Schrodinger's cat / the Big Leagues / the letter

i spend 18 days praying to be free from it. from the outcome of it. detachment detachment detachment. what will be will be. who you are you are. nothing to be done. you gave it your best, can't fight gravity. all that.


___* * *

it's 10:15pm when i get out from work. the final few days of the Fast, and i'm wrecked. my body is exhausted. the 15 hour days are not helping things. i walk out of my building and habitually check my networks waiting for the pedestrian crossing. 1 new message. Your application to Oxford. i haven't run fast enough. it's caught me at last. so this is the moment. i always imagined it would happen during the day - i don't know why. i imagined it would happen... not on the side of the street. (i cross the road). think what to do. how to do this.

there's a bus stop. i sit down. i need to say a prayer.


___* * *

in the car of your trunk, there is a cat. it could be alive, it could be dead. if we were quantum physicists, we would say that there is a 'superposition of states' - that both states exist simultaneously and are 'entangled'. This is because there is x% chance the cat is alive, and y% chance the cat is not. so, it's both. at the same time. the only way to find out, is to open the trunk. when you open the trunk, you force ('collapse') all the possibilities into one, final, definitive state.

i am accepted. i am rejected. i am both. i enjoy the moment.


___* * *

my decision is the Long Healing Prayer. (later my dad laughs when i tell him the story. 'what were you praying for? to avoid a heart attack?!)
___i don't care what it's called. i feel very close to this prayer. i've been saved by it before. when i sat on Mar couch staring at the ships in the bay and pretending i wasn't crying, this is the prayer i would say. it's caused earthquakes before. when i sat on the floor of our apartment in Santa Monica and mom asked 'what do you want to do with your life q?' and i couldn't answer and we both cried - this is the prayer we said. the Healing Prayer was there at the start of this mess. if this is to be the end - one way or another - this has to be the prayer to be said.


___* * *

three sentences in i half regret it. The Long Healing Prayer takes me between 8-14 mins to read depending on my mood. that's a long time to concentrate on something other than the cat in the trunk.

it occurs to me, Your application to Oxford could be anything. In 12 minutes i could check the email and all it will say is 'we are in the process of reviewing applications, thanks for your patience'. Somehow i know that's not the case... but it could be. The cat could not even be in the trunk. the cat could be at home still.


___* * *
1 new message. Your application to Oxford.

[click]

___Dear applicant

___Please see the attached PDF File.

___Best wishes

i stare at it for a minute. try and divine what that means. dammit. i didn't get in. that's it. that's the only thing that it could mean.

PDFmailer.pdf

[click]

(loading)


___* * *

... delighted ... inform ... successful.

w ait.

what.

what.

i start from the beginning, i can't find the beginning. it's like your blurry eyes slowly forming the shapes. i close and reopen and try to read slowly

I am delighted to inform you that your application to the University of Oxford as a graduate student has been successful. We would like to offer you a place...

[i can't breathe]. my hand is shaking. maybe i read it wrong, keep reading, keep...

Our admissions round is extremely competitive, and we would like to congratulate you most warmly on your success.


what?


___* * *

- q! Q!
- yyes, what?
- Q!
- ...
- why are you so quiet? are you okay?
- i... am ___uhm
- oh my poor baby, you're shocked
- yah.
- where are you?
- on. the. side bus stop street somewhere.
- why are you shocked?
- nothing makes sense.
- what? what are you talking about?
- i can't connect the dots. ___how did this happen?
- you made it happen.
- i don't understand how. i remember sitting in the living room, and you asking me what i wanted to do with my life, and me not having an answer, and everyone crying. it wasn't that long ago...
- 2008?
- six years isn't so long is it?
- it's nothing.
- so how?
- sshhh. baby. you really have no idea who you are you know that?
- ... sometimes.


___* * *

i'm still digesting.

