Monday, October 28, 2002
Memory
"You float like a feather, in a beautiful world...." (Radiohead, "Creep")
It's not that she's asleep. It's not that she's being rude. It's the feeling that comes over her....
Ever since...the white light. It's there...and suddenly she's in another world.
A flash of white. Where am I? A kitchen. It's all white, tile on the countertops, second floor, because the door is there and you can go down the back stairs. There's a kitchen table. Which house is it? I've forgotton. Running 'round. Yeah, 'cause I'm very little, just a wee lass, the counters are way above my head....Yellow. Things are turning yellow. Hey, I remember this place. 60th Street. My cousin's old house. The yellow kitchen table. We bobbed for apples one halloween. That was fun. Something my mom never let me do. The hallway, the pantry, bedrooms, bathroom, then living and dining room. I remember the sandbox and the church and the swingset and the landlord's garden....I remember Stowell. The kids my mom babysat. The grease fire. My brother, making Christmas cookies, we shared a room. I'd had an ugly wart on my foot, kept banging it against walls and doors to make it go away. After this though...the fire. Turned the oven "high" instead of "off". I was asleep, drifting, voices..."Wake up! Wake up! There's a fire!" My aunt, or my dad, or someone. I couldn't smell it. I didn't hear the smoke alarms. I smelled it when we ran outside, the sick and thick smell of grease burning. I could hear the alarms....Townhouse, Glenview. The kids next door. They never tanned, not even in summer, not even without sunblock. Never burned. Always white, pale. Parents would always scream. Death that year....
And then someone brought up the house. The blue house that caught on fire and scared the hell out of Crazy Girl.
You see, Crazy Girl wants you to think she's crazy. She really isn't. It's been years of knowing ghosts and getting used to that idea. She still isn't used to it. She doesn't want to be comfortable with it. It's not something that you're supposed to talk about, at least to people. Years of being teased at grade school, parents who never had a clue how badly she was tourtured, the evil games she played with friends, all of this taught her to keep her mouth shut about everything. Make believe? It might have been, if it still didn't happen to her all these years later. And she didn't want anyone to take her seriously. What if it had really been all in her head? What if it wasn't real? There's only one alternative to that, one that frightens her.
But she has to go. She has to go to the houses. She has to know...as if they will tell her. The graveyard did. She heard them whisper. She wasn't going to tell her friend that. They were whispering like they always do...like they have a secret that they don't want her to hear. Maybe they know something she doesn't...the blue house. She will have to go. She will remember. And that, too, scares her more than anything.
So maybe she isn't crazy. She would like to think so, but then again, she's in love, so she thinks that maybe the not crazy arguement is false. Crazy Girl is afraid that he'll find a saner, smarter, prettier woman and just leave her in the dust. Or, if that happened, she'd have to cut him off. Crazy Girl can get jealous, a feeling that she avoids if she can. She doesn't assume that she will ever be the winner, so she automatically conceedes to losing. After all, it's what she's used to....
"You float like a feather, in a beautiful world...." (Radiohead, "Creep")
It's not that she's asleep. It's not that she's being rude. It's the feeling that comes over her....
Ever since...the white light. It's there...and suddenly she's in another world.
A flash of white. Where am I? A kitchen. It's all white, tile on the countertops, second floor, because the door is there and you can go down the back stairs. There's a kitchen table. Which house is it? I've forgotton. Running 'round. Yeah, 'cause I'm very little, just a wee lass, the counters are way above my head....Yellow. Things are turning yellow. Hey, I remember this place. 60th Street. My cousin's old house. The yellow kitchen table. We bobbed for apples one halloween. That was fun. Something my mom never let me do. The hallway, the pantry, bedrooms, bathroom, then living and dining room. I remember the sandbox and the church and the swingset and the landlord's garden....I remember Stowell. The kids my mom babysat. The grease fire. My brother, making Christmas cookies, we shared a room. I'd had an ugly wart on my foot, kept banging it against walls and doors to make it go away. After this though...the fire. Turned the oven "high" instead of "off". I was asleep, drifting, voices..."Wake up! Wake up! There's a fire!" My aunt, or my dad, or someone. I couldn't smell it. I didn't hear the smoke alarms. I smelled it when we ran outside, the sick and thick smell of grease burning. I could hear the alarms....Townhouse, Glenview. The kids next door. They never tanned, not even in summer, not even without sunblock. Never burned. Always white, pale. Parents would always scream. Death that year....
And then someone brought up the house. The blue house that caught on fire and scared the hell out of Crazy Girl.
