I walk up to the mall and I see the business lady who will never be the jewel of my eye and I wonder why I should even bother.
“Hey there handsome! Are you ready to see a poor mistreated girl’s dreams come true?” she says, holding two tickets to the most unanticipated event I’ve ever gone to.
A bitter-sweet smile crosses my lips and I say, “Ready as I’ll ever be.”
Pictures, a Thousand Words Please
The jack-hammer busting up sidewalk just three feet outside my studio’s one window tells me it’s time to abandon sleep and join the waking world waiting eagerly outside. Normally I would begin a fruitless ritual of trying to counter the sound and intrusive vibrations of the jack-hammer intruding into my 7:00 a.m. mornings. Today however, I’m feeling pretty on top of the world. My spirit is buoyant and I decide to head out and find a pleasant way to spend the two hours I have before I start work.
After getting dressed, I step out my door to begin the day. As I’m locking up, my neighbor from across the hall opens his door and slides out in a manner very similar to that of Kramer’s from Seinfeld. A close talker by nature, Adam immediately fills my vision with a long and square head several sizes larger than a normal man’s. Multicolored hair of varying lengths stands up all over his head and constantly vibrates from his ceaseless movement. His huge eyes always have a look of alarm in them as they shift to and fro, back and forth. His dress is very much like Andy Warhol’s and I believe Adam lived in the Warhol flat for a few moons back in the day.
“Jason. Are you terribly busy? I have a new piece that I would very much like for you to see. Would you mind?” Adam inquires.
“I’m always down to check out your stuff señor,” I reply with sincerity.
Adam glances left and right nervously, licks his lips and says, “Alright, let’s go.” Pausing abruptly, he asks, “Do you have a cellular telephone on your person?”
There are a few notes of concern in his tone and I reply hesitantly, “Yeah....”
Adam throws his arms up and leans back away from me quickly before zooming back into his normal talking space and says, “Oh no, that won’t do. No, no, no. You’ll have to turn it off before you can cross the threshold. The government can listen to what’s going on through those little devices. I simply cannot have the Senate listening to what’s going on in my space. I can’t!”
I put a reassuring hand on his shoulder and calmly reply, “Not a problem Mr. Adam, here, I’m turning it off now.”
“Alright, let us venture onward.”
Adam moves to his door and begins unlocking the nine deadbolts securing his door. His paranoia is pretty intense at times and his drug addled mind is a little much to handle on occasion, but I’ve always gotten along well with the “crazies” and the socially awkward. They seem to sense I’m not uncomfortable around them and will often attach to me when possible.
Entering the domain of Adam is akin to stepping into a Tim Burton movie. The entryway is a long hallway with a low ceiling consisting of exposed rafters leading gradually down. When you turn the corner a world of backdrops, boxes, blankets and myriad of different lighting structures jump out at you. The whole loft is about eight times bigger than my studio right across the hall. The floor is hardwood and split up in many levels. Odd rooms exist with three steps to get up into them and then five steps to leave on the other side.
There is a closet with around twelve steps leading down into the “Rabbit Hole Wardrobe” as Adam refers to it. Cataloging all the small and strange items littering the place would require the skills of an archaeological team. Amid all this clutter is basic furniture consisting of couches and chairs. The ceiling is twenty-five feet above you and there are windows easily ten feet tall. These glass portals to the outside world are covered in thick black material shutting out all outside light. This is because the photography of one Adam cannot be tainted by uninvited light.
Adam has on many occasions lectured me on the importance of lighting when trying to capture an image. He’ll tell you he’s not a photographer but rather a manipulator of light, a gatherer of images. I love his work and I always feel privileged when he shares any of it with me.
Weaving through the wasteland of his art, Adam guides us to a far corner of the loft with a split-level area only about four feet by five feet. There are only two steps leading down to this recessed corner. On the wall is a covered easel with his latest piece, which is almost as tall as I am.
Adam is twitching and fidgeting as he says to me, “Listen Jason, this is a beautifully conflicted moment of juxtaposition. Fate brought me to these places and I am merely a historian in these captured moments. Please do not think of me as a creep.”
I’m not quite following Adam here, but then again I never really do so I reply, “Adam, I have no expectations, but I usually like what you’ve got to show me.”
“Yes, but I’ve never shown you yourself, especially not in such a horrific situation. My young friend, you need to extricate yourself from your current pickle, if you can. You’re heading toward disaster and I fear I may have locked you in.”
Now I am getting a little confused and slightly worried. Adam is fidgeting even more and the tone and pitch of his voice is modulating quite alarmingly. “Well, let’s quit beating around the bush as they say and unveil this thing.”
Adam looks back and forth between me and the veiled piece. His face twitches and I’m wondering what on earth I’m about to see. With careful movements Adam grabs a hold of the black cloth, looks at me and says, “Here you are my friend, I’m sorry.” Adam pulls the cloth off with slow grace.
