by Megan Boyle
• he would be confused about how ‘kidnapping’ works if he wants to hang out/be there
• i would say ‘i’m just kidnapping you, this is now a kidnapping situation, when you want to leave you won’t be able to’ (i’ll have a gun or something)
• he would think it was funny and go along with it and be like ‘oh my god, where’d you get the gun’
• we would tweet about it maybe
• at some point he’d say ‘i’ll just let you kill me when i want to leave’ and that would become a thing we repeat to each other as a joke kind of, both probably wondering ‘will it really happen’
• when it was the ‘someone wants to leave’ time one of us would address how it’s a kidnapping situation (would be interesting if i was the one who wanted to leave, i would be kidnapping myself too then i guess, maybe/technically)
• damn what would i do…i don’t think i could kill jordan…
• realistically i would probably just abandon the idea if ‘am i going to kill you’ or ‘i really want to leave’ things became too tense
• would be interesting if he developed stockholm syndrome and just liked being kidnapped by me and continued to be my (kidnapee? hostage?) forever
• would be interesting if that happened and one day we both decided to kill each other at the same time, like 30 years later
• would be interesting…30 years later…i’m assuming i’ll have a job again. he would need to come with me to work every day for it to still be kidnapping
• pictured leading him on a leash and saying ‘bad jordan’
• feels a little like i’m kidnapping already, by saying this, getting the gears in motion
• would be ideal if i was a high-powered criminal with a private plane and like…the stakes kept getting higher…jordan on a leash…flying to brazil to pick up the thing i’m a criminal about, like maybe more hostages or guns or drugs…would be good if i was simply a ‘high-powered melon criminal’…i just always knew where the ripe melons were…that is my power over people…the police are afraid of me also, somehow…because i’m not in jail yet…but i should be…everyone knows i should be…i commit sick twisted saddam hussein style melon-seeking crimes involving a lot of technology…
11:27PM: big spider approaching. appears to be strictly floor-based spider. interesting. does the person who thought of the ‘a spider walks across your sleeping face an average of eight times in your lifetime’ statistic get money, from inventing that?
11:54PM: still unable to update, am still trying to fix blogger/tumblr layout things. i need to chill and maybe just stop looking at computer tonight. feel isolated, extreme minimal contact with others, extreme looking at same surroundings, extreme looking at a computer.
APRIL 7, 2013
12:38AM: have spent an inordinate time finagling with blogger.com and doing stupid computer things to try updating one big update with all my previous days of updates which i haven’t been updating due to problems i’ve been having with updating (which were originally stalled due to moving out of an apartment and spilling soup on the faster computer i had been using).
3:54AM: sudden urge to watch ‘titanic,’ or just like. pictured leonardo dicaprio in a tuxedo like in that one scene. he’s happy to see kate winslet on the boat, they’re about to go to a fancy dinner. imagined him with that ‘beaming boo boo boy’ face, james cameron makes a director’s cut with that shot of his face for two minutes, the rest of the movie. laughing in chair now. that would’ve given more attention to ‘titanic.’ i wanted to call it ‘taiwan’ just now. debated smoking dad’s pot earlier. ate 1mg xanax. still haven’t taken a break from computer.
4:02AM: eating ‘hint of lime’ tostitos and cooking pasta. eating another 1mg xanax before pasta.
4:13AM: entertainment tonight is on TV. they are showing something about the mary tyler moore show reunion. have recently been watching mary tyler moore DVDs with mom and feeling comforted by them and glad they happened. the woman who played rhoda said ‘it’s what life is really about,’ about how much she loved mary and betty white. saw myself standing by the couch, turning up the volume to hear this, waiting for pasta to cook and felt something complex.
3:11PM: woke to some kind of ‘interviews with artists’ show on public television. someone had interviewed camille paglia, who looks like a shirley maclaine joan didion hybrid. listened with closed eyes while waking. camille paglia said george lucas was the greatest artist ever, because of ‘return of the sith.’ she talked about qualities of art made in other centuries. she observed those qualities in ‘return of the sith.’ she talked about ‘the longest recorded scene of physical combat over a lava pit’ at the end for a long time. i didn’t believe her about anything.
