Nov. 3, 2011 at 3:03pm
ghostbike es gibt nicht viele dinge, die man über sie wissen kann. man weiß, dass sie auf das rad gestiegen ist und es in bewegung gesetzt hat. man weiß, dass sie an einem bestimmten punkt anhalten und absteigen wird. man weiß, dass sie, wenn sie in irgendeinem moment zwischen anfang und ende ihrer fahrt mit ihrer bewegung aufhören würde, herunterfiele. aber vor allem weiß man, dass der luftwiderstand ihr sagte, dass sie lebte. in geschlossenen räumen starrten die menschen auf ihr rechtes bein. aus gewohnheit hatte sie um die hose ein gummiband geschnallt. ein kreis, unter dessen unterem rand der knöchel hervorsah, unter dessen oberem rand der ansatz des unterschenkels, der dann langsam mit dem pressen anfing, stockend. der wind kam ihr entgegen, strich seitlich am rahmen vorbei. am unterrohr, an den unterschenkeln, am sitzrohr, an sitzstrebe und kettenstrebe, an den knien, am oberrohr mit den oberschenkelinnenseiten, an der sattelstütze, am sattel. darauf ihr schambein, das sich jetzt abhob. sie stand auf, stellte sich auf die pedale, pedalkurbel, tretlager, legte ihr körpergewicht gegen den lenker, den oberkörper auf den gestreckten armen abgestützt, schief nach vorne, über die begrenzung, die der lenker vorgab, hinaus, aufgerichtet, auf und ab wippend, ein stoßen, mit dem rechten bein nach unten, in den boden hinein, mit dem linken bein gleichzeitig hoch, es führt den kreis nach hinten weiter, den das rechte bein nach vorne begonnen hat, ein kreis, der auf zwei größeren kreisen, den laufrädern, aufgesetzt ist, vorderrad, nabe, felge, reifen ziehen nach vorne, während sich das hinterrad nach hinten bewegt, abstößt, der schwung erhöht den takt, arme und oberkörper werden unbeweglicher, armspeichen, rumpfspeichen, je schneller die beine auf und abgehen, das atmen fällt in denselben rhythmus, sie duckt sich, macht die augen zu schlitzen, ein beschleunigter körper über einem gestänge, der kanal zieht sich vor ihr hin, sie zieht den rücken lang, kein dach, keine fenster, keine wand vom rad aus, vom rand aus, sie kann sich nebenbei haben, sie kann sich jetzt nebenbei haben, so wie sie ein fahrrad nebenbei haben kann, gleichsam wie aus versehen, kein nummernschild, keine datenrückverfolgung, keine kontrolle, so ist das, das sich nebenbei haben, den wind, den regen, den straßenbelag aussitzen, während sie sich vom praterspitz entfernt und der nußdorfer wehr näher kommt, wer näher kommt, im gleiten, wer kommt mir da nah?  du stehst auf, stehst im hof, das rad zwischen den beinen, bist in eile, ich frag dich, bevor ich versuch, aus deinem blick zu lesen, wie es dir geht, stattdessen, wie ich meinen patschen reparieren kann, du sagst, ruhig, unberührt, zuerst auf das kleinste ritzel schalten, dann die bremse öffnen, damit die bremsbacken weit genug von der felge entfernt sind, mit sanftem druck das schaltwerk nach hinten drücken, das laufrad rausheben, gerade, damit die bremsscheibe keine kratzer in den rahmen macht, ich beug mich, unter deinem blick durch, beug ich mich über das rad, jeden handgriff nach dem anderen, du siehst mir zu, wochenlang, meine hände bemühen sich für den reifen, nicht für dich, damit die backen weit genug von der felge entfernt bleiben, kann ich mich nicht einfach weiter nebenbei haben, wie ich mein fahrrad neben mir haben kann, dann bist du weg, gegangen, wo es doch viel besser geht, zu zweit das laufrad wieder einzubauen, eine zieht an der hinterradbremse, während die andere die schraube festdreht, nein, du stößt die luft zwischen deinen zahnreihen durch, genervt, ich will dich nicht nebenbei haben, warum sonst, du willst wissen warum, ich schweig, warum denn sonst, aus versehen sag ich, aus welchem versehen, aus welchem scheißversehen denn, der weg verengt sich, die kanaleinfassung kommt näher, große betonquader, deren oberfläche uneben ist, vom regen ausgewaschen, dazwischen rillen, gegen deren kante der reifen presst, sich dann erst drüberollt, zweimal dasselbe hineinsacken in die rillen, hinten und vorne und dazwischen den stoßdämpferkörper balancieren, es tut mir leid, hörst du, haltung, anspannung, nicht auf die seite kippen, ins wasser abstürzen, was wäre dann mit dem rad, ich könnte schwimmen, aber schwimmt ein rad, und wenn es von der strömung mitgetragen wird, wo bleibt es hängen, gibt es ein auffanggitter, gibt es ein riesiges auffanggitter am praterspitz fürs am rand fahren, für eine entscheidung, eine notwendigkeit, ich will wissen, wie ich auf das rad gestiegen bin und es in bewegung gesetzt habe und ich will wissen, wie ich an einem bestimmten punkt anhalten und absteigen wollte, und ich will wissen, wie steil eine rampe neben der quaderwand hinaufführt, vom kanal zur lände, und wie das auftauchen nur langsam geht, ich will wissen, wie der schmerz in den oberschenkeln weniger wird, wenn ich an den armspeichen reiße um mich hochzuziehen, ich will wissen, ob du ein fahrrad weiß anstreichen würdest, für mich, ob du es an ein straßenschild  ketten würdest, für mich,  die ampel zeigt grün, das vorderrad gleitet über die gehsteigkante, ein kurzer sprung, ich will wissen, ob ich, wenn ich an irgendeinem punkt zwischen anfang und ende meiner fahrt mit meiner bewegung aufgehört hätte, heruntergefallen  // weißes metall mit schwarzen plastiklüftungsschlitzen von der seite, kalt, brutal, über die ganze länge, sie konnte nicht sagen warum, das rechte bein war ein oberrohr geworden, das oberrohr ein unterrohr, wo das unterrohr hingekommen ist, konnte sie nicht mehr sehen, der oberkörper schon längst weggebogen, dort, wohin das fahrrad gekippt war, was sie wahrscheinlich nicht wissen wollte, so fühlt sich ein lastwagen an, so also fühlt sich ein lastwagen an. es gibt nicht viele dinge, die man über sie wissen kann. 2006 wurde sie an der weissgerberlände am donaukanal bei der siemensbrücke von einem lastwagen erfasst und getötet, als sie bei grün den radübergang auf der lände querte. im juli 2008 wurde an dieser stelle ein weißes ghostbike aufgestellt, das im august 2008 vermutlich von der MA48 wieder entfernt wurde. jedenfalls weiß man nicht, was sonst mit dem ghostbike hätte passiert sein können. http://www.textfeldsuedost.com/wiener-soundspaziergaenge/spaziergang-lesefestwoche-2011/  

ghostbike

es gibt nicht viele dinge, die man über sie wissen kann. man weiß, dass sie auf das rad gestiegen ist und es in bewegung gesetzt hat. man weiß, dass sie an einem bestimmten punkt anhalten und absteigen wird. man weiß, dass sie, wenn sie in irgendeinem moment zwischen anfang und ende ihrer fahrt mit ihrer bewegung aufhören würde, herunterfiele. aber vor allem weiß man, dass der luftwiderstand ihr sagte, dass sie lebte.

in geschlossenen räumen starrten die menschen auf ihr rechtes bein. aus gewohnheit hatte sie um die hose ein gummiband geschnallt. ein kreis, unter dessen unterem rand der knöchel hervorsah, unter dessen oberem rand der ansatz des unterschenkels, der dann langsam mit dem pressen anfing, stockend. der wind kam ihr entgegen, strich seitlich am rahmen vorbei. am unterrohr, an den unterschenkeln, am sitzrohr, an sitzstrebe und kettenstrebe, an den knien, am oberrohr mit den oberschenkelinnenseiten, an der sattelstütze, am sattel. darauf ihr schambein, das sich jetzt abhob. sie stand auf, stellte sich auf die pedale, pedalkurbel, tretlager, legte ihr körpergewicht gegen den lenker, den oberkörper auf den gestreckten armen abgestützt, schief nach vorne, über die begrenzung, die der lenker vorgab, hinaus, aufgerichtet, auf und ab wippend, ein stoßen, mit dem rechten bein nach unten, in den boden hinein, mit dem linken bein gleichzeitig hoch, es führt den kreis nach hinten weiter, den das rechte bein nach vorne begonnen hat, ein kreis, der auf zwei größeren kreisen, den laufrädern, aufgesetzt ist, vorderrad, nabe, felge, reifen ziehen nach vorne, während sich das hinterrad nach hinten bewegt, abstößt, der schwung erhöht den takt, arme und oberkörper werden unbeweglicher, armspeichen, rumpfspeichen, je schneller die beine auf und abgehen, das atmen fällt in denselben rhythmus, sie duckt sich, macht die augen zu schlitzen, ein beschleunigter körper über einem gestänge, der kanal zieht sich vor ihr hin, sie zieht den rücken lang, kein dach, keine fenster, keine wand vom rad aus, vom rand aus, sie kann sich nebenbei haben, sie kann sich jetzt nebenbei haben, so wie sie ein fahrrad nebenbei haben kann, gleichsam wie aus versehen, kein nummernschild, keine datenrückverfolgung, keine kontrolle, so ist das, das sich nebenbei haben, den wind, den regen, den straßenbelag aussitzen, während sie sich vom praterspitz entfernt und der nußdorfer wehr näher kommt, wer näher kommt, im gleiten, wer kommt mir da nah?  du stehst auf, stehst im hof, das rad zwischen den beinen, bist in eile, ich frag dich, bevor ich versuch, aus deinem blick zu lesen, wie es dir geht, stattdessen, wie ich meinen patschen reparieren kann, du sagst, ruhig, unberührt, zuerst auf das kleinste ritzel schalten, dann die bremse öffnen, damit die bremsbacken weit genug von der felge entfernt sind, mit sanftem druck das schaltwerk nach hinten drücken, das laufrad rausheben, gerade, damit die bremsscheibe keine kratzer in den rahmen macht, ich beug mich, unter deinem blick durch, beug ich mich über das rad, jeden handgriff nach dem anderen, du siehst mir zu, wochenlang, meine hände bemühen sich für den reifen, nicht für dich, damit die backen weit genug von der felge entfernt bleiben, kann ich mich nicht einfach weiter nebenbei haben, wie ich mein fahrrad neben mir haben kann, dann bist du weg, gegangen, wo es doch viel besser geht, zu zweit das laufrad wieder einzubauen, eine zieht an der hinterradbremse, während die andere die schraube festdreht, nein, du stößt die luft zwischen deinen zahnreihen durch, genervt, ich will dich nicht nebenbei haben, warum sonst, du willst wissen warum, ich schweig, warum denn sonst, aus versehen sag ich, aus welchem versehen, aus welchem scheißversehen denn, der weg verengt sich, die kanaleinfassung kommt näher, große betonquader, deren oberfläche uneben ist, vom regen ausgewaschen, dazwischen rillen, gegen deren kante der reifen presst, sich dann erst drüberollt, zweimal dasselbe hineinsacken in die rillen, hinten und vorne und dazwischen den stoßdämpferkörper balancieren, es tut mir leid, hörst du, haltung, anspannung, nicht auf die seite kippen, ins wasser abstürzen, was wäre dann mit dem rad, ich könnte schwimmen, aber schwimmt ein rad, und wenn es von der strömung mitgetragen wird, wo bleibt es hängen, gibt es ein auffanggitter, gibt es ein riesiges auffanggitter am praterspitz fürs am rand fahren, für eine entscheidung, eine notwendigkeit, ich will wissen, wie ich auf das rad gestiegen bin und es in bewegung gesetzt habe und ich will wissen, wie ich an einem bestimmten punkt anhalten und absteigen wollte, und ich will wissen, wie steil eine rampe neben der quaderwand hinaufführt, vom kanal zur lände, und wie das auftauchen nur langsam geht, ich will wissen, wie der schmerz in den oberschenkeln weniger wird, wenn ich an den armspeichen reiße um mich hochzuziehen, ich will wissen, ob du ein fahrrad weiß anstreichen würdest, für mich, ob du es an ein straßenschild  ketten würdest, für mich,  die ampel zeigt grün, das vorderrad gleitet über die gehsteigkante, ein kurzer sprung, ich will wissen, ob ich, wenn ich an irgendeinem punkt zwischen anfang und ende meiner fahrt mit meiner bewegung aufgehört hätte, heruntergefallen 

