 Living in such a state          taTestaTesTaTe          etats a hcus ni gniviL
 of mind in which time         sTATEsTAtEsTaTeStA         emit hcihw ni dnim of
 does not pass, space         STateSTaTeSTaTeStAtE         ecaps ,ssap ton seod
 does not exist, and         sTATeSt        oFOfOfo         dna ,tsixe ton seod
 idea is not there.         STatEst          ofoFOFo         .ereht ton si aedi
 Stuck in a place          staTEsT            OfOFofo          ecalp a ni kcutS
 where movements           TATeSTa            foFofoF           stnemevom erehw
 are impossible                              fOFoFOf             elbissopmi era
 in all forms,                             UsOFofO                ,smrof lla ni
 physical and                            nbEifof                   dna lacisyhp
 or mental -                           uNBeInO                      - latnem ro
 your mind is                         UNbeinG                      si dnim rouy
 focusing on a                       unBEING                      a no gnisucof
 lone thing, or                      NBeINgu                     ro ,gniht enol
 a lone nothing.                     bEinGUn                    .gnihton enol a
 You are numb and                    EiNguNB                   dna bmun era ouY
 unaware to events                                            stneve ot erawanu
 taking place - not                  -iSSuE-                 ton - ecalp gnikat
 knowing how or what               THiRTY-THREE             tahw ro woh gniwonk
 to think. You are in                01/29/97              ni era uoY .kniht ot
 a state of unbeing....                                  ....gniebnu fo etats a

--SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB--

                            CONTENTS OF THiS iSSUE
                           =----------------------=

EDiTORiAL                                                         Kilgore Trout

LETTERS TO THE EDITOR

STAFF LiSTiNGS


                               [=- ARTiCLES -=]


PAGE FROM A DiARY                                                   Crux Ansata

UNTiTLED DAiLY TORTURE                                            sweet disease

A RESPONSE TO CLOCKWORK'S "AN AMERiCAN HOUSEHOLD"                   StormChaser

A NEW YEAR'S EVE PARTY, or
Some SoB Writers Hang Out With Some Small People and Get Crazy        Noni Moon


                              [=- POETASTRiE -=]


LiFE                                                                      DeMoN



                               [=- FiCTiON -=]


THE MEN THAT EViL DO                                           A Piece of Caine

ALL THAT CAME BACK WAS THE TiDE                                     Aspiraphale

WHAT COURT DiD THAT NiGHT                                          Water Damage

SELF PORTRAiT:  ARTiST WiTH WORDS                                   Crux Ansata

DiGGiNG TOWARD THE ROOTS               I Wish My Name Were Nathan, Wannabe Sage




--SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB--

     EDiTORiAL
     by Kilgore Trout

     Whoops.  Look at me, I'm a liar.  The layout ain't changing.  Bwahahaha.

     So, I was looking at other zines to see how I could possibly change up
our layout, and ya know what I discovered?  Our layout rocks.  It's a damn
fine way of presenting a zine, and I'll be damned if I'm gonna kill a good
thing again.  So if you were hoping for a change, tough luck.  For those of
you who were dreading the change, there is nothing to fear.

     See, I do learn from past mistakes.

                                   --SoB--

     So, I'm back at school, so I'll be responding to email regularly once
again.  If you sent me something and I never got back to you, send it again.
If you still don't hear from me, come on down and stalk me until you get a
response.  In the meantime, make sure you pass the zine around to all your
friends and get em to join the distribution list.

                                   --SoB--

     Anyway, this is a pretty big issue, so I'll let you get right down to it.
We've got a lot of new writers this issue, which I am extremely pleased with.
I think you'll want to know that this is Noni Moon's last piece for SoB for a
while.  We think she's done a great job interviewing the writers this past
year, and we hope she drops in from time to time.  Any correspondence for her
can be sent care of me.

     So, hunker down with this hefty issue, grab a nice cup of java, and start
reading.  If you can make it through this whole issue in one sitting, give
yourself a pat on the back, and then write something for us, cause you are
obviously some type of superhuman.  See you in February.

--SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB--

     LETTERS TO THE EDITOR

From: BOB
To: kilgore@sage.net
Subject: OK 

wow ,what a trip,are you sure your not from the 70's dude?

[i am sorta from the seventies, in that i was born in '75.  other than that, i
 disdain most connections to that decade besides an occasional splurge of
 zeppelin music and early punk.

 i'm a product of the 90's.  the key word is synthesis.  that's what i do.]

                                   --SoB--

From: Mario Winterstein
To: kilgore@sage.net

hey "kids," love the friggin' zine.
only read issue 27, but fuck it, i can draw conclusions about the ocean from
a drop of water. best of luck, and (self-promo) we [i] started a zine at
home (sidney ohio) which i know you'll want to wish us the best of luck on
also. 
yeah...
pea/aenesidemus/etc.

[doesn't do your self-promo a lot of good if you don't tell us the name of
 your zine, but best of luck to you anyway.  send us a free copy of your zine
 and we'll, like, keep emailing you ours or something.]

                                   --SoB--

From: d@rthV@deR
To: kilgore@SAGE.NET


Hay.. whats up??? I think we have met but I amnot shure if you remember me 
or you are the same person.... any way I am linking to you page via my site 
I mean.. I will write a little for you.. When do you need them??? I mean I 
am presently {only because we were forgotten} the head of the w@W and fuck 
if I ain't lost on this damn PC, you would think Hackers of the early 
eighties would at least have a 286 no they used a damn 8086 with 11 snap out 
and in hard drives! I had a 286 back then... any way I write mostly about 
anarchy and shit like that.. trying to spawn interest in the hackers of the 
world use there skills in... well check out my page at... Let me just say 
that I am against the NWO!! AN I am a journalist student at WWCC!
http://fascination.com/pub/darthudr/darth.htm
Kinda slow because of all the graphics but I ahve been BUSY!!
laters!!
@@@@@:o) The
      d@rthV@deR

[i don't think we've met... you'll have to give me more information about
 where.  submissions can come in anytime you want to send them.  the more we
 get the happier i am, too.  we're against the NWO, too, although i'm taking a
 guess that w@W means world at war and that you are NOT some delusional psycho
 who thinks you are the king of the world wide web.]

                                   --SoB--

From: trishk
To: kilgore@sage.net
Subject: Please add me to the mailing list

Kilgore,
	I have been exploring the Net in search of brain food and by chance as
I was trolling. I found this odd little summary. Hmm, looks like a zine
of some kind.  The unBeing caught my eye and sucked my hand toward it. 
I fell into an issue and stayed for the duration.  Please add me to your
list.  My brain and antisocial element need the nourishment your zine
can give me.

Thanks,
Trish Kelly

[eat some fish while you read our zine, and you'll get double the brain food.]

                                   --SoB--

From: Leviathan
To: kilgore@sage.net
Subject: About AIDS and de-populaztion.

If your article was correct and the government did engineer AIDS to wipe
out third-world populations I think it could only benefit us. We have
spent to much time protecting and sheltering those who are not able to
meet the demands and expectations of society, this is one of the reasons
that our society has become such a Hell. We need to stop this "everyone
is equal" thought process, it only leads to our destruction. For us to
progress we must eliminate those who are useless to society as a whole,
thus providing more resources for those who will make great strides in
our technological and societal advancement.

[    Maybe, maybe not -- highly arguable point.  The point of the article
     was not to debate whether it was beneficial or not, but to reveal to 
     the public the genocidal proceedings of our own government behind our 
     backs, without our knowledge, directly affecting us.  A typical human
     reaction to any kind of problem whatsoever, as you have kindly shown 
     by your above statement, would be to completely destroy and eliminate 
     the problem.  A supreme moral issue, I guess.  I agree with you to a 
     point... sort of.  It seems as though you are one of those people who
     are against any kind of welfare, are you not?  Probably someone who 
     looks at any homeless person on the street and instantly thinks, "get 
     a damn job."  I don't wish to be cruel, mean, or anything remotely 
     like that -- just casually reading into your comments.  Somewhat of a 
     psychic gift I received a little while back -- several years after I 
     became immortal.
     
     Of course you are stressing a point that many people prefer to call 
     natural selection (and you can ask I Wish My Name Was Nathan about 
     that -- he's rather familiar with this argument.)  So, you look at the 
     human society and realize with all of our technological advancements, 
     medicine being a large one, it pushes us towards general immortality, 
     thereby eliminating the natural selection process commonly found 
     amongst other creatures.  Well, at the simultaneous point when I 
     realized this, I realized we have our own "version" of natural 
     selection -- natural human selection, if you will.  With this increase 
     in technology and science and whatnot -- especially in the last 
     century, comes an increase in general danger and even lack of complete
     understanding.  Out of all the people in this country, how many of 
     them do you think know how an automobile works, and how the parts 
     function?  I do not.  I know how to drive -- whether this is enough 
     prerequisite for letting a human being propel himself in a box across 
     the earth at rates excelling 100mph, who knows.  Probably not.  
     
     And so, with this increase in technology comes an increase in 
     technology related deaths -- car accidents, plane crashes, train 
     derailments, fires, bombs, spontaneous combustion... I'm sure you get
     the idea.  And also, with the increase in technology comes an increase 
     (at least for now) in less care for the earth.  More technology, more
     cars, planes, steel melting furnaces, etc., causes more heat and 
     pollution to be released into the atmosphere.  Think about all the 
     automobiles and transportatory vehicles in the United States and put 
     together all the heat they release together in a day and you have a 
     pretty substantial amount.  So if you take this heat and pollution 
     throughout the world, stir it around, it causes dramatic weather 
     changes.  Just look at the weather patterns in the past ten years 
     alone and see how much more unpredictable and destructive it has 
     been.  This too would be another form of natural human selection -- we 
     fuck with Nature and say, "We are the Gods of the earth -- no one and 
     nothing else.  Humans dominate."  Mother Nature just smirks and whips 
     up another 70 below 0 freeze in the upper part of the country, or 
     perhaps some massive flooding.
     
     Daniel Quinn suggests the solution to this problem would be to make 
     mammoth strides in our technological advancement to fix and control 
     the things we have damaged/destroyed to cause our own self-annihilation
     (even though I may not be able to spell the word at the moment.)
     
     Another question to propose to you, if I may... stating we need to
     eliminate those who are useless to society as a whole.  Well -- who in 
     fact do you propose be the Judge and Execution of such a thing?  By
     what standards do you state, "Well, this six year old provides no 
     benefit to our society, therefore we'll toss him into a burning vat of 
     grease."  Please do not think I am missing the point of your comment 
     -- humans, in general, have caused so much turmoil and vast evilness 
     to spread on the planet, it is rather sickening.  However, if this is 
     truly the case for eternity, and there is no solution for the problem 
     other than elimination, we can just progress on the same track society 
     is on now, and it will occur in no time.
     
     Of course, I am against that.  I am here to save the planet and 
     everything on it, whether it be human or rock.  I am not here to march 
     down the street with my shotgun and perform my own version of genocide 
     on those who I think be unworthy.  
     
     Happy New Year.
     
     
     
     clockwork]

[editor's additional comment:  check out www.paranoia.com/CoE for the Church
 of Euthanasia's homepage.  they don't believe in unwilled deaths, but they
 have links to certain groups that think that the only way to save the planet
 is to kill the humans even if they want to stay.  personally, i like CoE's
 "save the planet, kill yourself" maxim, but YMMV.]

                                   --SoB--

From: bircham
To: kilgore@sage.net
Subject: send me state of unbeing

Dear kilgore@sagenet, (i just read what your name was but i forget it 
already)
Please send me on the state of unbeing mailing list because i am 
waiting for a  book to come in the mail so i haven't any reading 
material. i came across your e-zine and  i thought, "boy, this sure 
fills my head with a massive amount of  wonder and helps me 
understand why  i  was brought into this life as a depressed teenage 
girl instead of a brilliant doctor or scientist who discovers a new 
element and  acquires a name in textbooks and encyclopedias
so that he is never forgotten." Okay, maybe not. I find the state of 
unbeing  interesting and the articles are not like anything i have 
read before. 
Cindy Bircham

[heh.  the name's kilgore trout, but that's okay.  one day my face will be
 plastered on flyers all across this country.  naturally, there will probably
 be a reward for my apprehension, but at least people will know my name.
 we're glad that you like the zine and that it's not like "anything [you've]
 read before."  we try our best to be fresh... sometimes, though, we end up as
 stale donuts with rotting jelly centers.  that smells really bad, and it
 tastes even worse, too.  don't try that at home.]

--SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB--


                                STAFF LiSTiNG

                                    EDiTOR
                                Kilgore Trout

                                 CONTRiBUTORS
                               A Piece of Caine
                                 Aspiraphale
                                  Clockwork
                                 Crux Ansata
                                    DeMoN
                          I Wish My Name Were Nathan
                                  Noni Moon
                                 Storm Chaser
                                sweet disease
                                 Water Damage


                                GUESSED STARS
                                     Bob
                                Cindy Bircham
                                  d@rthV@deR
                              Mario Winterstein
                                 Trish Kelly

                  BOOKS i BOUGHT OVER THE CHRiSTMAS HOLiDAYS
                      _Immediatism,_ essays by Hakim Bey
                    _Omens of Millennium_ by Harold Bloom
                          _The Magus_ by John Fowles
                   _Encyclopedia of Gods_ by Michael Jordan
                 _Subliminal Seduction_ by William Bryan Key
                  _The Essential Kaballah_ by Daniel C. Maat
                          _Ishmael_ by Daniel Quinn
                         _Providence_ by Daniel Quinn
        _Crack Wars:  Literature / Addiction / Mania_ by Avital Ronell
              _The Wisdom of Insecurity,_ _The Way of Zen_, and
                _Tao: The Watercourse Way,_ all by Alan Watts

--SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB--


                               [=- ARTiCLES -=]


--SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB--

     PAGE FROM A DiARY
     Crux Ansata

0036 111296

     On Friday, I went to the bank.  I both wanted to have extra gas money --
which I needed -- for the trip to my French teacher's house, and to have some
cash for Christmas shopping.  When I pulled into the parking lot, movement in
the car I had pulled in next to caught my eye, and I turned to see a kid, a
girl, in the car.  I remember thinking that I hate how parents will leave
their kids in the car when they run in to do errands, and look, that kid has
climbed into the front seat.  I figured she was putting on the radio or
something.  And then the kid put her keys in the ignition and drove off, and I
thought just how old I am.

     I meant to put that in the last time I wrote in my diary, Sunday, but I
don't think I did.  Last night I didn't write in my diary because I was
revising "Greece", which is what I am now calling the story I have now almost
finished.  Two more scenes, I think:  the final scene and the scene by the
pool.  But tonight I am working on my diary.  I can't put it off forever.  (I
imagine I could put it off indefinitely.  I could put it off tonight and die
tomorrow.  I tell myself, though, that I can't put it off forever to
artificially create a motivation to do it.)  "Greece" added much I hadn't
foreseen, and has dropped a few things I wanted to write about.  I imagine I
can put those in other stories.

     Tomorrow will be three years since A. and I met that night in Mr.
Gatti's.  Three year anniversary, if one forgives the fact that A. used to
count from the next week -- our first preplanned date -- and all the times we
have broken up, and the fact that we are not really technically going together
right now.  Neither her nor I really consider those blocks.  What God has
joined let no man separate.  I called her tonight, and it didn't take much
prompting before she figured out why.  ("I was going to call Wednesday.  Do
you know the date?")  That was an incredibly stressful experience.  It was the
same way when Dad was away at Squadron Officers School or Officer Training
School or the Persian Gulf or Chicago.  Whenever Mom and Dad would talk, it
seemed stressful.  I suppose part of it is because of the emotion of talking
to the person, and part of it is all the things you cannot know and cannot
say.  You can't talk about how miserable you are too much, because that will
bring the person down.  You can't make presumptions on their emotions.  You
can't forget that each second costs.  With A. and I there are extra elements.
Until I feel her out I can't be sure she hasn't found someone else or come to
believe she no longer loves me.  Now I can say with relative confidence that
she still loves me and that she has not replaced me, but this confidence
necessarily decreases in the morning when she gets up and goes about her life,
and every day thereafter until I see her again.  And yet there is a sense in
which I know these are unfounded fears.  My mind cannot know her feelings, but
to an extent my heart can, no matter how far apart we are.  Is that love?  Or
slavery?  Or both?  (Is there a distinction?)

     But I am bringing myself down.  Let us move on.

     Yesterday, I did nothing.  I spent a lot of time on the boards, and some
reading.  Nothing unusual.  The day I saw G. and them:  That was Saturday,
right?  So I have mentioned it?  That is hard, too.  Hanging out with people.
I seem to have some need for it, for the contact, but it is hard to sit there
and do nothing, and talk about nothing, smoking my cigarette and watching them
trying to get another drag or two out of their marijuana pipe.  I need the
acceptance, I guess, but they don't give me what I need.  I still look.  The
acceptance on the boards seems important to me.  That provides the network of
friends that I perceive myself as needing, that school used to provide.  I get
the human contact in class, too, hanging out with the French students.  I have
to say nothing, get people to talk, say things I already know.  I hate the
maintenance that goes in to friendships, for the dubious gain of an acceptance
fix.

     And yet, there is more I need.  When was the last time I could hold
someone in my arms?

     Damn, this is getting too pathetic.  I am moving on.

     On the bookmark in The Last Magician -- the receipt from Waldenbooks when
I bought Using Your Mind for a Change -- I have some scribbled notes.  I
suppose I'll be losing this bookmark soon, so I'll copy some of them down into
here.  Some of these notes are pointless, such as the notes I made about a
dream for an earlier entry or a line I want to include in "Greece", in the
pool scene.  (The line is, by the way:  "She sits beside me, so thoughtless,
so shameless, I expect she must be a little soft in the head.  That's what I
need sometimes, though.  Soft."  It is a cruel twist from the innocence of
childhood to the idiocy of naivete.  It expresses my dislike for the innocent
and the childlike.  I might substitute "simple" for "soft", and I will, of
course, expand on the thought.  I just want to make sure I remember the
theme.)  I have a quote here, from The Last Magician:  "Behind every lie, she
said, there is a wound.  One should be gentle with the bloody gashes in other
people's lives."  There is another great line I haven't bothered to write
down:  "Lust is a frightened manchild in the dark."  I, of course, would drop
the "man", but this author is female.  Next, there is a failed thought:  "Some
modern writing is dissociative.  It tries to say something in a mixture of
ways.  Like the gospels, or Gustafsson, or Hospital."  That last, of course,
is the author of The Last Magician.  I was attempting -- unsuccessfully, in my
opinion -- to express a difference between the modern authors.  There is one
group, like Vonnegut, that seem to write fragmentarily, never really touching
on anything, in a minimalist manner.  I don't care for that.  On the other
hand, people like Hospital or Gustafsson seem, as I try to in such stories as
"Greece", say something that cannot be said by saying it in a number of
different ways and painting up a picture that way.  I never really cared for
Impressionist painting, but I do like the literary style.  This leave only one
note.  (Quite a full receipt, no?)  This, I suspect, dates from when I was
reading Diana:  The Making of a Terrorist, and runs:

          Terrorism does not gain support by recruitment.  Terrorism 
          can  only mobilize people two ways:  Attacking  them,  and 
          forcing  them to take sides, or attacking  the  government 
          hard  and  quick,  forcing the government  to  attack  the 
          people indiscriminately.

This was an attempt to make sense of the actions of the Weathermen, to learn 
from their mistakes.  This exercise has been left to the student.

     The Last Magician is an incredible book.  It is the kind of book that
makes one contemplate giving up writing, never being able to match it.  It is
the kind of book that is painful to read.  But I don't want to get too far
ahead of myself.  I discuss some of this in journal notes I haven't
transcribed, yet.  So I turn to a yellow notepad.

     (Heh.  I just found a note in the margin of my notebook:  "In 'Greece':
Comment that he dresses, dumbass.  That will eliminate the whining about her
nudity."  I thought it was kind of foolish to write, and I supposed I might
have remembered in a revision, but when I saw this note I dug out my current
working copy and, sure enough, I had forgotten that revision.  Guess the note
did its job.  Anyway, on with something of more substance.)

     Here is a utilitarian statement.  I suppose I wrote it, but I don't know
if I believed it at the time.  In any case, this is what it says:  "Violence
is not right, but violence works.  To succeed at what is right is right, and
in that struggle violence is a tool like any other."  Of course, I am an
anarchist and a Catholic.  I don't buy that "the ends justify the means"
mentality.  I guess I wrote it, though.  This next, though, I know I didn't
write.  Bill Ayers of the Weathermen did.

          We can't get involved anymore in the kinds of actions that 
          merely say to people that this is wrong, or that is wrong, 
          because that doesn't tell people what to do, that  doesn't 
          project the kind of confidence, and the crucial nature and 
          importance of what we're trying to do in this country now.  
          We have to fight and show the people through struggle  our 
          commitment,  our  willingness to die in  the  struggle  to 
          defeat U.S. imperialism.  We have to convey these  things, 
          and October 8-11 is a concrete way that we can do that.  I 
          think  people should push out this slogan "Bring  the  war 
          home."   We're not just saying bring the troops  home  and 
          deploy  them some other place, we're saying bring the  war 
          home.   We're saying you're going to pay a  price  because 
          increasingly  guys in the army are going to shoot  you  in 
          the  back, increasingly the guys in the army are going  to 
          shoot  over  the heads of the Vietnamese, shoot  over  the 
          heads of the blacks, increasingly this country is going to 
          be  torn  down,  and we're not going to  be  bringing  the 
          troops home to be deployed someplace else, we're going  to 
          bring the war home, we're going to create class war in the 
          streets and institutions of this country, and we're  going 
          to  make  them pay a price, and the  price  ultimately  is 
          going  to  be total defeat for them.  That's the  kind  of 
          thing that we have to convey, and that's the kind of thing 
          that we have to build.

     Poetry it's not, but it tries to express what the Weathermen were trying
to do, and I can empathize with that.  The Weathermen made some mistakes, but
they also had some good ideas.  Any revolutionary group today would benefit
greatly from studying the Weathermen, and adopting rather more than they
discard I would expect.

     Then we have an actual page of notes from class.  Always a surprise in
one of my notebooks.  Then we find, in the margin of a "Greece" fragment:

          I feel a little uncomfortable on campus in Thursdays, when 
          the  ROTC are in uniform.  I used to be  uncomfortable  in 
          the business buildings, since everyone there almost seemed 
          in  uniform,  and  my  long-haired  scraggly  self  didn't 
          belong.   When  I  cut my hair for  ROTC  and  dressed  in 
          uniform  from time to time, I started hanging out  in  the 
          business   buildings.   (After  all,  they   have   coffee 
          machines.)  When the other uniforms are there, though,  it 
          is a problem.  I even see cadets I know, occasionally.  We 
          never speak.  They, in the nation's uniform, and I, in  GI 
          boots,  BDU jacket -- with patches, military beret, in  an 
          obscene parody of a soldier.
               I fight, but I'm not sure what.

     I wrote that last Thursday, between classes.  Following that I have three
pages of a letter to A., which I haven't typed up yet, much less sent.  I
suppose I will sometime over the next couple of days.  Then, out of the blue,
we have:

          Did  you ever stop to think about the saying, "The die  is 
          cast"?   Probably not.  The thing is rife with  ambiguity.  
          The  meaning, of course, is that the course is  set.   The 
          future  is  set.   But why?  One meaning is  that  die  is 
          singular for dice, and the cast is a toss.  The future  is 
          sealed  by  fate.  The other is that a die is  for  making 
          metal  molds, and cast is made.  Design, not fate.   Which 
          die gets cast?

