My Whole Expanse I Cannot See…

One day the world will end, our planet will die. There are some very likely ways we’ll meet our demise. Our sun definitely won’t last forever, whether it burns out, or explodes, we’re all dead. It’s also possible that we’ll kill ourselves long before that happens, whether it’s with bombs we use on each other, or pollution that turns our planet against us, suicides of a sort. These are such conventional ways to go, they’re not how I want to go.

When the world ends, I want it to end spectacularly. I want the walking dead to pound at my door, to shatter my windows. I want some rotting living corpse, some living dead girl to hold me close and chew out my throat. I want to feel her cold lips against my neck, her dead hands clutching my shoulders. My blood would pour down my chest, and I’d get sleepy. I’d bleed out happy, knowing that we don’t stop at death. I’d sleep, and I’d wake up.

How do you want us to go?

You can’t breathe. It’s hardware failure, the machine that pumps air into a hose that connects to a hole in your throat is letting you down. That isn’t exactly right, it’s really the hose that’s letting you down, an unexpected disconnection. Air that’s supposed to be rushing into your lungs is rushing nowhere in particular, steady and quiet-like. You’re quiet too, you can’t yell, you can’t move. You’re also quite alone, alone and not breathing.

Taking a moment, after the initial shock fades, you find that you can manage little gulps of air. The muscles in your chest aren’t entirely useless. So, you breathe small breaths, shallow breaths. You know that these breaths will be gone soon enough, that your chest will tire of its job. All you can do is space your breathing, not waste anything in panic. There’s really no reason to panic. Someone will either find you, or they won’t. You’ll either die, or you won’t. You’re strangely calm on these points.

You think about a woman, the one you used to think about to feel safe in these situations. You think about how she’s gone and far away, disconnected. You miss that connection to her more than you miss the connection that would bring air into your lungs. You know it’s ridiculous, but you also know it’s absolutely true. You wonder if you’ll ever feel that kind of connection again. You wonder if you’ll write about this later. You hear air rushing to nowhere, you wait.

Well, I’m back from guest blogging at Ecstatic Days and it was amazing, but I’m a little exhausted. I was definitely nervous that I would suddenly forget how to write and completely embarrass myself, but I didn’t. I managed to hold it together and write consistently decent posts. I wrote about why I write the way I write, tattoos, music, suicide, whatever was on my mind.

I met some really amazing people, fellow writers, I felt very comfortable.  It was a bit surreal discussing my writing with KJ Bishop here and here. She’s an absolutely brilliant writer and author of  The Etched City, one of the best novels I’ve ever read. 

At any rate, I’m home with plenty more to write, but not right now.

So, I’m out with my friend, Sarah and my assistant, Sarah, in Ybor City. Ybor is pretty much entirely bars, clubs and tattoo shops, with a few really good restaurants. لعبة الخيل عبر الانترنت I’m a regular just about everywhere. سباق الخيل مباشر Bartenders know me, waiters know me, the tattoo artists definitely know me.

We’re there on this particular evening for my seventeenth tattoo. It’s one word, “Downer,” etched into my left wrist. Lately, I get my tattoos from a fellow named, Colt, a tattoo artist like his father before him. His mom and dad are usually around the shop, or the bar next-door. It’s an odd little family business, but they’re happier than most nine-to-fivers, it’s obvious they don’t go home and hate each other.

“Downer, like Xanax and shit?” he asks.

I don’t have a computer when I go out, it’s just not practical. Whenever I’m out and about, I talk to people using the alphabet. I should explain, talking with the alphabet involves a person saying each letter of the alphabet and me signaling with my eyebrows when to stop at a particular letter. Then, each letter gets written down in a notebook.

I tell him, “no, it’s a Nirvana song.” I tell him, “but also, I do really like downers.” Morphine, Demerol, we’re old friends. They’re the upside of getting tubes pulled out of and shoved into the hole in my throat. I have this done every five weeks, one doesn’t want their trache getting stale. Still, it’s not a drug tattoo, I have two already. Been there. Done that.

Really, Downer is one of my favorite Nirvana songs. To me, it’s an indictment against insincerity. Downer mocks the fact that we do things and say things because we’re “supposed to,” and not because they’re right, or honest. People pray to God, whether they believe or not. People thank God out of habit or fear, whether He deserves it or not.

I don’t want to live my life pretending to be someone I’m not, simply to fit some arbitrary standard of “normal.” I try to show that in my writing, I try to show that in the words that are etched into my flesh.

Have you ever felt strongly enough about words to consider making them a part of your body? كيف تلعب بلاك جاك

So, I got mentioned at NPR.com. Oh, and look, a pig just flew past my window. I expect the Rapture tomorrow.

So, I’m taking the week off to guest blog at Ecstatic Days. Go check me out!

So, next week, starting Sunday, I’ll be guest blogging over at Ecstatic Days. Jeff VanderMeer is one of my favorite authors and for some bizarre reason, possibly mushroom addiction, he’s giving me seven days to fill his site with my nonsense.

Now, I don’t usually ask questions on my blog, but here goes… Does anyone have any topic suggestions for next week’s Ecstatic Days?

“I don’t want to be your friend

I just want to be your lover

No matter how it ends

No matter how it starts

Forget about your house of cards

And I’ll do mine

Forget about your house of cards

And I’ll do mine” –Radiohead

I’m certain that any fellow from Radiohead can walk up to any woman, casually say the above, and be in bed within four minutes. I just wonder if the song has any real-world applications. I wonder if I could try it without getting clocked. I think, maybe, it’s all in the delivery. Maybe.

I fairly recently came across Priscilla Ahn, and now I’m totally addicted. She’s a good writer who sounds amazing.

This is a conversation between me and an acquaintance involving Battlestar Galactica.

Person: I’m watching with my mom, who keeps up a running commentary

Person: Then I shush her, then I start to make comments and she shushes me

Person: it’s fun

Me: excellent

Person: it goes without saying that you’re better Battlestar watching company, right?

Me: I talk less

Person: but what you say is more interesting

Me: like, “OMGZ GAIUS IZ TEH SEKS?”

Person: yes

Person: yes, exactly like that