In the Quiet Box

Silence expands to fill the available volume regardless of the total. This is knowledge gained as a collateral effect of living. It could take decades before one notices what is happening. Different cities, different containers, different boxes all experiencing the same result. The silence is loudest in the night, in those moments before another bedtime. Silence haunts.

Amusingly enough the silence is not without a soundtrack. The noises heard tend to be generated in places other than the throat or head. The click of a kitchen light switch morphs into a rifle shot. An air conditioner fan takes on a near corporeal presence, a machine-age analogue of a waterfall coursing over a brim of rocks. Low hum punctuated by the pouring of rain outside the windows that surges in when the conditioner unit cuts off. The abrupt absence of a sound like that tricks the mind into thinking it is losing its balance. Living in a quiet box it is an easily acquired habit of leaning into sound because it offers support.

Support in the form of distractions from the vacuum of a life unrealized. Absences. Connections not formed, or frayed to the point of unviability. Projects uncompleted, or worse, never started because the attention was absorbed by some other thing in life and the mind failed to grasp the threads it should have followed. Funny how the hollow clattering of a butter knife into a sink (which was cleaned earlier in a fit of anxiety-induced housekeeping) can knock the mind from one track into another. A metallic thud serving as an accidental rin chime signaling the beginning of involuntary meditation in the temple of the head.

The knife lies still in the sink. Stillness broken by the hum and whirr of domestic machineries within, wind and rain without. The body reacts by pacing around the quiet box of its apartment. It cannot be helped that the mind is flooded with memories and regrets and the helplessness wrought by the realization that not enough has been done to find security in an unstable universe. In the stream of silences the head and the heart cannot escape the notion that so much potential appears to have been wasted or unrealized. Picture the tap on the barrel of water that was supposed to have enabled the successful crossing of a desert. Unbeknownst to all this tap was not secured before embarking. Miles of trudging through the heat and sand engendering thirst beyond measure, not to be slaked because the water dripped away.

Desperate discoveries occur in the silences of the quiet box. The stomach knows because it drops. No amount of pacing truly eradicates the gnawing sensation, but the motion can ease some of the discomfort. Discomfort? Do we really mean fear? Fear of having missed out on a cosmic scale and now not understanding how to get something back? Ah, this is it. Of course it is fear. A nipping at the heels brought about by a late-night revelation that you may not know what you are doing. Ever.

But you should know this by now. If you do not, surely that would be irrefutable evidence of the ineffectuality that you believe to be your shackles. It is this ineffectuality that howls the loudest in the midnight of the quiet box. Ineffectuality is the diamond-eyed beast that prowls the undergrowth just outside the dying circle of light. Growl and moan, rustle and snort, the impression is one of power that does not care how bright the fire you build. It will get what it wants. It will feed.

Living a life of balance is draining, in the face of knowing the universe does not need an excuse to eat you alive. The prime directive of that life is to find something, or better yet, someone with whom to share the quiet box of life. By such good fortune the beast will be kept at bay.

Sunday Meditation #46: Lost Tribe

In the course of my daily bread earning, I spend much time on the road. I drive a lot. Probably a fourth of that time is spent behind the wheel of a not particularly large automobile. This lifestyle affords me much time to think. This in itself is not a bad thing, but it does lend itself to excessive time spent thinking of things I'd rather not think about.

I am somewhere in Missouri, and even though the sunlight has made the day much more bearable, I harbor this irrational dislike for the state. I cannot put my finger on the way of it, all I know is that my presence in this heartland state is cause for irritation. It is illogical, I know. I cannot explain it. I suppose it is no coincidence that Missouri is not far from misery in pronunciation.

I am driving in between assignments. Par for the course. This drive time affords me a lot of time for contemplation, which is a necessary part of the daily diet for an introvert like me. What makes this different on this particular day is the music I am listening to as I drive.

For the record (pun intended) I have a CD in the car stereo. An oldie and goodie, "Joe's Garage Acts I, II, and III" by Frank Zappa. I have to on CD,  and on cassette. A relic from days long gone by. A relic of my brother.

My brother and I could almost sing the entire album from memory. We knew the lyrics. We could see past the surface of it all, the juvenile lyrics and the obsession with sex. We understood there was a deeper commentary going on, sometimes lost in the double entendres and clever words.

But that did not stop the cascades of memories. It did not hold back on the sadness and the pain I felt at rocketing down the highway and knowing there was no way to bring my brother back to this mortal coil. He has been gone over six years now, and the unreality of it all is persistent. He left us almost seven years ago, yet it seems sometimes that it happened just now.

What does it matter? you may ask. To that I say I don't know. Perhaps it does not matter to you. That would not surprise me nor would it pain me. All I know is that I am hurtling down the road and I miss my brother. He was a good man, in spite of the pain.

It occurs to me, in the watery sunlight of a Missouri afternoon, that I miss my brother. Terribly. He is the lost tribe, and I wander the forest in search of him.

A Few Words on Transient Grief

7:48 PM CST. Exhaustion and lassitude for dessert. It is dark earlier, to which we are resigned.

There is no meter of which I am aware to measure the suckage of any given day. If there were, it would probably be available at a big-box hardware store, and there would be one in my tool box or glove compartment, right next to the voltage meter or the air pressure gauge where I expect it to be anytime I need to check some voltage or wonder what the pressure is in my tires. Which is not that often, as you might expect. Still, when I want to know if a circuit is hot or the sagging tire does not convince me, it is nice to know that the tool I need will be there.

Except for today. Today, the tool was not there. Come to think of it, it never was, and I am confounded as to why this distresses me so much. Maybe because I was grasping at straws, fighting for air through a dense thicket of gargantuan irritation catalyzed by a Greek chorus of grief that chanted all day in my hind brain.