     That is the kind of moronic thing that goes through my mind.  It is
followed by two more pages of story notes.

     I have been at this for a long time, but fortunately this notebook only
has four more used pages so far, two pages of French notes and two of diary
notes.  This last excerpt is long, though.  Pack a lunch.

          1443
               The  Last Magician is an incredible book.  At  times, 
          painful.   I  wonder how odd it is that  I  identify  with 
          Charlie.   I  could see echoes in Lucy, but not  the  same 
          identification.  But it is not too odd to identify with  a 
          main character aside from the narrator.

               Charlie  was teased as a child.  The  book  resonates
          this.  It might have made him different, or it might  have 
          been  because.  He was an ethnic Chinese and  didn't  fit.  
          He was pushed to study.  He was on the outside looking in.

               I  am trying to remember my childhood.  I don't  know
          if I want to.  Read the conversation on the top of the car 
          in "Greece".  Before my first breakdown in seventh  grade, 
          I only have photos, a couple of minutes of video  perhaps.  
          No sound.  Nothing really.  Perhaps snatches of sound, but 
          I can't recall it.

               This  kind  of memory.  Sometimes, I thought  it  was
          normal.   Sometimes,  I didn't.  I went  through  all  the 
          things  kids  do  -- I was an alien, I  was  in  a  mental 
          institution,  I  had been given to my family  by  the  CIA 
          after  having  implants put in.  Clockwork seems  to  have 
          this  phenomenon.  He was the child of an  alcoholic,  and 
          abused.   I  was  not.   This  loss  of  childhood  memory 
          accompanied  by  the ability to fragment the psyche  --  a 
          Bobbi, a Nemo, the voice of God perhaps -- are symptoms of 
          DID.   Dissociative Identity Disorder.  This is  triggered 
          by  childhood  trauma, though.  Usually  childhood  sexual 
          abuse.

               I  realized  a couple of days ago I  cannot  remember
          being  teased.  I know it happened.  I don't know *how*  I 
          know,  but I think I know.  (I'm getting something.   This 
          is unbelievable.  Take it with a grain of salt.  There was 
          a  girl in second grade.  Her name was Penny.  She was  an 
          outsider.  No one seemed to like her.  I'm thinking I  was
          peripheral.   I remember a friend or two, and hanging  out
          on  the edges in the playground.  More later.  I  remember 
          she gave me a book, once.  I think she had a crush on  me.  
          I  didn't figure this out until she intruded back into  my 
          mind  recently.  I was a stupid child.  I was an  outsider 
          because  I was too stupid to fit in.  The startling  thing 
          it -- the grain of salt thing -- is her archetype.  Second 
          grade  is on the young side, but I was sexually  awakened, 
          physically.  The outsider.  And I was always struck by her 
          short,  dark hair.  Fast forward a couple of  years,  give 
          her a smoking habit, put a little less roundedness in  the 
          hair....)

               Why can't I remember being teased?

               Maybe  I never was, and it is so sensitive because  I
          feel guilty?

               God, this is a mindfuck.

               I think I'll go back to my book.

          1459
               The  next  girl I remember with this hair  was  Dawn.  
          Dawn  in  England  Dawn.  I never wanted her;  she  was  a 
          friend.  Heather's was different.  Next, was C.

     That really has been brooding choice for the day:  Why don't I remember
being teased.  I thought about it all day, and I really can't remember it.  I
remember being on the edges, and voluntarily separating myself.  I had tended
to attribute this voluntary separation in later years to a "I didn't want to
be your friend anyway" mentality.  I remember as a kid being a leader and
having friends.  So was there a point where I stopped having them?  It might
almost have been fourth, when I forced away any leadership tendencies.  Or the
teasing might have affected me so much I have completely suppressed the
memory.  I don't know.

     I told Mom tonight I can't remember being teased.  She didn't know about
my patchy memory.  I expected her to tell me that she remembered my being
teased as a child.  Instead, she asked, kind of surprised, "You were never
teased as a child?"  Like me, she assumes that all kids are teased, but she
didn't have anything to add.

     I told A. tonight I can't remember being teased.  She didn't know about
my patchy memory.  That surprised me.  I expected I would have told her.  In
conversation she said things that triggered memories of being teased in sixth
grade or seventh grade, but this doesn't help much for what I am trying to
figure out.

     Did I invent my own persecution as an artificial way of justifying my
voluntary -- for whatever reason -- exclusion from society?

     It sounds incredible, but not impossible.  Until I can piece together
some more memory, I won't be able to answer for sure.

     But I have gone on longer than I expected.  I think I'm going to have
another smoke and get to bed.  I have an exam tomorrow.  And so, I sign off.

0213 111296

--SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB--


     "Breathes there a man with hide so tough
      Who says two sexes aren't enough?"
                                                           --Samuel Hoffenstein


--SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB--

     UNTiTLED DAiLY TORTURE
     by sweet disease
        
     Morning.  Fuck it.  I've never been much of a morning person, but today
really takes the cake, or some such stuff like that.  With my hands carelessly
sprawled across my desk, and my head non-chalantly flopped between them, I
dream of a better life.  A life away from my science class, at the moment.
The borrowed television is playing a worn-out movie about protozoan.  Yay.  My
life is finally complete, because I've learned that diatoms are the most
abundant plant life on Earth.  Thank God for television.

     "Hey."

     Oh shit, I think to myself.  The girl I'm infatuated with just sat down
next to me and is trying to strike up a conversation.  I casually peel one eye
open and look her in the face.  "Uhm... hi."  Damn!  I blew it!  Why do I
always have to choke when this happens!  I mentally kick myself in the ass.

     "You tired?"

     Argh.  "Uhm... hi -- I mean... yeah."  <moan>

     "Yeah, me too."  She suppresses a giggle.

     Wow.  She thinks I'm some rambling vagrant.  'Do you wanna goto a movie
or something?' 'With you?  You pathetic little bastard.' 'Oh. Ok.' I play a
conversation between us over in my mind.  It hasn't happened though.. yet.  I
mumble something about getting 2 hours of sleep last night.

     "Well.. I gotta go.  The bell rang.."

     What?!  Am I *that* enticed?  I hastefully grab my books and jog out of
the room.  "Great video," I remark to the science teacher, sarcasm literally
dripping from my voice.  Hey -- you wanna know our school motto?  "At West,
respect builds quality."  Well, we've got neither.

     3:04am.  My eyes pop open.  "Life," I whisper to myself.  Man, I gotta
piss so bad I can taste it.  Yuck.  I slowly raise my frail body out of bed,
thousands of joints I didn't even know I had popping.  *Crack*... 'yow, that
one hurt.'

     I stare dumbly down at the porcelain bowl, the rancid fluid pouring down
into the murky depths of the toilet water as I relieve myself.  I think of two
things as this is happening:  how would one define religion, and why the hell
am I peeing on my foot?  Yes, there's a fine trail of amber liquid that took
it upon itself to separate from the main stream and dampen my foot.  "Fuck
you," I exclaim, possibly a bit too loud.  A loud snort emits from my parents
room.  I quickly flush and rush back to bed.

     I just can't sleep.  I lay here, staring at my white-washed ceiling,
thinking deep, philosophical things, like "why are there no chartreuse M&M's?"
and "what would Oprah Winfrey and Gordon Elliot's children look like?"  Eww...
that last one disgusted me thoroughly.  I reluctantly gaze over at the clock.
Arrgh, 4:15am.  How long have I been sitting here, pondering talk-show hosts'
children and the ratio of salt to bile at any given time in the human body?

     6:15am.  My alarm clock blares out the signal of "Wake up, or I'm
gonna...."  You get the picture.  My right arm extends, and arcs in at a
perfect 90 degree angle, devastating the little brown box.  "Eat that, you
bastard," I think to myself.  I chuckle softly and flop out onto the floor.

     8:00am.  English class.  In my dazed and confused state, I have forgotten
who the teacher is, and I find myself wondering "Who is this fat, annoying
bitch at the front of the room?"  Oh, well.  We're watching a video, since the
lazy, chauvinistic pigs who we call "educators" feel that we learn more this
way.  Once again, I return to my all-to-well known position with my arms
sprawled across the desk and my head added to the top of the pile.

     3:00pm.  Ahh, another day is through.  I'm heading for home.  I stare out
at the looming world beyond the crappy-yellow-colored paint of the bus and
trace my finger along the frosted glass which currently reads every profane
symbol I've used in this file, and then some... all backwards, of course, so
supposedly passersby can read them, even though everyone knows they're not
paying attention to some stupid school bus.  Who the hell would drive around
reading crap freshmen write on their bus window?

     3:35pm. The garage door slowly cranks open, much to my surprise.  I head
into the house, sit down, and watch TV for a few hours.  Time for homework.
Fuck it.  I work for half an hour, and then I flop down in front of the
trusted old friend, the computer.  Rat-tat-tatting can be heard for the
remainder of the night as I logon to the internet and chat with other zine
freaks on IRC, and dial up Erebus and Alcholiday.  Eventually, I tap out
"TIME" and, like magic, 11:00pm appears on the display screen.  We call it a
monitor.  Arrgh. I'm fucking tired.  I head up to my room, and pass out in a
heap of my own self-pity, ready for another day of the grind we call life.

     Se la vi.  Live it as full as they'll let you.

--SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB--


     "The vilest abortionist is he who attempts to mould a child's character."
                                                          --George Bernard Shaw


--SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB--

     A RESPONSE TO CLOCKWORK'S "AN AMERiCAN HOUSEHOLD"
     by StormChaser

     Sometimes alcoholism isn't a disease.  Sometimes it's a weapon.  Guilt,
feelings of inadequacy, and a lifetime of bottled-up emotions is all I knew of
my father.  He had such a capacity to love everyone but himself.  He tried to
kill himself the conventional way so many times but we stopped him.  This is a
story of how he disguised it.

     Even when everything was happy, my parents were together and happy, and I
was a normal kid.  I think he began there.  One day he went to a doctor.  From
that point on the doctors at work incessantly told my mom to stop him from
drinking.  He was a stubborn ass, though, and she didn't think anything of it.
Besides, he never got drunk, but he was never without an alcoholic beverage.

     Suddenly, he left us.  Next thing I knew, I had a stepmother and
half-sister.  I loathed him with more anger than knew I had.  But some
underlying knowledge that he loved me kept me loving him and I loved my
sister.  So I was there when he got sick.  He turned yellow.  His feet and
legs blew up like balloons.  To this day I don't know what was wrong with him.

     The bastard would not go to a doctor because he knew back then what was
wrong.  He would not go for me or for my sister.  Not even for himself.  He
thought we'd be better off without him.  He had ruined my life; I'd lost all
trust in people.  I couldn't keep a friend because I'd destroy it before they
could leave me like he did.  But I wasn't better off without him.  And my poor
baby sister doesn't deserve to grow up without a father.

     But he killed himself anyway.  His suicide note was his disease --
cirrhosis of the liver.  He died before I could get close to him.  I don't
know my father and I can never comprehend his pain.  But the scariest part is
that as each day goes by I become more and more like him.  Stubborn and alone.
And I can lie and hide feelings even from myself, just like he could.

     My point is to love your parents whether or not they seem to love you.
Help them before they're gone.  Because once they are gone you can't ever go
back, no matter how much it hurts.  Bits and pieces from relatives or
photographs is all I have left of my father.  Don't let it happen to you.
Somehow, if I can't right my life, I want to right someone else's. And
finally, no matter what you do, don't ever be like them.

--SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB--


     "I would like to remind
      the management
      that the drinks are watered
      and the hat-check girl
      has syphilis
      and the band is composed
      of former SS monsters
      However since it is
      New Year's Eve
      and I have lip cancer
      I will place my
      paper hat on my
      concussion and dance"
                                       --Leonard Cohen, "The Music Crept by Us"


--SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB--

     A NEW YEAR'S EVE PARTY, or
     Some SoB Writers Hang Out With Some Small People and Get Crazy
     by Noni Moon

                                 THE PLAYERS
         (for you people too stupid to figure out the abbreviations)

          CA -- Crux Ansata
          CM -- Captain Moonlight
          CW -- Clockwork
          DO -- Doorway
          HA -- Hagbard
          IW -- I Wish My Name Were Nathan
          JU -- Jujube
          KT -- Kilgore Trout
          NM -- Noni Moon
          RO -- Ronnie
          ST -- Styxx
          T# -- nameless teen
          WA -- Walrus

     When you sign up for these gigs, you never know what the people are going
to be like.  Sure, I'd hung around most of the SoB writers to get my
interviews, but I'd never been around them as a group.  Individually, they
could be pretty strange, and there were definitely some weird undercurrents
going on.  But put them all together, especially on a party night, and all
hell breaks loose.

     This article attempts to recapture the night of December 31, 1996, in all
of its extreme detail.  Thanks to my trusty tape recorder, most of the
conversations herein are verbatim.  Some conversations have been reconstructed
to the best of my ability and with the help of those writers who were
conscious at the time of the conversation.

     I doubt I'll be going to another SoB party for awhile.  It's just too...
well, you'll see.

                                  * * * * *

Monday, December 31, 6:02p

     Someone was knocking on my front door.  I opened it and found Kilgore
Trout standing there, smelling of cheap vodka.  He didn't appear drunk at all.

KT:  Ready to go?

NM:  No.  You're an hour early.  I've still got to get dressed.

[Kilgore walked past me and headed towards the kitchen.]

KT:  Oh, that's okay.  I've always been anal about being punctual.  I 
     don't mind waiting.  Got anything to eat?

NM:  I thought we were gonna eat later.

KT:  [opening cabinets]  Never can tell, Noni.  Sometimes the food at these
     parties really suck.  I remember last year we went to this one party in
     Westlake and -- ooh, Pop Tarts.  Brown Cinnamon Sugar even. Noni, you
     truly are the ultimate woman.  All you need now is the penultimate man.

NM:  And that would be?

KT:  Why, me, of course.  Who else could you possibly be thinking of? You can
     be Luke Skywalker to my Darth Vader, except you're not a boy, although
     you do act kinda boyish, and you do have both hands, which I admire in a
     woman.  Of course, I'm not dressed in a black jumpsuit with a cape, and
     I'm not the ultimate source of evil in the galaxy.  So maybe that wasn't
     such a good analogy.  Still, whaddya say?

NM:  I say no thanks.  You're definitely too strange for me.

KT:  But you're strange, too.  You've got blue hair.  I've always wanted to
     date a woman with blue hair.  Tried to date a woman with purple hair
     once.

NM:  What happened to her?

KT:  Nothing happened *to* her.  She just didn't like me hanging out in her
     bushes.

NM:  So you stalked her.  That's not exactly "trying to date."

KT:  I prefer the word "observing" myself.

NM:  Well, that's all I'm doing tonight.  Observing.

KT:  Speaking of observing, you really shouldn't answer the door totally
     naked.  Lots of nasty people in the world out there.

NM:  [covering myself and walking to the bedroom]  It's not something I, uh,
     normally, uh, do.  Er, excuse me.

KT:  [pulling a flask out of his black jacket]  Nice ass, by the way.

                                  * * * * *

Monday, December 31, 7:15p

     We pulled up to Crux Ansata's house in Kilgore's Tercel.  There was a
stuffed Santa Claus outfitted in army fatigues hanging from a noose of
Christmas lights under a giant oak tree in the front yard.  Ansat and Captain
Moonlight were taking turns throwing knives into him.

KT:  Hey guys!  I see you're using Santa for target practice again.

CA:  Gotta try out the new throwing knives we got for Christmas. Besides,
     since Santa brought these for us, we figured we'd like to give something
     back to him.

     Captain Moonlight threw a knife into Santa's chest.

NM:  I'm glad I didn't buy you anything sharp for Christmas.

CM:  You didn't get us anything, period.  Hey, Ansat.  Should we try out the
     new battleaxe?

CA:  [hurling a knife that lands in Santa's face]  Damn, I'm smooth.  Yeah,
     get the battleaxe.

KT:  Uh, guys, I hate to ruin your Santa slaying, but we've got a party to go
     to.

CM:  Can we--

KT:  No.  You can't bring the battleaxe to the party.  Alcohol and medieval
     weapons don't mix, not like Jack Daniels and RC Cola, anyway.

CA:  Let's get going, then.  Say, where is this party anyway?

KT:  Shhh.  [glances over at me]  Don't worry about it.

     There are some things people do that unnerve me.  Kilgore's avoidance of
a simple question was one of them.

                                  * * * * *

Monday, December 31, 7:42pm

     Somehow we ended up at Clockwork's house.  I lost my sense of direction
several times due to Kilgore's fascination with back roads that "will get us
there faster those big highway thingamajigs."  It also didn't help that Ansat
and Captain Moonlight were having a loud argument with Kilgore about the band
Black 47 and who was actually the biggest "Irish loving bastard" of the three.

     Kilgore honked the horn, and Clockwork and I Wish My Name Were Nathan ran
outside.

CL:  Hey, guys.  Hi, Noni.

IW:  Like your cocktail dress, Noni.  Didn't realize we were going anywhere
     fancy.

NM:  Kilgore said I should dress nicely.  

     Everyone broke out laughing except Kilgore, who was smiling wryly.

NM:  What?

KT:  Nothing, Noni.  You look great.  [to Clockwork and Nathan]  Boys, hop in.
     We've got a party to get to.

IW:  Can we all fit in there?

CA:  Sure.  Nothing like a crowded car to get to know each other real fast.

     Hagbard came out of Clockwork's house.  

HA:  Dammit, don't leave without me.  I'm not finished practicing my pratfalls
     down the staircase for my next improv show.

CL:  All of us cannot fit in that car.  Besides, it'll be more comfortable in
     two cars.  Where's the party?

NM:  Doesn't anybody know where this bash is being held besides Kilgore?

CL:  Nope.

IW:  Dunno.

CM:  No.

HA:  [practicing falling down on the grass]  Oof.  No.

CA:  It's, like, top-secret or something.

KT:  Trust me.  We'll have a good time.  

     Kilgore pulled out a piece of paper and scribbled down an address, making
sure that I couldn't see it.  He then gave it to Clockwork.

KT:  Meet us there.  Uh, pick up some people on the way, too, since we've got
     more space.  The more the merrier.

CL:  Will do.  

     Hagbard crawled into the back of the Tercel while Clock and Nathan headed
off towards Clockwork's Ford Probe.  The night was still young, and I was
already getting worried.

                                  * * * * *

Monday, December 31, 8:04pm

     We pulled up to a house in a nice part of town that had about fifteen
cars in front of it.  Loud hip-hop music was coming from inside, and a bunch
of people were standing around on the porch.  Kilgore parked in the front
lawn, and we all got out.

NM:  Whose house is this?

KT:  Uh, when I picked my sister up from high school a couple of weeks ago, I
     overheard some people planning a party.  I figured it would be fun to
     crash.

NM:  You mean this is a *high school* party?

KT:  Yup.

CA:  Cool.  Underage chicks.

NM:  No, it's *not* cool.  It's a high school party.  How much fun can that
     be?

CM:  Hey, I've only been out of high school for a semester, and I'm a cool
     guy.  These people can't possibly be as cool as I am, but, uh, they might
     come close.

KT:  Relax, Noni.  The kid's parents are away for the holidays.  We've got
     nothing to worry about.

NM:  I don't know about this, guys.  This seems so... juvenile.

CA:  Exactly.  That's what makes it so much fun.

     We headed towards the front door.  The kids on the porch stopped talking
and looked at us uneasily.

T1:  Who are you guys?

T2:  Yeah, you don't go to our school.

CA:  We're writers.

CM:  And artists.

HA:  And comedians with astronomy backgrounds.

KT:  We're also damn smooth.  Step aside.

T3:  Ronnie!  There are some people out here.

     A large teenager ambled out of the front door.  He looked like he played
football and was six inches taller than Kilgore.

RO:  I don't remember inviting you guys.

KT:  Of course not.  We're crashing the party.

RO:  I don't think so.

KT:  Oh, I *do* think so.  See, it's New Year's Eve.  It's a time of
     celebration, when all of humanity comes together to resolve to solve the
     world's problems and to help out his fellow man.  Of course, usually
     people just get plastered, but sometimes that's the best we can do.

RO:  Are you trying to tell me that you've got beer?

KT:  A keg.  Can we come in?

RO:  Hell, yes.  [turning around and yelling]  Beer's here!

     A loud rumble of applause and yelling burst from inside the house.

KT:  I figured you'd like that.  Ansat, help me roll the sucker in.

     Kilgore and Ansat went back to the car to get the keg from the trunk.
Now, besides crashing a high school party, we were also supplying alcohol to
minors.  Where the hell were guys like this when I was in high school?

T2:  Wow, you've got blue hair.

NM:  You're very observant.

T2:  Don't they like have a dress code at your school?  Our principal would
     freak out if someone came to school like that.

     It was gonna be a long night.

                                  * * * * *

Monday, December 31, 8:26pm

     Clock and Nathan arrived with an entourage including Doorway, Styx,
Walrus, and Jujube.  I hadn't met any of them previously since they hadn't
written anything for the zine.  Ansat and Kilgore had tapped the keg about
fifteen minutes ago, and the living room of the house was full of about forty
teenagers holding plastic cups of bad beer.

CL:  Uh, Noni, what is this?

NM:  A high school party.

DO:  Is there anything beside beer?

NM:  *We* brought the beer.  I doubt there's anything else here.

DO:  Oh.  Hmm.  Oh well.  [tapping his pocket]  Guess I'll just have to munch
     on these shrooms.  Anybody want some?

     Clock and Nathan nodded in agreement.

NM:  You do that.

ST:  You don't seem like you're having too much fun, Noni.

NM:  Good guess.

ST:  Well, it's already better than the New Year's Eve we spent sitting at a
     Whataburger.  Although we *did* get free biscuits at 2:30 in the morning.

NM:  We could be at a real party, or a club, or something.  Anything but this.
     Even Whataburger.

JU:  You'd still have high school kids there.

NM:  At least they'd be serving me.

ST:  Maybe there's a liquor cabinet here that the kids are afraid to touch.
     Not my house, not my problem.  Jujube, let's go find some wine.

JU:  Okay.  Can we smoke in here?

     Kilgore walked over with a cigarette hanging from his mouth.

NM:  I would take that as a yes.

KT:  Anybody seen my flask?  I gave it to some kid and it disappeared.  

WA:  Might check the kitchen.  I think I saw some kids pouring it into the
     orange juice.

KT:  Thanks, man.  

     Sandy, Styx and Walrus went off looking for the liquor cabinet.  

NM:  Kilgore, can you remind me why I'm here again?

KT:  Uh, because you're our friend, and we're having fun?

NM:  Not yet we aren't.

KT:  Look, if you wanna leave, we can leave and go somewhere else.

     Crux Ansata walked by talking to a young girl.

T4:  Oh, so that's what they're calling it these days.

CA:  No, no, no.  It's a real knife.  Do you wanna see it?

     Ansat pulled the knife out of his boot.  

T4:  You really *did* mean a knife.

     The girl walked off.

KT:  Having fun with the girls, Ansat?

CA:  Uh, like, when I ask someone if they wanna see my knife, it's NOT a
     come-on.  After all, my girlfriend would be really pissed.  Anyway, I
     need to go find my brother.  Last I heard, he and Walrus were singing old
     King Missile songs.  I need to hear a duet of "Jesus was Way Cool."

     Ansat wandered off, putting his knife back in his boot.

NM:  Hey, what happened to Hagbard?

     A loud crash came from the back of the house.  Hagbard came into the
living room and brushed past a few people before seeing us.

HA:  You get kids drinking, and the next thing you know they start trying to
     act funny.  One kid was gonna show me how he could fall, and he kinda
     fell on top of a vase.  Looked damn expensive, too.  Usually alcohol
     doesn't make people funny.  Alcohol and valuable antiques, though....
     Hee hee.