3:41PM: i’m sitting at the kitchen table. made coffee fed cats. ate unknown quantity of cadburry ‘mini eggs,’ sometimes tasted them. ate 60mg noopept. plan to do tao’s suggestion for re-organizing liveblog. seems monumental and annoying. every task seems monumental and annoying. shat and thought about how my external hard drive is missing. doesn’t seem to matter. there have been other periods in my life like this, i’m pretty sure. maybe most of my life. it’s been a week i think, since i’ve been at dad’s. seems funny to me now. joke that takes one week to tell, unknown punchline. smell seems to have normalized, or i’ve normalized to it. hair looked oilier the second or third day in, now it’s just hanging there. ‘hanging in limp resignation.’ sounds like a garfield…something…caption on 365-page garfield calender…
3:56PM: someone should insist that everything they write be published in one of those hard-to-read cursive fonts like ‘lucida handwriting.’ cursive is stupid. they’re just teaching you ‘in the future when you write printed letters, you will do it faster than you do now. some areas between letters may become connected by your pen lines. cursive will prepare you for this. don’t you worry. don’t lose sleep over this, little one. as long as you practice and do your homework you will be fine.’
4:42PM: seems impossible to imagine what i could be doing one week from today. no one to talk to but this thing. me and the cats in the hell room. the last time i said words was around 12AM last night when mom called.
4:54PM: ‘the things i’ve been wearing for at least four days in a row’ by tim o’brien. it’s like if i do something to change right now, then. something. no one to talk to. no voice in my head telling me not to do exactly what i’m doing, usually there’s a voice there, think it took the hint and is now taking a break from yelling at me.
5:05PM: there should be a charity ‘life donation’ thing. if my immediate death would stop the suffering of 100 people, i would donate the shit out of me. the charity organization has to make it so no one is sad about you dying, also. like, make sure no one remembers you. i guess that’s what happens anyway, eventually.
5:17PM: it’s sunny and 66 degrees. i’m sitting on the black wicker thing, smoking. cats are staring out the window like they’re missing something. college guys are playing some kind of sport maybe 100 feet away at my ‘11 o’clock.’
5:20PM: something that’s not my computer is making a noise like the ‘volume +/-’ function on macbooks. a bird maybe. or. a dog usually barks after it happens.
5:23PM: it happened again. the noise twice, then the dog four times.
5:25–11:02PM: walked inside. saw that my experimental ‘last try to update’ blogger update actually worked and decided to run with that. tweeted that i had moved liveblog to blogger as temporary solution until i reorganize on tumblr tonight. sam cooke and ethan ashley favorited tweet. thought ‘wait for the goods to roll in, sit back and wait for those tasty retweets, you motherfucker’ and felt pathetic but excited.
• showered. washed hair twice and used skin brush on my body.
• dressed in navy blue skirt, black tights, light blue button-down, black cardigan, thinking something vaguely about ‘don’t wear lazy/easy clothes.’
• fed cats, cleaned cat box, administered treats.<
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• checked internet for ‘goods that have rolled in.’ scant goods.
• moved ‘new car’-scented tree-shaped air freshener from table to bookbag.
• walked to car. it felt distinctly ‘sunday,’ like this ‘sunday’ feeling i remember days having since i was little, some kind of impending doom.
• unwrapped ‘new car’ air freshener. it smelled like the smell i’ve been smelling for past few bad days, like it is maybe the lead singer of the band of that smell. hung it from rear-view window.
• somewhere around 7PM while driving, felt like ‘it will be too soon before i’m at mom’s’ (mom made corned beef and cabbage for herself and dad, invited me over last night during 12AM phone call), called mom to say i’m going to whole foods first and they should eat without me.
• called zachary, not knowing why exactly. left voicemail where i said ‘corned beef’ but think it sounded more like ‘help me.’
• didn’t drive directly to whole foods. listened to xiu xiu. periodically checked phone for ‘goods that have rolled in’ and watched screens close automatically.
