The first
time I stood next to James I was under a North Beach Italian restaurant
waiting for the rain to stop and for the greeter to stop pestering
me. I was wishing I was back at Fisherman's Wharf watching
the silver statue men pretend their hands were fireballs and their
mouths Gatling guns.
The rain was coming down steadily when he dropped his newspaper on my
foot. I kind of chuckled. I nudged it over towards
him and acted like I was going to bend over and pick it up, but he made
sure to stop me. I assented, and we stood there for awhile
until he started talking to me about the Magnificent American Trio,
Walt Whitman, Herman Melville, and Nathaniel Hawthorne, because I
looked like Billy Budd. MAT, he assured me, would continue to
be referred to as the true “Dads of American
Literature,” even if “grand” and
“greats” started piling on top of the original
title. The problem, I was told, was that there wasn't even
any unit of measurement for Americanness back when they were around, so
there isn't much of a way to prove to you skeptics that these three
fellas were out patriarchal-y--and more importantly--legitimately
pounding the dime bookstands with their truth and their American
values. It was good for us, dammit.
The rain stopped as he started to talk about how Al Quaeda hates MAT
more than anything and that's why all those guys in those planes would
rather die than have to read House of Seven Gables, “Major
Molineaux,” and that Lincoln lilac poem--which they would
have had to do eventually if things had continued as they were
going--but he didn't finish because he was going across to Columbus and
I was heading up to Kearny. As he hassled away the black
shadow that was James, silhouetted by Chinatown's red lamplights,
looked a lot like a dancing peach tree.
James and I were lucky enough to meet again the next day, though quite
impersonally. This was in the Chronicle:
NORTH BEACH-- Last
night around ten p.m., a man was caught masturbating in the alley
between City Lights Bookstore and Vesuvio Café.
When detained, the man claimed democratic innocence, shouting,
“this is America! How is it possible a man can give
his life for this country in some damned colonialist war overseas and
not even be allowed to finish, especially if he wants to do
it to pictures of the preeminent American heroes?! Ahh,
humanity!” To the man's objection police seized
what they have called his “motivation”--a
postcard-sized picture that combines the images of Walt Whitman, Herman
Melville and Nathaniel Hawthorne into what they have termed
“a nineteenth century American literary-god version of Uncle
Sam.” It is unsure whether the man purchased the picture or
created it himself. The man was not drunk or intoxicated in
any way, Police said.
Given the history of the alleyway--Jack Kerouac Ave.--police are
considering the possible activist side of this behavior, but they are
at a loss as to what this literary masturbation-protest could possibly
mean.
Police have not identified the man, though he has been charged with
public exposure and fined a total of $659.
I sat at my table for a minute and then read the story again.
It was the same as before. There was no way this wasn't the
James from yesterday. I wondered if he meant what he did.
I went to the alley the next day after work to see where James got
arrested. I had a feeling he'd be there, claiming his spot or
something, but from afar I could see he wasn't, which was nice, because
I didn't want to have to see him.
But there were a lot of people there against the wall, some on
Vesuvio's side, and some on City Lights'. I couldn't tell
what they were doing, but since I could tell James wasn't there I kept
on going.
I started to hear a cheer rising from the area, and saw that the men
and woman were all shouting as they stood against the two walls, their
heads jerked up, to the left, right, and down. Their eyes
were either shut or way too wide: “No more war! No
more war!…” But the chant was not
uniform and crisp--there were trailers and moans, changes in
pitch. Every once in awhile someone would shiver and shake
and then they'd walk away, finally raising both hands to fight along
with the chant. I wondered why they weren't into the chant
enough to cheer.
But then I knew it all, horribly.
“No more war! No mOoOOOooore…”
Legs shook! and head jerks up! eyes closed and a long moooooooan before
grabbing pulling grasping at a single brick on the wall out of breath
and hunched over chanting quietly
Hands and arms moving hips too sometimes until the above one hand pumps
the air while the other pumps below and skin curly hair coils and ugly
and Keanes and North Face and trash and all looking up at the street
sign
Jack Kerouac Ave
More moans and half-assed chants no one falling but some losing balance
hands up then down heads jerked up to the sky someone shouting yes yes!