//

weißes metall mit schwarzen plastiklüftungsschlitzen von der seite, kalt, brutal, über die ganze länge, sie konnte nicht sagen warum, das rechte bein war ein oberrohr geworden, das oberrohr ein unterrohr, wo das unterrohr hingekommen ist, konnte sie nicht mehr sehen, der oberkörper schon längst weggebogen, dort, wohin das fahrrad gekippt war, was sie wahrscheinlich nicht wissen wollte, so fühlt sich ein lastwagen an, so also fühlt sich ein lastwagen an.

es gibt nicht viele dinge, die man über sie wissen kann. 2006 wurde sie an der weissgerberlände am donaukanal bei der siemensbrücke von einem lastwagen erfasst und getötet, als sie bei grün den radübergang auf der lände querte. im juli 2008 wurde an dieser stelle ein weißes ghostbike aufgestellt, das im august 2008 vermutlich von der MA48 wieder entfernt wurde. jedenfalls weiß man nicht, was sonst mit dem ghostbike hätte passiert sein können.

http://www.textfeldsuedost.com/wiener-soundspaziergaenge/spaziergang-lesefestwoche-2011/


 

Sep. 2, 2011 at 5:35pm with 1 note
  in memoriam claudia dietl  19. juli 2011 das handy plärrt, ich geh nicht hin wieder ein sommer, in dem ich mich frag, was ich bin was ich sein will oder sein kann / gundulas stimme dann doch reisst mich raus, aus meinem sommersportwahn, ein trainingsloch was is passiert? ich hör halb zu, greif zum kühlschrank, mein bier / ich stell fragen, hink hinterher, was is passiert? / ich war doch hier   die zigarette brennt, bin eine, die durch die wohnung rennt nie geht, nie steht, keine ahnung wohin, ich bin schneller dort du warst wichtig für mich, da, am rand von meinem zappeln, an deinem ort das einzige foto, das ich hab, ist ceijas rücken, daneben ein rücken von dir auf meinem blog die fischsuppe und wir da hab ich dich das letzte mal gesehn so nah warn wir uns nie, dassd was erzählt hast von dir / hab nur geredet von mir hielt wacklig das handy davor, was hab ich gedacht? jetzt denk ich ich hätt gern mehr mit dir gemacht   seit tagen krieg ich keine ruh hab die andern noch nicht verdaut in mir wurlts, großmutter, vater, onkel, jetzt du ich wein, denk nach, jogg den kanal entlang mit gewalt / leben halt das, was du schreibst, widerspricht deinem letzten schritt eine, an der ich mich orientiert hab / ich komm nicht mit   wir stapeln kisten keine sagt ein wort deine wohnung wirkt schwer ich pack bücher ein, was soll ich sonst tun an dem ort dieser freitag bleibt leer brille und buch hast auf den tisch draußen hingelegt mit klebeband die fensterrahmen zugeklebt ich schlag die seiten auf, sammel die wörter ein nur deine räucherstäbchen, die kriechen rein gramsci, haug, foucault riechen nach dir wien 2,  deponie / metall, glas, restmüll sind hier container 5 holz, container 3 altpapier der platzmeister winkt uns als damen heran wir fahrn mit dem laster die kübel fast zam er fuchtelt bettüberzug, donau, brief, juli, zuviel tabletten, gas, klebeband, campingmobil was fang ich jetzt mit deinen zeichen an?

  in memoriam claudia dietl

 19. juli 2011


das handy plärrt, ich geh nicht hin

wieder ein sommer, in dem ich mich frag, was ich bin

was ich sein will oder sein kann / gundulas stimme dann doch

reisst mich raus, aus meinem sommersportwahn, ein trainingsloch

was is passiert? ich hör halb zu, greif zum kühlschrank, mein bier /

ich stell fragen, hink hinterher, was is passiert? / ich war doch hier

 

die zigarette brennt, bin eine, die durch die wohnung rennt

nie geht, nie steht, keine ahnung wohin, ich bin schneller dort

du warst wichtig für mich, da, am rand von meinem zappeln, an deinem ort

das einzige foto, das ich hab, ist ceijas rücken, daneben ein rücken von dir

auf meinem blog die fischsuppe und wir

da hab ich dich das letzte mal gesehn

so nah warn wir uns nie, dassd was erzählt hast von dir

/ hab nur geredet von mir

hielt wacklig das handy davor, was hab ich gedacht?

jetzt denk ich ich hätt gern mehr mit dir gemacht

 

seit tagen krieg ich keine ruh

hab die andern noch nicht verdaut

in mir wurlts, großmutter, vater, onkel, jetzt du

ich wein, denk nach, jogg den kanal entlang mit gewalt

/ leben halt

das, was du schreibst, widerspricht deinem letzten schritt

eine, an der ich mich orientiert hab / ich komm nicht mit

 

wir stapeln kisten keine sagt ein wort

deine wohnung wirkt schwer

ich pack bücher ein, was soll ich sonst tun an dem ort

dieser freitag bleibt leer

brille und buch hast auf den tisch draußen hingelegt

mit klebeband die fensterrahmen zugeklebt

ich schlag die seiten auf, sammel die wörter ein

nur deine räucherstäbchen, die kriechen rein

gramsci, haug, foucault riechen nach dir

wien 2,  deponie / metall, glas, restmüll sind hier

container 5 holz, container 3 altpapier

der platzmeister winkt uns als damen heran

wir fahrn mit dem laster die kübel fast zam

er fuchtelt bettüberzug, donau, brief, juli, zuviel

tabletten, gas, klebeband, campingmobil

was fang ich jetzt mit deinen zeichen an?

Apr. 24, 2011 at 3:24pm with 5 notes
What you did matters. Or, The Girl With The Number Tattoo  #8  (fertig for now) Adam. There he was, Adam, finally. He could feel that Adam was coming, that he slowly emerged from that somewhat cocoon in which he had hidden himself. Let’s make it beautiful. There was a list of demands, he didn’t know where to start. A laugh on everyone’s face in the metro. Better education to everyone there, probably rather sociology than history, or maybe just some new brains. No more justifications. A portion of desire mixed with irony. A dancefloor full of handsome young boys in their underwear. That would please him at least. Just for the pleasure of watching. A governmental decision to put a low dosis of cocaine into the water supply pipes, so that everyone could feel a little bit more relaxed. And selfconscious. Adam wanted to hug everyone, not in the way he usually did, to seem open in preventing ackward silences. He really wanted to hug. He felt the power to channel his imagination into something else than ever-soaring levels of suspicion. He could feel Marguerite’s presence in the room. That was so much better than the presence of massmurder. It has been worth waiting. There was no need to spoil the excitement now by thinking of the exhausting work a relationship would require. If there would be a relationship. But why shouldn’t it tend this way. At least he could imagine things turn out that way. It felt like a century. But now he was ready. At least to start with a dog or a cat. And there it went, as Marguerite hadn’t want it to be. Another Monday morning, she was late, not that there had been a time she was expected to be in, how could they survey everyone? Though, there were cameras outside of the building, controlling security guards who controlled the entrances, there were cameras in the elevator, controlling all of the people who wanted to see the library, there was a warning, every time she turned on her computer, that she entered an official network that would censor any page she would like to see, a network that didn’t allow her to see any page containing the words that were the most significant to her. To her work. To her life, to be more specific, although that tended to become inseparable, sex, porn, gay or transsexual. At least no one complained about her self made schedule. But for her it counted. She couldn’t stand herself being late, in her own, quite neat structure.  There’s no perfection you could expect from others. And besides all of the efforts she took to get rid of this selfcementing habit, it still was better to stick to a strangling structure than to step into chaos. Adam. Adam ment chaos. It wasn’t his fault at all, but why not blaming him. That way it was easier to think about the whole thing. She should have known it. Especially because she usually mastered the Marguerite security warning: Consequences of every action you take are inappropriate to the action. Therefore it’s not the action that you should erase. But the consequences. So that all future occurences can still be monitored and reported. To make sure under any circumstances that they fit in what you think of them. Marguerite assumed full responsibility for her actions, except the ones that were someone else’s fault. There was no doubt that it was Adam’s fault. Wasn’t he the one pushing the whole thing in turning unpredictable? Now that she was late, it would be even harder to combat her memories’s sneak attacks of what had happened on the Sunday afternoon sofa. There it was. It has been evening, not afternoon, and it was on the bed, not on the sofa. How much energy would it cost her to reinstall the grounding feeling that it was Monday, that she was supposed to think in her straight forward, brilliant way. Lost energy, wasted to not losing herself in waves of craving. That was ridiculous. She had taken a shower, she had washed her hands a dozen of times, she had used hand soap, she had washed the dishes, she had used a body lotion. There was still his smell, on her hands. No, the fact that really was ridiculous:  it was Adam controlling her craving. No one was speaking about Ethan anymore. By doing the memorial service, everything that was supposed to be done was done. Life went back to its routines. There were two weeks left, until everyone she knew here would head to a different direction. She wasn’t good in saying goodbye. She never showed other people what was really going on in her, although sometimes emotional outragings made their way through her shyness. But then it felt more like an overwhelming, inappropriate outbreak, people usually reacted confused, unprepared of this sudden change of interaction. With dead people it was easier. That’s what Deidre liked about them. It had happened right before the memorial service. And it was nothing Deidre had expected to happen. Or she thought to be over that a long time ago. But Ethan offered her a cigarette. Lying there, on the floor, under her desk, knowing exactly that this was a way to get her. Deidre had quit smoking some time ago, or rather at some point she had decided that it was mistaking selfdestruction for passion that led her to this obsessive pattern. But what happened was just that the passion was gone. Not her fear of dying. Nor her desire for selfdestruction. She inhaled the smoke, she had to cough, like at high school, in the mornings, hiding in the back yard, looking for the music teacher she had had a crush on, she couldn’t believe she was telling this Ethan right now, but Ethan laughed. It must have been that feeling of intimacy that encouraged her to go on. what do you regret? what makes you think that i regret something? well, you’re dead. it’s not that bad. no? First it was spooky, but more than that, it was a relief, when he started to talk. Deidre noticed that it was the first time that she heard his voice. at least I don’t have to regret anymore. that’s tautologic. it isn’t.       but you repeated the word. i didn’t. you did. you seem to be quite judgemental. there’s nothing wrong with that. it’s cold. it’s not. it’s being wit. see? wit is judgement. you sound like this Eiserne Granathand guy. you mean that chubby Thompson? if this is his name. i’m not like him. anyway. Granathand fits better. Marguerite came up with it. so she’s wit. maybe. for sure he isn’t. there seems to be no more judgemental person than you. why do you want me to feel ashamed? i don’t. you did. you picked me. i didn’t. but you were lying under my desk. coincidence. there’s no such concept. you don’t believe in coincidences? no, i do. see. i just fell down there. but why mine? what do you expect to hear? i expect nothing. i just want you to tell me why. why? we’re stuck. no. so you tell me why? i can’t. why not? it’s your requiem. you have to know. what do i have to know? why it makes you feel bad. i’m not ashamed. why do you insist on that? your first word was regret. so what? so you regret to be the one who was there. what makes you think everything is centered around you? that’s archetypical for my gender. great. you shouldn’t feel ashamed. guess that’s archetypical too? no. stop telling me how i should fucking feel. see? gosh. no, i don’t wanna have another cigarette? no. are you mad at me? why should i be? you tell. because you are mad at me. you owe me nothing. so why would i be mad at you? because you owe me. i’m dead. how can i owe anyone anything? you left me with this strange feeling. stop looking for a meaning in every stupid thing. but i have to understand. there’s nothing to understand. what are you? a twentysomething explaining me how things work. it’s not my fault that it was your desk. you could have picked someone else. i told you i didn’t pick you. it’s annoying to talk to you. you repeat everything i say. so why do you talk to me then? to get things done. everything is done. no. i haven’t even started. you can’t anticipate everything only to feel safe. allow yourself some goddam spontaneity.  

