Whenever anyone tells you that you should spend more time doing one thing and less doing another, ask them why you can’t do both? After all, some of us are phenomenal.
No Subordination
April 15, 2010 By Leave a Comment
So, I was giving myself a psychological exam, in my head (translating thoughts into questions posed by an analyst), and I realized that, I differ from most people in yet another key manner: I don’t think of any source of authority with regard to myself. I feel no subordination to anyone or anything.
For a while, when I had a job, I thought of having a duty, but I never felt subordination to my boss. My religion involves a horizontal, rather than a vertical, sense of hierarchy. I don’t feel subordinate to the clergy. I certainly don’t think of myself as politically subordinate to anyone. The idea of having a “leader”, to me, is nuts. And of course I’m not a neo-fascist spouting off about a “commander in chief” – as though civilians had commanders, or as though military titles carried weight among civilians. In point of fact, the military is subordinate to the civilian powers, not vice versa.
I remember the fundamentalists always talking of “authority”. Always the lingo of fascism – always referring to “the leadership” or “headship” or being “under authority”. Who wants any of those things? Fearful little Mussolini’s perhaps, but not I. Nope – if a tendency to situate oneself as part of a vertical hierarchy of authority were a gene, I was born without it. No wonder I used to get so much flack as a young man over it. It’s one thing for a mature gentleman to feel no subjugation to anything – we can excuse that as eccentricity. But for a young man to demonstrate a complete lack of subordination, we think it abominable.
Yet another Asher characteristic. No sense of submission to anything at all. Nice to know.
Lycanthropy
February 1, 2003 By Leave a Comment
I think I understand something of lycanthropy. This condition, that forces me to eat meat in order to function, even though I find it repulsive upon reflection, is something like that. And the condition of the other person here, also having to have meat to survive, more even than I, means that I have to obtain it quite often. And then, of course, it’s hard for me to resist it, though it’s often bitter to chew.
Dream Last Night
January 18, 2003 By Leave a Comment
In a dream last night:
There was a large party of us that landed on a shore. The settlement was wiped out. We were exploring the ruin. I knew somehow that we needed torches, so I told anyone who would listen to make them. The problem was that we didn’t have but a little gasoline and some branches and somehow it felt as though we didn’t have much time. I could sense evil. Could sense death approaching. And then even though some of the howls were far off, I knew there were wolves in among us. I was trying to light a torch. As it so often is in my dreams, I run more slowly than in real life, drop things, make more mistakes, cannot turn when I need to turn. Whatever is required to defend myself, I cannot make my body respond adequately. It feels like amputation. I couldn’t get my torch adequately lit. You could feel the wolves… in the perimeter, so to speak… upon you but not upon you. Close enough that proximity was a challenge. They were unafraid and intent and confident. And I felt it behind me, turned and saw the yellow eyes. I had to beat the wolves off with branches. The whole party was moving, unwisely, I felt, farther in, seeking more understanding of what had happened, perhaps survivors, refuge from the wolves. There were more of them than us, and they were wild intelligent things bent on destroying us. Not ordinary wolves. Wolves in a nightmare. Somehow we lost the boats. I can’t remember, but I think someone in the party destroyed them. In these kinds of dreams, others around me act irrationally and I can’t prevent them. I can’t speak soon enough or clearly enough against the lot of them. So we were stranded and moving inward. I was attacked again, I think. I remember fighting something along a trail in the woods. I remember death, but I seem to have blocked it out. Bodies destroyed. There’s a leap, then. I don’t know why. I think perhaps I woke up and then fell asleep intot he same dream. That happens a lot. Sometimes many times in a row. I was building a boat. Large for a boat, small for a ship. They said such a boat couldn’t be built, but I kept on building it. And they watched from the bank as it coursed through the waters. They said I shouldn’t take it back because others would want to destroy me for it, punish me for it. That I shouldn’t let it be seen. But I did take it back. I sailed away from that shore. There’s another jump, and I’ve landed. We’re in Korea. There are several of us on the boat, I think. My wife is there. And indeed, we’re drawing some attention, but it’s indirect attention for the most part. Concealed. I remember we spent a little time there, and we were with people priests and deacons, monks too, I think. And then we had to leave. I think we might have been on the shorline port again, once, and saw them coming for us. The Korean police were after