An animated cartoon idea: a crudely drawn stick figure man is walking. He’s whistling. His mouth is just open space between the top and bottom of his head. He passes a man who is being eaten by lions. The man screams, “Help!”, but he says “Not my job.” Then he walks by a woman who got hit by a bus and is laying in the road. He says “Not my job.” Then he passes a man who is being attacked by a bear with a chainsaw. He says “Not my job.” Then he passes a McDonald’s with a Now Hiring sign in the window. He says, “Not my job.” Then he walks away and it’s over. Yay.
Marchdream 2016 - A Dream About My Departed Father
Dream March 2016
My father passed away January 3, 2016.
In the dream, I was with my Dad at a boisterous outdoor party. My mother had passed in 2008, and my Dad had come to this party with a new girlfriend. I knew the young woman from school; she was much younger than he, and in the dream I was worried about this. She seemed so damned fickle and likely to hurt him.
The three of us stood in a small cluster away from the roiling crowd of the party. She held my Dad’s hand in loose fingers and gazed away from him toward the revelry. Finally, she released his hand and ran to the cluster.
Dad followed her, and I stood transfixed as they had an argument. Dad shook his head slowly and solemnly left her side and returned to me. The girl vanished into the boil of people. Dad looked at the ground; the pain in his face was apparent, but he didn’t let it transform him. It hurt my chest to see him like that.
“She broke it off,” he said.
“I’m sorry, Dad,”
I embraced him, and he hugged me back as fiercely as he ever had. He then slowly walked up the hill to our right, at the top of which was an arch. It was minutes later as he approached the arch that I knew he was going to die. I hurried after him, determined to be there with him, but when I passed under the arch, he was lying still on his back in a great hall. Still.
I somehow knew that this was a dream, and that I might be able to rewind events.
So I did.
We were standing again by the crowd, but it had shrunken, and was populated only by immediate family members. Everyone looked to Dad. The young woman was gone.
The pained expression from before was gone. I hugged my Dad and told him, “I love you so much.”
He turned to walk up the hill.
Looking at my family, I said, “He’s going to rest there, but we have a chance to be with him.” But when I pivoted to follow my Dad, he was already under the arch. Everyone raced up the hill, but we found him as I had before, still and peaceful.
Dream Over
My father passed away January 3, 2016.
In the dream, I was with my Dad at a boisterous outdoor party. My mother had passed in 2008, and my Dad had come to this party with a new girlfriend. I knew the young woman from school; she was much younger than he, and in the dream I was worried about this. She seemed so damned fickle and likely to hurt him.
The three of us stood in a small cluster away from the roiling crowd of the party. She held my Dad’s hand in loose fingers and gazed away from him toward the revelry. Finally, she released his hand and ran to the cluster.
Dad followed her, and I stood transfixed as they had an argument. Dad shook his head slowly and solemnly left her side and returned to me. The girl vanished into the boil of people. Dad looked at the ground; the pain in his face was apparent, but he didn’t let it transform him. It hurt my chest to see him like that.
“She broke it off,” he said.
“I’m sorry, Dad,”
I embraced him, and he hugged me back as fiercely as he ever had. He then slowly walked up the hill to our right, at the top of which was an arch. It was minutes later as he approached the arch that I knew he was going to die. I hurried after him, determined to be there with him, but when I passed under the arch, he was lying still on his back in a great hall. Still.
I somehow knew that this was a dream, and that I might be able to rewind events.
So I did.
We were standing again by the crowd, but it had shrunken, and was populated only by immediate family members. Everyone looked to Dad. The young woman was gone.
The pained expression from before was gone. I hugged my Dad and told him, “I love you so much.”
He turned to walk up the hill.
Looking at my family, I said, “He’s going to rest there, but we have a chance to be with him.” But when I pivoted to follow my Dad, he was already under the arch. Everyone raced up the hill, but we found him as I had before, still and peaceful.
