(May 2nd 2008)
by Lia C. Trinka-Browner
When the wind blows and the rain feels cold…with a head full of snow, with a head full of snow…In the window there's a face you know…don't the night pass slow…don't the night pass slow…
*
Jerry G. and I walked out of the "Dingy Dog" early, around 10 p.m. This bar was quiet, but not without the regulars hunched over their 3-dollar Pabsts, The Only Ones playing on the jukebox, and the bartender telling "Dick" to get out. By the time we walked out the door, "Dick" was waiting for us.
"Evenin', ladies…" he choked towards us.
I looked over at Jerry's bearded face, and blank stare and looked back at "Dick."
"Oh, I guess I thought there was two of ya, like you were a twin sister."
I didn't know what else to do but to turn on my heel and walk the other direction, in the direction of the piss smell.
Jerry followed.
"Why does it smell like piss?" asked Jerry.
"Because someone probably pissed here, maybe Dick" I replied.
Jerry whose real name is Jerome is from a small town in North Carolina (slogan: "A Better Place to Be; Raise Up"). He's here because he needs a trip before he heads to New Orleans, Louisiana (slogan: "Come Fall in Love with Louisiana All Over Again") for med school. Because of this medical school talk, he shouldn't be questioning pee. But I don't say anything. We have an agreement of leaving.
"Okay, I'm ready."
"Get in the car."
The sound of strangers sending nothing to my mind…Just another mad, mad day on the road…I am just living to be lying by your side…but I'm just about a moonlight mile on down the road…
*
I'm remembering that I woke up the other day only realize that I just dreamt about my boss: an all too lucid dream about me with my boss and his wife. I wasn't too put "off" by it, but I also wasn't too turned "on".
The rest of the day was kind of a relived dream state cum nightmare. I would look at him and see his "O" face and then laugh, until the smile turned into a kid's smile, after posing too long with a crooked neck at the Wal-Mart photo center. Half smile, half irritation, half retardation.
It's funny when people I know pop up in my dreams to de-flower. The sex dreams. In these cases I always still have something I think is referred to as a "flower." I don't know exactly what blossoms, but it's got to be a white flower, because they're more delicate, virginal by rule. They can die. As if the dream only has three days left before the honeymoon's over. And then it's back to…
*
The car we rented in Los Angeles was gold, a "Sebring" which I thought was a word made up by Chrystler. Turns out it's a town in Florida (slogan: "Visit Florida"). Our Sebring was also a slick convertible, the kind that makes a person feel like pulling a Hollywood scenario: standing up and letting the white surrender scarf fly, held high in your right arm, behind you. But there were no scarves and the thought of bugs getting into Jerry's mouth left him firmly planted in his seat.
The 5 Freeway was all hot and windy and since no other cinematic options had been feasible, David Lynch took over for our headlights and we cruised California's (slogan: "Find Yourself Here" even though most people think it's "The Golden State") darkness.
Made a rag pile of my shiny clothes… Gonna warm my bones, Gonna warm my bones… I got silence on my radio… Let the air waves flow, let the air waves flow…
*
The newspapers in my parents house in Arkansas ("The Natural State" and formerly the "Land of Opportunity") when I was young had pictures of Ronald Reagen on them, among Olympic feats of democratic honor and valor. This was the triple-threat of information. Reagen was all actor/president/java hurler. I can't remember much else about the papers, only that they were there and UTNE Readers were there. I collected The New York Times for about a half a year when I was 24 and then recycled them all in one swoop. The paper collected in a cabinet. The color of the paper would fade slowly and I'd compare the "beigey brittle" February papers to the more "urine-stained" December papers. I was afraid to let it all go, as if I hadn't been documenting properly. But I also don't want to end up some kind of grandmother pack rat who collects everything because of some illness having to do with documentation and archiving. Besides the inside of a crummy shelf is probably not archival.
Studio 54 in New York City, New York (slogan: "I Love New York" and "The Empire State") closed its doors on February 4th in 1980, in November of the same year (my birth year) Reagan was elected President of the United States of America. Like Woodstock, Studio 54 had some revivals in far away places like Las Vegas, Nevada (slogan: "Wide Open") and Berlin. I was 15 when the club went to Vegas and had no idea. Bianca Jagger rode her way into the original NYC club on a white horse in 1975. It was her 30th birthday. The infamous prop of the evening was a gigantic white Man in the Moon with an equally gigantic spoon under its nose. George Trow wrote that on this birthday night, Diana Vreeland summed up Bianca's air.
"The thing about Bianca is the patrician quality," Mrs Vreeland said. "A little bit of this, a little bit of that—from where? Nic-a-ra-gua, is it? But, patrician. Always patrician. And, of course, there is the skin. That incredible skin." Mrs Vreeland started to leave to talk with Mick Jagger. "Mick is the most attractive man in New York, when he's had one or two days' rest," she said.
*
(Patti Davis' hard lesson learned?)
"Did you ever see that Playboy?" I asked.
Jerry is constantly referencing porn. This is why I brought up Patti Davis. Politics and porn. I think this has something to do with his medical thing. His Medical School. We drive through a TCBY to get frosties. Mine's covered in butterfinger chunks.
