what leads to tea and advil?

hours on the plane and more in the car which lulls me with the slush and hum and my mother's constant chatter and the heat running she swerves from one topic to the next and asks so many questions the city of brotherly love shines magnificently in the afternoon light and we cross a bridge and motel motel motel strip mall strip mall motel and then into the little town where i grew up all the same houses all the same there's ours my father in his sweat pants hugs me some of the furniture is different and then i drop my bag in the room where my grandfather lived and died

later at the local bar i meet with old friends the people on this earth i have known the longest outside of my family every one of them a study: the one who just moved into the city the one who became a cop the one with a secret she whispers to me at the bar the one whose grandmother who raised her just died the one who knows she is sexy and the one i haven't seen in fifteen years who looks exactly the same and tells me she is unemployed all have big smiles and we drink into the night remembering how it was mostly when we were teenagers and what ever happened to? on the way home i discover a pack of marlboro ultra lights in the hidey-hole in my mother's car and smoke about a half of just one

in the catholic church i notice everyone there is white and mention this to my father who specualtes that the church would be much stronger if after slavery the catholics had and my mind drifts because i don't really understand what he's talking about and so i'm nodding but really thinking that as long as i am here i should be paying attention and try to remember what it was about this place that held so much for me as a young person and then drove me away with such force as a teenager i like the dirge quality of some of the songs that suggest otherworldiness i like statues of the saints the stained glass windows the smell of incense i like how ritualized everything is i like when we all turn to each other and wish each other peace how we shake hands with strangers smile and say peace be with you

there are three children eight six and two that make me smile as soon as we get in the door after a long drive up into the hills in the northern part of the state my ears pop every couple of minutes as we pull in the last stretch of the ride there is snow on the ground and it is gorgeous the house is cozy with sad sounding geese honking and flying in V-shapes overhead [my older sister yells up to them you! are going! the wrong! way!] and the kids beckon me to discover new things they've received from santa there's lots of chasing shouting spinning running my beautiful beautiful sisters are there and it is such a relief to see them instantly i feel giddy and the wine is poured and i hug them and i laugh like i haven't laughed in a long time and we break out into song at the top of our lungs and dance like crazy people and tease each other mercilessly so that the children are quiet for a second and look at us like maybe we were once children too that night i read the little boy the youngest five bedtime stories and he is very cute and small with big eyes a toothy smile and a runny nose the cutest part is that he has made up a word for when he cannot think of the word that he wants and that word is "heh-heh" as in "uncle, you? heh-heh." which means please run a comb through the tangled mess that is my hair

the rockettes if you've never seen them are like watching a kaleidoscope of women's bodies that fall into impossible shapes and patterns only to realign themselves straight across the stage in dazzling costumes in NYC we take the subway and hold the gloved-hands of the children radio city music hall is tremendous and nostalgic the crowds outside are impossible we all pack tightly back onto the subway afterwards and my niece the eight-year-old reports seeing a man with six fingers on one hand back at my younger sister's tiny little manhattan apartment we all eat roasted red pepper soup and salad and the best pizza i have ever eaten the kids and my parents leave and i spend the night drinking wine and talking with my sister and her husband until i curl up under a warm blanket and fall asleep

the drive from NYC back to my hometown is cold and grey and the NJTP is clogged with traffic once again i doze in between conversations and when we arrive back home my parents take naps while i read and do laundry i miss my friends and i miss my partner more sharply than i thought i would and i start to come down with a cold and i think about the apartment all drafty and by itself plus i discover that benazir bhutto has been killed and we turn on the television and watch until we realize that CNN is more interested in talking about what this means for the security of the united states than in bringing us news from the people of pakistan

that evening i roast a butternut squash in the oven and mash it with salt and pepper and my father makes fresh pasta it feels peaceful he teaches me how to spoon just a little of the squash into the middle of the pasta squares and then press and cut to make ravioli it is blessedly methodical and time consuming my mother makes a salad and declares that everything is hereditary which makes me cringe she and my father drink a manhattan each then we open a bottle of wine my parents ask me if i ever listen to opera and i say no the voices from the speakers are gorgeous but so melodramatic and a bit too loud but my parents love it get almost teary-eyed they tell me: this is the part of the story when! and o! then this is the part when! and o! then this part here is when

i wake up the next morning to pack everything back into my bag and think about how i have not written in my diary or in this blog for a long time or if i have written it has only been sporadically and i think about how i have had so many things that i have wanted to write but that i am tired of the formula sick of how witty and anecdotal i tend to be that i rely on a set of conventions and as i hug my father goodbye and get into the car with my mother i think about maybe getting rid of the blog since the stories rise and fall in my mind faster than i can keep up with them and then my mother gets lost on the way to the airport which seems impossible but really it is true we are off the highway and zigzagging through philly's center city streets looking for an exit and my mother's voice is loud and very anxious and she questions how? how could this possibly be happening? and she thunks the palm of her hand on the steering wheel to emphasize how exasperated she is and says over and again o! and christ! and jeee-sus! and alll-right! the clock is ticking for me to make my flight and suddenly we are back on the highway and she is elated and reflective and analytical about how it happened and what the other possibilites might have been if she had or had not turned here or there or doubled-back or continued on or crossed-over or pulled-out-into or if only there had been a sign that was posted or an exit that should have been built or an on-ramp that should get constructed or a new road that could get public works funding i mean really now when you think about it it could be

i hug my mother goodbye and thank her for such a wonderful time together she gets teary-eyed and tells me how much she loves me and we smile and i head into the terminal and think about that word TERMINAL and i get a little shiver but the good news is that the airport is not as crowded as you'd think and i get through security and think about that word SECURITY and i wait for the boarding call and remember that on the last flight i was on i was seated next to an older gentleman who slowly ripped every page out of a magazine and folded them into little squares and stuck them neatly into the barf-bag thingy on the seat-back in front of him for the entire three-and-a-half hours and i hoped that it wouldn't be him again and it wasn't it was a blonde girl with a lot of make-up on who slept the whole time i was so happy to be back in houston when we touched ground but seem to have picked up a cold which i am now nursing with tea and advil.

there is no other troy (for me to burn)

In the dream, I was waiting downtown, outside of a hotel, checking each face that passed by for the one I wanted to see most. I was wearing my backpack and carrying a camera in the pocket of my sweatshirt. I was also holding an umbrella. In a short while, I saw who I was looking for -- a woman a little older than me. Quite short, with a neatly shaved head and large, soulful eyes. She was lingering outside the hotel doors as if she, too, were waiting for someone.

I was nervous, but I walked right up to Sinead O'Connor and said hello, introducing myself. She gave me a warm welcome by hugging me and asking me if I had been waiting for long. No, not long. "Listen," I said, getting right to the point, "I know we've only just met, but I've been wanting to talk to you about some things . . . " And I continued, a bit nervous, but feeling like this was the best way to approach her, since I didn't want to faun or gush, but ask her some direct questions that I knew she'd have answers to. She listened very carefully to my questions. I cannot recall the exact content of the questions, but I know the questions bore an enormous emotional weight for me, as if I'd been waiting my whole life to ask someone for an explanation. Sinead was so good. She told me that she could tell I was doing everything exactly right, that the questions were what mattered, for now, and to know that, just as I was struggling with what to do with problems unearthed by memory, so she was, too.

Things then shifted. Sinead was bored and said she wished she knew what there was to do in Houston, that she couldn't wait to leave because there was nothing, nothing, nothing happening here. I told her that it wasn't true, and then advised her, with growing excitement, to walk over to Allen's landing and check out how the bayous run together between the university and the jailhouse. I imagined that Sinead would find this contrast stunning, and that she could spend time reading the history of the landing that's been engraved on the walls there, perhaps see some people in kayaks or canoes paddling past. She could explore the grounds of the old, boarded up Sunset Coffee House, look at how massive the city seemed when you are dwarfed by its still-changing architectural history. Maybe she'd write a song about it.

Just as Sinead was agreeing to go for this walk, it started to rain. The streets filled with pedestrians carrying umbrellas and, in the rain and the crowd, I lost track of her. Had she gone back inside the hotel? Was she already on her way to Allen's landing? Shouldn't I find a way to invite her home to meet H. and have dinner with her? Also, didn't I need to at least get an autograph and a photo, to remember this unbelieveable meeting?

The sun finally came out. The streets cleared. I headed back to where the hotel was and went inside. I wandered a maze of floors and corridors, wondering how I would know which room was hers, and for how long I should look before heading back home.

The last thing I remember about the dream is that I did manage to find her, again. No, she hadn't forgotten that she should get to Allen's landing, but she'd be on her way out of town that evening. I tried to act casual about the whole thing. O yeah. Of course. No big deal. It's cool. Well, it was really great to see you, I said. Yeah, it was, she said, smiling, but a bit distracted. Goodbye, now.

Bye bye.

look what i can do (ribcage)

In the late-70s, I made an interesting discovery about my body.

