These stories are very unpolished, one-hour things. My friends' talent ... is like WOAH.
(Articulate, really).
--C.
Monday, May 10, 2004
Diane
(Mine)
"You never saw what hit you, did you?"
The words sledgehammered their way into my fractured skull. Somewhere between the pulsing hospital lights and the incessant Taiko drumming against my abused cranium, I realized that she actually expected a response. I could only manage a grunt.
"You knew you shouldn't drive after late nights in the OR. You know all about sleep deprivation. You're a doctor." The voice continued.
As the sixteen sets of fluorescent lights overhead slowly converged into four, I left the voice behind and set myself to the task of figuring out who this was and what she was doing here.
I was married, I think. I could certainly remember snippets of a wedding, and a lavish honeymoon in the Caribbean. I remember the lovely week of exotic shopping trips and even how thankful I was for Diane. That was her name -- a lovely, supple and sexy college senior who shouldn't have fallen for a balding fifty-year-old doctor. But she had. She relieved my fears constantly over the past year while we'd been dating. She'd supported me through long nights, doing her own studying in the hospital café. And yes, here she was at my bedside even though I could barely focus my eyes on the bright and vaguely familiar lights.
"I'm all bruised up from trying to drag you out from under that wreckage. You wouldn't speak… do you realize just how terrifying that was to me? You must never do that again." Diane kept talking, in that soft, slightly patronizing voice of hers and I drifted off into blackness, happy she was there.
Days later, they released me from my own hospital. By that time, I'd gotten back most of my memories, if none of my mobility. I was paralyzed from the waist down, my job as a surgeon was gone. And yet Diane was there pushing the wheelchair down the hospital ramp. I still couldn't remember much from the day of the accident, just some shadowy lights that forced me awake at night and caused the nurses (and a very sleepy Diane) to rush to my bedside. That will eventually pass, I was told. Diane patted my hand as I was lifted into the van.
That night, with Diane in her soft nightie curled up next to me, I finally felt safe. As Diane slipped out from my semi-conscious arms, it occurred to me that she was supposed to be driving me home that night. She had come all the way to the hospital just so I wouldn't be driving sleep deprived. I remember waking up to the click of my releasing seatbelt and the sudden lurch of the car. In almost slow motion I saw Diane tuck and roll out of the driver side door, as she steered the car into the oncoming semi, the headlights blinding.
I woke up screaming for the tenth night in a row.
"You never saw what hit you, did you?"
The words sledgehammered their way into my fractured skull. Somewhere between the pulsing hospital lights and the incessant Taiko drumming against my abused cranium, I realized that she actually expected a response. I could only manage a grunt.
"You knew you shouldn't drive after late nights in the OR. You know all about sleep deprivation. You're a doctor." The voice continued.
As the sixteen sets of fluorescent lights overhead slowly converged into four, I left the voice behind and set myself to the task of figuring out who this was and what she was doing here.
I was married, I think. I could certainly remember snippets of a wedding, and a lavish honeymoon in the Caribbean. I remember the lovely week of exotic shopping trips and even how thankful I was for Diane. That was her name -- a lovely, supple and sexy college senior who shouldn't have fallen for a balding fifty-year-old doctor. But she had. She relieved my fears constantly over the past year while we'd been dating. She'd supported me through long nights, doing her own studying in the hospital café. And yes, here she was at my bedside even though I could barely focus my eyes on the bright and vaguely familiar lights.
"I'm all bruised up from trying to drag you out from under that wreckage. You wouldn't speak… do you realize just how terrifying that was to me? You must never do that again." Diane kept talking, in that soft, slightly patronizing voice of hers and I drifted off into blackness, happy she was there.
Days later, they released me from my own hospital. By that time, I'd gotten back most of my memories, if none of my mobility. I was paralyzed from the waist down, my job as a surgeon was gone. And yet Diane was there pushing the wheelchair down the hospital ramp. I still couldn't remember much from the day of the accident, just some shadowy lights that forced me awake at night and caused the nurses (and a very sleepy Diane) to rush to my bedside. That will eventually pass, I was told. Diane patted my hand as I was lifted into the van.
That night, with Diane in her soft nightie curled up next to me, I finally felt safe. As Diane slipped out from my semi-conscious arms, it occurred to me that she was supposed to be driving me home that night. She had come all the way to the hospital just so I wouldn't be driving sleep deprived. I remember waking up to the click of my releasing seatbelt and the sudden lurch of the car. In almost slow motion I saw Diane tuck and roll out of the driver side door, as she steered the car into the oncoming semi, the headlights blinding.
I woke up screaming for the tenth night in a row.
Eleven Days
(from an amazingly talented Yune:)
You never saw what hit you, but the white blur that identifies itself as Dr. Herrins tells you when you wake up that it was a black sports car going over well over 100.
"Was the driver drunk?" you ask.
"No," he says, and in his voice you hear the clinical curiosity of a researcher. "But he'd recently taken a turn around the bend, if you know what I mean. His friends and family report that over the previous ten days, he'd been growing steadily more and more irrational. It culminated in the midnight ride that unfortunately caused your accident. He ended up dying shortly after the ambulance came. You're luckier."
You hurt too much to be angry at this madman who literally crashed into your life. Several major bones are broken, and there were internal injuries, although Dr. Herrins reassures you that now that your condition has stabilized, you're sure to recover. You'll be discharged in several months, and after that awaits a long regimen of physical therapy.
He sees how much the news depresses you. "Here's something that might cheer you up. Your parents and wife are here to see you, if you feel well enough for visitors."
You don't, not really, but you know that your loved ones must want the reassurance of talking to you while you're conscious, so you nod and they're sent in.
Your parents weep over you and have to be warned away from hugging you or holding your hand. It is a relief when they finally leave. Natasha sits quietly through the spectacle, then comes to the bedside once you two are alone. She is pale but brave, and helps you lift a hand to feel the baby kick.
"Do you remember any of it?" she asks after a long silence.
"No," you say, but you're lying; your body tenses as it recalls on its own the horror of that night. The memories are trickling back, like water through a crack in a dam. Flashes come to you later in the evening, after Natasha has kissed your cheek and departed, and you close your eyes to try to shut out the world.
Someone is dragging you out of the wreck. You turn your head, wanting to protest about how the asphalt is abrading you, only to stare into a ruined face, bloodied, flesh burnt, and still a rictus grin splitting its mouth. He is even more injured than you are. You have no idea where he has the strength to pull you out of the car.
Frost crawls along your bones. Even after you open your eyes, that terrible face seems to be grinning at you. You call for the nurse and demand something to help you sleep.
Instead, you dream. Sinuous, shadowy shapes twine around you. The next morning you feel more exhausted instead of rested.
More visitors over the next week and a half. Your boss assures you that your job will still be there for you when you get out of the hospital, and that the company misses your expertise. Your parents use more Kleenex. When you tell her that your sleep is troubled, Natasha sings you a lullaby, as though you were a child. It doesn't help. You dream of black worms burrowing through flesh, and at first you think it's a corpse, perhaps that of the other man, but with a shock that sends you hurling back into raw-throated consciousness, you realize that the body is your own.
And during the daytime, beyond the endless parade of well-wishers, your mind keeps re-constructing what happened during the accident.
"Get help, call 911," you gasp, wondering whether your cell phone survived the crash. But the man ignores you. "Eleven days, eleven days," he says, as though it's a chant. "They take eleven days, you see. And this would've been my eleventh night." He starts to laugh, and the sound grates against your ears as though nails were being dragged across your skull.
The lawyer of the man who crashed into you comes by as well. "I wasn't just Eric's lawyer," he says with an awkwardness unusual to his profession. "I was his friend, too. I just wanted to let you know that of course you'll be compensated in full for what happened. Eric's family agrees that it's what he would have wanted. He was a gentle man, truly. We were all shocked when we heard. But he had started changing in disturbing ways, just a couple of weeks before..."
