by 
I snap out of a daymare. The chair slides out
No telling the time gazing at the yuck brown sky
Nine o’clock? What? No, it’s only 7:30.
We love green. We accept green. We want our green superimposed
with a blue white. And bright. We don’t complain about the blue, but gray…
Gray we get. All of a sudden. Gray and wet.
A million shades of gray. Dark gray, sad gray, calm gray, dirty gray…
but it’s all wet gray.
Gotta accept the wind, too. Cold, leaf stripping wind. Trash bin tipping wind.
Gotta accept all the wet garbage superimposed on the pretty green grass.
On the chair again.
An unwelcome entry to the dry solace of this basement. He comes in.
The visitor is the inner demon, the tax collector, the assessor, and an impudent
imp in character. His grin is sickening. His hat, upon my nail, intrudes.
“Hey hey brotha man. How’s it going?”
“I should learn to expect you, I guess.”
“Yep! Every time the sun goes away. I guess I’m pretty regular!” He chides.
“Hey there… what are you drinking?” I show him the chipped teacup half empty,
the cup I’m already tired of.
“Vodka and cranberry juice.” I say. “You want some?”
“No thanks. I don’t drink!!” he smiles…. “You know that. You’re funny, dude.”
“What do you want now?” I ask, defeated.
“Well… it’s time for you to talk to me.”
“Talk about what?”
“You know….” He leads in, sarcastically. “A nice long good talk.”
A long pause ensues. I sip the teacup and decide to finish it off.
“Fuck you, you prick.” I say.
“Hey hey there buddy. You gotta face me sooner or later.”
His shoes tap simutaneously, and he folds his harms confidently. I hate him.
“Are you here to tell me what’s wrong with me?” I ask.
“Fucking hell yeah! That’s a part of it!” He chuckles, and his eyes brighten.
“Are you here to tell me what I need to do to get my act together?”
“You bet! And if you don’t get right with me this time, I’ll come back!!”
“Really? Can’t I just tell you to go fuck yourself?”
“No! You can’t” He chuckles with glee. “I got all the answers.”
“Fuck you.” I say, and start to shove him out the door.
“I’m your key to success!” He splurts, as I violently eject him. “See! The key!” He pulls out a golden key, and holds it up, as though it holds total importance.
I pull the key out of his fingers, snapping it between my thumb and middle finger.
“It’s plastic. Fuck you.”
“It’s not the real key! It’s, it’s… symbolic. You know that!”
I shove the silky wet fucker out the door. He puts up no resistance.
“I’ll be back next year you punk!” He yells.
“Ok! I can’t wait. Bring beer.” I say, then go pour myself another drink.
…i know you’re thinking about an answer to my question, so let’s not let this opportunity slip away, littlejar…
…so whaddaya say, huh ???…
…“IF you’re so satisfied with your choice of lifestyle & manner of being, then WHY the constant ‘over-the-top’ defensive posturing when someone questions what you post about ???”…
…thanks…enjoy your evening…
Author is clearly not a candidate for relocation to Portland or Seattle.
Upon closer inspection, Author appears to already be located in the Pacific Northwest. Situation is more serious than previously considered. Author may wish to explore relocation to Los Angeles or Sand Diego…
Upon still further examination — now post-caffeine — Author appears to have traveled extensively and may or may not currently be located in the Pacific Northwest.
If the former, suggest wardrobe upgrade.
If the latter, stay home. It’s probably raining less where you are right now.
The Author is to make his way through Flagstaff soon. I bet, therein, his spirits will lift along with the clouds. But I’ll take the poem for now, anyhow.
Had a real phone conversation with Little Jar today. How do you say “he’s a cool dude” with it having more meaning and depth than that? He like many, bears the weight of an intelligent mind put to work making sense out of a strange and apparently tragic world.
Well, whatever my two cents is worth, he’s alright in my book. I hope you make it through Flag, LJ. Again, it’s on me if you do.
Dang LJ, and its only two weeks into possibly one of the worst winters we’ve had in years. Bring back some AZ rays, please!
I dedicate the post today to one each bgw, who has inspired in whole or in part the character created for this piece by recent… questions.
You got your answer. There it is, as plain as dogshit by the door on a rainy morning.
It stinks, and you can pick it up and bury it with a smile on your face or just leave it there to continue to stink.
Damn… was supposed to be a day off the bike today. Went for a long walk down town among the gray buildings on a gray day. Then got out twice to ride. Fuck. When am I going to chill out and just rest?