It is a sunny day in November, in the Year of Our Lawd 2013, and I wanted to call my big brother and wish him a Happy Birthday! He would have been 50 years young today.

He would have been. But he is not, except in my memory and the memory of family and friends. The loss is four years old now, seeming just yesterday and forever ago. It was not until I was pounding on the steering wheel and screaming at the unknowing driver in the car ahead of mine, that I realized why my eyes kept welling up today for no apparent reason.

Big Bro would have been 50 years old today, and I am furious that I cannot call him up and give him some stick about it. He was always supposed to be older than me, and my heart has not yet wrapped itself around that unavoidable fact of our existence. Yelling at strangers who cannot hear me will not change all that, bit sometimes, on a bright November day, I do not know what else to do.

Echoes and Ricochets

It wasn't the two sets of strangers' fingers digging into my groin that brought tears to my eyes. It was a heart attack what did it. A heart attack that does not belong to me, but in some guise feels as if it had.

I was standing in the exam room, after the obligatory Q & A with the surgeon and the medical student who accompanied her. I had been asked more than once if it was okay for the student to be there, and if she could also participate in the exam. As I long ago shed most of my squeamishness when it comes to medical exams, I told them I had no problem with it. The way I see it, we all have to start somewhere, and how else is anyone going to learn this stuff?

So there I was, two people I had met for the first time only minutes ago, poking and prodding my groin to identify that what we were looking at was indeed a hernia. (It was. Yay, me.) They pushed somewhat hard, and it was moderately uncomfortable, but endurable in the name of medical education. I winced.

What was really working on my mind was not inguinal distress (fancy talk for "groin pain"), it was history. The student had asked a series of pre-exam questions relating to my medical history and that of my family, and she asked what proved to be the sharp question. Sharp, pointy, like a syringe needle.

"Do you have any siblings?"

There was a moment of silence, broken only by murmurs from the hall. Always, there is this dislocation when I have to decide between "have" and "had".


"Yes, one brother. Deceased."
"What did he die of, what did it?"
"He died suddenly, of a massive heart attack."
(concerned look) 
"I'm so sorry."
"It took us all by surprise. Thank you."

We then segued into a general discussion, away from non-physical aches. Procedures and concerns and recovery times allowed me to step back from the edge of the canyon that had  opened up in my head. Shortly after this exchange I was asked to stand so they could conduct the physical exam I mentioned earlier. The pain on the nerve endings acted as cover for the pain I felt in my heart and head, a peculiar ache caused by the loss of something that cannot be replaced. Subconsciously I think I was grateful for the physical hurt as a distraction. Exam concluded, I tugged up my undies, tucked in the shirt, and sat down to conclude the visit. Surgery and soon is for the best, we agreed, and I would let them know as soon as I figured out what to do. I left the office, got into my car and began the drive home. 

The canyon opened up again, right there in the middle of a busy street. Memories of my brother flooded my head, and I nearly swooned. I sobbed, briefly. What to do with the shards of the past that deafen and sting when I least expect them? Sitting confused and helpless there at the stoplight, I wondered. I had the sensation that someone was in the passenger seat; and maybe, just maybe, my brother's ghost smiled and said "Duck and cover yer ears, bro, duck and cover yer ears."

It was just like him to say it. I ducked, I covered, I held him close as the echoes and ricochets faded away.

Third Time the Hammerfall

August 8, 2012. Hot day, heated heart. Summer should not be the season for grief.

The argentine light of a Kansas City midday pouring down on the giant shuttlecocks on the lawn at the Nelson Atkins Museum, and I immediately think of my Big Bro. I think of the three-year old canyon in my heart, gouged into the terra cotta of my soul. The heat and the light make the sculptures shimmer before my eyes. At least, I tell myself that is the cause as I try not to think too closely about his absence from this earth, on this the eve of the third anniversary of his passing.

I think of giant racquets in the hands of us as young men, ten meters tall and blithely unaware of the power we had as we strode the mountains of our youth. We used to laugh at the words 'badminton' and 'shuttlecock', our teenage brains caught up in a naive naughtiness. Nothing that we could not make a juvenile joke of, that is certain.

I stood still for a few minutes out there on the heat shimmer and dry grass. I was watching my daughter amble slowly down the stone walkway, lost in her own thoughts on a lazy summer afternoon. I felt a tremor of joy seeing my link to the future; I felt a chill breath of wind, shifting my gaze down the lawn where something moved. It was a breeze that rippled the grass, would that make sense? My Occam's Razor solution to the alternative of seeing my brother's ghost out there by there sculptures.

Yeah, that must be it. It was only a breeze. That's the official story.

But me, I know better. My brother and I, we were giants again playing games under the sun, with a mighty backhand swing fading into the light.

Dog Days of the Soul

I once was possessed of the notion that I was a tough guy.  Not in the sense of looking to get into fights, or crush beer cans on my forehead or any such nonsense.  I thought I was tough that I could take anything the universe could throw at me.  It was a conceit that sustained me for quite a long time in my life.  The shame of it is that it was simply not true.  The universe, as only it can, disabused me of that notion in a manner most violent, then kicked me while I was struggling to stand up.

My Big Bro has been gone two years now.  I thought of him today, and realized what it was that had been nagging me a little since mid-July.

Remembering him reminded me that, really, I'm not as tough as I like to think.

Remembering him reminds me that I am human, as was he.  Beautiful, sad, flawed but ultimately worthy of love.  

This is a gift worth far more than being a tough guy.  I remember you, my brother, and rejoice in being human.

