Bowie and the Line

Looking down at the street, the young Bowie saw the line. “I still don’t get it”, he thought. It was supposed to mean something. It was supposed to change something in him, seeing the line. Of course, that was a metaphorical line he was looking for, while staring at literal lines in the world around him. He heard a car from afar and moved aside. He saw the car pass by. The line, to the car, guides the way. It divides traffic in neat groups, coming and going. From inside each car though, it was all coming. The world rushed at you as you perceive to be moving through the world. He moved back to the center of the road and stared again. He needed a line to follow, like the car, to guide him. To guide him towards what? It didn’t matter, the line knew, that was the whole point.

Bowie envied all those who saw the line easily. The lines of their lives that guided them, that led them. Sometimes he comforted himself thinking their lives must be more boring, his life was full of twists and turns because he didn’t follow a beaten path. But that was a lie. He didn’t eat well because he didn’t have a line to follow; he just ate what came in front of him. He didn’t sleep well. But most importantly, he didn’t work well. He knew, he knew, that if he could just be consistently on one path he’d excel. His brother Lucas was successful, he’d seen the line early on and followed it. He was also thin. Damn thin people. He heard a car coming from the other direction, right ahead of him. He moved to the side.

Digging through his bag of tobacco he waited. Only enough for one more cigarette. “I’ll roll this one, but I’ll smoke it later”, he promised himself, almost as soon as he saw himself lighting it – almost as if looking at someone else.

His father saw multiple lines, but he burned himself out trying to follow them all at once. Bowie never began a line, he was so unsure of himself, so afraid of turning into his father, a man who could neither paint nor play the guitar. He thought of his brother again then. The painter of the family, the pride and joy of his father. And what was he? Another wayward soul who thought that if he applied real-world knowledge to a concept he could make it real somehow. He could make himself see. The car had long past, but his cigarette was only halfway done. He went out to the middle of the road again and stared.

Bowie’s namesake was, of course, the famous musician. Why couldn’t he have just taken up music? He tried, he really had, but had no consistency. He thought of trying something else, but the spectre of his father’s failures stopped him. Where was his place in all of this? His sisters always coddled him, the little runt, they tried to convince him that nobody expected anything from him. That was somehow worse. Why should nobody expect anything from him? He had to have a calling. Something.

Suddenly, he felt it. First in his leg, then his whole body went numb. A car he hadn’t heard. A car whose driver had gotten distracted by a phone. As he flew through the air Bowie saw the line had guided the car right at him. Of course it had, he was the maniac standing in the middle of the road. “That’s why I couldn’t see it before”, he thought absurdly, as if time had stopped while he was flying through the air. You can’t see the line if you’re standing still, you can only see it moving, in every direction as it may be – but moving. Behind the car now, his body neatly on the street, right in the middle of the line he had analysed so much, he had his revelation. He’d never been so close to death. He’d never felt so alive.

Glenda’s Wedding

Glenda stood in line at the post office at 9:32 in the morning. It was a Tuesday. She was sixty-eight years old, but looked like she could be well into her eighties. Her skin was like old, thin paper. She wasn’t very tall and had grown sort of crooked in her old age. Her smile was still very sweet, but there was something almost sinister about it if she kept at it for too long. Almost as if she were mocking you. Today she was wearing a black sweater over a buttoned shirt that seemed to come straight out of a time machine. She’d been able to take good care of her clothes, but that didn’t make them any younger. In fact, her newest shirt must be about ten years old. Of course, her daughter and her sons had given her newer clothes over the years; Christmases, birthdays, mother’s days, but she hardly ever wore any of them. She liked the things that reminded her of her past. She clung to them like a sailor in a storm.

As the line moved forward ever so slowly, she scoffed in her head at her children and their internet. If everyone was using it, why was the post office so full this morning? Why was the line so impossibly long? She’d never acknowledge a thing like the fact that almost everyone in the line was older than her, that there was only one person receiving their packages where there used to be four, and that most of her line buddies paid in exact change and stories of their grandchildren. Some of them were in a hurry. Some didn’t want to fool around and were exasperated by the more senile among their contemporaries. They still didn’t have a choice; they were stuck in line just like the rest of them. Glenda understood though: it wasn’t that they were really senile or anything, they were just terribly lonely. She’d been lonely most her life.

