Tuesday, June 29, 2010

A June Night

An old story comes to mind. Intellectuals deconstruct it harshly, but it's compelling and disturbing to me, and that is good. The tale was written and takes place in the late 19th century. It is of two children who come across a street urchin, who tells them to be bad and go home and destroy mom's crockery and cookware and make a terrible mess. They are later warned by their mother that such naughty behavior will summon another mother, The New Mother, who has a wooden tail and glass eyes and is not nice. Not at all.

But the street urchin tells them that it won't happen. It's crazy. So the kids go home and trash the place and, of course, mom leaves and another mother arrives. She breaks down the door with her wooden tail and sends the kids screaming into the woods.

That's pretty much the extent of it. Every so often, the kids approach their former home and see new mom, with her spooky glass eyes.

The story was written in 1882 by Lucy Clifford. There you go.

As I said, if you look it up you'll find all sorts of analysis and deconstruction, particularly about the Victorian-era use of the word "naughty." But I think they make too much of that. These stories touch upon an adult desire to reveal the indifference, pain and horror of the world to children, who have been lied to about the whole affair.

So it's not a lesson for children, but a revenge fantasy for adults.

In other news, I'm sitting in my bedroom and taking a lot of pills. A little of this and a little of that. They all get together and form a super pill in my belly that makes it all go away. What is made to go away? It, you asshole, IT. I'm 37 years old and I don't have a woman and it doesn't get any better from there. One needs a woman. Women are fine things. You can make a nest in the heart of a woman, and make love with one, as well. The right one will also laugh at your jokes, forgive your physical flaws, and let you play with the wet, hairy place between their legs.

Sex. After sex you can put your arm around your woman, or she can put her arm around you. The combination of the two of you can create a force field that many a nasty thought and feeling cannot enter. If you can get one woman to fuck you and sleep with you, you've got yourself a magnificent talisman that will keep the damn werewolf of loneliness and self-loathing at bay. Whatever happens, you are not in it alone, just so long as that arm is around you, pulling you close.

Never take that arm for granted, gents. True, it may prove difficult as the hour grows late and you find yourself needing a little space in which to get comfortable. Never forget that the arm in question belongs to another being who is stating her affinity for you, whatever you are and hope to be. The arm pulling you close is pulling you away from a void. The void is a wine bottle when you don't drink. The void is pills and a romantic comedy. But no amount of pills, booze, or self-delusion can replace the smell and taste of a woman who has thrown it all in for YOU. The smell of pussy is part of it. Yes, I'm a caveman. But it's also the hopeful look. The hopeful look! The look your woman gives you that says, despite everything, I'm with you. I'm with you. I'm with YOU. Whatever the hell you are, you're worth it.

So in the absence of a woman, what am I worth? What am I worth? What am I worth?

Hydroxizine and lorazepam.

Friday, June 25, 2010

Your Buffoonery Echoes Through Time

If I've learned anything in this life, it's that human beings absolutely adore a pleasant fiction. Being human myself, I'm no exception. The expression, "The truth shall set you free" is a lovely, wretched lie. Take a moment to think back to all the times in your life that you were hit in the face with a bit of truth about yourself, and it sucked. Children like to do that. To ignore compassion and scruples in favor of a good, nasty joke. Once I purchased an expensive, vintage 1950's tan colored shirt with a slit pocket and loop collar, accented with stitched fleur-de-lis. What a shirt. It made me feel like Montgomery Clift in From Here to Eternity. Except for the getting shot part.

Then it happened. While standing on line at FoodMaster, buying some pretzels and day old creme horns, a 12 year old prick loudly pointed out that I looked like a fat Charlie Sheen. When I got home, an Internet search revealed that Mr. Sheen does, in fact, wear vintage shirts like that one. The Charlie Sheen Signature Series.

So that was a little bit of truth that didn't set me free. It set me out $70

Most people like to think that they will be around forever, sitting next to God or playing ping-pong with Martin Luther King. And if they do go "poof," at least their accomplishments will shine like a beacon throughout the ages. Or as General Maximus (Russell Crowe) in Gladiator told us, "What we do in this life echoes through eternity." Like having the moniker General Maximus. Cripes.

It's a lovely thought, and one is inclined to think that the "echo" will be of something magnificent and beautiful and heroic. Like Mandela going from prisoner to Prime Minister, or Ghandi marching to the sea to make salt in defiance of Limey law. Wonderful echoes, those.