                                  * * * * *

Monday, December 31st, 9:58pm

     After a while, someone had popped in a copy of Star Wars, and Kilgore was
trying to lead everyone in some sort of drinking game.  When it got old
watching Star Wars thru a din of noisy kids, I wandered into the backyard,
where Clockwork, Doorway, and Nathan were sitting on lawn chairs discussing
something.

CL:  No, look.  You can't go about this in a hard way.  You've got to look at
     this softly.

DO:  Right.  We've been over this before.  I know that.  

IW:  I don't think you understand, though.  It's not just a matter of knowing.

NM:  Hey, guys.  What are you talking about?  Somebody got a light?

     Clock leaned forward and lit my cigarette.

DO:  Discussing the purpose of communication and how we can improve it.

IW:  But it's kinda hard to improve something with only itself.  We're
     thinking about doing away with it and using telepathy.

NM:  Telepathy?  What am I thinking about right now?

CL:  Not mind reading, Noni.  Telepathy.  Although I can probably guess you
     think we're a bunch of looney quacks.

NM:  Yeah, but I've gotten used to it.  Kinda.  So, I guess I have to ask.
     How's the telepathy proceeding?

     Clockwork looked at Doorway.  Doorway looked at Nathan.  Nathan looked at
Clockwork.  They all looked at me and shrugged.

IW:  Hold on!  Did anyone happen to send the word "maverick?"

     The other two guys shook their heads.

IW:  Damn.  

NM:  Heh.  Keep trying, boys.  One day you'll hit it.

CL:  We need some DMT.  It worked for the Mckenna brothers.

DO:  And where are we gonna get that?

IW:  South America?

ALL THREE:  [yelling]  ROAD TRIP!!

     What's a girl to do?  Sometimes I just want to be around normal people,
of age, who aren't high-fallutin' philosopher types all of the goddamned time.

                                  * * * * *
     
Monday, December 31, 10:27pm

     I made my way to the front of the house, where Styx and Jujube were
drinking wine.  I figured I could start writing some of this stuff down in
case my tape recording was bad, but it was too much fun to watch a tipsy Styx
do Fenster impersonations from _The Usual Suspects._

ST:  Give me the keys, you fuckin' cocksucker!

JU:  No, no, it's too comprehensible.  Benecio del Toro is even harder to
     understand than the guys in _Trainspotting_.  Try again.

ST:  Give me the goddamn keys, you fuckin' cocksucker!  How's that?

JU:  Better.  Be a little bit more gutteral.

ST:  Blah blah keys, blah blah fucking cocksucker!

JU:  Perfect.  Gimme some more wine.

                                  * * * * *

Monday, December 31, 10:50pm

     I spent some time talking with Styx and Jujube about various people here,
from Kilgore's strange obsessions to Ansat's strange obsessions with knives.
Walrus and Captain Moonlight came out and sat down. Somehow, perhaps as if by
magic, Walrus produced two Mad Dog 20/20 bottles from inside his jacket.

NM:  How the fuck did you do that?

WA:  It's a secret.  Besides, what's a party without me drinking Mad Dog?
     Say, did you know my mom's starting to collect Ron Popeil products?  Ya
     know, the informercial guy who makes the RonCo dehydrator that all the
     potheads want to get so they can dry their weed in it?

ST:  Old material.  Heard it.

NM:  Huh?

ST:  Sometimes Walrus forgets he has told us something funny, so we define all
     of his little bits into two groups:  old material and new material.  If
     it's new material, then we haven't heard it before.  If it's old
     material, then we have heard it before, sometimes way too many times.

WA:  Heh.  Did I ever tell you about the time I dreamt I could fly in
     Wal*Mart?

ST:  A thousand times, Walrus.  Drink your Mad Dog.

NM:  Hmmm.  Interesting.  So, did you want to become a stand up comic or
     something?

WA:  Nah.  But I am a radio disc jockey.  Take that as you will.

NM:  I had a friend who wanted to become a standup comic, but he wasn't funny.
     No one wanted to tell him that cuz he was a nice guy.  He just thought we
     didn't "get his humor."  Apparently the folks on amateur night didn't get
     it either.

ST:  I could be a stand-up comic and do impersonations.  I've got tons of
     stuff from _Dune,_ _Blade Runner,_ _The Usual Suspects,_ _Full Metal
     Jacket,_ and much, more.  I *even* do an impersonation of an ape picking
     up a psychedelic mushroom, eating it, and discovering language.  Of
     course, I think that also requires Kilgore because it takes two to have a
     conversation.

NM:  Touring with Kilgore.  That would be an experience.

CM:  You seem to have some weird aversion to Kilgore.

NM:  It's like we know each other too will.  Like, I get the feeling that
     everytime I'm about to say something, he already knows what I'm going to
     say.  It's kinda unnerving.

JU:  Have you ever talked to him about it?

NM:  No.  I don't know why, either.  Usually I'm pretty upfront with this type
     of stuff.  But with Kilgore, it's like there's something holding me back.

     I lit a cigarette with Jujube's lighter.  The lighter was shaped like a
pair of female legs sticking out of a red miniskirt.

NM:  Nice lighter.  I bet all the guys grope this.

JU:  You better believe it.

NM:  I should get me one of these.  Too chic.

     Walrus took a chug from one of his bottles.

WA:  Yeah, that's one of the coolest lighters I've seen.  Of course, my dad
     found one in our garage that has a Confederate flag on it and plays Dixie
     when you light it.  I dunno where it came from, but it rocks.  [takes
     another swig from the MD 20/20]  Dawg in da house!

NM:  What exactly *is* Mad Dog 20/20?

WA:  It's wino hooch, man.  Fortified wino hooch.  This shit is 18%, man...
     and cheap!  You can get fucked up for the price of a Big Mac Value Meal!
     MD 20/20 is in the zone, and that's all you need to know. When I've got
     two bottles, I like to call 'em my "wine goggles."

     Walrus puts the bottles up to his eyes like binoculars.

CM:  That's goofy.

WA:  Living in Missouri does that to ya.  C'mon, let's go in and sing some bad
     gangsta rap songs.  We can do "Time to Make the Donuts" by Class A
     Felony.

CM:  Time to make the donuts?

WA:  Yup, time to make the donuts.  

     Captain Moonlight and Walrus give each other a high five and storm back
inside the house.

JU:  The scary thing is that Moonlight hasn't had a drop to drink tonight.

     Even the sober people were acting really messed up.  I went inside to
check on how things were going.

                                  * * * * *

Monday, December 31, 11:40pm

     Inside, the place was loud and raucous.  Someone else had taken over
Kilgore's spot at leading the Star Wars drinking game, tipsily fumbling thru a
bunch of pages of rules.  Most people were just watching and drinking whenever
they wanted to.  Kilgore came out of the bathroom in the hall, saw me, and
walked over.

KT:  Having fun yet, Noni?

NM:  A little more.  Your non-SoB writer friends are pretty cool.  They're a
     little bit more normal.  Except for Walrus and his wine goggles.

KT:  Wine goggles?

NM:  Never mind.  

KT:  Heh.  So, only about eighteen minutes until the new year.  Ya know, I put
     in the Star Wars tape so at the stroke of midnight, the Death Star would
     blow up.  Is that cool or what?

NM:  Innovative, even if it does sound a little bit dorky.  Whatever gave you
     that inspiration?

KT:  Oh, I dunno.  I figured watching the Death Star blow up instead of Dick
     Clark blabbing would be more enjoyable.

NM:  You've got a point.

T5:  Hey, how many drinks are we supposed to take if someone says, "I've got a
     bad feeling about this."

KT:  Chug the whole cup.

T5:  Oh.  I've got a bad feeling about this.

KT:  It won't hurt you.  The worst that will happen is you'll puke, and
     everybody's got to learn their limits somehow.

     The teenager lifted the cup to his lips and drank the contents.  He then
got an awkward look on his face and ran out the back door.  The vomiting
sounds I heard don't need to be described.

DO:  [from outside]  Shit!  Man, you're fucking up our concentration!  We're
     trying to unlearn language out here!

KT:  Heh, heh.  Funny guys they are.

NM:  Look, we need to talk.

KT:  About what?

NM:  About me and you.

KT:  What about us?  Does this mean you're reconsidering going out with me?

NM:  No.  Look, I think I'm gonna be taking a break from the zine for a while.

KT:  Why?  Everyone loves your interviews.  You're a good writer, and you add
     that real-life quality to the zine.

NM:  It's just, I dunno.  It's hard to explain.  

KT:  You don't have to explain it if you don't want to.  I may get on my knees
     and wrap myself around your legs begging you to keep writing, but if you
     wanna stop, that's fine with me.  Well, that's a lie, but you can do
     whatever you want.

NM:  Well, I think I need to explain it, but I just don't have the words.
     It's like for the past year, most of my creative output has been for the
     zine, and that's it.  I wanna try different things, in different mediums.

KT:  No one said you only had to write for us and that's it.

NM:  But it's like there's some strange attraction between me and the zine,
     like it's part of me.  You've given me an audience, and people know who I
     am.  A few people, anyway.

KT:  Do what you want, Noni.  Whatever you need, I'll see what I can't help
     you out with.

NM:  Thanks.  I appreciate that.

     Everyone in the room cheered, and we turned and saw the Death Star being
blown to bits.  1997 had officially started.

KT:  Hey, it's the New Year.  How about a kiss to start things off?

NM:  Not a chance.

KT:  Denied.

                                  * * * * *

Tuesday, January 1, 1:00am

     After the Death Star blew, our crew took off.  I drove Kilgore's car cuz
he had found his flask and finished it off.  We said goodbye to everybody, and
I drove Hagbard, Captain Moonlight and Ansat home.

     We got to my apartment around 1:45am.  I parked, got out, and went over
to the passenger side of the car.

NM:  C'mon, get out.

KT:  Huh?  

NM:  You're sleeping on my couch.  I don't want you driving home like that.

KT:  Oh.  

NM:  C'mon, lemme help you up.  Sorry bout have a second-story apartment.

KT:  No problem.  I've crossed cattle guards while drunk.  Steps are a piece
     of cake.

     We made it to the door, and I unlocked the door and plopped Kilgore down
on the couch.  He reached for the pack of filterless Gauloises on the
coffeetable and lit one.

KT:  Right now I'm really drunk and feel like white trash, but I'm also
     smoking French cigarettes.  These feelings are quite confusing.

NM:  Don't worry about it.  You just need some sleep in preparation for the
     nasty hangover you're gonna have tomorrow morning.

KT:  [exhaling]  I don't get hangovers, Noni.

NM:  Hmm.  Well, do you want anything to eat?

KT:  No, thanks, although I must say you have a very motherly quality about
     you right now.

NM:  Fuck off.  I'm just trying to be polite.

KT:  Sorry, it's the alcohol.  [stubbing out the cigarette]  I think I'll
     sleep before I make a bigger fool out of myself.

NM:  Good idea.  Sleep well.

                                  * * * * *

Tuesday, January 1, 11:32a

     I woke up and Kilgore was gone.  He left a note thanking me for being so
nice last night and also left me his phone number in case I wanted to go out
sometime.  He also drew a little picture on there of a stick figure with blue
hair.  I know why he's a writer and not a painter.

     A few things oughta be cleared up about the story that might seem a bit
unclear from the transcription.  The teenagers were, for the most part, in a
world of their own, and they talked a lot more than what I recorded.  I can
only be in one place at a time, and I decided to stick close to the SoB folks.
I heard from down the grapevine that the party had gotten busted shortly after
we left, and the cops didn't believe the kids' stories about a bunch of
college kids bringing free beer to the house.

     Doorway, Clockwork, and Nathan never did achieve telepathy that night,
but they came pretty close.  They said their closest matchups included
"breast, best, vest" and two "Lucille Balls" and one "old dead lady from a
popular '50s sitcom."

     Walrus didn't puke from drinking the two Mad Dog 20/20s.  Amazing.

     Styx's Fenster impersonation got better and better.  When he sobered up,
though, it really sucked.

     Jujube smoked even more cigarettes than I did.  Amazing.

     Captain Moonlight and Ansat were last seen walking into their house
together, singing "Time to Make the Bombing Devices."

     Hagbard's pratfall practices have steadily improved his performances for
the Monk's Night Out improv troupe.

     As for me, well, this is my last piece for SoB for awhile.  It's been a
blast, but I've gotta try my hand at a few different things for awhile.  I'll
probably be popping up from time to time, but until then...

--SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB--


                               [=- POETASTRiE -=]

"The poets?  They stink.  They write badly.  They're idiots you see, because
 the strong people don't write poetry....  They become hitmen for the Mafia.
 The good people do the serious jobs."
                                                             --Charles Bukowski


--SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB--

     LiFE
     by DeMoN

     Once again, my eyes open;
     anguish
     Scattered rays of light spill in,
     and singe dark eyes

     Rise and do their senseless bidding
     Stay within their imagined boundaries
     Toil alone, always alone
     Search for some purpose, some meaning
     and find nothing

     So i fight,
     i am the epitome of rage and hatred
     I fight blindly, striking down all in my path,
     and see the monster i have become,
     the demon they made me

     I continue battling
     They will not break me today, i whisper
     You will not win, i roar,
     but slowly, clenched fists open to reveal
     empty hands

     Victory, defeat, no difference;
     i cannot change things by myself
     Alone, in the dark, i cry
     and the teardrops burn

     This gift of life given to me by my creator
     is quickly torn from me by my brother
     I can fight no longer, been crushed too many times
     So i just wait, surviving on meager hopes, until she appears

     A black flame with soft white wings,
     only her touch can set me free
     Her deep eyes intoxicate
     Together we revel in our pain and misery, 
     and somehow, find a twisted brand of happiness, until
     a warm kiss, a last caress, and she is gone

     Alone again,
     time passes, memories fade, 
     and i cry and wait for this hell to end

     Once again they have won
     And somewhere a tear drops,
     and a flower burns,
     and an angel falls

     Such is life

--SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB--


                               [=- FiCTiON -=]


--SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB--

     THE MEN THAT EViL DO
     by A Piece of Caine

NOW

     The coffin shook with rage as it quaked in the ground, trying to spew
forth its contents like a bad piece of meat.  It was sickening for those who
were out for some late night Goth fun in the graveyard to hear the pitiful
cries that came from the grave.  A constant demonic howl that pierced the soul
on the most base level in the same way a broken relationship did, the crying
of a puppy half run over by some fat man in a Buick.  The ground shuddered and
heaved, trying to aid the expulsion of the moaning thing, and in one final
attempt the ground sprayed in all directions over the curiously afraid teens
who never fit in anywhere but with each other late at night in a graveyard,
and the coffin bubbled forth out of the crater and flew open

THEN

     The letter arrived by regular mail which was unsurprising to him as he
opened it with a steak knife.  Thin was always bad, he knew, and he barely had
to look at it to see the standard litany of the rejected.  He dropped it on
the floor and like so much forgotten it lay there quietly. The theme of unholy
angelic choirs sang through his head, mocking him and his uselessness.  He
walked upstairs calmly as his mind whirled and his head throbbed in such
pulsing chorus that it became indistinguishable from the voices that called
him a loser-waste of flesh-pathetic nobody-destined to be forever on the
bottom, and of course the ultimate in the litany of taunts, -nothing-

NOW

     and revealed the very enraged face of the dead, the corpse that regained
life and was pissed off about it all.  The assembled teens screamed in sheer
horror, for while they were forever reading and playing at the living dead,
they never intended to encounter one, especially not this one, this bloated
dark laughing fat man who snarled like a hellhound and stared with inhuman
intensity.  It hopped from the coffin and fell to its knees, crying in agony
as the teens made a break for it to escape what they so coolly professed to
care not for previously.  It would have none of that and despite the demon
chanting in its head it plodded onward and grabbed one of the teens by the
scruff and put a fist through the boy's chest, the warm feeling of blood on
his forearm as the teen screamed for as long as he could and saw his own guts
in its hand coming out of his chest before he died, and oh how it laughed,
laughed, giggled like

THEN

     and that was the worst of it, for he would not be nothing, he abhorred
the thought of it.  They rejected him because they knew he was destined to be
something.  They persecuted the Son of God when they realized he was going to
change everything, they persecuted Galileo, they always persecute the ones who
will bring change.  He knew he was the selected, one of those who would flux
the world with his acts and make it reconsider it all, the champion of change.
He sat on the edge of his bed with the hilarious green quilt and masturbated
furiously and when he exploded he let his seed take root on the carpet for his
was

NOW

     a little girl, feeling the teen's body impaled on its arm and hearing the
teen's dying gasp.  It leaned in close and took a delicious bite and chewed on
a chunk of the teen's left ear, like a piece of small leather in its mouth,
its tastebuds long since dead.  The voices whispered of its power and might
and its rage deepened as it wanted the whole world to know of its triumph over
death itself and of its newfound powers.  It stalked onto the street and went
to a house, one of the faceless many in the suburbs and could have been mine
or yours, and it pushed the locked door aside with the ease of slicing bread.
The mundane man of the house stood in his stained shorts and asked a question
that was drowned out by the voices hissing for violence and it shoved forward
and dug into the man's fleshy chest and tore, in a great juicy ripping sound,
a long flap of skin from him.  The man's pitch went immediately to high
soprano as he screamed the cry of the damned, the one yell that people make
when death visits, and oh was he death, he was death unlike

THEN

     the seed of the future, the beginning of the new way.  He shed the rest
of his clothes as unnecessary and the voices quietly whispered sweet death and
mutilation in his ear, and walked downstairs to where THE ITEM was stored.  He
fetched it from the desk with ease and loaded it patiently and took the few
spare clips in his other hand and the voices went up a pitch in anticipation
as the sound of someone entering the house floated in from upstairs and he
went and it was his sister, his sweet sister, who was a whore and a drunk, who
had been caught kissing his friend with an open beer between them and he
smiled and shot her five times and she looked surprised as she died and his
erection returned as he turned and faced his mother who stood in pure shock
and shot her four times in the face and the voices whispered their approval in
the darkness of his mind where

NOW

     any death before, the new incarnation of the reaper, here to decide who
was worthy of life, and the voices told it no one was.  It grabbed the man's
head and twisted it off like a jar and it was frozen in a look of sheer agony
and it liked it and took it with it as it stalked through the filthy living
room and ran into his ugly wife in the kitchen who was doing dishes and was on
her way into the living room when it shot a fist into her stomach and pulled
it out in front of her and it grinned its skeletal grin and the voices sung
his praises as she fell back and flopped around on the floor screaming and it
spoke for the first time and it said that she was destined to die and to have
a nice trip and behind it a small sleepy child came down the stairs and it
spun around and kicked the kid, and kicked the kid hard, very hard, hard
enough for his head to pop away with the groan of snapping muscles and bone as
it landed with a dull plop some distance away.  Death was here and death was
pissed and death had voices in its head to tell it who to take with it back to

THEN

     rage, rage seethed and bubbled and his anger against the world grew by
leaps and bounds as he ran outside feeling the caress of the wind against him
as neighbours and others came out or glanced out windows to see a naked boy in
the street shooting a gun at those who were near him and laughing with tears
streaming down his cheeks and they didn't really know what to do out of shock
but someone must have called the police after some time because they turned up
and saw carnage, body count all over, shot people, wounded people crawling
away pitifully and the boy in the center of the storm with a gun and police
react in a pretty specific way to this kind of thing and when the boy turned
with gun to face them and they shot him a number of times, they called the
ambulance but it was obviously too late and the boy had no ammunition left
after all so they felt foolish indeed and the funeral was

NOW

     NOTHING, oh dear lord no, he was an agent of the NOTHING and the voices
cackled as he stared at the blood on his hands and his bloated form and he was
aware he would never be the catalyst of the earth or the one who changed it
all but would return to NOTHING when his something here was done but why had
it happened this way he had it all worked out and the voices laughed, oh they
laughed like a demonic chorus of chipmunks and taunted his stupidity and
reminded him he was NOTHING in the beginning and NOTHING in the end and
NOTHING was his destiny and he railed and cried at being NOTHING but no tears
came because he had none left to give and he went out to the garage and poured
gas over the car the dead family had and he got in it and lit it up and the
flames raged around him and the voices laughed still as he lost anyway and
NOTHING was increased in power with the boy who thought he was something.
Silly boy, only in the end did he understand that NOTHING will come of NOTHING
and that to be something you have to live and take what moments come your way
and seize those precious moments and onwards and upwards, semper fi and all of
it, the clichés are all clichés because they are accurate, the secret to it
all is that you can't be something without being a NOTHING somewhere the same
way we go through agony and hurt to remind us how precious the happy times
are, and you have to walk through the darkness to see how bright the light is.
The flames were bright and higher and higher and he slowly cooked and his
nonflesh melted away while

THEN

     small, very small since no one truly spoken wished to admit a knowledge
of the boy.  The coffin was lowered into the ground without ceremony and the
men threw dirt over it and puzzled over why.. why it would happen... why it
wasn't prevented... why... why.. WHY

                  WHY
                                   WHY
                                                          WHY

NOW

     the answer came to him at his dying moments as he closed his eyes again
and a bright light came to him and he reached out for her hands and it laughed
and told him to fuck off, that knowing WHY at the end was useless, that
knowing WHY during was more important and not to waste what you have, and do
you know what

AHEAD

     The letter arrived by regular mail which was unsurprising to him as he
opened with with a steak knife.  Thin was always bad, he knew, and he barely
had to look at it to see the standard litany of the rejected.  He stopped and
thought for a moment and walked upstairs calmly and sat down at his computer
and began to type again and this time he knew WHY and

THEN+NOW+AHEAD

     his work is done.

--SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB--


     "Whoso would be a man must be a nonconformist"
                                         --Ralph Waldo Emerson, _Self-Reliance_


--SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB--

     ALL THAT CAME BACK WAS THE TiDE
     by Aspiraphale

     My friend Glen and I had stepped out between classes and gone for a
smoke.  It was a daily ritual- we were both seventeen, and while we couldn't
smoke inside the school building, no one really cared if we went outside to do
it.  I always bummed my smokes off Glen, but he didn't mind.

     We both attended Sir Walter Raleigh, a private high school in the middle
of Minneapolis.  It was for rich kids, but I got financial aid and was
accepted despite my family's lack of funds.   Glen had rich parents.  He had
his own car, and was always dressed in name-brand clothes.  For some reason,
we hit it off.  We had been friends since our freshman year.  We were an
unlikely pair.  He was big and athletic, while I was a scrawny hundred pounds.
He always wore expensive clothes; I always wore jeans and a T-shirt.  He was
inherently popular, while I was popular because I was his friend.

     We leaned against a waist-high brick wall in front of the parking lot and
smoked our cigarettes.  He was talking to me about his new car.  His parents
had gotten him a VW, a year old, because he was on the honor roll.  He liked
it more than his previous car, which had a little rust on it.  He was
explaining the merits of a four-cylinder engine and blowing smoke rings when a
car drove past.

     I wouldn't have taken notice, but it slowed down when it came closer to
us.  It was a nice looking red convertible.  There was a really big Hispanic
guy inside.  He jerked his head once, nodding.  Glen raised a hand.  The guy
drove away.  A couple minutes later, he drove past again.  This time he
stopped at the curb.

     "Hey."  He looked at Glen.  "What did you call me?"

     Glen shrugged.  "I didn't call you anything.  I just waved."

     "I heard you call me a dick."

     Glen tensed.  "No, I didn't."

     He was probably hopped up on something.  Crank is really big in the
Midwest, and the guy's eyes were bulging out of his head.  He looked really
paranoid. He got out of the car, and he was twitching.

