Topophilia and Static Shock

We walk out on the asphalt; outside are a million little lights on the skyline, somewhere up there are power lines, with those little basketball's that they suspend from the lines to help direct planes. "If a plane is gonna fly that low it deserves to get all tangled up" Its not like a spiderweb, the plane won't get tangled the power line will fall "If a power line decided to tower up there without massive plane tangling cobwebs then it shouldn't be up there at all" Imagine if we want back to the dark ages, there would be no little lights on the skyline. We are going out to the center of the little lights, to my favorite place in the city. "We have to catch a bus"

I wish I could walk everywhere, I wish, I want everything to be far away far enough to create adventures far enough so that travelers can come along the path into the shire "Bilbo let me tell a tale of a tale for travelers" At the same time I wish that that distance was good enough for walking, close enough but just far enough for an adventurous daring developing dreaming drawing walk. "A walk that would take you 3, 3 and a half hour length movies, but not one that would take you 7 movies with the last movie split into 2"

There are no adventures in story telling in the world anymore, from the beginning we are shown picture books with pictures from all over the world in it, from the beginning we are shown to meet to see people we are shown to meet to see the cultures the creations that make these individualistic sub groups of the global society. They only adventures now are in living, and this is the only place that adventures belong; experience can never be truly learnt as well as, easily as entirely as it can be lived; we jitterbug all over the sidewalk. We walk along the sidewalks and we wait for and catch and sit on the 99 bus that will take us to the center of all the hundred of little lights my favorite part in the city.

Not far from my favorite part in the city is a suburb part of the richest suburb in the city, there are big light colored pastel modern houses, they feature big open balconies and stylish futuristic yet classical curves and corners and cuts and space. Every house is built on the idea of space, not just how you can fill it but how you can leave it, and you can mold and mix space until it serves to become an aesthetic tool for place and posture, the filler that fills up and denies space. The sky is limited and vast and open and wide, everything that floats above the surface of the earth that space of air that we walk upon that we kick and breathe and blow is the sky, we can pretend to be like birds that hover and hover and hover. Big purple trees sprout of from the sidewalks, the sidewalks of that rich neighborhood near my favorite place in the world, the ones on the left of the road spread their branches as far right as they can and the ones on the right of the road spread out as far left as they can. Till they form an arc and arc like you see on the default desktop backgrounds provided on your Windows computer. They drop and shed all their little purple flowers out onto the pavement; the form that little purple arc makes above everything, they force the light to fracture before it falls, fracture and fall in little leaf like purple shapes. The main road you travel on has this arc feature except with beautiful large exceptionally expressive comforting trees, and when you pass by all the little roads on the left and right with the purple and the fragments of the sky and the sun and the sidewalks you feel like you temporarily pass by the adventures you see on your desktop and for a little moment you can feel like you have lived that adventure that that photographer has gone through that these strange people in their place space molding houses must feel everyday. They must look at us out on our road with the large comforting unpretentious green growing graceful main road, the road that provides adventures for every passerby, and from the inside of the adventure they must be so longing. To find someway to be discovered, discovered by Christopher Columbus when he set of on the gloomy Gothic beaches of Cardez past the Roman style theater past the castle overlooking the sea, the castle in Cardez.

The truth is that we all live in our own sense, an adventure, but from within the adventure everything else looks so much brighter and full of much more blossom and full of much more bloom. The flaw of humanity is the grass is always greener for us, the beauty of humanity is the willing the want to come home. I set of an adventure with you to the center of all the little lights to my favorite part of the city, and then we get lonely and then we get scared and then we go home and play PS2. The way for an adventure to become meaningful is to become part of the mind, second home from home. You can only truly love and understand and become enveloped in a foreign place when you can turn the corner when you can walk yourself back to the hotel when you can say hi in the language when you can pass by everything with a knowing sense of knowledge. The way for an adventure to become an adventure that we love that we miss that we appreciate, is when we love we miss we acknowledge it we appreciate it; when it becomes an intrinsic part of memory, when it become a second home of the mind of the thought when it becomes the place you pass by looking into and when it become the place you sink into looking out of.