Seattle Investment Strategy for November 2010:
Buy your snow shovel now. Buy five, and sell them to your neighbors.
The time of terrible parking will come.
Littlejar’s coming through Flaggle Rock, AZ? He can’t visit without sitting down for a pint at the Pay N’ Take, and I plan on being there…
…what’s sad, littlejar, is that you obviously just don’t get it…
…one more time you’ve gotta take it out to the limit without realizing that you have the answers, not me…i don’t pretend to have your answers, ever…
…if i called you out, it was to see if you were smart enough to know that…
@LJ,
I don’t give a rat’s arse about your inner demons. In recent speak HTFU & deal with them or stop boring us with them.
And No, you haven’t answered BGW’s question, stop ducking & diving & man up.
lj, I enjoy your posts, keep at it, but remember, every time you shake out the carpet, the poodles will go yap, yap, yap
And just by the way, I do not envy you that weather, not one bit.
@AfricanSingle,
Your point ?
Then there are some that would say “going for a long walk” and “got out twice to ride” IS chilling out and resting…
Getting a bit dark and grey here as well (along with some nice 50 mph winds)…but hey, it’s NOVEMBER. My trails are still dry, but now I don’t have the daylight to ride them after a 9-hour workday. That SUCKS.
It took me years to get used to it, but the worst part is that now that I’m gone I miss it. T-town of all places.
This post was all me until a few years ago. Arrogant and deluded.
He’ll figure it out eventually.
Great poem
+ 1 Loren.
Grey is more than a color here, it is an entity.
Nice work LJ.
This will be my forty-eighth Seattle winter (I spent a few years in CA during the 80s) and the sentiments expressed above are typical of folks who say the rain doesn’t bother them, then leave for Arizona when it get dark and wet.
Seven weeks until the solstice; fourteen weeks until we see a day as light as this again.
“Partly sunny skies today with a high near 55 all day today”
There will be miles. I’ll waste not one more minute here.
“There will be miles…” + 1
Nice. I’ll not be on the bike today. Desk jockey shit for me. Go forth and conquer!
Maybe I’ll see you out and about. I’ll doing the Magnolia/Queen Anne loop starting out from the locks around 3pm.
Ballard, I’m sorry to say in Seattle v. Ballard… I am now Seattle all the way. Fuck you, Ballard. You can have your fucking condominimajority and high prices. I used to feel at home in Ballard but today I was harassed three times by drivers, and only while going through Ballard. One guy in a silver SUV with Florida plates said “Get off the road” and made a swerve toward us even though he had a clear lane, and I responded with “Fuck you, I can ride where I want.” and he then threatened to kick both our asses and I called him a cunt and said: “Go back to fucking Florida, this is MY CITY.” Then the light turned green and he was gone.
Then I was honked at for being in the road on 8th heading south and so I turned around and yelled: “I’m speeding and so are you.” and then I passed EVERYONE to make it through all the green lights.
Then, a shitbird lady in a pickup passed me and said “Get on the bike path” I said: “Fuck you I can ride where I want.” and said some other things too. She said “You don’t pay taxes.” I was like, WTF? She said “You should get a car.” I was like, WTF? Get a car? She called me a loser, I said “Why am I a loser, because I don’t buy gas?” It was a nasty interaction, and the kind I don’t get down in SoDo and Central.
But it was a great ride with a lot of climbing and waterfrontage.
Bsllard is also the only place I’ve been threatened by SPD, too.
Ballard is Seattle just like SoDo is Seattle just like the Central District is Seattle. Ballard is also full of people, just like those other places (well, maybe not SoDo…that’s full of railroad tracks and disappointed Seahawks fans). Some people are cunts. Huge surprise. Some people have to be goaded into exposing their cuntery. I cannot believe you don’t earn some of this flak, LJ.
I ride through Ballard several times a week, and I’ve never been harassed on those roads any more than I have in any other part of the city.
It’s amazing what some courtesy and making a conscious effort to not have a pre-victimized look on one’s face can do for treatment on the road.
I’m gonna have to back LJ on this one. Ballard (in the last 3 years) has devolved into a somewhat angry place if you are on the road and on a bike.
A few bad apples?
Perhaps, but they sure seem to be on the road a lot.
I have no theory, no reason why this has happened, it is simply my observation based off of riding there recently, as well as hearing accounts from other riders who live in Ballard.
