Friday, February 27, 2004
Tackle Bottle
She opened the door, as they all did, to see him standing there.
Tall, dark hair that he never learned to comb even through years of research and discipline, that tousled mass on his head that contributed further to his charm, and that mole with little hairs that stood on the corner of his jawbone just barely conspicuous, he reached out to half hug her the way he did to all his friends, his big green jacket falling open, unzipped to reveal his persistently skinny frame.
"Gene!"
That nervous kind of shuffling, even though she could never spot the habits that betrayed him, unlike Jack, he never twitched, thumbed his clothing, reached under his shirt, or even looked down at the floor when he talked. Holding still, head drooped forward in that horrible posture of his. "Yeah, well, I was in the neighborhood visiting an old buddy from grammar school, and..." Gene had drawn and discarded many friends, but a few remained close with him over impossibly long periods of time. "Want to get some coffee?"
"Sure, Jeff just went out with the kids. Let me get my coat. It's great to see you, Gene, how many years has it been?"
Another cigarette down in the ashtray, the match clutched in between two fingers and the hands cupped, protecting the flame from inhalation, perhaps. They were inside.
"You know, Gene, what's this all about? You can't just keep this up forever."
"Aw C'mon, Jackie, I only got to keep it up till my dingus don't work anymore, you and I both know that. Plus, I'm not the looker I once was, so I'm not even counting on it much more."
"I just don't see why it's that way with you, what, do you hate them or something?"
"Hate them? God, no, of course I don't hate them. I swear, Jackie, you're losing your sense of humor."
Jack eyed his cigarette, pointed to the bottle. "Take another one, man."
The two walked out to the car, an old station wagon.
"Where'd you get this?"
"Borrowed it from my buddy. He actually lives right down the road from you. How you been?" He opened the door for her, his left hand guiding her gently by the shoulder into the passenger seat.
Gene sat and thought for a minute, searching for words, then grabbed his glass and the bottle. "There's no harm here, they all love me, man. And nobody suspects me, the dopey lookin chump from way back in high school, all those jockey I-bankers would probably think I was their wives' gay college roommate anyhow."
"Gene, I'm not worried about them. They gave up a long time ago, and if they really wanted you, you'd be in trouble. No, I'm worried about you, Gene. Once you started, you never could stop. I mean, one after the other, it's been that same frustration. Pretty good, and you know it, Gene. Pretty good, but never great, never worth staying around for. How are you going to get out?"
"Jackie, c'mon, I've been in this for too long now to settle down, plus, pretty soon I'll just be an old codger of a substitute teacher with a limp one all the time anyway, just charming some lady principle into extending me full benefits, paying some dues to an old crooked closed-shop commissioner in some college suburb. It doesn't have to sustain much longer."
"You keep missing the point, man, it's not about surviving. God knows everyone on this planet, let alone you, has the brains to survive, but you could be happy, Gene."
"Grow up, Jackie, you're just jealous cause you never had it my way, you don't know."
"You're the one who calls me about all these girls, Gene, I'm not the one asking for something."
"I'm two ahead." He lifted the bottle. "Man up, then roll me one."
They crawled cautiously around, Gene, meticulous behind the wheel, checking his blind spots, signaling when no one was around. The Oldies station played a song she didn't know, a romantic tune about some poor boy's baby leaving him behind.
They were silent till they pulled up to the old haunt, that diner that would've been clean if it had been a chain, but Gene always liked places that served mashed potatoes cold in little, somehow yellowish globs, and the coffee wasn't terrible.
"You look good, Gene, what've you been up to?"
Jack poured himself a glass, downed it, dripped the remaining whiskey into Gene's glass and cast around his apartment. "Thought I bought some beer the other day." Cans littered the floor and counter, the bed unmade lay beside the table where they sat. "C'mon, there's a liquor store nearby." He put on his jacket and opened the door.
They sat in a booth, the grey of the cloudy morning coming through the window. "Still freelancing a bit for the Post, direct deposit from my editing and reviewing keeps the bank card flowing. Jack came by my place the other day, kept me up all night talking."
