we were all really good friends, it turns out! we decided to communicate verbally! all of the trees, all of the people, all of the writings, minerals, and photographs. we were pioneers; we were settlers; we decided to communicate verbally; we decided to travel where all of the others had already travelled! we took these heroes as our models. they had traveled the worst of the rough roads before us. they were stronger and smarter than we were. not even living anymore and still stronger, smarter, and fiercer!
we didn’t even know the other people! we didn’t know how they were managing! maybe they weren’t managing at all, and everything that we assumed about their pioneering lifestyle was entirely fabricated! after all, we had always been blessed with over-active imaginative faculties. we probably took all the little clues that they inadvertently gave us and made some really sick and twisted assumptions! stranger things have happened, you realize. stranger beings and doings have almost certainly happened. and then, one day, just stopped happening! as in stillness, perfect stillness, perfect silence, calmness, and emptiness. a vacant lot type of phenomenon, as it were- a building demolished and the lot left to be reclaimed by the wilderness.
we decided to communicate verbally. in spite of all the serious warning signs. we willfully ignored all of the obvious warning signs and decided to plow ahead anyways. psychologists sometimes refer to this behavior as the “black swan phenomenon” and as a result the neighbor boy toby developed what might be termed a spiritual practice. He deployed spiritual languages, taken from a vast body of spiritual literature. we asked him on multiple occasions to teach us some of the more esoteric spiritual wisdoms. we politely asked him to instruct us. he spit in our faces and informed us not to worry, that this was a traditional opening gambit. he then led us down to the cellar where he had constructed an altar and proceeded to vomit all over his various spiritual paraphanelia. he was a troubled lad, that toby, but he was the best we had at that time. he later admitted to having spent some time at Burr Clinic.
was this really the intention? that I spend so much time down at the river? not testing, not drinking, not surveying, not measuring, not photographing or sketching, not talking, not dozing, but simply sitting there, staring glassy-eyed out into the proverbial nothingness. I want to take my friend aaron by the arm and shake him violently, I want him to snap out of it somehow.
the child was ill and/or the child appeared to be ill. constant coughing, constant vomiting, constant crying and murmuring. I went upstairs to the bathroom cupboard and brought down a thermometer. I put a wet washrag on her forehead warmed with several day’s standing dishwater. concern about the child’s illness. concern about death by mercury poisoning. concern about the child wandering around the metropolis in a state of dissociative fugue. she won’t know anything about her former life! All of that former life down the drain! as if all that psychological content had just been expunged from the record! she doesn’t know where she is going! she doesn’t know who to listen to! if someone gives her orders she will most likely follow them! without a single moment’s reflection! she wasn’t prepared for society! we failed her, over and over, we failed her! now it’s up to us to go out and rescue her and try to rectify our past mistakes. sure, sure, sure- sure she made quite a few of her own. of course we don’t take 100% responsibility. noone in their right mind would ever take 100% responsibility. but that is precisely the issue here! who is actually in her right mind? she’s out there wandering about the metropolis, we’re in here slicing roast beef before all the invited guests start arriving. we each have our own role to play, right? all the world is a stage? the child’s future, if she still even has one, is, at best, profoundly uncertain. of course that’s been the case for children since time quote-unquote immemorial, but at least they weren’t wandering around in advanced states of dissociative fugue!
they went over to each other’s houses, if you can believe it. they actually walked unannounced into each other’s houses without anything even remotely resembling a proper invitation or pretext! it was like pioneer times, when pioneers actually appreciated their neighbors. they put evildoers in the stocks and allowed birds of prey to chew up and shit out their eyeballs. pioneers developed codes of justice that we might do well to return to. and then it turns out that the child was simply faking her illness! chances are she will grow up and become an unrepentant malingerer! we need to help her right now, before she becomes too corrupted!
we tackled our problems one by one, in a streamlined and intelligent manner. we were really good friends, I think I’ve said that, but it bears being said several more times. we decided, against all odds, to communicate verbally. he was a groundskeeper/janitor at the local community college. the community came from miles around to be educated. they wanted to get on with their lives. the state of being uneducated had become, in a single word, unacceptable. tyranny fought unto death. the sickness, the ignorance, all of it fought and clawed and chewed unto death. the same words, over and over. the same fierce intention to communicate verbally, to tell each other important and interesting things, to always be keeping an eye out for the most relevant details; doesn’t matter as much as it used to what your neighbor imagines; doesn’t matter in the slightest what he does or fails to do for a living; as long as you communicate verbally, every single day for the rest of your natural life, commencing very early every morning and not ceasing until you fall down inert in the evening. if you go brain-dead of course you’ll be excused from this mandate, but a few people will almost certainly keep talking to you, at your bedside, no matter how deeply you’ve slipped into a vegetative or unconscious state. they think that this murmuring might bring you out of your “crisis.” for some preposterous reason cooked up in the backwoods meth lab of their thinking, they want you to continue on living. they want you to simply carry on with your living! and who cannot understand this desire? it comprises one of the most basic and decent of all the human desires!
