Marigold Jenkins was a rather forlorn young woman as she raced across the campus on a frigid day in January, clutching her violin case to her chest.
She'd come from the student canteen where she'd been happy talking with her friend Lingay Mather-Polk, anxious to tell her she met someone, someone she could finally relate to in a positive, affectionate way, "that way...you know?" though never at a loss for words, this was a new experience and Marigold was giddy with emotional energy, proud to have shed virgin status happily with the first person she could "really" relate to.
"Tell me you envy me, you're jealous," she teased her friend Lingay who had never been on a date, but then regretting her words said "Don't worry, I'll find someone for you," feeling positively expansive.
"What is his name?"
"His name, you know, is Martin, I've mentioned him before, he brought me coffee and an apple Wednesday while I was working in the record store and we met up Friday night at that hangout on Liberty, next to that gift shop you like."
"Oh, I see," said Lingay biting her lip, afraid of what she knew; that Marigold's love was sitting across the the room making out with Salli Roman, who at that moment stood and announced they would soon be wed, and when Marigold finally saw for herself, with a swift aversion and a direct hit to the solar plexus, heard what everyone heard, she drew back sharply, crept out of the canteen and without buttoning her jacket or looking for her gloves ran through town at top speed, her deep breathing forming crystals in the air, her boots clomping with loud thwacks through the ice-packed snow, she ran until she exhausted herself then trudged up the back field leading to the dormitory, forlornly clutching her violin case to her chest, in the first phase of a long and rugged love life.
Monday, June 28, 2010
#24 EXISTENTIAL DESPAIR FOR THE UNEMPLOYED
(Or MY stupid fucking life)
For those of you who recently received the boot, the pink slip, pink the color of gentleness supposedly to take the sting off of what it contains, take heed: it will require all your strength to navigate mind and body through the angles, the misleading ideas, false loyalties and mania that for a time will only be quieted with alcohol. My name is Peter Kaufmann but I'm now a statistic, in the state of idle - not in any redeemable motion but still running.
You may find yourself here, so take heed: there is much to do and that is how I began this period - motivated to survive, to thrive even - but as the weeks wear on I've stopped striving, now have trouble caring. I stopped after the first ten weeks. "Immature," I have been called. But the infernal buzzing in the head of tedious choices, activities, the furious echoes of reason seem unreasonable. I am here, I am there but the activity is not any damn where at all. I am hyperventilating in the airstrip that has become life - specifically MY stupid fucking life.
Then there is my spouse. The enormity of lamenting regret only gets in the way. Useless regrets that successfully bring me down further. I had plans. As well as huge responsibility. I took on so much, didn't I? Rhetorical. Let's stay the focus; focus a noun. Not to be confused with the verb of the same. Focus yourself. We need an action word to give us motivation, to keep momentum. Yes, that's right. Never slip. I can pretend forever if we have to that we are only ever so slightly downgraded - merely sidetracked. Nothing serious. I will be on top again. I can always go back to Utah or Montana or Michigan or South Carolina...oh God. I will find a new niche, maybe find myself at long last. More BS. Who we know is who we want to find.
My job was my self and that was how I kept my world upright. I am now formless, foolish and fantastically blindsided, looking at a court date. Witness for the prosecution. My best reference, possibly doing jail time.
I loved going to work. I loved my suits, my expensive aftershave, the morning effervescence, my desk, the coffee manned and made by my exclusive assistant, I even must say I loved my co-workers who kept the atmosphere humming at a high frequency necessary for the maintenance of those high numbers, batted about as if they were actual matter. The martinis, the endless menu of hyperbole feeding the ego of the entire group.
I loved coming home after an honest day's toil that felt like the upper strata of gamesmanship. Now home is a prison and I'm doing soft time. I could suffocate on the darkly drama going on in one life lived, now fragmenting or pulling apart, next to another life that looks on with agitation or is it pity? Rhetorical once again but maybe not.