Dream Over
Cocaine Hummingbird Eyes
Cocaine hummingbird eyes
Nibbling ten thousand glances
Each a fragment reflection of nothing
With minuscule edges so quietly sharp
Bleeding out the brain in legion lullaby
Nibbling ten thousand glances
Each a fragment reflection of nothing
With minuscule edges so quietly sharp
Bleeding out the brain in legion lullaby
Fish
Remember that breath? Brother has already inhaled that. Such a lovely taste of nothing. He allowed his skin to learn osmosis, gave the carnal coat the helm, locked away the screeching mind and dove head on into the Ichor Lake, a velvet hole infinitely collapsing in on itself
And Brother opened his mouth and said, “This feels good.”
While he cut through the murk, his skin began to barter with the Ichor sliding around it. It broke off pieces of his concentrated, original core, trading off parcels of Brother’s spirit. But those absences were soon filled with the waters of the lake. Because Brother’s eyes were shut in brutal bliss, he did not see the violet essence dart away into the blackness, like incandescent sperm squiggling away into oblivion. Soon, the skin had finished trading off all portions of Brother’s identity, except for the mind which had been locked away. The ichor was within. The ichor was without.
The night waters began to manipulate Brother’s outline, as it was inefficient for movement in the deep. Stretching and pulling and splitting and breaking. All of which forced Brother to open his eyes. Because this did not feel good.
In the remaining light of Brother’s mind, he saw how his traitorous skin had been changed. Arms and legs gone, morphed into pale scales and fins pushing him gleefully deeper into the ichor.
The mind did not recognize Brother, and shrieked and shrieked, but the clamor of the Animal urges was much too loud, and it swallowed the mind, as the ichor swallowed what was once a brother.
It swam deeper.
And Brother opened his mouth and said, “This feels good.”
While he cut through the murk, his skin began to barter with the Ichor sliding around it. It broke off pieces of his concentrated, original core, trading off parcels of Brother’s spirit. But those absences were soon filled with the waters of the lake. Because Brother’s eyes were shut in brutal bliss, he did not see the violet essence dart away into the blackness, like incandescent sperm squiggling away into oblivion. Soon, the skin had finished trading off all portions of Brother’s identity, except for the mind which had been locked away. The ichor was within. The ichor was without.
The night waters began to manipulate Brother’s outline, as it was inefficient for movement in the deep. Stretching and pulling and splitting and breaking. All of which forced Brother to open his eyes. Because this did not feel good.
In the remaining light of Brother’s mind, he saw how his traitorous skin had been changed. Arms and legs gone, morphed into pale scales and fins pushing him gleefully deeper into the ichor.
The mind did not recognize Brother, and shrieked and shrieked, but the clamor of the Animal urges was much too loud, and it swallowed the mind, as the ichor swallowed what was once a brother.
It swam deeper.
Sailing.
Sailing.
Cursor said I was a liar. I am a plague. My mind is punctuation. I have drifted away from system vitality on a sea that wasn't there.
Said Captain, "Welcome to my ship. You are a lad on the ladder to latter life. On this ship, you will be best friends with the corners of death. I suggest you drape those corners on your shoulders when you walk the deck. Be stately; allow the wind to spread death behind you like a cape. Allow the empty wind to make you beautiful for everyone who isn't here.
"Because between the waves ridging this invisible ocean, the vacuum has imagined a vacancy so deep to render your memories into dead breezes. On this ship, we will be still. However, we are moving assuredly, and each pace you make on my deck will dissolve another bridge between the islands of your spirituality."
I said that the sun was going down.
Said Captain, "To navigate my ship, I need not that close star nor the far away night shiners. They are gone, anyway. You are my chart. You are my path to darkness."
Silence was then cradled in silence. A thieving wind billowed my cape, and the ship rolled on an absent salt-water abyss.
Cursor said I was a liar. I am a plague. My mind is punctuation. I have drifted away from system vitality on a sea that wasn't there.
Said Captain, "Welcome to my ship. You are a lad on the ladder to latter life. On this ship, you will be best friends with the corners of death. I suggest you drape those corners on your shoulders when you walk the deck. Be stately; allow the wind to spread death behind you like a cape. Allow the empty wind to make you beautiful for everyone who isn't here.
"Because between the waves ridging this invisible ocean, the vacuum has imagined a vacancy so deep to render your memories into dead breezes. On this ship, we will be still. However, we are moving assuredly, and each pace you make on my deck will dissolve another bridge between the islands of your spirituality."