• zachary called as i made left turn into whole foods. parked far from the store. talked for maybe 15 minutes. felt a shaky/maybe mutual background awareness of ‘there is no more apartment between us, megan is the one who called.’ think my voice sounded like ‘there is a scorpion on my neck and i must remain calm’ for most of the phone call. his voice sounded weak and distant, like it was getting blown away or something. reminded me of phone calls near the time our relationship officially ended. he said he’s been eating healthy foods and running every day, making things out of wood, thinking about taking a vacation, asked me what i’ve been eating. i said ‘not much, hahaha! ohhhhh nooooo. well, there was the melon…bananas…took care of the hummus…half a sandwich? er. oh and pasta, last night i made pasta.’ he said ‘oh, pasta.’ sky was darkening to a blue shade. watched a shadowy triangle resembling a lightless landing airplane descend into distant trees. remembered watching the end of ‘signs’ this morning. earlier i had asked if he wanted to hang out soon and one of us changed the subject. i asked him again and he said ‘maybe…maybe next weekend.’ i said ‘next weekend like, how today is sunday, not this coming sunday? the one after that?’ he said ‘yeee-ah, the weekend after this sunday.’ i said ‘yeah. yeah, that would be good. we could go to atlantic city. or i could come help you make stuff with wood and ask your dad questions, so he likes me.’ he said ‘well, i don’t know about that.’ i kind of laughed and said ‘yeah, yeah definitely not that.’ he paused and said ‘i don’t know, maybe not.’ i don’t remember what i said. i knew it would be a ‘maybe not.’ a little later he said ‘well, so long.’ i said ‘so long’ and waited for the sound of him hanging up.
• saw 8:38 on my phone’s clock. brought both knees to my chest in my seat and checked phone for goods, seeing none. thought about how this would be a good scene in a shitty movie.
• entered whole foods. walked quickly past someone who looked like boyfriend of former co-worker whom i nearly dodged a threesome with on a night in 2010, in the produce section.
• whole foods cashier said ‘clear barcode, never works’ about a water bottle that failed to scan. i said ‘it’s clear?’ he turned the bottle in his hands then moved it closer to me, pointing at the code. it felt like one seamless motion. we didn’t make eye contact, we just looked at the bottle together and he knew exactly when to take it away. i said ‘oh shit, i see.’ i liked him. we continued to not look at each other as he entered the code. he said ‘i mean it’s good for the bottle, like, it makes it look good and all, but man.’ i said ‘yeah, but like. man. jeez.’ he just went through the motions, noticing and not-noticing me. felt so good. i wanted to continue. swiped my credit card and it didn’t work. swiped it again. he said ‘it says ‘no card read?” i said ‘yeah, no…card’ he said ‘here, try it backwards,’ miming how i’d do it, and i did. he tried it on his machine. he said ‘it’s been like this all day man, ‘no card read’ all day.’ i said ‘damn, whoa.’ i couldn’t figure out how to say ‘first the barcode and now this, right? two things.’ he handed me the bag without looking. i said ‘have a good night,’ sounding fake, meaning it. i looked at him but there was another customer.
• entered car and swallowed 15mg adderall. didn’t want to be at mom’s yet.
• names of where i drove until a little before 11PM, in order: 83N, 695 towards pikesville, 140 towards mom’s apartment [called mom to say i’d be later], 695E, 70W, exit for marriottsville road, 70E, 95S, 395 into baltimore city, 83S, 695W, 795 towards reisterstown, 140 towards reisterstown, back roads to mom’s.
• greeted ‘homeland’-watching parents. ate 15mg adderall. have been listening to ‘building nothing out of something’ album by modest mouse on repeat. also in the car i sang ‘me and bobby mcgee’ a few times. i like going ‘na na na nanana nanana nanana’ and ‘lawdy lawdy lawdy lawdy lawdy lawdy lawdy lord.’
11:02PM: made a text document of how i’d organize the days of liveblog in groups of four. heard kitchen sink running and parents talking in kitchen. dad said ‘a six karat nugget of gold, isn’t that great?’ mom said ‘oh no.’ continued to hear talking but not words. heard dad say ‘you can tell it’s gold by the sound, yeah.’
APRIL 8, 2013
1:33AM: got water from kitchen in preparation for thing i’m about to do. thought ‘this is better than dad’s apartment because you have more memories here, it’s been 22 days since you started liveblog which is the last time you remember feeling good but when you started liveblog the last time you remembered feeling good was only 10-11 days prior; how are you still living this way, how is anyone still…’
1:42AM: ate a sniggly niblet of adderall, maybe 7.5mg.