"Changing how?" you ask, intrigued despite yourself.
"He was growing paranoid. Going to the doctors and insisting on full medical exams, which of course came up with nothing. He was at the prime of his life and in great physical shape. And he started refusing to sleep with his fiancée because, he said, he was having nightmares and didn't want to wake her. He started researching parasites. In the autopsy, they also found evidence that he had cut his own arms with a knife, and there were some other strange wounds." He lifts his hands in a helpless gesture.
A suspicion clouds the back of your mind. You try to deny its existence. Then the lawyer says:
"It's amazing how fast the mind can deteriorate. In only eleven days..."
"You said he was doing research," you say abruptly.
He blinks. "Yes."
"Can I see whatever books or articles he collected? They might be of interest to me."
His brows are furrowed in puzzlement, but he nods. "You know it's hard to deny you anything. Just don't tell me that these strange obsessions are contagious." He chuckles weakly.
That is exactly your fear. Your flesh crawls. Or is it something inside your flesh...?
You start asking to meet everyone who knew Eric. You ask them embarrassing, personal questions that they answer anyway. You hear your parents whispering in the hallway about how you must be questioning why this happened to you, that you're investigating the source of the accident. They're unhappy about this turn of mind, but Dr. Herrins says that this is your way of taking control when you're helpless.
The lawyer delivers the books. You read voraciously and refuse to see anyone except the nurse who brings you painkillers and adjusts the reading stand for you.
You start asking for drugs to keep you awake, because the dreams don't stop. Neither do the memories.
He finally stops laughing. "They must be starving right now," he says in elation. "Because they feed on fear, you know. And God knows I'm not afraid right now. I welcome death with open arms."
There are wasps that lay eggs in burrows, along with an insect paralyzed by their sting. When the eggs hatch, the resulting larvae eat the insect. Many parasites feast on humans instead, since our dietary habits lead us to ingest other animals that are infected.
But what if it were more than a taste for human flesh? What if something preferred human prey precisely for the one thing that separates us from other species-our minds? Our psychological depth? Our fear?
And thus the dreams.
Natasha goes into labor early. Dr. Herrins frowns-although he is always frowning these days as he listens to you and marks your chart-and says that the shock of your accident may have contributed. The premature baby, a daughter, is placed in incubation, and everyone prays and hopes. Except for you.
"Don't you care?" Natasha asks you over the phone, crying for the first time.
"I won't get to see her anyway, even if she lives," you say.
There is a shocked silence. You babble into it.
"He gave them to me. And they take eleven days, you see. Eleven days to incubate. And last night, I woke up screaming for the tenth night in a row."
You never saw what hit you, but the white blur that identifies itself as Dr. Herrins tells you when you wake up that it was a black sports car going over well over 100.
"Was the driver drunk?" you ask.
"No," he says, and in his voice you hear the clinical curiosity of a researcher. "But he'd recently taken a turn around the bend, if you know what I mean. His friends and family report that over the previous ten days, he'd been growing steadily more and more irrational. It culminated in the midnight ride that unfortunately caused your accident. He ended up dying shortly after the ambulance came. You're luckier."
You hurt too much to be angry at this madman who literally crashed into your life. Several major bones are broken, and there were internal injuries, although Dr. Herrins reassures you that now that your condition has stabilized, you're sure to recover. You'll be discharged in several months, and after that awaits a long regimen of physical therapy.
He sees how much the news depresses you. "Here's something that might cheer you up. Your parents and wife are here to see you, if you feel well enough for visitors."
You don't, not really, but you know that your loved ones must want the reassurance of talking to you while you're conscious, so you nod and they're sent in.
Your parents weep over you and have to be warned away from hugging you or holding your hand. It is a relief when they finally leave. Natasha sits quietly through the spectacle, then comes to the bedside once you two are alone. She is pale but brave, and helps you lift a hand to feel the baby kick.
"Do you remember any of it?" she asks after a long silence.
"No," you say, but you're lying; your body tenses as it recalls on its own the horror of that night. The memories are trickling back, like water through a crack in a dam. Flashes come to you later in the evening, after Natasha has kissed your cheek and departed, and you close your eyes to try to shut out the world.
Someone is dragging you out of the wreck. You turn your head, wanting to protest about how the asphalt is abrading you, only to stare into a ruined face, bloodied, flesh burnt, and still a rictus grin splitting its mouth. He is even more injured than you are. You have no idea where he has the strength to pull you out of the car.
Frost crawls along your bones. Even after you open your eyes, that terrible face seems to be grinning at you. You call for the nurse and demand something to help you sleep.
Instead, you dream. Sinuous, shadowy shapes twine around you. The next morning you feel more exhausted instead of rested.
More visitors over the next week and a half. Your boss assures you that your job will still be there for you when you get out of the hospital, and that the company misses your expertise. Your parents use more Kleenex. When you tell her that your sleep is troubled, Natasha sings you a lullaby, as though you were a child. It doesn't help. You dream of black worms burrowing through flesh, and at first you think it's a corpse, perhaps that of the other man, but with a shock that sends you hurling back into raw-throated consciousness, you realize that the body is your own.
And during the daytime, beyond the endless parade of well-wishers, your mind keeps re-constructing what happened during the accident.
"Get help, call 911," you gasp, wondering whether your cell phone survived the crash. But the man ignores you. "Eleven days, eleven days," he says, as though it's a chant. "They take eleven days, you see. And this would've been my eleventh night." He starts to laugh, and the sound grates against your ears as though nails were being dragged across your skull.
The lawyer of the man who crashed into you comes by as well. "I wasn't just Eric's lawyer," he says with an awkwardness unusual to his profession. "I was his friend, too. I just wanted to let you know that of course you'll be compensated in full for what happened. Eric's family agrees that it's what he would have wanted. He was a gentle man, truly. We were all shocked when we heard. But he had started changing in disturbing ways, just a couple of weeks before..."
"Changing how?" you ask, intrigued despite yourself.
"He was growing paranoid. Going to the doctors and insisting on full medical exams, which of course came up with nothing. He was at the prime of his life and in great physical shape. And he started refusing to sleep with his fiancée because, he said, he was having nightmares and didn't want to wake her. He started researching parasites. In the autopsy, they also found evidence that he had cut his own arms with a knife, and there were some other strange wounds." He lifts his hands in a helpless gesture.
A suspicion clouds the back of your mind. You try to deny its existence. Then the lawyer says:
"It's amazing how fast the mind can deteriorate. In only eleven days..."
"You said he was doing research," you say abruptly.
He blinks. "Yes."
"Can I see whatever books or articles he collected? They might be of interest to me."
His brows are furrowed in puzzlement, but he nods. "You know it's hard to deny you anything. Just don't tell me that these strange obsessions are contagious." He chuckles weakly.
That is exactly your fear. Your flesh crawls. Or is it something inside your flesh...?
You start asking to meet everyone who knew Eric. You ask them embarrassing, personal questions that they answer anyway. You hear your parents whispering in the hallway about how you must be questioning why this happened to you, that you're investigating the source of the accident. They're unhappy about this turn of mind, but Dr. Herrins says that this is your way of taking control when you're helpless.
The lawyer delivers the books. You read voraciously and refuse to see anyone except the nurse who brings you painkillers and adjusts the reading stand for you.
You start asking for drugs to keep you awake, because the dreams don't stop. Neither do the memories.
He finally stops laughing. "They must be starving right now," he says in elation. "Because they feed on fear, you know. And God knows I'm not afraid right now. I welcome death with open arms."
There are wasps that lay eggs in burrows, along with an insect paralyzed by their sting. When the eggs hatch, the resulting larvae eat the insect. Many parasites feast on humans instead, since our dietary habits lead us to ingest other animals that are infected.
But what if it were more than a taste for human flesh? What if something preferred human prey precisely for the one thing that separates us from other species-our minds? Our psychological depth? Our fear?
And thus the dreams.
