Saturday, March 29, 2008

"Tell us your favorite story of spring"

Spring. Why did the crafters of the English language bless this season with a name implying some sort of speedy green explosion? It sounds like a sudden jailbreak from the brown and gray staleness of winter. No such luck

Spring isn't very springy. It's downright fickle. One day we get teased with fifty degrees and sunshine and everyone pours out of the office buildings in downtown Chicago at lunchtime. Their faces turn upwards like daisies catching the sun. The next day we get slapped upside the head with thunder-snow. Another day may look wonderful out the window but heading out without enough wool about the shoulders could yield a cold surprise. Today was one of those days. Brr!

I struggle to reconcile the seasons amidst all this concrete. One day it thaws a bit and I wander out to one of the few places where I know I can find large patches dirt. Green sprouting from the branches is a nice visual but I know spring is on it's way by the smell of the dirt and the aroma of thawing earth unadorned by floral scents or pollens.

I am the youngest of 5 children. As I reached the age of 3 I began watching all of my older siblings get taken off to school every day while I got to stay at home. I figured they were being carted off to the jailing which, by my estimation, they richly deserved. I got to pretend that I was an only child. I was happy. Without those other brats around to get me into trouble, my mom seemed to like me better.

During the long Upstate New York winters Mom & I would be cooped up inside together. I played house between the table legs while she vacuumed or swept. I pretended I was helping cook dinner by standing in the kitchen and licking bowls. I'm sure I was underfoot and as soon as it was a bit warm enough I was bundled up and plopped out on the porch to get some fresh air. In the rural area where we lived the breeze travelled for miles over open fields and the first scent of spring to hit my nose was the musky scent of the earth waking up. After the sterile winter, this dark, moody smell was potent with information and promise. I'm there again, just three years old, sitting on the back porch looking up at the morning sun, hearing my mom doing dishes and singing softly in the kitchen, whenever that aroma hits my nose.

I hesitate to let go of that place when it's time to end this break and head back to my stale office. I fidget at my desk for the afternoon thinking of the art I should be making or the fun I should be having. Spring is pretty slow, but it only takes a moment of that smell for that fever to explode.

Friday, March 28, 2008

The flow.

Trees looking like thick, black nerve endings silhouetted against the sunrise. They seem to spin and dance to show off how they've grown to compensate for wind, wires and sunlight. But I'm the one in motion. I'm not really moving, just staring at each new thing that comes up while we speed down the road.

I could do this all day. Just ride around and watch the world react to itself for hour after hour.

I could watch that grumpy old woman, who consistently muscles her way forward to get onto the bus first, as she begins to crack a smile at the bouncing baby in the opposite seat.

A girl of about 7 looks up and gives someone a beautiful smile. From person to person the smile spreads at least 10 people deep.

The bus driver stops and gets off the bus. Through the soiled window I see him run to a paper box and reach in. He comes back with an arm load of "Red -Eye" papers and hands them out to passengers to read.

Outside trees spin before us. Other buses hide at underpasses waiting for their schedule to start. People with weathered looking faces run and bike along the lake. It's March, amateur hour hasn't started yet so there's minimal competition for the walkways. The city rises up before us like a jagged set of grey teeth. In that city will be windows filled with very well dressed plastic bodies that have no heads. Construction cranes everywhere promise that soon the view one paid a few extra grand to have will be gone. Women march along in heels. A Staples shares a building with a dermatologist. Their signs mush together on the facade and somehow Botox comes off as an office supply.

I have to get off this bus and go to that job. FUCK! Not the job again! I shouldn't be there, not again, not today. I should be at home finishing that painting. Yeah, the one inspired by my day job, that one. Like it or not the rhythm which takes me away from the real work feeds the real work. "go with the flow!" one of my co-workers tells me. Yeah, the cash flow.

Tuesday, March 25, 2008

overload

They look pretty tiny from up here, those toy like cars zipping up and down Lake Shore Drive. Sometimes I wonder if I'll ever witness a crash while I sit dazing out the window. Mostly I look at each car passing the gap between the buildings and wonder about the people inside of them. Are they listening to music? Talking? Is there one person in the car or multiple? Is it two people fighting or are they laughing? Where are they going to? What is it like to be them?

What would it be like to be in a car zipping down the highway right now - heading off on the start of some adventure? What would it be like to not be looking at the sunshine go by from inside of a cubicle wall? I could take a hand glider and jump out the window, navigating the thermals and swishing between the buildings like a bird riding through an urban canyon. I could swoop by windows and peek in. In peeking maybe I'd see some momentary glimpse of an interior life that explains the strangeness I see acted out by people.

Someone explains in the elevator that driving and riding the bus take the same amount of time, 15 minutes. I hear a good reason to not drive in that statement. But he uses it to justify spurning public transit. One day, one more car on the highway and a bit more crap in the air for the sake of 15 minutes of transportation whoopee. I don't understand that. I don't understand the refrigerator full of stomach and teeth rotting soda and the vending machine full of junk food in the break room. The free water goes untouched. Do my coworkers realize that soda pop gives them rancid smelling body odor?

