2:35 a.m. EST. My husband is asleep in his chair, the precious person he’s seeing is zonked out close to him on the sofa. My partner is in bed, equally unconscious and I’m wide awake. Three people snoring, loudly, in my house, so I came outside to not disturb them, lest my head gets loud. I sat down in my cheap plastic chair, brittle from age and weather, and was greeted by the strong odor coming from the trash container. It will be picked up by the city on Tuesday. My buddies, my little ones, the smoky brown cockroaches, are running about, yet no one has stopped to say hi. The windows are behind me, Gabriel frantically scratching at them, wanting to come outside. That’s a hard No. The tag on his collar says “Escape Artist” for a reason. I’m looking at my immediate surroundings and I see several thin tree branches scattered about. I think about my former projects involving branches and gold spray paint. That, in turn, makes me think of Pet. The shared laughter, tears, and various creative pursuits. “Good times”.
Good times. I am drawn to….a time period. Maybe 2008. I had a blue PT Cruiser, turbo/convertible. That car was fun, but a massive pain in the ass when it needed repairs. No wonder they don’t make them anymore. Anyway, good times: I’m remembering driving, top down, from Coudersport to Austin Costello, Palsie sitting in the passenger seat. We were blasting Saves the Day, singing loudly for, well, no one to hear except each other and whatever wildlife milled about. We get to the intersection where, if you turn left and go up the hill, the road is still paved. If you go straight, it’s all dirt. I asked him what he wanted to do. He looked at me with those huge blue eyes and then RAIN. Rain just started pouring down, with no warning. We shrieked and laughed as I fumbled with the knobs to get the roof to unfold and cover us. It didn’t work. Like I said, there’s a reason they don’t make them anymore. We hopped out, getting soaked, laughing louder than thunder, trying to get the top to manually unfold. Palsie’s solution was that he would sit in the car and “fuck with that shit” and I would keep pulling. It worked. I hopped back in the car, which was soaked from the surprise downpour, and we watched the roof slowly crawl to the point where I could secure it. We cackled like banshees, stopped at this intersection in the middle of nowhere. I got the top secured and I looked at him and said “now what?”. He just smiled and shrugged. I told him to get out and switch me. So, back in the rain we went, switching seats and he plopped down behind the wheel and mentioned the turbo, asking what the pickup speed was like. I told him to just do it, so off we went. He decided to stick with pavement and we climbed that rural, bumpy hill fast as hell and I thought we would just launch into the sky once we reached the top. We didn’t, but my god was it a fucking joyride. Good times.
It Does Art 