8.6.2012.
This day I awoke from a nightmare, a phrase of an essay, a repeatedly cast phrase from my early life in my head was there ready on hand- in head really. I awoke anxious and then remembered the dream/ the nightmare relating to 2006 for that was what the nightmare was about? And too the repeated phrase I’d heard throughout my childhood and teenage years, an essay I hadn’t written yet but for the past few days knew I would..
This morning I awoke tense, unable to remember why, my body tense and tensing “The dream” I thought, remembering for I had been tense in some combination of justifiably running away while wanting to come toward.
A man I knew, who appears in my dreams for whom there is seemingly ever run toward and away as a set of impulses simultaneously going off at once.
I met him when he and I were much younger but now, last night, he appeared at a table with a contract. The contract was short and to the point, all that was required on my part was that I sign on. He only required my signature, that I sign and there would be some reward? Some prize? Relief? Or release? Some or all of the aforementioned. There was an animal I fled the table to be with because “only humans do this, only humans“.
The contract was brief, just a minor and clearly drawn stipulation and all that was asked of me, which is and would be all, was to sign my name and pull my prior testimony relating to the year of 2006. And thus the same phrase I went to sleep with in my head was there to tower and glower at me in the morning.
Title: “That Never Happened”
People, like sitcom or media types, often have catch phrases. A catch phrase being a repeated line, something they revert back to, over and over and over again.
Catch and/or key phrases become and are almost like a person’s eye or hair color, a swirl section of fingerprint or a smell and in that theirs. That for which they are identifiable, known and while not always entirely understood certainly seen through the prism of those catch phrase/s.
My father’s catch phrase, one of them, was: That Never Happened. I remember one instance in particular, the day I really saw what that catch phrase was rather than what he was telling me, and all of us. What the phrase “That Never Happened” really was, why he repeated it over and over again, what it was there for, and perhaps even the alchemy he believed it could and would always elicit.
We had all heard “That never happened” before, individually, in pairs and even the three of us: my mother, my sister and I. But never like this had he said it, within this set of circumstances.
Obviously my mother was the first who gave into this little phrase: That never happened. My sister and I on the other hand were born into it.
Somewhere between the moment my mother met him and everything that came after she would and did replace what she’d seen or heard (or both) with “That never happened”. He, her husband, would say “that never happened” and she would obey for my mother had been raised on obey.
I however had begun countering this particular catch phrase; my countering increased the older I became for I would… I made it my business to remember and remember well so that when and if the Earl of That-Never-Happened appeared, as he often did, I would remember the where, the when, what everyone was wearing and whatever I could remember about what preceded and followed because the Earl of That -Never-Happened would certainly be reappearing. And a little bit more of my mother would disappear whenever he did.
I became an in family professional witness.
For when and where I could recite exactly what was said, the setting and circumstance in as close to exact and in as much detail as possible…. Not always but sometimes if I remembered enough well enough it would jar my mother Martha’s memory. Or maybe simply give her enough that she could trust her own a bit again? That she could - maybe, that she could try and speak up for herself, for us. And at such points of having someone remember, take notes for her and speak them aloud at such times Martha would emerge a bit from the haze she was in, emerge from That-Never- Happened-Land and step into No-“That-Did-Happen-I-remember-too” land.
Martha needed a too, and I was that too.
So now Martha could rejoin what is happening right now land?
Except she really didn‘t like it there either.
On this particular day The Earl of That-Never-Happened lost a bit of his lands. Not that he noticed for as usual he was either drunk, hung-over or in a state encompassing both.
We, the family unit, were somewhere between Tennessee and North Carolina, the Appalachians- in a cream colored Volvo with leather tan interior driving towards vacation in an utterly respectable vehicle with open containers in the trunk. Resting in a cooler were Vodka, Jin and Scotch on ice with sandwiches and fruit for we were driving from Kentucky to Hilton Head, South Carolina. In between there would be a rest for the journey was to be two days and thus open containers in the back because on just such a vacation The Earl had found that he was in a dry county, surrounded by several other dry counties. The Earl never risked such again so open containers it was. Open containers and him ever correcting in those mountains, his wife offering to drive, him barking that he was fine.
On that drive he lost a bit of his land, The Earl of That-Never-Happened. Me, perhaps a sliver of my sister and my mother saw a distant glimmer of where she truly was, and in that, where she had put us: her children.
We had stopped at a McD’s for a bathroom break, the Earl got his coffee and of course there would be no food, that was a game he had enjoyed playing and was still playing.
We three ladies went to the lavatory. We all existed our stalls at or about the same time. We all three stood washing our hands, perhaps one of us was even in the drying stage when a girl in her McD’s uniform walked into a stall.
Tinkle. Flush. Exit Stall. Exit Bathroom.
No hand washing.
The McD’s employee of that particular McD’s apparently wasn’t one for silly notions such as washing one’s hands after using the lavatory.