A beautiful picture of the arch in front of the mall confronts me and my previous concern has become warranted. Below the arch stands a twisted image of myself. The piece is actually two images of the same place, laid over each other. One shows me and the Flower Girl, the other shows me and Rachael. I step closer to better examine this invasion into my private life.
The image with the Flower Girl shows us embracing each other with our foreheads touching. She’s on the left of me and it’s nighttime in the photo. The moon lights us up in a very ethereal way and there is sadness in this half of the picture. The other photo has me and the Business Lady standing close, both hands held while I’m grinning down to her returning smile. The day is bright behind us and the feeling the picture brings about is warmth and safety. The combined pictures have the two images of me overlapping. My body lines up perfectly in both images with my two heads at almost the same angle away from my shoulders.
The strange part is that I am standing in the same exact spot in front of the archway leading into the mall in both images. Adam has somehow graduated the nighttime to the daytime from left to right, showing each girl in the lighting of when the photo was taken. I’m standing in a murky grayness. A multitude of emotions are rampaging for dominance in me. The one I express is barely controlled anger.
“What the fuck Adam! You spying on me or what? Do you follow me around taking pictures of me all day? Tell me what the fucking deal is here!”
Fear and excitement vie for control over Adam’s face as he replies in a shaky voice, “I. Listen, I...I am not stalking you Jason. I roam the streets throughout all times of the day and I take pictures of many things. I listen to the voice of fate and capture her moments. It was just coincidence I thought when I took the first picture of you just the other night. Then fate spoke to me and guided me to return to the same spot a couple of days later and there I saw you again! I couldn’t have known you were to be there! I listen to the whispering’s of the sisters of fate! I couldn’t have known! I took the picture and when I developed them I was amazed at the positioning. You stand in the very same spot in both images Jason! I double developed the two negatives and faded them into this. I’m sorry Jason.”
“Do you really expect me to believe that shit Adam?” I reply even though my stomach has knotted up with a weird fear.
There is sadness on his face and in his voice as he says,
“I’m sorry Jason, but it is truth.”
“Bullshit Adam, fucking bullshit,” I say and then I go grab the piece off the easel. “I’m taking this.”
“It was only ever meant for you. You must stop seeing these women Jason! Heartache, sorrow and disappointment are all that can be gained from these two!”
“You’re fucking crazy. I better not see you following me around taking pictures of me. I mean it. My life is not source material for your art. Do you understand me?”
“Please Jason. I did not deliberately do this!”
I shake my head and open his door to leave and say, “Whatever, just stop taking pictures of me Adam.”
My stomach is twisting itself into knots as I leave and go back to my apartment. Once inside I set the picture up and study it some more. It’s very surreal and no matter how hard I try, I can’t shake the ominous feeling I get when looking at it. I should destroy it, but I just can’t stop looking at it.
Extra! Extra! Read All About It!
Each day is a new look at the present and every day comes with a fresh paper filled with articles concerning the current happenings in the world, the country, the city and our local communities. The news in these papers is always changing yet not truly new at all. There is murder and mayhem, political scandals and fugitive vandals. Sports scores and much more, I’m sure you’re familiar.
The format, as you know, starts with a headline followed by a story. The front page has a few select headlines chosen for their ability to grab the reader and invoke curiosity, that little monkey on our back that needs to know more. The article below the headline is generally cut short and the page number where you can find the remaining tidbits is right at the bottom.
If you pick up the paper to read the headlines, you’re really just looking for a glimpse of what’s going on in the world today. The most interesting parts to the article are right there on the front page. Indeed, you get a summarization of the entire article. The meat of the story and the details are left for you to pick over in the middle pages.
Whether you’re a headlines only guy needing just the basic information of many articles or you’re the type to read only those articles piquing your curiosity but in need of all the details, you are still in need of the Newspaper. To get your fix of sensational headlines spanning across many different topics or to soak up completely two or three articles of interest you must have access to the Newspaper.
The ones that like to read the entire paper and be completely informed as possible by todays biased and inaccurate media also need the Newspaper. The New York Times boasts a higher grade reading level than most other papers and this construed sense of quality cost upwards of $1.75 from newsstands to grocery stores to your local coffee shops. The local San Diego Union Tribune here will set you back fifty cents. Now the Sunday papers can be considerably more expensive, especially the New York Times, understandably due to lengthier articles and sections provided only in the Sunday edition along with a healthy supply of coupons. The New York Times is going to require you to part with a Lincoln because it is, as mentioned, of higher quality.
Monday through Saturday you’re looking at spending a total of three bucks for your local paper and if you need to have the same information presented to you with a broader vocabulary then you’ll be spending around ten dollars. This can add up over the years to a nice little bit of money.
So you find yourself to be the type needing only headlines to make you confident in your knowledge of current events. Perusing the headlines gives you ample amounts of small talk topics and boredom conversation ammunition. You also find yourself in line every day at the local coffee shop run by the corporate machine and right there easily accessible is both the paper and the fancy paper.
