08Jan / 2014

Shakespeare on dating

Words, words, words.

William Shakespeare, Hamlet, Act II, Scene II

Alpha and I saw King Lear last Sunday, in the original German, at the Burgtheater, in Vienna.

Shakespeare, really something that guy, eh?

Klaus Maria Brandauer was Lear. He was good. Everyone was good. Even the actors where you think, they’re not as good as the rest, they turned out to be good, too.

Four hours just flew by.

Alpha arranged the tickets, and being Alpha, we had front-row seats. Also, being Alpha, in the intermission, when the aisles and hallways of the theater suddenly fill with people blinking like moles and looking for the restrooms or the buffets, she said, “I’m going to the restroom so you go get champagne.”

Being me, I went and got champagne. Slightly out of character, I got it quickly, which gave me more time to try to find my wife in the crowd.

An usher informed me I was not allowed to bring the glasses and champagne bottle (one of those little piccolo bottles that hold two glasses’ worth) back into the theater-part of the theater with me. She was nice about it, though, when I explained my lost-wife situation, so instead of asking ‘what, do lots of people throw bottles at Klaus Maria Brandauer?’ I got her to let me leave the drinks with her while I searched.

Of course I never found my wife, all intermission long.

I called her a couple times, but her phone was turned off.

Later, she called me and we had the where are you oh by the stairs i’m also by the stairs which stairs those stairs going up me too which stairs going up go to the stairs by the restroom now i’m by the bar how am I supposed to find you if you keep moving around? conversation. Then the warning bells started ringing and the usher suggested I drink both champagnes and head back to my seat. I offered her one but she didn’t drink on duty.

So I had two champagnes.

And saw King Lear up close.

Argue, argue, stab, stab.

Alpha was good-natured about the drink snafu, so was I.

When you have been together a long time, little stuff like that doesn’t rile you up. If it had been a first date, it might have been different.

Who knows?

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02Jan / 2014

Little red hat

2014 is going to be the year Odin streamlines his life. The year he throws old crap away.

Like all his t-shirts with clever sayings on them.

Or not — his kids might want those, so he’ll hang onto them.

But his workshop, all this junk! And on top of that, the new beer making kit he got for Christmas. And not even counting the wet plate camera he hasn’t bought yet. Where to start?

Odin is sitting in the attic, telling his wife what’s in boxes so she can inventorize what they have in their attic prior to throwing stuff out. Odin is like, why not just throw it out and save a step. And he is also like, old magazines in this box. Painting canvases. Some sort of plumbing fixtures. Travel case for a harp.

In another universe, Odin has a temporary job taking inventory for some company. He is standing in front of a wall of televisions in a shop, counting them. The Space Shuttle takes off and then explodes. Odin sees two dozen images of debris angling through the sky, leaving a white trail.

Odin and his wife are doing pretty good in the cellar. They donate a lot of old clothes. Then, this box: ballerina duds. A princess dress. Like that.

A little red hat.

There is another universe, 20 years ago, it is the carneval season, children are being led through games at a public carneval party in the city hall.

About 20 years ago. Or only 12 — Odin gets his universes mixed up. It would depend which daughter, Thor or Loki.

Christ.

Through the blue haze of all the smoking mommies, Odin can see her, in her red hat, covered in confetti, wearing the red hat, dancing.

There was also a lady bug costume, he finds the hat to that one too.

Odin remembers a lady bug dancing, spinning in circles.

Odin and his wife box the red hat back up.

So anyway.

Today is the first work day of 2014. It is quiet out. Odin is not hungry at lunch time but he wants to check on the crows.

Odin strolls to the store. It is warm for the second day of January. The small grey crow swoops down and accompanies Odin to the store, where he gets peanuts and a curry chicken sandwich.

He sits on the bench and all three crows are there waiting.

It is such a quiet day, like the end of the world. Like the world could still decide 2013 was the final year.

The four of them eat sandwich, they eat peanuts.

What say the slain?

I dreamt someone on a motorcycle whipped my leg with a strap and captured me, I was balanced on the handlebars and gathered myself and kicked them to get away, and woke myself up kicking in bed. I asked the dream what it was and it said, what supports us binds us. It said, love. It said, vitality. It said, escape.