But unless there is a cosmic editor floating around out there, or in here, then everything we do rings in the echo of space like an annoying "Tap That App" ring tone. There are many more humiliating and embarrassing events floating around in eternity than noble ones. Here's a list of five, and this is just off the proverbial top of my head. Each of these anecdotes are true, and they are echoing through eternity like a fart in a cathedral.

1. I went to a Jethro Tull concert.

2. At King Richard's Faire in Carver, Massachusetts, a greasy turkey leg gave me a heinous bout of diarrhea. Before I could make it to Ye Old Port-a-Potty, shit happened. As I crouched down behind Vince Conway's hammered dulcimer booth and found a modicum of relief, a sexy serving wench passed close by and spotted my royal ass poised and crapping. We saw each other four more times that day, at the joust, during the parade, and around the merchants. Each time something horrible and unsaid passed between us. I imagine she was never the same. Poor dear.

3. A lady friend and I were caught having sex in the brush at a beach in Oyster Bay, Long Island. The timing and angle were extremely unflattering. My hairy ass rising and falling amid grunting and groaning and...well, you get it. Another life ruined.

4. In the men's dorm at a psychiatric ward (The Arbour in Jamaica Plain) I slept in a cot in a room with about 30 other men. A lack of planning had me sleeping in my underwear. That's the trouble with psychotic breaks...no chance to get ready beforehand and pack a bag. The blanket came off due to the stifling heat. But no big deal...I wasn't alone and we were all medicated into blissful sleep. At 3:06am something woke me up. It was a filthy, disheveled, underwear clad and most likely homeless man leaning over me while making kissy-kissy noises. When he saw my bugged out Tex Avery eyeballs, he moved on. I often wonder what would have happened if I woke up 10 minutes later.

5. Back when I walked amongst the living, I worked at the Fairmont Copley Plaza, mostly cleaning public areas in the wee hours of the morning. Big lobby, pictured above. At around 2am, my cohort Napoleon bet me $20 to stand on the Bulldozer heavy-duty marble buffer and turn it on. One had to hold on with vigor to prevent it from spinning out of control even when used properly. Neither one of us could imagine what would happen if one did something so idiotic. So I took the bet, stood on it and squeezed the handle, thus turning it on.

I can't be sure what happened next, but I know I flew through the air, into a ballroom and onto a wooden table, thus breaking a vase and tearing my uniform. Napoleon laughed until tears ran down his face, and I wondered if I had internal bleeding. While I did win the bet, a security guard later told me that it was all caught on film, and that is was hilarious in a baseball-to-the-crotch kind of way. Everyone who worked for the hotel eventually saw it, including me. It was not flattering. I looked like a fat rag doll.

All of these moments will live forever in time, the half-ass philosophers tell me. Right along with the storming of the beaches of Normandy, the burning of Joan of Arc, and man walking on the moon.

Monday, June 21, 2010

A Fine Moustache, Ruined!

Whilst perusing the Internet for interesting stories, news, and boobs, I discovered a curious photograph. No, it wasn't a grainy and disturbing crime scene snuff picture, or a still from an odd sex video involving horses and Charlie Sheen. Instead, the photograph showed the murder of facial hair. Specifically, the "toothbrush moustache."

We all know that Adolph Hitler turned the toothbrush moustache into his hairy heraldry. The emblem of a mediocre intellect and murderer. Take a look at this picture, though. It didn't have to be this way for the poor toothbrush moustache. Apparently, during World War I, an officer told Adolph to cut his handle-bar moustache. Hitler seems to have feared a naked upper lip, and thereupon turned to the bristles of a toothbrush moustache. And history was made!

And a fine moustache was ruined forever more.

Sunday, June 20, 2010

Some Thoughts On Guilt and Reality

My thoughts this afternoon have turned to evil men. To the extent that I believe that evil exists at all. The concept of "evil" belongs to the theists, and they can keep it. It has an romantic aspect that cruel and ignorant people don't deserve. Most people who inflict pain do so accidentally when they themselves are in pain, and they subsequently regret it.

But that is only the beginning of a cycle. Regret leads to guilt, and no tonic, medicine or fermented substance can ever take the vile poison from that agonizing sting. No application of heat or cold makes it easier to bear. Guilt is like a wound that forces you to favor it with shifted weight and careful movement, but not in a hand, leg or foot. And not just in your body. Guilt alters perception, of yourself, and the world. It colors your view of the past and makes it hard to be hopeful about the future.