While you’re waiting for Lady of the High Maintenance Latte and Grab Bag of Pastries to finish holding up the line, you can quickly get your headline needs without having to buy the paper. Excellent solution for your cheap tawdry ways! They always say, “It’s even better when its free,” so now the news each day telling you the unbiased accurate truth of the invasion of one middle eastern country and the double homicide of two teenagers visiting the city and how an eighty year old driver crashed into a fast food joint and the statement of a prominent presidential candidate pleading you to believe he absolutely did not molest a seventeen year old girl on a church led excursion to the river, is even better than before because you didn’t have to pay for it!
Never mind that everyone else wanting the paper has picked it up and paid for it along with their cup of steaming delicious coffee, you only need the headlines. Why should you pay for the entire paper when all you want is a tiny portion? It’s unreasonable and completely unfair for anyone to suggest you give up your hard earned money for such a small amount of news. You don’t even open the paper, well most of time you don’t, only when an article’s headline has really drawn you in and how could you be expected to resist the full telling of a story pertaining to construction workers like yourself being the victims of unsafe work conditions? Well?
This small little thing of scanning the headlines every day has increased your appetite for true stories of the world in which you live. Your curiosity has grown, you’re a man known among your peers as being knowledgeable of the big wide world out there. Pride swells your chest when you think of how learned you are and of the reputation you have gained. Each day while you dig in the ground alongside your fellow man, you fill them in with the details of the happenings of the world. You feel like a blue-collar anchorman, relaying the news among your former peers.
Only now that you’ve become the most informed hardhat, the headlines no longer provide enough to keep you in your elevated status among the other orange-vested workers. You need the details. You need the whole story, the truth and nothing but the truth. You’ll be damned though if you’re going to spend your hard-earned cash on the paper. You’re distributing the news to those who would otherwise remain ignorant because they don’t like to read the paper. The Newspapers should pay you for getting their compelling articles out there among those who would otherwise not care. Ludicrous it is for some snot-nosed punk kid in a Coffee Shop to hassle you to pay for the service you’re doing for your fellow man.
You are Robert, and you are the bane of my every morning. This little dance we do everyday has become so tiresome and so much more deadly than before. I ask myself many times why I should even care. It’s not me who is losing money due to Mr. Robert’s cheap ways. I get paid the same whether or not anyone pays for the paper. It would be easier for me to not be bothered by Robert’s thieving. I mean anyone with a computer and an internet connection can read the paper online for free anyway. It shouldn’t matter to me.
But for some reason I have not yet identified, it does. It really gets under my skin. My hatred for his actions is absurd and entirely overblown, but it burns hotly in my veins. I could say it’s the principle of the matter, that I have a personal integrity that simply cannot allow for such a daily transgression to occur. I could delude myself and others into thinking I can’t stomach the rules being broken so blatantly. But that would be a lie and honestly I’ve seen people steal numerous items from my store and have followed the corporate policy of not chasing after them and in the end I hardly cared.
It is him that bothers me. It is his attitude regarding me and what he is doing that boils my blood. His smirk, his passive aggressive stance and his half-lidded beady little eyes along with his small mind perturb me.
I see him coming from across the way and my mood is immediately changed and I am charged with adrenaline. The mere sight of him causes severe physical manifestations of anger and loathing. Hostile anticipation of our coming interaction radiates from me in waves felt by my fellow baristas and the tension becomes thick.
“Jason, why don’t you take your break,” says Liz.
Without taking my eyes off my approaching nemesis I reply, “Oh no Liz, I welcome these little bouts, they’re what I live for these day
s.”
Stacy touches the bunched up muscles in my shoulder and says, “Jason, he’s not worth it.”
“True, he’s not worthy of my attention, but alas he has gained it and I must continue to hold fast to my principles,” I respond.
A thought flutters through my mind and I’m amazed this epiphany did not occur to me earlier. The newspaper rack is a relatively small piece of furniture and thus easily moved. Robert is still thirty feet from the door so I move quickly into the lobby and pick up the newspaper rack and papers and carry it with me behind the counter. I’m smiling and I can’t wait for him to saunter in and notice my petty little endeavor. Giddiness sweeps through me and I can’t stifle a little giggle as my caffeinated body quivers with the ridiculousness of it all. Liz is on the register, and this simply won’t due.
“Pardon me Liz, but I need you to do a spin please. I’ll slide for you on the register.”
“Jason—”
I raise my hand and interrupt, “Do not seek to deny me this Liz. Spin the lobby please.”
The door opens and our lovely Mr. Robert walks through and he’s our only customer right now. How so very fortunate for me.
A devious smile is plastered on my face, totally incongruent with my normal expression when Mr. Robert usually approaches the register. He looks to the empty spot where his source of the happenings of the world regularly resides and confusion displays itself upon his unsightly face.
“Good morning Robert! How are you on this exceptionally fine morning?” I ask mockingly sweet.
He catches on quickly to my ploy, I must admit. His confusion gives way to rising anger, “What’d ya do with the papers?”
The Dark Roast Page 8