Tuesday, August 28, 2007

Ouvroir de littérature potentielle


Since the 3:15 experiment passed me by, I've decided to create my own exploration in September.

Instead of waking up at 3:15 am every morning in August and writing, I will abide by Jack Kerouac's 30 Rules for Spontaneous Prose. However, each day in September, I will concentrate on one rule and one rule only. It will be a month of obsession and a little bit of madness. How can it not be? Part of Kerouac's appeal is his maddness for writing. They are concise one sentence statements that are sometimes a bit obscure and open for interpretation. This will leave much room for play.

If anyone is interested in coming along for the ride, post a comment.

I will post the first rule up on September 1st at whatever time I wake up. I will then write the sentence on my hand to remind myself to continuously acknowledge it the whole day through. I have set aside a notebook that will be specifically oriented for this experiment. Let the fun begin (in 4 days)!

Countdown to a re-emergence of a piece of the beats and OuLiPo!

Thursday, August 23, 2007

Monday, August 20, 2007

"Are you Naked? I'm feeling creative."

Misheard lyrics. Belting out the wrong words and owning them, not feeling embarassed to sing your own song - this is audacity. On a computer, we write in bold for emphasis. Emphasize your life with the appropriate punctuation. Maybe today is full of commas, tomorrow could be a seemingly eternal exclaimation point! He said he thought the ellipsis in his head, so what he said wasn't technically a lie. The second portion of the statement was a detour from the proceeding untruth, so it is almost as if he masking-taped a new clause in just at the last moment to create veracity.

He called me up to make sure I made my flight so we wouldn't have to continue on to Tucson together. He said, "Did you make it?" I heard, "Are you naked?" We laughed and he said "Yeah, that's where our relationship is at now." But the fluky thing is since the first second I met him in the dark in the driveway on a Wednesday, I felt at ease against his shadow. I even kinda miss his wretched smelling cartoon farts that heated the cold Telluride tent.

Some were concerned: "You jumped in a car with a stranger?!" I'm not sure why most people can't understand a pure experience. I like to thrive on the unexpected and who better to provide unanticipated action than a complete stranger?


Talk to Strangers - Saul Williams said it best himself:

"Like that stranger may be yours,
who holds a subtle knife
that carves through worlds
like magic doors,
and that’s what I've been looking for,
The bridge from then to now,
...
But that square box don't represent the sphere that we live in,
The world is not a flat screen
I ain’t trying to fit in.
But this ain’t for the underground
this here is for the sun-
A seed a stranger gave to me
and planted on my tongue.
and when i look at you,
I know I'm not the only one.

As a great man once said,
There’s nothing more powerful
than an idea
who’s time
has come."

Riley's Awkward 2nd Goodbye

Making it to Phoenix from the near outskirts of Sedona in 2 hours was impressive considering the traffic we hit. Just as he pulled up to Terminal 4, we turned toward one another to say goodbye and implement the sideways rushed hug. It was that moment that I finally decided I had been traveling with a good friend as opposed to a random stranger. Up until the drive-by duck and roll drop-off, we didn't worry about me missing my flight and what we would do if it happened. We just enjoyed my last few hours on the gorgeous Arizona roads and what this new place had to offer.



The flight was delayed twenty minutes, so I made it without even having to convince an airport attendent of my need to get back to Denver to catch a bus so I could attend work on time Monday morning. While waiting last in line for Southwest Airlines, a young man, about the age of thirteen, was saying goodbye to his pregnant aunt. They had thought the line was moving and exchanged sentiments. The line didn't budge after a few steps and the two were left in an awkward silence. They had already placed a period on their sentence; the denouement had occurred - what now? The silent panic caused an internal giggle in me. Embarassment and awkwardness are two things that will always amuse me to no end.

Southwest Airlines doesn't assign seats - you are placed in a herd (either A, B or C) and it's a free-for-all after the gate double doors. I was last in line C, but the flight wasn't full, so I would have some choice. I was excited to see the plane scattered with open middle seats. How would I choose my seat partners? Were people offended or relieved by each passenger that passed them up? Does the last person on a full flight get stuck next to the screaming baby smelly fat guy that coughs, sneezes and incessently asks about your entire life for the duration of the flight? This musical chaircraft seating was a foreign experience for me. Travelers often feel foreign to me anyway, because many people become very quirky and unpredictable during travel. Alien creatures.

7.2"

Christoph handed me a red and black screwdriver and told me to return it to Heidi for him. Being late for a flight and then trying to smuggle what could be considered a spearing device didn't seem like a great idea to me. The security guy told me I could bring it on if it was under 7 inches. He promptly left the scene to obtain the official screwdriver ruler. He held it up in front of me to show me that it was slightly more than 7 inches. 7.2 inches to be exact.