Because Bird is the Word

The night before Father's Day, I was winding down from a relatively busy day for a weekend.  Chores were done, belly had been filled (spicy home-made bean and linguica burritos, if you are curious) and I had the luxury of some quiet moments with no agenda.  As is often my wont, I began to follow the inscrutable exhortations of my soul.

In this case, it meant a session on the interwebs and time in on the good ol' iTunes store, from whence I purchased some music.  What music, you ask?  Well, I'll tell you:

Stone Rollin', the new album from Raphael Saadiq and...the single of "Surfin' Bird" by the Trashmen.

I know, I know...you're probably wondering WTH?  How does that even tie together?

Honestly, I'm not sure.  I hear things and I jot them down on scraps of paper and napkins and stuff, so I won't forget.  The end result, especially when it comes to music, is usually eclectic mental flotsam.

Anyway, Stone Rollin' is an excellent album, Saadiq has talent and skill to burn, and discussion of it is a subject for another post.  "Surfin' Bird", well...it got me to thinking about Father's Day and my Big Bro, and how much I miss him since he passed away in 2009.

When we were kids, we heard "Surfin' Bird" on the radio, and we got a lot of hilarity out of it.  This was long before Family Guy got a hold on it (which, BTW, is one of the funniest things I've witnessed on television).  Big Bro and I could both do a credible imitation of the vocals.  Admittedly, that may not be much of a stretch, but we were good at it.

Hearing it again brought back some of the life he and I shared, so long ago.  It made me a little nostalgic for the silliness we could get into, and thinking of him made me think of what he was as a son, brother and father (to my nephew).  Big Bro was an imperfect person, but he had a big heart and an translucent soul.  He tried his best, straining against his limitations, to be the best dad he could be given the circumstances.

And we loved him for that.  Still do.

Happy Father's Day, Big Bro.  You still are the word.

Bookends: Eighties

Me and Big Bro, circa 1984

I was browsing some '80's and '90's music files tonight and I could not help but think of my brother.  The music led me to some pictures, specifically the one above.  It's a Polaroid, and my parents have the original.  I never used to get sentimental over old pictures, especially ones of myself, but things are different now.  As far as I'm concerned, that picture up there needs to be archived in a museum-quality case, suitable for framing.

I am struck particularly by our expressions.  Mine was showing a lot more self-assurance (youthful arrogance?) than I really possessed, and Big Bro?  Well, he was the shizznit, as that expression says it all.  He certainly could pull off the Look.  It gained in strength when he had a guitar in his hands, something I could not (and still can't) do.

I think that picture was taken at a time when I was beginning to feel I had any confidence at all of dealing with the world, out of high school and on my way to college.  It was a time I felt like I was right, even when I wasn't.  Untested youth has a way of doing that to a person.

I'm glad I didn't know then, what I know now.  I see this picture, and I cannot help but marvel at the power we didn't know we possessed.  Me and my Big Bro against the world, two saplings as yet unbent by the storms of life...the hurricane that took him down struck much too early.  The one that might take me, well, I hope its a long way off.

Until then, I'll think of him, and sink my roots deeper into the soil.

---

The following link (to myspace.com) is to a song by The Jesus and Mary Chain, that came out in 1989, which is kind of the cap on what I think of as my first (hopefully) Golden Age.  I listen, and I wish I could have sung this live with my brother on guitar.  I know he would have liked that.

Blues From A Gun

Fell From The Sky

The trip home took about an hour, when it usually took a quarter of that, and you weren't on my mind when I slid the car to the curb two blocks from home.  Sumbitch freezing rain and snow generally made a mess of things, and do you know this is the first time I've ever had to abandon my car?  Ever?  Hope it doesn't get towed.  Tomorrow is going to be a bitch getting out.

Where was I?  Oh, right, "parking" the car.  I resolved that I would have to leave it, so I grabbed my briefcase and lunch bag, the telescoping ice scraper, and stepped out into the snow.  The squeak of it beneath my boots set my teeth on edge.  Nothing for it but home.

It was while walking up the hill, on the main street that intersects mine that I first thought of you.  Well, not a thought so much as a feeling, if I am being accurate.  You know what reminded me of you?  It was the streetlights, in the snow.  The glow from them seemed particularly yellow, each surrounded by a flickering ruff of snowflakes tumbling through the air.  Trudging up the street, I felt a warm surge of deja vu course through me, and I looked up into the light, and there we were, trudging down City Park Avenue that one winter where we got a lot of snow and we were both in our teens.

Do you remember that, my brother?  You with the Miami Dolphins toboggan hat, and me wearing that ski jacket.  I think it was the one that made us look like the Michelin Man after a roll through through the remains of a campfire.  Man, that jacket ended up dirty.  That's what we got for delivering newspapers while wearing it, and generally behaving like adolescent males do.  Which is to say, with vigor and boisterousness, but rarely with common sense.

But we didn't need common sense, did we, Big Bro?

That's what led us to wander out in that snowfall, you and me and Carl.  Was it Carl that was with us?  I think so.  We ambled down Johnson Avenue, over to the avenue, making snowballs and trying to hit streetlights.  We all tried to catch flakes on our tongue.  And walking down the middle of the street, because there was no traffic!  Rebels, we were!

I remember walking up to Vick Street, no real destination in mind, and on the way we looked up into the ocher sky, not really watching where we were walking.  We stopped near a streetlight, and one thing that still sticks in my mind after all these years, is standing there with you in that sodium vapor glare with back lit snowflakes cascading down before us.  I remember that quite well, brother.