What you did matters. Or, The Girl With The Number Tattoo  #8  (fertig for now)

Adam. There he was, Adam, finally. He could feel that Adam was coming, that he slowly emerged from that somewhat cocoon in which he had hidden himself. Let’s make it beautiful. There was a list of demands, he didn’t know where to start. A laugh on everyone’s face in the metro. Better education to everyone there, probably rather sociology than history, or maybe just some new brains. No more justifications. A portion of desire mixed with irony. A dancefloor full of handsome young boys in their underwear. That would please him at least. Just for the pleasure of watching. A governmental decision to put a low dosis of cocaine into the water supply pipes, so that everyone could feel a little bit more relaxed. And selfconscious. Adam wanted to hug everyone, not in the way he usually did, to seem open in preventing ackward silences. He really wanted to hug. He felt the power to channel his imagination into something else than ever-soaring levels of suspicion. He could feel Marguerite’s presence in the room. That was so much better than the presence of massmurder. It has been worth waiting. There was no need to spoil the excitement now by thinking of the exhausting work a relationship would require. If there would be a relationship. But why shouldn’t it tend this way. At least he could imagine things turn out that way. It felt like a century. But now he was ready. At least to start with a dog or a cat.

And there it went, as Marguerite hadn’t want it to be. Another Monday morning, she was late, not that there had been a time she was expected to be in, how could they survey everyone? Though, there were cameras outside of the building, controlling security guards who controlled the entrances, there were cameras in the elevator, controlling all of the people who wanted to see the library, there was a warning, every time she turned on her computer, that she entered an official network that would censor any page she would like to see, a network that didn’t allow her to see any page containing the words that were the most significant to her. To her work. To her life, to be more specific, although that tended to become inseparable, sex, porn, gay or transsexual. At least no one complained about her self made schedule. But for her it counted. She couldn’t stand herself being late, in her own, quite neat structure.  There’s no perfection you could expect from others. And besides all of the efforts she took to get rid of this selfcementing habit, it still was better to stick to a strangling structure than to step into chaos. Adam. Adam ment chaos. It wasn’t his fault at all, but why not blaming him. That way it was easier to think about the whole thing. She should have known it. Especially because she usually mastered the Marguerite security warning:

Consequences of every action you take are inappropriate to the action. Therefore it’s not the action that you should erase. But the consequences. So that all future occurences can still be monitored and reported. To make sure under any circumstances that they fit in what you think of them.

Marguerite assumed full responsibility for her actions, except the ones that were someone else’s fault. There was no doubt that it was Adam’s fault. Wasn’t he the one pushing the whole thing in turning unpredictable? Now that she was late, it would be even harder to combat her memories’s sneak attacks of what had happened on the Sunday afternoon sofa. There it was. It has been evening, not afternoon, and it was on the bed, not on the sofa. How much energy would it cost her to reinstall the grounding feeling that it was Monday, that she was supposed to think in her straight forward, brilliant way. Lost energy, wasted to not losing herself in waves of craving. That was ridiculous. She had taken a shower, she had washed her hands a dozen of times, she had used hand soap, she had washed the dishes, she had used a body lotion. There was still his smell, on her hands. No, the fact that really was ridiculous:  it was Adam controlling her craving.

No one was speaking about Ethan anymore. By doing the memorial service, everything that was supposed to be done was done. Life went back to its routines. There were two weeks left, until everyone she knew here would head to a different direction. She wasn’t good in saying goodbye. She never showed other people what was really going on in her, although sometimes emotional outragings made their way through her shyness. But then it felt more like an overwhelming, inappropriate outbreak, people usually reacted confused, unprepared of this sudden change of interaction. With dead people it was easier. That’s what Deidre liked about them. It had happened right before the memorial service. And it was nothing Deidre had expected to happen. Or she thought to be over that a long time ago. But Ethan offered her a cigarette. Lying there, on the floor, under her desk, knowing exactly that this was a way to get her. Deidre had quit smoking some time ago, or rather at some point she had decided that it was mistaking selfdestruction for passion that led her to this obsessive pattern. But what happened was just that the passion was gone. Not her fear of dying. Nor her desire for selfdestruction. She inhaled the smoke, she had to cough, like at high school, in the mornings, hiding in the back yard, looking for the music teacher she had had a crush on, she couldn’t believe she was telling this Ethan right now, but Ethan laughed. It must have been that feeling of intimacy that encouraged her to go on.

what do you regret?

what makes you think that i regret something?

well, you’re dead.

it’s not that bad.

no?

First it was spooky, but more than that, it was a relief, when he started to talk. Deidre noticed that it was the first time that she heard his voice.

at least I don’t have to regret anymore.

that’s tautologic.

it isn’t.      

but you repeated the word.

i didn’t.

you did.

you seem to be quite judgemental.

there’s nothing wrong with that.

it’s cold.

it’s not. it’s being wit.

see?

wit is judgement.

you sound like this Eiserne Granathand guy.

you mean that chubby Thompson?

if this is his name.

i’m not like him.

anyway. Granathand fits better.

Marguerite came up with it.

so she’s wit.

maybe. for sure he isn’t.

there seems to be no more judgemental person than you.

why do you want me to feel ashamed?

i don’t.

you did. you picked me.

i didn’t.

but you were lying under my desk.

coincidence.

there’s no such concept.

you don’t believe in coincidences?

no, i do.

see. i just fell down there.

but why mine?

what do you expect to hear?

i expect nothing. i just want you to tell me why.

why?

we’re stuck.

no.

so you tell me why?

i can’t.

why not?

it’s your requiem. you have to know.

what do i have to know?

why it makes you feel bad.

i’m not ashamed. why do you insist on that?

your first word was regret.

so what?

so you regret to be the one who was there.

what makes you think everything is centered around you?

that’s archetypical for my gender.

great.

you shouldn’t feel ashamed.

guess that’s archetypical too?

no.

stop telling me how i should fucking feel.

see?

gosh. no, i don’t

wanna have another cigarette?

no.

are you mad at me?

why should i be?

you tell.

because you are mad at me.

you owe me nothing. so why would i be mad at you?

because you owe me.

i’m dead. how can i owe anyone anything?

you left me with this strange feeling.

stop looking for a meaning in every stupid thing.

but i have to understand.

there’s nothing to understand.

what are you? a twentysomething explaining me how things work.

it’s not my fault that it was your desk.

you could have picked someone else.

i told you i didn’t pick you.

it’s annoying to talk to you. you repeat everything i say.

so why do you talk to me then?

to get things done.

everything is done.

no. i haven’t even started.

you can’t anticipate everything only to feel safe. allow yourself some goddam spontaneity.

 

Mar. 28, 2011 at 3:28pm
What you did matters. Or, The Girl With The Number Tattoo  #7 By the time she reached the Center, she was wet like a street dog, her hair damp and shapeless, her make-up free face pale white, lips pursed together. She marched into her cubicle, pulled of the wet jacket and sweater, took out an old, but warm fleece coat, switched on her macbook which had been patiently waiting for her in the shelf. The look at the beautiful, reliable machine relaxed her somewhat: things worked, after some work, all would be in place again. She reached further in her shelf, retrieved a box of earl grey tea-bags from Hudson Bay and a dark chocolate bar, and then headed for the kitchen, cooking herself a thermos bottle of tea. She stood by the ever-lasting electric kettle, eyes tightly closed, concentrating on the Roma article, thinking hard of the line of inquiry. This is when the door opened and a plump shape walked in, giving off a vague feeling of self-emmersed laughter. Thompson has been there since 7am; his advisor told him he would like to see the third chapter soon, and Thompson understood it as an invitation to cancel his coy flirt with the morning jogging, and now was spending twelve hours a day in his carrel. He updated his facebook status to “Lettische Waffen-SS Einheit  Eiserne Granathand & me, as of February 1943”, and told his mother in Idaho that the next time she could call him was on December 23. He was a PhD student of Dennis Clark, the most famous Holocaust scholar in the world, and the fact that Clark himself condescended to supervise him, was both a lasting self-confirmation, but also a source of pressure, too. If it needed him to be even more serious, even more dedicated, to read longer, to go through more and longer materials, and to criticize other people’s work farther — he would do it. He would do anything to prove the world, and himself, that he was a serious scholar and a great human being, with an understated, and yet refined, sense of humor. Take this young woman from Quebec, wasn’t she a sociologist? Marguerite — she could very well use his insights. It is only historians who do proper empirical research — he was very skeptical of abstract sociological theories, just as Professor Clark stressed in his classes — he would need to sit down with this Marguerite and explain it to her. She seemed nice enough, though, and if he would take the time to explain to her the importance of his work, she could certainly learn. Just between you and me: she was very good looking. Of course, he didn’t appreciate these overly made-up women, who smelled far from perfume and wore short skirts, whose one pair of shoes would pay his mother’s year worth of restaurant checks. On the other hand, there was undeniably something about Marguerite — she was still quite young, and somehow delicate and fragile. He wanted to protect her, take her home with him to his parent’s farm, have her eat decent food, fried eggs and ham, wear a nice warm long wind jacket.  There was a time in the life of every great researcher to find himself a female companion, and as he thought about it, he would certainly have enough stature to afford a more, to say, experimental partner, a political scientist, even a foreigner. Though Marguerite, as far as foreigners went, spoke English really well; much better than the Slovak twins, who picked a fight with him the other day, when he wanted to explain to them why James Waller is the new pope of extreme violence research. Chopping the English grammar to pieces, rolling each R, gutturaling their Hs, they told him quite clearly that they neither did respect Waller, nore him, nor —- the worst! — Professor Clark’s penultimative book. It was a sad world, and Thompson felt yet again very lonely in his struggle for establishing the truth and historical events, as they really happened. Marguerite turns around, disturbed from her train of thought and sees a figure, one of those awfully looking awkward young guys from the weekly presentations, all red-cheeked and constantly overperspirating. She is focused on her essay and draws a blank on the identity of the person in front of her, and so she casts her eyes low and growls hi. She wills the water to cook. Thompson’s thoughts return to Marguerite. How pretty she was, now, her hair all wet, and in a sensible warm fleece jacket! and how pale. Did she sleep well? Perhaps she was sick? Perhaps she felt lonely? Women, after all, are so much more emotional creatures, and cannot hold to the pressure of the drastic academic life as well as men — not to speak of the haunting topic of the Holocaust. He was strong, and wouldn’t let the topic get under his skin, but a soft female — it must be taxing on her. Probably she was overwhelmed with all the senseless dying. He still remembered a class hysterically crying undergrads he had to TA in his first term. It was only understandable she was upset. He would help her. Are you ok? he says and reaches out to pat her shoulder — you look so pale today — did you sleep ok? Marguerite jumps back. That’s all she needed! Now this creature is trying to touch her. This is what you have when you creep out from your comfort zone — the jackals start descending on you, and the losers. She needs to draw a line between her world, and theirs. Thank you very much, I am excellent, she says as icily as she only can. I didn’t sleep much tonight indeed, but for the best reasons, if you understand, she adds, pouring the finally boiling water into her thermos bottle, is angry, almost spoils it on her left hand, leaves poodle of hot water on the desk, and leaves with decisive steps the gloomy kitchen. Thompson stands back, wonders what she meant to say, decided that it’s a quirk of her English, pours himself more of the tasteless filter coffee and goes back to his carrel, where, in a swirl of inspiration, writes down the two and half pages describing the massacre of Keringa. Marguerite is very angry when she sits down in front of her laptop, so angry that she types into her skype status don’t talk to me and switched her status to unavailable, and starts outlining the essay’s structure. Three hours later, she is well into the third page, the chocolate bar is almost finished, as is the thermos bottle. Now it’s a good time to call her head of department and explain to him why she shouldn’t be the undergraduate administrator. She hisses to her neighbor, Michelle, I need to make this call, Michelle saintly and somewhat absent-mindedly nods, and so Marguerite dials 9-1 (the Museum’s phone system treated Canada as an annexed territory, but at least it was less hassle with the pre-dialing) and starts talking to Jean-Pierre. Some ten minutes later, she is talking her head off and rubbing her neck in concentration, the door opens, and there stands Adam, looking more like a puppy than she has ever seen a man. Marguerite scribbles on a stick-in my department — I will come by after, taps on his belly, and shoves him gently away. Adam walks away, clutching the yellow note. Eventually, she talks the old fox of her chair from assigning her administrative tasks, takes out her compact and a lipstick she was keeping up in the shelf as an iron reserve, does a reasonable job of covering up the dark circles and adding red cheeks, and walks over to Adam’s windowless office. Ah, Rachel, I think Martin Rapoport was asking for you, I was just in the main office, she throws at Adam’s office neighbor, who picks up her notebook and runs away. Marguerite sits down in her chair, smiles brightly, and says to Adam, who looks like a child visiting a dentist, his face an only question: That was fun yesterday! We should hang out more often, don’t you think?, and with very little ado, she invites herself for Sunday evening for dinner at his place. Sunday noon, Marguerite reclines at home at her sofa, wearing a silk kimono, her hair in a towel with a hair mask; she put on Mozart’s Entführung aus dem Serail, and is now reading the Sunday Times. Yesterday was fun, she was at dinner with the Canadian cultural attaché, with whose son she studied at the EHESS; his wife made her favorite glazé caramelized apples. Later on, she will call her mother, as she does every Sunday, who updates her about her cousin’s Cécile divorce woes. She eats a pink grapefruit. She enjoys being alone, all by herself; all was neatly organized, and she could quitely think matters around her. Take this Adam: she wouldn’t allow herself grow all emotional and sentimental. She had a reputation to stand up to. She walks over to her book shelf, and takes the annotated Oxford third edition of Richard III — she sometimes used it in her Poli Scie 101. Here it went: Was ever woman in this humor woo’d? Was ever woman in this humor won? I’ll have her, but I will not keep her long. Amused, she goes to her bedroom, puts on the pretty light green La Perla lingerie and looks at herself in the mirror: very slender, with small breasts and pearl-white skin, all nicely shaped. She is very beautiful, she thinks, and is pleased. She probably is the prettiest thing Adam will ever touch in his life. Over dinner, she chats amusing stories from her Québec childhood, about her many cousins, aunts and uncles, she gesticulates and is very vivacious, asks for a second helping, and drinks quickly. Adam is in awe of her, and happy like a child (alone he didn’t have a happy childhood, so it is not a good comparison). Eventually she exclaims Why don’t you show me the rest of your place? pulls him behind herself, and goes for the door where she rightly assumes the bedroom is. It is somewhat chilly and small, there is a Vasarely poster on the wall, and on the night stand Ryszard Kapuściński’s Travels with Herodotus together with a box of night dragee sweets. Marguerite pushes Adam on the bed and holds his mouth [THE CYBER SECURITY WARNING: the following content is inappropriate and was erased. All future occurences will be monitored and reported to the Tech Help] Eventually, she loosens the strap of the robe, and lets him go. She is still breathless, her chest quickly raises and drops, and although it is still cold in the room, she is covered in sweat, as she lies down. Adam lies besides, rubbing his wrists. By the time blood returns to his arms, he strokes Marguerite’s belly, but by then he finds her sound asleep.