     "I thought I heard you call me a dick."

     "I didn't call you anything.  I just waved."

     "Oh.  I guess that's all right then."  The guy relaxed, then hit Glen in the
face.  Hard.

     It was the first punch I'd ever seen that actually looked like it did in
the movies.  Before throwing the punch, the guy let his arm go limp, to make
Glen think he wasn't going to hit him.   Then he threw all his weight into
Glen's face, snapping his head back with his fist, landing on the jaw with the
sound of a book snapping shut.  Glen stumbled back, his arms flailing.

     Then he righted himself.  The guy was still in fighting stance.  Glen
looked at him coolly, and did nothing.  He reached up tentatively with his
hand.  He touched his chin; blood was running down his mouth, and when he
removed his hand his fingertips were bright red.  He studied his fingertips
for a moment, and then looked down.

     When he'd brought his head back to normal position, he'd gotten a bright
splotch of red on his green Polo shirt.  When he looked down, he saw the
bloodstain.  His eyes widened, and he snarled.

     "I PAID SIXTY-THREE DOLLARS FOR THIS SHIRT!"  He screamed at the guy. He
stood up, looked at him, and ran at the guy, head down.  Even though the man
was larger than we were, he wasn't ready for this ferocity from Glen; he
thought Glen was just another little preppy.

     I'd never seen Glen so angry.  He ran at the guy and grabbed him by the
collar.  Glen turned quickly, and the pull yanked the guy off his feet.  Glen
kept turning, and he literally threw the guy over his car.  The guy landed on
his back on the tarmac with a grunt, and Glen leaped over the car at him.

     Glen kneeled on the other guy's chest and leaned into his face.   The
older man was dazed, and he couldn't really make sense of what was going on.
Glen grabbed his head and smashed it into the pavement, then hit him in the
face a couple more times for good measure.

     The guy just lay there.  Glen got back up -- he had blood all over his
shirt -- and walked over to me.   I'd never seen him as angry as he was, but
now he was completely calm.  He reached into his jacket pocket, reached in
slowly, withdrew a cigarette, and lit it.

     Neither of us said a word.  We sat on the wall, smoking, as the guy lay
out in front of us, face bloodied.  When Glen finished his cigarette, he
tossed it on the pavement, hopped off the wall and ground it out with his
foot.  He walked out to his car, changed his shirt, and walked back.  He
kicked the guy in the ribs before heading back to the school.

     I was impressed with Glen.  We parted ways to our different classes, and
when school was out he gave me a ride home.  I didn't see him again until he
was in a holding cell.  The guy had suffered from a concussion, fractured
skull, and a broken jaw.  He wanted to press charges.

     I was involved in the trial, for the defense.  I didn't actually have to
take the stand for two days after the trial started.  Before me, the
paramedics testified that they had found the man, whose name was Peter
Vasquez, unconscious in the parking lot.  Apparently, the fact that Glen had
just left the guy there, without calling an ambulance, hurt him.

     The doctors came and testified about the guy's injuries, which were
severe. He was wearing a big bandage on his head and spoke with a voice
muffled by his jaw, wired shut.  Glen had a split lip.  He hadn't even put a
Band-Aid on it.

     When I was called to testify, I told the jury that Glen had acted in
self-defense, after Mr. Vasquez had punched him in the face.  I told them I
didn't think there was any reason for Mr. Vasquez to have done what he did.  I
told them I thought that he had been on drugs.  I thought that I had been
convincing, and I had told the truth, but the jury didn’t seem to buy it.

     The trial lasted three days.  The jury ruled in favor of one Mr. Peter
Vasquez.  Glen was only seventeen, so he was only put on probation for six
months.  If he had been tried as an adult, he would have gotten two to five
years in prison.  He still wasn't very happy with his situation.

     In addition to being on probation, his parents grounded him indefinitely.
They put his car in a storage space and hid the keys. He was allowed to take
the bus to school, go home, and go to see his probation officer.  That was it.
On top of all that, the kids at school were spreading nasty rumors about him.
His first day back at school, he showed up with dark rings under his eyes.

     He sat alone at the lunch table, something unusual for him.  No one would
go near him.  I tried to sit down next to him, but he shooed me away.  He
looked down at his food, trying to ignore the kids that whispered, giggled,
and pointed at him.  Word was spreading that he was a druggie.  He would get
"accidentally" tripped in the hallway, or elbowed in the face; he couldn’t
fight back against that.

     We didn't have many classes together, so we had our lunch hour to get
together and talk.  Instead of eating, he grabbed my arm and pulled me
outside.  He pulled out a pack of cigarettes and lit one before handing the
pack and lighter to me.

     "I can't believe this shit," he grumbled around his cigarette.  "I might
as well be in prison for all the freedom I got.  I get to come to school.  Woo
Hoo."

     He took a deep drag on his cigarette, and exhaled.  We sat in silence and
smoked.  The sun was out, and it shone on his face, casting the shadows deeper
under his eyes.  "I'm not getting any goddam sleep.  I'm smoking more than I
ever have before.  All I do these days," he said, punctuating his sentence by
gesturing with his cigarette,  "is smoke."

     "No," he abruptly spat out.  "I smoke, and I fuckin' jerk off.  And I
watch stupid MTV game shows.  Nothing.  I'm going out of my mind."  He took
another drag.

     After several minutes of silence, he threw his butt on the ground and
stepped on it.  "I've got to do something about this crap.  It's driving me
crazy."  He walked back toward the school, and though I ran up and walked next
to him, he didn't say anything.  He walked back inside, got his lunch tray,
and ate by himself.

     I didn't see much of him for several days.  He just sat by himself.
After three days or so, I walked over to his table and set my tray down by
his.  He still had dark rings under his eyes.

     "What's up, dude?  You haven't said anything to me for days."

     He grunted.

     "What's that happy crap?" I snapped at him.  "You're pissing me off, and
that's not good.  Why are you being such a cretin?"

     He looked up from his food.  He swallowed, and then he looked up at me.
"Screw you, man.  You don't know what's going on.  You don't know what I'm
going through.  My life sucks right now.  And the last thing I need is you
being a dick."  He stood up, carried his tray over to the garbage can, and
dumped the whole thing in:  food, tray, silverware and all.  Then he walked
off.  I didn't follow.

     I tried to leave him alone after that.  All day I tried not to think
about him, didn't try to talk to him in class.  He seemed not to care.

     The next day at lunch, he set his tray down next to mine.  He started to
eat.  "What's up, man?"  I asked.  "I thought you were all pissed off at me."

     "Eh."  He shrugged his shoulders.  "I was having a bad day.  Sorry if I
was an asshole  to you.  In fact, I've been having a bad week.  This whole
probation-grounding thing is driving me crazy.  I'm trying to figure out a way
to get out."

     "Get out?  What do you mean?"

     He gestured with a tater tot.  "Just that; get out.  Leave this damn
town, get away from my parents and the damned probation officer.  Start fresh
somewhere else."

     I was doubtful.  "Good luck, but I don't think it's that great an idea.
Where can you go?"

     "I dunno.  Out of the country.  Mexico.  It's warm year-round."  He
grinned. "I'm passing Spanish."

     I shook my head and laughed.  "Yeah, right.  Mexico."

     He shrugged and stood up.  "Laugh if you want.  I gotta get out of here."

     We dumped our garbage in the trash and walked outside.  He handed me a
cigarette, put one in his mouth, and gave me a light before lighting his own.
The wind blew the hair away from his forehead.  I think that's how I'll always
remember him.  Cigarette dangling from his lips, squinting into the horizon,
tie flapping, hands in his pockets.  The wind blew the hair from his forehead.

     "It wouldn't be too hard,"  he said.  "Hitchhike down, head west.  Baja."
He smiled.

     "Yeah, right.  Baja."

     He sighed, and we both sat on the wall, smoking our cigarettes.  The wind
smoked more of them than we did.  We ground them out and headed back to the
school, parting ways in the hall.

     That night, a Thursday, I think, I woke up at three in the morning.
Rapping on my window.  I groaned, rolled over.  The window opened, and I sat
up.  Glen was coming through the window.

     "Jesus fucking Christ, man, what the hell are you doing?"  I rubbed the
sleep from my eyes and looked up at him.  He had on a backpack, jeans and a
T-shirt.  "Your parents are gonna kill you!"

     He brought his fingers to his lips.  "Shut up!"  he hissed in the
darkness. "I'm headed for Baja."

     I sputtered.  "What?  Are you crazy?"

     "I'll keep in touch!"

     "Why did you come here first?  If my mom hears you up here, she'll..."

     He cut me off.  "Well, then, be quiet!"

     I calmed down.

     "Now, I'm here for a very logical reason.  I've got three hundred bucks
to my name.  I figure that'll get me, maybe, to Texas.  Do you think you could
help me out?"

     "Oh, man..."  I covered my eyes.

     "Dude." He was begging.  I grunted.

     "Dude.  Think about all the damn cigarettes I gave you.  I gave you my
old bike.  We've been tight."

     "Damn."  I got out of bed, the wind from the window chilly on my bare
legs. I walked over to my desk, yanked open the drawer.  "All I got's a
hundred fifty.  This is from my damn job, man; you owe me."  I shoved the cash
into his hand.

     He grinned at me.  "I owe you.  I'll send you a postcard."

     "Yeah, right.  From Baja, right?"  I laughed.

     His smile widened.  "Damn right."

     He sneaked back out the window, and I rolled over and went back to sleep.
I thought it was all a dream, when I woke up, but my desk drawer was open and
all the cash was gone.  I went to school, not knowing what to expect.  He
wasn't there.

     When I got back home from school, my mom was waiting for me. "Have you
seen Glen recently?"

     "Not really.  He was in the lunchroom yesterday; I didn't see him today."

     "His mom says he ran away.  Do you know anything about this?"

     I shook my head.  "No idea."

     "Jack Michael Irving, are you lying to me?"

     "No, mom.  Geez."  I waited a second.  "Where'd he go?"

     "They're looking for him.  The probation officer's upset.  Nora's sick
with worry."

     "Wow."  I went to my room, and sat down.

     Eventually I stopped wondering what had happened to Glen.  I became more
popular in my own right at school, and made new friends.  Glen faded from my
thoughts.  About a month and a half after he snuck through my bedroom window,
I got a postcard.  It was postmarked Mexico.  In scribbled handwriting:  "Not
too far from Baja.  Just got to make a short sail across the Bay Of
California.  I'm almost there, man."  No signature.

     I haven't heard from him since.  I hope he made it to Baja.  Some nights
I wake up, my wife warm at my side, and I almost hear him rapping at my
window.  I look up, and see only the tree moving about in the wind and the
moonlight, gently scratching the glass.  He’s never there.  I think he made
it.

     I can see him, in my mind's eye, laying on a towel on a beach somewhere
in Baja, salt water at his feet, grinning up at the sky.  He's drinking an
ice-cold beer, peering through sunglasses at the waves out on the Pacific. And
the wind's blowing the hair away from his forehead.

--SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB--


     "...a friendship that prides itself on the sharpness and vigour of its
     dealings.  I like love that bites and scratches till the blood comes.  It
     is not  vigourous and free enough if it is not quarrelsome..."
                                                          --Montaigne, _Essays_


--SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB--

     WHAT COURT DiD THAT NiGHT
     by Water Damage

     Court descended the steps into the Indigo.  His dark eyes were hard and
cold, in stark contrast to his youthful face and mussed black hair. It was
apparent in his face -- he had a mission.

     The predominant color here was red, a dim red that seemed to radiate from
the furniture and the walls.  The coffee shop was filled with a few dozen high
school students, a couple of staff members working the coffee bar, and one
particularly obnoxious punk band.  Tonight, it fit Court's mood, and he felt
at ease here.  Knowing that it would be easy to accomplish what he had to do
here comforted him, and he relaxed.

     He let his eyes scan the place, looking for...

     There.  Over by the stage, past that group of mohawked junior-high
pseudo-anarchists, he recognized her hair.  Her hair had obviously been cut
since the last time he had seen her.  Short and straight, Anastasia's red
locks seemed to add even more grace to her already gorgeous figure. She was
perfect, in Court's eyes.

     Perfect in his eyes, too, Court observed, noticing that Anastasia was
speaking to some big guy, who looked as enraptured with her as Court felt. One
of the little punks moved out of the way, and Court saw the guy taking Ana's
arm.  Court regarded the situation with skeptical interest and a lot of
curiosity, then remembered to look hard and tough again.  Guy and girl turned
to look at the band.

     Court had absolutely no idea who was playing tonight, which didn't bother
him at all because they were so bad it made his head hurt.  His facade did its
job well, because the few who turned to see him when he entered knew there was
something different about this Court, that he was not the same Court of
earlier this evening.  He maintained his stern expression, until a
particularly loud power chord erupted from an amp. This didn't bother Court,
but the subsequent shower of sparks and the explosion that came after that
did.  He raised an eyebrow and looked in the direction of the stage.

     However, he didn't see the amp, he saw Anastasia.  She was looking
directly at him.  Her pale skin and green eyes had a curious look to them, a
look that shook him out of his bravado.  All at once his nervousness
overwhelmed him, playing a terrifyingly rapid melody in his head, and set to
the backdrop of the loud noise of malfunctioning equipment that was coming
from the stage.  His false confidence thus evaporated, Court quickly turned
and ran out of the coffee shop.

     All of Court's attention was turned now to the pinball game.  His little
steel ball had scored him many points, and as long as he kept focus, he was
sure he could rack up free game after free game.  Being his only refuge after
his failed attempt to make conversation with Ana, the game room offered a
solitude that no other place in the Student Union could, especially this
pinball game.  Court allowed his mind a respite from thinking of her, and
instead he thought of scoring 40 million points and being first on the high
scores list.  And so far, with a score of well over 39 million, he was about
to do just that.  However, Court had some really bad luck that he couldn't
seem to shake.

     His ball rushes to the top of the playing field and comes to it's apex.
Motionless for a moment.  It begins it's slow, inexorable descent to Court's
waiting flippers, but a touch on his arm and a voice in his ear annihilates
his concentration.

     Court stares as the ball accelerates, and he stares when the ball lands
on one of his impotent flippers.  Hands trembling with anxiety, Court looks
down at the table but does not see the impending doom of his little pinball.
Instead, as the little sphere rolls down the incline, he sees a reflection in
the table.

     A sweet voice accompanies that reflection, and it's the only thing Court
is hearing right about now.

     "Court?  Are you listening?"  Her hand was still on his arm.  

     Court's mind was busy racing.

     HiAnaDoyoulikebeingcalledAnaorisitAnastasiathat'ssuchaprettynamedoyouwant
togetcof...

     She exhaled, her breath a lot closer than before, and that blasted away
any trace of rational thought.

     "Yeah, yeah, the band was great and all that," Court says, now
comprehending the situation.

     "I didn't like them," Anastasia says.  Then, "What do you like?"  And
after a moment, "Do you want to go somewhere?"

     All Court can think of to say right now is, "the big guy?"  However, he
doesn't say that, because he's being lead out of the game room by the object
of his desire.

     Court thinks this is great and everything, in spite of his earlier failed
attempts to execute his foolproof plan of winning her affection, but he is
having a hard time picturing what is going to happen next. Floral perfume
fills his nose, her thin skirt is flapping against his jeans as they walk.
Anastasia walks purposefully and quickly, like she knows exactly what is going
on.

     Poor Court, though is utterly confused.  She asks him what he is thinking
about, but he doesn't answer.

     He's thinking, "Where in the world is that big guy?"

     Court never found out where that big guy was.  As it turned out, it
didn't matter much.  Ana made Court drive, told him to go to her house, but
Court never made it because he ran out of gas.  Court remembers in perfect
detail what happened during the rest of that night, but he's too shy to tell
anyone about it.  He asks me to keep it a secret, too.

     "We'll let them use their imagination," he says with a smile.      

--SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB--


     "Uh, does anyone want to see my unit?"
                                   --Butthead, _Beavis and Butthead do America_


--SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB--

     SELF PORTRAiT:  ARTiST WiTH WORDS
     by Crux Ansata

     I am sitting in a darkened movie theater.  There is a Monty Python film
on the screen.  I've seen it before.  Everyone's seen it before.  Every man,
woman, and child capable of speech can recite the film from beginning to end.
In a bizarre vindication of Lamark, infants are being born capable of speech,
but only for reciting this film.

     I am sitting in a darkened movie theater.  I am suddenly aware of a sharp 
pain in one leg.  I look around, and see a fellow in the row ahead of me.  
Wrapped up in the movie, he has dropped his cigarette in his lap.  I snap at 
him:  "Do you mind!  You're hurting your leg."

     I am sitting in a darkened movie theater.  There is a hand on my leg.  It 
is not an unpleasant feeling, though it is an unfamiliar one.  I look over at 
her.  I am returning her caress.  We slip out, forgetful of the friends we 
each came in with.  We are driving, fast, down back roads, but I am not paying 
too much attention to where I am driving.  I have other things on my mind.  We 
park.  We kiss.  She whispers in my ear to put my hands around her throat.  I 
am scared; I remember unpleasant happenings in my childhood.  Thinking back, I 
fail to think of the present.  I crush too hard.  Panicked, I push the body 
out of the car and slip back into the theater.

     I am sitting in a darkened movie theater.  I am alone.

     I am sitting in a darkened movie theater.  I relax, and let time go by 
around me.  As I relax, time speeds up.  People come in, grow old, die around 
me.  Some leave, but very few seem even to realize there is a world outside 
this room.  I try to forget that there is.

     I am sitting in a darkened movie theater.  On the screen, a small, 
inoffensive man is being beaten.  The people around me are laughing.  I am 
crying.

     I am sitting in a darkened movie theater.  I am cradling a small Arab boy 
on my lap.  His white burnoose drapes around both our laps.  He understands 
nothing going on up on the screen, but that is alright.  I can hardly follow 
it myself.  There is little call to use Italian in Algeria.  I can follow the 
action, and so could he if he were watching the screen, but he isn't.  He is 
playing with a large cockroach he captured outside his house.  The cockroach 
runs up one hand to the other, and the boy shifts his hands, to perpetuate the 
process.  I imagine the cockroach must imagine he's going somewhere.

     I am sitting in a darkened movie theater.  It isn't dark enough.

     I am sitting in a darkened movie theater.  A girl sits beside me.  We are 
in love.  I gaze over at her.  She is angelic, so young, so pale, so slender.  
I pull her to me, crush her to me, and we kiss, deeply.  She seems 
extraordinarily alert, like she is superaware of every sensation.  Painfully 
alive.  I feel her body convulse slightly.  I imagine she is crying, overtaken 
with emotion, and relax my hold.  She coughs.  Her child's body is wracked 
with spasms.  Her white dress is streaked with red.  After a moment, she turns 
paler, and is still.

     I am sitting in a darkened movie theater.  A girl sits in front of me.  
In the glow of the screen the fabric of her blouse shimmers and holds close to 
her skin.  It seems to glow in the dark, a pale blue, almost more white than 
white.  As she breathes, the blouse swells and contracts around her, below the 
ribs, pulsing slowly.  I am reminded of the breathing of a toad.

     I am sitting in a darkened movie theater.  In front of me, a screen full 
of actors is staring at me.  They laugh.

     I am sitting in a darkened movie theater.  I lean back and look up at the 
ceiling.  It is odd, yet soothing.  Herring-gull gray, lightly domed, and 
quilted into small squares, each swollen out, pendant, with a little cloth 
covered button in the center.  The walls are quilted gray like the ceiling.  
Only the floor has been spared, carpeted with a dull flesh-pink.  The forest 
of hanging pads hangs in upside down rows, like miniature molehills, or ant 
heaps, or rows of even schoolgirl's breasts, a canopy of nippled buds.

     I am sitting in a darkened movie theater.  No girl puts her hand on my 
leg.  I cry.

     I am sitting in a darkened movie theater.  I look up at the screen.  On 
it, a man is sitting in a darkened movie theater.  He looks up at the screen.  
On it, a man is sitting in a darkened movie theater. ...

--SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB--


     Stuckness shouldn't be avoided.  It's the psychic predecessor of all real
     understanding.  An egoless acceptance of stuckness is a key to an
     understanding of all Quality, in mechanical work as in other endeavors.

               -- Robert M. Pirsig, "Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance"
                

--SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB--

     DiGGiNG TOWARD THE ROOTS
     by I Wish My Name Were Nathan, Wannabe Sage

     "Everything is true, everything is permitted." -- Hassan i Sabbah
     "Nothing is true, everything is permitted." -- Chaos Magick
     "Everything is true, nothing is permitted." -- Dada
     "Nothing is true, nothing is permitted, and shut up." -- Government

     "This is my Lamp of Truth.  It says so right on the base:  'Flip the
switch to be Enlightened.' I think the lamp looks nice in the middle of the
room, don't you?  Someone might trip over the cord so I don't have it plugged
in.  See the design on that lampshade?  I slave to keep it dusted.  I think
I'll paint the lamp some day.  What a pretty lamp nonetheless!  I wish I knew
how it worked.  I have an idea, let's take it apart.  Of course there's no
instructions.  I'm telling you, I need to take it apart to understand it.
Aaah, if I break it, I'll just blame you." -- Man

				   * * * * *

     Tobiah was sitting on a metal bench outside in the cold waiting for his
bus to pick him up.  Shivering there uncomfortably in a too-light jacket
grasping his arms around himself reminded him of high school, when he used to
do the exact same thing.  He hated the cold.  He hated to shiver.  But he also
hated the annoyance of carrying around a heavy jacket all day as he shuttled
from class to class.  Tobiah's nose dripped resentfully, watery mucous covering
his lip and running down over his lips, where he wiped them on the sleeve of
his polyester jacket and grimaced at the sound it made.  The last thing he
needed now was for a girl to hit on him.

     "Move over," said a girl who appeared out of nowhere and who proceeded to
rap her fist on Tobiah's shoulder.  "I wanna sit next to you."

     Tobiah scooted over a foot and proceeded to ignore her, caring more at the
moment to preserve his warmth the old-fashioned way -- by squandering it.  He
continued to breathe hot air into his hands, which he'd had to rip out of his
pockets in order to keep his runny nose under control, and muttered over and
over again in his mind how much he wanted the bus to arrive.

     The bus was in fact late, having slid over some ice into oncoming traffic.
The driver was okay.  The bus was not.  Tobiah would be waiting a while.

     "Here, kid, mop yourself dry," the girl said, waving a tissue in front of
Tobiah's face.  "You're gonna get a rash."

     He was glad to accept the offer.  He snatched the tissue away and held it
bunched up over his nose.  "Thanks," he said.  "What do you want in return?"

     The girl smiled.  "That's an odd question.  Ordinarily, nothing, but since
you asked....  What's your name?"

     "Tobiah," he said.  

     "That's an odd name."    

     "It's just a complicated way of saying 'Toby.'"   

     "Well, I like it anyway.  I'm Leonania."     

     "Shit, talk about complicated names," Toby said derisively, sniffing up a
wad of mucous in surprise.

     "I'm just kidding.  My real name is Kathryn."     

     "Oh, okay."    

     Toby sat back against the brick wall the bench was attached to and sighed
deeply.  He had come down with a pounding headache, which could only mean that
he'd inadvertently stirred up enough heat while talking to sensitize his brain
again, reminding him that he wasn't wearing a hat.

     "What's wrong?" Kathryn asked.     

     "Headache."    

     "You've got no hat."     

     "Ssssh, leave me alone.  I want my head to freeze again so I don't feel
it."

     "Well, okay."  

     Kathryn was quite warm, thank you very much, with a leather jacket
equipped with a furry collar, a thick green hat, heavy gloves, and jeans.