"So do you want me to check it, or chuck it?"
"Fuck it - chuck it. I gotta make a flight."

What didn't make sense to me is the 7 inch rule. Does a 6.8 inch screwdriver insufficiently impale the jugular? Man, if 6 inches is an insufficient impalement length, there must be a lot of un-up to par guys out there. Heidi laughed about the screwdriver and said "No biggie."

TCQ: "You couldn't converse even if you had react juice"

I failed thrice:

1. Within the first half an hour, my navigating skills lead us east-ish when we wanted west-ish.
2. I choked on the clutch when stuck in a rock ditch up the switchbacks to the waterfalls.
3. I was ill-prepared for camping .

He reassured me that I served my purpose: an ear to take in and a mind to spit out responses.

I didn't fail at all:

Getting lost is part of the expedition.
Failing is inherent and
sometimes being unprepared prepares you even more for future endeavors.

Topographical Traffic Engineer



Somewhere between Sedona and Phoenix I asked Christoph a question about the painted yellow lines on a two-way road. He had been attempting to pass a law-obeying motorist, yet each curve kept our line solid as opposed to broken. I wondered if there are particular curve or incline angles that resulted in perforated yellow paint or not. He told me that is something the Topographical Traffic Engineer comes up with. Brilliant!

Christoph has been telling people that he is a retired engineer, simply because he's taken the last year off to travel around the world, free from work or school. We all have our interpretations of definitions; I'd say he took a sabbatical. But even if this could be considered fabricated, life is continuous. Though we may be checking different boxes for our occupations from time to time, living is really our only job. We work to live, not vice versa. We play to live.

My parents don't understand why my sister would want to travel to Peru over New Year's. Why not? Is there a good reason NOT to expand one's experiential horizons? Why limit oneself when the world is large and navigable and provides so many delicious foreign fruits. I want to crown my kumquat with an umlaut! This is impossible from my current position, so it only makes sense to make the shift and sail the ships.

If Thens: Conditional Statements

Mr. Suzuki (Zalewski?) introduced them to me in freshman year advanced mathematics. Conditional statements: if this, then that. And I live like a conditional statement where I pursue the this so the that materializes. i.e. If Ken comes to work on time then I'll convince him to let me leave early for roadtrip. If I lived in Ophir, I'd get a gopher and name him Larry. If I go to the moon, I'll bring you back a small bottle full of it. If I stocked a vending machine, I'd sell scenic views. If I made road signs for a living, I'd ask you to marry me. If I were a candy chemist, I'd devise swiss fish!
He said he couldn't get feet off his mind and because of the focus, couldn't come up with a good If Then. Sometimes focus is too limiting. Maybe it's okay to be unpredictably erractically scattered. I know I've noticed these past few days that by being a juggler, one becomes much more adept at multi-tasking. He can listen, respond, engage and be conjuring up an entirely separate statement (saved for an appropriate time of release) all at once. An impressive listener.

Next will be syllogisms. If I saw a beautiful sunset, I'd point it out to you. If I pointed it out to you, I'd veer from eyeball prodding. If I saw a beautiful sunset, I'd veer from prodding.



Wading Under a Bridge

His Swiss father once sat in a hot tub surrounded by beautiful young women, entirely interested in enticing him. Though the chance was there and the chance was nice, he made a conscious decision to announce to the sexy Sirens his fidelity to his wife. Christoph saw this all occur from a distance. His father was unaware the impression of pride he had stamped upon his son's vigilant eyes. Life is full of pivotal points hinged with difficult decisions: it is fun and transiently satisfying to indulge, experiment and explore, but like Ben Folds says "I got my philosophy and I trust it like the ground. That's why my philosophy keeps me walking when I'm falling down."

We discussed roofs, literally & figuratively. It is important to keep an ambitious attitude in life, to seek more, desire betterment, but we can easily be caught in this vicious ladder climb and lose sight of how high we've already clomb. Contentment used to be such a scary word for me. I thought those who were content were just quitters on living or boring. I guess my young, racing mind needed constant action and improvement - Why wouldn't they want to continue to progress?!?

