SolitarySnail.com

The Return

Blagging

I'm back from vacation and socializing. I'm done with that. Forever. Maybe.

Time to get back to work!

Silver Repetition

Paperscraps

When I think of repetitive things in the world, I remember being a child on a see-saw titling up and down. I see a white mouse running in a silver wheel. I look at the moon twirling 'round and 'round the Earth. I realize my eyes are blinking. Now. Again. Again.

The Gift of Sun

Paperscraps

It's the sun in my hands. You can see the light glowing between my fingers, can't you? I can't let you look because it would hurt you if I did, and that's not what I want to do with the sun. I honestly don't know why I have it. I have no idea if there is even anything important I need to ever do with it. I just have it, and I can use it. But I don't because I only want to use something so beautiful and wonderful and brilliant for something that would help the world, to use it to do something good, but I have nothing good to do. Even with an object as wonderful as this, there is nothing to do to really help this world.

Living with Time

Paperscraps

I hold out my arm and stare at the bone. It shines spotless, white, cleaner than I thought it would be, parked among the red coral reef. The skin falls away, unravels from both hands and arms. The flesh, muscle, veins, arteries, fat, and everything else inside piles on the ground. My bones are all exposed now. But I don't feel as if I ever had any flesh at all that was lost. It feels the same as it did before, even though I know it didn't. Automatic amnesia. And now the bones were always a soft gray, and now the flesh is back, and it has never changed. But yesterday I would have disagreed.

Someday maybe the bones will be bleached clean and I'll remember again how it feels to be pristine, the way I forget my teeth used to be whiter before the coffee and tea stains, after the dentist scrubs them back to their original state, sands off the grime of years of living and chewing. And again I will be afraid to wrap my hands around the mug when these teeth feel so smooth and pure until I forget and take a sip when I'm not looking. And then gray teeth that were always gray, and it seems to make no difference.

Paperscraps

My foot relaxes on the pedal. My car is drifting across a black tar ocean. It floats by the buoys of bobbing streetlights and passing sharks of other cars. My vehicle is a piece of driftwood rocking on the sea, rocking me to sleep. The wheel has lost my grip and takes my gentle forehead in its stead. A current comes too strong and we tumble together under the waves, bubbling down, down into black depths. Before I sleep I see the twinkling lights of blue; flickering fish that swish their tails at me as I come rest on the ocean floor, and I feel my hair rise out in the water like a field of seaweed.

Enlightenment

Paperscraps

Some days are more vegetative than others. You just want to lie back and let the algae grow until the snails crawl along to eat it. Close your eyes and let the clouds align themselves until the rain will fall just right to fill your glass to the brim. And if you're lucky, the water will spill over and your eyes will open and you'll see the snail scraping the algae slowly with their radulas.

But other days the sky will be too empty to bring anything but drought. And the algae will shrivel and the snails will hide away, and you'll open your eyes and only see your skin with its tiny, vellus hairs and the flakes being baked by the sun.

Sincerely, Stalker VI

Paperscraps

Dear Cotton-Picker:

Your cat threw up all over the living room floor and then crawled through it. (You've never told me her name, by the way, so I've started calling her Scratches.) I cleaned it up and gave Scratches a bath. She needed it anyway.

Oh, and your Mom called. She said she'll call back later tonight around 7 o'clock. She wants to know why you've never told her about me before. Funny that? Why haven't you?

Sincerely,

Snicker-Snack

Capitalizing It

Notices

Yes, I just put two ad boxes on the site, but only because Project Wonderful looks awesome and all my favorite webcomics use it.

Basically, if I make any money, it will just go to me advertising on other sides. In short, this seems sort of like a capitalist banner exchanger in which people earn credits which they can use to advertise in return rather than the traditional communist type with everybody joining a rotating banner exchange or something.

For now, I just have two tiny boxes because it fits the layout. The same ads show up on every page. The ads aren't animated, noisy, or Flashy, which means they shouldn't get in the way. Usually I like the sites that advertise through Project Wonderful because they're smaller and more homemade, so maybe we'll see something awesome show up in a week or two. I personally click the links that show up through Project Wonderful advertising and find awesome things all the time, which is the main reason I put these squares on my site.

For now, there are no restrictions or filters on who can advertise here. I'm not very picky or censory. I may cut out sites if they put pictures of nipples or something that I would get tired of staring at, but I doubt that's going to happen. The only other reason I'd really ban a site from advertising is if it were something unethical, but I have a feeling scam artists don't get approved by Project Wonderful very often.

Comatose Brain

Paperscraps

I don't remember the day that my brain began to die. It's as though over time, with weighty eyelids, it slowly slipped into a coma and iced over after all those still years. As the weights lifted off my brain, instead of being relieved it began to slow. The mind doesn't shrink with disuse, it just stops moving. It still fills the skull as much as it ever did with still jelly. I tried to revive it, wave a whiff of scent beneath its nose to spark a reaction, but all sensations had been cut years ago, little climbers on the side of the mountain, safety ropes snapping as they drop, reaching out uselessly, falling to their own eternities, while the mountain top, cold and numb, doesn't even shift a bit of its dead weight to notice what should have been a dramatic event.

My Masterpiece

Paperscraps

My greatest masterpiece is not my long and tired book written lastly in my life. It is the youthful story I created when, naive, I thought that I could write. What I did was magic, not writing. I made something that was thoroughly enjoyable to write and hopefully to read. Those characters are the most vibrant, dimensional people I have ever made. Their personalities became so expansive that they no longer fit inside my mind but rather sat beside me and looked over my shoulder as I typed their stories, pointing fingers and making objections and corrections and suggestions and jokes with one another. Their lives are so full that I could not properly document it all or do it the least bit of justice in one lifetime.

When I die, I won't be so sad to see myself go as I will to see them die with me. They are so rounded out as people now that the thin pages of their books hardly qualify as holding their vitality. The pages are brushed with the mere imprints of their characters, their stories are but their ghosts. The book covers are their graves, with the stone etched, titles their epitaphs. There they lie, and may their ghosts haunt the hands of the living for centuries to come. They would enjoy nothing more than, if they can not live forever, to lurk behind a bookshelf and when an unsuspecting reader becomes engrossed to leap out over their shoulder and frighten the daylights out of them.