his name was Karl, and it was his job to take out the recycling. Of course it all went to the landfill but we wanted to keep up appearances. I’ve already pulled you into my chamber, into my little death-dealing strategies and the methods I have discovered for unmasking and eventually neutralizing those strategies. you probably think I don’t realize the extent to which my life has visibly gone off the rails but I have no intention to alter that- I let people think what they like. look at the bookshelves for a moment. I know, I know that you want us to communicate verbally. I realize how eagerly you want to tell me an “interesting” story or ask “apt” or “pertinent” questions. these are regarded as the essential survival skills nowadays, but look at the bookshelves for a moment, think about the state of so-called book or print culture, think about our ongoing dialogue and the way we keep revising that dialogue according to the random tidbits we’ve picked up from our reading. I’m not beyond conceding that every now and then we do exchange critical information or insights. I’ve dragged our dilemma into literature because I can’t seem to deal with the reality, just as before I was guilty of dragging literature into our own private dilemma. I didn’t want people to see it. I didn’t want anyone to know it even existed. there was no lie I wouldn’t tell if it meant buying just a little more time. this approach turned out to be, in a single word, feeble. a certain voice, I won’t say whose, droned on with little or no interruption. after several months of this almost perpetual backsliding, it became obvious that even neighbors found our whole manner of life unacceptable. by the use of very subtle but also very direct psychological mechanisms they implied that they would prefer for us to live in some other geographical area. “there are a lot of other really nice areas,” they started telling us on a regular basis. they even started bringing us news clippings about apartments situated in other, very far away, areas. who knows, maybe they will be the ones to eventually move on with their lives. There’s every chance in the world that they will go off somewhere and get educated. My friend Karl the janitor will get the privilege of being able to clean up their mess if they make one, and in environments like that it’s almost impossible not to. “messes will be made” is in fact the slogan of his janitorial company. I guess they want all parties concerned to be aware of the inevitable. of course he wears a huge key ring on his belt and it jingles perpetually. he wears knee high work boots, I realize that I’ve already said that, he walks along the highway thru dirty snow towards the community college. It’s a foggy day but it’s possible to just make it out in the distance- in case you’re wondering, and honestly, I’m well aware that you aren’t, but even so, I’ve asked him to tell me everything he can about his conscious existence because I was told in no uncertain terms to become a sort of temporary or makeshift biographer and hence, for this project I have decided to make an important exception and communicate very directly with anyone who can give me information regarding him. I prefer to communicate verbally, and I think that I’ve already indicated as much. when my so-called natural life finally comes to a premature and most likely self-induced close- well, in those final minutes I’ll probably think back to episodes such as the following: he walked along the highway and people threw half-filled soda cans at him. he walked along the highway on his way to the grocery store, to procure foods, he was a person who always enjoyed the various foods, they came in all shapes and sizes, and the important information was usually printed right there on the box or the wrapper. the experts advise us to study these texts very carefully and begin to piece together the sordid background conditions contributing to an obvious and critcal failure of nerve, most likely caused by eating the same foods, over and over, many times, in succession, without pause, without feedback, and without regard for the larger community. and it’s too bad, you know, because we all used to be in really outstanding health. we would go to astonishing lengths just to communicate verbally. people weren’t always constantly trying to tell us how to exist. but we let them get in too close, and now they are tyrannizing every little part of our being. hence the bookshelves, hence recourse to what is oftentimes covertly referred to as the “bookshelves.” the manner in which I see him, the manner in which I sometimes observe him, escaping, evading, spraying on his homemade invisible potion, disappearing for days, sometimes even weeks at a time, texts with no titles or page numbers, completely abstract letters and images that only refer back to the grocery store and it’s weekly list of bargain items.
how’s it been going recently, Roger? I heard about your new artistic practices. I thumbed thru a magazine recently and there they were, some of your new artistic practices. there was an article about you and your so-called new artistic practices. people oftentimes gathered, I realize that’s not a recent social phenomenon, they have been doing it for ages, they gather together without method, without purpose, without intention or clarity- any old pretext will do- even your new artistic practices, the way you seem or appear to be constantly practicing, bobbing your head in time to all the natural rhythms, people call them “the natural rhythms” or “the rhythms of nature.” this is what, every day, this is what I think they have been looking for, all the old artistic practices, all the discarded and peculiar pioneer ethics.