When we three witnesses returned to the car our collective astounded silence spilled out in the car. The Earl wanted to know what we talking about. We relayed what had occurred.
“That never happened” The Earl of That-Never-Happened said.
Someone, perhaps two perhaps all three of us countered and told the story again, as if perhaps he hadn’t understood.
“That never happened” he said with the same except now even more inflated air in which he said it the first time, every time- as if holding a scepter while sitting several feet above on a throne. But as we three said semi-simultaneously “Yes it did” he sipped his coffee, you could feel rage come off him, growing more frustrated in that air particular to despots.
Again the three all contributed and it was again (?maybe for the first time) pointed out that we three were there and he wasn’t, hadn‘t been- only our eyes had been in the room. At which rather than ending things this sparked him into becoming more enraged because one of us had pointed out the obvious “We were there you were out getting coffee- we were there to see it you weren’t” and someone, perhaps Martha, perhaps myself though most certainly not sister may have even implied that he was being unreasonable, and I do believe the word “crazy“ was used.
And he repeated to us what in his view we weren’t understanding “I said it never happened - it didn’t happen”.
My mother sat looking first frustrated and angry- followed by confused and desolate. The Earl of That-Never-Happened looked nearly smirky, victorious for he had won the argument of what had and had not occured, of what could and could not have occurred and thus could not have been witnessed by anyone as he was in charge of all he did, and did not, survey
And so it was. I’ll never know exactly what branch of the crazy tree he was sitting on at that and those moments.
Did he actually believe that in declaring this or that to be or not be- in what passed for his mind - did that make it so? Or was it simply a calculated mind control mechanism, having worked well and repeatedly with my mother (and small children) perhaps he simply thought he could cast that spell forever, never to have it countered, questioned or ultimately battled.
Was it the soul-less pomposity of either of those? or some other possibility? - I don’t know.
What I do know is that if he were to ever read or comment on anything here or forthwith his reply would be or have been: “That never happened”. Though having read perhaps a rephrasing of the very same.
How crazy is/was he? Crazy enough that if one were to enter a room in which he was barred view and every person who emerged from that room said they were just in a room painted in color A) he would say to each: no you were not in a room of color A), the room of color A) does not exist- that is not the color .
“No - if you saw any color it was color B)”.
And if two were to come back from a room he had never seen or been in and say “It is/was color A)” He would say no it is/was not color A) but Color B), though he himself had never been in that room.
That he had never seen the room would do nothing to alter this declaration.
If three were to leave and report “We were all just there, we have been in the room and you have not been in the room either at this moment or ever. We, on the other hand, who have been there and were there are telling you the color was and is color A)”. The Earl of That-Never-Happened would declare “ No it can not be for I say it can not and could not have been . You will see what I tell you to see and remember what I tell you to remember as I tell you to remember it”.
Volvos really are wonderfully safe cars.
Solid.
Turn the heater off in winter, come back to the car and often there’s still leftover warmth.
Holds sound extremely well too, sound reverberates like in no other vehicle. Though I was never screamed at like I was in a Volvo so I suppose I don‘t have another motor vehicle to compare it with.
So loud, and that car with its windows closed. Holds sound so well that even into the next day it had been like having been at rock-n-roll concert the night before. That ringing of the ears a hold over from that thing some would call my father, I don’t know exactly what he was. Male, yes. A biological material contributor, yes. A financial provider of whom I was his property, yes. But father, parent? No.
That horrible ringing in the ears from what he kept screaming over and over again “Forgive and forget. FORGIVE AND FORGET!” That was another one of his catch phrases.
The thing to remember about catch phrases is they always have one or more hooks.
The hooks aren’t always bad, the hooks aren’t always for reeling you in and then smashing your skull.
Both those days in the Volvo were like that though, like I felt a gear in my brain slip- take notice of itself and correct a bit. Run smoother? No I wouldn’t go that far but from that point on those two phrases lost their prior command and control capacity.
My mother’ d look in my eyes as he’d say the once always effective line “That never happened” sometimes checking with me and later bracing herself because eventually I’d look at him with absolute rage and hatred and scream.
Though at first it was that I would become very alert because - never could quite wrap my head around what he was doing, gaming generally I guess. At those “that-never-happened” moments I knew to pay attention because whatever he was about to say was going to be the height of bollix, intended to maim or daze but mostly just win. There was never any goal beyond that - just winning some game. He was the bowling ball and we were the pins.
Anyway time Martha’s eyes would meet mine as he’d whip out the that-never-happened phrase she’d look a bit afraid because whatever that lie was - I was going to be calling him on it. I was doing so with increased loudness and I didn‘t care if the neighbors heard.
After the Volvo screaming incident I started screaming back. Meanwhile Martha just seemed to be waiting for all the obeying to pay off- not in this world of course.
