9:12pm :: "Everything that's keeping us together is falling apart"
Intervention is not always the best choice of action, or just maybe not within the American family unit. Differences never iron themselves out as many say, they just fold further more until the whole thing is cracked, broken and irrepairable. The desert was always looked towards as a place of healing, a relief from the bitterness, and an escape from over-industrialized East. I belive that the desert can heal bodies and minds but not souls. Souls are tired and stubborn, thirsty for relative happiness. In an environment which thursts so much beauty onto an individual at any one time, it is difficult for the soul to see past whatever is in the focal point of the mind's eye: that singular goal for which we all strive for; the true meaning of our lives. Open the windows and let your hair down, allow it to fly wildly around the car in the hot, dry wind.
I'm thinking now that I am actually spiritual, but not in a typical way. I feel that I'm under the influence of a much greater force, something definitely super-human, but not in a tangible or traditionally-spiritual form. I think Nature has been directing me. I feel pulls, silent voices, beckoning. Exploration beyond what I can possibly explore, a horizon far beyond what I can possibly see or even fathom. A world much too blue and beautiful for my own crowded, dark self. We not only need an excuse to wake up each morning, but also to go to sleep each night; otherwise, we would fry ourselves out of our minds, staring out onto the horizon until the blood vessels in our eyes cracked and our bodies shut down.
Despite all of this melarchy that passes through my head, I must re-assert that nothing, absolutely nothing, goes as we have planned, especially if we had had a finite and controlled image for the experience. Nature, and human nature, will not allow it. When these things go wrong, we stare at our feet, watching the pieces fall to the ground.

9:52am :: I seem to remember having a dream last night that I was fixing someone's house. This dream is especially strange to me because I have no ability to fix things, besides fixing them so that they will still be broken. I think I should join a tour to fix lives, get on the bus with Alicia Silverstone and spread the word of pop culture. Bat out of hell.

12:19am :: Something is very interesting and intriguing about cowboys in the snow. Lines of them, wearing semi-identical attire, sitting on indifferent horses amongst each other. There is no snow in this sunken desert, only white people who emerge from trailers wearing shorts and backwards baseball caps in 40-degree weather. I'm not one to make fun. I am toasty in my cage, heated gradually by the residual high-intensity light beams and sealed off somehow from the gradual cooling of the outside. Maybe it was those bao zi that I cooked today.
Tomorrow I suppose I begin a path at ending social isolation with Chinese food. It hasn't really done anything for my creative abilities, so there's no real good reason to maintain it. I am not happier for it, nor I am more depressed or lonely. I find myself eagerly seeking social contact, but somewhat resistant towards it when I actually receive it. Maybe I'm just fucked. This seems to be the simple answer for many things. Maybe I just need more drugs. Why does that sentence sound grammatically incorrect when I say it to myself?
I found myself this morning being abruptly awoken by my alarm clock. I was dreaming, as is evidenced above, and although it wasn't a nightmare in any way, I was very relieved to have been woken up by the alarm. For whatever reason, what I was dreaming about was not overly comfortable to me, and I needed to get out of it. Maybe this is the answer: I'm never comfortable. Maybe I just need to listen to more music. I think that's definitely part of the answer. I also need to spend more time in the desert. I think I should go out tomorrow to Sasco and walk into the desert, not caring where, or for how long, almost as if posessed. Or maybe I'll just go for a bike ride. Maybe I'll sit around drinking beer throughout the morning and take a mid-day nap only to awake in a way that only the afternoon can greet you. Maybe I'll sit at Starbucks for hours in front of my computer, pondering the words I'm writing now. Or maybe I'm just too indecisive.

