Was it hot?
Imagine zipping yourself into the heaviest clothes and winter coat you own, stepping into a sauna, and wrapping yourself in a wool blanket. Now be thankful that I didn't ask you to imagine being on the boat John Mitchell was on that day because it made the situation I just described seem pleasant by comparison.
John tried to take his mind off the heat and the flies and the cigarette smoke and the smell of diesel fuel and rotting fish by re-reading the information he had on his target, Aman Umoja--Aman--the visionary musical prophet of Africa. Not that he needed to. As an archivist for Polydor Records--but more importantly, as a lifelong music lover--he was very familiar with Aman's story. It was the stuff of legend.
Aman was born sometime in the late 1940s in Kindu, in the Democratic Republic of Congo (then the Republic of Congo) to a prostitute, who died while giving birth. His father was unknown, but was believed to have been a soldier or musician (or both).
In a sense, though, Aman was a child of many parents. He grew up in the brothel where his mother had worked, and was raised by the women she had worked with. They were the ones who named him Aman, which means trust or safety in Arabic, in the hopes that he would enjoy both throughout his life. Aman was also an appropriate name for him because of his unusually large size as a child--He was the size of a man.
Aman didn't have any formal education. He learned everything he knew about the world by helping out the women--he called them all his mothers--in the house. When he wasn't doing whatever needed doing, he was learning piano, guitar, violin, and various percussion and wind instruments--as well as many different musical styles--from the musicians who frequented the brothel. It was because of his masterful ability to bring together all musical instruments and styles that his mothers gave him the surname of Umoja, meaning unity in Swahili.
John Mitchell slapped at flies the size of hummingbirds as his boat puttered along the river. He was making his way to the village of Kilanja, a distant tributary of the Congo. It was here that he hoped to find the master tapes of the Kinshasa Sessions, the legendary recordings Aman had made in the early 1970s. Part librarian, part obsessive/compulsive detective, and part musicological Indiana Jones, John had spent the better part of the past three years making phone calls, writing letters, combing the Internet, chasing ghosts, pursuing every imaginable lead, and coming up empty handed every time in his quest for the Kinshasa tapes.
But this was it. He'd finally traced the tapes to a record company's vault in Kilanja. And now a journey that had started in New York City and seen John pass through Frankfurt, Nairobi, Kinshasa, and onto a rusted out fishing boat on the Congo, was quickly reaching its conclusion. He took a drink from a hot bottle of Coca Cola that mocked his thirst rather than quenching it, and returned to his file on Aman.
When he was 16 years old, Aman moved to London where he secured a scholarship at London's prestigious Conservatory of the Arts. Bored, Aman dropped out after a semester, choosing instead to play music on street corners and the occasional club. When the weather turned cold, he stowed away on various freight trains and cargo ships and made his way to Calcutta, where he spent the next 12 years jamming with local musicians and helping to create Afro-hindu, Ghunjaba, Shank, and other hybrids of African and Subcontinental music.
In the 1960s he converted to Islam and returned to Africa. Much of his musical output from the mid to late 1960s was marked by Middle Eastern and North African instrumentation and phrasings. His masterwork of this period was the double-album Allahu Akbar, an intense, psychedelic, musical interpretation of the Koran, which many musicologists describe as a Muslim Love Supreme.
After arriving at the docks of Kilanja, John's bus ride into the town's center was an outstretched middle finger to the idea of safety and restraint, but he made it, and he (eventually) found his way to the offices of the ironically if not ambitiously named Skyscraper Records. (Two Story Records would have been a more apt name.) There he met Thierry Diawara, the professorial archivist with whom he'd exchanged several snail mail letters over the last several months. After pleasantries and tea, they went together to the vault.
The vault was more of a shed, a shack of cinder blocks with a rusty iron door sitting in the middle of a small walled-in courtyard behind Skyscraper Records' offices. Thierry fumbled with the keys, and John felt the build up of three plus years of anticipation, hope and fear coursing through every nerve ending in his body. This was it. The Kinshasa Sessions' master tapes were behind that door. Just before getting to see them, getting to hear them, John's mind raced through the back story of the Kinshasa Sessions one final time.
Aman left Islam in 1971 and went back to recording secular music. This was when he traveled to Kinshasa, and for six weeks during that sweltering summer he recorded almost around the clock. These sessions, the Kinshasa Sessions, were the missing link in Aman's career, the transitional recordings between the spiritual music of his Muslim years and the otherworldly transcendent funk of his stratospheric pan-African superstar years, the music that precipitated his ascendancy to the realm of prophet. Music that quite possibly no one had heard since it was recorded. Music that got lost and shuffled around and recovered and lost again and found and hidden under a rock and now here it was again. It was like if Bob Marley had a missing album that he'd recorded just before Exodus, or Nirvana just before Nevermind, or Dylan just before Blood on the Tracks, or the Beatles just before Abbey Road, or Prince just before Purple Rain, or Miles Davis just before Bitches Brew, or Sly just before There's a Riot Goin' On, or any other legendary artist just before an iconic, genre defining album. The Kinshasa Sessions had the potential to be all those things and more.
Thierry opened the door. The tapes were ruined.
Nobody had gone into the vault for years, but the roof had leaked, and rats had infested the place. The room was a mess of melted, chewed-through cardboard and reels of unspooled tape. Nothing was salvageable. This was it, the end of the trail. The Kinshasa Sessions were no longer. Their music exists only in our imagination.
Friday, May 7, 2010
Thursday, May 6, 2010
May 6 - The Hero
The last two soldiers were pinned down by enemy fire, terribly outnumbered. The situation was hopeless . . .
And then a man in a huge, shiny suit of yellow and red armor burst in. The soldiers cheered his arrival.
"Yeah, motherfuckers!" yelled one of the soldiers. "You better run away as fast as you can! Iron Man lives again!" Part of him felt really stupid as soon as he said it, but then he figured, Screw it. Iron Man!
Only, why was he cowering behind the bunker? Why wasn't he flying around and shooting bad guys and deflecting bullets and fearlessly kicking untold amounts of ass?
