Sighs Matters

11-3-98 Tu 7:59 AM
A Wilshire Hill Elementary shitter.  My principal eyed me narrowly at the meeting yesterday.  I couldn't tell if she was suspicious or critically appraising.  Maybe that missing journal fell into her hands.  I better look out.  [blue ink sketch of paper towel dispenser, soap dispenser, sink, and slum-shouldered man in Van Dyke in mirror--me] 12:30 PM  Silent reading again.  I went next door to use the phone to call the pharmacy to replace the inhalers that vanished.  The ladies had Caesar salad fixings.  I said how good it looked, and they invited me to join them.  I felt a little sheepish, but I did.  They talked about losing weight, trips they've been on.  What else?  Got the hard and painful autumn nostril scabs.  I read a good chunk of Independence Day on the way to class last night.  I leave the house an hour earlier so as not to walk down Pico after dark.  When I get to school, I have an hour to kill before class begins.  I read twenty-five pages of JK.  It was all right.  Not terrible, but not good enough to inspire me to anymore work.  I'm Mr. Holland.  Jim's my opus.  Whatever.  Ugh.  What else?       "...Can't seem to find my way-ay/Someone tell me what to say-ay/Don't know where I'm going/Or where I come from/ I'm so bad..."  Yeah, right.  Okay.  Whatever.  "This has potential.  Thanks for the trip."  Alternatives.  Sighs.  Whatevers.  Sighs matters.  Size matters.  Godzilla comes out on video today.  I wonder if I'll even be able to get to the bottom of the appointed next page by nightfall.  For what are you thankful?  I've heard you shouldn't end a sentence with a preposition.  What about questions?  Is it okay to ask, "What are you thankful for?"  Or do you have to ask, "For what are you thankful?"?  Irene has a voice like a cartoon mouse.  Dina Rodriguez.  Ooh.  The kids are trying to make up a spell.  "Bloody Mary, you are scary, you live in a prairie," they say.  I look up at them.  "Cemetery," I say.  A moment of realization.  "Ooh," they suck in their breath.  What else?  I am Sam.  Sam I am.  That Sam-I-Am, that Sam-I-Am, I do not like that Sam-I-Am.  What else!  It's sunny and blue out there.  Lighter blue than this ink, though.  We have to make our Thanksgiving turkeys for the calendar.  Or is it turkies?  [a sketch in blue ink of Dr. Seuss's Sam I-Am leaning over a plate of green eggs and ham]

11-1-98 M 11:50 AM
What to say?  I'm at Papa Rico's waiting on the hot chicken sandwich.  That's about the most remarkable thing I can think of.  I spent all morning correcting and grading papers.  About 4 hours.  The kids wrote in their journals and did some math review.  There's some kind of bilingual fucking meeting after school.  I typed my fifteen minutes this morning.  If I can do my 3rd person page after school today, I'll be on schedule to work to work with Jim, the sorry geek.  I'd rather go and rent a movie, though.  I've got the new LA Weekly here at the table with me and Independence Day, but I won't look at either until I've written three pages into this mofo.  What else?  It's already November.  Yikes.  Where's that sandwich?  Gabi is looking beautiful today.  Didn't see her at Kendall's party.  Didn't see Anne either.  Wish I could have hung out longer.  I've got to shave this queer goatee before tomorrow.  What else?  Tomorrow is election day.  I don't know what that means exactly.  Man, I'm hungry.  I didn't have any breakfast this morning.  Papa Rico's is having monster pizza promotion.  There are monsterfied pizza characters, a Frankenpizza, a mummy pizza, and a phantom pizza.  Here's my sandwich.  Got to five it a second to cool off.  I'm drinking only water.  The sandwich is a little bland.  I haven't read the newspaper yet today.  Don't think I will.  What else?  I'm a geek.  Ten minute of lunch left.  Got a whole nother page to write if I can even think of enough crap to get me to the bottom of this one.  The school bulletin had quote by Francis Bacon a the top, something about how writing makes a man exact.  I write all the time and I'm a pretty equivocal kind of ass, so I guess Mr. Bacon isn't as exact as he thought he was.  What else?  When is this gluey snot going to leave me alone?  My sandwich is gone.  I'm still hungry.  Tomorrow maybe I'll go to Subway.  What else?  Five minutes until I have to go.  What else?  I wish I hadn't a got so stoned Saturday.  I'm such a dumb-ass.  Whatever.  I come to so many crossroads, but I just keep going down the road I'm on.  What else?  I guess I better get going.  Maybe on the way back to class I'll see something to get me to the bottom of this page. 