10:23AM: wrapped blanket around shoulders as socially appropriate alternative to wearing hot pink jacket indoors. have been inside, organizing pictures. parents woke a while ago. thought i would be sneaky and pre-emptively garner coffee to avoid being asked if i want coffee. it worked. ate remaining 75% of former ‘snigley niblet’ of adderall. mom saw me with blanket around my shoulders and said ‘oh no are you frozen?’ i said ‘i’m fine, thank you’ but felt the same coffee thing.
11:01AM: heard mom say ‘in the fifties, you know, she had what they call a nervous breakdown’ and a little later, ‘she started selling oranges from her estate, you know, her orchard, from her estate in florida.’ dad is clearing his throat and saying ‘mm-hmm’ with extra subwoofer bass in his voice.
11:04AM: mom is still saying the same story…laughing…just heard ‘anyway, i thought it was interesting, she died at eighty-one.’ they said things about aging for a while, think my mom wanted to squeeze out the drippings of the story. dad said ‘oh boy time for me to get that rock salt out of the trunk.’
11:10AM: overhead mom tell a story about an old man who volunteered at the aquarium with her a few years ago. the old man volunteer was very old and frail. he smiled a lot and didn’t say much. sometimes he and mom would say ‘hi’ to each other at the beginnings or endings of their shifts. sometimes mom would watch him answer people’s questions. sometimes mom would see him sitting on a bench, staring at the fish tanks or some distance beyond them. she said ‘he wanted to be left alone, i’d just as soon be left alone, i didn’t want to talk to anyone either.’
i like imagining them in a giant open room, staring at fish tanks at different times, or seeing each other through a fish tank and not knowing they saw each other. the man was in a concentration camp. not sure how mom knows this.
11:52AM: in a quavering voice, mom said ‘she said ‘don’t forget your name’ to the little girls, every night before they fell asleep, she said ‘be sure to say your name so you don’t forget it.” dad paused and said ‘hm,’ matter-of-factly.
12:13PM: dad approached my bedroom, opened hall closet door, walked away. a few minutes later he asked mom where the WD-40 was. mom said something about the hall closet. a few minute
s later the front door opened. mom walked into the hallway and said ‘mike?’ she went into the bathroom. i said ‘i think he’s outside.’ she said ‘what?’ i said ‘i heard the door open, i think he’s outside.’ she made a noise like ‘jesus christ’ and said ‘yeah, he’s just. looking for something.’ a little later it sounded like something small and made of metal had been tossed up the stairs. dad said ‘i hope that fixed it, that oughta do it.’
1:57PM: drinking coffee. some inane shit is happening that i don’t want to take time to write about more than to say ‘shit is inane.’ getting ready to do something B.D.O. style but this time it’s baby’s day out: no big whoop. would be a bigger whoop if my phone wasn’t [inane shit omitted]. seems like the solution for something should be ‘pour a gallon of milk on your head.’ or ‘pour a gallon of milk on the head of the first farmer you see.’ like one or both of those are probably ‘troubleshooting’ answers in the manual for one of the first cell phones. instruction manual for the internet, made by the department of defense in the 70’s or 80’s: it’s just one page that says ‘pour a gallon of milk on the head of the first farmer you see.’
4:36pm: Driving to macmedics now. 77 degrees and sunny outside. Seems bad, though. Surreal ‘why is it always too bright sometimes’ thing combined with ‘too hot, can i still breathe if it’s hot?’
5:04pm: dropped off computer at macmedics. The same man who’s helped me before helped me again but I don’t think he recognized me. He brought his friend out from the back. They had similar reactions to computer damage. The friend took out the battery and said ‘that’s a fire hazard, that’s a fire hazard’ and they repeated that and ‘not good’ to each other a few times. Told them I had spilled soup on computer and got scared and drunk friend had a screwdriver, which is all true except I was the one who ripped off the back and did most of the unscrewing. The friend said ‘is your friend an 800 pound gorilla?’ I said ‘admittedly my judgment was not the clearest at the moment,’ feeling like a pro-conversationalist. The man I knew said ‘it’s okay, it happens to all of us. Pictured him and the friend, both in their mid-40’s I think and wearing wedding rings, getting drunk in a basement LAN party with computer guys I knew in high school. Seemed hard to picture when they would’ve been doing that. computer seems probably okay, needs new parts, they took it overnight. I signed an iPad saying I understood things as the man I knew described. When it was time to go the man looked at my hand like we might shake hands. He gave me his card. It seemed like we might shake hands again.