Early one autumn, near the beginning of a new school year, I surprised myself by realizing that I could -- and you must visualize this, please -- hook the bottom tip of my left ribcage over the waistband of my corduroys, the same way a normal child might poke a thumb through a belt-loop or tuck one foot behind the other while standing around, waiting for his mom to pick him up from the bowling alley. It was a neat fit, and it was comfortable. Secure. Weirdly cozy, like a little way of saying hello to that unknown part of my body. And, because I have been who I am since at least this age, the act went from being a one-time discovery to being a fully-blown neurotic habit. From September of that year through May of the next, I graduated from simply hooking the tip of my rib over the waist of whatever pair of jeans or uniform pants I was wearing to going even further with my practice, thrusting my hip back to get at my waist from a better angle, and moving the lower ribcage all the way over the width of the pleather belts my mom bought for me that cinched in tight around my middle. I would hook the rib as far over the belt as I could, then push the belt, very gently, in, so that the boney cage, at the same time, was pushed out. And I did it over and over. I did it waiting for the bus. I did it during mass. I did it while taking a break from vocabulary homework. I did it while laughing like a lunatic at Scooby-Doo. And, like I said, this went on for months -- two whole seasons of my own brand of body modification.

Since I was as shy as I was skinny, I never told anyone. I never said to Stephen Hansbury, "Watch this!" Or, even to my sisters, "Look what I can do!" Not that it was a secret, but it was a private thing. It wasn't something to show off. It was my body-idea, and I'm pretty sure I had an inkling that other children were not doing this.

That said, when summer rolled around, and I was spending my days leaping through the sprinkler out front, my mother stopped me with a weird look on her face one afternoon: "Come over here." She trained a critical eye on my narrow chest with its newly formed lump protruding above and to the left of my stomach. I remember her gently poking at it, and then sending me on my way. A few days later, I was in the doctor's office, my mother nervously gritting her teeth as he poked at the lump and asked me a few questions. Does it hurt? No. Does it ever get red and puffy? No. I remember there being some conversation and confusion, and I felt an intense worry. The doctor asked me if I was doing anything, like pushing on my chest or pulling at it in any way. I reluctantly nodded yes. "Will you show me?" Barechested, I got up off the examining table and, for the very last time in my entire life, I thrust my right hip out, pulled my torso up so that my left ribcage jutted up and out, and, with real gusto, bore down and hooked my lower-rib cage over my belt, pushing it all the way out. It was quite a performance. I wish I had said, "Ta da!" and made jazz hands. My mother nearly fainted. The doctor told me that I needed to stop doing this. Right away.

I don't remember much after that visit. I mean, I don't remember struggling with trying to stop. I remember that the ribcage eventually returned to normal and, in the years since then, my mother has commented on it and concluded that the growing human body is a malleable and amazing thing. Really, there is no trace of it that I can see.

But, lately, I been wondering what would have happened if I hadn't stopped -- What might my body might have finally become? What kind of exceptional freak might I have been, and how much they would have charged to come see me, locked in my cage and eating lightbulbs?

brang? durn?

thirty-six

1. early morning voice overs
2. small wildflowers
3. the tea house
4. short walks that clarify
5. lion's pose
6. throat
7. thresholds
8. pink moons
9. window panes
10. films noir
11. soft foot touching
12. rattle and clink of dishes while reading
13. heirloom tomatoes from the co-op
14. peppers and herbs out back
15. my sisters' voices
16. students with grills
17. communal meals
18. everday mazes
19. letters in the mailbox
20. calendula
21. dreams of the dead
22. taking notes
23. stacks of books
24. small children's pointing fingers
25. the gaze inward
26. solitude's ease
27. brain stretching
28. muscle tickles
29. skin tags
30. endless leg bones
31. the edge of missing people
32. intrasubjectivity
33. soul showers
34. joining
35. towards and further
36. surprising halos

clever, clever

(To be read in Andy Rooney's voice:)

You know how, lately, you must secure an especially sensitive on-line account by choosing three questions to which you and only you knows the answer? And you think and think: "What will I always know the answer to?" And then you finally land on three very clever questions that you are sure will prevent any fraudist or theif from busting in and taking all you've got? It's the cleverness I want to disabuse you of, especially if you are a writer and being clever is your specialty.

(To be read in my voice:)

In 2004, I opened an account with ______, and came up with some very clever questions and answers. Typically enough, I never used the on-line account, opting for the old-fashioned way of dealing with my affairs -- through the postal system or on the phone. But recently, feeling even more 21st century than ever, I decided to go back and try to get into the account on-line, only I forgot the password. Inevitably, I could not get ______ to send me the password via email, so I called up and got an operator. The operator told me she could send me an email confirming my password if I could answer the three questions I posed to secure the account when I opened it. Simple enough, I thought. "Okay," I said, "Shoot." I nailed the answers to the first two questions, which I will not, of course, reveal to you on-line (buy me a beer and I'll tell you).

Then came the third question, which the operator introduced by saying, "Okay, and so, now, the last question is . . ." She paused, cleared her voice, and then she deadpanned, "Who is the worst student?"

I was not only stunned by this question, but I was also incredulous about its odd phrasing -- "WHAT? 'Who is the worst student?' What does that mean?" Not even, "Who is the worst student I've ever had?" or "What is the name of the student who did X?" but a brief, almost dull-witted articulation of extremes. I couldn't believe it. Remember, I am the author of this question and I presumed that I would always know the answer.

When I confessed that I was totally stumped, the operator, feeling sorry for me, said, "Well, you wrote the question in 2004, does that jog your memory at all?" "Hm, 2004 . . . 2004 . . . I'd have to look at a grade book," I replied. What was going on in 2004 that was so awful, and why was it that I could no longer access that memory after being triggered by a question designed for its immediate recall? At the same time, I think the question is also a bit green, because it supposes that, really, this student was the worst! ever! and none would ever match her or him in what I am sure was an astonishingly aggressive and endlessly dramatic approach to learning. The question betrays a Chuck who, in 2004, could not -- or would not -- separate the professional and the financial from the emotional. It's a Chuck who chose, finally, not a question at all but, instead, a mood -- one that has no answer, only endless questions attached to it.

And I wondered, at the same time, what other kinds of bizarre questions people ask themselves the answers for in order to access their digital hordings, and how many questions have answers that go unremembered, or that are based on moods. I wondered about mean-spirited questions, sort of like my own, or ones motivated by love, anger, jealousy, loss, broken-heartedness, or delusions of grandeur?

Even though I am hating closure these days, I'll tell you that, while I never figured out the answer to the question, and had to go through a whole rigamarole to get a new password, I feel like the more I think about it, the closer I come to understanding who this might have been and why I thought I'd never forget the answer. Sorry for the vagueness, but I'm still cautious about the limits of pseudonimity.

(To be read in someone else's voice:)

(I know this seems like a lame ploy to keep readers interested in a blog that hasn't been very active these days but, really, the beginning of the academic year along has me taxed in ways I didn't expect!)

bettin' on the bull in the heather

What's that Sonic Youth song? The one where Kim Gordon counts by tens?

And the bass booms along a low down dirty beat, keeping you rooted in the earth while her vocals go up into the creaking sky?

The urgency of Kim's message gets more and more heated, only to be tempered by a rat-a-tat on the drums and a shake-a-shake in your right ear.

I'm grooving on this right now, hard core, thinking back to a time when it was the early 90s and I am stuck living in a motel room whose only protection is a broken sliding glass door, and the sink overflows every night with the unflushed waste of other rooms' debris. The smell of cooking fish from the communal kitchen. Everyone's sick. 70s drapery and a bed bolted to the wall. It was cheap. A time when I was new to H/town, fresh from the northeast, thinking "Soon," and "How fast I'll be done here," and "My ideas are abstract and important."

Notice that Kathleen Hanna dances into the frame and sticks out her tongue. She punches Thurston in the face by accident while Kim curls up in a nightie in what looks like a little kid's bedding. Kim has understood something. She stares into the camera and, tacitly, asks the viewer why he's so interested in seeing some betting game gone so weird. Thurston gives a horse a banana.

You can dance to it and feel proud, but you shouldn't expect anyone to leave feeling any better.

http://youtube.com/watch?v=2T4BsnXmJaI

granny creeps

cone of uncertainty

Erin was easy. If I can just remember not to drive the car into any really deep puddles, I'll be fine. And now there's Dean [remember Dean? ah, boyfriends . . .], who was predicted to wreak havoc all over the Gulf region of the U.S., but more recent evaluations of what will happen next week is that it will head right into the Yucatan, and by that time it will be more of a depression than a hurricane.

The language of weather parallels the language of the psyche: depressions, storms, and floods. Scorchers. Weakening systems. The cone of uncertainty: I picture all treacherous doubts funneling into the top of my head and swirling around in my brain before being pumped to my heart, where they flutter and jump until a more predictable pattern emerges.

Fruit flies. Mosquitoes. Fire ants.