The panic; I haven't mentioned the panic I feel when my beloved asks me what I am going to do today. It's all forced fakery: looking for jobs online, keeping that appointment with the recruiting agency that has many recruits, not so many positions, making some calls to keep the lines of communication open, filling out the unemployment form, going to the bank still in panic, other times with a false sense of devil-may-care denial or then, complete indifference to what appears to be Reality. It changes by the hour - my modus operandi. The lid is coming off...burning with antipathy, unsure, robbed - is it supposed to be like this? I was lead to believe that certain things would be my due.
But all that is apparently over. This new era - "down styling," the newspaper headline reads - is code for bullshit and screams fatuity. The way has always been up. Everyone knows that. Trying to give the downward spiral a new twist may work with some, not with me. Definitely not with my spouse; she signed on for ascension.
On a good day, I take it for what it's worth but others are concerned. I'm starting to crackle. But in this I am not alone. All over the city we are crackling. Our film of endurance is shredding like our credit scores. How long will this last? I wonder throughout the day about the endgame but this gets me exactly nowhere and gives my solar plexus a jab to send me reeling. Takes all I've got to maneuver through the labyrinth of meaningless hours. It would be better to stay in bed, undercover. But that wouldn't look so good now would it? Again, rhetorical. Excuse me, I've forgotten the true meaning of serious dialogue, the give and take of ideas that surround a position. In the end, I've only a fragment to go on - pieced together for yet another day in the state of idle. Or is it exile?
To all of you in a similar circumstance, crumbling under the high-octane pressure that is the good life, take heed: This too shall pass, but that doesn't give much specific advice and certainly no edge. What we know is what we long for. Meanwhile, go to the park, read a paper...I see my precious stock that was supposed to yield our place in the sun as reached a new low. Maybe shop for dinner. Trying to economize, ha, ha, ha...makes me sick, maybe too sick to eat after all. I drown my hunger in the nearest bar where I'm sure to find all of you who also feel the clamor in your head...the sudden need for a cold, dark respite.
The personal has become the political though I am not sure which side I am on or the tactic to use. Should you think that all is lost, again remember, This too shall pass though platitudes will get you nowhere in the here and now of this lamentable pass, take heed...
Hey bartender, Gina honey, can you give us another round? What do you mean my card has been denied...fuck that, I just came from the bank..."
For those of you who recently received the boot, the pink slip, pink the color of gentleness supposedly to take the sting off of what it contains, take heed: it will require all your strength to navigate mind and body through the angles, the misleading ideas, false loyalties and mania that for a time will only be quieted with alcohol. My name is Peter Kaufmann but I'm now a statistic, in the state of idle - not in any redeemable motion but still running.
You may find yourself here, so take heed: there is much to do and that is how I began this period - motivated to survive, to thrive even - but as the weeks wear on I've stopped striving, now have trouble caring. I stopped after the first ten weeks. "Immature," I have been called. But the infernal buzzing in the head of tedious choices, activities, the furious echoes of reason seem unreasonable. I am here, I am there but the activity is not any damn where at all. I am hyperventilating in the airstrip that has become life - specifically MY stupid fucking life.
Then there is my spouse. The enormity of lamenting regret only gets in the way. Useless regrets that successfully bring me down further. I had plans. As well as huge responsibility. I took on so much, didn't I? Rhetorical. Let's stay the focus; focus a noun. Not to be confused with the verb of the same. Focus yourself. We need an action word to give us motivation, to keep momentum. Yes, that's right. Never slip. I can pretend forever if we have to that we are only ever so slightly downgraded - merely sidetracked. Nothing serious. I will be on top again. I can always go back to Utah or Montana or Michigan or South Carolina...oh God. I will find a new niche, maybe find myself at long last. More BS. Who we know is who we want to find.
My job was my self and that was how I kept my world upright. I am now formless, foolish and fantastically blindsided, looking at a court date. Witness for the prosecution. My best reference, possibly doing jail time.