Catch (aka key) phrases remind, either the teller or the hearer of one or more things. Though conceptually similar to triggers in the world of psy- they’re not entirely the same? Hmm, but back to catch (&/or) key phrases.
On a television program named Cheers most of the characters had catch phrases, most sitcoms usually do. On Cheers one of the hooks was, as I recall, ‘Back in…” so as to remind perhaps himself and certainly all that he was a small town guy. And of course there was a postman who told of facts which may or may not be true and most certainly would have had a questionable origin. Or “always the note of surprise” from the Harry Potter books, a bit of shorthand in that catch phrase.
Shorthand and catch phrases are related? Perhaps the same- hmmm hadn’t thought much about it before, truth be told.
About a decade after those two Volvo incidences I walked into KFC’s corporate office, The Earl of That-Never-Happened ex -wife, my mother, died. The woman from human resources who greeted me first offered her condolences and then asked what had struck me as an odd question to pose upon meeting someone for the first time:
“Are you still in contact with your father?”
There was a lot in that question and that’s what made it surprising because though we’d never met she knew enough to know, to know that the odds were good I would and did have nothing to do with the man/earl.
“No“, I replied not feeling a need to elaborate because she afterall had formed the question perfectly, which was strangely comforting like saying: we don’t know- but we know enough, we saw enough to know just what he was/is.
“He’s a legend around here- people still talk about him,” she said without any tinge of positive regard. A legendary monster some people say really did and does exist while others having never met, much less worked with, such a monster they could and can hardly believe such creatures roam the Earth.
If the Earl of That-Never-Happened were to have read all this the only things he’d take away from the text is that he must be very, very important having been referred to as both a legend and an earl. The broader implications of either term, or anything in between, would escape him entirely.
And so this morning a boy who shares my father’s first name appeared in a dream. That face so fondly held offering me a little contract on which to sign my name, disavowing what I had seen. Meanwhile that phrase for an essay had still been percolating while I slept: Mr./The Earl of That-Never-Happened.
Thursday, March 21, 2013
String(theor(y/ies): CAtcher in the Rye: Iowa: Morgensons: St. Louis: Thanksgiving:
September 7-8-9, 2012: Iowa
Was it Iowa?
I don’t remember but Iowa seems right, J.D. Salinger’s Alma Mater. I was offered a full ride by the recruiter.
We, my mother and I had driven from St. Louis after Thanksgiving with the Morgensons and I was offered a full scholarship. No student loans - no financial strings or tenterhooks from home.
“The only reason they want you is you’re better looking than any of the other people who go there. Did you look at the yearbook?” my mother said “Yuck- you’d be the most attractive person on campus.”
The campus wasn’t attractive, the town wasn’t attractive “your college friends are going to be your contacts in life- in business and looks matter, they just do,” my mother said “I’m not telling you to turn it down (beat) just think about what you could missing out on.”
No students loans, no hurricanes and none of the games that followed. But that was the year she had started to be nice to me; she hadn’t been a mother and I so wanted her approval that I turned down a full scholarship.
A great school?
No.
An inspiring landscape?
No, at least not the day we were there.
Fully paid for?
Yes.
Everything about my mother’s air said she would not approve the choice “but I’ll support you no matter what you decide”.
Hurt remembering that on the mat today- and really seeing it, especially from here- from all that came after and what it would have meant to and for me to just have been able to get that slip of paper ASAP from the University or College of Anywhere.
And who was it who raised me on “the importance of college” and “you can tell who has been to college and hasn’t” ? The same person who in her own particular way told me turn down a full scholarship in that way only a parent can tell their child while dangling all they‘ve withheld.
Iowa?- Hmm
maybe the show me state?
I’ll have to look that one up.
I remember I liked the library; Wright didn’t build it but you could certainly see him in the design.
How did Martha tell it? What did she say? When the cousins asked- how did she play it and portray- because portraying her kids as this or that was rather a specialty of hers, not that I found out about that until her death. Me being on full scholarship would’ve gone against the grain of how I was being portrayed, unbeknownst to me. To me she’d show up and tell all her problems, her suicide plans, etc.- me, well I wasn’t really her job.
Me, I just went on as if the offer had never happened- maybe because I wasn’t sure exactly what had happened or was happening for that matter only that I had been counting down the years for twelve years and it was getting near the end; I only had to make it a little bit longer.
“She didn’t want to go,” would that have been what my mother said? Like when my younger sister was offered a spot at a summer program for middle schoolers who showed promise in science at Duke University.
“She didn’t want to go,” Martha said.
Was that the truth? Was that what actually - did that reflect the actual reason as to why my sister didn’t go to Duke for part of a summer? She hadn’t wanted to go on camping weekend thing either but Martha had made her go- not to Duke but away for a weekend wherein Martha had planned on leaving town and going to Minnesota so as to leave me alone with the Earl-of-That-Never-Happened.