     "Don't your legs get cold?" she asked, looking at Toby's bluing calves.

     "I can't feel them anymore.  Doesn't matter."     

     "C'mon, Toby," she said, clapping her hands together, "Put your legs up
here where I can hold them.  You're much too cute to go to waste."

     "Good grief, every day it's the same thing.  No, Leonania, or Kathryn, or
whatever.  I'm perfectly fine.  You don't have to save my life.  Sheesh! Let a
guy freeze, wontcha?"

     Kathryn leaned back, bemused.  Toby seemed like a tough case.  "I'll
tickle you," she threatened.

     "Go ahead, I can't feel a thing."  

     She took the bait and immediately reached for Toby's knee and squeezed it
between her thumb and forefinger.  It elicited no response.  "Hmmmm," she said.

     "Told ya so," he taunted against his will, wanting ever so much to stay
quiet so his headache would go away.  He realized with dread that upon thinking
of his knee, it started to regain feeling again.  "Damn!" he cursed.  It
started to ache and throb.  "Did you break it or what?"  He found himself
rubbing his knee for warmth, cursing his luck.  "Where the hell is the bus?"

     "Probably it's stranded, or it got in a wreck while sliding into oncoming
traffic or something.  That's what they said on the radio, at least."

     Toby looked up, appalled.  "You knew that all this time?  I coulda gone
home!"

     "I *was* trying to keep you warm," Kathryn said.  

     "Dammit, dammit, dammit!" he cursed, standing up uneasily, his confidence
weakened both by his numb legs and the tenuous grip his shoes had on the icy
sidewalk.  "I'm going home now!" he announced, waddling forth down the
sidewalk, bracing his face against the breeze he encountered once out of the
bench's enclave.  "Thanks for the kleenex!" he said, and went off.

     Kathryn watched him leave, awed.  It was a tense first meeting, she knew,
but it only made her more determined to make her his.

				   * * * * *

     The next morning it was even colder than before, but the bus didn't have a
wreck and Toby didn't have to wait outside in the cold but for ten minutes.  He

clambered up the steps into the bus and took the first seat behind the driver.
The driver shut the door and proceeded to release the brake.

     "Uh, you might want to wait for Kathryn," Toby said.   

     "Kathryn who?  New rider?"    

     "Uh... I guess.  She was here yesterday."    

     "Well, too bad for her if she doesn't show up on time, that's what I say.
I got a schedule to keep.  You tell her to show up earlier tomorrow."

     The bus took off, and Toby let forth a resigned sigh.  Remembering how she
treated him the day before, though, he was indifferent if she had to walk
today.  He sat back and glanced over his notes.

				   * * * * *

     That day he looked around offhandedly for Kathryn.  He wanted to return
her tissue.  Although it annoyed him for girls to try to save his life, he was
very polite about turning them down.

     What caught Toby by surprise was the sudden onslaught of female
intervention in his life.  This was nothing like in high school, when he
distinctly remembered girls' mothers warning them to stay away from him.  Maybe
it was the lack of parental supervision that now allowed these girls to brashly
attempt to rescue him from death.

     Just a week before, when it hadn't been half as cold, a different girl
named Jackie tried to save his life while he sat half-naked on the bench
waiting for the bus.  She made a big fuss about hypothermia and
vasoconstriction and the warm-blooded nature of mammals that necessitated their
search for heat energy to prevent dying.  He brushed her off politely but still
saw her stealing worried glances at him from across the commons sometimes.

     He looked sideways and saw Jackie peering at him.  He walked on.

     Toby had a class in the Fine Arts building on the third floor.  Having
arrived early, he waited in the stairwell and sat in a window overlooking the
parking lot.  He saw the heavily-clothed people rushing around below like
oversized steaming ants who were eager to get bachelor's degrees.  He wondered
if he should go sit outside in the cold to attract some more feminine
attention.  Before he could do it, people started shuffling up the stairs.
Class was starting.  He'd have to wait until lunch.

				   * * * * *

     At lunch, Toby went outside and sat in a tree and munched on a sandwich.
He let his bare legs swing playfully below him as he scanned the crowds for a
trace of Kathryn.  He couldn't spot her and assumed that like most people she
was probably eating at a fast-food place, if she had showed up at all.  He let
her slip his mind.

     Instead, he started thinking about the prophet that was supposed to arrive
sometime that week.  It was big news at Howard College, which tended toward
religious dogmatism in lieu of a nearby video store.  A minor prophet was
supposed to materialize in a crowd of people in a shower of light.  No one knew
what a "shower of light" was supposed to look like, but they all agreed that if
it were to happen, it'd be pretty much proof that the prophet was really from
the beyond.

     Toby had thought it would be cool for a prophet to arrive and bring good
news from God, so he had written the anonymous letters to the town and school
newspapers predicting the prophet's arrival.  He fully expected the prophet to
show up.  It had been a slow winter.

     It was recorded fact that no prophets had ever arrived on the campus of
Howard College.  If Toby had attended the freshman inculcation instead of
dropping acid and visiting the bell tower on campus which was his only reason
for going there, he would have found out that Artemis Howard, the founder of
the college, had indeed intended the students of Howard to be raised in a God-
fearing manner that would prepare them for direct words from the Lord.  The
provost of Howard had been reminded of this every year since, although the
statement eventually lost its meaning once Time declared that God was dead.
Toby's prediction came at an excellent time to jumpstart the murmuring
premillenial fever that would soon overtake the college.

     He finished eating his sandwich and jumped down from the tree.  His legs
were numb and he was sent sprawling to the ground.  He got up, face and arms
reddening from the impact, smiled proudly, and entered the crowd, trying to
judge its enthusiasm for the prophet.

     "You're gonna go inside?" he heard a smoker boy say to another.  "I know
it's cold, but dontcha wanna wait for the *prophet*?" he jeered.

     "Hey, watch it, bucky.  It's gonna show up.  You fuckin' heretic."    

     Another small group of people, a few boys, a few girls, were eagerly
discussing the letters they'd read in the paper.

     "I am, like, *so* in tune with God right now," one girl gushed.  "I think
something *awesome* is gonna transpire."

     "I am totally in agreement.  Listen, listen.  I've been following Timewave
Zero for a few months now, and that thing says novelty is supposed to be
*decreasing* this week.  Now, if a prophet shows up, that'll totally invalidate
McKenna, and it'll *prove* there's a God."

     "Unless it's a test of our faith.  Think about that one," one boy added
cautiously.

     "Just act happy, alright, then God'll be cool with it."     

     "Do you think the 700 Club reporter will really show up?"   

     "If he wants to escape Hell, he will."

     Toby walked on, cheered by the excitement.  He wondered what the prophet
would say.  Obviously, if it showed up in a shower of light, it would have to
be good news, right?  Hmmm, he hadn't specified the color of the light.  It
could be anything -- red, green, *black*.  He started to worry.  He rifled
through the pages of the paper to reread the letter he'd sent to see what
possibilities he'd left open.  He hadn't counted on this.

     Just within hearing distance, he heard a sobering voice:  "What if it's
the Prophet of Doom?"

     Toby rushed to the bus stop.  

				   * * * * *

     Back in his apartment, Toby found his roommate Brad asleep in front of the
television.  He walked into the kitchen with the remote and pressed his thumb
on the volume button until the television's speakers shuddered and the windows
rattled.  Seconds before Brad woke up screaming, he pressed the mute button,
then walked into the living room and said hi.

     "I just had this horrible nightmare," Brad groaned, "and I can't remember
what it was about."

     "Gosh, again?" Toby asked.  "How often does that happen?"   

     "Every time I fall asleep in front of the television.  Must be some bad
shows on, working their way into my mind."

     "Hmmm, maybe it was the news.  Have you heard about that prophet that's
supposed to appear?"

     "Yeah!" Brad said, suddenly sounding interested.  "Omigod, I think that's
what I dreamed about!"

     "You dreamed about the prophet and it was an omen so horrible that you
woke up screaming?" Toby asked, frightened.

     "Good Lord, it's true!  It can't be!  We're all going to die!" Brad cried.

     "We're all going to die!" Toby screamed.  "And you're going to have to
answer for raping Clarissa."  

     Clarissa had been, and still was, Brad's girlfriend.  A few weeks before,
they had gone on a date and had sex.  Brad became morbidly sure that she had
cried "no!" during orgasm, meaning their moment of passion had consumated in
rape.  He was avoiding her now, not answering the phone, staying out of her
sight at school.  Her increasingly adamant and worried messages on the
answering message attested to Brad that she was about to haul him in to the
police.  Toby did nothing to comfort the sinner.

     "The prophet's coming to single you out, Brad.  He's gonna damn you to
hell."

     "Oh, please, God, NO!  It can't end this way!  I was supposed to go to
seminary school!  I tried to do everything right!  Oh, sweet Jesus, forgive me,
oh, forgive me!" Brad moaned.

     "Yeah, Brad, you're going to hell.  'A man's got needs?'  What kind of an
excuse is that?" Toby jeered.

     "I never said that!"     

     "Tsk, tsk.  But you thought it.  In your heart of hearts, you thought that
ravaging that poor girl was the necessary thing to do, didn't you?  Otherwise,
why did you go through with it?"

     "She wanted me to, she --" he protested.     

     "Brad!  How dare you!  You're a gusher of lies this afternoon, aren't you?
Blaming it on *her*!  Have you heard Clarissa's wailing cries on the answering
machine?  You've killed a part of her!  She's *dying*, all because of *you*,
Brad!"

     "Aaaaaaauuugh!" Brad wailed, falling to his knees.     

     "What is all this?!  You've got some ego, haven't you?" Toby shrieked.  "A
prophet of God is arriving this week and you think it's all for *you*!  What
hubris!  What pride!  You'll fall, Brad, you'll fall, and that prophet will
smite you!"

     Brad was crouched in a fetal position on the floor, whimpering.  

     "Get out of here, you sack of shit!  You sicken me!  Get out of my sight!
I want to concentrate on the glory of God, not the agents of Satan!"

     Brad crawled out of the living room and Toby shut the door behind him.  He
smiled.  He had the room to himself.  He was glad that Brad left.  But, he
worried about the possibility that a prophet would arrive only to smite Brad.
That sounded a bit extreme.  That sounded extremely ominous for Brad.  Toby
started to worry about him and his soul.  Could anyone be so wicked to be
singled out by a miracle of punishment?  His better judgment told him no.  He
rationalized that Brad was simply overdramatizing his plight.


				- 2 -

     With Brad out of the room, Toby was free to explore the solipsistic
fantasy that was his life.  He had learned the secrets of existence while
skipping freshman inculcation at Howard College.  He had randomly picked Howard
out of a collection of college flyers he'd received, namely for the boast that
their "tallest bell tower in the Northwest" got you "closest to God." When he
arrived, though, he learned to his chagrin that there were a large number of
fundies around him.  But, he figured a sizeable portion of the populace was
just there for an education like himself, so he would skip the inculcation and
a good deal of proselytizing.  He was in fact the only professed non-Christian
on campus, a discovery that would later amuse him greatly.

     In the dorm he stayed in his freshman year, Toby dropped acid.  This was a
ritual that he'd learned from high school: when you expect the next several
hours to be boring, show up tripping -- it might just save you from a life of
crime.  Then he trekked to the chapel and found the entrance to the stairwell.
He climbed for minutes and minutes up the twisting stairs past twenty small
windows in the brick until he reached the top.

     He looked up over the edge of the short wall surrounding the bell and the
brightness of the day, amplified by the acid, overwhelmed his eyes, making him
clench them shut.  Then his head hit the rim of the bell and an infinitely
serene tone rang out and completely filled his mind.  As he would later think,
he forgot everything he ever believed.  An odd sense of importance dissipated
his worry about his eyes, and he looked up again.  He could manage.  He
abruptly positioned himself on the ledge surrounding the bell and looked down
over the scenery, overwhelmed with wonder at being able to see for miles and
miles over forests and plains and nearby cities.  The sky was completely empty,
a solid hemisphere of blue.  A light breeze was blowing.  And as he watched, a
graceful bird dropped dead in flight and spiraled to the ground.  It was the
sort of thing that stopped you from getting too philosophical.

     This incident nearly panicked him.  He hadn't expected anything like that
to happen.  He wouldn't lose it up here, would he?  The sun suddenly seemed
much too bright to prevent it.  But the possibility seemed silly.  He had some
sort of control, didn't he?  He gazed over the treetops and witnessed another
bird die in flight.  This one seemed to explode as if it had eaten Alka-
Seltzer, leaving behind only a sudden *pop*.

     "Did I do that?" Toby wondered.

     At the thought, his mind seemed to suddenly take off, like he was peering
into a long tunnel through which he was also flying.  Startled, he watched the
effect suddenly reverse itself; he flew backwards through the tunnel, right
back to where he started.  The whole incident seemed like a quick nod.

     Quivering, Toby looked back up only to witness two more birds defy logic
by falling into the sky after retracting their wings.  He followed their path
up into the brightness of the sun, where he lost them in a forceful squint.

     "Am I imagining this?" he wondered.  As if in confirmation, a whole forest
of trees below started shaking happily as if blown by a strong wind that didn't
exist.  His eyes widened in wonder and pain.  "Am I imagining *all* of this?"
Every bird in every tree around him suddenly flew up with a fluttering of wings
and exploded in a flurry of feathers like a congratulatory fireworks show.

     Toby figured that meant "yes."  His eyes rolled back in their sockets, and
he rolled back over the ledge, fell, and hit his head and fainted.

				   * * * * *
     During his faint, Toby experienced a sudden bout of total recall,
docmumenting the fact that he had discovered solipsism before, when he had just
started experimenting with dangerous illegal drugs.  He had no idea why he'd
forgotten; perhaps the idea wasn't interesting enough for him.  The details
came out as if he were reciting them from short-term memory.

     Toby had given up the quest for social acceptance in seventh grade  after
a rash of measles outbreaks descended upon students sitting close to him in
most of his classes.  And he had given up the quest for objective truth when
his eighth-grade baking-soda-and-vinegar volcano for the science fair had
mysteriously erupted into red flames.  Free from social obligations and the
rationality of science, Toby started rebelling against his parents.

     His first act was to get a tattoo.  A nice longhaired boy hanging around
behind the video game arcade had given him a lick-'n'-stick tattoo with a blue
star on it, and about forty-five minutes after applying it, Toby found himself
completely changed.  Swimming in an electrostatically charged sea of thought,
Toby walked around his neighborhood, noticing how his new-found sense of
rebellious purposefulness had given all his senses a new clarity and
importance.  He had a new spring in his step; in fact, when he thought about
it, the bottom of his shoes turned into Flubber and a saucy springy sound
broadcast from his footfalls.  He laughed a loud, raucous, Dionysian laugh,
which he could have sworn filled the entire neighborhood and made everyone
sitting in their homes look up and grin.   Everyone he passed by seemed to
understand his new-found rebellious nature.  When they saw Toby approach, they
wisely looked down and stepped aside, so as not to incur the wrath of a naughty
teenager.  Toby felt he could peer into these passersby's minds and understand
their abeyance.  He almost lost his cool at how everyone -- kids, adults,
animals? -- reacted in the same robotlike manner by looking down and stepping
aside; some of them even fled.

     His desire to walk having been abated, Toby returned home and shut himself
in his room.  He was amazed at the power a simple tattoo had given him.  His
overriding emotion, however, was the joy of discovering his ability to
influence people just by imagining that he was powerful, for that's all he was
doing, wasn't it?  Looking down at the large blurry decal on the back of his
hand, he even allowed himself to fear his power.  He didn't deserve this sort
of influence, did he?  Of course not.  But he *did* have it, right?

     The doubts and the counterdoubts spun into an intricately complex tapestry
of confusion in Toby's mind, which he resolved by forgetting all of it and
starting over.  The simplest explanation had to be the correct one:  he'd
always had this ability, but it had been latent until he decided to exercise it
by rebelling against his parents and getting a tattoo.  Allowing for some
humility, he understood it all at once.  These people had acted afraid simply
because he wanted them to.  Easy enough.  But he hadn't copped a mean enough
expression to fool everybody, had he?  Of course not.  The amended answer:  if
these people obeyed him without his telling them to, there must be some
intimate link between him and everyone else; namely, that he had invented them
for his own pleasure.  Only he had free will.  The obvious answer that every
two-year-old seems to understand.  Why had he forgotten it?

     Toby looked back at various annoying or painful events in his life and
chided himself for letting his inventions fool him so.  The whole time, he
could have simply spoken up -- or what? imagined himself powerful like he did
today? -- and gotten them under control.  But he wasn't an egomaniac.  He
understood clearly that if he hadn't been able to handle them before, he might
not be able to control them later.  And also, a lot of the things that happened
seemed more enjoyable just *because* he didn't consciously cause them.  So, he
went to sleep, awed and overjoyed by his discoveries, and woke up dazed, but
with the firm conviction that he should try to find out how he'd let all this
happen.

     The new attitude he adopted toward other people didn't earn him many
friends over the next four years.
				   * * * * *

     When he came to in the bell tower, Toby felt no more hallucinogenic
effects of the acid besides having an intensely focused insight into the
philosophy he'd once forgotten and was now rediscovering.

     Looking down at his new campus again, a realization leapt into his heart.
It somehow seemed imperative that at least one other person would have joined
him in the bell tower, but every tiny figure he saw scurrying about below
headed straight for the auditorium, according to schedule.  As he had
remembered, people tended to obey him when he was tripping.  Was it really just
the tattoo?  He had  harnessed the ability to control his people on several
occasions.  A sickeningly demoralizing  thought shocked him: maybe he wouldn't
be able to regain that power.  Perhaps it would be impossible, even, for him to
control over people he'd never met.  But he had some power over those in his
neighborhood, who he'd only casually known.  Maybe it was more intricate than
person-to-person contact.  Maybe he'd have to immerse himself in their culture
for decades to be able to understand them.

     His isolation in the bell tower suddenly reminded him of Quasimodo.  Was
he indeed going to find himself isolated from all these people forever, from
the humanity which he invented?  The possibility seemed silly.  What kind of
inventor would be utterly out of touch with what he had made?  An Einstein?

     Einstein.  Hmmm.  The classic example of invention gone awry, wasn't it?
His discovery of the relation between matter and energy led to the unleashing
of the power of the atom.  Then that innocuous discovery got into the hands of
Oppenheimer, who warped it into a way to brutally dispose of thousands of Japs,
and then the Bomb came to enslave the most "advanced" countries in the world in
a neverending game of King of the Mountain.  Einstein didn't want to claim
responsibility for all that, but since he had indeed discovered the means by
which it would all happen, didn't he have to be blamed?

     It sounded ludicrous to Toby, although the thoughts emanated from his own
mind, which had supposedly created Oppenheimer as well.  He reeled under the
stress of comprehending the sheer complexity of what he had supposedly created.
Could he really be responsible for all this?  Was he really born eighteen years
earlier, only to conjure up the infinite complexity of the human race before he
became fully conscious at a few years of age?  Or had he been alive for the
whole duration, but only "human" at this late stage in the game?  Because if
not, he would have had to have been the only human on earth before he invented
the others: so where had he come from in the first place?  Had he just created
this planet called earth for the purpose of watching his inventions play and
kill and create?  He didn't want to credit himself with having been *that*
powerful.  Moreover, he didn't want to take responsibility for all that he saw
around him.

     These doubts, more shocking and grounding than any he had let himself
experience before, startled Toby into seriously rethinking his solipsistic
reality.  He knew he couldn't take credit for everything people had ever done,
but that would imply giving them credit for it, which implied they were all
like him.  But he knew they weren't, since they didn't have power over him.

     He reconsidered Einstein.  What that man had discovered took on a life of
its own, literally exploded into its own existence, which certainly continued
after he had died.  If that were true, then Toby wouldn't have control over
human beings when he died, would he?

     Unable to comprehend how humanity could have become so complex in his own
mind before he was conscious to realize he had created it, and unable to
understand how it could exist after he died, Toby made a compromise.  He
decided that if he ever had spawned another human being, that it had instantly
broken away from him to take on a life of its own.  And if he and that other
human had spawned another human being, then it too had instantly broken away to
take on a life of its own.  And everything each of them did instantly broke
away to exist by itself.  It was a scary, weakening thought.  Maybe Toby hadn't
created any of the people around him.  But if he hadn't, then how was he able
to maintain any power over them when he wore his tattoo?  He couldn't decide.

     His mind overwhelmed, he walked down the spiraling staircase of the bell
tower and silently joined his colleagues at dinner.  He eyed them with a
curious suspicion the whole time.

				   * * * * *

     In an attempt to verify his solipsistic theory, Toby decided he'd create a
prophet.  It seemed like an excellent way to test his powers, if he had any.
Maybe he hadn't directly created anything but his own thoughts.  But once his
thoughts became public, they would take on a life of their own.  Toby fully
expected the prophet to appear because so many people were talking about and
expecting it to happen.  He had an idea about group miracles, such as the mass
sighting of the Virgin Mary at Fatima.  The children had witnessed the prophet
announcing Mary's forthcoming arrival -- at a specific time, date, and place.
Enough people had heard what the children had learned that they expected it to
happen and therefore made it come true.  Much the same, Toby expected the
prophet to appear.  He regretted his lack of specificity.  The steadfast
religious beliefs of the people on campus and the millenial fever were sure to
trigger a miracle or two.  All they needed was an official prediction.  An
anonymous letter to the local papers?  Only someone with extremely close ties
to God, or some lunatic, would write such a letter.  But the people on campus
didn't want to believe it was a lunatic.

     What he only realized later was that he had no idea what the prophet would
say.  He had been sufficiently vague in his letters to allow for any
possibility.  If he could not predict what the prophet would say, then how
could he really know if he created it?  Perhaps his inner self would know, and
his outer, ordinary self didn't.  Toby felt sure that somehow, he'd know that
whatever the prophet said was obvious, thereby validating his solipsistic
reality.  Nonetheless, the loophole upset him.

				   * * * * *

     And what was only more annoying was the fact that all these girls were
trying to save his life.  Sitting in Brad's chair in front of the turned-off
television set, Toby suddenly got the uncomfortable feeling that Kathryn was
nearby.  He jerked his eyes toward the window, and saw nothing.  He stood up
and peered through the blinds and saw no one either retreating or ducking under
the window.  Confused, he looked back toward the television and realized a
letter was on it.  He walked toward the letter and saw it inscribed with his
name.  There was no return address but he somehow knew it was from Kathryn.

     He opened the envelope and pulled out a piece of paper which had nothing
on it except a sentence written in a female hand:

     "Please stay warm, Toby."     

     "Dammit!" he cursed, balling up the letter and tossing it near the trash
can.  "She's gonna make me sick just reminding me about this!"  Each such
warning drove him closer to considering going naked just to show these girls
that he could take it.  After all, he rationalized, wasn't he just imagining he
was cold?

     He marched into his room and took off all his clothes.  A few minutes
later, lounging on the living room in front of the television he was afraid to
turn on both for issues of its former volume and for the static electricity it
would generate, Toby realized he didn't really want to go out naked.  He wasn't
prepared to bring up the issue of winter nudity on a Baptist campus, not to
mention that the reactions of the females and some of the males might cause
mutual upset.  He returned to his room and put on a conservatively-cut speedo
and returned outside.  It was about minus ten degrees celcius today.

     Toby walked down to the bus stop in order to make an appearance on campus
for afternoon classes.  The few other students huddling around in their heavy
coats took on a noticeably less self-pitying posture about seeing Toby.  He
heard all their whispers, or at least knew where to look, when he saw puffs of
condensation float emanating excitedly from two nearby people.  He didn't want
to sit down, noting the metallic, heat-sucking nature of the benches and their
backrests.  His feet had instantly stopped providing painful messages to his
brain and retreated into a numb selfishness once he had stopped walking, for
which he was grateful.