[to be continued].

notaprayer

Dear alleverythingverymassivelargeGod
Forgive me if i have fallen down even where there was no step to trip on, like on sunny tuesdays. Forgive me for being scared of tomorrow/s, and for having intense allergy attacks everytime i see a cat because i know i shouldn't play with them but i can't help it because i'm weak. Forgive me for not loving J and making her sad, and even more for not being able to forget her and even even more for being angry at myself for feeling lonely even though i know it's normal because i'm disappointed i'm not a robot. You are alleverythingful so You don't need my reasons. You know me.

Help me shake tomorrow's hand, and unloose my tongue to respond to my friends, who i miss. i don't know the words for the things i feel, so i cannot describe anything. You know all. So, everything that needs to be said, You know. So, just...

everything.  

she doesn't return my text.

she doesn't return my text. i'm not surprised. or upset. maybe i'm relieved, i think i'm relieved. (and she's not the only either, no one has this week).

___[
___Therapist: do you think there's a problem?
___Q: ___no. there's no sign of a problem.
___Th: __really?
___Q: ___yah really.
___Th: __you know what the thing is? the thing is you never see it.
___Q: ___...
___Th: __what tends to happen is, you wake up, and you're 50, and your family has left you, and your friends hate you, and there's no one around and you're all alone. and you're great at your job and it suddenly occurs to you that you don't care. and that's all you've got. and now there's no time to do anything about it. it's too late. that's the problem.
___Q: ___is that what you're seeing?
___Th: __yes. ______do you sense it?
___Q: __  can i tell you a secret?
___Th: __sure.
___Q: ___it's worse than that. ___... i already know it's happened. it's just time before i screw it up beyond repair
___Th: __...
]

no one all week. (but wait, i'll get back to that in a second:

**___ in the evenings, when i walk home, i've been staring at people. i can't stop staring at them. the beautiful girls and the pudgy boys. and the teenagers with the ridiculous hair. and i think, it's a river, it's a thought that just moves from person to person as i walk: who loves you? and you - who loves you? is it him? it is? do you feel like she does? can i sense it? - if i stare at you. i hope somebody does, you deserve that. (maybe even... _)
___[ Q: ___no.
____H: ___ what do you mean?
___  Q: ___ it's this horrible feeling i get after sex.
___  H: ___ ...
___  Q: ___ like, i look at her. and all i can think is: someone should love you. leave this. leave here. find someone who does.
___  H: ___ ...
___  Q: ___ and, f&ck, i can't believe i'm about to say this___,
___  H: ___ ...
___  Q: ___ and. i'm thinking it to myself too. y'know? i'm telling myself the same damn thing. who is this? where'd she come from? why are you here q? just... anyway, ___.
___  H: ___ oh q. [as she puts her head on my shoulder and my arm around her] whatarewegonnado?
]

and all these beautiful ___in the evenings ___coming out of the gym , is it for somebody? is it for you? will she notice? is it still the same?

___*___*___*
- why didn't they text you back?
- i wouldn't text me back.
- ?
- dude, how can anyone put up with me? i'm here one minute, then i disappear for weeks without a word. then all of a sudden i'm back. who can keep up.
- well. you're doing your stuff, you're handling your busi-
- no. nono. no. i'm just a prick. admit it. i can. i can admit it. i'm just a self-centred prick. i'm not there for anybody. i can't be. i just descend into myself, into all the things that terrify me. and i fight with them, and when i come back... there's not usually anyone around. and that's okay.
- ...
- it is.

___*___*___*

it is okay. it is okay. it is okay.

i amuse myself. two weeks ago, on a wednesday night. i stumbled to my couch, hand trembling. taking big, voluminous breaths. who does this? i thought to myself. who gets drunk on a wednesday drinking straight whiskey and then sits down and reads Harold Bloom's introductory essay to the Complete Poems of Hart Crane.  (which i have read four times. and never the poems themselves. Hart Crane is hard. but the essay makes me happy. i love reading people write about things they love, things they believe in. Harold Bloom loves, believes in Hart Crane. it makes me happy, the sincerity of it. so i read it. from time to time).
___(my roomate comes in a week later. i have my football tucked under my arm - it comforts me somehow - and i'm holding the whiskey, and struggling to hold Bleak House open above my head, but it's too heavy and keeps falling on me. jesus dude. )

