the indians did it: my love affair with fire

The Indians did it. And I think they were the only ones. Up until the Euro's came & invaded. The Indians lost (yeah) but they passed down something a little bit more sinister to their conquerors & to the rest of the world.

...

This morning on the bus ride to work, I had a revelation: I've been at it for 20 years. I remember we were all sitting in that Waffle House in Covington, small-town Georgia, the four of us laughing & talking. We were young & in love with life. Rod had always preferred cloves. His father had been a drama professor at our University, but passed away when Rod was just a kid. I always imagined his dad smoking a pipe while reading, a glass of scotch on the side table & a fuzzy cat on his lap. Emily was half-Japanese & the Japanese love to smoke it up, but she didn't. It was Kathi that was the maniac. She'd fill up the aluminum ashtray time & again & the waitress would change it. Often. And there I was, an innocent kid thrown into a lion's den. So I started puffing.

...

I can look at my astrological chart & tell you why I smoke. I have Mars in Libra (a writer's, drinker's, socializer's paradise) & for the last twenty years (up until this past December), my progressed Ascendant was in Pisces (a dreamer's, escapist's, drug addict's paradise). You can call me a dreamer & I can say that I'm a writer & all my favorite writers smoke(d), maybe. I imagine they did. But I want to stop using excuses, like astrology (you probably know nothing about it & don't care), or writing (cause I'm sure there are many writers out there smoke-free), or socializing (cause smokers usually have to stand on balconies outside of parties, not in them). I want to get to the truth.

...

Some say that people who smoke want to control fire. It goes back to the times when fire was necessary, you needed it for stuff - like starting fires. And if you had a little fire, you had a lot of power. You could cook stuff up & people would be warm & they'd warm up to you. Maybe they'd sneak into your cave late at night, just to get closer to you & your fire.

Some say that people who smoke do so cause they like to watch the smoke rise up from their nostrils, much like a dragon would do. And dragons also have power. I think if I were a dragon, I'd have ultimate power.

But some people say that those who smoke are just like the common drug addict. You know that guy/gal? The one hiding in the corner, the one who will do absolutely anything to feel pleasure rather than pain, even if pleasure means you have to suffer later. I wonder if I'm one of those people. All I know is that I've quit many times but then I start up again. Cause it's really so easy to quit smoking, so easy to stop. It's just the starting up again that's the curse.

Here in Japan, people smoke a lot & I've always admired it. I can ride the bullet train with an Asahi in one hand & a cigarette in the other. I can go to most Makudo's (McDonald's) & smoke away after my two cheeseburgers, coke & fries. I can't smoke on the streets near the main stations however, or I gotta pay ¥2000 (20 bucks). (I heard that if I feign 'ignorant foreigner' I don't have to pay.) So sometimes I can't smoke outside, but what I can do is slip inside those smoker's booths & they are in all the finest places. The shiny new airport, of course. The shopping malls. The department stores. Even the hospitals & those smoking booths are always packed with people, some with tubes coming out of their bodies, all of them smoking away. You can find a smoking buddy anywhere in Japan, don't worry. If you smoke, come on over & at ¥300 ($3) a pop, you can do two packs in a day. It's really that great !!

...

I don't know why I'm writing this shit about cigarettes. I guess I'm just tired of smoking. Yet I'm a realist sometimes, even though I'm mostly a dreamer. I know that the next time I pass a konbini (convenience store), I'm probably going to buy some Mild Seven 6's, the soft pack. But the dreamer in me is hoping that one day I'll pass by the konbini & go straight home, or go to the gym instead, & lift heavy weights over my head (not making out with white sticks), somehow forgetting I was ever a smoker. Cause I think I've wasted a lot of time & money trying to control fire & I've waisted a lot future heartbeats watching that dragonsmoke rise rise rise.

...

There was that one time I quit after I met Michelle in the Philippines. She wasn't a smoker & hardly ever a drinker. I was planning to meet her out in LA for Thanksgiving, to visit her US extended family for the first time, so a month before that I decided to wear 'the patch.' That seemed to work. But still I'd often take the patch off to light up. And that felt really weird. Smokers out there, you ever done that ?? And there were those vivid dreams that scared me shitless. I lived them the week after I eventually took the patch off & didn't buy smokes, to wait the addiction out. And you know what? It worked for over two years till that night at the bowling alley in Kingsville, Texas.

My unit was drunk, as usual. My fellow Navy reservists & I were on a weekend trip to Bumblefuck, Texas. I don't really remember what I learned. We were there to spend government money is all. And drink. It's a sailor tradition. Well, I had also quit drinking for about a year before I joined, but yeah I gave in.