Today I purchased wood filler. The intent is to make the window in the shower look less like a rotting frame and more like -- like a window. Will this work? The window is beyond opening and closing, although we gave it a shot when we first moved in. "It will be nice," I thought, "to have an open window to air out the shower and keep down the mildew. Much nicer than the shower in the old apartment, with that broken gas heater installed in the tiles opposite the shower head." But opening the window requires a serious effort, and every time one of us did, more and more of the frame crumbled off, and more and more of the frame cracked. So this wood filler isn't going to fix anything. It'll just make it look better by filling the wood in where there isn't any. I'll need to use sandpaper.

This is a description of the coffee mug in front of me: a smiling, cross-eyed, grey elephant skips rope against a sea-foam green background, with these words written next to him: TTPbIT-CKOK, TTPbIT-CKOC TDE-TO PYXHYA TTOTOAOK

Yesterday I made pasta sauce using fresh sage from the sage plant Cake left us. Sagacious Cake's sage plant. It was delicious.

feels like

With the "feels like" temperature spiking at 115 degrees in the heart of the city, you've got to really steel yourself for the day's events. What happens when it is this hot? If film noir has taught us anything (which it has), it can only be trouble. Time to hole up, watch The Asphalt Jungle (dir. John Huston, 1950) and Strangers on a Train (dir. Alfred Hitchcock, 1951), and try to make it through the next week.

august already? (dream)

Where, I ask you, has the summer gone?

I had a dream last night that, with great excitement, I realized that I had bought a fishtank, a large, glowing cube of exotic-looking, fantastically-colored fish that I was keeping on top of my dresser in the bedroom. It was a spectacular sight, especially at night. When I went to feed the fish, I realized how tiny they were, and also realized that the towel I had forgotten that I was carrying was supposed to be placed inside the tank in order to increase the amount of nutrients in their food. Against all rules of logic, the towel, rather than soaking up all of the tank water as I feared, simply disintegrated and fed the fish, who were suddenly large and beautiful, swimming in terrifically complex geometric patterns.

Instead of being satisfied with these results, though, I recklessly went in search of another towel to add, hoping for even better results. I came back to the fish tank, which was still on the same dresser but now so high up I had to climb on the knobs on the dresser to help me reach the top. The whole structure was profoundly unsteady, but I was determined to add another towel. Once I got to the top and peered into the fishtank, I knew my plan might cause problems, but I figured it was too late now, and so I began to put the second towel into the tank. About half-way in, the problems started. The towel was getting very wet and heavy. I noticed that the fish in the tank were frighteningly big, shark-sized, with open mouths and sharp teeth. Much to my horror, I saw that one of the fish was battered and diseased, and that its eyes had been eaten out by the other fish. All of the fish bumped up against the side of the tank with astonishing force. I lost my grip on the dresser, and the whole thing tipped. I clutched the lip of the tank for support and grabbed at the heavy, water-logged towel, thinking it might anchor me.

We fell. Water and fish went everywhere. I scrambled to pick them up to put them back inside the tank, but I couldn't tell which onces were alive and which ones were dead. Some had become so small I couldn't tell if I was holding a fish or not. The room was also very dark, and I worried about stepping on the fish as well as getting bit by them. Their population, since the falling of the tank, had grown significantly. The floor of the bedroom was covered in several inches of water.

Then it dawned on me that I needed help. If the situation was going to improve, I would need to call someone. The realization stopped me in my tracks. Who? Who could I call for help?

(Thanks to Julie Doucet's My Most Secret Desire [Drawn and Quarterly, 2006] for the inspiration, I am sure.)

terror, gasoline, and the local

I was driving back from the Y, dreaming of the tempeh, lettuce, and tomato sandwich I was going to get for lunch at Field of Green's [it pains me to keep the apostrophe, but it's their spelling], when I noticed, in my rearview mirror, an enormous, sleek, red pick-up truck bouncing down Montrose towards me. It was lunchtime, and so the traffic was a bit heavy, and the truck stood out because of its color, size, and shiny newness. It stayed behind me for a couple of seconds, then pulled around so that it was in the lane next to me. As we waited for a light to change, the driver of the truck, a man, leaned over, waved, and motioned for me to roll down my window.

I wasn't sure. I've had some problems with men in trucks and other large vehicles that have ended badly. There was that time, right after 9.11, when a man from Whole Foods was sure it was me who threw a carton of raw eggs on his SUV, which had "Bomb His Ass and Take the Gas" and "I'll Be for Peace after We Get a Piece of Them" signs and American flags decorating its windows. That whole thing went on for fucking months, almost a full year. And how many times have I been riding my bike only to be nearly run down by some asshole driving a Hummer, speeding through the urban landscape like he's fleeing a scud-missle attack? H. and I were once almost killed by a man driving an SUV so large it couldn't fit around us in a supermarket parking lot and so the driver decided to teach us a lesson by nearly running us over and then coming to a screeching halt, getting out of the cab, and demanding to know which one of us touched his car while his terrified children watched from the tinted windows.

Feeling generous, I took the risk anyway, and rolled down my window. Maybe he needed directions to the vegan lunch place I was about to visit . . . I raised my eyebrows and tilted my head up.

"Yeah?"

"Hey!" he yelled, leaning way over, wild-eyed, frantically gesturing. The truck was so wide it could easily have fit four or five other people in the front. "I need your help!! I drove off this morning without any money and my truck really needs some gas!! I'm on empty!! Would you pull over so I can borrow some cash?? -- I just need a couple of bucks to make it home!!"

What!? I almost laughed out loud. "Um, no," I said, shaking my head and looking back at the traffic light, which was about to change to green.

But the guy was pissed. "FAGGOT!!!" he yelled, and gunned his motor and sped off down Montrose, swerving as fast he could in and out of the lanes.

Ouch. You'd think I'd be used to it by now since it's a word that I've been accosted with ever since I can remember. Still, it stings. Anyone whose ever been called a faggot knows this. Anyone who has ever been mean enough to use the term to describe someone else knows its easy power. I'd say, in the past five years, someone yells this at me about twice a year. It always catches me off guard, especially since it happens when I least expect it -- like today, or like the time I was unlocking my bike at the Half Price Books and a school bus rode past and a chorus of children screamed it at the top of their lungs from their windows, or the time I was walking down to one of my favorite watering holes and someone yelled it from a truck window, or the time I was camping with H. and someone yelled it at us as we were packing up our tent, or the time I was visiting friends in Austin and their crazy neighbor started to interrogate me about faggots, or . . . well, you get the drift. And, look, I know that this guy was -- clearly -- out of his mind. I know, I know . . . it was just the icing on the cake, really.

But, it makes you think about terror and terrorism, and anti-gay violence, injurious speech, and the cultural and emotional trauma that it takes so many of us so many years to get the fuck over; and you think about that big red truck and that man's frenzied truck-to-car begging for money so he could fuel it, and you think that maybe this is not some Mad Max future, but right now, right here.

What did this guy actually think was going to happen, anyway? That I was going to say, "O, you poor man! Yes, let's drive past the homeless vet begging for booze money on the median strip and the gaggle of street kids looking to stir up some trade and park safely in the Exxon station so I can get out of my car and meet you face to face, at which point, I am sure you will not stick a gun or knife in my face and rob me or, worse, shoot me or stab me. Yes, please, by all means, let's pull over -- the wax job on your truck clearly indicates that you need me to buy you some gas. In fact, let's use my credit card so you can fish the receipt out of the trash and steal my identity after I drive away."

I reminded myself that tailing this guy and trying to run him off the road was not a good idea. I took a deep breath and put my turn signal on. "It's gonna be alright," I said to myself, "It's gonna be tempeh, lettuce, and tomato. It's gonna be a little cup of vegan gumbo soup. It's gonna be a slice of lemon in your glass of water -- you'll love it," I promised myself, "you really will."

remember (what everyone else forgets)

I was sort of dreading the trip back east to the family reunion. The whole idea of reuniting with people who I felt I had nothing in common with seemed like a chore, an obligation. My strongest memories of this side of the family are the two-dozen or so cousins I would see once a year, those who would tease me for reading inside while everyone else was outside playing hockey. These are the guys who couldn't believe I knew nothing whatsoever about the big game that was playing on TV on Thanksgiving. I would just be patient and wait for it to be over. More recently, I would see these cousins at my sisters' weddings, and it was hard to explain the academic job search, how you could be a "doctor" and still have a hard time making ends meet, the problem of adjunct teaching at four different campuses, what I was writing about, not to mention the queer thing. It was easier to speak in vague generalities like, "Yeah, I like living in Houston" and "Teaching is going well" and then direct the conversation back to easier subjects like marriage and kids.

My older sister is the one who told me that my anxieties were largely a part of a family hangover, and that this is the side of the family who I should feel most connected to -- tall, goofy-looking, working class people with yellow teeth who are just as socially and physically awkward as I am. I didn't really believe it until H. and I showed up for the "day in the park" picnic. Throngs of cousins and their kids stood in what looked like uncomfortable half-circles, smiling in their baseball caps and sunglasses, waiting to figure out what was going to happen next. I thought to myself, if I can walk into a classroom of thirty complete strangers and act like I was born inside a university, then I can, surely, mix in with this group of blood relatives. And so I did. I plunged right in, tapping into that energy that makes me "go" when I'm teaching. I walked right up to somewhat familiar faces and re-introduced myself and H. I turned to give a hug to the next person and asked the kids if their teeth had been stolen or if they fell out on their own. I easily made my way from young to old as if I belonged to this family more than anyone else did.

