Sunday, February 20, 2011

C/O Night



The United States of America
what do I care
about your super malls and
deserted dusty desert highways
the lonely light of a homesick highway
electra glide patrolman

draws a lonely golden creek between the mountains
your war on terror communism and drugs
lost and won and lost again
and stars and bars and drunks and stripes
on your shoulders and around
and your single
mothers working the split shift at Norms

your suffocating suburbs with their rows and rows and rows of homes
your working class in black and white and your heroes in technicolor
apollo, vietnam and saginaw and

dead presidents, money on your mind

your great lakes who took a thousand sailors to her depths
the new jersey turnpike, winter dawning
of walden or Kafka or mice of men or saviors in ryes or

bright lights big city
flakes of ash and soot and snow still falling through your dreams
there is a girl in new york city that paul simon called the human
trampoline
i call her blue
for the the color on her door, Delancey street, the number varies
it only opens with the secret codeword of my heart and there it is

i enter as a thief would enter - quietly
for a second I can see her lonely
lost in thought behind her typewriter
the antique wooden swivel chair creaks black hair, green earrings, blue jeans
black eyes straight in mine she says
across the ocean of our
ruins, pointless conversations, business cards and
karma
banging them pinball machines
of our failures, victories and dreams:

You do, you know. Care, I mean.

Monday, February 14, 2011

All Singles Day...

So it's that silly day again. We've all seen the movies and heard the cheesy song about the boy/girl who doesn't get a card in the high school mailbox or posted flowers or whatever is the Godot of this day. It's a cultural cliche even for all us peeps who were lucky enough to have seen light outside The Home of Fly-over states and bad posturing. In the end, the girl get's the boy or vice versa. Here in Israel it's two hours left of this florist-invented day and I haven't gotten a single lousy binary FB salute or digital bouquet of flowers. Reason to believe my admireresses can be counted by the dozen minus twelve.


Makes me think of a conversation I had the other day, when one of my friends in this my new homeland came for a visit. For whatever reason we started talking about the notorious "Shidduch Crisis" in the religious Jewish community – meaning the fact that a large crowd of religious singles nowadays tend to stay single forever, until the "girls" find themselves in their late 30's or early 40's and the ""boys stay singe until they have no reasonable chance of attracting a fertile "girl", and until both have at least one friend who is a grandparent. Anyway we had our share of Israeli Stock Brandy, and he looked me in the eye and said with the absolute gaze of the middle aged halfway drunk:

"Listen man, you and I are men right?, and we tend to talk about things in a general perspective, you know. But, listen. On a personal level. When you find yourself googling your ex girlfriends, or looking up their new boyfriends twitter pages to get a clue, right, you are pretty pathetic right? And you do this bullshit even though she, during your relationship, mistook your bed for that of a bunch of other guys..horrible. And so like...it turns out she has left the continent to go to France, or she has met mr. Right and they are planning their rehearsal dinner or whatever? Or she's knocked up and in seventh heaven, crazy and out shopping for strollers and stuff?

Well. Ok. So then, you kick them off your facebook page, and remove their addresses from your e-mail app. And you try to focus on that novel you should have written by now, or that job you landed or being a good Jew or whatever. And you move on. And then after two years you can't help but googling her again, even though you are really over her. And so you find out that she's met a goyishe boyfriend, or has joined Jews For Jesuses or is studying to become a dentist. And you feel nothing, you know? You've even lost your ex. And all that is left after work is having too many drinks with your equally lost flat mate and watching dumb US Romcoms....  And I kind of wonder....do you get much lonelier that that? It's a weird thing, you know."

I have to admit that the above is what I recollect of a fairly long monologue, but it's the gist of it. I don't remember what I answered, I quite honestly was embarrassed. I'm not one for spilling the beans and I usually shy away from intimate conversation. But I can't help wonder what Valentines day is about... It's not like a there's a "I'm White, Male and Successful And not an Unemployed Looser Day", is there?

