EXTEMPORANEOUS WRITING - "Adrift"

first comment: a city in the world
second comment: a woman’s name
third comment: a type of transportation
fourth comment: an animal
fifth comment: an article of clothing

Joel Macara: Hamburg
Kevin Doherty: Irma
Linda Selke: a unicycle
Michael Bunn: a three-legged one-eyed cranky opossum
Christopher DeBoard: pantaloons

"Adrift"

Hotel Absteige

Hamburg

13 September, 1993

Mrs. I. Lindstrom

4130 Bedford Rd.

Stoneham, Mass.

Dear Mrs. Lindstrom,

This is a very hard letter for me to write, indeed I hardly even know where to begin. First of all, I hope you will be able to read my handwriting without too much difficulty. My penmanship is usually much more legible, but the hotel where I am staying, listed on the letterhead above, is far from opulent; indeed, it is far from merely adequate, but alas it is all that I can afford. The three sheets of ancient, dusty stationery which I unearthed at the bottom of a drawer are apparently all I will ever see, and I have much to convey to you, so I must write to you in this impossibly small script.

I wish that I could introduce myself to you properly, but this brings me immediately to my problem: I am adrift. It appears that I have forgotten who I am, and my sole link to my past life seems to be your name and address. I have enclosed a drawing of me, made by an acquaintance. As you can see I have rather unruly, curly hair, which is a dark brown, and my eyes, which my friend was kind enough to draw with a kind of mischievous sparkle, are blue. My face, I think is not an unpleasant one, though I will leave that to you to decide for yourself. Do you recognize that face, Mrs. Lindstrom? I’m not sure how old I am, but after many hours of pondering that unfamiliar countenance in the mirror, I would place my age between 30 and 35. I stand about 5’10”, I think, but I’m not sure exactly because everything over here is metric and I have no idea how tall 175cm is. I am thin, but you may remember me with more weight, as the clothes I was wearing at the beginning of my story no longer fit well, but seemed to be made for a larger man.

The beginning of my story is this:

I opened my eyes. It was dark. I could smell, what? Maybe hay, maybe horses, maybe strong coffee, maybe all of those things. My head hurt, a lot. Light was seeping in around the edges of a blind, pulled down over a window. I had no idea where I was. The room seemed to be moving. I saw the shadow of a woman against the light in the window. “Yeerma!” she seemed to be saying. “Yeerma, something, something, yeerma…” and then, nothing.

The next thing I remembered could have been moments later or days, I don’t know. I was opening my eyes again. The room I was in was no longer moving. The window shade had been lifted and a soft morning glow was filling the space around me. It seemed I was in some sort of tiny house, with a tiny stove in one corner, the bed where I lay filling most of the opposite corner, and various tables and chairs, all covered with piles of stuff, filling the space between. There was a tiny door at the end opposite the bed, and one tiny window on each side. The door opened suddenly, and once again silhouetted in the morning light I saw the shadow of the woman I had seen before. Her hair tumbled from her head in beautiful, luxurious sable curls, a perfect hourglass figure in a plain cotton dress, the outline of flawless femininity, the rays of the morning sun emanating from behind her head made me think I was beholding a vision: my own sweet, beautiful Angel of Mercy. “Yeerma!” she cried once again.

The angel stepped inside, closing the door behind her, and as she did I could finally see her face. I did not notice her eyes, which are a fiery black, as if crafted from jet. I did not notice her lips, which are full and soft and crimson. I did not notice her skin, which is tanned and sun-kissed. All I could see, as I lay my eyes for the first time upon my Angel of Mercy, was the enormous wart which sits on the very tip of her nose. I have spent so many minutes staring at that very wart in the weeks since that first day, I could describe it to you in full, Technicolor detail. Suffice to say that it is the sort of wart which allows you to notice nothing else. Even as I got to know my Angel better, I would often have to tear my gaze away from it, or jolt myself back to reality as the conversation around me faded to a dull hum and all I could hear was my own inner voice, screaming, ”Why don’t you cut that fucking thing off?”

“Yeerma,” she said again, walking towards me and offering me a glass of water. Then she began talking to me, in a language I have never heard before, but which sounded to me as if she were constantly trying to cough up an unpopped kernel of popcorn. She spoke to me, though, in calming, comforting, tones, and I understood that she was trying to nurse me, to take care of me; and I was more than willing to let her.

She talked on and on for a while, but I honestly had no idea what she was saying. I began to know how it must feel to be a dog, sitting at its master’s feet as the master blathers on and on about its human concerns. Their ears perk up when they hear certain words, like “cookie” or “walk” or “go for a ride”, but the rest of it is just meaningless babble, as comforting and familiar as it might be. As she talked on and on, I only kept hearing the word “Yeerma” over and over again, and my ears perked up once when I heard the words “Stoneham Mass”, just before I succumbed once again to sleep.

Over the next few days, I slowly regained my strength. I learned, through much finger pointing, that my Angel’s name is, I think, Faina. At least that’s what it sounded like to me. I asked her to write it down for me, but when she did, all she had written was Фаина, and at that point I didn’t know if she had the world’s worst penmanship or whether I had been kidnapped by space aliens, so I just smiled and nodded and continued to call her Faina.

 

I soon learned the meaning of “Yeerma” and of my connection with you, Mrs. Lindstrom. After days of sitting like a patient dog and listening to Faina drone on and on, entranced by the carbuncle on her nose as she fed me, shaved my face, and wiped my brow with cool water scented with lavender, it began to dawn on me that “Yeerma” was my name, or at least it was the name which she had given me.

Forcing myself to lift my eyes from the tip of her nose to meet Faina’s gaze, I pointed at myself, asking her, “Yeerma? Me? I am Yeerma?”

“Yeerma! I am Yeerma! OK!” she cried, running over to a small chest across the room. She came back with a pair of blue jeans, a T-shirt, and a pair of beat up sneakers, and I understood immediately that these were my clothes. She reached in to the pocket of the blue jeans and pulled out a crumpled piece of paper, inscribed simply with your name and address: Irma Lindstrom, 4130 Bedford Rd., Stoneham Mass.

Now, losing one’s memory is a funny thing. I cannot tell you where I was born, the name of my mother, or even if I am married or not. But I am fairly certain, even now, that “Irma” is not my name. Some remnant of the old me remains, insisting that Irma is a woman’s name, and despite all the uncertainties in my life right now, I do know that I am most definitely not a woman.

So, by way of the elaborate game of charades which had become the means by which Faina and I communicate, I managed to convince her that my name was not Irma. Then, what is my name?, she seemed to want to know, after 5 minutes of pointing at me, shrugging her shoulders and giving me quizzical looks. I turned to the pile of clothes, my only link to my identity, for answers. I found none. The pockets were empty, save for the piece of paper bearing your name. I unfolded the T-shirt, which had been laundered but still bore some iron-colored stains in spots, and saw that it read “FRANKIE SAY RELAX” in giant block letters across the front. I searched for meaning in those words, and, finding none, told Faina that my name was Frankie. “Fronky!”, she said to me, kissing my forehead. As she tucked my old clothes back into the small chest, I drifted back to sleep. Frankie say relax.

