A Higher Duty

May 11 Sat.

Eliminating a long turd in the bathroom of the West LA Mark Taper branch of the Red Cross offices. Sorry to be so crude, but that's what's going on. I missed four on my CPR exam.
I've got a head cold. Supposed to help Sandy Bacchus move today. Still haven't been able to get a hold of that Kobata guy.

The Red Cross must have the most sterile shitters in the world.

I just ate a Double Quarter Pounder with Cheese AND an Arch Deluxe with fries dipped in mayo, and an iced tea. I should be getting back to class now, but I'm called upon to fulfill a higher duty--or should I say doody?

You don't ever go up 'n' front of a bus and make a right turn...



May 13 Monday

Oh, gosh. The movie "Addam's Family Values" is on the TV, the Dodgers/Expos are on the radio, the computer is on heading Thematic. Unit.
Memory Today was the last day of school for my class. They go on to the fifth grade.
I think I'll go have some raisin bran, but Henry Miller said to finish what you've started, and I've already started this. I thought I'd copy the line, but then I'd have to stop this long enough to look it up, and that would be counter-productive to having already started. What should I do?

Groping in the Dark

Yesterday I handwrote three journal pages, read a chapter in the Hall book with some good pep talks for beginning your novel, the novel, my novel: Just go for it, don't think. I also read a few more chapters of Tom Robbin's latest effort. At Denny's I ate a slice of coconut cream pie, all right, though, cuz I did fifteen sweaty minutes on the windmill, uh, I mean treadmill. We won our softball game. I'm not hitting well. The Penguins are skating against the Rangers right now. I'm going to play guitar when I'm done. I wonder how Walter's recording career is going. Jeopardy just started, shall I leave Madison Square Gardens?

May 10, Friday

This pen looks to be draining the last of its life fluid. I shall retire it with all appropriate honor befitting its service. I'll play Taps with my lips. Good-bye loyal shit writer, good-bye.
Ah, yes. I like this uni-ball-DELUXE. I was supposed to attend una tardeada de literatura at Los Angeles' historic Union Station, but I had so much end-of-the-year crap to get done after school I was already late when I realized I didn't have my wallet and would have to pay for parking. Instead I came home and turned on the ceiling fan and mixed a Goldschlager and orange juice. That's where I am now. Ross Porter is telling me overe the airwaves from St. Louis that the Dodgers are giving away free blowjobs at Busch today.

"Writing the first draft is like groping one's way through the dark, or over-hearing a faint conversation, or telling a joke whose punchline you've forgotten."
"Lower your standards and keep going," is William Stafford's advice for writer's block. I like this advice, though I find Stafford's claim to fame, that silly-ass poem about the runover deer to be over-rated and a prime example of maudlin.

It's funny how roundness of character refers to that disparity of contradiction which I'm afraid infests my ideas
like rats in an acacia
Whu?

You muist scenically present summary and situation


...but if you lie and I find out, I will definitely leave you.
She wants somebody to lavish her ego and pussy and all that.Validate her insecurities by recongizing them and dispelling them, but not too easily.

I Doubt There Are Carwashes Anywhere Else in the World

May 8, 1996

I didn't get far with this yesterday. What was the big distraction? Shit. I have to get a hold of Bob Kobata at Bret Harte High tomorrow. It's imperative. I need to call the Red Cross about a CPR class. I'm not going to have any breathing room until after the 16th. The bullshit is all stacked up.
I'll never again go to Emilio's.
I didin't buy any weed last month. Some kind of new record. The principal said in my evaluation that I had good leadership skills. I suppose that may be true more often than not, but definitely not always.
I've got to go to my brother's now to wait until our softball game starts tonight. I'm in Pacoima; he's in Reseda; the game's in Sherman Oaks, I think, and there's no use going home to LA first. Right now I'm sitting on the teacher's lounge toilet, visualizing basehits. It's time to go right now, but I ought to finish this exercise. The horns of dilemma. There'll be an ESPN double header on the tube in that polluted bacherlor pad Mike calls home.  Maybe we can hit the Reseda Room for a beer and pool.

On the way out to the parking lot, Marti Gonza headed me off and said she wanted me to do a John Wayne imitation at Arlene (the obese old elf with the green gunk flowing from her eyes) Duke's retirement. Cha. ~~~~Now I'm at Denny's. I ordered a Charleston Chicken dinner for $4.99. It includes fries and vegetable fo the day, and I got an iced tea. This Denny's is on the corner of Saticoy and Reseda. Across the street, next to a car wash, smoke pours from a place called the BBQ shack. This is America.

Why do I doubt there are carwashes in Europe or Russia or anywhere else in the world other than the good old old U. S. of A.?

I'm depressed again. I'm not sure why. I'm not producing. Inundation of bullshit. Maybe I'll have dessert. Pie and a shake. How would that make me feel?

Let's call this the end for now. Don't despair, Jim. I'm a comin'.