She glanced down at the wedding invitations in her hands. There must be almost a hundred there, and it was still a pretty small wedding. Her daughter had lightened up so hard when she’d told her. Glenda had returned a warm big smile and told her daughter that the first marriage was always the most memorable. Her fiancé had taken terrible offense at this. Left the room in a huff, in fact. Only hours later was Glenda’s daughter able to convince him that her mother’s remark hadn’t been cynical at all, but rather a reflection of her own experience. See, Glenda had been married thirteen times in her life, producing seven children with six different men. Glenda had a habit of collecting men, the way some people might collect stamps or model airplanes. As soon as she got one “in the bag”, within the first three months she’d start to get bored of him. It wasn’t anything personal, and most of the time she still cared deeply for them. In her youth it had been much easier to jump from one man’s arms to the next; she’d been very beautiful and didn’t have any children to worry about. Sometimes the divorce was the hard part. Some men just didn’t want to let her go. She’d make their lives miserable or cheat on them until she was free to bag another ring for her collection. It wasn’t about money, not really. She usually didn’t mind prenups, separation of property or any of those things. The only men she took money from were those who owed her child support, and even that she didn’t press for. When it came, it came. The one time she’d inherited money (her sixth husband had been the only one to leave her a widow) she’d given most of it back to the children he’d had before meeting her. Her extended family was enormous and she was well liked and loved in many households. Sure, seven children is not a small number, but the amount of adults that called her mom was even greater.

As Glenda stood in line, she thought of her last divorce a couple of months ago. While getting men to marry her had been easy in her youth, her eleventh, twelfth and thirteenth husbands had been quite a different story. She’d already had all her children by then, and was halfway through her fifties. She’d promised her children, and her herself, that that was it. Thirteeen was enough. In fact, it was an enormous number. Most people would think even half to be an outrageously large number. And still, as she finally got to the counter to mail her daughter’s invitations, she thought of her own first wedding. How lovely, how white, how pristine. And everyone told you how beautiful you looked, and everyone wished you well, and for one day, everyone loved you.

She winked at the old man behind the counter. Maybe fourteen was to be her lucky number.

Hoy

Hoy, a cuatro días de la meta, no publiqué nada.

:(

Escribió Ricardo el Miércoles, 2 de Febrero de 2011. Ric no lo podía creer. ¿Por eso te creíste haber fallado? Te faltaron solo 4 historias. Estabas tan cerca. Pero por llegar tan cerca de la meta, igual había premio. Eso no lo sabías, ¿verdad? ¿Sabías que hubo un mes en 2011 donde publicaste una historia al día, sin falta? Claro, no ganaste un público. El público no se gana tan fácil. Pero no por eso dejas de ser un escritor. Si ya se escribió el Coronel No Tiene Quién le Escriba, te falta escribirle el compendio, El Ricardo no Tiene Quién lo Lea. No por eso dejas de escribir. No lo dudes. Eres escritor. Riky se asusta, no le gusta llamarse nada sin poder respaldarlo. De todos tus impulsos, tu impulso creativo nunca murió. Quizás la vida se te interpuso, aunque a Ricardo no le gustan las excusas. Ric está lleno de excusas. Especialmente ese tipo de excusas, las inexcusables.

Un conejo una vez explicó a todo un público en Cuenca eso de los Ricardismos. En la confraternidad de Ricardos sabemos lo que es eso de llamarnos de muchas formas.

Ésta transmisión se interrumpe porque Chippy recibe un mensaje de aliento y Rikardoré recuerda que no solo su Ricardismo lo ha llevado a tener muchos nombres sino también todos los apodos que le han dado las personas que ama. No ama todos los apodos, pero El Presi tiene que aceptarlos por lo que son, llamados de amor. Dokari se cuestiona esto de las multiples personalidades, pero sabe que no escribe solo. Tal vez ese es el juego, no escribir solo. Ese siempre ha sido el juego y el Ric que filmó sus hogare(s) por fin ve una forma de no extrañar tanto a los que con el tiempo se vuelven extraños. Quizás no es necesario ver la evolución de todos al mismo tiempo, quizás son como árboles en muchos jardines que basta regar de vez en cuando para maravillarse de lo grandes que se han convertido.