10-30-98 F 9:16 PM
Whatever.  More bad attitude today.  Like I don't really care.  Like it doesn't matter.  WHATEVER.  I got on internist scrubs soaked in fake blood.  Felt like an ass walking to school.  Shirelle will be on me the moment the bell rings.  I haven't eaten today.  I had a big pot of rice last night.  I'd like to walk up the street for a burger, but I'm embarrassed to be walking around like this.  I burned the shit out of my tongue with some hot coffee I made the mistake of trying to drink with a straw.  My tongue is numb.  The roof of my mouth is sore.  I ate a double bacon cheeseburger and fries with mayo, and now I hate myself.  I was about to read "The Legend of Sleepy Hollow" to these dumb kids, but someone talked, so I gave them a math test instead.  Ms. Holzt delivered some sugar-dipped balls of fried dough.  The grains tear at my wounded mouth.  I need to suck some ice cubes.  I need to purge.  I wish I had bulimia. 

Every Tock of the Clock Puts a Hitch in my Ribs

10-29-9812:40 PM TH
I'm so bummed I have to go to work tonight.  Oh, big deal.  You can use the money.  Terrible.  Terribility.  Skeletons out of the closet.  I was paranoid about the walk tonight, and then Mr. Martinez gave me a ride in his Trooper.  What else?  I'm fifty minutes early.  I need to just finish this.  What else?  You shouldn't smoke.  I could go for a drink.  What else?  What.  Something I don't even want to write.  I'm full of fear.  Halloween tricks.  Every tock of the clock puts a hitch in my ribs.  I need to get to the batting cages.  My balls ache.  My dick dribbles.  It dampens cold.  What's it to ya?  Anyway.  Giving some  what happened?  Maybe... whatever.  Desert in my throat.  There's a bat gnat in here.  Whatever.  You forgot your jacket stupid.  ...not getting in those tights again this year.  You know last year I looked like Baryshnokov;  this year I'd look like Jackie Gleason  [black ink emblem of the United States Senate] Whatever.  Just giving some test tonight.  What was I going to say? And two pages to go still.  It's already five forty-five.  What else?  When I get home...what?  Jim seems like a bad joke tonight.  Jim seems like a bad joke tonight.  The suggestion of murder and robbery.  Shouldn't I open the door out there?  The students may be waiting.  Class isn't 'til six, though.  How's to--There was knocking at my chamber door.  It was Sheryl.  I've got to get my books.  Oralia is here with her baby.  I don't have any idea what to do tonight.  I fell all discombobulated.  My throat is dry and scratchy.  My eyes are a little dry.  My post-nasal cavity a little drippy.  There are only three students here so far.  My class is going to get closed form lack of interest before my credential expires.  What else?  Man, there ain't nothing.  There ain't no life nowhere.  My mortality strikes me hard suddenly.  Douglas whatever-his-name's testicular cancer.  Was that all it was?  Four students.  It's after six now.  They don't like to come for testing.  Would have maybe read some more Independence Day.  Maybe on the way to work.  I should have walked.  I had some foreboding, though.  Ana Rita walked in.

While I Walked Down Pico Tonight

1:45 PM W 10-28-98
Dawn Delgado of "Book Pals" is here reading Charlie and the Chocolate Factory to my class.  She's got wide eyes and heavy breasts, of a form the first artists used to carve idols, wearing overalls today and hair in pigtails like a farm girl.  I have lusted in my heart many times.  What else?  What new can I say?  Miss Villasenor is out on the playground.  Shrill said she wouldn't be coming over tonight.  She picked up doctor's togs for me.  Still need a surgical mask and some fake blood.  We talked about renting a limo on Halloween.  What else?  Not a lot to report.  I'm supposed to think about protection.  What protections do I use in my daily life?  I guess it refers to psychological defenses.  Maybe Jim or Aaron or one of the girls could talk about protection as in condoms.  Miss Delgado is done reading all ready.  Now she's leaving.  Pity.
8:56 PM  There's nothing to write.  I only have fifteen students tonight.  My class is going to get closed.  All the extra work I've done in the last two years just to get to zero.  What will keep me from falling back in the hole by this time next year?  All this financial worrying--it never used to affect me, but now, the system owns me, owns my mind now, too.  It's no wonder I can't write.
Every time I put on "Fast, Cheap, and Out of Control," I fall asleep.  It's a documentary about a naked African mole rat researcher, a lion tamer, a topiary gardener, and robot designer thrown into a blender with B-movie stock footage and old cartoons.
I kept Independence Day open while I walked down Pico tonight and read it bit by bit as I passed under each street light.  You can just about read from one light to another.      What else?     I'll make pot stickers with spaghetti sauce when I get home.      All of the sudden, I think I'll finally do the rollerblader scene tonight.     I saw a Foster's beer in the fridge, on the bottom shelf, way in the back, hiding.  The jig is up for him now, though.