There is a place by the river, the roads pass by the river, a low lying sort of bridge; there are slopping flat greens and there they built a short little building and on the base some slim little houses. The building is modern, abuses space but creates place, it has reflective blue glass, the buildings at its base a warm linear modern houses with little lights in the inside and fresh new Ikea furniture and thousands of people those young people you see on TV. Out on the river are small little sail boats, masts up in the air bobbing on the river completely at the whims of the maritime breeze never moving very far left or right but always bobbing very much a little up and down, there is always, this is always the best place for sunsets. The colored tinted lights split out from the center of the orange sun that is slowly diving back into the ocean like a bird diving smooth and graceful and splash less; they are reflected by the water that shivers and shimmers due to the endless long length waves that break and turn white at the sands of the beach there out on the right right across the river on the other side opposite the river opposite the big blue building. The light mixes and melts with the tinted blue windows making a deep sunset color; the right of the river hangs a few small buildings, shacks were the street cleaners keep their mops, people lazy to go out to the beaches, dipping their ankles in the swirling swimming surf that has bubbly frothy white foam floating on the top because of the action of the waves and the maritime breezes. And when it becomes dark, and the boats still bop and they cars still pass and the lights in the buildings still shine you can see blaring out the CBD, warm and yellow and distant and far enough, just far enough to be another adventure.

We come out to see our favorite part of the city at its favorite time of day. Eventually we will bore of the place eventually we will leave this place forever. I want to go West because all my friends are there because there are the big bright lights, that will the biggest adventure I will take. You want to go back East because there is no place like home to you and this is the biggest adventure you have ever had. Today on my way to a BBQ I passed by all these purple streets and purple roads and I was forever an outsider passing by looking into; inside me is the great desire to move forward and inside me is the great desire to pull back.

Today we go to the center of the equator and down by the sea and past all the volcanic islands of Indonesia and we pass by so many sea turtles, today I went to the center of all the little lights on the skyline and I went to my favorite part of the city.

Not in anyway a religion

In my dream there are lots of people sitting around me; about 4 or 5 people clustered on my right and 3 people clustered on my left, one of them standing. They're all Caucasian some of them blonde some of the brunette I can't see any of their faces because in dreams you can never really see anyone's face. The one closest to me on my right, the brunette in purple is saying 'Wake up the nurse wants to talk to you' to my left is the standing nurse blonde and wearing white holding a clipboard just like the nurses in those old American films. So then I open my eyes and she keeps saying wake up wake up

And when I open my eyes and look around nobody's there. No nurse wants to talk to me. The room is exactly the same except the chairs which everyone was sitting on are no longer there.

Absolutely uninterrupted sleep; I haven't had that for months. First it was because of the nurse dreams; but they stopped as soon as I gave up smoking. I had started only about 3 months ago but I was instantly hooked; satisfying my childhood love of the second hand smoke blown out by my relatives. The dreams started coming when I started learning how to roll my cigarettes quicker and hence; when I started increasing my nicotine intake ten fold. I would wake up rub my eyes realize that I had only fallen asleep 3 hours ago; sit around spend 2 hours trying to fall asleep again; smoke; fall asleep for 3 hours; have another dream then wake up again. Quitting was easier then I thought I nailed it on my second try. It was, for me, like choosing tobacco over absolute uninterrupted sleep; sleep won. If only every smoker had to face an ultimatum like I did. Shortly after I quit I saw an anti smoking ad featuring a man with a Trachea. Just in time I guess.