What you did matters. Or, The Girl With The Number Tattoo  #7

By the time she reached the Center, she was wet like a street dog, her hair damp and shapeless, her make-up free face pale white, lips pursed together. She marched into her cubicle, pulled of the wet jacket and sweater, took out an old, but warm fleece coat, switched on her macbook which had been patiently waiting for her in the shelf. The look at the beautiful, reliable machine relaxed her somewhat: things worked, after some work, all would be in place again. She reached further in her shelf, retrieved a box of earl grey tea-bags from Hudson Bay and a dark chocolate bar, and then headed for the kitchen, cooking herself a thermos bottle of tea. She stood by the ever-lasting electric kettle, eyes tightly closed, concentrating on the Roma article, thinking hard of the line of inquiry. This is when the door opened and a plump shape walked in, giving off a vague feeling of self-emmersed laughter. Thompson has been there since 7am; his advisor told him he would like to see the third chapter soon, and Thompson understood it as an invitation to cancel his coy flirt with the morning jogging, and now was spending twelve hours a day in his carrel. He updated his facebook status to “Lettische Waffen-SS Einheit  Eiserne Granathand & me, as of February 1943”, and told his mother in Idaho that the next time she could call him was on December 23. He was a PhD student of Dennis Clark, the most famous Holocaust scholar in the world, and the fact that Clark himself condescended to supervise him, was both a lasting self-confirmation, but also a source of pressure, too. If it needed him to be even more serious, even more dedicated, to read longer, to go through more and longer materials, and to criticize other people’s work farther — he would do it. He would do anything to prove the world, and himself, that he was a serious scholar and a great human being, with an understated, and yet refined, sense of humor. Take this young woman from Quebec, wasn’t she a sociologist? Marguerite — she could very well use his insights. It is only historians who do proper empirical research — he was very skeptical of abstract sociological theories, just as Professor Clark stressed in his classes — he would need to sit down with this Marguerite and explain it to her. She seemed nice enough, though, and if he would take the time to explain to her the importance of his work, she could certainly learn. Just between you and me: she was very good looking. Of course, he didn’t appreciate these overly made-up women, who smelled far from perfume and wore short skirts, whose one pair of shoes would pay his mother’s year worth of restaurant checks. On the other hand, there was undeniably something about Marguerite — she was still quite young, and somehow delicate and fragile. He wanted to protect her, take her home with him to his parent’s farm, have her eat decent food, fried eggs and ham, wear a nice warm long wind jacket.  There was a time in the life of every great researcher to find himself a female companion, and as he thought about it, he would certainly have enough stature to afford a more, to say, experimental partner, a political scientist, even a foreigner. Though Marguerite, as far as foreigners went, spoke English really well; much better than the Slovak twins, who picked a fight with him the other day, when he wanted to explain to them why James Waller is the new pope of extreme violence research. Chopping the English grammar to pieces, rolling each R, gutturaling their Hs, they told him quite clearly that they neither did respect Waller, nore him, nor —- the worst! — Professor Clark’s penultimative book. It was a sad world, and Thompson felt yet again very lonely in his struggle for establishing the truth and historical events, as they really happened.

Marguerite turns around, disturbed from her train of thought and sees a figure, one of those awfully looking awkward young guys from the weekly presentations, all red-cheeked and constantly overperspirating. She is focused on her essay and draws a blank on the identity of the person in front of her, and so she casts her eyes low and growls hi. She wills the water to cook.

Thompson’s thoughts return to Marguerite. How pretty she was, now, her hair all wet, and in a sensible warm fleece jacket! and how pale. Did she sleep well? Perhaps she was sick? Perhaps she felt lonely? Women, after all, are so much more emotional creatures, and cannot hold to the pressure of the drastic academic life as well as men — not to speak of the haunting topic of the Holocaust. He was strong, and wouldn’t let the topic get under his skin, but a soft female — it must be taxing on her. Probably she was overwhelmed with all the senseless dying. He still remembered a class hysterically crying undergrads he had to TA in his first term. It was only understandable she was upset. He would help her.

Are you ok? he says and reaches out to pat her shoulder — you look so pale today — did you sleep ok?

Marguerite jumps back. That’s all she needed! Now this creature is trying to touch her. This is what you have when you creep out from your comfort zone — the jackals start descending on you, and the losers. She needs to draw a line between her world, and theirs.

Thank you very much, I am excellent, she says as icily as she only can. I didn’t sleep much tonight indeed, but for the best reasons, if you understand, she adds, pouring the finally boiling water into her thermos bottle, is angry, almost spoils it on her left hand, leaves poodle of hot water on the desk, and leaves with decisive steps the gloomy kitchen. Thompson stands back, wonders what she meant to say, decided that it’s a quirk of her English, pours himself more of the tasteless filter coffee and goes back to his carrel, where, in a swirl of inspiration, writes down the two and half pages describing the massacre of Keringa.

Marguerite is very angry when she sits down in front of her laptop, so angry that she types into her skype status don’t talk to me and switched her status to unavailable, and starts outlining the essay’s structure. Three hours later, she is well into the third page, the chocolate bar is almost finished, as is the thermos bottle. Now it’s a good time to call her head of department and explain to him why she shouldn’t be the undergraduate administrator. She hisses to her neighbor, Michelle, I need to make this call, Michelle saintly and somewhat absent-mindedly nods, and so Marguerite dials 9-1 (the Museum’s phone system treated Canada as an annexed territory, but at least it was less hassle with the pre-dialing) and starts talking to Jean-Pierre.

Some ten minutes later, she is talking her head off and rubbing her neck in concentration, the door opens, and there stands Adam, looking more like a puppy than she has ever seen a man. Marguerite scribbles on a stick-in my department — I will come by after, taps on his belly, and shoves him gently away. Adam walks away, clutching the yellow note. Eventually, she talks the old fox of her chair from assigning her administrative tasks, takes out her compact and a lipstick she was keeping up in the shelf as an iron reserve, does a reasonable job of covering up the dark circles and adding red cheeks, and walks over to Adam’s windowless office.

Ah, Rachel, I think Martin Rapoport was asking for you, I was just in the main office, she throws at Adam’s office neighbor, who picks up her notebook and runs away. Marguerite sits down in her chair, smiles brightly, and says to Adam, who looks like a child visiting a dentist, his face an only question:

That was fun yesterday! We should hang out more often, don’t you think?, and with very little ado, she invites herself for Sunday evening for dinner at his place.

Sunday noon, Marguerite reclines at home at her sofa, wearing a silk kimono, her hair in a towel with a hair mask; she put on Mozart’s Entführung aus dem Serail, and is now reading the Sunday Times. Yesterday was fun, she was at dinner with the Canadian cultural attaché, with whose son she studied at the EHESS; his wife made her favorite glazé caramelized apples. Later on, she will call her mother, as she does every Sunday, who updates her about her cousin’s Cécile divorce woes. She eats a pink grapefruit. She enjoys being alone, all by herself; all was neatly organized, and she could quitely think matters around her. Take this Adam: she wouldn’t allow herself grow all emotional and sentimental. She had a reputation to stand up to. She walks over to her book shelf, and takes the annotated Oxford third edition of Richard III — she sometimes used it in her Poli Scie 101. Here it went:

Was ever woman in this humor woo’d?

Was ever woman in this humor won?

I’ll have her, but I will not keep her long.

Amused, she goes to her bedroom, puts on the pretty light green La Perla lingerie and looks at herself in the mirror: very slender, with small breasts and pearl-white skin, all nicely shaped. She is very beautiful, she thinks, and is pleased. She probably is the prettiest thing Adam will ever touch in his life.

Over dinner, she chats amusing stories from her Québec childhood, about her many cousins, aunts and uncles, she gesticulates and is very vivacious, asks for a second helping, and drinks quickly. Adam is in awe of her, and happy like a child (alone he didn’t have a happy childhood, so it is not a good comparison). Eventually she exclaims Why don’t you show me the rest of your place? pulls him behind herself, and goes for the door where she rightly assumes the bedroom is. It is somewhat chilly and small, there is a Vasarely poster on the wall, and on the night stand Ryszard Kapuściński’s Travels with Herodotus together with a box of night dragee sweets. Marguerite pushes Adam on the bed and holds his mouth

[THE CYBER SECURITY WARNING: the following content is inappropriate and was erased. All future occurences will be monitored and reported to the Tech Help]

Eventually, she loosens the strap of the robe, and lets him go. She is still breathless, her chest quickly raises and drops, and although it is still cold in the room, she is covered in sweat, as she lies down. Adam lies besides, rubbing his wrists. By the time blood returns to his arms, he strokes Marguerite’s belly, but by then he finds her sound asleep.

