Morgan

Morgan is the type of person who is me. I am me, and Morgan is Morgan, and Morgan is me. It should logically follow that I am Morgan. But I’m not.

I first realized I wasn’t Morgan the night we met. She sat in that corner with bloodshot eyes and a crooked smile, and I knew immediately that she was other. She wasn’t totally foreign, though, and I watched her laugh spastically, alone, until one or both of us lost consciousness.

I saw her everyday that week, on the streets, my unbearable office, in the fractured crevices of my sleepy brain. Any yellow-haired woman of average height teemed with potential, luring me away from the cages each day set for me, until a face unlike Morgan’s emerged and my mood plunged into visceral contempt. I somehow went about my days accomplishing no less than usual, but each let down was greater than the last and took far too long to pass.

I’m sure she didn’t think of me until the night we met again at a bar, I don’t know, a late night something or other. She had the same straw hair but she’d lost the glare of heavy-handed insanity that drew me in when we’d met. She was with a friend of mine, Chris, a person I’d known my whole life. She looked more subdued than before, like Chris had put her in some sort of trance. I saw directly through it, though, into her destructive, chaotic universe, and I couldn’t tell if I wanted in or out. I normally would have sat down with him for a drink, but the prospect of re-introducing myself to this Valkyrie seemed impossible. I swallowed my next few drinks too quickly and stumbled home to find a reality that wasn’t so faint.

That night I dreamed that I was awake. Typically, I don’t address my own consciousness in dreams, but I felt that I had woken up surrounded by sheets and pillows I didn’t recognize. My spotless apartment became a shabby house with no heat and a sunken, dripping ceiling. I wanted to look around the room to gather my bearings, but I had no control over my movements. My eyesight had grown worse. Once my eyes adjusted to the dark, I found myself groping for pair of glasses on a nightstand. I put them on and floated to the bathroom, past a digital clock blinking blue, 12:00. When I turned on the light, I looked in the mirror and saw nothing but the wall behind me. I blinked, and I found myself back in my own bedroom, splayed on the floor, covered in piss and vomit. I showered and slept naked in my bed, waiting until morning to figure out what the hell just happened.

I wasn’t too concerned the next morning, I knew what it was like to drink too much or take whatever pills and roasting papers that came my way. Someone must have passed me an anonymous pill, one that specializes in fucked up dreams. That was all. I had been paralyzed in dreams before, though it usually happens the moment between discovering I’m dreaming and actually opening my eyes. No cause for alarm, the world is a strange place.

Things never returned to normal, though. I woke up without any concern for the day. I couldn’t even remember how to go about checking the calendar, either. I looked at the clock on my wall, but the face made no sense to me anymore. The hands didn’t seem to be pointing to anything significant, all I could see was my entire day overlapping at every “moment” the clock claimed to correspond to. I sat on the edge of my bed with my head in my hands, hoping someone would tell me what was happening. I had no one to hope for but myself, so I moved to the couch and stared mindlessly at the flickering lights until I noticed that the sun had set. I climbed back into bed and slipped back into swirling sleep.

I still had no idea what day it was the next morning. I knew where I was, who I was, but not when I was. I figured I should get dressed for work, since it didn’t seem likely that I wouldn’t have to go today. It was comforting to remember what “today” meant. I clumsily clutched at some sort of routine, starting with my clothes and breakfast, then taking a shower, getting into bed, leaving my apartment, going back in to get my keys. Not quite right, but the best I could do. I walked down the street, checking to make sure other people were doing the same. Everyone looked so familiar that morning, like we had fought in the same platoon in some foreign army. The world was loud, the trains and planes overhead, the shrieking of brakes and babies, private cell phone conversations, all screeched through my head. I watched a clock tower tick furiously with no regularity, furious with me for some unknown transgression. I waited at the corner of the street for some direction, and saw nothing but a crumpled newspaper oblivious to traffic laws. I grew worried that the front-page headline might collide with the gum wrappers I saw barreling down the road. I was too nervous about this to continue walking to work, my terrifying compartment in this world, so I let the same wind that swept the trash down the street carry me back into my bed.