Sincerely, Stalker V

Paperscraps

Dear Flagstring:

Today I found your stash of porn mags. Not cool. We're going to have a chat next time I see you.

I threw them all away, except for the Victoria's Secret catalogue. I circled a little item you can get me as a Christmas gift. Hint-hint.

Sincerely,

Baroque

Popcorn Yarn

Paperscraps

Once upon a time there was a piece of popcorn that wanted to be a ball of yarn. So it decomposed in the earth until its nutrients were taken in by a plant, which was eaten by a sheep, and the popcorn grew as wool on the sheep's body until it was sheered and spun into yarn.

Whether or not that actually happened, at least ~I~ can say I spun a piece of popcorn into a yarn.

Retribution

Paperscraps

Someday I'm going to have to pay for what I've done to my characters. I know they watch me. They lurk behind the reflection in glass and bubble in the bottom of my drinks. They play cards in the shadows in my room while I sleep and ride clouds when I walk in fields. When I die they're going to surround me and demand retribution, or at least a reason why, why did I run their personalities ragged, end stories without epilogues, rewrite their lives until even they did not know what was reality, why must they suffer death and misery at my hands, all because I could not keep my brain from imagining dark paths late at night, sleeping shallowly, always thinking the worst.

And what will I say? That I giveth and taketh, to be thankful that they exist at all? Will I say that they made themselves, made their own ends, not I? How could I try to shift the blame or give no response at all, or say the truth, that I don't know, when their faces are not murderous but soft and weary like my own?

The Deer's Flight

Paperscraps

Sometimes a deer leaps like it was never meant to be on Earth. It floats, hooves motionless above the ground, as naturally as it walks. Scooping liquid from one end of the pond and bringing the water to my lips, I watched the deer bend forward and drink from the opposite end. The ripples made from its mouth spread out like a ghostly hand towards my end of the pool. Its black eyes watched me as its tongue lapped the water. It stayed only a moment before it flew away. Watching it leap and disappear, I felt a lightness in my chest, but when I tried to jump, I sprang only a few paces before hitting the ground solidly with both my feet.

The Experiment Lives Yet!

Blagging

I can't believe I missed so many days, but I hope the "Sincerely, Stalker"s will redeem me. Of course, I'm not looking to YOU for redemption but myself because I will always be the person most disappointed with myself for missing an update, let alone so many in a row.

But, yeah, this series may or may not continue. We'll see how long it takes before the jokes are all worn out... for me. I wrote them all pretty much in three-minute shots and will never spend much more time on writing them, so don't expect great literature from these letters. But I have learned that the faster I write, the better I am at being random. I'm also apparently really random if I'm drunk, but only if I'm REALLY drunk. (Hint: I was seriously drunk when I smashed "Let It Fly" on the keyboard. I won't pretend it makes sense, but the freaky part is that I didn't even realize I was rhyming at the time.)

Hmm, apparently my most random short pieces all clock three minutes. I shall call them Three-Minute Marathons from now on! That's probably what Paper Scraps SHOULD have been all about, but I'll have to settle for mixing in longer pieces and well thought-out shorts.

At least, tonight, I can say the experiment hasn't died yet. It moves forward more randomly and speedily than ever!

Sincerely, Stalker IV

Paperscraps

Dear Moonshine:

I don't know why you changed the locks on your door. It took me forever to climb the stormdrain and pry open that window. You may need to replace the locks on that window, by the way. I broke them getting inside, and I'm sure you don't want to leave a front window unlocked all the time. Who knows what kind of burglars and crazy people would try to sneak in while you're asleep!

Sincerely,

Toast

Sincerely, Stalker III

Paperscraps

Dear Newspaper:

I just want to say I'm sorry for eating all that leftover meatloaf. Were you saving it? I didn't think about it until after I'd already heated it up, and you know how that stuff isn't any good reheated twice, right? I would have asked probably if you were home during the day when I pull your spare key out of that fake rock and unlock your door.

Anyway, I'll bring you something nice tomorrow to replace it. And don't worry about me losing your spare key. I've already made myself a copy.

Sincerely,

Gadfly

Sincerely, Stalker II

Paperscraps

Dear Mr. Diary:

Today I went into your house and found a girl's purse on your couch. It wasn't mine, and I have no idea where it came from. What is this? Are you cheating on me?

I checked the girl's driver's license and paid her a visit. She didn't answer the door, so I left a message tied to a rock through her window, asking her to please call me when she gets home.

Later I went down to the river for a walk. It's nice and peaceful there; I can really clear my mind. It's a small river, but pretty nonetheless. I wish you could join me someday for a walk there. We'll have to make a date.

Sincerely,

Lampshade

Sincerely, Stalker

Paperscraps

Dear Mr. Raven:

It has come to my attention that you have not returned my calls in over a month. I know you are there, I can see you, but you check the caller ID and throw your phone down on your bed with blue sheets each time. If you continue to ignore my calls, I will be forced to leave a rhinoceros beetle between those blue sheets the next time I break into your house.

Sincerely,

Snorkel

I Make

Paperscraps

My name is not a noun, it is a verb. I am an action. I am in motion. I am doing something. I don't just exist, I create. I am not the result, I am the cause. I am not a sculpture to be carved, I am not a knife to be used, I am the scraping of the blade, the swinging of the wrist. I am the song as it comes into being, not the notes suspended in the air or the piano keys pressed beneath the fingers.

The Flaking

Paperscraps

The make-up washes off. It always comes off. If you don't take it off, you will shed it.

You can't hide forever.

A painted statue flakes over centuries, leaving solid stone. A painting reveals beneath it a canvas, bare wood. There is no picture there but the oblong grains in the wood. Our world dissolves to bare nothing.

Crawfish Races

Paperscraps

He carried the live crawfish in the same white-and-red-checkered french-fry holder as the boiled, bright red crawfish. These live ones had dark red shells and claws, blood red highlights. He handed one to each child and the race began. The children yelled and screamed, banging their hands on the table, trying to urge their crawfish to the center. The normally aqueous crawfish floundered under the hot sun, rolled over on their backs. Half of them tried to scramble off the table, make their way to the big, bright, cool pond only yards away. The children's arms banged on the table like a coliseum audience, shook the surface, rocked the confused animals. The ones on their backs rocked back and forth with the shaking. Slightly disgusted at having to touch the crayfish, the children quickly snatched the fallen by a leg or part of the shell and flung them right-side-up on the table. Finally a few startled crawfish rushed forward, away from the smashing arms, and the race ended. The crawfish were all gathered up into the food container again. The man squirted water over them like ketchup as the victorious children screamed and threw their arms in the air, running to the prize table to claim their reward.

