took his hand off of the stick shift and began calling out gears to me.  I didn't know what to do.  In the empty space he would shift and calmly call the next position the shiftknob was supposed to be in.

I didn't know he was speaking to me.  I thought it was another one of his exercises to keep me on my toes so I would always be aware of my surroundings.  One of those "what street is that?!" spot quizzes.  I think it may have been one of his best attempts to connect with his kid who was not into the "arts" as he was.

In fear, I placed my hand on the shift knob with my fingers spread so I could see the 1 2 3 4 5 R grid, do not break his possession.  Be good.  If you do good, he will not be disappointed.

Understanding that he wanted me to move the shifter while he worked the pedals and the wheel, I was incredibly hesitant.  Before that day I'd only read about it in magazines, Road & Track and Car & Driver and Model Builder and the RC aero rag on my stints at the library in the periodicals instead of going to school when I missed the bus because you can't get to Greenbelt from Bowie without missing have the damn day anyway, might as well go to the library on your bike and make sure you're back home before he is and no one is the wiser (fuck it and fuck Eleanor Roosevelt H.S.).

I shifted with my left hand for close to five minutes before he took over again.  And that was my first taste.  The second was driving school in a powder blue Chevy Cavalier with a stick that was way too long for the shitbox that it was.  And the standard minted was the Falcor that I drive now.  That was when I learned and am still learning.

Every time that I hold that stick, my dad does cross my mind.  My dad and where my love affair with the Fairlady line of sporting two doors began.  The way that he would cut through traffic and move through the shift gates was impressive to my young mind.  He wouldn't be able to drive my F250 for shit and it makes me laugh.  It makes me laugh because if you can pilot a junker with finesse, imagine what you can do with a coupe.

There are times I wish he'd taken the leap to see me outside of the framework of his knowns.  We have much in common.  I would love to be able to speak to someone who understands the rage and fire inside as much as he knows it and hides it and clamps it and eats it and focuses it and the ways it eats you alive.

I'm never going back to him.  He is as welcome in me as he has said I am in him.  Big ol' bag o' nopes and it does make me laugh to understand that happy endings are for stories- not history.  Consolation prize: he tried and it planted a seed and a passion for Nissan coupes and the design philosophy throughout their years.

My artistes' eye is still there.  The lines are classical music if you see its shape.  When you think salon coupe GT as comfortable cutting into the wind as whipping around corners, steady as the shaft of an arrow and fickle if you tease it, from its stance to the cut of the A pillar to busy tail lights and sloop nose that can accommodate aero headlight glass or no.

I think back to that day and how I must have looked in the passenger seat with frightened eyes looking at the digital gauges and being thrilled and awed and stupefied at a tachometer that wasn't a dial.  In the years following, I was disgusted at the tach that wasn't analog.  And then I was enlightened to the tune that dashboards can be removed and replaced with whatever the pilot finds most useful.  And then I went away to college and the car disappeared and I remembered that he didn't actually give a shit.  For a moment I was his son and for a moment he was a dad.  And then he was confused as to why I was upset that the car I cleaned for the better part of a year and got to touch and fell in love with was shipped off for who knows what.

It just... it pains me... he has no idea who I am.  He had no idea then and he has no idea now.

I used to think he was just crazy.  I still do.  I am.  I am a functioning adult from his loins so....   it kinda fucking follows.  Also why I'm not waiting in line for progeny.  Some things should stop.  Accidents don't happen without a breath of agency and this time around I can be the eyes he didn't have then.  The discerning he absolved himself of.

Do I want to make him pay for what he's cost me: of course.  Can I?   Yes.  Will I?  No.  He will die in his bubble on his own time.  My life is worth more than enlightening a grown child, talented though it may be.  Do not attempt to turn a mountain, it will return to the sea on its own time.

Driving the truck, blasting music that is foreign to his circuits, with the windows down... ...he could have enjoyed himself and his child.  Us both now in a solitary confinement.  I hope he is pushing a standard, but we all know "it ain't that damn likely."  With age also goes the tooth for sporting.




///Noname - (Diddy Bop) ~ driving music

Over The Last Weeks

What we've learned is that we are not a multi-tipped novelty pen.  What each one of us does, all of our others are accountable for.

The pain, torment, rage, and (I am crying waterfalls and I don't want to) absolute hatred, are experienced because of what our others did out of kindness, compassion, sympathy, empathy, love, and understanding...

When I tell you I can't speak about something and then go on to speak about it- it's not a joke a or a hide to try to find something to target you for or insulate myself.  There is a cost.  There is a very real cost.  Often psychological, sometimes physical too.

I am terrified that if I "go into a shell" folks will think I've lost it or something.  I am, unfortunately, beholden to wherever my body happens to be and if that means it is in a cage that also means we are too and I cannot be in there with them because they all should not be in there.  When we are in there, rebellion is inevitable.  What is the only way out?  What is the one way they can each live their own?  It is not a dual blessing and curse.  It is unfortunate.

