(In case you’re interested, the maple’s the one with the wide three-pointed leaves.)
Over the next several weeks, I slowly started noticing that Larry might, just might, be having an effect on the rest of the world. In the next town over, citizens boycotted the new superstore trying to move in. Coincidence? Maybe. Maybe not. The school’s baseball team actually went on strike, saying they didn’t want to be billboards for Nike anymore because of the workers’ conditions. The amazing thing was, most of the students supported them.
At first I thought this was happening at my school because the Larry vortex emanated so close by. But according to several newspaper and magazine articles, students across the country were beginning to reject the commercialism being shoved down their throats. The consumer backlash was bound to happen sooner or later—ebb and flow, supply and demand, that sort of thing. Did Larry deserve a tiny piece of the credit? Who knows?
My feelings of joy were short-lived, though, because betagold left another message on the bulletin board.
I JUST WANT YOU TO KNOW I’M CLOSING IN ON YOU, LARRY. AND IT’S NOT FROM ANALYZING YOUR POSSESSIONS EITHER. I’M GOING TO TRACK YOU DOWN MY WAY. YOU MUST BE USING A CELL PHONE, THAT’S WHY I CAN’T TRACE YOUR MODEM LINE. BUT SOONER OR LATER, I’LL TRACK THAT DOWN TOO. I KNOW SOMEONE AT THE PHONE COMPANY, AND THEY’RE COMING UP WITH NEW TRACKING SYSTEMS ALL THE TIME. LOTS OF PEOPLE THINK YOU’RE DOING GOOD WORK, BUT I THINK SOMEONE WHO DOESN’T STAND BEHIND HIS/HER WORDS IS A COWARD. EVEN THE NEWSPAPERS PRINT THE NAMES OF PEOPLE WHO WRITE INTO THE EDITORIALS.
P.S. IT’S NOT THAT I DISAGREE WITH WHAT YOU’RE SAYING—I HATE CONSUMERISM TOO. I JUST THINK THE WORLD DESERVES TO KNOW WHO YOU ARE.
P.P.S. DO YOU LIVE IN NEW ENGLAND, LARRY? HOME OF THOREAU AND EMERSON, YOUR IDOLS? LOTS OF RED MAPLES UP THERE.
The pen that had been clenched between my teeth fell into my lap. I was usually meticulous about not putting anything in the sermons that could lead to me, but red maples—who would have thought? And who was betagold anyway—a botanist detective? There was no way he or she could track me down, especially not based on a tree. I had a plan, goals. What did betagold think—this was some kind of game? I made a note to get a new cell phone line, then I put my pen back between my teeth and typed a response:
AS I TOLD YOU BEFORE, I FEEL MY IDENTITY ONLY GETS IN THE WAY OF MY WORK. IF I TELL PEOPLE WHO COME TO THIS SITE THAT I’M BLACK OR A COLLEGE PROFESSOR OR A RETIRED BUSINESSWOMAN, SUDDENLY EVERYTHING I SAY GETS FILTERED THROUGH THAT. SOME PEOPLE MIGHT CHOOSE NOT TO HEAR THE THOUGHTS OF SOMEONE FROM A CERTAIN DEMOGRAPHIC. HOW ABOUT CONCENTRATING ON WHAT I HAVE TO SAY INSTEAD OF THE MEASLY IDENTITY OF THE WRITER?
P.S. I’VE NEVER BEEN TO NEW ENGLAND. IS IT NICE?
I wasn’t happy about having to lie in the postscript, but I didn’t have much choice. If betagold was on a mission and was anything like me, this harassment wouldn’t stop until Larry was uncovered.
And the worst of it was, just like me, betagold could be anyone. Somebody I already knew.
Anyone at all.
My mother always understood how curious my mind could get and put in many hours trying to keep it busy.22 But with her gone, my insatiable hunger for knowledge sometimes crept into the mischievous category—witness my online interlude with poor Ms. Phillips or the time I broke into the high school on a Saturday night and set all the clocks back fifteen minutes just to mess up the routine. So when I picked the lock on Peter’s briefcase one night at two a.m., it was pretty much just business as usual.