11:49am :: Christmas is approaching, and the Sonora just gets hotter, day by day, at least in essence and sensibility. I have to type out a passage I read in a book yesterday, which was taken from the journal of Alvar Nuñez Cabeza de Vaca, who wondered the Southwest for 8 years.
"Asked whom they sacrificed to, worshiped, and entreated for rain and health, the Pima Indians replied: a man in Heaven. We asked his name. Aguar. They said they believed he created the whole world and everything in it. How did they know this? Their fathers and grandfathers had told them; it had been passed down from a distant time; the old men knew that Aguar sent rain and all good things. We told them we called this deity they spoke of, Dios, and if they would call Him this and worship Him as we specified, it would go well with them. They replied they understood well and would do as we said. We ordered them to come down from the mountains fearlessly and peacefully, reinhabit the country and rebuild their houses and, among the latter, they should build one for God with a cross placed over the door like the one we had in the room and that, when Christians came among them, they should go to greet them with crosses in their hands instead of bows or other weapons, take them to their houses and feed them, and the Christians would not harm they (sic) but be friends. The Pima told us they would comply."

The Pimas are, of course, a tribe from the surrounding area, living for centuries along the Santa Cruz River in the pueblo which became Tucson. One of the oldest missions in the country was built here: San Xavier del Bac, and it amazes me how quickly the Pimas turned towards Christianity, although I'm sure not all accepted it so willingly and that Cabeza de Vaca's accounts were a little bit one-sided. The ideal Christian story is that Indians were overtaken by the will of God, and were smitten by his presence. They quickly converted to Christianity, renouncing all ties to their previous Pagan ritualistic lifestyle. I'm always bothered by these accounts. Christians often paint it as if Native Americans never had a faith at all, or they demean that faith, insisting that Christianity holds so much more of the truth. I think I should learn to speak Papago, not to communicate, but to understand. I somehow have the impression now that this would be difficult. Enough.

12:10pm :: I just got a call for a "Mr. Forrester" from a woman whom I didn't know. After telling her that she had the wrong number and hanging up, I recalled my pathetic stunt of civil disobediance with the USPS. Apparently they have started selling out information, which shouldn't surprise me, but the lengths that these people go to: obtaining the list, then cross-referencing it with the phone book for a number to go with the address, it just seems so extreme. What's not extreme though? "Your holiday cookies just turn out better."
Sure it's the holidays, but why not be a scrooge all year? Reject all significant dates in an effort to maintain individuality and cynnical indifference. What? The holidays are overrated anyway. This is unimportant though. What is important is the dual threat of my day. I need a chair, one more to complete the circle. It's like those jewels you had to collect in Sonic the Hedgehog, each a different, but equally brilliant color, shimmering while Sonic stood proud with his hands on his hips.

8:10pm :: I think we, as humans, are just sad with our over-zealousness. When I get drunk, I get stupid ideas and get all worked up over them only to find myself tired, and lacking the ambition and mental and physical energy to undertake whatever I had wanted to do. All music sounds good to me and all movies look great to me, but I fall asleep always, and wake up to a soft glow from the tv. These are the memories I have from Asia. I suppose I had to get that senseless alcoholic stupor out of my system at some point or another, but I really wish I would have explored things with a less blind eye. Yeah, hindsight is.... blah blah blah.
I've across the dilemma of Christmas dinner. Actually it will be a Holiday dinner, since we will most likely eat it on Saturday the 28th. All the same, I only have one chair at the moment, and will have to acquire 3 more. I have thought about actually renting a dining room set, or just 3 chairs. I found 2 at the thrift store today for $6 a piece. There were also 3 very nice ones, but they were $35 a piece.

11:17pm :: I feel more relieved than ever that I have finally received a moment's rest from that awful cubicle hell. I still do enjoy leveling-off those men who call up and use terms incorrectly in hope of proving to me that they actually know what they're talking about. One guy tonight spoke of "splitting cookies." I imagine taking a knife to a Chips A'hoy and attempting to cut it into sections like a cake, only to find that the damn thing just splits apart and crumbles. What about Soft Batch? How closely related are Gizmo and the Keebler Elves?

I should never complain, but how can I not? It's supposedly genetic. At the supermarket tonight, instead of the usual cheap wine, I decided to opt for very cheap champagne. Of course, watching "Wayne's World" last night, I do remember that it's not champagne unless it comes from the Champagne region of France. Movies from the early 90's can teach a lot, like how to not make mistakes. I think I'm going to make a movie very soon, and it will include Gizmo for the true, conniving little monster he was. Who's not worthy?