That memory, those snowflakes...you came back to me tonight, as I shoveled off the walk in front of my gate.  I paused briefly to rest, and as I did my gaze wandered up to the streetlight across the road.  The shape of the light, the yellowy glare...and snow drifting down like flakes of memory from the sodium sky.

I closed my eyes, a little upwelling of liquid heat making me gasp against the cold wind.  I heard, or thought I heard, the faint squeak of footsteps behind me.  For a few precious heartbeats, I was home again and we were walking down the middle of the road, secure in the knowledge that we would catch some snow on our tongues, and that we would live forever.

And you do, my brother.  Because my heart still beats, you do.

American Diwali: Requiem

Blood of our veins
was not turmeric and vermilion,
ours the waters of a different ocean
all flowing into singularity

They light the lamps
dress the courtyards
while I light candles
in the closets of my mind

Buttery glow as they chant
I whisper prayers to you
mineral tang of salt and sea
the currents that carried you away

This Festival of Lights, good over evil,
I wonder, will you return? Somewhere
along the Gulf Stream in my heart,
or melding with the Ganges of my mind?

They light their lamps
I light mine (and yours), to see
your ashes a rangoli on the current
Lit brilliant by the diya of my heart

-----

The Gulf Stream and the Ganges River are thousands of miles apart, but it pleases me to think they intersect in the form of souls.

----

In memory of Big Bro, out fishing the cosmic sea.

Starchild

"Captain" the First Lieutenant said, "We are on station".  His voice rang out in the hushed confines of the bridge.  The Captain gave no sign he had heard beyond a languid wave of the fingertips from his left hand, which propped up his chin.  The ship, small as it was like all of the Fleet's Special Ops research vessels, depended surprisingly little on electronic communications.

And with a crew of four, rare was the need for an intercom, mused the Captain.  Four? he thought.  Check that, make it three.  He was reasonably certain that no longer being alive was a disqualification from being a crew member.  The Commander's body currently lay in the cargo hold, quietly and without protest relieved of command.

The Captain rubbed his temples with his right hand, leaning forward to stare at the anomaly on the bulkhead-cum-monitor that loomed over the command space.  A star field, diamonds on black velvet scintillating through the visible spectrum, marred by a smudge of nothingness at the center.

Nothingness, he noted, not unlike my heart.  He coughed and spoke.

"Lieutenant, secure the orbit.  Prepare the Commander for terminal descent, on my mark."

"Aye, aye, sir" replied the Lieutenant, bending over his command station.  He leaned to his right to confer with the Flight Engineer, a pale thin man who seldom spoke, but knew when to make it count.  Their hushed murmurings barely registered on the Captain's ears, as he stood and stared at the thing on the screen.

A black hole, he thought, a supermassive black hole. Jesus, those things scare me.  Light, gravity, nothing would escape this monster...yet it quite possibly was the only hope for the Commander.  The Captain had seen many a strange and terrible thing in his years of travel, but black holes had always held a special fascination, and terror, for him.

And today the Captain was going to ask a black hole for a favor: either take the Commander forever and erase his memory or give him life.  I must be nuts, muttered the Captain. The Psych boys back in Command Central would probably be all over him when they returned.  If they returned.  The Captain wasn't so sure he wanted to go back.  Not after all this.  He sighed and shook his head. There was no avoiding it now, they had come so far, and the black hole was right there.  He forced himself to focus.

"Lieutenant, set course as we discussed. Prepare the Commander for ejection, set on my mark."

"Aye, sir."  The Lieutenant and the Engineer exchanged furtive, knowing glances, then shrugged.  A low thrum sounded through the ship as the engines fired.  The black nothing on the screen expanded slightly, slowly as the ship accelerated.  The Captain sat down heavily in his chair, face in hands.  He said nothing for a long time.  A chime sounded at their approach to the critical point where they would have to jettison their cargo, and use the gravity well to hopefully slingshot them back out into open space.  The Commander's body, secured in an escape module, would continue on, into the heart of the black hole, drawn in by the insatiable pull of gravity.

"On my mark," said the Captain in a voice roughened by a sudden tightness in the throat that the other crew members pretended not to hear, "...3...2...1...Mark!"  The Lieutenant hit the manual eject button.  Dull clanks sounded from below, then the ship jerked a little as the module broke free.  The three crewmen sat silently, eyes on the screen to watch the module heading for its target.  They grunted softly as the artificial gravity cycled to keep them stable as the ship changed course.  The external cameras flicked from front to bottom view, tracking the Commander on his last flight.  It was a faint blur against a color darker than black, winking out in a final burst of visual light as it crossed the event horizon.  The Captain closed his eyes.

Goodbye, brother...may you be reborn somewhere in this universe, son of the white hole on the other side of time. Goodbye.

The Lieutenant waited as long as he could, not wanting to disturb the Captain in his meditations.  Finally, he said "Captain?  Set course for home?". 

At first, the Captain said nothing.  He was silent so long the Lieutenant thought he might be sleeping.  Just as the Lieutenant was about to ask again, the Captain abruptly opened his eyes, looked up at the now blank screen, and said "Yes, for home...wherever that may be."

Happy Birthday, Big Bro, wherever on the Universe ocean you may be.  Your crewmates miss you.

Kickdrum Girl

"She was a fast machine
She kept her motor clean
She was the best da...(skizzzrwwrrrrxxxkkss skids the needle across the grooves)

"Who is that, Daddy?"

I looked up to see my Wee Lass giving me that quizzical look she has perfected, when she sees me doing something that leads her to question my mental health.  She hasn't gotten the hang of cocking one eyebrow yet, but it should not be too much longer.  Fortunately, none of the other patrons in the sandwich joint had noticed me doing my best Angus Young imitation while mouthing the words, although they could certainly hear the song given the high-pressure volume of the radio blaring through the place.