Some people raise children with the idea, the goal of them becoming independent, successful and ready for the world. Others, those like my parents, its almost as if vampires could and can give birth and when their child is growing they figure just how much life force they can suck out without actually killing them. Over the years they just bleed them out- a bit here, a bit there and most often while dangling approval or care or perhaps even love like a trinket that really, really can be had.
Was it Iowa?
I don’t remember but Iowa seems right, J.D. Salinger’s Alma Mater. I was offered a full ride by the recruiter.
We, my mother and I had driven from St. Louis after Thanksgiving with the Morgensons and I was offered a full scholarship. No student loans - no financial strings or tenterhooks from home.
“The only reason they want you is you’re better looking than any of the other people who go there. Did you look at the yearbook?” my mother said “Yuck- you’d be the most attractive person on campus.”
The campus wasn’t attractive, the town wasn’t attractive “your college friends are going to be your contacts in life- in business and looks matter, they just do,” my mother said “I’m not telling you to turn it down (beat) just think about what you could missing out on.”
No students loans, no hurricanes and none of the games that followed. But that was the year she had started to be nice to me; she hadn’t been a mother and I so wanted her approval that I turned down a full scholarship.
A great school?
No.
An inspiring landscape?
No, at least not the day we were there.
Fully paid for?
Yes.
Everything about my mother’s air said she would not approve the choice “but I’ll support you no matter what you decide”.
Hurt remembering that on the mat today- and really seeing it, especially from here- from all that came after and what it would have meant to and for me to just have been able to get that slip of paper ASAP from the University or College of Anywhere.
And who was it who raised me on “the importance of college” and “you can tell who has been to college and hasn’t” ? The same person who in her own particular way told me turn down a full scholarship in that way only a parent can tell their child while dangling all they‘ve withheld.
Iowa?- Hmm
maybe the show me state?
I’ll have to look that one up.
I remember I liked the library; Wright didn’t build it but you could certainly see him in the design.
How did Martha tell it? What did she say? When the cousins asked- how did she play it and portray- because portraying her kids as this or that was rather a specialty of hers, not that I found out about that until her death. Me being on full scholarship would’ve gone against the grain of how I was being portrayed, unbeknownst to me. To me she’d show up and tell all her problems, her suicide plans, etc.- me, well I wasn’t really her job.
Me, I just went on as if the offer had never happened- maybe because I wasn’t sure exactly what had happened or was happening for that matter only that I had been counting down the years for twelve years and it was getting near the end; I only had to make it a little bit longer.
“She didn’t want to go,” would that have been what my mother said? Like when my younger sister was offered a spot at a summer program for middle schoolers who showed promise in science at Duke University.
“She didn’t want to go,” Martha said.
Was that the truth? Was that what actually - did that reflect the actual reason as to why my sister didn’t go to Duke for part of a summer? She hadn’t wanted to go on camping weekend thing either but Martha had made her go- not to Duke but away for a weekend wherein Martha had planned on leaving town and going to Minnesota so as to leave me alone with the Earl-of-That-Never-Happened.
Some people raise children with the idea, the goal of them becoming independent, successful and ready for the world. Others, those like my parents, its almost as if vampires could and can give birth and when their child is growing they figure just how much life force they can suck out without actually killing them. Over the years they just bleed them out- a bit here, a bit there and most often while dangling approval or care or perhaps even love like a trinket that really, really can be had.
Recipe for a NNOT Waldorf Salad
Once upon a time a woman ate a ten thousand salad dollar at the Waldorf Astoria hotel in New York City, New York.
I know next to nothing about this woman except that on one day during what could have been any season within some unknown year of the mid-later twentieth century a woman, who may or may not have been from Connecticut, ate what became a ten thousand dollar salad.
The rest of this piece will be avaliable via a link at a later date when I am not experiencing the usual "technical difficulties"/blocks.
I know next to nothing about this woman except that on one day during what could have been any season within some unknown year of the mid-later twentieth century a woman, who may or may not have been from Connecticut, ate what became a ten thousand dollar salad.
The rest of this piece will be avaliable via a link at a later date when I am not experiencing the usual "technical difficulties"/blocks.
Letters to WS Merwin: String Theor(y/ies): part of my screen is missing. Thus I am b-ing blocked from tagging: TWERPS!t
Letter 53/ fifty-three/ quinz trois/
Behavioral Modification
March 20/20 13
Dear Merwin,
Once upon a time our mother, my sister’s and my mother- thus our mother gave us small books of poems. To my sister she gave Robert Frost and to me Emily Dickenson. As you know I have great respect for Emily and I really, really like Robert Frost. Robert was my first pla(y)giarism
I’ve been reading you Merwin and for the most part your work is really dark.
However I very much like some of your poetry in Bears. I didn’t care for anything I came across in the Mask of Janus and thus skipped ahead to Bears finding a wonderful poem about poetry as well as a poem I am looking forward reading regarding a Greek character- perhaps Prometheus again?
