​

In the morning, the haze that clouded his mind had not lifted like it usually did. The haze usually lasted until something in his day warded the bad spell off. Sometimes it was good food that did the trick. Other times, a hello from a friend, maybe a nice conversation, or pretty eyes from a stranger. But today the haze lurked and stalked. Something had gone terribly wrong. What has gone wrong? Moe thought as he looked at the center console of his car and was glad that sweet escape was so near. He was slipping. Running out of time.

​

Moe entered the Waffle House. It was empty except for two waitresses and an old cook. The whole atmosphere was permeated with their jaded expressions. They didn’t talk amongst each other, and they all seemed to be absorbed in their own world. It was truly strange, Moe thought. They weren’t even occupied with a book, phone, or magazine. Each employee stared off in their own direction and seemed to be focused on the refrigerator hum and the routine click it made.

​

He sat down in a booth seat as one of the waitresses handed him the menu in silence. They knew, he thought. They can smell it too. That something is wrong.

​

The waitress came back in a few minutes and asked him what he decided on.

​

“I’ll take a T-bone steak with a side of hash browns.”

​

“Anything else?”

​

“No, that’ll be all.”

​

The waitress nodded, went up to the cook, and whispered the order to him. Afterward, she sat down on a bar seat near Moe.

​

Moe sat in silence, letting his thoughts dribble out like the last droplets of water being expunged from a wet towel. It was something his sister had taught him. “If you let your thoughts dribble on by themselves, they usually lead to answers, make you go insane, or both,” she used to say. It was her way of joking and advising him. She was always clever, Moe thought. She would know what to do in this situation.

​

Moe tried to track down what was bothering him. To navigate the fog clouding his mind. He began by closing his eyes and remembering his day as it happened in exact detail. He woke up around eight in the morning to get ready for his job. He had just cleaned his room the day before, and as he woke, he remembered the odd sensation. It felt organized but sterile and cold, like a doctor’s office. He went out of his room and, on his way to the kitchen, glanced at the purple glass vase on the dining table. He drank a glass of water in the kitchen, stared outside where a pair of power lines greeted his view, and – Moe suddenly paused his reflection. His thinking fixated on the purple glass vase. Moe had a peculiar habit of fixating on various objects when serious things were happening. One time his father was speaking to him about his future when he had fixated on a bottle of shampoo. The font was anorexic, and the borders of the graphic print on the bottle looked uninspired and forgettable. Who the hell designed this bottle, he had thought. Sometimes it would get worse. Back in Moe’s college days, his teacher had mentioned his unimpressive grades and asked him how he planned to improve. But Moe couldn’t give an answer because he was too busy imagining the Babe Ruth bobblehead on the desk speaking in a Brooklyn accent and swinging his bat ferociously. Moe didn’t mind most of the time and thought it was humorous. So it was with the vase on his dining table. He fixated on the object. But it did not speak. It was quiet. Reflecting a warped purplish figure back to Moe.

​

Moe snapped out of it. To hell with that vase, he thought. Where did the fog come from?

The vase. That purple vase. It would not go away. That purple glass vase is strange. Strange because now that Moe thought about it, he had never had flowers in that apartment. It also didn’t help that the vase wasn’t in the center of the table. Rather, it was awkwardly off-center. In fact, Moe couldn’t remember ever owning or buying a vase.

Like old corrupted film, his thoughts dribbled on, recycled, and collapsed in on each other rapidly. He felt a rising sensation that his apartment was strange and unpredictable. He couldn’t trust it anymore. Home was not home. It was a highway full of traffic waiting only for the inevitable accident to happen. The apartment wasn’t unfamiliar, but he felt like it wasn’t his and belonged to someone or something else. Or maybe it belonged to no one, and things could pass freely at their leisure. Maybe that’s how the vase had appeared. By its own will to pass and stay awhile for some or the other reason. Maybe that’s the form demons and ghosts took on now that their myths had gone unbelieved for generations.

​

Moe couldn’t stop thinking about it now. He had worked himself up, and every time he closed his eyes he would see that purple vase. It threatened his authority even in the private room of his mind. How had it gotten there? He wondered. It threatened his authority with a terrible question.

​

​

But it was enough. Drowning under a question doesn’t tend to help, and neither does obsessing over a vase, he thought. If he kept this up, it was only a matter of time before the vase would appear in front of him. He glanced to his right, stealing glances at the silent employees. I’m being watched, he thought. Waiters don’t usually act like this. Pressure mounted on Moe as he felt suffocated by the employees not looking at him directly but certainly feeling how the air had changed from the moment he had stepped in.

​

Minutes passed, and soon enough the waitress came back with his food. The food looked okay. The T-Bone steak was a decent size but looked a little over-crisp and dry. The hash browns looked appetizing with its oily coating and golden crust, but Moe’s brooding had made him lose his appetite. And the more he looked at his food, the more he noticed it was staring back. Everything was conspiring against him, he thought.

​

Moe couldn’t take the silence.

​

“Can I ask you a question?” Moe asked the waitress sitting at the bar.

​

She didn’t answer immediately but seemed to snap back into reality a few moments after Moe asked.

​

“Do you like working here?”

​

“Hmmmm...I can’t say I do.”

​

“What do you love?” Moe asked

​

“Hmmm, I don’t think I have ever thought about that in such blunt terms. I’m not sure how to answer that. How do you answer something like that?”

​

Silence settled briefly in the restaurant again before Moe disturbed it again.

​

“That’s what I’m trying to figure out. I don’t have an answer. Doesn’t it bother you that you don’t know what you love? Why keep waking up to loveless days? Even the crackhead has something he loves.”