he told me, in so many words, that he had become middle-aged. he said “I have finally reached the middle part of my life. if I hang my clothes on nails it is just another way for me to cope with the fact that most of the human beings I knew and loved as a child have become almost cartoonish, and that, yes, in my own eyes, I have also become almost cartoonish. for example, when I walk down the street I often notice the children out playing stickball or badminton secretly chuckling as I approach, which makes sense, because traditionally it is the children who have always appreciated and even sought out the cartoonish. But recently I’ve also been noticing more and more adults chuckling also, and I don’t know whether to attribute that to the fact that I have in fact become more cartoonish or that more adults are simply becoming re-attuned to the pleasures of the cartoonish. the recent rise in popularity of comic books and cartoon programs aimed at adult populations suggests the latter- namely, that I have in fact been cartoonish for a considerable period but so far it has only been the children who noticed because they were the only ones with a sharp eye out for the cartoonish.
I go outside and look at the trees and then I come back indoors refreshed and rejuvenated. I tell myself again and again: we don’t need to communicate verbally. nobody is forcing us to communicate verbally. nobody is putting pressure on us to communicate verbally. say what you will regarding the so-called “self” and so-called “others” dilemma- nobody has yet dreamed up the argument that could undermine conversation.
(many were the nights I ended up down in the basement, wanting to be apart from other people, but unable or unwilling to describe what was happening, insofar as verbal communication was concerned, and verbal communication does always seem to be quite concerned, yes, concerned about us in ways that we have not thought of ourselves, ways we have not considered ourselves, we have instead thrown ourselves on the mercy of people who are stronger than we are: maybe artistic figures, maybe so-called spiritual leaders, seated or standing or pacing back and forth in front of an audience, thinking out loud for the audience, comprised of adults, children, and animals, describing all manner of earthly experience- I won’t get into it here because it’s already all out there, available in even the smallest of libraries or newsstands. people want to be told the things that they already know, they never of tire of hearing things that they already know, they pour their time, attention, and energy into the already-cast mold of another, and the fluid runs off onto the pavement, it dries or disappears or is licked up again off the pavement, so desperate are our inter-urban associates, they already know everything, they already have everything, writing about it won’t make any difference, your bundle of writings and etchings, carried down to the basement along with your ridiculous “photography bag”, where in a dim room with a single 45 watt bulb, in the basement, people always seem to be following me, always seem to be talking to me, verbal communication, verbal communication, people walking up to each other, sometimes venturing out into public, never could get enough of the sensation that comes from simply walking out into the public, situating your body in public, bone weary most of the time, not allowed most of the time, hoeller’s garret, spent way too much time alone in the garret, it didn’t add up to anything, the dream didn’t add up to anything, sitting alone in the basement, not enough room for my bookshelf and who knows, that might be a good thing, a person reaches back into the past, who really knows, a person ends up reaching all the way back into the past, maybe the bookshelf will crush you, maybe the bookshelf will steal from you, how many more examples of quiet confusion and bitterness, an old man, an angry man, a failure, purely and simply, a failure, it doesn’t matter in the slightest if we don’t venture out into the public, the public is no longer terribly concerned with your data, no longer terribly concerned with your images, neither on one hand your data or on the other your images, some people prefer the data, others prefer a stream or series of images, we do our best to communicate but guess what- most of the time our best isn’t good enough! we spent several hours wildcrafting along the edge of burr woods. some had recently returned from spending time at burr clinic where they had learned some of the latest coping techniques.
I cycled around the perimeter because that’s what I was instructed to do.
we spent quite a bit our time circulating between burr woods and burr clinic. one week we’d be at burr woods and then the next week we’d be at burr clinic. we circulated freely in, around, and between them. the legendary nature of both burr woods and burr clinic- they apparently had the same benefactor and, contrary to most first impressions, played similar roles in the so-called community.
burr woods was not actually that far at all from burr clinic. they were separated only by a railroad track, a highway, a river, a wasteland, a park, a food/merchandise outlet, a media empire, some restaurants, some apartments, and several blocks of abandoned and crumbling warehouses. it was only about a 20 to 25 minute walk from burr woods to burr clinic and some people made this commute or at least something close to this commute every day.
burr woods had at one time been considered a kind of recreational area, but when the park came into existence the center of recreational gravity shifted. people who had for years been spending the lion’s share of their free time hiking and picnicking deep inside the calm of burr woods were now pursuing these activities deep inside the lesser but still significant calm of the park. as burr woods became a less popular destination among the general public a different element started to frequent it, namely the so-called homeless, the so-called transients, and the so-called mentally ill. most of them existed peacefully and created no trouble for themselves or anyone else, but occasionally someone became confused or distressed to the extent that he or she decided or it was kindly decided on his or her behalf that a little time at burr clinic might be helpful for all parties involved. people walked quite freely back and forth between burr woods and burr clinic, and in fact were encouraged by the local authorities to do so. they were encouraged to, whenever possible, take matters into their own hands. to cultivate something along the lines of rational thought. burr woods certainly had its advantages but burr clinic played an important role also. for a certain period of time these two institutions served as the polestars of our secret and shame-filled existence.