"I downloaded Paris Hilton's sex tape."
"What, you hadn't seen it yet?" I replied.
He paused holding his spoon right before his lips.
"Well, I saw it but I didn't own it."
"But, does it count as owning it if you downloaded it for free?"
The spoon slides out his mouth and he just shrugs.
Two days later and we're driving across country, through Missouri (slogan: "The Show Me State" as well as "Where the Rivers Run"). We didn't know we would end up this far away. This road only a windy river of piss and chimeras.
"You wanna drive?" Jerry asks.
"No way, Jesus drives this train." I sarcastically yelled whilst simultaneously cranking up The Rolling Stones.
*
So, hidden around my room there are about 5 different shoe boxes, a steel box I welded myself and a wooden box all filled with photos, clippings and postcards: some are of more famous people. All the Patti's are in there. Patti Smith, Patty Hearst, Patti Davis. Patti Davis, like Jane Fonda, has written more than one book about her life. Or her cats. Patty Hearst wrote one book that was made into a movie. They don't make these girls like they used to. Well, they do, only I'm more interested in these girls. And maybe those girls don't even make themselves like they used to.
I found a postcard of Moby in that box. It had to be tossed, it must've gotten in there by accident. I found pictures that my dad sent to me of Bob Dylan playing at the Newport Folk Festival in Rhode Island (slogan: "Unwind; Hope") and another picture of William Burroughs with Lydia Lunch. My parents, even though they know I buy the New York Times still send me Sunday's articles if they're about the Whitney or the Met. Now I don't even ask them to help me pay for the airfare.
*
For I'm sleeping under strange, strange skies… Just another mad, mad day on the road… My dreams are fading down the railway line… I'm just about a moonlight mile down the road…
*
So, Patti Davis posed for Playboy?
Yeah, in 1994.
I wonder if Hustler ever asked? Did you know that John Hinckley was sent to St. Elizabeth's psychiatric hospital in Washington D.C. (slogan: "The American Experience; Taxation without Representation"), the same place that housed Ezra Pound? Sometimes there is no coherence in mapping out these roads that have crossed, but haven't touched.
Pound's musical "Cantos", deemed structure-less by some people was written partially at St. Elizabeth's. The second volume "Thrones" was written in the end of the fifties there. Pound later said that, "Thrones concerns the states of mind of people responsible for something more than their personal conduct."
Speaking of Studio 54, I've heard David Lee Roth used to go. He, recently, having a protest-song moment, only without the protest, has gotten fiercely into folk music…bluegrass, more specifically. On the "Late Late show", David Lee performed the song "Jump" amidst 7-8 bluegrass musicians playing their hearts away. The tricky part, so it seems, is that David Lee doesn't seem to remember how to dance if it doesn't involve tight pants and cock thrusts, which only slightly fits with bluegrass.
Patty Davis, Patti Smith… Patty Hearst? Patti Cakes. All patrician in their own way. Patti Smith sang a song about Patty Hearst's kidnapping, where she became Citizen Tania to the Symbionese Liberation Army. This was sang in a lovely heavy petting/ heavy breathing cover-style based on Mr. Jimi Hendrix's "Hey Joe". Patti sang a question about Patty getting' it from a black revolutionary every night.
Raymond Pettibon made two movies in 1989 called "Weatherman '69" and "Citizen Tania" (These are as good as "Sir Drone" with Mike Kelly wearing a tee-shirt that reads "I'm Mellow") The camcorder is cheap but the goods aren't. I've always wanted to see Sonic Youth and Mike Watt break records of Simon and Garfunkel. Everyone needs a release. Release Tania, release Winona, release yourself all over some white notebook paper and send it to someone you love. I just want a sign to hold. It'll say "RIDE THE WHITE HORSE" or "RIDE THE WHITE RELEASE" whatever that means.
*
I'm hiding sister and I'm dreaming…I'm riding down your moonlight mile…
"There are so many ways to get into drugs."
I stared ahead at the road, waiting for Jerry to tell me about what his mother, the doctor, had sent him this time. Usually it's something that he compares to Ritalin or Adderol, although I think everybody compares every pill to those.
The ghosts of the decades just before ours haunts our own airwaves and our understanding of what fun means. At times we imagine ourselves belonging to so many of them, these decades, and adopting their hips (their hipness) and their language.
It's miles to go before we ever even think about hitting our destination. Even then…it's just a big crystal line in the road, illuminated by the big white moon.
I'm riding down your moonlight mile
There I go now… coming home no… baby
Yeah, there I go now… coming home now… baby
Yeah, I'm coming home
*
1971: Sticky Fingers released
Bianca and Mick were married.
Jim Morrison dies
Patti Smith performs in Sam Shepard's play Cowboy Mouth
The Nasdaq is created
Diana Vreeland Fired from Vogue
Trump International Tower and the Rothko Chapel are both completed.
AMTRAK opens its doors for business.
1981: "Start Me Up" is released as a single by the Rolling Stones
Prince Charles and Princess Diana were married.
Bob Marley dies.
AIDS is "recognized".
TCBY and MTV are born