The dreams stopped but my 3 hour sleeping pattern continued; it went on for days and days and weeks and weeks until I decided that I'd have to try everything. Strong alcoholic drinks before bed; failed; very unpleasant to wake up to find your drunken spew all over the floor and your clothes and stuck in the little bits of your fringe that hang down over your face and even more unpleasant to have to continually wake up to it every 3 hours for the rest of the night. Lots and lots of exercise before bed; failed; and I would wake up starving and eat all the potato salad left in the fridge. Watching boring documentaries; failed; because when you wake up and you lie there for 2 hours waiting to get back to sleep focusing completely on the documentary waiting for it to knock you out, you suddenly become entranced in it. Never have I learnt so much about the rise and fall of the Stock Exchange. Having sex because apparently after ejaculation men just roll into sleep; failed; and apparently trying to wake your date up after 3 hours and asking for another round is not romantic or spontaneous or sexy or attractive in anyway. Sleeping pills because they may be deadly but they are affective; failed; and that was the scariest failure of all.

The sort of things that I remember about dreams and that I remember about sleep are; that they are a wonderful thing to have.

I remember sleeping; and dreaming, and then; being woken up. There I was, in one instant; in this big place that looks remotely like a lollipop field but I don't know exactly everything is to blurry with people surrounding me talking to me but I could never really clearly see there faces; and suddenly something would filter in Wake up we have to go; we're gonna be late if you don't wake up. The words would at first seem almost part of the dream but then as they got thicker and thicker and more and more solid; the dream would get thinner and thinner and then just turn grey and then I would open my eyes to half see you standing there under the yellow light talking to me telling me to wake up. And those type of dreams; or those type of wakings; would only work against you because for those first 10 seconds that I'm awake I stay convinced that the reality, the warped morphed reality, of my dream still exists and still applies; my mind is convinced that even though the dream in which that reality existed disappeared a while ago into the grey. I remember rubbing my eyes saying I know I know cause the watermelon told you so right? And you would look at me funny and say What? But the minute you say it I would snap out of the dreams old reality and realize nothing I said made sense. My dream had nothing to do with watermelons; but I know if I said it in my dream it would make sense.

I remember my repeating dreams; my recurring dreams. I stopped having recurring nightmares once I became 14 but before that every year I would have the same nightmare; a yearly ritual. I would be sitting on a canoe out by this big blue lake; the sort of lakes you see in films, films called 'Return of the Swamp Monster to Jefferson Camp' , the sort of films that they parody in kid shows where the boyfriend and the girlfriend sit on a boat by the lake the girlfriend going 'Gee Joe I don't think we should be out here' and the boyfriend crooning here into premarital penetration. On one side of the canoe would be me, and on the other side a bunch of fat people, and slowly the canoe would tilt and I would be on the elevated side the canoe almost reaching a perfect vertical position, me sitting there grinding my teeth clutching the sides and-

I would sit up in bed, wake up with that feeling in my chest that you get when you swing too high on the swings, pant; find myself completely out of breath.

Though the nightmare stopped coming to me I would often get the same, almost yearly, dream about me and a group of friends at a large amusement park filled with roller coasters and water slides and fast food stores. And we would slide down the massive water slide each of us sitting in our huge individual inflatable blue and yellow doughnut shaped tubes and right before we got to the end; where there would be some sort of blockage and we would all panic; I would wake up.

I remember having fantastic dreams, and then being woken up; and feeling completely pissed at the person who woke you; at the sun or the alarm clock or just yourself. Being pissed when you find out that the fantastic reality is not. And no matter how long you lie in bed you can never get your self to fall asleep again the whole thing has left you entirely high and dry.

There are so many different types of dreams and different ways of realizing that they are in fact dreams; that I could never write them all down. The only reason I document this is because; there is something amazing about how much a dream captures you and envelops you and sucks you in. You are so convinced that this is reality even though it goes completely against what the laws of true reality had ever stated. If I wanted to end on a shocker I could say But what is true reality? But I honestly believe that this; is it; not because of life is wonderful and life is full of joy because life can be full of shit; but because this reality is the only thing that effectively strips away the fake reality the warped reality the wonderful reality of dreams. And I won't believe in any Matrix or Inception theory that tells me that this; is all some sort of well fabricated dream.

