1
It wasn’t laziness that did us in. We were just too damned scared.
Of course, who could blame us? Certainly not our fellow man, woman, or child. It’s quite presumptuous to ridicule someone’s choice in lifestyle or preference in long-term goals while embodying those same selections and epitomizing those steps with every personal action taken. That’s not even accounting for stigma. Just imagine the horror, the shock!, of calling out the very sins you’re guilty of. Better to just keep quiet, move along, say nothing.
So we said nothing.
Dad didn’t, though. He was the kind of fire-breathing, straight off the peaks of Olympus guy. His eyes burned with that brand of righteous zeal you used to dream about while attending an over-charged sermon, only his was the temper that burned from within, not above. He was the avatar of loud, the god-machine of in-your-face. He was at once the crazy loon on the street corner proselytizing the end of the world and the colossus, guarding the harbors of Rhodes against any fool arrogant enough to believe he could squeeze a ship through.
That was then, though.
--x--
Dad was born Norman Unus, though everyone called him Noe. Much of his earlier life, and much of our collective earlier life, is gone. Just fine, nobody around can read it anymore.
Some people told me, when I was much smaller and far more intelligent, that he had once killed and eaten a dragon, when such a thing still existed.
All I knew for sure about Dad’s earlier life was that he loved to sail and he was born old.
--x--
Dad lived and breathed in his room, his library, lined floor-to-ceiling with books. He never called it a library. He yelled at me for coming home from my first day of school and comparing his room to a library. He told me, “A library is a boring place where people talk about their favorite fluff in hushed tones, as if ashamed of the ideas that might have crept off the page and gotten lodged in the tightly-wound balls of yarn they keep between their ears. You do a disservice to every thinking, true-breathing man when you call this room a library!”
To think, five years old and I knew what disservice meant!
He took me by my little arm and held my shoulders in one great, lined hand. He dropped down quickly to his knees and looked me in the eye. I could see the soulfire going in him already, though I’d never really started to recognize it before. I just knew when he got that look in his eye he’d probably talk to witches or spooks that weren’t there, or go on for hours about the “disservice” all people were doing to… well, people. This time, though, this time that fire was aimed at me.
He was even smiling.
“No, son,” he said, “This is a war room. This is no safe haven to mewl about pulp ideas derived from this week’s issue of Slam! or to hush obvious ruminations on your flavor-of-the-week author. There is no sanctuary here. This room holds a never-ending battle of point and counterpoint; of gothics decrying the nymphic visions of the romantics, of muckrakers literally throwing shit in the face of every well-meaning political memoir out there, of transcendentalists looking over it all and laughing while well-meaning socialists look up and curse. This is Whitman’s mountain where he gave his barbaric yawp, this is the room Donne heard for whom the bell tolls, this is the hall wherein Beowulf did slay loathsome Grendel, this is the final resting place of Excalibur. That library,” at this, he spat, “is the room where the women come and go, talking of Michelangelo.” He slapped me across the face then, hard enough to draw blood and leave a hairline scar that would serve to define my cheekbones and lead to a copious amount of female incursions in my later adolescent and graduate years. “And don’t forget it.”
I didn’t forget.
Not even when he and the room burned away, like so many snowflakes settling on an ever-changing sea.
--x--
Despite an ever-growing litany of political thriller, intrigue, and action movies as evidence to the contrary, change doesn’t happen overnight.
Would that it did! Take global warming: say you woke up on a bright Sunday morning in January only to find your East end ground-level apartment filled with ankle deep water and the air temperature at 86 degrees. I’ll bet that would get a few election-year politicians moving! Assuming they could get unstuck from the mud of the Potomac, that is.
Sudden change has never been a problem for humans. We’re very adaptable organisms (or, as Dad liked to say, “squirrelly bastards”). We get slammed with flu bacteria, we create antibodies and beat the tar out of those suckers. A bomb goes off in your backyard, you move. We react to the obvious, the loud, the immediate.
We’re also terrible procrastinators.
This is the danger of slow change: three people at work are seen coughing, sneezing, and looking genuinely unwell. The next day, they call in sick. A day later, two more people call in sick. It’s December, though, and the flu’s been going around already. Easily rationalized. You’d never guess that in five more days, the media would be reporting on an epidemic likely to kill millions.