The ache doesn't distract from self-loathing, like the stab of a self-inflicted wound. It does the very opposite. It magnifies your flaws, moral or otherwise, and prevents you from embracing a pleasant fiction that may spare you from bitter disappointment in yourself, in your nature. When life provided an opportunity to show your mettle, and you failed. The rest of your days will now be spent reconciling the person you've become with the person you hoped you would be. Guilt represents a refusal to accept your actions in a given moment. A moment that will live forever in your mind, and can never be revisited.

And it is there that the remedy to guilt, and perhaps even the resultant self-hatred, may be found. One doesn't have to accept an action once taken, for we are all moved only partially by ourselves. The world moves us, as well. Acceptance that the past cannot be changed, if carefully handled and considered, may just provide a modicum of freedom from that past. The practical application of knowledge about the hard lesson learned, coupled with acceptance of our failing (fixed in time), may lead to something resembling peace.

But even then, there is the echo of a moment that will forever sit unchanged. Fixed.

Have you ever done anything that haunts you? Did you ever get so angry with someone you love that compassion failed and horrible words, or actions, emerged to fill the void momentarily left by the momentary absence of our love and patience? That's a large question, and not abstract for some of us.

One hundred and thirty eight days ago, I turned to vodka in an attempt to reduce agony of what my psychiatrist would later call, in a report to the court:

"An episode of self-destructive dysphoria rage, a rational response to irrational and pathological self-loathing leading to racing thoughts, identity disturbance, suicidal thoughts, self-mutilation and eventually an episodic psychotic break. Mr. Lyle reacted to his failure to pay a utility bill with a frantic desire to kill himself, as punishment for a "crime" that had been blown out of all proportion in his mind. The unpaid bill was a judgment that rendered him feeling totally worthless, terrified and unique in failure. The break lasted for several hours."

What did I do? Simple. I got drunk and began making a noose. My father came up the stairs to my flat and tried to stop me from hanging myself. I pushed him, and he was caught off balance and fell, cutting his head. Before I succumbed to alcohol poisoning, I summoned an ambulance. He was taken away, and before passing out I threw myself down a flight of stairs and punching myself in the jaw.

I've never hit anyone, and didn't him my father. But I did push him. Three weeks ago, I told the court that I wanted to declare my guilt in open court, and suffer the worst possible punishment. They granted the former request. My lawyer tells me that, given my father's testimony, I could walk away with no probation order. That doesn't sit well with me. So I'm essentially telling the court to give me one or two years of weekly probation. It pleases me that my attorney understands my need to embrace my guilt and declare it publicly.

But no present course of action will reduce or eliminate the guilt and remorse I feel. It's with me all the time.

Friday, June 18, 2010

The Story Your Colors Tell

The river near my flat must have been an impressive sight to men and women of an earlier time, in wilder, greener times. On a summer evening such as this, a painter of any skill could identify, by mouth or brush, the colors in seemingly endless variation. A student of botany would corral all that green under a single word that speaks to both aesthetics and function; chlorophyll. But as my eyes scan the river bank, back across the snow-capped clover that leads to it, and then up to myriad bushes and trees, it is clear that one word (no matter how apt) is not large enough to contain all the emerald shades before me. And an approaching summer storm can render every patch of shining, bright green into something dark and lush. Color and light work together. They are pals. Comrades.

Men and women walk the Earth with skin as white as newly-struck alabaster or onyx (the artist is ever present!), or brown like ancient amber. So much variation. Some people are described as white, while others are given the label black. But in truth, have you ever seen two people with skin that is exactly the same hue? We generalize, and all generalizations are inaccurate by definition, but closer inspection reveals the truth of it. That we are all unique, even on the surface. Every body is a world unto itself, circling the sun along its own path. Taking it places that can be seen reflected in our pigmentation, our flaws, our eyes. The pigmentation of our skin tells a story far more interesting than one of evolutionary adaptation. It also tells our co-workers if we've been on vacation in Jamaica, or sick and in bed in our flat. Our skin tells ancient tales as well as reports recent developments. A blister can be a dispatch from the Front. A new red and white pimple a monument to adolescent hormones that will surely lead to frustration and angst.