​

“Well, now that I think about it, I do like my days off and walking. Breathing. Things like that are peaceful.”

​

“Does it not bother you, though, to love such little things?”

​

“It doesn’t.”

​

“That cannot possibly be a real answer.”

​

“It’s as real as your steak and hash browns. They’re getting cold.”

​

Moe looked down at his food as the waiter suggested, and looked back up.

​

“Why did you come here?” She asked.

​

“Something’s wrong. I’m looking for something.”

​

“Well, a lot of answers are found in the most unlikely of places, but I don’t understand your riddles any more than you do.”

​

Silence refreshed the atmosphere once again before she got up and walked away. Moe would not see her face for the rest of the night.

​

Moe questioned himself again. He was surely looking for something, but the rotten question revealed its purple reflection again.

​

The only possible lead Moe had was a memory. He remembered listening to some classical music when he was younger. It was music his mother or father had listened to. Moe found it somewhat enjoyable and never gave the music much thought until one day a song had moved him with a warm happiness. The flurry of instruments advanced quietly, and getting steadily louder, stomped down, disbanded, whispered, and climaxed altogether like gossiping daughters. Moe’s favorite part was the violins, which played with such collective strength and strain that threatened to break their own thin strings, not accustomed to such enormous song that filled every corner of the imagination.

​

Moe had taken it for granted at that age, and it was the only time he would hear that song. But Moe, remembering the grand sound, noticed something. Moe loved the song so much that it propelled him further than just mere happiness. Past happiness was something that was plainly put: fundamental. Necessary for making life bearable. This necessity. Something most people fail to recognize even though they depend terribly on it. This thing can be found if you look closely at a person, maybe an animal, or a building. Hidden amongst those things, you see what Moe had seen in his favorite tune. The underlying brush strokes that make up the base coat of reality, objects, and everything in between. And heaven lay in this base coat. Without heaven as a primer, everything would resort to a dull evil. Hell’s love would rise, and heaven’s bleeding love dripping would cease and fill the heavens, making the sky red. And so if this underlying heaven that Moe witnessed in his reveried song could be accessed, he could launch a counterattack and even possibly defeat the purple question.

​

Moe saw it and decided that this was what he needed. He needed heaven and to hold it at least for a moment. That was the only way his life could be bearable.

​

But to hold heaven in his hands seemed an absolute mystery to Moe. What would that even entail? He thought. To bring down and manifest heaven on earth seemed an impossible task. But to hold it in the possession of a single person. To hold it for even a moment. It was nonsense and arrogant.

​

Moe suddenly snapped out of it as the silence broke from water hissing on the grill. The old cook was cleaning the grill from the day’s grease and potato-onion buildup.

​

Shortly after, the other waitress said, “If ya ain’t gonna eat your food, you might as well walk out. There’s no use for you to be sitting there scaring the other customers away.”

​

Customers, what other customers? Moe thought as he stood up and walked to the bathroom.

​

In the bathroom with his back against the wall, Moe felt every bump of the imperfect drywall as he slid down to the floor. The tile floor announced itself to Moe as he quietly pondered like light rain. Lightly. Watering the ground where the plant would spring from and bear fruit to an answer.

​

But as he analyzed the tiles thoroughly, he noticed a pair of dangling legs in one of the stalls. Moe stared at those legs that were almost trembling and pastel white. A white so pure and clear that it almost shone his reflection back. Strange, all too strange. Possibly even dangerous, Moe thought. He stared at the legs for some moments, trying to locate any meaning in them while keeping the bathroom entrance in sight. But suddenly, just a moment later, a sure calm wind possessed Moe as he thought, well, who might this be other than God? An arrogant claim. But nevertheless, Moe was running out of options.

​

In a moment, Moe changed his position on the floor from sitting to kneeling. He then proceeded to shuffle his way to the stall on his knees and whisper a hello. No answer.

​

“I need help,” Moe said, “I need a piece of heaven to hold in my hands. Just for a moment. Only then will I see the path clear to me. So you see God, I am entirely in your hands.”

​

There was only silence. What was God trying to say here? Moe thought. There was only silence. Could he be present in silence? Could he be nothing?

​

The more Moe thought about it, though, the more he realized something. Isn’t this very moment in this bathroom an encounter with God and thus heaven, he thought. Moe was the only one present in this bathroom, and was it not he who was solely holding this experience? Was this not the wish Moe had asked for?

​

Moe’s skin began crawling as he realized this, and he scrambled. This was his chance to grasp what he needed. He felt almost hot with fever, afraid he would miss a sign. What is God trying to tell me? he thought. He needed to be fully present.

​

Then Moe started to taste the air of the room, which tasted like petrichor laced with salt. This taste soon enveloped his body with a soft positive charge. Buzzing around in isolated areas and then collectively through the whole body until a collective warmth emanated. It was like the morning’s first sun rays hugging him on a crisp day. He was glad to feel the same warmth he had felt from his revered song once again. For Moe, everything felt brighter and his body lighter, filled with certain joy.

​

But as Moe contemplated this feeling more and more, he realized that within this ecstasy of experiencing a bit of heaven was a question. A question in the same way the purple vase from earlier had posed him with a deadly question. Except in the case of the question heaven asked, it proposed something more interesting than the threat of death. It promised that the incompleteness of reality could be made whole, that the madness of it could be understood, and that the worst of contradictions could be mended. It was the third part to complete the trinity after life and death. Here God danced forever, switching partners, explaining to all eager humans why the mule brays in pain under his master’s heel. And they all laughed when he was finished telling it because they had been worried for nothing.