Her bangs, blond, fell across her forehead and she raised a hand to tuck them away, her left ear still pierced up on the cartilagenous ridge. "Well, Matthew and David are in school now, so I don't have much to do anymore except work out. I write a little, you know, old poetry. Jeff just got promoted, so we may be moving soon."
The waitress came with the coffee, and she looked at him for a minute. "Could you pass me the cream?"
Jack and Gene headed down the sidewalk to the liquor store, stepped inside.
"Bottle of Jameson."
"Twenty-five fifty."
Jack plunked down the bills, old and limp.
"Need a bag?"
"Thanks."
Back outside, the went for the subway stop in the little park two blocks away.
"No, man, but how can you stand not really wanting it? Not really having any desire? How do you even do it? I mean I know how it goes, but aren't you looking?"
The train screetched up and the doors hissed open. Inside, they opened the bottle, each taking a swig. "Stand clear of the closing doors, please."
The oak door with the bells on a peg closed and jingled, and Gene walked out onto the front lawn, turning to wave goodbye to her, now clad in pyjamas and sipping on some tea she made, sheepish and tired as he headed to the station wagon. The wind blew some cans and twigs, and some kids playing football down the street, three of them, the oldest ones, girls, shouted. The youngest boy waved at Gene, but he'd already turned to unlock the door.
She sat down to that opened notebook. David had crayoned a little drawing of the family on the pages. She flipped back to her thin, blue scratches, the lines that never really moved her, that just sat lonely and limp on the light blue lines of the spiral. She wondered if she'd left the window open, and took a sip of tea.
The phone rang. "Jeff, yes. How was the meeting? Oh, that's terriffic...yes, I put them in the mail when I woke up this morning." She felt a warm drop fall on her hand, then reached up to shut the window, listening to her husband, strolled across the room to turn up the thermostat.
The train hissed to another stop further downtown. They stepped into the night breeze and descended the mesh iron stairs onto the sidewalk.
"Hey, Joseph."
"Gene, Jack."
Inside the bar, an old sixties pop song about going back home played through the speakers, too small and buzzing with overdrive.
"Two whiskeys, lots of ice."
"What?" demanded Gene.
"Huh?"
"What do you think I'm asking for, anyway? This is just the way it goes, man. Everyone knows that, everyone has this problem, don't you remember school? Experimenting? All those books we read, being free?"
"Gene, it's what's keeping us out of life, there's a reason people get married, there's a reason why. People need that kind of thing, everyone wants to fall in love, not just be loved, not just to be wanted by lots of people, but to look at something that could be, and really want it to. You think having two girls in the shower is sustainable?"
Gene laughed nervously. "Not so loud, man, there's those two at the bar. What do you say, for old time's sake?"
Jack was busy rolling another cigarette, but he thought a minute. They could do it. His memory flashed to those moments of abandon and recklessness, nights where he was drunk and nothing mattered, nights like this. But then the other thoughts, the pain and the guilt, the thoughts that would cross his mind every time he kissed a woman, those lightning flashes of perversity that had haunted him even through his marriage to Jeanne. "No, man, no way. That was all for one thing. To see if we could. And we could. I got no more questions on that front. It's better to beat off and leave others out of my unloving, unrespecting cycles."
"No, man, I'll play fair this time, I'll call her again. I'll send her flowers. Hell, I'll marry her."
"Shut up, you dumb idiot. Don't play with me tonight."
The car bumped along the road, scattering the kids playing football onto the grassy patches by the sidewalks. They stood, their eyes following him as he rolled by, appraising, accusing him of ruining their game.
He pulled past his buddy Greg's house. He was probably still asleep. So he pulled around the bend, up to the drive near the high school, back down towards the river, and up to another house. He was running out of houses to go to, running out of friends to stay with. The young girls weren't going for him anymore, he had to double back onto his old liaisons.
He rang the doorbell. She opened, like they all did.
"Gene? Is that Eugene Mannes? I haven't seen you in a long time."
"Um," her hair, no longer green but brown, her eyes naked, having shed their caked mascara years before, "your house is quiet. Where's, um?"