Your personality also has a say in what color you'll display to the world. An attractive young lady of pleasing proportions may be more inclined to cover a bit less on a white hot summer day. A finger of sunshine, a beam fired from a distant star, moving across the small of her back as she lies in her yard or on a beach. Even then the color of her body will not be uniform. Sun worship requires impossibly difficult prostration, kneeling, lying and stretching. With the aid of clothes and a summer evening growing dim and dark, the illusion may just work. But a lover or trusted friend will know the truth, which is ironic since they are the ones she is trying so desperately to fool. A partner knows that between her bronzed legs and back sits two alabaster cheeks. A white bum that shines with white light and reminds both the Sun Goddess and her devoted follower that all perfection is a lie. It has to be. The belly and breast and face may speak of the careful application of sun, of attraction, of "vacation sex." But that ivory bum tells a different story. It brings to mind that Coppertone ad, the one with the dog. I think of a woman in her flat, around about February, telling her friends that she needs to get a bit of color.

The white bum reveals all.

And in an attempt to attain a uniform color, a "bronzing" chemical, or perhaps tanning salon, will be employed. But it never looks exactly the same. That bum will never be as tanned and weathered as one's face.

Only a nudist, willing to reveal cheeks as white as a February snowdrift to strangers, earns the right to prance about with a perfectly uniform brown body. But even then, it's never totally even. None of us are one color. Just like the water lily on Mystic river that is bright green at the base and dark green on top and a million shades in between. We are all a kaleidoscope, within and without.

I'm thinking of my own body now. The soles of my feet are dirty, and dead skin at the heel has been picked away (a nasty habit). Toenails are pink, but white where they grown too long. Weight loss has given me a shape that pleases me a bit more than when I was obese, but I'm still as white as snow over most of my body! Between my legs, my thighs are a bit darker (perhaps from walking and rubbing) than my hips, which are the color of driven snow. As a man, I must accept a forest of what can only be referred to as, "ass hair." Kind women have said that I'm a teddy bear, and refer to my hairy bum and back and chest as "fur." But it's not fur! It's black hair that emerges from skin that is tanned (arms, neck and face) to white (just about the rest of me).

My blood is red, tears and sweat are cloudy-clear, and scars are a darker hue than the skin once cleaved. Some of my hairs, wherever you may find them, are turning gray. This pleases me. My eyes are gray-green. Linda once said that they look like the sea. Not the blue off a Florida beach, but like the North Atlantic. Deep and rich with algae. I like this, as well.

Perhaps those green eyes resemble the green of the trees that line the Mystic River. And the white flower of the lily pads might resemble my white hips and ass. I keep those parts hidden, except from women who have promised to love me, and accept all of me, even the white parts that need more than a little sun.

The flora of the Mystic River let it all hang out, with no concern or shame like the silly apes we be. White flowers, rich green shoots and leaves, brown and gray bark...it's all there. No shame in cause and effect that leads to this color or that.

And color reveals so much! The attractive woman with almost (but never total) uniformity of color indicates that the owner of the body is very aware how pretty it is. The obese man with a body the color of a salt flat, except for the face and hands, reveals a shyness or even shame that is defining in more ways than one. Even the old men at the "L" Street bathhouse in South Boston tell the world so much with their ruddy complexions. They simply don't like to use sun block, do they?

So much color, along the river and along the lines of our bodies. My friend Linda is getting color in her face now, as she loves taking care of horses, and that gets her outside. My brother, Kent, is turning red, then tanned. He plays a lot of tennis. My left arm is a bit more tanned than my right, as it gets that way while I run errands with the car. Down all those sunny streets.

A unifying theory of color is needed. Music can reduce me to tears in a matter of minutes, or even seconds. But so can the halo of white light around the moon just before a winter storm rolls in. Or the colors of Halloween; from the leaves to the orange of pumpkins to the red of apples still on the tree or in a barrel of cold water, ready for bobbing. Yes, I've been known to be so taken by these images that I have to fight back tears to prevent embarrassment.

The fall has so many stories, and not all are colored by Ray Bradbury and full of pumpkins and apples. Some years, self-loathing and depression cripple my romantic inclination to pass out candy and present decorations. Some years, the back stoop light is off and the blinds are drawn. Darkness. Romantically, I could say that it speaks to my yearning for the darkness of impending, eternal death, or something. But in reality it indicates my desire to simply be left alone. It's a sad darkness, not an intriguing one that fills a wild ravine and compels children to invent scary stories. It's a dark bulb, and one not blown but dark by choice. The flip of a switch.

Eyes possess the power of the Mystic River. The orange of a carved pumpkin is the color of happiness and mystery during childhood (children still enjoy and fear the dark corners of the world, god bless them, and the emblem of this is a Jack-O-Lantern). Of light crippled to let the mind flourish in darkness. Like crystals or mold.