The man in the yellow and red armor ran through the firefight and joined the soldiers in the other bunker. They stared at him as he took off his helmet. Despite the grave danger they were all in, eventually awkwardness got the better of him.
"What?"
"No offense, but we were expecting you to be considerably more, you know, badass," said the first soldier.
"Yeah, we figured your armor would be iron instead of--what the fuck is this?--cardboard? We thought you were bulletproof and could fly, and shit like that," said the second.
"Oh right," said the man in the armor. "Sorry. I get that a lot. You're thinking of Iron Man."
"Right. Ain't that you?"
"Ha ha. No, I wish. No, I'm not Iron Man. I'm Irony Man."
"Wow, we totally weren't expecting you," said the first soldier.
"Yeah, we absolutely did not see that coming," added the second.
"Yeah," said Irony Man. "Pretty cool twist, huh?"
"No, not really," said the first soldier.
"Totally," said the second. "This whole shitty situation is like rain on your wedding day."
And then they laughed. The three of them laughed. They laughed and laughed and laughed. And when they stopped laughing, all the bad guys were gone. Which was kind of ironic.
Don't you think?
And then a man in a huge, shiny suit of yellow and red armor burst in. The soldiers cheered his arrival.
"Yeah, motherfuckers!" yelled one of the soldiers. "You better run away as fast as you can! Iron Man lives again!" Part of him felt really stupid as soon as he said it, but then he figured, Screw it. Iron Man!
Only, why was he cowering behind the bunker? Why wasn't he flying around and shooting bad guys and deflecting bullets and fearlessly kicking untold amounts of ass?
The man in the yellow and red armor ran through the firefight and joined the soldiers in the other bunker. They stared at him as he took off his helmet. Despite the grave danger they were all in, eventually awkwardness got the better of him.
"What?"
"No offense, but we were expecting you to be considerably more, you know, badass," said the first soldier.
"Yeah, we figured your armor would be iron instead of--what the fuck is this?--cardboard? We thought you were bulletproof and could fly, and shit like that," said the second.
"Oh right," said the man in the armor. "Sorry. I get that a lot. You're thinking of Iron Man."
"Right. Ain't that you?"
"Ha ha. No, I wish. No, I'm not Iron Man. I'm Irony Man."
"Wow, we totally weren't expecting you," said the first soldier.
"Yeah, we absolutely did not see that coming," added the second.
"Yeah," said Irony Man. "Pretty cool twist, huh?"
"No, not really," said the first soldier.
"Totally," said the second. "This whole shitty situation is like rain on your wedding day."
And then they laughed. The three of them laughed. They laughed and laughed and laughed. And when they stopped laughing, all the bad guys were gone. Which was kind of ironic.
Don't you think?
Wednesday, May 5, 2010
May 5 - The Bridge
Although the cliff top villages of Mijiland and Xeronovia were practically adjacent, it would have been impossible for someone to walk from one of the villages to the other. At their closest point, they were about 200 feet apart, and there was no bridge connecting them.
Several hundred feet below the villages, a raging sea surged and crashed on a strip of rocks and boulders that formed a sort of land bridge between the cliffs upon which the villages were built; however, the land bridge was inaccessible from both villages. The cliffs were too high and sheer to climb down, and even if you survived the descent, it would have been impossible to climb back up.
Although Mijiland and Xeronovia were literally a stone's throw away from each other, they didn't interact at all. Hundreds of years ago, the peoples of the two villages had traded with each other by throwing goods across the divide, but those trades had long since collapsed over mutual allegations of violating the other tribe's trust. Since then, there had been no contact between the two villages. They may have been right next to each other, but they may as well have been worlds apart.
One day, upon reaching his 20th birthday, brave and stoic Mijilander Altus Begenchovatt went through the series of coming of age rituals that all Mijilanders went through when they reached the Mijilander age of adulthood. He completed--and aced--the oral exam given by the Mijilander elders. He performed the Mijilander Hot Foot, a ceremonial dance performed on hot coals. And he hunted, killed, butchered, and cooked a wild boar.
One task remained: to drink a flagon of fermented kamonichaida juice and ritualistically connect himself with the sea below by urinating into it from the highest cliff in Mijiland without getting so much as a drop on the rocks below. Every bit of it had to land in the ocean.
He drank the juice, climbed to his spot, and readied himself. This was it.
But just before he began, a huge gust of wind knocked him off the cliff and he plummeted into the angry waters below.
Miraculously, he survived the fall and swam to the land bridge that connected the cliffs upon which Mijilander and Xeronovia were built. He was safe but stuck. There was no way for him to climb back up, so he survived on food thrown to him by the Mijilanders, and at night he slept on pillows and cushions they dropped to him.
At about the same time in Xeronovia, wise and resourceful Mergendaya Shinihatoot also reached her 20th birthday and set about completing the rituals that marked Xeronovians' coming of age. She passed the oral exam of her tribe's history and culture administered by the Xeronovian Senior Council. She harvested the fruit of an entire jombwala tree. And she domesticated a full-sized razor toad using only her bare hands.
One task remained: to pick a Xeronovian Iris from the cliff side and transplant it in front of her chosen new home.
She spotted the one she wanted, took a deep breath, and stretched out to pick it up; however, just as she was stretched out as far as she could go, the rock she was holding onto crumbled and she plummeted to the sea.
Incredibly, she survived and swam to the land bridge where she was helped out of the water by Altus. It was the first time a Xeronovian and a Mijilander had ever met face to face.
As they couldn't understand each other's language, getting properly acquainted took some time; however, time was the one thing they had plenty of. Neither tribe had the technology or know how to attempt a rescue, and everyone involved--Altus and Mergendaya and everyone in their respective tribes--resigned themselves to the fact that the two young adults were stuck on the land bridge and would likely spend the rest of their lives there together.
The days turned into weeks and then months, and Altus and Mergendaya developed their own pidgin language, a hybrid of Mijilander and Xeronovian. They survived on the foods and drinks their tribes dropped to them, and combined them together in ways that were sometimes inedible and sometimes transcendent.
They also got to know each other, and their respective tribes, better. They counted on each other, developed a mutual trust, and quickly found that they enjoyed each other's company immensely.