What say the hanged?

Memory is not carved in stone after all. It is reinvented all the time. It is stories you tell yourself, and you know how reliable stories are. You find a little red hat and make something up, because you know who wore it, and you know how much you love her.

May we always remember.

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18Dec / 2013

Dramas are cheaper than comedies

Man, it’s freezing out.

Winter.

But Odin doesn’t wear his hat when he goes to the store. He doesn’t want to make it any harder for the crows to recognize him, and he thinks a hat might do that. It sure freaks out his cats when he wears a hat.

So, no hat.

He buys honey-roasted peanuts and a baloney sandwich in a poppyseed roll. The crows meet him at the bench. Not immediately. He stands there for a minute eating peanuts before the first one, the grey one that reminds him of a duck, Huginn, appears on a telephone wire and swoops down for a piece of baloney sandwich.

Then the second grey one swoops down from the left and fights over another piece of sandwich with Muninn until Odin tosses them a couple more pieces.

For a while, they all hang out, eating silently.

Odin feels particularly unstuck in the multiverse today. All day, he has been slipping easily from one to another.

He is at a movie premiere with his daughter. Standing in the cinema lobby, they crack jokes and watch people, observing the different tribes that show up at movie premieres – the movie actors, the journalists, the photographers, the fans, the weirdos.

They wonder if they should buy popcorn. They agree popcorn should be handed out free at movie premieres. They count uncanny botox foreheads.

Botulinum toxin is the most lethal toxin there is, his daughter says. 100 mg would be enough to kill everyone in the world.

Like Odin himself, Odin’s daughter is a fertile source of useless facts. This makes Odin smile. He has been smiling all evening.

You might want to use 200 mg, though, just to be sure, Odin says.

His daughter has another thing in common with him, too: she attracts nuts. Odin realizes this when a little man appears in their personal space and asks her if she is an actress in the movie they are about to watch.

She laughs and says no.

The lobby is very crowded and noisy now, and the man talks fast, so Odin catches only a portion of what he says, but he hears him say that a local film festival always shows dramas, but never comedies or action films, because dramas are the cheapest. He has something white in the corner of his mouth.

Probably food.

Is that right, Odin says. He moves to stand between the little man and his daughter.

So they show dramas. And documentaries. Documentaries are even cheaper than dramas.

For a while, he tells them about a movie he recently watched. Odin runs through his entire repertoire of things you do to signal a conversation is winding down, but nothing works.

Finally, Odin says, well okay then, grabs his daughter and walks with her to another corner of the lobby.

At one point, Odin gets the autograph of an actress his daughter and he both like.

At another point, they watch the movie. It is okay. It is a comedy, not a drama, and they laugh a lot. Afterwards, the cast come onstage and talk for a while, then Odin and his daughter go home.

Although Odin is unstuck in the multiverse, he is not entirely without control.

On days like this, he can slip almost effortlessly from one universe to another.

He is in his car, realizing it is snowing.

He is riding a train.

He is someone else, in 1972.

He is a man waiting for crows.

He is watching a beautiful woman.

He is playing Arvo Pärt with his daughter – she plays the piano and he plays the cello. Then they give up and he switches to the singing saw and they play it that way, and laugh and laugh.

He is digging post holes with another man, holding a heavy motorized auger between them.

He is back with the crows.

What say the hanged?

Live it up.

What say the slain?

They say live it up, too.

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11Dec / 2013

Careers in Science: Oneirology

Honey, if you want to be dreamy, you gotta get up early.

The oneirologist has this epiphany climbing the subway stairs, way over on one side by the handrail because a train has just disgorged a load of passengers who are all coming down the stairs like the oneirologist is a salmon.

And as he climbs he watches them and some look relaxed and some, one mother in particular, are hurrying. The woman is hurrying and dragging a little kid by the hand, as if they have two minutes to reach a connecting ride. And the oneirologist thinks, you can be efficient or you can be dreamy. Then he thinks of his daughter, who is both efficient and dreamy. So he sort of revises his thought to be less absolutist. If you want a fast commute in the morning, you have to be organized. If you want to be poky and dreamy, though, you have to get up early and allow yourself a lot of time.

