emerald fingers finger the smog
There are times when being a radio is difficult because people keep so many bricks and throw so many chips from them. Those bricks are heavy (never mind the unintended L7 reference), and the air feels tight like a square sealed for a no-happen future opening.
I used to be scared of driving at all. I used to be scared of driving in small towns, then on highways, then in big cities, Manhattan excluded and elevated to its own category. Now, as of this week, I drive through Manhattan to get to my job in New Jersey. Another fear down the drain, and this morning I feel sad.
I don’t like a thing to end because then there is vertigo and scarecrow-like lack of direction. By thing I mean book, movie, music, a project, a fear, in which case a sense of completion or simply enjoyment is satisfying and so, for those same reasons, I do like a thing to end. Now I need a new jersey to tackle.
This week I’m highly empathetic and my sense of smell is so sharp it might cusp into hallucination. Driving over the Goethals Bridge each night there is first a distinct smell of chlorine accompanied by memory of swimming in public pools, and then, halfway over, there is the smell of poop, a conglomerate of all animals’ feces. People sweat. The bathroom at work smells like Play-Doh. The hallway has eggs and whiskey. Olfactory voices in the head, essentially.
Yesterday I did confrontation like a good debbie in Texas. I don’t do confrontation well, but a duck needed to be squared and lit lest my psyche crumble under the heavy weight of doormat. Another fear down.
Each time I finger-flick a fear away, I think, "That wasn’t bad at all. No reason to be scared of anything really." Then vertigo with a long, stagnant-pond future threatens. And so I opt to cultivate and whip-crack fear, cycle through the thing, even though the fear, the conquering, and the next, all are apparently arbitrarily bound and found. At least then there are stones to step on.
I used to be scared of driving at all. I used to be scared of driving in small towns, then on highways, then in big cities, Manhattan excluded and elevated to its own category. Now, as of this week, I drive through Manhattan to get to my job in New Jersey. Another fear down the drain, and this morning I feel sad.
I don’t like a thing to end because then there is vertigo and scarecrow-like lack of direction. By thing I mean book, movie, music, a project, a fear, in which case a sense of completion or simply enjoyment is satisfying and so, for those same reasons, I do like a thing to end. Now I need a new jersey to tackle.
This week I’m highly empathetic and my sense of smell is so sharp it might cusp into hallucination. Driving over the Goethals Bridge each night there is first a distinct smell of chlorine accompanied by memory of swimming in public pools, and then, halfway over, there is the smell of poop, a conglomerate of all animals’ feces. People sweat. The bathroom at work smells like Play-Doh. The hallway has eggs and whiskey. Olfactory voices in the head, essentially.
Yesterday I did confrontation like a good debbie in Texas. I don’t do confrontation well, but a duck needed to be squared and lit lest my psyche crumble under the heavy weight of doormat. Another fear down.
Each time I finger-flick a fear away, I think, "That wasn’t bad at all. No reason to be scared of anything really." Then vertigo with a long, stagnant-pond future threatens. And so I opt to cultivate and whip-crack fear, cycle through the thing, even though the fear, the conquering, and the next, all are apparently arbitrarily bound and found. At least then there are stones to step on.
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