us. The Church has a secret way out of that country. A ‘railroad’, of sorts. It was elaborate. Changes of cars. Parking at one place and taking passages through buildings, connecting to residences, back into dark stairs, abandoned areas, and ultimately out into the air again. We had to go blind down stairs or into abandoned open buildings at times. All of them connecting somehow. They kept urging us that we had to hurry, that there was no time, that we had to be absolutely quiet, lest we be heard through the walls. I saw my wife take a wrong turn in the dark. I wanted to tell her but we had to be quiet. I thought she would back up when she saw us going the other way. She didn’t. I was being ushered down stairs. I couldn’t let her be lost. I turned to go back for her, and I was alone. No one behind me. I went back, but I couldn’t find her. There were too many ways to turn where she entered. I called very lightly to her and to the others. No answer. I had to find her. I decided to get help and tried to hurry down the way I thought those in front of me had gone. Tried to catch up to them, to take them back. But no one was there, and I came out on a large hill of rocks on a beautiful beach, a resort, crowded with Westerners speaking French or English, maybe some Russians too. It wasn’t a large hill, so I searched it, but found no one. I was really worried now. Desperate. I went back, realizing how hard it would be to retrace my steps in the dark through that maze of connecting passages, rooms, stairs, and buildings.But I would try. And this time, I would call out loudly for her. I remember stepping into the dark. To my right the wood was a few boards with a lot of space between them. Rotten, a little, I think. Not solid wall. I was going to try to see within that chamber, and then I woke up. I felt the intense need to return to the dream and rescue my wife, at least, even if the police got us. But I couldn’t fall asleep again. And I had, at last, to remind myself that it was a dream, that she was safe, and that I didn’t have to return to it. It strikes me that this dream may be another form of the trapmare that I have, sometimes. The dream from which one can’t escape. And if one wakes, one is plunged into it again in a few minutes by irresistable sleep. Dreams where the irrational prevails.
Writing
April 9, 2002 By Leave a Comment
Writing, my writing, is usually a solitary act, and there are so many pressures from everywhere. The piles of papers in my office are pressures. I have to write in my time for my reasons… I have to find myself writing, so to speak. I can write in community, but it’s a different kind of writing. The kind I’m wanting to do now, to return to, is writing that can’t be pushed in or governed by business of any sort. It has to be the defiant act of a young man luxuriating in the mentality of free time, time to throw the paint of words around, not so much to play as to try things, have fun, find his intensity, his passion, give it words to take shape, the mentality too of guiltlessly buying books and supplies as they may offer the least assistance or impetus or spurring, not pushing himself too hard, and feeling free to take seriously what he even dabbles with, like a boy in an open school, like a young man turned loose in the college/playground/theatre of his own mind, a young man driven to say what he is thinking, and be persuasive, and affect the world, and so coming of age. Then it has to be tempered and cultured by the grown man who wants to write stories, implying something finished, or not unfinished simply from being erratic and undisciplined. And then lastly, it must be shared with someone who is mated to his soul, shaped partly – intentionally – but not entirely by the knowledge that he will share it. And then it becomes a dialogue, coming out of solitude. At least, I think these things are true.April 2002
Paying
February 5, 2002 By Leave a Comment
You tell a person there’s a reason to live
And he lives because he believes you
That makes you responsible for him being alive
However much he may have picked up the will to live
You held it out to him
You fathered and he mothered the life
And no, you can’t live it for him
But yes, you can’t simply expect him to forget it
And show him the door and say “you don’t owe me anything”
Even if you do nothing else
You can’t tell him not to let it matter
You can’t expect him to go quietly
You can’t tell him to “forget it”
Because when he was finally ready
To let it all slip away
You stopped him
Made him know what it’s like
To want life for a reason
You showed him what it looks like
To be loved
Through your eyes
So if he calls your name
And if you matter to him
As much as life does
That’s the price you pay
February 5, 2002
Defiance
December 25, 2001 By Leave a Comment
Welcome
November 3, 2001 By Leave a Comment
Asher Black opens the tall oaken doors that moan on their hinges. It is quite apparent that he has no butler. He is wearing a black smoking jacket, black reverse pleated gaberdine wool trousers, and black leather house slippers. He is smoking a black sandblast 90 degree drop briar pipe that smells at once spicy, pungent, and aromatic.