"Robert? He left. Firm sent him to Thailand, I just couldn't go."
"Um," He looked down at the floor, but caught her in that grey sweatshirt, those pajama pants and those slippers. The radio tuned to the classic rock station in the background. She stood there, silent, leaning on one hip, the other leaning out, staring at him, those blue eyes. "Can I come in?"
She just kept looking at him. "I got your postcard from London, Gene. That was two years ago." Staring.
"I guess I, uh, well..." Gene coughed into his green jacket, the cuff, let his eyes climb up to really meet hers, now. "Do you want maybe to come out, for some coffee?"
"Sorry, Gene, I would, but I got to meet Clara at the airport in a couple minutes."
"Great, I'll drive you." He was looking back at the floor.
"Gene, I can't, Clara called a week ago, she's going to stay with me awhile, things are still bad with her."
"After all this time? Jesus." He tried again to look at her face, wanting to, that softness despite all the time, even the little smile, but...
"Yeah, Gene, after all this time. Some people don't forget so easy, I guess. I have to get ready. Give me a call sometime, I'd like to talk with you." She closed the door.
"Jesus." He let the car coast down the hill, that oldie, about the chapel, and getting married, was on. Gene switched the station.
The crows shrieked and poked at one another on the wires, and the young quarterback dropped back for a pass, her arm cocked back as the little boy ran past the defensive line and touched her with both hands. The three girls and all those boys backed up a few more yards down the street, and the play started again.
She opened the door, as they all did, to see him standing there.
Tall, dark hair that he never learned to comb even through years of research and discipline, that tousled mass on his head that contributed further to his charm, and that mole with little hairs that stood on the corner of his jawbone just barely conspicuous, he reached out to half hug her the way he did to all his friends, his big green jacket falling open, unzipped to reveal his persistently skinny frame.
"Gene!"
That nervous kind of shuffling, even though she could never spot the habits that betrayed him, unlike Jack, he never twitched, thumbed his clothing, reached under his shirt, or even looked down at the floor when he talked. Holding still, head drooped forward in that horrible posture of his. "Yeah, well, I was in the neighborhood visiting an old buddy from grammar school, and..." Gene had drawn and discarded many friends, but a few remained close with him over impossibly long periods of time. "Want to get some coffee?"
"Sure, Jeff just went out with the kids. Let me get my coat. It's great to see you, Gene, how many years has it been?"
Another cigarette down in the ashtray, the match clutched in between two fingers and the hands cupped, protecting the flame from inhalation, perhaps. They were inside.
"You know, Gene, what's this all about? You can't just keep this up forever."
"Aw C'mon, Jackie, I only got to keep it up till my dingus don't work anymore, you and I both know that. Plus, I'm not the looker I once was, so I'm not even counting on it much more."
"I just don't see why it's that way with you, what, do you hate them or something?"
"Hate them? God, no, of course I don't hate them. I swear, Jackie, you're losing your sense of humor."
Jack eyed his cigarette, pointed to the bottle. "Take another one, man."
The two walked out to the car, an old station wagon.
"Where'd you get this?"
"Borrowed it from my buddy. He actually lives right down the road from you. How you been?" He opened the door for her, his left hand guiding her gently by the shoulder into the passenger seat.
Gene sat and thought for a minute, searching for words, then grabbed his glass and the bottle. "There's no harm here, they all love me, man. And nobody suspects me, the dopey lookin chump from way back in high school, all those jockey I-bankers would probably think I was their wives' gay college roommate anyhow."
"Gene, I'm not worried about them. They gave up a long time ago, and if they really wanted you, you'd be in trouble. No, I'm worried about you, Gene. Once you started, you never could stop. I mean, one after the other, it's been that same frustration. Pretty good, and you know it, Gene. Pretty good, but never great, never worth staying around for. How are you going to get out?"
"Jackie, c'mon, I've been in this for too long now to settle down, plus, pretty soon I'll just be an old codger of a substitute teacher with a limp one all the time anyway, just charming some lady principle into extending me full benefits, paying some dues to an old crooked closed-shop commissioner in some college suburb. It doesn't have to sustain much longer."