The apartment is warm and the parking hut is cold. The sparkling white wine is warm and the demeanor is cold. The whole thing, meanwhile, reaks of bananas. Bananas may be a pleasant smell when taken into the context of a greater array of scents, but an overwhelming and constant banana scent has the potential to drive the sanest person absolutely mad.
I read quite a bit about Pancho Villa in my book tonight while on the phone with people with ass-slow computers. He is the personification of what I feel is wrong with the West: a glorified myth, brought upon by business interests seeking to increase tourism and the mystique associated with their respective towns. Columbus, New Mexico would be nothing without his image, even though the image which is conveyed by the "historians" there is almost completely false. We have to remain objective, and never take economics over education. It's better to tell gawky tourists the boring truth than send them home to Michigan to tell their cocktail friends the gorey fallacies. Pictures of men hanging from the gallows and speeches by over-zealous, social Darwinists is the real legacy of Pancho Villa: a myth in the most true and absolute sense of the word.

1:27am :: I've decided that I should really just stay up all night, drinking fake champagne and pondering the world outside (it's cold and dark). The mountains stare at me through the darkness, their eyes unmoving, like paintings; dots on a vast horizon. I wonder what everyone else I know is doing right now. Probably sleeping. Who needs sleep when you have alcohol, silence and a pair of big-ass headphones? nevermind, it's sleep time

11:02am :: Now I've got that stare and I'm ready to die (now I've got that stare). I need to spend more time alone. It's gotten to the point on this thing where I just have nothing write. I suppose I've gotten burned out on everything and I need to find something else to do. The newspaper holds promises: a county park service, the City, the Community College, lots of potential but no genuine promises, only text that smears and gets on your fingers. I have ten.
I think I've gotten into a less general malaise, and a more genuine malaise. I eat, but don't really have any concern as to what it is. I sleep, but don't really have any concern as to how long. I travel, but don't really have any concern as to where I go. Life is ending, depending upon how you look at it. Life, for many, ends in their 20's, when they resign themselves to expectations and pressures. Others continue pursuing life, and wind up old men and women who can't stop blabbing about ludicrous experiences they've had, which no longer are interesting to the younger people who are the intended listeners. The men grow beards, and have this dark complexion that appears as though their skin will break off at any minute. The women sit in trailers, occasionally getting into a small, American-made sedan far past its time to visit the Wal-Mart or library. Who knew that the library was such a crux for society? Most of us would rather sit in Barnes and Noble, reading books in order to feel, or appear, much smarter than we really are, while sipping overpriced coffee and generally not understanding the world. I don't understand, neither do these authors. We just all like to think that we do, so that women will look at us and say "ooh, he's deep and troubled." No one's in trouble, some of us are just looking for it. See, nothing to write. Maybe I just need to read more.

10:50pm :: I think "malaise" is a really amazing word. The meaning solely conveys the meaning, but the sound of it seems to convey an artistic quality. "A general malaise." I don't know who wrote that, but it's nice. Hold down your shift key and hit the 5. What happens? Exactly what you and I both expected. Why aren't more songs written about computers when they've practically taken our lives? When is romaticism going to develop from the image of the wide eyes in front of the dim screen like it has with the rain and ocean. I suppose only natural things can be romantic, although car rides are romantic, however little the ride involves the car. Forget the formalities, Jane, we need full-on, frontal nudity in a tasteful, HBO sort of way. Make the parents think about their children and wonder where they are with a Mc Carthyist sort of fear. Who wants Sam's Club pudding?
I looked at car rental today for LA, and I could get a piece of shit for 3 days for $80 and a $60 plane ticket from Phoenix. I could also rent a car in England, and I think I should.