I loved going to work. I loved my suits, my expensive aftershave, the morning effervescence, my desk, the coffee manned and made by my exclusive assistant, I even must say I loved my co-workers who kept the atmosphere humming at a high frequency necessary for the maintenance of those high numbers, batted about as if they were actual matter. The martinis, the endless menu of hyperbole feeding the ego of the entire group.
I loved coming home after an honest day's toil that felt like the upper strata of gamesmanship. Now home is a prison and I'm doing soft time. I could suffocate on the darkly drama going on in one life lived, now fragmenting or pulling apart, next to another life that looks on with agitation or is it pity? Rhetorical once again but maybe not.
The panic; I haven't mentioned the panic I feel when my beloved asks me what I am going to do today. It's all forced fakery: looking for jobs online, keeping that appointment with the recruiting agency that has many recruits, not so many positions, making some calls to keep the lines of communication open, filling out the unemployment form, going to the bank still in panic, other times with a false sense of devil-may-care denial or then, complete indifference to what appears to be Reality. It changes by the hour - my modus operandi. The lid is coming off...burning with antipathy, unsure, robbed - is it supposed to be like this? I was lead to believe that certain things would be my due.
But all that is apparently over. This new era - "down styling," the newspaper headline reads - is code for bullshit and screams fatuity. The way has always been up. Everyone knows that. Trying to give the downward spiral a new twist may work with some, not with me. Definitely not with my spouse; she signed on for ascension.
On a good day, I take it for what it's worth but others are concerned. I'm starting to crackle. But in this I am not alone. All over the city we are crackling. Our film of endurance is shredding like our credit scores. How long will this last? I wonder throughout the day about the endgame but this gets me exactly nowhere and gives my solar plexus a jab to send me reeling. Takes all I've got to maneuver through the labyrinth of meaningless hours. It would be better to stay in bed, undercover. But that wouldn't look so good now would it? Again, rhetorical. Excuse me, I've forgotten the true meaning of serious dialogue, the give and take of ideas that surround a position. In the end, I've only a fragment to go on - pieced together for yet another day in the state of idle. Or is it exile?
To all of you in a similar circumstance, crumbling under the high-octane pressure that is the good life, take heed: This too shall pass, but that doesn't give much specific advice and certainly no edge. What we know is what we long for. Meanwhile, go to the park, read a paper...I see my precious stock that was supposed to yield our place in the sun as reached a new low. Maybe shop for dinner. Trying to economize, ha, ha, ha...makes me sick, maybe too sick to eat after all. I drown my hunger in the nearest bar where I'm sure to find all of you who also feel the clamor in your head...the sudden need for a cold, dark respite.
The personal has become the political though I am not sure which side I am on or the tactic to use. Should you think that all is lost, again remember, This too shall pass though platitudes will get you nowhere in the here and now of this lamentable pass, take heed...
Hey bartender, Gina honey, can you give us another round? What do you mean my card has been denied...fuck that, I just came from the bank..."
Thursday, June 24, 2010
#23 MELVIN'S SON
When Melvin's son died he felt a great misalignment, his only son who took an overdose of heroin one night at a party and never came home - when that happened Melvin buried more than his son. His ego, what there was of it, was lain to rest. Melvin thereafter felt he might be invisible, he was beginning to doubt his solidity and he began to brood, unfamiliar with emotional states of any intensity. He was becoming less engaged each day and marveled that no one seemed to notice. He did not recognize himself. He expected to one day look into his mirror to shave and see a blank space. He was vaguely disavowed, he knew it, but was not prone to analysis.
After the funeral Melvin continued on as before; as if nothing had happened at all. His job hummed along although Melvin's wife Marietta took to drink until she started gaining weight and then took to pills to drown out Melvin and the dead son who slipped away from her at age sixteen when she couldn't reconcile motherhood with her darker side.