"What, the music? You know who that is?"  I replied.  I sighed in relief knowing that we managed to drown out the line about ...the best damn woman I have ever seen...It occurred to me that perhaps "You Shook Me All Night Long" by AC/DC was probably not the best song to sing in front of my daughter's heretofore unsullied ears.

"It's AC/DC.  One of the best concerts Daddy saw when he was a kid was AC/DC!"  I left out the part about the cannons and Angus Young mooning the crowd.

She scrunched up her face and said "AZ/DeeShee?"

"Ay-cee Dee-cee, sweet pea.  It's a band that I listened to a lot when I was a kid."  I proceeded to break into another round of air guitar, cajoling her to play along with me.  She said "Dah-dee, I don't want to play guitar. Can you play guitar?"

I told her no, I couldn't play guitar.  Fair to middling as an air guitarist.  Real guitar?  I'm a big bowl of suck when it comes to real guitar.  I don't know what made me say it, but then I told her "My Big Bro could play guitar.  Really well, too."

"Did he play air guitar, Daddy?" I laughed.
"No, pumpkin.  He could play real guitar.  One with strings.  Plus, he could grimace musically."

She gave me a startled "Huhhh?" look when I said that.  I could hear the Scooby Doo voice in my head.  I just laughed and tried to explain what "grimacing musically" meant.  I was grasping at the best words for it, when the radio again came to my rescue.  "More Than a Feeling" by Boston: the radio spirits were looking out for me.  This was a perfect song to demonstrate my Big Bro's technique.

So it came to pass, that on a Sunday afternoon I was rockin' the air guitar with my face contorted into all sorts of musical shapes, ones that I remembered from watching my brother play.  He may have looked goofy sometimes, but he did it with honest feeling and verve.  I must have pulled it off successfully, because Wee Lass was laughing that silver bell laugh and asking me to "do what he did again!"

I managed to keep the tears in my throat and a musical grimace on my face, all the while grinding out power chords and banging my head like a pro.  I felt a bit embarrassed to notice some of the other customers begin to stare at me, maybe thinking I had lost my marbles.

That's okay.  They could stare all they wanted.  I had my daughter laughing with me at the table, and my brother playing his guitar in my heart.  And when she picked up those air drumsticks to pat out a rhythm on the table, while watching my feet to learn the kick drum, I felt the circuit close.

Nothing like a little rock and roll with those you love.  Nothing like blood music to fill the heart.

I Wish I Knew

And so it starts
You switch the engine on
We set controls for the heart of the sun
One of the ways we show our age

He had no way of knowing, but James Murphy gut punched me tonight.  Not literally, I mean, I don't know him personally (although I'd like to) but it was the song he was singing.  I had iTunes set on shuffle and LCD Soundsystem came up, and there was James singing "All My Friends", a song I really like but should probably not listen to when I am alone and tired.

Such was the case.  I was reading some study material for a class I am taking, alone in the light of the goofy ceiling fan (the blades look like giant palm leaves) that hangs down from the middle of my dining/living room.  Tired, too, and my mind kept wandering from the task.  So James gets to the part where he sings the lyrics I quoted above, and I...I had to put my head down and take a deep breath.

'Set the controls for the heart of the sun' put me in the wayback machine, because he 's right.  It did make me show my age.  Indirectly, I must say, but showing all the same.  I recalled that line as the title of a Pink Floyd song, which made me think of my brother.

I thought about him, and how huge his absence seems to me.  All the albums we bought, the songs we listened to, the time (not) wasted messing around with the stereo, cassette decks, tuners and amplifiers.  The insistent electric piano in "All My Friends" came back at me like a new wave version of Philip Glass, a version I could really wrap my head around.  This as opposed to the time back in college, when I spent some days listening to Glassworks and for the life of me I couldn't quite get into it (sorry, Philip.)  The piano reminded me that maybe I should give it (Glassworks) another go.  Perhaps another time.

So it was the song, me and my memories.  James asks "Where are your friends tonight?"  This is a question I could not answer.  I closed my eyes and listened intently to the music, and for a few precious moments me and Big Bro were back in his room at my parents' house, with the low end wood look paneling and that ridiculous shag carpet in a hue that had aspirations of being orange.  And the paneling and the carpet and the cracks in the ceiling didn't matter because we had the turntable and a stack of albums set up.  The tape deck was running and we were making a mix and drawing covers for the cassettes.  He was good at it, he could have been a great graphic artist.  We put the music on and mixed and laughed and quoted the good parts of the songs, which I wish would never end.

I suppose they never did, never will as long as I can remember him.  I wish, oh I wish, I knew where he was tonight, my friend, my brother.

Oh, if the trip and the plan come apart in your hand,
you look contorted on yourself your ridiculous prop.
You forgot what you meant when you read what you said,
and you always knew you were tired, but then,
where are your friends tonight?

Lyrics from "All My Friends" by LCD Soundsystem, from the album "Sound of Silver".  Used without permission.  i hope James doesn't mind.

Broken String

Clash played on the stereo,
teenage wreck party long ago.
He sat, girl in lap, laughing
as I mouthed the words.

Coolness was his light,
Basking in it, my lot.
Heard him saying
"That's my brother"

Affection just made it
through the buzz blanket
wrapped around my head:
In that moment, I belonged.

Clash on the stereo tonight
all guitars and sneers
and me mouthing the words
to his picture in my head

No beer tonight, too pathetic,
Besides I want the clear memory
of him unvarnished, unaltered,
of that guitar in his hands

Mouthing the words again,
theater of the mind lit
by his crooked grin and
woodpecker laugh.