The Dream Log

Paperscraps

When I wake in the morning, my dreams escape. I open my eyes and find my bedroom door flung wide, rocking on its hinges. So one night I locked the door and went to bed. I chased my dreams all night, and they danced away from me, mocking and making faces, the little demons, thinking that they would evade me quite easily in the morning. But then I opened my eyes and they tumbled against the trap, all piled against the unopenable door like a trainwreck.

I got out of bed slowly and walked to the door. All around the doorway the dreams had shrunk and in the daylight turned to objects: a chair, a pen, a book whose words told the stories I had encountered that night. I sat in the chair and flipped through the pages, recalling all my fantasies good and bad, and where the words were fuzzy and faded with age I took the pen and revised them in fresh ink.

Catch a Hummingbird

Paperscraps

If you've ever caught a hummingbird, you'll know that its feathers are like tiny jewels woven together and that the bird peeps. And if you've never caught a hummingbird, and you walk onto your porch one morning and find that the last one flew away years ago, you may wonder why you didn't take care long ago to notice that fewer and fewer arrived each spring. When you go into your garden and find a few of the flowers have disappeared, you may not wonder what sort of things may be gone tomorrow. Instead, you'll think that it's good we have photographs and a few locked in zoos. But you will never know that hummingbirds peep.

The Scar

Paperscraps

A scar is nothing to overlook. It says not that you need to be more careful, less clumsy, more cautious. It is not the banner of a victim. It does not linger as a reminder of your mistakes. It is not a testament of your experience. It is not there to say that we cannot live without pain, that everything we pass in this world touches us and marks us forever.

It is a sign that you can heal, that your body isn't ready to stop yet, even though you want to sit around and stare at your skin all day.

Offbeat

Paperscraps

My heartbeat is irregular because it's dancing. More than a metronome, it beats its own rhythm in 6/8. You'll never see me sitting melancholy because my heart is always laughing to a circulatory song. And when it wears out all the faster, like a pair of running shoes, and I crumble on the floor in my thirties and listen to the sole split, I'll still feel the rush of running and think it was better to use them to shreds than never step and never scuff the bottoms of my heels.

Scope

Paperscraps

The flower design on her shirt looked rather like a target through the scope of his rifle. That was why her boyfriend bought it for her.

Amphibean

Paperscraps

It began as a single cell. Then it was just a blob, a circle, floating in the water. A transparent balloon with a black center. A single eye floating in the sea.

Then it began to grow body parts. A little head and tail emerged. A tiny fish, it wriggled and swam around the pool. Little eyes bulged out of its green body. Its gills fluttered in the slimy murk.

That's when the legs began to appear. At first they were stubs, but soon the tadling could wave them about and use them for propulsion. The tail began to disappear, a bit more each day, as though it were being sucked into its quickly plumpening body.

Then one day the gills were gone, and the animal had lungs. It crawled onto the shore. It came out of the water.

And there it looked around warily a moment at the sky and trees before it took a mighty hop.

I came back to the pond every day to watch this creature develop, like a masterpiece painting in progress, watched its appearance alter before my eyes without changing its DNA, and wondered if I, too, had once hopped out of a pond much bigger than myself, somewhere long ago.

Penguin Sympathy

Paperscraps

It was a shower of photographs when I turned over the bucket. The ice cubes caught reflections of the light and danced away clouds, trees, the faces of him and me. We knelt on the ground in our little-kids' overalls and set our little toy penguins on the Antarctic ice. But their world was quickly melting in the July sun, and soon they lay on the ground, parched, their little beaks gasping for water.

That's when he took a thumb-sized little gun-shaped twig and said that you had to shoot animals to put them out of their misery. He handed one to me, and he began to point his at the toys and say, "Pshwhh! Pshwhh!" I leveled my gun with one little penguin. His bleak, white plastic eye with the crooked, off-focus black paint dot told me he was already dead from the drought anyway as I leveled the scope, said, "Pshwhh!", and watched his little body roll and crumple as a cloud of feathers flew up in the air.

Let It Fly

Paperscraps

When cantaloupes are flying across sunset boulevards. And tanktops are all dancing down insets for the cards. We'll walk along the placid lakes and bourbon riversides. And eek the crawl about the road that gunshot never stride. We'll taste the rumble of the hills as planets move in alignment. And when they shift we'll argue if they ever drift or not. But when the capital letters fall and gerrymanders yawn, we'll sink into a deep, deep sleep and hibernate the moon.

The New Office

Paperscraps

The office dwellers lived in their cubes from 8 a.m. to 5 p.m. The workspace was, when the company gave it to them, a barren tundra of gray-walled cubicles and white ceilings with all those tiny little dots that you could count as you leaned backwards in your rolly office chair. When the new company opened its new building and the lot of new employees were presented the new floor with the sweep of the lead manager's arm, they all stood with their purses and briefcases and cups of coffee in hand and observed the meaning of a gray sea under a cloudy sky.

Slowly, cautiously, like a herd of domesticated animals introduced to a new stable and pasture, the employees began poking their noses around, snuffling the desks and chairs, pressing against the fence-- rather, the windows on either side of the floor, looking out at the small city buildings and streets.

The next day they brought in decorations. Everybody spent the morning plastering their cubical walls with posters, calendars, artwork, brightly-colored Internet print-outs, photographs, crude sketches made by children, and sometimes just colorful paper or trimming. They repainted the main walls around the floor that afternoon. Each wall a different bright color: red at the entrance, blue on the north window side, yellow on the doors with the managers' offices and restrooms, and green on the south window side. They covered the ceiling with posters of movies and famous paintings until it was an impossibly disorganized collage.

The floor was still pieced together out of the kind of boring squares that always get scuffed up eventually. The employees brought in throw-rugs and decorated their sections where the chairs didn't need to roll.