On a rainy day after his mother left him waiting downtown for hours on a street corner, his plans for the day ruined, Melvin's son returned home in a taxi, using his week's spending money, enraged beyond endurance, looked his mother in the eye and told her he wished she wasn't his mother, wished he had a strong mother, a sane mother, or just a nice mother, who showed up when she was supposed to, did normal things. Instead he had eternal guilt over his lost son-ship - he couldn't love his mother so delusional and irritating. "What have I got? A fucking head case and I can't take anymore of this crap around here"...he bellowed at her, he was close to crying but he refused, in her presence, and as he hurtled himself toward the door, he said a silent prayer in gratitude that he would be getting his driver's license in two weeks.
He finished high school living with his grandparents twelve miles away. He called his father now and again but did not speak to his mother. Melvin bought him a used Jeep and sometimes they'd take rides in the woods. He joined the army at eighteen and served a four-year hitch, saw combat in a war he considered dubious at best.
He entered college when he got back from the army, needing no money from his parents who seemed like a long-ago memory with no core. He wrote his father every three or four months because he was sensitive to his father's affection but said nothing about himself; neither where he was or what he was doing.
Melvin's son did finish two years of community college and had a degree in metallurgy and could accomplish alchemy with his skills. He was sought after by various high profile firms but after a night sitting in a restaurant in a necktie, listening to a stranger talk to him about a job he knew or cared nothing about - his uncle arranged the meeting and he was at that time, still trying not to offend - he knew if he turned this down, there was nowhere else to go so he began to drink much more and started taking cocaine with his girlfriend, Brenda, hanging out in the North Beach music scene trying to pretend that it had a big joyous meaning: he knew this wasn't likely the case, that this was a satire, a petty one at that, but he was there to drink vodka and see what else was available. Sometimes he would sit in with a band when they needed a drummer (in this too he was sought after) but never took music or himself seriously.
Melvin's son never got a job: Melvin found this incomprehensible having worked for the same company everyday of his working life, but in a way admired it: the pure spunk of thinking you would be absolved of the troubling dual between pleasure and toil though he himself found them interchangeable.
After a time, Brenda tired from so much partying, noticing her looks and health were failing fast, settled down with a job, partied less, turned instead to downers, and then after losing her job, heroin. Melvin's son followed her. He was just thirty years old, he had no reason to choose this path; he was handsome, intelligent, capable...Melvin did not understand his son and he felt a deep remorse as his wife found relief in anti-depressants and gossip and his job hummed along.
Melvin grew each day more certain that his life lacked any meaning, was without a touchstone. He knew he was losing himself in the mystery of what his son's life stood for but his son was dead and Melvin could not ask him the many questions that invaded his mind nightly.
He knew about drugs, he wasn't ignorant of the world, he just didn't understand the motivation; drugs were for sickness, disease. Recreational drug use had never entered the consciousness of Melvin. Alcohol he understood, his father drank heavily. Melvin and Marietta had a highball on Christmas Eve with his parents, a ritual long established.
He didn't get the value of artificial stimulants. What for? he'd sometimes ask. He encouraged his son in abstinence, to shun alcohol especially because it was socially encouraged. These were Melvin's views; he offered them to his son for what they were worth. In those innocent days, Melvin never worried about his son who was more intelligent than most and talented in numerous ways. Melvin was confident his son would never do anything stupid or shallow and would have a brilliant future, wrong on all counts.
Melvin's son did not get married but for a time lived with a woman named Eileen who had a daughter. She coddled him until he became too sick and then ditched him, left him for nothing, now dependent on one thing only. He never had any children, he did not fall into the usual traps men do but remained distant from all that life had to offer or claim. Melvin and Marietta often wondered what their son did with his time. He never spoke of much, though now Melvin searched his memory for clues, things spoken, but unheard...what was that comment he made at the dinner table before he left for the army? Melvin was trying to retrieve conversations he could vaguely remember for something he missed. Melvin would not accept that a man, his son would turn to such savage artificial means if he had any power in the world whatsoever. It wasn't exactly a suicide but Melvin, in his own mind, did not feel absolved. He expected a reckoning though nothing like it was ever forthcoming as his life hummed along and his wife remained in a state of numb.