Natasha goes into labor early. Dr. Herrins frowns-although he is always frowning these days as he listens to you and marks your chart-and says that the shock of your accident may have contributed. The premature baby, a daughter, is placed in incubation, and everyone prays and hopes. Except for you.
"Don't you care?" Natasha asks you over the phone, crying for the first time.
"I won't get to see her anyway, even if she lives," you say.
There is a shocked silence. You babble into it.
"He gave them to me. And they take eleven days, you see. Eleven days to incubate. And last night, I woke up screaming for the tenth night in a row."
The Writer
(by Rose)
His tea had long since grown cold, but he drank it anyway. As he drained the dregs from the chipped glass, he slowly slid off his stool and out of his long-held spot at the bar. He tossed some change in the direction of the heavily pierced student who had been bringing him drinks all night and limped out of the repugnantly modern glass and chrome diner, trying to shake his foot awake. Picking the street that seemed most likely to head east, he set off with a purposeful stride, the kind of eyes straight ahead, no nonsense pace meant to keep any unsavory characters at bay.
Just as the sun was beginning to rise over the odd mixture of ugly square apartment buildings and crumbling historical monuments and he was beginning to despair of ever reaching his destination, the fog from the early morning sea began to envelop him. With relief, he sank into the sand, opened his coat to pull from a pocket a tiny beat-up, leather-bound notebook and the pen he had swiped from the travel agency, and began to scribble furiously.
It seemed that he had been writing for only a few minutes when the bright noon sun was obscured by large dark clouds and the downpour started without warning. Unable to maintain the flood of words that had come to him for the first time in a long time, but unwilling to leave the peacefulness he found in the water surrounding him, he sat steeled against the wind and rain, allowing the elements to move him into a trance and drift him down memory lane.
It'd been years since he'd been to France, but he still remembered every street sign, every cafe, every word learned, every second of that one fateful day, from his first step off the train to the last words whispered in his ear as he floated off to sleep. The young greenhorn had ended up in Nice on a whim, an adventure picked by a stray dart and a much abused map, and as he plunged into the warm sunshine, he felt certain that lady luck was on his side.
He settled himself at the first small table, at a sleepy sidewalk cafe, and watched as the rest of the tourists, his day's travel companions, milled into the town, buzzing about the quaintness and the salty air.
Shunning his menu, he smiled at the bright-eyed eager girl who came to take his order and enquired, "Is there anything in here as sweet as you?
As she blushed and stuttered, he straightened and barked out his order, "Coffee, black, and pernod, just a little water."
"Ah, poor boy," called a lilted laughing voice from behind. He turned, just as heard the scrape of another wicker wire chair being pulled up beside him. "You think you admire purity and innocence, but you can't stand the dull-wittedness of the girls fresh from the farm."
"But if she had joined in your parrying, you would have thought her hardened, rude, all too boringly world weary," she said. The woman could have been anywhere between twenty and fifty, dignified but svelte, and dressed in an impeccable traveling suit. She continued on, not letting him get a word in, "You fancy yourself a writer, don't you? You have that air of clever self-importance about you. Give me your most recent story."
Feigning an air of confidence, as if being challenged in such a manner by such a woman was an everyday occurrence, he passed over his best piece, a detective story with a charming, mysterious, standoffish hero and an equally strong, clever female counterpart, exactly the type he wished he could find. Somehow, he thought, he maintained an unruffled mien as she read, skipping back and forth between pages, pursing lips, clucking, laughing fiendishly. When she finally came to the last dog-eared page, he was on pins and needles. Two cups of coffee had come and gone, while she nursed her red wine and contemplated.
"Have you ever been with a woman?" She nailed him with a stare.
"Of course!" he protested.
"Was it what you wanted it to be?"
She seemed to see right through him. It was hard to tell whether an affirmative or honesty would be more worldly, more right.
"No answer needed. Your problem is that you're too young, too idealistic. You want things to be grandiose, meaningful, perfect. Maybe that will happen. Maybe not. But either way, you're not getting it on paper. Wit is that which was often thought but ne'er so well expressed."
His tea had long since grown cold, but he drank it anyway. As he drained the dregs from the chipped glass, he slowly slid off his stool and out of his long-held spot at the bar. He tossed some change in the direction of the heavily pierced student who had been bringing him drinks all night and limped out of the repugnantly modern glass and chrome diner, trying to shake his foot awake. Picking the street that seemed most likely to head east, he set off with a purposeful stride, the kind of eyes straight ahead, no nonsense pace meant to keep any unsavory characters at bay.
Just as the sun was beginning to rise over the odd mixture of ugly square apartment buildings and crumbling historical monuments and he was beginning to despair of ever reaching his destination, the fog from the early morning sea began to envelop him. With relief, he sank into the sand, opened his coat to pull from a pocket a tiny beat-up, leather-bound notebook and the pen he had swiped from the travel agency, and began to scribble furiously.
It seemed that he had been writing for only a few minutes when the bright noon sun was obscured by large dark clouds and the downpour started without warning. Unable to maintain the flood of words that had come to him for the first time in a long time, but unwilling to leave the peacefulness he found in the water surrounding him, he sat steeled against the wind and rain, allowing the elements to move him into a trance and drift him down memory lane.
It'd been years since he'd been to France, but he still remembered every street sign, every cafe, every word learned, every second of that one fateful day, from his first step off the train to the last words whispered in his ear as he floated off to sleep. The young greenhorn had ended up in Nice on a whim, an adventure picked by a stray dart and a much abused map, and as he plunged into the warm sunshine, he felt certain that lady luck was on his side.
He settled himself at the first small table, at a sleepy sidewalk cafe, and watched as the rest of the tourists, his day's travel companions, milled into the town, buzzing about the quaintness and the salty air.
Shunning his menu, he smiled at the bright-eyed eager girl who came to take his order and enquired, "Is there anything in here as sweet as you?
As she blushed and stuttered, he straightened and barked out his order, "Coffee, black, and pernod, just a little water."
"Ah, poor boy," called a lilted laughing voice from behind. He turned, just as heard the scrape of another wicker wire chair being pulled up beside him. "You think you admire purity and innocence, but you can't stand the dull-wittedness of the girls fresh from the farm."
"But if she had joined in your parrying, you would have thought her hardened, rude, all too boringly world weary," she said. The woman could have been anywhere between twenty and fifty, dignified but svelte, and dressed in an impeccable traveling suit. She continued on, not letting him get a word in, "You fancy yourself a writer, don't you? You have that air of clever self-importance about you. Give me your most recent story."
Feigning an air of confidence, as if being challenged in such a manner by such a woman was an everyday occurrence, he passed over his best piece, a detective story with a charming, mysterious, standoffish hero and an equally strong, clever female counterpart, exactly the type he wished he could find. Somehow, he thought, he maintained an unruffled mien as she read, skipping back and forth between pages, pursing lips, clucking, laughing fiendishly. When she finally came to the last dog-eared page, he was on pins and needles. Two cups of coffee had come and gone, while she nursed her red wine and contemplated.
"Have you ever been with a woman?" She nailed him with a stare.
"Of course!" he protested.
"Was it what you wanted it to be?"
She seemed to see right through him. It was hard to tell whether an affirmative or honesty would be more worldly, more right.
"No answer needed. Your problem is that you're too young, too idealistic. You want things to be grandiose, meaningful, perfect. Maybe that will happen. Maybe not. But either way, you're not getting it on paper. Wit is that which was often thought but ne'er so well expressed."
Four AM.
(by Cheng)
His tea had long since grown cold, but he drank it anyway. It was bitter and strong and he gulped it down without a second thought. The inside of the cup was stained the color of a stale banana, attesting to the long sad hours he'd spent at this desk. He made a mental note to wash it, when he actually got around to the strewn dishes and plates that covered the kitchen table. It'd been a week of long nights. Again, the small hand on his watch pointed down and to the right, the little pips that actually indicated the time were long since rubbed away. His head throbbed. The page was still blank.