     No sign of the bus.  No one was trying to save his life, either, he
figured because there was a critical mass of people at the bus stop to
embarrass any humanitarians into silence.  He was happy for this, except that
he figured a little conversation would be nice so that he would remember to
stay awake.  To pass the time, he peeked into the front of his speedo and said,
"Wow."

     In a screaming mass of steamy exhaust, the bus arrived, and the others let
Toby get on first, whispering to each other the whole time.  He sat back in a
seat and brushed the ice out of his hair and prepared for the pain of thawing.

				   * * * * *

     Back on campus, Toby looked around eagerly for Kathryn so he could yell at
her to leave him alone.  He knew this was a lost cause, since he hadn't even
seen her face the morning before, her being the type to seek the comfort of
winter clothing.  Not to mention, he'd never seen her before yesterday either.
He spat an ice pellet at the sidewalk and hurried inside.

     He had about an hour before his next class, so he sat in the library
reading room with a copy of "Advocate" to avoid small talk.  He forgot that the
size of the library suggested that most people did not read and wouldn't catch
the reference.

     "Um, excuse me, hi?" a voice said.      

     Toby put down the magazine and remained looking in the same general
direction.  "What?" he snapped.  For a solipsist, he couldn't understand why he
couldn't control his imagination enough to be left alone.

     "Aren't you cold?" the girl asked.      

     "Not inside."  

     "I know, yeah, of course, I meant, like, outside," she corrected herself,
grinning uneasily, trying to look in his eyes.    

     "Outside the cold eventually numbs my nerves so it doesn't matter."   

     "Wow, that's brave."     

     Toby looked up in surprise.   

     "I've never known someone so willing to lay their life on the line for
Christ."

     It was Toby's turn to grin uneasily.  He nodded and hid behind the
magazine until she went away.

     For the rest of the hour, there was no sign of Kathryn.  He went to class,
took the bus back home, and put on sensible clothing and decided to forget
about the whole matter.

				   * * * * *

     Once he had forgotten, Kathryn finally showed up, as Toby soon figured out
by looking behind him to see where the running footsteps were coming from on
his way back to school the next morning.

     "Hi, Toby," she said, catching up to him.    

     "Hi."     

     "You look warm today."   

     "I guess I do.  The temperature's up a little," he said, grinning.  Also
he was wearing jeans and a long-sleeved shirt.    

     "You've been looking for me, haven't you?" Kathryn asked, following him.   

     Toby was a little startled.  "Uh, not particularly."   

     "Oh, you, stop kidding.  I heard what you were wearing yesterday.  It
sounded really cute."

     He stopped walking and turned around.  Maybe she was a defector from the
prudish standards of Howard!  He looked at her face for the first time and
noticed that her eyes were gleaming, hard to look away from.  "Cute, how?"

     "Oh, you just want your ego cuddled."   

     "I guess I do," he replied, thinking that there seemed to be nothing wrong
about imagining that he was complimenting himself.  There was an uncomfortable
silence, since Kathryn wouldn't respond, but only stood smiling at him until he
turned around and kept walking.

     As they approached the bus stop, Kathryn finally spoke up.  "Why were you
dressing so skimpily this week?"

     "I'll tell you the truth," he lied.  "I was just caught by surprise.
Didn't know it would be so cold."

     "Are you from the south?"     

     "Yehhhhp," he drawled, smiling.    

     "You weren't bitching about the weather, though.  I like that in a man."

     "Awww, 'twarn't nothin'," he jibed.  "After all," he said, "the weather's
all in my mind anyway."

     Kathryn honed in on that.  "All in *your* mind?"  

     "Well, uh," he stammered, "I meant, when I'm thinking about it."      

     "I'm not so sure that's what you meant, Toby."

     Kathryn stepped ahead and peered into his face for a while, until she
nodded and sat down on the bus stop bench.

     "So, you think you control things?" she asked grinning, arms crossed.      

     Toby sat down on the bench, startled.  It seemed like his mind was being
focused against his will, like the time up in the tower when all the birds
exploded.  Did Kathryn know she was a figment of his imagination?  It would be
devastating for her!

     "No, my dear, all I control is my own thoughts," he said, in a very suave
manner.

     "Aaaaaaaaaaah," she said sarcastically, greatly upsetting Toby.  "Why
don't you just imagine that I won't be devastated by finding out you think you
invented me?"

     Toby's eyes goggled at that, and he decided he should stay quiet to avoid
any more confusion, either for himself or her, since any confusion of hers
eventually meant confusion for him.  "I don't know what you're talking about."

     "I don't know how you could be a more obvious liar," she said, still
smiling.

     "Listen," Toby said, disturbed.  "Why are you doing this?"  

     "I'm not doing this.  You're just imagining that I am!  It's all your
trip, isn't it?" she asked, apparently with great pleasure.

     "Damn, where's the bus?"      

     "It'll never show up, because that would make things too easy for you."    

     "Because you imagine that I don't want it to show up?" he asked.      

     "Nope.  Because *I* don't want it to show up."    

     "Oh."     

				   * * * * *

     "Can I make things clear?" Kathryn asked.    

     "Sure, go ahead," Toby said, confused, but warm.  

     "I happen to know that you think you're imagining this."    

     "I figured that out," he said, deflated, but somehow relieved.  He hadn't
had great success in interpreting the world through a solipsistic lens and
wanted to find out how his people saw things.

     "*All* this."  

     "Yeah, I know."     

     "But none of this should matter, should it?" Kathryn asked.  "It shouldn't
matter that I found out that you think all of reality is in your imagination.
After all, I think *I'm* imagining all this."

     Toby looked up in interest.  "Yes?  That's cool!  I always wanted to ask
one of you what you thought reality was like.  I'm intrigued."

     "You sound distinctly condescending, Toby.  You ought to stop that.  More
precisely, *I* ought to stop imagining that you're being condescending.
Because *you're* a figment of my imagination."

     "What?!"  

     "*I* created all this.  All this cold weather, this late bus, you, the
idiot who thought a metal bench would be great in the north, I made it all up,"
Kathryn said, smiling.

     "But... I thought *I* did," Toby said.  To preserve internal consistency,
he never thought he'd tell anyone about that, but at the moment he was in a
serious predicament.

     "And just for fun, I gave you the idea that *you* had come up with it all.
You know, for self-esteem and such.  Do you like it?  Did it empower you?"

     "Um, I, uh...  Well..."  

     "Wait a second, hush.  Someone else is coming."   

     Another rider was walking up to Toby and Kathryn.  Upon approaching the
bench, he looked up in surprise and clumsily continued walking down the
sidewalk toward a more distant bus stop.

     "Geez, Toby, that was close."      

     "How do you mean?" he asked.  

     "He almost realized that we found it out."   

     "Found what out?"   

     "He knows that we've cracked his secret," Kathryn said sadly.    

     "What?"   

     "I've been fooling you, Toby.  *That* guy is the one whose reality we
exist in.  He imagined up all this.  Neither of *us* did.  We're his pawns.
Lucky he let us continue this little game and didn't smite us."

     "Him?  Who is that guy?"      

     "It's always the one you least suspect."     

     The real inventor of all reality had turned around and passed by the two,
murmuring, "And don't you forget it!"  He then covered his mouth and burst into
laughter and ran off.

     Toby's mouth fell open as he watched the guy run away.      

     Kathryn reached into her pocket and pulled out a small square of paper.
"Here," she said, placing it on Toby's lolling tongue.  "You'll need this.
It's gonna be a long day."

     Toby closed his mouth.

     "And looky here," Kathryn said.  "Once we both realize that we're not in
control, the bus finally arrives.  C'mon, let's go to my house."  Kathryn
tugged on Toby's arm and led him away from the confused bus driver and toward
her house.

				   * * * * *

     Toby decided that Kathryn probably had something important to say and gave
in.  He'd mulled over his solipsistic reality for more than a year and a half
to no avail.  He had drifted through classes, gradually accepting the fact that
he couldn't understand everything he had created, and to a large extent, he had
given up.  The idea to create a prophet on campus was just a way of amusing
himself.  

     "As you can see, I still live with my parents, but they're at work.  Aaah,
they couldn't even tell if we were tripping.  No need to worry.   C'mon, sit on
the couch and tell me how you think you created all this."

     Toby was speechless.  He couldn't decide whether to deny everything, to
get up and run out, or to fall asleep in self-defense.  He still wasn't sure if
he was pulling a great joke on himself or not.

     "You're not," Kathryn said.   

     "Okay, okay, now, stop it!  You're freaking me out!"   

     "Are you saying that you're freaking yourself out, because I don't really
exist?" Kathryn probed.

     "No!  Stop it!  I give up.  I was deluded."  

     "You were, huh?  So you really believed all that?" she asked, taking a
more relaxed posture.    

     "Well, I'm still not entirely sure -- and-please-don't-interrupt-me! --
but I *was* finding it difficult to explain how I could have come up with all
of reality."

     "*All* of reality!  Wow, you went pretty far.  Most solipsists are content
with thinking they're the only sentient beings in existence."

     Toby's eyes lit up.  "Hey, maybe that can explain this --"  

     "Stop!  No!  You're wrong!  I won't let you go down that path either.
It's even more ego-cuddling than what you were thinking.  Plus it makes you
sort of cold to your fellow people, being robots as they are."

     "Ahh, yeah," he said, thinking that he hadn't exactly been at one with
humanity anyway.

     "Solipsism has been officially disproven by the government, you know."     

     "What?!"  

     "Yes, in 1879, the U.S. government did some philosophical inquiries, all
top-secret, you know, collaborating with the top-ranking metaphysical minds of
the Western world, and decided that solipsism was not a good mindset for the
citizens of a democratic world power.  It tends to discourage voting."

     "Oh," he said, startled.      

     "No, seriously, Toby.  It's just a silly way to think.  It might be
comforting to think that you're living in a dreamworld, but it's just not
logically consistent.  Everyone can imagine she's living in a dreamworld.  And
so what?  What does that prove?"

     "Well, I might just be imagining that everyone else is imagining that
they're living in a dreamworld."

     "So *what?!*" Kathryn snapped.  "It's as equally pointless.  Listen, Toby,
I'm here to help you.  You won't get much further in life with these silly
ideas about reality."

     "This is all starting to remind me of a speech my fifth-grade teacher gave
to me once," Toby said with bitter nostalgia.

     "Hmmm.  You weren't a solipsist that far back, were you?" she asked with
lip-biting concern.

     "No, not just yet.  Back then it was me cutting in line to the drinking
fountain because, as I explained, I was thirstier than the other kids, who were
just taking advantage of the opportunity to drink just because they could."

     "God forbid you turn into a communist," Kathryn said, grinning.  

     "Oh no, I love America."      

     "Yeah," she replied, her grin fading.   

     A nervous silence ensued, in which Toby refused to laugh and Kathryn
refused to press on until she figured out what sort of fool Toby was.

     Toby spoke up.  "Say, Kathryn, have you heard about that prophet that's
supposed to appear on campus?"

     "Yes!  In fact I have.  That's one of the reasons I wanted to talk to
you."

     "Oh, really?" he asked, nervous.  Did she know?   

     "Yes, yes!  What the *hell* is up with this millennialist fever going
around?  Why do people fall for this over and over?  Christ is supposed to have
returned ten thousand times in the past *already*.  Why are people so attracted
like moths to the year 2000?  Is that really such a sweet and pure number?
It's just another big candle people are gonna get burned up in."

     "Millennialism?  Since when did that come into the picture?" he asked,
irritated.     

     "You know as well as I do that religious revivalism has been increasing
recently.  I used to attribute this to people's longing for some sort of
spiritual filler so long denied in American life, but now I *know* it's a mad
rush to get saved before the Rapture when all their best friends and drinking
buddies disappear off the face of the earth."

     "You're mighty cynical, Kathryn," he said, unwittingly speaking to her as
if she were still in his imagination.

     "There you are, speaking to me as if I were still in your imagination!"
she scolded him.  "I think I know what I'm talking about, alrighty?"

     "Sorry," he mumbled, cheeks burning.    

     "But I'm glad you brought it up, because I wanted to talk to you about
this too.  Think about this -- I really *am* in your imagination in some form,
right?  I mean, all you can do is *perceive* me.  All perception occurs in your
mind.  So, in reality, I might just be a really complicated hallucination."

     "Yeah, that makes some sense.  I've considered that before, but --"   

     "But wait!  That's about as far as you can take it, Toby.  Everything else
in reality, you must experience the same way, through perceptions.  Biologists
know that sensation is primary, but those senses are filtered through your mind
even before you can consciously perceive them.  So, necessarily, unless you
consider yourself to be perfectly objective, your mind warps everything it
senses into perceptions that are appropriate for you at that given moment,
right?"

     "Yes.  I've taken acid.  I know that perceptions aren't always accurate."

     "And in a few minutes," she said, "they'll really be fucked up.  But
somehow it makes it easier to understand things.  Anyway, the whole point of
this is that the prerequisite for solipsism does exist, in that your brain
holds an interpretation of reality that only you can have.  It's only a faulty
step forward to believe that since you created the interpretation, that you
created the actual thing.  Unless, of course --"

     "-- you think you created the actual thing too," Toby said, realizing the
fallacy he'd taunted himself with many times before.   

     "Exactly," Kathryn said, smiling and bouncing happily on the couch.   

     "Just a second, Kathryn," he said with a hint of sarcasm.  "Do you think
you're teaching me something new here?  I knew this all along."

     "Oh yeah, wise guy?" she asked unflinchingly.  "Then what's with this
immature clutching of solipsism?"

     "First of all, I want to know just *how* you knew about that in the first
place.  I never told anyone, especially you.  This sort of weirdness only makes
it easier to believe that you're a product of my faulty brain, which is somehow
allowing you to grill me about this."

     "Haven't you ever heard of mind-reading, silly?" she asked.      

     "Yes I have, but that's a little impossible, as any scientist will tell
you."

     "Not exactly, my friend," she said.     

     Her words seemed to be strangely sinister and all-knowing, but Toby forgot
about that when he saw something moving out of the corner of his eye.  He
snickered.  "Wait, what did you say?" he asked suddenly.

     "'Not exactly, my friend,' I said," she said.     

     "Whoa, that's like infinite regress there and all," he blathered, his
thoughts starting to expand into ludicrosity as well as deeper realms.     

     Kathryn sensed this.  "I think you're about ready for the important stuff
now."     

				   * * * * *

     "You drugged me," Toby said, giggling.  

     "What, already?  Your brain must be congested with the stuff!  That
notwithstanding, you knew that already."     

     "I know.  I was just pointing it out," he laughed.  After thoughtful
consideration, he added, "'Notwithstanding.'  We're sitting!  It's true!" He
looked into space again for a few seconds and remarked, "That was *really*
funny."

     "Glad to see you're joining me now.  May I continue?"  

     Toby was looking at something visually appealing and only caught the
question after several seconds.  "Hmm?"

     "May I continue?  We were talking about mind-reading."      

     He looked back, comically turning his head with wide-open eyes to meet her
gaze.  "Miiiind-reading."

     "Yes.  Please try to concentrate.  This will be interesting."    

     "Okay."   

     "Let's start at the beginning.  You wondered how I could know that you
were a solipsist without your actually being one."

     "Yes, Kathryn, I wondered that, and I still do," Toby replied in a
newscaster's voice, giggling.

     "Well, let's say that I myself had that point of view for quite a while
myself, until a few years ago.  But, I worked myself out of that.  When I saw
you two days ago -- which really wasn't the first time -- I understood that you
might be a solipsist yourself."

     "That's really interesting," Toby said, finding his concentration rapidly
returning.  "You too?  What was that like?"

     "It was fun for a while, you know, thinking that nothing really mattered
because I had just made it all up.  It helped me fail some classes I didn'tparticularly like, too.  Kind of a radical way to get rid of a problem, you
know, by ignoring it until it goes away, because the class *did* go away, but
the grade remained."

     "Kinda like a tracer," Toby suggested.  

     "Yeah!  I was gonna say that, but it sounded silly."   

     "Better to say it's like an afterimage, I guess.  It's not the actual
class that haunts you anymore, but the residue left behind:  the grade.  Sorta
the same way something you look at for a long time leaves a fuzzy afterimage."

     "That's pretty deep, you know."    

     "Aaah," Toby said, "it's all bullshit.  Acid turns me into an armchair
philosopher on acid."

     "Nothing wrong with that."    

     "I guess.  We were talking about solisp-- solisp-- solipsism.  I didn't do
what you did, how you ignored problems to make them go away, or how you got
apathetic, and all that.  I was trying to figure out the way it all worked when
you destroyed my mind," he said, giggling.  "*Destroyed* my mind!  What the
hell!  I meant to say something along the lines of -- uh, those lines are
destroyed too.  Forget it.  It was fun anyway."

     "Listen.  The whole point was, that I had an intuition that you were
thinking along those lines yourself, and I wanted to help you out of it."

     "Meddling in my mind, are you trying to do there by helping me, aren't
you?" Toby asked, grinning.

     Kathryn gave an uncomfortable smile.  "You could look at it like that, but
it's really very important.  Is it alright?"

     Toby waved his hand through the air, dismissing the problem, and also
giggling at the momentary sensation -- er, perception, that his hand had flown
off in the process.  "Talk me to death, Kathryn.  This is fun."

     "Okay, thanks.  Do you know what I meant when I said that I could sense
that you were thinking solipsistically?"

     "Not really.  I'm trying to ignore that part."    

     "But don't!  Don't!  It's the whole point of this, okay?  You gotta
understand that."

     "All I can do right now is pretend I understand."      

     "Exactly!  That's so deep!  Listen, think about, oh, a school setting,
okay?  About education.  About how people learn things."

     "Ohhhhhkay...."     

     "The purpose of that is to make sure the kids all learn how to function in
society, right?  But even lower-level than that is to get the kids to
understand the teachers.  I'll admit, that hardly ever goes mentioned, and so
hardly ever works anymore, and that's the whole problem with education now, but
I've got to tell you why, first."

     "I think I'll sit back and try to absorb this into my tongue.  Hee-hee!"   

     "Good.  Now, in the ideal case, let's limit ourselves to that, a teacher
is supposed to form a special bond with her student, right...?  Oh, wait,
you're not going to talk.  Okay, a special bond.  That bond serves to make it
easier for the student to learn, and for the teacher to teach.  Also, it
includes some sort of friendship, in the ideal case.  That make sense?"

     "Yes.  You can talk reeeeeally well there."  

     "Practice.  -- I suggest that that bond is merely a high degree of
similarity of thought.  In other words, the two have to think alike, or as
closely alike as possible.  That's how the bond comes into being."

     "It's like learning the teacher's style."    

     "Yes!  Exactly!  It's the same in really any close relationship.  Two
people have enough similarities in one way or another that they feel
comfortable with each other.  Just like in a romantic relationship, where two
people feel the same sort of comfort, but taken to a higher level.  You know
how they can complete --" she said, pausing.  "Complete other people's
sentences.  (That was a little silly of me.)"

     "Huh?"    

     "Forget it.  Remember, being comfortable is an important part of it.  But
to me, comfort is just recognizing that similarity.  And, here's the point, I
felt that sort of comfort when I met you."

     "Yeah?" Toby said, suddenly excited.  "I was just going to say that it
seems like I've known you for years.  -- Have I?"

     "Who knows?  Probably not.  But underneath, we're very similar.  I can
sense that."

     "How?  How did you know that?  It's so weird!  Is this that all where you
could tell I was thinking in a solipsistic manner?"

     "Yes, it was.  But see, it wasn't on any conventional level of
understanding, you see.  I mean, think about the analogy.  I wasn't familiar or
comfortable with you on a personal level, since I didn't know you.  I wasn't
familiar or comfortable with you on, say, a physical level, since we look very
different.  But, on some level, I knew we were similar.  And that was in
recognizing that you were solipsistic."

     Toby sat back in deep consideration.  "This is turning into... some sort
of pattern.  I mean, I can't really concentrate on what you're saying.  I keep
on thinking of things being similar, like ice and water and steam, and even
couches and benches, and... that's really odd.  Couches and benches aren't
really similar at all, except that you can sit on them.  But, say, we're more
similar than a couch and a bench, since we're both people... and students...
and young people...."

     "Yes!  Think about the teacher and the student again.  The way our society
has it, the teacher is way older than the student.  So the teacher has grown up
in a different time period -- a different culture, practically.  This didn't
happen in the past, because culture didn't change so fast, but now it's a big
problem!  Teachers and students are naturally uncomfortable with each other.  I
mean, look at what I'm doing to you now.  I'm teaching you things.  But this is
being a lot easier than if, say, Artemis Howard himself tried to teach you all
this."

     "Wow, holy shit, this is amazing!" he blurted out.  "I've never thought
about learning this way!  You know, Kathryn, I feel really out-of-place on
campus, since -- ha-ha -- I'm an atheist!  Why the hell did I come here in the
first place?  I can't be comfortable with either the students *or* the
teachers!"

     "But Toby, all is not lost!  If you understand that you're different, you
can work to see things in their perspective, and thereby become more
comfortable with them.  It doesn't have to mean you turn into a fundamentalist,
but you can at least learn how they think."

     "Oh, wow!  I just thought of something else.  I was thinking -- ha-ha -- I
should have just changed *them* to understand me... but that was really silly!
It's really *hard* to do that!  I don't even know how to!  The way you're
talking at me, I think it *would* be possible somehow to do it, but it would
take so much energy!  If I just think like *them* though, then I can be a
little more comfortable."  He added, "But I won't turn into them!"

     "Think about this, though, Toby.  This may sound offensive, but look at
civil rights legislation.  It sounds good on paper, but the government tried to
change everyone's mind all at once through a law.  What kind of familiarity was
there between the white hick racist and the college-educated liberal lobbyist
at the time?  None!  None at all!  Just like with teachers and students who
have nothing in common, trying to impose new ways of thought upon a whole
segment of people raised in racist times was ludicrous!  And it didn't solve
the problem, of course, it only increased tension that didn't have to exist.
You see, if the people responsible for education had, say, taken all the kids
away from their parents' homes and taught them multiculturalism to begin with,
then a whole generation would grow up with these ideas already in mind."

     "Parents would sure as hell hate that, though.  'You doggone turned my kid
into a nigger-lover!'"

     "Yeah, that's one of the drawbacks of society.  Kids have to be raised in
their own families.  It really holds back progress, you know.  Families and 'it
takes a community to raise a child' kind of things are great for traditional
societies that don't want anything to change -- hell, it worked great for
thousands of years -- but it really hinders widespread social change."

     "Okay, you've blown my mind yet another time.  Push harder!  Maybe I'll go
insane," Toby said, giggling madly.

     "Oh, if you believe half of what I'm going to say, you'll easily be
considered insane."

				   * * * * *

     "You can make this teaching analogy with just about anything, Toby.  See
that computer over there?  Why do you think those things are getting so damned
popular now?  Just a few years back, one could assume that you didn't have a
computer, but now people give you their homepage URLs when you meet.  Oh, by
the way, mine's <http://www.localprovider.com/~kathrynp>."

     "'Whack whack?'  What the hell?" Toby blurted out, laughing hysterically.

     "That's the way you pronounce slashes, you know.  I heard it in the
alternative media."      

     "'Whack whack!'  'Whack whack!'  You're fucked up!"    

