Anthony needs to get robbed
It is all a set of circumstances. One that I try to manipulate or one I don’t”
I’m not sure it is boiled down that way
If someone wants to take my lunch money on the train with a knife and I purposely manipulated the situation. I start talking about his mama. I tell him his shoes are stupid. I do this because I have a bright idea that I can take him; I can control things. I had what I thought was an idea about the entire situation. I instead am thinking without a fucking net. I believe I know where it needs to go and with that I am beat, stabbed. I’m dragged through all the train cars. All of this is because of my belief that I know where it needs to go, and with that it becomes the only reason the shit went bad for me.
What?
My idea that I think I know is only what creates a set of fucked up circumstances for me. The outcome will always wind to a conclusion that teaches me that I fucked up, or I am dead, whatever. But if a person is standing in front of me with a knife trying to take my lunch money and I do nothing or I do something that comes to me automatically right in the moment, and I still get stab. So in this case this situation will turn out as a moment that starts bad but opens into a chain reaction of positive experiences if I continue with this method; pretty soon I won’t need that dude with a knife.
“After you get out of the hospital”
“After I get out of the hospital.”
“This is some crazy sentences.”
“How do I know what is happening? How do I know that self preservation is the answer? How do I know that it is not? I don’t know a Goddamn thing from moment to moment. Why do I pretend to is the only question. I don’t know who I am, what I am, or what all of this is for. So it make sense to wait for instructions, or do nothing till something comes.”
“Insane”
“My solo involvement is the only problem.”
“Not the man with the knife?”
“Not the man with the knife. He is trying to reiterate the absurdity, and I need to listen.”
“This life is got you on somethn’
“Staring at the instructions don’t do shit.”
William is hiding from peace.
“The fucking quiet bothers me but I want to hold onto it. I just want to hold on to peace.”
“Like it’s dragging you.”
“No.”
“Ok.”
“Like sitting back in a fucking canoe on a slow moving stream in a quiet place.”
“That is a lot of ins.”
“Forget comfort. Not that I don’t enjoy food or sex or tv, vacations, music but it ain’t a respite. It is representative of something. It ain’t a place. The comfort is 5 10 15 20 minutes a day before I am looking for it again. I am always looking for it when of its time is up. I got to keep stringing it together. The food the sex the movies the bars, the instas. When I’m not working I’m stringing. I am setting up my day to string. I don’t even get a break when I’m working.”
“You make me sound like I’m an addict”
“Because you are Goddamn it.”
Not altered
How is it not altered? It is escape from something. It makes you say imbecilic things. I don’t like myself in it. I know it is shelter from something.”
“The traffic.”
Anthony has spoilers.
“The way I have seen it for awhile now is like a mudslide that grabs you along and begins speeding.”
“Like the coffee.”
“I can see that I don’t like myself much. I can see around others like yourself I am trying to make myself ok to make them feel ok, but I’m not ok.”
“You always make me feel terrible. But this is sadder than usual.”
“Ok there is that. It is not that I want to steal a bears lunch from in front of him. It is a discovery. I’ve removed enough distractions and now stayed home long enough to open doors in my mind that I haven’t been.”
“I keep myself surrounded by disillusionment to avoid shit like that.”
“It is there though. I see that I am fragile. I see I have this instability. I say this not looking from a broken place, like I’m in despair I say it as a revelation, something I have stumbled on.”
“This is for a couch.”
No. I would be searching through effects. I’m telling you that I am there in the room with it, I’m right next to the source of all the problems I would be talking about.”
“Spoiler.”
“I was first suspicious of my suspicion with all the good things happening to me; I didn’t enjoy them. Lately I wanted the money and job security to tighten down on me and not let any light in. I was strangely unhappy during that time. I started to look around.”
“You have to remember to use disillusionment as a blanket and this time cover your head.”
“Ive gotten to far in this empty house.”
“Spoiler alert.”
Lanvin likes to get out of the way.
“It’s not about growth. It is about excavation.”