So many actions I witness I don't comprehend. If I could peek in, if I could see something in those inside moments when they think no one watches, maybe then I could see the splinter under the skin which leads to such behavior. Maybe then some magic words would pop out of my mouth and extricate that splinter from the place that it hurts. "There is nothing that you need...you don't have to prove anything...nothing belongs to you so stop worrying about losing it."

A shadow passes over my desk. It looks like the wings of a predatory bird circling down on me. Its just the construction crane next door as it works busily to block my view. Soon a shiny glass and concrete slab structure will be just 30 feet away and when I go to my window I will see my own reflection.

Like a thick, black blanket pulling itself up over the Atlantic, night comes. It will cover us soon under its chilly shield. We kick under the covers with our electric lights and poke holes in the darkness that reach into outer space. Out past the space station, past the garbage ring, past the asteroids and fat planets, they may see our lights. Maybe they'll be impressed by the glimmer and figure we'll make great pets.

Monday, March 24, 2008

Glove story

It's February, cold and dark, and Glove sits a the cafe with the windows steaming over. It sips a latté and thumbs through a book. Ignoring a funny twist in its center, Glove focuses just on what's before it. "Remember, Glove, you are empty in this moment. There is nothing to worry about." Atop the latte sits a tiny storm of white foam and brown thickness. It leaves a bubbly mustache on Glove's upper lip at each sip.

Hand bounds through the door and grabs up Glove in affectionate reunion. It orders a similar blizzard-topped drink. Hand boasts about what has been happening in its life. Glove listens. Glove shares its pointerless meanderings. Hand guffaws, chuckles and interprets with shock Glove's singing, gardening and yoga escapades. Hand has been exploring the planet and shares shiny stories of Cairo, Iceland, Sydney, London. Glove has been exploring people and pockets and its stories are less glamorous, perhaps more rumply about the edges and softer in their reasoning. But they are both no less happy.

Hand questions Glove. Why it was no where to be found the last time Hand sought it out? Hand looked everywhere! But hands do not need gloves in all seasons and find other things to toy with. And gloves, once carelessly dropped, don't wait quietly in drawers, pockets or closets. Gloves can be picked up by anyone and find other things to keep warm. And so it happened that the last time Hand looked for Glove it was keeping something else warm.

Hand, being a hand, must fiddle with Glove's various extremities; tugging at a finger here and a thumb here. Glove, being a glover, can't help but wrap up the affection.

At some point they've caught up and chuckled over all that a hand and a glove can. The latte mugs are empty of liquid and filled only with tidal rings left by receding foam. A muffled silence fills the air.

Then, Hand grabs Glove; shoving it into a pocket. Now, Hand can warm some place that it did not realize had grown cold. And for a knit in the frigid fabric of eternity they are Hand and Glove.

But hands do not live in gloves and eventually Hand must go do hand things and Glove quietly puts itself away in a drawer. Glove convinces itself that, for a short bit at least, it likes the drawer. It's cozy and glove can snuggle its fading warmth inside.

Hands are meant to keep reaching out and grabbing things. There is no fault to being a hand. Sometimes Glove wishes it were more like a hand. A glove can get lost from it's hand and find itself warming any foreigner who finds it. A glove can't help it. And when you're a glover the world is only your mirror and shows you what you are by being the thing that you are not. The world is full of hands always telling gloves that they are empty and nothing without them.

Glove picks itself up out of the drawer and drags itself into the bathroom. It looks into the mirror and remarks with only a little surprise the over stretched and sagging body it sees in there.

Hand had come by with that well groomed charm and clean manners and didn't Glove just find itself wrapping that up. Again. Glove thought it loved Hand. It liked the way being around Hand provided a warmth and direction. But too soon Glove realized that it had once again been put away. The horrible boiling that rose from the pit of the stomach, broke a sweat on the back and moistened its eyes was the realization that Glove had deceived itself once again. Hands are simply not born to live in gloves.

"Stupid Glove!" It mutters at itself, still rumpled and still covered with Hand's fingerprints. It had just loved being picked up, touched and adored for a change. But hands do hand things and gloves are discarded with only their memories of warmth and shape as comfort.

"Stupid Glove!" It shouts to the reflection. "How could you have been so stupid! How could you have dared to hope again? You know you sat there and probably said all of the wrong things! You know your jokes are corney! YOU KNOW DAMNED WELL that no Hand ever comes back!"

And in the mirror Glove saw, finally, just how selfish it had been, expecting to be filled up. Hand always let Glove imagine life could be different. With Hand, Glove had a taste of a life that it never felt on its own. Glove wished it had been born a hand, not a glove. That way it could have bones to hold itself up and muscles with which to grab what it wanted.

Just then Glove wondered with every fiber of being if it was really meant to be a glove at all? It had built these seams, knotted them off and divided itself into all these fingers and then hoped that someday just the right hand to fit these contortions would come along. Glove had merely succeeded in twisting itself up into all sorts of weird shapes and spent a lot of effort on making it all look natural.

