Big Fish

Like a sea turtle crawling out of Poseidon's dream kingdom, Mohammad
Ali materializes, pumping a gloved fist. Frozen on my poster in a
fierce victory roar, he reminds me of a T-Rex. Emblazoned across his
torso is "Impossible Is Nothing," which is brilliant but not really the
way Addidas intended it. I don't remember much of the months before but
I seem to be on the tail of a Lucy trip. I notice a small arm across my
chest; its nails are pink and glittery. There is silence, within and
without me. It is exactly 5:00 AM. Morning has broken, like the first
morning.
Gently, I escape from the arm and find the bottom of my grunge suit:
Above Sea Level jammie bottoms enclosing soiled Calvin Klein boxers.
Now I examine the creature which has been sharing my futon. It has blue
hair and its tongue has a peculiar metal growth in the shape of a
playboy bunny, the uses of which seem emblazoned on my psyche. The
creature is quite beautiful, of quite questionable legality and wearing
my red-and-green plaid pajamas. It's smiling and seems harmless for the
moment. I find my slippers.
There's a note-pad on my desk with the following inscriptions:
"Asperger's Syndrome, Lie Detector Test, When is my trial?"
"Shit," I say out loud. I open the fridge, which has exactly and only
the items I'm looking for: orange juice, eggs, cheese, bacon,
half-and-half, and coffee. Ja provides; I start the kettle.
I get on the internet and check my e-mail. There's a letter from Black
Sheep Publishing House; apparently they want some changes to: "Fuck the
World."
"You do it," I fire off. The next letter is from Titania, the lesbian
mother of my biological child. Apparently, Maude has spoken her first
word, which is "Fuck." Smart girl.
Tyler Durden once said that when one has insomnia, everything is a
copy of a copy of a copy. Well, during an acid trip, everything is an
original art work. Here I am on this black "Dell" Monster, fondling
some strange appendage which clicks in appreciation. On top of the
computer and monitor, there are three hills of CDs. Beyond them, there
is clutter.
"Cuddles" the teddy bear chills between a cylinder of tennis balls and
"A Concise History of the West." He's holding up his trademark "I Love
You" heart. Cuddles came to live with me as a result of a brief
relationship with a slim red head, who saved him from retail slavery
because the alpha bitch of the group bought the same thing for her
boyfriend, "Pot Ninja" Neal. Both girls have faded into the ancient
mythology of our tribe, which only goes back about two years because of
our Rastafarian religious practices.
After deciding against writing to Tit in my enlightened state, I take
a long, crooked piss into the grunge king, which occupies an enamel
throne a full two feet above the floor. The ceiling is only six inches
above my head and I am not a tall man. On one side of this exalted
monarch is the sink, which is liveably cluttered with the essentials:
Advil, Anti-Septic Mouth Wash, an electric tooth brush which belongs in
a museum and CK "Eternity" cologne. The latter is used exclusively for
going to class blazed; I wear patchouli on dates.
Guarding the left of said grunge king is the shower, which despite its
funky appearance is one of the more comfortable ones I've had the
pleasure of working with; its stream is thick and hot with over twenty
minutes of endurance. I once found the slimiest corner of it to be
populated by a three inch green slug, whom I carefully placed on the
grass in appreciation of his entrepreneurial spirit.
Now, this bathroom is separated from my living/bedroom by two stairs.
The shower itself is another step up. So my discovery of this green
slug either proves the long abandoned theory of spontaneous generation
or he scaled the sewer pipes and crawled in through the small hole in
my drain. This must have been a fantastic adventure, something parallel
to Columbus' voyage, and really deserves a novel unto itself.
In the far corner of the bathroom is no man's land, a gigantic space
piled with spare blankets, dart-boards, warring tribes of Progresso
Soup, a plastic box of rations, and a rather spendy chess computer, all
guarding a book shelf, home to a think tank ranging from Hemingway's
"Death in the Afternoon" to an outdated travel book on "Thailand," to
"Catherine the Great," a gift from Ruby that served as a disappointing
substitute for Will Durant's "The Napoleonic Age," which also turned
out to be a disappointment, all the more so because I had waited for it
with an almost religious awe.
This reminds me of the Jonny Lang album "Long Time Coming," which was
actually the straw that broke my relationship with Ruby. It was a long
time coming and I awaited it as a front-line soldier awaits his mail.
Everyday I survived in the trenches of this diseased mercantile war. I
awaited the wash of prana, which is sanskrit for life-force, that
Lang's past albums had given me. But it simply didn't happen. After
moving out of our apartment, briefly into jail and then into my Mom's
spare bedroom, I finally got to listen to this holy grail of music. It
was beautiful, complete and at peace with the world, just like "The
Napoleonic Age."
And I am not beautiful, complete, or at peace with the world. I am
still an angel with a broken wing and I still consider Napoleon a
brother in arms against the mediocre, mercantile forces that replaced
him.
Now the howl of the kettle calls me into the living room, where I fix
my coffee. As it cools, I drink a glass of orange juice. Everything
comes down to this day and it's just like any other day. I pull apart
one of the CD hills and, as often happens, find "The Greatest Hits of
the Grateful Dead" on the first try. I put on Track 2: "I Will Get By."
Then I add half and half to my coffee and half a tea-spoon of sugar. It
is a great existential mystery to me that the sugar that in my
childhood days seemed pure Prana now seems a necessary poison, gleaming
menacingly at me. I force the coffee down with a mixture of exultation
and revulsion. It's actually the most expensive coffee available in
this posh shit-hole of a city but coffee and I have long had a
love/hate relationship, something like the Soviet/Nazi pact, only much
more enduring.
Next, I start making breakfast. I crack the eggs aggressively: ten
eggs and not a shard in the bowl. I prepare the whole breakfast like
Cobain performed "Unplugged," lazily and perfectly. I set up the table
in front of my nameless friend. My friend the boom-box is now singing
about Casey Jones, who better watch his speed and the girl is awake. I
place her breakfast in front of her: a large portion of scrambled eggs
with cheese, three slices of bacon and a glass of orange juice.
"Do you want Tabasco?," I ask.
"That's okay," she says with the accent of a Southern lady. I sit on
my bean bag and eat my own primitive feast, carefully not thinking
about my dilemma. Nonetheless, my inner reptile is contemplating my
move, which will have to be a castle into a highly compromised corner.
She's worn out her welcome at Neal's house, has a Coke habit and no
place to go.
Having cleaned my plate, I observe that she has eaten all her bacon,
half her eggs, has placed her plate on the sink and is smoking my pot
on my two foot bong, which she wields with amazing dexterity. I finish
her eggs.
"What's your name again?"
"Sarah."
"Give me a hit, will ya?" She hands me the bong and I take one full
one, giving her the bong back and fish out my wallet before I release a
stream of smoke that Puff himself would have been proud of. I give her
two fifties out of a roll that increases my suspicions about myself.
"Get some groceries and whatever. I have some business to take care of;
I won't be back till this evening." I say this in a harsh way, to let
her know not to invite any friends.
After making sure my legal papers are in order, I walk out into the
new snow. A bright half moon still rules the sky as I scrape off my
White Taurus with a resolve half Viking and half Zen. Getting in, I let
the car warm up while I zone out simultaneously on the leopard steering
wheel and the blue dashboard heaters. Then I swim out of my driveway
into a primitive ocean of ice, concrete, lights and billboards. I miss
my life, Bob.