Moe was in awe of this third thing and started to notice how his whole life had changed. He no longer could only view life in a negative light. He could start viewing it with more breath and lightness.

​

Suddenly, though, Moe started hearing a strange sound. Sirens in the distance were getting louder and louder. Unsure if it was an omen from God or a coincidence, Moe slumped down on his knees and contemplated the sound. After a few minutes, the sirens shut off abruptly. Moe stayed still, trying to catch any trace of the third in these signs. But Moe sensed that something was wrong and panicked. The warmth was fading away; he started hearing whispering voices outside the bathroom conversing, and the legs under the stall quickly picked themselves up. Moe was slipping back as heaven hid itself again.

​

“No, no, no. Don’t leave God. I still need the answer. You didn’t give me a full answer; I still need a way. If you leave me now, you would have tricked me. You can’t possibly expect me to find the answer. You don’t even know if it’s possible. To bring heaven on earth myself. That’s absurd. That’s impossible suffering. You don’t understand what it means for mortal men. You’re not human; how could you possibly know?”

​

The conversation outside was steadily getting louder and louder until it went silent. Then there were loud bangs on the door.

​

“Halberd County police department, come out with your hands up!”

​

Moe’s life drained from his body. He didn’t have time to understand it all.

​

The officer repeated again, “ I repeat, this is the Halberd County police department, come out with your hands up!”

​

Silence.

​

“Alright, we’re coming in!”

​

In this frenzy, Moe mistakenly concluded that he had only one option left.

​

From his knees, Moe sprang to his feet and made a mad dash to the bathroom door as the officer opened it. He slipped through it under the officer’s arm and into the dining room and slid to a stop as he saw another officer blocking the exit.

​

Before any of them could say anything, he vaulted over the bar and sprinted down the kitchen line into the back of the restaurant.

​

He sprinted past the dish machine and gleaming silver kitchen equipment until he burst through the back door of the restaurant and ran to his car.

​

And the last thing Moe did and could think to do was to reject God’s suggestion. God’s joke, he concluded. That he himself had to find the other half of the answer. Moe’s worry was justified, since reaching the other half of the answer in bringing heaven on earth and holding it meant refinement. Becoming a person so pure that there wasn’t so much of a person left. What was left was an instrument that could interpret the order of the world. Moe surely could’ve borne the weight if it hadn’t been brought on him all at once and crushed him. But at the same time, his loss of purpose had also been eating him from the inside out. At any rate, Moe was faced with the impossible, and the evidence of his despair was heard in the loud crack of the hollow tips lodged in his skull. He had answered the purple question.

I finally come home. It’s quiet inside. Silent objects clutter around and leave nothing but my thoughts to think about. I take my dogs out for a walk. The wind pushes against my figure as I walk with them for ten, fifteen, sometimes even twenty minutes. I then go back inside and sit down for a moment. A half moment of silence later, I feel the phone in the right pocket of my blue jeans. I pull out my phone and twenty, thirty, sometimes even an hour passes by.

 In a moment, I snap out of the illusion. The chatter of the world and the noise of it all leaves me stranded on an island. What am I doing, no, what am I supposed to be doing? What am I feeling? I was thinking about something important? I’ve forgotten all of it. Everyday my thoughts are blended with flavors of information of all kinds. Political opinions, products, cheap entertainment, useless information, and quick information all glued together. I haven’t time to digest it all to figure out what it means. Eventually, it all accumulates into one ugly undigested mass. It obscures my connection to existence, writing, nature, and my own self. 

It also leaves me with an irritating itching to get back to it. Back to the showpiece that is the world. Worst of all is when I walk outside and look at a tree. It seems boring because its simplicity deceives me more and more. I can’t seem to focus on what makes the tree special. 

                                ∗ ∗ ∗

The modern experience, more specifically the modern American experience is a very peculiar one. We don’t have the worst problems in history but we arguably have the most absurd and tricky ones. The Joker in The Dark Night proclaims that he is like a dog chasing a car and he importantly emphasizes how he wouldn’t know what to do if he caught it. It seems like we are at a point in history where we have caught the car and we are left wondering: what happens next? We have created the opportunity for many people, much more than any previous time in history, to lead relatively comfortable lives. We have really big problems, don't get me wrong, but at the same time most of us have a house, tv, food, cell phone,a pet, or maybe even a video game system. The rapid advance in technology has allowed this to happen which is great, but it also has created something never before seen in history: a worldwide connection. 

This worldwide connection, through technology, negatively affects my writing process through the addictive forms of media and cheap entertainment. In the same light, it also nourishes my writing process immensely by the sheer accessibility it provides.

As an aspiring writer I try to connect with myself and the environment around me on a deeper level so I can convey moods, emotions, and setting better in my writing. The sculptor Auguste Rodin, who created the famous sculpture titled The Thinker, would stare at objects and active subjects for long periods of time. For instance, his human sculptures came from the ability to capture every expression the human body provided. Every little movement, twitch, and strain of muscle fiber went into his human sculptures. He imparted this laborious process to the poet Rainer Maria Rilke who was able to adopt this style of observing the world and infuse it in his poetry to great success. This process of observation and insight is what's important here; It’s what every artist does and what great artists do especially well. Miles Davis’ modal jazz in Kind of Blue , Sylvia Plath’s confessional poems that leave a painful hot sear on your brain, and Toni Morrison’s calm and almost quiet prose: light as a feather and heavy as an anvil. These artists, and most likely your favorite artists, bring something to the table that only they can bring. It all starts with observation and the cultivation of this process, from which insight springs out from.