I am blending in and being as human as possible.  As citizen as possible.  As reasonable as possible.  It hurts tremendously to see that effort fall flat and be exploited  by some, it is ecstatic to see that effort be rewarded by some and flower into map expansions and discovery of new ways to exist and new ways that others exist and new planets and star systems and, fuck me, galaxies.  It is incredible to feel the weight of the sight of others frittering about on the 400 degree oil of life and ourselves, warming our palms near the electric coils, spreading stories of boogie beasts beyond the 60 watt LED light bulb in the sky because the truth is you have to stick close or you will be left behind.  Large enough to fry and small enough in the greater consciousness to slip right through the metal lattice and join the disposable.  Faulty.

When you finally get a chance to turn the music off and see pain for what it is.  When you don't have to protect other people from what you know you are.  Every damaged person worth their weight in time is worth listening to.  The songs are the same.  The cadence's are similar.  The verses are close.  There is a world spanning web of sunsets and sunrises and star anthems and moon odes and solar salutations and a disturbingly familiar scent to the blood that breaks away from a palm while you are trying to wash a glass and a reflect on the evenings high-points and the metal gush of the air mixes with the scented soap as it shatters in your hand for reasons you don't understand.

I have been helped by some that there is no way I can repay.  Literally, with the expanding fabric of life and space time (I've been over the calculations before) there is no way I can repay them before I or they perish, that is what's up.  They offered big and I took only what I needed from what they offered.  I don't understand why, attempting again and again to emulate that truth I continue to ...  I don't understand ... what am I getting wrong each time?  It's not every time, but when it goes poorly, it goes straight to the poor house!

I know I am not entirely sane.  I know I can learn fairly quickly.

I know I have to communicate better.

Everything is not okay.

The margin for error is small.

The people that I hold closest know.  Because we've been speaking with each other and developing language protocols through literally thousands of interactions.

It is unfair to expect anyone, outside of that set of individuals (not the ones I've met face to face or otherwise, for the longest) to know the language too.

What I've learned to broadcast is not ubiquitous.  Thirty two years on planet Earth, and we still have not been able to crack a universal code.  I don't mean to cry, but I am in tears that there is so much more work to do looking ahead to remain human.  I like it here.  I enjoy it because I can be like them and sometimes, when they are willing to play with me, they can be like me too.

I know my schizophrenia is a constantly evolving symbiotic organism (said through thick medication).  We understand it.  I understand it.  You're breaking up!



Please don't leave me!









Kill them all.

Please don't leave- kill them all.









I like to help.  Pay it forward.  Play when you can.  Know us.  If we can't play, say so.  We are shadows.  If you insist on addressing us as a galaxy system to visit, you would be well to address the star inside the nebula and the planet and attendant moon (if necessary) and... or just the comet.  You can also call the sign Hobbes.  I'm sure he'll answer.

The construction was developed over six years.  Before the period of the shatter, layers of designs were gardened to safeguard us.  After the period of the shatter, layers of designs were welded together to safeguard you.  I'm sure it'll answer.





Crews are at work, thirty four hours a day, reviewing diagrams to build a better future.

One spark at a time.

One death at a time.






LET'S GO!




///There's still a lot of work to do, if we are to survive.  We are game, if you are willing to play with us, just know: there are rules.

Rest Is A Cocoon

As we rest and breath over past and history and details.  Knowing more.  Growth is a strong word.  More like molting.  Showing that you have not died.  Showing that the fire, though about you and your skin and your nerve and eating through the marrow of your bone, has birthed, not consumed, you.  In love again.  The moon drives past my house real slow.  I howl out of the window, a scarf around my neck.




///Gold Panda - "Fifth Ave"

Holdovers and Artifacts

Food is a reward.  It is a fact.  And a holdover from days, years, decades of "discipline" (call it what you will, I've come to understand and know it by it's other name: abuse).  I have managed to unwire many things hard coded into me and I am happy for that.  It is one of the things that has been very difficult to dismantle.  "You can eat when the work is done".  The entire idea of getting caught eating.  Getting caught eating first.  I've been deconstructing why exactly it is I feel so uncomfortable eating around other people and I do know that has something to do with it.

Getting punished for eating or resting before the assignment is done.  Even alone it is still enforced consciously to avoid the unconscious recoil.  Even before cutting weight for the wrestling team and working to the point of exhaustion because getting caught in the house brought severe consequences for quite some time to the point where, and I will grant him this, my father would see me working and tell me it was okay to stop and I would insist on continuing because his word was not too be trusted.  It plays back into the whole he says one thing and waits and watches and waits and then springs the trap the next day or two weeks off or two months off.  Sycophant in a way.  An issue of control.

How he used to strap a governor on my face.  What the hell was he afraid of?  We could've been friends.  Left and right barrels with one trigger.  Ah well.  The point is this: artifacts.  Afterimages that have refused to fade through the years and I have to remind myself there are many more to come and many more erasers to try.  An aversion for food is very unhealthy.  I will strive to continue to dissociate the two.  Food is necessary and vital and has nothing to do with occupation, preoccupation, goals, failure, desertion of duty, breaks in time, success, or operations.  If I am eating it is because I should be, not because I've somehow tricked my way into it or trapped my way to a plate or have let someone down by taking the time.