I know the songs,
"Know Your Rights" with guitar!
and by all rights, my brother,
you should be here

Touched by madness,
Loved by gods and mortals,
a vibrant broken string
uncoils in my heart.

In memory of my Big Bro.

The Dropoff

There's that scene in Finding Nemo where Marlin and Coral find themselves face-to-face with a huge badmutha of a barracuda.  The barracuda is hovering there in open water like a demon.  This image hasn't left my head since I saw it for the first time years ago.  I tell myself its only a movie, but my subconscious says otherwise.  This time of year, the demons hang close, reaching out to pull me into the deep.

As many long-time readers already know, it was in August seven years ago that my preemie infant son died, about 2-1/2 weeks after his twin sister had passed away.  The road out of the badlands of grief has been long and difficult.  The heart of summer has never been easy for me since that time, although I had begun to achieve some balance.  It had been a delicate balance with constant adjustment.  This balance was lost and any peace of mind was lost last year.

Also as many readers already know,  my Big Bro suddenly passed away last August just one day after my son's date.  So the dog days of summer began then, and continued this year, with a horrific 1-2 punch to the heart and soul of me and others.  Suffice to say it is understatement to call August a 'difficult' month, emotionally. This August has been particularly bad.  Well, this summer in general has been bad. I've been brittle and melancholy and snappish and exhausted and out of it.  Now I know why, although I'm always surprised now at how I'm surprised by these feelings.

I feel as if the road out of the badlands has been a steep climb up with a sudden plunge into the abyss.  I find myself clinging to the precipice as tightly as I can, but my legs are dangling out over depths that fade from violet to purple to black.  Over my shoulder, I can see that barracuda hovering above the inky black, eyes and teeth aglitter in the pale light from above.  He darts in now and again to test my defenses but hasn't gone in for the kill.  I flail and swing, hoping to fend it off for another day.

I'm not sure how long this state of affairs will last.  Part of me keeps fighting, and that part is exhausted.  Another part just wants to let go and get it over with.  All of me wants to get away from the dropoff.  It is mighty cold and lonely when you miss your blood, so much.

Laughing 'Til It Hurts: The Lighter Side of Heart Trouble

It has been 6 months since my Big Bro passed away suddenly, last August. It took my breath away to face that realization, amazed and saddened that it seems like such a long time and no time at all. Six months and the brother-shaped void in my heart is nowhere near to filling up.

I think about him, in some way, nearly every day. It most often happens when I am listening to music. Recently I was shutting out the world with my iPod, headphones on and air guitar amped and ready to rock. As often happens, a song will come on and Big Bro is right behind it. This particular day it was "Sheer Heart Attack" by Queen. Not exactly what you would call 'easy listening' music, more like 'six-Mountain-Dews-and-a-head-full-of-teenage-angst' music. It's fast, it's aggressive and it kicks ass. In the context of my brother's death, it is also funny as hell.

Funny to us, anyway.

Big Bro most likely died of a massive heart attack. When I think about it, I'm not sure he could have gone very many other ways. His was a life and an attitude that invited the quick, the sudden dramatic event. Do I wish I could have said goodbye before he slipped away? Hell, yes. But he knew and I knew, deep down, he didn't want a long drawn out and ultimately futile fight. So perhaps it was better for him this way.

I also know this: his sense of humor was deep, sharp and wicked. He more than most people I have known could enjoy tremendously the bittersweet joy of rockin' out to a song named after 'what done 'im in'. And when I hear Freddie Mercury snarl "DoyaknowDoyaknowDoyaknow just how I feeel!", I can hear my my Big Bro saying "Yes...yes, I do."

(drum solo!)

Hey, heyheyhey, it was the DNA!

That made me this way!

Hey, heyheyhey...

Ain't Seen Nothin' Like Him

Sometimes I wonder, 

what I'm gonna do, 

cause there ain't no cure 

for the wintertime blues

(awesomepowerchordprogression)

(bestairguitaristever)

(exceptformybrother)

(wait)

(mybrothercouldreallyplayguitar)

(dammit)

So I'm in the car the other night and I'm yawning at the same time my mind is racing a million miles an hour, all I want to do is go home, just go home, so I can eat and rest. It occurs to me I cannot figure out from what I need to rest. I don't mine coal or pick vegetables or work on high steel. My ass sits at a desk most days and I push buttons and move a mouse and draw stuff on tracing paper.

Oh, and I use a lot of Post-its.

Anyway, I'm in the car trying to stay awake and the radio is on

"and the radioman says it's a beautiful night out there

And the radioman says rock and roll lives

And the radioman says its a beautiful night out there in Los Angeles..."

AIIIIGGGH...no, that's "Screenwriter's Blues" by Soul Coughing, which is a good song but it is not even what was playing on the radio. The radio. The radio plays almost all the time while I'm in my car because I like music and songs and lyrics...

...and I am, in all honesty, sometimes afraid of the quiet...

...because that means I'll have to listen to the noise of  my own head. I suppose that is why I have always been easily distracted and irritated by outside noise. I'm sensitized to it, and I struggle to control the internal stuff and outside noise is just more rocks in the pond. I am getting better at disregarding the noise and embracing the silence. I am practicing, I get help. Just not right now...

See? So, like I said I was in the car, sitting at a stop light, listening to the radio and 

"Radio is a sound salvation,

Radio is cleaning up the nation

They say you better listen to the voice of reason..."