** the Seattle Seahawks, their pre-game psyche-up mantra is
we all we got / we all we need.
i don't believe that.
______at least,
____________not the second part. ***

___*___*___*

when i was 16, i remember my mom asking me if i was alright. and i said i was. and i felt like i was. very alright. completely alright. i felt perfectly alright. and she said oh baby. we won't know yet. we won't know for a long while yet. one day, we'll know what i've done to you.

___*___*___*

please help me words. please help me. you used to. you used to be all i had. i believed in you. everything i couldn't say in any other way you were there for. what's happened to us? why is it so hard to say what i mean now? why do i not mean anything? maybe that's the problem. maybe it's that i've stopped meaning anything.

___*___*___*

she asks me if questions can run on. oh girl. you don't even know. there are no answers, the questions just run. on. across. around. on and on. not an answer in sight. it's just a field of questions. like rabbits and landmines.

___*___*___*

it bothers me when i dream of you
i hate that you're there ,
we don't even speak, it's very civil
you just... you do your thing.

___*___*___*

one day i'll find a way to

______one


____________d a___y

things that haven't worked, a list:

+ hiphop.

+ having sex.

+ having more sex.

+ not taking pills.

+ taking pills.

+ taking more pills.

+ not taking pills.

+ reading Dickens.

+ taking a walk to get some air.

+ buying things i don't need with money i don't have.

+ buying more things i don't need with money i don't have.

+ running till my legs shake.

+ lying on my couch and staring at the ceiling.

+ lying on the floor and staring at the ceiling.

+ listening to on the line on repeat.

+ texting you, knowing that you don't want to hear from me anymore, because last week you gave me one last chance and i didn't know what to say because i don't know what to say because i don't know what to do think be - but i don't think i have any friends and even if i did i miss compiling end of year lists with you and now i don't know who to do that with and i'm not sure what this the all is was f&ckf&ckf&ck ___f  &   c  k_________.

+ masturbating.

+ working out. (heavier. heavier. make it hurt. it doesn't hurt enough. make it hurt more. ok, you can't physically lift that. fine. fine. you know what, half the weight. lift it 40 times. that'll show you. again. no? no? ok. run till your legs shake. oh. you know what, that's not an excuse. rowing machine. another 5 minutes. another 5. another 3. your arms are cramping? fine. walk home. but you're not allowed to eat for 5 hours. that's what you deserve. lick that.  ___who are you? ___)

+ writing variations on neruda's first lines (it so happens i'm tired of being a man).

+ not texting you. texting other people. making them laugh. undressing them. being confused about why it didn't work. doesn't work. can't work.

+ not having memories.

+ staring at my bookshelf.

+ waiting for it to rain.

+ opening my piano lid, sitting silently with my hands in my lap for 7 minutes. getting up. closing the lid. walking away. (___what a sad song that was___)

+ taking a shower.

+ washing all my sneakers.

+ icecream.

+ cinema.

+ movies at home.

+ aimless internetting.

+ iphone games.

+ texting you.

+ not texting you.

+ calling my mom. (and not saying anything)

+ scrolling through my contacts list thinking who i can call, knowing full well i won't call anyone because i wouldn't know what to say because because because. (___because is an open parenthesis that has no close. it's the ledge. just... is. and we all sit and stare, waiting to see what happens. but nothing. just silence. because is a word that has stood us up our whole lives. you know why? ___(

+ not drinking whiskey.

+ opening my windows for air.

+ showering again.

+ working on apps.

+ Southpark.

+ Community.

+ starting a conversation with the old lady sitting besides me at the cinema. ( wishing i knew her better. she was sweet. she made me feel happy. i wanted to be near her. i wished she were somebody in my life that i could visit. and change her lightbulbs for her. maybe once a week, i could time it for garbage day, so she wouldn't have to take the trash out.  i hope she doesn't have to take her own trash out // i hope i'm not sitting here writing this. )

+ going to mom's house.