Over the next few days, as I regained my strength, my world began to widen. I learned that the tiny house I am in is actually a wagon, a horse-drawn Gypsy wagon just like in every storybook you’ve ever seen about little innocents being kidnapped by a traveling circus. And this wagon is only one of a group, eight wagons who collectively make up a traveling show. I began to meet other people, too, as Faina brought them in to shake my hand, call me Fronky and talk to me in their incomprehensible babble.

One day, soon after I had regained enough of my strength to step outside, I had gone behind the wagon to relieve myself, when for the first time I heard someone speaking in a language which I understood.

“Oh, Lydia, Lydia, have you seen Lydia?

Lydia, the tattooed lady-” I heard someone singing nearby.

The sweet sound of English washed over me like a cool stream on a summer day. “Hello? Hello?” I cried out to the air around me, desperately trying to fasten the too-big blue jeans around my waist. I ran out from behind the wagon, through the blankets which were hanging out on a clothesline to dry, and ran smack into Mad Trevor. Mad Trevor looks to be about 80 years old, with a wrinkled, gap-toothed face which makes me think he’s always about to snatch the hat from his head, slap his thigh and exclaim, “There’s gold in them thar hills!” He’s only about 5 feet tall, so I nearly knocked him over as I came running out through the laundry.

“Do you speak English?”, I asked him.

“I not only speak English, I am English, squire!”, he replied, giving me a sweeping bow in the process.

I was so overjoyed to finally hear my Mother Tongue, to be able to communicate at last with another human being, I hardly knew what to say or what to ask first.

“I’m Frankie,” I said. “Can you tell me where I am? Do you know what has happened to me?”

“Lucky for you, squire,” he answered me, “I’ve an audience with Her Majesty this very evening. I shall present her with a complete list of your concerns.” Then, picking up a length of rope which had been on the ground at his feet, he said, “Please inform Lady Grantham that I shall be in the drawing room.”

It was then that I realized that although Mad Trevor and I speak the same language, we are seldom having the same conversation.

Over the next few days, through hours of torturous charades with Faina and rare moments of lucidity with Mad Trevor, I managed to learn a little bit more about my situation. This little band of wagons had found me by the side of the road, beaten and battered but still breathing. I was, apparently, in Germany, as I learned that we were making our way to Hamburg where they knew of a field where they could park the wagons and perform their show. According to Mad Trevor, Faina and the others were either from Estonia or were the surviving children of the Romanov dynasty. To be honest, they didn’t appear all that imperial to me, least of all with warts the size of my little finger popping out on their faces, so I figured Estonia it was. No wonder I couldn’t understand them. Who even knows what language they speak in Estonia?

I also learned, over those days, that I had a skill. I could sew. One of the men, a juggler whose name I cannot begin to spell, but which sounds like someone suppressing a sneeze, had split his trousers, minutes before giving a performance in a small village in the forest. “Give them to me,” I insisted, realizing that I might as well be jumping up and down, saying “Dingo’s got my baby.” So, I resorted to the kind of acting-out which Faina and I had gotten so proficient at, and once I convinced young Abchoo that I wasn’t saying “Drop your pants and dance with me”, he handed me the torn trousers. Faina brought a needle and thread, and without thought I had mended them in just a few moments.

A clue, Mrs. Lindstrom? Do you know a tailor, perhaps?

As we made our way closer to Hamburg, and news of my sewing ability spread through the little troupe, I began to learn that I was to meet someone named Aleksandr, and that I was expected to tailor a piece of clothing for him. I learned that Aleksandr was someone not so much respected in the camp as feared, and when people spoke of him they seemed to lower their voices and look over their shoulders a bit as if in fear of drawing his attention. I also learned that the task which was about to be given me was nearly an impossible one, a long line of seamstresses had been unable to please this Aleksandr.

“What am I to make for him?”, I asked Mad Trevor one afternoon as he fed the horses, asking them if they found the Burmese climate agreeable.

“Pantaloons!” he answered. “You’ve got to make a pair of pantaloons for old Aleksandr, and he’s got three legs!”

I reminded myself never to ask Mad Trevor a serious question again.

It was two days later, as we finally pulled our little caravan into that field outside Hamburg, when I learned that I would finally have my meeting with the mysterious Aleksandr.

After supper that evening, Faina walked me to the door of a wagon, which I had never entered before that night. It was the finest wagon in the caravan, brightly painted and festooned with tassels and little jewels which still sparkled in the dancing light of the nearby campfire. Faina motioned for me to go in, and then pulled her shawl tight around her shoulders and walked away quickly.

I cautiously entered the wagon, and as my eyes adjusted to the warm, flickering light inside, I saw before me the most beautiful man I have ever seen. He sat in a chair, more like a medieval throne, facing me, one elbow resting on the armrest, the other hand raising a goblet of dark, blood-colored wine to his lips, He wore the pants favored by horsemen, his black boots still on as he stretched luxuriously across the throne. His hair was long, a dark chestnut brown which fell from his face in soft waves. Beneath heavy eyebrows and dark, lush eyelashes, his ice-blue eyes smiled at me nearly as much as his soft wine-stained lips.

At that moment I understood why Faina’s carbuncle interested me more than her perfect hourglass figure.

“It is a pleasure to meet you, Fronky,” he said, in a deep baritone voice which already had me fingering my jugular and absentmindedly wondering if it was going to hurt. “I have been hearing much about you.”

“Happy to meet you, Aleksandr,” I said. “Mad Trevor had me a little, well, apprehensive. He even thinks you’ve got three legs!”

Aleksandr’s face immediately lit up with mirth, a wide smile revealing perfect white teeth and his blue eyes sparkling with what seemed to be their own light. He laughed.

“Oh, no, no, Fronky,” he finally said. “I am not Aleksandr. This is the great Aleksandr.” He motioned towards a small cage in the corner.

How do I describe what I saw? A hideous creature within, small, low to the ground, perhaps the size of a raccoon or smaller. It was mostly gray in color, except for its narrow, elongated face which was white as if painted up as some kind of nightmarish rodent clown. It had an angry little pink nose like a freshly picked scab, and one, just one, tiny little expressionless black eye; and as my eyes fell upon it, it opened its mouth to reveal rows of razor teeth, and hissed at me menacingly. Aleksandr had three legs.

“Then who are you?” I asked, shuddering, turning back to the man in the throne.