Mar. 4, 2011 at 4:21am

mit dank an finney

Jan. 30, 2011 at 5:21pm
What you did matters. Or, The Girl With The Number Tattoo  #6 Maybe it was Ethan, or Ethan’s strange, cold body. Deidre couldn’t figure it out. As always, when something was stressing her out, she went to the pool, diving her head under the water, feeling the strength of her muscles, listening to the rhythm of her own breathing, watching the bubbles that came out of her nose. She never wanted to dive up, she always wished that she could stay there a little longer, down there, at the bottom of the pool. The tiles were quite old,  but the pool itself didn’t seem to be, at least it wasn’t disgusting, or at least it wasn’t in this strange view of the world her googles created, somewhat kaleidoscopic. It was not that she was afraid of this upcoming memorial service. She just really felt strongly that it was determined to be ackward. No one really cared about that guy, most of them hadn’t really known his name, before he was lying there, at the floor, becoming this dirty little scratch an institution that dependant on forces it constantly had to please didn’t need. No doubt that no one had even touched him, this boy has been kind of this shy, insecure little whatever, never talking much, always moving like he had decided, at one point in his life, to live without a body, only using his feet to carry his head around, a stick in his ass. Deidre was sure that she has been the only one in a long time that had had touched him. Maybe it was this parallel, that somehow striked her. She didn’t want to have to lie on that floor, cold, to be touched again. It seemed harder than she had imagined to embody the Israelian summer night‘s dream in this somewhat stiff, selfcentered city, falling for the numbness of a winter’s cold. At least it would be fun to watch all of these people, so obsessed with their massmurders, death marches, transports, traumas, to watch if they would be able to find a way how to deal with this one, concrete body, whispering what was his name again, oh, this boy, I remember I met him once, in the elevator, it must have been September, I guess, but he looked healthy, didn’t he, well? Probably they would try to overplay their insecurity not to know how and where to look while someone would certainly hold a speech filled with these ackward words of loss, tragic, remembrance, youth and fate, they could easily copy it from their books, no big deal. Probably they would sit there like she had been sitting at these strange and never ending catholic worship ceremonies when she was a kid, living in that goddamn village, trying to concentrate on her legs that she somehow had knot into each other, she has been quite an athletic kid at that time, to calm them down, not to jump up, not to hit the wooden wall of the bench in front of her, to make some beat, to distract her somehow from this strange …. At least she would be well prepared. Unless she would have to sit next to Marguerite. Imagine Marguerite, doing her stupid flirtshow with this Adam, never being aware that he felt uncomfortable in her presence. Although Deidre thought that he was one of those guys you don’t have to waste a thought about, she somehow felt sorry for him, watching him being patronized, seeing that he knew it but had no clue how to get himself out of the situation. Marguerite’s greek statue shaped face next to his Foucaultian head, bald, with dominant glasses framing his greyblue, featureless eyes, Deidre never had figured out, if it was supposed to be some sort of mimikry or if it was just quite a smart camouflage way of hiding his natural bald head, they made quite a pastiche, overall. There were still some hours to go, time wasn’t always mercyless, and Deidre promised to herself to think of her arms chopping through the water or the shabby tiles floating down there, under her body, just in case she would need to pull herself together. It was embarrasing to laugh at a memorial service, that’s something she knew without having experienced it.   The Meyerhoff Theatre was quite packed. Adam hadn’t expected so many people there. As always he tried to find a seat in the rows in the back, not to be at the center of attention. Understatement had proven to be his golden path, no need to step out of his box, not today. And although it was supposed to be one of those lame performances, you could never be sure, if the whole thing didn’t turn out to be an interactive experience, forced on everyone. He had seen things like that on TV. And his ability in reading the new cultural signs hadn’t improved yet. There were plenty of badges, filled with names he should have known given the time he had spent at the Museum. He sneaked on a seat between two spotlights. Marguerite hadn’t shown up. He noticed that he was looking for her. Peter was entering the hall. He passed by his seat, smirking, pinching Adam’s shoulder in this manly way that suggested cameraderie, Adam smiled back, Peter headed to the front. Well done, that one. There was a displeasing silence. Everyone seemed to be unconcentrated, maybe somehow really touched, it was hard to get a feeling of what was going on. The director grabbed the microphone, he spoke in this stretched way, spitting out one word after the other,  Adam concentrated to follow him, trying not to loose the track, wondering if he spoke the same way if he ordered something in a restaurant. His overweight didn’t speak for that. He smelled Marguerite’s chanel 5 before he even noticed that she was sitting next to him. „Hi“ she whispered, giving him this big smile, he nodded, reaching out to carress her shoulder, not knowing why he did it, it was too late to stop his hand from doing it. Marguerite put her bag in front of her feet, struggling with the scarf, that got stuck in her hair. Adam hold his hands tight at his body, trying not to reach out to help her. The director went on talking. It still seemed to be the introduction part of the speech, although he wasn’t the type to make a real climax in any parts of his text. „That’s exactly why all of them are that much into the Holocaust. Imagine him at the gay bingo. A complete failure,“ Marguerite whispered in his ear, he could feel her breath on his skin, he sobbed, burking down a laugh. It felt like at school, just somehow better. Why not sitting out that next two hours as the two Muppets, only with more sex appeal. Was it a kind of regression? Or could you see it as an act of freeing yourself. But freeing from what? And why was it that there were always coming negative somewhat second hand psychonanalytical categories into his mind, trying to merge everything that happened to him into this familiar pattern of personal crisis, in a way proving that  insufficiency had to be his eternal stage of existence.  His hand lay on Marguerite’s tigh, it was musculous, he hadn’t expected it to be. He hadn’t expected to feel that much, if he looked at it, being honest.   It rained like mad, Marguerite was pissed. Why hadn’t anyone told her that it turned out to be one of those days. She tried to pull her jacket over her head, which was senseless, of course, it was supposed to be one of these tight cut, clinging jackets, perfect for a show off, not made for an outdoor trip, and how could she have known that going to work would turn out into a fucking boot camp experience. She rushed to the metro, not sure what way heading. Noone would notice that it was the same blouse she wore yesterday, but she knew. She decided to go to the office. The article she was supposed to write wouldn’t do it itself. And there were these emails waiting to be sent, an appointment for the monthly waxing procedure to be arranged, a call with her advisor to be made, in short, a future to be arranged. The people in the train were annoying, every time she needed some space to get her thoughts sorted there was an elbow stuck in her back, a leg hitting her tighs, why could people never accept this invisible circle she drawed around herself, that she tried to protect, she wasn’t a crash race car, after all. The trap was to draw a comparison between the fate of the roma people in the Anhaltelager and what happened in France right now, that she knew instinctevly. Although it seemed quite a la mode to draw comparisons, of whatever, to deconstruct master narratives, dominant victim groups, universalizing discourses, or to simply put your name on the map. She was good in dumping people, but still it was sometimes hard to develop a convincing argument, that made her untouchable, there was a difference, over all. She shouldn’t have agreed to write this dumb article, but it seemed too late to play the sickness card. She would have to avoid numbers. For sure. Maybe similarities in the structure of exclusion, deprivation of rights, deportation, on a very abstract level, maybe that would be a way to go. Adam’s way of kissing her had surprised her. It was more gentle and at the same time more passionate than she would have thought. Once he had put off this ackward glasses. It had took her some time to let her thoughts go, but then, at this certain moment, she fell for it, she just decided to let it go, and maybe it was the other way round, her passionate way of kissing him was what had surprised her the most. It somehow crashed with the pet concept she really was up to. She knew it was going to trouble her, which had not been part of the plan. She never had thought that he would take the control out of her hands. He looked so different first. It scared her to step out of her box. It had been a moment of freedom, still. Probably she would need to be very clear of the differences, more than pointing out the structural similarities. They could nail her on that, it was no stage in her career to survive getting nailed. And it wasn’t a smart thing to step out of two boxes at the same time. At least it was too overwhelming for her, she would freeze as always, losing any agency. Adam‘s neck was soft, it felt familiar caressing it, she felt the prickel going through his body, where did all these excitement come from? Maybe it was exactly the excitement that you can’t predict, not by what you think of the person you’re about to fuck, first, second not by what you think of yourself. Maybe there was no logic to be found. He was caressed her eyes, her cheeks, in this gentle, soft manner, while she felt his body, merging with hers, hungry, passionately, craving. There was no craving in the way she planned the text. There was no desire to say something. To make a point. To be excited about an idea she would like to stick to. Worst, she was afraid to never find it again, glamour with brains, glitter with empathy, seriousness with a twinkle in your eyes. All night long they had kept their Muppets habit, there was so much fun, she never had talked that much, rolling on a couch.  She should have stop to tear his jeans down when he looked in her eyes with this nondescript gaze. It was just that she didn’t want to stop. But he could have told her that he was transitioning. At some point at least.

What you did matters. Or, The Girl With The Number Tattoo  #6

Maybe it was Ethan, or Ethan’s strange, cold body. Deidre couldn’t figure it out. As always, when something was stressing her out, she went to the pool, diving her head under the water, feeling the strength of her muscles, listening to the rhythm of her own breathing, watching the bubbles that came out of her nose. She never wanted to dive up, she always wished that she could stay there a little longer, down there, at the bottom of the pool. The tiles were quite old,  but the pool itself didn’t seem to be, at least it wasn’t disgusting, or at least it wasn’t in this strange view of the world her googles created, somewhat kaleidoscopic. It was not that she was afraid of this upcoming memorial service. She just really felt strongly that it was determined to be ackward. No one really cared about that guy, most of them hadn’t really known his name, before he was lying there, at the floor, becoming this dirty little scratch an institution that dependant on forces it constantly had to please didn’t need. No doubt that no one had even touched him, this boy has been kind of this shy, insecure little whatever, never talking much, always moving like he had decided, at one point in his life, to live without a body, only using his feet to carry his head around, a stick in his ass. Deidre was sure that she has been the only one in a long time that had had touched him. Maybe it was this parallel, that somehow striked her. She didn’t want to have to lie on that floor, cold, to be touched again. It seemed harder than she had imagined to embody the Israelian summer night‘s dream in this somewhat stiff, selfcentered city, falling for the numbness of a winter’s cold.

At least it would be fun to watch all of these people, so obsessed with their massmurders, death marches, transports, traumas, to watch if they would be able to find a way how to deal with this one, concrete body, whispering what was his name again, oh, this boy, I remember I met him once, in the elevator, it must have been September, I guess, but he looked healthy, didn’t he, well? Probably they would try to overplay their insecurity not to know how and where to look while someone would certainly hold a speech filled with these ackward words of loss, tragic, remembrance, youth and fate, they could easily copy it from their books, no big deal. Probably they would sit there like she had been sitting at these strange and never ending catholic worship ceremonies when she was a kid, living in that goddamn village, trying to concentrate on her legs that she somehow had knot into each other, she has been quite an athletic kid at that time, to calm them down, not to jump up, not to hit the wooden wall of the bench in front of her, to make some beat, to distract her somehow from this strange ….

At least she would be well prepared. Unless she would have to sit next to Marguerite. Imagine Marguerite, doing her stupid flirtshow with this Adam, never being aware that he felt uncomfortable in her presence. Although Deidre thought that he was one of those guys you don’t have to waste a thought about, she somehow felt sorry for him, watching him being patronized, seeing that he knew it but had no clue how to get himself out of the situation. Marguerite’s greek statue shaped face next to his Foucaultian head, bald, with dominant glasses framing his greyblue, featureless eyes, Deidre never had figured out, if it was supposed to be some sort of mimikry or if it was just quite a smart camouflage way of hiding his natural bald head, they made quite a pastiche, overall. There were still some hours to go, time wasn’t always mercyless, and Deidre promised to herself to think of her arms chopping through the water or the shabby tiles floating down there, under her body, just in case she would need to pull herself together. It was embarrasing to laugh at a memorial service, that’s something she knew without having experienced it.