We were in a 'dry town' but you could bring alcohol anywhere. You just couldn't buy it. (That day we went to a restaurant & MN3 Burrud brought in a blender. They let us stay with all our rowdiness but once Burrud started humping the table, this old cowboy stood up from his table where he was sitting with his wife & asked us to leave, politely.) Anyway, that day & night, with all the beers & blended cocktails, my willpower weakened, my senses heightened - I think it was Seaman Brown from Oklahoma that I bummed the first one off of - It's all just a hazy memory, beer, balls, lanes, pins & then that first puff. I was hooked again. I puffed away for nine more years up until just over a year ago, when I read that book.

It was the same book that got celebrity actors to quit. I don't really care for actors cause I think most of them are full of BS. I met enough of them in LA. Directors are cool. Writers are boring. Musicians are the best. Actors suck ass. (Sorry any actor friends out there reading this, I'm messing with you; you other actors, get lost). Yeah, so this guy Allen Carr got me to quit.

It had been a rough Saturday night & I woke up & saw that book sitting on top of the book shelf, hiding under boxes of Marlboros & lighters, ashes from incense darkening its white cover. It had been there for three months, but that morning I decided to open it. It was called the Easy Way to Quit Smoking, by A. Carr. Kintaro had given it to me cause I wanted it & he said he even read some of it, but he stopped so he could keep smoking away. Well, I sat down & read the entire book in one day, over 200 pages.

I stopped. I quit & I gave the glorious book back to Kintaro. I couldn't believe it. Somehow something clicked in my brain & I became a new man. I could breathe again. After a week I could smell ramen from miles away. After a month I would walk up stairs two-, three-at-a-time & for the first time I could squat more than what I weighed. Suddenly I stopped wanting to stay in bed when I woke up. I started cycling over 100km a week. I lost 33 pounds in four months & felt super good. This guy Mr. Carr was a definite miracle worker. Well, up until last April, when I eventually gave in (I'm a drug addict, remember?).

It was hanami (cherry blossom viewing) that came around & I started drinking & eventually someone gave me a smoke when I asked, cause hey, people like me & smokers like to give me their fire. And I've been puffing away since then, making deadlines to quit (but never meeting them): Independence Day (Jul 4); my birthday (Oct 31); Thanksgiving (Nov 26); Christmas (Dec 25); New Year's (Jan 1) etc etc.

So I asked Kintaro for the book back but he had already given it away.

So, that's where I'm at today. But I'm not alone. SpaceMan is right there with me. We've often sat at his apartment & talked it over, over whisky & smokes. He's quit many times & started again too. We talk about the the dangers of both: EtOH & nicotine. How the two are tied together like star-crossed lovers, one always in search of the other. They're almost like Eros & Psyche, or Romeo & Juliet. Adam & Eve. And yeah The Serpent & Eve.

There was that one year I smoked but didn't drink. That sucked. Romeo was without his Juliet.

Do cigarettes serve any purpose other than making me look cool to some people, & uncool to others? Are they Dr Kevorkian's in rolling papers, dooming those of us hellbent on self-destruction? Does alcohol just do nothing more than to numb my brain & tell me that cigarettes do make me look cool & no, I definitely look cool in everything I do. I think I hate them both.

But I tell you what - I'm really in love with cigarettes. I must be. Cause they are with me wherever I go & whatever I do. I spend a crap load of money on them every year, more than I spend on clothes & girlfriends. I love them cause whenever I'm lonely, they're there. And whenever I need to concentrate, they help my brain cells fire away. They intoxicate me & soothe my drug-addicted soul. Like my friend said after she lit up for the first time after trying to quit: "sin never tasted so good." And I love them (I must) cause whenever I wake up I want to give them my lips & they are usually on my go-out-the-door-checklist: "keys, wallet, iPhone, headphones, smokes."

...

Like I said, I don't know if I'm going to walk into that konbini or just walk on by the next time, cause remember? I'm a realist & a dreamer. So right now I'll dream of walking on by & dream of taking deep breaths of fresh air. And I dream it might be today, tomorrow, or the next that I don't light that smoke again. But the reality is this: the choice is mine.

...

Wow, I just got a craving for a hot waffle. I can see the yellow slice of butter melting. And I can see the maple syrup dripping from the sides & running onto the plate. It's there, that waffle. I can almost taste it.

I wonder who invented the waffle. Did the Indians do that too?

i am dead

I am dead,
cause everywhere around me
I see pictures of
you. I was
good. I was good. Then
you came back
into my life & I
started dying right after
you left me
again. I was
good. I was
good,
I said.