I've sort of surprised my self in this note, because I'm not religious; not like this; theory of mine is in anyway a religion. I've never had much firm unshakable beliefs before except that I hated capsicums in all form and color and that I hated the taste of blood.

But my sleep pattern was starting to change and not in the way I wanted; 3 hours of sleep followed by 2 hours of waiting became no hours of sleep followed by all hours of waiting; and if I didn't write things down and pick a side when it came to the theories of the Matrix and Inception and Vanilla Sky then I'd never see any dream again.

For the first time in months I feel sleepy; a sleepy that I know won't shake off. But more importantly this is a sleepy that I haven't felt ever before in my life, a sleepy that I know won't shake off ever; a sleepy that doesn't leave in the next 8 hours or tomorrow morning or tomorrow afternoon or tomorrow evening; a sleepy that lays itself over you and doesn't release itself until. Until it doesn't need to cling there anymore, because nothing in the world is gonna wake you up after this.

Scrap

I deleted another thing I was working on when I found this draft. I don't remember writing but it must have been in Winter when I was desperate for a little sunshine. Anyway I think its incomplete but it's been so long I don't remember how it was meant to end; or even what its called.

Sometime when the rain stops pouring and the wind stops blowing and the clouds stop covering; thats the time when the sun will and the blue sky will emerge. If it doesn't happen now; if it doesn't happen ever. Then I escape to the past; where these things happened. There are jars all over the house and nobody associated them with their previous contents. We keep the labels on saying "Spagetti Sauce" or "Strawberry Jam" but their insides are clean and clear and if not for the labels; transparent. Nobody looks at them as spagetti sauce jars or jam jars they have become the jars for the chocolate biscuits the jars were there is money that I sometimes put in and sometimes take out. There is nothing in this house that gives me indiciation of the previous owner. I sometimes find something of mine; that is old and dusty and mine; and I pretend its the former occupant's. I pretend I've stumbled into something significant of someone else's lives. Better still if the thing I find actually is something significant of mine. Then me and the former occupant have, so much in common.

Umbrellas out but for once "For once it does not look like rain"

You looked at me then the sky and smiled; the past so the sky was turning blue and the sun was emerging from the clouds, and at the same time the cloud as wisping away from the sun. Then you talked but I can't remember of what and then after many hours we departed I decided to walk home and you took the train to meet your old friends. On sunny days like those I wished we had more open train stations old fashioned train stations with old fashioned trains but sometimes, all the time, I want things over sentimentalised.

Despite all my efforts I could never bottle days like that and how wonderful if I could. I tried taking pictures but its magic was limited to the fact that outside the frame things were still wet and grey. The thing I hate most about wet and grey days is that I can't leave the houe on wet and grey days and I'm forced to stay at home, and pretend to find significance in others because I have already fully explored the significant things in me, in my own life. I can bottle rain, and this rain, even on sunny days has a penetrating darkness in it. If I break the bottle of rain its completely likely it will escape all over the white tile floors and change the weather. I feel jealous you and all my friends can leave on grey rainy days.

And the whole mood of the day permeiates into my life faucets. I must, to keep to the occasion, wear dark moody clothes and sit on the coach reading books. Ah summertime, the light airy dresses and shorts and the potato chips and TV shows.