It wasn't that he didn't have much to write. His head swarmed with sentences, words and phrases, just like when he was younger -- when he'd churned out book after book. Back then, he'd even gotten an occasional mention in the New York Times Book Review section. That was twenty-two years ago. He wasn't a good writer, not better than most, but he wrote. And that meant that phone calls from Tom, his editor, usually told him that a check was in the mail - not that he was weeks behind on his latest manuscript. He grasped for a sentence, just to get him going. He extended a mental hand, but pulled it back immediately. The hand was so dead, like a withered branch covered in old dried moss. He shuddered, and far away, he registered the rattling sound of a pen hitting the linoleum. At fifty-three, he wasn't that old. But his eyes were firmly pressed shut and he didn't look.
He hunted around for a happier thought. Long ago, he recognized that as his defense mechanism, the way that he escaped from the present time by hiding out in his mind. Back then, of course, those thoughts translated to words on a piece of paper and those words earned him money. "Idealistic," they'd called his work. It wasn't far from the truth; he'd created an ideal world in his own mind. One where he had kids; one where Stacy hadn't left after discovering how unromantic writers actually were; one where people actually lived their dreams of romance novel freedom and went on lavish European cruises.
It'd been years since he'd been to France. He'd gone with Stacy after his first book deal. They'd spent a real honeymoon laughing down the Seine and drinking far too much. It didn't seem to matter that they were pairing the red wine with the delicate oysters, even if their shocked garcon tried repeatedly to change their minds. It wasn't as if they knew what he was saying anyhow and they'd laughed off his protesting tone in a way only silly Americans can. He wrote nothing on that trip.
He opened his eyes; the world had righted itself. Impulsively, he moved to check his watch but didn't read it. The time was irrelevant.
Bending down, he retrieved the fallen pen, dismissing quickly the click of his aging spine. He felt slightly better and wasn't going to lose that feeling. He had decided what to write. It was to be a memoir, an autobiography of sorts. It wasn't the paperback romance that Tom wanted; but it was sure to have enough fantasy to make him happy.
While the water was boiling for another cup of tea, he pondered how he was going to write it. "Write what you know best, first" was the adage of his freshman English professor, and he wondered what that
would be. A mischievous grin spread across his face. He would write
from the end; start from the last paragraph and work towards the first. That'd be sure to get him writing, and maybe bring out some of his old wit.
He sipped his hot tea, the momentary scalding being a fantastic jolt.
He wrote the first sentences of the last paragraph without even thinking. As he lifted his cup to take the second sip, he reread what he just wrote, as was his habit.
There was a crash and hot tea spilled into his lap.
"At fifty-three, I finally had the courage to kill myself." With a start, he realized, wit is that which was often thought but ne'er so well expressed.
His tea had long since grown cold, but he drank it anyway. It was bitter and strong and he gulped it down without a second thought. The inside of the cup was stained the color of a stale banana, attesting to the long sad hours he'd spent at this desk. He made a mental note to wash it, when he actually got around to the strewn dishes and plates that covered the kitchen table. It'd been a week of long nights. Again, the small hand on his watch pointed down and to the right, the little pips that actually indicated the time were long since rubbed away. His head throbbed. The page was still blank.
It wasn't that he didn't have much to write. His head swarmed with sentences, words and phrases, just like when he was younger -- when he'd churned out book after book. Back then, he'd even gotten an occasional mention in the New York Times Book Review section. That was twenty-two years ago. He wasn't a good writer, not better than most, but he wrote. And that meant that phone calls from Tom, his editor, usually told him that a check was in the mail - not that he was weeks behind on his latest manuscript. He grasped for a sentence, just to get him going. He extended a mental hand, but pulled it back immediately. The hand was so dead, like a withered branch covered in old dried moss. He shuddered, and far away, he registered the rattling sound of a pen hitting the linoleum. At fifty-three, he wasn't that old. But his eyes were firmly pressed shut and he didn't look.
He hunted around for a happier thought. Long ago, he recognized that as his defense mechanism, the way that he escaped from the present time by hiding out in his mind. Back then, of course, those thoughts translated to words on a piece of paper and those words earned him money. "Idealistic," they'd called his work. It wasn't far from the truth; he'd created an ideal world in his own mind. One where he had kids; one where Stacy hadn't left after discovering how unromantic writers actually were; one where people actually lived their dreams of romance novel freedom and went on lavish European cruises.
It'd been years since he'd been to France. He'd gone with Stacy after his first book deal. They'd spent a real honeymoon laughing down the Seine and drinking far too much. It didn't seem to matter that they were pairing the red wine with the delicate oysters, even if their shocked garcon tried repeatedly to change their minds. It wasn't as if they knew what he was saying anyhow and they'd laughed off his protesting tone in a way only silly Americans can. He wrote nothing on that trip.
He opened his eyes; the world had righted itself. Impulsively, he moved to check his watch but didn't read it. The time was irrelevant.
Bending down, he retrieved the fallen pen, dismissing quickly the click of his aging spine. He felt slightly better and wasn't going to lose that feeling. He had decided what to write. It was to be a memoir, an autobiography of sorts. It wasn't the paperback romance that Tom wanted; but it was sure to have enough fantasy to make him happy.
While the water was boiling for another cup of tea, he pondered how he was going to write it. "Write what you know best, first" was the adage of his freshman English professor, and he wondered what that
would be. A mischievous grin spread across his face. He would write
from the end; start from the last paragraph and work towards the first. That'd be sure to get him writing, and maybe bring out some of his old wit.
He sipped his hot tea, the momentary scalding being a fantastic jolt.
He wrote the first sentences of the last paragraph without even thinking. As he lifted his cup to take the second sip, he reread what he just wrote, as was his habit.
There was a crash and hot tea spilled into his lap.
"At fifty-three, I finally had the courage to kill myself." With a start, he realized, wit is that which was often thought but ne'er so well expressed.
Courtship
(by Yune)
His tea had long since grown cold, but he drank it anyway and smiled through its bitterness at Elizabeth. The girl sat demurely across from him with her eyes lowered, but every so often she would glance up at him through her lashes with the hint of a promise on her lips. That promise had kept Jean-Pierre in the Baylors' parlor for the past hour despite over-brewed tea and stale biscuits and the frigid presence of Mrs. Baylor.
He'd met the son of the family on a dig in Guatemala, both of them archaeology students. He had become fast friends with Robert, enough to plan to accompany him to his home in England on one of their breaks. Jean-Pierre had no home of his own worth speaking of. It'd been years since he'd been to France, and his parents had long since disowned him. He was most at ease in the rain forest anyway, with dirt on his face and tools in his hands. Not with these formal phrases tripping his tongue and this dark suit stifling his movements as he expressed his regrets about the accident on site that had claimed Robert's life just before break.
You must come anyway, Elizabeth had written on behalf of the family. Robert told us so much about you. Then a line that had been, he hoped, entirely on her behalf despite its plural: We want to meet you.
Robert had told him that his sister was "a lovely girl. You'll like her, Jean-Pierre." And he did, very much indeed, to the point where Robert's death, once a painful knot in his heart, was easing away into forgetfulness.
"Mama, please." Elizabeth put a hand on her mother's arm, interrupting the list of Robert's accomplishments. "I want to hear about what Robert did on the dig."
Mrs. Baylor slammed her teacup and saucer onto the table; through some miracle, the ceramic did not shatter. "That dig killed him!" She rose and rushed out of the room.
"Mama never approved of Robert going into archaeology," Elizabeth said, sounding unconcerned. "But I think that's how he would have liked to go. Not this young, of course, but involved in a project. Poor Robert. He tried very hard to be a proper older brother. Always introducing me to his friends out of the fear that I would become a spinster at this rate." She smiled. "But I didn't like any of them. Men these days... I do have my standards, you know."
He wondered if she was warning him off. But the curve of her mouth was impish. "So what do you look for in men?" he asked.
She tilted her head and thought for a moment. "Directness," she decided. "And wit."