12:08am :: NO mayonnaise. I keep getting messages from girls in Phoenix. I don't understand why people don't read and why they have to be so dense. I suppose I could move to Chandler and get a job as a sanitation engineer. Good pay, but it uses none of my talents, and who am I really helping. I should teach disadvantaged children to play the drums and become introspective, social outcasts so that they grow up reading Miller and hating their upbringing. This is what everyone needs: hate, keeps us alive. Not really though. I don't think we need hate or love, we just a general malaise to keep us in step with everyone else. "I can't connect" says the man in a way which assumes that I give a shit. Sure, if I lost my internet connection, I would go berserk, but this is why I have dial-up and do not planning on leaving it until I can feasibly get a T1 connection. I'm thinking of your wide-open eyes.
The bum at the corner selling newspapers now ignores me. I think with his big cross, he's identified me as a potential heathen and given up hope. I just don't care. I did watch an 'Exorcist' sequel this weekend which featured a priest having part of his face ripped off. It wasn't very realistic: the brain was exposed, but if you ripped off your skin, why would your skull crack as well? The human head is not nearly well-protected enough, and this is why we all should wear helmets, the dorky roller-blading adolescent type of helmets. I think if I became mayor of the world, I would demand this from people, and then legalize pot. These two would sort of balance out I think. I can't believe how long it's been since I've done drugs of any kind. I have nothing against them, and don't feel as though I've "grown out of them," it's just that I never have the opportunity to do any drugs now. I'm more interested in mushrooms than pot though, and these seem to be hard to come-by, and I would not want to buy any from someone whom I didn't know very well, considering all of the potential dangers with that sort of drug. But screw it, I would rather spend my money on trips to Madera Canyon and Garden Herb Triscuits. Where are the hot pockets hiding?

11:20am :: When will this sick experiment in democracy end? The air is clear but the skin is frost-bitten, curling in a purplish-black. The movers and shakers do so in U-Hauls with poorly-packed couches and lamps bouncing around in the back.

9:54pm :: I feel sick. Throat tense, eyes heavy, loss of appetite, inability to focus. Maybe this is just a new way to feel. It may be nice to experience a novel perspective of reality.
Do you use a Swiffer? If you don't, everyone will hate you, if they don't already. I'm reminded randomly of an abandoned house at the bottom of the hill from my house in Tennessee. It had that sort of staned wood color to the walls, rusted roof and general slant that tells you it's old. I asked my mom about it, and she told me it was a historic house, older than our's. It was on the property of another house, and in the path of a road that was never built. I used to stand where that road ended, near my friend's house and look down the hill to that house, wondering what would happen to the house if they built the road. The hill seemed so steep that I didn't see how they could have built a road down it.
There are too many memories from Tennessee, hardly any bad. I think it's the bad childhood memories that bring you into a normal, albeit frustrated, adulthood. When you have something to hide, you're more likely to attempt to assimilate and remain anonymous. Or maybe I'm just being too self-righteous.
I bought some ham today, and it made me ponder the reason ham and turkey from a supermarket deli do not taste like their genuine cousins. Why can't we eat quality meats without cooking an entire animal to do so? I just want a half pound of something, I don't want to rip an enormous

