the post without a name

coffee and cigarettes, that's what i'm watching. neither of them a habit of mine. coffee, that stains the teeth and fouls the breath. cigarettes, the same but worse. though i'm a person who is more at ease when i've got something with which to seem occupied. in fact, i'd make a perfect smoker. in fact, i could stand a cigarette right now. i'm sort of edgy. it's the sleeping pills. this is the third night in a row, and they give a kick before they put the hammer to my temple. i'm in the kick part. all kind of jagged. there was a girl, she taught me about the devil's hit. or the double hit. i was never sure what it was called. what it is, she would drag off the cigarette and then put her mouth on yours and blow it in. this was sort of a kiss. we kissed a lot this way, pretending it wasn't really kissing. probably i got a little bit of cancer off her. J. that was her name. but with more letters. what other stuff we did, we couldn't excuse with smoke. she was not a bad sort. she was dating a man from poland or some place like that. he was a writer i've never read, or heard of except for from her. she told me the story of how he came home one day with a grant check from the NEA, proud, inspired, someone had found him worthy. she told me that and blew cigarette smoke into my lungs. lightness into my head. that was a long time ago. i think it was NEA. it was one of those thirty thousand dollar things. i'd like that. that's not going to happen to me. i have a reading on monday. what i need, i'm serious, take me seriously, a valium. how easily can i get that? do one of you have an extra? i'd give you ten bucks if you'd send it to me. is that illegal to ask? probably illegal to do. i've never had a valium. readings, it's like nothing else. not like teaching. i like teaching. readings, i'm not sure i like them. i used to think so but not so much anymore. i'd rather stand in the proper light and make muscles. no, i guess when it comes down to it, the idea of that sort of bothers me too. i guess i'd rather be accidentally witnessed. wouldn't you? this film, it's not bad. very short pieces, semi sharp, the one with iggy pop and tom waites the best so far. tom waites, they played one of his songs in the movie i went to today. robots. that sucked. ask my son. i don't go to the movies anymore. i don't like being with all those people. especially if they eat. especially if they eat popcorn. i used to tend to move around in the movies a lot. this speaks a lot about my inability to really be with people. ask any girl whose not with me and thinks its her idea and she'll tell you that we're not together because i couldn't sit still in the movie theatre. she'll say, he couldn't be around people he was always moving away. people made him under easy. that's what that girl would say. there was a time when i went to all of them, all the movies. the summer before i went for my master's in screenwriting, i thought my life was going to be about movies. so i saw everything. even dennis the menace. god, what the parents must have thought about me. the little girls, they sat behind me bouncing popcorn off the back of my head. but that was a long time ago and now i refuse the theatre. unless my son wants to go. since returning to the country almost three years ago, i've taken him to two movies and seen one other. this was a date. i must have really be trying to convince myself and that girl that i liked her. i know what the problem with this writing is. it's too blocky. this will cause you to skim. all the words jammed together. you look for something of interest. most certainly you are not fully with me. right now, i feel more close to you than normal. isn't that odd? and common. that lack of balance. are you going to give me a valium? that's care. one time, i was working at CBS, the price is right, and a woman, she gave me a pill. she was young and she said i seemed stressed. i liked that she was brave enough to offer a pill to a stranger. especially one in a position that seemed to be of authority. i don't know why i ate it, but i did. it didn't do anything to me. or nothing that i could tell. those were the days. that's a lie. there never have been days. today, today is the day. that's what you'll tell yourself tomorrow. yesterday, all my troubles seemed so far away. ask most anybody who knows me and they'll tell you that i'm always singing beatles songs. if you don't know this about me, then you don't knowknow me. you know? i remember, graduation party for high school. we had this teacher, mr p, good guy. what he did, he introd us to poetry by starting with songs. sounds of silence. white rabbitt. american pie. we'd analyze those and then move on to poetry poetry. you know, ee cummings. buffal bills defucnt/used to ride a silver smooth stallion/and shoot clay pigeons/onetwothree juslikethat/god he was a handsome man/and what i want to know/is how do you like your blue eyed boy mr death? anyway, he gave us elanor rigby, mr p did. we were all of us drunk at the graduation party singing it, teaching it to an underclassmen who walked around all night drunk and singing it and crying. there was a fire and i burned my platstic gown. those were the days. ask elanor rigby. this reading, monday. christ. what is writing? like everything else, an act of seduction. god, i've gotten lazy about these things. as if people will just fall at your feet. robots, by the way, was souless. even a little kid can see that. especially a little kid can see that. watching my son at karate, i remember how i never learned what people tried to teach me. i learned everything only as i wanted to. i've been a terrible student of everything. even wrestling, i never had the basic moves. i was good, too. third in the state, a wrestling state, but i couldn't do the most basic take down. with me, it had to be other things. other ways. as if people will just roll onto their backs. these colorado days, these colorado nights, they're almost over. what is writing? it is really talking to hear your own voice. only you've got an excuse. you imagine an audience so you're not crazy. not even that vain. is that the right spelling? about that valium, hate to return to it, but it is the one thing that links all this. it is the one thing that acknoweldges you completely. honestly. jarmusch, he lights people properly. do you know how interesting looking you can be? god, with the right camera person, with the right lighting person, you could be something to behold. you know that, right? i'm not talking just about beauty. that might be part of it. but you know, other things can make one interesting. there is no way to end this. where do you think you get the faces of strangers in your dreams. this is important. are they just faces you don't remember remembering or have created them entirely. how close to god do you think you are? do you want to be? answer me, would you? any question here. any stated or implied question. but not later. answer me, you know, now. i would like to read someone else's work. i'd like to fold orgami. is that the right spelling? i'd rather be a dancer or a goalie. in hockey, i mean. there is no way to end this. something abrupt is going to happen. so it goes. i guess most people either feel they are not watched at all, which is not true, no such thing as the invisible, or they feel that they are more watched than they actually are. what would you rather be, if you had to be one or the other, if you COULD be one or the other--absolutely invisible (ok, the absolutely part is redunant, as if there are degrees of invisibility) or fully witnessed? you want your fifteen minutes, but only if you can shape them. do you want people to watch you treating your girlfriend like hell? faking an orgasm? drinking out of the carton? plucking your eyebrows? shrinking in front of your doctor? getting petty over something stupid? scratching? putting on a bandage? oh, no. suck in your stomach, stick out your chin. strike a pose. even the ugly things you talk about, make them virtues. the way if you call yourself a bitch, it implies something good about you. here, do this. make a list of the truly awful stuff about yourself and post them in the comment section. go on, get naked. i dare you. cheap trick, by the way, daring. childrens' games. all this goading. i really like you right now.