Because of daily food and supply drops from both sides of the divide, the Xeronovians and Mijilanders on top of the cliffs got used to seeing each other, and as time went on both tribes began following the cooperative lead of Altus and Mergendaya. Trade resumed between the Xeronovians and Mijilanders, tentatively at first, but soon more robustly. Commerce and other relations between the two tribes were helped along by a sign language involving colored flags that Altus and Mergendaya had created so that they could communicate with their families above.
Months passed.
Altus and Mergendaya had their first child almost exactly two years after their falls. Their second came just 18 months later.
Relations between the tribes continued apace. Work soon began on a suspension bridge connecting the two villages, and it was completed by the time Altus and Mergendaya had their third child. The bridge brought the two villages together not only physically, but also socially and culturally.
Meanwhile, as their children grew older, Altus and Mergendaya decided that they wanted them to have a life beyond that which was afforded by their land bridge. It was decided that the same technology that led to the suspension bridge would be adapted to create a pulley ladder for transporting people up and down the cliffs.
And so several months later, the five of them went up the cliffs, Altus and Mergendaya for the first time in several years, their children for the first time ever. While it was a tremendous change for all of them, it wasn't completely and shockingly new. There had been communication among all of them since their falls--so much so that Altus and Mergendaya both felt that they already knew their in-laws. They integrated into life on the cliff tops very smoothly, as did their children.
They split their time between Xeronovia and Mijiland, and founded a language school where they taught Xeronovian, Mijilander, and Mijinovian, the hybrid language they'd created at the base of the cliffs. And when their children were old enough to run it on their own, Altus and Mergendaya retired from teaching.
Although they still spent a lot of time in Xeronovia and Mijiland, they spent most of their golden years together on the land bridge they'd made their home all those years ago.
Several hundred feet below the villages, a raging sea surged and crashed on a strip of rocks and boulders that formed a sort of land bridge between the cliffs upon which the villages were built; however, the land bridge was inaccessible from both villages. The cliffs were too high and sheer to climb down, and even if you survived the descent, it would have been impossible to climb back up.
Although Mijiland and Xeronovia were literally a stone's throw away from each other, they didn't interact at all. Hundreds of years ago, the peoples of the two villages had traded with each other by throwing goods across the divide, but those trades had long since collapsed over mutual allegations of violating the other tribe's trust. Since then, there had been no contact between the two villages. They may have been right next to each other, but they may as well have been worlds apart.
One day, upon reaching his 20th birthday, brave and stoic Mijilander Altus Begenchovatt went through the series of coming of age rituals that all Mijilanders went through when they reached the Mijilander age of adulthood. He completed--and aced--the oral exam given by the Mijilander elders. He performed the Mijilander Hot Foot, a ceremonial dance performed on hot coals. And he hunted, killed, butchered, and cooked a wild boar.
One task remained: to drink a flagon of fermented kamonichaida juice and ritualistically connect himself with the sea below by urinating into it from the highest cliff in Mijiland without getting so much as a drop on the rocks below. Every bit of it had to land in the ocean.
He drank the juice, climbed to his spot, and readied himself. This was it.
But just before he began, a huge gust of wind knocked him off the cliff and he plummeted into the angry waters below.
Miraculously, he survived the fall and swam to the land bridge that connected the cliffs upon which Mijilander and Xeronovia were built. He was safe but stuck. There was no way for him to climb back up, so he survived on food thrown to him by the Mijilanders, and at night he slept on pillows and cushions they dropped to him.
At about the same time in Xeronovia, wise and resourceful Mergendaya Shinihatoot also reached her 20th birthday and set about completing the rituals that marked Xeronovians' coming of age. She passed the oral exam of her tribe's history and culture administered by the Xeronovian Senior Council. She harvested the fruit of an entire jombwala tree. And she domesticated a full-sized razor toad using only her bare hands.
One task remained: to pick a Xeronovian Iris from the cliff side and transplant it in front of her chosen new home.
She spotted the one she wanted, took a deep breath, and stretched out to pick it up; however, just as she was stretched out as far as she could go, the rock she was holding onto crumbled and she plummeted to the sea.
Incredibly, she survived and swam to the land bridge where she was helped out of the water by Altus. It was the first time a Xeronovian and a Mijilander had ever met face to face.
As they couldn't understand each other's language, getting properly acquainted took some time; however, time was the one thing they had plenty of. Neither tribe had the technology or know how to attempt a rescue, and everyone involved--Altus and Mergendaya and everyone in their respective tribes--resigned themselves to the fact that the two young adults were stuck on the land bridge and would likely spend the rest of their lives there together.
The days turned into weeks and then months, and Altus and Mergendaya developed their own pidgin language, a hybrid of Mijilander and Xeronovian. They survived on the foods and drinks their tribes dropped to them, and combined them together in ways that were sometimes inedible and sometimes transcendent.
They also got to know each other, and their respective tribes, better. They counted on each other, developed a mutual trust, and quickly found that they enjoyed each other's company immensely.
Because of daily food and supply drops from both sides of the divide, the Xeronovians and Mijilanders on top of the cliffs got used to seeing each other, and as time went on both tribes began following the cooperative lead of Altus and Mergendaya. Trade resumed between the Xeronovians and Mijilanders, tentatively at first, but soon more robustly. Commerce and other relations between the two tribes were helped along by a sign language involving colored flags that Altus and Mergendaya had created so that they could communicate with their families above.
Months passed.
Altus and Mergendaya had their first child almost exactly two years after their falls. Their second came just 18 months later.
Relations between the tribes continued apace. Work soon began on a suspension bridge connecting the two villages, and it was completed by the time Altus and Mergendaya had their third child. The bridge brought the two villages together not only physically, but also socially and culturally.
Meanwhile, as their children grew older, Altus and Mergendaya decided that they wanted them to have a life beyond that which was afforded by their land bridge. It was decided that the same technology that led to the suspension bridge would be adapted to create a pulley ladder for transporting people up and down the cliffs.