9:59am :: After beating my computer practically senseless, I have realized what the Num Lock key does on laptops. Christmas music at Starbucks has given way to depressing folk rock. Whatever happened to good old American rock n' roll, like the Stones and the Beatles?
Turning left onto River Road today, I came very close to hitting an elderly couple crossing the street. I didn't mean to do it of course, I just did not see them. I have never actually seen anyone cross the street at that intersection, so I don't usually keep an eye out for it. I suppose this is just an unwanted function of complacency. I suppose this is why most accidents happen so close to home: our minds are so comfortable with our environments that they shift into a separate mode, and our eyes begin seeing only what they expect to see. Either way, I am going to look out for people at every intersection here in town now. There are far too many pedestrians here in Tucson. Hasn't anyone ever heard of driving? I thought I was living with a bunch of California refugees? People that have to drive their cars to go one block.
Enjoy this silence. The dust gathers slowly on the small of your back, the top of your head and other places which are hard to reach or see. The dust eventually collapses the tower and we fall as if we were never anything at all. "I am Methusaleh and this is my curse." A good line. Who wants ice cream?
Why is it that our bodies discern pleasure from a shower but discomfort from a rain? I wonder how are physical selves are intended to cope with a lack of immersion in water. After all, our ancestors bathed in the rivers and creeks of the landscape, immersing themselves in the wet wonder of nature in a vain attempt to devolve to a former, much more comfortable water-based state. No thinking, no feeling. No purpose, no design. Who saved room for cream?
I think coffee only tastes good because we force it upon ourselves gradually, just like alcohol. Although, alcohol never really tastes good. Can anyone honestly say that they enjoy tequila? It's like swallowing turpentine, except you're supposed to take it with some lemon and salt, and then it becomes sexual. Let's get drunk and tear off each other's clothes in some vain attempt to reach a mutually agreed upon emotion. I think casual sex is like an unwritten contract, where a misunderstanding can suddenly turn a friend into an enemy. I have had only one friend where sex turned us against each other. This doesn't bother me though. She is there, and I am here, floating, immersed in a warm lagoon, my cells reproducing asexually. No desires, no worries.
Maybe I should go to the front steps of the park service and throw myself at them, demanding a job and refusing to leave until I am given one. Nothing pans out as expected, and although this always floats on the brain, it is tied up and gagged in the trunk, while aspiration and optimism handle the wheel, gabbing about their dreams, threatening the audibly-squirming reality in the back with violence and "or else"'s.
When is Air coming to Arizona? Their last album is a depiction of Monument Valley, of this I am sure. The music encompasses the desert, and reminds me of the Beavis and Butthead movie somewhat, when Beavis trips on peyote and the cacti begin to dance to a bad White Zombie song. Cacti are ridiculously motionless, moving not for the wind nor the storm. The stubborn succulents. That's why a cactus that's dancing is so interesting and is something I would like to see. We like to put those huge saguaros into our own image, with their long arms, broad shoulders and proud postures. That's why I think I am so struck when I see one that has been destroyed by lightning: spawned by a miracle but struck down by a phenomanon. "Whatever! Whatever!" Cacti individually are imperfect, having their own beautiful quirks and fascinating attributes. Collectively, they are perfect though, choosing their own domain and thriving in it.
The field of chollas awaits me. Not only is it 10:30, but it's also the start of new moments, new scenes of life. The camera fades in quickly without introduction, and we the audience are challenged to discern the events and background. Movies are too quick to underestimate our intelligence and analytical abilities. Dancing cacti really does not make you think, it just makes you watch. No underlying purpose, no intentional design.

10:37pm :: 12 hours later, I am mostly satiated and have various tastes on the end of my tongue. Awaiting reflection.

10:58pm :: At the laundromat today, one of the semi-homeless men who frequent the place offered to buy some detergent from me because the machine wasn't working, I just gave it to him for free. This should come back as karma, no?
Big plans tomorrow: drive to Cascabel to hike on the white cliffs, wander through the Autumn-colored woods of the upper San Pedro River, and stroll through the vast field of jumping chollas. Nothing is more exciting to me than a field of jumping chollas. Arizona seems to be a place keen on quelling my obsessions: as soon as I gain one of these insatiable desires to find or do something, Arizona seems to always provide a suitable answer in a timely manner. Why can't everyone be like this? Arizona should teach classes.
I began planning a move to Salt Lake today. This will not happen.
The papers say that the wind is blowing, and those of us who are locked in cages, shrouded by dollar bills, are oblivious. In the end, we just don't know, but always refuse to admit it. It's a strange issue, and I would need to investigate further in order to explain it.
I watched a program on the Methuselah tree tonight: a tree which supposedly exists deep within California's White Mountains, and has been alive for over 4,000 years. California is amazing. Mt. Whitney, the 2nd-highest point in the country, is less than 100 miles from Badwater, the lowest point in the country. How can anyone survive there and not marvel? At least at things such as this, that are so obvious.

I don't believe that I am searching for anything anymore, only attempting to fill my head with images of beauty. Things that are so striking, so awe-inspiring that my mind will just crack. I think if you allow yourself to be drawn in by nature's lure, then you will eventually become so selfless that you renounce all of your humanity. I think nature is like a little boy, letting us out of a jar, watching us scamper around aimlessly, only to stamp us into nothing. Nature, and especially the desert, is for me, something which causes me to jump back into reality.