“He doesn’t want to grow.”
“It’s never growth. Why is it growth? It is ignorance.”
“You are born excetra.”
And growth or expansion to what? It is excavation or your murky interpretation without it. I come undone as I think about myself through him sounding like a idiot. I get near him and I start buffering. He doesn’t know what to say to his boss, his car was broken into, his family is making demands. He shows up with this ill-advised self; trying to think— impelled by the future, using thoughts that are dripping with a preoccupation with the past.”
“Sounds intellectually backwards on paper.”
“It is a lot of work. A lot of interference. I want to castigate, but it’s a trick. I have to just observe and I save myself. I have to be a passerby. Besides like I know what I’m talking about; there has been plenty of times my high handedness has made me sound like a dolt. Or you 100 percent of the time.”
“I know the steaks not real, but”
”Hoodwinked into thinking I can grow. I’d rather do as I’m told— which is nothing all of time, and something gets clearer.”
“Well I don’t like the hard work.”
“Same thing.”
“So you say.”
“I’d rather get out of the way.”
Nicholas doesn’t know his best interest.
“I can’t just want anything. It is not that simple. The pain and confusion comes when I want something from her. She was there and I couldn’t do anything about it. She showed up one day in my life like she belonged.
“This is sounding less and less like a friendship and more and more like a scientific method.”
“What are you talking about?”
“I don’t know.”
“Well it didn’t matter if I predetermined what it is and stay devastated by the results.I apparently don’t know my best interest. I don’t have a clue what this person means or anything else for that matter. I just have ideas that I play out and slowly- or all at once, runs me into the bottom of the ocean. This happens in small ways daily or devastating ones until I stop making decisions.”
“What are you talking about?.”
“I’m trying to figure it out. You know when I stand back and watch the machinations; when I with every fucking tendon I have in body hold myself back. I watch her with her crazy erratic undulation’s; well, I, at this point for the most part anyway see what I need from all of this. All her inconsistencies somehow from here eventually reveals an answer for me. This seems like the way.”
“Like you’re not supposed to do anything.”
“Yeah..well..”
Henry is afraid of peace
“I’m afraid of peace.”
“You mean like the ocean?”
“I mean like the peace. I have to have a distraction going on. I need to have problems with my car; Naomi and me fighting about something. I need this because I am nothing without it. What the hell am I without all of this?”
“You surely wouldn’t be fun to be around, because I need to complain about my stuff and you can’t be done.”
“The idea of something so calming followed by something so visibly resplendent seems to burn holes in me, how do I get things done feeling so calm and peaceful?.”
“How do you get your laundry done feeling like that?”
There is nothing more scarier than peace. It is like some sort of erasure wiping away that perfect temperature of anger that you need in the bike lane. It’s like I would be some sort of vegetable or something sitting on the edge of a bed waiting for someone to tie my shoes.”
“Where would you be going as a vegetable?”
“I don’t know.”
William’s fear is the problem.
“The more things work out for me the more fear comes up.”
“Fear of a good meal here.”
“It is easier having problems. I can busy myself.”
“Sounds like a problem.”
“I have to accept doing less to get more good shit.”
“What less and less?”
“Less and less.”
“Sounds like a problem.”
“Only the fear.”
Lanvin is talking about me.
“He’s addicted to death.”
“Eating here can make that easy.”
“Positive things happening to him increases the fear that he is not in control of things.”
“Like he wants things fucked up.”
“He’s at least selected that feeling. He’s in charge of being miserable.”
“Sounds crazy.”
“Positive things would be harmful to him. It’s not the success of it, it is ‘where’s it coming from in his life?’ like good things should be measured.”
“Ok.”
“Let’s not even think about it happening all the time.”
“That’s crazy.”
“You think?”
“I hope you aint talking about me.”
Anthony don’t care.
“People don’t care.”
“Ok.”
“Everybody is just trying to maintain comfort. It is like an island that they don’t want to get to far away from before scurrying back.”
“You’re talking about this pecan roll.”