Melvin was awakened at 3:14 in the morning two months after the death of his son. Marietta had been sleeping downstairs since shortly after the funeral. Somewhere in the late night sky with the cloud coverage moving swiftly across the window's frame, Melvin went on alert - maybe he was dreaming but he sensed an inner shift and heard the old Sycamore tree branches beating against the house; he saw that his son was in the bedroom looking placid only to begin to drift away when Melvin spotted him. Melvin saw him walking away with his back to the room and his son waved a casual goodbye, a gesture that lightened Melvin's heart: It was the same wave he gave Melvin as he walked to the bus that would take him to Fort Brass saying Don't worry Dad, I'll continue to show up like a bad penny, with a cartoonish walk and an idiosyncratic wave that Melvin couldn't help laughing at. Melvin saw him repeat this funny gesture as he drifted away into the night and he waved back or at least he thought he did.
A partial moon could now be seen in the window's frame but Melvin slept and when he awoke and found himself alone he bawled in a spontaneous burst of resonate sobbing that had been buried beneath his vacuous efforts at maintenance. He cried for everything lost and the utter futility of living with any certainty; it was all a riddle. His wife nor anyone else heard Melvin's sobbing, it did not last long and lingered only shortly in his chest but when he awoke the next morning he felt solidly stationed, he projected an air of slight bemusement lately missing in his demeanor; he thought it might have been only a dream, his son had not really appeared in the bedroom - but Melvin wasn't sure of anything now and it really didn't matter - when he looked in the mirror to shave he saw that he had been restored. He hoped his son would visit him now and again but was prepared to let him go.
After the funeral Melvin continued on as before; as if nothing had happened at all. His job hummed along although Melvin's wife Marietta took to drink until she started gaining weight and then took to pills to drown out Melvin and the dead son who slipped away from her at age sixteen when she couldn't reconcile motherhood with her darker side.
On a rainy day after his mother left him waiting downtown for hours on a street corner, his plans for the day ruined, Melvin's son returned home in a taxi, using his week's spending money, enraged beyond endurance, looked his mother in the eye and told her he wished she wasn't his mother, wished he had a strong mother, a sane mother, or just a nice mother, who showed up when she was supposed to, did normal things. Instead he had eternal guilt over his lost son-ship - he couldn't love his mother so delusional and irritating. "What have I got? A fucking head case and I can't take anymore of this crap around here"...he bellowed at her, he was close to crying but he refused, in her presence, and as he hurtled himself toward the door, he said a silent prayer in gratitude that he would be getting his driver's license in two weeks.
He finished high school living with his grandparents twelve miles away. He called his father now and again but did not speak to his mother. Melvin bought him a used Jeep and sometimes they'd take rides in the woods. He joined the army at eighteen and served a four-year hitch, saw combat in a war he considered dubious at best.
He entered college when he got back from the army, needing no money from his parents who seemed like a long-ago memory with no core. He wrote his father every three or four months because he was sensitive to his father's affection but said nothing about himself; neither where he was or what he was doing.
Melvin's son did finish two years of community college and had a degree in metallurgy and could accomplish alchemy with his skills. He was sought after by various high profile firms but after a night sitting in a restaurant in a necktie, listening to a stranger talk to him about a job he knew or cared nothing about - his uncle arranged the meeting and he was at that time, still trying not to offend - he knew if he turned this down, there was nowhere else to go so he began to drink much more and started taking cocaine with his girlfriend, Brenda, hanging out in the North Beach music scene trying to pretend that it had a big joyous meaning: he knew this wasn't likely the case, that this was a satire, a petty one at that, but he was there to drink vodka and see what else was available. Sometimes he would sit in with a band when they needed a drummer (in this too he was sought after) but never took music or himself seriously.