In likewise fashion, I try to connect in one way or another to the environment around me everyday. What's going on around me? What feelings does it evoke? What does it mean to me? What does it mean for other people? I’m constantly observing. Joan Didion does something similar when she mentions,”I write entirely to find out what I’m thinking, what I’m looking at, what I see and what it means”. I take a similar approach to writing and find a lot of joy in writing for the purpose of materializing what the world means to me.

 It is at this point where media and cheap entertainment begin to seep into my brain. It coats the soft tissue in an artificial liquid film that is near impossible to get rid of. Endless voices, products, quick gripping entertainment, and short form content. Whatever you like, personalized to you. It’s the perfect form of artificial engagement that is quite delicious and addicting. This is a struggle that I see not only myself face but also my friends and family. I can’t say that most people who interact with social media and cheap entertainment have the same struggle I have, but from my experience it seems like something people struggle with. 

Here in America and in many other parts of the world there is this fast paced lifestyle that is being lived. There are exceptions of course, but it seems that the majority of people lead busy lives. In this case, cheap and fast engagement and entertainment, think McDonalds, is perfect because it fits into the schedules of busy people. We can measure what happens when we eat a lot of junk food because we become increasingly unhealthy. But what happens when we consume too much fast and cheap content? It's not so simple to concretely say what happens. But I can speak from experience as a retired scrolling warrior: Back then, especially during covid, I became increasingly disillusioned with reality and mentally unhealthy. I had a terribly difficult time finding meaning everyday.

This loss of meaning seems to underlie a lot of the mental health problems we have today. What actually matters? What am I here for? Necessary questions. The problem seems to be that technology doesn’t lend itself very well to these questions due to its addictive form and design.  

As the silence gets sparser and replaced with these fast forms of engagement, it makes it harder to focus. More importantly, it makes it infinitely harder to figure out what I’m thinking, what I’m looking at, what I see and what it means. I'm not thinking about the here and now. Rather, I end up being more invested in a simulated reality rather than my actual reality: my everyday life. My personal connection to my everyday life, which informs my writing, is divorced from me and takes backstage in service to the showpiece that is the world. 

One of the reasons I wrote the poem It is The Beauty earlier in the semester was partly due to this disillusionment with reality through media and cheap entertainment. The poem was a very important reminder to myself about what I want to accomplish in life. I want to learn how to notice all the ugly bits of the world. The beautiful, painful and apathetic parts as well. 

Werner Herzog, the filmmaker, once said something that gave me a slap in the face that I haven't been able to forget. When describing the jungle he says,” Of course, there's a lot of misery. But it is the same misery that is all around us. The trees here are in misery, and the birds are in misery. I don't think they sing. They just screech in pain…Taking a close look at what's around us, there is some sort of harmony. It is the harmony of overwhelming and collective murder. And we have to become humble in front of this overwhelming misery and overwhelming growth and overwhelming lack of order. But when I say this, I say this all full of admiration for the jungle. It is not that I hate it. I love it. I love it very much. But I love it against my better judgement”. Herzog seems really grumpy and definitely views the glass half empty. Despite this and the many miseries he mentions, his message is a positive one in the end: We have to see the world for what it is and then embrace it. He views the glass half empty but in doing so he indirectly acknowledges that it is half full as well.

In a similar sense as Herzog, I want to better understand how this misery all around us gives the opportunity for beauty to be birthed. And my writing is my outlet for doing just that: understanding. 

Getting to know and understand the world is difficult but technology is a massive aid that previous artists did not have access to. The accessibility it provides allows me to pierce through boundaries and leap over obstacles that were not possible to traverse in the past. I can devour great stories and learn more about how other people view the world. And at some point, I will be able to use this insight to fill the pages of an empty book with life, color, and style. 

Nowadays, in contrast to my covid days, I have a better relationship with media and entertainment. It feels good and I feel a little bit lighter. Despite this, it is an everyday struggle which is harder some days and easier during others. I have an idea of what direction I’m taking in life, and realizing the importance of not being distracted by so many unnecessary things is crucial if I am to go where I want to go.

Technology is an especially double edged sword because it lends itself to what each individual makes of it. Each individual can use a cell phone or computer in any way they like according to their whims and desires. It's a very powerful tool but also a clever one because of its inherent design to keep you artificially engaged. 

Although it's an unfair struggle, there is a balance to be had with technology in order to stay connected with my own existence and writing. But on a more broader scale it’s questionable as to whether it's possible for many people, especially the younger generation, to find this balance for themselves and for their own reasons. 

The front door has been left open. There is nobody to be seen in the dingy apartment. Everything is silent except for a small box TV quietly playing.

 NEWS REPORTER 

Hello folks, here is a bulletin from CBS News: Yesterday in the upper Dallas area there have been 2 shots fired in a local deli from what seems like a bolt action rifle in broad daylight. The deli operator Walter Macfarland was the only casualty. Expect more updates shortly as there is an ongoing investigation. Stay tuned. 

INT.-OUTDOOR SUPPLIES AND HARDWARE STORE —YESTERDAY MIDDAY

Among the back aisles of various tools and hardware, there are two friends: LOU and REED. Everything is normal except that Reed is convincing Lou to cut his hair with the store “borrowed” hairclippers. 

LOU

(Apprehensively) What the hell are we doing      man. You said you knew a place.

REED

I do know a place and that place is here. Best of all, it's free. 

LOU

You know I'm always up to go along with the stupid stunts you pull but we’re in a store Reed. A law abiding store. There's no reason we should be doing this when a haircut is literally seven dollars.

REED

We’re just having fun, plus seven bucks to spend on lunch instead sounds great. But really, we’re not even stealing anything.