 

The Meyerhoff Theatre was quite packed. Adam hadn’t expected so many people there. As always he tried to find a seat in the rows in the back, not to be at the center of attention. Understatement had proven to be his golden path, no need to step out of his box, not today. And although it was supposed to be one of those lame performances, you could never be sure, if the whole thing didn’t turn out to be an interactive experience, forced on everyone. He had seen things like that on TV. And his ability in reading the new cultural signs hadn’t improved yet. There were plenty of badges, filled with names he should have known given the time he had spent at the Museum. He sneaked on a seat between two spotlights. Marguerite hadn’t shown up. He noticed that he was looking for her. Peter was entering the hall. He passed by his seat, smirking, pinching Adam’s shoulder in this manly way that suggested cameraderie, Adam smiled back, Peter headed to the front. Well done, that one. There was a displeasing silence. Everyone seemed to be unconcentrated, maybe somehow really touched, it was hard to get a feeling of what was going on. The director grabbed the microphone, he spoke in this stretched way, spitting out one word after the other,  Adam concentrated to follow him, trying not to loose the track, wondering if he spoke the same way if he ordered something in a restaurant. His overweight didn’t speak for that. He smelled Marguerite’s chanel 5 before he even noticed that she was sitting next to him. „Hi“ she whispered, giving him this big smile, he nodded, reaching out to carress her shoulder, not knowing why he did it, it was too late to stop his hand from doing it. Marguerite put her bag in front of her feet, struggling with the scarf, that got stuck in her hair. Adam hold his hands tight at his body, trying not to reach out to help her. The director went on talking. It still seemed to be the introduction part of the speech, although he wasn’t the type to make a real climax in any parts of his text. „That’s exactly why all of them are that much into the Holocaust. Imagine him at the gay bingo. A complete failure,“ Marguerite whispered in his ear, he could feel her breath on his skin, he sobbed, burking down a laugh. It felt like at school, just somehow better. Why not sitting out that next two hours as the two Muppets, only with more sex appeal. Was it a kind of regression? Or could you see it as an act of freeing yourself. But freeing from what? And why was it that there were always coming negative somewhat second hand psychonanalytical categories into his mind, trying to merge everything that happened to him into this familiar pattern of personal crisis, in a way proving that  insufficiency had to be his eternal stage of existence.  His hand lay on Marguerite’s tigh, it was musculous, he hadn’t expected it to be. He hadn’t expected to feel that much, if he looked at it, being honest.

 

It rained like mad, Marguerite was pissed. Why hadn’t anyone told her that it turned out to be one of those days. She tried to pull her jacket over her head, which was senseless, of course, it was supposed to be one of these tight cut, clinging jackets, perfect for a show off, not made for an outdoor trip, and how could she have known that going to work would turn out into a fucking boot camp experience. She rushed to the metro, not sure what way heading. Noone would notice that it was the same blouse she wore yesterday, but she knew. She decided to go to the office. The article she was supposed to write wouldn’t do it itself. And there were these emails waiting to be sent, an appointment for the monthly waxing procedure to be arranged, a call with her advisor to be made, in short, a future to be arranged. The people in the train were annoying, every time she needed some space to get her thoughts sorted there was an elbow stuck in her back, a leg hitting her tighs, why could people never accept this invisible circle she drawed around herself, that she tried to protect, she wasn’t a crash race car, after all. The trap was to draw a comparison between the fate of the roma people in the Anhaltelager and what happened in France right now, that she knew instinctevly. Although it seemed quite a la mode to draw comparisons, of whatever, to deconstruct master narratives, dominant victim groups, universalizing discourses, or to simply put your name on the map. She was good in dumping people, but still it was sometimes hard to develop a convincing argument, that made her untouchable, there was a difference, over all. She shouldn’t have agreed to write this dumb article, but it seemed too late to play the sickness card. She would have to avoid numbers. For sure. Maybe similarities in the structure of exclusion, deprivation of rights, deportation, on a very abstract level, maybe that would be a way to go. Adam’s way of kissing her had surprised her. It was more gentle and at the same time more passionate than she would have thought. Once he had put off this ackward glasses. It had took her some time to let her thoughts go, but then, at this certain moment, she fell for it, she just decided to let it go, and maybe it was the other way round, her passionate way of kissing him was what had surprised her the most. It somehow crashed with the pet concept she really was up to. She knew it was going to trouble her, which had not been part of the plan. She never had thought that he would take the control out of her hands. He looked so different first. It scared her to step out of her box. It had been a moment of freedom, still. Probably she would need to be very clear of the differences, more than pointing out the structural similarities. They could nail her on that, it was no stage in her career to survive getting nailed. And it wasn’t a smart thing to step out of two boxes at the same time. At least it was too overwhelming for her, she would freeze as always, losing any agency. Adam‘s neck was soft, it felt familiar caressing it, she felt the prickel going through his body, where did all these excitement come from? Maybe it was exactly the excitement that you can’t predict, not by what you think of the person you’re about to fuck, first, second not by what you think of yourself. Maybe there was no logic to be found. He was caressed her eyes, her cheeks, in this gentle, soft manner, while she felt his body, merging with hers, hungry, passionately, craving. There was no craving in the way she planned the text. There was no desire to say something. To make a point. To be excited about an idea she would like to stick to. Worst, she was afraid to never find it again, glamour with brains, glitter with empathy, seriousness with a twinkle in your eyes. All night long they had kept their Muppets habit, there was so much fun, she never had talked that much, rolling on a couch.  She should have stop to tear his jeans down when he looked in her eyes with this nondescript gaze. It was just that she didn’t want to stop. But he could have told her that he was transitioning. At some point at least.

Jan. 24, 2011 at 10:18am
What you did matters. Or, The Girl With The Number Tattoo  #5 Time is rarely our friend.  Usually she’s a real bitch.  The kind of person who does exactly what she wants, irrespective of the requests of those around her, even when she stands to cause real harm.  She doesn’t heal any wounds.  She only makes you think you’re healed – that is, until you run into your former lover when you’re in the grocer’s on a Sunday morning, hung over and unwashed and disappointed by the previous night’s conquest.  Or worse yet, the same morning, the same state of disrepair, but now you’ve just run into a mutual friend of your former lover, around whom you don’t know how to behave, but who can be counted on to deliver an embellished report detailing your greasy hair and ill-removed mascara to the aforementioned ex. Time has no sympathy for us, or for our weaknesses.  Marguerite was keenly aware of this, having experienced this type of encounter within the first month of her arrival in Washington.  She hadn’t told her ex James, now an assistant professor at GWU, that she was coming to the capital because things had ended so uncomfortably and besides, he hadn’t been generous enough in bed to warrant the kind of telephone call that would warm a cold or boring evening.  So it was much to his surprise and her dread when he discovered her in the middle of the produce section at the Whole Foods on P Street, holding three tomatoes in her right hand and enjoying the artificially moist and cold air from the crisper. “Mags?” Merde. She hated when he called her that. It had started as a joke, that he would tease such a pretty woman with such an ugly nickname.  The contrast had made him feel powerful for some reason.  So he kept at it. “Oh – James – um, hi.” “Mags!  What are you doing in DC?” Lie, lie, lie, she told herself.  “I’m just in town briefly, for a short stint at the Holocaust Museum.”  Fucking hangover, she thought, disappointed in her inability to lie faster. “Oh, wow, that’s, um — that’s really great,” he said, uncomfortably and dishonestly.  She hated how awkward he was and wondered why the hell she’d ever convinced herself she could love him. She looked him over: Ill-fitting mass-produced button-down shirt.  Old fleece sweater.  Pleated pants.  Cheaply cut hair.  Poor social skills.  He was everything she hated about academics in the United States.   “Yeah, thanks.  Well, I’d better be going,” she suddenly said, hoping to forcefully extricate herself from this situation before he invited her for coffee – something they both didn’t want to happen, but as an American he would feel compelled to make the offer.  And before she knew it she was through the checkout line and back on the sidewalk.  She quickly returned to her subleased flat, where she violently sliced the three tomatoes and then spent the next thirty minutes in a steaming shower. Time was definitely not her friend.  And it certainly hadn’t done anything for poor Ethan.  But Marguerite knew this and learned to make the most of it, delighting in the short and intense relationships that could happen during brief trips to foreign cities like this one.  That’s why she never let a good opportunity pass her by.  So the next morning when she discovered Adam standing alone in the Hall of Remembrance she couldn’t help herself.  That strange room was home to an eternal flame (didn’t JFK get one too?) and the names of various concentration camps printed on the walls in a futuristic angry-sad font.  It also had the best light of any place within the museum.  Her heart rate increased because of the excitement of finding him, which gave a nice flush to her cheeks.  This is so much better than being upstairs, she thought. Adam’s head turned as he heard shoes on the marble floor, relinquishing his solitude.  In this light he was almost glowing, and although he was far from handsome, she found his smile infectious.  She returned the expression as she walked over to him. “What are you doing here?”  She hoped he wasn’t thinking romantically sad thoughts of the people who had been memorialized here, or perhaps brooding about something in his own life that had moved or troubled him.  Then again, maybe he would need company. “I am planning a summer seminar course,” he said in his fantastic accent.  “I come here because this room has the best light, and no one ever stays in here for very long… so I find that it is a nice place to come and think – no?”  Marguerite loved his pragmatic appreciation of the space and his use of too many words in English.  At that moment she desperately wanted to go with him back to his office, shut the door and hop onto his desk.  She hadn’t had sex in an office since that one summer in Israel, where it was so fucking hot and the view from the office windows at Hebrew University looked out over the golden Dome of the Rock and the Al Aqsa Mosque.  Here, the best thing she could hope to see from Adam’s office would be the top of the Department of Agriculture building – and that would be if he were one of the lucky few within the Museum staff to actually have a window office.  But she suspected that he was too shy to try something like that, and resigned herself to trying to have him in her bed.  “Are you going to Ethan’s memorial service this evening?” she asked. “Yes, I believe that I should – I will go to it.  And you?”  He smiled again.  “I hope I will see you there.” She blushed deeper, but before she had a chance to confirm her attendance a loud voice crashed into the room and broke their privacy. “Hey – what are you two doing here?  I thought I was the only one who knew about this place!”  It was Thompson, a red-faced, overweight, loud fellow who always wore shirts that were too small and ties that were terribly ugly.  Today he had on a grey and white striped shirt and blue and black pinstriped pants, both of which strained to contain his corpulent frame.  He was laughing as he talked, like he always did.  But she didn’t find him funny.   So she bid Adam adieu and walked back to those damn elevators.   Hours later and the darkness had again descended on the fellows’ study; the black square seemed all the more menacing in the face of Ethan’s untimely death.  Marguerite switched off her Macbook Pro and breathed deeply, readying herself for the memorial.  She wondered how empty the Meyerhoff theatre would be, how many attendees would come only out of politeness, or how many, like her, to pick someone up.  Emilia had planned to go, of course, but Leila was having one of her crises and needed emotional support.  No matter, Marguerite could sit with Adam. Because of him, she was actually looking forward to this ridiculous service so much that she couldn’t concentrate.   Then again, perhaps it was the discomfort of running into James yesterday.  Regardless, it had taken her three hours to get through a single page of Bloodlands. At the other end of the study, Deidre had similarly spent the afternoon staring into the screen of her Sony Vaio, unable to make words come from her fingertips, frustrated and angry with herself.  Normally, when something bothered her she found comfort by throwing herself into her work, but not today.  She could not forget the hours of questioning, the harsh fluorescent lights, and the feeling of genuine fear that she had in the DC police station.  They had kept her all night, but Time, her tormenter, made it feel like a week.  Again Deidre lowered her head down onto her desk, blonde hair spilling past her shoulders, cool wood surface pressing against her cheek.  She let her head slide further down, almost off the side of the desk, and let her eyes fall to where Ethan’s body had lain, making sure it wasn’t still there.  It wasn’t still there.  But she didn’t believe her eyes and kept blinking anxiously, violently, checking and rechecking, feeling all the while like someone was watching her, standing over her shoulder. As she rose to leave, she felt someone touch her shoulder.  But no one was there. My god, she thought, am I going mad?  Tense, she checked under the table one last time. 

What you did matters. Or, The Girl With The Number Tattoo  #5

Time is rarely our friend.  Usually she’s a real bitch.  The kind of person who does exactly what she wants, irrespective of the requests of those around her, even when she stands to cause real harm.  She doesn’t heal any wounds.  She only makes you think you’re healed – that is, until you run into your former lover when you’re in the grocer’s on a Sunday morning, hung over and unwashed and disappointed by the previous night’s conquest.  Or worse yet, the same morning, the same state of disrepair, but now you’ve just run into a mutual friend of your former lover, around whom you don’t know how to behave, but who can be counted on to deliver an embellished report detailing your greasy hair and ill-removed mascara to the aforementioned ex.