Would you have rationalized the bomb in your backyard?
It’s easy to take this as an extreme example. You can’t go through life rationalizing everything. Rationalization of events is counter to survival instincts! Likewise, you can’t live as though every minor change is one that will lead to a calamity of mythic proportions. You’d never go outside! And that would be a shame.
Especially if the bomber missed your backyard and hit your house.
--x--
The slower the change, the more dangerous it is. History shows people won’t react to an event change until the events are culminating in something so large and unavoidably ugly that we wish fondly for the times the 800 pound gorilla was tearing ass through our string-of-pearls-structured lives.
The most dangerous is the one that took so long to arrive, you never saw it coming, and don’t even know by its limp when it has passed. The change that is with you, with me, right now. If the flu can kill millions with just a few months of subtlety, imagine a change that slunk to the forefront over 208 years!
--x--
Dad and the pundits both called it “progress,” though the former with a much bigger sneer than the latter.
--x--
If anyone who comes to this planet after we’ve wasted away cares to compile a semi-complete, mostly-authentic lexicon of human history, they will probably figure it all went to pot when they outlawed blank paper ten years ago. These future archeologists, whomever or whatever they are or how many tentacles they might have, will naturally suppose this to be the sign of End Times, or whatever archeologists comprised mostly of natural gas and space dust would call End Times. They’ll suppose this, and they’ll be wrong.
The sign it was all going downhill was not that they outlawed blank paper, but that we didn’t make a peep.
--x--
I’m writing this on a series of Plasti-lock business card backs, reams of silicon toilet paper, in the margins of Federally-approved texts, on the sides and bottoms of styrofoam cups, on plastic meal trays (in marker, pen doesn’t stick so well), and whatever piece of government non-biodegradable crap I can find, in a closet, lit by one candle at a time (long candles, and good! I only have three), and stored underneath a few loose floorboards so the zombies, when they lumber by, can’t find them. Not that they’d even know what they’d found. This could never be for them.
I’m writing for the aliens.
This is a story about my dad.
--x--
Tuesday, August 19, 2008
Thursday, August 14, 2008
The Cemetary
“What’s your name, son?”
The kid gurgled, his eyes flying in several directions before replying. “E-evan.”
“Okay, Evan,” the paramedic said. “My name’s Jon. I need you to focus on me. I mean really focus. Can you do that?”
Evan did his best impression of a nod and locked his faltering gaze onto Jon’s face. Jon looked over his shoulder and waved.
“Charlie! The board! Now!”
Charlie looked away from the wreck and ran to the back of the ambulance, grabbing the backboard and snuffing his cigarette on his way over. He slapped the board down next to Evan and immediately moved to the boy’s feet. Jon nodded and moved above Evan’s head, careful not to look away from Evan’s face for too long.
“We’re going to move you now, Evan. We need you to hold very, very still.” Evan did not respond, but he did not look away. Jon took that as assent and nodded again. Charlie motioned a three-count, then both he and Jon lifted Evan onto the board.
Evan did not make a sound.
Lashing the kid to the board, Jon cursed silently inside his mouth. He and Charlie lifted and placed Evan onto the collapsed stretcher in the back of the ambulance, then slammed the doors. Jon turned to Charlie. “How’s the other?”
Charlie shook his head. “Fubbed.” Jon paused for a moment.
“How long until the police get here?”
“Maybe three minutes, max,” Charlie replied.
“Any word on backup from Central?” Jon asked.
“Tapped out.”
Jon swore, then turned to the side doors of the ambulance. “Least there’s only one, then,” he muttered. “You’ve got maybe twenty minutes to go fifteen miles.”
“Shock?” Charlie asked. Jon just looked at him. Charlie nodded, then dashed for the driver’s side door and darted in with one quick open-close motion. Jon slid in through the passenger’s side and moved to the rear of the ambulance with Evan. Evan was, thankfully, still conscious. As Charlie slammed the ambulance into gear and threw the sirens on, Jon sat down on the stretcher opposite Evan.