Lomography

There is no greater sport; lomography! Go down to the river, that goes down to the sea; and see everything through a lens with a shutter that clicks. Sometime see things; as if it was seconds away from a polaroid. There is the ocean that you've followed from the river that, has birds swooping over and blends darlingly into the sky, ah what a day. And you see it with white borders equal in length at the two sides and the top; but extended at the bottom like all polaroids are. There is no greater recreation; sometimes go down to the beach when the ocean is calling and shaken of its nervousness and the deepest cleanest blue. There are endless stretches of sand; along with endless stretches of sky. There's a long flat line out there that you can't always see because the sun is sitting flashing in your eye. Go out with a hat and a wicker bag and its so bright you have to put your hand over your eyes.
The sand is completely toasty and deep and it moves aside for you; but gently and only when you ask it too. The water keeps asking you to dip in forever. And when you are in there; when you just get in and your lungs are fill to the top with atmosphere; there is a feeling like jelly is encassing you. But it's not exactly jelly; it adjusts itself perfectly to your shape like jelly; but its not as suffcocating it is light breezy effortless and when you first get down there you lose all clarity of what is wet and dry. When you have to resurface you lose the senseless shapeless escape that is down there; here returns the sensations of soaking and dry; of hot and cold. Then you take 3 steady breaths again; and one big one; then you dive in submerge yourself in the understanding salt.

I Decided To Be

I decided to be a dancer
But I could not move my feet
I decided to be a writer
But I had no words to speak
I decided to be a leader
But revolutions are never easy
I decided to be an ocean
That makes things seasick, quesy.

Dear Me

I'm submitting this for something so I revised it

Dear Me

She sometimes sends me emails in the middle of the night. She never has, set times on anything. They could be short one sentence pieces; they could be 5 miles long. Sometimes I never read them I just, like looking at the number 1 standing there by the word Inbox. And when I do read them I will think of too many too long multiple replies. I couldn't show her I was laughing; a

'hahahahaha'

sometimes just didn't cut it. The obstructive-ness of language; of writing to her and not speaking with her and talking to and her watching her react to me reacting to everything she says. I would think constantly of French philosophers; if I could find some way to make my

'hahahahaha'

come off the screen with the same tone I would use and all those 3 dimensional feelings I had would come through to. I tried so many different variations of smiley faces but this

:D

could never really simulate me laughing and smiling and acting how I do when I talk to her.

I sometimes think that maybe; I only love her because she loves me. I only love her because I am delusional and I will accept anyone who told me anything with the letter L in it. But then I’ll remember that she doesn’t love me that way; and I just imagined and wished; that she loved me that way. I must love her then I guess.

Come pull me closer to the walls so I can feel how you have an instant pull that flows through concrete. After all; there are no after all's in a world where you're gravity's everlasting.

How many times do I have to write things down until they lift themselves off the table? I don't think it could ever actually happen. Jump into me for god’s sake; jump into me the ability to fly to her or at least; to write to her a little more three dimensionally.

Sometimes we plot 3 dimensional graphs on our calculator because we have nothing better to do in maths class and we sit there in the sun seeping through the window and everything is warm and sleepy and she’s next to me and she’s warm and sleepy.

Television taught me how life could never be so wonderfully edited with the perfect soundtrack and perfect timing and the perfect punch lines over hovering sunsets; she taught me life does not have to be like that to be perfect.

Sometimes we listen to Chopin nocturne in C minor but then she says that it upsets her. It upsets me a little bit too. Should we be more impressed by Mozart the boy genies or Beethoven the deaf wonder god? It doesn't matter they are both dead; when I close my eyes and when I can't see the titles on the CD I cannot tell them apart. Except I know Beethoven made

tun tun tun tun TUN TUN TUN TUN

and Mozart didn't. I can't tell the difference between Italian and French either.

Dear You

There are no, actual borders, that separate countries from countries; your country from my country. And that disappoints me; there are no thick black lines between countries that might have, at least slowed down the Nazi's approach to Poland. There is no equator or Capricorn or Cancer and there is no compass that points North. I can't ever remember where North point is; let’s see if the sun rises; in the east; and sets; in the west then I should be able to pinpoint North but I look up and its midday. The sun is dead centre and my eyes hurt from looking. Sometimes you tie up your hair real tight in a bun cause it's so hot. And we walk around pretending like nobody else lives here and that its only you and me and the dead centre sun. My hair is always on my neck and there's nothing I can do about it I suffer. You walk in such a way that you stay in my shadow so you stay cool and I don’t know how you do it with the dead centre sun but if anyone can do it it’s you and anyone did do it and it was You.