The internal memos seemed innocuous enough—demographic surveys and reports from many of Peter’s top advertising clients. As I skimmed through them, however, it became clear that they were extremely confidential23—future ad campaigns, most aimed at the “lucrative youth market.”24 I checked out the ads. Joe Camel was gone, but the tobacco companies weren’t giving up on the illegal teen market. An ad for a major designer deflected the criticism of paying Asian workers only dollars a day.25 A beer company wanted to come up with a print ad as collectible as the vodka ads traded by teenagers. It went on and on, enough material to hang corporate America by its designer tie.
I scanned the report onto my hard drive, then put the original back in Peter’s briefcase.
I was furious with Peter’s involvement in all this. Hey, thanks for the roof over my head, the food in the cupboards, but do young women in Indonesia have to suffer for my well-being? Not in the world I want to live in.
I sat up all night creating my own ads. I made the Gap model look more anorexic than she was, I turned the swoosh into a swastika, I even hooked the men in the cigarette ads up to oxygen machines. I hadn’t had this much fun since I hacked my way into Blockbuster’s system and ordered a hundred copies of Pee-Wee’s Big Adventure.26
I didn’t worry about Peter. If he had this information, other bigwig executives did too. I posted my new ads onto Larry’s Web site, hoping for some kind of reaction.
Two hundred sixty-seven people responded by breakfast. Kids posted ads of their own; some of them created parodies of the companies in my ads, some came up with new ones.27
The ads actually made me feel closer to Peter; I was following in his footsteps in a subversive, anticonsumer way. I enjoyed commenting on the world of advertising without being in it.
And for a perennial outsider like me, that was a giant plus.
“It’s official! He’s a guy!” Beth said.
“Unless he’s a plus size woman who wears boxers.”
She pelted me again.28
I rubbed my arm and asked her if we should track Larry down.
“Absolutely not. Suppose he’s some geek with a mullet, living in the Everglades? I don’t want to know!”
Reason #56 not to tell her.
If Beth had read betagold’s message the other day, she didn’t mention it now.
“I’ve been doing research on consumerism since last fall,” she said. “And I’ve never seen any of that information he just posted. Either Larry has great sources or he’s starting to make stuff up.”
“Are you kidding? Corporate America? There’s miles of stuff we don’t know.”
“You’re right. Of course, you’re right.”
We sat in the cafeteria with a deck of tarot cards Beth’s twenty-two-year-old sister, Marie, had given her. Beth kept looking at the instructions as she turned the cards over, her face growing more serious by the minute. She suddenly swept all the cards off the table and shoved them in her bag.
“What’s the matter?” I asked.
“Nothing.” She shifted her eyes away from me. “These cards are stupid. You can’t read someone’s fortune. I don’t even know why Marie gave them to me. More mumbo-jumbo crap we don’t need.”
“It was bad, right? I can take it.”
She took the cards out and showed me the one on top—a skeleton rowing a boat out to sea. “Death, okay? See how lame they are? As if you’re going to die.”
I stared at the skeleton and couldn’t help shivering. “Maybe this came up because I’m going to the cemetery today.”
She almost jumped from her chair in relief. “Yes, of course! Three years ago, right? I knew it was this week.”
She rummaged through her science notebook and pulled out a cream-colored envelope with “Mrs. Swensen” written on the front. “Can you put this with the flowers? It’s just a little note, like last year.”
Good old Beth. I wanted to tell her she was the only person who truly comforted me when my mother died. But from my emotional straitjacket, all I said instead was “Thanks.” I shuffled off to my next class with my heart aching.
I knew it was wrong, but during biology lab I stuck the tip of my pen under the envelope flap and opened Beth’s letter. “Dear Mrs. Swensen, I still miss you, we all do. Josh is doing great; you’d be proud. Keep watching over us. Love, Beth.” Not too sappy, just the right amount of sentiment. Beth had always been Mom’s favorite.
I stopped at the florist on the way home f
rom school and got a big bouquet of tulips for my mother’s grave. (“Two lips are better than one,” Mom used to say.) Peter pulled up to the house, preoccupied and harried, doing what he always did this time of year—throwing himself into his work. We drove most of the way in awkward silence.
“Katherine wanted to come today,” Peter finally said. He waited for my reaction, but I didn’t give him one. “I thought it might be too soon,” he added.
The thought of making this pilgrimage with the odds-on favorite for my new stepmother made me cringe. “Well, that was nice she wanted to come,” I said, completely for his benefit.