“Okay Evan, glad to see you’re still with us. I need you to answer a couple of questions. Don’t look away from me!” Evan’s eyes snapped back onto Jon’s. “I need to know a bit about what I can give you. Easy. Don’t respond at all if the answer’s no. Widen your eyes twice if the answer’s yes. I’ll play a guessing game on the yes’s. You understand?”
Evan’s eyes widened and shrunk twice.
“Great. You’re doing great, kid. Okay, do you know where you are?”
Evan’s eyes widened again. Jon pulled a pen light out of his shirt pocket and shone it into Evan’s eyes.
“No concussion. There’s a bit of luck.”
Evan’s steady gaze did not indicate he appreciated Jon’s levity. Jon swallowed and continued.
“Are you taking any medications?”
Evan didn’t respond.
“Are you allergic to any medications?
Again, Evan did not respond. Jon glanced down, towards Evan’s feet.
“Okay, Evan. You’re doing fine. I need to load a transfusion into you. You’ve lost a good bit of blood. Do you know what your blood type is?”
To Jon’s amazement, Evan’s eyes widened twice. When he was that age, Jon could barely remember the day of the week.
“Can you still speak at all? Can you tell me what it is?”
Evan formed his lips into a ring, giving him the look of a ghastly fish. His skin was almost chalk-white.
“O?”
Evan’s eyes widened twice.
“Positive?”
Evan didn’t respond. Jon whirled around and opened the mini-fridge and removed a packet of blood. He stripped open two heating pads and sandwiched the packet in between.
“Needs to warm first, kid. I need you to hold still right now and do your best to stay awake. Are you in a lot of pain?”
Evan did not respond. Jon went into the medical supply trunk and started unpacking large swabs of gauze.
“Evan, I also need you to do me a favor. Don’t look down.”
Evan’s eyes widened twice.
Jon set about layering the gauze on Evan’s stomach. The blare of the sirens was giving him a profound headache. He always hated riding in the back. As the gauze soaked up more blood, Jon ripped into more packages and kept pressing them down. A few times, Evan’s eyelids fluttered. When they did, Jon made loud noises and snapped his fingers rapidly, bringing Evan’s attention to him.
Once ready, Jon set about prepping an IV rig for the blood.
“How long we got, Charlie?” he shouted over the din.
“Four minutes.”
“You’re lucky you didn’t get us killed, driving that fast! Radio Central, tell them we’re coming in red fuckin’ hot!”
Charlie laughed. “Way ahead of you.”
Jon smiled and looked back at Evan. Evan’s eyes were wide and his face much clammier than before. He was staring down, directly at his feet. He was staring at a two and a half foot piece of jagged metal rammed at an odd angle through his stomach. The wound was covered with bright red gauze that had already saturated and was delicately dripping across his ashen skin, sliding noiselessly to the floor. He opened his mouth to speak, to scream, to say anything, but Jon placed a hand on his forehead and pushed him back down.
“I told you not to look down, kid,” Jon said, his voice heavy. “Just stay with me a bit longer. It looks worse than it is.” Jon looked away as he jammed the IV needle into Evan’s arm. The kid’s eyes were getting to him. Too big. Too bright.
“You’re going to feel a bit warm and light-headed as this stuff makes its way into your system. Just stay awake. Two minutes, that’s all I’m asking. Then we’ve got you in safe, and you’ll be all right. Just two minutes."
Though his lids and lips were trembling, his pupils beginning to dilate, Evan managed to widen his eyes twice. Jon smiled.
“‘Atta boy.” Jon finished attaching the IV rig to the stretcher, then threaded the tube through his thumb and forefinger to make sure everything was flowing all right. He felt a sharp jolt and heard squealing tires; Charlie’s signature arrival. Charlie leapt out and ran to the back as Jon opened the rear doors. They lowered the stretcher, extending the wheels, then ran Evan towards the emergency room doors. Several nurses rushed to meet them.
“What’ve we got?” one of them, Sarah, asked.
“Car crash. Steering column. Initial shock fourteen minutes ago. Severe hemorrhaging, O+ IV inserted three minutes ago. No allergies or anything noted.”
Sarah nodded, then wheeled him away towards surgery. Jon and Charlie wound down to a light jog, then stopped moving altogether. They stood, panting for a few seconds. Another of the attending nurses approached them.