Despite Lou’s unsatisfied expression in response to REED’s stupid logic, he hesitantly goes along with REED’s antics. REED finds a chair for LOU to sit on and prepares the clippers.

LOU

Just hurry up man and when you start cutting, just do it fast. Don’t take your time just to be obnoxious.

REED

(Snarkily) Yeah, yeah. I know

Reed proceeds to cut Lou’s hair. Halfway through the haircut the loud noise of the buzzing hair clippers catches the interest of the older employee RANDAL. Randal walks around investigating the noise.

RANDAL

Am I going crazy again? No, what's that noise? Hey, you can’t demo the tools in store, you gotta buy ‘em first ya’hear!

Randal wobbles through a few aisles following the noise until he turns the corner on the aisle where REED is cutting LOU’s hair.

RANDAL

What in…… Hey! What are you two doing? You can’t use a store product without buying it. 

REED

(quickly curts) We’re not stealing anything I promise old geezer.

RANDAL

Huh!? Old who? No, you two stay right where you are and we'll see how that holds up in court

REED

What? Court? Fuck this.

Reed darts off

LOU

Reed you dolt! What the hell did I say!

REED runs off with RANDAL in hot pursuit through the store and into the parking lot. LOU with his half cut head of hair runs about the store and hides behind the cash register in the ammo and fishing department. A stranger slowly walks up to the register.

`

INT.-OUTDOOR SUPPLIES AND HARDWARE STORE –Cash Register -MIDDAY

STRANGER

Hello, do you work here?

LOU

(Stammering) Uhhhh, yeah? For the moment yes……ummm……what’s up?

STRANGER

I was just wondering if ya’ll have 9mm ammo boxes. I need some for my semi-auto Kriss Vector rifle.

LOU

Kriss who? Vector? Uhhh…… we should have 9mm ammo around here somewhere. I'm relatively new so I’m not sure where everything goes.

STRANGER

Don’t worry kid. I'll look around. By the way, what's wrong with your hair? 

LOU

Uhh..you know things happen, idiots exist,and um… just a bad hair day.

STRANGER

Right, no worries. Just curious. Oh one more question. Are you guys selling that Mosin-Nagant rifle back there? The one right behind you.

LOU

Huh? Oh, this one (picks up the rifle and puts it on the counter). Uhh…yeah this one is old and I’m not sure what condition it’s in, but yeah. What's your offer? 

STRANGER

I’ll take it off your hands for 500.

LOU

(Hesitantly) Yeah…that sounds reasonable. Why not?

STRANGER 

Here ya go kid. (Counts money) One, two, three, four, five hundred. Here ya go. 

LOU

(Hands rifle and pockets money) And here you go mister. One crusty Mosin-Nagant. 

The stranger walks off with his new purchase while a distraught and sweaty Randal bursts through the backdoor of the shop.

RANDAL

(huffing out of breath) I swear……we weren’t as evil…… as those kids when I was their age. We were better…… We had something going for us. We were……HEY! (Grabs Fishing pole)

LOU 

Damnmit!

Randal spots Lou and chases him out the store with a fishing pole and throws other various hardware items at him.

INT.-LOU’S APARTMENT —NIGHT

Lou, after laying low in his apartment for most of the day, invites REED. They recall the events of the day. LOU cooks himself food while REED sits and watches the TV.

REED 

Your hair looks fine now.

LOU 

(Irritatingly) Yeah, because I had to drive across the whole city to get a haircut and explain to the barber why I look like a crackhead. 

REED

Why’d you go halfway across the city for a haircut?

LOU 

Just in case any cops were around looking for someone with a recognizable haircut. Don’t you have any situational awareness man?

REED

(Quickly curts) Hah, they aren’t looking for you man. You gotta relax. We did something stupid but we didn’t steal anything or do anything evil. Here I’ll prove it.

Reed cycles the channels until he arrives at the nightly news.

REED

Here. So your paranoid self will be satisfied, here's the news. If anyone is looking for us they’re sure to report it. 

LOU

(Shakes his head) Whatever.

While the NEWS REPORTER babbles on about various happenings in the city, a tired and paranoid Lou stares at his half cooked food. He leaves the food and gets ready for bed instead. 

LOU

(mutters to himself) I’m not even hungry anymore. 

Hey Reed, I’m heading to bed, you should probably go home man. My dad is working late but he’ll get here any moment now. 

REED

Huh, really? You’re not even gonna let me crash.

LOU

I would, but I just need to sleep peacefully. My dad is gonna be stressed from managing the deli and it would just be a weird situation. We’ll hang out sometime later this week. 

REED gets up from the worn out leather couch.

REED

Yeah, I’ll hold you to it and Lou— but sorry about today. I know I’m careless sometimes but I didn’t mean for things to go how they went today.

LOU

It’s whatever man. I’m just tired, drive safe. 

Reed leaves the apartment and Lou turns off all the lights and crashes on the couch. AS Lou falls asleep, the TV stays on as the News Reporter continues to babble on about various happenings around the city. 

NEWS REPORTER

There were several shootings today and this first one is perhaps the strangest one out of all of them. Sources in the upper Dallas area reported two shots fired in a local deli from what seems to be an old WWII style rifle: a Mosin-Nagant.The deli operator Walter Macfarland was the only casualty.

Lou is half awake and hears the news. He gets up and walks calmly, almost eerily, to the kitchen and back to the small living room. He feels the wad of 500 dollars still in his jean pocket and mutters quietly.

LOU

Wait……who killed that man. Who killed my dad.

