the innocent eye test

-I know you, I know you. You're the only serious person in the room aren't you, the only one who understands, and you can prove it by the fact that you've never finished a single thing in your life. You're the only well-educated person, because you never went to college, and you resent education, you resent social ease, you resent good manners, you resent success, you resent any kind of success, you resent God, you resent Christ, you resent thousand-dollar bills, you resent Christmas, by God, you resent happiness, you resent happiness itself, because none of that's real. What is real, then? Nothing's real to you that isn't part of your own past, real life, a swamp of failures, of social, sexual, financial, personal, . . . spiritual failure. Real life. You poor bastard. You don't know what real life is, you've never been near it. All you have a thousand intellectualized ideas about life. But life? Have you ever measured yourself against anything but your own lousy past? Have you ever faced anything outside yourself? Life! You poor bastard.

--The Recognitions

"Nous embrassons tout, mais nous n'estreignons que du vent" -Montaigne

What does it mean to eat your enemy? To boil him, to chop him up, and eat him? It was a good deed for the more utilitarian primitive societies, protecting the body from more ignominious violations, wolves and the like. And yet, for the more mystical tribes, it was the greatest punishment imaginable: forbiddance from entering the sacred pyre. For how else would one's soul rise? How could it be distilled from the corporeal if not by fire? At a heretic's burning in the middle ages they'd measure the wind's direction lest some unfortunate beholder catch a whiff of the hell-bound fumes. Had Christ's tree been used as firewood instead of framing, how things might have changed! But for all their esteem, the Romans could never reach Grecian understanding. Imagine the early martyrs, limbs torn by lions, grinning with satisfaction at their murderers' shallow thinking.

Smoke was the Ojibwean medium for prayer; the peace pipe, where it wasn't possible to break your promise because it already resided in another realm, already condensed into ethereal mandate. So then, to inhale directly, and it must be directly, which excludes the foil/bic pen method, it must be unadulterated, contained, and then expired. It consists of nothing less than a communion with nature's inestimable complexity, and then, with exhalation, resulting in submission to the sublime.

Jessie got a lot of shit for smoking her oxy. I remember when she thought that the oxy referred to was the acne medicine and was all like "hey, I've got lots of that stuff!" Then, a few months on, she started positioning it on the aluminum like puzzle pieces, it took a lot of practice. Others griped with righteous indignation, as if pills improperly used didn't really belong to those who had acquired them. But she remained steadfast in her methods, saying that inhalation was more mellifluous, that it might not get you as high but that it was a more otherworldly experience, like slowly slicing through the gossamer between heaven and hell as opposed to experiencing the latter or the former in more extreme degrees.

I remember, in a meeting, comparing my addiction to a scene in Our Hospitality where a distraught Buster Keaton, dangling hopelessly on a cliff, finds his salvation in a rope cautiously lowered in his direction. He grips it with a desperate hope only to realize that, upon his arrival on sure ground, his saviour, who he is now tethered to, is trying to kill him, and had only saved him for the purpose of finishing him off himself. He must now attempt to hide behind whatever objects are in his and his assailant's immediate radius, which proves to be quite scarce. Slapstick abounds until finally they find themselves on opposite sides of a train-track where, sure enough, a locomotive blithely sets him free.

I maintained that there is an element of luck to it! That where we live, what we do, who we love, most likely plays a larger role in recovery than our self-motivation/control does. Which isn't necessarily an avenue towards empty excuses. We all have some single moment that, if we are willing to recognize it, is more than enough motivation than we need. If we are willing to recognize it, willing meaning open to. It's not a matter of self-salvation, but hearing the distant bellowing of an approaching train which lacks the kinetic resources to stop, even if it intended to.

But part of me dislikes this metaphor as well. It lends itself easily to "demon possession" or, its secular counterpart, "illness." I am not ill, I have no more claim to this country's fucked up healthcare system than anyone else. Had a 28 year old patient on medicare earlier tonight. Previous medical history consisted of "migraines," "depression," "irritable bowel syndrome," and "restless leg syndrome." I've got the first three nailed down and could most likely rustle my legs into a syndrome if it meant social security and all the vicodin I could eat for the remainder of my helpless days.