And so several months later, the five of them went up the cliffs, Altus and Mergendaya for the first time in several years, their children for the first time ever. While it was a tremendous change for all of them, it wasn't completely and shockingly new. There had been communication among all of them since their falls--so much so that Altus and Mergendaya both felt that they already knew their in-laws. They integrated into life on the cliff tops very smoothly, as did their children.
They split their time between Xeronovia and Mijiland, and founded a language school where they taught Xeronovian, Mijilander, and Mijinovian, the hybrid language they'd created at the base of the cliffs. And when their children were old enough to run it on their own, Altus and Mergendaya retired from teaching.
Although they still spent a lot of time in Xeronovia and Mijiland, they spent most of their golden years together on the land bridge they'd made their home all those years ago.
Monday, May 3, 2010
May 4 - Meeting for Lunch
When she arrived at the park, he was already there, sitting on a park bench waiting for her.
He was sitting cross-legged, and his pant leg was hiking up his shin so she could see his white shin where his socks weren't high enough. Standing back so that he couldn't see her, she watched him check his cell for messages: nothing.
From where she was standing, it looked to her like he was having some sort of inner monologue or dialogue with himself because occasionally he would tilt his head or change his expression slightly, as if in response to a point that only he was privy to.
Who is this guy? she thought to herself, and not for the first time. How is it that he is the one I'm meeting? She looked at his shins and tube socks socks and tennis shoes, and then at his growing pot belly that he always made jokes about--as if acknowledging it was enough, as if self-deprecating humor about it was his way of telling her he knew it was there and he was going to do something about it, only he never did. 'I swear I'm starting my diet tomorrow. Seriously,' he'd laugh as he polished off another donut. Minutes later, there would still be powdered sugar on his upper lip. She used to laugh along with him. Then she just smiled. Then she didn't even look up from the paper anymore.
'I'm up for whatever,' he would always say, convinced that that was the answer to her prayers, as if she would be delighted to have finally found a man who was flexible and willing to do whatever she wanted to do. And she had to admit that at first it had been nice to make decisions and have someone be there with her. But the longer they stayed together, the harder it became to ignore the suspicion that he wasn't really open-minded. He just didn't have any ideas of his own.
It was the same with work, and the way he would wax philosophical and share his ideas about the dangers of working too much. There's more to life than just work, he would say. You gotta take the time to enjoy yourself. Only, what did he ever do?
It wasn't like they'd started out this way. If they had, they never would have gotten anywhere. If it had been this way from the beginning, she would never have gotten that involved with him.
But it wasn't that way, it was gradual, subliminal. It wasn't one big thing, it was a million minuscule ones, microscopic compromises that only really added up to something unignorable once years had passed and it was too late to change.
An older couple walked by walking a poodle. A group of kids ran by kicking a soccer ball. And she walked up and kissed him hello, and they went to lunch.
He was sitting cross-legged, and his pant leg was hiking up his shin so she could see his white shin where his socks weren't high enough. Standing back so that he couldn't see her, she watched him check his cell for messages: nothing.
From where she was standing, it looked to her like he was having some sort of inner monologue or dialogue with himself because occasionally he would tilt his head or change his expression slightly, as if in response to a point that only he was privy to.
Who is this guy? she thought to herself, and not for the first time. How is it that he is the one I'm meeting? She looked at his shins and tube socks socks and tennis shoes, and then at his growing pot belly that he always made jokes about--as if acknowledging it was enough, as if self-deprecating humor about it was his way of telling her he knew it was there and he was going to do something about it, only he never did. 'I swear I'm starting my diet tomorrow. Seriously,' he'd laugh as he polished off another donut. Minutes later, there would still be powdered sugar on his upper lip. She used to laugh along with him. Then she just smiled. Then she didn't even look up from the paper anymore.
'I'm up for whatever,' he would always say, convinced that that was the answer to her prayers, as if she would be delighted to have finally found a man who was flexible and willing to do whatever she wanted to do. And she had to admit that at first it had been nice to make decisions and have someone be there with her. But the longer they stayed together, the harder it became to ignore the suspicion that he wasn't really open-minded. He just didn't have any ideas of his own.
It was the same with work, and the way he would wax philosophical and share his ideas about the dangers of working too much. There's more to life than just work, he would say. You gotta take the time to enjoy yourself. Only, what did he ever do?
It wasn't like they'd started out this way. If they had, they never would have gotten anywhere. If it had been this way from the beginning, she would never have gotten that involved with him.
But it wasn't that way, it was gradual, subliminal. It wasn't one big thing, it was a million minuscule ones, microscopic compromises that only really added up to something unignorable once years had passed and it was too late to change.
An older couple walked by walking a poodle. A group of kids ran by kicking a soccer ball. And she walked up and kissed him hello, and they went to lunch.
May 3 - Writer's Block Party
Whenever she couldn't think of any new ideas (usually about once a week), Lucinda would announce a Writer's Block Party and invite the other writers from her apartment complex over to her place, where they would drink and talk about their latest projects and try to get their ideas flowing. But mostly they would just drink and hang out. There was Lucinda who wrote erotic horror screenplays, Maggie who wrote children's books, Fatima who wrote detective novels, and Rebecca who did inspirational writing.
Their gatherings had started out as more serious weekly meetings they'd called Write Club (The first rule of Write Club was you did not talk about Write Club.). Their intention was to do serious critiques of each other's work and offer each other feedback, but they had all individually come to the unspoken conclusion that none of them really had the heart/nerve/courage/whatever to give anyone else anything other than praise and encouragement for a piece they shared or a kind and understanding ear when they shared frustrations about rejection letters and the like. And so Write Club quickly (d)evolved from weekly meetings to weekly Writer's Block Parties.
Lucinda had just finished cleaning up after one Writer's Block Party. She was still hungry and there was nothing in her apartment besides spaghetti (no sauce), flour, canned yams, and a container of cottage cheese that had already expired but not so long ago that she felt she had to throw it away just yet, so she left it in the fridge and went down to the 7-11.
