You should bring a fishing pole with you...a two piece with a reel that holds 200 yards of 15 pound test....I can hook you up with hooks and line and stuff....its pretty third world in many respects still....the water is decent to drink though...bring plenty of bug repellent...Skin-So-Soft is the bomb, as the no-seeums can fuck you up around the beaches sometimes....bring however many books and magazines you can...there's a place in town to trade them in and people are always loving to get fresh reading material down there.... as for clothes; T-shirts and shorts will get you there and back...maybe some light sleeves or pants to protect you from the vicious sun....sunblock and good sunglasses are a plus too....maybe a bed roll and a sheet and a small pillow and you're all set..should be able to get all that in a back pack and a carry on with your laptop.... when you get there, you can find out just how tall you are, by jumping in the middle of the river....Click here to get to that site I was telling you about.
to karolina
It's late at night. I quit drinking cause all my heroes were spooking me out about it. I woke up Friday morning with big red puffy eyes (I hadn't drank a bit). I felt ok but my eyes were super bloodshot, scary. I went home from work cause I got sick of everyone saying, "rough night last night?" They already know I'm a drug whore, and I looked really pathetic, like I had a drinking problem. I'll get back to that in a second. Anyway, I've been editing down the website's stories to bind into a book, for real. It's gonna look like any paperback you own, except it's gonna have a delicate pale pink dust jacket: fucking sweet. So, I've been editing these stories down and re-writing them so that the old rambly diary-style shit sounds like the new more economical, professional sounding stuff. Man, it's been superfucking hard. So I got a couple days off work for my puffy eyes, but couldn't pry myself away from writing to go to the doctor. If I weren't writing, and instead, say, playing Scrabble so intensely that I couldn't go to the doctor and get my eyes fixed, people would say I have a problem. But as it stands, they say I'm committed and passionate. But regardless, I have scary bloodshot eyes. I'll go to the doctor Monday
I relate: an email exchange with a stranger who reads commonplace
HIM:That gagging thing you spoke of; I do that too…
ME: How so…?
HIM: The tongue scraper, it's a plastic device, given to me by my dentist, that
scrapes all the bacteria off your tongue; my wife won't use it because it
causes her to gag. I, on the other hand, use it daily, after brushing, and,
therefore, gag regularly. It's just kind of easy to do when you're scraping
your tongue.
ME: that's a lot weirder than my gagging habit. I just HAPPEN to do it upon the occasion of brushing my teeth. I don't erroneously inflict it on myself.
HIM: Well, I think the tongue scraper thing is not too weird, more like fidgeting with a toothache, kind of compulsive. Really, though, the tongue scraper's tops if your interested in better breath. On the other hand, I don't gag while brushing my teeth.
ME: See, no, that's weird. With a toothache: the tooth is in your mouth, so the compulsion is right there. Same with my toothbrush gagging; I'm already brushing my teeth, so it' s not that much of a stretch to gag. You're going out of your way. You have a problem.
merry Christmas little red-haired girl
It's 7:10pm in the newsroom. Quiet. I called you last night to see if you wanted to go get food. I stayed home from work to edit my book all day and at 9pm I realized I had forgotten to eat again. I can do anything else alone, but I hate to eat by myself, so I called you. I know, I know, I'm totally disrespectful to what you want and need in the face of what I want and need, I know, I know. But I did call everyone else first: my friends, then friends that I'm not very close to, then people I like who don't like me, then people I don't like, and then you. And somehow that seems wrong, cause I don't get on with any of those people the way I do with you. But just so you know that I thought: "I shouldn't do this, she doesn't want to me to call her."
Your friend wrote to me. He wrote me a poem. An awful awful poem. That's definitely YOUR BOY. Other than that, I bought a laptop and a ticket to Costa Rica. I'm done with my record and almost done with my book. I've been so busy that I haven't washed my clothes in weeks and my apartment is a petree dish. I'm sick with flu and all my friend have girlfriends and none of them have called me for weeks, as if they were just waiting to have girlfriends so they didn't have to settle for hanging out with me anymore. No one has mentioned New Year's. I stayed in Tampa longer than I wanted to, just so I could spend one last New Year's with my friends, because I can't see that happening now. Let me just flat out admit that I have been horribly lonely. But that's also pretty conducive to leaving; at least I won't feel like I'm leaving something behind. When I get to Puerto Jimenez on the Osa Peninsula, with few inhabitants and even fewer with the capacity to speak to me, it won't be that much different from Tampa, aside from the beauty. There will be a cliff and a scary ocean out the window, which can be easily as effecting as any really good friend. I mean, what could anyone mean to you that would put you in touch with a sense of your place on earth, of your mortality, the way you feel when you look at the ocean and realize you could just step in and go away forever and neither you or the water would have any hard feelings about it? Wow, that sounds morbid. And you already think I'm psycho. All your loved ones think so too. This all sucks pretty badly for me. I miss you. Have a good Christmas.