In one of your poems there was/is an ending line about charity, a blade of grass and a stone. I have seen charity like that and receive some of it now.
I have also received and seen the other kind of charity, the kind that isn’t a stone being set upon a new blade of grass.
In your work it tends to be individual sentences that I find appealing and not the entire package. Merwin you are better in those sentences than anyone I’ve ever read- including all the usual-big-name-in-poetry-suspects but you are so damn dark; it is as if you’re lurking around the corner of nearly all of your own sentences.
So-
Thus I have decided I will be seeing Robert instead.
So-
“Let’s still be friends”
- given the parameters of our relationship that shouldn’t be difficult. Plus I like Robert‘s- poetry, it is also a decent restaurant and I have had largely positive associations with that name…though I am now very, very fond of the phrase “Dear Merwin”.
I was able to do two of the things that - well actually I’d hoped one only …
As you know one of the things I decided as I endeavor to get my skills back I will also make sure things left unsaid get said and those things left undone get done. Two of those today: one a matter of gratitude- the other a matter of conscience.
One of the two “left unsaids” today was easy, good memories of the woman and news updates as to the old neighborhood. I didn’t get very specific in my thank youz because every time I tried I started crying because those feelings are so very, very tender and what she did often without even knowing meant and mean so much.
She was glad to hear that she’d had a positive impact? Meaning? - something. She phrased it for me- she did one more thing for me, having already done more than I know she could ever know. I’m going to try and write some of it to her, the specifics. But would that, in a way, be a burdening?
I was able to manage to tell her one specific: how grateful I was for knowing that in some houses, in some families the kids (in particular) and the wife and everyone are glad when “Daddy’s home”. I don’t know that I would’ve known places like that existed. Her kids would actually run out to meet their father, they missed him, liked being around him but of course he liked them as well. They loved him- but of course he loved them. He was capable of love.
“All the time they spent in the garden together,” said this old point of gratitude. I couldn’t imagine such a thing then and can barely conceive it now and never would have known people can and do live that way.
My sister once said, rightly, many years ago while I was living with -behold the mustard-: “when he comes home its just like Dad“.
Yeah- didn’t want to be around him, near him and he wore me down and there I was, there she and I eventually were sitting on the couch when again a big angry malcontent walked in the door. But hey- mustard had his proxy captive: moi. Meanwhile my sister was entirely correct on that point not that I ever told her.
But that is not why I’m writing you Merwin, there’s something I want to get down while its fresh.
I had an interaction with someone today, several actually, but there was one in particular…
I had made a phone call- hoping as I always do that the other person- that that’s not ‘really’ who they are. (A.k.a denial). I had made prior attempts to find out just one thing: are two children knowingly being put in harm’s way by their parents.
Unfortunately yes.
I of course did not want to believe this because that would be too awful and thus I still maintained a glint of hope until I received a phone call late in the day. I had been doing yoga.
I also started the day doing yoga having had a bad morning but finally when whatever ‘broke’ I was able to get some tasks done, one of them was calling a particular office. I made an inquiry about someone I indeed had gone to high school with though she never spoke to me at our high school, not once. Which hurt a lot because she and I lived in the same house. This astounding and daily slight was noted by friends - some of which I didn’t even know I had (Thanks Gee-Gee wherever you are)
This person, I’ve always lost the bet on what they were capable of but now midway through life I‘ve accepted that she is capable of anything. Let’s call her So-N-Such. When I was growing up I’d ever say “oh- So-And-Such- wouldn’t do that”, - But it would always turn out that So-And-Such not only would do that but had done that. It would- always - turn out that way in the end. Ever I was the one saying “no-they-wouldn‘t“ because whatever it was so often so mean or conscienceless it would literally blow my mind.
But hey I’m one of those idiots who used to believe the world is mostly populated by people trying to do their best at being truthful and decent. But of course as you know Merwin that is not the case.
I called the So-And-Such’s office, asked a few questions, noted the price difference in some things and having told myself, having hoped (as usual) that “No So-And-Such wouldn’t do that”- but par usual So-And- Such had and is putting her children in harms way.
Of course there was still a chance because I had only spoken to a receptionist and thus there was still a chance.
Previously I had asked a question, received no reply and thus hadn’t heard from So-And-Such or their partner and thus they are: The So-And-Such-es. Thus I had called their office today to see if perhaps, hopefully “ So-And-Such wouldn’t do that”- not that because then she’d be a monster.
According to the office’s receptionist So-N-Such is a monster.
Later that day and during my second round of yoga I received a phone call from the same area code as So-And-Such’s office. I heard the voice of a very young child, still all gurgle-ly and nearly talking in the background - understanding so much and being able to say nothing. And too I heard the now strong southern accent of the mother: So-And-Such.