“Do come in,” he invites. “I hope you’ll be comfortable here, that you’ve brought writing, or at least your excellent minds, and will be pleased to stay for some time.”
Plot
July 15, 2000 By Leave a Comment
A man plans to bomb an auto dealership at night because his aging maternal grandfather was fired by the dealership’s manager to make room for younger, cheaper salesmen. He enlists the aid of one of the salesmen of the dealership. He convinces the salesman to help him. Before the bombing takes place the original planner changes him mind; the risk of harming someone is too great. The salesman, however, continues with a version of the plan. The dealership is destroyed. The salesman, however, is killed in the bombing. From a need for catharsis, the original planner then takes a job as an automobile salesman and is eventually promoted. Some time later, the manager of the destroyed dealership comes to work for him as a now aging salesman. Faced with the opportunity to repay the man for firing his grandfather and for the death of the salesman, the planner has to choose between revenge and his own ethos. He decides to allow the salesman to work out his days at the dealership without prejudice. The salesman, however, discovers the manager’s role in the bombing and has him charged with the crime, upon which he is promoted to the salesman’s place as manager. Hearing another prisoner talk of his father’s poor but honorable little business and the respect he has earned in his community, the planner, awaiting his fate, concludes that there is no justice in the world, no just revenge, and no glory in the dead salesman’s end. Instead, what matters is life lived creating justice in and around oneself, drawing in all that can be made just by it.
Dialgogue
July 15, 2000 By Leave a Comment
So you want to blow something up?
No, not just any kind of something. Something in particular.
And why are you telling me this?
Because you also want to blow up something.
You’re nuts.
Probably. So what?
What do I want to blow up?
You’ll settle for anything. You don’t have anything particular in mind. Just something will do.
I see. And how did you come to this conclusion?
You haven’t focused your anger, your hostility, your sense of dreadful destiny. That’s because you don’t yet know the source of your oppression. You don’t yet know your oppressor.
Dreadful destiny?!? Oppression?!?
Laughter is good. You should go with that – with your ability to cover your emotions with laughter. You might very well need it for what we’re going to do.
I don’t believe this. And what is it we’re going to do, according to you?
We’re going to discover together at what precisely you are angry. And then we’re going to blow it up.
That’d be my boss. He oughta be blown up, but I’m no murderer.
What if your boss quit work today, what then?
They’d just hire someone else like him, possibly even worse.
Exactly. So then is your boss really the primary object of your anger, or is it something that can be killed without committing murder?
It’s the whole environment, the whole system at my job, and at every job like it.
Well, let’s let other people worry about other jobs like it. Talk to me about *your* job.
You’re talking about blowing up the dealership. This is crazy.
No, *you’re* talking about it, and I don’t think your crazy. Do you?
All right, let’s say hypothetically I blew up the dealership, then I’d lose my job, most likely everything I own, and I’d go to prison.
Perhaps. Suppose for just a moment that you only lost your job. How would that stack up against blowing up the dealership.
I can always get another job. I’m still not too old, and I can feel it coming anyway – the day they fire me to make room for younger blood.
All right, so it is possible that the only thing you’d lose is something that you’re going to lose anyway, only in this case you’ll be in control of it.
I guess that’s possible.
Character
July 15, 2000 By Leave a Comment
The sales work wasn’t that rough. It’s all about knowing people, after all. Oh yes, and about positive thinking. No one ever did anything for themselves without believing that things would work out for his benefit. It wasn’t lying either, telling that old couple that I was thinking of buying that car for my wife. It was telling them what they wanted to hear, what they needed to hear. And they would be as happy – happier – with that car, as with any other. Hadn’t they felt better about buying it, knowing they were stealing it from someone else. Getting something practically for free, an edge over someone else, didn’t that make it easier for them to part with their savings? And that’s what it took. They were going to steal from my wife, if I’d actually had a wife, and yet I didn’t hold it against them. I gave them a steal of a deal. All things work together for good, and what’s good is good for me.