You see, Crazy Girl wants you to think she's crazy. She really isn't. It's been years of knowing ghosts and getting used to that idea. She still isn't used to it. She doesn't want to be comfortable with it. It's not something that you're supposed to talk about, at least to people. Years of being teased at grade school, parents who never had a clue how badly she was tourtured, the evil games she played with friends, all of this taught her to keep her mouth shut about everything. Make believe? It might have been, if it still didn't happen to her all these years later. And she didn't want anyone to take her seriously. What if it had really been all in her head? What if it wasn't real? There's only one alternative to that, one that frightens her.
But she has to go. She has to go to the houses. She has to know...as if they will tell her. The graveyard did. She heard them whisper. She wasn't going to tell her friend that. They were whispering like they always do...like they have a secret that they don't want her to hear. Maybe they know something she doesn't...the blue house. She will have to go. She will remember. And that, too, scares her more than anything.
So maybe she isn't crazy. She would like to think so, but then again, she's in love, so she thinks that maybe the not crazy arguement is false. Crazy Girl is afraid that he'll find a saner, smarter, prettier woman and just leave her in the dust. Or, if that happened, she'd have to cut him off. Crazy Girl can get jealous, a feeling that she avoids if she can. She doesn't assume that she will ever be the winner, so she automatically conceedes to losing. After all, it's what she's used to....
Sunday, October 13, 2002
Passage
The wind whips around her in frenzy along with the dead leaves of the trees that mourn their loss but only for a season. Cold and bitter wind bites at her face, hand, legs...chilling her to the bone but it's not just that because she's been chilled ever since she felt the last grip of sanity slip away into hopelessness and suddenly there is no time, there is no space, it is all simultanious and she can't stop it. Cold feelings plauge her in the way that she wants them to leave. Leave and be gone. She wants to know why she is here and not there and why she is always plauged with visions of there when she's here and wonders when it all ends.
It all will end when the light goes out, she thinks. So when does it happen?
She wants to run. She wants to run so hard and so fast that her feet leave the ground and she is in midair and flying, flying high above the city, above the lake, above the ants that stand a foot taller than her when she on the ground. She wants to fly over oceans, contients, space, time...fly over everything and anything she can just to see...just to know...to learn of people everywhere. What good are books when books can't tell you the intimate details of people? The outside is but just another layer to these creatures. Oh, what treasures they hold! Such joy, such pain, such mercy, so unforgiving. They are everything and nothing, a complex mixture of emotions and realities.
Oh reality, sweet reality. If there was such thing. But now she's in just a total state of disreality. Surreal. They are no one and everyone. Even Love is surrealistic. I could ask him what I want to know, but he won't understand it. They never do. They can't...too logical, too rooted in the concept of reality. Then the fatal words escape her lips: "Oh Wicked, where are you?" There is no answer and there never will be one but she will ask nonetheless and that is what makes the whole idea dangerous. Oh, lord, what have I done? "Hosea, I'm so sorry." "I wish you here, James." "I curse you, Black Jacket. You told me the truth." Now they are gone...gone but not forgotten. She woke up one morning and her head was empty and it unsettled her. All she wanted was for him to hold her. Just one kiss to make her forget the pain. She's not smart. She's not pretty. He says he's attracted to her personality but she knows that her personality is bland and not the one inside her head. She knows that she will never get the total understanding of her personality so she chooses never to reveal it. I can hide from you, Mr. Blond, because that's all I've ever done for anyone. I can't let myself out. "What do you believe in?" she asks the cold, bitter wind. She can't express what she believes in because no one understands it. But she also knows that no one really cares. That's what it comes down to; no one gives a damn about anything really. What they do give a damn about is the trival aspects of a tiny universe that will end...as soon as the light goes out. Was he listening when she talked about the ghosts? She hopes not. She was drunk and talking about it...trashed. Delusional. Really. Because she's crazy. She's obviously not sane. She was drunk and telling a story and making stuff up...really she was. She's not smart. She's not even sane. Can't he see it? Can't he see that she's crazy, that she's stupid, that she's bland? Why doesn't anyone believe her when she says that she's normal and bland and average. Not pretty. Nothing. She isn't any different. No one is. We are all the same. So why doesn't anyone believe her? Anyone can write stories, poetry...anything. They can do what she does. She isn't any better than anyone else. What is wrong with these fools? Words escape from lips: "Forgive them, Father, they know not what they do."
Tears run down her cheeks as she fights it. She fights the deluge of compliments or insults...they are the same to her...because she is average, any average person can do it, only if they are willing to. If she can do it, so can everyone else. You choose to do it or you don't. It's that simple. She chose to do it. So can everyone else if they tried. Most people don't want to try. It's the hard road, not easy, but it can be done. She is not a brilliant writer. She is not pretty. She is not smart. She is just an average Jane living the way an average Jane should. Why does everyone think she's different? Why does anyone think they are different? What the bookworm may lack in social graces she has gained in imagination or knowledge. What the socal butterfly lacks in knowledge or imagination she has gained in social graces. Neither is better. Neither is worse. There is no distiction from the smartest man in the world and most stupid man in the world. What one has, the other lacks, but what anyone will find if they look hard enough is that the stupid man might have something the smart man lacks. She is just like everyone else.