+ having an amphetamine-comedown panic-attack and demanding to be dropped off at the train station at 11pm Christmas eve. ( // being disappointed when they didn't know you can't listen to anything i say when i'm like that )

+ not writing because i refuse to be a mopey sad internet blogger.

+ writing mopey sad internet bloggerisms.

+ listening to the rest of Cupid Deluxe. 5 times. each time in reverse order, last song to first.

___*___*___*

i give up. 

done:doing / things / stoppage time

___nocturne.

all day i've worried.
measured myself in bathroom mirrors:
__waistline and grade point average,
reputation and shades of dark under my eyes.
__it bothers me that i respect my exhaustion so much.

i'm under every bed,
whimpering and scribbling ideas for personal statements:
__ways to hide the shadows of self-unactualised me,
unsure what it would mean to fail at this one.
__or succeed. i can't find any meaning in it, beyond: do.


___*___*___*

___Oct-Nov-Dec.

i've given up trying to understand years. time used to mean something. maybe somewhere it still does, not here. ___i've stopped understanding myself. for one thing, i can't tell the difference between what i'm doing and what's being done to me. i see sun, i lay in it. someone suggests a book and the title stays with me, i read it. no idea why. i wake up, i walk. i walk. 50 minutes each way. every day. i hate waiting for the bus one morning it must have been pleasant and i took off walking. never stopped. ___sitting, waiting for my coffee she hands me her number. this has never happened to me before. i call it, no idea why. i can't think why i would. but then, i can't think why i wouldn't. seven days later she's half-naked on my couch. i'm kissing her chest and smelling her neck, but the whole time i'm thinking who did this? did you do this? do i? do we? how did this thing happen, i wasn't driving. (what is done, and what is doing - gone).

- q-dear, are you alright?
- ... [i can never say 'no'. silence or a grunt of some form is code for 'no', but then i surprise myself:] no.
- ... [now she's speechless, i never say no] what's happening, what's going on?
___what can i tell her? i fall asleep drunk more often than not, i'm maxing out on every pill in my cabinet, my gums bleed all day i can taste myself rotting, all day i chew gum to hide the taste and smell, and to distract people from noticing my decay, it's noisy in my head i can't tell sunday from thursday my internet stopped working weeks ago i can't remember if i have friends or not  i just move - i have a pattern of movement i just repeat it.
- i don't know. nothing. i'm worried. i missed the cambridge deadline.

that was before. it's better now. 

all night there are footsteps outside. it used to scare me. now i know: possums. bush-turkeys. lizards. snakes. bats. they're so loud - when i first moved here i was keeping a wooden post besides my bed to attack the marauders running laps in my backyard all night. sometimes now they comfort me...

it's 3am. i've been working on this since 8am. i took the day off work to finish it. i've been hopped up on speed and green-tea for weeks i can't feel my tongue and i've been chewing the same piece of gum since after lunch. the windows are all still open and a paper-thin moth knocks itself against a lighbulb. i ignore it. then five. then twenty. my entire ceiling, my desk, my lamp is quivering with them. i only notice because i tap my laptop screen to move one aside. i look up, and smile, and keep working. i pick up a paper, put it back down. pick up another bundle, shuffle through, find what i'm looking for, throw them all back. all the while the moths flutter about. now their wings occasionally become detached when they pick the wrong stack of paper to land on. i'm usually saddened when i kill something. but this seems... different. i feel like they are being absorbed into a dreamscape. they are part of a magic sequence and are entombed in it. in a year, it's the first time i've ever seen them, so i figure they are a distinct feature, part of the quality, of this particular, unique moment.  i keep working. when i look up again - at 3:47am - there are no moths left. not on the ceiling, not on the table. no where. i don't understand where they came from, or where they went. or how. (what is done, what is doing). i just move, i keep moving. to the couch. where i read the newest draft.

december is always the heaviest month. i hide from everything. avoid people. avoid my liquor cabinet. avoid thinking, no thinking. move. just the pattern, just the steps. wake. walk. work. walk. gym. walk. sleep.