Either I fell asleep and missed the night, or no time passed at all. The music playing in or outside my room distracted me from whatever task I was ignoring. The closer I got to my speakers, the softer the music, though. From what I gathered, it was a mixture of my three beautiful songs, combined in a hideous, brown chatter that distanced itself from me with every new measure. I needed to call my mother. Would she remember me? Where had she been for so long? I couldn’t remember her phone number, so I flipped through my photo albums. I found a picture of me in a cap and gown, standing next to a proud middle-aged woman and decided this must be her. I stared at the photograph until seven digits came to me, took out my phone, and dialed it. It rang five or ten times, and a woman answered.

“Hello?”
Hello.
“Hello? Morgan?
Morgan? “This isn’t Morgan.”
“Hello? Who is this? How did you get this number?”
“I’m really not sure, madam.” She was starting to make me nervous.
“I’d say you have the wrong number, but you are calling from my daughter’s phone. Did she lose it?”

My mother had died three years before this phone call. Startled by this realization, I hung up the phone and promised never to try calling her again. It would be selfish of me to interrupt her rest. Everything must have been so wrong, but I couldn’t tell why. I stayed in my bed to try and figure out what it was I was supposed to be figuring out. The ticking of the meaningless clocks disrupted my muddled inertia. Taking them all down and locking them in my bathroom seemed like a good place to start. I reconsidered, since I might need the bathroom later, so I put them in cabinets, my washing machine, and buried the biggest one in the backyard. Maybe then we could forget each other.

My friend Chris must have seen me burying my clock because some time after I finished he came to my door. I was glad to have a visitor, I had forgotten that feeling. He made a face at me that I couldn’t interpret, and asked me if I was okay. What a boring question. Too boring to answer.
“Do you hear that creaking?”

“What creaking?” he answered. I couldn’t place his expression. How could he ignore the sound?

“The door, why has it been creaking since you opened it.”

“Are you feeling okay?” Maybe I misinterpreted what he said earlier. This felt like the first time he asked.

I decided he should hear the creaking, that would probably explain everything. I wanted to put it on my speakers, it was a very interesting noise, but I couldn’t find them.

“I must have buried them with the clocks.”

“Buried what? You’re seriously freaking me out.” His presence dwindled into a wretched annoyance so I went back to my bedroom. He walked in after me and stood by the door. I invited him to sit on the bed but he didn’t listen. “What’s with this shovel?” he said, looking down at the muddy tool breathing steadily at his feet.

“Ignore that. I want to talk about the time we found that dead raccoon in the backyard, when we were kids.” I knew he wouldn’t remember.

“What are you talking about? You weren’t there, that was me and Morgan. How do you know about that?”

I must have just heard the story and forgotten whose it was.

“Listen, I’m just here to get Morgan’s phone. She said she doesn’t care how you got it anymore, she just wants it back.” He spoke calmly but his eyes burst with incendiary hatred. I wanted him to leave. I gave him the phone in my pocket and asked him not to come back. Wherever I got that phone, it was a small price to pay for some peace. “We may not really know each other, but I’m a bit concerned. Maybe you should get some help, or at least some sleep.” I looked at the floor until he left. At some point, the creaking must have stopped. Maybe he took it with him.

His advice seemed reasonable, so I sunk into my closet to sleep. I wanted to be near my clothes in case of an emergency. I made a bed out of all of the denim I could find and drifted somewhere else.

**************************************************

“Hey, you feeling better?”

I snapped out of my sleep and my eyes opened. Chris flipped a switch illuminating the foreign bed with the same sheets and surroundings as I saw in my dreams. I still couldn’t control my body, though, and I started hearing another voice in my head before my mouth made the words I spoke.

“A little bit, I have a headache though.” I knew this couldn’t be me, my head felt fine. As far as I could tell, I didn’t have a head at all. My body stretched and curled in the bed. I could feel myself drifting back to sleep.

“Alright, well I got your phone back. Please don’t ask me to go back there, Morgan.”

“Thanks Chris, could you plug it in for me? It’s probably running low.”