A child with a phone, of course it could have just been a coincidence but I knew Mrs. So-And-Such might be, probably was the voice in this background as the area code matched the office I’d called that day, today. For over two minutes I said “hello? Is there anyone there?” during which I heard all those cute sounds captured from cell phone but eventually hung up. Wanting to confirm what had just taken place I called the number back which I knew in likelihood was So-N-Such.
“Hello you just made a call to this number?”
“No you called me,” said Mrs. So-N-Such.
I paused knowing full well I had been on a mat doing yoga when I got up to answer an incoming call. I stood there amazed she’d lie this fast but this is what she does, this is who she is.
“No I didn’t,” I replied.
(Pause)
“Did you call (name of business withheld) today?”
“Yes,” I say.
I don’t remember what Mrs. So-N-Such said next, an inquiry of some sort and I suggested she speak again to her receptionist for enlightenment and then I hung up.
To talk with Mrs. So-N-Such-es is a dangerous undertaking as such creatures seek to confuse and put others off balance. Tactically when and if one knows a party is a So-N-Such it is best to limit their access as their first and constant order of business is to daze and confuse. It is what So-N-Such-es do for they are The People of the Lie.
In my usual hope against anything approaching sense…I hoped. But that was ever the nature of my many wrongs to Mrs. So-N-Such: I wouldn’t accept who she really was but instead kept wishing she was someone else, treating her thusly and then being surprised at the outcome because I hadn’t and wouldn’t accept her as herself rather than who I would have liked for her to have been. I’m over that.
Having answered So-N-Such’s and having hung up I receive(d) a phone call from Mrs. So-N-Such for I had cut off the exchange without a fight. So-N-Such loves fighting. There is nothing to fight about and only a single issue at hand.
I sent a single sentence text in the form of question. I would and did ask the same question 3 times- today -as opposed to the 3 times I’ve asked over the last three or four years. So-N-Such sent texts replies clearly not interested, still, in answering the question as well as well six or seven calls resulting in 3 voice mails which I know are poison I will never be putting in my ears. The question remains unanswered though now I have no doubts as to what the answer is.
The first time I asked the question, via text, I received a reply and what I glimpsed didn’t answer what is a very, very simple yes or no, true or false variety inquiry. Having obviously received a non-reply reply I asked the question again.
I asked Mrs. So-N-Such the same question again adding “Yes or No?” because perhaps she didn’t understand how simple this is and could be.
Again the beginnings of another reply text from Mrs. So-N-Such that didn’t appear, again, to address the question posed: the one and only thing that matters.
“Are you reading my messages?” Mrs. So-N-Such’s second or third text begins and asked.
“No” I replied, as there is only one issue at hand and those replies are off point.
I then received something new to me: an MMS. I had no idea what an MMS was/is but Mrs. So-N-Such did/does and thus Mrs. So-N-Such decided to send me something I would have to read. Finding a way to make people do things they don’t want to do was one of So-N-Such’s specialties, one of them.
I had never encountered an MMS before which, I learned today can function as receiving an unavoidable text. As an unavoidable text is and was a new experience for me I did read the first MMS from Mrs. So-N-Such “ Then you don’t really care…”
Though in a way Mrs. So-N-Such is right for I care not for Mrs. So-N-Such in this matter but the two children who have knowingly been put in harm’s way by Mrs. So-N-Such herself.
I decide to ask the question one more time and this time include Mr. So-N-Such in my phrasing of the inquiry as he too in the past has not replied to this question. And guess what?
Yep Mr. So-N-Such starts ringing me.
Or at least I presume it was Mr. So-N-Such as again the same foreign area code appears and it matches both the office and Mrs. So-N-Such-es‘ area code, so I presumed this to be Mr. So-N-Such.
I had no intention of speaking to Mr. So-N-Such as there is only one simple question that can and could have been answered with a “true” or “false. A “yes” or a “no”. Instead I’m receiving entirely different and unrelated replies.
I receive another MMS and look only for whether a simple answer to a simple question is there. It is not. I don’t read the MMS. I won’t. There is only one issue now and I will not be diverted.
So that was and is Mr. and Mrs. So-N-Such.
I sent one last message “I ask (the question) bcuz I care.”
Who do I care about though?
To Mrs. So-N-Such: if Mr. So-N-Such encouraged this putting of your children in a harm‘s way: get yourself and your children out of there.
To Mr. So-N-Such: if Mrs. So-N-Such encouraged this putting of your children in harm’s way: get yourself and your children out of there.
And lastly if Mr. and Mrs. So-N-Such readily and easily agreed on putting their children in harms way: God Help Those Children because though their parents won‘t kill them their parents will sacrifice them all the same.
…
……
……….So Merwin,
That was my day,
MCA
Behavioral Modification
March 20/20 13
Dear Merwin,
Once upon a time our mother, my sister’s and my mother- thus our mother gave us small books of poems. To my sister she gave Robert Frost and to me Emily Dickenson. As you know I have great respect for Emily and I really, really like Robert Frost. Robert was my first pla(y)giarism
I’ve been reading you Merwin and for the most part your work is really dark.