I was asked by my superiors to chronicle this journey back and forth between burr woods and burr clinic and they made it fairly clear that I was not at liberty to decline their “suggestion”. so in a certain sense I was ordered to chronicle this to-ing and fro-ing of people I did not really know and in a certain sense did not wish to know either. I generally do not wish to know very many people at all, regardless of their station or incentives in life. I simply do not wish to know them. I see them, of course, I am aware of their bodies when I venture out into the public. I occasionally converse with them, I occasionally initiate verbal exchanges. but not too terribly often. no, not too often at all. the people I live with, on one hand, and the people I work with, on the other, provide more than enough human contact for me not to feel too estranged from humanity, although feeling estranged from humanity would not necessarily constitute for me the worst or saddest or most terrifying state of affairs. it’s a state of affairs like any other. it has its proverbial pluses and minuses.
For a period of about 25 years I was unemployed and lived alone in a semi-converted garage. I was eventually asked by my professional health service provider to consider becoming a little more engaged with the so-called community, to initiate a little more human contact, in whatever realm I thought might be enjoyable or could perhaps be of some use in. “the community needs more useful individuals such as yourself- venture out into the unknown! venture out into the psychological wilderness!” which was an uncanny thing for her to say given that I would eventually be assigned to burr woods, which was not only a “psychological wilderness” in the fullest sense of the term but also an actual wilderness area, an actual undeveloped expanse of semi-natural earth containing numerous species of untamed and undocumented minerals, vegetables, animals, and more recently, humans.
this assignment came in the midst of what has sometimes been referred to as the “re-wilding” or “back to nature” or “back to the land” social/ecological movement. apparently people had become sick and tired of living in cities and wanted to live closer to nature, wanted to live securely “nestled in the bosom of nature”, as their spokespeople sometimes described it. the people camping out in burr woods may or may not have subscribed to this ethos, so, again, according to my superiors, it was my job to find out. “it’s a standard piece of reportage, a standard piece of immersion-based journalism- just align your life with the lives of your subjects for a couple of weeks and then report back to us what you’ve seen- nothing more complicated than that.”
the first person I met was in denial. the second person I met was in denial. the third person I met was in denial. the fourth person I met was in denial. the fifth person I met was in denial. the sixth person I met was in denial. the seventh person I met was in denial. the eighth person I met was in denial. the ninth person I met was in denial. the tenth person I met was in denial. the eleventh person I met was denial. the twelvth, the thirteenth, and the fourteenth were also in various states of denial.
not a good friend, no, not even capable of selling his work. spreads what he calls his important papers or documents out over the picnic table and begins what he calls the process of sorting and sifting. “there must be some meaning here, I can’t believe that I am already totally bankrupt.” and I hate to be the one to tell him, but I do, I tell him that in the meaning department he is in fact totally bankrupt. he’ll have to get out there and generate something from scratch, he’ll have to build it up out of nothingness, out of the primordial nothingness. not a good friend, not especially, not even capable of marketing his own creative potential. we have a serious talk. we have a series of serious talks at the picnic table. he keeps his papers spread out, day and night, and works intermittently under a tarp. he keeps the papers weighed down with rocks so they don’t blow away in the night. for a long time now he has drawn inspiration from the historical figure thoreau, hoping and then planning to live out in the middle of nowhere, for a brief while at least, but preferably for a not-so-brief while. preferably for a very, very long time, maybe his whole life perhaps, however long that life might happen to be. he tried explaining to me that it wasn’t in his nature to actively market his work. this was in keeping with his image of himself as a non-actor of sorts, someone who refrains from all action or activity whenever humanly possible. aside from important time spent under the tarp at his picnic table, and a little bit of recreational hunting now and again, he was a mellow guy. he didn’t get terribly excited or interested. he had his own way of doing, or as the case might be, not doing things. on the one hand there’s wilderness and on the other there’s civilization. civilization, so-called at least, always does everything in its power to co-opt the wilderness. it does whatever it can to take the wilderness inside of itself. this sometimes works for awhile but eventually the tables are turned and the wilderness, so-called, reincorporates civilization. they are on uneasy terms. it reaches a crisis sometimes. my friend attempts to sort this out over many, many hours hard at work at his picnic table, hunched over the various papers and documents. it’s unpleasant work but the only kind I know how to do, he explains. I realize that not only will I never find a buyer or editor but outside of a few close friends and associates, noone will ever be even the slightest bit interested, and even the interest of those so-called friends and associates is not guaranteed. when I die most likely all this creative work will die with me. it will have made absolutely no impact. it will have made absolutely no difference.