“I am Piotr.” he answered. “I am Aleksandr’s caretaker.” Over the next few minutes, as I found myself dreamily swooning and being drawn into his eyes, Piotr explained to me that the Great Aleksandr was an opossum, at one time the most famous and legendary performing opossum in all of western Estonia. Entire villages would turn out for their performances, eager to see the amazing Aleksandr the opossum as he rode horses, performed rope tricks, and even juggled five tiny acorns as he rode astride a galloping Arabian. Among the members of the troupe, Aleksandr had gained the status of a sort of god, a charmed being who could lead them from the obscurity of their mountain villages to fame and fortune on the gilded streets of western Europe. Disaster had struck a few months earlier, though, in a disastrous confrontation between Aleksandr, a retired schoolteacher and an angry Doberman Pinscher, which had left Aleksandr without one eye and one leg, and the retired schoolteacher without a dog.

As the weeks had passed, Piotr had been caring for the injured creature, first nursing it back to health and then training it, once again, to perform. Now, as we entered the big city of Hamburg, the time had come for Aleksandr to make his return to the world stage, and to lead the ragtag group of performers to their destiny. All that was needed was a costume.

Reverently, Piotr stood and walked to a table across the small room. He picked up a box, which I could see was filled to overflowing with money, and moved it aside, revealing a small quantity of sumptuously dyed, embroidered fabric. “this is the fabric,” he said, “which you will use. You have been sent to us to clothe our little Aleksandr in this beautiful fabric, to cloak him in Glory as he leads us to our fortune.”

“Umm, okay”, I answered.

“I will leave you to your muse,” he said, handing me the fabric and nodding towards the hideous creature in the corner. Without another word, he let himself out of the wagon, and I myself whimpered just a little bit as I heard the door click shut.

I have discovered that I have the ability to sew. I can repair a lost button, a split seam, a frayed hem. Unfortunately, that does not make me a designer, least of all a designer of pantaloons for three-legged one-eyed ornery opossums. But there I was, in the fine wagon of a fine man whose fine people had rescued me from the side of the road, so the least I could do was try.

I grabbed the fabric, along with some tailor’s chalk, a measuring tape, and some straight pins which I found on the table nearby. I approached the cage in the corner, trying the best I could to appear more reverential and adoring than horrified and repulsed, which was what I was actually feeling.

“Umm, hello, Your Possumness,” I said. “You certainly are, umm, worshipful. So, I’m just gonna open up the door to your cage here and see if I can-”

At that moment, the unthinkable happened. Just as my hand entered the Mighty Aleksandr’s cage, he reared up, hissing at me again in one-eyed fear and rage. Suddenly he sprang towards me, his horrible teeth bared as he stumbled towards me in his lopsided three-legged run. Before I knew what had happened, I looked down, to find the warm blood of the awful creature running over my hand: he had impaled himself on one of the pins in my hand and had died on the spot.

I had just killed Aleksandr, the marsupial demi-god who was worshipped by the little Estonian circus cult I had found myself in. Now what do I do?
My options seemed limited as I wiped the blood of the dead opossum off of my hands with the embroidered fabric. Visions of Estonian acrobats tumbling after me with pitchforks in their hands, not to mention Faina and her wart chasing me down with a hatchet, filled my head. I had visions of Piotr as well, but they had nothing at all to do with warts, pitchforks, or hatchets. I scrambled for a plan. My panicked eyes landed on two things: the box full of money and a unicycle propped up in the corner.

I had stuffed my pockets full of stolen Deutsche Marks, but I had no idea how far that would get me because I have no earthly idea how much a Deutsche Mark is even worth. I had snuck out of Piotr’s wagon, with the unicycle. I could hear Piotr talking to the others. He was either telling them that Fronky was about to make their dreams of greatness come true, or that the Great Aleksandr was demanding a human sacrifice, I don’t know which. I snuck out past the circle of wagons, and climbed onto the unicycle.

Funny the things you can do when the chips are down. Mothers lifting cars off of their children, that sort of thing. There I was, on a dark road beside a field in Hamburg, Germany, with a pocketful of stolen Deutsche Marks and a dozen mad Estonian circus performers about to discover that I had murdered their hideous little leader. After a few false starts and a couple of scraped knees, I learned right then how to ride a unicycle.

Riding a unicycle requires one thing, Mrs. Lindstrom: balance. Above all, you must find that point where you are neither falling backwards nor leaning forwards, that place where you are perfectly poised in the here and the now. And as I rode along on that dark, foreign road that night, riding towards the bright light of a strange city, my hands empty but free of bonds, I found my balance. I am a man without a past, and with an uncertain future. I have no passport, no papers, and I’m not sure exactly how much money I just stole. But I am here, I am present, and I am balanced atop this goddam unicycle and riding for all I am worth. I started to laugh.

I am about to run out of room so I must end my story. I spent a couple of days wandering the streets of Hamburg, not really sure what I was looking for. The only German I can speak is “Sprechen-zie Deutsche?”, which means “Do you speak German?”, which is a completely useless phrase to know when you are actually in a German city. I finally stumbled on this place, the Hotel Absteige, in a rather seedy part of town where I figured I could afford the room and they wouldn’t ask too many questions or require too many documents.

And so, Mrs. Lindstrom, that is my story. I hope you know me. I hope you recognize my story and that you will send word. I am not sure how long my stolen Deutsche Marks will last, but I will wait here at the Hotel Absteige until the funds run out.

And perhaps my face is one you’ve never seen, my name is one you have never known. Perhaps that piece of paper in my pocket was there by some totally unrelated quirk of fate. Who knows? But worry not, Mrs. Lindstrom. I am adrift, I am afloat, but I shall not be pulled under.

Your servant,

Frankie

 

 

EXTEMPORANEOUS WRITING: "Black & White"

When I was in high school, I was on the Speech & Debate team - I know, I can practically hear the snickers and the “that figures!” already. One of the categories, which I did not compete in, was called “Extemporaneous Speaking”, where they were given some random topic to consider and 5 or 10 minutes to prepare, and then had to get up and deliver a coherent speech on that subject. I remember hearing one guy being given the topic of “Pagodas” and thinking to myself, “How the hell do they do that?”
So, I am going to try my hand at “Extemporaneous Writing” and we’ll see what happens, although I will allow myself much more than 5 minutes.
So, I need your help. First five comments below (one per person, please!):
first comment: a color
second comment: a number
third comment: a profession
fourth comment: a year
fifth comment: the last word of the essay should be _______.
 Please, have mercy on me! The idea here is to foster creativity and possibilities, not to mention some humor, not to torment the writer.
 Looking forward to this. Thanks for playing!

Cody Pimental: Red!
Heidi Jinea Cappadona: Ten
Scott Barnett: Rabbi
Richard Feldman: 1979
J Buzz Webb: simultaneously.