It was, of course, exhausting, but it mixed things up just right, and before I knew it, the shy, quiet, high strung boy who felt radically alienated from everyone else was gone, and, for the first time, I had animated conversations with all sorts of people in my family, who seemed as relieved as I was that I had lost my fear of being the black sheep.

Alcohol is important to this side of the family, sometimes dangerously so. It was both interesting and a little unsettling to see what happened when the bar opened towards dinner. Certainly the bonds formed in the park over whiffle ball, kite-flying, and hoagie-eating became, in the evening, more lubricated with the addition of old-fashions, manhattans, side-cars, beers, wine, and lots and lots of cigarettes. At one point, late, I realized that half the family was trashed and telling wild stories at the top of their lungs and the other half was slumped over a half-empty drink, ready for bed. In the room where the bar was, a couple of poster boards had baby pictures of everyone in attendance ("Guess the Baby" was a game you could play), along with a couple of candid shots from over the years. One of the candids was an enormously embarrassing photograph of my cousins and me from the mid-1980s. In it, I am fourteen or fifteen. My hair is, like, shorn up the sides and off at a gigantic, bizarre pointy angle to the left side of my head. I am emaciated, with bad acne. A pair of round metal glasses sits on my nose. I'm wearing all black. And even though everyone else in the photo has bad mullets and big permed hair, clad in white jeans and day-glo t-shirts, I am the one who everyone sees as an index of 80s poor taste. The thing to do at this point in the reunion is to yell "Flock of Seagulls!" or "Devo!" and then use your hands to shape an imaginary new wave hairdo before collapsing in laughter. I do it, too, to make sure eveyone knows I am not shy, not the outsider. Then I catch the eye of my cousin T., who I have only met once, and we step out for a smoke.

I remember T. from when we were both eleven. She came to visit my family for about a week, during which time we spent an entire day floating in inner-tubes down the Delaware river. This is all I remember. She's my father's sister's daughter, adopted. We clumsily began a conversation remembering the tubing trip, and then went in circles, talking about her search for her biological parents and the hurt she felt when they were rude to her, telling her to go back to her adoptive parents. We talked about feeling like outsiders, like black sheep. As a teenager, I remember hearing that she was always in trouble, although I don't know exactly what that means, now. I have a cousin on the other side of my family who once accused me of the same thing -- "You were in a lot of trouble in high school, weren't you?" Trouble? It's not something you ever think you are in -- just the way your life goes, unlike regular teenagers' lives, yours will be trouble. We smiled about this, finishing cigarettes.

Then T. asked me what I knew about why her mother and my father were taken from our grandparents as kids. This is something that I always forget to remember -- when my father and his three older sisters were children, they were taken, by the state, from my grandparents. They were also separated from each other. The sisters were put in different foster homes, and my father was put in an orphanage. No one really knows why. One result was that T.'s mother was very badly abused. Eventually, my grandparents regained custody of their kids, and the reason why it happened was never, ever talked about. When my father has asked people from his parents' generation why this happened, he cannot get a straight answer because the response has always been, "Your mother always loved you kids and you better believe she fought tooth and nail to get you back." T.'s interesting observation of this is that, as terrible as the situation was, she believes that the trauma my aunt grew up with is what brought her to adopt her children, and that, had the abuse never taken place, my cousin T. might never have been my cousin.

I really enjoyed this conversation because it was a strange, intimate moment in which secrets were shared and a mystery emerged. It was a serious talk, and it also reminded me why this reunion was, in fact, of historical significance. I come from a family that came very close to being torn apart. My father and his sisters, who organized the reunion, are now the oldest members of the family. The outside conversation with T. shows that those who have always felt the most outside the family can, finally, come together and talk, and that, importantly, we are the ones who will remember what everyone else almost forgets.

quick sketch

At the Bus Stop, in Capital Hill, Sunday night karaoke is sung by the neighborhood's most interesting people, including my old friend Seanna, who performed a killer cover of Sid Vicious' "My Way," and H's old friend GC, who tore it up with a rousing rendition of Modest Mouse's "Float On." The beer was nice and cold, and we drank until no one was left but us, and they threw us out. You should have seen H. do his cover of Gary Newman's "Cars" -- it brought down the house.

feet out the window (stomach just above intestines)

The unwritten part of this travel is that I have some sort of virus, some bug, which, since about Tuesday, has had me sick -- at first almost unbearably so, frighteningly so, but now almost manageable. Almost, but not totally.

Upon our arrival at Kalaloch, in a nauseated panic, I made a call to my doctor's office. I was told that I needed to stop eating the normal foods that I eat and stick with dried toast, bananas, rice, and tea. That, and to get some rest. Real rest, not hike-for-several-hours-and-then-drive-for-a-few-more kind of rest. After posting my last entry at Port Townsend, I slept for pretty much the entire day and that whole night. I was exhausted and very sad. Today I feel okay, but I am sick of being sick, sick of herbal tea and plain white rice, sick of having to explain to wait staff -- no, no butter, just rice, just toast, no jelly, no jam, just dry, just sprite, no coffee, no cheese, water only, just the broth, do you have any bananas?, no, no cocktail, yes, I am sure I only want an apple . . . I keep thinking I've turned a corner, but not yet.

This morning, we said goodbye to H's cool cousins who live in this amazingly cute 1970s treehouse-looking home in the woods near Bellingham. We drove north to see them yesterday, and had a really chill afternoon and evening, taking in the fresh air, the view, and the trees, talking about politics, driving their biodiesel truck to the co-op for vegetables and cooking, and hanging out with the kids. We spent the night in a camper in their front yard and woke up to singing birds.

We landed in Seattle around noon. We've checked in to the Ace hotel in Belltown, where we've rented a tiny little room with a shared bath on the hallway. It's a pretty hip place, what with the hip-hop being piped into the bathrooms and the tattooed and crooked haircut crowd. We did some much-needed laundry in the basement. Everything is painted white and all the fixtures are clean stainless steel. I've got my bare feet hanging out the window onto 1st street as I type this, and I am trying to will health back into my body, to calm all of my internal organs down. H. is out at a barber shop down the block getting a haircut. We have plans to go see some live music tonight, perhaps meet up with some old friends, but I'm taking it about an hour at a time, which means that I might be just as content reading Don DeLillo's new book, Falling Man, which, so far, is pretty great.

I'll post some photos when I have a couple more minutes.

notes on the nose (bald eagle)

It's really too bad you cannot take a photo of scents, because the strongest sense I have been exercizing the past couple of days has been through the nose. Seattle smells strongly of flowers, everywhere you turn. And while I love how jasmine and honeysuckle perfumes the street I live on, Seattle's flowers are an incredible variety of sweetness -- like wandering through a vaporised herbal tea. And after just one day in Seattle, we took a ferry and landed on the Olympic peninsula, which is not only stunning, at times unbelieveable, to see, but also home to a clear air filled with the fresh aroma of coniferous trees.

I think we've been really lucky with the weather, too. The days have been warm and sunny, bright and clear, so you can see gigantic snow-capped mountains on the horizon while you comb the beach for rocks. We've seen lots of deer (some as close as several feet away), butterflies, chipmunks, salmonberries, spittlebugs, a rabbit, seagulls, and little fish swimming in crystal clear waters. The ancient Hoh rainforest was a mesmerizing twisting, draping, and hanging of deep yellows, emerald greens, light golds, and pale oranges against the blue sky. We wandered a trail along the bluffs leading to Dungeoness Spit and ate a picnic lunch. Just as we were leaving the beach, we looked up and could not believe that we were seeing a magnificent bald eagle perched in the branches of a pine. Let's call it part of the national narrative that H. and I are trying piece together whenever we travel during the July 4th weekend.

Right now, we're on-line at a little cafe in Port Townsend, where I'm eating toast and drinking mint tea. We arrived in time yesterday evening to watch some fiddle-players at the Centrum in Fort Worden state park, which looks like this really interesting former-military base turned arts complex slash college campus. We returned to the park for fireworks last night (the temperature drops a bit in the evening, and the strong winds brings a little chill to the air, so folks were wrapped in blankets) and watched them burst over the water. We're staying in a hotel that used to be a brothel, where the different rooms are given women's names. It's got a claw-footed tub!

Tomorrow we're headed north to Bellingham to visit some relatives of H, then back to Seattle for a couple of days. The most important thing to do today is nothing, which I, for one, cannot wait to get to.

accomplishments (of sorts)

-Realized I have kept a pretty good blog for an entire year. Only regret the wording of one or two entries (esp. one in which I describe state employees in a way that reeks of self-important, bourgeois expectations). Always interesting to see comments from people I've never met. Blurkers who read this blog should always feel free to comment.

-Finished the semester, graded two big stacks of papers and exams, turned in grades, and then ran screaming from the institution.