"You keep missing the point, man, it's not about surviving. God knows everyone on this planet, let alone you, has the brains to survive, but you could be happy, Gene."
"Grow up, Jackie, you're just jealous cause you never had it my way, you don't know."
"You're the one who calls me about all these girls, Gene, I'm not the one asking for something."
"I'm two ahead." He lifted the bottle. "Man up, then roll me one."
They crawled cautiously around, Gene, meticulous behind the wheel, checking his blind spots, signaling when no one was around. The Oldies station played a song she didn't know, a romantic tune about some poor boy's baby leaving him behind.
They were silent till they pulled up to the old haunt, that diner that would've been clean if it had been a chain, but Gene always liked places that served mashed potatoes cold in little, somehow yellowish globs, and the coffee wasn't terrible.
"You look good, Gene, what've you been up to?"
Jack poured himself a glass, downed it, dripped the remaining whiskey into Gene's glass and cast around his apartment. "Thought I bought some beer the other day." Cans littered the floor and counter, the bed unmade lay beside the table where they sat. "C'mon, there's a liquor store nearby." He put on his jacket and opened the door.
They sat in a booth, the grey of the cloudy morning coming through the window. "Still freelancing a bit for the Post, direct deposit from my editing and reviewing keeps the bank card flowing. Jack came by my place the other day, kept me up all night talking."
Her bangs, blond, fell across her forehead and she raised a hand to tuck them away, her left ear still pierced up on the cartilagenous ridge. "Well, Matthew and David are in school now, so I don't have much to do anymore except work out. I write a little, you know, old poetry. Jeff just got promoted, so we may be moving soon."
The waitress came with the coffee, and she looked at him for a minute. "Could you pass me the cream?"
Jack and Gene headed down the sidewalk to the liquor store, stepped inside.
"Bottle of Jameson."
"Twenty-five fifty."
Jack plunked down the bills, old and limp.
"Need a bag?"
"Thanks."
Back outside, the went for the subway stop in the little park two blocks away.
"No, man, but how can you stand not really wanting it? Not really having any desire? How do you even do it? I mean I know how it goes, but aren't you looking?"
The train screetched up and the doors hissed open. Inside, they opened the bottle, each taking a swig. "Stand clear of the closing doors, please."
The oak door with the bells on a peg closed and jingled, and Gene walked out onto the front lawn, turning to wave goodbye to her, now clad in pyjamas and sipping on some tea she made, sheepish and tired as he headed to the station wagon. The wind blew some cans and twigs, and some kids playing football down the street, three of them, the oldest ones, girls, shouted. The youngest boy waved at Gene, but he'd already turned to unlock the door.
She sat down to that opened notebook. David had crayoned a little drawing of the family on the pages. She flipped back to her thin, blue scratches, the lines that never really moved her, that just sat lonely and limp on the light blue lines of the spiral. She wondered if she'd left the window open, and took a sip of tea.
The phone rang. "Jeff, yes. How was the meeting? Oh, that's terriffic...yes, I put them in the mail when I woke up this morning." She felt a warm drop fall on her hand, then reached up to shut the window, listening to her husband, strolled across the room to turn up the thermostat.
The train hissed to another stop further downtown. They stepped into the night breeze and descended the mesh iron stairs onto the sidewalk.
"Hey, Joseph."
"Gene, Jack."
Inside the bar, an old sixties pop song about going back home played through the speakers, too small and buzzing with overdrive.
"Two whiskeys, lots of ice."
"What?" demanded Gene.
"Huh?"
"What do you think I'm asking for, anyway? This is just the way it goes, man. Everyone knows that, everyone has this problem, don't you remember school? Experimenting? All those books we read, being free?"
"Gene, it's what's keeping us out of life, there's a reason people get married, there's a reason why. People need that kind of thing, everyone wants to fall in love, not just be loved, not just to be wanted by lots of people, but to look at something that could be, and really want it to. You think having two girls in the shower is sustainable?"
