the field

sue sat up.
sue: so what if she doesn't love you? it's the things you love and not the other way around that defines you, as you... see???
mudd: i tried that. quiet as it's kept, it's not working out so great.
sue: we'll talk more on the subject later...
mudd: i don't know. i don't know anymore. i thought i did but i don't. not really.
sue: the museum is about to close and you are going to have to leave. we'll talk more about the subject later.
mudd: my fifty minutes is up? i understand...
(mudd fevershily buttoned up his navy blue winter coat and pulling his collar tight around the neck rubbed his balding head)
sue: in a perfect situtation how would you like to see this resolved?
mudd: i'd want to her in my arms and tell her this is going to be the way the way it is and no one can help it a bit.
sue: and... how does that make you feel?
mudd: angry and dejected. i don't know how i'm supposed to feel... but it's not like this. i didn't want this. i didn't ask for this.
sue (the t-rex skeleton): we'll talk more about this later... okay???
mudd flattened his dry spiked hair against his head with a sticky palm heaved a sigh.
mudd: i suppose
sue: good- bye
mudd: bye
and with that the boy named mudd stomped down the stairs and into the cold february evening out onto the cracked steps of the field museum and after lighting a clove cigarette wandered home.

07 ocT 02

do you want this jacket?
i'll give it to you, because i am cloaked in failure.

it's one ten in morning and i am wide awake. i think i might go home after i punch out on or two more pages of this journal thing and finish watching mission impossible two. i am going running tomorrow and lifting weights. i have the l.a. police test in two months and i need to get in a lot better shape if i want to be placed high on the list of applicants to ensure a place at the academy. quiet as it's kept... i don't think it's that hard to become the l.a.p.d. i think they're hiring illegal aliens... so long as you can prove that you've lived in the states for more then five years or something. there is no bench press test nor is there the mile and a half run, it's a stationary bike and a chest expander test. what the hell is that???
i need to stop eating so much, not because i'm going to get fat (which i am) but because food is so damn expensive. it's like all the guys i went to high school were the same but they swelled. since school started and i haven't been working full time i think i put on a pound or two. i need to to start watching what i eat because i am slowly killing myself. my dad didn't drink or smoke but he packed away the oreos three at a time... fitting those soggy things in his mouth, finishing a row after a meal. i think i eat a little bit better then him but i have moments.
for the next two weeks i am going to just try and chill out...

paht whatever of whatever: or... the story about the samurai and ronin

"that's what tetanus is for babe"... the nonsequitor overheard today by my neighbors talking.

michigan: maybe you drink too much
bear: maybe i breathe too much... ha ha
michigan: you're drunk and i'm leaving. call me when you've sobered up.
bear: you can't leave because i'm already gone babe.

narrator: bear pushes past the other young man and having pulled open the door stumbles down the stairs walking into into the damp false dawn of morning.
samurai: (to each other).... bear is a non- issue, leave him to destroy himself
narrator: and they watched as he steadied himself and resumed a slow shuffle down the center of the street through the patchy predawn light.

bear: you know, i can hear you... in my minds eye (pressing a swollen finger to his bruised temple)...
narrator: what???
bear: your thoughts. i can hear them: resuming a slow shuffle down the street blah, blah, blah... pressing a bruised finger to his swollen temple. are your ready???
narrator: i suppose... it's highly unorthodox.
bear: it's all in the past now. everyone is living in the past, constantly. it's self sustaining. no future, no present... only the past. even as you read these words you're only really reminiscing about the word you just read last, like this one, or this one...no wait... this one
narrator: so, it doesn't matter does it? because it's already done...
bear: exactly... you've said it yourself... from many, one.
narrator: upcheck has been left for dead.
bear: he will survive
narrator: the man becomes sullen, he becomes morose... his girlfriend breaks up with him. in a different time, a different place they would have been married. she would have had a million of his babies.
bear: all of this has been written...
narrator: from many, one
bear: from many, one
michigan quietly cat leaps from the open window of the three story burn out, the building has been gutted by a fire long past since... and falls gracefully to the waiting samurai below. he falls towards the earth and the warm dry clay, kicking up a cloud of coarse smoked earth and the expectant sinewy arms of the samurai below...