___in a way, this is it. i didn't know it was, or would be, but it is. when i started, i thought, well, if it doesn't work out this year, we'll try again next year. but actually, we won't. either i'm good enough, or i'm not. either it happens, or it doesn't. i've done all i can to prepare. my 5-year plan has run its course. now i write my statements, and i hide my blemishes, and i sing my songs, and


___*___*___*

i don't know what to write about anymore. i know that i miss writing. i used to need to do this. it used to remind me who i was, and who i wasn't. it was a way of looking at things, and seeing adventure and erotica and tragedy and romance in little tuesdays and dented afternoons. now it's just haze. a unified mass of what else could it be? a self-fulfilled proposition that takes me for granted in its design. my days just are. they are a fact, a truth. but they don't really mean anything to me anymore. they just go. like a river. i float. i paddle. i don't know why - instinct? habit? i don't know. but i just proceed through it. edging on. 
___and it's noisy. and sometimes it goes from thursday morning to sunday night and i don't know what happened. how. whether it was something i said or did, or whether it just happened to me. whether it requires any input from me at all. whether i'm a passenger or not. who are you? why are we undressing? are you doing this? i thought you were numbers on a piece of paper, how did you come to be here?

she leaves.

i walk to my bed.

and start shaking my sheets to find her detached wings.

monday night lights

i'm playing the piano. Satie's first gymnopedie. i've played this three times in the last fortnight. i'm not sure how it's happened, but each time it reminds me more of Seattle. of Mar's couch. of all that. i don't remember listening to it much during those weeks. it must just be the sound of how i've chosen to romanticize that time.

it ends. i close the lid. get up. i have a bottle of whiskey stashed away for nights like this. but in a hospital on the other side of town my friend is giving birth to a baby girl. it would kill me if every time i hold that baby i have to remember i spent the night of her birth on my couch, drunkenly staring at my ceiling. for whatever reason, i decide that it would ruin her life. demean it. i'll have to stick this one out sober.

i walk back to the piano. open the lid.

Sunday morning she was here. she told me she liked the moonlight sonata. i didn't play it for her then, so i start to play it now. my loneliness is a physical object. i sense its contours. my next door neighbours, the hippies from down the hill a-ways - the girl hippie comes into the kitchen. i can see her making tea. i make an effort to play well. i want to comfort her. i want her to like me. i want us to have a moment that will make me feel less lonely. so i try to play very well. i hear her tea-spoon strike the side of her cup gently, and see her put it down softly. she's listening to me, attempting to be quiet. i'm pleased. she lingers a moment in her kitchen. i can't see her face, but she is wearing a large green tshirt. i'm lost i secretly make the notes of Beethoven's moonlight sonata say that for me; and wait to see if she responds. when i next look over she's gone away. back into her own world. i'm alone. with a strange sound emanating from a large wooden music box. i stop playing.


___*___*___*

- i think i miss j-bird.
- you think?
- i think.
- you do.
- how do you know?
- i've lived with you long enough.
- [i bite my lip, i'm annoyed at this] maybe i'll call her.
- call her already.
- maybe i will.
- what're you going to say?
- that i was wrong? that i miss her. that i'm an ass. something. i don't know.
- so call her.
- i will. ___later. 
- later?
- yah. later.


___*___*___*

i ask to the borrow the car. he gives me a look: are you sure you know what you're doing? what a silly question: never. but i need this. he thinks about it: i thought you're missing j-bird. clearly he doesn't, that's why i need this. he shakes his head and goes to get me the keys, saying that makes no sense. he's right. it doesn't.

i come home four hours later. my skin feels weird from sweat and semen and lube. my abdominals hurt. i'm dizzy and i fall asleep before i have time to think.