     "It's a fun way to live, you know.  Anyway, about computers and such.
Technology is just like a really good teacher.  Think of that.  Once upon a
time, women had to spend a good portion of their time knitting or whatever they
did.  It was a really intricate art with all those stitches and such, took all
that time, energy, and patience.  But then technology comes along and machines
spit out fabrics and other machines cut out shirt shapes and other machines sew
them together.  And naturally, people love this!  Women can do other things
with their time, and people can get a wide variety of clothing without having
to find the resident knitting guru.  Think of it as if the machines 'teach' the
thread how to be a shirt.  Machines are really efficient teachers.  People are
not.  That's why people love machines.  Computers are just another example of
that.  It's a way to 'teach' your words into becoming nice printed documents,
for example --"

     "And programming is teaching the computer how to do new things.  Ohhh,
lordy, that infinite regression is happening to me again."

     "Ain't it fun?"     

     "Oh man, it's like a fractal.  Flashlights teach the room how to be
visible...  that's going a little far, isn't it?" Toby asked sheepishly.

     "No, not at all!" Kathryn exclaimed.  "Certainly no one refers to a
flashlight's function in those terms.  I mean, there are a lot of different
words for the same basic things.  If you think of things my way, a lot of verbs
involve teaching of some sort."

     "An idea is creeping into my mind.  You said that teachers and students
have to be familiar with each other to have learning go on, and you related
that to two people in a friendship having to be familiar with each other.  But
I know that *perfect* familiarity, i.e., a duplicate of myself, would be
unbearable.  Even thinking of myself as I am is unbearable sometimes.  What's
going on with that?"

     "Hmm, I'm not sure.  Talk about it some," Kathryn suggested.     

     "Well.  That technology thing.  People aren't going to settle for the
technology we have today, are they?  I bet that computer there will be upgraded
in a year, tops.  If technology is so great, why don't people stick with it?"

     "It wears out!"     

     "Wears out... I mean, just like the novelty of having a duplicate of
yourself around.  That would be fun for a few days -- well, hours -- and then
I'd go batty.  I wouldn't like it.  The fun would wear out.  Just like
technology.  Or... oh, boy, this is fucked up -- just like how a flashlight
wears out, in terms of batteries, and can't teach the room how to be visible
anymore."  He paused.  "Oh, that's *way* out there."

     "Not really!  You have to change the batteries, and it'll be the same
flashlight it ever was, right?  Unless you get a new flashlight altogether,
which is brighter and doesn't use batteries as much.  But that might not
happen.  Or, with the duplicate-you example.  You'd want to change the
duplicate in some way to make it more interesting.  Say, give him a cocky
Cockney accent.  But it would still grow stale.  Better to just get a new
person to be friends with.  Or, like how people upgrade computers.  They still
perform the same function, but maybe in a different or faster way.  But we
can't really get a totally new tool to replace it yet."

     "Yeah!"   

     "Think about how it works in your mind.  It might be comfortable to hold
the same beliefs since childhood and think the same thoughts all day long until
the end of time, but that'll wear out pretty quick.  You'll have to adapt your
thoughts.  Kind of like staring at a bright light.  It might be fun for a few
seconds, since it's pretty novel and stupid, but you'd want to get rid of that
pretty quick as well.  So, instead, you'd have to think of something completely
new."

     "Hmmm."   

     Kathryn's eyes lit up.  "Aah-hah, Toby.  Think of this.  Life itself is
like that.  Why don't we have only amoebae inhabiting the earth?  I mean, look
at 'em -- they can live on a small amount of food, and they reproduce really
quickly.  Why did they have to evolve into things like jellyfish?  That just
complicated matters.  Or even reproduction itself.  Amoebae divide asexually,
don't they?  So why is there even this deal with two things getting together to
make a new thing?  That's too much trouble!

     "But look at it the way we have been.  Somehow, the amoeba got tired of
being all alike, eating the same shit, reproducing the same way.  So the DNA
mutated and something changed.  Oooh!  The *DNA* was what got tired of being
the same.  It had to be!  The amoeba, as we well know, couldn't have had those
kinds of complex thoughts.  Yes, yes!  It's like, how sensation and perception
differ.  DNA is like the sensation, and the amoeba is like the perception.  One
is primary, one is secondary.  Only the primary thing can make any difference.
But that doesn't explain why amoeba are alike in the first place.  We agreed
that perceptions may differ widely from reality... ooh!  The way each amoeba
lives out its life cycle is completely unique, isn't it?  They don't all move
to the same beat.  They slither about in utterly different ways to eat utterly
different ways at different times in different places after the DNA has created
a new one.  Kind of like how the perception, once separated from the sensation,
can take off in any way possible.  So, so, back to DNA, when the whole amoeboid
way of life became unsuitable for the DNA, it somehow managed to get sexual
reproduction into the picture.  Sort of like if you had the boring situation of
having a clone of yourself around, you'd want to find a totally new person to
be friends with.  That way, the longest a strand of DNA has to experience the
same structure is through the one lifetime of the organism it creates.  By
necessity, that has to change whenever two organisms reproduce.  So there's
constant variety!  That's how DNA solved boredom!"

     Toby stared at Kathryn for what seemed like minutes.  "I think I'm about
to flip out now.  You've blown my mind to pieces.  Can we go outside and walk?
I want to be sure I still can."

     "No, and think of this!  Before sexual reproduction even came into the
picture, the DNA mutated slightly when the amoebae divided -- sort of like how,
with your clone, you'd want to change it around somehow to make things more
palatable -- for *both* of you!  But that's just a little set of changes!  If
you *really* wanted to have fun, you have to find a different person!  Just
like how sexual reproduction forced DNA to find different DNA to connect with!
Oh, good lord, this does work -- it's like how you can upgrade your object X of
technology until it just doesn't do the trick anymore, then dump it, and try a
totally different object Y!"

     "Aaaaah!" Toby cried.  "You're destroying my mind!"    

     "Destroying!  Destruction!  *Destruction!*  Holy fuck!  Now, if we weren't
tripping right now, I wouldn't have been able to convince you of *any* of this.
Maybe I could have *adapted* your thoughts," she chattered, nudging Toby on the
shoulder, "like the amoeba could have *adapted* to new environments, or you
could have *adapted* your clone, or you could *adapt* the computer to your
current needs.  *BUT*, since we're tripping, we both went past that primitive
adaptation process, and I *destroyed* your thoughts, and replaced them with a
totally new framework of reality!  Just like the primitive animals *destroyed*
relying on the asexual reproduction process and went on to a new way of
reproducing, or how you *destroyed* the possibility of being friends with your
clone since you knew it wouldn't work out and instead found a totally new
person, or how the computer as technological giant might be *destroyed* and
replaced with something totally new and inconceivable!  Oh, but that's only if
the computer wears out.  Right now it's okay to adapt it." She leaned back and
took some deep breaths.

     "Kathryn, you are a goddess.  I can even forgive you for stretching out
the meaning of the word 'destroy'."     

     "You're just saying that because we understand each other so well right
now.  You might as well be complimenting your own understanding."

     "That's true.  Now, listen here.  I see a trend here.  When DNA started
marching towards constant changes, or constant novelty, that resulted in
bigger, more complex animals.  And, technology, marching along, is also
resulting in more intricate shit.  I guess you could say that my choice of
friends since childhood has gotten more complex too -- I won't accept just
anyone else as a friend.  It's looking like everything is heading towardstotal, absolute complexity!  Like... oh... why can't I drink out of a river
anymore?  I don't even live by a river, first of all.  And also I'd be afraid
of contaminants.  And also I'd want to carry the water around with me.  So, for
all this, we've created Evian.  Portable rivers.  And we pay for it too!"

     "That's so true!" Kathryn exulted.  "You're starting to blow my mind too.
That computer -- when we upgrade it, don't we just make it more complicated?
With bigger programs and bigger disks and more intricate graphics and all?
When will that ever end?"

     "Well, I, for one, dislike that complexity too.  I admire people who can
write whole programs in wacked-out stuff like assembly language."

     "I guess I do too.  Everyone knows that's so hard to do.  Heeey --" she
started, thinking Toby would complete her sentence.  Instead, as she exclaimed,
"Like women who still knit!" Toby exclaimed "People who actually *do* do things
the old way!" They were both speaking of the same thing.

     "Yeah, look at that!" Toby exclaimed.  "I certainly admire people who do
things the old-fashioned way.  It's hard work, but it's simpler in the long
run, isn't it?  Like people who live in the forest in huts.  They don't have
electrical bills, or water bills, and they don't care much about if a flood
wipes away their house."

     "And when you knit your whole wardrobe, it probably costs less, and you
get everything in the right size, and you don't have to complain about the
design!  Well, look at that for a second.  This is mind-boggling.  If people
actually admire simpler things, then why do we continue to make things more
complex?"

     "As I just said, it's easier to buy a shirt, pre-made.  It's easier to
carry bottled water instead of purifying river sludge.  We do things that are
easier!"

     "Like that DNA thing again.  Through mutations alone, amoebae could have
asexually evolved into people.  But that would have really taken a long time,
even more than billions of years!  DNA sure as hell isn't going to give up
sexual reproduction now, since creatures have evolved so much faster with it.
I bet those amoebae are still pretty similar to their counterparts from the
beginning of their existence -- but we as people are way different from the
first human-like primates that existed only millions of years ago!  And I'm
sure as hell not going to use an abacus to balance my checkbook."

     "Although someone might admire that," Toby said.  

     "I still can't figure why people could admire things done the harder way.
It's really not *easier* to build a house with logs, is it?"

     "Well, if it's all logs, you don't have to find special sizes of lumber,
or plywood, or bricks, or anything.  It's easier in that you have a smaller
number of different things to hunt for.  But it's harder because it takes more
time."

     "Yeah!  Shit, could all this revolve around time?  Maybe time is what
motivates Westerners to go for the easier solution, since things done quicker
are more efficient, and therefore better."

     "Efficient in terms of time, only.  The stuff used to make the product is
more complex though.  Who can manually repair their post-1990 car engines
anymore?  The cars are probably put together faster, but they're sure complex
as hell."

     "But it's better, because they were made faster.  But if I knitted my
whole wardrobe, and it turned out to be warmer and stronger and prettier than
something I could easily buy at Wal*mart, people would still say I wasted my
time.  Because even with the cruddy clothing I could get at Wal*mart, even whenit wore out, or wasn't warm enough, I could just buy *more* clothes to make up
the difference.  It takes much less time."

     "You know, time isn't only a Western thing.  Isn't that what you said
motivated the DNA to seek sexual reproduction?"

     "Hmmm!  Westerners... are akin to DNA... since we seek to do things in
shorter amounts of time, and in a greater variety.  But it makes things more
complicated in the long run."

     "And Easterners -- or at least the ones that used to exist -- uh, isn't
'Western' just shorthand for modern, and 'Eastern' shorthand for traditional? -
- anyway -- do things in longer amounts of time, and in a lesser variety.  And
things are still simpler to this day."  

     "Westerners -- or modern people -- can do so many different things, have
so much variety, and get it done really quickly, although there's a buildup of
complicated garbage left behind.  Not to mention can be really hard on the
people emotionally to be caught up in the building process.  And traditional
people do so few things, have so much conformity, and get things done slowly,
although there may be a buildup of boredom, and a loss of new ideas, although
they're generally more at peace with life."

     "Gee whiz, which way is better?"   

				   * * * * *

     "It's that trend I was talking about," Toby remembered.  "If you look at
things in the big picture, modern people are in line with DNA, since we both
work to make new things, and in the process create complicated things, but take
less time to do so.  So, if we wanted to be supremacist, we'd have to agree
that modernism is 'nature's way.'"

     "No, no!  Look, Toby, remember about destruction!  Living things always
die, don't they?  Doesn't this imply that at some time in the future, DNA will
have to die, as well?  It's got a fixed amount of products to work with,
namely, the food on earth.  That can't remain forever."

     "Oh, but plants thrive off sunlight too."    

     "Yikes.  Well, that's good.  Life will probably go on forever, until the
sun burns out then."

     "But you said destruction.  So, I can see how that works in with things in
our society.  We're trying to destroy economic inequality between the races and
the sexes, to make things more efficient -- by making everyone feel like
they're getting rewarded equally for the same work.  But -- oh, yeah, fall of
Rome, all that.  Our society may well destroy itself.  But it doesn't *want*
to, though!"

     "Of course not.  Animals don't want to die, either.  They succumb to
sickness or starvation or massive bleeding and things.  It's not like all the
processes sustaining its life have to go away at once.  One or two little parts
is enough to destroy it."

     "Same way with society, I guess.  Maybe the Western way of valuing the
product over its creators, and the dollar over the product, is going to destroy
the creative spirit.  That's certainly an important part of our society, so it
would be sufficient to kill it off."

     "Yeah, maybe," Kathryn said.  "But it might just cripple society, and it
will function in a simpler manner after that."

     Toby's eyes widened.  "Aaaah!  So things *could* get simpler, couldn't
they!  More complexity isn't the only way to go!"

     "Of course not, Toby.  You just figured that out?  The only thing is, the
overriding push is in the way of more complexity, more life.  People might
enjoy the idea of taking a vacation for the rest of their lives, but that isn't
economically feasible.  The economy wants all the people, or as many as
possible, to work to promote its own needs.  Think about it this way -- the
economy, once created by people, took off in its own direction.  And now it
controls us --"

     Toby nodded frantically.

     "-- Just like how the sexual reproduction in DNA took off to make mating
really difficult, especially with people.  Animals look for superficial
physical features to pick reproductive partners.  And people do too, but we
also consider economic success, intelligence, et cetera.  We're manipulating
DNA, we think, by being so choosy with how we choose to reproduce, but it's
*still* controlling us, because we think we *have* to reproduce in the first
place!  And the economy, which we created to simplify trade, has become so
gargantuan and intricate that a presidential upchuck in Japan can affect sushi
stock for months!  We may think we can control the economy, by being
conscientious consumers, but it still controls *us*, because we are
participating in it and keeping it alive!"

     "Jesus Christ, I thought the mind-blowing was over."   

     "Hell no!  So, see, these are the things that push us along modernity.  We
may envy simpler people, but our culture -- which we created -- has taken
control over how we think about time and health, so we may personally want to
live in a cave, but our culture teaches us that's a bad idea, since it's
wrought with dangers and difficulties.  Although if you were born in a cave,
you'd learn what was dangerous first-hand.  And, the protestors in the sixties
thought they could control their government through free speech and peaceful
demonstrations, but the government, which people created, had taken such
control over them that their efforts were futile.  And, the terrorist
anarchists, who have given up on government and try to blow it skywards, are
promoting government by acknowledging its existence!  It's only our government
because we give it power through belief.  It's only our money because we
believe it represents value.  It's only our society because we follow its rules
and pretend it all matters!"

     "Kathryn, Kathryn...," Toby moaned, slapping his hand upon his knee, "If
I wanted to learn, I'd go to school!"   

     Toby burst out laughing, and Kathryn couldn't help but follow.   

				   * * * * *

     "Let's go outside.  *Please.*"     

     Toby and Kathryn walked outside.        

     "Oh shit, it's COLD!" Toby shrieked, and headed back indoors.    

     "That's just the acid."  

     "Yeah.  Hell, why should I be concerned with the cold?  Isn't that only a
problem because I *believe* it is?"

     Kathryn nodded.     

     "Heh heh.  Let's go back."    

     Toby and Kathryn stood outside, enduring the wind chill.    

     "Toby, don't be silly, though.  You could still get sick."  

     "Not if I don't think I will, right?  Hey, isn't that a cool way to think
about things?  It's just the opposite of hypochondria.  People get sick because
they think they should be.  I'll just believe I don't have to be sick."

     "Don't carry it too far, Toby.  Hypochrondriacs *don't* really get sick
all that much.  And *you* won't stay well all that much if you abuse your
body."

     "Hmmm... you really think so?"     

     "Look, your mind is not your body."     

     "Oh, yeah, but....  Like you say, my body created my brain.  And my brain
created my mind.  But if my mind has power over my body, isn't that like the
government having power over its citizens?"

     "There are still real rebels who don't believe in a government.  Just like
real athiests who don't believe in any god.  So, they won't be affected at all
by what the higher authorities believe.  So you can still get sick, because I
don't think you have enough power to convince all your immune cells to be
perfectly efficient and repel all attacks.  Besides, the immune cells have very
little to do with your mind."

     "There's a distancing factor there, then.  It's sort of like, if two
people fall in love, then, there's that familiarity they have....  Think of
this.  Think about if by being in love, they created a romantic bond which took
off to  exist beyond them.  That bond will induce both of them to keep it alive
-- like how society induces people to preserve it.  One of those people could
reject the bond, and that would effectively split the bond, although the other
person might still think it exists.  But it takes a hell of a lot of people to
destroy the notion of society, though, although it's easier for one person to
reject it, since it seems so beyond him.  It's that complexity shit again.  The
more complex things get, the easier it is for the little parts making it up to
rebel, but the more difficult it is to die entirely.  Exactly!  That's just
what we've been saying all along!"

     "That's very true.  But back to the thinking-yourself-well thing.  Your
mind isn't even in contact with your immune cells.  Your brain isn't really,
either.  The bone marrow makes the immune cells.  But the brain can secrete
hormones that control the bone marrow.  So, really, it's very very difficult to
ward off disease with your mind alone.  Although I would concur that a lot of
emotional stress going on nowadays is merely a product of the mind, so you
could stay healthier than stressful people just by thinking yourself well.  But
you need medicines that can attack disease on its own level to be healthier
than *that*."

     "Sigh.  So I can pretend to be Superman and ignore the cold weather, but
it will still freeze me dead in the end."

     "Yup.  Capitalism can pretend to be Superman and ignore the deteriorating
mental health of its workers, but it will still destroy itself in the end."

     "Aaah, that's a refreshing way to think," Toby said.   

     "Yup.  But if you want to be more efficient, you can kill it off in faster
ways."

     "Let's go inside."  

				   * * * * *

     "This all gets me thinking.  What then, is the purpose of life?" Toby
asked.

     "Oh geez.  We're fucked up, we can do this.  Well, from the DNA
creationist point of view, the purpose of life is to continue, and get morecomplicated.  That's what it did until people came along.  But, we've decided
that technological and intellectual evolution are more important than
biological evolution.  That's evident in how modern countries are in fact
practicing massive reproductive counseling -- contraception -- and abortions --
to prevent or control life, and also in how our technology is tearing apart the
stable worlds of the rest of the earth's life, thereby preventing its
evolution.  The societies we've created care less for the people than for the
products.

     "But, life itself created these problems, didn't it?  The life that exists
in technology, the life that exists in the idea of progress, the life of an
economic system, all of which have skyrocketed beyond our control.  I believe
the only way this society could change is not by changing the culture or the
government or the economic system, but maybe only by destroying the people who
make all these things exist.  Or, 'simply' changing all their minds at once to
avoid having to teach them why they should give those things up.  Who the hell
would teach them that?  It would take an organized force to -- like the
government itself -- and that ain't gonna happen!  Anyway, it would involve
destroying mindsets and cultures.  But people would immediately create new
governments and new economies and new cultures to take the places of the ones
they destroyed.  Shit!  Think of this -- whatever force is able to destroy the
attachment to society and government, that fucking force would take off into
its own existence, and we would have to destroy that!  Maybe *that* would be
the new de-facto government!  These  people would then blindly work themselves
up to this level of complexity yet again!

     "So, from that point of view, the purpose of life is to destroy itself and
start anew.  But, that's just the same thing as saying the purpose of life is
to continue and get more complicated.  If it's me that dies, then I'm destroyed
and my biological waste lives a new existence, maybe as food for worms.  If I
choose to reproduce, life will still continue, but in my child.  It's all the
same -- but you have to consider who carries it all out.

     "Any way you look at it, life involves creation and destruction.  And if
that's all it involves, then that's how you have to define life.  Life is the
ongoing process of creation and destruction, on any level you look at it,
whether it be people, or DNA, or technology, or society, or even atoms and
molecules.  It doesn't make *sense* to ask what the purpose of life is.  To say
the purpose of life is to create and destroy is to say nothing at all, except
that it just exists.  FUCK!  That's your answer!  Life simply  *is*."

				   * * * * *

     "With that kind of mindset," Toby said, "nothing really matters, does it?
So I could just go kill myself, and it wouldn't make any difference, would it?
'Everything simply is' -- until it isn't."

     "But, no, Toby!  That's exactly the wrong thing to do!  Do you ever
*really* think nothing matters?  Of course not.  You want to survive, you want
to create things and even destroy things.  You *hate boredom*.  That's  because
everything in you revolves around life!  Everything around you revolves around
life!  And it all has its own purpose, namely, to exist.  It's silly to call it
a 'purpose,' but that's the reason it *does* exist, isn't it?  The mind's
purpose is to create, carry out, and destroy thoughts -- after all, that's all
it does, isn't it?  That means that's its purpose.  That's why it exists.  The
brain's  purpose is to create, carry out, and destroy neural connections.  The
body's purpose is to destroy food, carry out the nutrients, and create energy
out of them.  All of these processes have a life force!

     "We as humans tend to think nothing but ourselves has 'conscious' desires
or purposes, and it *is* true in that nothing else has the human mind, and
nothing else can create or understand the desires and purposes in the way that
our mind does.  BUT!  It is also absolutely *false* to think nothing else has
desires and purposes -- the ultimate purpose of everything is to exist.
Molecular bonds may not express their desire to exist in the same way that a
fighting tiger does, but don't they both *exist* nonetheless?  -- But I wonder;
can't something exist without something wanting it to?

     "Wait!  The real fallacy is thinking that there *are* such things as
desires and purposes.  If the human desire to exist is really a desire, that
means there is a need that created the desire, and then a way to fulfill that
need.  But the need for the mind to exist springs from the mind itself and from
the structures that create the mind, namely, the brain -- as a government's
need to exist comes from itself and from the people who believe it must exist.
And, if you take away the need everywhere, then the object will fail to exist!
The government will fail to exist if it doesn't need to exist and the people
don't need it to exist.  If the people let go of their needs, and the
government lets go of its selfish needs, the government is gone -- zap --
instantly.  The *mind* will fail to exist if it doesn't need to and the brain
doesn't need it.  So, if you take away the 'need' or the 'desire' for X to
exist, you take away X itself!  Therefore, desires and purposes and needs are
simply the life force itself."

     Toby was wrenching out his hair.  "But *WHY*???  WHY do we exist???"  

     "'Why' is the most useless word.  But, if you must have an answer:
BECAUSE."

     "Aaaauggggh!"  

     "Look, Toby.  Your mind has created this level of complexity which cares
about the question of its own existence, right?  The problem will elude you
forever unless the *need* to answer that question goes away.  You can lose your
mind, your brain can decompose, the atoms making your brain can go nuclear, and
that will get rid of the question.  Or, you can understand that the question
just exists!  You're feeding this question -- your mind wants this level of
complexity to go away, so it keeps on throwing thoughts at it, hoping that the
question will *adapt* or *destroy itself*.  Your brain will keep throwing
electricity into the neurons that create your mind until IT *adapts* or
*destroys itself*.  Your blood will keep throwing nutrients at your brain until
IT *adapts* itself away from nutrients or *destroys itself*.  It's just like
how people solve problems -- they throw resources and energy at it until the
problem adapts itself into a not-problem, or until the problem is destroyed!
Only, we can *understand* that.  Everything else that's feeding the layers of
complexity above them don't *understand* why they do it -- they just *do it*!

     "If this basic question of existence didn't exist, your mind wouldn't
exist.  If your mind didn't exist, your brain wouldn't exist.  And so on!
Look!  The question of existence *just exists*, because if IT didn't exist, YOU
WOULDN'T EXIST!"

     "Aaaauggghhh!  So how can I be sure I won't just pop out of existence any
second now?!!"