the same words- we kept seeing them! after several weeks alone in the supermarket it was as if we were constantly hearing them! we couldn’t get away from these words! the very words designed to help us! the very words designed to assist us!
no way of explaining why we decided to camp out or live in the supermarket. we were newcomers to town and our only friend was a clerk in the supermarket. she talked to her boss, who in turn talked to the owners, and incredibly, they allowed us to bed down in the stockroom. we brought some bedding, some toiletries and few other personal so-called effects, 2 small lamps, some clothes, and about 9 books apiece- incredibly, they said we could eat the food in the store. there was a small kitchenette, complete with a small set of dishes. we were newcomers, and all of a sudden, one of life’s major hurdles was cleared! we couldn’t believe our good fortune. we literally could not believe our good fortune. neither of us was employed or even very employable. our resumes, which we carried around, folded up in our wallets, invariably produced laughter when they were unfolded and presented to people. in fact, that become their primary value. at social events, for example, when we desired to be entertaining in some way, we would produce these tattered documents and invariably people would think we were joking around, that we had brought these props along to the party so as to create minor amusement. we had to think about these things beforehand because neither of us were particularly skilled in the arts of conversation. that’s what parties primarily are, that’s what life primarily is, one opportunity for conversation after another, a perpetual and unceasing round of conversation, some of it voluntary but most of it absolutely demanded of one- we had failed miserably in this highly crucial department, and in subtle and not-so-subtle ways we were starting to face the unpleasant consequences. our berth at the supermarket was most likely short term, but incredibly, the details regarding length of stay had not been brought up by any of the parties concerned. perhaps they realized that stace and I didn’t have an abundance of prospects. either at that time or in anything one might call the foreseeable future. we brewed coffee and stared out the back window into the alley. they asked that, with the exception of coming out into the store to gather our foodstuffs, we remain sequestered in the stockroom. not only was this request perfectly reasonable and easy to understand and support, it was what we would have done anyway. neither of us particularly relished being seen out in public, even in the most demarcated public spaces such as a supermarket or restaurant. only for a large sum of money could either of us be lured into a restaurant. they were claustrophobic, overheated, and the wait staff were constantly intruding with questions and comments. maybe they secretly desired to become our best friends, but we had lost or neglected the arts of conversation to such a degree that we usually didn’t know how to respond to even the most straightforward of inquiries. eventually we were both diagnosed with psychiatric disorders and neither of us put up any resistance or protest. we quietly accepted the diagnoses and the attendant stigma that went along with them. I suppose, thinking back on it, that there were also advantages. take the people at the supermarket as an example. a single glance in our direction seemed to be enough to confirm for them that we both had serious issues and unless someone came to our immediate aid we would be left to our own damaged and ineffectual devices, which invariably would result in some form of obvious and most likely public humiliation or punishment. hence we were both offered a berth in the supermarket, for an undetermined period of time. a cursory glance in our direction confirmed for them that we had become absolutely inseperable. I would be unable to navigate thru life without stace as she would be unable, and perhaps even unwilling to navigate thru life without me. we were good friends, and this was our favorite poem, written by the Hungarian sandor csoori:
we were good, good and obedient,
like the little boys hung with cherries in the promenade, we didn’t trample the grasses and didn’t undermine the dahlias planted in the park.
we were good, good and obedient:
we hissed out even in our sleep for the stray dogs kicked in the back, but we avoided the eyes of cowering men as though they were puddles of blood at an accident.
we were good, good and obedient,
we saw georgia’s cliffs in brave sunlight, we drank its wine, we saw the black sea trudging home at night and the ancient gods left without mouths, and wit velvet stomachs, we ate dinner out of sheer spite.
Mozart, standing on his high, cold star, played music for us to the horse-radished rump of beef.
we were good, good and obedient,
the wind blew, the years swayed to the side with us, like an airplane circling slowly over a lit city-
the fine, drifting ashes of the advertisements’ fires and the world’s fires shot up to us,
the epaulets of generals hurrying to receptions glowed yellow, but we watched, instead, with chattering teeth, jansco’s paradisiacal women on the movie screen and the perverse little panties they hung on the crosses of graves.
we were good, good and obedient, misfortune stepped, in her skirt, over our aching nose bones, through us the past was brought to pass, but we still fondled the memory of a trumpet resounding ball from the time of the war, as though stuffed pink sacks had taken our places, dreaming, those nights.