"Black & White"

I knew it wasn’t going to be a good day yesterday when I pulled into the parking lot at Chromacorp® (a division of Omnico Industries), and some prick had scrawled “FAGOT” across the sign at the head of my space. I knew who it was. It was that asshole Austin Houston from accounting, or “acounting” as he would probably spell it. I never could figure out exactly what that guy’s problem is. He’s had it in for me ever since that pretty blond chick Bunni or Fluffi or whatever her name is from Marketing said in the lunchroom that my ‘59 Cadillac Eldorado is nicer than his stupid Hummer H3. I guess he was doomed from the start, with a name like that. I mean, who names their kid that way? And Charisse, who works in the cubicle next to me, told me that his family wasn’t even from Texas. They were from Vermont or Minnesota, some place that’s about as un-Texas as you can get.

Anyway, I shouldn’t have been too surprised, because it had already been the sort of day when you realize that you probably never should have gotten out of bed to begin with. First thing in the morning, I discover that my cat, Mrs. Danvers, has left what I hope is a hairball on the floor just outside the bedroom door. By “discover”, I mean to say that I stepped right on the alleged hairball with my bare foot, and as I did I looked up to see Mrs. Danvers regarding me from her spot on the nearby ottoman, flicking her tail and looking at me with an expression which seemed to say, “I pity you, pathetic human.” “And good morning to you, too, Mrs. Danvers” I mumble, making my way to the bathroom to wash off my foot and grab some moist towelettes. I should mention that I love moist towelettes. They smell nice and have a thousand and one uses.

Anyway, I clean up Mrs. Danvers’ mess, leaving behind, I might add, a light refreshing scent, and make my way, at last, to the kitchen for some coffee. There is one K-Cup left in the cupboard, thank God for that anyway. 90 seconds later I’m cradling that precious cup of warm caffeinated goodness in my hand, only to have my hopes dashed when the half-and-half I pour into it congeals into a nice layer of cottage cheese-like substance and my coffee now looks like the bottom of the East River. Now I am forced to start my day with a hot, steaming cup of Dandelion and Star Anise tea called “Seven Chakra Fusion” left here by my last boyfriend, Julian. Remind me never to date a macrobiotic yoga instructor again, even if he does look like John Stamos and can put his legs behind his head.

Anyway, so I finally make it out of the house and into my car, my beautiful 1959 Cadillac Eldorado, which I have named Mrs. Trumbull after little Ricky’s babysitter on “I Love Lucy”. She is an absolute beauty, a chrome-plated, tail-finned head-turner. I bought her on an online auction for $8,500, and then spent another $6,000 to have her restored and road-worthy. She’s painted in a fabulous shade of 1950s aqua called “Desilu” with a contrasting hard-top in a shade of white called “Steamed Milk”, and her interior stuns with upholstery in a dazzling grey called “Shawshank Sunshine” and the dashboard in black. But it’s not really black-black; it’s called “All Souls’ Eve”.

The ride to work, at least, was OK. It usually is. For 15 minutes, driving the back roads from my place to the office, I’m happy. Behind the wheel of Mrs. Trumbull, I am special, I am a celebrity like Eileen Davidson on the red carpet of the Daytime Emmys. She plays Kristen on “Days of Our Lives” and when she walks the red carpet, everyone waves and screams and wants her to stop so they can take her picture. Well, that is how I feel when I am driving to work behind the wheel of beautiful Mrs. Trumbull: everyone is smiling at me and waving and giving me the thumbs-up. And yesterday, this really cute guy leaned out of his window and yelled, “Nice ride!” to me and winked, which had me feeling pretty good until his girlfriend leaned forward in the passenger seat with a cigarette hanging out of her mouth and a pierced upper lip, and gave me the finger.

So, as I’m pulling in to the parking lot of Chromacorp®, and wondering to myself why a cute guy like that would wind up with such a skank, I look up to find Austin Houston’s illiterate handiwork, and it’s just par for the course on a morning like this. Luckily, a handy supply of moist towelettes is never too far out of reach, and in just a few “Hawaiian Breeze”-scented swipes, my parking sign is once again clean and dignified: “reserved for… Mr. S. Patrick”. It’s not much, but in my world of cubicles, entry-level management, and $25,000 salaries, it’s still something. And Mrs. Trumbull loves her parking spot.

I work in the Nomenclature Division at Chromacorp®. The Nomenclature Division consists of me, three girls, and our supervisor, whose name is Helen but whom we are required to address as “Mrs. Rosenfeld”. It’s our job to name colors for clients, which can be anything from cosmetics companies or paint manufacturers to food producers. We are the ones who decided that the green shirt you’re wearing is actually “New Bamboo” and that your daughter’s bedroom is painted in that just-so shade of pink called “Glass Slipper”.

It had already been a rough week at work and it was only Wednesday. On Monday, that bitch Mrs. Rosenfeld walks into my office, with what I immediately recognize as a New Account folder under her arm. Mrs. Rosenfeld is an exceedingly unpleasant woman, with a narrow, pinched-up face and a shock of brittle dishwater-blond hair. Sometimes when I see a pay phone I am tempted to call her cell phone, disguise my voice, and hiss, “Condition, Helen! You’ve got to condition!” Anyway, she walks into my office, wearing the same god-awful navy blue suit she’s worn every Monday since I started working there. It looks as though she bought it off of Alexis Colby back in 1986, and cut the shoulder pads out in her sole nod to fashion some time back in the 90s, which instead only makes her look as though she’s malnourished or else wearing her big sister’s hand-me-downs. So, I’m mentally naming the navy blue of her suit “Mediocrity” when she drops the folder on my desk and says, “Goth!”

I look up and see her grinning at me, her tobacco-stained teeth showing, her expression exactly that of someone who doesn’t really care to smile very much, but is trying it anyway because it may make whatever unpleasantness is about to come a little less unpleasant.

“Umm, good morning, Mrs. Rosenfeld” I muttered. This always bothered me because I am 43 years old and I haven’t really had to address anyone as “Mr.” or “Mrs.” Anything since I was collecting money for my paper route when I was 14. “Excuse me…?”

“Goth!” she exclaimed, again, and went on to explain that the New Client folder which she had just dumped on my desk was for Lacrimosa Cosmetics, a line of products targeted towards the Goth market. My job, apparently, was Red.

Lacrimosa’s entire line was 15 shades: 3 black, 2 green, 2 blue, 1 yellow, and the rest red. Seven shades of red, and the client wanted ten viable names for every shade. Ten! And she wanted them by Thursday, by 10:00am for a fucking PowerPoint presentation for the client. I’ve worked with this client before, too, a humorless cow from behind the former Iron Curtain named Lenochka Fatassovich. We had the torturous task a couple of years ago of naming her failed line of Pageant Cosmetics sold with the Honey Boo-Boo name.