Maybe I use my commas and semi colons in all the wrong ways.

'There is no wrong way it’s just grammar you're not in high school anymore'

But we are wrong grammar counts in every aspect of your life you can never shake of its importance. You can shake off the importance of drawing 3D graphs on your calculator but you can't shake off grammar. The only thing that is constant is change, one thing is certain in life and that is uncertainty; when I was younger my parents owned a Foucault book and I never read it.

Don't over analyse things you tell me. I'm not; I'm just stating what some bald gay philosopher said years ago. Is it certain then; that my love for you is uncertain? And; movable, changeable, unsteady? If the only certainty is uncertainty then the certainty that my love is uncertain must be uncertain itself. I don't want it to be though, I want certainty that this; this inner chest motion this contraction in my ribcage when I think about; that this will go away because it’s almost annoying like hiccups.

I feel like it’s been 500 days; and sometimes I have the feeling it’s been more. You are so infuriatingly spectacular in my mind; yet so modestly yet confidently amazing; so very contradictory in my head. You're so contradictory, that I feel like you are fragmented; I hate your giggle. That way that you giggle and you look at everyone and you tilt your head down with your eyes to the table, and at them you smile and with their jokes you laugh and I sit there shuffling my feet feeling terrible down in the depths of my gut. That is the most annoying giggle I've ever heard. But I remember that you don’t smile at me that way and you don’t laugh with me that way because with me you look up and you look right at me burning your eyes in my cornea and you laugh big cucumber triangle shaped sandwich laughs and you smile lemonade on a summer day. And you never say anything that I hate when you’re with me because with me you say everything that is you, everything that is you from its centre to its core everything that you emulate when you wake up in the morning and I could never hate anything that was so you in that way. And with them you say everything that you can just form with your tongue and you stare at the table and you shuffle your feet. Once you told me that you felt terrible down in the depths of your gut and we went walking around town pretending we were alone and you paced in my shadow in the noonday heat.

Sometimes when you ask me to let you listen to my MP3 with me then I give you one earphone for the left ear and I keep one for my right. And I hate how the right ear is so overexposed and I start to get annoyed at you for asking. But you never complain no matter what song I put on you never tell me to change to something else; and you also bought me these headphones when I dropped mine in the fish pond. You watched me drop them in the fishpond, you helped me pull them out, you took me to the repair shop and you bought me new ones, handed them to me and you didn’t say anything, you never wanted anything back for them. And sometimes when we go out you ask me do you have your MP3 player with you? Then I go back to the restaurant because I check at your request and find it not there. And when I get back you look and me and you smile like Lemonade and you day lets go and you don’t say anything that I don’t like to talk about.

When we sat together and we shuffled our feet tired of walking and the sun was moving down the hill we would watch ants swarming around things, food, leaves, and other dead ants. What do they do at night? I don’t know I guess they just sleep. Ants don’t sleep. Oh, well then I don’t know. It’s actually starting to feel cold. Isn’t that funny how that works.

The different parts of you; are so split apart so completely un-whole that I have to split you up in my head; to try and fully understand you; to try and fully understand this. And then there you are all over in ever segment in every sphere of my mind. I fail at trying to understand this; this chest ache this Inbox Impatience; but I want to dive into you and discover you.