And the boss, he’s just doing his job. Larry. He just wants to motivate me. Telling me I have to sell 20% more than last year, which was 20% more than the year before that. If I give 110% of myself, he said, I could do it. He believes in me. I do to, I guess. I have to. It’s me and only me that determines if I get to stay in this job, and there’s only me to blame otherwise. Last week when they let Mr. Felka go, that was understandable. He wasn’t making his quota. They really let him stay longer than they had to. He’ll be happier now that he has more time on his hands. He was looking forward to retirement. It’s just a little earlier, after all. And he doesn’t really need the full retirement package. Where’s he going to go, and old man like that? He never took a vacation in his life. He was always here, trying to sell cars. And then last week Larry finally tells him that he needs a break. He could’ve died working himself like that, and then it would look bad for the dealership. And severance pay – they’re phasing that out, anyway. Not fair if he were to get it, when no one else will. No, Larry did the right thing if you ask me.
Pretty soon my hair will go from white to gray. But I’m not like Mr. Felka. No sir-ee-bob. I think positive, which is why I can’t afford to give that old man much thought. He made his own bed. It’s not up to me.
“Hi Larry. That was a sweet deal, eh – that old couple driving away in that Chrysler. You’ll have to drive something else home on the weekends, now.”
“Yeah, I’m swinging back. I’ll be up 20% over next year easy if I keep this up.”
“No. Felka was dead wood. You did what you had to do. I’d've done the same thing if I was in your shoes. After all, you have to answer for the whole company. Like you say, you were doing him a favor. It’s just that you’re compassionate, that’s all, so it’s kind of hard to know if when you’re doing the right thing. In this case, I’d say you definitely did.”
“Yeah, young blood is what we need all right! Gotta keep those tankers moving.”
Why was he looking at me so funny? Ah, he’s just trying to figure out if I think he should feel guilty. Serves him right, canning old Mr. Felka. Of course he’s right, though. That’s what I have to be – that ruthless… no, that committed, if I’m going to hang onto my job. I might even outlast Larry, if the corporate boys figure out their paying him too much. Hell, I might even have his job before long. I’ve just gotta keep up this uphill climb, keep Larry off my back, so he doesn’t have a good reason to… I just need to think positive. Positive. Positive.
Setting
July 15, 2000 By Leave a Comment
The tables were sticky. It didn’t matter where one would move. Pull out a chair… it was sticky too. Dim lighting didn’t hide it. Even the missing bulbs at some of the booths failed to conceal the tacky syrupy sheen over everything. Even the waitresses seemed to have it. I wondered if, bumping into one of them, I’d have to pull my loose shirttail from her as though it’d been caught in taffy. The booth-backs were straight as boards, since that’s what they were – boards covered with a janitorial grey vinyl, like smooth icing on maple cake, punctuated only by a column of tufted buttons on each side. One had to lean forward – towards the slime – as soon as one sat down. Like the thickly caked makeup on a faded southern belle, someone had tried to liven it all up with a plastic garland arond each of the suspended lights, which were in fact suspended over the black treadmarked tables only by their black electrical cords from the black foam ceiling panels. There were the usual pufferies: a smoke plastic rack of 1-inch jelly tubs on each table, a shaker of white sugar, some sweet and low packets, salt, pepper. There wasn’t a napkin in sight. Not anywhere. Nothing with which to create a sanitary spot. There was perhaps one ashtray on every fifth table in the designated smoking area, so designated by the occasional stray ash or butt. It is as though any possibility of sensory pleasure had deserted along with any hope of hygiene. One waitress with swampy black hair and a lazy eye which it was difficult not to watch stood resting with arms crossed over the back of one booth. Another sat on a stool at the counter, holding two yellowy fingers to her mouth in which was a half-spent slim brown cigarette, staring vacantly from sunken black spots that could almost have been eyes. I didn’t look at the carpet, fearing it might be the one thing that remained alive after the holocaust that was this diner. The pie cooler chugged away. Something made an occasional shuffling sound through the window to the kitchen. Olivia Newton John crooned, barely audible, over the ceiling speakers – “You have to believe it is magic.” And it was. Black magic, with eye of newt no doubt today’s special.
Waiting
June 9, 1997 By Leave a Comment