Instead of no and everyone else eventually agreeing
A senior angry at this amusement park use of the body and goes towards
the big church and Francis Assisi's replica angrily shaking his head
A bookstore employee coming out laughing and shaking head.
A waitress joining the wall people
Chanting gone, only moans now the banner NO MORE WAR waves in the wind
but it could be blown by the moans and bellows
People gathering to watch self love-in perhaps to self-love later
James, that landslider
Protest war dead people?
Truly alive people grabbing and grabbing and grabbing then releasing
ecstasy until it splatters on the wall and splashes guilt up onto their
faces
A husky bearded man has rage in his eyes but pumping continues then
drops his jaw moans shakes pauses rages again punches the wall then
walks away shaking his head unable to walk at first but then resumes
path strongly
“Its adaptive,” Tracy said, lowering her voice like
she's serious. “The theory is that we've adapted it
to convince ourselves of happiness no matter how angry or guilty we
feel about ourselves…or how meaningless.”
“Okay..”
“Okay, so say you're gonna start like a blog or something.
“Okay.“
“When you
start it you're really into it and are kind of hopeful, but you realize
that it can fail if not many people will look at it or post on it or
whatever. But later, once you've invested a lot of time and
effort into it, no matter what, you're gonna just assume it will work
out because if it doesn't you'll feel like you wasted a lot of
time. And nobody wants to fuckin' feel like that, like some
foaming diseased rat or something--except this would be worse than
being a rat because you would know that you're just a rodent.
It would be like animorphing into a rat.”
“And you're moving that to the big
scale…?”
“Yeah just transfer that to life.”
"But there's no beginners time to life when people look at the
possibilities of failure. There's no metaphor between early
on in the establishing of a blog and childhood…you never
consider failure…you're the happiest ever when you're a
child.”
“No no no…you're missing the point because what
you just said is the point...”
“I don't--”
“Think about it. You went to high school.
Then college. And now you got a job. And then
what? What are you gonna do then? Retire?”
“Yeah I guess so. I'll probably die too.”
“Yes!” She banged on the table with the
hand that wasn't holding her drink and cigarette and nodded
furiously. Her bob bobbed.
“Death? You're gonna stress death? That's not too
original.”
“Well that was fuckin' confident…what, are you and
death into some kind of mutually sick s&m domination game or
something? Are you, like, comfortable with it?”
“Well of course not…I don't wanna die.”
“Exactly! No one wants to die. That's
fuckin' crazy. But its unavoidable!…Do you get it
now? Depression Realism, that's the name of it, it pulls up
the corners of your mouth to make you forget you're gonna die and make
sure you have some kind of worth in your life…besides
retirement,” she added, taking a drag out of her cigarette
and smiling into a sip of her vermouth.
“Okay so what about enjoyment, pleasure?”
“Hey…good…I don't wanna be a
pedagogue…what…are you asking if you can ever
actually be happy?”
“Yes.”
“Well yeah, you can…of course…If you
couldn't ever be happy and you were going to die anyway wouldn't you
just want to get the whole thing out of the way and smash your head
through a railroad tie?…or maybe shoot yourself in the heart
with a hollow-tipped bullet while you were watching on an
ultrasound?…then you could see it fuckin'
explode!” She banged the table with both hands this
time, finished with both her cigarette and her drink, and stared at me
with huge animal eyes. “But if you're happy,
there's got to be a difference between a pure, objective happiness and
some societally instilled version…there's got to be real or
created…”
“And what the hell does it matter whether your happiness is
real or created…either way you're happy and either way
you've got something to do with it…it doesn't come into
you…you've got to physically pull or pump something to make
yourself happy.”
“Yeah, but you know the feeling of, like, a really good day,
you just wake up and are smiling, maybe because the sun is
shining…”
“Okay, alternative hipster, but what's the difference between
the sun making you happy and society making you happy? They're both
outside of you…they're both created.”
“Okay…well the societal one takes away from your
individuality…”
“And just like that you're a Capitalist.”
“Fuck you, sophist.” Her head fell down
and she looked at the floor, kind of fidgeting with her
bracelets. “Well there are some things that bring
you pleasure that you can just do…just yourself.”