El Magister Ricardo Salcedo Martínez no está seguro si compartir esto. Primero, la historia no tiene conflicto. Mal. Bueno, tiene conflicto, pero quizás no está bien planteado. Ricardo quiere escribir y para empezar a hacerlo de nuevo le está haciendo un nanai a un chico que recién salido de la ARCIS se convenció que si escribía mucho lo aprendería a hacer bien. A sus ojos de veintiañero había fallado. Tarkovsky le recordó hace poco a Ricardo el treintañero, con un toque de Sacrificio, que efectivamente el camino de la repetición no estaba tan perdido. Qué pretencioso suena Tarkovsky en éste contexto, pero el profesor Salcedo se puede dar esos lujos. A Riky le sigue asustando la pretensión.  

Entonces, ¿qué queda? Escribir. Para mí. Para todos. Para nadie. Algunas cosas las esconderé, como he ido imitando a las ardillas con sus nueces por años. Otras cosas las publicaré en éste blog. Sí, el mismo blog absurdo que tengo hace ya una década. Y como una cierta nota musical sabe muy bien, yo nunca he echado a nadie de mi casa.

Almost Done

A man goes into the post office expecting to receive something. He gets nothing and is horribly upset.

Think about it.

Final Escrito a la Rápida

En un Internet café, hace ya varios años, una chica vio a un chico que le gustaba. Su papá era el dueño del local. Ella pasaba muchas de sus tardes aburrida y sentada detrás del mostrador esperando que lleguen clientes, contando el tiempo que usaban las maquinas, cobrándoles, dándoles su vuelto. El día que ella lo vio lo encontró extremadamente atractivo. Su sonrisa, su pelo, desde la primera mirada no dejó de pensar en él. Después de ese día él empezó a entrar al local dos o tres veces por semana. Ella se emocionaba cada vez que lo veía entrar.


Un día trato de acercarse a él y decirle algo, pero no pudo. Tres días después, su padre la dejó a cargo del local. Ella, violando totalmente las reglas de privacidad, utilizó el computador servidor para espiar a su amor. Anotó todos sus emails, nombres de mensajero instantáneo, toda la información que podía encontrar sobre él. Cada vez que su padre la dejaba sola en el local, ella se dedicaba a mirar el computador de su querido. Ella se sabía todas sus páginas web favoritas, todas sus bandas favoritas, comidas, amigos, todo. Finalmente, después de casi un mes, ella se armó de valor y le mandó un mensaje instantáneo. Ahí, en el anonimato del Internet, ella pudo decirle a él todo lo que sentía y pensaba. Cada pequeño detalle que se le iba ocurriendo ella le dijo, y él, sin saber con quien hablaba, le siguió el juego. ¿A quién no le gusta ser alabado?

Él empezó a ir al café solo para hablar con ella. Siempre en el mismo Internet café, uno al lado de otro, conversando por horas. Cuando él le empezó a pedirle fotos a ella, ella se puso muy nerviosa. Le dijo que no tenía ninguna y que no podría mandarle nada. Él le repetía una y otra vez que ella seguramente tenía una cuenta de Facebook o algo y simplemente no se lo quería decir. Él insistió tanto que la chica empezó a buscar como loca fotos de chicas atractivas. Le preguntó todos los detalles de lo que él está buscando en una mujer y ella buscó y buscó hasta que encontró la chica perfecta. Esa sería la foto que ella usaría.

Pasaron los meses y él estaba enamorado. Iba cada cuando podía gastar los pocos pesos que tenía y se sentaba a chatear con su enamorada por horas. Oficialmente habían comenzado un noviazgo por Internet, y él le era fiel en la red y fuera de ella. Hasta que un día él se desfiguró la cara en un accidente y ella nunca le volvió a escribir.

Calvin’s Cave

Calvin stood alone in the cave. It was dark and it was damp and he hated it. He hated being there. It was probably the place he hated most in the world. This is where she’d died.

The love of his life had passed away in that cave only months before. Every single person who would talk to him about the matter would tell him how it was an accident. These things happen to cave climbers, why should she be any different? She tripped. She fell. End of story. But he knew that wasn’t the case. She wasn’t just a “cave climber”. She wasn’t just one of them. She was the best. She was the absolute best. The love of his life. And nothing would stop him from finding whoever was behind her death. Over and over Calvin heard that it didn’t make sense that she was murdered. Why would she be? She had no enemies. She had no money. No motive. And besides, she’d been alone when it had happened. But that’s the part that didn’t make sense: why would she be alone? She always went out with a spotter. It was just common sense. A sudden onrush of adrenaline that didn’t let her think clearly? Preposterous.