He leaned in and kissed me on my damp forehead. I gave up trying to tell him that I wasn’t Morgan. I tried everything I could think of to indicate that I was trapped, but nothing worked. I decided all I could do was to sit in the darkest corner I could find and try to wake up. Nothing happened. Now all I can hope for is to wait until the right time to show Morgan the nothing that her life could become.

Swish

The fog slips past the lamp and brushes the wind, reaching pitifully into the void before dying quietly, a whisper. The light imitates this world, its intrinsic dimness slips into the night and tricks the eye. Glimmering steps appear and fade, the supposed stars blink behind the vapor thicket. There is a faint cracking, like joints snapping in and out of place. What could it be? no one asks. But these are just words. A thought we’ve had, expressed poorly, clumsily, with little syllables, little miracles. A wicked feeling slides into your spine. It twists your nerves, climbs, and disintegrates your brain. The whip cracks your sharpened mind back into existence, and the earth spins an unimaginable velocity.

The Ramen Factory

Watch this movie.


http://www.facebook.com/video/video.php?v=576704771907

Before you grow old and die

The time was right to leave but I had no place to go. I went to the beach to watch the water. The ocean sang to me the way it always does and I don’t remember any of the words. The blue wind was midnight and noon and the heavy clouds stole my grey thoughts. I reached through my thoughts for you, but I had trouble moving my cold fingers. A distinct lack of sensation unlike the ambiguous numbness in my chest. I couldn’t understand why I had lost your face. I tried to be less ambitious: I started with the contours of your nose, I spread my mind to your cheekbones and jaw, but it all mixed and swirled until I couldn’t even recognize my own imagination.

I knew you were more than a face, so I thought of downtown lights and holidays and dancing but it was all sad piano and restless sleep. In the height of my thoughts the waves crashed and demanded to be heard. I left my brain and listened to the tide until it calmed. Above the sea the tension dispersed the way our warmth softly died, like a star without planets or purpose. Evening came so I let my thoughts drift away and sink quietly into the air around me.

The idea is hard to put into words. All the time I spent preparing to lose you, and you slipped through the cracks in my brain before we met.

Last night got ridiculous

How long have you been thinking that?

Not long at all.

Well, it's really none of my business.

Here's a long story I wrote about nothing

Jamie sat by his window in the morning trying to figure out what it felt like to be a cloud. After a short inner debate, he concluded that there is no reason that clouds should feel anything like the emotions humans typically associate with them. Having accomplished nothing, he walked to the beach feeling something like satisfied.
Seven a.m. was usually too early for Jamie to be outdoors or awake, but he couldn’t sleep. He had few responsibilities, though, so he didn’t mind operating on little sleep. His walk to the beach was pleasant, and he sat on a rock just the right distance from the ocean. He closed his eyes, listened to the waves, and relaxed. His head was empty and his heart beat calmly and quietly.

The sun broke through the thick, dead clouds and crawled across the sky. Jamie hadn’t moved or thought for hours when he noticed a man plodding along the beach. His hair was grey, greasy, and tangled. Jamie noticed nothing else about this stranger before he realized the man was walking towards him, perhaps with the intention of speaking to Jamie. Jamie felt unprepared, as if he had almost forgotten the concept of verbal communication.

He considered initiating conversation, then decided to let the other man say something first. The man said nothing, though, but sat next to Jamie on his rock. He took out a wood pipe, packed it, struck a match, burned the brown leaves, and inhaled serenely. For some reason, Jamie liked that this man smoked a pipe, and contemplated how he might look smoking one. He wouldn’t want to smell like smoke, though, so he concluded that he would not start smoking a pipe. These thoughts turned slowly in Jamie’s head and the moments continued to pass without consequence.

The man finally spoke as Jamie stood up to leave.
“Are you hungry?” he asked. Jamie thought for a second.
“Yes,” was all he could think to say.
“You should come with me, then.” The man stood up and walked away. Jamie didn’t feel much like considering the offer, so he just followed. He left the tranquil grey shore behind him without looking back.