So, by Wednesday, yesterday, I was already in the middle of a bad week. I had stared at these seven shades of red for hours, and these were not your typical reds, either. These were not pretty, sexy shades of red we might associate with fire engines, candied apples or the lips of a Geisha. These are the murky, black-tinged shades of red more common in those “Blood on the Highway” and “Red Pavement” videos they show in driver re-education classes. The hawkish sound of Helen Rosenfeld shrieking, “Goth!” kept playing over and over in my head. I had googled every possible variation of “blood”, “gore”, “coagulation”, “hemorrhage” and “unhappy teenage girl” I could think of. Out of 70 required submissions, I had come up with exactly twelve, with exactly 24 hours to go before Lenochka Fatassovich would storm in to the office wearing a huge fur coat when it’s 74° outside. Anyway, I was just about to add “Uccidimi”, which loosely translated is “kill me now” in Italian, to my list of submissions, when who should walk into my office but Felicia Birdsong, the insufferable Pollyanna from Human Resources, who inexplicably insists that we address her as Felix.

“Good morning, Sean!” she chirps as she practically skipped into my cubicle. “Gee, it’s a fan-tabulous morning, don’t you think?”

“Oh, hi, Felix” I answered, hoping she didn’t notice me rolling my eyes at the sound of her voice. “What’s up?”

What is up is that on top of my current assignment, aka: “Mission: 70 Shades of Gore”, I had been chosen by the Human Resources department of Chromacorp® to write the copy about Nomenclature Division for their updated Orientation and Recruitment Pamphlet. 200 words or less on Color Nomenclature and What It Means to Me due by Friday. Fuck me now.

“We heard you keep a blog. This should be super-perfect for you!” she twittered as she fluttered away, humming. At least I added one more possibility to my list of submissions for Lacrimosa: “Ucciderla”, which means “kill her” in Italian. Lenochka will love that one.

So since yesterday, along with being veiled in a thick, gooey coating of Goth red, my mind has been occupied with Thinking About My Job. Maybe it’s just me, but I think that over-analyzing anything which we do, or think, or see every day is almost never a good idea. It’s easy enough to get dressed and get out of the house every morning until you start asking yourself why you always put your left sock on first or why you always count to a hundred mentally while you’re brushing your teeth. So here I am, thinking about my career in Color Nomenclature here at Chromacorp®, and wondering how the hell I ever got here.

The first time I ever had an answer to the question, “What do you want to be when you grow up?” it certainly wasn’t this. I wanted to be a Rabbi. That was particularly odd because I grew up in an Irish Catholic family.

I remember it well. It was 1979 because the Iranians had just kidnapped a bunch of Americans and we were all collectively counting down the number of days they were in captivity. “Day 79 of the Hostage Crisis” and bumper stickers showing Uncle Sam giving someone the finger with the words Fuck Iran on the backs of patriotic vehicles everywhere. I was about 9 years old at the time, and I was with my dad at Lexington Market in downtown Baltimore. Dad was buying crabs and arguing with the man behind the counter about the price, when I turned around and saw him. This man, this vision, was walking towards me. Over six feet tall, blindingly handsome, dressed all in black with a beautiful long coat down to his feet, an impeccable, fur-trimmed black hat and these beautiful curls falling down the sides of his face. I was entranced. I tugged on my father’s hand, and asked him, “Dad! What is that guy?”, to which he answered, turning back to the fishmonger, “I dunno, some kind of Rabbi, I guess.”

I decided then and there that I wanted to be a Rabbi.

I was in fourth grade at the time, enrolled in Our Lady of Perpetual Sorrow parochial school. We weren’t a particularly religious family, we only really went to church on Easter and whenever my grandparents came for a visit. But my dad’s mother, who really wasn’t his mom but was his father’s second wife, apparently came with boatloads of money and insisted on a “proper Catholic education”. I overheard my mom on the phone once, telling her friend Connie, “If the old battle-axe wants to pay for that ridiculous school, who am I to argue?”

And so it was a couple of weeks later, when we were in class with Sister Dessicata, an ancient nun who, despite being completely wrinkled and withered, had the clear, melodic voice of a young girl, like the voice of Snow White in the Disney movie. Kids around the school used to whisper that she had made a pact with Satan so she could live forever and she was actually over 500 years old. Anyway, she asked the class one day if we had an idea of what we would like to be when we grew up. Amy Baker answered “structural engineer” and somebody called her a dyke and threw a pencil at her head. I didn’t even know what a dyke was. Then it was my turn, and when I told Sister Dessicata that I wanted to be a Rabbi, her face got all flushed and she burst out “Jesus Christ!” and grabbed me by the ear and dragged me all the way to the Headmaster’s office. My dreams of being a Rabbi were over.

But I digress. Somewhere along the line my life was forever changed by four little words: “Cherries in the Snow”. My mother’s lipstick had fallen out of her purse, and rolled towards me across the floor, coming to a stop at my feet with the bottom of the tube facing me. I picked it up and read the label: “Cherries in the Snow”. And I saw it. I saw that the color inside that tube was not red. It was, indeed, Cherries in the Snow. The jeans I was wearing were no longer blue, they were Indigo, and later “Faded Glory” and later still “American Dream”. I became obsessed with colors and the stories they can tell, and after a two-year program in Color Theory at Lancaster County Community College, my career here at Chromacorp® was born.

So, I pulled an all-nighter last night. Drinking Red Bulls and smoking a bunch of pot I bought off of my next door neighbor’s kid. I thought a lot about my job, and jobs in general; about how the daily grind can transform doing even something you love into drudgery. The sweet art of defining the color of a rose can become a 70-submission deadline dangling over your head like some eastern-bloc Sword of Damocles. The trick is in remembering the rose, and remembering the heady, waxy scent of that lipstick, and how Cherries in the Snow looked on your mother’s lips.

And so, I managed to finish my copy for the Chromacorp® Orientation and Recruitment Pamphlet. I hope Felix likes it.

“A career here at Chromacorp® is a career in color. Here you will have a unique opportunity, to become a servant of beauty, naming and defining the thousands of colors which please our eyes and enrich our lives every day. And also, to become a servant to the merciless, insatiable machinery of commerce, by reducing the essence of everyday beauty to the banality of a commodity, another way for someone to make money. So, welcome! Welcome to Chromacorp®, where you can serve your community, serve God, and serve Satan, simultaneously!”