And my mind turns back to all those shades of green. From my eyes, to my newly planted pepper and tomato plants, to the maples and oaks and elm and evergreen along the river. And those wonderful lily pads that will, in time, produce a shock of white above the dark water in just a few weeks. Say what you will about form, but I treasure all the complexions of Linda, Kent, Clare, Annie, my father, Melanie...they all have their own unique forms. And their own unique palettes to produce them. Your colors tell a story, and it may not be the one you are trying to tell. Your colors say a lot about you. They reveal so much. Of what you've done and what you hope to do or be. And every passing storm makes you a bit darker, like the heart of a black oak tree, or the slowly moving, algae rich water of an ox bow.

Wednesday, June 16, 2010

My 21lb Best Friend

Today, I broke one of the laws of Men. While walking my beautiful 21 pound dog, Annie, down Gardner Street towards the Mystic River my eyes caught sight of a strip of pristine green grass next to a condominium complex. There were many people around the neighborhood, as there always are, but no condo denizens sat or strolled near the Green Mile.

So I seized the opportunity to let my beloved canine go "off leash" for a few minutes on grass that didn't belong to me. A rebel I was, but with a cause. The cause was, and remains still, to make Annie happy. Her happiness is the most important thing in my universe. Why? Because human beings are short-sighted, greedy and fanatical, and any creature that relies on humans for a fair shake is not going to fair well. There isn't much I can do about that, except spoil all of my pets rotten, in a Karmic attempt to balance out the atrocities in the world around us.

That was the abstract idea behind taking her off leash to run amok on condo property. If anyone tried to stop us, I could passionately advocate compassion, kindness and decency. To let my little dog, rescued from the mean, hot and aromatic streets of San Juan, Puerto Rico run wild for a moment or two on this cool, June day.

But nobody tried to stop us. While I thought about the trees swaying back and forth in the breeze, the smell of paint wafted off a recently painted flag pole. It was pleasant. Annie took advantage of a rare treat in the city; off leash sprinting. What Linda calls, "Zoomies." She bounded back and forth at least 10 times, and with a little guile I managed to slip the leash back on her. I kissed her, and we ran down the street and into the projects where I live. In my study at The House of Four Cats, Annie and I continued playing. It was wonderful.

And now it is locked in my memory. Ha! Oh, no they can't take that away from me.

The cliche of a lonely person finding company and solace in cats and dogs. There are many people like me. Animals are ancient magic. They remind us that we are just animals, too. Smart, strange animals, but animals nonetheless.

Annie looks at me. Those eyes say a lot as she leans over with a playful lick.

Tuesday, June 01, 2010

A Pack of Lies

It began wet, full of struggle, blood and tears. It may very well end the same way, I do not know. Clean, long white hallways leading to others. Carefully one can move and move and move and find him or herself outside in the hot sun. Green leaves sway in the wind, but sweat appears on the brow. There are other people about, and they think a lot like you. But you will be told again and again how different you are from the herd.

Most greetings are met with a smile. I ask a young man, well-dressed with the latest cell phone in his hot hand, what number bus will take me to Copley Square. I'm not sure what is there, but going there provides a necessary illusion. One has to appear intent on a goal, on getting somewhere or doing something. Briefly I think of what it would be like to stab this man in the neck. The blood, the screams, the disruption above all else.

He tells me to take the #89 bus, and it may as well be gospel.

As I wait, I look about the waterfront of Boston and imagine grotesque actions of the past. My mind bends that way today, and I can't stop it. They used to tar and feather people here. One human being, to make a point, would hold another down and coat his delicate body in boiling tar. Physical pain would follow for the victim. By the time the feathers were applied in mockery, he cared not what happened to him. The pain of his seared flesh would insist upon being heard first, before pride. There is no pride when you are in agony.

From the moment you are born, you are forced to listen to the music of chance. Money helps. Money helps a great deal. In fact, life for human beings is all about money. Wealth keeps your toilet clean of specks of your own shit. Wealth allows a million lies, and they are all lies about dignity. "I'm not an animal, I'm of God" you can tell yourself. It's a fiction that allures.

In reality, you are an animal that went down an evolutionary path which led to self awareness and written language. We are all living on the backs of past generations. We don't arc towards justice or goodness or godliness. Ideas like that are mere distractions while we fuck and make little ones. You're a life support system for the machinery between your legs, never forget that. You don't matter one whit.

God loves you? That's nice, spread your legs. We are above all other creations of god? Super. Stick it in. Cum. repeat.

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