Dear Everything

Sometimes I go out and buy a Winnie the Pooh book; I like looking at the original illustrations I like reading the book. If there are never ever any tomorrows, then that must mean by default there must never ever be any today’s. Dear You; sometimes I love you and sometimes I don't love loving you. Often I don't love loving you; but even more often I forget that I do; because I feel like this hiccup annoying but fantastic splendid far from annoying feeling I get; is perfectly natural. Is perfectly expected; by anyone who hangs around you because you have a force that flows through concrete. But the point is I love you all the time whether I notice it or not whether I like it or not. If the only certainty is uncertainty then I'm fine; then you are fine but remember you are better than fine you are beyond expectations you are an A++; because what I feel is so very uncertain in the way it rises and falls. Because you are so very uncertain you have predictable -only predictable to me- wonderful, perfect, broken but perfect, characteristics but when you choose to assert them is random. And if you are so uncertain and if the things you invoke in others- not only me because you have a force that doesn't just flow through concrete it flows through oceans it flows through seas- if you are so uncertain in a definite certain way; it is undeniable your force but when and where it catches me I can never tell; then you are forever. Dear You; I sometimes write to you about my cat I sometimes write to you about my fictitious dog; I sometimes write to you about my friends and I sometimes write to you about MacDonald’s. But dear you I always seem to write to you about you; and I always seem to write to you about me. Dear You, Dear Me; Dear Everything: I love you like some chasm has opened inside me and its all your fault and I love you like some chasm was deep inside me and its all filled up and stuffed and its all your fault. I love you in such a way that my words come out 3 dimensional from the screen. I love you like oh; it is such a relief.

My Wishy Washy Love Affair

Another one of those ones that I wrote a while ago but I never finished. I remember how this go's but it be wrong to finish it. Its quite a good ending for a short story anyway.

Other then my other loves, I loved it when she made decisions for me; honestly I loved it when most anyone would make decisions for me; but she did it best. She would say to me Look What Do You Wanna Do? And - if I just shrugged my shoulders she'd get mad- I'd tell her a few things I'd like to do then she'd say Probably Best You Do This. She didn't make decisions for anyone but me, everyone was grown up to make up their own minds; and sometimes she let others make her mind for her. But she knew what I was like, my absolute irreputable unseparatable love affair with indecisiveness, and she was nice enough to access situations to find the best option -my least favourite part fo decision making- and nice enough to let everyone else think she was bossy.

The Start of My Indecisive Adventure:

She initally decided it would be morally obscure for her to pick which university to go to. I knew what I wanted to do; I wanted to do the subjects I was best at and the subjects I liked more; I just didn't know where to do them. Best one in the country this, most suitable for your corse that; please make the decision for me. She thought it be wrong because for the whole week she'd had people arrange and set her mind for her. Whenever this happened I would be in a state of freefall trying to figure out which way to go; towards the electrons or the protons; towards the North pole or the South. I thought maybe I'd go to the Uni with the big farm on campus, what a trivial reason to base one's future on. I thought maybe I'd go to the Uni with the highest entry requirements; what a nerdy reason to base one's future one. I called her everyday to find her in the same state of decided undecided prearranged despair.

I decided not to tell her when I left; because she was already arranged enough as it was. If I told her, she would just arrange herself more. Best not tell her; best let her figure it out for herself; realize I'm not around anymore; and then come to her own conclusions on what to do. If I told her she'd have no thrill in figuring it out on her own and hence would take no initiative in making her own mind. I knew her well enough to make a few decisions for her benefit; I didn't think I knew myself well enough to make my own decisions when on the road. But there I was on the road. I took a few usefull useless essentials; put it all in a very large very old van I bought. I, with my P liscense went out on the road, a huge decision, to avoid having to stay home, and make other smaller decisions. I brought my ladder with me.

A Wife

Maybe if I had a wife she'd make all my decisions for me. Back home my friend would make all the decisions for me and she knew me well enough to make the best ones. So a wife should, a wife would do the same thing. I wondered where I could find a wife; as if they wandered around wearing veils and holding bouquets. I gave my friend a phonecall

"I think I wanna get married"

"Big life choice there"

"My wife could make all my decisions for me you see"

"Try a bar?"