“I’m talking about fear.”
“Of course. That is what I was thinking.”
“Nobody really cares about you or whatever you’re into. They really want to, but they don’t”
“I started paper machete …..”
“I don’t care.”
“Ok.”
“I want to.”
Slowie wants to avoid scars.
“Well it would be a mental scar that would take a long time to heal. I would suffer all the damage.”
“Sounds dramatic.”
“No. You are just unaware of what causes your damages. You wake up to a house on fire.”
“I know gas is filling the place but I can still make myself sleep soundly.”
“I’m aware.”
“Of course.”
“They give me something that say’s commitment. I take off all of my clothes in front of them and slowly they abandon me. It isn’t the loss of sex I’m the most afraid of, it is the loss of true commitment. It’s costly.”
“You can afford it.”
“I can’t.”
“You’ve survived.”
“I think about myself. I can see their commitments to their half commitments; doing just enough, but not fully present so their abandonment doesn’t cause them injury. I just have to be aware.”
“That sounds carefully constructed.”
“It is.”
“It is also too much awareness.”
“The defacement is too scary.”
“Yeah.”
“I want to see who they are when the risk is equivalent.”
Anthony likes being aware.
“I just want to be aware of it.”
“Ok.”
“It could all be used as a means to the end once the mind is made up.”
“I can’t get over how claustrophobic you can make me feel.”
“For the miserable, I’m just saying cancer, suicide or whatever else—good or bad, they are in the check out line using one or the other.”
“You are choking me here.”
“Their life is the testament, friends reduced, non committal, not there when they are there. It is always ‘Everything is fine.’ when it is not.”
“What is your point, Kevorkian?”
“They’ve made a decision.”
“What?”
“They are in charge. ”
“Ok?”
“And I can’t do anything about it, but I just want to be aware of it. So I ca act accordingly.”
Lanvin is focused on fear.
“I’m afraid.”
“I didn’t think she would be working today as well.”
“No.”
“What?”
“Fear is driving everything for me.”
“I figured as much.”
“You don’t care.”
“I do. I’m just hungry.”
“I apologize for all my side effects . My driving, my working out, my education, my neighborhood.”
“You’re choice in men.”
“Listen.”
“Ok.”
“You have to care about my fear instead.”
“What?”
“Listen.”
“Ok.”
William is overlooking.
“I’m not given anything.”
“Condiments?”
“I’m not given any means to live.”
“Here we go.”
“Nor how to recognize a problem.”
“What test are you taking?”
“I don’t know.”
“Sounds like it.”
“I’m overlooking issues all together.”
“If it allows me to eat my lunch in peace.”
Slowie played to lose.
“The errors have mounted. I remember my best impersonation as a man.”
“It’s not possible.”
“I stayed as far away while staying very close. I could hear his breathing all the time. I would text him to schedule our bedroom tet tet tet, grounding the hours down to late; trying my best to avoid the bulk of his day—any rejection…”
“You can’t be rejected”
“I can be. Again I stayed away but was very close. I was running a good game. He sounded hooked, but confused. He started to be confused, but retreated when I didn’t bite. This was the volleying that wouldn’t be good for me.”
“Doesn’t seem simple.”
“Mapped out that way, but nothing like it. His apprehension turned into the building blocks for somebody else.
William can’t bring you comfort.
“You cannot comfort anyone.”
“Not even with a blanket.”
“Listen.”
“I am.”
“There is nothing you can do to make a person feel comforted. There isn’t enough money, sex, career advancement to make a person feel like they shouldn’t jump from a bridge.”
“Your’e jumping all over my weekend.”
“They have too much going on in their mind, and that is where it is to be decided.”
“What?”
“It is where they have to get it; it is where they have to make the decision.”
Lanvin holds on.
“There is a pain and innocence about him.”
“Yes.”
“No, listen. There is this terribleness about him, wretchedness. It is like he is eating away at himself even though he can destroy me with his words.”
“Sounds sort of promising.”