Lou walks slowly and deliberately to his dads room and grabs a 1911 pistol under the mattress which he stuffs in his pants. He carelessly leaves the front door open as he walks slowly out of the apartment and into the street clutching his head and pulling at his hair. 

Ext.-STREET OUTSIDE APARTMENT– NIGHT

LOU 

(mutters to himself) What am I doing?

 Lou walks down the empty street until he comes to an older house. Dogs inside start barking at him. Lou pauses for a minute and grabs his gun, stares at it and throws it at the house breaking a window. The dogs stop barking for a moment and continue barking even louder. Lou breaks down and collapses on the pavement. He drags himself in the prone position while bawling his eyes out. 

LOU

Mother……Father……gone. There's nothing anymore, there’s nothing anymore.

Lou drags himself across the pavement a few more feet until he starts shivering and curls up in a fetal position and passes out. 

EXT.-STREET OUTSIDE APARTMENT– MORNING

Lou’s cellphone wakes him up and he answers it. It’s Reed

REED

Did you see the news Lou?

LOU

Yeah, you’re the one who put it on. Don’t you remember.

There is silence for a few moments before Lou announces

LOU

I hate this place…… I’m leaving this shithole. Sorry Reed. 

REED

Where ya going!? The police are probably going to catch the man who killed your dad. Don’t you want to see it?

LOU

The police, the murder, hell even the judge. They can all rot in this shithole they call home. I have no father or mother, I have nothing Reed! I'm going to California.I’m sorry.

REED

(Sighs)There’s no stopping you I guess. I’ll come by to help you pack and say goodbye.

LOU

Thanks man. I’ll see you there. Bye.

Lou stands pondering his choice grimacing. He begins walking back to his apartment as the screen fades to black.

A final delusion

A feverish sleep

Measuring the distance

between

An Onion and God

I escaped the stuffy ensemble of choir chanting and reverberating organ tones as I walked into the calm breaths of evening wind on that fading summer day. Finally, Sunday church had ended. I walked around the wide building and looked at the single off centered spire that bathed in the burnt oranges and yellows from the sunset. The spire itself seemed to faintly suggest the architecture of its still standing relatives: the great cathedrals in Europe. I never really understood the greatness and long ancient history of the Church. Why did people have such reverence for the service that went on inside? Most confusing of all was the idea that someone, at the end of time pointed their finger left or right, in the comfort of a chair, separating the eternally damned and saved. It didn’t make sense, how could you damn someone forever and not feel bad?

This sequence of thought always came back to me every Sunday after church. I was getting tired of it and it weighed heavy on my mind until school busied me for the week. I went to church in a scratchy cotton polo and ironed dress pants. I behaved, unlike the other young kids my age who would wail and squirm during service. It was a drag, but I did it all for my mother. Although my relationship with my mother was somewhat distant, we always seemed to be functioning on the same wavelength. She was dear to me.

As I walked back to the car, I thought about my mother and why she went to church every Sunday like it was a school for adults which you never graduated from until you died. I sat down on a curb in front of the car and carefully took stock of all of my mother’s attributes. My mom is nice to everyone….. she once helped a tortoise cross the road………she cooks all the time…..she works hard for money. I was slightly perplexed. Do I just need to learn how to be nice, help animals cross the road, cook, and work hard for money in order for me to understand Church service? “Rats”, I muttered. My mother smokes cigarettes everyday I thought. Do I need to learn how to do that too? Do you go to hell for smoking cigarettes? Would I need to hide under my bed to smoke cigarettes?

As I contemplated these questions with intense thought, my mother walked up to the car seemingly tired from talking to all the church people.

She called out,” You ready to go Reed?”.

I nodded with enthusiasm.

“Me too. It's getting late,” she said tiredly.

I hopped into my mom’s 2006 Infiniti and buckled myself. As she started driving she asked gently,”You know what’s tomorrow, right?”.

“Yeah, I have to go to school”.

“Yes. That and you have to bring an item for the class show and tell,” she added.

“It’s fifth grade mom, middle school is next year, and they’re still having us do show and tell. Why? Shouldn’t we be learning something useful”.

My mother sighed,” Reed, it is useful, you just don’t see it. It's your 2nd week and getting to know the other kids through show and tell is useful. I know it might seem stupid but stupid things are sometimes fun. That’s why they do it.You have your whole life to learn other things. You understand, right?”.

“Yeah”.

I wasn’t totally convinced but my mother had always helped me in any way she could and her voice, so full of sureness and grace, reassured me.

Eventually, we pulled into the neighborhood I lived in and arrived at the driveway of my house. I noticed the empty driveway where my dad’s car would be.

“Is dad not home yet?” I said.

“No, he had to take some rich guy on a tour of some property on the other side of town. He always takes his time with those rich clients, trying to get them to buy a house. Anyway you need to go to bed, he probably won’t be back until later”.

“I wanted to ask him something,” I muttered in protest.

“What is it?”

“It's that thing he was talking about last night when he got back home. Ummmm, something about how humans chase their own tail just like dogs. Humans don’t have tails so what was he talking about?” I asked.

My mother laughed,” Oh Reed, your father is crazy sometimes. All he was saying is how people go crazy chasing themselves when they get wrapped in their own world. Sometimes you forget things and go round in circles looking for a solution that doesn't seem to exist. Some people are more lucky than others. It's sorta like a dog chasing his tail”.

“Huh,“ I replied, twisting my head in confusion.

“I’ll explain it to you some other time, it’s already 8:30 and you have school tomorrow”.

“Okay”, I answered meekly.

