9-13-01 6:31 PM Th

Nigh school. Fucking work. My beautiful daughter was so playful when I left. She’ll be asleep when I get home. I’d like to go out for a drink and hear what the public has to say. Part of me is craving an apocalyptic change. Part of me wants to carpet bomb Afghanistan daily, until there is nothing left. Part of me thinks that if another Muslim so much as lights a firecracker anywhere, we should nuke Baghdad for starters. Part of me thinks, though, that they may be onto something—that this is the Great Satan, this fucked up unnatural way of life we call the American Dream.     Put me in a desert with a flock and an oasis and my wife and daughter and let me live life closer to nature and God. That sounds right and good. We Masons, we Americans, are builders of Towers of Babel; and so, they have come down—an act born of the hatred inspired by our own forked tongue.

Traitorous?

 Is it Freedom vs. Repression? Is it a lashing out against the female leg, miniskirt, bikinis, and “Baywatch.”

I talked with my brother this morning. He wanted sixteen dollars sent to some guy who had loaned him some cigarettes but was getting weird about the payback, and the prison had, as usual, screwed up his canteen order, he said.

A kid in my class today wrote that dinosaurs destroyed Africa. I added a few more lines to Jim and am now on page 165. Rochelle wants to go to the gym tomorrow. I want to go to happy hour. Someone needs to babysit. I think I know who loses this conflict.

I want a drink. I don’t want to work anymore. I want to be a hunter. And I want to grow marijuana. And I mourn the towers. I love to drive, but cars and freeways and cement are surely evil. Whatever. God and/or Allah can’t hold it against me because I haven’t any choice or say in the matter. The Garden was trampled when I got here. But Thou Shalt Not Kill. An eye for an eye. I’m starting to see the Koran as lame. Senorita Villa wants our classes to be pen pals. I read some more Chesapeake today. The Indians have been wiped out. The Choptank are all gone. Extermination has written history.

 

Gloucester Sunset, 1880 Two people in a rowboat in calm water, sailboats in back

Tu 9-11-01 2:41 PM

A serene scene that belies a day of horror, beyond horror, beyond the shit I normally call evil. The alarm came on at six this morning. The jackass DJs said something about a highjacked plane being crashed into the World Trade Center. I hit the snooze button. Déjà vu? Dream. Hijackings are so commonplace. The World Trade Center was attacked by terrorists in ’93. The buildings still stood. There were few, if any, casualties. I figured it was a small plane with a fanatic in the cockpit. I fell back asleep, and the alarm came on again. The news was the same. I was not dreaming. I turned on the TV. One of the towers was burning near the top. The fire department would put out the fire. I watched with the perverse wonder that somehow accompanies scenes of cataclysm. You feel witness to history.  I watched in fascination as I sat on the edge of the bed trying to motivate myself to get ready for work. I left the volume off so I wouldn’t wake the wife. The odd thrill of disaster as I watched the smoke pour from the tower was turning to dull recognition. Hadn’t a small plane crashed in the Empire State Building? Suddenly, a jetliner entered the picture and exploded into the other tower. The phone rang, and I immediately feared for my sister, the flight attendant. It was Thing, wanting to share the horrific sense of fascination. I told him, I’d call him back. I called Idaho. My dad was still asleep. I apologized for waking him. I said everything was fine with me, but was Bernice still there? She was. Whew. I told him what I knew. He said he’d put on the TV. I got ready for school and watched the towers burn from the various angles and focal points the networks provided. I still guessed the firefighters would get the fire out. Then they showed smoke bellowing from the Pentagon, and my skin crawled. We were under attack. Where would they strike next? I felt nauseous. My brother is locked up in DC. Was he safe? I wanted to cry. He can’t run to safety. Ugh and fuck. Should I go to work? New York City and Washington DC. Was LA on that list? What targets would they be after around here? Terrorists could crash a plane into Disneyland, I guessed, but it wasn’t open yet. I had a weird combination of nonchalance and dread. The wife was up. I put on the volume. Another plane was down near Camp David, they said. Was this Pearl Harbor? Ugh. Patriotism and self-recrimination jostled around my mind. American arrogance and injustice met with unspeakable death of innocents. Ugh. I can’t think. I can’t write. None of these have been the right words. What’s with this world? Ugh. Ugh. Fuck. I went to work. Carried on like any other day. I wanted to be in charge. If I was in charge, none of this would have happened. Yeah, right. Someone’s always pissed off about something.