Jean-Pierre swallowed. Wit was not his forte. Ancient artifacts required no clever words. But her eyes were a coquette's, and her mouth so inviting, and directness he could do. Gamely, he spoke of the two things that had been on his mind ever since he entered this place: "These biscuits and tea are horrible. Would you care for dinner elsewhere?"
Her smile widened. "Very much. I've been wishing you would say something like that. If you'd done so earlier, I wouldn't have had to be the one to chase Mama off, and we wouldn't have had to sit here for the past hour and a half."
He wished so too, now. But not too bad a start, he reflected as he held the door open for Elizabeth. After all, wit is that which was often thought but ne'er so well-expressed.
His tea had long since grown cold, but he drank it anyway and smiled through its bitterness at Elizabeth. The girl sat demurely across from him with her eyes lowered, but every so often she would glance up at him through her lashes with the hint of a promise on her lips. That promise had kept Jean-Pierre in the Baylors' parlor for the past hour despite over-brewed tea and stale biscuits and the frigid presence of Mrs. Baylor.
He'd met the son of the family on a dig in Guatemala, both of them archaeology students. He had become fast friends with Robert, enough to plan to accompany him to his home in England on one of their breaks. Jean-Pierre had no home of his own worth speaking of. It'd been years since he'd been to France, and his parents had long since disowned him. He was most at ease in the rain forest anyway, with dirt on his face and tools in his hands. Not with these formal phrases tripping his tongue and this dark suit stifling his movements as he expressed his regrets about the accident on site that had claimed Robert's life just before break.
You must come anyway, Elizabeth had written on behalf of the family. Robert told us so much about you. Then a line that had been, he hoped, entirely on her behalf despite its plural: We want to meet you.
Robert had told him that his sister was "a lovely girl. You'll like her, Jean-Pierre." And he did, very much indeed, to the point where Robert's death, once a painful knot in his heart, was easing away into forgetfulness.
"Mama, please." Elizabeth put a hand on her mother's arm, interrupting the list of Robert's accomplishments. "I want to hear about what Robert did on the dig."
Mrs. Baylor slammed her teacup and saucer onto the table; through some miracle, the ceramic did not shatter. "That dig killed him!" She rose and rushed out of the room.
"Mama never approved of Robert going into archaeology," Elizabeth said, sounding unconcerned. "But I think that's how he would have liked to go. Not this young, of course, but involved in a project. Poor Robert. He tried very hard to be a proper older brother. Always introducing me to his friends out of the fear that I would become a spinster at this rate." She smiled. "But I didn't like any of them. Men these days... I do have my standards, you know."
He wondered if she was warning him off. But the curve of her mouth was impish. "So what do you look for in men?" he asked.
She tilted her head and thought for a moment. "Directness," she decided. "And wit."
Jean-Pierre swallowed. Wit was not his forte. Ancient artifacts required no clever words. But her eyes were a coquette's, and her mouth so inviting, and directness he could do. Gamely, he spoke of the two things that had been on his mind ever since he entered this place: "These biscuits and tea are horrible. Would you care for dinner elsewhere?"
Her smile widened. "Very much. I've been wishing you would say something like that. If you'd done so earlier, I wouldn't have had to be the one to chase Mama off, and we wouldn't have had to sit here for the past hour and a half."
He wished so too, now. But not too bad a start, he reflected as he held the door open for Elizabeth. After all, wit is that which was often thought but ne'er so well-expressed.
It had to be said
(by Cheng)
His tea had long since grown cold, but he drank it anyway, staring out through his dark glasses. It'd been years since he'd been to France, but he knew these streets like the back of his hand. He planned long and carefully for this day. As the cab stopped on the Champs Elysee, he jumped out and sprinted the rest of the way to the Palace. A good spy never walks. Twenty minutes later, he was jumping from a lasered hole in the ceiling of the presidential office. As he landed on the big center desk, he whispered a single word to the single representative of the French people.
"Cowards."
Wit is that which was often thought but ne'er so well expressed.
(This awful piece was the result of my trying to fit the lines into as short a space as possible)
His tea had long since grown cold, but he drank it anyway, staring out through his dark glasses. It'd been years since he'd been to France, but he knew these streets like the back of his hand. He planned long and carefully for this day. As the cab stopped on the Champs Elysee, he jumped out and sprinted the rest of the way to the Palace. A good spy never walks. Twenty minutes later, he was jumping from a lasered hole in the ceiling of the presidential office. As he landed on the big center desk, he whispered a single word to the single representative of the French people.
"Cowards."
Wit is that which was often thought but ne'er so well expressed.
(This awful piece was the result of my trying to fit the lines into as short a space as possible)
Saturday, May 08, 2004
Eight times
(Mine)
He was always watching the sky, hoping for a sign that the war had ended, but again the faint flashes of light in the distance told of exploding bombs and dying people. He rested his head in his hands and silently prayed. Again, his sister was out there in the war-torn mess of Denmark, flirting with the strict border patrol, every night bringing more innocent Jewish children out, over the border to their little farmhouse in Sweden. Every time the distant booming sounded, his hands clenched -- he saw, in mind's eye the lovely long brown hair of his twin sister being thrown against some shattered skeleton of a building.
She had been a model, back in the days of peace. Never quite famous enough to be the first targeted by the Nazi forces, but pretty enough to entice some young recruit, fresh out of German propaganda schools to let her and her "baking" over to the other side. She had a nurse's uniform and on the return trip, she actually had a nice little warm loaf of bread for the kind soldier (and it rotated daily) so that he'd let her through with more "flour" on the next run. So far it'd worked perfectly, and he'd been surrounded by now seven young Jewish kids, all squeezed in the one nice warm bed up in the loft. They were sleeping soundly, but he waited, for her and for the eighth.
She was running late. He was going to be worried; there was nothing she could do to help that, but the baby wouldn't stop crying. She'd fed him, from her own breast, but it wouldn't quiet. She certainly couldn't smuggle a crying bag of flour over the border; no amount of eyelash batting would allow that. At the strike of ten, the gates closed and she'd have to spend the night on the wrong side of the barbed wire fence. Spending the night with a crying child and the hollow faces of the imprisoned, the people trapped in the ghetto, yellow stars sewn to their shirts. It was almost too much to bear, how many people she couldn't save. It was nine-thirty… she'd have to do this the hard way.
She swaddled the months old boy, still whimpering, as warmly as she could, and tied it securely to her chest. She may have to run, even if she'd hoped it wouldn't come to that. She left her building, seeming to come from the hospital, to keep up appearances, and headed for the guard tower. The new guard was young in his teens, that at least made it easier. She put on the sobbing nurse story.
"Look, junger Sohn, please… I pulled the baby from his mother, a fellow nurse. She'd been hurt by one of them," she spat, her disgust not for the Jews but for the Germans, but he'd never know that. "I have a grandmother in the farmhouse on the other side, she's got milk; and you know how hard that is to actually come by here in Denmark. You've got to let me out and get this baby some food."
She noticed how his eyes lit up at the mention of the word milk and pressed it further, "She may even have chocolate," she whispered. That did it; at the promise of sweets, the boy, he was barely sixteen, opened the gate. "I'll be back," she said, blowing him a kiss. He looked longingly after her.
It was almost midnight by the time she got back. She sank down into her cozy easy chair and sighed. "That was far harder a mission than I'd ever hope to do again."
He was always watching the sky, hoping for a sign that the war had ended, but again the faint flashes of light in the distance told of exploding bombs and dying people. He rested his head in his hands and silently prayed. Again, his sister was out there in the war-torn mess of Denmark, flirting with the strict border patrol, every night bringing more innocent Jewish children out, over the border to their little farmhouse in Sweden. Every time the distant booming sounded, his hands clenched -- he saw, in mind's eye the lovely long brown hair of his twin sister being thrown against some shattered skeleton of a building.