“The gifts I give he appears to analysis like on a conveyor belt at the airport not sure how to accept. I know it is a self destruction when gifts—given, and received, are hard to digest.”
“More scars than this filet.”
“Mine are healing because I know where they come from now. I can look at him, and see, that he is open to the subjugation that I once was.
“They should name this place Macabre.”
“No, listen, I say all of this because he slips up and shows an innocence I didn’t know was possible. The innocence seems out of body. It is such an innocence that is like an echo that I can hear in myself and others at times. It is like a truth. That innocence is what I hold onto.”
William’s suit gets rumpled.
“I defend people who seem to be working on their own prosecution, a case that requires longstanding punishment.”
“Mainly with a rumpled suit.”
“I can see why. I just feel them as magnets drawing all this shit towards themselves. It’s like I am watching myself stand in this river as dregs curve around me towards them. I stand there hammering out statements on their behalf, all while mentally they are losing.”
“Is this your excuse for the loss?”
“I’m saying its read as a loss as clients might scream at me later if they’ve finished the day in handcuffs. But they’ve lost long before this. They are trying to lose. They are punishing themselves for something, and it’s their mind that makes it happen.”
“Sounds depressing.”
“I can say the same for my mother who mainly calls to tell me all the people dying in her life. Almost like she’s burning down the forest in her radius and calling to tell me how sad it is that she has no trees to catch shade from.”
“Your making me sad.”
“No I’m not doing anything.”
Anthony is lost in control
“I used use sex to control her.”
“Ok.”
“You are ready not listening.
“I am.”
“I was so desperate to be seen, and I felt like if a woman was ensnared in something physically, initially my chances were good that they would have to be a bit arrested.”
“For what?”
“More of a commitment.”
“Marriage?”
“No. Again I was so desperate to be seen, for whatever that means. It is like I am always feeling around looking for something substantial. The control was me thinking that she needed to be kidnapped through sex to.. ”
“Ransom?”
“Essentially myself. I figured it was going to happen through something vulnerable like that and she would have no choice, or anyone during that period anyway.”
“Ok.”
“I would get some sort of commitment out of it that was different and more satisfying than what is talked about or presented.”
“Sex is a hostage situation for you?”
“I’m valuable, the other person is valuable. I need commitment to that value. There has to be some suspicion.”
“Yeah ok.”
“You’re lost.”
“I am.
“Don’t worry I am too.”
1/9/24
Slowie wants to trade in her loneliness
“He was never lacerated, because he was holding out for something better. But I left him behind because he just happened to enter my life when my body was at its best.”
“He’s right here eating this dry toast.”
“He saw me all the way to my goddamn creamy center, and wanted me. I wasn’t ready for that galactic stability. I was muscles and tendons stitched with fear and guilt. But I thought he was beguiling and everything all at once.”
“Full of guile.”
“My gross problem other than Barneys at the time was that my body was resplendent, and I became its first victim using it like a knife to carve up men. Drop them to rubble all while leaving my intimacy in my purse out in the living. room.”
“I know. My gashes have never healed, and you always carried a purse the size of a tire.”
“Your revenge is to see me now, as age tries to force its way in and put her fucking feet on my coffee table.”
“No. I’m a dude, whose victim to the past images in my head not the emotion.”
“Regardless I was held captive by it.”
“You’re living high cotton, though. That is its own erasure.”
“I would sale all of this shit—mainly loneliness for Mr. Beguiling. Who wanted to see me without the knife. Didn’t give a shit about it and was trying to give me everything else.
Lanvin can still have peace
“I don’t want my fucking peace to make somebody else feel uncomfortable.”
“Ok.”
“Listen.”
“I am.”
“I don’t want to join you.”
“You mean now?”
“I don’t want to have to join you in something mundane that is upsetting you. I stumbled there. I’ve stumbled to this place where peace has become a prerequisite.”
“Tryin to understand.”
“Do you?”
“Something about not feigning outrage for my troubles.”
“Will that make you uncomfortable? Can you still do it?”
“Yes.”