The cashier, whom she must have seen a hundred times in the last month, didn't register any recognition of her as he beeped her Combos and chili dogs. She was putting her change in her purse when she dropped a few coins. Bending over to pick them up, she saw a pen on the floor and grabbed it, too. She thought about asking the cashier if it was his, but then figured, Screw him. Guy doesn't want to recognize me, he won't get his pen back. And this made her feel pretty pleased with herself, and then she felt embarrassed that she was so pleased with herself, and by the time she got back to her apartment, she'd forgotten all about it. She poured herself another coffee mug full of wine to accompany her food, got in her favorite chair, and turned on the TV.
When she woke up (late) the next morning, it felt like God has used her head as a stress ball. It wasn't until after coffee, water, a couple of Advil, a shower, and a breakfast burrito that she found her journal on her bedside table along with the pen she'd found at 7-11. As she picked it up, she realized that she'd done some writing at some point last night. As it always was after she'd had a few drinks, her penmanship was erratic but legible.
Her drunken writing was occasionally amusing, but almost always worthless; however, this time around she was at first incredulous, then impressed, and then blown away with what she'd come up with: finally, the outline for an ending to Blood Lust. She'd been unable for weeks to finish her lesbian vampire screenplay sober, but apparently last night a drunken Lucinda had knocked out of the park.
Over the next couple of days, she fleshed it out (so to speak) and submitted it to her agent, who was very happy with it.
And the same thing happened after the following two Writer's Block Parties. She finished off the evening with Combos, chili dogs, and red wine, and then woke up the next morning with a debilitating hangover and a solid outline for whatever scene she'd been laboring to finish.
Like a superstitious baseball player going through a hot streak, she was obsessive about not doing anything to jinx it. Every week she followed the same habits religiously: Writer's Block Party, Combos, chili dogs, red wine, sleep. Yet she was also curious, as well as generous. And so about a month later, after several mugs of red wine, she tentatively shared her experiences with the rest of the group and divulged her theory that somehow--as ridiculous as this sounds and I would never say this sober--the pen was behind it.
Predictably, the others teased her about it, but they were also--after a few more bottles of wine--curious.
Maggie was the first to volunteer to take the pen home and try it out, but only after Lucinda made her swear on everything she held dear that she wouldn't lose it. She held her hand up with mock seriousness and swore. She also followed every word of Lucinda's instructions down to the pre-sleep menu of red wine, Combos, and chili dogs.
The next morning, Maggie woke up with two things: a soul crushing hangover, and a sloppily rendered yet masterfully imagined ending for Chicken Scratch, a children's book she'd been struggling to finish about DJ Feathers, a shy but but talented chicken who learns to believe in himself through the power of hip-hop.
The next week, Fatima took the pen home. And though--like the other women--she didn't have any memory of doing so, she apparently used it that night to come up with an ending for Dial M for Masala, the latest in her Raja Pradesh series about a retired Bombay police detective turned curry chef who is constantly called upon by his former colleagues to help them solve murder cases that always seem to revolve around food.
Rebecca was the next to try the pen, but she was leery. A devout Christian, she specialized in writing modern updates of Biblical parables for www.dailydevotion.com, a website dedicated to the retelling of the Bible's greatest stories in a more contemporary setting.
Over the last several months, she'd been struggling to find some--she didn't want to say inspiration--new ideas for her stories and according to everyone else in their group, the pen seemed to have all the answers. But she was hesitant about using it. For one thing, she thought the whole thing was ridiculous. But at the same time she was actually kind of afraid of the pen. She felt it was unholy, a manifestation of the devil (either literally or as a metaphor) tempting her with the easy way out.
Even still, she reluctantly took it home with her. Per Lucinda's instructions, she had a couple of chili dogs, some Combos, and a glass of red, and set it on the notebook on her bedside table. Then she tried to will herself to fall asleep, but she couldn't. The pen was too much of a distraction. After a second and then a third glass of wine, she threw it out the window and promptly fell asleep.
The next morning her notebook was empty, but in her miraculously hangover-free head, she had an idea for a(n admittedly autobiographical) story about not giving in to temptation. She wrote it up that morning and it was very well received on dailydevotion.
The rest of the group wasn't nearly as impressed with Rebecca's story as her readers were. In fact, it took them quite some time before they forgave her for throwing out the pen, but the process of forgiving was helped along by the continued inspiration the pen gave them in its absence:
Maggie wrote a spin-off of Chicken Scratch about DJ Feathers' friend Sasha, a young pony who learns to stand on his own feet and win the big race without depending on a supposedly magical set of horseshoes to help him along.
Fatima came up with an outline for a novel called Keema Karma which took Raja Pradesh in a very different, magical realism inflected direction. It roughly echoed the plot of Maggie's horseshoe story, substituting an enchanted curry recipe for the horseshoes and a cooking contest for the horse race, but the underlying message of believing in yourself was the same.
Lucinda changed the names and a few of the details of their experiences with the pen, and rewrote them as a screenplay for The Devil's Quill, an erotic thriller that debuted on Cinemax a few months later.
As for the pen, it landed intact on the sidewalk below Rebecca's apartment the night she threw it out the window. It's still somewhere on that street or down the block, waiting to be picked up again.
Their gatherings had started out as more serious weekly meetings they'd called Write Club (The first rule of Write Club was you did not talk about Write Club.). Their intention was to do serious critiques of each other's work and offer each other feedback, but they had all individually come to the unspoken conclusion that none of them really had the heart/nerve/courage/whatever to give anyone else anything other than praise and encouragement for a piece they shared or a kind and understanding ear when they shared frustrations about rejection letters and the like. And so Write Club quickly (d)evolved from weekly meetings to weekly Writer's Block Parties.
Lucinda had just finished cleaning up after one Writer's Block Party. She was still hungry and there was nothing in her apartment besides spaghetti (no sauce), flour, canned yams, and a container of cottage cheese that had already expired but not so long ago that she felt she had to throw it away just yet, so she left it in the fridge and went down to the 7-11.