 

9-8-01 Sa 9:28 PM

I never left the premises today. In fact, I haven’t left the place in over twenty-four hours except I went out to the curb to bring in the trashcans. I grilled a package of thighs out back. They came out good. I threw some sage and rosemary sprigs on the fire. Smelled nice.

[pencil sketch of Great Grandma and Great Granddaughter] So, I’ve hardly left this, but I’ve hardly written, either. I typed fifteen minutes and read some Chesapeake. Jim is stuck in a jail cel with a transvestite, a deputy is standing under one of his expectorations that’s stretching from the ceiling. Rochelle brought “Chocolat” from the video store. They don’t have “Metropolis,” she says. “Memento” was all checked out. Now she’s making devilled eggs for a party. I’m not going because I have a baseball game at Crystal Springs in Griffith Park. I haven’t played in a month, and my right calf, Achilles tendon, and big toe don’t fell a whole lot better for the rest. I read a couple of pages of Cheever’s diaries last night. Maudlin. My shoulders ache. I’m going to have to tell Alex tomorrow I can’t play anymore. My back hurts. What else? II should have gone for a bike ride or something. Rocky and Bullwinkle are on. A Fractured Fair Tale. What else? What more? Who cares? Just go. Go. Go . Go. The dog is sleeping on the couch. Mr. Peabody, the dog, and his boy, Sherman, are sailing Fulton’s steamboat, Clermont.

Here is a picture from Virginia City. Hohum. What about this mentor thing? What about a house?

 9-6-01 Th 8:47 PM

I’m at night school. Hello. My name is Johnz. Nice to meet you. I should hang myself. And the little bitch who’s in here during the day leaves me little notes not to move stuff. I just move away the shit she leaves piled in front of the chalkboard which is about the only thing I need to use in here. I’m thinking of rearranging the whole place and telling him to fuck off.      I’m about read for a drink.     I haven’t had a drink since Sunday noon.

Excuses. Pacifico. The Bounty. Food and Grog. Alison has just come from Asia. Kelly’s in a play. Mark is here. I never met before tonight I I I. “Are we gonna go dancing across the street?” asks Alice. “I don’t want to force you guys to do something you don’t want to do.” “Oh, but I have my credit card,” she rejoins herself.

“Asia: Land of Mystery,” I say.

 Alison’s face ages and rejuvenates between her utterances. “Whose finishing drinking?” she asks.

“When you haven’t drunk for five days is better than drinking every day,” I hear myself slurring. I feel like a total psycho freak that doesn’t belong in society.

4-7-01 Fri 12:01 PM

Got all hammered at the Bounty last night. And stoned. Don’t fell much like being at Wilshire Hill right now, but I am. I gave the kids a test and lay down on the couch. I was so pompous last night.     I have to call Mariachi.

Wallace, Idaho  1997

 

9-3-01 M 1:07 PM Labor Day

The Phillies are trying to hold off the Mets at the Vet. I’m on the couch watching TV. I typed fifteen minutes on the toilet yesterday. Ho-hum. I don’t remember where I left off, but I know I’m behind. Nica had an asthma attack. He had been up having a water fight with the other kids. His dad hooked him up to an atomizer or vaporizer or something from which he inhaled some medicinal steam. The kid passed out. I was afraid he passed out because he was asphyxiating, but now I guess he was just tired. We left around five. I had told my mom that we were going to her house, but we went to mother-in-law Marilyn’s. I had been looking forward to lying on the couch at my mom’s, working the crossword puzzle, and keeping tabs on UCLA/’Bama and Oregon/Wisconsin. Instead, we went to Marilyn’s where I sat out back on a wood bench beneath the bougainvillea, because the cat dander isn’t as bad out there. My mom had already thought we had snubbed her by letting Marilyn come up to babysit instead of bringing the baby down to Orange County on Friday; then Saturday morning got bungled and figured she’d stress—as had been the theme of the week: women stress over little things meant I had to stress out about them, too. So, I said we needed to take the baby to my mom’s, but when we got there, no one was home, and we were locked out. I called my mom on the cel phone. She said she thought we were meeting at Marilyn’s!? Apparently, the plan had been changed, but no one told me. Whatever. The baby had shit in her diaper. I took it off and cleaned her up and let her crawl around naked on the grass while we waited for my mom and Josh. I needed a nap but didn’t get one. We had to meet Rochelle’s friends at the Orange Circle Street Fair. Weh we were just getting into the car to leave, Lulu jumped into Rochelle’s lap and spilled bloody Mary all over her clothes. Augh.