Two years before, in a small village outside of Tuscany, they’d met. She was of Punjabi heritage and he’d been stunned by her from the first. It was her hair. That long, beautiful hair that he knew had to be incredibly cumbersome for climbing anything, let alone caves. Calvin himself knew nothing of extreme sports.

Calvin had been working with a programming company designing new security ports for Wifi networks. He was to go to a conference in Rome, but had always wanted to see Italy and asked for a ticket a week early to see the sites. The company agreed and three days after arriving at Fiumicino airport, he found himself lazily playing on his computer at an outdoor café. A few tables over was a beautiful lonely girl on her laptop. A Macintosh. Calvin wanted very much to go over and talk to her, but he’d always been shy and had no idea how to start the conversation. He decided to see if he could hack her computer, not realizing that it was probably the creepiest way to approach her possible. Imagine Calvin’s surprise when she hacked him back, and then some. In the middle of Calvin panicking (he couldn’t turn the damn thing on anymore) she came over and smiled. She simply said: “I win”, and walked away. He followed her with a gaping gaze as she walked and suddenly his computer turned on and began playing “Chica Cherry Cola”. Later, when he asked her why that specific song, she simply replied that she wanted him to know what to ask for when he ordered her a drink.

Back in the cave now, he thought of those beautiful first few days. She wouldn’t give up her name and it was only until he was able to hack into her computer again that he found out. They played the game of hacking each other back and forth until they got bored of it and decided to just tour around. Rajveer, he thought to himself and sighed. He’d never heard that name before in his life, but soon it would take over his every thought and action. Walking almost to the point where she’d fallen (an accident!) he remembered fondly holding her hand and whispering that he loved her. She hated when he repeated her name over and over again. He always insisted that he didn’t care that it was unisex. She would try to shrug it off, but Calvin had always been persistent with her. Sometimes he even thought he hadn’t so much romanced her into marriage but had worn her down.

How had he just let her come here alone! He’d always valued her independence, even loved her for it. Yes, she’d been a cave climber long before meeting him. Why, why hadn’t he just been here, too? If someone had to fall, why couldn’t they have fallen together? Calvin stood on the exact spot where she had fallen and after the overwhelming sadness washed over him he fell silly. He felt stupid. Incredibly stupid. What the hell did he know about climbing? How could he tell if there was foul play? There wasn’t even blood. There wasn’t anything. How could he even be sure that it was this very spot? None of it made sense. What was he doing? He was no detective. He’d asked and asked. There were even witnesses who’d seen her go in alone. None of it made sense. None of it was warranted.

I killed her, he thought. He’d let her go. He…he just couldn’t live without her. Suddenly he felt ashamed. He hadn’t even brought her flowers. He’d thought he’d come in here like a detective and he’d find her, he’d discover they were liars, that they were wrong, that she was right there. How can’t you see that my wife’s right there?! Negligent park rangers. Everyone, nobody, nothing…it just, it just doesn’t make sense. Furiously, Calvin began punching into the walls of the cave until his hand became bloody. He crumbled unto himself and cried until he fell asleep.

When he woke up his lamp had died out. He tried to feel his way around and as he did he kicked the lamp into the abyss. He was alone. Alone and deep inside an unforgiving cave. It just wasn’t going to be possible to walk back now. He tried standing and he felt himself lose his grip on the ground. He just wasn’t going to move.

For days he just laid there. He’d brought some water with him, but the lack of food and the cold was slowly killing him. The death in the cave would probably be faster than the death outside, either way, ever since she’d left, he’d felt like he was slowly withering away.

After almost a week, he heard a faint whistling and for a moment couldn’t tell if it was a hallucination or a dream. The song was Chica Cherry Cola, and in his hunger-crazed mind Calvin thought it was his Rajveer coming to take him to heaven with her.

Turns out it was just a climber who happened to be passing by. Calvin cried out and the man took him on his shoulders. Rajveer, while sweet and loving, was a reckless woman. One day he’d see that. She’d fallen. He had not.

The Word Violence Hides Under

As he shoved his bosses’ enemy’s face into the toilet, he pondered about the significance of violence. People always thought of him as just the muscle, a big guy with no brains. He was actually a very well read man, one of the many college educated without a degree that had to find less than honorable ways to make a living.

Survival: the word violence hides under to justify itself.

Bullshit. It still felt good.