-Raised a last glass and said goodbye to long-time close friends A. and S/Z, who are moving to Singapore. Still somewhat in denial about that. Can't really picture Houston without them.

-Packing for trip to Seattle, a city I've never been to but that I've wanted to visit for quite some time. Hope to run into an old friend from my teenage years, who I haven't seen since the early 90s. Plan to spend time on the Olympic Peninsula, visiting the coast and the rainforest.

-Finishing Nick Flynn's Another Bullshit Night in Suck City, a devastating memoir about a son, a father, homelessness, poverty, and work. Read it.

-Contemplating the interviews with Democratic Party presidential candidates I watched on PBS the other night. Journalists of color asked the questions. Particularly excellent was Michel Martin from NPR. She'd finish her question and I'd declare "A-NAL-Y-SIS!" while pointing to the screen.

I'll be posting from the road, y'all.

body

In Jennie Livingston's 1989 documentary Paris Is Burning, there's a shot of one of the subjects at a ball, descending the stage, completely naked. "Body!" shouts one of the MCs into a mic from the floor as the crowd goes wild, "Body! Body! Body!"

It is with this in mind that I began the day. An imaginary voice-over followed me from the bedroom to the kitchen and bath, exclaiming the word over and over. My knee has healed, and I took the last dose of nausea-inducing antibodies, but I am dragging stress around with me like a giant bag of rocks. The muscles of my upper-back, neck, and right shoulder are twisted up, stiff and painful, and there's a big red zit next to my right nostril. I'm scruffy. "Body!" I hear echoing in my head, "Body! Body! Body!"

And so what to do? I made an appointment with a place in the neighborhood that advertises for massage. I described the place to a friend, who queried, "THAI massage? Isn't that the kind that finishes with a happy ending?" No, no, I assured her, this place is legit. I looked up the website and it should be fine.

But I wasn't so sure once I got in and I met my massage therapist, Pauline, who was wearing a lot of make-up and, of all things, a short skirt. That seemed unusual. Where were her Birkenstocks? Nose-ring? She led me to a little room and I disrobed, leaving my boxers on for good luck.

"First time here?" she asked. Yes. I laid down on this futon-like mattress and the massage began. A lot of warm oil poured over my back. But she seemed awfully close -- practically sitting right on top of me. Shouldn't I be up on some sort of table?, I wondered, and shouldn't she be walking around this table?

She bent over my shoulder and whispered into my ear, Did I want a simple massage or deep tissue? Deep, I replied, I twisted a muscle in my neck. I could feel her breathing on my neck and she murmured very slowly, "Ahhh . . . IIII liiiike youuurrrr tattoooooo." She pulled one of my arms back and laid my hand so that my fingertips touched right above her knees. A bit hesitantly, I pulled them away. She picked them up and rubbed them, and put them back pretty close to where they were originally.

I decided right then and there that I could very easily say "Stop it" or "That's not why I'm here" if anything more unusual started happening -- No problem. But I was super-disappointed about the whole thing because, really, that's NOT why I was there, and I was afraid that the $80 I spent was not going to do a damn thing for the knots in my back and neck. Okay, I thought, why don't I just take a deep breath, relax into the massage, and see what happens.

A few minutes later, Pauline got up from beside me and, much to my alarm, she removed her skirt. The lights, mind you, were very, very dim, and it wasn't like she was completely naked, but she certainly was no longer wearing the skirt that she came in with. She climbed on top of my back and started, how to describe it? kneeing? yes, kneeing the oil into my shoulders. Kneeing it, if you can picture that, with her thighs sliding back and forth along my sides. It all happened very quickly. When I finally got around to responding, I uttered, a little louder than I wanted to, "Um!?!" She stopped. "Does it hurt?" "No," I said. "Okaaayyy, let me knooooow if it doooeesssss," she soothed. And I thought, But! I can feel! Your crotch muscles! Tightening! Against my spine!

Is this normal? Maybe this is what is meant by "deep tissue."

The knees in the upper-back, though, was super-intense, and they did the trick of pushing the knots in my back flat for about ten minutes. She used her elbows, too, then climbed down off my back and did my legs, head, and neck. The next thing I knew, the massage was over, and I was beginning to wonder if maybe the back-climbing part of things was just the way this woman liked to work. As soon as that part was over, she reattached her skirt and kept on working. So maybe it's all in my head?

Recently a friend of mine, let's call her Wendy, went to visit a massage therapist and had an orgasmic release. Wendy didn't go to the therapist for a happy ending, it just happened that way, and from what I remember of her description, the therapist was very cool about the whole thing. While a different experience from my own, I thought about Wendy's massage as I was walking home, and thought about how work on the body might always verge on the sexual depending on how we think of it.

And so this is how I spent the morning of H/town's Pride Celebration, with a nearly-naked woman sliding around on my back. I have to say, hours later, that something really worked. The knots are still there, but the severity of the stiffness is nowhere near as bad as it was. The massage was actually quite good, although I don't think I'll be going back. It was too oily.

But H. and I will be heading out to the parade this evening, rain or shine. Our street already has little places marked off for the floats. It's one of the good things about living so close to Westheimer -- we can walk to the parade and meander down the street, pop into a bar and have a couple of beers. I know I'll be keeping my eyes peeled for Cyndi Lauper and Margaret Cho, both of whom are in town for a live performance tomorrow, and both of whom are rumored to make an appearance in Montrose tonight. I'll bring the camera.

daily rain

It's been rough, these past few days, but I'm glad for the rain. For the past couple of days, it comes down hard out of a dark grey sky in wide curtains, lightening and thunder like angry exclamation points.

Those damn antibiotics didn't work, and I've been back to see the doctor. Now I'm on round two, this time I'm on something stronger that takes just about all of the energy out of me. Gosh, it is really just astonishing how exhausted a person can be after doing practically nothing all day. I guess that's called "rest." I'm not very fond of it.

Wednesday I went to have an MRI done on my knee and I went to see a specialist. I go back again this afternoon, to see what has developed.

I've had two dreams about going to visit a friend who is out of town who doesn't realize she's left her apartment unlocked.

knee, i worship thee

all knobby patella and elastic cartilage, bending at my whim . . .

Why You Should Not Get a Knee Infection:

1. It hurts.

2. It's gross.

3. It'll make you sick with fever.

4. It will make you think that someone has a pin in a doll somewhere.

5. It will force you to look up subcutaenous infections on WebMD where you will learn about necrotizing faciitis and its symptoms. You will quietly decide that you have this and the resulting panic will ebb and flow all day.

6. It will make you spend a lot of time inside, which will make you very cranky. And paranoid.

7. It will cause you to miss work during a condensed summer schedule where every minute counts.

8. Like some colds, it will seem like you are 100% cured in the morning, but will get worse as the day goes on, and leave you distressed and exhausted by nightfall.

9. It will call attention to your other, non-infected knee, and you will start to compare and contrast the two, out loud, to anyone who you can get to look at them (especially your partner, who has been very, very kind), even if it has only been about an hour since the last time you rolled up your cuffs for inspection.

10. It will make you miss your favorite yoga classes.

The Short-List of Good Things about It, if It Does Have to Happen:

1. You might remember how totally awesome your doctor is and it might give you pause over how lucky you are to have health insurance.

2. You might get some anti-inflammatory drugs, which act like mild-sedatives.

3. You might have vivid dreams every night about people from your past.

4. You might have time to read.

5. It might become fodder for a blog entry.

say "hi" to your knee

When my sister and I were kids, we loved that joke.

About two weeks ago, I twisted my ankle and fell, onto the sidewalk, knee-first, as I was getting out of a car. I scraped up my right knee pretty badly. I treated it with peroxide, band-aids, and neosporin until scabs formed. I thought nothing of it, really. I went swimming in Barton Springs Creek, went to the gym, practiced yoga, went to a few parties, and taught my first classes this week.

Yesterday evening, as I was leaving my office, I noticed a slight pain on the top of my knee, almost like a spider bit me. When I got home, I took a look -- no bite, nothing but the just about healed scab, but the knee-cap was so sensitive and painful. Hot. A few hours later, it was hard to walk. I took some extra-stregth tylenol and drank some chamomile tea, put the knee on ice, and googled "suddenly my knee is killing me" and "why is my knee so hot?" I checked WebMD and called my dad, who sells artificial knee implants to hospital emergency rooms. He told me it sounded like I got bit by a spider and recommended amputation.

At 2am I woke up with some really bad, throbbing pain. I couldn't move the knee very easily, but I got up to take some more tylenol and worried the rest of the morning about what was wrong with me. I called out of work sick and went to the doctor's office around 10.

My doctor tells me the knee is swolen from a subcutaneous infection. Gross! I'm also running a fever. I got a nice big batch of antibiotics and anti-inflammatories to treat it. I spent the day dozing and re-reading The Big Sleep by Raymond Chandler. It already feels better, but it'll be a while before I am swinging from the chandeliers. I go back tomorrow for another visit.