Are ther asshats throughout the city? Oh, you can bet on that. But Ballard used to always be a few grades “nicer” than the rest of the city.
That seems to have changed.
Maybe with all the new “urban density” going on there, things are getting tighter and tempers shorter? At least in Sodo you’ve got a bit of room to move.
SoDo is like Tucson. Huge wide streets. It’s full of trucks. The air stinks… but I seem to ride trouble free.
Ballard is very crowded and though there are many good cyclists living there, the car problem is huge. It is noticeably more crowded. Even downtown seems to have less traffic problems.
But, apparently, according to some people, I’m causing all kinds of problems riding a bike and should just get a car.
It makes my blood boil when someone questions my right be ride my bike on the road. Nothing someone can say or do that makes me madder than:
“Get off the road”
littlejar— there is no helping stupid people. If you let them get to you (blood boiling), they win. I like to reply to such assholes with a smile and a thumbs-up, and say, “thank you, concerned citizen.” They usually don’t even get it.
Mikey – I’ve done that, hundreds of times. I’m sick of people thinking they can tell me what to do when I’m not posing any danger to them.
AND these people, drivers, are continually holding the ability to run me down and kill me. It is no different than arrogant people with loaded guns running around pointing them and yelling. This is what an urban cyclist lives under, all the time. Tell me I’m weak for letting it get to me SOME TIMES like when I’m threatened and then harassed twice in the same section of town.
One of the things this bitch said was this: “So what is the difference” I said: “The difference is, if I cause a collision, you get a dent. If you cause it, I am dead.”
Dyed in the wool car-culture is not stupidity, per instance. Stupid collectively – not a doubt. It is, however, PROGRAMMING and the effectiveness of private interests programming us is quite on display here in this vast Church of Auto. We don’t worship God, we worship the explosive power of chemicals and the awesome complexity of machines.
I’m just a rat in the church, trying to survive.
I like my car. ’04 Honda Element. I like it alot. It lets me do in a couple hours what it would take me a day to do, assuming I even had a geared bike to climb out of this stagnant little cesspool of inbreeding. Of course there’s the C&O which couldn’t be more fixed gear-friendly, and gets me there eventually. But I digress-My point:
In my view, driving a car gives me few if any privileges and a shitload of added responsibilities. Not something I take lightly.
LJ— look, we all understand the feeling. We all know that such assholes are actually frustrated by OTHER CARS, not bicycles, and take out their impotent fury on the only people they can— the vulnerable users. Weak, stupid behavior. In almost every case, these people have created their own gasoline-dependent nightmares and are too stupid to break the cycle. Their lives are a living hell, not yours. So don’t let them get to you— ever.
Me? I buy about a tank of gas per month for my little four-banger; my friends give me shit because I won’t drive across Lake Washington— twelve miles. I’m taking the bus to Westlake Center Saturday morning for the “Rally To Restore Sanity.” Should be run even if it rains. See yez out there.
PS— bought a pair of 700x32C rain tars and a pair of one-size-too-big MTB shoes today, so I can wear more socks and try to keep my stupid feet from freezing on every ride over 30 miles.
Errata: “fun” even if it rains. I regret the error.
It could be that I’m actually clergy of said Church of Auto. Though I choose to ride because I love it, and because I do not like to drive, I own in my rig one ridiculously big 300 HP motor that I rebuilt myself. I understand the machine called car so well that I’m known to resurrect them FROM THE DEAD when no one else around could. Rise! Start!! Rise!
The rig has burned so little gasoline that I actually have to burn off old gas. So, I do so by continually tuning and tweaking it. I intend to buy roller lifters and other performance enhancers. Sure, I can build bikes… but what really gets me out of a jam or helps others in the same way is my prowess with fixing cars. And, I study this art.
I’d still love to see every internal combustion engine on Earth silented. I’d love to see the Church of Auto leveled to the ground.
Remember the Colonel asking Pvt. Joker about his PEACE button and BORN TO KILL. “It’s a commentary on the duality of man, sir!”
Mikey- try the plastic bag trick? Vapor barrier.
Kid— damn good idea, I shall try that. I’ve been successful with wearing neoprene booties and stuffing a chemical hand warmer on top of my cycling shoe inside, but I HATE those stupid booties and those hand warmers cost like a buck a pop. Here’s to hoping that thick poly socks do the trick… Ride on, brother.