Gene laughed nervously. "Not so loud, man, there's those two at the bar. What do you say, for old time's sake?"
Jack was busy rolling another cigarette, but he thought a minute. They could do it. His memory flashed to those moments of abandon and recklessness, nights where he was drunk and nothing mattered, nights like this. But then the other thoughts, the pain and the guilt, the thoughts that would cross his mind every time he kissed a woman, those lightning flashes of perversity that had haunted him even through his marriage to Jeanne. "No, man, no way. That was all for one thing. To see if we could. And we could. I got no more questions on that front. It's better to beat off and leave others out of my unloving, unrespecting cycles."
"No, man, I'll play fair this time, I'll call her again. I'll send her flowers. Hell, I'll marry her."
"Shut up, you dumb idiot. Don't play with me tonight."
The car bumped along the road, scattering the kids playing football onto the grassy patches by the sidewalks. They stood, their eyes following him as he rolled by, appraising, accusing him of ruining their game.
He pulled past his buddy Greg's house. He was probably still asleep. So he pulled around the bend, up to the drive near the high school, back down towards the river, and up to another house. He was running out of houses to go to, running out of friends to stay with. The young girls weren't going for him anymore, he had to double back onto his old liaisons.
He rang the doorbell. She opened, like they all did.
"Gene? Is that Eugene Mannes? I haven't seen you in a long time."
"Um," her hair, no longer green but brown, her eyes naked, having shed their caked mascara years before, "your house is quiet. Where's, um?"
"Robert? He left. Firm sent him to Thailand, I just couldn't go."
"Um," He looked down at the floor, but caught her in that grey sweatshirt, those pajama pants and those slippers. The radio tuned to the classic rock station in the background. She stood there, silent, leaning on one hip, the other leaning out, staring at him, those blue eyes. "Can I come in?"
She just kept looking at him. "I got your postcard from London, Gene. That was two years ago." Staring.
"I guess I, uh, well..." Gene coughed into his green jacket, the cuff, let his eyes climb up to really meet hers, now. "Do you want maybe to come out, for some coffee?"
"Sorry, Gene, I would, but I got to meet Clara at the airport in a couple minutes."
"Great, I'll drive you." He was looking back at the floor.
"Gene, I can't, Clara called a week ago, she's going to stay with me awhile, things are still bad with her."
"After all this time? Jesus." He tried again to look at her face, wanting to, that softness despite all the time, even the little smile, but...
"Yeah, Gene, after all this time. Some people don't forget so easy, I guess. I have to get ready. Give me a call sometime, I'd like to talk with you." She closed the door.
"Jesus." He let the car coast down the hill, that oldie, about the chapel, and getting married, was on. Gene switched the station.
The crows shrieked and poked at one another on the wires, and the young quarterback dropped back for a pass, her arm cocked back as the little boy ran past the defensive line and touched her with both hands. The three girls and all those boys backed up a few more yards down the street, and the play started again.
Wednesday, February 25, 2004
Green Benches
The old men sitting on the bench wonder
Why the young men sitting across are not happy,
Why with vigor they sit and wonder why
Dead men across the sea sat so long in wonder
Of ancient things.
A young lady sits on a bench with
A younger lady inside her
And wonders how come these countless
Men even have
Any time at all.
The old men sitting on the bench wonder
Why the young men sitting across are not happy,
Why with vigor they sit and wonder why
Dead men across the sea sat so long in wonder
Of ancient things.
A young lady sits on a bench with
A younger lady inside her
And wonders how come these countless
Men even have
Any time at all.
Monday, February 23, 2004
ralph nader is running again. i'm going to vote for him. suck it.
Friday, February 20, 2004
“Il est tres regrettable que ce cote toxique des processus animiques se soit jusqu’a present soustrait a la recherche scientifique. L’action des stupefiants dans le combat pour le bonheur et le mantien a distance de la misere est a ce point apreciee comme un bienfait que les individus, comme les peuples, leur ont accorde une solide position dans leur economie libidinale. »
-Sigmund Freud, Le malaise dans la culture.
