FlamingText

Notes, September 17 2005

  Looking out the window through the iron slats of the fire escape I can see the full moon peeking through the clouds that hang in the sky above a brick building across the way, where somebody has leaned out over the edge of the roof to paint the word "loser" in black and white block letters that cover the fading white letters of the old "Holmes Business School" sign. In the foreground, affixed to an awning on this hotel's facade, a flag emblazoned with the Seal of the Great State of Oregon flaps in the breeze alongside its companion Old Glory. The Seal is rendered in gold filigree on a field of royal blue and features an eagle with its wings spread over a scene depicting, among other things, a covered wagon and a big three-masted sailing ship. On the reverse I can just make out what I'm pretty sure is a beaver, but the whole thing is fluttering around too much to be certain. Somewhere in the distance a car alarm is going through the familiar sequence of jarring sounds that all of us urban dwellers now know by heart, like a jukebox that only has one song, a little ditty called "help somebody's trying to steal me!"

  C'mon everybody, sing along, you know the words: "HELP me! HELP me! Somebody's trying to steeeeeal me! To steeeeeeal me! They're taking the STER-eo! I'm SER-ious! Please call the po-LICE! po-LICE! po-LICE! They're Steeeeealing Steeeeealing me! STEAL-ing! STEAL-ing! STEAL-ing! Me! Me! Me! Me!"

It occurs to me that my favorite part of the story of the boy who cried wolf is the ending when he is eaten by wolves and everybody within earshot can finally get some peace and quiet.

  The noise stops and the night is peaceful again. Down below a streetcar rattles by without incident and when it's gone there's nothing but the faint sound of conversation filtering up from the kids on the corner of Stark and 11th who are sitting in the doorway of the Red Light passing a bottle around. Across the street well-dressed boys are queuing behind a velvet rope, waiting to get past the doorman and into the strobing, throbbing, thumping interior of Boxxes.

  I am at loose ends on this Saturday night, my travelling companions having made other plans for the evening and leaving me to my own devices. Earlier tonight I went over to Machine Works and used my festival pass to get into the DaDa Ball, but there's only so much enjoyment I can derive from standing amidst a crowd of strangers dressed in their artfully decrepit ensembles of tattered ballgowns and brocaded testicle harnesses and duct-taped nipples. It's all very nice but I feel like a voyeur, like somebody's square uncle who decides to check out this Burning Man thing he's heard so much about just to see what the big deal is. And really, let's face it, I've never been good at striking up conversations with strangers in these kinds of settings, especially a stranger that's dressed as a six-foot tall go-go dancing Wonder Woman. If Wonder Woman were into bondage and domination. (Wait a second -- golden lasso? Magic bracelets? Holy crap, Wonder Woman was into bondage and domination! I may need to reevaluate some of my childhood memories.) So I came back "home" to this hotel room after a brief stop in a too-rich-for-my-blood teakwood and polished brass hotel bar for a ham-with-mustard panini and a ten dollar scotch.

  Now I'm sitting here looking down on the corner of 11th and Stark through the faint amber tint of overpriced whiskey, basking in the simultaneous sensations of captivity and freedom that arise from being completely alone in an unfamiliar city. Behind me 100 channels of basic cable beckon but for now my attention is hooked on this program. What it lacks in plot development it makes up for in richness of theme and subtext. Two blocks down the brightly-lit Powell's sign welcomes late-night book browsers. The cars and people continue to trickle past, the streetcars glide by on electric rails and the beggars on the sidewalk ask passers-by for change. Deep sigh as I look up to where the full moon is slowly rising and shining down on everything in the city regardless.