“Anyone else?” she asked.
“One passenger, will be DOA. She’s still at the scene.”
“You left one?” the nurse asked, incredulity creeping into her voice.
“Already dead,” Jon replied, no hint of emotion in his voice. “No other ambulances, needed to get this one here. We’ll go back and get her to the Despard morgue.”
“Should probably bring her here,” the attending said.
“Local matter,” Charlie replied. His face mirrored Jon’s voice.
“She from Despard?”
Charlie nodded as Jon turned to look at him.
“Neighbor’s daughter.”
The kid gurgled, his eyes flying in several directions before replying. “E-evan.”
“Okay, Evan,” the paramedic said. “My name’s Jon. I need you to focus on me. I mean really focus. Can you do that?”
Evan did his best impression of a nod and locked his faltering gaze onto Jon’s face. Jon looked over his shoulder and waved.
“Charlie! The board! Now!”
Charlie looked away from the wreck and ran to the back of the ambulance, grabbing the backboard and snuffing his cigarette on his way over. He slapped the board down next to Evan and immediately moved to the boy’s feet. Jon nodded and moved above Evan’s head, careful not to look away from Evan’s face for too long.
“We’re going to move you now, Evan. We need you to hold very, very still.” Evan did not respond, but he did not look away. Jon took that as assent and nodded again. Charlie motioned a three-count, then both he and Jon lifted Evan onto the board.
Evan did not make a sound.
Lashing the kid to the board, Jon cursed silently inside his mouth. He and Charlie lifted and placed Evan onto the collapsed stretcher in the back of the ambulance, then slammed the doors. Jon turned to Charlie. “How’s the other?”
Charlie shook his head. “Fubbed.” Jon paused for a moment.
“How long until the police get here?”
“Maybe three minutes, max,” Charlie replied.
“Any word on backup from Central?” Jon asked.
“Tapped out.”
Jon swore, then turned to the side doors of the ambulance. “Least there’s only one, then,” he muttered. “You’ve got maybe twenty minutes to go fifteen miles.”
“Shock?” Charlie asked. Jon just looked at him. Charlie nodded, then dashed for the driver’s side door and darted in with one quick open-close motion. Jon slid in through the passenger’s side and moved to the rear of the ambulance with Evan. Evan was, thankfully, still conscious. As Charlie slammed the ambulance into gear and threw the sirens on, Jon sat down on the stretcher opposite Evan.
“Okay Evan, glad to see you’re still with us. I need you to answer a couple of questions. Don’t look away from me!” Evan’s eyes snapped back onto Jon’s. “I need to know a bit about what I can give you. Easy. Don’t respond at all if the answer’s no. Widen your eyes twice if the answer’s yes. I’ll play a guessing game on the yes’s. You understand?”
Evan’s eyes widened and shrunk twice.
“Great. You’re doing great, kid. Okay, do you know where you are?”
Evan’s eyes widened again. Jon pulled a pen light out of his shirt pocket and shone it into Evan’s eyes.
“No concussion. There’s a bit of luck.”
Evan’s steady gaze did not indicate he appreciated Jon’s levity. Jon swallowed and continued.
“Are you taking any medications?”
Evan didn’t respond.
“Are you allergic to any medications?
Again, Evan did not respond. Jon glanced down, towards Evan’s feet.
“Okay, Evan. You’re doing fine. I need to load a transfusion into you. You’ve lost a good bit of blood. Do you know what your blood type is?”
To Jon’s amazement, Evan’s eyes widened twice. When he was that age, Jon could barely remember the day of the week.
“Can you still speak at all? Can you tell me what it is?”
Evan formed his lips into a ring, giving him the look of a ghastly fish. His skin was almost chalk-white.
“O?”
Evan’s eyes widened twice.
“Positive?”
Evan didn’t respond. Jon whirled around and opened the mini-fridge and removed a packet of blood. He stripped open two heating pads and sandwiched the packet in between.
“Needs to warm first, kid. I need you to hold still right now and do your best to stay awake. Are you in a lot of pain?”
Evan did not respond. Jon went into the medical supply trunk and started unpacking large swabs of gauze.
“Evan, I also need you to do me a favor. Don’t look down.”