[This is a fragment, an opening for a story that needs to be finished.]

Ammunition

Paperscraps

The moth was made when the Wind decided it wanted to build a weapon. So it strapped to fan-shaped leaves together with some twine and blew it towards the Fire. These little aeroplanes then fed the Fire, and soon the smoke rose and the Wind carried it away. It pushed it towards a human who was smothered and stiffly laid in the Earth. And so the Wind fed the Earth, and the Water in the body was released and trickled to freedom. The Wind picked up this Water and made it fly. The weapon was created here, where the Water turned to hail and broke the glass window that had been keeping the Wind out all along. But you have already been lain in the Earth and the Wind never got what it wanted anyway.

My Hands

Paperscraps

Harken to the quill, which once did fly, But now upon the table does it lie, And in the hand of motion makes truth shone, Or, in the mischief hand, does as it would alone. A stick of charcoal or a graphite stick Does much to give my hand a steady tick As, as a seismograph, it reads the shift Of turning plots instead of mantle drift. Look upon the fountain as my hands engage A river that loops and curls around the page Is made by a paddle that holds the river whole And spits it out where'er it wants to go. But now my fingers simply push a little ways To travel what before had taken days. My hands are now the breathing of my mind As it conducts its words from one cell to another kind. For now my fingers brittle and joints which crack Must be worn down and frayed like horse's tack. And someday, when we can place a chip in ear And with the slightest hint of thought we steer, And to tell a tale my mind bypasses wire, Although my hands will know they must retire, They will wiggle and twitch and curl just ever so, As though invisible words from their tips yet flow.

Tina and the Ten-Dollar Bill

Paperscraps

Tina had never been in love before. She was all of seventeen but yet to find a person whom she wanted to date.

Her friends sought to remedy this situation. Having exhausted the list of boys in their school and neighborhood, they decided to go downtown one night and sneak into a club where underagers usually slipped away from the world to drink, dance, and socialize. Teenagers from all over the city gathered here to make pairs, and surely Tina would meet someone new.

Tina and her friends, Maria and Ellen, put on their most flattering clothes, fixed each other's hair and make-up, donned jewelry, and slipped on their finest high-heels. Tina herself put on a beautiful green top with matching shoes to flatter her auburn hair. Ellen dressed in blue, and Maria draped herself in pink.

The three caught a bus downtown and began the long walk to the secret club. The walk from the bus stop to the building was several blocks of dark, somewhat sketchy alleys. Only out here could a teenager find refuge and a drink from the mundane world of parents and laws.

Along their walk they passed by several strange people leaning against buildings, but they only watched the girls pass by. But one woman, dirty and dressed in ragged clothes, stepped in front of them and asked, "Please, if you have a little money to spare..."

Maria and Ellen shied away and walked on. Tina hesitated a moment, the old, limping woman blocking her path, but staring at the poor woman's face she realized the person had probably been thrown out of a nursing home. Tina's face suddenly grew hot about the expensive clothes she wore and the rags this woman carried. Without much consideration, she pulled out a crisp, ten-dollar bill she had planned to spend at the club and handed it over.

The woman clutched the money tightly, then grabbed Tina's shoulder with her dirty, bony fingers and whispered, "I know what you're looking for, but you won't find it unless you only accept a drink which fizzes and a light to carry you through the dark, and when you dance you must face your partner and keep your eyes in his locked in his gaze. If you cannot do these things, take care that tonight you do not let your friends lead you elsewhere except the bus stop and home. I may not be here to help you when you make your way back."

The woman disappeared. Maria and Ellen were calling Tina to hurry up. Tina couldn't see which alley had engulfed the woman with its darkness, and she cautiously continued her journey with her friends.

Before they entered the club the music was already pounding in their ears. Inside the place was mostly dark but blazingly lit in the center where mobs of people danced. The girls made their way around the dancing crowd, past all the wall-hangers, to the back where the bar was filled with people. The girls took in the scene. Tina watched drinks passing around, exchanging hands, thinking about what the old woman had told her.

It wasn't long before they met several guys. One of them tried to dance with Tina, but she noticed that most of the couples were dancing with the girl's back to the boy. Worried about the woman's warning, Tina tried to spin around to watch her partner's eyes, but he spun around to keep behind her. After an annoying trial, Tina edged her way out of the dancing crowd towards the bar.

A group of drunk friends, out on their first night, giggled and swirled on the stools. They saw Tina and decided to pull her into the circle, swearing they had seen her before. Several of them offered Tina a sip of their drinks, but Tina passed them all. The drinks were all flat and not what the woman had warned her to drink. Flustered and annoyed, Tina couldn't bring herself to break from that warning.

As she leaned against the bar, a boy slipped beside her and tried to start a conversation. The music was so loud that they couldn't hear each other well, but then the boy shouted something to the bartender and offered Tina a fizzy gin. She stared down into the cup for a moment. The boy stood there hopefully, and she took the drink in her hand and smiled at him.

After drinking a little and giving up hope of talking over the music, the boy pulled Tina to the dance floor. Tina kept a grip on his hands, arms, shoulders, so he couldn't pull away and dance behind her back, but after a while she realized he wasn't going to dance that way anyway. She kept her eyes on his and they danced together to the never-ending stream of heavy beats.

Tina felt the night was going well. She was dancing with someone and kept her eyes locked with his, had taken the fizzy drink, and she began to feel a great weight lift from her chest and head. She thought to herself that, even if this wasn't love, this was someone she could get along with, if only they could get to a quieter place and talk. They couldn't even hear well enough to exchange names.

The night music moved into a slower song, the DJ announcing a romantic dance request. Tina and the boy interlocked arms to dance. They might have heard each other speak over the music now, but they had no need to say anything right now. Almost over, Tina thought to herself as the music slowed, and then I can take my eyes away when we step off the dance floor. This should work like a charm.

But then Tina heard Maria and Ellen shout her name. Without realizing what she was doing, her eyes shifted from the boy's, across the floor, to see her friends calling her from the side. Tina's breath broke when she realized she had spoiled the whole plan.

"Tina!" her friends rushed to the floor, each with an arm wrapped around a boy, "We're ready to leave! How about you and him?"