But  then again. It also makes me think of the fantastic story as told by the political idiot and fantastic Singer-Songwriter Steve Earl, a story about a 20-something hitch-hiker he pick's up who has a burning desire see New York City.  The older alter ego reminisce about his own trip to NYC and the complete failure it was, an how all the Big-Town pretty girls ignored him. So he thinks he has to warn the young man. But then, just when he is about to open his mouth to warn him, he changes his mind, and realizes: "but then I knew I'd just be jealous if I didn't wish him well. Slipped the kid a twenty saying Billy give'm hell""

In the end, though, having someone may not be as difficult as being alone, but as far as I (very) faintly remember, it's a struggle as well, and we all need as much love and support we can get. Whether the strength to find someone anew or the courage and innocence to find someone new. So to all you couples struggling with everyday lives, boredom and mortgages; and to all you singles trying to keep the faith alive in the face of the opposition of added years and added fears:

This is my twenty. Give'm hell.

Headlines....

...is now back on track, but now the darn images won't display:-(



Instead of doing homework, I found a new way of procrastinating - re-designing my blog! Let me know what you think!

Sunday, February 6, 2011

Birthday rant

I was going to write something witty about today being my birthday, but all that came out was everything but. It came out more like the lyrics of a Country song, so I ditched it. Suffice to say that according to the Gregorian calendar I'm a year older, and Jochanan was kind enough to invite me to a sushi place in the "Old City" which to my astonishment actually served OK sushi. So we had sushi and debated the Middle East future in light of the Egyptian revolution, and to a slightly lesser degree, the Hizballah takeover in Lebanon. In short he took a slightly gloomier view than me, in the short run I don't believe the consequences  for Israel will be disastrous. In the long run it might mean war, but as J.M. Keynes so eloquently put it, "In the long run we're all dead". For the time being I hope Egypt manages to get some sort of democracy going, and that the Old Guard don't decide to start murdering people as soon as the media limelight goes elsewhere.

It's been raining quite a lot in Beer Sheva lately, even pouring down at times, and a nice result is that the dessert town turns green and start blooming all around.


I've started a new Ulpan and I'm finally starting to get my head around the passive verbs. Just wish my teacher wasn't the Energizer Bunny she is. She's around 55ish and jumps around like a happy puppet, flashing off hyper smiles and going with any wild association that happen to fly through her head. She absolutely love teaching and her pedagogic style is that of Bugs Bunny. On Meth. In short she is driving me insane.




What else?

* The Vibe is looking more and more like a Guru for each day. Lately he has started wearing a white scarf as sort of a skirt over his also other-wise all-white outfit. And he is slowly building up a following for his Vibrating Spleen. Just now he came back from TA having made almost 500 shekels off his sessions. He might be the next Big Thing. He might be the new black. Or white.

* The Vibe is by the way very excited it's my birthday and keeps asking me what my plans are for my birthday. He's finding it difficult to accept my answer that I have none. Right now he's locked himself up in his room with one of his Vibration followers. Sorry, clients.

* A muslim Nazi keeps sending me pictures of Adolf Hitler, Goebbels, Quran and Gospel quotes and general rantings of how and why I shall burn in hell. On Facebook, where else? In order not to get blocked, this ingenious prat makes up new profiles for each batch. What the hell you want from me man? Get a life!

* My friend Frederick has finally gotten around to the next chapter in his comic strip creation career, by means of teaming up with a cartoonist that pics his scripts, and the two have now successfully premiered their Internet comic strip Biff Zongo, a strange blend of bad-taste, high-brow, below-waist, elitist white trash screwball comedy. Not for the feeble minded, though.


* Last night I dreamt a consortium had sent up a satellite with a great big disk on it, with which they would be able to cause solar eclipses by shutting out the rays of our nearest star, wherever and whenever they wanted. Basically they meant to make sunshine a commodity to market like any commodity. No money, no sunshine. India doesn't want to cough up the dough? - NO SUN FOR YOU. Remember where you read it first.

Anyway. Below a picture of myself, the author, at age 41.00. That's all for now. So long.

Party on, Wayne.