My vision of hell is an inverse of the cartoon Hell. Some people like to use the phrase “hot as hell.” And I can recall a couple of Looney Tune cartoons in which Hell is depicted as a place full of flames and a little red devil. And didn’t Dante write something about it as an “inferno”? But, all of these are fucking bullshit. And if it is not, then goddamnit, Hell does not sound that bad to me.When I was in Florida, I liked to romanticize Virginia winters, and the joy of seasons, and how great it felt to cuddle up in coats and scarves, to be able to see your breath in the frosty air, and to have red, blistered cheeks. But, fucking hell - enough is enough already. It is early April now and in the upper thirties! Cold as fucking balls. My vision of hell is freezing – a desolate, icy cold desert land. The cold is just so painful, and in a way that heat can never be. When it is insanely cold, you never get a hazy mind or faint – you are painfully, painfully aware of the cold. Your body becomes numb, fingers could fall off if you just accidentally hit them against a hard object like a telephone pole or a fucking laundry machine. Maybe even a chair. Fingers drained of blood and brittle and white and goddamn it hurts.
Death always seems just right over the next hill. Two more lights away. And a right at the Texaco. And there it is. So close when it is cold outside. (I’m pretty sure this is why all of those New England writers were so dark.) But with heat you just sort of meld into the heat waves and become one and the same with the fractures of light that steam over asphalt surfaces. With coldness, your mind does not become dopey or tired. You are Awake and aware of every single pore of your skin that is exposed to the wind. In the heat, we are completetly unaware of how are skin is not the air. In the heat, we absorbe those UV rays with love – a high. And, yeah, you’re right – it is something about the heat.
Today, thanks to this modern world we reside in, I connected with the Sunshine State, and I think caught some of the sun’s energy through the telephone lines. Dialed 1 followed by a 941 interrupted by a brief pause as I thought for a brief second about the $64,000 question that I find myself asking way too often – the story of my fucking life and a question that was posed mainly about who I was calling, but which really was a brief, existential dilemma – and anyways, I uttered what the fuck am I doing?, and then quickly remembered and dialed 359 with a brief pause because I always dial numbers like they are said - the first three numbers all together with a slight hesitation and then the final four numbers – and then the denouement: 3297.
And I asked Anne, who picked up the phone, if Bonnie was there and she wasn’t. I can pick up the phone a thousand some miles away from you and talk to you in real time and you are at the other end of this line and living in that Stevens House, and living your Sarasota life, and that is fucking awesome. So, I talked to Anne for about ten minutes before she had to leave for work and it was wonderful being able to talk to Anne in the living room. I was sitting on that couch, which was at one point in time, a white couch, sun filtering in through those curtains that we stole and dyed blue, living the lazy life to the max, and she was being the busy bee, getting ready for work, looking silly in her waitress uniform like she was playing dress up, and she was telling me about her life, and it was so comforting. I wanted to just go through the New College student directory and call up random people and Connect. MCI, Sprint, and VoiceStream – for the love of God, this is not a promo for you guys. I just really think telephones are so magical, connecting me to you and you to me, despite geographic distances. And Walt, would you cringe to know that I am using your “connecting me to you and you to me” shtick to talk about an appliance? We are evolved. Earth, we will surpass all your natural limitations. We are aliens, this human race of ours. And look at what I just said – “of ours.” It is ours. Yours and Mine. And that’s so capitalist to use possessive pronouns. But, whatever, we can do that. Remember, we are aliens. Cosmic beauties hurling through space, we have lost contact with Mission Control, and have long forgotten what our mission exactly was. It’s that damn lost memory disease our species has. Where exactly did I put those keys? What exactly are we doing on this planet?
Perhaps a better question is: Who cares? Perhaps that is the best one. And turn up that radio when you’re feeling lonesome and not feeling like engaging in conversation with whoever it is that keeps asking these questions. Fucking crank it, I say. Louder. Louder. Louder. Happiness through sensory exhaustion.
I’ve got a tape player in my mom’s minivan (my current mode of transportation), and it is getting so much Brucie Bruce action these past few days. Springsteen’s cock has been inserted in the always receptive tape deck since whenever the fuck I put it in a few days ago. I now know every word to Born in the USA, and Bruce’s kisses have been turning me inside out for days, for lifetimes, and do his kisses turn you inside out, too? I drove Maggie home from work last night and she was excited by Bruce, and we talked about Bruce and what we loved about him, and she knew most of the words. Last night, I saw Kissing Jessica Steinwith Sarah, and she too loved Bruce on the drive there. And today, I drove around with Mary because that’s what we like to do, and listened to Bruce, and Mary loves him, too. We all love him. I love that – when so many people love a singer and I can share a listening moment with them. Sharing is caring indeed.
Mary, Bruce, and I drove around Northern Virginia this afternoon and repeated I’m on fire, saying perhaps the most sincere thing we would allow ourselves to say all week. We sang it with meaning, almost trembling in our recitation. A low lament. Not a yell. Not at all.
We went to this hookah bar out in Falls Church that I went to once in high school with some girl from PIRG. It was an Egyptian cafe and in this shopping center where most of the stores had Arabic signs out front. We went in, sort of nervous, and were received to somewhat less than welcoming stares. Mary, the blonde, slutty looking white girl and me, the flaming (say some) gay boy were just a little out of place. But, after about the first ten minutes of feeling very stiff and out of place, and after smoking like dragons from fruit-flavored hookahs, we were in a much more convivial mood and realized that the unwelcoming stares were largely invented by our own slight nervousness, and the waiter was friendly and we sat for way too long, and tried to do to far too many smoking tricks. Neither of us could get down doing doughnets. And, then me feeling so lightheaded since I never ever ever smoke - we sat some more until I felt more clearheaded. And then we left the restaurant, joined up with Bruce, and watched the beautiful, beautiful star known as The Sun make its way closer and closer to the horizion, and darken gradually from a shade of yellow to a shade of orange to a shade of gold to a shade of red to dusk.
And last night I had the best sex of my life. And, I almost followed that by saying: Too bad it was just a dream. But, it wasn’t too bad it was just a dream. It was a fucking wonderful experience. It was this real weird dream, the setting was New College, and the boy was Chris Hollerhan, who was one of my obsessions, but who I haven’t even thought of in forever. Dreams are so weird and fascinating and great. And this morning, after waking up, I masturbated on my bedroom floor, taking pleasure in tensing up all my “muscles” as much as I could. Straining my legs and stomach. And it felt so good. And right after I came to half recollections of my dream, I curled up the toes of my right foot and rubbed them against the still tensed ankle of the back of my left foot.