Tina looked back at the boy. He still smiled, not realizing like Tina what was going to go wrong. Tina let herself be lead out of the club with her friends. The boy followed her, and outside her friends told her they were all going to take a different bus out to one of the city parks. Tina stood numbly and thought hard. If she had only kept her eyes locked to the end of the song, but maybe it didn't matter? She had kept her eyes level with the boy's through many songs, maybe only the first song counted.

"I'll walk you to the bus stop," the boy offered.

So the six of them set off down the blocks. Maria and Ellen were rather tipsy, as were their dates, and Tina began to wonder if a trip to the park wouldn't be best after all to sober up before sneaking back home. She had kept her eyes locked with her partner's through the first song, and almost all the others, so it must have counted enough to make a trip to the park safe. She would just make sure they went straight home after the park.

As they walked down the blocks, Tina saw the old woman huddled in an alleyway, watching them pass. Her friends hurried her onward, not noticing the woman at all, and Tina watched the woman disappear over her shoulder. The boy watched the direction of Tina's gaze carefully.

At the bus stop, Tina piled on with her friends and her friends' dates, but the boy had to go back and take his friends home.

"I'll give you my number," he said, writing it down quickly on a slip of paper. Tina was swaying a bit from the drink and didn't have the presence of mind to give him her cell number or even name. She got on the bus and watched him out the window as he stood at the stop, waving her away.

"We'll go to the park," Tina said to her friends, "but we'll go home after that."

They spent a long time at the park. Midnight has passed when they left the club, and it was one o'clock in the morning by now. Maria and Ellen were gibberish by now. They were sharing a flask their dates had carried with them, but Tina refused. As the hour passed, her eyes had lifted from a fog and now she was chilled with night air and worried about getting home soon. She was ready to drag her friends back by their hair when she checked her pocket and realized she had no more money for bus fare. She had accidentally spent the rest of her money at the bar buying drinks with the boy, whose name she still hadn't gotten. She stood stock-still and felt a large, liquid lead weight drop in her stomach. She thought of the ten she had slipped the old woman and began cursing herself until she was shouting out loud.

"Hey, heyhey!" Maria grabbed Tina's shoulder, "calm down! What's going on?"

"I don't have money for the bus!" Tina wanted to scream but kept her voice in her throat.

"Oh, no!" Ellen said.

"We only kept enough for our own fares!" Maria fretted, "but don't worry! We'll find a way back. Maybe-- maybe we'll think of something."

The girls and the two boys sat down by a big fountain. The water tinkled and sparkled in the light of the streetlamps. Tina curled her hands under her chin and contemplated her situation. Maria and Ellen chattered with each other and their dates, but as the conversation wore, an uneasiness grew among them, and tempers began to rise. The girls were arguing with their dates now, and everybody's voices rose to shouts in heated debate. Then suddenly one of the boys pushed Ellen, and then a fight broke out among all four of them. Punches, kicks, and yells went flying. Tina got pushed backwards into the fountain in the fray. She resurfaced, spluttering, and saw the four of them all running as a cop walked around one of the corners. Tina ducked back into the water and waited. She surfaced cautiously, peering over the water. The cop was gone. Her friends were gone. Their dates were gone. Tina climbed out of the fountain and stood on the edge, dripping wet, broke, and a long, long, long walk from home.

She pulled out her cell phone. It was waterlogged. The ink had run away on the slip of paper with the boy's number. She put both back into her pocket and began a long walk home.

She hugged her cold arms and shivered down the streets. She hadn't been able to find her friends anywhere in the park. She wondered how late it would be before she got home. She had to make it back before three if she wanted to sneak into her room. Anytime after that, her father would be sleeping lightly enough to hear her slip in the back door. She wished with all her might that she had never given any money to that old woman. She hadn't taken the advice anyway, and now she couldn't afford a bus ride home.

She saw a green car stop across the street from her. She cautiously watched it pause but decided to ignore it. She heard a car door open and slam and running feet. She looked up rather bitterly from her cold arms and saw the boy hurrying across the street to her.

"You!" she shouted, not knowing his name.

"What happened to you?" he asked. "I thought you were on the bus, or, well, not walking by yourself... dripping wet?"

"I had a little trouble," she explained, "and I spent all my bus fare."

"I'm so lucky I came this way!" the boy said. He waved the car on, and the driver waved back and drove down the street. "I was going back to the club, and I looked at this alley that you were watching so closely, and this old woman told me to hitchhike home and take a green car, and she..." and he laughed to himself a little before continuing, "she gave me some money and said it was for bus fare. I guess I'm lucky I saw you walking here." He pulled out a crisp, ten-dollar bill from his pocket and showed her.

Tina didn't explain anything that night. She could tell the story another day. She just collapsed into the boy's arms in a hug and started crying. They were both still a little drunk and not sure what was going on, but once Tina was done crying they laughed whatever was bothering them away and took the bus home with the rest of Tina's money.

Insomnia Casserole

Paperscraps

Ingredients:

A reason to be awake early the next morning (1)

A computer, video game, book, or compulsive activity (1, or more to season to taste)

Soda (22 oz.)

Snacks (3 cups, diced)

Parsley (fresh)

1. Decide to go to bed early.

2. Take out compulsive activity. Loose track of time.

3. Stop in the middle of the activity and realize how late it's getting. Take out soda and snacks.

4. Set a medium-sized saucepan to boil.

5. While boiling, lose complete track of time in the activity again. Pig out on that soda and snacks.

6. Realize you can't go to bed until the sugar wears off. Continue with that compulsive activity. Did you know compulsive activities work chemically in the same way as drug addictions?

7. Far too late, go to sleep, knowing you have three to four hours left. Proceed to toss and turn, grinding to a fine powder, as you worry about how little sleep you're getting.

Once you finally fall asleep only to wake up too shortly thereafter, garnish with fresh parsley. Serves one, even though it doesn't serve you well at all.

Mr. Havershter

Paperscraps

Mr. Havershter observed the populace walking on the streets down below his window. "Miss Violet, have I received Mr. Andrews' letter yet?"

A women with bushy black hair tied back tightly in a bun watched the old man carefully. ".... No, sir," she replied.