A naked eye pretends
To watch the beach as
Neurons burst.
I laugh, and
Dendrites quiver
In a beaten
Childrens' dance.
Wade through
Marshes of cells and rotten fluid
Burst on the floor
While swell kids fire blankets and
Wake to open mouths.
-Sigmund Freud, Le malaise dans la culture.
A naked eye pretends
To watch the beach as
Neurons burst.
I laugh, and
Dendrites quiver
In a beaten
Childrens' dance.
Wade through
Marshes of cells and rotten fluid
Burst on the floor
While swell kids fire blankets and
Wake to open mouths.
No Need to Guess
That mess pounding that mess
Heap upon heap and
Crouded mascara and hair
And shavings crowd around.
Crowds wander and shoot
And thrust and exercise,
Pound, thrash, mess upon mess.
A ghasp and a finishing touch on
My face and a disgusted
Sortie and forlorn forever,
A quiet lady covers herself in a towel.
That mess pounding that mess
Heap upon heap and
Crouded mascara and hair
And shavings crowd around.
Crowds wander and shoot
And thrust and exercise,
Pound, thrash, mess upon mess.
A ghasp and a finishing touch on
My face and a disgusted
Sortie and forlorn forever,
A quiet lady covers herself in a towel.
Monday, February 16, 2004
The Jesus Series: Playing Chess
Jesus sat down in a park long ago
To play chess against James and John.
The apostles won two out of three matches,
But then Jesus cheated and won.
Jesus sat down in a park long ago
To play chess against James and John.
The apostles won two out of three matches,
But then Jesus cheated and won.
The Jesus Series: Jesus Liked Everybody
Jesus hated wars and stars and ships,
And now experts say he hates men,
But in truth he hung out with whores and witches
And would rather we kiss than condemn.
Jesus hated wars and stars and ships,
And now experts say he hates men,
But in truth he hung out with whores and witches
And would rather we kiss than condemn.
The Jesus Series: Fightin'
Jesus and I have had lots of fights,
And I’ve often been left for dead,
But that after three days trick I taught him back then,
Helped a lot when he busted my head.
Jesus and I have had lots of fights,
And I’ve often been left for dead,
But that after three days trick I taught him back then,
Helped a lot when he busted my head.
The Jesus Series: Eucharist
Jesus would get so drunk
His blood’d turn to wine.
Sunday mornings he’d
Transform it back,
And now we celebrate that all the time.
Jesus would get so drunk
His blood’d turn to wine.
Sunday mornings he’d
Transform it back,
And now we celebrate that all the time.
The Jesus Series: Everyone Makes Mistakes
Jesus hit mary not so hard that one night
He was drunk and what could she do?
When the child of god gets his nose in a bottle
You just wait til the night is through.
Jesus hit mary not so hard that one night
He was drunk and what could she do?
When the child of god gets his nose in a bottle
You just wait til the night is through.
The Jesus Series: Jesus and I
Jesus and I are clever friends
We both steal bread from Rome,
And give it to children of hungry streets
And say that it grew on its own.
Jesus and I are clever friends
We both steal bread from Rome,
And give it to children of hungry streets
And say that it grew on its own.
Thursday, February 12, 2004
ma petite cherie
ma petite cherie
ma petite cherie
tes yeux sont comme des lacs
mais ce dont je voudrais
plutot parler
ces sont ceux de ton petit cousin jacques
ma petite cherie
ma petite cherie
tes levres tremblent a la touche
mais ce dont je voulais
plutot parler
n'appartiennent pas a ta bouche
parce que...
ce qui est bon c'est la dedans
a l'ombre et bien cache
il faut pas se plaindre de nos faibles destins
mais plutot chercher la verite
ma petite cherie
ma petite cherie
t'as le gout d'un bon vieux vin
mais je suis désolé
je dois t'abandonner
c'est le vinaigre que tu deviens
ma petite cherie
ma petite cherie
tes yeux sont comme des lacs
mais ce dont je voudrais
plutot parler
ces sont ceux de ton petit cousin jacques
ma petite cherie
ma petite cherie
tes levres tremblent a la touche
mais ce dont je voulais
plutot parler
n'appartiennent pas a ta bouche
parce que...
ce qui est bon c'est la dedans
a l'ombre et bien cache
il faut pas se plaindre de nos faibles destins
mais plutot chercher la verite
ma petite cherie
ma petite cherie
t'as le gout d'un bon vieux vin
mais je suis désolé
je dois t'abandonner
c'est le vinaigre que tu deviens
J'ai du marcher pour oublier que j'avais faim.