Melvin's son never got a job: Melvin found this incomprehensible having worked for the same company everyday of his working life, but in a way admired it: the pure spunk of thinking you would be absolved of the troubling dual between pleasure and toil though he himself found them interchangeable.
After a time, Brenda tired from so much partying, noticing her looks and health were failing fast, settled down with a job, partied less, turned instead to downers, and then after losing her job, heroin. Melvin's son followed her. He was just thirty years old, he had no reason to choose this path; he was handsome, intelligent, capable...Melvin did not understand his son and he felt a deep remorse as his wife found relief in anti-depressants and gossip and his job hummed along.
Melvin grew each day more certain that his life lacked any meaning, was without a touchstone. He knew he was losing himself in the mystery of what his son's life stood for but his son was dead and Melvin could not ask him the many questions that invaded his mind nightly.
He knew about drugs, he wasn't ignorant of the world, he just didn't understand the motivation; drugs were for sickness, disease. Recreational drug use had never entered the consciousness of Melvin. Alcohol he understood, his father drank heavily. Melvin and Marietta had a highball on Christmas Eve with his parents, a ritual long established.
He didn't get the value of artificial stimulants. What for? he'd sometimes ask. He encouraged his son in abstinence, to shun alcohol especially because it was socially encouraged. These were Melvin's views; he offered them to his son for what they were worth. In those innocent days, Melvin never worried about his son who was more intelligent than most and talented in numerous ways. Melvin was confident his son would never do anything stupid or shallow and would have a brilliant future, wrong on all counts.
Melvin's son did not get married but for a time lived with a woman named Eileen who had a daughter. She coddled him until he became too sick and then ditched him, left him for nothing, now dependent on one thing only. He never had any children, he did not fall into the usual traps men do but remained distant from all that life had to offer or claim. Melvin and Marietta often wondered what their son did with his time. He never spoke of much, though now Melvin searched his memory for clues, things spoken, but unheard...what was that comment he made at the dinner table before he left for the army? Melvin was trying to retrieve conversations he could vaguely remember for something he missed. Melvin would not accept that a man, his son would turn to such savage artificial means if he had any power in the world whatsoever. It wasn't exactly a suicide but Melvin, in his own mind, did not feel absolved. He expected a reckoning though nothing like it was ever forthcoming as his life hummed along and his wife remained in a state of numb.
Melvin was awakened at 3:14 in the morning two months after the death of his son. Marietta had been sleeping downstairs since shortly after the funeral. Somewhere in the late night sky with the cloud coverage moving swiftly across the window's frame, Melvin went on alert - maybe he was dreaming but he sensed an inner shift and heard the old Sycamore tree branches beating against the house; he saw that his son was in the bedroom looking placid only to begin to drift away when Melvin spotted him. Melvin saw him walking away with his back to the room and his son waved a casual goodbye, a gesture that lightened Melvin's heart: It was the same wave he gave Melvin as he walked to the bus that would take him to Fort Brass saying Don't worry Dad, I'll continue to show up like a bad penny, with a cartoonish walk and an idiosyncratic wave that Melvin couldn't help laughing at. Melvin saw him repeat this funny gesture as he drifted away into the night and he waved back or at least he thought he did.
A partial moon could now be seen in the window's frame but Melvin slept and when he awoke and found himself alone he bawled in a spontaneous burst of resonate sobbing that had been buried beneath his vacuous efforts at maintenance. He cried for everything lost and the utter futility of living with any certainty; it was all a riddle. His wife nor anyone else heard Melvin's sobbing, it did not last long and lingered only shortly in his chest but when he awoke the next morning he felt solidly stationed, he projected an air of slight bemusement lately missing in his demeanor; he thought it might have been only a dream, his son had not really appeared in the bedroom - but Melvin wasn't sure of anything now and it really didn't matter - when he looked in the mirror to shave he saw that he had been restored. He hoped his son would visit him now and again but was prepared to let him go.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)