“Do you think so? I thought so too.” It was one of those only-child moments when your parent forgets you are his kid and just talks to you like a regular person. We had been having more of these moments lately; I liked them.
Peter swung the Jeep into the lane near Mom’s grave and we both got out. Soon the rose bushes lining the path would be in full bloom. I could find my way to the spot blindfolded—twenty-two headstones from the corner, sixteen in.
“They just put the monument back last week,” Peter said. “Stupid vandals spray-painted this whole row.”
Sure enough, the two stones next to Mom’s were covered with red squiggly lines.
“They had a heck of a time cleaning the granite,” Peter continued. “But it looks like they did a pretty good job.”
I nodded. The back of her tombstone showed only the faintest traces of paint. But graffiti would have been a welcome relief compared to what awaited me on the other side of the stone. There, etched into the granite underneath Mom’s name and dates, were my own.
JOSHUA SWENSEN
1983–
I stared at Peter, too stunned for words.
“While they had the stone out to be cleaned, it only made sense to put your name on too. The guy at the monument place said it was definitely the smart thing to do.”
“Probably ’cause it’s not his name,” I answered.
“Your mother thought you’d want to be buried here. I told her you might want a plot of your own with your family someday, but she said you came into the world with her, might as well go out too.”
“I do want to be buried here,” I said. “Just not now. Having my name on the stone is kind of sick, don’t you think?”
He ran his finger across the letters. “It does take some getting used to. Seems so permanent this way.”
A shrill noise filled the afternoon sky. I knew it was one of the crows in the birch nearby, but the picture on Beth’s tarot card flashed into my mind, as if the skeleton itself was cawing, laughing as he rowed into the darkness.
JOSHUA SWENSEN JOSHUA SWENSEN JOSHUA SWENSEN
The first number was 1983, but what would the second number be? I stood in front of the tombstone as if it held the answer—like a wide-eyed tourist standing around a roulette table in Las Vegas, waiting to see where the spinning ball would land: 2061? 2043? Or maybe something sooner, like 2002? The purpose of this depressing visit was to reflect on my mother’s death. Little did I know I’d be pondering my own.
I took some photographs, then laid the tulips on the grass, placing the envelope from Beth behind them. We both said a few silent prayers, then Peter moved several steps back, the way he always did, to give me some time alone with Mom.29 I stood silently and prayed, but if truth be told, I still felt her spirit much closer in the makeup department at Bloomingdale’s.
On the drive back, my mind ping-ponged between the skeleton in the boat and my name carved into the headstone. I was only seventeen and in perfectly good health; dying seemed ludicrous. However, I had always been superstitious. Maybe these signs pointed to another part of me dying—namely Larry. Maybe betagold was gaining on me, and Larry didn’t have long to live.
As Peter and I drove home in silence, my mind raced. It was too soon to give Larry up. His work wasn’t finished.
Yet.
SERMON #163
Let’s talk today about consuming something a little different, shall we?
How about the feast of celebrities we all dine on?
What are they up to? Who’s getting divorced? Who’s got the eating disorder? Who’s cheating on a spouse?
Eat it up—first by the spoonfuls, then by the wheelbarrows, then by giant Mack trucks filled with gossip and tidbits and CRAP about other people’s lives.
Why are you concerned with people who don’t care one iota about your life? Maybe because you don’t have one …
And while you’re at it, make sure those televisions are going all the time—round-the-clock sitcoms and “infotainment.”
Eat! Stuff yourself! There’s always more. Step right up—your fifteen minutes of fame have arrived! Let us worship YOU! Talk into the microphone, look into the camera—we want to know EVERYTHING about you.
And after we’ve picked your bones clean, we’ll move on to the next victim.
See those skeletons over there? They are all that remain of the celebrities you used to worship. That one on top? He was in one of those boy-bands you tore your hair out over last year.
Such a shame.
Such a waste.
He was such a lovely boy.
Who knows why some things take off? Pet Rocks, Crazy Bones, Hula-Hoops? Who Wants to Be a Millionaire? Sometimes the culture just grabs on to something and pulls. And pulls and pulls and pulls. It makes no sense; there’s no reason for it. If there had been warning signs, maybe I would have noticed.