Time has no sympathy for us, or for our weaknesses.  Marguerite was keenly aware of this, having experienced this type of encounter within the first month of her arrival in Washington.  She hadn’t told her ex James, now an assistant professor at GWU, that she was coming to the capital because things had ended so uncomfortably and besides, he hadn’t been generous enough in bed to warrant the kind of telephone call that would warm a cold or boring evening.  So it was much to his surprise and her dread when he discovered her in the middle of the produce section at the Whole Foods on P Street, holding three tomatoes in her right hand and enjoying the artificially moist and cold air from the crisper.

“Mags?”

Merde. She hated when he called her that. It had started as a joke, that he would tease such a pretty woman with such an ugly nickname.  The contrast had made him feel powerful for some reason.  So he kept at it.

“Oh – James – um, hi.”

“Mags!  What are you doing in DC?”

Lie, lie, lie, she told herself.  “I’m just in town briefly, for a short stint at the Holocaust Museum.”  Fucking hangover, she thought, disappointed in her inability to lie faster.

“Oh, wow, that’s, um — that’s really great,” he said, uncomfortably and dishonestly.  She hated how awkward he was and wondered why the hell she’d ever convinced herself she could love him. She looked him over: Ill-fitting mass-produced button-down shirt.  Old fleece sweater.  Pleated pants.  Cheaply cut hair.  Poor social skills.  He was everything she hated about academics in the United States.  

“Yeah, thanks.  Well, I’d better be going,” she suddenly said, hoping to forcefully extricate herself from this situation before he invited her for coffee – something they both didn’t want to happen, but as an American he would feel compelled to make the offer.  And before she knew it she was through the checkout line and back on the sidewalk.  She quickly returned to her subleased flat, where she violently sliced the three tomatoes and then spent the next thirty minutes in a steaming shower.

Time was definitely not her friend.  And it certainly hadn’t done anything for poor Ethan.  But Marguerite knew this and learned to make the most of it, delighting in the short and intense relationships that could happen during brief trips to foreign cities like this one.  That’s why she never let a good opportunity pass her by.  So the next morning when she discovered Adam standing alone in the Hall of Remembrance she couldn’t help herself.  That strange room was home to an eternal flame (didn’t JFK get one too?) and the names of various concentration camps printed on the walls in a futuristic angry-sad font.  It also had the best light of any place within the museum.  Her heart rate increased because of the excitement of finding him, which gave a nice flush to her cheeks.  This is so much better than being upstairs, she thought.

Adam’s head turned as he heard shoes on the marble floor, relinquishing his solitude.  In this light he was almost glowing, and although he was far from handsome, she found his smile infectious.  She returned the expression as she walked over to him.

“What are you doing here?”  She hoped he wasn’t thinking romantically sad thoughts of the people who had been memorialized here, or perhaps brooding about something in his own life that had moved or troubled him.  Then again, maybe he would need company.

“I am planning a summer seminar course,” he said in his fantastic accent.  “I come here because this room has the best light, and no one ever stays in here for very long… so I find that it is a nice place to come and think – no?” 

Marguerite loved his pragmatic appreciation of the space and his use of too many words in English.  At that moment she desperately wanted to go with him back to his office, shut the door and hop onto his desk.  She hadn’t had sex in an office since that one summer in Israel, where it was so fucking hot and the view from the office windows at Hebrew University looked out over the golden Dome of the Rock and the Al Aqsa Mosque.  Here, the best thing she could hope to see from Adam’s office would be the top of the Department of Agriculture building – and that would be if he were one of the lucky few within the Museum staff to actually have a window office.  But she suspected that he was too shy to try something like that, and resigned herself to trying to have him in her bed. 

“Are you going to Ethan’s memorial service this evening?” she asked.

“Yes, I believe that I should – I will go to it.  And you?”  He smiled again.  “I hope I will see you there.”

She blushed deeper, but before she had a chance to confirm her attendance a loud voice crashed into the room and broke their privacy.

“Hey – what are you two doing here?  I thought I was the only one who knew about this place!”  It was Thompson, a red-faced, overweight, loud fellow who always wore shirts that were too small and ties that were terribly ugly.  Today he had on a grey and white striped shirt and blue and black pinstriped pants, both of which strained to contain his corpulent frame.  He was laughing as he talked, like he always did.  But she didn’t find him funny.   So she bid Adam adieu and walked back to those damn elevators.

 

Hours later and the darkness had again descended on the fellows’ study; the black square seemed all the more menacing in the face of Ethan’s untimely death. 

Marguerite switched off her Macbook Pro and breathed deeply, readying herself for the memorial.  She wondered how empty the Meyerhoff theatre would be, how many attendees would come only out of politeness, or how many, like her, to pick someone up.  Emilia had planned to go, of course, but Leila was having one of her crises and needed emotional support.  No matter, Marguerite could sit with Adam. Because of him, she was actually looking forward to this ridiculous service so much that she couldn’t concentrate.   Then again, perhaps it was the discomfort of running into James yesterday.  Regardless, it had taken her three hours to get through a single page of Bloodlands.

At the other end of the study, Deidre had similarly spent the afternoon staring into the screen of her Sony Vaio, unable to make words come from her fingertips, frustrated and angry with herself.  Normally, when something bothered her she found comfort by throwing herself into her work, but not today.  She could not forget the hours of questioning, the harsh fluorescent lights, and the feeling of genuine fear that she had in the DC police station.  They had kept her all night, but Time, her tormenter, made it feel like a week.  Again Deidre lowered her head down onto her desk, blonde hair spilling past her shoulders, cool wood surface pressing against her cheek.  She let her head slide further down, almost off the side of the desk, and let her eyes fall to where Ethan’s body had lain, making sure it wasn’t still there. 

It wasn’t still there. 

But she didn’t believe her eyes and kept blinking anxiously, violently, checking and rechecking, feeling all the while like someone was watching her, standing over her shoulder.

As she rose to leave, she felt someone touch her shoulder.  But no one was there. My god, she thought, am I going mad?  Tense, she checked under the table one last time. 

Jan. 14, 2011 at 3:43am with 1 note
[Flash 9 is required to listen to audio.]  

hot pink is the “it” color of 2011. says the ny times. our year indeed.

geh dames dames: woamer hund

Jan. 11, 2011 at 6:50pm with 1 note
versuch über das ende vom crotch ______ liebe e wär gern hier und wärs lieber nicht muss mich schleunigst reorganisieren. dazwischen nachdenken. fad sind mir meine sätze. fad ist mir mein schieben. eine wichtige (und irgendwie so erbärmlich banale) erkenntnis der letzten jahre: je genauer  du sagst, was du willst, desto wahrscheinlicher bekommst du es. wenn du klar formulieren kannst was überhaupt. also was wollen. vielleicht lieber anfangen mit dem nicht wollen: nicht wurschteln nicht am existenzminimum wurschtln nicht allein wurschteln nicht so viel rauchen beim wurschteln kein uneingelöstes versprechen geben werden alles liebe u ______ liebe e wär gern hier bin wieder da einen kahlschlag probieren   alles liebe u ______ liebe e wär gern hierund auch sonst is es ganz schön wieder hier zu sein muss mich schleunigst reorganisieren. und das mit dem kahlschlag aufschieben. also wenn schon nicht was wollen, dann halt was spürn my dear. ich hab immer noch mut. du willst mit mir augenbrauen wachsen. ich bin ungeduldig. i know you have told me. ich bin überfordert. erinnerst du mich dran, fragen nach der zukunft erst zu stellen, wenns draußen dunkel ist. ich bin immer noch stolz. yes, dreaming may be selfish. ich hab angst. nicht jeden einzelnen meter zurückrudern müssen. zusammen entschleunigen. geh dame dame     geh dames dames alles liebe u Marea Alta’s Gender Crash II: 5.2. 2011, 21h brut: bands: geh dames dames, Licking Lashes, Martin & The evil eyes of Nur moderation and performance by DENICE and the GERMAN DRAG TEAM, MARA CA$H & MISS TORI MISSPELLING

versuch über das ende vom crotch

______

liebe e

wär gern hier
und wärs lieber nicht

muss mich schleunigst reorganisieren. dazwischen nachdenken. fad sind mir meine sätze. fad ist mir mein schieben. eine wichtige (und irgendwie so erbärmlich banale) erkenntnis der letzten jahre: je genauer  du sagst, was du willst, desto wahrscheinlicher bekommst du es. wenn du klar formulieren kannst was überhaupt. also was wollen. vielleicht lieber anfangen mit dem nicht wollen:

nicht wurschteln

nicht am existenzminimum wurschtln

nicht allein wurschteln

nicht so viel rauchen beim wurschteln

kein uneingelöstes versprechen geben werden


alles liebe u

______

liebe e

wär gern hier

bin wieder da

einen kahlschlag probieren

 

alles liebe u

______

liebe e

wär gern hier
und auch sonst is es ganz schön wieder hier zu sein

muss mich schleunigst reorganisieren. und das mit dem kahlschlag aufschieben. also wenn schon nicht was wollen, dann halt was spürn my dear. ich hab immer noch mut. du willst mit mir augenbrauen wachsen. ich bin ungeduldig. i know you have told me. ich bin überfordert. erinnerst du mich dran, fragen nach der zukunft erst zu stellen, wenns draußen dunkel ist. ich bin immer noch stolz. yes, dreaming may be selfish. ich hab angst. nicht jeden einzelnen meter zurückrudern müssen.

zusammen entschleunigen.

geh dame dame     geh dames dames

alles liebe u


Marea Alta’s Gender Crash II: 5.2. 2011, 21h brut:

bands: geh dames dames, Licking Lashes, Martin & The evil eyes of Nur
moderation and performance by DENICE and the GERMAN DRAG TEAM, MARA CA$H & MISS TORI MISSPELLING