The cashier, whom she must have seen a hundred times in the last month, didn't register any recognition of her as he beeped her Combos and chili dogs. She was putting her change in her purse when she dropped a few coins. Bending over to pick them up, she saw a pen on the floor and grabbed it, too. She thought about asking the cashier if it was his, but then figured, Screw him. Guy doesn't want to recognize me, he won't get his pen back. And this made her feel pretty pleased with herself, and then she felt embarrassed that she was so pleased with herself, and by the time she got back to her apartment, she'd forgotten all about it. She poured herself another coffee mug full of wine to accompany her food, got in her favorite chair, and turned on the TV.
When she woke up (late) the next morning, it felt like God has used her head as a stress ball. It wasn't until after coffee, water, a couple of Advil, a shower, and a breakfast burrito that she found her journal on her bedside table along with the pen she'd found at 7-11. As she picked it up, she realized that she'd done some writing at some point last night. As it always was after she'd had a few drinks, her penmanship was erratic but legible.
Her drunken writing was occasionally amusing, but almost always worthless; however, this time around she was at first incredulous, then impressed, and then blown away with what she'd come up with: finally, the outline for an ending to Blood Lust. She'd been unable for weeks to finish her lesbian vampire screenplay sober, but apparently last night a drunken Lucinda had knocked out of the park.
Over the next couple of days, she fleshed it out (so to speak) and submitted it to her agent, who was very happy with it.
And the same thing happened after the following two Writer's Block Parties. She finished off the evening with Combos, chili dogs, and red wine, and then woke up the next morning with a debilitating hangover and a solid outline for whatever scene she'd been laboring to finish.
Like a superstitious baseball player going through a hot streak, she was obsessive about not doing anything to jinx it. Every week she followed the same habits religiously: Writer's Block Party, Combos, chili dogs, red wine, sleep. Yet she was also curious, as well as generous. And so about a month later, after several mugs of red wine, she tentatively shared her experiences with the rest of the group and divulged her theory that somehow--as ridiculous as this sounds and I would never say this sober--the pen was behind it.
Predictably, the others teased her about it, but they were also--after a few more bottles of wine--curious.
Maggie was the first to volunteer to take the pen home and try it out, but only after Lucinda made her swear on everything she held dear that she wouldn't lose it. She held her hand up with mock seriousness and swore. She also followed every word of Lucinda's instructions down to the pre-sleep menu of red wine, Combos, and chili dogs.
The next morning, Maggie woke up with two things: a soul crushing hangover, and a sloppily rendered yet masterfully imagined ending for Chicken Scratch, a children's book she'd been struggling to finish about DJ Feathers, a shy but but talented chicken who learns to believe in himself through the power of hip-hop.
The next week, Fatima took the pen home. And though--like the other women--she didn't have any memory of doing so, she apparently used it that night to come up with an ending for Dial M for Masala, the latest in her Raja Pradesh series about a retired Bombay police detective turned curry chef who is constantly called upon by his former colleagues to help them solve murder cases that always seem to revolve around food.
Rebecca was the next to try the pen, but she was leery. A devout Christian, she specialized in writing modern updates of Biblical parables for www.dailydevotion.com, a website dedicated to the retelling of the Bible's greatest stories in a more contemporary setting.
Over the last several months, she'd been struggling to find some--she didn't want to say inspiration--new ideas for her stories and according to everyone else in their group, the pen seemed to have all the answers. But she was hesitant about using it. For one thing, she thought the whole thing was ridiculous. But at the same time she was actually kind of afraid of the pen. She felt it was unholy, a manifestation of the devil (either literally or as a metaphor) tempting her with the easy way out.
Even still, she reluctantly took it home with her. Per Lucinda's instructions, she had a couple of chili dogs, some Combos, and a glass of red, and set it on the notebook on her bedside table. Then she tried to will herself to fall asleep, but she couldn't. The pen was too much of a distraction. After a second and then a third glass of wine, she threw it out the window and promptly fell asleep.
The next morning her notebook was empty, but in her miraculously hangover-free head, she had an idea for a(n admittedly autobiographical) story about not giving in to temptation. She wrote it up that morning and it was very well received on dailydevotion.
The rest of the group wasn't nearly as impressed with Rebecca's story as her readers were. In fact, it took them quite some time before they forgave her for throwing out the pen, but the process of forgiving was helped along by the continued inspiration the pen gave them in its absence:
Maggie wrote a spin-off of Chicken Scratch about DJ Feathers' friend Sasha, a young pony who learns to stand on his own feet and win the big race without depending on a supposedly magical set of horseshoes to help him along.
Fatima came up with an outline for a novel called Keema Karma which took Raja Pradesh in a very different, magical realism inflected direction. It roughly echoed the plot of Maggie's horseshoe story, substituting an enchanted curry recipe for the horseshoes and a cooking contest for the horse race, but the underlying message of believing in yourself was the same.
Lucinda changed the names and a few of the details of their experiences with the pen, and rewrote them as a screenplay for The Devil's Quill, an erotic thriller that debuted on Cinemax a few months later.
As for the pen, it landed intact on the sidewalk below Rebecca's apartment the night she threw it out the window. It's still somewhere on that street or down the block, waiting to be picked up again.
Sunday, May 2, 2010
May 2 - The Torture Warehouse
A few minutes after I got on the bus, we were stuck in traffic. There were police cars and emergency vehicles everywhere. A couple of helicopters hovered above downtown. What looked like several city blocks were closed off.
"Any idea what's going on?"
The driver looked back at the woman through the rear view. "Somebody called in a bomb threat at city hall."
"Are we gonna be able to get down to 3rd?"
"Don't know."
The bus hadn't moved more than a couple of inches in the last five minutes. A few people had gotten off other buses and started walking.
"Are the police going to reroute us?"
The driver didn't look at her this time. "Don't know."
The woman looked at her watch. "I really have to be at 3rd and Sumner, like, now." She was speaking half to herself, half to the driver. "OK, just forget it. I'll walk."
The driver exhaled loudly through his nose.
"Can I get off here?"
The driver shook his head and opened the door. She got off, and I took her seat.
"Bomb threat," he said to nobody in particular as he pulled the door closed. "What the hell is that? Threaten to blow up a building, kill a bunch of innocent people."
Traffic opened up a bit and he eased forward a few feet.
