JHFARR.COM

Does the Universe have a tail or is it like a tree? Is everybody crazy? Are things a mess? If one of us finds hope and common sense, does the world get any better? Is reality zero-sum? (“Is this all there is?”) If I show you twenty facts that say “we can’t” and you don’t get depressed, are you the one who needs an intervention? If I throw a rock into the water, how many ripples will I see? What did my friend mean when he said this world’s “on fire”? How do you know the baby’s going to be all right? What if I die and I’m still here?

For the record, real-life hero journeys kind of suck. On the other hand, the cool thing about being an artist is you never get to quit. None of this lying around and feeling guilty like my mother did because the doctor used forceps to pull my brother Bill out after he got twisted when she when started going into labor in the elevator. (You can read about him here.) That must have been a time, all right. How this turns a person into a social idiot and meth freak is between him and the angel bands, but I think about him rather often, especially how he died alone, delirious and screaming in the V.A. hospice ward:

“I have money! Lots of money!”

That would be the three or four grand I was holding for him, which I kept. (Serves him right for peeing in my shoes when I was ten.) I’m not sure why he thought this mattered in his situation, but then from all I knew, he never seemed aware at any point that he was dying from the cancer in his lungs and everywhere. Another benefit of meth, I guess, besides saving dough on toothpaste. I see more and more resemblance to him in my own face as I age—six years younger, but folks thought I was his kid brother. Having a gap inside my own mouth where I need an implant isn’t helping, either. One of the first signs of The End is not replacing missing teeth.

Meanwhile back in Taos, all is temporary. The only thing that keeps the alligators down is living in the moment, which I try. When this works, it is a refuge. Yesterday I swept sticks in the dirt because the sun was out, and that was slick.

I used to tell my psycho-analyst before I fired her, “I can’t help it that I’m this old,” meaning that I’m on a different track than most of the known world, at least the parts I read about, and grading for success is stupid. It’s my path, after all, and everybody’s got one. The worst thing you can ever do is make comparisons. It’s such an ingrained habit for me that the effort not to do so, while wholly mental, is akin to hoisting duffel bags of rocks. With any luck at all I watch those thoughts and let them slide away to wake up for a second and experience I am simply That Which Sees.

We’re dying from the stress. If I were any good, I’d have had a traditional career or manifested like Picasso and be living on my island. There’s no way to catch up. I’m too old, it’s over, everything is fucked and costs too much. We’ll never leave this hovel. I’ll die friendless in the dirt. How can I create my art when all we do is struggle? Houses here are too expensive, but we can’t afford to move. America is doomed. I don’t want to leave el Norte, but Taos is absurd and nothing feels like home…

The negativity is automatic (and untrue). One reason I haven’t posted much for several years is that I’ve been climbing out from under. I don’t want to talk about it, really, but the key is my desire. Liberating “Johnny,” who had everything he needed on the day that he was born. It’s as if I haven’t yet begun to write—how weird! We’re getting there, however. Two months ago I busted out of character and bought a goddamned truck. Just one different thought, a piece of the new narrative, and things come jumping out like Jesus, Santa Claus, and rock and roll.

This is how it is for me but maybe not for you. Nobody knows, remember. No one has the goods.

The vantage point above is very close to where we live. Yes, I know you’ve seen this view. I can reach it by driving less than fifteen minutes and walking briskly for ten minutes more, and every time, I’m simply stunned. So what, though, in the larger scheme of things? We have to leave our old adobe rental. No one is pushing except the two of us—it’s both a physical and metaphysical necessity—but this morning, I seem not to be able to figure out how. Perhaps it’s best to not even try the thing directly but simply live, and write what must not be forgotten. One always has a choice, you know: believe or not believe! So here we are, right now.