It Will Rain

IPOD SHUFFLE - part II

“I have decided to embark on a writing series. At least three essays, all to be inspired by whatever song happens to pop up on my Ipod at the moment.” Here’s the second one:
(In the interest of transparency, the actual song which popped up on my Ipod was “Why Don’t We Get Drunk” by Jimmy Buffett, but if you know that song, you’ll understand why I think it best to wait for the next track…)

“All American Boy” by Steve Grand
Well, actually I am sort of cheating here because this song didn’t actually just pop up on shuffle, but it is indeed playing on my Ipod, where it has practically been on repeat since I first watched the video on YouTube a couple of days ago. As a matter of fact, I doubt that I would be able to write anything coherent right now regarding some other piece of music, because I have been somewhat obsessed with this particular song, the video, and the artist for the past 72 hours or so.
It was one of those links which had been persistently popping up on my Facebook feed for a couple of days: Gay Country Singer Surprise YouTube Hit -scroll, scroll, scroll. Then, one morning I noticed another link, to a TV interview given by this new breakout singer and for some reason or another, decided to watch it. There was this beautiful man, talking about how grateful he was for the attention he was getting, tearing up as he told the story of how he felt like a constant disappointment to his parents (something most gay children can identify with) but ultimately gaining his mother’s acceptance, and talking about his song. “It’s not about being gay,” he said,” it’s about that longing for someone.” I learned that he had produced the song and the video himself, financing the project with his credit cards and going broke in the process. I was intrigued. So I decided to watch the video.
How do I describe my reaction to this video? Let’s just say that before the first 45 seconds had elapsed, I had tears streaming down my cheeks. Why? Well, I’m not really sure why. But something I was seeing and hearing and thinking was striking a chord inside me, something visceral that I could neither withstand nor fully understand. I saw an image of a man, a beautiful man, who has obviously been smitten. I am hearing his words, telling us all about it: “his eyes are holdin’ me, just a captive to his wonder”, and we are hearing a sad, joyful, everyday, uncommon story about sweet, hot, unrequited, precious love. I’m crying because it’s a bittersweet, sad story. But I’m also crying because I’ve been waiting for so long to have this story told to me in this way. I’m watching this beautiful talented boy, tell a heartbreaking story of his love for another man, that perfect, sexy, sweet unattainable “All-American Boy” we have all fallen in love with at one time or another. I no longer have to hear this story told to me by the voice of a woman. No Diva has to sing an anthem to me about that impossible ache we feel when that taste of perfection, that irresistible mix of sweet and hot, is just beyond our grasp. Now I can hear the story told the way I feel it, by one of my own, in words that seem to speak for all of us.
When he sings, ”I say we go this road tonight.”, there is meaning there for many gay men. It’s that moment when you steel yourself, you make that decision, to make your move and put those feelings out there, feelings which could just as easily leave you tied alone and dying to a fence as lead you to a loving embrace. Can you know how my heart swells when I hear this man sing, “The way your shirt hugs your chest, boy, I just won’t forget” and “I drink the moonlight from his eyes”? It is as if a mirror has finally been lifted up in front of me, showing me, by way of this beautiful music and these amazing, poetic lyrics, a reflection of my own feelings and my own experiences.
I think that one of the things about gay men which kind of makes other people nervous is our fairly unbridled sexuality. Men, without the tempering effects of women; well, you get the picture. But it’s who we are, it is a part of our identity and culture which, while we celebrate it in our own society, we tend to downplay a bit with the world at large. With the exception of nearly every Gay Pride Parade in the world, which sometimes make it look as though we equate Pride with dancing in public to bad House music wearing rainbow jockstraps. This song, and the video, both manage to keep that element of sexuality present without being overwhelming or distasteful. “I'm gonna wrestle you out of them clothes, leave that beautiful body exposed, and you can have my heart and my soul and my body... just be mine”…
And then, the kiss. That one instant when it was actually all attainable: the sweet love and the hot sex and the promise of that beautiful All-American Boy, with the dopey grin and the pickup truck and the ass in those jeans… The music hangs, the kiss ends, and the picture becomes clear that it is really never going to happen. For now the dream of that perfect love is just that: a dream. And even now, after watching this video 50 times or more, I cry. I cry because I am sad; I know that story, I have lived that story. And I cry because I am happy; I am happy to hear a voice, our voice, singing about our kind of love, even if it is imperfect and unrequited, and even if it is hot and sweaty and makes other people nervous sometimes.
So thank you, Steve Grand. Thank you for writing this song. Thank you for sitting in your parents’ basement and recording it, your musical arrangements and your beautiful voice giving perfect shape to that human longing, that hunger to be enfolded safe within the arms of another. Thank you for singing it to me, for me, for all of us. And thank you for making me cry for all the right reasons.
Now I must go and watch the video one more time

IPOD SHUFFLE - part I

I have come, of late, to call myself a “dog-writer”. It is a phrase I have coined myself, and it is not necessarily a good one.

Allow me to explain. Like most dog owners, I spend many hours every week walking the dog. Often it is early in the morning, before the sun has even risen, or out in the woods or on the beach, some place that can lead to solitude, introspection, contemplation. Now of course, while I am walking the dog, much of the time my mind is focused on immediate, temporal needs, such as “How am I supposed to pick up THAT?”, or even trying to decide the best way to prevent Dooby from dismantling the neighbor’s split-rail fence and using it for a chew toy. But there are still many moments left for my mind to wander, and much of that time I am mentally writing.

And let me tell you, I have written some amazing shit on those dog walks, too. Razor-sharp wit, brilliant turns of a phrase, humour worthy of Oscar Wilde. In my mind I have already left my thankless job as a pharmacy technician many times, to embark on my new thankless career as Brilliant Writer. Book signings at Barnes & Noble, “An Evening With the Brilliant Mind of Paul Halley” selling out to nearly 65% capacity at every community college east of Albany, a thousand Courtyard Marriotts await… But inevitably, somewhere along the dog walk the thread gets lost, overtaken by the Doobster finding a wadded Kleenex on the sidewalk or reminding myself to stop at the ATM on my way to work, and by the time I get home, most of it is gone, like that awesome dream you had about whatever it was before it just became a blur like “The Andalusian Dog”. In an affront to my Holy Trinity of Augusten, Sedaris, and Sloane, my brilliant Virtual Essays never get written, my Virtual Pulitzer never received, and the only book I’m signing is when I buy Sudafed at the pharmacy.

There is another time, though, when my mind tends to set itself free, and I dog-write, and that’s when I’m listening to my music on my Ipod. Now, over my lifetime I have managed to amass a fairly humongous music collection. According to Itunes, I’ve got 455 albums, 4,234 songs, 11 days 17 hours 40 minutes and 40 seconds worth. It covers a lot of decades and a lot of different phases of my own life. So, sometimes when I’m listening to my music, I’m thinking about where I was and what I was doing when I heard that song. Or I might be thinking about the song itself, the words or the melody or the talent of the performer. But my mind is excited, thinking, mentally writing, dog-writing.

So, in an effort to knock myself off of this literary tuffet I’ve been on, I have decided to embark on a writing series. At least three essays, all to be inspired by whatever song happens to pop up on my Ipod at the moment.

Here’s the first one:

“Below the Line” by Josh Groban

Mark and I have tickets to go see Josh Groban in concert in October.