I quit those things
you hated
about me. I left
that place that
you hated
to be.
I got somewhere
new.
I got somewhere
new.
I lost
40-fucking-lbs
thinking of you & I
got someplace new, just
to be so lost again now
thinking of you.

So
I go
to my door to get
inside
my silvery green leather
(it smells
so new),
slip my head inside
my golden knit
cap &
I pull on
my white Chuckie
T's.
They are so so white & that's
gonna change
- gotta be - &
I leave
the smoke of my place &
I drop this
lighter that makes music &
I cross the threshhold
& breathe for
the first time
today,
in peace.
There.

That lady I passed, she had a smile on her face.
Who was she thinking about, that lady? Secretly
I wish it was me.
Finally, there's no
you.

I cross over &
watch briefly
these ramen goers leaning over
steam &
slurping away.
I don't know where I'm going
but I see a red-painted door. There,
the grocery store &
donuts & cakes. No,
no
not them today. But fried chicken,
maybe.
So many good things that are
bad
for
you are really cheap
today. It's a Xmas sale but
I don't know
what I want. So I'm just gonna
feel this
avocado.
This guy's ready
& so is this one too but
no not you.
Maybe
in a few days,
baby.

There's that chicken I was
maybe looking for. But
I have some
at home &
I wanna
cook that up like
I used
to do
for you,
wrap it up, like
you used
to do to
me,
but with soft skin &
no,
not with this bag of lettuce
in my hand.
I think
I'm gonna squeeze
a slice of this fat
tomato
in, too.
That should be good,
& that California red over there.
Soon I'll be jumping on the grape train,
drinking & then
thinking of
you,
till the end of time.

(But suddenly now wishing of
drinking
to this new
you
sometime.)

I walk outside.

You know the music in my
head
makes me scared - like
Yusef once said - & now
Liam says how many special people change &
how many lives get rearranged, where were
you -
yeah where were
you
baby -
where were you when we were getting high?

(But then
you,
so where are
you
now?

Cause
these Neptunian colors
paint pictures in my mind &
the music we dance to
plays on until
time
stops.
You
should
know.)

So then this other you just slipped into the sunshine & gardens over there & out through the doors of
my head.

(I feel alive
cause I'm thinking of
you.)

I must've stopped being dead. Or maybe
(I'm lost
somewhere in Heaven.)

why i like flowers

They last only a little while, coming in spring, but dying soon after. So they come back again & life feels clean. (Smells good, too.)

They come in many colors & they make girls happy. (I hope so.)

And they have exotic names that I can't remember. But their scent lingers with me sweetly, long into the night, long into this cold winter.

They are the greatest thing.

(I feel like a bee right now, ready to go home & make honey.)

Flowers, that's what they are.

in a little while

(photo: a heart-shaped rock I pulled out of the Itadori River in Gifu)

I just want to forget that anything happened. But then, that wouldn't be right. It was an experience, that was all.

One day I will carve out a place in this world, but now I'm all over. I think I'm going to the sea, not to get away from, but to get closer to me.

TD asked me to write about love for the Feb issue of his magazine. So I've been thinking a lot about it recently. What is love? So I asked BusyBee. She said,

It makes me feel alive.

That's perfect, I thought. I have been a zombie, the living dead for a long time. I wondered what it was like to feel like she said.

BusyBee's man is in France. I met him. He's skinny & tall but she says he's sexy. What she likes most about him is his strength, but it's not physical. "All these guys who talk to me are afraid of you," she said. "But he's not." Then she said if she doesn't see her guy soon she's gonna die. She was serious. Life for her is love & sex, pure & simple. So she bought a $2500 ticket & will stay there just eight days. She said she can't hold out much longer.

I too wanted to feel alive, so I went out & tried. And it worked. Then soon after I had music in my head & my stone heart started to melt.

But now I'm thinking of the sea, getting away from here, getting closer to me.

People either push you forward or hold you back. They lead you where you should go or hold you where you shouldn't be. This new one taught me to keep moving, so I go, never still, don't slow me down & let me get out of here.

In a little while, I'll be there, falling into the sea. It's that pure & simple.

coin laundry

It's been a year since I read that book, the one that got me to quit smoking. I lasted four months & had given the book back to Kentaro before I needed it again. I smoked & couldn't stop. I asked him for it back, but he told me that he gave it to some Africans. Maybe they were his neighbors or something. Kentaro never read the book. He still smokes.

This morning on my walk to work I was wondering how I did it. It was all mind control. The guy said to just think about it all. It's an addiction. People who smoke are drug addicts. I think maybe 35% of Japanese people smoke.