Bumpass Hell ‘01

 

9:21 PM Th 8-30-01

Shit. I’m tired. The wife told me to go out, but I feel too old and broke and conservative and tired. I typed fifteen minutes on the laptop during a meeting in the auditorium at Wilshire Hill today. It was a very depressing meeting. I don’t want to be a teacher anymore. I want to pass through the door into a new life.

I don’t know if I can do a good job anymore. I puttered around my room a few hours trying to straighten up and get ready for the new school year. I didn’t feel like I knew what I was doing. I had volunteered to be a mentor teacher, and I felt like I must be a joke to the other teachers, like I’m the one who needs a mentor. I have to check out a website for the application. I rode my bike home. Rochelle can’t find her keys, so I had to give her mine so she could take the baby for a checkup. Otherwise, I might have gone out for a drink. I tried to read the newspaper but dozed off. The phone rang. Rochelle’s sister wants a piece of us this weekend. My friend, Drew, invited us to a barbecue this weekend. I was supposed to call him back. The baby is 29 inches long, which puts her in the 90^th percentile for her age and 19 pounds which put her in the 50^th percentile. What a kid! I go the grill going out back and threw on some marinated swordfish. I nuked some leftover rice and canned peas and poured Rochelle a glass of Rosemount ’99, red. The baby ate Rice Krispies and Cheerios and peas and rice and a little swordfish. After dinner, I finished the paper and watched the Bosox lose in a sweep to Cleveland, UNLV blew it against Arkansas. And now here I am recording the most mundane aspects of my life. I don’t have the nerve to try to smoke up something revelatory. Where’s my divinorum?

 

8-29-01 Tu 3:35 PM

Tim would have preferred not to have to ask the big, armed, no-nonsense father for his daughter’s hand in the presence of the farmer’s hunting buddies, but Meredith’s father said, “What are you doing here?”

“Well,” Tom gulped. “I’ve come to ask if it’s okay with you if I marry your daughter.”

Tom says the old farmer grimaced at his buddies, like get a load of this guy. “What if I say no?”

Tim said, “Well, I’m going to ask her anyway.”

Merdith’s father frowned and nodded and said, “Good.”

When we got to Aunt K’s, we drank Yuenglings and Cheap Red Wine (so read the label), and ate past and watched the baby crawl around, climb into the dishwasher—that kind of thing. I don’t remember what we did after dinner. Maybe that was the night we watched the stinko, lame-ass movie “Hannibal.” We had cantaloupe and French toast for breakfast Thursday morning. It rained that day. I read the rest of Lord Jim. The end kind of redeemed it, but I think it could’ve been better edited—a hundred pages shorter. Part of the problem is that Marlowe is such a bore, boor., so pompous. Conrad invented a good story but a bad storyteller. Whatever. Who do I think I am? We went down to the lake after the rain stopped. Cody, the German shorthair/lab mis sprung from the dock into the lake and frolicked about. We drank some beer. Had pizza for lunch. Swordfish for dinner. Magpie called with a flat tire. Chuck and I went to go help her. The jack broke. Chuck had to go back to the house for a floor jack. We changed the tire and went back to the house, played Monopoly, and drank into the night. Had scrambled eggs for breakfast the next morning. Chuck and I drove to Cricket Hills and played the back nine. I might’ve done ok, but I bookended my round with elevens. Ugh. I needed a pitching wedge. We had burgers and beers at ne 19^th hole. Chuck’s sister came over. We had roast chicken for dinner. Just drank and talked after.

 8-27-01 M 8:30 AM EDT 5:30 AM PDT

We're heading back west, coach. The gate agent used the dress code to bump Rochelle from first class. The last I wrote, 15 minutes on the laptop, we were consulting with Mac's lawyer, Fern, in her office. I'm going to do fifteen minutes here in this travel notebook, too, to try to fill the book. I'm exhausted. A week ago today, we saw Mac in the DCDC (District of Columbia Detention Center). Fern drove us from her office. We parked on a residential street near the historic home of Frederick Douglas. We filled out some forms and handed them to a woman behind a glass window. After a while, we were buzzed into a wire cage where we were frisked. I had to leave behind my pen and the baby's book (Forgot them when we left). The clock in that room in the prison did not move its hands. We were buzzed through another cage door. The elevator was broken, so we had to go up the stairs. We waited in another room lined with glass windows and phones where the prisoners talk to their visitors. Ada made friends with everyone there. Everyone there was black. After about an hour, Mac came in wearing an orange jumpsuit, hair cropped short.