The irony of all of this is that, for the past few months, my left knee was suffering from a tear in its cartilege, and it hurt like hell. It finally started to feel better when I kissed the concrete.

seven things (tag, i'm it)

1. I was on a bowling team when I was in the fourth grade.

2. Once, going through airport security in the 90s, I was stopped by a guard who was convinced I was MCA from the Beastie Boys.

3. I was an altar boy.

4. I am deathly afraid of rollercoasters and almost all carnival rides.

5. I've performed naked in front of a live audience.

6. My first love tattooed my name on her upper-back, near the left shoulder.

7. I've been arrested.

I was tagged by Cake to list seven things you might not know about me. I tag JiP of Bad Texas fame.

underdog

The first performance artist I ever knew was a woman who lived in the township where I grew up, named Suzanne (pronouced "Susan", from what I can remember). She was known, when I was a kid, for rollerskating up and down the blocks of Delran with her cat in a bag, a wide cape trailing behind her. Capes, long, long skirts, and her rollerskates: she was completely out of place in the mall-obsessed, consumer-savvy Delran of the late-1970s and 1980s. When I was seven, she was probably 23. The kids on my block called her "The Rollerskating Lady." She lived in an apartment complex across the highway. When I was very young, she was like a celebrity. I wanted to ask her questions. She made me so curious: did she *know* she was wearing things that made people gawk, or did she not? Did she *want* for people to look at her funny, or did she want to be accepted? Later, when I was a pre-teen and early-adolescent, even though she was about fifteen years older than me, I thought of her as a kindred spirit -- a weird-o living in an anti-art, pro-athlete, all-white middle-class suburb.

She also had a beautiful voice, and sang in the Catholic church attached to the Catholic school I went to from first- through eighth-grade. She wore her plain brown hair long and straight. She had an Irish face, often scrunched into a contemplative frown. She did not seem to care in the least what anyone thought of her even though it was clear to me that she was an outsider. When I would ask questions about her, my parents told me she was retarded, which did not seem correct to me since she was not, to my mind, the same as other people I knew who bore that description. I have a bad, emotionally-charged memory of being in the second grade, just when school was about to let out for the summer, and hearing stories about how some older boys bought a slice of pizza at the parish carnival and purposely dropped it on the blacktop so they could laugh at her when she walked over and picked it up and ate it.

When I stopped going to mass in high school, I stopped seeing Suzanne. Shortly thereafter, however, my cousins came to visit from north Jersey and asking if we knew Underdog. "Who's Underdog?" "She's this crazy woman from Delran who's been on the Howard Stern Show who has this whole dance that she does." My mother interrupted, "That's Suzanne! And that Howard Stern ought to be ashamed of himself for exploiting that poor girl!" Really? Suzanne? The Rollerskating Lady? She was on Howard Stern?

It was true. Suzanne had made quite a name for herself through Stern's radio and television show as The Underdog Lady. Although I never saw this show, or her performance, I was left with the same feeling about how "funny" she was as the day I heard about dropping the slice of pizza -- a sort of soul-crushing blow to the heart triggered by the awful realization that cruelty comes readily and easily to people, and that people take a real pleasure in watching it happen over and over again.

When I left for college, Stern's book [title?] came out. I heard there was a photo of Suzanne in it. At a bookstore, I opened up right to a page with a photo of Hollyweird Squares, a knock-off on Hollywood Squares and, in one of the squares, sat a tiny little Suzanne with the word "Underdog" marking her square. I looked at the picture for a long time, trying to see the details of her face. I didn't buy it.

Time passed. I moved to Houston and meet people from all over the place. Every once in a while I was reminded of and tried to accurately describe this Suzanne from my childhood, a.k.a. Underdog, a.k.a. the Rollerskating Lady. I have not thought about her for what? -- years, probably. Today, however, my sister forwarded me the Wikipedia entry on Suzanne Muldowney [her full name], and I found out that she has Asperger's Syndrome, and that she has worked hard to shed the Howard Stern years, to bring dignity back to her art by establishing herself to be an artist with a life-long devotion to public performance. Underdog is not her only character, but one of several that she brings to life in public at small-town New Jersey parades and carnivals. This, I think, is really cool.

It's hard, still, though, because (as I discovered over the past, um, three hours has it been?) YouTube videos of her are accompanied by really mean-spirited comments that totally debase her. I can't even watch the stuff left over from Stern. I got about five seconds in to one of her picking up tootsie roll candies at a parade before I had to stop it. Just mean. Horrible. Like the pizza slice. It fucking makes me die inside.

I'm interested in seeing the documentary film about her, though, which got rave reviews from the critics when it screened at the Atlanta Film Festival last year. The trailer makes the film seem decent. You can watch the trailer at www.artofmadness.com.

multiple choice

Which of the following is most likely to drive a writer working at home stark raving mad?

a. The all day beep-beep-beeping of bulldozers backing up combined with the upsettingly loud, non-stop sound of explosions and crashes of who knows what? at the construction site right next to where he lives.

b. The terrible screams of cats fucking and fighting under the apartment.

c. The fruit flies swarming in the kitchen.

d. The upstairs neighbors' heavy-footed thudding back and forth across the apartment.

e. All of the above.

cityflowers

jade

nasturtium
pepper
sunflowers
vines
pomegranate flowers (inside)

mystery bloom
mystery bloom with gas light
pomegranate tree with hank
pomegranate flowers
nasturtiums

two thousand six hundred and four

Since January, I've been getting a bill from AT&T that says I owe them for long distance. These are little bills, not more than $8.00 accruing each month. The problem is that I don't have AT&T for long distance, I have Working Assets, that groovy company that gives you pints of Ben and Jerry's ice cream, donates money to great causes, and is linked to Sprint. When I moved in with H. a few years ago, I decided to get off the AT&T corporate teat once and for all, opting for Working Assets long distance, and SBC for wireless and land line.

Since January, I've been calling AT&T, trying to clear up the bill. This is difficult because my SBCglobal account is also now called AT&T, only, I've come to find out, this is different from "the old AT&T" or "legacy AT&T" which is the one that's billing me for the long distance I never ordered. To try to straighten out this mess, I called Working Assets, who told me to call SBC, who told me to call AT&T, who told me to call Legacy AT&T, who told me that my local provider is the one who switched me and that I had to call them. I call back SBC and an operator tells me that there is no record of this, but that she'll get to the bottom of it by doing a three-way [no giggling] call to the Legacy AT&T. This happens a couple of times with promises made on all sides that the account will be removed. But the bills still come, and the amount is increasing.

Then I get a call from Legacy AT&T telling me my name is being sent to a creditor, which really pisses me off. This past weekend, I spent about an hour and a half on the phone, mostly waiting and being transferred to various "associates" named (I wrote them all down) Kevin, Nikki, Judy, Clarence, and Heather, all of whom, ironically, sound like they are from south-east Asia. When I would ask for last names, I was told they were not allowed to provide me with last names, which makes me wonder if I was being helped by prison labor in the global south. Finally, I was transferred to "Tricia," who tells me in heavily-accented English that she even though she is a supervisor, she cannot help me. According to Tricia, the person I needed to speak with works in the "Slamming Resolution Center" and I will have to call back on Monday between 9am and 5pm and thank you for choosing AT&T. I hang up.

But, as things go with me lately, it doesn't stop there. As I'm getting off the phone, I hear the mail carrier posting letters in our box out front. After I hang up, I check the mail. There is only one envelope, and it is from AT&T. I open it and it says that I owe AT&T a past due amount of $2,604 on my long distance plan.

$2,604 is a lot of money. I immedately fly into a rage. I am irrational with anger. I am the world's victim. I shake my fist at the sky and grit my teeth, cursing god's cruel joke. I decide that not only have I been slammed (had my long distance switched without my authorization), but I have also had my identity stolen and someone, somewhere is having lengthy phone calls in my name.

Since today is Monday, I took off from the university early and called AT&T back and asked to speak with the Slamming Resolution Center. It took forever. I hung on the phone even though the recording told me it was going to be at least 30 minutes and that, since Monday was their busiest days, I should call back on Wednesday. I was mistrustful of the recording and held on. Finally, after about ten minutes of muzak and advertisements for all kinds of useless AT&T services and products, I managed to get "Blair," who told me the $2,604 bill was -- oops! -- a little typo, and that the bill was supposed to read $26.04 [I should have been able to figure this out on my own, but, like I said, I was through the roof with indignance and didn't bother to compare.]. After going around and around with Blair, who kept finding ways to put loopholes in my demand that he erase all charges and close the account, he finally does what I tell him to. I even got a confirmation number in case anything goes wrong.

But this is the point: if you get slammed by the heartless and soulless AT&T, you not only have to be tenacious and patient, you have to bully them just as hard as they are bullying you. The operators will try to talk you in circles. They will tell you that your local provider switched you even though you explain a million times that you've already heard that version of the story and it didn't do you any good to hang up and call your local provider. They will say things like "O, I see, well, I can remove two months of charges for you, okay? Let me go ahead and do that for you right now . . . " and you have to reply, "NO. You will remove ALL of the charges or you will transfer me to someone who will." They will say things like, "Ah, okay, our record now shows that you were the one who made the agreement with your local provider that we can now find to be in your long distance plan which, Mr. J_______, as you can plainly see, is why we have been able to reduce your charges by 5% for you today." And you HAVE to tell them that that makes no sense because they are expecting to bewilder you with nonsense so that you'll just give in and they can continue to profit off of your weariness.