We don’t go to a lot of concerts. The last concert we went to was to see Joan Armatrading in Boston and that was at least six or seven years ago. What I remember most about that concert was that Joan was suffering from a touch of laryngitis that night, not exactly auspicious for a singer on tour. So, she had a bit of trouble hitting some of the notes that night; but anyone who knows Joan Armatrading’s music knows that hitting the high notes isn’t her forté anyway. Hell, she has a hard enough time hitting some of the not-so-high notes. But that’s OK with her fans, like me, because that is how she sounds. And then, when it came time for “Willow”, her signature song, she basically just sat there and let the audience sing most of the song to her. Imagine, being a performer and being able to allow yourself to sit back and let waves of love pour over you from the audience in the form of their singing your song, which you wrote, to you. Must have been pretty awesome for her. The audience enjoyed it for sure. Well, except maybe for Mark, who isn’t exactly a Joan Armatrading fan and probably couldn’t even pronounce her name properly. By the end of the concert he looked exactly like someone who had just lost 90 minutes of their life for the sake of their spouse; 90 minutes which he would never be able to get back.

Of all my complaints about my marriage, and they are thankfully few and mercifully trivial, I would have to say that Mark’s relative disinterest in music is one of the major ones. I have always been the sort of person who would hook up the stereo first on moving day, and pretty much have “tunes” going on all during the day. Mark, on the other hand, is a TV person, a self-proclaimed “boob-tube child”. If he is awake and he is home, you can pretty much guarantee that the television is on, even when he is nowhere nearby, which has always been a bit of an annoyance, not to mention a mystery, to me. I mean, who would rather hear disembodied voices hawking the Sham-Wow! or Debbie Boone’s Lifestyle Lift while vacuuming or washing dishes than a little Etta James or even some Dean Martin? Mark would, that’s who. And it seems that TV trumps Music in this house, so much of my music time is relegated to my time alone at home, or walking the streets of Provincetown with my Ipod playing. In any real relationship, there will be at least half of the time when it’s not about you, but about your partner instead. This, for me, is one of those times and I have learned to accept it.

So, concerts and the like are a rare occasion in my life now, but it wasn’t always that way. I have some amazing memories which revolve around concerts, from all the other parts of my life.

The first concert I ever went to was to see the Grateful Dead. Talk about jumping right into something with both feet! No pussyfootin’ around for me, no messin’ around goin’ to see Little Feat or Bonnie Raitt; no I’m gonna start right off with Advanced Concert-going. All that meant of course, is that my friend Cindy and I were obliged to smoke as much of the marijuana which was being passed up and down every row and aisle in every direction as we possibly could. Then, when we had smoked our fill and we could sit back, glassy-eyed, I watched the girls in gauze dance around barefoot down on the floor of the Baltimore Civic Center, and let the sounds of Jerry Garcia and “Truckin’" wash over me like waves of Concert Coolness. It was fantastic.

I think the best concert I ever went to was a band called Dépêche Mode, an ‘80s Techno Pop band, back in 1985 or so. Three guys up on the stage, a drummer and two guys with keyboards, and all this music came pouring out of the speakers all over us. The concert was at the Meriweather Post Pavilion, a great outdoor concert arena in suburban Maryland, and they served beer in these enormously huge plastic cups. So there we were, all this Electric Youth dancing around like maniacs with these jumbo beers in hand, to this amazing, angry yet optimistic music. And it was all very intense and liberating because back then people my age weren’t sure if we’d live to see 30, partly because the Commies were going to drop a bomb on us and partly because we were starting to see a lot of people our age dying of a strange new disease. But when the band started the night with “Black Celebration” and the lights slowly went up onstage, the crowd went wild and we just lost ourselves in that awesome intense techno-80s moment.

Then, after that concert, I almost got myself arrested. It’s kind of a long story, but let me put it this way. Among the people I went to the concert with were my best friend and roommate, Tim, and his current boyfriend, whose name I can’t remember but we’ll call him Greg. Greg worked in a trendy clothing store at a pricey shopping center in downtown DC, selling pleated slacks and sweaters with shoulder pads sewn into them to people exactly like Tim and me but with more money. He was kind of cute, and by the end of the concert, he was no longer Tim’s boyfriend. He wasn’t my boyfriend either, but he was definitely my date, at least for the second half of the night.

Now, in the Potomac river which runs alongside DC, there is a tiny little island-slash-national park called Roosevelt Island. It's only accessible from the Parkway on the Virginia side of the river, via a little parking lot and a tiny footbridge which crosses over onto the island. Well, after ditching a not-very-happy Tim somewhere downtown (I paid for that one for weeks), somehow or other “Greg” and I decided that Roosevelt Island would be the perfect place for our hot and sweaty little tryst. Maybe it was the jumbo beers that made us think that scaling a locked fence would be a great idea and that nothing could possibly go awry, or maybe it was our overactive hormonal surges, I don’t know. And believe me, scaling a locked gate on a footbridge is not an easy accomplishment, either. But we did it, we jumped over the fence and made our way into the park, our own little private island where we could frolick, as it were, anywhere we liked. And was it the jumbo beers that had us thinking that the hillside just opposite the parking lot where we’d left the car would be the ideal spot for us to, well, frolick? I don’t know, but that’s what we did. And just as we were getting our Girbauds down around our slouchy-socked ankles, we were horrified to see a pair of headlights turn into the parking area just over a hundred yards away. A pair of Police headlights, that is. And even more horrified when the Police headlights were joined by a Police flashlight, one of those super-bright long range flashlights that they’re always flashing around on "CSI" even when the lights are on. We laid there, frozen in our tawdry embrace, Perry Ellis and Willy Smith accessories strewn about on the grass around us, certain we were about to be exposed and imagining what the next few hours were going to be like in the Arlington County Jail, especially if they ever got wind of what we were in for. But mercifully, we must have been just outside the range of the CSI flashlight, and after a few minutes they gave up and drove away, leaving a ticket on the windshield of Greg’s car.
Now, I would like to tell you that at that point, Greg and I collected ourselves and our belongings, and made it back to the car and away, with dignity. I would like to tell you that, but I’m sure you realize that that’s not what happened. I mean, we were already there.

I never saw Greg again after that night. But it was still the best concert I ever went to.

"...a world so hateful some would rather die than be who they are. And a certificate on paper isn't gonna solve it all, but it's a damn good place to start. No law is gonna change us, we have to change us. Whatever God you believe in, we come from the same One.

Strip away the fear, underneath it's all the
Same Love.
About time that we raised up."

Mission: H2O

I am looking for the humor in my own situation.

The average influenza virus, according to Google, is approximately 130 nanometers in size. That is, approximately 130 one-millionths of a millimeter. That means that you could line about 139,000 of the little bastards across the diameter of one thin U.S. dime. That is pretty small. Unimaginably small, as a matter of fact. It somehow doesn’t seem right that something so unimaginably small can fuck a human being up so completely.