"Probably never catch the guy. And if they did, so what? Like that guy, McVeigh. Blows up that building and kills all those people, all those babies. And yeah, I know they executed him, but what'd they do? Electric chair? Lethal injection? Man, that ain't nothing. That's too humane. He probably didn't even feel a thing. We're all worried about 'cruel and unusual', but that guy didn't care thing one about cruel and unusual when he killed all those babies. That man should've suffered."
Traffic loosened up a bit more, and a police officer motioned for the bus to turn right. The driver acknowledged her with a wave and turned the corner.
"No, man. See, what I think we need for guys like that is a torture warehouse. Just line up all those guys from death row and send them on through."
He straightened out the wheel and started up the street. "Just this big warehouse. Filled with all sorts of stations. You'd have one room with rats, one with dogs, another one with alligators--"
"Snakes!" added an old man sitting in the front seat.
"Yeah, snakes. Put a shark tank in there. Get a fire room, a freezing room. Broken glass."
A few people at the front of the bus laughed a bit. I couldn't tell if the laughter was genuine or nervous, but either way he knew he had an audience.
"Some people might say that's cruel and unusual, but I don't care. I say anyone who kills another person, blows up a building, whatever--we should just send them through the torture warehouse. And I--I would be happy to be the, the proprietor of the torture warehouse."
For some reason when he said the word proprietor I pictured him wearing an apron in a yellowed, old-time photograph of him and his family standing proudly in front of the torture warehouse, est. 1912.
He turned another corner. "Just send all them criminals through the torture warehouse."
More people laughed, and he looked back through the rear view mirror. "And if any of ya'll want to oppose the torture warehouse, I say we send you through the torture warehouse, too."
And, as if because of the finality of that comment, we were finally clear of the downtown traffic. The driver stopped talking, and concentrated on his driving. The other passengers went back to their newspapers, and I got off at the next stop and continued on my way to work.
"Any idea what's going on?"
The driver looked back at the woman through the rear view. "Somebody called in a bomb threat at city hall."
"Are we gonna be able to get down to 3rd?"
"Don't know."
The bus hadn't moved more than a couple of inches in the last five minutes. A few people had gotten off other buses and started walking.
"Are the police going to reroute us?"
The driver didn't look at her this time. "Don't know."
The woman looked at her watch. "I really have to be at 3rd and Sumner, like, now." She was speaking half to herself, half to the driver. "OK, just forget it. I'll walk."
The driver exhaled loudly through his nose.
"Can I get off here?"
The driver shook his head and opened the door. She got off, and I took her seat.
"Bomb threat," he said to nobody in particular as he pulled the door closed. "What the hell is that? Threaten to blow up a building, kill a bunch of innocent people."
Traffic opened up a bit and he eased forward a few feet.
"Probably never catch the guy. And if they did, so what? Like that guy, McVeigh. Blows up that building and kills all those people, all those babies. And yeah, I know they executed him, but what'd they do? Electric chair? Lethal injection? Man, that ain't nothing. That's too humane. He probably didn't even feel a thing. We're all worried about 'cruel and unusual', but that guy didn't care thing one about cruel and unusual when he killed all those babies. That man should've suffered."
Traffic loosened up a bit more, and a police officer motioned for the bus to turn right. The driver acknowledged her with a wave and turned the corner.
"No, man. See, what I think we need for guys like that is a torture warehouse. Just line up all those guys from death row and send them on through."
He straightened out the wheel and started up the street. "Just this big warehouse. Filled with all sorts of stations. You'd have one room with rats, one with dogs, another one with alligators--"
"Snakes!" added an old man sitting in the front seat.
"Yeah, snakes. Put a shark tank in there. Get a fire room, a freezing room. Broken glass."
A few people at the front of the bus laughed a bit. I couldn't tell if the laughter was genuine or nervous, but either way he knew he had an audience.
"Some people might say that's cruel and unusual, but I don't care. I say anyone who kills another person, blows up a building, whatever--we should just send them through the torture warehouse. And I--I would be happy to be the, the proprietor of the torture warehouse."
For some reason when he said the word proprietor I pictured him wearing an apron in a yellowed, old-time photograph of him and his family standing proudly in front of the torture warehouse, est. 1912.
He turned another corner. "Just send all them criminals through the torture warehouse."
More people laughed, and he looked back through the rear view mirror. "And if any of ya'll want to oppose the torture warehouse, I say we send you through the torture warehouse, too."
And, as if because of the finality of that comment, we were finally clear of the downtown traffic. The driver stopped talking, and concentrated on his driving. The other passengers went back to their newspapers, and I got off at the next stop and continued on my way to work.
Saturday, May 1, 2010
May 1 - The Breast Room
They were in bed making out.
"God, I love your breasts," he said.
She laughed.
"They're just so--God."
"Thank you."
"I wish I could just spend the afternoon in a room made of your breasts."
They kissed a bit more.
"What?"
"What?"
"What'd you say about a room full of breasts or something?"
"Ha ha. Yeah. Your breasts just feel so nice. I wish I could be surrounded by just them for an afternoon."
"You want a room made out of my breasts?" The kissing slowed down.
"Well, um, yeah. They just feel so nice and perfect and, um, nice. Don't worry, it's a compliment. Ha ha."
"No, I'm sure it is. I just want to make sure we're on the same page here." The kissing had stopped completely now, and she was sitting upright. Breasts covered. "So like, you want a room made out of my breasts? Just, like, my breasts in actual size replicated a bunch of times and covering the floor, the walls, the ceiling? I just want to make sure I'm picturing this correctly."
"Well--"
"And is there furniture in this room that's also made out of my breasts? A breast sofa? Breast lamps?"
"I really hadn't thought it out that far. Come on, you're being silly." He tried to kiss her.
"But it's just my breasts, right? I'm not actually in this room. It's just, I don't know, hundreds of sets of my breasts in there."
"Um--"
"And is it just the boob, just the fleshy part? Or are there nipples all over the place, too? Because those are two entirely different situations."
"Seriously, I didn't think it through. You're right, though. It's weird. A room consisting solely of your breasts would be, um, yeah. No, that's a weird idea. Ha ha. Just forget I ever said it." He tried to pull her over to him again.