Jan. 7, 2011 at 8:07pm
What you did matters. Or, The Girl With The Number Tattoo  #4 Marguerite pushes the heavy door open and thinks, these slow-heads will never help me, not to open the door, nor to lift a suitcase, lifts her badge to the guards, waves it in front of them, as they yet again didn’t notice, takes of her leather jacket and leaves her cross-over on the belt, walks through the detector, is pleased that this time her boots didn’t beep, collects her belongings, and walks towards the elevator. She is a fine young woman, fairly tall at 5’7, her long curly dark blonde hair curls over the light brown leather jacket, she walks swiftly towards the elevator, pushes a strand of hair from beneath the bag’s belt, her high heels clicking on the stone floor, she doesn’t look right not left, boots, legs, woolen tights, black miniskirt, grey merino top, chanel nr. 5 and the long curly honey-colored hair, and in the middle of it all Marguerite’s face, that lovely , and yet somewhat strict face of Greek statue, with a straight nose, large eyes, high-set eyebrows and fair, not somewhat pale, skin. She had highlighted her eyes with smoky lines, and set on a triple coat of mascara; it was Wednesday, and one of the older fellows were supposed to talk. Well then, Wednesday it is, she thought before, putting a coat of mascara after another, and deciding for the suede leather boots, those that went almost over her knees. She was younger than she looked; she was really just 31, but then, she had been out with her thèse since five years only. Her parents had sent her to a boarding school in Ville de Québec when she was twelve, “pour tu civiliser un peu, ma chérie”, followed by a BA at the Université de Montréal, and for her thèse, she first went to Duke, didn’t like it, left for her aunt’s to Paris, and wrote in three years at la E.H.E.S.S. Et c’est-ca, there she was, 26, a doctorate in hand on comparative political analysis of semi-genocidal multi-language areas. She liked political science, it was exact, you could read ten pieces and come up with an idea, she didn’t have to write beautifully, nor did she have  to produce a book. Soon, she was up-and-running for a assistant professorship for modern comparative poli-sci, and got it, with a little help of her French friends. Indeed, she learned to play the foreign card, because she had been abroad, and others werent’t. It was a bit cruel, having been out there and fun, while those who stayed in boring Ontario (and what could be more dull than that) suddenly had a player’s disadavantage. Alors, she started to teach, Pareto, Max Weber, and bits and pieces of that German Herfried Muenkler, offering courses on the conflicts in Bosnia and honor’s course on comparative genocide, published, and then there she was, with an early tenure, a year off coming, and decided to pursue that old idea and do a close analysis of Swiss cantons during the Holocaust, the border policemen taking in Jews, the meso- and macro level. She could do Italian well, was often enough in Nice, and the neighborhood; and then there had been Hans, her off- and on boyfriend throughout the first three semesters in Paris; she could deal with German, especially with the civilized, Swiss German, without the crude ß and the Nordic unpleasant sentence melody. Alors, Switzerland it was, an obvious, safe topic, on which noone knew anything, let alone the poli-sci colleagues; and she would get to fly plenty to Europe, and change in Paris, and generally have fun. It was a great plan! To get a hang of things, she applied to a fellowship at the Holocaust Museum, and got it, soon enough. Et alors, there she was, sharing a fellows study with another seven wonderful human beings, charming PhD students, who, although historians and/or German and Eastern Europeans (well isn’t it the same, really), were decisively so much more fun than the senior people from the large main room. Mon Dieu! She will never forget the first day at the Center. This young woman with unfortunate hair color and eye-make up of a sick panda-bear, wearing an ill-fitting pant suit, introduced her group to more and more miserable looking, middle aged, overweight men, who looked like they have never lived. She has never seen such an amassment of men with whom she didn’t want to sleep with — if she didn’t count the American Politological Association’s annual meeting, but that was a different category altogether. As she walked into the library, she noticed groups of people standing together and quietly talking, there was an unpleasant silence and some gravity. She didn’t like it when things happened she didn’t know about. What was this? She speeded up, and walked into the study, and headed for Emilia, her favorite; she was antropologist at the Brooklyn College, living together with her Palestinian partner, Leila; in DC, they moved into a housing project in Capitol Hill and threw amazing house parties on Friday evening. Leila was a vegetarian, prepared mass amounts of colorful salads and delicious spicy soups, and always had a stuffed shisha and great lesbian exploitation videos ready. Emilia, always composed and oriented, looked today bit beside herself. Chérie, what’s the matter? -They found Ethan dead yesterday. - Ethan? you mean the intern? - Marguerite! he was not an intern! he was a special fellow, you know, the Australian exchange! - ah well. Special exhange. I remember him filing the ITS files most of the time. Anyways, who found him? -  Deirdre did. She was pulling a late night and then she saw his body and blood- - I always tell you, there is no point to work here after 4 pm. All use you have from it is that you find dead people. If you are a nerd, you spoil your teint, posture, and have to deal with police. Where is Deirdre now? - They let her go only today at 8 am, apparently! Interrogating her all night. Noone at the Center answered her calls, so it took so long until she eventually reached someome and they had a sent there their lawyers. - Merde! that is awful. What a band of chaotic bastards. Bon, as for me, I am pretty certain it was Ethan’s tranquilizers. He was on them all the time. He must have lost balance trying to get on the folders up on the shelf — he would always reach standing from his chair. Thse bastard pills can be dangerous, I tell you. Équilibre, and all. With these words, Marguerite puts down her cross-over, throws her jacket over the chelf, switches on the ancient computer they were given, and decides to read the latest Brubaker book on inter-ethnic conflicts in Rumania she was saving for a day of trouble. She loved Brubaker’s writings, but they were dense, and she could use dense reading today. Tomorrow would be another day. 24 hour, 180 pages, 643 footnotes, many graphs and several described orgies of violence later, indeed, it was. She went to the librarians to return the Brubaker book, thought she may want to head later with Emilia for a martini and talk a bit about this antro-touch on reading the violence texture these kinky sociologists did lately, it seemed. May be that could go to one of the bars on Logan and she could check out some cute guys. She smiled, unconsciously, at this plan, and then noticed someone staring at her. Peter. One of the senior scholars. An aging guy, once handsome, whose peak was undeniably beyond, but he wouldn’t notice. He was still fun and smart in his own way, but he had an annoying habit of getting too close to her. -Marguerite, my sunshine, always bring the smile of the morning! [This is too cheesy to be believed, she thought] - Peter, good to see you. What’s up? He came even closer, so she could smell his aging breath and a certain unpleasant smell older men seem to evaporate — perhaps they eat too much meat? — talking about some New Yorker article on some policial scientist’s theory on the inner-Bosnian state conflicts. -  Thank you so much, Peter. I will look into it. If you excuse me now- She tapped him on the shoulder, and with a wave of hair and energetic hip movement, walked away. Peter, the old creep, reminded her of something else she almost forgot. Or someone. Adam, the real-thing-Europe-sources analytist, fresh from Berkeley, sat in his cave of an office, lunettes en écaille on his nose, in one of his black shirts, remaints of hair, and a happy tommy cat belly. Ever since Marguerite laid her eyes on him, there was something distinctly endearing to his person, a je ne sais quoi. So she took up a sport of dropping bye, teasing him mildly, waving her hair, touching her neck, talking of this and that and nothing much in particular; he sat back, first unconcentrated, then confused, eventually happy as a child. He was her pet project. Edmund Hillary said of Mount Everest he wanted to climb because it was there; she had Adam.

What you did matters. Or, The Girl With The Number Tattoo  #4

Marguerite pushes the heavy door open and thinks, these slow-heads will never help me, not to open the door, nor to lift a suitcase, lifts her badge to the guards, waves it in front of them, as they yet again didn’t notice, takes of her leather jacket and leaves her cross-over on the belt, walks through the detector, is pleased that this time her boots didn’t beep, collects her belongings, and walks towards the elevator. She is a fine young woman, fairly tall at 5’7, her long curly dark blonde hair curls over the light brown leather jacket, she walks swiftly towards the elevator, pushes a strand of hair from beneath the bag’s belt, her high heels clicking on the stone floor, she doesn’t look right not left, boots, legs, woolen tights, black miniskirt, grey merino top, chanel nr. 5 and the long curly honey-colored hair, and in the middle of it all Marguerite’s face, that lovely , and yet somewhat strict face of Greek statue, with a straight nose, large eyes, high-set eyebrows and fair, not somewhat pale, skin. She had highlighted her eyes with smoky lines, and set on a triple coat of mascara; it was Wednesday, and one of the older fellows were supposed to talk. Well then, Wednesday it is, she thought before, putting a coat of mascara after another, and deciding for the suede leather boots, those that went almost over her knees.

She was younger than she looked; she was really just 31, but then, she had been out with her thèse since five years only. Her parents had sent her to a boarding school in Ville de Québec when she was twelve, “pour tu civiliser un peu, ma chérie”, followed by a BA at the Université de Montréal, and for her thèse, she first went to Duke, didn’t like it, left for her aunt’s to Paris, and wrote in three years at la E.H.E.S.S. Et c’est-ca, there she was, 26, a doctorate in hand on comparative political analysis of semi-genocidal multi-language areas. She liked political science, it was exact, you could read ten pieces and come up with an idea, she didn’t have to write beautifully, nor did she have  to produce a book. Soon, she was up-and-running for a assistant professorship for modern comparative poli-sci, and got it, with a little help of her French friends. Indeed, she learned to play the foreign card, because she had been abroad, and others werent’t. It was a bit cruel, having been out there and fun, while those who stayed in boring Ontario (and what could be more dull than that) suddenly had a player’s disadavantage. Alors, she started to teach, Pareto, Max Weber, and bits and pieces of that German Herfried Muenkler, offering courses on the conflicts in Bosnia and honor’s course on comparative genocide, published, and then there she was, with an early tenure, a year off coming, and decided to pursue that old idea and do a close analysis of Swiss cantons during the Holocaust, the border policemen taking in Jews, the meso- and macro level. She could do Italian well, was often enough in Nice, and the neighborhood; and then there had been Hans, her off- and on boyfriend throughout the first three semesters in Paris; she could deal with German, especially with the civilized, Swiss German, without the crude ß and the Nordic unpleasant sentence melody. Alors, Switzerland it was, an obvious, safe topic, on which noone knew anything, let alone the poli-sci colleagues; and she would get to fly plenty to Europe, and change in Paris, and generally have fun. It was a great plan! To get a hang of things, she applied to a fellowship at the Holocaust Museum, and got it, soon enough. Et alors, there she was, sharing a fellows study with another seven wonderful human beings, charming PhD students, who, although historians and/or German and Eastern Europeans (well isn’t it the same, really), were decisively so much more fun than the senior people from the large main room.

Mon Dieu! She will never forget the first day at the Center. This young woman with unfortunate hair color and eye-make up of a sick panda-bear, wearing an ill-fitting pant suit, introduced her group to more and more miserable looking, middle aged, overweight men, who looked like they have never lived. She has never seen such an amassment of men with whom she didn’t want to sleep with — if she didn’t count the American Politological Association’s annual meeting, but that was a different category altogether.

As she walked into the library, she noticed groups of people standing together and quietly talking, there was an unpleasant silence and some gravity. She didn’t like it when things happened she didn’t know about. What was this? She speeded up, and walked into the study, and headed for Emilia, her favorite; she was antropologist at the Brooklyn College, living together with her Palestinian partner, Leila; in DC, they moved into a housing project in Capitol Hill and threw amazing house parties on Friday evening. Leila was a vegetarian, prepared mass amounts of colorful salads and delicious spicy soups, and always had a stuffed shisha and great lesbian exploitation videos ready.

Emilia, always composed and oriented, looked today bit beside herself. Chérie, what’s the matter?

-They found Ethan dead yesterday.

- Ethan? you mean the intern?

- Marguerite! he was not an intern! he was a special fellow, you know, the Australian exchange!

- ah well. Special exhange. I remember him filing the ITS files most of the time. Anyways, who found him?

-  Deirdre did. She was pulling a late night and then she saw his body and blood-

- I always tell you, there is no point to work here after 4 pm. All use you have from it is that you find dead people. If you are a nerd, you spoil your teint, posture, and have to deal with police. Where is Deirdre now?

- They let her go only today at 8 am, apparently! Interrogating her all night. Noone at the Center answered her calls, so it took so long until she eventually reached someome and they had a sent there their lawyers.

- Merde! that is awful. What a band of chaotic bastards. Bon, as for me, I am pretty certain it was Ethan’s tranquilizers. He was on them all the time. He must have lost balance trying to get on the folders up on the shelf — he would always reach standing from his chair. Thse bastard pills can be dangerous, I tell you. Équilibre, and all.

With these words, Marguerite puts down her cross-over, throws her jacket over the chelf, switches on the ancient computer they were given, and decides to read the latest Brubaker book on inter-ethnic conflicts in Rumania she was saving for a day of trouble. She loved Brubaker’s writings, but they were dense, and she could use dense reading today. Tomorrow would be another day.

24 hour, 180 pages, 643 footnotes, many graphs and several described orgies of violence later, indeed, it was. She went to the librarians to return the Brubaker book, thought she may want to head later with Emilia for a martini and talk a bit about this antro-touch on reading the violence texture these kinky sociologists did lately, it seemed. May be that could go to one of the bars on Logan and she could check out some cute guys. She smiled, unconsciously, at this plan, and then noticed someone staring at her. Peter. One of the senior scholars. An aging guy, once handsome, whose peak was undeniably beyond, but he wouldn’t notice. He was still fun and smart in his own way, but he had an annoying habit of getting too close to her.

-Marguerite, my sunshine, always bring the smile of the morning!

[This is too cheesy to be believed, she thought]

- Peter, good to see you. What’s up?

He came even closer, so she could smell his aging breath and a certain unpleasant smell older men seem to evaporate — perhaps they eat too much meat? — talking about some New Yorker article on some policial scientist’s theory on the inner-Bosnian state conflicts.

-  Thank you so much, Peter. I will look into it. If you excuse me now-

She tapped him on the shoulder, and with a wave of hair and energetic hip movement, walked away. Peter, the old creep, reminded her of something else she almost forgot. Or someone. Adam, the real-thing-Europe-sources analytist, fresh from Berkeley, sat in his cave of an office, lunettes en écaille on his nose, in one of his black shirts, remaints of hair, and a happy tommy cat belly. Ever since Marguerite laid her eyes on him, there was something distinctly endearing to his person, a je ne sais quoi.

So she took up a sport of dropping bye, teasing him mildly, waving her hair, touching her neck, talking of this and that and nothing much in particular; he sat back, first unconcentrated, then confused, eventually happy as a child. He was her pet project. Edmund Hillary said of Mount Everest he wanted to climb because it was there; she had Adam.