night of 8/20/2012

the person is possibly my brother. up in our bedroom we grew up in. i have an old (like, vt100 terminal) on, on the bed. i'm saying that i'm going to do a [thesis? paper?] the right way this time. usually i skim sources and just pull quotes. this time i will actually read every fucking one. i almost tear up saying this.

night of 7/24/12

We young teenagers in the neighborhood--and some of the smaller kids, too-are taking turns racing down a dry, bumpy decline, on some kind of saucer or skateboard. The neighborhood is out on a warm evening and chatting. The sled turns out not to be hard for me to control, and I tend to win the races.


The party migrates gradually down the grassy suburban block. Most kids stay to race a little more and then trickle over. [cut]

I rejoin he crowd sullen, and someone with me tells Janine that I didn't win, I "placed." J-- makes a sympathetic face. I tell her no, that was wrong: I didn't even place at all. J-- winces. She doesn't care whether I win, but knows it hurts me to lose.

Most are trickling home as the sky darkens. The rest of us have arrived in front of a Jewish temple. It is not a synagogue but a kind of indoor garden, where each member houses and tends a small symbolic plant on the rows of shelves. Many of the neighbors are members. They allow Gentiles to partipate. I'd thought all the slots were full but it turns out there is one left, and I quickly sign up. (They tell me to write the check to "Beth Israel 30 years old.")

Short shelves girdle the small temple, holding small boxes and plastic bags. There is one empty. I am given some nutritive soil and seeds, and then some shoots already begun growing. I seal the bag and replace it on the shelf. I feel better.

night of 6/13/2012

i am graduating. we've cleaned out the dorm room. i wander outside and round the corner of the building to a magnificent view, with an opulent outdoor stage overlooking the lush quad. i've never seen this before. i realize that i'd always left the building on the other side, toward the far more utilitarian classroom buildings. i go back inside and return to my hall--maybe forgetfully, maybe nostalgically. passing a room i see a calculator embedded in the floor. at my room is a fey blonde moving in, seems a bit bemused and a bit scared at my appearance. "don't worry! i'm leaving town. just wanted to see the room one more time. i had a wonderful year!" he humors me. "there's no calculator in the floor, though..." feigning disappointment.

i go back out and sit on the sloping grass in the beautiful quad. K-- and some other girls are descending the hill, wearing Disney princess costumes. they are stunning.

night of 3/20/12

J-- and I are back on the SF peninsula. We can't find where we're going because what was once El Camino has been chopped up into different names for each township. Like "Independence Avenue." We're unfolding a big map to figure it out.

I'm at the bazaar, held in a series of massive interconnected warehouses. Dad has sent me to find a "pineapple spark plug" for the car, so-called due to a split, splayed protuberance resembling a pineapple's leaves. There's an auto parts stall but I'm afraid to talk to the purveyor.

Now I can fly. Soaring home down near the 280, the scenic route. It's getting dark; harder and harder to see. Holding my arm before my face as I fly, in case I run into the indistinct branches, weaving between the dim forms of trees. I look down in the last light and see a doe and her young child. I overfly for a better look. The doe leaps, time slows, her nose at the arc's top rises to just before my face, I drop my arm down, both of us still, regarding each other.

night of 2/21/2012

I go to a room in the back of the house, looking for a place to hang my pictures. I find a room that ought to make a nice gallery: well lit by windows, white, nice wood trim. I discover that it's full of Dad's paintings. He must have forgotten to take them with him, as he did all the other paintings in the house, when he moved out and my family moved in. Some of the pictures are quite good. I begin taking them down and laying them on the floor. One big one, the one I noticed first, and liked, an abstract collection of dark moody shapes collected into a central mass on a dim background of sky, I notice is in three separate pieces, painted on wood, that I lay carefully so as not to scrape. Then I move on, further back and deeper into the house (which apparently is massive) to another door which slides open at the touch of a button, to reveal another gallery, expansive enough to be a small museum. I don't know whether this will also house paintings, or will be empty.

night of 2/20/2012

1 i need to shit bad. i've moved into a dorm or run-down hotel with some friends and the squalor is unbearable, like a crack house, and the toilet is so filthy i have to look elsewhere. after wandering first into a hotel, then into an airport, finding only detestable toilets, i find a men's-room sign that leads me into the back rooms of the airport, stacked high with parts and machinery. i pass through one plastic-curtained doorway after another until finally a clean toilet appears. later i am retracing my steps in order to lead some others to it. now, though, the big back rooms are crawling with processions of hulks, either robots or men in heavy armor. we are forced to hide, and eventually to arm ourselves and fight. [i've had the dream of a search for a toilet before; in addition to filth, they also tend to have an exaggerated lack of privacy.]

2 i am in the audience of a trial. the defendant has produced an advertisement that has been found objectionable. (it involves a boat somehow; maybe promising it as a prize.) the prosecution exhibits other ad campaigns that accomplish similar goals, but are more tasteful. nearing the end of the prosecution--it's not clear that there will be a turn for defense--the prosecutor announces that the case will rest at 2:00 precisely, and he points to a clock high on the wall. it is encased in glass. the time is a few minutes shy of two. the judge, on this signal, throws a heavy object at the clock case, shattering it. i raise my hand and say i'd like to ask a question. (i did this once before, during the case, and was told to wait.) i'm aware that questions from the audience are unusual but feel compelled to try. now i am allowed, but time is almost up. "why didn't you set aside any time to discuss whether the actions of the defendant were in any way illegal?"

night of 2/14/2012

back to the house i grew up in. he's there, somewhere, maybe upstairs, but i don't see him. this after the apocalyptic change, leaving the world is demon-haunted. we can be possessed, absorbed, from anywhere: a wall, a street, a pool of water. i must act the right way in order to avoid drawing the demons' attention. the walls and the shadowed corners inside the house are likewise inhabited. after all this time, though, they are no longer horrifying. i need only act the right way: i can; I know how. this is simply what one does to survive.