He grunted to himself. His rigid posture prevented him from leaning to get a better look, so he merely tipped his nose downwards to peer at the common people mingling about on the streets. Normally he didn't waste his breath sharing his business with his cleaning servant, but today he felt a particular need to vocalize his annoyance and she was the only person around.

"I've sent him three letters so far, Miss Violet, THREE. And he hasn't even answered to one? Did you talk to the postman like I requested?"

"... Yes, sir, I did," Miss Violet replied, rolling her eyes. Mr. Havershter hadn't moved from the window so he didn't see the face she made. "Maybe it will come tomorrow."

"Hrmph."

Miss Violet was yanking the used sheets off the bed when Mr. Havershter's daughter, Lydia, arrived.

Lydia smiled and nodded at Miss Violet, "Is he...?"

"Don't mind me," Miss Violet said, "I'm just finishing my rounds."

"Hello, Dad," Lydia said with a brilliant smile. Mr. Havershter didn't move a muscle.

Lydia glanced at Miss Violet cautiously, who sighed, yanked the pillow out of its pillowcase, and announced without enthusiasm, "Mr. Havershter, your daughter's here to see her."

"Let her in," Mr. Havershter said.

Lydia waited a moment, then walked up to her father. "Father! I'm here!"

Mr. Havershter turned from the window, his face expressionless. "Lydia, nice to see you. Have you come to tell me you've left that awful man?"

"No, Daddy," Lydia sighed, "Abe and I are still together."

"You know I didn't approve of this marriage. Especially after I'd already arranged to have you marry the young Jockens."

Lydia bit her tongue and smiled. "How are you feeling this week? Has Dr. Ferrin been treating you well?"

"He has me on all kinds of pills and powders," Mr. Havershter frowned, "and yet my ailment seems to only get worse. I have terrible rheumatism in the mornings and arthritis in the evenings."

Miss Violet finished changing the sheets on the bed and queried, "Now, err, Mr. Havershter, did you fill out those notes like the doctor asked?"

"Yes, they're on my desk," Mr. Havershter said.

Miss Violet looked around and spotted the clipboard resting on the swinging-arm tray beside the bed. She picked it up, looked over the list, and then left the room with the laundry.

Mr. Havershter turned slightly to watch the street out the window as he said to his daughter, "Lydia, you should feel lucky you're young and YOU don't have rheumatism. The daily paperwork is so tedious and personal that alone it makes it a burden."

Lydia sat in a chair by the window, watching her father stare blankly down at the streets. He didn't speak for minutes, so Lydia said, "You'll be glad to know Abe and I have settled on a house now. Maybe if Dr. Ferrin says you're well enough, you can come visit."

"Abe? Afford a house? I'm sure it's no mansion."

"It isn't, but we don't want a mansion."

"You deserve a mansion, Lydia. Jockens could have afforded a mansion for you. As it is, you have to make an income just to afford living! I can't imagine a daughter of mine having to work. It's shameful. I should never have let your mother send you to school. That's where you got these ideas."

"I'm going to talk to Dr. Ferrin this week," Lydia pressed on, "and ask about moving you out of here and into the house with us. I think if you took a nice room with us, it would help with your ailments. I could hire a nurse to watch you during the day, and it would be so much better than if you were stuck here all by yourself. This place is only making you worse."

"This place? This is my home! Where you grew up!"

Lydia looked around the sparse, white room, from the TV mounted high on the wall to the medical equipment stand in the corner. "Oh, fuckit, Dad... I mean, I'm sorry, pardon me, but... I just don't like you being here alone, now that Mother's gone."

"I get along quiet well. Miss Violet keeps the house nicely, and I have plenty of quiet time for my business and letter-writing. ... Speaking of which, have you heard anything from Mr. Andrews?"

Lydia sighed and leaned back in the chair. She closed her eyes. It helped her imagine things better. "No, I believe Mr. Andrews must be awfully busy these days, and the post is awfully slow in Africa. You know how it is."

"Well! It's still of the utmost importance that I receive his letter immediately. If you see Miss Violet on your way out, please remind her again. Her mind is so scattered and dim, she often forgets what I've told her."

"What is it that's of such importance, Father?" Lydia asked. "Maybe if you told me, it would alleviate some of your worry."

"Don't be ridiculous, daughter," Mr. Havershter chuckled. "Don't you start to fret about all this. Women's minds are not meant to calculate such business transactions as these or suffer worries. It leaves them prone to such imaginations when they are worried."

"Imaginations?" Lydia popped one eye open, the other closed against the glaring, orange sunset light now tipping through the windows.

"Yes, women are vulnerable to cases of such hysteria and delirium, when they are worried."

"Yyyyes. Deliriums." Lydia rubbed her forehead. "Regardless, I'm going to talk to Dr. Ferrin. We'll see what he thinks about moving you."

"See? There you go worrying," Mr. Havershter said. Lydia simply embraced him, gave him a kiss on the brow, and told him she'd visit again soon.

As she left, Mr. Havershter turned to look out the window again. Down below the common people hailed taxi cabs and flipped their cellphones open and shut. Mr. Havershter watched as though he were staring into a void.

A nurse entered with a tray of food. Her hair was bright blonde, but still tied back in a tight bun. Mr. Havershter turned to her and said, "Ah, Miss Violet, has the post come today? I'm still waiting for that letter from Mr. Andrews."

Essay on Unlimitless

Blagging

Apparently unlimitless isn't a word. But I typed it without realizing that was so. And I didn't feel compelled to change it, either.

So I open the Godly Bible that is <a href="http://www.merriam-webster.com">Merriam-Webster</a>, conveniently in online format, to see what's going on. Unlimited is probably what I had in mind. It means boundless, infinite, lacking any controls, not bound by exceptions, undefined, unrestricted. Then I look for the other half, limitless. I only see an entry on limit. What you would expect, it is mostly the opposite of unlimited, it's something bound, restrained, confined, finite. Limitless is supposed to negate that, according to the logic of suffixes, and so putting this logic together, unlimitless is the opposite of unlimited, which is limited.

But is that how you read it? Did you even notice the word? I honestly don't know whether your answer is yes or no, but I know that I didn't notice. But I know both of the defined words, and I didn't use either of them, and I think it's not just an accident of me combining words when I'm trying to say too much at once. Somehow unlimitless feels more infinite than either one. It's something so limitless, it can't even be confined by the idea of a limit, so it's unlimitless. We aren't beginning with an idea that was ever so very finite in "Ivory Shell," so the word limit doesn't have the same meaning as you may think. So negating it twice has a different effect than if we negated the usual definition twice.