J'ai du manger pour oublier que j'avais du mal a marcher.
J'ai du oublier pour manger la pensée de ma femme.
J'ai du écouter la dame, car
J'avais trop faim, donc
Tu m'as donné un peu de pain.
J'ai du manger pour oublier que j'avais du mal a marcher.
J'ai du oublier pour manger la pensée de ma femme.
J'ai du écouter la dame, car
J'avais trop faim, donc
Tu m'as donné un peu de pain.
Monday, February 02, 2004
karang and jameson
Chapter Two
"Adma Toure!" The family, excited to see their returned son, swarmed around, the women exclaiming to each other, "The guest is here! The guest is here!"
They gave us heaps of food, then we lounged outside, joking and laughing. They laughed hugely when I told them my own name, Moussa Coly, and we spent half an hour jibing each others' ethnicities and cracking wise about America and city folk.
A swarm of kids buzzed around the compound, harrassing the goats and chickens, hitting each other, throwing sticks, and laughing. Their bare feet were hard from bare tramps through the dust roads and hours of soccer, and their bellies, hard and bloated from malnourishment, paraded themselves accusingly above slack waistbands.
"The men are working right now, about the only time they ever do that. I like hanging out with the women, though, it's more relaxed, and even stateside I like women more than men," Over our day-long voyage, Kurt had never had an opinion. Now, he stated this last with the same blasé tone, as if he were still rattling off tidbits about the local agriculture.
I wandered over to sit on a fencepost, half shaded by a nearby shack, playing occasional games of tic tac toe with kids who passed by, until some of the younger men passed by on their way home from the fields. They greeted me casually, standing around rolling their Gambian tobacco into cigarettes. One guy smiled at me, showing he had no front teeth at all, just two huge canines jutting out of his blackened gums.
Our conversation wrinkled and clogged frequently, stopped up by mutual ignorance of the others' native languages, but we managed a trickling thread that saw the burning sun sink into an evening calm.
"Your president is bad. He likes to kill people, only likes war," the one with no teeth looked stoically perturbed by U.S. foreign policy; there was no anger in his voice, just quiet observation.
"My president is bad. But your president likes to steal from the people, so maybe all presidents are bad."
Horrified, the toothless one said "You can't talk that way, president Wade has people everywhere, you must be careful what you say or you could get hurt."
"I didn't know."
"Just be careful, live carefully."
I said goodbye and rejoined Kurt by the women, who still pounded the rice and millet in rhythmic timing, even tossing their pestles in the air and clapping in between each thumping blow to the grain.
"Let's head in for dinner, we've got a big day tomorrow."
The chickens Kurt had bought alive in the market that day now sat in a bowl of rice in Kurt's small hut, covered in a red sauce made mostly of peanut oil. There was more than enough, and we devoured the whole bowl in customary Senegalese silence, the only disturbance coming from Kurt's bony kitten, Samba, who climbed into the bowl, trying to eat all the chicken. Kurt would pick him up and toss him across the room, only to find him there seconds later, whining for more food.
Kurt offered me a peanut butter cookie which I ate much too fast, and we sat munching, me contemplating the adventures already behind me and Kurt probably just enjoying his dessert.
"Tomorrow we're biking to Tabacouda. I hope you like biking."
I assured him I did, having resolved to be up for anything and worried what I would do if I were left alone in this small village, barely able to speak to anyone and too unfamiliar with the countryside to safely explore.
"Great. Well, we should probably go to bed now if we're going to get a head start on the sun."