I said that the sun was going down.
Said Captain, "To navigate my ship, I need not that close star nor the far away night shiners. They are gone, anyway. You are my chart. You are my path to darkness."
Silence was then cradled in silence. A thieving wind billowed my cape, and the ship rolled on an absent salt-water abyss.
Dream Part Three - New Members of the Baboon Congress: Leaving the Writer
We rounded the last curve; the walkway ended at the open roof of the house, and moonlight shone on a circular tub of stained tin.
“That’s the tar beetle pit,” the writer said to me. “Go watch it, but don’t put your hand in it until I say so.”
He had a lot of demands, but I acquiesced to all of them because of guilt at having forgotten his novel.
My brothers and the writer stayed behind, looking up at me as I approached the tub. Inside, hundreds of thousands of centimeter-long black beetles cascaded over one another, each oozed from their mouths and anuses a purplish thick paste, which reeked of licorice and onions. They crawled over each other to reach the lip of the tub, but constantly fell back, creating the illusion of a rising escalator. At the center was a pool of the licorice sludge.
“Put your hand in the middle,” said the writer.
I pushed my hand in up to my wrist. It was tepid, and after a few seconds my skin prickled as if circulation was poor.
My brother A screamed, and Z was shouting.
The writer had shoved A off the path into the empty space. I watched in horror as he fell down, smashing through the stucco floor, through another floor into a dark space crowded with baboons.
Z struggled with the writer at the brink, but was overwhelmed by his strength, and he toppled backward, plummeting down and down into the area where A had been carried away.
I yanked my hand out of the sludge and clutched it to my chest. My heart beat pounded, and for a moment waves of pain radiated from it like fire in my arteries.
I pointed at the writer, licorice spit and shit dripping from my fingers. “You are a . . .”
“I am a writer,” he said. His chin jutted out, and his face grew heavy with fat. He looked at me as if bored. He sat down at the edge of the walkway, swinging his legs in the emptiness.
I peered down for a few seconds, choked with worry, before I finally leaped. The fall was fast, and I landed softly on my feet in a cellar that smelled of urine and meat. The space was huge and empty. A gigantic caged gate was ahead of me, and through it I could see a well-lit area with rising rows of chairs and tables, like a university classroom. The chairs were occupied by bipedal baboons that occasionally stood and chatted with one another in what sounded like Spanish. In all the brown and gray fur, I caught a glimpse of rich red. It was my brother Z! He was leaning forward on a table, concentrating on a source of light that washed over all of them.
I didn’t see A, and it made me sick.
An enormous, two-headed gibbon crawled down from a crevice above when I stepped to the gate. It stood on the main lock of the gate, four eyes searching me, the heads turning inward to search each other.
“Por que você se aqui?” they asked.
“I don’t speak Spanish.”
“Not Spanish! Portuguese. Why did you fall in here?”
“The writer pushed my brothers down here. I want to see if they’re okay.”
“Raise your tar beetle shit hand to us.”
I did, and the gibbon heads sniffed it, then licked the back of my hand clean. Each head bent towards the opposite shoulder and vomited.
“Eu não posso acreditar como eu amo a vomitar isso!” they said, and unlocked the gate with a lever hidden in the above crevice. The gibbons gestured for me to enter before creeping up into the darkness. The gate rolled open on a track, filling the air with a horrible grinding noise. Hundreds of baboon eyes focused on me, as well as those of my brother. The huge light into which he’d been staring went black.
Z called my name and waved for me to join him.
A tall baboon in the front row grabbed my hand and led me up to my brother, who sat in a chair between two ancient baboons. One moved two seats over to accommodate me and my missing brother. I embraced Z, asking, “Where’s A?”
“He went to the bathroom.”
I exhaled in relief and we both sat down.
The descending rows of tables and chairs faced a low platform at the fore of the auditorium. The baboon to my left pointed to a red button on the table in front of me. Every seat had a button.
“Push the button for a piece of his oblivion,” he said.
“What?”
Below, a great line of light spouted up from the center of the platform, and unfolded into an enormous hologram of the writer’s head. Except for his face, his skull was transparent, revealing his brain. His brain was the center of the powerful light; the folds radiated with it. His head slowly rotated. The writer looked different from when I last saw him. His face was lean, his expression crisp and aware.