No, I will not acknowledge any outside source in this battle. I am not a victim to some haphazard genetical game of chance. For all of psychology's supposed great strides in this century the discipline remains, at least popularly, Cartesian, as a means of disassociating ones self from ones self-inflicted illness as if it were a poltergeist.

And doesn't Buster end up finding a use for the shortened piece of rope he's still attached to?

Oh shit, no good youtube videos. Of what real use is this goddamn website!

Spoiler alert.

He saves his true love from a waterfall.

She had sought him out.
Trying to save him.

I am convinced that I am the only employee of the ER that rides public transit. Even the "Environmental Services" people have cars. Encountering patients at the bus stop is not uncommon, sometimes I give them cigarettes, try to rep the hospital a bit, "did they take care of you alright?" Mixed responses, some raves, most complain about the wait time, the more outspoken ones wish they had scored better scripts.

Drug-seekers; they have little notes in their accounts to which most MDs don't pay much heed, they're too busy to be negotiating and more often than not just give what they're asked for. No, it plays out for the seeker in other ways, maybe a prolonged wait time (which they are very quick to pick up on and bring to my attention), or perhaps in the curt attitude of the other clinical staff. They'll get what they want, eventually, if they're willing to wait and, perhaps, be a little humiliated in the meantime. Being lectured by cranky nurses over their missed followup appointments, setting up primary care etc.

And, of course, there are the downright leeches, feeding off of taxpayers' money and not blinking, willing to jump through whatever hoops. They're getting free, free, vicodin. But there are also the seekers with a palpable sadness in their eyes, seeping with diffidence. They are ashamed, perhaps the way one feels going to one's family for money knowing they won't refuse you. Perhaps even resentful of a system that makes it all too easy.

I watched as she absconded, briskly made her way up the stairs to the stop while stealthily placing the paperwork into her inner coat pocket. Gone were the dark sunglasses, a common prop in the drug-seeking game. I smiled at her and she restively replied, sat on the bench and began to type a text message, rolling her body forwards and backwards.

I took a drag of my cigarette and it goes down wrong. I let out a set of vicious coughs before beginning to wretch feverishly. I cupped my upper lip with a fist and breathed deeply into it, slowing down the intervals until I could breathe normally again. I laughed facetiously. "That didn't go down well." "Happens sometimes," she replied. I desperately needed a glass of water but the last bus of the night was pulling up. "Condition - you have to learn to do something about it."

She got off at the pharmacy nearest to the hospital, the one I'm always giving nice upstanding folks directions to. Nice folks who have no idea how even so slightly deviating from the printed instructions could really knock their socks off.

The tremors scathe his emaciated body. His right arm especially, finds it difficult to type. The quivering escalates until he pins his wrist to the desk, like a child being caught with his hand in the cookie jar. Takes a breath, feels it coming on, gags a few times, enough to get to the restroom, just can't keep anything down. Tears and sweat dripping into the red-tinted water. He feels the skin on his wrists tingle as if some small insect were creeping along up his arm. His head throbs, can hardly read the labels on the little orange containers. Oh glory! There's just the one that's not prophylactic, that's meant for exactly this situation. Lost in a mess of paper and empty cigarette boxes. Collapses back onto the bed and screams into his pillow. This is it, the voice speaks. This is what you had planned for yourself all along. You chose this, and why? The voice sounds like that of a politician. There were never any goals, no ambitions. But now, it says, we will succeed. A thin rainbow-coloured film hangs in the air and screams. Lines and shapes moving around like in an Oskar Fischinger film. He stares, wanting it to disappear. This was never a weight attached to you. There was no foreign involvement. No sacrifice. And now you must wait, it says. It will come to you. But you must wait.