That's that. I really don't want this to be a blog about getting the run around by the powers that be, but it is a very real and annoying -- potentially endless -- part of life, one that has the potential to overshadow the fact that you had your last day of classes today, and the gardeny perfumes of jasmine and honeysuckle this spring has been so lovely, following you everywhere you go in this city, and that you don't want to jinx the weather by saying out loud how glad you are that you can still keep all the windows open and sleep well in the cool evening air.

sometimes the answers come in the mail

"Hey you Lose your Driver License
at the 'Airport' Shone Shine Stand
We had you 'Page' at the Airport
that day. Sorry it take so long
to mail you DRIVES LIC
back to you.
P.S.
I found it behind the stand"

no command to smile this time (not again!)

I stuck it in my back pocket after picking up my boarding pass at the IAH airport, thinking that when I went through security, I'd be flashing it a couple of times anyway. I didn't even realize it was missing until I got in to New Orleans, hopped out of the shuttle, and needed to provide ID to get into my hotel room. Suddenly my hard-earned driver's license was nowhere to be found, making me very, very unhappy and filling me with a deep sense of dread.

Steady readers know about my year-long fiasco with TxDPS, and so I won't recount that hellish scenario again. But since I have really bad luck with driver's licenses, I assumed the worst: that I would not be able to get onto my return flight without it, that it would not be found, that there would be hours of waiting at the DPS to get a new one, that some crazy glitch in the system would delay the production of a new one . . . for these and other reasons, I was in no hurry to get back to the DPS. (Yeah, I checked and if you lose your license you cannot just "order a new one on-line." You have to go get one.)

While on the flight home (which I got on using my work ID), I also realized that I needed a license to present to the people at the D______ Unit I'll be taking my students to visit for a prison field trip this coming Friday. This morning, I remembered that JP commented on this blog about the one DPS you could go to in the city that, from what he knew, was almost always empty. I emailed him and got both sympathy and directions, and headed South right after work, at 3pm.

The miracle is this: I was there for about a total of fifteen minutes. I stood behind a couple of people in line and then boom! my photo was being taken and I was issued a temporary license and on my way home. I have no great hopes for its smoothe arrival on Hawthorne, but I am keeping my fingers crossed.

What's weird is that, even though the wait was short, the workers were very much the same as the ones I encountered at the place on South Gessner, who I figured were overworked and, for this reason, machine-like and unhappy. No one smiled or looked me in the eye. No one provided an explanation for what was going on. There were a lot of one-word commands that I had to ask to be repeated so I could understand.

I assumed, going in, that, since I just got a license, the replacement would be a digital copy of the old one, which is, surely, somewhere on file. This means that I figured that I wouldn't be getting my photo taken, but would just pay a fee and someone would place an order for a new copy. When I first arrived, I explained that I lost my license and needed a replacement. "Fill this out and come back when you're done." Anyone could quickly and easily just check the "no" boxes and scribble a fast signature on the form right there but, rather than point this out, I just circled around and got back in the four-person line. When I get back to the desk, about 45 seconds later, she points to another line of waiting motorists, "Line to your right." I wanted to say, "The line for what?" but, again, kept my mouth shut and got in it.

I stand in the short line and get called forward from behind a screen with a finger wave, "Next," the woman orders. "Hello," I smile, "I lost my license and I'd like to --". Before I can say, "get it replaced," she interrupts me by saying "Social security." "O, I'm sorry what? O, you need my social . . . ?" I am looking to find her eyes but she is staring at a computer screen. Her mouth is a straight line across. "Okay, sure," I say and recite three numbers before I realize she is not listening to me, so I stop and say, "O, wait a minute, so, do you want the number or the actual card?" Reply: "Card." Not looking at me. I put the card on the counter. She types in numbers and frowns deeply at the screen, reading my record, I guess. "Middle name," she says. I tell her. More tapping and scrolling and frowning. "Street you live on?" "Hawthorne," I say, trying to exactly mimic the robotic sound to her voice. She looks some more and then, satisfied, says "Ten dollars." I use the zombified voice again as I hand her cash, "Here. You. Go." She takes the money and says, dully, "Sign." "Yes," I drone, wanting to enjoy this little game, but my spirits are dampened by her joylessness, her profound alienation -- how much she must truly hate this job! Then, "Red light. Left thumb." Then, "Right thumb." Mm-hm. "Walk to the X." I move as robotically as I can over to what looks no different than the scuffmarks all over the floor except that it seems a little gummier from having once had black electrical tape on it in an "X" shape. No command to smile this time. I stare dumbly at the camera and the flash pops. The whole time, I wanted to ask, "But can't you just send a replacement license? Do I really need a brand new one?" But this just doesn't feel like the kind of place where you are allowed to ask questions, only take commands. She pulls a temporary license out and signs it and pushes it toward me: "Sign." "New license in the mail two- to six-weeks. Next." I mimic her a final time, trying to sound as bland and exhausted as she does, "Thank. You. So. Much." I push each word out of my mouth, and dodder over to the exit sign and leave. It's all I can do to not stick my arms out in front of me to impersonate a sleepwalking zombie.

The good news is that I now know the place to go get your license renewed or replaced that is the least crowded place, ever. (Thanks, JP!) Rather than publish it, lest the secret get out and it become overcrowded, just know that you can use me as a resource and I'll send you the directions, as long as you promise to do the robot thing with your voice, too.

inside

For those of you following in my footsteps, here's three shots I took of the inside that also made it onto the camera. The shots I took of the bathroom didn't come out, but you can see its folding door next to this little brown couch, pictured here with my Dickies backpack thrown on top. The little desk did not come in handy for writing, but you could, ostensibly, sit at it and gaze out the window at the teepee next door while your tamales microwave on high. I kept my laptop on my lap as I sat on the brown couch with my notes spread out around me.

Yes, it is dark in the teepee, although a little bit of sunlight comes in through tiny windows and, of course, the front door, if you keep it open. (I did find one mosquito and one brown recluse in the teepee.)

I say it is high time we claim Wharton as a writer's retreat -- a place for solitude and focus.

Dibs on Teepee 2!

yurts

I swore that since the camera shut down every time I tried to juice the little bit of energy out of the dying batteries that it meant there were no photos to be had of my motel experience a few weeks ago but, as you can plainly see, here's two I took the day I arrived.

My friend Cake claims these look nothing like teepees. "More like cupcakes. Or yurts," she says, but I think she's been listening to too much Laurie Anderson. If I had only taken a photo of the No Vacancy sign with it's Indian logo, you'd get a better feel for these teepees.

i really owe you one (new york city)

Sometimes, when I meet new people in Houston who ask me where I am from, originally, and I tell them that I was raised in New Jersey, there will be a lifting of the eyebrows and a smile followed by, "How lucky to be so close to New York! You must really miss the city!" It used to be that I would feel embarrassed explaining that I never took a bus or train into NYC as a teenager because it was, actually, a couple of hours away and, well, Philadelphia was so much closer -- a matter of minutes. For Texans, especially, a couple of hours drive to a city like New York might seem like nothing, but when you grow up in a tiny little mid-Atlantic state that believes it has a distinct "North" and "South" to it, these hours seem long, and the northern stretch to the city seems far.

This past week, I've been attending a conference in New York and, really, for the first time ever, I've been able to finally check out the city as I've always wanted -- no theater tickets, no shows or concerts, no big plans to have the ultimate city experience. Instead, I've been getting on the subway, getting off in random places, and walking in the bright, sunny Springtime weather: bookstores, coffee shops, bars, parks, vendors, trucks, benches, corners, E train downtown, L train to Brooklyn, Union Square, Christopher St., Avenue A, Chelsea, Nolita, Grand Central Station, Tompkins Square Park; finding a health food store with a juice bar, eating pineapple fried rice with tofu and sunflower seeds, bagels with veggie cream cheese and tomato slices, looking and not buying, late-night cab rides back to the hotel, the cityscape in the window as my nightlight.

I also have had the pleasure of reconnecting with two long-time friends from two very different periods of my life. My friend Gretchen (see post below) who I lived with in Syracuse, and my friend Jama, who I met in Houston (at the much-missed Toopee's Coffee on West Alabama) and worked with in the Queer Artist Collective in the mid-1990s.

It was with a wide sense of time that I got to play catch up with Jama in this unfamiliar city, remembering, as we drank margaritas one night and walked through Brooklyn the next, the mid-90s in a way that made the past seem unbelievable to me -- the intensity of being in Texas' only DIY queer peformance art troupe (ever? yes, ever!); who we were back then, and how pissed off, wounded, and unglued we all were; how we ever managed to get anything done (not to mention done well and with sold-out audiences each night) without any money but with a whole lot of over-inflated egos, dexterity, and ambition; in addition to what has become of us, the QuAC kids (as we were sometimes called); was difficult and astonishing for both of us. Seeing her smile lets me know that it is good to live through your twenties and come into a third decade of existence with a past that dazzles as much as it scares the living daylights out of you.