Jamie walked with his head down, looking for pebbles and trash to kick. He dragged his feet and played with the rhythms of his steps. He occasionally lifted his eyes to check the stranger’s path. He wasn’t paying too much attention to the stranger’s pace, yet he never seemed to lag more than a block behind. Eventually they reached neighborhoods Jamie hadn’t seen before. The houses were battered and mostly abandoned. The man opened a rusted iron gate and walked up the steps to a massive house with splintered pillars and a warped, heavy brown door for an entrance. The man paused for the first time and turned around, finding Jamie staring from the gate.

“Please, come in, there’s something I want to show you.”
“I thought we were going to eat something,” said Jamie, confused.
“We will, but I have something to show you first,” the man replied before opening the door and walking inside. Jamie wasn’t as hungry as he was curious, so he followed the man into the house.

He closed the door after walking in, sealing himself the dark, moldy mansion. His thoughts seemed to echo off of the high ceiling as his eyes slowly adjusted. He felt content noticing cracks in the walls and missing tiles before the old man emerged from a doorway holding a candle. “Come downstairs. There’s something you need to see.”
Jamie hesitated, but didn’t feel much like thinking about what to do. It was much easier to just do as the stranger said. He walked to the doorway and descended the stairs, let by the man and his candle. He thought he heard a sad, poorly tuned organ playing faintly, but the creaking of their feet on the stairs soon drowned this mysterious trickle of music. When the two men reached the bottom of the staircase, the stranger set the candle down on a table and walked slowly to an enormous door that seemed like a vault from a bank to Jamie. “Come inside,” said the man, unlocking the door and pulling it open with great effort.

Jamie didn’t know what to do. He wasn’t sure that he could make it up the dark stairs and out the door if he left, but he certainly didn’t feel like going through that door. The man stood patiently, watching Jamie and waiting for his compliance. Jamie eventually grew tired of deliberating and walked toward the man and the door. The man seemed pleased and stepped inside the dark room.

The door shut behind the two men and they were left in complete darkness for a moment. Jamie’s spine and heart screamed for him to leave, but he had stopped listening to these warnings many years ago. Without warning, the man flipped a lever on the opposite side of this jail-cell room and Jamie saw it standing on a white table: a tiny, shriveled human being, with the face and proportions of an old man but standing no taller than twelve inches high. The man’s expression was unchanging and terrifying, like a person basking in excruciating pain.

When Jamie saw this man, he tried to scream. He may have succeeded, but he heard nothing. What he actually heard was the sound of nothingness, like finding oneself inside a vacuum in space without being crushed to death. A thousand disembodied jet engines crammed into Jamie’s brain and revved themselves simultaneously. Jamie’s senses were destroyed and he stared paralyzed and wide-eyed at this petrifying abomination.

The stranger watched Jamie with glee. He finally turned off the lights and guided Jamie out of the room. Jamie fell to his hands and knees, convinced he had just experienced eternity in that room.

“It wasn’t always so beautiful!” shrieked the stranger. He giggled and rubbed his hands together. “He used to make dark feelings. My experiments changed those into that noise! I am sure that I can make the noise beautiful soon.”

Jamie retched, disgusted and terrified. He gathered his strength and pushed past the stranger to run up the stairs and out the front door. He ran several miles back to his apartment. His heart wasn’t used to beating so madly, his lungs whimpered and his throat blazed. He reached his apartment, slammed his door, locked it, and fell to the floor. He couldn’t control his thoughts. His mind thrashed and spat and split itself amongst the wretched image of that shriveled man and the maniacal smile of the stranger. He climbed into bed, clutched his blanket, and shut his eyes.

His head swirled, he found himself back on his rock watching the grey, sad clouds, which split apart as the sky reached down to crush him. Jamie didn’t know how to escape the sky, so he hid under the rock he was sitting on. Under the rock, he found the stranger, waiting for him. Jamie forgot his fear of the sky, now more concerned with distancing himself from the stranger. He emerged from under the rock in the front room of the stranger’s mansion. Hoping to leave the house, he opened the door, which led him back to the basement. Jamie realized that he must be asleep.

