the search
The sky is keeping secrets from me. The answers are up there, somewhere, but tonight the universe is taunting me- the moon hangs in a cheshire grin, a perfect crescent smirk, and the stars are winking, concealing.
My newly formed day-in/day-out existence has been complicated. This morning, for the first time in years, there occurred to me the possibility of a search. I dreamed of the old apartment building I once inhabited. Well, I didnt dream so much as I awoke with the taste of it in my mouth, the queasy-musty taste of 1932 and Cedar. And I could swear that for a moment before my eyes cleared I could see Hannah laying in the doorway near the heater. Hannah was my roommates mutt. She was a good dog.
I remember the first time the search occurred to me. I came to in a rocking chair situated on a porch above the world (or at least the world sifted through a small country town) and i soaked everything in through rusted screens and dirty windows and jack kerouac. It was a great time, but you must consider that generally, the best times are for me the worst times, and that worst of times was one of the best.
But that was then, and this morning when I got up, I stared into the mirror as usual, showered, considered shaving, dressed and began to put the usual belongings into my pockets: wallet, notebook (for taking notes and writing down occasional thoughts), a pen, keys, ipod and the leash (otherwise known as the blackberry). They looked at the same time unfamiliar and full of clues. I stood in the center of the bedroom a stared at the little pile of things. What was unfamiliar about them was that I could see them. They might as well have belonged to someone else. I think a man can look at this little pile on his bedside table for thirty years and never once really see them. The pile is as invisible as his own hand.
Once I saw it, however, the search became possible. I poked through the little pile in search of a clue about as well as Vincent D'Onofrio on Law and Order pokes through the dead man's possessions, using his pencil as a poker, his face squinted in a "I'm a tortured genius" sort of look.
The idea of a search comes to me again as I am on my way to work, riding the #32 bus across town. Its a bitterly cold day. The wind is fierce but the sun is big and bright. The monuments are casting long shadows, and my fellow riders are all squinting as the driver turns the bus onto 15th street and into the sun. Everything is orange.
What is the nature of this search, you ask?
Well, I dont know. But I have an idea that it might be simple- so simple that it is easily overlooked. The search is what I, or the guy two rows in front of me on the bus, or the lady next to me taking up more than her allotted space, would undertake if we were not sunk in the everydayness of life. Everydayness is so blinding, so binding- so to even become aware of the possibility of the search is to be onto something, I think. Not to be onto something is to be in despair.
So now if I could just figure out the "something" I am onto, and what the little pile of clues on my bedside table means, then some progress might be made.
Do you, my dear Watson, have any ideas?
My newly formed day-in/day-out existence has been complicated. This morning, for the first time in years, there occurred to me the possibility of a search. I dreamed of the old apartment building I once inhabited. Well, I didnt dream so much as I awoke with the taste of it in my mouth, the queasy-musty taste of 1932 and Cedar. And I could swear that for a moment before my eyes cleared I could see Hannah laying in the doorway near the heater. Hannah was my roommates mutt. She was a good dog.
I remember the first time the search occurred to me. I came to in a rocking chair situated on a porch above the world (or at least the world sifted through a small country town) and i soaked everything in through rusted screens and dirty windows and jack kerouac. It was a great time, but you must consider that generally, the best times are for me the worst times, and that worst of times was one of the best.
But that was then, and this morning when I got up, I stared into the mirror as usual, showered, considered shaving, dressed and began to put the usual belongings into my pockets: wallet, notebook (for taking notes and writing down occasional thoughts), a pen, keys, ipod and the leash (otherwise known as the blackberry). They looked at the same time unfamiliar and full of clues. I stood in the center of the bedroom a stared at the little pile of things. What was unfamiliar about them was that I could see them. They might as well have belonged to someone else. I think a man can look at this little pile on his bedside table for thirty years and never once really see them. The pile is as invisible as his own hand.
Once I saw it, however, the search became possible. I poked through the little pile in search of a clue about as well as Vincent D'Onofrio on Law and Order pokes through the dead man's possessions, using his pencil as a poker, his face squinted in a "I'm a tortured genius" sort of look.
The idea of a search comes to me again as I am on my way to work, riding the #32 bus across town. Its a bitterly cold day. The wind is fierce but the sun is big and bright. The monuments are casting long shadows, and my fellow riders are all squinting as the driver turns the bus onto 15th street and into the sun. Everything is orange.
What is the nature of this search, you ask?
Well, I dont know. But I have an idea that it might be simple- so simple that it is easily overlooked. The search is what I, or the guy two rows in front of me on the bus, or the lady next to me taking up more than her allotted space, would undertake if we were not sunk in the everydayness of life. Everydayness is so blinding, so binding- so to even become aware of the possibility of the search is to be onto something, I think. Not to be onto something is to be in despair.
So now if I could just figure out the "something" I am onto, and what the little pile of clues on my bedside table means, then some progress might be made.
Do you, my dear Watson, have any ideas?
posted by Jared Ragland at 3/03/2006 10:35:00 PM
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