That is, this makes more sense if word meanings are more than just addition and subtraction, that they move beyond going from positive to negative, back and forth. That shuffling them too many times can shift the intention of the root.

Ivory Shell

Paperscraps

Let's start from the beginning. In an egg. The ivory shell is whole and pure. Simple.

We crack it. Crawl out from the inside. And here we are exposed, naked bodies, writhing in blood.

The shell disintegrates. Is tarnished. Bloodied. Ruined.

We are dried. The shell disappears. The blood is only stains beneath our feet. Where did our egg go? We search for it endlessly.

Our body withers. We grow old and die. Cursing that there ever was an egg with its simple, ivory shell.

We wish we had always been new. Just beginning. Unlimitless potential. That moment in that shell. We knew everything then. We knew the universe.

Because it was all within the ivory.

Fire with Wings

Paperscraps

When you sit on the dirty floor, hunched over a candle, it's only a matter of time before you realize why you meditate with a candle. You're searching through the great, blind, unknowing universe for a single point of light. Representing this physically helps you understand what you desire abstractly.

And it's the heat from the candle that you need most of all. The universe is made of energy, and a burning fire emits energy. You take this dose in small portions, wrapping your palms around the candle and carrying it to your body. Matter begets energy. Energy begets matter. You could turn this heat into something you can use, if you could only figure out how. You hold it in your hand, shaping it like clay, then you hold it to the sky and let the little thing take wing and fly out into the universe. You send your messenger to somewhere, the embrace of hope.

And when you snuff the candle and turn on the lights, everything in the room is still the same, the same tattered chairs and bland tables. The same dirt on the floor and scuffed tiles. The people you know do the same thing they would have done anyway, but for all rest of tomorrow, you may sit at your desk and think of your little piece of hope, fluttering outside in the breeze, trying to tag a cloud. And maybe, then, you'll finally do something differently, and then you'll really set the events in motion for your messenger pigeon to reach the moon.

Vines

Paperscraps

Whenever Marty sees a long string swaying in the breeze, a gentle tick-tick-tick of the rope, he thinks about the day his father hung himself. These vines in the jungle reminded him of just that. They rocked like steady pendulums, counting each still second his dad's corpse hung, suspended in memoriam, before the police cut him down.

These vines blocked the jungle entrance. Marty stood in the field of stumps, freshly cut old-growth rainforest. His hiking boots sank into the deep muddy tredmarks of the logging machines. He remembered being held back before by beaded curtains that swayed too much like nooses, little fishing lines luring in the lost. He always shied away because of his dad.

Because of his dad.

Because his dad had already taken the glory out of suicide, Marty was doomed to wander the earth until his natural death. The fishing lines lured him, but he knew that if he took the bait, everybody afterwards would blame his dad. But no, Marty would have wanted this end anyway.

At least, since no one was around to watch him, Marty took a determined stride forward and pushed his way past the vines, past the nooses and spiders' webs and lures, letting his hands be filled with satisfaction at the touch of their tendrils, a small release from the daily burden of life, imagining for a moment that perhaps he, too, could someday take in their quiet rocking, gently rocking him to sleep.

He entered the jungle.

Word Shapes

Paperscraps

When I look at the words, it's not that I read, I just see shapes. And if it were up to me, words would look like their meanings.

h l l ways

croWn

brYnches

bVrds flVing aVvwvVay

ableTTop

cOrclOs

sEAs

loVVers

Lo.oK

jHmP

krxsskrxss

wobBle

pPpPaSs OuTt

prIck

But even without my artistry, the more I read, the more the words take shape and become the objects themselves, until some day perhaps

I'll be looking at the thing itself but only read the word.

RSS feed!

Notices

The RSS feed is finished. Sooner than I thought. It's even validated! I even wrote a script to make an RSS item for each blag I publish! I feel like a real programmer now.

The only problem is that my RSS feed doesn't seem to like using HTML tags other than paragraphs. Oh, well. Readers can make do with a couple of blips here and there. That's what they get for not visiting the site itself and using a silly RSS feed instead.

The only item that WON'T ever appear in RSS is the Information page. That's just not necessary.

Controls are controllable

Notices

The controls at the top and bottom of each page should actually work now. I completely left out a lot of ifs & thens when I rewrote the script.

Also, each post should have a permanent link now, and you can find that link at the bottom of each post. Be forewarned that a permanent link "Unscrambles" your preset conditions. But that shouldn't matter since it isn't that difficult to reset those conditions.

Coming soon (not in any particular order):

<ul>

<li>"Cheats" in the CSS file to make this site look better if you're using IE (right now it's adjusted to <a href="http://www.mozilla.com/firefox/">Firefox</a>)</li>

<li>Today's Paper Scrap</li>

</ul>

Today's updates have been brought to you by a Respiratory Infection, complements of Overexposure to Mold. Respiratory Infection, the makers of Yellow Flem™ and Horrible Coughs™: It's not flem without them!

Kingdom Fungi

Paperscraps

A fungus is not a plant. It has its own Kingdom down the street from the plants, right next to the animals. There, toadstools dance in little circles, fan-shaped fungi climb trees, and mold and mildew spores fall like snow. You'd be more accurate calling it an organism, but go ahead and call it a creature, if you'd like to stretch that definition.

And what a strange creature it is. It sticks its little tendril fangs into the dead and sucks upon the energy, turning the sculptured deceased into piles of indeterminate mush. It flaps its little wings through the air and pours into the mouths of animals, making nests in their lungs and suffocating them, then eating them from the inside-out. Its head slowly rises out of the swamp, feeding on the dank and dark, its round, bald head shining like the full moon.

Fungi are solitary reproducers but arise in armies. The singularity of each creature combined with its sheer quantity creates the sense of one monster standing in a hall of a thousand mirrors. They appear overnight and multiply each day.

