Notebooks #1

Something about a summer heat that seems to be the catalyst of the spirit of a country. It's been chronicled as that, at least, so it has to be in some way true. Perhaps, in the same way that boiling water spearheads chemical reactions (water changing into steam, pasta becoming soft, etc.), the heat foments the interactions of everyday life.

Walking toward the launderette I see three girls dressed all nice in tight, form-fitting dresses. It is hot out and it's only 10 a.m. Immediately, it occurs to me that youth today has no boundaries in terms of night, fancy clothing and day, casual clothing. But on the other hand, what do I expect them to wear? Jammies? Well, what were women wearing in 1910? If they were privileged, they spent hours putting on dresses and make up. In fact, they couldn't be seen unless they had spent that amount of time on themselves. Petticoats and embroidered gowns require three maids to dress one woman alone. Is that true? And if so, were their true lives spent only indoors in private?

Why do some people just sit in the launderette waiting for the clothes? Do they look forward to the time to themselves? Or are they afraid their clothes will get stolen? Stealing from the launderette is a social taboo. It's just not done, although one easily could do it.

Shit, I left my wallet in my pants and it's too late now to do anything about it. It's evident that I am semi-out of my mind.

A family of african-americans enter the laundromat. The mother, who can't believe her children are so incompetent. The daughters, who don't think to come into the laundromat with a bin of clothing. A mother in this scenario must be tired of her incompetent children; her manner is so bitter and pissed off. The children react childlike, happy, carefree, naive in a way. Happily they realize their stupidity and run back into the car. I wonder how long they'll have to endure life before they become like their mother, or what seems to be the antithesis of themselves. Perhaps they have to experience motherhood first.

A kombucha seems the cure to ails as these, lately. But I have to wait for the washer to finish to get my money. I am literally useless at the moment.

"Do you have anything else? This is all wet." The attendant of the liquor store throws down my twenty as though it is trash. "Excuse me?" I am shocked out of my stupor. I wonder if this is one of those moments where I have to be assertive. "This twenty, it's wet. Do you have something else?" "This is all I have." I am thinking about how I should assert myself in a situation like this, so much that I don't even mention that the twenty had just been through the washer. "It still works," I say. I wonder if I should suggest, maybe snidely that I exchange the bills for him so he doesn't have to touch it. "I know it works. I just don't want to touch it when it's wet. It freaks me out." This catches me off guard and pondering the meaning of his statement, I laugh and put back the bottle of kombucha. It's not too much trouble to go one block down to the next liquor store, I know they have kombucha there. "Ok," I chuckle earnestly.

Halfway down the block I realize perhaps he thought I did something sinister to the twenty. The first possibilities that come to mind are obviously: semen, urine. Perhaps he thinks he is the butt of my sick fetish. Could he have really thought all that in the time that it took for him to feel that the twenty was wet? Evidently this pet peeve of his goes back further than that. But why didn't I mention it just went through the wash? It's an earnest mistake, and if anything, the bill was cleaner than he might have suspected. Was it me or was it him?

I also think that a good way to have responded would have been: "Here's how you fix this wet bill. Take it, wait, and then it's dry."

At the second liquor store there is the spirit of the summer again: the attendant is lounging in the middle of the aisles, watching CNN. Jesse Jackson is eulogizing on Ted Kennedy's life. I immediately mention to the attendant that the bill just went through the washer, so it's wet. He seems caught off guard too--I have to repeat myself. "Oh," he says, "as long as it's green, it's good to me."

The man behind me says that "that stuff" is good, referring to the kombucha. He has a cut on his face and looks a bit crazy. But I wonder if I too look crazy, having literally just woken up thirty minutes ago. Perhaps I always look crazy to some people in liquor stores. I think, in this heat, we are all a bit crazy.

