Undercurrents in my Life

On our walk this morning towards Ladronka though hardly abrading its border in the end, I stepped in psí hovno. Well, I assume it was psí hovno. It could well have been lidské hovno, but I suspect not, as most people clean up after their pet humans when they leave waste product on the sidewalk. After stepping in said psí hovno, I spent many minutes shuffling along the gutters of our street (since the event happened close to our home on the way back from hardly abrading the border of Ladronka) scraping the front portion of the sole of my shoe across as many dew-laden, unsuspecting plants and grassy tufts as possible. It was a classic moment of absurdity like Camus described in The Myth of Sisyphus.

Regardless, I suspect that the reason that characters like the plumpest humorist of our time get killed off early in stories is because they are the “funny guy” who, if he stayed around, would irritate the other prominent characters to the point of murderous rage. However, since characters such as the plumpest humorist of our time are killed off early, their essence mellows into a gentle nostalgia for the other prominent characters. The ideas and anecdotes of the dead flow through the remainder of the story as undercurrents, as deeper thoughts. In this sense, though he was far from the plumpest humorist of our time (yes - he did have his moments), Lee experienced the same fate. He was killed off early in my story. Likely, had he lived, given his attitude towards the world and humankind in general, he would have irritated me to the point of murderous rage. Instead, his ideas and anecdotes flow as undercurrents in my life, giving deeper resonance and meaning to many situations.

The final dream I had before beginning my day around 6.45 concerned Michael Denison. I had just met a human I’d never seen before at a library. It appeared to be a library. It was shabby. Strips of filthy cloth hung from the rafters and from the bookshelves. The books themselves were bound in tight leather or oiled metal, repelling any touch. This human I’d never seen before wanted to be my “friend”. He wanted to accompany me somewhere or perhaps anywhere. We began walking. It wasn’t a city, exactly, that we found ourselves in when we left the library. I suppose my mind wanted to recreate the campus at Texas A&M University, but the result was a ruin, perhaps reflecting the state of my dreaming mind or perhaps reflecting the state of the actual university campus after the bombs hit Eastern Texas late last night.

We started up a long, filthy, sloping alleyway (Damnation Alley?) and partially along its length, we came upon Michael in an alcove partially covered by more dirty strips of fabric. He was seated, as he always seems to be in my imagination, in a slightly leaning chair with a growing smirk on his lips. His dirty blonde hair still fell to his shoulders, or just past them, as it did in the good ol days. He had a notebook on his lap and a pencil in his hand. He was writing music.

Suddenly, we were transported to a hospoda where Michal was going on about a melody in his notebook to a pudgy, long haired guy sitting beside him. My point of view was floating somewhere between and slightly above them. The pudgy, long haired chlap sang the notes of the indicated melody, reading them from the page. Though I was just a hovering point of view floating somewhere between and slightly above them, they both fixed their eyes on me. I assumed they wanted my opinion. I, too, sang the melody, though my opinion dissolved into the air much as I, Michael and the pudgy, long haired kluk also did.

We were walking through the deserted campus. Michael still had the notebook in his hand. He was going on about his new livelihood. Apparently, the notebook was his new livelihood. Upon closer examination, the handwritten notes were “synchronized” to dialog printed above them. Apparently, the music was being written for a TV series or for a film or some other abomination. This is my way forward, he stated. We passed another library, but it was not the same library I started out in. This library was resplendent. The books glowed, basking the filthy street with a warm light through immaculately spotless windows. Just then I noticed that the library was the only source of light. Night had fallen and it also appeared to me, unsurprisingly, that Michael was wavering between himself and a Chris Cutler-like apparition.

Suddenly my mind was on Herr Bender. I knew he was somewhere in the library. He has always been a book fiend, of course, and much more than I have been. The dream ended before I could enter. The darkness took me. It sucked me back into a state of waking.

On 18 November 1993, Michael wrote this to me:

When I came to college, my intention was to distance myself from my parents, and try to reclaim a life I lost when I was 13. The relationships I made with people between those times were all superficial, and I knew them to be so. The ones I have made since then have held me up, and also thrown me down. It has felt like people care about me, but either grow tired of me, or have to let me go as they leave, like some sort of necessity no longer needed.

I’ve spent much of my life trying to bond with people in a manner that is not superficial. It is the very reason that even though I’ve passed through so many jobs, I’ve maintained a few close friends from those jobs. I’d say that employment, at least for some, and especially in the sort of contract oriented freelance type positions I had during so much of my “career”, consists of the work itself, which is given the highest priority, and then the social aspect. For me, it was always the opposite. Work was always a bit of a burden or at best amusement. What I spent most of my strength of will attempting to accomplish was create bonds with other humans. Lasting bonds. I never wanted acquaintances. I wanted from the initial conversation to speak about philosophy and the human soul. I found out early on that this is certainly not what most of my workmates wanted. Of course, that fact did not deter me. Fuck um.

Michael and I drifted apart. The last time I saw him was when I visited Texas for Jayson’s wedding. Michael and Dave and Bender picked me up at the airport in Houston. I was stumbling half out of my mind in an alcoholic stupor when Michael found me at the telephone attempting to get in touch with whomever might be close.

He wrote that friends grew tired of him. This was not the case with us. I kept leaving. I relocated and relocated until my homebound soul was tattered, ripped, scattered all over Europe and North America.

In the Three Subject Quotebook, Michael is recorded uttering this:

It is definitely interesting how people become so unhappy with themselves that they induce a change in their surroundings so that they can believe, in their minds, that they have changed themselves.

I’ve always wondered if, when he said this, he was referring to me. Každopadně, Michael’s ideas and thoughts and writings (of which I have many) continue to flow through my life as undercurrents.