As Larry continued to post each of his possessions, word of mouth increased. He’s a guy, he wears jeans, he can’t be too old. Or can he be? The chat rooms overflowed with theories. Soon, a cult developed that analyzed each item, building a profile of who Larry might be. I spent as much time planning which item to post as I did on my sermons. Larry’s total hits grew by more than 90 percent each day.
As the school year came to an end, graduation and prom became the only topics of conversation. Since I wasn’t attending either, May should have gone along at a nice, manageable clip. If two things—utterly beyond my control—hadn’t happened.
The first cosmic tweak came from a college freshman named Billy North, at the University of Georgia. According to his Web site, Billy loved to play solitaire, fly remote-controlled airplanes, and surf the Internet. I guess he also liked to manipulate words and letters the way I used to play with the magnetic numbers on my mom’s fridge. Well, he must have had a chunk of free time on his hands, because he printed out all of Larry’s sermons. Then he printed out Larry’s logo, got a pair of scissors, and cut four small rectangles, removing the plug, floppy disk, dove, and planet from inside the peace sign. He took this Larry “stencil” and placed it over each of the sermons. Sure enough, a pattern of words emerged: east, city, water, boy. Billy posted this series of words on Larry’s bulletin board, and suddenly identifying Larry from the hidden clues became all the rage. Kids logged on to analyze the latest sermons with a fervor that hadn’t been seen since people scoured the cover of Abbey Road for clues of Paul’s death.
I tried not to laugh when I read his original message, but when I placed the peace stencil over the sermons myself, I had to admit his theory held some water. Many of the words did point to me. I used one of my other screen names to post this message:
IF LARRY KNOWS ABOUT YOUR WHOLE SYSTEM, THEN IT’S NO GOOD ANYMORE, RIGHT? HE’LL JUST PUT WORDS IN THE WINDOWS THAT LEAD YOU AWAY FROM HIM.—24ME
Billy posted this back:
IT’S A SUBCONSCIOUS THING. LARRY WANTS TO BE FOUND OUT. HE’LL END UP GIVING HIMSELF AWAY. HE CAN’T SUBVERT MY SYSTEM.
Needless to say, I now spent much more time editing my sermons. Instead of just concentrating on the words, I had the architecture of the piece to think about.30 And Billy North was right about one thing; no matter how I tried, the words in the stencil’s window very often described me—young, quirky, reader. I had to fight myself to change them. I hated to admit it but a few times I actually left them in. Maybe Billy was right and
Larry would sabotage his career.
Of course, it was only a matter of time before betagold chimed in with an opinion:
LARRY, YOU CAN’T POSSIBLY THINK I NEED THIS COCKAMAMIE PRAYER WHEEL—OR THOSE PHOTOGRAPHS—TO FIND YOU. I’M GOING TO TRACK YOU DOWN THE OLD-FASHIONED WAY, WITH PURE DETERMINATION. ALL THE CRACK-POTS MIGHT BE HAVING FUN WITH WORDS, BUT REST ASSURED THIS IS NO GAME TO ME.—betagold
Between Billy and his wacked-out theory and betagold’s Lt. Gerard mission, I should’ve quit while I was ahead. There were a dozen reasons to stop, and the rational part of me knew every one verbatim. But the part of me that loved to race down the highway in my car seat, the part whose adrenal glands surged with those fight-or-flight hormones, that part wanted to keep Larry going. Not only wanted to continue but wanted to risk it all and go for broke. As I twirled around in my hammock swing, I knew a boatload of reasons wouldn’t make me stop being Larry. He was the perfect alter ego for a loner like me—outspoken and opinionated. He didn’t need to bury himself in a privacy cocoon, like good old Josh.
The risk was its own reward. So I started working on pseudo ads skewering Benetton and Abercrombie & Fitch. There still was a lot to be done to fight the tsunami of consumerism, and I was sure as hell going to do my share.
You want me, betagold? Come and get me.
The next thing that happened made the whole Billy North thing seem almost normal.
One of Larry’s sermons—the one about the richest nations consuming themselves into oblivion while almost half of the six billion people on the planet live on less than two dollars a day31—had stirred up many discussions in the chat rooms. Larry wrote a follow-up about the World Bank and how it could help Third World countries by forgiving them some of their debt.32 The sermon had been posted weeks ago with not a lot of fanfare.
The Gospel According to Larry Page 4