(translated from the Hungarian by len Roberts and Laszlo vertes)
stace found this poem in the vintage book of contemporary world poetry edited by j.d. mcclatchy and published in or around july 1996. we were good and obedient, stace and I, and the poem not only made sense to us, but it helped and supported us as we wended our way thru society. there were constant references to, we discovered, the so-called postmodern literature, and when we bedded down in the evening we talked back and forth, for several hours, about what this so-called postmodern literature could possibly mean. what were these documents after? what were they designed to convey? had they been designed somewhat recklessly, or with the utmost of care? were they concerned about the general public, or with marginal cases like us? did they make these sorts of distinctions? our guess was that they probably didn’t. maybe that’s what makes them postmodern. one guess seems as good as another. quite a few of the people had decided to live in what might be called group or institutional housing. they were asked and even encouraged to consider such housing. such housing had a number of undisputable benefits. for one, we would be guarded at night. yes, there would be an attendant paid to watch over us as we slept in the night. even if we chose to sleep by day, an attendant would be there. probably not the same one but one most likely as diligent. our meals would be provided as long as we came down at the designated times. we would even be offered clothing on a first-come first-serve basis. unfortunately, we would not be able to share a room, as we wanted to, but they promised to give us adjoining rooms, and to allow us to bore a very small hole thru the wall so as to be able to converse deep into the night from the comfort of our own beds. we thought these conditions thru and discussed them at length in the supermarket. as confused and ill as we were, we both knew we wouldn’t have our stockroom berth in perpetuity. at some point we would be politely asked to leave, and to clear out our belongings. if we refused, the request would be rephrased in a decidedly less polite fashion. if we still refused the authorities would probably be asked to assist them, and if we still refused, we might end up spending serious time in prison or jail. neither of had had ever been to prison or jail and as much as we more or less welcomed all the experiences that life or fate had to offer, spending time in prison was one of the noted exceptions. we enjoyed our freedoms, for the most part, we enjoyed this rare opportunity to live undisturbed in the supermarket. when the time came for us to depart we decided to do so politely and quickly. the more we discussed it, the group or institutional housing we had been hearing so much about didn’t seem like such a terrible option. after all, we had to live somewhere. we had to have a roof over our heads. neither of us had ever been particularly fond of the outdoors or nature. camping out in deep wilderness was another of our noted exceptions. very different from prison, perhaps, but equally to be avoided at all and any cost. we needed to be housed, pure and simple, we didn’t even mind the term “warehoused”. any sort of house was sufficient. left to our own meager devices we very well might end up homeless. neither of us were particularly eager to bring our own lives to a deliberate or premature close but another homeless experience would most certainly bring that resolve to the test. we had in fact met during a time when we were both in the homeless condition and we decided on the spot to help one another out or beyond or past that condition. she had a few contacts out east, I had a few contacts up north, we were both semi-employable and willing to work long hours for little money. it probably goes without saying that we were younger and more vigorous then. we hadn’t been devastated and humiliated by contemporary existence. or maybe it was just plain existence, the simple human condition, that proved to be too much for us in the end, and reduced us to the state of living in various stockrooms. yes, the stockroom at the supermarket had not been the first, by a long chalk. a bike shop, a movie theater, a sawmill, and an art supply store had all at different times taken us in and given us living space in their stockrooms. this is one of the things that made stace and I different from others. we didn’t mind living in stockrooms. we were quiet and neat and made no trouble for our various keepers. we were good, good and obedient. yes, we decided to adopt that line as our motto. when people asked us about ourselves that single phrase often sufficed. people would understand us immediately and most of the time there would be no follow up question. we had always been the sort of people who wanted to make a difference or impact. we hadn’t been very successful with this particular goal but stace was talking about screwing up her courage and attending classes at the local community college. we had been hearing a lot lately about the need to give something back to the local community and we both agreed that this might be the best place to start. she would attend the actual classes and I would do the actual homework. when test time came around I would coach and prepare her intensively. when term-paper writing came around I would assume this task all on my own. all stace had to do was go to class and take notes. as soon as she left the class her job was completed, at least until test time, when she would submit to the coaching. we realized that the pop-quizzes would pose a serious problem, but we decide we could absorb the damage to our grade as long as we performed in all the other key areas. we were good, good and obedient, maybe I have already mentioned that. at a certain point we had both been diagnosed with serious psychiatric disorders. we needed to work together to accomplish the work of one student. that way we would advance toward our goal of giving back to the community. of course it might turn out that the community did not desire or need what we had to offer, so we needed to examine and study very closely, extremely closely in fact, what the present and projected needs of the community actually were, and tailor our efforts to those needs, so that our contribution, if we in fact ever made one, might be appreciated and relevant. we didn’t want the community to indulge us just because we had psychiatric disorders, and accept our contribution out of pity, whether it was actually helpful or not. we had both seen cases before where the community actually accommodated a contribution that was a positive nuisance in order to make the contributing party feel that he or she had made something along the lines of a positive difference.