___*___*___*

my dad is happy to hear my voice. i haven't called him in three weeks, he was worried. what's going on with you? i don't know. so i tell him i don't know. what i want to say is i'm ashamed. i don't know of which part exactly, i just don't think there's much point in speaking to people. i don't tell him that. we talk about my exercise regimen instead.


___*___*___*

she likes the moonlight sonata. i'll play it for you later i say. i'm sitting on the oppositest part of the couch. hoping to just wait it out until she leaves. or my roomate comes home. either one. she's a nice girl. she shouldn't be here. i see where this is going. it makes me sad. the conversation continues, i'm not sure what i'm saying. she's reading something from out of a book. she's moved closer to me. i lean over and kiss her cheek. very softly. she keeps reading. i kiss lower down, near her neck. softer. i run my lips up towards her eye, kiss the corner. ...
... ___she lunges at me with her mouth.

goddamit


___*___*___*

- i had the stupidest monday.
- me too.
- it was horrible.
- me too.
- it was so bland, not even bad, just dull.
- me too.
- ehm.
- ...
- ...
- so you called j-bird yet?
- a- _____,_______no


___*___*___*

after the gym talk, he asks what's really going on. my priorities are screwed up. my life is aimless. i know i have to fix it. and fix it now. i just don't know how. i keep thinking about it. but all i come up with are circus sideshow distractions. he listens quietly.

several hours later i'll order clothes i don't need off the internet with money i don't have and feel better about the world for 40 seconds. at least i will have gotten through a few more hours.

all these goddamn hours.

just the shells of pistachios - nothing on the inside. just keep cracking them open, one after another.

monday slowly sinks.

my island grows smaller.


___*___*___*

when i next look over she's gone away. back into her own world. the light from her kitchen is off. i'm alone. i stopped playing weeks ago.

40 hours.

it's about midnight when i get home and see the email waiting for me. i take a deep breath and scan , looking for the un in unfortunately or con. it's quite long, it takes a few scans. then: right. yes. un.

something in me knew,- stop.

just stop. it's important not to think. i turn on an episode of friday night lights. watch five. when that doesn't hold my attention anymore it's about 6am. i put on some shorts. whatever tshirt is on the ground. start running anywhere. after 10 minutes i'm breathless but i can't go back. i can't be there. i'm too ashamed to be in my own home. my castle deserves a better master. 50 mins later i come stumbling up my steps. ashamed at not having been able to stay away further. i can't be here. i can't. i must disappear or i must leave. there's no other way.


___*___*___*

when he wakes around 8 i've drank half a bottle and i'm lying on the couch doing not particularly much. i've managed, despite the rum, to stumbled through a shower and half dress myself.

- get dressed.
- mmmmno. mmmmmaybe. wait. __wwwwhy?
- you're coming with me to have breakfast. and look at a few houses.
- doooo you know i haven't slept in ininin.... 27 hours?
- yes. and i know you can probably barely walk, but i don't want you home alone all day. no telling what you'll do.


___*___*___*

i'm a little clearer when he drops me back home in the afternoon. i lay on the couch doing more nothing much. something in me kne- stop. nono.

i put an end to that with whatever's left in the bottle. 


___*___*___*

when she arrives i'm back on the couch.

- oh dear.
- you are in deed.
- didn't go well then?
- no idea. what. you're, talking. about.
- how much have you drank?
- no more left. need more. let's go for walk. but later. when i can walk again.


___*___*___*

i dressed myself. the shower felt nice. i'm calmer. where's my towel? (i get her a towel). walk her to her dinner party. hey, go home and try to sleep will you? how long have you been up? not sure. (i count in my head) 38. 38 hours i say. you must be exhausted. except i'm not. go home, leave the key in the mailbox, i'll check up on you later. not one bit. i leave her at her restaurant and walk the block a while.

i have a new bottle. just in case. 


___*___*___*

i get home. undress. text my mom back because she's starting to worry. which is starting to annoy me.

and collapse.