However I very much like some of your poetry in Bears. I didn’t care for anything I came across in the Mask of Janus and thus skipped ahead to Bears finding a wonderful poem about poetry as well as a poem I am looking forward reading regarding a Greek character- perhaps Prometheus again?
In one of your poems there was/is an ending line about charity, a blade of grass and a stone. I have seen charity like that and receive some of it now.
I have also received and seen the other kind of charity, the kind that isn’t a stone being set upon a new blade of grass.
In your work it tends to be individual sentences that I find appealing and not the entire package. Merwin you are better in those sentences than anyone I’ve ever read- including all the usual-big-name-in-poetry-suspects but you are so damn dark; it is as if you’re lurking around the corner of nearly all of your own sentences.
So-
Thus I have decided I will be seeing Robert instead.
So-
“Let’s still be friends”
- given the parameters of our relationship that shouldn’t be difficult. Plus I like Robert‘s- poetry, it is also a decent restaurant and I have had largely positive associations with that name…though I am now very, very fond of the phrase “Dear Merwin”.
I was able to do two of the things that - well actually I’d hoped one only …
As you know one of the things I decided as I endeavor to get my skills back I will also make sure things left unsaid get said and those things left undone get done. Two of those today: one a matter of gratitude- the other a matter of conscience.
One of the two “left unsaids” today was easy, good memories of the woman and news updates as to the old neighborhood. I didn’t get very specific in my thank youz because every time I tried I started crying because those feelings are so very, very tender and what she did often without even knowing meant and mean so much.
She was glad to hear that she’d had a positive impact? Meaning? - something. She phrased it for me- she did one more thing for me, having already done more than I know she could ever know. I’m going to try and write some of it to her, the specifics. But would that, in a way, be a burdening?
I was able to manage to tell her one specific: how grateful I was for knowing that in some houses, in some families the kids (in particular) and the wife and everyone are glad when “Daddy’s home”. I don’t know that I would’ve known places like that existed. Her kids would actually run out to meet their father, they missed him, liked being around him but of course he liked them as well. They loved him- but of course he loved them. He was capable of love.
“All the time they spent in the garden together,” said this old point of gratitude. I couldn’t imagine such a thing then and can barely conceive it now and never would have known people can and do live that way.
My sister once said, rightly, many years ago while I was living with -behold the mustard-: “when he comes home its just like Dad“.
Yeah- didn’t want to be around him, near him and he wore me down and there I was, there she and I eventually were sitting on the couch when again a big angry malcontent walked in the door. But hey- mustard had his proxy captive: moi. Meanwhile my sister was entirely correct on that point not that I ever told her.
But that is not why I’m writing you Merwin, there’s something I want to get down while its fresh.
I had an interaction with someone today, several actually, but there was one in particular…
I had made a phone call- hoping as I always do that the other person- that that’s not ‘really’ who they are. (A.k.a denial). I had made prior attempts to find out just one thing: are two children knowingly being put in harm’s way by their parents.
Unfortunately yes.
I of course did not want to believe this because that would be too awful and thus I still maintained a glint of hope until I received a phone call late in the day. I had been doing yoga.
I also started the day doing yoga having had a bad morning but finally when whatever ‘broke’ I was able to get some tasks done, one of them was calling a particular office. I made an inquiry about someone I indeed had gone to high school with though she never spoke to me at our high school, not once. Which hurt a lot because she and I lived in the same house. This astounding and daily slight was noted by friends - some of which I didn’t even know I had (Thanks Gee-Gee wherever you are)
This person, I’ve always lost the bet on what they were capable of but now midway through life I‘ve accepted that she is capable of anything. Let’s call her So-N-Such. When I was growing up I’d ever say “oh- So-And-Such- wouldn’t do that”, - But it would always turn out that So-And-Such not only would do that but had done that. It would- always - turn out that way in the end. Ever I was the one saying “no-they-wouldn‘t“ because whatever it was so often so mean or conscienceless it would literally blow my mind.
But hey I’m one of those idiots who used to believe the world is mostly populated by people trying to do their best at being truthful and decent. But of course as you know Merwin that is not the case.
I called the So-And-Such’s office, asked a few questions, noted the price difference in some things and having told myself, having hoped (as usual) that “No So-And-Such wouldn’t do that”- but par usual So-And- Such had and is putting her children in harms way.
Of course there was still a chance because I had only spoken to a receptionist and thus there was still a chance.
Previously I had asked a question, received no reply and thus hadn’t heard from So-And-Such or their partner and thus they are: The So-And-Such-es. Thus I had called their office today to see if perhaps, hopefully “ So-And-Such wouldn’t do that”- not that because then she’d be a monster.
According to the office’s receptionist So-N-Such is a monster.
