this is the time they never show in movies, or include in novels… the killing time time. we’re packed. spent the past 3 hours cleaning this place and regathering our stuff to move upstairs. now we sit for 40 minutes waiting to go up. it took one elevator to move down from 6 – it’ll be two to move back up. had to buy an extra elevator’s worth of dishes, pans, food, cleaning stuff, moroccan clothes… how can a 10 day stay turn into an extra elevator? and all this extra stuff stays when we leave, so it’s money short time used and lost. otherwise, its bulk and weight carried on our backs.
lady k is sitting next to me, stern, glowering. i turn and say “boy, you’re a bundle of radiating joy.” she laughs, says “i’m sorry, i hate this waiting part.” now she’s back in brood mode. this is not a welcoming apartment, but at least it was our 10 day hole. folks with places to stay have no idea what’s entailed in frequent moving. this will be our 31st change of bed in 9 months – 31 places to serially sleep. this move is for 16 nights. then a month in the sea coast town of essoaira. after that, only the shadow knows. no place to go back to, don’t know where we’re going – we’re grasshoppers trying to outrun winter in a world of air-conditioned ants.
figure when the earth breaks into sporadic pools of isolated people, lady and i can survive by traveling between surviving enclaves and entertaining them with our poetry. to pay for our entertainment, they can house and feed us and give us a wee bit of hashish for the road.
and the earth will break, at least as we know it – i’d say there’s a 99.9999999% chance of it happening within the next 43 years. if it doesn’t go via global warming, it’ll be social cooling, or it’ll be by some escaped man-made virus, or germ that’s gained super-virus powers because all the anti-biotics and humane growth serums we’ve dumped into the water, or some country with the initials u.s.a. will start dropping atomic bombs, or franken-corn will take over the earth’s vegetative system killing everything in its path and then die off itself, or the bee collapse and lack of pollination will starve us, or scientists will try to geo-engineer a fix to global warming (which will of course backfire and fry or freeze us faster), or the earth’s magnetic field will fade out & realign itself (it’s about 150,000 years overdue), or an asteroid will hit us, or honesty will come into vogue destroying the very basis of the world’s economic and political systems, or the cheney-bush beast will declare martial law and cancel the next elections – and we all know if they stay in power any longer, the earth is doomed. i figure lady and my trekking about with all our possessions on our back is training for the future.
my true sorrow for the coming future will be its lack of electricity – there’ll be no web world, and how can i be sure i exist if i don’t receive cyber feedback?
watched american movie dubbed into french on belgium woman’s tv here in marrakech. lady k went to the dvd menu, told the movie to talk to me in english, with english subtitles just to be sure – it said sure, will do. it lied. machines do what they want to me. so does marrakech… the city toys with me by day, and i good naturedly go along, so it rewards me for being a good sport by getting me stoned each night.
you know what T.V. stands for, don’t you? Totally Valueless Theoretically Void Tired Vision Trash Value Trendy Validity Trite Vocalizations Turgid Vocabulary Turd-ish Vociferation Treated Vomit Typically Voyeuristic.
i read you couldn’t walk across the street here without being offered hash. i have yet to be offered any, anywhere. only way we got hash here or france or grass in krakow was to ask strangers. so far we’ve asked three strangers where to find smoke, and all three have known.
i don’t wear walkmans when i walk because i want to hear what’s coming from behind when they come to take me away. i want a fighting chance to get away. gotta get away before they get you in the car. once you’re in the car, they have you, you’re meat. i’m just going to tell them “i’m not me. go away now. i’m closing my eyes. you can’t see me.” then when they’re laughing, i’ll run away.