Been blocked off with boxes the past two weeks or so. When I try to gain entry the smell repulses me. I open the window and throw away the rotting bananas and pizza crusts, liquid oozing gingerly down the front of the refrigerator. Cooking, for me, is a healthy sign, as a productive parsimonious exercise. The Tahitians used to put into the water an intoxicating mixture prepared from the huteo nut or the hora plant; the fish, drunk with it, floated leisurely on the surface, and were caught at the anglers' will. Australian natives, swimming under water while breathing through a reed, pulled ducks beneath the surface by the legs, and gently held them there till they were pacified.

Because it's a good sign to be able to talk to people about it. But then they're all like "that's so cool" and you're all like
"NO it's NOT. It's FUCKING HELL. You fucking hipsters."
In the rec room there's a poster with a quote by Elizabeth Roosevelt who I'm sure was a really great person but that quote's so full of shit. "Great minds discuss ideas; Average minds discuss events; Small minds discuss people." And you're all like I like the use of semicolons but personally I'd reverse that quote completely.
Small minds discuss ideas. (anybody can discuss ideas)
Average minds discuss events. (ok, I can agree with that)
GREAT FUCKING MINDS discuss PEOPLE. (which might preclude most philosophers but whatever)
Eventually settled on valium. Cause ativan just puts him to sleep.
And lithium...man that was a great song. And apparently Chantal Akerman is addicted to it.
And everyone's like "it's such an expensive habit" but you win a couple grand on online poker a couple hours after that dude from Sierra Leone installed your internet. The guy who you smoked cigarettes with and who told you fascinating stories about the war at home and who asked specifically if he could use your towel after taking a leak.
Just like cigarettes, when most of the people you work with spend more money at starbucks on a daily basis than you do on those pall malls.
2 packs a day. J thinks I smoke too much. "no seriously dude, at 22, that's waaaay fucking too much!"
Teleological. Cart purposive. And that's what pissed our protaganist off so much during the duration was the ends-based motivation of the treatment. Very pragmatic when you knew all along it was a matter of god and the devil being at war over your soul. So results-on-paper don't suffice. TIMELINES don't suffice.
So we go to meetings because of his dui's, and my dear mother's premature departure. And any of my friends with half a brain still in tact sensing my perfidious nature. But those meetings. "Those guys all have families!" J says. "We don't have families. We're young and stupid." And he has a great girlfriend, and if she had a kid, he says, "everything would change."
Are there no nice girls in portland?
N keeps saying that I need to meet a nice girl. One that doesn't remind me of my mother.
Gettin' drunk. Lost most of yesterday's earnings on a really really stupid call. A weak flush draw which I blame on my withdrawal symptoms. What draws me to high stakes? Poker's one thing. But what about the appeal of every time you shoot up you don't know whether you'll make it out alive or not?
Because, putatively speaking, you're supposed to marry before losing the parent of the opposite sex. And if we're to really buy into the notion of spiritually sanctioned marriage then there's this gap that needs to be filled somehow.
Pompey just won the cup. Steve Mitchelmore must be ecstatic. Well done to them.
Chelsea will still win the CL just calling it now. 2-1 Drogba and Lampard scoring. Ballack muthafucking MVP.
Oh and Redknapp as England manager? Isn't it so painfully obvious to anybody other than myself?
So, about "the gap." They say that addiction is a means of forgetting a SPECIFIC event. Bullshit. I mean, if right now I had the ability to read small print I'd dig up my copy of Inner Experience. "Le non-savoir." or perhaps more importantly losing the desire to savoir et sil navait pas de ciel je tamerias et sil ny avait pas denfer je te CRAINDRAIS." Though he muthafucking slay me yet will I muthafucking follow that piece of shit is how I translate that.
and it wouldn't be a danielpost without a mountain goats youtube video. What else have I done since acquiring the internet other than chat with people, play poker, and watch mountain goats videos?

My precious has arrived.

The guy who installed my internet was from Sierra Leone and we smoked cigarettes and talked about african soccer.

More to come.

Those damn telecine-rs
They botched up all my flickers.

:(

Enjoy.



Music: Philip Jeck, Maja Ratkje, Exuma, Philip Glass

16mm Found Footage, B&W and Colour, 8'

edit: man, embedded video looks terrible. link here