I remember back to that school I taught at two years ago in the bad part of town. Some of the kids smoked in class & they were junior high students. The teachers would nudge them to put them out. Some of these kids never wore uniforms, they rode their bikes through the halls & spent most of the time sitting outside on the school grounds, smoking & chatting with the teachers. At this school, each yanki (yankee, or bad student) had a teacher who'd follow them around. These teachers were huge, bigger than me, & they had a lot of patience, more than me. Often they'd gather behind the trees outside of campus, smoking away, out of view of the kids. I remember that one kid who hit me & I heard that he got a job at a gas station after graduation. He was happy. I was happy I finished that school, too.

. . .

Back to my walk. The air was so clean, the sky so clear, the rice paddies long barren. I started reading signs. Katakana is easy enough. ラーメン　(ramen). コインランドリー (coin laundry). I thought how cool katakana is. It makes Japanese more interesting than Chinese. Then I saw this old house with a wooden horse girdle, those things they put on a horse to pull a cart. It must have been hanging there a hundred years.

Mind control. My mind is out of control. How did I do it? I need to find that book & stop thinking about the signs I've read, the music in my head. Slow down my beating heart, slowly, slowly love.* The sky is clean & blue. I wish I could dive into it.

*U2 from In a Little While

thoughts

Something sleeps on the surfaces
Solemnity dug down beneath
Bestial shapes of beauty snug
Safe between waves of words

Scenes so scary they transcode
Forms of profane speech to color
Becoming song
Becoming song

xmas cake

BusyBee, she's a girl I know. Twenty-nine years old & ready to marry. She's tired of playing the field. She says she used to be an expert at it. Now she's getting excited about Xmas.

When she was a little girl in her small hometown, she used to wake up early on the 25th & bake cakes with her mom. Last year she was living at home. On Xmas day she baked cakes for both her parents. They had to work.

Now she has a tiny little apartment next to the station. We stand out on her balcony sometimes smoking cigarettes, drinking beers, talking about life, watching the train go by. She has a pot of tomato plants & some herbs out there. I'm not sure what kind, but she uses them in her cooking. Sometimes we see one of those dark trains go by with no riders, like a ghost express, & BusyBee gets scared. It's kind of cute.

The other day she told me, "Vandelay, my microwave sucks. It's too small & I can't bake a cake in it. It doesn't have ... how do you say ... an oven." She says it so sweetly. I can't imagine her saying anything mean to anybody. She's like the opposite of me.

It seems there aren't any ovens in Japan, at least I haven't seen one. There are lots of fish broilers. My microwave has a reinji ("range") function, so I can bake up stuff, but I never do.

. . .

I walked to another pond today, during lunch. This one was not quite as nice as my pond. There was a chain link fence surrounding most of it, a sign saying "Dangerous. Do not swim." I imagined someone diving into those muddy waters. But on the other side the water looked less murky, & there was a new walkway, fresh grass. Two old guys were there fishing. One pulled up his rod with three minnows squirming on it. I'm not sure if that was what he caught or if it was bait.

Anyway I walked back through more rows of vegetables. Wow, the broccoli plant was huge. I was tempted to grab one & put it in my pocket. Broccoli Rocks. I saw some nasu (eggplant), cabbage, lettuce, radishes, etc. All of this made me want to be a farmer.

(I know this isn't so interesting. I'm currently fasting during the day & I feel like shit. My tongue is rough & I have a bad taste in my mouth. It's the toxins. I can feel my liver repairing itself. My body just wants to sleep. Earlier it wanted to eat & I nearly gave in. I grabbed a can of tuna but stopped just before opening it.)

On the way back, an ambulance went by, loud sirens, a man's voice in the loudspeaker probably said something like, "hey get the hell out of my way!" & the cars actually pulled over. In Japan, I've seen police cars, ambulances, firetrucks trying to get around idiots that won't pull over. Many just keep driving, not a care in the world. (I'm kind of pissed off at Japanese drivers now cause I nearly got hit twice on my walk.) That's why they use loudspeakers, I guess.

I also saw an interesting sign. It read, "No hunting in this area." What?! I was still in a residential neighborhood. The sign was official. I've never seen a gun in this country. I've heard of hunters here, but thought they were myths. Like Momotaro, the boy who came to Japan in a peach.

. . .

BusyBee tells me about the "illuminations" in Japan, how wonderful they are. She's right. They brighten up the city & it kind of feels like Christmas. Couples stroll through the lights holding hands. It's romantic.

Xmas here is for lovers. They drink champagne, eat cake, & other stuff. I imagine the love hotels are booked months in advance, but there are so many of them. Even if you are out in the sticks, I'm sure you can find a room.