Baboons from all across the room pushed their buttons, sounding like dozens of people simultaneously pushing the plastic bubble in the game TROUBLE. As the buttons were pressed, sections of light within the writer’s brain went dark. By degrees, the writer’s countenance changed, his chin receded, his cheeks slackened and swelled, his eyes lost their electric intensity and concentration, pupils seeming to fade and retract within, to gaze noncommittally at an inward erosion.
My brother pushed his button three times fast.
The writer’s spinning head flickered, froze for a moment facing all of us in this baboon congress, his decreasing intelligence and curiosity apparent in a mouth hanging open to release an unrestrained river of drool.
“Fuck the writer,” I said, and pushed the button, leaving a smear of tar beetle shit and spit.
Dream Over
“That’s the tar beetle pit,” the writer said to me. “Go watch it, but don’t put your hand in it until I say so.”
He had a lot of demands, but I acquiesced to all of them because of guilt at having forgotten his novel.
My brothers and the writer stayed behind, looking up at me as I approached the tub. Inside, hundreds of thousands of centimeter-long black beetles cascaded over one another, each oozed from their mouths and anuses a purplish thick paste, which reeked of licorice and onions. They crawled over each other to reach the lip of the tub, but constantly fell back, creating the illusion of a rising escalator. At the center was a pool of the licorice sludge.
“Put your hand in the middle,” said the writer.
I pushed my hand in up to my wrist. It was tepid, and after a few seconds my skin prickled as if circulation was poor.
My brother A screamed, and Z was shouting.
The writer had shoved A off the path into the empty space. I watched in horror as he fell down, smashing through the stucco floor, through another floor into a dark space crowded with baboons.
Z struggled with the writer at the brink, but was overwhelmed by his strength, and he toppled backward, plummeting down and down into the area where A had been carried away.
I yanked my hand out of the sludge and clutched it to my chest. My heart beat pounded, and for a moment waves of pain radiated from it like fire in my arteries.
I pointed at the writer, licorice spit and shit dripping from my fingers. “You are a . . .”
“I am a writer,” he said. His chin jutted out, and his face grew heavy with fat. He looked at me as if bored. He sat down at the edge of the walkway, swinging his legs in the emptiness.
I peered down for a few seconds, choked with worry, before I finally leaped. The fall was fast, and I landed softly on my feet in a cellar that smelled of urine and meat. The space was huge and empty. A gigantic caged gate was ahead of me, and through it I could see a well-lit area with rising rows of chairs and tables, like a university classroom. The chairs were occupied by bipedal baboons that occasionally stood and chatted with one another in what sounded like Spanish. In all the brown and gray fur, I caught a glimpse of rich red. It was my brother Z! He was leaning forward on a table, concentrating on a source of light that washed over all of them.
I didn’t see A, and it made me sick.
An enormous, two-headed gibbon crawled down from a crevice above when I stepped to the gate. It stood on the main lock of the gate, four eyes searching me, the heads turning inward to search each other.
“Por que você se aqui?” they asked.
“I don’t speak Spanish.”
“Not Spanish! Portuguese. Why did you fall in here?”
“The writer pushed my brothers down here. I want to see if they’re okay.”
“Raise your tar beetle shit hand to us.”
I did, and the gibbon heads sniffed it, then licked the back of my hand clean. Each head bent towards the opposite shoulder and vomited.
“Eu não posso acreditar como eu amo a vomitar isso!” they said, and unlocked the gate with a lever hidden in the above crevice. The gibbons gestured for me to enter before creeping up into the darkness. The gate rolled open on a track, filling the air with a horrible grinding noise. Hundreds of baboon eyes focused on me, as well as those of my brother. The huge light into which he’d been staring went black.
Z called my name and waved for me to join him.
A tall baboon in the front row grabbed my hand and led me up to my brother, who sat in a chair between two ancient baboons. One moved two seats over to accommodate me and my missing brother. I embraced Z, asking, “Where’s A?”
“He went to the bathroom.”
I exhaled in relief and we both sat down.