I've finally slowed down a bit (not much, but enough) to see why contentment can be a very useful state of being. Comfort and security are two things a state of contentment can provide. It is also important to remember that maybe it is best to consciously decide which areas of one's life need constant mining and which sections are fine at the very state they are at. Being in a constant state of movement can cause panic and stress - it is good to stop, observe your life, realize what is vital and make sure to keep it alive. Just as a house needs walls for structure, a roof is essential as well. (Heights and extensions may vary)

"Just Benny"

"The Love Connection, man! You guys are on the Love Channel!" The man's beady umber eyes twinkled in sync with his loud smile. We stopped to take notice of the chalk drawing he was in the process of making when he decided to grab our concentration with a seemingly forceful statement about our relationship. We refuted his accusation and gave him our perspective on the chalk woman's enlarged magenta lips. "There is no truth, just perspective." Christoph offered chalk man. The man was ecstatic by his response and proclaimed Christoph to be some sort of philosopher. Yeah, I'd consider him a philosopher, professor, but mostly just a student of life.

When we asked chalk man his name, he replied: "Just Benny." It was as if he was humble of his title: "Yeah, nothing spectacular... just Benny." He explained that he had once worked with a large chef who ate crisp peaches and smoked like a broke stove who used to announce himself as Just J.

I guess that's what the best of us do - plagiarize actions, thoughts and philosophies from others to create our own personal awesome montage. Somehow the discussion tilted toward the Platonic Solids: Icosahedrons, duodecahedrons and Sacred Geometry. As it progressed, I noticed that Just Benny told every pair of people that passed by that they were on the Love Channel or that they looked beautiful. After our 7-minute too long interaction with Just Benny, I asked Christoph what he thought about this peculiarity. Is something just as genuine if it is shared with any person that passes by? What about selection and sincerity? I understand his motive is to bring people to a compassionate level, but the cynics of this world might see right through his positive pumping device. Am I a cynic?

Dolores Egg Toss


Every town has its annual Festivities in which all the chilluns come out to play the wacky games, giggle and drink cheap Root Beer Floats. Me and my traveling companion were lucky enough to fall upon such a town at such an instance and dominate their Annual Egg Toss until all the 9 and under ones were sobbing over their failures. Okay, okay, maybe we didn't make any young ones cry but we did beat the town Firefighters in a close egg toss, catapulting our egg nearly 40 yards and catching it with such grace, it coulda been a baby's head.

August 11 SCHEDULE OF EVENTS

Pancake Breakfast 6:30 am
Crafts and Food Booths All Day
Softball Tournament All Day
Mountain Bike Race 9:45 am
Parade 10 am
Galloping Goose Rides 11 to 3 pm -on the hour
Chain Saw contest 11 am
Stomp Rockets 11:30 am
Water Balloon Toss 11:45 am
Arm Wrestling 1:00 pm
Penny Hunt 1:30 pm
Egg Toss 2:00 pm
Watermelon eating contest 2:30 pm
Water Fight 3:00 pm
Duck Race 3:30 pm

Esposito Hitchhiker

Just outside of Telluride, past the Conoco on 46, we saw a young man trekking the lengthy incline south and slowed to let him enter our Elantra world of Blackalicious. Elantra saved his footsteps 42 miles and he was quite pleasant to have in the hatch; he gave us some local knowledge and hope for grandmothers everywhere! (he was hitchhiking down to Mancos to visit his dear G'ma)

Surprisingly, I did not inquire the fellow about his name. Christoph pointed out to me that I am nearly annoyingly interested in names. Every story he told, my first response would be about labeling lineages - everything from pets to parents, I required a full signature. This helps me capture an image of the characters involved in a story. It is an act of engagement to me; I want to store the memory, so I need details.

One of my favorites things about my morning co-worker is his method of recounting individuals from his past with full names. Isaac Coudorea, Maggie Nelson, Chelsea VanMach, Tapanga Lawerence... He even sneezes with a name: Abignali! I think names interest me so much because they are all so different and surprising. Learning new appellations is adding words to my vocabulary. It is even fun to hear a story about a person with the exact same name of someone I already know; the unknown leaned up against something familiar tickles me.

Words, letter combinations, sounds and memory sparks are all very enlivening to me. Language, in any form, brings me to life. "Rösti" are Swiss (*) hashbrowns. "Giggerig" is loosely translated from Swiss German to Love Crazy in English. "Jein" is German slang for "Yes/No"

Maybe I am crazy but I love burnt hashbrowns! Jein me giggerig, mais me gusto Rösti Brûlé!






Pictured above are (left to right) Pygmy and Steggy

Green Chile Cheese Boar

After stabbing my purlicue with swiss army bottle opener, we began our ascent up a rocky switchback toward Telluride's gorgeous waterfalls. When Elantra wouldn't make it up where the big boys could go (jeeps) we parked under some nice rock coverage and trekked the rest. No more words needed here.











Surreptitious Tent Pitching



Upon the entrance of Telluride, Colorado, we were stopped for about 45 minutes. We thought for a moment there might be a quota on the town. An Audi full of rowdy women occupied our front view; they were shaking their blow-up doll man out the sunroof, waving to the construction workers. Lewis Black kept us company over the mp3 player.