She had been a model, back in the days of peace. Never quite famous enough to be the first targeted by the Nazi forces, but pretty enough to entice some young recruit, fresh out of German propaganda schools to let her and her "baking" over to the other side. She had a nurse's uniform and on the return trip, she actually had a nice little warm loaf of bread for the kind soldier (and it rotated daily) so that he'd let her through with more "flour" on the next run. So far it'd worked perfectly, and he'd been surrounded by now seven young Jewish kids, all squeezed in the one nice warm bed up in the loft. They were sleeping soundly, but he waited, for her and for the eighth.
She was running late. He was going to be worried; there was nothing she could do to help that, but the baby wouldn't stop crying. She'd fed him, from her own breast, but it wouldn't quiet. She certainly couldn't smuggle a crying bag of flour over the border; no amount of eyelash batting would allow that. At the strike of ten, the gates closed and she'd have to spend the night on the wrong side of the barbed wire fence. Spending the night with a crying child and the hollow faces of the imprisoned, the people trapped in the ghetto, yellow stars sewn to their shirts. It was almost too much to bear, how many people she couldn't save. It was nine-thirty… she'd have to do this the hard way.
She swaddled the months old boy, still whimpering, as warmly as she could, and tied it securely to her chest. She may have to run, even if she'd hoped it wouldn't come to that. She left her building, seeming to come from the hospital, to keep up appearances, and headed for the guard tower. The new guard was young in his teens, that at least made it easier. She put on the sobbing nurse story.
"Look, junger Sohn, please… I pulled the baby from his mother, a fellow nurse. She'd been hurt by one of them," she spat, her disgust not for the Jews but for the Germans, but he'd never know that. "I have a grandmother in the farmhouse on the other side, she's got milk; and you know how hard that is to actually come by here in Denmark. You've got to let me out and get this baby some food."
She noticed how his eyes lit up at the mention of the word milk and pressed it further, "She may even have chocolate," she whispered. That did it; at the promise of sweets, the boy, he was barely sixteen, opened the gate. "I'll be back," she said, blowing him a kiss. He looked longingly after her.
It was almost midnight by the time she got back. She sank down into her cozy easy chair and sighed. "That was far harder a mission than I'd ever hope to do again."
Mission
(Yune)
He was always watching the sky, hoping for a sign that the war had ended. When he had been younger, the distant nighttime fireworks had been to him a spectacle of beauty; now he knew they were the death-flares of ships, an end to the brutal battles wrongly full of color and light. His sister was on one of those ships-tall, graceful Erin, whom he mostly remembered as a smiling face and strong arms enclosing him on her rare leaves. He missed her, but knew she was needed out there.
Suddenly there was an explosion high above him, far larger than any he had seen before, and then a string of smaller ones following. His throat closed. That had been the station that orbited the planet.
And the others--had one of them been Erin's ship? And then one of the distant points of light was no longer distant as it streaked downward in the sky. It was going to crash-right there, on their land. He stood there staring for several thundering heartbeats until he realized that he should run. He had only taken a few steps before the sudden blast threw him off his feet and flung him toward the house and into darkness.
When he recovered consciousness, he was lying on his bed. Sitting next to him was Erin.
He shouted her name and she stood up to give him her familiar smile and embrace.
"Was that your ship?" he demanded.
She nodded. "Sorry for the crash landing. I was running out of fuel."
"As long as you're back home," he said.
She hesitated. "I can't stay for long," she said. "This is the first place they'll look for me."
"Why are they looking for you?"
"I destroyed the station," she said calmly.
"But the rebels have been trying to do that for years!"
"I know. That's why they finally found someone on our side to do it."
The world seemed unbalanced. "Why did you do it, Erin?"
"The war had gone on too long," she said. "I don't think you can even remember a time when we had peace. It's time we started over, and by now, they have the resources to do it for us. In the end, what does it matter which empire claims us as theirs on the star-maps?"
There was a gun under his pillow that he kept in case looters ever came by. He reached for it now. He wasn't sure he would be able to use it on his sister. But she wasn't his sister. She was a traitor.
Even so, it was difficult to make his fingers curl around the gun.
Harder than anything he had done or ever would do, he thought. But he would do it. "So you destroyed our last defense," he said, hoping impossibly for a denial.
"I did it. It was hard, but I did it." She sank down into her cozy easy chair and sighed. "That was far harder a mission than I'd ever hope to do again."
He was always watching the sky, hoping for a sign that the war had ended. When he had been younger, the distant nighttime fireworks had been to him a spectacle of beauty; now he knew they were the death-flares of ships, an end to the brutal battles wrongly full of color and light. His sister was on one of those ships-tall, graceful Erin, whom he mostly remembered as a smiling face and strong arms enclosing him on her rare leaves. He missed her, but knew she was needed out there.
Suddenly there was an explosion high above him, far larger than any he had seen before, and then a string of smaller ones following. His throat closed. That had been the station that orbited the planet.
And the others--had one of them been Erin's ship? And then one of the distant points of light was no longer distant as it streaked downward in the sky. It was going to crash-right there, on their land. He stood there staring for several thundering heartbeats until he realized that he should run. He had only taken a few steps before the sudden blast threw him off his feet and flung him toward the house and into darkness.
When he recovered consciousness, he was lying on his bed. Sitting next to him was Erin.
He shouted her name and she stood up to give him her familiar smile and embrace.
"Was that your ship?" he demanded.
She nodded. "Sorry for the crash landing. I was running out of fuel."
"As long as you're back home," he said.
She hesitated. "I can't stay for long," she said. "This is the first place they'll look for me."
"Why are they looking for you?"
"I destroyed the station," she said calmly.
"But the rebels have been trying to do that for years!"
"I know. That's why they finally found someone on our side to do it."
The world seemed unbalanced. "Why did you do it, Erin?"
"The war had gone on too long," she said. "I don't think you can even remember a time when we had peace. It's time we started over, and by now, they have the resources to do it for us. In the end, what does it matter which empire claims us as theirs on the star-maps?"
There was a gun under his pillow that he kept in case looters ever came by. He reached for it now. He wasn't sure he would be able to use it on his sister. But she wasn't his sister. She was a traitor.
Even so, it was difficult to make his fingers curl around the gun.
Harder than anything he had done or ever would do, he thought. But he would do it. "So you destroyed our last defense," he said, hoping impossibly for a denial.
"I did it. It was hard, but I did it." She sank down into her cozy easy chair and sighed. "That was far harder a mission than I'd ever hope to do again."
Currently grooving to: Stanford Talisman - Keep Your Eyes on the Prize
Why Yune + I are weird.
More improv game results:
Timmy walked over to his bike that his brother had crashed into the wall. "Damn!" He swore and examined the bent remains. Hoisting the crushed wheel over his shoulder, he went back to the house. "Steven! You bastard, come here and see what you've done!" After a moment, a footstep resounded from the basement. "That you left in front of my lab?" Steven asked. "I thought there was a burglar when there was actually not any. I grabbed the bike and hurled it toward the shadow. My aim wasn't accurate, I ended up hitting the wall of the garage. Sorry." Beaker in hand, he bent his arm and flipped the frame of the wheel against the wall to shake the dent out. "Maybe I can fix it," he offered. Timmy stared at his brother and snarled. He raised an angry fist and shouted, "Maybe!? You'd only maybe fix it? I'll expect full compensation for this!" Steven calmly poured the contents of the beaker on the wheel. There was a great crunching sound as the metal suddenly snapped into a bunch of pieces. Slowly, the rest of the wheel formed a perfect circle as Timmy gaped at the transformation. Grabbing the beaker he doused his torn jeans, hoping it would effect a similar miraculous repair. "NOOOO!" screamed Steven lunging for his brother, but it was too late. Flames burst from the wet cloth. "You fool! It should only be used on bikes. Now, I have no choice but to watch you burn, since I never could create a formula to extinguish these flames." Timmy shrieked as the chemical ate away at his jeans. Minutes later, Timmy's charred jeans were fallen but his boxer saved his dignity. Steven snickered. "Good choice in wearing silk boxers with bikes on them because the chemical doesn't affect bikes that way."
