Day 86: Intrepid Dynamism

            I think I might let this thing run its course and become something different.  Maybe I'll do daily essays, or pop culture rants.  I could use it to organize events, or review 2 star movies.  The 2 star movies I review could get separate 2 star scores, explanations of how good of a two star movie it is (for being a two star movie).
            I need to go out and eat something.  Maybe I should go to the grocery store.  Boring.
           In the last two weeks I've discovered the absolute joy that is proofreading.  It's an instant source of improvement in this thing that I'm trying to get good at.  Not that it doesn't help to just write every day.
           Also, discovered that you can have a conversation with yourself.  I'm probably the last one to figure that one out, though.  You can think of the things that bother you and write them out, and then proofread that.  You can proofread the newspaper.
           Lesson I've learned about my own writing #1! (I wonder if a lot of people have this problem):
           Do not introduce machines or mechanisms which you (I) understand.

          Other thing I should have learned long ago about relationships/life:
          Nothing is about me!  It's always about the other person.  People like when things are about themselves.  It's a paradox, but that's only until someone lets it end naturally.  Or, it's about eventually figuring out what someone wants you to be and then acting like that, so you're duplicitous.

            

           “When do I get to see Mr. Grey? “  Jim asked, the room freezing.  No one dared look up from their notepads. 

            “Are you sure you’re asking me that?”  The attendant stooped down, talking over his glasses.  He gestured at the other men in the room, whos masses were little more than bundles of air.

            Jim contemplated this for a second, chewing the nails down to the cuticle on his pinky finger.  Suddenly, his mind was far away.  “Who are you, anyway?”  Jim asked, throwing his hands in the air.  He flashed a doubting look at Roger, who had one eye closed completely.

            The man snapped his fingers and a chandelier fell, the candles on it already burning. He snapped them again and they were in a cave by a gorge, Roger salivating like a grown up baby.  A waterfall lent its ambience to the scene, it looked too natural to be manmade and too perfect to be natural.

            “I’m Mr. Grey’s right hand man!”  He broke into what could have been a musical number.  “You’re not here, you should know that.  You have been to the hospital before, but you won’t be now.  This is all your mind putting this back together.” 

Each time he snapped, the pictures changed.  With a click, they were in Madrid.  Another crackle of the fingers landed them in ancient Egypt.  A group of slaves sold each other braided hair.

            “Wake up, Jim!”  The man yelled in Jim’s face, and Jim stared up to see the slideshow still going on.  A group of students were led in by a bearded man wearing a flannel shirt, denim jeans, and sporting an especially creepy pony tail.

            “Sit down.”  He said shortly and sternly to a pudgy kid who refused to relax.  The kid sat on his knees in the chair, his blubborous features bouncing. 

            “Open heart surgery,”  The instructor said, waiting for the rustling to stop.  He flashed an angry look at the pony tailed man.  “Some older people need to get pacemakers put in.  So we put them in.  It’s not pretty.  It might be a little out of these kids.”

            The teacher insisted that the slide show continued.  He sat with his arms crossed, trying his best to look serious.

            Some of the kids didn’t enjoy the slideshows of people cut open on tables.  One in particular pulled a knit cap over his eyes, whistling, humming, and shaking violently.  The tallest one leaned back in his chair sucking his thumb, but his eyes glued up to the screen.  Jim watched anxiously, afraid of where this dream sequence may lead him.  He waited for his mind to catch up to his body.   A clatter of steel toed boots clicked through the hallway outside, silhouettes flashing past the lit window.  The noises rebounded endlessly through the corridor, the echo seeming to get louder and then turning into the screech of a door opening.

            “And this next one is what it would be like if you had no oxygen on the moon.”  He revealed a bright red pulsating humanoid mass that lost liquids in a five shot sequence untl it disappeared completely.  The air was sucked out of each blood vessel with a pop, like bubblewrap.

            “You’re still studying in space.”  Jim said to himself.  A montage flashed through his mind, in which he saw himself shaking hands with Mr. Grey and receiving his diploma.  Next, he was in space studying in a bubble orbiting a space station.  Then, with the help of three other space workers, he used a giant rectangular cue tip to clean the lint from an outerspace belly button.  A few men were lost, but overall it was a good day.  They all sat around the microwave for heat and cooked Hot Pockets inside of it for sustenance.  They used their hands to remove the greasy pouches from their wet paper sleeves.  The attendant was there then, standing outside watching the security cameras.

            “Are you remembering now?”  Mr. Grey’s disembodied head asked from somewhere.  “Now do you get it?!”  It popped into three smaller bubbles, like a camera taking pictures from different angles. 

            Jim woke up in a cold sweat where he was sitting, covered in space particles floating overhead.  A frozen laugh flew past with its agreeable edges and saccharine pointed tongue.  A candle lit itself at the edge of the universe.

            “Machines acting up again.”  A man wearing an engineer outfit pulled a long level that came out of the ground.  The furnace burnt brightly behind him, grey matter spewing from it and dissipating like dust in the air. 

            Another engineer came in, thumbing through an oversized manual.  “It says here if we… if we…  Well just pull that lever.”

            They worked at the lever for a minute to no avail.  The second engineer crawled next to it, eyeing it from up close like a pool shot. 

            Jim and Roger remained suspended in the slug.  The slugs face suddenly warped, and it consumed itself slowly.  Otto tugged from above the hole, and they flew back into the room the same way they had exited.  They entered the booth with the door closed airtight.  Roger dusted himself off and sprung to his feet, a fear spreading across his face as he saw Otto charging into the machines gates. Jim stood fiddling with the dials on the machine in reverse slow motion until that energy had run its course, and then stared back at the door.

            “Ok Otto, you win.”  Jim said, opening the cage before Otto would forcefully pry it open.  “Why didn’t you want us going in there?”

            “It’s theoretical.  It’s not supposed to work.  You don’t exist in it.” Otto shook his head like he just saw two oversized possums jump into a mincemeat maker.  He laughed with a southern drawl and then became more stern.

            Otto produced a magnet with a chain linked through it, and held it in front of Roger and Jim.  “You fellers just couldn’t wait.”