The descending rows of tables and chairs faced a low platform at the fore of the auditorium. The baboon to my left pointed to a red button on the table in front of me. Every seat had a button.
“Push the button for a piece of his oblivion,” he said.
“What?”
Below, a great line of light spouted up from the center of the platform, and unfolded into an enormous hologram of the writer’s head. Except for his face, his skull was transparent, revealing his brain. His brain was the center of the powerful light; the folds radiated with it. His head slowly rotated. The writer looked different from when I last saw him. His face was lean, his expression crisp and aware.
Baboons from all across the room pushed their buttons, sounding like dozens of people simultaneously pushing the plastic bubble in the game TROUBLE. As the buttons were pressed, sections of light within the writer’s brain went dark. By degrees, the writer’s countenance changed, his chin receded, his cheeks slackened and swelled, his eyes lost their electric intensity and concentration, pupils seeming to fade and retract within, to gaze noncommittally at an inward erosion.
My brother pushed his button three times fast.
The writer’s spinning head flickered, froze for a moment facing all of us in this baboon congress, his decreasing intelligence and curiosity apparent in a mouth hanging open to release an unrestrained river of drool.
“Fuck the writer,” I said, and pushed the button, leaving a smear of tar beetle shit and spit.
Dream Over
The Powerful Baby, the Roach, and the Twinkie
This is a modified version of a story I told my niece. I don't know what I was thinking telling her the baby took steroids, and her parents quickly corrected that. Of course, it's just ridiculous, I don't support ANYONE illegally using steroids, especially BABIES.
The Powerful Baby, the Roach, and the Twinkie
One day a chubby and darling baby girl sat in her high chair, preparing to eat a delicious Twinkie. She smacked her lips and rubbed her hands together. But when she reached for the cake, a sly and spry cockroach scampered over the tray and snatched the Twinkie, laughing as it ran off.
The baby was furious . . . and hungry. She got a membership to the gym and began lifting weights and taking lots of steroids(whoops) to bulk up. Soon she was incredibly strong and began to canvass the neighborhood to find the roach. She knew roaches liked to scurry below.
She came to the first house. With a baby roar, she lifted the house from the ground, but there was no cockroach at the bottom, only a woman washing clothes. Enraged, the baby hurled the house into the sky, and it smashed against the moon!
She came to the second house, and pulled that one up, too. No cockroach, only Peppa the Pig in the bathroom. Peppa yelled, “Hey! Shut the door!” The baby wailed, and threw the house into the sky, where it crashed into the sun!
She came to the third house and with both hands ripped it up from the foundation. And there he was! The scoundrel roach! The roach was scared. He held on to the Twinkie and shook like he was cold. The baby held the house up high, and the roach thought she was going to smash him. But the baby put the house down to the side and sat next to the roach. She took the Twinkie, broke it in half, gave one half to the roach. They laughed, and each enjoyed the shared Twinkie.
THE END
The Powerful Baby, the Roach, and the Twinkie
One day a chubby and darling baby girl sat in her high chair, preparing to eat a delicious Twinkie. She smacked her lips and rubbed her hands together. But when she reached for the cake, a sly and spry cockroach scampered over the tray and snatched the Twinkie, laughing as it ran off.
The baby was furious . . . and hungry. She got a membership to the gym and began lifting weights and taking lots of steroids(whoops) to bulk up. Soon she was incredibly strong and began to canvass the neighborhood to find the roach. She knew roaches liked to scurry below.
She came to the first house. With a baby roar, she lifted the house from the ground, but there was no cockroach at the bottom, only a woman washing clothes. Enraged, the baby hurled the house into the sky, and it smashed against the moon!
She came to the second house, and pulled that one up, too. No cockroach, only Peppa the Pig in the bathroom. Peppa yelled, “Hey! Shut the door!” The baby wailed, and threw the house into the sky, where it crashed into the sun!
She came to the third house and with both hands ripped it up from the foundation. And there he was! The scoundrel roach! The roach was scared. He held on to the Twinkie and shook like he was cold. The baby held the house up high, and the roach thought she was going to smash him. But the baby put the house down to the side and sat next to the roach. She took the Twinkie, broke it in half, gave one half to the roach. They laughed, and each enjoyed the shared Twinkie.
THE END
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