So Glove, a bit reluctantly at first, gave up on ever fitting over another perfect hand. With a tug here and a letting go there it started to come apart at the seams. Stitches that had been years in the making found themselves being easily torn open. And one day it discovered happily that what had always been inside of it was not empty at all. It had been blocked out by hopes for hands, but it was still there. Only now, it was free.

Friday, March 21, 2008

Crimes of thirst

We waste water. We waste water growing grain and then using that grain to produce "food" which barely substitutes for anything edible or nutritious. I walked into the kitchenette this morning and saw the usual Friday box of doughnuts. All that sunshine and energy and it becomes a doughnut? A doughnut that some fool will eat (especially that guy 3 cubicles down who likes to make protein shakes and talk about loosing weight) and it will make them heavier. It will take more gas to propel that heavier body around the planet. Why do we do this? Why do we spend our money and our time and energy making things to eat that don't really feed us? Why? I really want to know. Why do we put food into our body which hurts us? Why is there not a law saying that it is illegal to waste water and resources on making food that is not healthy? Why is there not a warning label, just like we have on cigarettes, saying that a food is bad for both the environment you live in and the one under your skin?

We waste water making soda pop. Thousands of liters of water go into making just a few liters of soda pop. Soda pop companies bought up their shelf space in major supermarket chains right after those chains took over all means of distribution and crowded all of the little guys out. So now we had big buildings claiming to sell "food" and those big buildings sold major parts of their interior off to the highest bidder. The bidder packaged various liquids and solids up and labeled them as "food". We buy that shit, stick it in our bodies and wonder why we are so tired all of the time. We wonder why cancer is on the rise. We wonder why we are becoming an obese nation.

We waste water making water. It takes 5 liters of water to make one liter of bottled water. And then there's the carbon emissions wasted on making the bottle and shipping those containers (think how heavy that is... and how much it must take to ship that stuff) full of tap water from other part of the globe to a grocery store. Never mind the pollution caused by printing label which claims that water from some non industrial nation rampant with water born diseases is somehow cleaner and purer than what comes out of my tap. Please. This is Chicago. We figured out clean water over 100 years ago. Just send the dirty bits down river to St. Louis!

It would be easier on our planet and its water if we just ... went to the tap and drank water.

Thursday, March 20, 2008

#948 on the #147

Another bus ride. It could be so plain, so blazé, such a perfect time to tune out. I don't. I watch, knowing that sooner or later I will be rewarded.

The driver lurches the vehicle ahead just as an elderly woman is turning to take her seat. A young black man in the next seat over reaches his long arm out around her quickly so she doesn't loose balance. The reach, the way his hand went around her side, it's not how one usually touches a stranger. But the look on his face is only concern. With the aid she recovers. They smile at one another as if to say "isn't it funny?"

People cling to poles and straps waiting for seats to open up. A man with nails rippled from poor nutrition and smooth hands holds onto the bar in front of me. A woman whose hair is dyed the color mine used to be sits two seats ahead. By the sight of her roots, her natural hair color is the same as mine, as well. Her dye job looks fake under the flourescent lights. Did I look like that? Hair splashes over the fur collar of her coat and the strawberry blonde mixes with thick black.

At Bryn Mawr we reach the usual snag thanks to a deep hole that prevents usage of the right lane. An older man gets on. He's tall and skinny and lopes up the aisle. His clothes aren't tattered but they droop a bit on his frame. His chin hasn't seen a shaver in about a week and the silver stubble seems to fatten his cheeks out a bit. He's lifting his shopping bag to make sure not to hit anyone with it. His lips are covered with magenta lipstick. Covered like he tried to eat the lipstick covered. Magenta like a pure printing ink. Some sort of extreme treatment for chapped lips? Did he make the mistake of grabbing something in the bathroom that he thought was chapstick and his wife got a good joke instead? What IS in that shopping bag?

People look up at him and quickly dart their eyes to the floor. A little girl in the front row wearing pants the same shade as his lipstick gives him a big smile. Magenta lipstick on an old man... that's a pretty good reward for a Thursday.

Tuesday, March 18, 2008

reflection

I catch sight of her in the glass of store window. Neat black skirt, tall boots, pea coat, gloves in the left hand; umbrella tucked under the right. Well put together, she could be someone important on her way to do do something meaningful. She could be someone successful on her way home after a good day at work. I watch her like I'm curled up and cold in the sheltering niche between 2 buildings. I eye her with a jealousy, feeling my filthy and mismatched clothes and the matted hair on my head. I get so envious because it makes me feel surprisingly dirty when she makes an appearance.

I know who she is; she's an actor. I know because I know under that veneer anyone can buy at Ann Taylor she is me, a dirty, homeless, drunk. And as a drunk I may never get used to colliding with a reflection that looks like someone else. She looks like someone I don't deserve to be living a life I don't deserve to live.

I march past the stores, reminding myself that these boots cannot be worn again without serious attention from a cobbler. Rounding the corner and taking hold of the damp railing that leads down into the subway, a shadow catches my eye. It's just a flit of rags in the wind and a whiff of unwashed personal funk. There she is - who I am. A few bad decisions away, there I sit.

"God bless you" I say over my shoulder and I head down into the train station to go home.