To the SEMI-FAMOUS AUTHOR
Well, since you asked.
1) I've been editing down a year's worth of COMMONPLACE into book form, and I'm publishing it with my printer friend. It's a lot harder than I imagined (I did like 5,000 words a week average - but it taught me to write - almost).
2) Tonight I went to my fisherman friend's house in St Pete (over the bridge) to talk about our Costa Rica trip and I'm a little more sure of what's going on now.
3) I went to Ft Myers to eat Thanksgiving w/ my parents. I brought my computer and wrote/edited.
4) I've been intensely lonely. Y'know, since that red-haired girl you met, I haven't made a connection with any woman, aside from physically (I never even made a connection with MY EX-GIRLFRIEND, who you met in N.Y. - but we suffered through so much trying that we eventually forged some vague, unhealthy bond ). The LITTLE RED-HAIRED girl now realizes I'm impatient and that I value my wants and needs over hers, so no matter how attracted she is to me, she thinks I'm wrong for her, I'm sure.
5) I wrote that letter, the one you read featuring you. It's published on OPENLETTERS today (openletters.net). She thinks it's "awesome that I turn my life into art". But I'd rather just have her. Fuck the art
6) I'm happy, but I'm way too autonomous and I need love and searching for it is too much pressure and waiting for it makes me want to drink. So, life feels pretty static.
7) I go in tomorrow at 11am to get this skin cancer frozen off my temple. But I am happy, oddly enough, and I think about your drinking warning every day, and I agree with it, and everything will be good once I get some new stimuli (i.e. Costa Rica). Alright. Hope all is well.
I hung out with horsegirl the other night
HER: I knew you were just trying to get in my overalls. I had a discussion with Cathy one time when I was downstairs waiting for you in THE FRIENDSHIP GARDEN and I told her, "Why would any woman go up to his apartment if they didn't want to get screwed?" Next time we should go to the movies.
ME: I knew you'd see it that way. Just because I vaguely, shyly verbally inquired, "Do you want to mess around?" does not mean that I wanted anything. Not that I don't think you're the sexiest, and not that I don't think about that a lot when I'm with you, but if I really WANT something, I don't ask. It was more like feeling I SHOULD do something. Who's Cathy? Oh, Catherine, THE PERFORMER's girlfriend? Maybe that's why she always stands two feet away from me; she thinks I'm gonna jump her or something. Between your saying that to her and her seeing girls' cars parked out front of our house all those mornings, she must think I'm a real slut. Yeah, movie, fine, cool. Next time.
from karolina
It was good, I liked it. Even though I sound scary and in the end I'm always (sometimes) the one that gets screwed. But I guess that's part of the archetype you suggested.
How are you feeling? Are your eyes better? Poor baby… But it´s so romantic to be taken by writing like that. Let it. I can't wait to read the finished product.
I wish I could tell you everything that's happening with my life, that would be hours of chatting, my hands can't bare. But know you are I my heart, and we'll catch up easily. I have a week and something left here, still don't have a visa or a backpack or anything concrete but my will. That's enough. In the next few days I will be able to tell when I'm leaving. I got it sort of planned until New Years eve, then it all goes crazy. Listen, the cheapest faire I was able to find was $700 to Costa Rica, I don't think I can do that, but tomorrow I'm asking again. Who knows, anything is possible. Are you sure that as an aside adventure you don't want to come down to Brazil, you would enjoy it, you could write on the train. OK, let's both work on it.
Can you call for free from your work to Argentina? There's only 1 hour time difference, I would love to talk to you. I tried calling the number you gave me but no 800 numbers work.
I've been eating in exorbitant amounts of steak lately, rare. Had a dream that I turned into a vampire, and have been stealing a lot lately. But only small things like flowers from flower vendors on the street and random things that should be mine.
Kiss
k