DAMMIT! There it goes again! "Radio, Radio" by Elvis Costello. You see what I mean? You see what I am up against? That kind of crap happens all the time. Some days I can't seem to finish a thought because my mind constantly gets sucked in by all these tangents and eddies and sidebars and asides and really, folks, sometimes I wish it would stop, STOP, STOP so I could at least remember what it was I set out to accomplish.

SO, I'm in the car, at the light, blah, blah, blah, and this amazing song comes on. It was amazing not only for the classic rock song that it is, but also because I hadn't heard it in years. YEARS. I was amazed and stunned and yes, even had some little tears in my eyes while I was smiling.

"Pinball Wizard" by The Who. I heard that opening guitar strumming sequence, followed by that power chord...and the lyrics just started spilling out of me and there I was in my brother's room at home listening to the stereo (yes, people, an honest-to-god turntable along with dual cassette decks) or maybe we were in the car with the volume up way too high but it really didn't matter, no it didn't, it didn't, because what really mattered was that Big Bro and I and some friends were strumming that air guitar and windmilling just like Pete Townshend onstage and...

"Ever since I was a young boy,

I played that silver ball

From Soho down to Brighton,

I must have played them all

But I ain't seen nothing like him

In any amusement hall..."

...was spilling from our lips like we were born to sing it, rock it, just they did and I realized that I was singing it, loud, just like we used to and that's when I choked up and out of the corner of my eye Big Bro was playing his guitar and grinning like a possum and I realized then and there that yes, I ain't seen nothing like him, ever, and never will again.

But he sure played a mean guitar. And on the stage in my mind, I'm leaning into the mic and he's in front of that huge Marshall stack and he hits that chord again and plays, plays, plays and I sing, sing, sing. I surprised myself because I remembered all the lyrics. After all these years...

"How do you think he does it?

(I don't know)

What makes him so good?

I drove on down the road, a rolling one (or maybe two) man rock and roll band singing badly at the top of my lungs. It was perfect. How could it not be? With backup like his, I always sound good.

Trivial Pursuits

It's about 8:00 in the evening as I write this, sitting on the couch in my living room. Quiet here, except for the drunk monkey stompings of the neighbor kids upstairs. At least, I think it is the kids. It may actually be drunk monkeys. Stranger things, my friends...

It is quieter than usual, though. The radio is silent because the streaming audio kept cutting out, I finally closed the window on my laptop screen. Maybe I should by an actual radio receiver, instead of relying so heavily on the internet. Fookin' internet, Thief of Time and Purpose...

Does it depress you to eat food prepared almost entirely in the microwave? It does me, sometimes. Not tonight, though. I'm a little proud of myself. Tonight, I heated everything up in the microwave, but aside from the can of corn I had, the rest of my homey little meal was fixed from scratch by lil' ol' me. I had some leftover rice (with herbs and garlic) and a container of homemade bolognese sauce from the freezer. This weekend I planned ahead, and made extra of most things. Something immensely satisfying about having really good food ready in a few moments, and know that it wasn't ultra-processed glop-in-a-box...

Did I mention that it's quiet, tonight? That makes me tired, and sleepy...

The refrigerator is humming again, I know I've written about that before. This time? It doesn't sound so lonely. I think I know why. I saw a ghost today, and he followed me home...

It was music that did it. I was trolling through my iTunes today for aural relief of work-induced monotony, and in the middle of  "Fire" by Jimi Hendrix I looked over and my brother was there, smiling at me and playing some bad-ass air guitar with that ridiculous musical grimace on his face. He grimaced a lot when he played, he knew it, but couldn't help himself. We made fun of it, but somehow I knew he wouldn't have been the same player if he hadn't, and anyway I couldn't play guitar worth a good goddamn. I can grimace musically with the best of 'em, anyway, so that's what I did sitting there with the ghost of my brother...

Later, when I left work, he was in the car when I got in, and I wasn't surprised. I reckoned he was going to come back for an encore. I looked over at him as I started the car, he grinned and we took off into traffic. On the ride home, we made up lyrics to the songs on the radio, shared some inside jokes and made fun of the other drivers. Arriving home, we reminisced and laughed like bastards when "Anarchy In The U.K." by the Sex Pistols came on the radio. We played that cassette so much when we were teenagers that the metal film flaked away and the labels rubbed away to nothing. The ghost watched quietly as I finished making dinner, and I sat down to eat, catching up on e-mails...

I only teared up once, when I stood up to put the dishes in the machine. My brother's ghost put his hand on my shoulder as if to say goodbye, and when I turned to say it he was already gone. Across the room, his picture looked over at me, the little silver urn that holds a fraction of what he was, gleaming in front of the photo. I'm not sure, but I think I saw something wispy, like a bit of fog or smoke, swirl around the top. My brother, he just looked on and grinned...

Ghosts. The fodder of a million nightmares, or welcome salve for a broken heart? I know what I think, how about you?

Running Lights

Christ, my head hurts. Sleep or liquor I can’t tell.

I heard your voice, or laugh, cupped by the waves and tossed into my ears. That dream again, waking up on the beach, cold and slick with dew. I’m never sure if I had been drinking. It’s the only reason I can think of these days, that I would fall asleep on the beach. Then again, I’m never sure if I am really waking up or just dreaming I’m waking up. I sit up abruptly. The gray smear of the horizon congeals into focus. My heart pounds in the usual manner as I struggle for balance. I think the sun is coming up, or maybe just behind a drapery of fog and mist. The salt-metal tang of the ocean fills my lungs.

The remnants of the dream I was having, it was a party I think, or were we just sitting in your room listening to Jethro Tull, or Black Sabbath? Albums. I had Aqualung in my hands and you were pretending to play the flute. We always thought if funny to hear a flute in a rock band.

Funny but cool.