I went up to my room, brushed my teeth, put on my pajamas and wondered about what my mother had said. I hopped into bed staring at the ceiling. People get wrapped in their own world and forget things. I repeated this phrase in my head until the world slowly dissolved and just before the sleep fully took hold, I heard the sound of the TV turn on and a faint pop from what seemed like a bottle.

I awoke in the light haze of that early Monday morning. I got up and looked at the clock which read 7:30. The bus passed at 7:50 which gave me only 20 minutes to get ready. My mother usually wakes me up but today she didn't. In a moment, I brushed my teeth, jumped into my clothes, grabbed my backpack and headed downstairs, where the sound of voices speaking on TV could be heard. My mother was dead asleep on the couch with an empty bottle of wine on the coffee table. I had no time to ponder this scene and walked out the front door.

I walked through the neighborhood toward the bus stop and kept a fast pace for a while. Eventually, I slowed within eyeshot of the bus stop. I caught sight of one of my classmates with a glossy white helmet in hand, the ones that race-car drivers wear. Why would they have that I thought and then I stopped. My chest tensed as I realized that today was the class show and tell.

I slowly reeled back towards my house, but stopped when I heard the screeching brakes of the school bus in the faint distance. With no time to go back, I looked around in a fumbling fright. I had to show something. I couldn’t turn up embarrassingly empty handed. The faint screeching brakes of the school bus were becoming louder and louder. I looked around for a few more moments until I spotted a house ahead that had a garden laid out in the front yard. Maybe I could show a plant or an interesting gardening tool of some sort I thought in a blur. I entered the neighbor's garden and looked around with fright, carefully scanning the area. There were only tomato plants and some lemongrass sticking out of the ground in rows. The tool shed was locked, and the tomato plant was too big to carry. I then resorted to tugging at the lemongrass, which put up a fight, but I eventually managed to pull it out. The bus screeched louder than before, which meant I was out of time. I bolted to the stop and got there as the bus was leaving, but the driver looked in my direction and the screeching brakes could be heard again. “Come on kid, did ya sleep late or something, Come on!”. I got onto the bus, took my seat and waited for my nerves to calm down.

Upon inspecting the lemongrass, I noticed a small white bulb at the bottom. This isn’t lemon grass I thought. I scratched the surface of the bulb and smelled the sharp sulfuric smell of an onion. What am I going to do with this? What can I say about an onion? What’s so important about this onion?. All these thoughts revolved in my head during the entire bus ride in an effort to defend my onion in the class show and tell. The bus arrived and I walked into the school anxiously awaiting my unsure fate that Monday.

∗ ∗ ∗

I walked out of school and needless to say, I was embarrassed. During the class show and tell, my teacher Mrs. Walker had announced with enthusiasm,” Ok Reed, it's your turn to show and tell”.

The eyes of all the kids stared at me in confusion when I brought up the small bulb of onion with its healthy green stem. I had told the class a half -baked lie about how the onion was a gift from my grandfather who lived in Canada. The class looked confused.

One kid had asked,”Do onions even grow in Canada?

Another remarked,”My grandpa would never give me an onion as a present”.

“That’s not an onion, that's a shallot,” another kid exclaimed.

I didn’t know how to react. I had felt as if each kid was taking their turn stepping on my onion with their dirty shoes, just for fun.

When I got home that Monday I had decided to step on the onion myself and destroy it. Although the onion was the root of my demise, I stopped myself from destroying it. This onion was not to blame. It was merely breathing the air and taking in the sun when I had plucked it in the morning. I tried to convince myself that it didn’t matter and that I should forget about it, but I couldn’t. The rest of that Monday was spent replaying the events in my head. Thinking of what could’ve been if I had done this or that or maybe if I had remembered to bring something to the class show and tell. These thoughts tied knots around me and it was all that occupied me for the rest of the week.

∗ ∗ ∗

Sunday came and it was time to go to church again. I walked into the wide building with a single spire and sat down on the wooden pew with my mother. Church began as normal: the stuffy choir chants and reverberating organ tones ensued. Even then, the thought of the onion stayed with me. This thought stayed with me in such a way that I felt as if a small onion were beginning to grow in my head.

The Pastor began the service with all the proper rituals and movements required of him. Although he was of older age, his face was rather plump and well fed. He had a slight sag to his face and wrinkles that looked thoroughly ironed out in such a way that made his old age less noticeable. His clean shaven head had a slight red tinge to it from the constant cleaning and shaving. His presence in full gave off the authority of a boiled vegetable. We called him Pastor Bell. Pastor Bell eventually got around to his sermon and proclaimed in an uneasy but stern tone,” The kingdom of God is at hand and very soon we shall be judged. And we shall be judged based on what we bring on that day of judgement. Do we bring acts of kindness, love, or forgiveness? Maybe we bring evil deeds, thoughts, and intentions”.

Pastor Bell had a way of talking that created a slight confusion that led to an increasing fog. He talked of love, kindness, evil, and sin as if I knew them like close friends. He wielded such words like strong gusts of fog that did little more than make you feel perplexed.

As the sermon continued, I began to feel exhausted and fed up with thoughts about the onion that kept creeping back with increasing tide. I felt a sleepy weariness beginning to take hold as Pastor Bell’s voice echoed in my head: We shall be judged. And we shall be judged based on what we bring on that day of judgement.