Timmy walked over to his bike that his brother had crashed into the wall. "Damn!" He swore and examined the bent remains. Hoisting the crushed wheel over his shoulder, he went back to the house. "Steven! You bastard, come here and see what you've done!" After a moment, a footstep resounded from the basement. "That you left in front of my lab?" Steven asked. "I thought there was a burglar when there was actually not any. I grabbed the bike and hurled it toward the shadow. My aim wasn't accurate, I ended up hitting the wall of the garage. Sorry." Beaker in hand, he bent his arm and flipped the frame of the wheel against the wall to shake the dent out. "Maybe I can fix it," he offered. Timmy stared at his brother and snarled. He raised an angry fist and shouted, "Maybe!? You'd only maybe fix it? I'll expect full compensation for this!" Steven calmly poured the contents of the beaker on the wheel. There was a great crunching sound as the metal suddenly snapped into a bunch of pieces. Slowly, the rest of the wheel formed a perfect circle as Timmy gaped at the transformation. Grabbing the beaker he doused his torn jeans, hoping it would effect a similar miraculous repair. "NOOOO!" screamed Steven lunging for his brother, but it was too late. Flames burst from the wet cloth. "You fool! It should only be used on bikes. Now, I have no choice but to watch you burn, since I never could create a formula to extinguish these flames." Timmy shrieked as the chemical ate away at his jeans. Minutes later, Timmy's charred jeans were fallen but his boxer saved his dignity. Steven snickered. "Good choice in wearing silk boxers with bikes on them because the chemical doesn't affect bikes that way."
Currently grooving to: Stanford Talisman - Beulah
Wednesday, April 07, 2004
Rush Rush Rush
Yeah. It's like that. I had a long blog written but I didn't save it.
--C.
--C.
Currently grooving to: Chris Cagle - Chicks Dig It
Saturday, April 03, 2004
Life & Exhaustion
Rush has yet to start and I'm already going nuts. I really need to take a good 4 hours off for paperwork and errands and stuff like that.
I spent yesterday cheering on RA applicants, TA a class, playing the trombone and doing Improv with some people at FroSoCo. Too much fun for my own good. But all that shouting has made me hoarse the day of Battle. Not good.
We'll see how today goes (all Battle setup all the time.)
--C.
I spent yesterday cheering on RA applicants, TA a class, playing the trombone and doing Improv with some people at FroSoCo. Too much fun for my own good. But all that shouting has made me hoarse the day of Battle. Not good.
We'll see how today goes (all Battle setup all the time.)
--C.
Currently grooving to: Barenaked Ladies - When You Dream
Tuesday, March 30, 2004
Back on campus
It's the first day of classes for everyone else but for me (and a good number of others) it's just a day to hang out and chill and watch everyone else go to class. Not that I have nothing to do... my list is amazingly long, and not as if I went to class previously. However, the record shows that I have no class and thus am the object of envy, anger and awe of many a person trudging to class at 8 AM.
--C.
--C.
Currently grooving to: Soup Dragons - I'm Free
Sunday, March 28, 2004
What's more fun than...
Having a big dog slobber all over your face. It's great, Herbie (Justy's dog) just loves me.
Photos to come.
Photos to come.
Why Cheng is an idiot and is saved by his brothers.
I'm an idiot (a fact not lost on many of you) and I apparently left my keys in the motel room. To make a long story short, Nick W, who was unable to drive me back up is still picking up my keys. Crazy.
--C.
--C.
Road Trip Part 2
So in the whirlwind of my life, I have, on pretty much a whim, decided to go down to SLO via Monterey with Stewart, Rose (E) and Mike; bus down to LA and get driven back up to Stanford with Nick W. Currently at the very start of day 3, Saturday, having spent a night at Stewart's friend's beach house, an afternoon on Cannery Row and at Monterey Bay Aquarium and a second night in a rather drab Motel 6 a few miles away from Hearst Castle. I seem to be working in images right now so I'm going to simply describe a few of these, mostly for my benefit.
The pounding surf at night. I've always loved the sound of the water and at night the waves looked so magnificent, white-crested and dark. It reminds me of dozens of novels that I've read, set in the ocean or with the backdrop of stormy, tossing waves. The lone lighthouse atop the rocks and the chilly breeze augment the image -- it could almost come from somewhere up in New England.
Hoards of whiny children in line at the aquarium. I don't know why this image is stuck in my memory but it is. I can deal with angry, upset, curious children and maybe a couple of whiny ones but large numbers of them are just too much.
At the aquarium, there are all sorts of cool things that I saw, but honestly, none of them stick out. I have plenty of photos, however, and that will definitely suffice.
Yeah, that's about it.
--C.
The pounding surf at night. I've always loved the sound of the water and at night the waves looked so magnificent, white-crested and dark. It reminds me of dozens of novels that I've read, set in the ocean or with the backdrop of stormy, tossing waves. The lone lighthouse atop the rocks and the chilly breeze augment the image -- it could almost come from somewhere up in New England.
Hoards of whiny children in line at the aquarium. I don't know why this image is stuck in my memory but it is. I can deal with angry, upset, curious children and maybe a couple of whiny ones but large numbers of them are just too much.
At the aquarium, there are all sorts of cool things that I saw, but honestly, none of them stick out. I have plenty of photos, however, and that will definitely suffice.
Yeah, that's about it.
--C.
Friday, March 26, 2004
Sorry Sorry Sorry.
I'm sorry I haven't blogged in what, 3 months.
E-mail me for the standard "Cheng's life summary".
This past weekend I spent at the airshow with Bernardo, who is extremely passionate about airplanes (understatement). I was there for the ride.
I wrote a little two page thing the morning of the second day but being the sap-ball that I am, it was extremely overblown and not worth posting. Instead I'll try to summarize it and add some insights that don't sound like they came from a Hallmark "Friends" card.
The practical details, for those of you who like concrete details of my life rather than fluffy handwaving, are as follows. I went to the airshow at the Lemoore Naval Air Station in Central CA (right near Fresno). There were a lot of cool-looking planes on static display as well as some nifty planes doing aerobatics. The Blue Angels were there which was really cool and the they had a few demos that were quite impressive. My memory recalls details like "loud one, red one, black and yellow one" etc. so if you want any sort of useful information on the planes shown go to Bernardo's webpage: here. Instead, I had a great time people-watching (as I am wont to do) and enjoying the sun (and getting a rather fierce farmer's tan).
But if you came here to read about the air-show I'm sorely afraid that you're at the wrong place. Instead, I'm making a second plug for Bernardo's website. I'm going to be discussing some thoughts about what I (as a non-avation-minded person) got from the show.
As far as the people there, I could divide them into 4 major groups:
Airplane fanatics, fans and people generally interested therein (and associated parents, wives, husbands, children and friends -- that's me)
Military and veterans and their entourage. (The airshow was dedicated to "The American Hero", and many of the honorees were present, especially those who fought in WWII and Vietnam)
Rednecks or people who were just there because it was something to do. ("I dun never seen nuthin' dat darn fast befo'")
And a small group of professional photographers because it was such a beautiful day and a lot of magazine-quality shots were possible. (Just look at Bernardo's webpage for something that a damn good amateur could do that day and think what a guy with a 30 lb camera could accomplish)
And then of course: pilots, owners, Navy, vendors and random people who keep the whole show running.
More importantly, I found it really interesting to see this many people and how they each responded to the planes. There were a few emotions that just showed really strongly on many faces: pride, excitement, joy (as well as boredom and no small amount of strain). However, I never realized until Saturday, just how much planes rely on trust and faith.