He opened his eyes and saw his familiar ceiling. His mind awoke before his body, though, and his limbs struggled to respond to the commands of his screaming brain. Finally, Jamie felt his arms and legs. He propped himself up in his sweat-soaked bed and breathed heavily, trying to calm his frantic heart. He focused on his breathing, making it steady and deep. When he thought he had calmed himself, he noticed the faint organ music coming from outside his door. Perplexed, he walked to his door, unlocked the deadbolt, and turned the knob. He opened the door and saw the hallway of the home he grew up in. The same red hallway carpet and family pictures from his parents’ house. He stepped into the hallway and the organ music grew louder. He followed it past his sister’s old bedroom, past the children’s bathroom, and came to his mother’s bedroom. The walls and door shook from the music of the organ and the knob trembled in Jamie’s hand. He turned the knob and was blasted by the same noise he heard in the stranger’s basement. He saw his mother in a rocking chair, grinning madly, clutching the shriveled old man. She began to laugh hysterically, cradling the shriveled man in her arms. Jamie tried to escape the room, but the door he walked through to enter the room had disappeared. He only saw a window behind his mother. He darted past her as she clutched desperately at him. He opened the window and climbed out.
Jamie panted and coughed and slipped. He rolled out of the window and down a steep hill full of dead shrubs and thorns. He finally collapsed at the bottom of the hill. His dizzy head bled into the dirt but the blood didn’t soak in. It amassed sickeningly on the soil in a dark red puddle. Jamie stood up slowly, brushed himself off, and saw that he was in front of the stranger’s mansion.

He burst through the gate, ran up the stairs, and struggled to open the massive door. He walked through the dark room and found the door to the basement stairs. He opened the door and stepped through, into the grass. He was outside the house again, facing the front door with nothing but a dark field behind him. Bewildered and exhausted, he wondered if he would ever escape.

He breathed deeply, climbed the stairs, and pushed through the door once more. When the door shut behind him, he stood a while in thought. He turned around, and decided the best way to the basement was through the front door. So he opened the door, which led him right to vault in the basement. His skin started to tighten, he felt like he was shrinking. He knew he had very little time. He opened the heavy door. The illuminated white table sat silently in the middle of the room. Soon he wouldn’t be tall enough to climb onto it. He struggled to the top of the table, stood on it, and faced the door. He was now no larger than twelve inches high. When he looked to the back of the room, he saw the stranger flip the lever that turned on the lights. Jamie turned to the door and found his former self. There was a soft, beautiful sound, the sweetest any man has ever heard. As Jamie looked at himself, an expression of excruciating pleasure spilled from his terrifying grin.

The Trees

When I was a child I liked to climb trees. Not just trees, though, I liked to climb everything. Couches, cabinets, and eventually I worked my way up to the street light in front of my house. These were all great, especially the streetlight, but trees were my favorite. Sinking my shredded fingertips into the bark, straining to lift myself higher, I could sit proudly on just the right branch and turn into nobody.

The trees never cared about anything. They came before us without fear of God or clothes or money or hell. It never mattered to the trees if I climbed them or even looked at them. They just swayed in the breeze and died in the winter, with no deviation from their simple purpose.

I love Shel Silverstein, I always wanted to live a life that he would believe in. It broke my heart when I discovered The Giving Tree was wrong. Maybe I thought that throughout my whole life there was something there to provide me with everything I needed, whether I understood where my life was going or not.

When I got older and the story got more serious, I thought maybe I could be the Giving Tree. Someone in need could take my branches, trunk, and love. I think that’s natural. I started out thinking I could feed eternally. Then I thought that I could be the one to provide. Lots of people probably stop here.

I don’t think I want to go back to believing any of this, I can’t see how life made any sense then. I’ll probably say the same thing in five years about the reality I see now.

Maybe I should have given my life away. I could resist the world and give my life to a loved one, or succumb to the higher forces and live my life the way everyone wanted me to. I got caught in between, though. Now I don’t live my life at all. I watch my family and the doctors and the children live my life for me. I think its pretty obvious now that the struggle is the point. Escaping the struggle is impossible. If you think you’ve succeeded, you are just paralyzed, watching the struggle take place without you.

The Beginning

This is my blog. It's mostly just a place to put my unfinished thoughts and wasted time. Enjoy.