After our first night of seeing each other, with only a few dollars in my pocket, I got lost on the way back to my hotel. No matter which way I turned, it seemed, the subway I needed was nowhere to be found. It was late -- really late -- and I was really, really tired. The more I wandered, the more confused I became. Wasn't I just at this corner? Wait a minute -- is this Seventh Street or Seventh Avenue? In addition, my ATM card was not working. I was, as they say, shit out of luck. Feeling brave and desperate, I stepped out into the street and hailed a cab. When I got inside, I said, "Hi. I need to get to 53rd and 6th Ave. I only have four dollars in my pocket. Can you take me as far in that direction as possible?" I braced myself for a surly reply to get the hell out of the cab, but, miraculously, the driver said, "Don't worry about it." He raced me all the way to the hotel and smiled as he collected my measly cash. When I climbed out, I touched him on the shoulder and said "Thank you so much. I really owe you one." When I related this story of kindness to Jama's girlfriend, Joann, she said, "Chuck, that is what we call a true New York moment."

Cool.

feat. guest blogger, gretchen (new york city)

It's been wonderful to rediscover life with Chuck after having had to do without it for so long. For some reason, during the time we spent sharing space in the physical and metaphysical realms, there were a lot of towels involved. Tonight has involved far fewer towels, unless you count napkins, which Chuck enjoys torturing. Dinner at Angelica Kitchen was interrupted by the realization that he'd once again committed this small domestic abuse, wholly inappropriate in this whole food, vegetarian sanctuary. (Who knew it was the East Village cafeteria? Dining hall days came rushing back.) I took advantage of the opening to swipe a forkful of his marvy Roots of Spring pie. Mmmm, tofu cheese. So glad he had a fresh tube of Italian toothpaste from Ricky's, where fabulous Latino stock clerks spritzed us with Votive room spray, serenaded us with "Blow That Whistle" and ushered us to a wall of Tom's of Maine's finest -- unavailable in the Hilton-on-Sixth gift shop. (It's just past the doors where a rather lost Dee Snyder -- yes, that Twister Sister -- asked me for directions to Warner Center. Alas, I couldn't help him besides offering a sotto voce "thanks for the music.") Keeping to the Italian theme, we repaired to Bar Veloce to swap Ciaos and loaded glances with the loaded Fernet Branca fans next to us in this slip of a bar. Only the nutella panino was more delicious. But posturing wit aside, man, it feels good to laugh again.

no vacancy (at the teepee motel)

I think I saw a short article about this place in the Houston Chronicle a couple of weeks ago and, since then, I have had it in the back of my head as my Spring Break destination. It’s called the TeePee Motel, located off Hwy 59 South about an hour’s drive from Houston, and I’m the guest staying in Teepee Number 3.

I know I am going to hear a collective groan of disappointment when I reveal that my digital camera has dead batteries, so I have no photos to post of this weird slice of Tex-Americana. I know I should have checked before taking off but, you know, I was more focused on getting together the materials I needed to start writing a talk on jailhouses and universities that I’m supposed to be giving in New Orleans in less than a month. I figure holing up for twenty-four hours in an architectural anomaly will inspire me to think critically about my theorization of institutional space and the production of knowledge. So here I am.

When I first drive up to the TeePee Motel, I literally gasped. The photos on the web site don’t do the place justice. Ten identical, beige-colored, one-room “teepees,” built out of concrete and plaster, sit in a perfect line at a right angle off the highway, like a row of giant cupcakes. There is nothing else but a parking lot and some grass and puddles. And the highway. If I open the door of my teepee, there’s my parked car, that stretch of grass, some trees in the distance and, behind the trees, what looks like little houses or, more likely, trailers. Every so often, a rooster crows.

The teepees are daringly close to one another. I’ll say about five-feet apart. There is a little walkway leading from the parking lot to the teepee’s dark-brown door, which is centered in a recessed entrance. (I know my friend Cake will call me later to tell me my architectural vocabulary is impoverished. I’m trying the best I can!) There are three tiny windows in the teepee, two are on either side of the teepee, like little ears, and one is over the sink in the bathroom, directly across from the front door. The windows have dark brown awnings. The tops of the teepees come to a point, and have three little spikes, suggesting, I think, feathers. I am reminded of the igloo-shaped building that Julianne Moore moves into at the end of Todd Haynes’ Safe.

Inside, the room itself is not much: a bed, a little desk, a small fridge, a microwave, and a chocolate-brown couch. The ceiling is about nine feet. The trap door in the ceiling tells me there is an attic that comprises the architectural point of the teepee. A television juts out from high on the wall near the front door, reminding me, eerily, of a hospital room. There is a Gideon Bible on the desk, but I’ve placed it in the top drawer of the nightstand, where I think it is supposed to be.

Since I arrived around noon, I’ve been reading and writing. I’ve kept the door open for fresh air, although there is an air-conditioning unit and I opened one of the windows, too. The kindly woman at the front desk, who called me by my first name, asked me if I was a writer. When I told her I was, she let me know that there is a couple saying in TeePee Number 1 who both write children’s books, and that they’ve been staying there since their house burned down a few weeks ago. I have not met them yet, or any of the other inhabitants. When I asked, the same woman told me the teepees are almost always full, especially on weekends. Right now, the neon “No Vacancy” letters on the TeePee Motel highway sign are lit, which means, obviously, we’re at full capacity.

The families in Teepees 5 and 6 are friends. They’ve had their camping chairs out in front of their teepees and a cooler of beers and some wine going all afternoon. There are some kids throwing a Frisbee. There’s a man in Teepee 1 who is just sort of hanging out in the doorway. I smiled and waved at him earlier. I want to stress that sort of hanging out in the doorway is not at all a weird or creepy thing to do. It’s, like, the only thing you can do, unless you brought a chair with you. It’s a good way to get some air. (The teepee is a little stuffy, but it is also really humid today and, right now, the skies are dark with clouds threatening a thunderstorm.)

According to the website, the Teepee Motel was built in the 1950s, and survived for years before finally shutting down in the 1980s. You can see the disrepair of the teepees in photos posted from the late-1990s. Fortunately, some lucky and kind soul won the lottery and donated money to the motel to renovate the teepees, which is why I am able to, um, use them as a writing retreat.

Surely, there is something to be said about how the stereotype of the “Indian” gets perpetuated by this kind of hokey 1950s Americana, and how the historical specificity of various Texas tribes gets erased by a vacation-style teepee experience for white people. (I have not seen all the guests, but all the ones I have look white to me.) But there is also something -- what? campy? queer? about this place. It’s the kind of place you want to bring your friends from New Jersey to see. Teepee Number 2 (no lie!) was the setting for a scene in the 1995 cinematic remake of Lolita.

I plan to heat up some tamales I picked up from Whole Foods in the microwave later and, if I get enough writing done, watch the film Medium Cool (1968) on my laptop. I am hoping there will be a terrible storm later, and the sound of the rain on the teepee’s roof will lull me to sleep.

the only way to do it (if this is you)

If you wake up, disjointed, from a long night of spring break celebrations that went on way, way too long, you might spend several minutes composing imaginary apology emails to all of those who were witness to your caterwalling and booty-dancing in the wee hours of the morning; or, you might, in an apocalyptic mood that accompanies these kinds of mornings, decide that you are actually dying, and the current raggedness you feel is only the terrifying beginning of what will surely be a long and painful decline. If this is you, go ahead and get up and immediately call your partner, who has been happily busying himself at work unaware of your impending doom, and alert him to your condition. Notice that he is unsure of what, exactly, your problem is. Be grateful that he is a pro when it comes to your eccentricities. He will gently remind you that eating some food will help put you in the right frame of mind. You will hang up and force yourself to gather your wits about you only to discover that you tossed the last pair of contact lenses onto the bathroom floor before passing out the night before, and you will quickly call and then drive to the optometrist to pick up some new ones. On your way, the appeal of miso soup and steamed kale with rice will be so great that you will steer yourself in the direction of the vegan buffet out on Richmond, only to learn that, since today is Monday, and the chairs are all turned up on the tables, the restaurant is closed. Initially, you will be devastated by this unfortunate circumstance, and you will stand in disbelief in front of the restaurant for a couple of minutes, trying to will it to open right then and there with a fresh pot of miso soup ready for your ladeling. Fortuantely, in the last analysis, what seems like an upset will actually be serendipitous because the buffet at the vegetarian Indian food place on Kirby has that clear-brothed, very hot and spicy soup that cures any body that's trying to crash through its spring break like yours. You will notice the effects immediately and practically come to tears as you pay your bill, eternally thanking the cashier for his righteous existence. If this is you, go ahead and treat yourself to a cup of coffee at the fancy little cupcake place that's opened up down the block before you head home to call the plumber. The caffeine will be excellent, and you will drink it as you simultaneously watch the plumber fix the sink and type yourself a new blog entry.