Having neglected this apparatus for a while, I shall try to write at length.

Most of last week was alloted to recording, and Tony and I performed relatively well in this respect. Beginning with a lost improv, Monday hooked us up by the armpits after drowning us in equipment failure. In specific, Tony’s N-Track machine died. The details of its repair and eventual failure again (resulting in the loss of our improv) is not important.

The improv began with an oscillator droning along the lines of Vegkoref but with a steady rhythm. A mandolin joined on the second pass. Tone throbbed on bass. Incidental percussion littered the piece. An Emerson-like keys part dueted with bass and mandolin. I already miss it. Loss leaves only vestiges of memory which quickly decay into a skeleton of what actually was. What actually was no longer exists. It is only the bare bones now.

The other pieces recorded are perpetually alive for posterity.

Now for the PocketMod.

I’ll go backwards. Whilst walking by the main building at the University of Texas below the sadly famous tower, I read these words on a plaque:

CORE GOAL

Transforming lives for the benefit of society.

I thought to myself, wouldn’t the following be better?

Transforming society for the benefit of lives.

The reason I think so is simple. Creating a structure and then attempting to force people to live in it and conform to it leaves a large swath of humanity out in the cold. A preferable alternative is to have a malleable infrastructure which bends to the quirks of its members. I believe that Acy, at least, would agree that the education system in the US of A suffers from the words on that plaque at UT. It aims to file off all of the rough edges of each individual until each fits snugly into place.

Malleability. Think of it.

In the cafe, the voices of people sound murky. They are commingling with the music murmuring from hidden speakers. It all combines to be a muddy slush flowing into my ears. I removed my headphones and it washed sluggishly over me. My mind moves more and more slowly.

I shall leave.

I’m at Diner 24. That, in itself, is not surprising, since I was hungry after seraching for the Steve Reich boxed set called Phases. Searching for good music makes my tummy rumble and always has. I used to sift through the cd stores in New York City (Greenwich Village) for hours. I was faint from the effort. Once, Natascha had to pretty much carry me to the diner across the street and feed me forkfull by forkfull until I had regained my strength.

Yes, those were the days.

I just ordered Phases. I look forward to perusing the contents as well and indulging in the fantastic music for hours. The day it arrives will be consumed by the overlapping melodies.

I wonder why Justin does not like Steve Reich. He pointedly told me once that I should explore Philip Glass until my ventricles explode with delight, but to stay away from Reich for fear of clotting.

I wonder how cobbler came to mean a sort of pastry filled with cooked berries or other fruits? A cobbler is someone who fixes footwear. The idea of the semantic drift is truly staggering.

• Repairing a shoe
• Filling the shoe with a foot after reparation
• Allowing the shoe to become a crumbly pastry
• Detaching the foot from the remainder of the body
• Allowing the meat of the foot to become vegetarian
• Making sure the vegetarian items within the ex-shoe is now a fruit
• Popping the whole thing into the oven
• Feeding the result to southern geezers in casinos or upscale hotel buffets

Yeah.

The moment of Viking showing himself to me. It was so real that I know my subconsciousness misses him. I wish I could recall the remainder of the dream. Besides the multitudes of people in the past, and how we were all at Tony’s before we went to the… the celebration. But Tony didn’t come. I was sitting and Scott Hazle was there (actually, he was there from the beginning), and reminding me of lucidity. Damn.

At first, I thought it would not work, the initial bit, but on second and third listen, it does. It recycles the mind from what had happened before. Now it is time to put that beautiful melody again within the framework.

I must record this here so I may perhaps write about it at a later date. Why do I not write about it now, you ask? It’s the infernal breezy feeling in my cerebrum.

This duration blindness in the middle-aged exile is quite a widespread disease. Later, when I decided to avoid the exile’s obsession with his roots (exiles’ roots penetrate their personalities a bit too deeply), I studied exile literature precisely to avoid the traps of a consuming and obsessive nostalgia. These exiles seemed to have become prisoners of their memory of idyllic origin—they sat together with other prisoners of the past and spoke about the old country, and ate their traditional food while some of their folk music played in the background. They continuously ran counterfactuals in their minds, generating alternative scenarios that could have happened and prevented these historical ruptures, such as “if the Shah had not named this incompetent man as prime minister, we would still be there.” It was as if the historical rupture had a specific cause, and that the catastrophe could have been averted by removing that specific cause. So I pumped every displaced person I could find for information on their behavior during exile. Almost all act in the same way.

It goes without saying that this reminds me very distinctly of Vesna and her ilk.

“Do you like sex?
“It’s ok”
“Can I come in?”
“No, you cannot.”
“What is wrong with you?”
“Nothing. I am just smoking a cigarette.”
“You must be a fag.”
“If you think so.”
“Your kind is everywhere.”
“Possibly.”
“Goodnight.”
“Goodnight.”

Conversation with a woman outside:

She drives up in a car. I am smoking a cigarette.
“Did you need something?”
“Like what, for example?”
“You were staring at me.”
“No, I am smoking a cigarette.”
“Well, did you need something?”
“Who are you? Do you work here?”
“No.”

Why was she so uptight?

I know some of my friends better than they know themselves. I am thinking of Christian in particular, though I am sure the statement applies in general. They, too, know me better than I know myself in ways. It is the advantage of an outside point of view.

We should rejoice in the opinions of others.

After the movie came the silence
After the silence came the grief.