The oneirologist couldn’t live any other way. This is why he goes to bed so early at night, so he can get up early and dink around.

The oneirologist likes to watch what happens to the light outside as he drinks his coffee.

The oneirologist likes to listen to the evolution of the sounds in the house as people and animals and garbage trucks start their days.

The oneirologist likes to do some stretches and pushups.

The oneirologist likes to scramble eggs.

He likes to write a little in a journal.

Last night, on his way home from meeting a friend at an advent market and drinking hot winter punch and catching up on things, the oneriologist was accosted by a lot of beggars. The first one got all his change, the ones after that were out of luck.

In one instance, as he waited for a street car, being accosted by one beggar prevented him from being accosted by another beggar. He watched a woman, who was giving off strong vibes of psychological trouble, preparing herself to accost him, when a man swooped in from out of nowhere and began telling him a story. This is known as the narrative method of panhandling.

Unfortunately, the oneirologist is hard of hearing, and it was noisy, and the man was speaking fast, and in dialect, so the oneirologist resorted to empty phrases to keep the conversation rolling:

Is that right?

Oh, that really sucks!

Man, no fooling?

He wanted to give the man money, but was out of change and said so. He apologized a second time as the man left. The man had his pride and said, no problem!

There but for two months salary and a suit go I, thought the oneirologist.

Two months salary, a suit and manners. He thought. And a bath, or a makeover.

But, otherwise.

The oneirologist recalled a recent visit to a jewelry store to buy a Christmas present for someone who had, fortunately, specified exactly (exactly!) what she wanted.

The sales clerks had ignored him for fifteen minutes. Normally, around Christmas time they are swarming you, right?

They would have ignored him for longer, until he left, but he grabbed one by the suspenders, or whatever, and dragged her to the brightly-lit glass display case and said, ‘that one there,’ and made his purchase.

It had been a Saturday, and on the weekends the oneirologist dresses in a more casual manner, and had looked rather bummy right then.

But still.

Even a five, if he’d had a five, he would have given it to the guy.

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06Dec / 2013

Maybe this is why you’re so tired sometimes when you wake up

Odin like goes into your bedroom when you’re sleeping at night? And stands at the foot of your bed?

Odin can see really well in the dark, even with just one eye. Remember, the other one’s down at the bottom of that, that pond of wisdom that giant guy drinks out of every day. Who’d want to drink out of a pond with an eye in it?

Whatevs.

Look, he stands there, Odin, and looks at you sleeping there in your bed, he stands there in those black clothes and that belt and boots and the one eye scrunched up and looks at you with the other, piercing one and the long white hair and he doesn’t even try to whisper when he says, child you are beautiful and blessed and full of grace.

He holds up a hand when he says it, a hand that has held many a sword and old weapons like that.

Child you are beautiful and blessed and full of grace. Being a god, his voice wakes you up and you’re like, whoa, it’s Odin.

Beautiful and blessed and full of grace, and life is short so always do what makes you smile. Within reason, of course, you know the drill, but here is the thing: never wait until something is perfect, because you are beautiful and real and the beautiful and real are never perfect, only the creepy and fake are perfect.

And Odin stands there, like a negative image of Cab Calloway in a white suit, and he holds out both hands and says, ‘inky dinky do,’ and does a little dance step, a sashay, to the left. Your ten-gallon aquarium burbles in the corner of your room, fish all fast asleep.

And the monsters under your bed stick out their heads and say, ‘inky dinky dee,’ and before you know it Odin is doing this call and response number in your room with the monsters under your bed and in your closet, the one in your mirror and the ones in the shadows cast on the ceiling by your curtains, even the little fellows in your wallpaper who, when you stare at the wallpaper long enough, march in long, crooked inky-black lines around your room like jerky 1930s animated cannibals only these are not racist imagry, they are not flesh, they are made of coal and ash and fire and lava, demons, or a cross between imp and demon and they dance with their little spears and Odin sings, ‘wagga wagga yappa do’ and they repeat it and the monsters repeat it.

And you sing along.