I don't know anything, she thinks, and they think I'm the wisest human.
Ignorance is bliss...and strength. Better to not know than know and be bitter. She smiles.
Heaven forgive these fools.
Her feet land back on the ground as the wind twirls the autumn leaves about her, their last dance before the snow. She feels warmer now.
The wind whips around her in frenzy along with the dead leaves of the trees that mourn their loss but only for a season. Cold and bitter wind bites at her face, hand, legs...chilling her to the bone but it's not just that because she's been chilled ever since she felt the last grip of sanity slip away into hopelessness and suddenly there is no time, there is no space, it is all simultanious and she can't stop it. Cold feelings plauge her in the way that she wants them to leave. Leave and be gone. She wants to know why she is here and not there and why she is always plauged with visions of there when she's here and wonders when it all ends.
It all will end when the light goes out, she thinks. So when does it happen?
She wants to run. She wants to run so hard and so fast that her feet leave the ground and she is in midair and flying, flying high above the city, above the lake, above the ants that stand a foot taller than her when she on the ground. She wants to fly over oceans, contients, space, time...fly over everything and anything she can just to see...just to know...to learn of people everywhere. What good are books when books can't tell you the intimate details of people? The outside is but just another layer to these creatures. Oh, what treasures they hold! Such joy, such pain, such mercy, so unforgiving. They are everything and nothing, a complex mixture of emotions and realities.
Oh reality, sweet reality. If there was such thing. But now she's in just a total state of disreality. Surreal. They are no one and everyone. Even Love is surrealistic. I could ask him what I want to know, but he won't understand it. They never do. They can't...too logical, too rooted in the concept of reality. Then the fatal words escape her lips: "Oh Wicked, where are you?" There is no answer and there never will be one but she will ask nonetheless and that is what makes the whole idea dangerous. Oh, lord, what have I done? "Hosea, I'm so sorry." "I wish you here, James." "I curse you, Black Jacket. You told me the truth." Now they are gone...gone but not forgotten. She woke up one morning and her head was empty and it unsettled her. All she wanted was for him to hold her. Just one kiss to make her forget the pain. She's not smart. She's not pretty. He says he's attracted to her personality but she knows that her personality is bland and not the one inside her head. She knows that she will never get the total understanding of her personality so she chooses never to reveal it. I can hide from you, Mr. Blond, because that's all I've ever done for anyone. I can't let myself out. "What do you believe in?" she asks the cold, bitter wind. She can't express what she believes in because no one understands it. But she also knows that no one really cares. That's what it comes down to; no one gives a damn about anything really. What they do give a damn about is the trival aspects of a tiny universe that will end...as soon as the light goes out. Was he listening when she talked about the ghosts? She hopes not. She was drunk and talking about it...trashed. Delusional. Really. Because she's crazy. She's obviously not sane. She was drunk and telling a story and making stuff up...really she was. She's not smart. She's not even sane. Can't he see it? Can't he see that she's crazy, that she's stupid, that she's bland? Why doesn't anyone believe her when she says that she's normal and bland and average. Not pretty. Nothing. She isn't any different. No one is. We are all the same. So why doesn't anyone believe her? Anyone can write stories, poetry...anything. They can do what she does. She isn't any better than anyone else. What is wrong with these fools? Words escape from lips: "Forgive them, Father, they know not what they do."
Tears run down her cheeks as she fights it. She fights the deluge of compliments or insults...they are the same to her...because she is average, any average person can do it, only if they are willing to. If she can do it, so can everyone else. You choose to do it or you don't. It's that simple. She chose to do it. So can everyone else if they tried. Most people don't want to try. It's the hard road, not easy, but it can be done. She is not a brilliant writer. She is not pretty. She is not smart. She is just an average Jane living the way an average Jane should. Why does everyone think she's different? Why does anyone think they are different? What the bookworm may lack in social graces she has gained in imagination or knowledge. What the socal butterfly lacks in knowledge or imagination she has gained in social graces. Neither is better. Neither is worse. There is no distiction from the smartest man in the world and most stupid man in the world. What one has, the other lacks, but what anyone will find if they look hard enough is that the stupid man might have something the smart man lacks. She is just like everyone else.
I don't know anything, she thinks, and they think I'm the wisest human.
Ignorance is bliss...and strength. Better to not know than know and be bitter. She smiles.
Heaven forgive these fools.
Her feet land back on the ground as the wind twirls the autumn leaves about her, their last dance before the snow. She feels warmer now.