Ho Hum or The Sum Total of Spectrum

Oh, no! Another book to fill! Let's keep this one glib. To fold in half and take places.

A bad first page can contaminate a whole book.

Hey Jen, do you think you could ever be friends with

May 7, 1996 Tuesday

OK. Let's do it. Here we go again. Book 5?
I feel detached from my subconscious lately. My conscious life, my professional self, has been sucking up a lot of energy. I had a lot of crap to do mostly at work that hasn't alowed me to think and write from low.
Bunk.
What does this mean? I'm becoming a person of tailored appearance. An uncomfortable suit hangs in the closet.

Jordan had a nice steal and Piazza homered in the bottom of the ninth to tie the game. Commercial. Jeopardy Teen Tournament. Bulls/Knicks. Ift he Dodgers win it soon, I'll watch the Simpsons after, and then the second half of the Bulls/Knicks. Isn't that fascinating? Isn't it important that I record this for posterity?

The sky was not blue. It was the sum total of spectrum.

Which is also the color of nothing.

Amen

May 6 Mon.

Man I'm zonked. Just returned from Yosemite. We, Shirelle and I, left here on Friday around 6:30 pm after fighting over Shirelle not having her rent money.   We sipped beer and chewed jerky and the radio tuned in appropriate Arlo Guthrie tunes up Highway 395. The Sierra glowed peacefully under the full moon. I turned off up at Pleasant Valley Ridge Dam Reservoir Campground at midnight. I thought it was too late to pitch the tent, so we moved our gear into the cab of the truck and slept in the back. Shell was none too subtle about her discomfort, and she shivered as if she were naked in the Antarctic winter. It was neither serene nor idyllic. Some drunk rednecks talked loudly all night about their escapades in outwitting cops. I was up before the sun, tried nightcrawlers in a couple of Owens tributaries. It was pretty chilly. I didn't feel like I was gonna get anything, so after about an hour we loaded up and headed to Big Meadow along Rock Creek. I hiked down along the cold creek; in the shade of the canyon the sun had still not risen. I tried a salmon egg and Zeke's Floating Bait sandwich. No luck. After only about twenty minutes or so, we headed down to Tom's Place and had some bacon and eggs. Tom's is kind of a rural outpost general store/bar/diner with deer and elk heads and taxidermic fish mounted on the walls. On Saturday nights it can turn into a bit of a hootenanny with people coming from all over the mountains to to party down.
After breakfast we drove back up the mountain to Rock Creek Lake. It was still frozen over. I trudged through the snow to a place where the ice had thawed, and I worked it with lures and eggs and Power Bait. No luck. I hit the creek just below the lake. My feet crashed thought the snow. Didn't catch anything. Then we tried Convict Lake, but it was too windy to even bother casting. We were going to try Devil's Postpile, but the road was closed because of snow. So we thought we would just head into Yosemite to meet my mom and John and Karen, but the Tioga Pass was still snowed in. A guy at the 76 station said we needed to drive up to Minden and could get over on 88 and then go back down 120 and head in from the west. Five and half more hours of driving, over Monitor Pass, into the barren high country, over wide green valleys, I threw my line in the Carson River. No luck. Marklesville, Woodsford, past the Cutthroat Saloon, to 88, past Kirkwood, streams of melted snow meandering through alpine meadows, on to Jackson, and then down the 49 through Calaveras County, gold country, past Sutter's Mill, through Angel's Camp, where they hang the laundry across Main Street, past Mark Twain's cabin, over rollling green hills: I wanted to embrace it, to roll naked over every inch of it; over the wide Stanislaus river, the wide Toulemne, Shirelle blew me, the orgasm was incredible, it went with the landscape, driving right along side the game warden trying to concentrate on the pleasure and the curves in the road, to the 120 emerging from the tunnel, the holy spectacle of Yosemite Valley, the falls, the half dome, it busts the eyes, down into the valley. We got a place at Housekeeping Village, grilled shrimp over the open fire, I strummed some guitar, smoked, tripped on the bark of the lodgepole pines, saw faces in the trunks of the trees, tripped on the flames in Shrell's eyes. We boned, we fucked, we made love, we held each other tightly, and ground into each other, no pounding, the orgasm lasted a long time. Woke up around 7:30, had some cereal, read and wrote. Felt great. Struck camp. Headed to a reservation booth, got a site at Lower Pines, on the Merced. Met Mom, John, and Karen at the Ahwanee. Had a bloody mary on the redwood deck, dogwoods flowering all around, water pouring down the the steep granite walls from thousands of feet above us. We went back to the Merced and set up our camp, drank beer, ate sandwiches. I tried a wooly, barbless lure in in the Merced. Didn't catch shit. Took a deep nap. Met the folks that evening for pizza at Camp Curry, back to camp after, set a fire, strummed some, read some, passed out. Woke up this morning, tried my luck along the river at Upper Pines, did a tightrope walk across the river on a fallen tree to an island in the stream. Still no luck Went with the family to lower Yosemite Falls, took some pictures, had lunch at the Yosemite Lodge. Drove home. Just got here. Amen.