some people suggested that burr village was one of the best things that could have ever happened to us. I don’t know. I don’t know anything. I don’t have the proper perspective. when JD was kind enough to give me a ride down the mountain, when he scooped me up out of the corner…I don’t want to just table certain matters, nor do I want to remain anymore at the wanton mercy of various “skillshares”. because the fact is- and I know I’m not the first one to complain about this- some of the people facilitating these “skillshares” simply don’t know what they’re talking about. some people suggested, in both private conversation and major media outlets, that burr village, our village, was one of the best arrangements we as human beings had ever decided on.
“good evening, friends and colleagues. I’m so happy you were able to make it this evening. allow me to begin with a few potential additions to the charter-in-progress. let there be no further principality, neither redeemed, restored, annexed, remodeled, imported, established, suspended, etc, that is not akin to or at the very least guided by the same values as burr village. the same or at least very similar values.
let there be no further proximity, let there be no further talking, let there be no further proposals to turn our local crisis into an internet slideshow. and even if there was such a proposal that was followed up on and eventually turned into an actual viable slideshow presentation, well, then after one or two cursory viewings let there be no lingering interest in or reference made to that particular slideshow. because let’s face it, no matter how many safeguards we develop and put into place our crisis will, sooner or later, be transformed into a historical slideshow. there is just no getting around it. no matter how ferocious or vigilant we are portrayed by the various organs of burr electronics and media- let the village come into its own, if that’s possible. let it quite simply and naturally come into what is sometimes referred to as “its own.” it’s the prefect phrase for this occasion and I will be using it several more times before the end of my talk.
everyone of us at here at this meeting tonight must by this point have had at least some cursory exposure to or contact with the internet. I probably don’t need to tell you what most of the search engines reveal when it comes to burr village. the city founders allegedly dug an enormous hole in the ground, lined it with concrete, painted it ocher, and dubbed it burr canyon. the resultant pile of dirt was hauled several miles away, secured in place with concrete, and dubbed- you guessed it- burr mountain. this is our legacy. this is what we have to live up to. people who were willing to truly take on the tough and intractable problems. no matter how many times you circulate thru this area, if circulate is even the appropriate term and I seriously doubt it, but nonetheless, no matter how many times and under what ridiculous circumstances you decide to circulate thru this area, calling it, of all things, unnatural, but please note this- only when compared to burr village. if you take any of the other surrounding towns, cities, or villages, the same standards no longer apply. it’s as if we as a human community had finally achieved our long-standing goal of colonizing the moon. that’s how badly some of us wanted to leave behind business-as-usual. for a brief and wonderful moment, burr village did in fact seem to be a viable option or answer. we had a lot of serious financial, political, artistic, and psychological problems and it seemed entirely reasonable to expect burr village to be a relatively quick solution to at least a few of those problems.
I don’t know if you people traveled here by car, by foot, by public transit, or by bicycle, and at the deepest level of my being I feels as though perhaps it doesn’t make a damn bit of difference. as the great poet said once, “we were good, good and obedient.” we looked up into the stars, we enjoyed the night sky, we mapped out whatever obvious constellations appeared to us there and then connected the dots in such a way that actual children’s cartoons appeared in the heavens. here is yet another example of the species attempting to create a world in its very own image. another example of a species appearing to be very fond of its image. we were good, good and obedient- I don’t think I can say that enough. strong, strong and reliable. intelligent, observant, fair-minded, hard-working, pro-active. we didn’t let the problems come to us so much as we ourselves went to the problems. we created these sorts of reversals on an almost continual basis. not just daily, but hourly, and that includes our trips into uncharted wilderness. it was our way of marking time; not in the sense of merely passing or wasting it, but very deliberately marking it, making sure of it somehow, insofar as that’s possible, via coded language, if we were private, or via open and obvious ritual if we were more on the side of the public, and increasingly we were so, increasingly wanting our own lives to somehow be aligned with the public, to partake of civic investment, civic splendor and vision…..