Why does Jesse Jackson feel the need to speak after Ted Kennedy's death? Does he really wake up and feel that need or is just CNN? It seems that a person only enters our collective consciousness when he is dead. Otherwise, we pass through reality in a dream-like state. I think this state is necessary in going about our day-to-day business, or else we might lose our cool. When a person has died, we can sum up his entire existence soberly. It is a closed statement, ready to be examined. It is there in front of us, and there is no danger of being shocked or surprised. Ted Kennedy can do nothing else now to surprise us. If he was alive he might have done something utterly horrifying and arguably, had.

A bumper sticker reads, "Drink and Drive" in big letters. Below, in smaller letters, it says, "lose your license." But since the first statement is larger, it seems to be at first telling you to Drink and Drive. At first I thought it was a bumper sticker in defense of drunk driving. But, in their right minds, no one would willingly heed the advice of that kind of statement. This puts into question the nature of bumper stickers in general. No bumpersticker could really convince a person to do something, he must ponder the consequences first. In such a short statement, no one will be persuaded to vote a certain way or go solar. In other words, if this bumper sticker failed to convince me to drink and drive, won't other, more reasonable bumper stickers all fail in their purpose as well?

If I can go home, take a shower, fold my clothes and get ready all in the time that it takes for "Sister Ray" to play, I will be content. It strikes me that if I can conduct all of my daily chores in the time that "Sister Ray" can play, I will feel successful. "Sister Ray" will be my measurement of success.

Success is such a evasive feeling perhaps because the ways to measure it are elusive and subjective. Perhaps I might spend more time figuring out how to feel successful, rather than worrying how to be successful. I wonder if the idea of success, which seems to drive everyone to get out of bed in the morning, is what sets us apart from other animals. Or, I wonder if a cat who has thoroughly groomed himself, and has just perched himself atop a stairwell to survey the land before him, momentarily feels successful.

The african-american mother, bags under her eyes, has truly left her children to watch over the clothes in the laundromat. The kids wander the street outside and occasionally monitor the clothes in the washer. They don't play, or converse with one another, but rather seem to each be talking to themselves. They regard me peripherally, only when they happen to capture me in their field of vision. Once, I see the younger girl looking at me in the reflection of one of the dryers, but it does not bother her that I also can see her.

I do look insane.

The clothing follow a lose sense of gravity. They seem to be chasing each other, as though the best, most alluring position is to be at the bottom of the dryer, rather than the top. As soon as they fall, they are back at the top again. If the dryer was spinning slower, they would have a longer time to spend at the bottom and their flight would be farther. If the spin was any faster, they would have no time at all to fall to the bottom. At this speed, they have just enough time to, at the peak of their ascent, fall at an angle before they are swept up by the rotation. Their movement seems restless, never sure about itself. In a way I think poor people might feel about themselves. Perhaps this is how we are all holding on to the world: loosely spun about because of the earth's rotation, we may as well be clutching the equator with our backs to the ground.

The only decor in the laundromat is a framed puzzle. To be sure, the puzzle is unique and pleasant. A home with a straw roof in a Balkan peninsula setting. My mind is drawn to foreign countries, the countryside, the open landscape. I am temporarily taken outside of this shitty laundromat, but then I think how strange it is to see a puzzle framed as a picture. But what is a puzzle really? A passtime, a diversion? It is a puzzle in the sense that you have to put the pieces together, and not all of them fit because of their shape. It isn't a puzzle in the sense that you have to figure something out, like a word problem or a crossword puzzle. It is a physical puzzle, and not a mental puzzle. Because of course there on the box of the puzzle is the picture that the puzzle eventually forms. What kind of success, then, can you feel, having put together all the pieces? You might as well frame it and keep it forever. Perhaps whoever framed this puzzle did not mean to divert our attention from the mundane act of cleaning clothing, did not mean to call our attention to this beautiful domicile, but rather meant to proudly display his accomplishment of piecing all the pieces of this puzzle together. His sense of accomplishment required a calling attention to, to feel genuine.

Sometimes, when I am full of thoughts, hung over and fresh from a sleep, I feel like I have to grip the earth's surface, just to hold on to everything.