It’s a long number, and when it’s over, Odin says, when you wake you’ll forget all this, but remember what I said.

And you say, inky dinky do.

And Odin says, no, before that.

And you both laugh.

This happens about five times a week. Maybe it’s why you are so tired sometimes.

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28Nov / 2013

The multiverse is everywhere

There are days it is nice, when it is snowing and windy, to sit inside at lunch and watch the snow while a space heater blows hot air at your legs, and not go out into the cold to buy a sandwich (because you are skipping lunch) and not go buy fresh lottery tickets (because you gave all your cash to your wife and kid this morning, and the last Visa bill was ahem bigger than expected). Just sit inside and watch the snowflakes and think about the origins of the universe, and the ongoing popping into being of the multiverse, and how when you finish reading this cosmology book you will retain less than 1% of it but oh well.

There are days it is nice, when snowy and winding, to sit inside where it is warm and think about the perfect, broken, imperfect and absolute beauty of all of this, this world, the way simple natural laws and teeny-tiny strings (apparently) add up to all this stuff! Crows who recognize your face and hop onto the bench to eat your chicken sandwich! Children the size of mountains! Clouds full of millions of worlds!

(It helps if you develop the ability to see in more than three or four dimensions, depending on whether you consider time a dimension. Some are very tiny, it takes practice.)

(For the purposes of this essay, time is considered a dimension.)

There are days you remember yesterday’s traffic jam and are glad you took the train.

Endless days.

Days you throw your head back and laugh at the broken beauty of it all, just wait until you’re alone in the room.

Endless.

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22Nov / 2013

Cosmology

Odin tries to describe how he is feeling to his wife, on a mobile phone with a dodgy connection.

“I feel like I am on the verge of a panic attack.” The word ‘verge’ echoes.

She tells him to take a walk.

“I am taking a walk. I’m on the way to the store to get a sandwich for the crows. Here’s Huginn already.” Perched atop a Peugeot, a grey crow the size of a duck watches Odin walk past.

Odin buys a chicken sandwich and some honey-roasted peanuts, because he wants to see if the crows will eat an entire sandwich, and wants to have something left over for his own lunch in case they do.

He sits on the bench and in less than a minute, all three crows arrive. The black one, Muninn, is the cockiest. Odin puts a piece of sandwich on the bench beside him, then turns and tosses pieces to Huginn and the third crow, a smaller grey one. When he turns back, Muninn is already dismantling his sandwich a couple meters away.

Odin has to throw the third crow another piece because Huginn took the first two.

The third crow has no name.

Eventually all the crows have food.

They eat all of the first half, and most of the second, of Odin’s sandwich. Odin eats the peanuts.

It is an unnaturally quiet, grey day and Odin’s heart is beating wildly. He has no idea why.

What say the hanged?

The universe was made from the body of the giant Ymir almost fourteen billion years ago. It is thought to be flat, but you know what else used to be thought flat. It is 46 billion light years in radius. Beyond that, who knows.

Beyond that, the multiverse.

Beyond that, everything else.

Beyond that, an infinity of possible things.

An infinite number of worlds just like this one, and worlds slightly different, and worlds way different.

Worlds in which you see a strange, tall, black-haired woman at the store and try not to stare. Worlds in which you see her, and say hi. Worlds in which she brushes you off. Worlds in which you have coffee. Worlds in which you never see her again. Worlds in which you become friends.

Worlds in which pieces of an airplane land on your house and you are interviewed on the news.

Worlds in which you buy a used hat and don’t get headlice.

Worlds in which you bake an apple pie for Thanksgiving without a recipe, from start to finish.

Worlds in which you go outside in the dark to throw out the garbage and step on a hair brush instead of a garden clog and think a hedgehog is hiding in your garden clog and chuckle at your mistake.

Worlds in which you are full of electricity and don’t know why.

Worlds upon worlds upon worlds.

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Metamorphosism

Category Archives: Familie

Shakespeare on dating

Little red hat

Dramas are cheaper than comedies

Careers in Science: Oneirology

Maybe this is why you’re so tired sometimes when you wake up

The multiverse is everywhere

Cosmology