I stepped out of the hut and onto my bed of twigs, stretching on the woven mat and closing the mosquito net. I was burned badly by the heat of the sun and quickly passed out from the exhaustion of riding through sand and the mental navigation of a culture totally obscure and different from my own.
Exhaustion carried me through half the night, but soon the alien surroundings found me restless and frightened. Hyenas laughed outside the fence and birds called to each other, the crickets screaming inside their shells while I lay naked and silent under a thin sheet and protected only by a net, straining my memory to conjure dreams of my home and my girlfriend out of the heaving cries of animals who knew better than me how to live here.
Chapter Two
"Adma Toure!" The family, excited to see their returned son, swarmed around, the women exclaiming to each other, "The guest is here! The guest is here!"
They gave us heaps of food, then we lounged outside, joking and laughing. They laughed hugely when I told them my own name, Moussa Coly, and we spent half an hour jibing each others' ethnicities and cracking wise about America and city folk.
A swarm of kids buzzed around the compound, harrassing the goats and chickens, hitting each other, throwing sticks, and laughing. Their bare feet were hard from bare tramps through the dust roads and hours of soccer, and their bellies, hard and bloated from malnourishment, paraded themselves accusingly above slack waistbands.
"The men are working right now, about the only time they ever do that. I like hanging out with the women, though, it's more relaxed, and even stateside I like women more than men," Over our day-long voyage, Kurt had never had an opinion. Now, he stated this last with the same blasé tone, as if he were still rattling off tidbits about the local agriculture.
I wandered over to sit on a fencepost, half shaded by a nearby shack, playing occasional games of tic tac toe with kids who passed by, until some of the younger men passed by on their way home from the fields. They greeted me casually, standing around rolling their Gambian tobacco into cigarettes. One guy smiled at me, showing he had no front teeth at all, just two huge canines jutting out of his blackened gums.
Our conversation wrinkled and clogged frequently, stopped up by mutual ignorance of the others' native languages, but we managed a trickling thread that saw the burning sun sink into an evening calm.
"Your president is bad. He likes to kill people, only likes war," the one with no teeth looked stoically perturbed by U.S. foreign policy; there was no anger in his voice, just quiet observation.
"My president is bad. But your president likes to steal from the people, so maybe all presidents are bad."
Horrified, the toothless one said "You can't talk that way, president Wade has people everywhere, you must be careful what you say or you could get hurt."
"I didn't know."
"Just be careful, live carefully."
I said goodbye and rejoined Kurt by the women, who still pounded the rice and millet in rhythmic timing, even tossing their pestles in the air and clapping in between each thumping blow to the grain.
"Let's head in for dinner, we've got a big day tomorrow."
The chickens Kurt had bought alive in the market that day now sat in a bowl of rice in Kurt's small hut, covered in a red sauce made mostly of peanut oil. There was more than enough, and we devoured the whole bowl in customary Senegalese silence, the only disturbance coming from Kurt's bony kitten, Samba, who climbed into the bowl, trying to eat all the chicken. Kurt would pick him up and toss him across the room, only to find him there seconds later, whining for more food.
Kurt offered me a peanut butter cookie which I ate much too fast, and we sat munching, me contemplating the adventures already behind me and Kurt probably just enjoying his dessert.
"Tomorrow we're biking to Tabacouda. I hope you like biking."
I assured him I did, having resolved to be up for anything and worried what I would do if I were left alone in this small village, barely able to speak to anyone and too unfamiliar with the countryside to safely explore.
"Great. Well, we should probably go to bed now if we're going to get a head start on the sun."
I stepped out of the hut and onto my bed of twigs, stretching on the woven mat and closing the mosquito net. I was burned badly by the heat of the sun and quickly passed out from the exhaustion of riding through sand and the mental navigation of a culture totally obscure and different from my own.
Exhaustion carried me through half the night, but soon the alien surroundings found me restless and frightened. Hyenas laughed outside the fence and birds called to each other, the crickets screaming inside their shells while I lay naked and silent under a thin sheet and protected only by a net, straining my memory to conjure dreams of my home and my girlfriend out of the heaving cries of animals who knew better than me how to live here.