In the meantime while I try to enforce this very simple principle, I will continue to attempt to escape and nibble when I can.  I understand it may seem strange, but if I ever eat with you heartily it's because it means a lot to me to be able to do so and I hope it comes across that way.  I will be willing to do many other things with you before I will agree to eat with you at a table.  There are still several more relics that need eradicated, raised, and (some) built upon.  This one is the one that needs leveled to rubble first.  A dead heat, but the one I want to focus first and burn away.




///Bonobo - "Pick Up"   ...the loud minority...


///Tricky - "Overcome"  nothing to gift, so ill gift you this, for now

Reel

Sometimes I wonder if it's real.  Outside and inside at the same time.  Odd shifts.  I can explain them, but explanation goes so far.  I still want, to the point of near desperation, to cut you apart and examine the individual pieces.  It can be done.  There is never a good time for it.  It has to be a final project or at least somewhere near final.  Very close to final before another change.

The hardest part is finding a reasonable candidate.  We can do it.  It is far from impossible.  Especially if it is the beginning of a stout library.  There's no foul there.  Storage space must be brought into consideration.  On top of that is figuring out how to pay for capacity because storage space is worth gold by volume, plain and simple and the library will be extensive.

The other question being the simple fact that availability will be a major issue.  Think it through.  There's no impossible in "can't."  There is some cant in can't though.  Cannot get too canted because nothing flies right canted.  All the control surfaces get way off and then holding the stick upright leads to poor action.  We're gonna need a lot of jars.  Like a fuck ton.  Jars are cheap though and so is water.  Things are going to rot, but that's fine.  Lids contain stank.  That's really good.  It's not beyond our capacity so that's good too.  Temporary storage.  I still need more practice and it is an unfortunate obstacle.

You have to be better about taking out the trash though.  If you can't take out the trash how can I possibly trust you to store things properly?  You can't.  We both want this though and how hard do you work to make shit happen when it's only you on the line?  That's not fair to me.  At all.  Fuck progress, stop short changing me.  It's not fair, plain and simple, Mr. plain and simple, and you know that.

All I'm saying is, sit the fuck down, have a smoke, and think about it for a minute.  How retarded would it be to buy two dozen mason jars at once?  For two, you haven't really thought out the actual land routes or air routes yet.  For three, you have not worked out the cash because last I checked gas still costs money.  And for four, your exit strategy is ill formed at best.  I'll throw a five in there because you're actually listening now so it's pretty much a one: you still have a lot of work to do.  I know it's very... open ended... but you know what I'm talking about.  Talk to me when you've actually got some shit laid down.

It's hard, difficult, to think with you shouting.  It's not easy to know if it's real.  Hard, but challenge accepted.  I'm not sure about you.  I don't like it.  Othering.  Too much othering.  To be honest, I'm disappointed in you.  You can do better.  It's flummoxing.  Diagnostics failure?  Yes, for chryssakes, yes.  How many different ways do I have to paint it?  We were born different.  We weren't.  I'm nothing like you.  I know.  We are the same.  No, we are not.  Yes we are.  NO, we are not.  That is unacceptable.




///Goldie - "Dragon Fly"        next to Fury, top ten. new music is great but i am happy to rewind the classics.  songs i hope to someday play for my children. when theyre ready.  when we get there.

That Instant

you realize you almost said "we should hang out sometime" and then realized, before the words left your mouth, that it was a terrible idea because the little time you had with them was the perfect amount of time.

Cheeseburger (and the origins)

The cheeseburger.  The curse of curses.  Cheeseburger!  Cheeseburger!  Cheeseburger!  To invoke the cheeseburger three times in a row is to call down all of the thunderbolts of heaven and bring ruin to your foe, and also to yourself, because the Cheeseburger fallout is too long lived and too deadly to dissipate with any amount of speed.  The Cheeseburger is not to be toyed with, not to be thought of, not to be spoken of, under any circumstances and is the last resort of the desparate, the dying, and the backstabber.

The cheeseburger, in and of itself, is a fairly innocent and delicious thing.  However, in it's delicious simplicity it also signifies missing the mark.  It is much easier to screw up what you're trying to achieve, or miss the mark, or any other failure.  It's easy to fail (most of the time).  And when you do you can relax, because you hung it up and won at failing, which has a much higher success rate than succeeding.  You stuffed your face with a Cheeseburger, and it was delicious.  More than that,

the guy in Popeye would always pay Tuesday for a hamburger today.  The term comes primarily from dart games.  When you miss one and then two and then know you're going to miss three and as you walk up to the board you pull the darts out and one thought dominates: I will gladly pay you Tuesday for a mark today.   Cheeseburger!  Cheeseburger!  And that's not all.  A person can Cheeseburger.  A person can also be Cheeseburgered.  Often times the Cheeseburger will be invoked by a sworn enemy or opponent as you are shooting.  At that moment you have been Cheeseburgered.  The Cheeseburger will take over your mind and destroy your shot at success.

Some do succeed, despite the Cheeseburger in the room.  Never for long.  Do not mess with the Cheeseburger.  It will end whatever it touches.