Evan’s eyes widened twice.
Jon set about layering the gauze on Evan’s stomach. The blare of the sirens was giving him a profound headache. He always hated riding in the back. As the gauze soaked up more blood, Jon ripped into more packages and kept pressing them down. A few times, Evan’s eyelids fluttered. When they did, Jon made loud noises and snapped his fingers rapidly, bringing Evan’s attention to him.
Once ready, Jon set about prepping an IV rig for the blood.
“How long we got, Charlie?” he shouted over the din.
“Four minutes.”
“You’re lucky you didn’t get us killed, driving that fast! Radio Central, tell them we’re coming in red fuckin’ hot!”
Charlie laughed. “Way ahead of you.”
Jon smiled and looked back at Evan. Evan’s eyes were wide and his face much clammier than before. He was staring down, directly at his feet. He was staring at a two and a half foot piece of jagged metal rammed at an odd angle through his stomach. The wound was covered with bright red gauze that had already saturated and was delicately dripping across his ashen skin, sliding noiselessly to the floor. He opened his mouth to speak, to scream, to say anything, but Jon placed a hand on his forehead and pushed him back down.
“I told you not to look down, kid,” Jon said, his voice heavy. “Just stay with me a bit longer. It looks worse than it is.” Jon looked away as he jammed the IV needle into Evan’s arm. The kid’s eyes were getting to him. Too big. Too bright.
“You’re going to feel a bit warm and light-headed as this stuff makes its way into your system. Just stay awake. Two minutes, that’s all I’m asking. Then we’ve got you in safe, and you’ll be all right. Just two minutes."
Though his lids and lips were trembling, his pupils beginning to dilate, Evan managed to widen his eyes twice. Jon smiled.
“‘Atta boy.” Jon finished attaching the IV rig to the stretcher, then threaded the tube through his thumb and forefinger to make sure everything was flowing all right. He felt a sharp jolt and heard squealing tires; Charlie’s signature arrival. Charlie leapt out and ran to the back as Jon opened the rear doors. They lowered the stretcher, extending the wheels, then ran Evan towards the emergency room doors. Several nurses rushed to meet them.
“What’ve we got?” one of them, Sarah, asked.
“Car crash. Steering column. Initial shock fourteen minutes ago. Severe hemorrhaging, O+ IV inserted three minutes ago. No allergies or anything noted.”
Sarah nodded, then wheeled him away towards surgery. Jon and Charlie wound down to a light jog, then stopped moving altogether. They stood, panting for a few seconds. Another of the attending nurses approached them.
“Anyone else?” she asked.
“One passenger, will be DOA. She’s still at the scene.”
“You left one?” the nurse asked, incredulity creeping into her voice.
“Already dead,” Jon replied, no hint of emotion in his voice. “No other ambulances, needed to get this one here. We’ll go back and get her to the Despard morgue.”
“Should probably bring her here,” the attending said.
“Local matter,” Charlie replied. His face mirrored Jon’s voice.
“She from Despard?”
Charlie nodded as Jon turned to look at him.
“Neighbor’s daughter.”
Monday, August 11, 2008
Stutterstep
I wish I could be a mouse
Shuffling from home to home
Hiding by day; sieze the night
Stuttering, hush'd moans and groans.
And in this world you'll see
A wonderful cheeseblock, for me
Delightful pillagery
A wonderful heartache, for me.
In the light, we run from you
Twittering, crying aloud
But everyone knows you can't
Find a scared mouse in the dark.
Behind the drab curtain,
A wonderful mouse dance, again
That every living thing
In darkness comes dancing with me.
Oh! What a sight!
Got that feeling tonight!
Let every mouse dance 'fore light!
Shuffling from home to home
Hiding by day; sieze the night
Stuttering, hush'd moans and groans.
And in this world you'll see
A wonderful cheeseblock, for me
Delightful pillagery
A wonderful heartache, for me.
In the light, we run from you
Twittering, crying aloud
But everyone knows you can't
Find a scared mouse in the dark.
Behind the drab curtain,
A wonderful mouse dance, again
That every living thing
In darkness comes dancing with me.
Oh! What a sight!
Got that feeling tonight!
Let every mouse dance 'fore light!
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