And yet on occasion this beast, while gnawing on the unworthy remains of the weak, the fallen, may be plucked from its feast and made a garnish for another! And so the gaping maws fall into another gaping maw. This beast, having consumed numerous pieces of souls left decaying on the ground, bundles them into a package, only to become a brick masoned into the wall of another's life force. Such is the way of energy's journey, passing through smaller and smaller tunnels that shave it down to nothing, whittle it to a pebble. We devour the banquet only to become a snack. As greedy as we are, we give little in the end, a bite to a fungus, a nibble to the next who eats it!

Unhappy Aardvark

Paperscraps

Nothing well can come of an unhappy aardvark. All the ants it eats will release their toxin in its mouth. A distasteful zebra to the whole calamity. Raw oystershells eaten alive, never noticing the brilliant completely unrelated hues beneath the unscrubbed surface. If only we could get one happy aardvark, we could make a rainbow of scallop shells suspended in the air.

New Driver

Paperscraps

Dave had never seen a car before. He grew up in an era before the Industrial Revolution. He had always been too poor to afford a horse or ride in a carriage, so he learned to walk everywhere. On one of these walks a time traveler captured him and whisked him away to the Twentieth Century. Back then he had just been "David", but his new master insisted on calling him "Dave" as it was one syllable shorter.

Oh, right. The time traveler had intended to make him an unpaid laborer, telling David that he was an indentured servant now, but right now Dave had a chance to escape. The time traveler was passed out in the living room with an empty bottle of bourbon, and it was only just before sunset. The car keys were setting on the kitchen table.

Dave grabbed the keys so the master couldn't follow him in his car. Dave knew he was faster on foot than the old man. He had no intention of driving away until he walked past the shiny, black automobile. It was a low-riding convertible, the top left down absentmindedly, with a narrow, lean, hungry look on its body. Dave stopped a moment to run his hand over the smooth, warm metal. He had seen the master sit behind the wheel and turn the key in the ignition, had asked how it moved and gotten a quick explanation about pedals and gears before being slapped upside the head and told to go wash the kitchen. Dave slipped around to the driver's side and hopped over the door, landing gently in the leather seat. David looked down at the two pedals and tugged at the big stick on the steering wheel. He looked around and found a keyslot, searched for the matching key, and cranked the engine cautiously. The motor whined to a start and then began to purr.

Dave turned the wheel but didn't move. He pushed the biggest pedal and didn't move. He pushed the other pedal and listened to the engine roar with each tap. He giggled. He shook the stick for awhile and then accidentally slipped it. He noticed a little marker moving over some letters and numbers as he moved the stick. He considered them for a moment, then, with a little bit of trouble, set the marker to "Ready."

He hit the biggest pedal, noticed it didn't move, and then hit the smaller one that had made the engine roar. He and the car flew backwards and demolished the front porch. Dave looked behind him and noticed that the trunk resembled an accordion. Worried that he would wake the old man out of his drunken stupor, Dave moved the stick and tried the other settings. "P" just put him in the same dilemma as when he began. "N" was just as unresponsive. He skipped over the numbers and when for "D".

"D" made the car go forward. Dave cursed the car makers for not using understandable letters, like G for "Go" or F for "Forward" or maybe B for "Backwards" instead of R. Dave lurched the car out of the driveway, bumped over the ditch with the left tires, and made it onto the road.

He centered himself on the line. Luckily for him, the master lived far, far out in the country where Dave rarely ever saw another car drive by the house. The car drifted slower and slower, and Dave gave the fast pedal a tap every so often to get it going again.

The little hand on the strange timer was wavering between ten and twenty. Dave felt like he was flying by the world. On foot, it would take him a minute to walk by these trees, but in the car he passed them by in a quarter of that time. The speed thrilled him. He felt lifted with joy at seeing the world pass by as though he were racing at the top of his lungs but feeling completely rested and relaxed. The evening bugs buzzed around him. The daylight birds making their last rounds fluttered around him, hopped about beside the road while Dave passed, waving to them. He marveled at the progress he was making by just tapping his foot lightly every so often. As he and the car dashed into the sunset, Dave felt as though everything that lay ahead was going to work out well with him here in the fast-paced future.

Dancing Body

Paperscraps

I should have been a dancer. My body is naturally tall, lean, and narrow. My joints are flexible. I want to jump when I hear music. My body demands open space and lots of movement.

But my brain decided it wanted to be a writer. So it bends my legs and jams them beneath a desk and sets my long fingers to typing. And my antsy feet are not situated for this sitting all day. My legs beg to be free.

But my brain could not handle standing beside a barre: bending, flexing, lifting, leaning. It could not handle making the same leaps and circles all day. My brain makes my feet stumble instead of fly. I can turn the world on an axis in my mind, but for the life of me I cannot turn myself on my toes. And so my brain shuffles my body back to some pen and paper, apologizing for its motor cortex, and together my brain and body sit and long for the day when it can try to dance again.

More pencils, more books, a lot fewer teachers' dirty looks

Blagging

What is it like to be a graduate instead of a student? Not very different, except that I'm reading and writing more.

Of course, living across the street from my university doesn't help drive home the idea that I'm not going to classes anymore. Soon enough, though, I'm sure I'll realize that I have actually graduated.

But as soon as I got out, as soon as I was free of buying books and heading down to the scholarship office to find out what was going on with my bursar's account now, everybody wants me to immediately enroll in graduate school. I hate to admit it, but all of my favorite writers (that I can name off the top of my head) never went to graduate school, sometimes not even college in general. They lived in libraries and lived life outside of school. They hated school or couldn't afford it. Their writing professors were not humans but spiny creatures made of leaves.

Don't believe me? Just try to find out what school YOUR favorite writers attended. I don't regret going to school for as long as I did, but no more, I say, no more. I didn't get to spend nearly enough time reading and writing while I was an undergraduate student because I was too busy reading and writing things which were assigned, and I can only imagine the same thing would happen if I were a graduate student. The best advice I got in college about writing was "write two hours a day, read as much as you can". Now that I have a nice summer ahead of me with enough part-time work to cover the bills, that's going to be my goal until the fall, and we'll see where I am then.

Finally finished

Blagging

I finally finished the blag script. Or so I thought. Apparently, the way I designed the code makes it break if I only have one post in the archives. So here's a second one.

This mildly confuses me because the very first original script didn't have this problem. I must have left something out in the rewrite.