Due to our unexpected delay, we arrived at the free campsite after dark to see that it was apparently FULL. Persistent travelers do not give up because of signs. We kept our cat-eyes out for an open parking spot and/or patch of dirt to erect the tent. When we finally found the perfect open space, neighbors of it came up and tried to pop our bubble: "Three people have already tried that and have been booted." Christoph kindly asked them what would be the best maneuvering we could pull so as not to be the fourth. Our new neighbors, Dave and Andy, lent us their lantern to pitch the tent as far back behind as many trees as possible. Within ten minutes, we were all set up and on our way to free illegal camping. Christoph told me to grab all my stuff and put it in the tent, and I told him I had it all. He was baffled that I had packed a Polaroid camera, two squirt guns and even a plastic lizard but failed to pack camping gear. Thankfully, he lent me a sweater and we decided not to worry about it until after we got back from town.

Fly Me to the Moon Saloon was just opening up and allowed us to check out the band before committing with a cover charge. We hopped on the foosball table and I killed him thrice. To pet his ego a little bit, I allowed him to beat me in pool a few times at The Sheridan down the street.





The walk back the tent was feasible; though we'd shared a few pitchers, we had flashlights to navigate the way. Besides, every star in the sky was shining down - every star. Had I not been so tired from the trip, I would have sat in a swing and watched for meteors.

Learn Parallax

n. An apparent change in the direction of an object, caused by a change in observational position that provides a new line of sight.

A quarry ran alongside us to the right. I mentioned Garden State and how I'd always wanted to stand along the cliff of a deep pit. He promptly took the next side road and we sifted through sammiches to find the least soggy of them all: Ostrich.
-would you like buffalo or ostrich?


After a brief hike toward the edge, with locust-looking grasshoppers bounding alongside my stride, I concluded that the hike would be too long and it would be better to just soak it in from afar. So I cracked a Karma and he joined me on a weather-worn rock to look over the horizon of the drop-off. Silence and vast skies.





Back at the car, I mentioned how my last lengthy roadtrip had been with David and how he told me I was a terrible photographer on the banks of Coney Island. Christoph briefly introduced me to the basics of photography. Here are a few of my attempts at implementing my new knowledge:







Notice the perfection of shadow inclusion!

Lost Already

Navigator deficiencies.



Shouldn't you be watching the road?

How to Purchase a Styrofoam Cooler with a Stranger

Though set to depart at eight o'clock a.m., he said he'd wait a few hours for the company and free sandwiches. Though we'd shared a short discussion in a dark front yard, a passport scan on a stoop in front of sushi and a mutual love for adventure, we were still technically strangers. Though we thought a twelve inch styrofoam cooler would suffice for an Ostrich, Buffalo, Boar and Turkey sandwich, we were wrong. Off we were, southwest-ish toward Tucson...

Thursday, August 02, 2007

Visits schmisits!

Jackie came to visit for a week and we began by hanging out with the dagster.



She likes to write, too.



She loves Jackie cause she looks like me :)


Jackie lived the Naropian life for one day which consisted of biking to class, eating Steak Quesadillas and drinking Margs at Rincon del Sol during a one hour break, then watching pretentious writers/artists (in this case film-maker) use their lecture time as an excuse to make people watch her films (which were actually pretty kickass) and then going to Dolan's for a whiskey during the next one hour break. The whole Summer Writing Program ended at Catacombs, a dive bar beneath the Hotel Boulderado. We sat at a table and wrote for a few minutes then rode our bikes home. So tired.



The same deer comes every day to visit our backyard and eat our weeds. Jackie, Pete and I whistled sweet songs to her as she munched on our wild, unwanted plants.



Hiked Sanitas...






And unfortunately, I'm not much of a paparazzo, so those are basically the only Colorado photos we gots.

Onto Syracuse! Trenton Waterfalls!



x RESTRICTED AREA x


You take the secret trail scattered with NO TRESPASSING signs...


WEE!


getting closer...


And Along the Way...

this is eddy's flower- he left it behind but I kept it.


Please save this to your desktop.




Mushroom ears!


We made it!!!


dancin on the edge


Jackie and camo rock



Much bigger than they look -


Smiles because this is one of the reasons I come home...



"Oh look at the pretty red leaves!"


They're red for a reason:


See how the mossy elephant has poison ivy eyes? Yeah, so did I, after unknowingly playing with the poison ivy. And poison ivy ears- itchy ears are no fun.




To finish off the wonderful waterfalls adventure, we made a friend with an inch worm in Jen's car. Inchy!