It was kind of late when I left Tracy's and I had missed the last
direct bus route, so I hopped on the BART at Mission and took it up a
few stops. There were a couple guys next to me talking about
James. I could tell by the combination of their age
(mid-twenties) and their conversation topic.
“Well, if I was gonna masturbate to an author I'd probably
pick Jodi Picoult or James Patterson… I guess R.L. Stein,
Stephen King or Michael Crichton if I was in the mood for some
kinkiness…you know, a little horror or some
monsters…”
“Jodi Picoult?! Those are all rape
books…you're sick!”
"Hey, you know what my dad always said: pussy's
pussy…”
They burst out laughing hysterically, holding their messenger bags with
the two Davids inside and leaning their fixed-gear bikes against some
empty seats. They stood by the door, maybe going back to
Berkeley or something. It was only me and them in the
car. They knew I'd been listening and decided to include me.
“How about you, man…what's your masturbatory
choice?” I guess my clothes gave me away as a
confidante.
I thought about maybe saying T.S Eliot, Celine, or Hemingway, but I
decided I'd join their laughter. “I don't know,
probably C.S. Lewis. I'm really into super-kind Christ lions
and boy-kings.”
“Haha…you're sick man!…I read those
when I was a kid…”
“Yeah, me too…my mom made me when she made me go
to Sunday school…”
There was a pause and then they continued talking between
themselves. They'd exhausted the topic, and my
fixed-gear-less inclusion didn't fit any more.
They remained on the car when I got off at Market a few minutes later
and walked back to my apartment. I made some oatmeal then
went to bed.
And it was all fine! Colors and colors and faces on wheels
zooming in then out, eyelids baggy hanging then stretched tight and
plastered because of rapid movement. In and out in and out,
there are five, six, seven, eight of them. They're like
pistons, eight pistons, neighboring heads never moving in the same
direction, opposite, opposite, powering something, maybe an
engine…their lips are disgusting, and its all the same face,
in and out, in and out, eight times over, four at once coming in, lips
never able to kiss me because of the speed with which they move,
plastered back then sloppily lurched, just like the eyelids.
The skin is saggy, injury prone, seems like it could tear like a
cardboard box, with oil spots that look like they could squirt off, and
now the spots zip off and tap me on the head as I sit in a black
history month chair, knocking on my forehead. Old, the
elderly, the man from the alleyway, the old disgusted man, and now he's
disgusting, pumping in and out, in and out, his head times eight pushed
up, down like a piston, but now the pistons are turning into bodies,
continuing the movement, but bending at the knees instead of the metal
arms like oompa loompas turned sideways, but much older and much
longer, almost reaching me from across the street with their sharp,
stern stabs of their eyebrows, which somehow withstand the massive
effect of air while the lips and eyelids still expand like they're
making room for ping pong balls and contract like they're making
caricatures. The heads are shaking like eight
bobbleheads. In and out in and out never stopping, only
morphing changing into hate of the bearded man, who hates himself why
isn't that enough because there's a god, and now god hisself is
bringin' his cracker ass down hea to reg'late a bit 'fo' all these
sinners burn in the hands of an angry, angry judgment day god, using
war protests as an excuse for self-degradation and pleasure!
Pleasure is for men like the old piston man, happy and withholding,
withholding and happy, inseparable as he gives me a kit kat and then
takes it away, getting off on being withholding but going to heaven to
party with god and both Van Halen brothers and David Lee Roth, looking
down on Sammy Hagar because he makes all that tequila, but definitely
fuckin' partying' with the Boss, and also Sinatra, and Bette Davis for
sure. As James watches form his huge, erect ivory tower it
comes:
IN head
one:
“boy”
OUT.
IN head
two:
“when” OUT.
IN head
three:
“I”
OUT.
IN head
four:
“was”
OUT.
IN head
five:
“in”
OUT.
IN head
six:
“the”
OUT.
IN head
seven
“war”
OUT.
IN head
eight:
“she”
OUT.
IN head
one:
“was”
OUT.
IN head
two,
“all”
OUT.
IN head
three:
“mine.” OUT.
IN OUT IN OUT IN OUT IN OUT IN OUT IN OUT IN OUT INLOUT IN OUT IN OUT
IN OUT IN OUT OUT OUT OUT OUT OUT OUT OUT OUT OUT.