I'm hardly religious (no, that's not right) and I keep postponing my little discussion on religion to a later date, but it was still rather moving (bleh, I hate using that word) to see planes as an almost physical demonstration of faith. As the planes crisscrossed the sky, thousands of feet up, the pilots not only relied on their planes and their flying skills but also (in the instances when they just cut their engines) on a few simple laws of physics. Sure, we all take physics for granted, the laws of aerodynamics no different from the laws of gravity or inertia we use everyday; but these extra laws aren't built into our subconcious. Knowing that you're falling, tumbling through the sky and being secure in the knowledge that a quick pull on the stick in front of you will make it all work again, is really something else. Trusting that your altimeter says you're 5 feet above the other plane so that you don't crash as you fly straight at each other at over 1000 km/h, again is quite a lot of trust. The amount of pride and joy the pilots' faces showed when they safely touched down only demonstrates that a small miracle has taken place. I'm not getting all sappy about physics (meh!) but I do now have a greater appreciation for just how much strength of spirit it takes to pilot a plane.
The second thing I learned over the weekend is just how much the military is like a fraternity in it's best sense. This is not only beccause there is a degree of unspoken comradrie between the various soldiers. I've always thought the best part of Phi Psi was trusting your brothers. The Navy pilots show this well. Admitedly, the crews were all just doing their jobs; they also had a life/lives on their hands. What really got to me was the formalized acknowledgement of the help of crew when the pilots deplaned. I wasn't paying attention to what was going on in the skies and watched instead an Air Force pilot after deplaning, salute his ground crew individually. That small gesture says a lot. Not only did he place his life in their hands, but also he knew it.
Lastly, I saw a lot of people who are truely passionate about planes. Owners of various airplanes spend hours polishing up the nose cone to a reflective shine, days reconstucting parts of the wing to historical accuracy. One guy was a computer systems analysist but you'd never know that from the way he talked about such and such engine and such and such detail. This, you could see, was their entire lives. and yet they fly these things, risking it all "in one turn of pitch and toss" as they say. Among the fans, we had people whose eyes just lit up when the planes appeared, could name each and every plane from miles away; people for whom this was life. And it was contagious. I had a great time because, quite frankly, Bernardo did. He's probably disappointed, reading this, that I don't remember a thing he told me about the details of the planes; I just don't have a head for that kind of thing.
I did say I wasn't going to get all sappy and here I am effusing about grandiose topics of trust and passion. Ooops. I tried. Like I said, objective and intelligent comments are elsewhere.
More to come, I have no more excuses.
--C.
E-mail me for the standard "Cheng's life summary".
This past weekend I spent at the airshow with Bernardo, who is extremely passionate about airplanes (understatement). I was there for the ride.
I wrote a little two page thing the morning of the second day but being the sap-ball that I am, it was extremely overblown and not worth posting. Instead I'll try to summarize it and add some insights that don't sound like they came from a Hallmark "Friends" card.
The practical details, for those of you who like concrete details of my life rather than fluffy handwaving, are as follows. I went to the airshow at the Lemoore Naval Air Station in Central CA (right near Fresno). There were a lot of cool-looking planes on static display as well as some nifty planes doing aerobatics. The Blue Angels were there which was really cool and the they had a few demos that were quite impressive. My memory recalls details like "loud one, red one, black and yellow one" etc. so if you want any sort of useful information on the planes shown go to Bernardo's webpage: here. Instead, I had a great time people-watching (as I am wont to do) and enjoying the sun (and getting a rather fierce farmer's tan).
But if you came here to read about the air-show I'm sorely afraid that you're at the wrong place. Instead, I'm making a second plug for Bernardo's website. I'm going to be discussing some thoughts about what I (as a non-avation-minded person) got from the show.
As far as the people there, I could divide them into 4 major groups:
Airplane fanatics, fans and people generally interested therein (and associated parents, wives, husbands, children and friends -- that's me)
Military and veterans and their entourage. (The airshow was dedicated to "The American Hero", and many of the honorees were present, especially those who fought in WWII and Vietnam)
Rednecks or people who were just there because it was something to do. ("I dun never seen nuthin' dat darn fast befo'")
And a small group of professional photographers because it was such a beautiful day and a lot of magazine-quality shots were possible. (Just look at Bernardo's webpage for something that a damn good amateur could do that day and think what a guy with a 30 lb camera could accomplish)
And then of course: pilots, owners, Navy, vendors and random people who keep the whole show running.
More importantly, I found it really interesting to see this many people and how they each responded to the planes. There were a few emotions that just showed really strongly on many faces: pride, excitement, joy (as well as boredom and no small amount of strain). However, I never realized until Saturday, just how much planes rely on trust and faith.
I'm hardly religious (no, that's not right) and I keep postponing my little discussion on religion to a later date, but it was still rather moving (bleh, I hate using that word) to see planes as an almost physical demonstration of faith. As the planes crisscrossed the sky, thousands of feet up, the pilots not only relied on their planes and their flying skills but also (in the instances when they just cut their engines) on a few simple laws of physics. Sure, we all take physics for granted, the laws of aerodynamics no different from the laws of gravity or inertia we use everyday; but these extra laws aren't built into our subconcious. Knowing that you're falling, tumbling through the sky and being secure in the knowledge that a quick pull on the stick in front of you will make it all work again, is really something else. Trusting that your altimeter says you're 5 feet above the other plane so that you don't crash as you fly straight at each other at over 1000 km/h, again is quite a lot of trust. The amount of pride and joy the pilots' faces showed when they safely touched down only demonstrates that a small miracle has taken place. I'm not getting all sappy about physics (meh!) but I do now have a greater appreciation for just how much strength of spirit it takes to pilot a plane.
The second thing I learned over the weekend is just how much the military is like a fraternity in it's best sense. This is not only beccause there is a degree of unspoken comradrie between the various soldiers. I've always thought the best part of Phi Psi was trusting your brothers. The Navy pilots show this well. Admitedly, the crews were all just doing their jobs; they also had a life/lives on their hands. What really got to me was the formalized acknowledgement of the help of crew when the pilots deplaned. I wasn't paying attention to what was going on in the skies and watched instead an Air Force pilot after deplaning, salute his ground crew individually. That small gesture says a lot. Not only did he place his life in their hands, but also he knew it.
Lastly, I saw a lot of people who are truely passionate about planes. Owners of various airplanes spend hours polishing up the nose cone to a reflective shine, days reconstucting parts of the wing to historical accuracy. One guy was a computer systems analysist but you'd never know that from the way he talked about such and such engine and such and such detail. This, you could see, was their entire lives. and yet they fly these things, risking it all "in one turn of pitch and toss" as they say. Among the fans, we had people whose eyes just lit up when the planes appeared, could name each and every plane from miles away; people for whom this was life. And it was contagious. I had a great time because, quite frankly, Bernardo did. He's probably disappointed, reading this, that I don't remember a thing he told me about the details of the planes; I just don't have a head for that kind of thing.
I did say I wasn't going to get all sappy and here I am effusing about grandiose topics of trust and passion. Ooops. I tried. Like I said, objective and intelligent comments are elsewhere.
More to come, I have no more excuses.
--C.
Thursday, January 01, 2004
Wednesday, December 31, 2003
That was really odd
You may have all just been spared of my ceaseless ranting by a weird error that prevented my accessing all blogger-hosted sites. (And this affected only me.) I tried everything, and now have mozilla as a result so at least it wasn't a total loss.
--C.
--C.
Update: Go here for the story of what happened.
Tuesday, December 30, 2003
Ah, Stanford
I'm just about to go to bed, when all these people come online. Only in college does prime chat and hang out and be awake time happen to START at 11 PM.
I'm making a list here of things I wanted to blog about but didn't. If I remember I'll type stuff up tomorrow.
Stanford in the Winter
Existentialism
Politics (ack, not again?) and alerts
A wave out to the world, and have a great new year.
--C.
I'm making a list here of things I wanted to blog about but didn't. If I remember I'll type stuff up tomorrow.
Stanford in the Winter
Existentialism
Politics (ack, not again?) and alerts
A wave out to the world, and have a great new year.
--C.