Later that day and during my second round of yoga I received a phone call from the same area code as So-And-Such’s office. I heard the voice of a very young child, still all gurgle-ly and nearly talking in the background - understanding so much and being able to say nothing. And too I heard the now strong southern accent of the mother: So-And-Such.
A child with a phone, of course it could have just been a coincidence but I knew Mrs. So-And-Such might be, probably was the voice in this background as the area code matched the office I’d called that day, today. For over two minutes I said “hello? Is there anyone there?” during which I heard all those cute sounds captured from cell phone but eventually hung up. Wanting to confirm what had just taken place I called the number back which I knew in likelihood was So-N-Such.
“Hello you just made a call to this number?”
“No you called me,” said Mrs. So-N-Such.
I paused knowing full well I had been on a mat doing yoga when I got up to answer an incoming call. I stood there amazed she’d lie this fast but this is what she does, this is who she is.
“No I didn’t,” I replied.
(Pause)
“Did you call (name of business withheld) today?”
“Yes,” I say.
I don’t remember what Mrs. So-N-Such said next, an inquiry of some sort and I suggested she speak again to her receptionist for enlightenment and then I hung up.
To talk with Mrs. So-N-Such-es is a dangerous undertaking as such creatures seek to confuse and put others off balance. Tactically when and if one knows a party is a So-N-Such it is best to limit their access as their first and constant order of business is to daze and confuse. It is what So-N-Such-es do for they are The People of the Lie.
In my usual hope against anything approaching sense…I hoped. But that was ever the nature of my many wrongs to Mrs. So-N-Such: I wouldn’t accept who she really was but instead kept wishing she was someone else, treating her thusly and then being surprised at the outcome because I hadn’t and wouldn’t accept her as herself rather than who I would have liked for her to have been. I’m over that.
Having answered So-N-Such’s and having hung up I receive(d) a phone call from Mrs. So-N-Such for I had cut off the exchange without a fight. So-N-Such loves fighting. There is nothing to fight about and only a single issue at hand.
I sent a single sentence text in the form of question. I would and did ask the same question 3 times- today -as opposed to the 3 times I’ve asked over the last three or four years. So-N-Such sent texts replies clearly not interested, still, in answering the question as well as well six or seven calls resulting in 3 voice mails which I know are poison I will never be putting in my ears. The question remains unanswered though now I have no doubts as to what the answer is.
The first time I asked the question, via text, I received a reply and what I glimpsed didn’t answer what is a very, very simple yes or no, true or false variety inquiry. Having obviously received a non-reply reply I asked the question again.
I asked Mrs. So-N-Such the same question again adding “Yes or No?” because perhaps she didn’t understand how simple this is and could be.
Again the beginnings of another reply text from Mrs. So-N-Such that didn’t appear, again, to address the question posed: the one and only thing that matters.
“Are you reading my messages?” Mrs. So-N-Such’s second or third text begins and asked.
“No” I replied, as there is only one issue at hand and those replies are off point.
I then received something new to me: an MMS. I had no idea what an MMS was/is but Mrs. So-N-Such did/does and thus Mrs. So-N-Such decided to send me something I would have to read. Finding a way to make people do things they don’t want to do was one of So-N-Such’s specialties, one of them.
I had never encountered an MMS before which, I learned today can function as receiving an unavoidable text. As an unavoidable text is and was a new experience for me I did read the first MMS from Mrs. So-N-Such “ Then you don’t really care…”
Though in a way Mrs. So-N-Such is right for I care not for Mrs. So-N-Such in this matter but the two children who have knowingly been put in harm’s way by Mrs. So-N-Such herself.
I decide to ask the question one more time and this time include Mr. So-N-Such in my phrasing of the inquiry as he too in the past has not replied to this question. And guess what?
Yep Mr. So-N-Such starts ringing me.
Or at least I presume it was Mr. So-N-Such as again the same foreign area code appears and it matches both the office and Mrs. So-N-Such-es‘ area code, so I presumed this to be Mr. So-N-Such.
I had no intention of speaking to Mr. So-N-Such as there is only one simple question that can and could have been answered with a “true” or “false. A “yes” or a “no”. Instead I’m receiving entirely different and unrelated replies.
I receive another MMS and look only for whether a simple answer to a simple question is there. It is not. I don’t read the MMS. I won’t. There is only one issue now and I will not be diverted.
So that was and is Mr. and Mrs. So-N-Such.
I sent one last message “I ask (the question) bcuz I care.”
Who do I care about though?
To Mrs. So-N-Such: if Mr. So-N-Such encouraged this putting of your children in a harm‘s way: get yourself and your children out of there.
To Mr. So-N-Such: if Mrs. So-N-Such encouraged this putting of your children in harm’s way: get yourself and your children out of there.
And lastly if Mr. and Mrs. So-N-Such readily and easily agreed on putting their children in harms way: God Help Those Children because though their parents won‘t kill them their parents will sacrifice them all the same.
…
……
……….So Merwin,
That was my day,
MCA
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