Trying to pinpoint the moment when the little fiends found their way into the sanctity of your body is just about impossible. Out of the hundreds of seemingly innocuous daily activities: answering telephones, turning doorknobs, flushing toilets, or kissing a friend hello, or maybe even just having a conversation; it only took one. One opportunity for that 130-nanometer little shit to take its shot and move on in to the Land of Milk and Honey which is You; and your life is about to change completely, at least for a few days.

Things which were of monumental importance to you yesterday will vanish completely from your priorities. Gotta get those whites washed? Ha! Need to check those spreadsheets on the Henderson account? Fuck the Hendersons. At this point, the world is lucky if you can stand up long enough to crank the thermostat up to 80°.

Now, the most basic and perfunctory activities, things we do every day without thinking about them or giving them much effort, become the most colossal and often impossible tasks. The thought of standing at a mirror and shaving your face, for example, is so absurd that it is almost laughable. As is going to the kitchen to prepare something to eat; but that’s okay really, because the thought of actually consuming food is about as far from your mind as taking a Jazzercise class. Basically, any activity which requires you to be upright longer than one or two minutes and which isn’t immediately essential for basic human survival is pretty much out of the question.

And somehow, that 130 one-millionths of a millimeter-sized invader has the power to alter the passage of time. Days pass by like hours, you can practically watch the shadows move across your walls as they whiz by. Hours pass like minutes: is it 6:00am or 6:00pm? God forbid you have to sit down and catch your breath on the way to the bathroom; before you know it, you’ve been sitting on an ottoman with your nose running and staring at a dust bunny in the corner for 25 minutes.

The scenario: you’re in bed. You awaken to find you are thirsty. This is what happens when you are well:

Get out of bed. Go to kitchen. Get drink. Return to bed.

Elapsed time: no more than 90 seconds.

This is what you experience when some bastard sneezed on a pen last week and handed it to you to sign something:

“Oh my god. I am so thirsty. My tongue is so huge. Is that even my tongue? Terminal fucking cotton-mouth. I must get water. This is going to be really, really hard. I better rest up for it.”

At this point, your brain settles in for a nice long soak in the 101° crock-pot which your body has become. Numbly, you sink into the Lucy-In-The-Sky type of dreams which fever induces: marshmallow skies, tangerine horses and there, that beautiful luscious, flowing river of ice water, no, Pepsi! Yes, yes, it’s right there, so cold and so wet, and you raise that giant scallop shell full of liquid heaven to your lips and quench, quench…

And then the clock chimes in the other room and you wake up, realizing it was all just a dream and you are still dying of thirst. Okay, this is going to require real action. That beautiful river of Pepsi was just an illusion. I’m going to have to get up, get to the kitchen, and get myself a glass of water. It can’t really be that hard. As a matter of fact, it’s such a simple thing that I’m going to be able to actually do it. Pretty soon.

Now, a mission such as this one requires three things. The first thing is courage. Not because there is anything scary or inherently dangerous in your apartment between the bedroom and the kitchen. It requires courage because you know full well that everywhere outside of this little cocoon you have created for yourself, it is numbingly, bone-chillingly cold. Somehow, that microscopic little virus inside your body has managed to alter the very air around your body. Your skin will break out into goosebumps and you will begin shivering uncontrollably the moment you are exposed to the air outside your covers, despite the fact that the thermostat says 79° and the dog’s tongue is hanging out. So, you have to work up some courage, as if you were about to jump into a freezing river to save a drowning litter of kittens type of thing.

The second thing you need is a plan.

“Okay, so once I’m exposed to the cold outside and I’m upright, I know I’ve only got so much time. Two minutes, tops, before we reach system failure. Gotta plan this out right. Step one: gotta get the bathrobe. Where the hell is it? Back of the door. Holy shit, that’s like 3, 4 feet away from the bed. I could be exposed for 10, 20 seconds at a distance like that. That’s okay, I can do this. I just have to get out of the bed on the side closest to the door. Which way am I facing now? Fuck, this is so hard.” And so on.

And third, you need the strength to accomplish your goals.

“Alright. Got my plan. Time to move out. One. Two. Three. Hang on, just one more minute. One two three. Shit! Why can’t I move my arms?”

At this point, you realize that in the past few hours, or minutes, or seconds, or whatever unit of time it’s been, in your tossing and turning and rolling over in attempt after vain attempt to get comfortable, you have managed to roll yourself into a kind of human burrito and you have pinned your own arms to your sides. God, this is going to be even harder than you thought.

Eventually, though, with much effort and great resolve, you manage to extricate yourself from your percale prison. Sit upright, feet hit the floor, let’s do this thing.

“Oh my god it’s cold out here. Where are my glasses? Screw it, I don’t need to see anything. Bathrobe. OK. Got the bathrobe. Where the fuck do my arms go in this thing?” Three and a half minutes later you have finally managed to put your bathrobe on.

“So cold. The bathrobe helps. This hood is the best. I love this bathrobe so much. Now, to the kitchen. No need to raise my head, I know where the kitchen is. I wonder what time it is. I wonder what day it is. What am I doing again? Oh yeah, going to the kitchen. Wait, there’s the thermostat, what is the heat on? 82°? That can’t be right. I’m turning it up.”

“OK, heading to the kitchen. Must get vessel for water. Better use something plastic, my grip’s not the best right now. Can’t see a fucking thing, should have put my glasses on. There, that green blob, I think that’s a plastic cup.”

“Alright, got my cup. Water. Sweet, liquid, refreshing water. Inside fridge.”
At this point, you need to give yourself just one more little boost of courage, as you realize that opening the door to that refrigerator and sticking your face inside of it will be somewhat akin to running buck naked through a blast freezer.

“Oh my god I’m freezing. Fill, damn you! Fill that goddam cup!” And after an eternity of 5 seconds, the cup is finally full. Your goal is within your grasp. You raise that green blob up to your mouth and drink. As the water flows through your mouth, over your swollen tongue and down your parched throat, you can practically hear the little dehydrated cells in your body cry out in joy as they soak in that beautiful water and spring back to life like a dried out old kitchen sponge.

Sweet relief. Now, just fill the cup one more time. Five more seconds in the blast freezer. You can do this. You’re shivering and half the water is sloshing out of the cup onto the floor, but you could not possibly care less about that. Cup full. Back to bed.

Shivering, aching, functionally blind and semi-hallucinating, but fully hydrated, you shuffle your way back to the bedroom.

“I’m leaving the bathrobe on. That’s one less thing I’ll have to think about next time.”

You fall into bed, face first, pulling all your assorted bed sheets, comforters, blankets on top of you as you do, moaning half in pain and half in relief that you are back safe in your little sweat-filled cocoon. Just before you go back to sleep, you reach over and drain the green plastic cup on the nightstand, ensuring that the next time you wake up thirsty, you will have to repeat this entire process over again.

Elapsed time: two and a half hours.

“Oh, shit. Now I have to pee.”