Week in the Life

May 4th already!

May 5th already!
That faculty presentation-- almost a week ago now-- was, I suppose, a success in spite of itself. The dome the faculty was supposed to construct necessitated eleven marshmallow and oops I only gave them ten each, and I called the marshmallows mushrooms! But the principal and the vice-principal both told me I did a very good job, and Mrs. Feig took me aside and said I was really blossoming and that I should get myself an administrative credential, enroll in Cal State L.A. in the fall. That night Shell and I met Mariachi and Sanyo Mason (she of the haunting face) in the losge level of Dodger Stadium by the right field foul pole for the Colorado Rockies first visit. The Dodgers won. Shirelle packed some sandwiches and salad and fruit and cream and stuff in a picnic basket, but the dick security guard wouldn't let us through the turnstiles because, he said, the picnic basket might be used as a weapon. "Shall I cut off my hands, too?" I asked. Meanwhile he let a dude with a portable TV go through, as if that were any less deadly.
Mariachi was his usual animate self.
When we went out to the Mustang after the game, it wouldn't start cus it was out of gas. Doh! A cool black guy in a crow's nest security tower overlooking the parking lot radioed a triple A tow truck which gave us a gallon free. Also I met an usher named Promise hale who said I looked like a good golfer, he could tell, he said, and refused to believe that I suck. Another ushere, who had the voice of throat cancer, wouldn't let me watch the bullpen over the rail as Nomo warmed up. I remebered the night that we hurled all manner of violent obscenity at Ron Darling before game 7 of the NLCS, and I'm convinced we rattled his ass, but I want Nomo to win. So what for the security guy not letting me watch quietly?
On Wednesday I had that Partners in Education thing at CSUN. They modled a series of math activities to foster true conceptualization of measurement and the need for a standard. After, i called Mac who picked me up on the way to CSUN stadium where we watched the No. 13 ranked (nationally) Matadors lose an unisnpired effort tto defending NCAA champion Cal State Fullerton. Mark Kotsay homered for the Titans and Fick went 0 for 4 for CSUN. That night we won our softball game by a goodly marigin of eight. I was 1 for 3 and scored a run and also got on on an error at third. Thursday was psycho-motor day. Did that whole thing, then spent a couple of hours typing documents for my portfolio. Candace gave me and "Exceeds Standards" for my Authentic Assessment Portfolio Review, and I'm scheduled to make my Credential Presentation May 16. However the Site Coordinator said I needed to talk to the Program Director about my missing CPR and computer classes. Tom said he could take care of the other bullshit--that's the word he used, but the computer teacher is the stereotype of the over serious Asian bean counter.
The Lakers were eliminated from the playoffs that night.

Coming up next: A kitchen spat, night on the Owens, fishing the Eastern Sierra, the LONG detour, HWY 49, Yosemite, and more!

Son of a Gun

Mon April 29


Son of a gun. My teacher's portfolio doesn't exactly meet the criteria for earning a California Clear Credential. This Thursday is the final "Authentic Assessment" class before we go before the final qualifying panel. I'm kind of anxiously unworried about it.
Yesterday I got out to Perris Lake about 9:30. After getting a license and a 6-pack and finding a decent spot, I didn't have my line in the water until about 10 and by that time the wind had picked up too much to get a cast out deep enough from shore. A more skillfull and determined fisherman might have been less daunted by the blow, might've hiked around to the other side of the lake and cast with wind at his back, but I was going out to meet my grandparents and didn't have that much time. I sat on the bank and wrote three pages on my tackle box. There were a lot of bugs on the shore; I bet there's a point each day when bass come up looking to dine on them, but it wasn't this particular time. Next time I'll have a better idea of how to approach fishing Perris.
My grandma made some sandwiches with roast beef and french bread and showed me citizenship papers of some of her great grandparents who came over from Germany in 1852, names of Geist and Eiffert. One of their children married a Sherwood, who was a Union captain in the Civil War.
I was supposed to call them when I got home. Their son, my uncle, died in a car wreck before I was born. They like you to call to let them know your home safely. I forgot to call. Again. Jeez. Felt like a heel. Then they called here, and I wasn't home and they were worried. I was up at Emilio's with the Swamp Thing and Shirelle. We had a couple of bottles of wine that turned out to be $30 each. Doh!
There's champagne in the fridge. Dodgers are beating the Cubs 10-3, but it ain't over yet.
Mrs. Sasada came by while we were watching Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory and should have been mixing (exhanging students to mix English learners with native speakers). Doh! I smoothed it over, though. Said something using the film as scaffolding to pre-load imagery when we read the book, which I had no intention of reading until now. She said, "Oh. Very good. Make sure you keep mixing," and she left. Tomorrow I've got to do a faculty presentation. Busy freakin' week.

Flames reflected in her glasses.