"But, like, how would my breasts--I don't even know how to ask this question. I guess I'm wondering about logistics. Like, I can only assume you would've had to have cloned them."
Now he'd become a genetic scientist.
"Seriously, forget I ever said anything."
"Well yeah, but you did."
"How about if we just rewind to about one minute ago. Let's just go back to that time and, like, be there. I'll have more of a filter this time. Actually, I'll just not think that. No more thoughts of breast rooms. Can we do that?"
"No, I'm not mad. I'm just saying. That's a really fucked-up thing to fantasize about."
"I wouldn't say I was fantasizing about it. I mean, it's not like I sit around while you're not around and think of a lounge made of your boobs."
"So now it's a lounge? Before it was just a room, but now it's a specific room?"
"No, I--"
"Well, that's what you said, right? You're over there thinking about your little boob lounge. Presumably I'm not around, but that's OK. You've got the best part of me all around you, so, you know, yea you."
"I--Jesus." He sat up next to her. "You have no idea how much I wish I could take that back. It was stupid and weird and yeah, I seriously didn't think it would upset you so much, and I'm sorry. I really am."
"You didn't think it would upset me? So you did stop to think about it then. You got the boob room idea in your head, thought about what my reaction would be, and figured I would be flattered by it or at the very least not repulsed by it. At any rate, you must have thought I would give you a favorable response, that overall I would be pro-boob room, and then out it came. Does that sound about right?"
"Honestly, I don't remember. You've got to believe me. Maybe I thought about it, but I--crap. I don't know. I definitely didn't expect it to be such a big deal. Otherwise, of course I never would've said it."
"But you did think about it. And you thought I would be fine with it. You thought I would be delighted that you wanted to lounge out in a room made entirely of my breasts."
"There's absolutely nothing I can say at this point to make this OK again, so I'm not going to say anything else."
"Fine." She got up.
"Wait. Where are you going?"
"What do you care? You're done talking, right?"
"Come on, don't. Just--I'm sorry, OK?"
"What are you even sorry about? You don't even know, do you?"
"Whatever it is you're upset about, that's what I'm sorry about."
"Nice try," she said leaving.
And as she left, he was equal parts ashamed and relieved. Ashamed that he'd ruined their evening, and relieved that things hadn't progressed to the point where he might have commented on her vagina instead.
"God, I love your breasts," he said.
She laughed.
"They're just so--God."
"Thank you."
"I wish I could just spend the afternoon in a room made of your breasts."
They kissed a bit more.
"What?"
"What?"
"What'd you say about a room full of breasts or something?"
"Ha ha. Yeah. Your breasts just feel so nice. I wish I could be surrounded by just them for an afternoon."
"You want a room made out of my breasts?" The kissing slowed down.
"Well, um, yeah. They just feel so nice and perfect and, um, nice. Don't worry, it's a compliment. Ha ha."
"No, I'm sure it is. I just want to make sure we're on the same page here." The kissing had stopped completely now, and she was sitting upright. Breasts covered. "So like, you want a room made out of my breasts? Just, like, my breasts in actual size replicated a bunch of times and covering the floor, the walls, the ceiling? I just want to make sure I'm picturing this correctly."
"Well--"
"And is there furniture in this room that's also made out of my breasts? A breast sofa? Breast lamps?"
"I really hadn't thought it out that far. Come on, you're being silly." He tried to kiss her.
"But it's just my breasts, right? I'm not actually in this room. It's just, I don't know, hundreds of sets of my breasts in there."
"Um--"
"And is it just the boob, just the fleshy part? Or are there nipples all over the place, too? Because those are two entirely different situations."
"Seriously, I didn't think it through. You're right, though. It's weird. A room consisting solely of your breasts would be, um, yeah. No, that's a weird idea. Ha ha. Just forget I ever said it." He tried to pull her over to him again.
"But, like, how would my breasts--I don't even know how to ask this question. I guess I'm wondering about logistics. Like, I can only assume you would've had to have cloned them."
Now he'd become a genetic scientist.
"Seriously, forget I ever said anything."
"Well yeah, but you did."
"How about if we just rewind to about one minute ago. Let's just go back to that time and, like, be there. I'll have more of a filter this time. Actually, I'll just not think that. No more thoughts of breast rooms. Can we do that?"
"No, I'm not mad. I'm just saying. That's a really fucked-up thing to fantasize about."
"I wouldn't say I was fantasizing about it. I mean, it's not like I sit around while you're not around and think of a lounge made of your boobs."
"So now it's a lounge? Before it was just a room, but now it's a specific room?"
"No, I--"
"Well, that's what you said, right? You're over there thinking about your little boob lounge. Presumably I'm not around, but that's OK. You've got the best part of me all around you, so, you know, yea you."
"I--Jesus." He sat up next to her. "You have no idea how much I wish I could take that back. It was stupid and weird and yeah, I seriously didn't think it would upset you so much, and I'm sorry. I really am."
"You didn't think it would upset me? So you did stop to think about it then. You got the boob room idea in your head, thought about what my reaction would be, and figured I would be flattered by it or at the very least not repulsed by it. At any rate, you must have thought I would give you a favorable response, that overall I would be pro-boob room, and then out it came. Does that sound about right?"
"Honestly, I don't remember. You've got to believe me. Maybe I thought about it, but I--crap. I don't know. I definitely didn't expect it to be such a big deal. Otherwise, of course I never would've said it."
"But you did think about it. And you thought I would be fine with it. You thought I would be delighted that you wanted to lounge out in a room made entirely of my breasts."
"There's absolutely nothing I can say at this point to make this OK again, so I'm not going to say anything else."
"Fine." She got up.
"Wait. Where are you going?"
"What do you care? You're done talking, right?"
"Come on, don't. Just--I'm sorry, OK?"
"What are you even sorry about? You don't even know, do you?"
"Whatever it is you're upset about, that's what I'm sorry about."
"Nice try," she said leaving.
And as she left, he was equal parts ashamed and relieved. Ashamed that he'd ruined their evening, and relieved that things hadn't progressed to the point where he might have commented on her vagina instead.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)