I drove but didn'd find any bars that looked like they had women in them . It was getting dark. Other then fieldtrips for school, I'd never spent a night away from my matress with my two pillows and digital alarm clock with taped down snooze button. I had a matress in the back; not my mattress but a mattress from one of the guests room. If my friend found my matress missing she'd catch on to early and the thrill would be lost. I left the house at 9am it was 7. I wondered how long I could keep driving.

Breakfast Lunch and Dinner

I brought a hotplate but I didn't have any plugs in my van so its relevance seemed futile to me. I brought boxes of bread; that would expire in a few days. And so much peanut butter. I never understood how well of I was until I saw how much peanutbutter I managed to get. Only a rich kid could get so much peanutbutter. I forgot to bring a knife. I didn't want to stop driving, the closer I got to; the pointed end of the road sitting on the horizon; the better I would feel. How long can a person go without food? A week without water a month without food; I had brought lots of water. More water then peanutbutter. I didn't need any kitchen utensils to drink water. I very often needed to stop and piss. When I pissed in the wind I constantly feared the wind would blow it back onto my jeans. I'd forgotten to pack more jeans. I packed 12 pairs of boxers and two more shirts but no jeans. I tried pissing when there was no wind; but there was always wind. I learned to pee with my back to the wind; so the wind would help blow my piss further and further away from my solitary jeans. I wondered if anybody would pass by and stare at me taking a leak; but nobody passed by. I ate bread and sometimes crammed my fingers in the peanutbutter jars and licked them clean. I saw lots of stores as I drove by; but I refused to stop. I had to take shits in the bushes but it was ok. The sight of the sun rising and the wind rustlng through made it; a relaxing experience. I didn't see any hitchhikers so far and I wondered whether; if I did; should I pick them up. A hitch hiker might have a knife for my peanutbutter. As a guy old enough to get a P Liscencse for a manual car I didn't have to worry about a knife wielding hitch hikers. What if the hitchiker was a girl? Are hitch hikers marrying material. My friend called me as I was pulling over somewhere to sleep.

"Did you try a bar?" She started listing local bars in our neighbourhood; that we sometimes went to to get chocolate milk.

"No. Hey"

"?"

"Are hitch hikers marrying material?"

"Did you see one today?"

"No"

"They can be. But girls don't hitch hike"

"Rapists?"

"Rapists. Rapists are the reason we don't do anything anymore. There were loads of rapists in the old days but; back then a stranger was just as likely to rape you as your uncle was. It was better to be away from home back then."

"Lots of Oedipus complexes"

No More Bush Shitting

Early in the morning; around 9. Driving I wondered if eating peanutbutter of the same hands that I used to touch the steering wheel and clutch of this mysterious old van was the alriight thing to do. I saw a few people walking by and pulled over to ask them if they had butter knifes they could give me. Nobody ever did. Did nobody leave the house with butter knifes anymore; how many people now compared to the amount of people back then had Oedipus complexes. I knew I didn't have one but those aren't the things that are very obvious; it might rise up from the dark suddenly. All the better I was leaving home. I was taking a piss in the sand and just as I was zipping up my jeans somebody approached the van. I saw the person from a distance; had to run all the way back to the van; back to the main road. Luckily that person hadn't seen me taking a leak. It was a girl; she was wearing sunglasses eventhough It wasn't particularly sunny. She looked at me and it was if she didn't see me; she had to take of her sunglasses and put on a pair of ridicolously large almost Dumbledore glasses from her pocket. When she did; and when she looked at me; then I finally felt recognized; ah she see's me now. I did the only thing I could think to do; I pulled out my hand stretched it towards her big framed face. She grasped it firmly; we shook hands, one shake looking each other in the eye.

"Is this your van" She was absolutely casual as if the handshake had elminated the formailty required in the conversation. That was the objective of the handshake.

"Yeah; hey do you..."

"?"

"Have a knife?"

She pulled out from her pocket a very small cracked here and there plactic knife that you get from fast food joints as well as a napkin. I liked her instantly.