     "Toby, calm down, child.  Remember, your mind is still full of tons of
questions, thoughts, ideas, and beliefs, each of which exists, perhaps trying
to understand itself, perhaps feeding or trying to destroy the levels existing
on top of them.  It'll take some work to get rid of those ideas.  Because even
as you destroy some ideas, others will take their place, each seeking to
understand its existence.  It's like people who destroy their government.
First of all, if you, a lone person, realizes you don't need the government to
exist, then it doesn't matter for you anymore -- but look at the two-hundred
and fifty million others who still think it does matter!  When you think you
personally solve the problem of existence, it's only one train of thought
existing on top of the other deeper layers of thought in your subconscious.
Those lower forces of thought will instantly regenerate new questions of
existence, just as when a people will regenerate a government after they
destroy the previous one. That's the process of life.

     "But conceivably, the people *might not* create a new government -- just
the same as your mind *might not* create new thoughts.  And, as we expect, thepeople without government would act like real humans -- without laws, they'd
soon butcher each other and die off.  Or, they could each realize deeply that
the categorical imperative prevents them from harming each other, and they
could all survive -- but that's *implicitly* a government! So, if you can
convince yourself in your mind that all the questions have been answered, then
thoughts will vanish, and you'll lose your mind!  Then your mind will cease to
exist.  But your brain will still be functioning, firing off neurons.  So new
thoughts *will* come along, and you'll have a mind again.  May not be sane, but
it will be a mind.  But consider that your brain can't create a new mind in
time -- that it can't fire the neurons anymore.  Then, the brain will cease to
exist.  And there, we know that you can't regenerate your brain, so you will
die, and cease to exist, and then all the cells making up your body, if they
can't divine oxygen without the heart and the lungs functioning, they will
cease to exist as well.  Then, you, by definition, will cease to exist as a
human."

     "I'm *really* not wanting to accept all this.  It makes me afraid."   

     "That's good!  That means your mind is still working.  If you're afraid of
losing your mind, you'll probably find a way to assuage the fear.  And, the way
your mind does that, is by relentlessly creating new thoughts whose only
purpose is to exist.  You can take pride in this, you know, Toby.  The mind is
a beautiful machine, that works non-stop, usually until the brain cannot
support it.  So, revel in this!  Revel in life!  Create thoughts just for the
hell of it!  It's the only way your mind can exist, you know.  But now you
ought to see -- you have the *choice* of what to think about.  If you hadn't
run into me, and if you hadn't come up with solipsism to amuse yourself, you
might have let yourself be sucked in by society's mind-programming, inducing
you to think society's thoughts.  And that's no fun!  Where's your sense of
control?!  But now, if you choose,  you can take the society trip.  Ride along,
thinking like they want you to, and understand that you've got it under
control.  If something bothers you, it's only in your mind, isn't it?  And, if
you find yourself getting bored, then create trouble!

     "Maybe that's what human life is all about!  We're just trying to STAY
INTERESTED!  It's when you think you understand it all -- good or bad -- when
things get boring!  So you seek to change it -- to adapt it -- or destroy it!

     "But we're not alone in this!  Everything in existence is doing the exact
damn same thing!  DNA is trying to stay interested, working to optimize itself,
creating buttloads of different possible organisms through recombinations and
mutations.  If it didn't, it would end up generating a never-ending series of
damn boring amoebae!  And, in doing so, it would also threaten its very
existence as well!  Just like people who get in a rut and let it tear them
apart.  Existence desires change, to keep itself interested, so it will want to
stick around.  The will to live is the will to *live*! If there were no will to
live, there would be no existence! The IS!

     "What if humans are the *only* beings that recognize the will to live?
Wouldn't that explain a hell of a lot of our problems?  What if only people can
get BORED with staying INTERESTED?  Look at everything we've created to combat
that boredom -- religion, folklore, language, technology, spacecraft, atomic
bombs, cookies, lawn darts, beer, Willie Nelson, plant polish, television, the
internet, pornography, hairstyles, fashion, literature, spelunking, remote
controls, fingernail polish, war, politics, time!  All this, to make us forget
that we're getting bored with staying interested in living!

     "We have to feel sorry for those poor souls who still ask the question,
who still perseverate on the eternal question 'why?' 'Why do we exist?' 'What
is our purpose on earth?' We've all known it all along!  But no one wants to
believe it -- to *really* believe it -- because then the question would no
longer exist.  It's so *final*.  So all along, people have built up endless
structures of complex thought to satiate our interest -- religion, philsophy,
science.  If someone asks you the meaning of life, chuckle to yourself, and
LIE!  Say, 'Oh, it's God's will!' (which is really our *own* will), or say,
'There is a higher purpose,' (which is a BIG lie -- it's a LOWER purpose, thelowest of all, the IS), or just be direct, and say, 'BECAUSE.' In any case,
they will seek a second opinion -- something more *interesting* -- and continue
to ask the question.  Even *you and I* will continue to ask the question.  I
know you'll go home and think, 'Well, gee, I know the answer, so what can I do
in the meantime?' (in other words, 'What can I do to avoid the final
understanding of this answer?') If a person wants to live, he already knows the
meaning of life!  If someone wants to die, it's the same thing -- he has
figured it out at some level and just wants out!  EVERYONE IS ALREADY
ENLIGHTENED.  But it's too boring to know the answer and then die happy, so we
must continue to live!  Why do we exist?  BECAUSE!  So revel in it!  Exist!
Enjoy it!  Then die!"

     "This is DNA's pinnacle of achievement, as well as its fatal flaw!
Everything people have done is a silly process meant to sustain our interest in
existing.  You can finally understand that the struggle to *finally* answer the
'question' of life -- whether through philosophy, religion, masturbation,
science, fame, duty, suicide -- is a self-defeating project, an ever-running
engine of futility!  It's the fuckin' cosmic joke!  People try so hard to
answer the questions that don't exist, the questions that can't be answered,
because all along in every possible way, the answer is *IS*!"


				- 3 -

     Kathryn spun around, having turned away from Toby is her soliloquy, and
announced, "There!  It's answered!  All is answered!"

     Toby sat dazed on the couch, stiff as a board.  Then a huge smile crept
onto his face, and he said, "I want to keep on talking about it."

     "No!  There's nothing more to say!  It's answered!"    

     Toby's smile grew so wide that all his teeth were visible.  He choked out
a cry of joy.  "I can now finally understand that question -- should one speak,
or stay silent?  It just doesn't matter!  We can talk about this forever, and
it will get us nowhere, but it will maintain our interest.  Or, we can stop
talking about it, and we'll simply find other things to do."

     "Exactly!"

     "I don't think I'll look at a late bus the same way again."      

				   * * * * *

     Toby spoke up again, remembering something.  "Um, Kathryn.  -- I thought
you had something important to tell me," he chuckled.

     "Well, really, now, Toby, nothing is important, is it?  Wait -- we'll
*pretend* things are important, won't we?"   

     "Hee hee, hee hee hee.  What did you really want to tell me?"    

     "This was all about solipsism, right?"  

     "I theenk so, senora."   

     "Well, there.  I've just given you new and fresh ways to revive your
solipsism.  I guess that's just the way this turned out.  Solipsism, monism,
dualism, Daoism, Christianity, egotism, community service, yoga, and baseball -
- it's all saying the same thing.  Just find something that keeps you
interested, and do it.  Just do it.  Even the corporate megalopoly understands
the secret of existence.

     "As for solipsism, it's perfectly true.  Your mind alone has  the ideas,
beliefs, opinions, and thoughts that create your version of reality.  Some saysolipsism is the belief that only you can know the absolute truth.  But, as
I've pointed out, everyone already knows and deeply understands the absolute
truth of IS.  So, let's revise that.  Only you can understand your own peculiar
instantiation of reality.  Only you can understand the absolute truth in *your
own terms*, however complex or simple or silly or logical they may be.

     "But, Toby, you didn't create reality, only an interpretation.  Reality
exists below you, reality exists beyond you, and you're stuck in the middle to
figure it all out.  However, you have final authority over how you control your
reality.

     "Perhaps you really can influence people with your thoughts.  The easiest
way is for your brain to tell your leg to kick someone.  There, you've
influenced that person, and he'll influence you right back.  Or, you can think
up some words and say them.  Then you've influenced a person.  Or you can write
something down and hand it out to be read.  That will influence someone's
thoughts. Or you can have sex with somone and control his or her emotions for a
little while.  You need to be pretty persuasive in any case to actually control
another person the way you want, but these are skills you can learn.

     "Can you really control someone's thoughts directly?  Science hasn't found
a way.  Psychics and telepaths are sure they can read thoughts -- so how far is
it to being able to control them?

     "Just look at the structure of the reality science assumes we live in.
Say everything is merely the result of adding layers of complexity to the basic
nature of existence.  That existence through time ineffably spawned the
structure of electromagnetic radiation, to keep itself interested.   Then, on
top of electromagnetism, the structure of atoms and physical matter ensued.
Then, on top of that, those atoms combined into molecules, creating more
complex structures.  Then those molecules formed into galaxies and planets.
And, electromagnetism existing on one of those planets formed into atoms and
then molecules and then water.  Everywhere, it's the basic structure of reality
being added upon.  You combine two atoms into a molecule -- you've really just
combined a lot of electromagnetic radiation into a bigger amount of radiation -
- and below that you're really just reshaped existence in a very complex way.

     "So, considering that, all manipulations and changes you make to some
level of reality, the changes propogate through the lower levels -- in effect,
the changes just exist.  So, on earth, biological life formed, and then brains
formed, and then eventually people formed.  The brain of each  person, when
created, formed a mind to satisfy its need to exist.

     "With that in mind, how could you control someone else's thoughts?  Just
like with learning, you need familiarity.  One slow and cumbersome way people
now control each others thoughts is through spoken language.  Two people are
familiar with the same language, and also familiar in that they are people,
living on top of a biological reality, existing on top of a material reality,
existing on top of an electromagnetic reality.  So the sound waves carrying
speech can indeed be understood by both *as* sound waves, and furthermore, both
people understand the sound waves represent speech.  Unfortunately, once the
receiver understands what has been said, the unique structure of his mind will
perceive the words as possibly having meanings alien to the speaker's intent.
That's the way it goes.

     "So, can people actually control the thoughts directly?  Can their brains
send out waves representing a specific thought, independent of language, and
thereby communicate?  Well, maybe they already do.  But what messages are sent
this way?  What messages *can* be sent?  The sender brain and the receiver
brain aren't the same!  Each of them learned everything it knew through
essentially random patterns of interneural connections.  If the brain itself
were to send out a message in its own language, wouldn't that language would
necessarily reflect its own neural structure -- which is alien to the
receiver's structure?

     "It might seem to disprove telepathy -- but consider two radios, one built
in 1930 and one built today.  They are utterly different in structure, but they
do the exact same thing.  They can both receive the same signals and interpret
them -- i.e., convert them into sound -- the same way.  So aren't any two
brains effectively the same in comparison?

     "But look.  The two radios don't receive the same signal if one's antenna
is missing, or if one is tuned to a different station.  It's really very
difficult to have two radios randomly tuned to the same thing.

     "Does that matter, though?  Two people raised in the same culture are
tuned to the same essential thought patterns, but their personalities and
personal experiences may differ widely.  So, conceivably, they could
communicate through their brains, couldn't they?

     "Look at the limitations, though.  How are any two brains familiar?  Two
people raised in different parts of the United States may only be familiar in
terms of American culture.  So what could they say to each other?  Possibly
relate already-understood facts about the number of states in the Union?  Or
look at two people raised in the same household.  They could mutually agree on
who their mother was.  But could they relate any new information?

     "I wonder.  Any train of thought one person is having is dependent on all
the thoughts that person has had in the past, which have led him to think what
he is now thinking.  If he wants his brain to communicate this thought to
another brain, the other brain would have had to have been thinking in the same
way in order for any hope of communicating directly.

     "In effect, a translation is required -- some way for a thought built on
top of XYZ in one brain to be communicated to another brain built on top of
IJK.  And that translation must be in the form of a shared language.  A
language of thought?  Perhaps.  If two people could learn to project their
thoughts through a shared code, then they could brain-speak to each other.  Two
people in a close friendship might inadvertently develop such a code by
thinking in the same way, by agreeing on so many of the things that make them
familiar.

     "But could this code be taught to everyone in say, a country?  Maybe it
could, but then look at the high degree of familiarity all these people would
have!  Think about how boring that would be!  But, look how comfortable, as
well.  You could be assured that your neighbor agreed with you.  But people
want to stay interested.  And having everyone thinking essentially the same way
would quash the creativity required to sustain their interest in being
telepathic.

     "So, as we have seen over and over again, Toby, an extra level of
complexity was devised -- spoken language -- that allowed people to maintain
more individuality, and thereby focus their creative energies in more
independent ways.  People rushed to devise a spoken code, and the code was made
beautiful, to maintain people's interest in speaking.  Vowels, pauses,
enunciations, volume, rhythm, rhyme, meter.  All in the interest of
communicating in a slower, but more *interesting* way!  And thousands of years
later, even speaking became blase!  So the elite devised writing.   Visually
appealing communication, over the sonically appealing communication of speech,
which existed after the comforting appeal of telepathy.  And recently, even
written language has worn thin.  Too many stupid, repetitious books out there.
So the elite developed electronic communication -- radio, television,
computers.

     "Isn't it funny, Toby, that our means of communication have resorted to
more and more basic processes, but those which take more and more time to
interpret?  All to maintain interest!

     "People's very first form of communication was love -- the most intricate,
complicated relationship two people can have.  Who can explain it, who can
understand it, without experiencing it?  But isn't  love just a complicated wayof expressing familiarity?  And in this complication, isn't misunderstanding so
easy?  Love is the wellspring of misunderstanding, although when two people
understand each other, the messages they manage to  send carry  so much more
importance.  But love can be expressed simply, as well: two  friends can
express love in friendship, and two people in the same society  can express
love in the sense of brotherhood.

     "Telepathy, brain-to-brain communciation, is also very complex --
expressing ideas in recursive structures built on  abstractions like fear,
attraction, justice, time, causality, and order.  Although,  brain-to-brain
communication can be simpler than that -- like the mob mentality that connects
crowds of people, and even simpler, between human and animal, through the
animal magnetism that tells us another brain is nearby.  But with the
essentially random construction of the brain, it is very difficult for a
telepathic message to mean the same thing for the sender and the receiver --
all personal detail and connotation is lost.

     "So we migrated to spoken language, requiring so much more work to produce
and interpret, but expressed in a simpler form.  Our  ears can only detect
ranges of frequencies.  So our brains have to take this information from our
ears, and concatenate all the little frequencies over time into patterns of
sound.   Then, those little patterns of sound have to be interpreted as
phonemes, and those phonemes together must be interpreted as words.  It's
slower than telepathy, and much slower than the spark of love.  And  look all
the different ways you can speak the same word -- all the work our brains have
to do to get meaning from sound!  Still, sonic communication can be very simple
and direct -- such as wild animals shrieking into the night.

     "Visual communication, though, is much simpler to interpret.   The retina
can detect colors, brightnesses, and all human brains contain the structures
to see lines and detect distance.  And, visual communication needn't vary over
time.  A still sequence of letters can contain a message.   All the mind needs
to do is match a pattern with something it's seen before.  But look how slow
reading and writing are!  Much easier to speak than write.  And look at the
loss of meaning that writing entails -- you lose the context of immediate
shared experience, the enunciation of speech, the body language. But the
element of time allows written language to be crafted into near perfection
before it is transmitted -- and the message can be interpreted over and over
again, much more intensively than the memory of a whisper. Even here, one can
simplify visual communication -- but not much -- by flashing light at a
flatworm's visual cortex.

     "Look, Toby, look!  By settling on more basic means of communication, the
messages we can communicate are similarly limited, and the messages transmitted
take our brains longer to interpret.  The amount of possible novelty decreases
with each new form of language -- but the amount of interest increases in
decoding it!  Look at electronic communication -- ONLY zeroes and ones!  How
easy to represent, how difficult to understand!  People don't even try to
decode that, but leave it to computers!  What's next, Toby?  What's next?  Will
people finally  resort to EXISTENCE as the primary means of communication?
Isn't that the simplest message to transmit, but with the most amount of
interpretation to understand?   Will all this evolution of communication
finally end when our desire for novelty leads us finally to receive the only
basic message:  IS?"


				- 4 -

     Toby wrenched at his hair with a strained smile.  "'Should one speak, or
should one remain silent?'"

     "Do what you want, that's what I say."  

     Toby let out a deep breath and sank into the couch.  "You know, Kathryn,"
he repeated slowly, "I could have sworn you had something important to tell
me."  And then he broke out laughing, convulsing, shaking madly in the couch.
"Something *important*!  Something *important*!"  

     "I guess not.  I guess I was just meant to tell you something
interesting."

     "You know, after you've told me all this, I think I should tell you
something.  I have a secret.  You know that prophet we're supposed to be
waiting for?  The one supposed to come and bring us news from beyond?  I  was
the one who predicted it.  I just wanted to see what would happen.  But, you
know, I just don't care if it comes anymore."

     Kathryn grinned widely in silence.      

     Toby waited for an answer, and then looked up, shocked.  "Oh my god."

     Kathryn shrugged her shoulders.    

     "Boy, am I dense."  

     Kathryn nodded and laughed.   

     "But I don't get it!  If you're here, then how does anyone else know?"     

     "Maybe you'll just go tell them what I told you.  They won't know the
difference.  Look, Toby:  you created me.  I am your prophet.  So, in effect,
you were the prophet all along.  If you want everyone else to know, you have to
go tell them."      

     "But... I don't really want to anymore.  I don't care."     

     "That's just fine, Toby.  You wanted a prophet to appear, and zap!  I
appeared.  If everyone else still wants a prophet, then they'll get one too.
Maybe as a group, maybe individually."  

     "As a group... I have a feeling the people on this campus wouldn't want
you as their prophet."

     "Yes, most definitely, I am a totally inappropriate person for them.  But
for you, ...."

     "Everyone will find his own prophet," Toby considered.  "And that prophet
will tell them exactly what they already knew all along.  It's all about
existence."

     "Perhaps not so, Toby.  If true Christians learned that it was all about
existence, then what would any of their devotion, symbolism, myths, and rituals
mean?  Nothing!  That would destroy their faith!  Anyone expecting a prophecy -
- or any lesser knowledge -- will only accept what they want to hear."

     "So, that's why you basically taught me that solipsism is the way to go."

     "Yes."    

     "So, if the people on campus do see the prophet... it will tell them that
they are the chosen ones, and that God is happy with them, and that the
heathens outside will have to repent?  Or even that *they* are the heathens?"

     "Right!"  

     He sat back in deep thought.  "Just like the alien freaks... their prophet
will be in the form of some peaceful emissary from beyond -- or as a murderous
invader?"

     "Right!  They see them all the time."   

     "And like how the government sees 'prophecies' as the fact that  foreign
threats have launched dangerous subversive ideologies, or that its own ideology
is the most humanitarian?"

     "Yes, and they think that now."    

     "All these groups, all these people, are seeing everything happening
according to plan, that everything they do is fulfilling their plan, and that
something is always tripping up their plan."

     "Exactly!" Kathryn exclaimed.  "When any of these people experience
intimations of the more basic reality, they can only interpret it in the way
they know best.  And, unless they are exceptionally receptive, the real truth
will continue to evade them.  It may not be at all obvious to anyone, but
everything that people do is just a way to continually reformulate the question
of existence in new terms, to maintain their interest."

     "Is the end near?"  

     "The end of what?  The universe, the earth, life, human strife, ignorance,
what?"

     "The millennial fever is getting to me.  If... if so many people
concentrate on that year, if so many people think something important is going
to happen, then by god, it *will* happen!  Look at the acceleration of
technology, knowledge, population, misunderstanding!  What's going on here is
completely unprecedented!"

     "As far as you know, Toby.  If the millenium brings the end to something,
that something will necessarily reappear.  History repeats itself.  How do we
know a country as technologically advanced as ours hasn't existed in the past?
If it reached the kind of End you're fearing right now, then perhaps it did
destroy itself so well that we've never been able to detect its traces."

     "But, but, couldn't this be the end of *everything*?"  

     "Toby, calm down.  From a hundred miles above the earth, nothing looks
like it's going to end.  The solar system hasn't yet become bored.  Physical
reality seems so predictable to us because it isn't changing yet -- it's
satisfied.  Perhaps it takes the physical mind much longer to become bored.
And consider why it hasn't become bored yet.  All the layers of complexity
existing on top of the physical world -- the stars, the planets, the galaxies -
- still satisfy its need to exist.  Just like the mind, which satisfies the
brain's need to exist.  It will take a hell of a long time before physical
reality understands itself and ceases to exist.  Just like human technology --
we are working harder to create things that solve problems in less time in more
complex ways.  So, tracing back, the universe operates so simply -- scientists
imagine they have unified all the forces down to two -- and it is hardly
working at all to solve its problem of existence; it will take forever for it
to do so.  But people, we're too fast.  We think too much.  Our need to exist
will be satisfied much sooner.

     "So, let me rephrase my answer.  Yes, a person could assume that the end
of everything is approaching.  Everything around us points to that.  Technology
is evolving too fast, social strife is growing much too complex, economics is
spiraling out of control.  Maybe those are the things that will end.  But what
are the attributes of all these?  Profound corruption, strife, and
misunderstanding -- too much form over function.  Maybe the End will be the End
of classic human misunderstanding, or the End of the modern scientific age that
has accelerated technological innovation while ignoring the human spirit."

     Toby held his hand to his head.  "Of course!  It could be good, whatever
it is!"

     "I think if you take yourself out of the picture, you'll be able to
interpret it more clearly.  If you're concerned about the End, that impliesyou're concerned about dying, somehow.  For a solipsist, the end would mean
that you lose your ego.  Big fear for a person like you.  Stop being so damned
egotistical.  Maybe this 'big change' will be worldwide enlightenment," Kathryn
scolded him.  Then she looked up and smirked.  "Remember, I am a prophet here.
I don't think I forecasted any catastrophic doom.  Be optimistic."

     "If I wanted to be the prophet and tell them everything we just discussed,
most likely it would just fall flat."

     "That's true, but not because you don't think you know what's going on.
Any failure to explain this will result from a lack of communication.  You must
be familiar with all the people you speak to.  But how can you do that?  You
either need to come up with an argument broad enough to apply to everyone, or
one specific enough that you can teach a few people.  In any case, these people
probably won't have the benefit of acid to shave away all the noise in their
self-centered, crazed monkey minds.  If you must speak, you must pick an
audience and pick a way to communicate best for that audience.

     "Will you go for the slow, cumbersome spoken word, so personal, but so
easy to misinterpret?  Will you go for the craftable written word, slowly
ingested, lasting beyond your death to be re-read and re-interpreted by
millions, but risking the possibility of confusion you cannot predict?  Or will
you choose love -- to share the secrets of existence with another person in the
most intimate possible way?  Perhaps you will just spend the rest of your life
learning, trying to finally explain it all to yourself.

     "Or, maybe you will choose to be silent, and let your very existence be
the word."     

     Toby solemnly nodded.    

     "Well, Toby, it's been fun.  Maybe you'll see the End of something big
during your life.  But you'll also see the Beginning of something just as big
and exciting.  Try to keep your head, and, above all, stay interested."

     Kathryn walked toward the exit.  "By the way, my being your imagination
and all, I suggest you get out of this house before the real owners show up."
She walked out and closed the door behind her.

     Toby rushed after her, swung open the door, and opened his mouth to ask
something silly, but by that time his need for Kathryn had evaporated, and so
had she.

--SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB-SoB--

State  of  unBeing  is  copyrighted (c) 1997 by Kilgore  Trout  and
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