I laugh weakly at the memory, then wince. I am clutching at the cold sand so hard the little fragments of shell and rock dig into my palms. It grounds me and the dream wisps vanish, blown out on the water by an offshore breeze. On the horizon something moves, small pale spheres seeming to float over the mercury sea. They fade in an out as I blink slow as an iguana in a blizzard.

The beach is empty, not even a gull to keep me company. The sand is pristine in its wind-driven undulations. If the feet of others had touched it, the wind and waves must have blotted out the prints long before I woke. The notion makes me sad, that I am alone. The tightness in my throat gets stuck while my muscles work furiously to keep it from erupting in a full-on sob. All I hear is the hiss and grumble of the waves with the grass on the dunes in counterpoint. I shake my head and make to stand.

Dizziness nearly takes me to my knees. The world swirling in my head while I flap my arms for balance. I surf a curl of nausea, chest and belly heaving in a struggle for dominance over the contents of my aching stomach. Peristalsis continues to work in the right direction and breakfast or dinner or who knows what I last ate stays put. My head bobbles in the wind and the lights on the horizon flare a little brighter, a little closer.

Or so I thought. It was then that I heard your voice again, I swear to god it sounded like it was coming from across the water and I rubbed my eyes and sonofabitch if those lights didn’t get brighter, turning red and green and sitting on top of the masts or poles or something and there it was the boat and it was heading for the shore and jesus Christ on a pogo stick there you were and you were waving and I yelled out your name and waved back grinning like a fool and my heart swelled up and I wanted to come welcome you back home so I started running and running hard right for the boat because goddamnit it was coming back to the dock they were throwing out the ropes and it must have been a good trip because you held up this big mother of a tuna fish and I smiled because you were back and I kept running to the boat and then you set the fish on deck and started shaking your head with that melancholy smile and the ropes were drawn back in and I said no, no, don’t leave let me get on board I want to come fish with you like we did when we were kids and please just one more time and you faintly called out “No, man, not now, I just wanted to let you know I’m okay and the fishing is excellent...” and then you waved and I came to a crashing halt falling on my knees and sobbing as the boat receded out into the sea.

It was then I came to and found myself on that sandbar, again. Soaking wet in water up to my waist with the salt of my tears mingling with the salt of the ocean. I screamed again, watching those lights hovering so far away on the horizon. The wind swallowed up my puny mewlings, the lights disappeared over the rim of the world. Swimming back to shore, I swore I heard you say “When its time, my brother, when its time.” The beach is no proper bed, but I lay down in the grit, my head cradled on seaweed, and dreamed of our youth.

Road To Mare Tranquillitatis

An invisible highway rushes on, and today your earthly remains will join the traffic. I remain land bound, too weak to follow and choking on the tears of shame. I will miss you.

When you left for good, it was to knowledge that I turned for comfort, as I often do. As if the tomes and the maps could bring you back, or make me understand why you had to leave. This time it was an effort doomed to failure, unless you count the sheer accumulation of data as success. Pardon my bitter laughter, but as much as I like a good, solid fact this time data may as well be vapor for as long as it lasted and as hard as it was to grasp.

The maps tell a very different story than the one I have written in my heart, the epic first recorded when you were born, and I followed, young lives becoming our Iliad and our Odyssey. The conceit I carry would make you laugh, of that I am certain. Maps. How do you map a surface that is restless and liquid? One that refuses to stand still?

The Spaniards “discovered” the Gulf Stream in the 16th century, using it as a highway for the ships carrying plundered gold from the Americas. Ben Franklin drew a map of the currents in the 18th century, all scratchy lines and sepia tones. Mr. Franklin’s map is in stark contrast to the digital satellite constructs I came across in my search, looking for that map of you. The bright colors writhed hallucinogenic across the screen and my eyes swam in my head. From tears or fatigue I do not know, but I smiled to think about old ink and Day-Glo posters and how these ends of the spectrum were the very essence of my memories of you.

Colonial powers used the mighty unseen power of the current as a road, and I cannot escape the comparison. This complex Ouroboros of upwellings and boundary conditions carrying life and salt over the swallowing vastness of the ocean is probably the perfect place for you now. The things you will see, at home with the fish and waves. I long to follow, but stand here on the shore, watching and waiting for courage which seems to have abandoned me.

Did you know the moon was full, five days ago? Of course you did, you have a spectacular vantage point I am sure. It was hypnotic and I spent some time staring at it through the naked branches of lonely trees as I walked through a chilly evening. The limpid breeze traced cool circles on my cheeks, lost in reverie. G-maw was there, too, telling me about the moon as we looked through her binoculars and the small telescope I used to have. She liked the moon, and could name some of the craters and seas. I still remember Copernicus and Tycho and Sea of Rains, their Latin names unfamiliar on my tongue. I stood still in the faint glow of streetlights as a memory surfaced, like Nessie in the murky loch of my mind. The big faintly blue smudge on the face of the moon, just right and up of center, that one is the Sea of Tranquility. It saddened me to think you may never have sailed those waters.

Speaking of waters today would have been your forty-sixth birthday, my brother, and it is today that your ashes will be cast upon the face of the Gulf Stream, by your beloved wife and in the presence of friends. I regret that I will not be there to see it, alone in my shame and timidity. Your loss weighs heavy on my mind and stayed my hand from making my way to join them. Know that I love you, my brother, and I hope that you forgive me my weakness.

Scientists say that the Gulf Stream carries the maximum amount of water in the fall, so it is fitting that you will be a passenger in this time of cold velocity. Brother, I bid you farewell, and pray that the current you loved to fish will carry you to your own Mare Tranquillitatis.