burr coat and blanket, burr community outreach, burr clinic, burr candies, burr sporting goods and supply store. I don’t know how this happened. I don’t know how or why I am living here. I met stace in new orleans. I stopped keeping a diary. I know that at some point I spent serious time in burr clinic but can’t I put that behind me? can’t I become somebody different? and the voice responds, probably not. why not just head down to the river. watch traffic lights over the field like you used to do at mulholland. this place can be as familiar or as strange as you want it. the immense red brick fortress, the tangled vines outside the cemetery, the way the train locomotives allowed themselves to run empty. I press their books against my body, I throw my notes into the landfill, I gather up as many photographs as I can carry and head out on foot for the warehouse district. Gary is still probably living there but we’re having a hard time communicating. the old stone bridge, I kept saying that, the old park overlooking the viaduct, the once familiar faces now completely closed off and suspicious; that time we spent together in mulholland may as well have not even happened. just another disappointing outcome, another disappointing series of images, flip them across the screen fast enough and you can start to see your new life unraveling. the old one apparently didn’t fare any better but it hasn’t been relevant since you started to live in the supermarket. my career as a journalist seems to have ground to a halt. I vaguely remember being asked to go out on some sort of embedded assignment. I don’t know anyone in this town. I didn’t know anyone in the last town. we write our messages down on scrap paper or we speak them into machines and just hope that they eventually reach the parties for whom they’re intended. I don’t know if there will be any coherent response but the message may not have been the sort that could even elicit one. I just added a little more to the general state of confusion. I attended the speech at the burr civic headquarters and most of my worst suspicions were proven to grounded in absolute, indisputable fact. I bedded down in the stockroom on a narrow pallet of foam pads and blankets. yes, this is the way I will be living for the rest of my life. I stashed several boxes of photographs inside the old bottling plant. nothing like this has ever happened to me before. I seemed to be awake but I was sleeping. I seemed to be an adult but I wasn’t. we found ourselves living deep in the cavernous heart of burr village, pretending to be interested in things that we were no longer interested in. spewing out sentences that were no longer tied to the system. I will be shocked in the morning. I will probably be told to keep quiet. there seems to be a lot of good sense in that suggestion. I won’t put up any resistance.
burr jones became my mentor. I headed down to the village. I woke up early in the morning and decided to head in the direction of our village. I knew burr would be there somewhere, lurking about like he always does. burr jones, the principal character. burr jones, the principal nothingness. of course I made an error. of course- I made a series of errors. I hugged burr jones out in public, I hugged him without really knowing or wanting him. the crimes and accusations are piled up on various people I know. we don’t know what it is like to communicate. we don’t even know what it means- “to communicate.” I tried to write a short story about a person named Les based on that epigraph from Dostovevsky, taken from either one of his novels or letters. “I have a new plan- to go mad.” In my little work, the first part was: “Les Myers aspired to insanity. These are the simplest or foundational facts or assertions of the case. these are the tentative first principles from which we will proceed cautiously. Les Myers aspired to insanity. Let’s tease this out a little bit. There was a human being, his name was Les, there was a condition known as insanity, and for various reasons it was a condition that Les wanted to experience or embody, at least for a certain period of time”
he came cycling down the path. yes, he had psychological problems. I took him by the lapels, in the traditional manner, and shouted something loudly into his face. I had read in the newspaper about the latest cure for insanity. I myself had a desire to eventually go in that general direction. I had been kicked out of my teaching post. Les just cycled around here; we couldn’t get any citizen journalists interested. he spent a lot of time writing out random notes for his article. he gave us the impression that for awhile he had lived a so-called life of adventure. I knew it was a lie. I took him by the lapels, in the classic or traditional manner and bellowed into his face that he was lying about all of this so-called adventure. he had never even left the area. he had no friends in the area. these two statements taken together tell a very frightening story. we wanted him to admit that he had been crawling along on the ground. like so many other organisms he was simply crawling along on the ground. this attempt to be good friends; this attempt to communicate; this perverse desire to always be thumbing thru photograph albums. it just didn’t make sense for a person like Les. we were not the least bit surprised to hear that he was living out at the edge of burr wilderness. I don’t know if he was keeping company with some of the other people who lived there. What do most people call living? what do most people call working? what do most people call waking up early in the morning and getting on with the business of interpersonal relations? these were questions les kept asking. he asked the thin air these questions. he stood out in the middle of empty fields thinking that was where he may encounter the answer. the diary was full of self hatred. he didn’t want to communicate. he didn’t want to create an online presence and he didn’t want to be remembered by ancestors. everything we did and said was in error. everything we had become was an error. we laid down on the pavement. it seemed like the natural outcome.