I wondered: What If I brought that onion on the day of judgement. I would be among many souls awaiting my turn in line. Meanwhile, little devils would come from the sky and trample my onion into a limp pulp. Would it still be worth anything I thought? My turn would eventually come and I would walk up the stairs to the altar of judgment and present my tattered onion. God would not say a word for his expression showed a clear verdict. His face gestured to the fiery chasm of hell. That onion would be the root of my demise. No, it couldn’t be, he wouldn’t do that. An onion is not evil and much less a trampled one. Onions grow from water, sun, and soil. Ha! I thought. I had finally figured it out. The elements nurturing an onion aren’t evil so an onion can’t be evil. That onion would save me. I'll grow an onion and prove it. Wait, I thought. I would grow the onion and I'm a human. Humans are evil sometimes. My mind caved from the disbelief from chasing an answer that seemed to not exist.

I felt putrid sitting on the pew from a wave of nausea. I was sweating and on the verge of sleep. I should ask Pastor Bell. No, he wouldn’t know. His confusing explanation would be the death of me. He's always too busy shaving his head anyway. How could he know if an onion would get me into heaven?

What if I brought that onion on the day of judgment……onion on the day of judgment……onion on the day of……. that onion…...onion, I thought in a final delusion before going off into a feverish sleep.

A final delusion

A feverish sleep

Measuring the distance

between

An Onion and God

Today’s order of operations was relatively simple, replacing brake pads on my friend’s diamond grey Mitsubishi sedan. After that the day was ours to seize, easy. But in truth, knowing ourselves: we were probably going to lose track messing around and take a couple hours detour to complete this small job. In the end it didn’t matter to any of us, we were all having fun either way.

Working in the summer heat was not the smartest move but we all had the energy to expend. Despite this, I soon felt as if most of the water in my body was fizzling out and evaporating, leaving me dehydrated. Thus, it was the prime time to crack a cold bottle of water. I went inside hurriedly, greedily, and efficiently. Spending my time in order to return and not lose any of the action. When I came back out and I saw a couple of the neighborhood kids messing around on their pre-teen mode of transportation: two scooters and a skateboard. I believe they were all brothers, although they looked somewhat different. What ensued then was young adults entertaining the endless amount of questions and comments coming from these youngsters. My friends seemed to be getting increasingly annoyed as they were already, of their own accord, off schedule. An hour brake-pad job was staring to creep just under three. It seemed like a odd social situation but I wasn’t as bothered. I was rather preoccupied with a range of slow burning feelings and thoughts humming along in my subconscious.

I didn’t realize exactly what was going on in the background but it was of the upmost importance. In the midst of this strange, but precious, situation I paused every now and then and payed particular attention to those kids. Listened to them. Actively trying to listen and understand what they were saying, what they were expressing. It occurred to me that being curious and unbothered, as these kids undoubtedly were, seemed like a precious dying norm that characterized many childhoods. Nowadays, the wireless connection unifying people results in the fear of being perceived by the entirety of the world. It makes it exceptionally hard for these kids to act with any lasting confidence and self-esteem. Without knowing it these kids were revolutionaries. Independent sailors mapping their adventure as they went. Unbothered with bright and erratic eyes. They weren’t the most popular bunch. Nor were they the most attractive and aesthetically pleasing bunch. Nor did they have chiseled faces that seem to act effortless, mogging everywhere they went, no. One, the oldest it seemed, had messy thick hair with a confident but overly conscious face lined with worry, he seemed to have something to prove. The next kid, the middle child, was the most absent minded of all with a calm demeanor that was occasionally shy. The last kid was of course the youngest and you could tell not only from his size but also from his overly mischievous grin constantly asking questions, as if he was in fact born yesterday. Strangely he seemed the most intelligent out of all youngsters. They were imperfect as imperfect humans come and they seemed to be enjoying every moment of it.

This is what I saw, but something else was present as well. Something more whole. These kids. These damn kids. I couldn’t put my finger on what I was feeling then. Their faces were each distinct, characteristic, humble, and special. There was something fundamental about them, about their face. Something fundamental like the air we breath or food we eat. It was a certain spirit that could be found anywhere in the world, wherever children roam. More importantly, the notion that wars are fought for faces like these to exist and play around without worry seemed to me terribly important. I would die for these kids. These kids deserved a chance at life. They deserved to grow and see the putrid sludge and pearly incandescent sides of life and make an independent decision. They deserved to live above us adults and that’s why they seemed so fundamental to me. In fact these children give me some hope in the midst of these increasingly dense and modern days. Hopeful, because of the fact that an adult is a big child as well.

So then, my craned head looks up at the sky from a slate grey coffee table in the middle of the city. I can’t understand it. Why do people find beauty in the reflecting sky with its wisps of white. I am unable to realize the beauty of it, of it all. It’s all there and I know it’s all there, though under a foreign spell. The solid blue sky, vibrations of human hearts, thumps of tired worn boots, clacks of selfish high heels, hasty squeak of sneakers, and silent humbleness of bare feet. The masses of bodies in and between the concrete prisms. Each with blood to pump, eyes to see, nose to breath and soul to make choices one lives with. I still can’t see it. The beauty of a human. If I could see it then forgiveness would be a sure result. An accomplishment that would materialize an obelisk within that would extend outward, understanding everything at once and resting.

My saving grace, my last chance of redemption is written on the walls. As people pass by with intent, with lives to live, and worlds to see. I sit in the midsummer sunshine accompanied by faltering breaths of wind observing a bird on the scaffolding above. My saving grace: I am no more important than the bird on the scaffolding above. I’m not worth more than the drunkard in the alley beating a dog or the dog itself. More importantly, is that all these things individually are etched with inherent beauty. Bird, drunkard, and dog. Once I realize this beauty and enact forgiveness, then I might be able to medicate the aches, stomach tied knots, and gain a simple beautiful sight. A sight that would allow me explain this whole story in just one perfect word.