7:55 AM MDT 30,000 ft

Over the Rockies, flying home: the last I wrote, we were visiting my brother. I had hoped we might sit around a table or something, that he could hold the baby, I could give him some I had bought for him, but we had to talk on phones through a glass window. I thought it would be hard to talk like that, that there would be any awkward silences, but we talked the full hour without any pauses. He has bronchitis, which sucks, but he didn't talk too much about how shitty it must be. We mostly talked about sports and the clowns we know back home. Then a guard came and took him away. Fern took Rochelle, Ada, and me back to the hotel around four o'clock. The girls fell asleep. We needed diapers, so I went out to get diapers. I stopped at a bar, the Capitol Hill Lounge and had two beers and a quesadilla. I got diapers at CVS, but they didn't have any breast pads. A downpour broke on the way back, so I stepped into another tavern and wrote in this notebook. When I got back, I read some more Lord Jim. Then, we went back out onto Pennsylvania Avenue, and Rochelle got a pizza. The baby attracted many fans to the sidewalk table where we ate. We were to jagged out to stroll over to any memorials or anything, so we just went to bed.

We met Fern again early the next morning so she could depose me. She said I would be a witness during Mac's trial. I don't know too much about it. Just that he told me he was repo-ing cars. The second day's visit to the DCDC was pretty much a repeat of the first. though I felt a little bit worse knowing I wouldn't be seeing him the again the next day. We left DC straight from the jail. Horrendous traffic knotted up the expressway to Baltimore. Rochelle drove while I played with Ada, but I typed a page, too. We got to Jim's and Meredith's in Highland, New Jersey around eight. They grilled steak and chicken, served it with corn, and pasta salad, and kept the beer coming. Jim told a funny story about driving to upstate New York to ask Meredith's dad for her hand in marriage. He drove all the way up, and her dad wasn't there. He waited in the car in while it snowed, practicing what he would say. When Meredith's dad came driving back, he was in a pickup with two other guys. All of them got out of the truck carrying rifles.

 

8-20-01 6:46 PM M

We’ve come from the DCDC—the District of Columbia Detention Center. Saw Mac in his orange jumpsuit. He hid how depressed he must be. I last wrote in Atlantic City before I went out to prowl the boardwalk on Saturday night. I ended up at a poker table in Bally’s where the cocktail waitresses seemed merely to be a rumor. I played with two brothers (the black kind), a mother and daughter combo, a Vietnamese fisherman, and Madame Zelzah, the seventy-five-year-old psychic gypsy. I spotted Zelzah right off, but was too stubborn to give in. She won five hands in a row, and I asked her if she read palms, too. She feigned not to know what I was talking about. I asked her if she had taken a peek at the Tarot deck and gotten the fortune card before she’d come out. She fixed me with the evil eye and put on a hex whereby the cocktail waitress would never come to our table. The daughter next to me complained to her mother that she was thirsty. I said to the dealer, “Hey, I usually like to drink some beer while I’m playing poker; are you allowed to do that in Atlantic City?” The daughter laughed. The dealer nodded. I said, “I been to Las Vegas a buncha times, and they actually have a woman who brings drinks to the table. Do they do that here?” The daughter snickered. The dealer said sourly, “Yes.” We played a few more hands. Madame Zelzah won them all. “You sure they got cocktail waitresses at THIS casino?” I asked. “You sure it’s not the Sands? Cuz if they don’t have ‘em here, I can go over to the Sands and lose my money.”

The Vietnamese fisherman said through his gold teeth, “D’bar there. You just go to bar. Get you own drink.”

“Who the fuck is this guy?” I said, “Mind your own business, or I’ll give you a few gold teeth to bet with.”

The daughter didn’t laugh. The dealer said nothing. I turned to the pit boss. “Hey, Boss, you guys got a water fountain around here, or something? I’m dying of thirst.” He was confused and stuttered something and shrugged and finally made up his mind I was an idiot and kept walking. “I’m out. Good luck everybody. I’ll be at the Sands,” I said.