I like this place

[dddrum]

I found the note, crumpled and faded and smelling a bit of cigar smoke and ashes, sitting atop the pile of rubbish outside the bar. it was a handwritten bit of scribbling on three by five index card. the girl I was with at the time peered over my shoulder as we tried to decipher it's meaning. Her hair spilled over my shoulder as she nuzzled against my neck. Her perfume made me a little dizzy, a little weak in my knees. Here's what we could make out in the slow flashing hum of the neon light.

"leaving

Registered: Apr 2003
Location: up on the hill
Posts: 5526


Thanks everyone, I'm quite enjoying myself since I stumbled across this community. I hate babies. Is this a story? Why yes, it is.

"Its a story,
'bout a brand new monkey.
that was happy to be hanging with us peeps.
All of us with wits of gold
like our mentor
a man we call Ze Frank,"
sung to tune of the Brady Bunch theme song, ran through my head over and over as i tried to make sense of my new and wildly interesting surroundings.

A new community. A new life. No babies. Yes, this is what I have been waiting for. And this is my story."

it made very little sense at the time. But later, as the months passed and the girl and I grew apart, sense started to emerge. I still have the note pinned to my bulletin board.

I was just an ordinary kid I suppose. My life went on without adventure or accident. It was pleasant enough. Being unremarkable wasn't proving to be any great burden. In fact, i found being unremarkable put most people at ease with me. Making friends was easy since I posed no challenge to anyone's ego, rather the opposite was true. Boys and girls throughout my grade school years often found solace in the sense of superiority they imagined they felt toward me. I was the perpetual mascot, No one ever saw me coming. I was below the radar. What comfort.

30 years later, I got a message from God. At least I think it was God. He looked a lot like John Stewart, and he was on TV on something called the “Daily Show.” He told me that this was my moment of zen. That’s when I realized that my calling in life was to paint people’s houses. “Good thing that’s what I already do,” I smugly told myself and laughed.

I was late for the boat today, the president said 'glad you could make it...you must be pretty special to keep a boat waiting for you...I said...yes..in some circles, smiled and walked to the bar.....

Benny was there, as always, practicing with the grenadine and orange juice. Every night, some schmuck would order a Tequila Sunrise just to watch Benny's huge round face pucker up, making a face slightly resembling Harpo's gookie. It was always a spectacle and people love spectacles. Benny and Marge commanded the bar. That was a fact. Their presence at the bar was enforced by some unwritten rule that everyone abided by. They would sit on their stools, always at some distance from each other, never one right beside the other, Benny to the left, Marge further to the right, and glare at each other. Everyone knew what was coming, yet they took their time, savouring the moment.

I watched. That's what I usually do. Everything normal, nothing unexpected. My life was a series of paper dolls cut out of flowered wallpaper, the pattern differing slightly with each doll, but all cut from the same roll. Pleasant. Except for the babies. They kept eating my paper dolls.

I feel that subtle inner ear sensation tells told me the boat is about to leave dock, the release of the mooring ropes and shift of several hundred pounds of rope off of the port side of our ship as they are taken off by the dock crew, the light touch on the throttles by the helmsman, a almost palpable sense of anticipation that flowed through the craft just before actual movement took place...yes, there it is, now I felt the surge of the motors take charge of our craft as it swung out into the harbor.
Something about this trip felt different than the usual ferry trip. Perhaps it was the presence of the "tool" on board this trip. Note to self, reduce his campaign contributions next time just a bit. Don't want to let the employees go thinking they can adress me familiarly like that in the future.

still, i have to question, is this a story? could it be that i've just strung together bits of cabbage and sealing wax, shreds of dignity and old newspaper. a mache abstract full of spit and fulminated mercury and signifying nothing. the ship was one night, the bar, i think another. they were connected by only one thing, a subtle whisp of a connection that maybe i alone could discern. a scent, perhaps. an atmosphere beyond the cigar smoke and tinkling of martini glasses. there was the quiet subterfuge of old love seeking renewal through intoxication and small talk. if only i could focus, perhaps you might understand where i was headed.

If only I could focus... Sometimes my mind jumps from one theme to another with little apparent reason. It's like a succession of different voices inhabit my mind, each one trying to move me toward a certain destiny, only for the next voice to jerk me towards another, contradictory, destiny. If only I could focus... Is my life a story? What kind of story? Is it story with meaning, with a moral? Or am I tossed from scene to scene for some higher beings idle amusement to be left in limbo when the interest has passed? I can only think that whoever it is that is now writes this story is without any great talent for literature. But all this is absurd. If only I could focus... now where was I headed?

Does it really matter where I am headed? Perhaps it is my own arogance to presume that I can even begin to controll the direction my personal story takes. Arrogance?. Maybe it is just some kind of controll issue with me. Perhaps I need to practice letting go of some of that. After all, everyone around me has effect on which direction I go from minute to minute. I might think I am headed that way when suddenly a voice, a smile, a wave, or even an auto wreck could sublty or radically alter my destination. Am I the author of my story or just one of the characters in it? Focus, focus, I'm thinkin I should just make sure to take lots of pictures along the way.

Mind like the lens, pushing subtle background noise to where it belongs. Focus, focus... great minds speak of navels, breathing. Mine's not so great- only makes me think of oranges, orgasms. Skinny bits of white membrane stuck to the skin. What does it all mean? Absently, I start humming Pink Floyd. The woman behind me taps my shoulder.

"Oh, Hi Marge" I said. It was Marge.
"I saw you at the bar with Benny".
"Benny!" she says, rolling her eyes, "Benny's always at the bar".
I thought the same could be said of her, but I just smiled and said nought. I had met Benny and Marge when I had painted their house a few years ago. Flamingo Pink outside, Canary Yellow inside. In those days they were like two lovebirds. I was on the outside looking in. At first, I didn't realise that it was a cage I was looking into.

It's easier sometimes.. to be ignorant, not to know... "comfortably numb".

But you had to notice Marge. She wasn't a beautiful woman. She wasn't young. But she made you look. It was not intentional, mind you, but you had to notice her. There was something really odd about Marge.. the way her nails were always perfectly done - a bright bright shade of coral red. Her eyes were a clear green and her hair made you think of 50s housewives conduct books.

Beyond the green was a forest. I liked to go there sometimes. The trees, and the gentle bellowing growl of a panther snoring. The raucous cries of wild parrots, and the hissing of assorted large spiders and snakes. Yes, here was where I finally felt at peace. A green glowing fungus stood against the black shadows in the green canopy of trees. I feel a kind of wildness that makes me want to stare into the darkness, crouched, poised for a sudden attack, like a wild beast. My eyes widened and my lips curled into a smile. Tonight, I will crush my prey.

Babies . . . Babies in the forest, abandoned to die because their parents believed the prophecy. But the prophecy must always come true, however it happens. If I eat the baby, gnawing with sharp white teeth, a carnivore of the mind, will I not only take on its destiny for my own? If I absorb this bundle of potential, of innocent life waiting to explode, will it finally fill me and complete me? I feel that I am only half a man, sometimes.

There. In the space between the thrumming of the bullfrogs and the crickets' signal-song. A high, reedy wail. I shot out all of my senses across the green darkness like an ethereal net. There was my prey, trembling behind elephantine leaves that dripped, drooped with humidity over its tender form, betraying itself with one keening note of despair. It was all I needed. My radar locked in, my nostrils flaring at the sweet, familiar pungency, I sprang forward with unimaginable speed, and a terrible purpose.